Budget talks: This is getting nasty

CNBC's Ron Insana just said that Wall St. analysts traveling overseas are embarrassed by the debt ceiling debate.

Oh my gosh. Those poor darlings.

We need to resolve this right away. Now it's gone too far. Wall St. analysts are embarrassed.

 

Yeah, you could argue that one either way, so wasn't sure which way he was going.

 

That would be correct. Bartman gets the focus and he had very little to do with the Cubs' collapse.

 

Not to interrupt the GOP in-fighting....but really the whole mess is about pols who have allowed themselves to become boxed in by special interests. It's easy to sign pledges and collect checks on the campaign trail - and then you realize that a couple of those pledges conflict, that a couple of your big donor sources have different demands on a specific bill - that what they want and demand has no chance of getting through and it's not going to get any easier with outside groups being given the green light by the courts.
I'd think a signed bill that is only 51 percent "good" is better than a bill that is 100 percent "good" and is vetoed or doesn't pass.

 

The Democrats are just as boxed in.

Boehner is in the middle. Who's joined him?

 

Did I specify?
Hell - I'll throw in the media as part of the proble, people who seem fixated on determining who is "winning" the political argument, who is weak, who is strong, blah, blah, blah...
You look at the choices Obama and Boehner have as potential labels: traitor, coward, caver, idiot, weak.....and those are from people in their own party.

 

If he was really in the middle, he'd be supporting tax hikes since poll-after-poll-after-poll show Americans are willing to pay the price to work on the debt.

http://www.capitalgainsandgames.com/blog/bruce-bartlett/2292/americans-support-higher-taxes-really

 

It's easier (and cheaper - which is the real crux of the problem from a media standpoint) to speculate on who is winning that it is to expend the money & effort it takes to cover a story of this magnitude.

 

If the President hadn't tried to jam $400B worth of tax cuts into the deal at the last minute, and had signaled his support for the deal, we'd probably be done already.

I don't expect Obama, Reid, Pelosi, to agree to the "Tea Party" terms. But they don't have to go that far.

Boehner is someone they can deal with. He's willing to do a deal without the support of his wing.

But, the Dems won't meet him in the middle.

 

Nearly half the current deficit is revenue lost to the great recession. A good chunk of the rest is from tax cuts - either by the previous administration, or the ones republicans insisted on in the stimulus (which was more than one-third tax breaks).

That's not opinion; it's fact (and one I'd like to see you acknowledge).


Zero revenue increases - when taxation is at it's lowest point in 60 years - is certainly NOT the middle.

 

LMAO.

They've already backed up to their own 15-yard-line.

And the Teapissers are throwing fits because they won't back up 10 more yards, then down the ball in the end zone.

Zero revenue increases - when taxation is at its lowest point in 60 years - is certainly NOT the middle.

 

The only way that could be defined as the middle is -- and forgive the sports analogy -- if you take the 50-yard line, where Obama started negotiating from, as the "new" end zone. The "middle" is now the 25 yard line. But Boehner wants it at the 10. The Tea Party wants it through the tunnel and out in the parking lot.