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Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios
Well no, but if America goes down the tubes Russia might get greedy.
If our economy stinks we won't be able to get involved in an international conflict, public support or not, and Russia will be free to have a European landgrab.
China may also pull something.
Best case scenerio in this event is Russia and China butting heads.
Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines
Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.
Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios
Because the global economy is so intertwined.
America is the global consumer, along with Asia and Western Europe.
If America stops consuming as much as it does, the economy of supplier nations gets hit. Which in turn will reduce supply, which will backlash against smaller consumer nations.
The US will be fine, but it could take years before we are able to act on the world stage again. And that would mean disaster for smaller countries, both economically and politically.
Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines
Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.
Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios
Sure, the system that works for a nation with a smaller population then California will automatically work great for a nation with ten times the population.
Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines
Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.
Grey Templar wrote: Well no, but if America goes down the tubes Russia might get greedy.
The UK, France, and Germany might take offense to that.
Somehow I doubt the UK, France, and Germany can take on Russia.
Keep in mind that Georgia managed to shoot down a Backfire.
Well ain't they special
Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines
Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.
Grey Templar wrote: Well no, but if America goes down the tubes Russia might get greedy.
And the Spain would stand up and point out they have a bigger GDP and no-one pretends they're even slightly capable of bucking international convention and going on a land grab, and then everyone would look at Russia, swept away in its painful nostalgia driven fantasy, and they'd all feel back for the poor former empire.
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Ratbarf wrote: Take a look at Hungary and Greece. If America crashed again it would only get worse.
There would be impassioned but almost entirely peaceful protests, and difficult challenges for legislators?
It's not really the same thing as the wars through Europe you were talking about earlier, is it?
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Grey Templar wrote: Somehow I doubt the UK, France, and Germany can take on Russia.
Yeah, you're wrong there. France or Britain are a match by themselves. Germany isn't far behind. All three together, as dogma said, it isn't even a contest.
And that's only looking at total spending. Once you factor in the gross corruption inherent in the Russian military (where troops are regularly drawn away from training to be sold to local businesses as cheap labour for the profit of commanding officers), then you're looking at a military that is barely capable of dealing with issues within its own borders - the idea that they'd be able to launch an offensive action against NATO forces, even without the US, is kind of laughable.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2012/12/05 07:22:31
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
There would be impassioned but almost entirely peaceful protests, and difficult challenges for legislators?
It's not really the same thing as the wars through Europe you were talking about earlier, is it?
I was referring more towards the recent rise of far-right/fascist political parties in those countries. Notably Jobbik and Golden Dawn. I mean, history repeats itself right? The last time Europe had a decade of economic stagnation/crisis they ended up with Mussolini and Hitler.
Grey Templar wrote:Sure, the system that works for a nation with a smaller population then California will automatically work great for a nation with ten times the population.
It would indeed. It's based on rates, which do not differentiate between small and large numbers. But good try with the meaningless rhetoric.
Besides, the real loser in that deal would be Canada. We'd be forced to inherit all that crazy.
There would be impassioned but almost entirely peaceful protests, and difficult challenges for legislators?
It's not really the same thing as the wars through Europe you were talking about earlier, is it?
I was referring more towards the recent rise of far-right/fascist political parties in those countries. Notably Jobbik and Golden Dawn. I mean, history repeats itself right? The last time Europe had a decade of economic stagnation/crisis they ended up with Mussolini and Hitler.
So we get to fight the Battle of Thermopylae VIII?? And Spartans?! Sign me up
Honestly mate, I cannot see hungary and Greece pulling a Hitler/Mussolini type government. And if they did, who is really gonna car?? Greece and Hungary dont exactly produce much that is highly valued outside of those countries.
whembly wrote: If ya'll want some fireworks... have the GOP just pass a bill to make Bush's tax cut permanent and dare the Prez/Senate not to pass it.
I don't see that as being a tough fight. The President has said any deal must raise taxes on the top 2%. This is unambiguous. The people will understand this argument and agree that GOP is trying to screw them. Obama will call it balancing the deficit on the backs of our poorest or some such.
whembly wrote: IOr, pass the Simpson-Bowles in it's unedited entirety and dare the Prez/Senate table it.
.
This is a better argument. The counterargument is that this was agreed to in a bilateral manner for the fiscal situation at the time it was agreed to, not the fiscal situation we have now - but this is a far more subtle argument to try to explain to the voters. I think the GOP's best possible win in this is will include that element.
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whembly wrote: If ya'll want some fireworks... have the GOP just pass a bill to make Bush's tax cut permanent and dare the Prez/Senate not to pass it.
I don't see that as being a tough fight. The President has said any deal must raise taxes on the top 2%. This is unambiguous. The people will understand this argument and agree that GOP is trying to screw them. Obama will call it balancing the deficit on the backs of our poorest or some such.
whembly wrote: IOr, pass the Simpson-Bowles in it's unedited entirety and dare the Prez/Senate table it.
.
This is a better argument. The counterargument is that this was agreed to in a bilateral manner for the fiscal situation at the time it was agreed to, not the fiscal situation we have now - but this is a far more subtle argument to try to explain to the voters. I think the GOP's best possible win in this is will include that element.
Agreed on both points.
I don't think anyone knows exactly what the Prez/Dem/Rep full plans are... but, like Seb said earlier... this is politics 101 and I'm sure there's negotiations going on. They'll get it done.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Okay, what's going on here??
Mitch McConnell offered to give Democrats a chance to go on the record to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff... by agreeing to allow a floor vote on Geither and Obama's plan... and Reid refused to put it up for vote:
If the President’s proposal was made in good faith, Democrats should be eager to vote for it. So I’m surprised the Majority Leader just declined the chance for them to support it with their votes. I guess we’re left to conclude that it couldn’t even pass by a bare majority of votes, and that they’d rather take the country off the cliff than actually work out a good-faith agreement that reflects tough choices on both sides. … I think folks should know who actually wants to raise taxes on family farmers and manufacturers, and who thinks we can solve our fiscal problems without doing anything serious to our real long term liabilities. Democrats are so focused on the politics of this debate they seem to forget there’s a cost. They’re feeling so good about the election, they’ve forgotten they’ve got a duty to govern. A lot of people are going to suffer a lot if we go off this cliff. That’s why we assumed Democrats wanted to avoid it. We thought it was the perfect opportunity to do something together. Apparently we were wrong.
But... technically, Mitch couldn't have done this because that bill has tax/revenue changes... and that needs to start at the House. Right? Unless they could use that "Budget Reconciliation" function?
Let's hope that this is just an act and they're privately negotiating behind the scene.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2012/12/06 01:44:22
Washington (CNN) -- Taxes on the wealthy are going up, House Speaker John Boehner conceded Wednesday in challenging President Barack Obama to sit down with him to hammer out a deal for avoiding the fiscal cliff.
Obama, however, continued to insist on Republicans first ensuring no tax hike for anyone but the top 2% of Americans as a first step toward a broader agreement on tackling the nation's chronic federal deficits and debt.
The statements reflected how negotiations on the automatic spending cuts and tax hikes set to occur on January 1 -- the fiscal cliff -- have evolved since Obama's re-election last month.
Republicans once opposed to any new revenue in their quest to shrink government now realize Obama's victory and public support for the president's campaign theme of higher taxes on the wealthy leave them with little negotiating leverage.
Less than four weeks from the fiscal cliff, GOP leaders face a choice: Agreeing to Obama's demand to hold down tax rates on most Americans while allowing higher rates on top earners, or being blamed for everyone's taxes going up in 2013.
Washington (CNN) - In a significant development in the fiscal cliff standoff, Republican Sen. Tom Coburn, a leading deficit hawk, said Wednesday he would support higher tax rates on wealthier Americans as part of a broader deal with President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats to avoid the crisis.
"I know we have to raise revenue," the senator from Oklahoma told MSNBC. "I don't really care which way we do it. Actually, I would rather see rates go up than do it the other way, because it gives us a greater chance to reform the tax code and broaden the base in the future."
Coburn, who served on the Simpson-Bowles fiscal commission and participated in the Gang of Six deficit talks, was one of the first Republicans a couple of years to embrace raising revenue to reduce the deficit. At that time, he wanted to do it through reforming the tax code by eliminating loopholes and deductions that he argued favored the rich and powerful. But now he appears to be the first GOP senator to say publicly he would back increasing the tax rates on the wealthy, as long as that increase is coupled with spending cuts and entitlement reforms.
Ratbarf wrote: I was referring more towards the recent rise of far-right/fascist political parties in those countries. Notably Jobbik and Golden Dawn. I mean, history repeats itself right? The last time Europe had a decade of economic stagnation/crisis they ended up with Mussolini and Hitler.
And Franco, everyone forgets poor Franco. He's left standing at the side shouting 'I was a tyrant as well, you know!'
That said, the political situation was really very different. The democracies of all three nations at that time were very new, with little history or tradition behind them. Note that in countries with longer traditions of democracy (and not even that much longer in some cases) fascism barely got a look in. And don't forget that fascism was a very direct response to the rise of communism, both internationally and within the countries in question.
It wasn't just economic problems, is what I'm saying. Politically those countries had significant other issues causing instability.
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d-usa wrote: Looks like the line in the sand is shifting:
Washington (CNN) -- Taxes on the wealthy are going up, House Speaker John Boehner conceded Wednesday in challenging President Barack Obama to sit down with him to hammer out a deal for avoiding the fiscal cliff.
Obama, however, continued to insist on Republicans first ensuring no tax hike for anyone but the top 2% of Americans as a first step toward a broader agreement on tackling the nation's chronic federal deficits and debt.
That's a smart move by the Republicans - they were never going to win from a position of protecting tax cuts for the wealthiest 2%. Now they can say they've conceded something, so now it's up to the Democrats to concede something...
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2012/12/06 02:54:09
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
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I remember watching the Dow freefall four years ago. This is going to be nothing by comparison, even if we do go over.
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Think we should go over the Fiscal Cliff. For a reality check for carreer lifers in politics
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Ratbarf wrote: You know that if they can keep this peace thing up it will be the first time in 500 years that a new century hasn't been inaugerated with a Europe shattering war?
How is this even tangentially related to American fiscal policy?
The massive government spending on WWII is a big part of what dragged us out of the Great Depression.
It wouldn't work now, the government is way too far in debt too early in the scenario to do it again.
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Grey Templar wrote: Sure, the system that works for a nation with a smaller population then California will automatically work great for a nation with ten times the population.
Do we have any evidence it can't?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2012/12/06 04:53:47
So with all this military spending listed. Why in the nine circles of hell do we still have combat troops deployed in Europe? The mobility bases I get, but why the feth are we wasting billions on stationing ground troops in Germany still?
I beg of you sarge let me lead the charge when the battle lines are drawn
Lemme at least leave a good hoof beat they'll remember loud and long
KalashnikovMarine wrote: The mobility bases I get, but why the feth are we wasting billions on stationing ground troops in Germany still?
As I understand the base in Germany is now a fairly important part of any deployment/supply effort into the Middle East. It's where critically wounded troops get taken for major operations.
That said, I have no idea if Germany is used in that role because it's actually useful in its own right, or just because they have a base there so they might as well make use of it.
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
We could save a bit of money by making people actually pay for these:
Apropos nothing, I don't really see any logical reason to use the FILBE over the ILBE. DOD spending is excessive from the F35, all the way down to the equipment soldiers carry on their backs.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2012/12/06 06:09:00
KalashnikovMarine wrote: The mobility bases I get, but why the feth are we wasting billions on stationing ground troops in Germany still?
As I understand the base in Germany is now a fairly important part of any deployment/supply effort into the Middle East. It's where critically wounded troops get taken for major operations.
That said, I have no idea if Germany is used in that role because it's actually useful in its own right, or just because they have a base there so they might as well make use of it.
The base you're talking about is Rammstein, and one of the mobility bases I was referencing, but there's something like 300,000 American Marines, airmen, soldiers and sailors stationed in Europe, they aren't all transit and medical staff.
I beg of you sarge let me lead the charge when the battle lines are drawn
Lemme at least leave a good hoof beat they'll remember loud and long
I believe we should go over the cliff. Let the stalemate continue.
Then if the Republicans had the political sense to play the Democrats game they would immediately start using the line "It would have been much worse if we followed Obama's plan."
Repeat, repeat, repeat.
The last thing the GOP needs to do is agree to a tax hike with the understanding that some spending cuts will get done in the next ten years. That is the standard deal, it has been made before and the spending cuts pretty much never end up happening.
Besides all that, we are talking about 40 billion dollars of increased revenue, assuming that everyone keeps making the same money, and pays the increased amount in taxes. The deficit for 2011 was around 1.3 trillion. So it would take around 30 years just to pay that off.
This is feel good legislation to say "yay we followed through and taxed the rich as promised", without it having any positive effects on the deficit or economy.
KalashnikovMarine wrote: The mobility bases I get, but why the feth are we wasting billions on stationing ground troops in Germany still?
As I understand the base in Germany is now a fairly important part of any deployment/supply effort into the Middle East. It's where critically wounded troops get taken for major operations.
That said, I have no idea if Germany is used in that role because it's actually useful in its own right, or just because they have a base there so they might as well make use of it.
The base you're talking about is Rammstein, and one of the mobility bases I was referencing, but there's something like 300,000 American Marines, airmen, soldiers and sailors stationed in Europe, they aren't all transit and medical staff.
Yeah, theres Ramstein AFB, along with the European Regional Medical Center that are the big ones. There's one base that does literally nothing other than transportation (it's also fairly close to Ramstein). Graf plays host to most all European nation's military training needs (we train with, and train about a dozen nations' militaries there, its kinda cool, but really outta the way)
I don't think we have 300,000 people in Europe. I think its closer to 100k, as IIRC, the army has round abouts 35k, and that number is shrinking with base closures and troop draw downs. Certain bases really only had a purpose during the cold war. Like Berlin (which was closed down a long time ago) and Fulda (which was a speedbump in the Fulda Gap, the "only" reasonable place that the Soviets could penetrate into NATO held lands)
