Fire Them All!
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com
The not so “Super Committee Failure” ended with a whimper and finger pointing on Monday without so much as cutting a single penny in the bloated federal budget. Not only that, but these reckless jokers didn’t even bother to negotiate up to the wire to give a deal their best shot. They just gave up two full days before the deadline. I guess getting home for Thanksgiving is more important than fixing a country teetering on calamity. The words “pompous, self-centered, and arrogant” come to mind. This boneheaded move is classic party politics. It puts political gain and posturing above the good of the country. We have no statesmen, just bag men.
I’ll bet members of the Tea Party who voted for $2.4 trillion in more spending a few months back feel sold-out right now. With tax receipts falling and employment dropping, some predict the $2,400 billion freshly created cash will not last until November 2012. Yes, there is a very good chance the country will, once again, run out of money. That alone will be a coming catastrophe because the “spend now, cut later” cards are now all used up. Long before that, the country will slide into trouble. Of that, there is no doubt. Sure, some of the ratings companies have said they won’t cut U.S. credit ratings, but how long is that going to last with mountains of red ink piling up.
According to Martin Weiss Ph.D. of MoneyandMarkets.com, America’s true total government debt outstanding is “118.3 percent of GDP (including U.S. government agencies).” In his most recent report that came out the day the “Super Committee” failed to reach a reduction deal, he warned, “Do you truly think the three largest credit ratings agencies are going to simply ignore Congress’ failure? I think that’s a pipedream! The rating agencies have flatly stated that their next likely step is to downgrade the U.S. government. That’s the specific, unambiguous definition of their “negative outlook” for the United States. But we’re not the only ones pointing this out. Even Merrill Lynch agrees that a downgrade is imminent: “The credit rating agencies,” writes Merrill, “have strongly suggested that further rating cuts are likely if Congress does not come up with a credible long-run plan. Hence, we expect at least one credit downgrade in late November or early December when the Super Committee [failure] crashes.” (Click here for complete post from Martin Weiss.)
I think Democrats and Republicans feel if they can hold out until next November, their party will win. Then, they can fix the deficit the way it will benefit their party and their campaign donors the most. I guess they figure that the so-called automatic cuts really do not kick in until 2013, so there is plenty of time to change things with a new Congress and, maybe, a new President. I think this political brinkmanship will blow up in their faces. The economy could easily get out of control and the U.S. could start looking like one of the PIIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain.)
If the EU debt crisis implodes, there is no way the U.S. is not going to get sucked under. Congressman Ron Paul says U.S. banks have “$1 trillion in exposure” to the European debt crisis. I heard Jim Cramer say this week that he thinks EU banks have “a minimum of $10 trillion in bank debt.” With an enormous land mine in Europe ready to be stepped on, how can our politicians take this big of a risk with our national debt and economy? We need to get our financial house in order, or at least start to! Now, it looks like Congress will get absolutely nothing done on the deficit until after the next election. I say fire them all for putting the country in jeopardy and not doing their jobs.
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About the Author
Greg Hunter
Greg is the producer and creator of USAWatchdog.com. The site’s slogan is “analyzing the news to give you a clear picture of what’s really going on.” The site will keep an eye on the government, your financial interests and cut through the media spin. USAWatchdog.com is neither Democrat nor Republican, Liberal or Conservative. Before creating and producing the site, Greg spent nearly 9 years as a network and investigative correspondent. He worked for ABC News and Good Morning America for nearly 6 years. Most recently, Greg worked for CNN for shows such as Paula Zahn Now, American Morning and various CNN business shows.
Tax receipts will continue to fall until justifiable debt restructure is allowed for tens of millions of americans. http://www.occupynews.blogspot.com/2011/11/justifiable-debt-restructure-would.html
Jail Norquist for obstruction and other nefarious crimes. Pull the rest of the Super Committee away from their dinner table and back to the meeting. They could get their decision done in about 15 minutes.
PIIGS should go the way of Iceland and let the “ripples” rip.
The US banking system is in large part and continues to remain…unaccountable.
Round up those cats and get the world economies rolling again.
Happy Thanksgiving. God bless America. THROW THE BUMS OUT!
Greg, wow, gosh, gee, why don’t you tell it like you feel, ha ha!. The only thing those fools up in Washington D.C. are doing is more of the same. Even I, just a lower IQ knuckle walker out here thought that the “Super Committee” was a ploy to “kick the can” and was a very stupid idea in the first instance. If fact, I’m not even sure that appointing a super committee to do the job the Constitution gave exclusively to Congress was constitutional, assuming it was, it was a fools idea. Congress is broken, its full of special interest mouth pieces, greed and corruption. They go up there with modest means and come out in 10 short years or so wealthy, how does that happen Greg? How long can the American people be hoodwinked into believing the next election will solve all the problems? I don’t think firing any of them will solve anything as any new member will be “brought along” so to speak by the club, same old game, having a party while Rome burns. This can’t turn out good.
Lastly Greg, your article was not only true in fact as sad as it was, but even more so it was heartfelt. This lowly knuckle walker is very appreciative for your work, have a nice Thanksgiving.
Art,
You make a very good point when you say, ” the “Super Committee” was a ploy to “kick the can” and was a very stupid idea in the first instance.” You are correct sir!!! It was just a ploy to put off the hard decisions until after the election. It only cost us all $2.4 trillion!!!
Greg
greg.
love the pic.
have we gotten to a piont where jobs,and cuts will not fix this country. i looks like it to me. even if ron paul gets elected,his plans will not fix the ecconmy. but i hope he wins to save my freedom to suffer.
im glad yesterdays artical is over.lol
Jay,
One way or another the economy will right itself. I think it will not be fixed until after the next big crash, and one is surely coming. Thank you Jay for your support.
Greg
So we have to break a second leg before the first leg is fixed?
gasp.
Greg,
I agree it’s high time to clean house. This is not about left or right politics, it’s about accountability. We have a bunch of renegade cowboys in Washington who have completely failed their constituents. Talk is cheap, we need responsible results and we need them yesterday.
Thank you Baja and Fnpmitchreturms.
Greg
The super committee was designed to fail. This is an attempt to shift the blame from politicians when austerity cuts take place automatically. This is just designed to give both parties cover and blame the American people rather than laying the blame where it belongs. The FED and the elite oligarchy who have brought the country too the brink by design to implement a new world order where the USA is a third world country stripped of its assets by the banksters and industrialists who want to rule the world through economic slavery.
I don’t see any other way we as a nation could have gotten to this point except by design. End the FED; nationalize all the FED’s assets.
Thank You Greg for your reporting and the continuing education of the American people
“With an enormous land mine in Europe ready to be stepped on, how can our politicians take this big of a risk with our national debt and economy?”
Good question Greg. I think the key word in your question is “politicians”, because that is what they are. I couldn’t help myself but look up the definition of the word, here it is:
politician |ˌpäləˈti sh ən|
noun
a person who is professionally involved in politics, esp. as a holder of or a candidate for an elected office.
• a person who acts in a manipulative and devious way, typically to gain advancement within an organization.
Could not of said it better.
That sums it up for me, especially a person who is a professional and manipulative. Because of that, they can only see to the next election. As you also state, they think they can hold out till next November. We will find out, won’t we.
Thank you Steve and NM for the comments.
Greg
“Do you truly think the three largest credit ratings agencies are going to simply ignore Congress’ failure?
Yes, I think they will.
First off, the Ratings Agencies can all rot in Hell, these were the same shysters that gave fraudulent investment vehicles like “Timeberwolf” and criminal organizations like Enron, Lehman Bros and AIG AAA ratings until they blew. Secondly, the problem with the US economy is not government debt, it’s unemployment. Once we have gotten 20 million unemployed Americans back to work there will be a huge surge in tax revenues.The entire “Debt crisis” has been ginned up by Right Wing Hawks and enemies of social programs in order to gut those very programs. Also wars to increase US imperium are a nonstarter, they do nothing for anybody other than those who own stock in munitions industries, like far too many congresscritters.
Yes, fire them all, then jail them.
So, you think we can
keep raising the limit on our credit card without ever paying in down in a significant way…that is funny
As I said in another thread elsewhere, the SuperCommittee was not a failure at all. The SuperCommittee was little more than a foot-in-the-door and an easy way to userp congressional authority.
The next time the subject comes up the response will be luke-warm. People will remember the failure and the uselessness of most of our elected officials without the realization that decisions are being taken away from their elected officials (however useless they are) and handed to a small, hand-picked group of like-minded individuals who can be bought much easier than the whole.
Much the way that ‘executive orders’ are an end-run around the supreme court, ‘super committees’ will be the future of the ‘end-run’ around those pesky congressmen like Ron Paul who actually have a conscience and check it before voting.
It matters not at all what the klowns in Kongress (those same pathetic people- Reid, Franks, Boehner et. al. ) attempt (or the executive branch for that matter). The outcome (something to the effect of a sovereign default/U.S. dollar removed as reserve currency/North American Union) is apparently just over the event horizon of the next election. If the government assembled 100 “Stupor” committees the politicians there would not be able to make an intelligent gathering of facts, followed by rigorous analysis, and synthesize solutions to present to the citizenry (let alone take bold action): it is above their collective capacity to do so and the citizens are quite zombified. Fire them? A charming thought, however no one wants to get rid of “my legislator” with seniority or a committee chairmanship irrespective of how inept, stupid or corrupt the politico is. Our only hope left is to have three more political parties (right, centrist and left) in addition to the right-center Republican and left-center Democrat parties which cannot seem to run the county at all. It might force some semblance of real debate and cause real action to occur. For starters we have to cut spending…… and end the undeclared wars!
Greg,
This is just another example of the sold-out politicians we have in office. This whole “super committee” is eye wash for the stupid. Even if they had reached some sort of agreement the so called cuts are a farce when looked at over ten years.
Until We the People vote all the characters currently in office OUT, there is no chance of improvement.
Right on Chuck!!
Greg
Fire them all?
They believe we all work for them. We should explore options to place our taxes in escrow like we would a bad landlord until they remember where their bread and butter comes from.
I’m going to keep on responding with the same type of comments to these great articles: Our federal government is co-opted by private globalist banks who need to things:
1. Our national economy to collapse so that uninformed voters will demand increased social policy which further strengthens Wall Street profits and policy control, and so that voters will eventually accept economic integration with other nations once Americans no longer believe that our sovereign economy is the best long-term solution to feed and clothe our families.
2. To use their control of our money supply and the profit from our tax dollars to continue their globalism efforts around the world as they seek to use the remains of the US economy and American naivete to create an interdependent global system of central banks under their private control.
This is why I believe the Occupy movement is critical right now, if it’s directed correctly and doesn’t fall into the trap of seeking treatments for symptoms rather than going to the root of the problem and removing Wall Street from Washington.
Yes, we need to “throw the bums out”!
Unfortunately, the “we” needs to be a majority of Americans. This “we” is not in place as of yet.
I will try this Thanksgiving to awaken family sheeple by speaking the truth. Unfortunately, my comments will be drowned out by comments about Lady Gaga, NFL, and Jersey Shore.
The overall joke of this “super committee” is the fact that they were simply trying to cut only 1.2 trillion over 10 years. Truth is that they should be trying to cut 12 trillion over 10 years. Just more smoke and mirrors, folks.
Methinks there are some Rothschilds and other Illuminus ones sitting somewhere getting a gigantic chuckle watching Democratic and Republican sheeple blame the “other party” failing to cut the 1.2 trillion as if cutting the 1.2 trillion in 10 years would actually mean anything.
God bless, Greg. God bless.
Thank you hbeachrealist for you blessing and support!!!
Greg
Happy Thanksgiving, Greg.
Well, getting a little hot under the collar today. This is nothing more than another papercut. Another poke in the eye of the sheeple, and they damn well deserve it. I have been talking about this collective mess for years. I have tried to warn my friends and family on what is coming. I have tried to tell our government to Stand Down and stopped what they are doing to OUR COUNTRY! Letters and Town Hall meetings don’t get it. They just placate to the populace. Our Legislature is no better than Corporate CEO’s, that vote themselves pay raises and every perk in the books.
You all can talk about poverty but the fact is most do not know poverty. I have seen it first hand, compliments of Uncle Sam. I will tell you they would be happy to eat out of our trash cans. No Social Security or Medicare in those countries. You just die off!
So as we all sit around the table for the feast, think about what others only dream of. It is headed that way because we choose to be complacient. There are many in the world that will be happy to see us in a deplorable state and we are helping them fulfill their dream.
Thank you Sling!! Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family as well.
Greg
USA, best pig in the world. I always said we have the best bankers , maybe even better then the Queens. Two kinds of wars going the fake ground wars and money control war. The money war is what can cause a real war. PEACE
Our Representative actually admitted on the local news that from the beginning at least some of the Committee members had no intention of cooperating with the Other Party. Sad.
Ellie B.
Thank you for the info!!!
Gregt
In the 2010 elections there was a suprize in my district in that the sitting Congressman of 20+ years (a Democrat) was defeated. The people that voted the new Congressman in sent him to Washington with a simple job.
Reduce the size of govt. – pending but not looking good.
Pass a Balanced Budget Amendment – Fail.
Reduce Federal spending – Voted for the debt ceiling increase = FAIL.
It appears as though I will be shopping for a new Congressman/woman next November.
Greg
Good article! As usual congress does NOT work anymore. Unless Ron Paul wins the coming election (which is doubtful, although I’m voting for him) “OUR REPUBLIC” doesn’t stand a chance.
You see, we left SOUND money when the FED/IRS was implemented in 1913.
Henry Cabot Lodge then a senator wrote to a colleague stating that “He could NOT support the bill implementating the FED-fractional reserve banking system as he thought this would be highly INFLATIONARY and detrimental to the American people and now about 100 years later Mr. Lodge foretold history.
Thomas Jefferson warned us that “If you allow the bankers to control your monetary system, first from inflation then through deflation the banks and businesses that grow up around the banks will confiscate much of the public property and your children will wakeup homeless in the country their forefathers conquered”.
JFK knew what was wrong….the day after his death silver certificates were pulled from the free market…..
What are we hearing now….50% of homeowners are underwater..this all goes back to a SOUND monetary system which doesn’t create runaway inflation.
Thomas Jefferson also stated, “From time to time the Tree of Liberty needs to be refreshed with the Blood of PATRIOTS and Tyrants”.
A government that does not represent “The People” needs to be replaced!
Greg,
Bravo to the title “Fire Them All!”
Since those fools in Congress are doing nothing, fire all of them would do our country a big favor. In fact, we will create 535 new high paying jobs with excellent benefits. That is something the “current” Congress is unable to do.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Ambrose
‘We need to get our financial house in order, or at least start to!’
It’s too late.
Along with this economic judgment which has fallen we will soon see the Iran,Russia,China,North Korea hammer fall on our cities.
That’s what always happens to wicked,reprobate,Sodom like nations.
We could not learn from history and God has removed his blessing from USA. Now we wallow in the putrid death curse of all civilizations who ignored God’s many,many warnings.
Isaiah 13:11-13
It seems that the super committee members realized any cuts made would be blamed directly on them and it would affect their next election.
Our federal government cannot shrink but always must grow. Cuts are virtually impossible with this chained-up King Kong of a government we have.
The constitution is broken. I say we make a database of our best educated citizens. We draft from that database those to serve in congress for four years. If they come out wealthier than when they went in they are automatically executed for treason. Hell I was drafted to fight in Nam, you get real honest when you realize you may die at anytime.
Our elected officials, who work for us after all, need to be put in their place.
1. They spend too much time, and need too much money, to insure their re-election. Limit them to one term; extend the current term by one year.
2. They must join Medicare and Social Security and abandon the plush benefits they voted themselves. No special privileges at all.
3. Limit the number of lobbyists to 250; make them bid for an annual lobbyist license with the auction proceeds going to the Treasury.
4. Limit all contacts between elected officials and the 250 lobbyists to take place 9AM-5PM in the office with video cameras and mikes and streamed onto the Internet (easily done with current technology). Any contact outside the office, and outside the above hours to be a crime.
Lobbyists will be less influential under my plan since nobody gets a second term, so the need for re-election support evaporates.
well greg. If the euro falls and we relaspe into another depression(although i don’t think we ever got out of this last one)we will see desperation the likes of which these poloticians have never seen.
Few poeple care right now because it just doesn’t hurt enough. But when uneployment payments stop,taxes jump up, unempployment jumps; it will hurt. And when those people realize that there is no hand out, no program, that uncle sam is broke and the only way to sustain themselves is by selling everything they own including there 401k’s. THATS WHEN THE CAN IS KICKED NO MORE. When the pain gets too great, the ploticians will be removed. How they are removed is anyones guess.
read all your stuff..thanks for all that you do
brian,
Yes, my friend we are fast approaching the end of the road. Maybe they can put it off until after Christmas and New Years?
Greg
Hi Greg
I am sensing we may be subjected to an overnight devaluation of the US$ as soon
as mid-late Dec. 2011 or within 2012.
Enjoy the holidays – next year they may be very very different.
The For Lease signs and homeless are increasing dramatically with
the destruction of individual wealth, liberties, timeless beliefs and structures for
success and expansion.
Even Whole Foods will shut down. As mentioned before the NYSE will no longer
exist.
I highly advise people to prepare for their survival – it is time to prioritize
your security – water, food, protection etc. over the same o same o financial
investing and trading.
The Seer
The Seer,
So good to have you back. Please do not stay away so long before you comment!!!!!! We love your perspective!!!
Greg
“I guess getting home for Thanksgiving is more important than fixing a country teetering on calamity. The words “pompous, self-centered, and arrogant” come to mind. This boneheaded move is classic party politics. It puts political gain and posturing above the good of the country. We have no statesmen, just bag men.”
Well said Greg – and that goes for the entire article. Your frustrations are shared with the rest of us.
Frankly I doubt most people thought the Committee would really come up with something meaningful and susbstantive. In fact I recall you seriously querying this whole process (in concert with many others) when it was announced.
As we all now know the latest treasury reports put national debt at over USD 15 trillion (15,000,000,000,000). The national disgrace.
As one media report put it:
“The national debt is the sum of the debt held by the public plus the so-called intragovernmental debt. The latter is that debt held by federal trust funds, such as Social Security, when the government borrows from those trust funds. Those figures are $10.3 trillion and $4.7 trillion.”
“Terence P. Jeffrey, a veteran budget reporter and columnist for CNSNews.com, reported that the new debt per family, based on the Census Bureau’s estimate of just more than 76 million families in the United States, is $197,579. Jeffrey calculates the debt per person worker in the private section at $160,545.
Those figures drop just a little using numbers from the U.S. Debt Clock. It reports that the debt per taxpayer is about $133,373, while the debt per citizen is about $48,000. It reports a debt per family of about $182,000, based on an estimate of about 82.5 million families.”
Appalling is an understatement of this gross economic mismanagement as a result of poor quality management and oversight by successive administrations. It’s only a matter of comparing who is worst now.
Any responsible Government would run budget surpluses and dramatically pay down debt in the good times. That never happened.
I am not least surprised that the politicians came up with nothing despite all the politics involved. Just look at the track record.
In any event they are far too preoccupied now in soliciting bxxxxs – oops, sorry I mean busy seeking large personal and party campaign re-election donations from the vested interests – than looking after the national interest (which is always secondary to personal and party interests).
Then these wallies, who believe they are all knowlegable and better than the rest of us, stand up and lecture their own constituencies, as well as foreigners for heavens sake, about economic management and democracy. Really – what a tragic farce.
Thank you Sean S for the kind words!!!
Greg
I totally agree, Fire Them Now!
I would like to ride them all out of town on a rail like the old days.
Hey Greg
Can you say SUPER CALAMITY. same group, just a different name.
Greg… I enjoy your analysis here and on CoasttoCoastam. That being said, I remember several weeks ago you made a comment “At some point in the future we will grow ourselves out of this mess.” Now that is not an exact quote but close to what you wrote.
Do I gather you are not a believer in PEAK OIL? Or, if you are, how could you say that here in America we can grow ourselves out of this problem.
I wrote an article that was on many websites even ZEROHEDGE back in Oct titled: Peak Silver Revisited: Impacts of a Global Depression, Declining Ore Grades & a Falling EROI, which can be found here: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article30905.html
We don’t really know what the true inflation adjusted value of commodities are due to the fact that money has been siphoned into derivatives rather than physical assets. This has disguised the value of commodities far great than monetary printing alone.
The EROI – energy returned on invested is everything. In 1930, USA oil and gas EROI was 100/1 (1 barrel of cost to bring 100 barrels to market), by 1970 it fell to 30/1 and in 2000 it was 11/1. Presently the estimate for USA oil & gas is 9-10/1. Shale oil is 5/1 and Tar sands comes in at at pathetic 2-4/1.
The Suburban Economy was built on an EROI of oil and gas of 25-30/1. I can’t see anyway of growing out of this mess because there is not the available HIGH EROI energy to do so.
I am simply amazed that almost no one in the mining industry understands the principle of the falling EROI and its impact on the mining industry.
I wanted to know if you have done any research or what are your thoughts in this matter.
Lastly, Jeffrey Brown presented, at the ASPO USA conference in the beginning of Nov, the Land Export Model and its change in oil exports to 2020. He shows that NET EXPORTS declined from 40 mbd to 35 mbd from 2005-2010. With a 0.1% decline rate in the 33 oil exporting countries, the NET EXPORTS will decline from 35 mbd down to 21 mbd by 2020. If the 33 exporting countries suffer a mere 1% decline rate, the NET EXPORTS will decline from 35 mbd to just 16 mbd.
How do we Grow ourselves out of this mess if this turns out to be the case?
Happy Thanksgiving
SRSrocco,
If I said that I meant years in the future and only after we have hit bottom. The bottom is a long way off. Thank you for your comment and analysis.
Greg
A Happy wish to you & family on this day when all is on the line for the Nation we all love to call home. A blast from the past that is now upon our front door steps. http://www.fame.org/pdf/buffet3.pdf. I think you should run a story on this & see if the MSM picks up on the content Warren Buffets Dad laid out so correctly.
M. Smith,
This is pure gold!!! This is the first couple of lines and it says it all: “Congressman Buffett stresses relation between money and freedom and contends without a redeemable currency, individual’s freedom to sustain himself or move his property is
dependent on goodwill of politicians. Says paper money systems generally collapse and result in economic chaos.”
Ron Paul has one big piece right: close down the military bases outside the country. I suspect that the people in Washington understand that the party is over, but the people in place never do what needs to be done. It always takes new faces in high places, and hopefully we will get that in the 2012 election.
When was the last time you heard a politician announce: “I don’t care if I get re-elected!” “Let’s do what’s right for the country…”
Career politicians are more concerned with keeping their job rather than doing their job.
http://napoleonlive.info/politics/chronology-of-failure/
Wake up America! The “Super Committee” was supposed to fail! The
Politicians have no interest in helping the people of this Country!
As long as THEY have a job and money, they don’t care if you starve!
Most people won’t do much until they get scared or feel pain. When they have been trained not to think as most of America has, getting scared and feeling pain will both come at the same time. Specifically hunger pains. And it will be too late. But then I’m sure there is a football game on TV to keep them distracted until such time as that happens.
good luck with firing the bums as long as diebold is doing the voting.
g.johnson,
You are a funny but realistic man!!!
Greg