Why “Deficits” Don’t Always Matter:

12 November 2013

As “Fiscal Conservatives,” we take issue with how the “Conservative” side of American politics looks at deficit spending and debt. Here’s why:

Every year, our family takes in a certain amount of money as “income.” A portion of that income, we use to make “capital improvements” and “investments.”

A portion of funds employed for capital investments constitutes down-payments for new real estate properties, for which we take out mortgages.

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If One Were to Look at selective parts of our family balance sheet, one might see:

Deficit Spending: We have added 80% of “spending” in relation to the 20% down-payment

Increasing Debt: We have added that 80% of “debt” to the balance sheet. This debt addition may be offset by total reduction of principal on all mortgages.

Over more than three decades of such “deficit spending,” our debt-to-equity ratio is less than 50%.

Any political “Conservative” might say that we are “spending” ourselves to ruin, and that we risk leaving a mountain of debt to our children and grandchildren.

Our children don’t mind.

Regards,
(($; -)}
Gozo!

[NOTE: The above post on “deficit spending” was prompted by our reading of Why The Most Important Budget Event Of The Year Has Had No Impact, which was posted earlier today by Stan Collender, at “StanCollender’s Capital Gains and Games.”

@GozoTweets

BEATING A DEAD HORSE DEPT: What Republicans Understand About Government—or Fail To:

14 January 2013

Republican Objection to Chuck Hagel’s nomination focuses entirely on the Republicans’ disagreement with the Senator’s policies. Otherwise, his character and capabilities stand unquestioned.

In relation to the confirmation process, one might believe that Republicans expect only to vote for cabinet members who would serve their own, Republican, partisan agenda, rather than serve the elected officials whose political values won the relevant elections.

In the current case, the “elected official” is our reelected President of the United States. The political values relate to those voted on by the majority of the people of the United States.
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Something There Is, about the American political system and majority rule, that leading members of the Grand Old Party of the Republic fail to understand.

Maybe it’s not the American “government” that’s the problem. Maybe it’s just the “Republican” side  which, by failing to understand how our government work, constitutes America’s real “problem.”*

As someone younger and wiser once said, “No wonder Republicans hate government: they don’t know how it works.”

Regards,
(($; -)}
Gozo!

@GozoTweets

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*Ronald Reagan, “First Inaugural Address”

IF GOZO TWEETED: Tweet #0002

24 MARCH 2012

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If you always vote for the candidate who promises you fifty-cent gas, you’ll always get the government you deserve.

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Regards,
(($; -)}}
Gozo!

@GozoTweets

Advancing America to the Rear

Only by Turning Around and marching toward the rear can we Americans sustain an illusion of ourselves as the most-advanced nation. For some people, an illusion of leading is more important than progress. As of this today, with the signing of healthcare reform, into law, those Americans are momentarily held at bay.

Let the Republican Party keep putting all of its creative energy into derailing and repealing this important change. The rest of us don’t have that luxury: we need to keep moving forward.

Back in the 1980s, Ronald Reagan defined government as the problem, not the solution. That’s like complaining that air is often polluted, so we shouldn’t breathe it. We have no real choice about whether to breathe the air, or whether to have government.

And So While the Republicans prefer to keep fighting against government rather than improving it for all of the people government serves, the Democratic Party keeps working at making the government “of the people” and “by the people” do a better job of serving the necessities “of the people.”

Throughout the Course of the healthcare-reform debate, the Republicans have insisted that they believe in reform, yes, too, but: We need to take it slow. We need to start over. We need to go step-by-step. Etc.

Now, the Majority in Congress has managed to pass reform—through the ugly political process by which all difficult change is made. And the best thing for the Republican Party to do, to be true to its word throughout the process, would be to get to work with the majority in Congress, making healthcare-reform work better for all of us.

Instead, State Attorneys General—Republican attorneys general—are initiating a lawsuit to block the bill. Republicans in Congress say that they will fight to repeal the bill.

Was There Ever Any Truth behind their “we believe in healthcare reform, too” and.....whatever else they said in their festival of denial? Show us some evidence.

Government Is an Inefficient and messy process of compromise. Nobody really likes it. But some of us have to be more mature about how we deal with it. Just as in any family, the adults of the American populace cannot afford to spend their time throwing tantrums. There is much more work to be done.

The Republicans Continue to assert that compromise is not an option for them. Fortunately for us, they have some good ideas that have been included in the new law. Fortunately for us, the Democrats seem to take it all seriously, trying to make the best law they can get for the American people.

Meanwhile, the Republicans moan and shout. They initiate law suits and vow to repeal. The new law moves us forward. While the Republicans throughout government insist on turning around and marching backwards. Continuing a thirty-year effort to lead the United States as “the most advanced nation” in the world—marching loudly and proudly to the rear.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!