[Ian]

From the Washington Times (http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050914-120153-3878r.htm):

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said yesterday that Republicans have done so well in cutting spending that he declared an "ongoing victory," and said there is simply no fat left to cut in the federal budget.

Mr. DeLay was defending Republicans' choice to borrow money and add to this year's expected $331 billion deficit to pay for Hurricane Katrina relief. Some Republicans have said Congress should make cuts in other areas, but Mr. DeLay said that doesn't seem possible.

"My answer to those that want to offset the spending is sure, bring me the offsets, I'll be glad to do it. But nobody has been able to come up with any yet," the Texas Republican told reporters at his weekly briefing.

Asked if that meant the government was running at peak efficiency, Mr. DeLay said, "Yes, after 11 years of Republican majority we've pared it down pretty good."

Where's the "I gave myself a hernia from laughing so hard" smiley?

[longeyes]

The Republicans are fat and smug and blind. They are in power, for now, only because most sane Americans recognize that The Other Side is even worse, populated by political lunatics and moral thumbsuckers.

Delay is one more good reason not to be a Republican and, seriously, to think third party. Many of us know that the time has come for alternative thinking--if we want America to survive. If the right leader steps up '08 could be a lot more interesting than watching Hillary Obama mudwrestle with The Unknown Comic for the White House.

[Justin]

* WAR IS PEACE
* FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
* IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

And introducing:

* FAT IS THIN

[cracked butt]

Mark this date on your calender. I think I may have cast my last vote for a Republican (or democrat for that matter) :banghead:

[xd9fan]

:barf: :barf: :barf: :barf: :barf:
I will no longer vote GOP...........www.lp.org :uhoh:

Ian love your first line :) could not agree more

[Henry Bowman]

This is truly scary. :uhoh: How out of touch with both reality and your political base can a person be? :confused: :banghead:

[Fly320s]

Maybe he was being facetious.

Rush Limbaugh was talking about this today on his radio show. Limbaugh's opinion is that DeLay was joking and giving the Democrats a little jibe at the same time. Limbaugh might have the transcript of today's show at his website.

If Tommy boy Delay wasn't joking then he needs a good smacking... with the federal budget. :evil:

[R.H. Lee]

A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking about serious money.

[rick_reno]

And here I thought it would never end. I sure am happy it's over.

[wild billz]

By stating that the government is lean it will easily encourage people to disagree, and then offer up solutions on where to cut expense, neither party like losing its funding, but calling BS on him would result in bringing areas to light to reduce. He did say that if you identify an area that can be reduced to bring it forward. Maybe this was just a ploy to get folks to admit they are fat on pork. One can at least hope that he is calling a bluf.

[HankB]

I hope DeLay was being sarcastic . . . if he was serious, then he's as out of touch on the budget as Bush is on the border.

[Ian]

Guys, the emperor is naked. DeLay is serious. To him, the huge programs are all essential spending, and "waste" is comprised of the little pissant stuff like the Tea Tasting Board.

Hear hoofbeats...expect horses, not zebras.

[Dave Markowitz]

Yet another example of why the Republicans are referred to as the Stupid Party.

[FeebMaster]

I thought they were the Evil Party.

[rick_reno]

I thought they were the Evil Party.

No, they're the "Less than Evil Party" or the "Sometimes Evil Party"

[bountyhunter]

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said yesterday that Republicans have done so well in cutting spending that he declared an "ongoing victory," and said there is simply no fat left to cut in the federal budget. I'm really old and still remember some things.... way back when, the worst insult that could be hurled was when the repubs would accuse the dems of being "tax and spend".....

Fast forward and the GOP is now the party of MASSIVE pork spending, to wit the horrific debacle of "Star wars" and all the sink hole projects that spawned like the $6 BILLION supercollider in the Texas desert that now sits unfinished after $3B was spent on it.

The new GOP mode of operation is:

BORROW AND SPEND

I have actually heard GOP "expert" economists diatribe at length about how the "prosperity" under Reagan proved that DEFICITS DON'T MATTER.... translated, what that means is:

Why should I care if I turn this country into a third world nation in 25 years.... I'll be dead by then.

[bountyhunter]

could be just a ploy
By stating that the government is lean it will easily encourage people to disagree, and then offer up solutions on where to cut expense, neither party like losing its funding, but calling BS on him would result in bringing areas to light to reduce. He did say that if you identify an area that can be reduced to bring it forward. Maybe this was just a ploy to get folks to admit they are fat on pork. One can at least hope that he is calling a bluf. I like you're enthiusiam, but I suspect that scenario is about as likely as the one where that flattened out possum that just got run over by an 18-wheeler is just "playing possum" to fool the other cars.

Anytime a theory involves a poltician being honest, clever, or doing something to intentionally cut funding...... you can be sure that theory needs to be revised.

[beerslurpy]

This is classic Keynesian economics. Bush is just Roosevelt III. The War on Terror is just a low-intensity version of WWII to sop up the damage from a low-intensity version of the Great Depression. If there was significant unemployment, there would be a draft in addition to the crazy spending. You know I'm right.

They could balance the budget and give us a 2 trillion surplus tomorrow if they would just turn off the public feeding trough.

[dasmi]

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said yesterday that Republicans have done so well in cutting spending that he declared an "ongoing victory," and said there is simply no fat left to cut in the federal budget.
Bloody hell. Please tell me he didn't really say that. That's it. I am no longer a Republican. It's over.

[RealGun]

No, they're the "Less than Evil Party" or the "Sometimes Evil Party"

How about "The Lesser of Two Evils party"?

[wild billz]

Bountyhunter, you are right, i was being overly optimistic. as my momma used to say wish in one hand and cr@p in the other and see what gets full first. I’m not that old, but I sure do miss my old country, but that said, I was over in the UK for a few months and its sure better here. I just do not like the trend we are sliding.

[publius]

Who knew he had a sense of humor?

[DeseoUnTaco]

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said yesterday that Republicans have done so well in cutting spending that he declared an "ongoing victory," and said there is simply no fat left to cut in the federal budget.
As they say about politicians, they will tell you that up is down and down is up. Gee, if I were in charge of the budget, a) there would be no deficit b) there would be a tax cut and c) we would start paying off the national debt, all at the same time.

We've got two big-government parties (Dems and Repubs) and one small-government party that gets 0.5% of the vote (Libertarians).

[spartacus2002]

The main thing the two parties have succeeded at is tricking Americans into thinking the Dems and Repubs are at opposite ends of a rope, engaged in a tug-of-war.

Reality is that they are holding hands and skipping merrily together towards an authoritarian state.

Like Standing Wolf says, we're not there yet -- but I say, the goons' gungrabbing response in NOLA just took us one helluva lot closer.

[SpookyPistolero]

I feel like a ship at sea in a hurricane as my political course gets shoved all over. This year has given me a lot to think about though, that's for sure. I used to be a pretty adement Republican supporter, but after seeing things like this, I just can't accept it. They used to be the lesser of two evils to me.

As usual I can't find the quote of whomever said that a man must vote his conscience and I find that to be true now. I will have to make it a libertarian vote next time. At least I'd lose the race with a clear conscience.

[mete]

Take a look at the recent Transportation bill , it's loaded with PORK !!....NYC has Bloomberg as mayor. They had a large deficit and instead of just letting it get bigger as a politician would ,the business man Bloomberg said no we are going to do something about it . And he did !!

[longhorngunman]

There's lots of ways to stop spending all OUR money. Like getting out of this debacle of a war. Billions upon billions spent, with no end in sight. It's a losing proposition that the recent hurricane brought plainly to the surface. It's time to withdraw from the quagmire that is the War on Poverty. Decades of waste and many lives wasted. :D

[drinks]

DeLay de louse, de biggest mouf in de house, and his little <> buddy, Perry, the <>, destroyed the state of Texas political balance , by using highly illegal money laundering programs to buy seats in the Texas house and the Texas Fed. House members.
In the process, they wasted several million dollars of tax payer's money, a factor in job cuts in schools, both teachers and support staff, tax increases at the local level, extra sessions of the Texas legislature, many more millions wasted and the only thing the sessions accomplished was to raise the pay of judges, who cannot survive on only $120,000 or so a year, and a major increase in legislatures pensions.
Every one in Texas is really proud of the efforts of DeLay and his buddies, especially the ones now suffering under Ronnie Earle's totally unfair felony indictments for just doing the usual Texas pol things.
:D :barf:

[Gordon Fink]

http://www.lp.org

~G. Fink

[Graystar]

DeLay says the era of big government is over!And the era of humongous government has begun!


NYC has Bloomberg as mayor. They had a large deficit and instead of just letting it get bigger as a politician would ,the business man Bloomberg said no we are going to do something about it . And he did !!You’re kidding...right?

Bloomberg's answer was to raise everything...taxes, fees...everything. Bloomberg treats the city services as services provided by a business. If New Yorkers want the services then they have to pay. He made absolutely no effort to root out corruption and waste. But then...why would he? Those are his buddies.

[LAK]

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said yesterday that Republicans have done so well in cutting spending that he declared an "ongoing victory," and said there is simply no fat left to cut in the federal budget
Well; I suppose to global socialists everywhere, Tom DeLay is making perfect sense here.
------------------------------

http://ussliberty.org
http://ssunitedstates.org

[robert garner]

Names aside what we have here are Socialists or Facists;Personally I've been supporting the Fascists, no more though. I cannot see the libertarians
accomplishing much, but lacking a Jeffersonian Democrat party I must resign myself to the Libertarians. At least Billary will know her way 'round the House.
Keep 'em Clean and Ready boys(just to be on topic)
Leonidas

[beerslurpy]

This has nothing to do with the war in Iraq, which is a drop in the bucket overall. The elephant in the middle of the room is entitlements- SS, Medicare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, subsidized housing, enormous beareaucracies that only exist to employ people. There is easily 1-2 trillion dollars per year hidden in there.

The only problem is that those entitlements create enormous constituencies that vote. I guess the excess population will come in handy if there is a war, but somehow I dont see the parasites as being worth much in a firefight.

[HankB]

The elephant in the middle of the room is entitlements- SS, Medicare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, subsidized housing, enormous beareaucracies that only exist to employ people. A recent George Will column asserted that since LBJ's "Great Society" was kicked off, anti-poverty programs have consumed about 6.6 TRILLION dollars - that's $6,600,000,000,000. (As an exercise try to figure out how high a stack of $100 bills that is! :what: ) Note that this number is surprisingly close to the national debt, and does NOT include Social Security retirement benefits.

And we still have the same, or worse, levels of poverty.

GWB's new Medicare drug program's stated costs have been sharply increased since the bill was passed - in the next 20 years, current estimates are that it will cost us about 17 trillion dollars.

Where's that money going to come from?

[CAnnoneer]

Well, finally De Lay shows himself for what he is - an opinionated, self-centered, deluded, arrogant fool. Now it is out for all to see.

"The truth can be denied by some, ridiculed by others, but in the end, there it is." W. Churchill

The entitlement can go away in only two ways - controllably and uncontrollably. The former will never happen because there is no political will to do so. The latter will certainly happen, when China and Saudi Arabia stop giving us their money by buying our federal debt. That is when the real fat-cutting will happen. Which brings me to the idea that besides a good career, more guns and more training are a sound investment in my future.

:cool:

[Gordon Fink]

The elephant in the middle of the room is entitlements—SS, [etc.].…

Well, the Social Security Administration and the Department of War, but it looks like we’ll be stuck with both of those for a long time to come.

~G. Fink

[longeyes]

"The entitlement can go away in only two ways - controllably and uncontrollably. The former will never happen because there is no political will to do so. The latter will certainly happen, when China and Saudi Arabia stop giving us their money by buying our federal debt. That is when the real fat-cutting will happen. Which brings me to the idea that besides a good career, more guns and more training are a sound investment in my future."

The laughing and joking by the likes of Tom Delay and his Merrye Men will end when either the money flow gets abruptly yanked (foreign debtors having had enough) or the printing press gets overheated and the serfs recognize that American currency is looking like the Argentinian peso of yesteryear (think wheelbarrows to buy a burrito).

The masses of Americans are frankly clueless about the real situation in America today, on so many levels. They take it, as the psychobabble wisdom of the day, tells them to, "one day at a time." You can't run a civilization one day at a time. You need sound planning based on reality, and Reality, for those in the know, is a chateau in Switzerland and occult bank accounts.

The big question for the future is which will be the favored exchange of the future, gold or ammo? Or maybe it will be the bottled tears of all the Dr. Phil graduates?

[longeyes]

Question of the day:

When did politics and stand-up comedy become one and the same thing?

[Justin]

Longeyes, I'm sad to report that the antics that take place in reality have resulted in irony being put on life support.

[dasmi]

Where's that money going to come from?
You, me, and our children.

[longeyes]

"Where's that money going to come from?

You, me, and our children."


No, not to worry: our debts--if not our sins--will be forgiven. By the Great Compassionate One-World State of the Future. Formerly great empires will be forgiven as well as the downtrodden Third World nations of today, and the resemblance between former and latter will start to become pronounced. The Great Leveling will occur, and a thousand years of peace will prevail, albeit at a somewhat reduced standard of living.

So don't worry, no one will have to pay. There will be a price, though, and you already know what that is.

[Nightfall]

This is the saddest laugh I've had in a long while.