Dear Mr. President..........

Mr. President, this is a pivotal moment in the history of our country. In the coming days and weeks, decisions will be made about our national budget that will impact the lives of virtually every American in this country for decades to come. The time is now for the American people to become significantly involved in that debate and not leave it to a small number of people here in Washington.

At a time when the wealthiest people and the largest corporations in our country are doing phenomenally well and in many cases have never had it so good, while the middle class is disappearing and poverty is increasing, it is absolutely imperative that any deficit-reduction package that passes this Congress not include the horrendous cuts, the cruel cuts in programs that working people desperately need that are utilized every day by the elderly, by the sick, by our children, and by the lowest income people in our country, that the Republicans in Congress, dominated by their extreme rightwing, are demanding.

America is not about giving tax breaks to billionaires and attacking the most vulnerable people in our country. We must not allow that to happen.

In my view, the President of the United States needs to stand with the vast majority of the American people and say no to the Republican leadership and make it clear that enough is enough. No, we will not balance the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable people in this country--on our children, on our seniors and the sick. No, we will not do that. Working families in this country have already sacrificed enough in terms of lost jobs, lost wages, lost homes, lost pensions. The working families of this country are hurting right now. Enough is enough.

Now is the time to say to the millionaires and the billionaires in this country and to the largest corporations that in many ways have never had it so good that they must participate in deficit reduction, that there must be shared sacrifice, that deficit reduction cannot be based on cutting back on the needs of working families and the middle class but that the rich and large corporations have also got to participate in this process.

sanders.senate.gov...

This is just a short excerpt of a 90 minute speech Senator Bernie Sanders gave yesterday on the Senate floor, urging The President to essentially SHOW SOME GUTS and start defending the middle class and the poor in this country and not cave in to corporate interests and billionaires who don't want to share any of the burden...but force the rest of us to take all the pain.

I urge everyone to read it.

Part of the speech is here:

This is a man I'd vote for President....too bad he won't run.

He's virtually the only one that I know of who fights so strongly for the middle class and poor. He's it.

I just hope everyone reads the entire speech...if I could post the entire speech here I would.

He seems to be one of the very few out there that actually gives a damn about the jobless, the poor, and the now struggling middle class that is going extinct.

Here are more parts of the speech I want to share:

The middle class, the elderly, the sick, the children, and the poor have already sacrificed enough. It is time for those people on top, the people who are doing extremely well, to also understand they are Americans, they are part of our country, and they have to contribute to deficit reduction. The fact is, moving toward deficit reduction in a way that is fair is not as complicated as some would have us believe. In fact, if you are not beholden to Wall Street, large corporations and wealthy campaign contributors and you are not frightened about the number of 30-second ads that may be thrown at you if you take these guys on, it is quite easy.

You want another idea? At a time when our manufacturing sector is collapsing, when 50,000 factories have shut down in the last 10 years, when millions of workers have lost good-paying jobs, the U.S. Government continues to reward companies that move U.S. manufacturing jobs overseas through loopholes in the Tax Code known as deferral and foreign source income.

Fourth, if we ended tax breaks and subsidies for big oil and gas companies, we can reduce the deficit by more than $40 billion over the next 10 years.

Fifth, if we prohibited abusive and illegal offshore tax shelters--what I just talked about a moment ago--we could bring in $1 trillion over 10 years. That says to the corporations and the wealthy: Sorry, you are no longer

Sixth, if we established a Wall Street speculation fee of less than 1 percent on the sale and purchase of credit default swaps, derivatives, stock options and futures, we could reduce the deficit by more than $100 billion over the next decade and also--also--tell Wall Street we are not going to tolerate their outrageous behavior which led us into this recession in the first place. We are going to try to get a handle on their speculation.

I can tell you that I, my office, requested a GAO report that found that the Pentagon had $36.9 billion in spare parts it does not need and which are collecting dust in government warehouses. We can do better than that. Frankly, in my view--I think I speak for the majority of the people in my State of Vermont, I suspect, in this country--it is time to begin bringing the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan at an accelerated rate. We have been in Afghanistan now for 10 years. It is time for the Afghan people and their military to take responsibility, in terms of defeating the Taliban.

Further, I will not deny for one second that there is waste and fraud and bureaucracy in almost every government program out there. I think we have to take a hard look at them all. I believe that in addition to the Pentagon, we can save hundreds of billions of dollars a year by eliminating unnecessary bureaucracy. The ideas I have enumerated, and some I have not but which will become part of the Record, if we did all or some of these things, we could easily reduce the deficit by well over $4 trillion over the next decade, if not, in fact, much more. It would be done in a way that is fair, and it would not unnecessarily and needlessly ruin the lives of some of the most desperate and fragile and hurting people in our country today, millions of people who are just struggling to make ends meet. Those people would be spared.

I have no clue why sanders is blaming all this
on the GOP when the Dems are equally guilty.

pot and kettle come to mind here

reply to post by boondock-saint


That's all you have to say?

He's talking about Republicans refusing to raise any taxes and cutting programs that help the middle class and poor...while at the same time cutting taxes even more for corporations and billionaires. You do realize that this will be disastrous if Republicans get what they want?

And yes, Democrats have been cowards and haven't done much of anything to stop it. He is, however, not one of the cowards. Many Democrats are just as much in the pocket of the same interests Republicans are.

Did you read the whole speech?

He addresses the President as if he is in control. Mistake #1.

Mistake #2: He didn't address the real issues at the core of this entire fiasco (being the demise of our Republic).

I know his heart is in the right place, but he's discussing the side effects of symptoms, not the root cause of the disease which has infected our Republic.

reply to post by Cryptonomicon

Mistake #2: He didn't address the real issues at the core of this entire fiasco (being the demise of our Republic)

I assume you are speaking of corruption? He speaks about corruption all the time, he's speaking about it in this speech.

I truly believe if this man were able to give a speech, this speech or many that he has done, the American people would absolutely support him.

He has given ideas how to cut spending, create jobs, reign in tax loopholes, etc.

What is it that people want? The idea of just cutting taxes and everything will be great is simply not going to happen.

Wealth disparity in this country has exploded, and as we sit here and comment jobs continue to be shipped overseas because of our terrible trade laws (which Bernie is against).

reply to post by David9176


The symptoms are vast. And Sanders solution is to keep us all indentured servants to the Feds?. Cuts have to be made, and taxes have to be raised. That is the ugly truth. And neither side will agree to that.

We can’t spend, spend, spend and expect the taxes on the rich to bail us out of this mess. It doesn’t work like that and is simplistic thinking. We all have a part in this game.

And we can’t cut taxes all over the place and expect people to go out and spend their new found wealth, since there are so very few jobs out there. But I do think that there should be some form of incentive for business to move jobs back here.

I believe that a flat tax, across the board, would go a long way to fix our economy. Heck, it would make an accountants job a whole lot easier.

reply to post by TDawgRex

And Sanders solution is to keep us all indentured servants to the Feds?

How?

Cuts have to be made, and taxes have to be raised.

That's essentially what he is stating...i shared quotes from the speech.............

Anyway, this speech is being sent with a petition to the President that people are signing. I won't give the link but you can find it on Sander's website.

Currentlly has 60,000 signees..petition was just released today.

reply to post by David9176


The entitlement programs that are found throughout our numerous Federal agencies. Farm subsidies, welfare, Guaranteed housing with zero down, etc. A lot of people are just lazy and living off the gov’t dole. Many of these programs help keep those people serfs.

I think that some of these programs should be eliminated and others to be given a time frame to help people get back on their feet. And others should have some type of community service tied to them to receive benefits.

I also believe that EVERY federal agency should take 15% monetary cuts. With a force reduction of 50% higher management, 10-15% Middle management and 10-15% working stiffs. Maybe even higher for the last two.

I think that there are Federal agencies that have too much say in the way States make their laws and conduct business. All you have to do is look at the top 10 worst cities list and realize that throwing gobs of money at them doesn’t fix them.

I know, it a bit vague, but, I think that the monster has grown to fat. It’s time for a diet.

OP u r missing the point I was making.
here let me help you understand.

Dear Mr. President,
cut the Fed Gov in half
cut the military budget in half
debt problem solved

urs truly

boon

reply to post by David9176


Both sides have already agreed in principle to accepting the best of the other sides plans.

We need the deep budget cuts, and we also need to get rid of the tax loopholes, credits, and deductions.

This blogger noticed it in a recent interview.

There is a solution to the problem. Paul Ryan has a decent take on the situation, but his plan isn't perfect. The Democrats have some decent ideas, but they aren't aggressive enough. Ron Paul has some great ideas, but he is handicapped by the Republican leadership.

We can fix this problem, but we all need to sacrifice, and the government needs to make strong decisions and directives and stop pandering to corporations, and stop pandering to what pollsters tell them. They need to actually LEAD the country for a change, instead of just responding to lobbyists and pollsters.

reply to post by David9176


Sanders does have the guts to say it, unlike the spineless democrats. I wouldn't just say spineless, I'd say many Democrats know exactly what they are doing, many of whom are one in the same with the Republicans. I still cannot believe for the life of me that people still buy this Ayn Rand tricke down BS, I really don't, and then they want to refer to this current president as socialist.

Trickle economics has done nothing for this country. The day we decided to focus on the wealthy creating jobs was the day that started it all. It was under Reagan that the debt ceiling exceeded $1 trillion and more than doubled through his administration. It was under Bush that this financial crises occured. Obama is continuing the same cycle, we're at $14 trillion now and what has he left us with? A renewed patriot act, billions wasted further on Libya and this marijuana war, and yes, the continued Bush Tax cuts. Seriously.

So what would the libertarians have us do? Continue the same charade, but take it to the next level. What a joke, and yet when Ron Paul gains a mere 4 or 2% of the vote, it's a conspiracy, everybody is sheeple, nobody wants to vote for another hack that will allow the corporations to completely loot what's left of this country. But people can continue their fantasies here on ATS about libertarianism and Ron Paul, the fringe of conservatism, this country needs a good lesson and it clearly hasn't experienced on, elected somebody like Ron paul will really show this country what Ayn Rands vision creates.

It's the 2012 elections, there's nobody I have to look to... I thought I did, but the progressive party is looking like a joke at this point, no sign of them running, no sigh of a plan. If Sanders or Dennis Kucinich run, they'll have my vote... to the lesser extent Kucinich, but I can see myself voting for him.

Originally posted by boondock-saint
OP u r missing the point I was making.
here let me help you understand.

Dear Mr. President,
cut the Fed Gov in half
cut the military budget in half
debt problem solved

Boon, I agree with you on the military budget, I am glad there's SOMETHING we can both stand on, regardless of the nonsense you tend to post on here. Cutting the federal government half? This isn't a solution, this is an empty plan that insists upon solutions. Government is broken, "cutting it down" will not fix it, it will only move the problem. Government needs to be fixed, it needs to go through an audit, republicans, democrats, they all need to be held accountable by the constituents. Right now most of their constituents are just following the band of drums by the media.

You can't fix a broken car by cutting it half. Once you fix it though, you can make it faster by cutting down the weight!

reply to post by Southern Guardian

Sanders does have the guts to say it, unlike the spineless democrats. I wouldn't just say spineless, I'd say many Democrats know exactly what they are doing, many of whom are one in the same with the Republicans. I still cannot believe for the life of me that people still buy this Ayn Rand tricke down BS, I really don't, and then they want to refer to this current president as socialist.

Absolutely agree.

Trickle economics has done nothing for this country. The day we decided to focus on the wealthy creating jobs was the day that started it all. It was under Reagan that the debt ceiling exceeded $1 trillion and more than doubled through his administration. It was under Bush that this financial crises occured. Obama is continuing the same cycle, we're at $14 trillion now and what has he left us with? A renewed patriot act, billions wasted further on Libya and this marijuana war, and yes, the continued Bush Tax cuts. Seriously.

Trickle down has been a disaster. It's severely weakened the middle class while at the same time increasing deficits because the tax cuts were never accounted for....and at the same time more and more people need government help to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. I can't believe people continue to buy into trickle down...which is essentially the belief that profits will create jobs. It's pretty apparent that's not true...not with the record profits corporations are currently raking in.

Obama supposedly did not want to extend tax cuts for the wealthy...but did anyway as he supposedly caved to pressure by Republicans...which also ended up creating no jobs...and at the same time increasing our debt even more. While I want the patriot act to end, our first issue should be to get out of these wars and to fix our fiscal problems. Marijuana should be legalized and taxed...that's instant revenue for states and the federal government. It's really a disaster. The Bush tax cuts are going to be made into a political fight for the 2012 elections...majority of people in this country believe the wealthy need to pay more in taxes, this will play into Obama's favor....he needs to grow a sack first though because apparently he doesn't have one.

So what would the libertarians have us do? Continue the same charade, but take it to the next level. What a joke, and yet when Ron Paul gains a mere 4 or 2% of the vote, it's a conspiracy, everybody is sheeple, nobody wants to vote for another hack that will allow the corporations to completely loot what's left of this country. But people can continue their fantasies here on ATS about libertarianism and Ron Paul, the fringe of conservatism, this country needs a good lesson and it clearly hasn't experienced on, elected somebody like Ron paul will really show this country what Ayn Rands vision creates.

Couldn't agree more...actually just stated something quite similar in a few threads recently.

It's the 2012 elections, there's nobody I have to look to... I thought I did, but the progressive party is looking like a joke at this point, no sign of them running, no sigh of a plan. If Sanders or Dennis Kucinich run, they'll have my vote... to the lesser extent Kucinich, but I can see myself voting for him.

Well, Sanders (Vermont) isn't in my state nor is he running for President since he caucuses with Democrats, can't think of anyone else I would vote for besides him. He's done more to help struggling Americans than most yet no one knows it.

Hope all is going well.