Who came out ahead in the debt ceiling deal?

Everyone that makes above 500K always makes out. The rest of us lose equally mostly. The financially poorest will be driven down further.

this helps

I think it is a great pity that Obama and the Democrats, who after all won the last election, have had to renounce their plans for increased spending that would have made America a better place for all its citizens.

No one came out ahead. Everyone’s going to keep liking who they already liked and disliking who they already disliked. The damage to the Republicans was already done when the country started seeing them as obstructionists. The damage to Obama was done even earlier than that when the story fed into the continuing narrative that he is an ineffective leader. No change, no improvement—that is, business as usual.

@johnpowell I think Colbert makes an intelligent point about the super committee. Instead of hundreds of Congressmen arguing and worrying about re-election, you give a dozen suckers “the honor” of solving it. I’d be surprised if they get a lot of volunteers, but then again, maybe some people would like the fame and power regardless.

What I like about the super committee is that they will actually get something done. Guaranteed they will piss a lot of people off, but they will get stuff done without clogging up Congress for weeks. Whether or not you think that is a good thing is matter of opinion. Or rather more if you are inherently pessimistic, optimistic, or somewhere in between (realistic?).

@cockswain :: I see it as one step closer to a dictatorship. I guess “getting something done” just to get something done depends on the party in power. Some will like it and some will hate it.

I would have loved if Obama could have snapped his fingers and gave us the public option. But it would suck balls if Republicans could do the same since they usually hurt poor people.

Just one guess: the rich?

The squirrels across the country. Unlike the pigeons they have a better food source. They don’t have to rely on grandma for left over bread. Plenty of nuts on trees.

The rich benefit in the short term. If the economy does not recover due to skewed income distribution then everyone loses. The deal takes money from those who can least afford it, further widening the gap between the rich, the poor and hopelessly squeezing the middle class..

There are already signs that the already slow recovery is slowing down further. The most important thing, which everyone has been ignoring, is getting employment up. People without jobs can’t buy things and if people don’t buy things then industry does poorly and we end up in a downward spiral.

I sure know I didn’t. Oh yeah, this is a great idea – let’s see what we can do to save money..ah yes, let’s ensure no one goes near education for fear of never affording it and that those who do go near it aren’t ever able to pay for it or get out of debt. Yes!

Fuck whoever wrote that suggestion.

@johnpowell I agree about the public option. Either we needed to fully socialize health care, or fully privatize it without these nonsensical rules about buying it across state lines, but a compromise in between is not as effective as either of those options. Giving consumers more choices in health care with less regulation would force competitive pricing, both with regard to insurance and provider costs. Personally, I look at health care as a basic human right that gov’t should provide, so that’s the camp I fall in.

When you say getting something done depends on the party in power, what do you mean with regard to the super committee? They are bipartisan, so theoretically should act in accordance with their party principles. Theoretically this should force entitlement reform, tax reform, and defense spending. Hopefully eliminate a lot of wasteful, redundant, non-bid contract sort of spending. But I could be hoping for too much from our leaders. How they will actually behave very much depends on what lobbyists donate to their campaigns.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Your link doesn’t work. What does the deal do to education? I’m sure I’ve missed plenty of details about it.

@cockswain It’s fixed now. Sorry about that. Basically, the fucked up gist is that graduate students would be paying interest on their loans during school whereas before you didn’t have to pay any interest or loans when you were matriculated full time. People simply can not afford this.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir That’s a shame they’ve changed that, as education is extremely important to the nation. But unless I’m missing something, the article asserts it will tack several thousand dollars onto grad students. I don’t see how that, although burdensome, will prevent someone from wanting to go to school or being able to ever finish paying back loans. It will make it more expensive, but what’s the alternative? Not being able to qualify for a good job? It sucks, but it doesn’t seem like it puts education out of reach.

Everybody alive today gets to spend borrowed money for a little while longer, so in an odd way, each of us are winners, including the politicians who create the problem and then take credit for “solving” it. How they sleep is a mystery to me. Today’s children and their children, and their children’s children who will labor to pay back the money are the real losers. But nobody seems to care about that.

@josie My husband & I just had a conversation about How they sleep is a mystery to…

@cockswain I just posted that on FB and I’ve already talked to two people who will be significantly less likely to try to go for their Master’s now. Consider this, after 6 years at NYU, I am paying off around 78K in loans but during the past couple of years I’m paying off just interest. Initially, it was $900/month. I’ve consolidated all my loans and switched them all to the Feds and that lowered my payment to $400/month. I have a full time job, as does my husband (who is also paying off his college loans) but I’ve got a house and two kids as well as 3 relatives to account for and we’re struggling. I am going into a PhD program in the fall and am scaling back my employment to part-time. Because of in-school deferrment, I wouldn’t have to worry about that $400/months when my income is much lower come Fall. Now, after 7/1/12, I will, for awhile since this PhD program usually takes 5–7 years.

Yes, I see what you mean. Why the article says it will add several thousand isn’t clear then.

@cockswain They’re thinking about payments of around $200/month since Federal loans can’t exceed the numbers they provide but for those of us who had other loans that are now Federal loans, the amount is higher. I think they were also thinking about 2 years or less Master’s programs but many of us aren’t in Master’s programs but in programs that are a lot longer.

Yeah, I’m not a fan of not being able to assist citizens obtaining PhDs. It will just put us further behind in the future. But I suppose it is still better than the alternative, as one would have more satisfying work by comparison. Maybe just the same disposable income as a blue-collar worker though.

Nobody comes out ahead; it is a travesty.

Clearly the dems totally caved to the reps. The country loses. The economy stays in the doldrums or gets worse as government spending declines and people get poorer. The corporations aren’t going to make more stuff. They know that no one has the money to buy it, and even if they do have the money, they aren’t spending.

Maybe the really wealthy gain, but not as much as if the government were to stimulate the economy.

I really wish we had just defaulted…. We are going to eventually, might as well do it before we destroy our currency. Although maybe destroy our currency is a good think I dunno.

@josie That’s why I keep asking why the Republicans don’t like to pay their way now, but always spend and borrow.

I think the biggest winners in this whole fiasco are the cable news pundits idiots..

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Higher education has long been impractically expensive. My dad got a BS in Biology from a state school for a fraction of what I spent – in another state school, in a poorer state. It’s not like anything really changed.

@flutherother We have no money to spend to make America a better place. Even military R&D spending ought to be put on hold, if you ask me; we’re presently well ahead of pretty much everybody in terms of bleeding-edge technology. And none of it seems to help with the present problems.

@Nullo That it’s inpractically expensive is a different truth and conversation from whether grad students can actually pay for it. It’s not like this deal lowered the costs, they just lowered support for affording the costs. They say the same about chemo medications which drives me crazy. People somewhere out there (profit driven asses, let’s call them) put market prices on things like education or healthcare and then there are organizations out there or the government that tries to help with the costs of either but can’t (understandably) and cuts funding but the problem, the root cause, is still the private sector, making arbitrary prices up, both for medications (no fucking injection should cost $3300 like Neulasta does/single shot, trust me.) and education.

@josie Really? You really believe those politicians should care about my kid being buried in debt? That’s sentimental bs. Screw my kid, let him pay my debt. He’s young, he can take it. Unlike the ninnies now who hates all kinds of taxes. And i will tell him to dump his debt to his kids. Tax haters hate this country so much they see it only as an evil tax fiend out to choke the life of them. I swear to bejesus if I hear one more republican say tax increases kill jobs I’m going to vomit on my tv screen.

Not the citizens of America. If I had to guess the politicians came out ahead.

Not the American people.

The entire process of providing peace, order and good government of, by and for the people has perished from the USA.

Just remember that 2012 is an election year.

The whole thing is set-up by Mitch McConnell to try to ensure that our rich and corporations have no part in balancing the budget, that all the heavy lifting falls to the middle class and poor in the form of cuts that primarily affect them. It’s designed to prevent any chance of revenue increases of any kind from happening.

The bipartisan commission would be OK if it weren’t for the fact that Republicans are appointing only hardliners who will accept no taxes, no loophole closing, no end to oil and corporate jet subsidies, no revenues of any kinds. Further, if the commission does recommend any revenue increase, that must be subject to a cloture vote to move ahead in the Senate. However, if it recommends only cuts, Filibuster is forbidden. That gets a straight up or down vote. One set of rules for Republican wishes, another for Democrats.

The only ace-in-the-hole Democrats have is the expiration of all the Bush Tax cuts. Congress must act and Obama must sign to prevent that from happening. But does Obama have the cajones to play hardball the way Republicans do? I don’t think so. I think they will continue to preserve Bush tax policy even though they have control of only one house of the Congress. The Bush tax policy is slowly killing America. But ideologues don’t even notice the results their policies bring. They are so absolutely certain their ideology is perfect that they simply blame the consequences of following it on someone else and carry right on over the cliff, insisting all the way that they are the only ones with any understanding of how things actually work.

In the short term, the tea party extreme-right Republicans would appear to have gained in the battle but The Battle is not what American needs to regrow the economy, move toward full employment, energy responsibility, and domestic peace.

Ironically, the demographic of the average Tea Partier doesn’t seem helped at all. But I guess they “feel” better.

I think I’m in the minority on this thread in not being fully disgusted by this. No question that our debt to GDP ratio is a serious problem and the cuts that need to happen will eventually hurt all of us. Or at least hurt until we adjust to the change in lifestyle. But I think all (or maybe only most) of us are disgusted that the wealthy won’t need to feel that pinch in the same way the rest of us do.

No one wants to see any program that affects them directly to have reduced benefits.

Believe it or not, I am not a fan of this plan either. I do not believe this “compromise” will cut the deficit enough to make too much of a difference. I’ve said this before, but all tax breaks should be cancelled, and serious cuts and reforms of social programs should be enacted. But I think you all know that the GOP and Democrat Party lack the testicular fortitude to do such “radical” things.

@mazingerz88 Don’t tell me you’re accusing the GOP of class warfare. That would be hilarious.

I don’t think this compromise does much either. It avoided default, and puts the power to enact reform into the hands of this new committee. As mentioned before, this committee can be a good thing or awful thing. The formation of the committee is the real action that came from this.

@cletrans2col Accusing the GOP of class warfare is not a ridiculous assertion.

@cockswain And who can say if either party will listen? Didn’t the “Blue Ribbon” debt commission do the same thing this committee will be doing?

@cockswain @mazingerz88 Have you not heard the rhetoric of your party?

These “blue-ribbon” commissions are news to me. I did a brief search and see that they historically don’t appear to accomplish too much. Which is dis-enheartening. If you know of any particular ones worth searching for to read about, let me know.

Regarding your other comment, I’m not sure what you’re getting at. As an aside, I generally identify with the social principles of the Democratic party (always hoping they’ll make progress in that area), and am libertarian from an economic standpoint. Only somewhat because I very much also believe in socialized healthcare and finding effective ways to assist the lower class out of poverty. I think the wealthy have established a comfortable enough lifestyle for themselves that they have plenty of room to give back to a system that spawned them such riches without having their every selfish whim diminished. But besides that, yeah, free market all the way with leaner gov’t correcting externalities and investing in education, science, and technology.

@cockswain Thing is, when you say, “giveback”, that’s charity. Paying taxes is not charity, that is something we all have to and should pay. That being said, the current tax rates are fine, but we should end the subsidies.

I don’t exactly agree with your distinction, but not enough to not be in overall agreement with you. Ending many of the subsidies is fine with me. Most of them don’t apparently accomplish anything actually anyways, according to supply and demand economic theory. I say “most” because there may well be exceptions of which I’m unaware and I’d hate to be a liar.

I’m all for a reformed simplified, tax code that is clear and not easy to exploit.