Paul Abrams: On the Debt Ceiling, Silence is Golden: Let Wall Street Battle the Tea Party.

Will Obama Cave On Extending The Debt Ceiling?
Sit back and let Wall Street Lobbyists do battle with the Tea Party nutjobs they elected to Congress. Let Pimco explain to them what will happen to their bondholdings. And, Goldman Sachs can explain what it would do to the Stock Markets. Let the hedgies inform them about who buttered their bread. …No negotiations. No discussions. No deals. No way. No how. If President Obama were to show strength during these negotiations then it would set up an interesting battle between the lunatic Tea Pa...

Understanding The Attacks On Public Employees
This post originally appeared at Campaign for America's Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF. You can barely open a newspaper or turn on a radio without hearing about states and local governments bankrupted by high-paid Public Employees, their pensions and their unions. How much of what you are hearing is really true, and how much is just one more Wall Street-funded campaign to turn people against each other and our government? What do we see if we look around at the...

Conservatives Admit Debt Ceiling Threat Is A Bluff
It's increasingly clear that Republican leaders are bluffing when they threaten to destroy the full faith and credit of the American government by allowing the Debt ceiling to be shattered unless draconian Budget cuts are made. And a clear bluff is a bad bluff. There is no need to concede to any of their demands to protect American credit and the Global Economy. Last year, the now-Speaker John Boehner said Republicans would have to deal with the Debt ceiling like "adults." And this week, the ...

Raise the debt ceiling but with conditions
The National Debt is the amount of money that the United States owes. It is exactly like our own household Debts, reflecting the amount of money coming in versus the amount of money going out including paying off debts previously incurred (like car loans and/or Credit Card charges, etc.) It also includes interest on those debts and, oh, those interest charges! The nation has always been in debt except for a brief stint under President Andrew Jackson who made it his mission to eliminate the natio...

Sarah Palin: Obama 'hell bent' on weakening America
While appearing as a guest on the Laura Ingraham radio program Friday, Sarah Palin openly said what many believe: President Obama is purposefully weaking the United States. “What I believe that Obama is doing right now — he is hell-bent on weakening America," she said. Palin explained by using then Senator Obama's own words in 2006.  While debating whether or not to raise the Debt ceiling, he said: The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s Debt Limit is a...

Weekly remarks: Obama vows more jobs are coming; Eric Cantor vows GOP will be party of 'cut and grow'
Weekly remarks by President Obama, as provided by the White House Last month, our economy added more than 100,000 private-sector jobs and the Unemployment Rate fell sharply. This follows encouraging economic news, from increased auto sales to continued expansion of our Manufacturing sector. Now, we know that these numbers can bounce around from month to month. But the trend is clear. We saw 12 straight months of private-sector job growth -- the first time that’s been true since 2006. ...

Huckabee: Hold Obama accountable on debt ceiling
On Neil Cavuto's show this afternoon, Mike Huckabee called on Republicans to hold Barack Obama to his erstwhile position on the Debt ceiling. "One of the things that gives this a little bit of juice for the Republicans is that Senator Barack Obama in 2006 stood on the Senate floor with an impassioned Speech, saying that we should not raise the Debt Limit, that it was the lack of leadership, and that George Bush was just completely derelict in duty by asking Congress to raise that Debt limit. W...

Glenn Beck to Michele Bachmann: Are you seriously voting against the debt ceiling?
He insists (as he’s done before) that he’s on the fence about whether they should vote no, but if even a guy who’s famous for apocalyptic Rhetoric is uncomfortable with the possibilities from this vote, it’s a cinch that the GOP will rustle up enough support to raise the ceiling. (No less than Paul Ryan admitted as much yesterday.) The suspense isn’t whether the votes are there; the suspense is whether The One will very foolishly try to capitalize on the GOP’...

Ryan: Debt Ceiling Will be Raised
MSNBC.com reports: Even as it exposes fault lines in the new Republican Caucus, a looming clash over the Federal Government’s borrowing power could serve as a major bargaining chip for Republicans hoping to force President Barack Obama to green light major Spending Cuts. Some conservative Republicans have urged their GOP colleagues to resist raising the ceiling — which currently clocks in at $14.3 Trillion — under any circumstances. Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota is collectin...

Debt Be Not Proud
Jan 17, 2011, Vol. 16, No. 17 • By YUVAL LEVIN AND WILLIAM KRISTOL Get alerts when there is a new article that might interest you. As the 112th Congress begins its work this month, it must take up some unavoidable unfinished business left behind by its predecessor. In their frantic, sloppy struggle to advance big-ticket items on the liberal agenda, the Democratic leaders of the 111th Congress not only failed to produce a Budget for the current Fiscal Year, they also failed to address the fa...

Obama trumpets economic growth
The Private Sector added 103,000 new jobs in December and the Unemployment Rate fell from 9.8 percent to 9.4 percent. "Now, we know that these numbers can bounce around from month to month. But the trend is clear," said the president, whose 2012 re-election prospects may well hinge on the condition of The Economy. "We saw 12 straight months of Private Sector job growth—the first time that's been true since 2006," he said. The economy added 1.3 million jobs last year. And each quarter was ...

Obama says economy moving in right direction
The Private Sector added 103,000 new jobs in December and the Unemployment rate fell from 9.8 percent to 9.4 percent. "Now, we know that these numbers can bounce around from month to month. But the trend is clear," said the president, whose 2012 re-election prospects may well hinge on the condition of The Economy. "We saw 12 straight months of Private Sector job growth—the first time that's been true since 2006," he said. The economy added 1.3 million jobs last year. And each quarter was ...

Obama claims job growth as adminisration success
The Private Sector added 103,000 new jobs in December and the Unemployment rate fell from 9.8 percent to 9.4 percent. “Now, we know that these numbers can bounce around from month to month. But the trend is clear,” said the president, whose 2012 re-election prospects may well hinge on the condition of The Economy. “We saw 12 straight months of Private Sector job growth — the first time that’s been true since 2006,” he said. The economy added 1.3 million jobs l...

Obama trumpets economic growth
President Barack Obama talks about the latest reports showing a decline in the Unemployment Rate as he highlights his economic policies in a Speech on the factory floor of the Thompson Creek Window Company in Landover, Md., Friday, Jan. 7, 2011. Obama also announced Gene Sperling as the new head of the National Economic Council. President Barack Obama is trumpeting private-sector job growth and lower Unemployment, telling the public that "the trend is clear" on The Economy — and it's enco...

What B-52 Ben Really Said
2010-12-01 130,712,000 When he took the gavel to be Chairman of the Federal Reserve, there was 135 million employed Americans out of a population of 297 million Americans. The latest data available as of Dec 1st 2010, was 130 million Americans employed out of a population of 311 million. There are 4.6 million fewer employed Americans since Ben started. So today we have 14 million more people looking for 4.6 million fewer jobs. That’s not good. In fact, it should be his number o...

Meet Your New House Speaker
I think Matt Taibbi finally gained admission into my Personal Pantheon of Awesomeness with the shit-eatin' grin he wore nonstop while being interviewed by Sam Seder when the latter was subbing for Keith Olbermann during Christmas week. Taibbi always has a sort of bemused smile, but his cat that swallowed the canary, Can You Believe We're Actually Doing This Glee that two guys who used to talk frequently for the listening pleasure of a few hundred people listening to The Majority Report on Air Am...

Obama talks tax cuts; Republican vows health care bill repeal
President Obama and House Republican leader Eric Cantor offered different ways to create jobs Saturday, with Obama touting his Tax Cut program and Cantor promoting Repeal of the president's "job killing" Health Care bill. In a radio address a day after the Unemployment Rate dropped from 9.8% to 9.4%, Obama cited the agreement he reached with Republicans last month for a two-year extension of tax cuts signed by him and predecessor George W. Bush. "Independent experts have concluded that, taken t...

Palin: Obamas deliberately trying to weaken America by raising the debt ceiling
I can’t tell if she’s being serious or just making a rhetorical point to rub his face in his Senate vote against raising the ceiling back in 2006. Quoth The One at the time: The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s Debt Limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies

This MSNBC Segment Is The Dumbest Thing You Will Ever See About The Debt Ceiling
Email Sent! You have successfully emailed the post. Sorry, we couldn't think of a more polite way to put this... this MSNBC segment (via FireDogLake) is just about the dumbest thing we could imagine seeing on the Debt ceiling. In an attempt to clarify and simplify what this is is all about, reporter Richard Lui dresses up as "spending" and stands under a ceiling, which he compares to a Credit Card borrower's credit limit, which the US is about to butt up against. First of all, the Debt ceiling ...

Palin: Debt ceiling a plot by Obama to weaken America
Confused, hateful, or both? Sarah Palin is charging that President Barack Obama is “hell-bent on weakening America” by pushing to raise the National Debt ceiling. “What I believe that Obama is doing right now — he is hell-bent on weakening America,” the possible 2012 Republican contender said Friday on “The Laura Ingraham Show.” She accused the president of “purposefully” trying to harm the country and acknowledged that her stinging comments...

MSNBC Flunks Remedial Math on Debt Ceiling
Earth to MSNBC executives: your anchor, your reporter, and your editors do not know what they’re talking about. They just badly misinformed your viewers. The “Debt ceiling” is a limit on debt, not spending. The “ceiling” is an artificial limit set by Congress; it can be raised, even repealed, with zero harm to the Republic. There is no intrinsic reason why the US cannot raise its level of debt above current levels. There are, however, many reasons why it should rai...

GOP faces spending test as debt nears $14.3T ceiling
The Obama Administration on Thursday told Congress the government is about to hit the $14.3 Trillion Debt ceiling and will need authority to borrow more, kicking off the first major test of spending restraint and the strength of Republicans' new congressional power. Republicans said they won't agree to a higher Debt Limit unless Democrats agree to strict new spending controls. Democrats warned the GOP not "to play chicken" with The Economy and said hitting the limit could be worse than the finan...

Geithner Pushes Congress to Raise Debt Ceiling
Reuters reports: Republicans acknowledged on Thursday they will have to sign off on more Deficit spending to avoid a Debt default that would roil Financial Markets and bring the government to a grinding halt. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner pressed lawmakers to raise the nation’s $14.3 Trillion Debt Limit to allow the United States to borrow more and avert a crisis in the coming months. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, a Republican, said he recognized the need to allow the ...

When one year beats eight
WHEN ONE YEAR BEATS EIGHT.... Back in April, Ron Brownstein made an observation that seemed hard to believe: "If The Economy produces jobs over the next eight months at the same pace as it did over the past four months, the nation will have created more jobs in 2010 alone than it did over the entire eight years of George W. Bush's presidency." Of course, that was before crises in Europe caused an international slowdown. It was easier to make that kind of prediction in April, when job growth lo...

Dems accuse GOP of breaking vows at 'dizzying' pace out of gate
Democrats are reveling this week as GOP leaders have walked back some of their top campaign promises just days after taking control of the lower chamber. Republicans stormed to power in November's Elections on vows of balanced Budgets, increased transparency, and reduced Deficit spending. Yet in the first days of the 112th Congress, GOP leaders have adopted rules allowing deficits to explode; dismissed Congress's nonpartisan budget score-keeper as irrelevant; slashed a spending-cut promise in ...