Job workers brawled in western Michigan today as the auto industry continues in its death throws. Meanwhile, the Obama administration pushed plans to use bankruptcy filings for GM and Chrysler to free the companies of their retiree entitlements. The plan seems to be to see Chrysler sold to Fiat and GM re-formed under additional Government loans. Meanwhile the job losses continue to mount with no end in sight.
Update: Youtube link is dead, but there’s a video from the news station available here.
The House Republicans gave an outline of proposals for an alternative budget plan today. Specifics on how much the budget would cost and what affect it would have on the deficit are due to be released next week. Among the proposals are spending cuts on everything except defense and lowering the top tax rate from 36% to 25%. A tax cut of that magnitude would free up money used by those in a position to hire workers and would likely be a huge shot in the arm to the economy.
Senate Republicans will be introducing a series of amendments to the budget next week in an attempt to cut spending from the budget. House Democrats are able to restrict the number of amendments that can be offered, so House Republicans are opting to present their complete budget alternative when it is finished.
The big question at this point is if the Democrats will be willing to listen to alternatives or if they will continue to press their agendas forward in a unilateral fashion.
Just look at that number… $11 Trillion dollars and growing fast! A trillion is a large number, and a bit hard to wrap my head around, so I looked around for some comparisons. I came across this over at tysknews:
Trillion = 1,000,000,000,000.
The country has not existed for a trillion seconds.
Western civilization has not been around a trillion seconds.
One trillion seconds ago – 31,688 years – Neanderthals stalked the plains of Europe.
$1 Trillion would be enough money to buy about a 1,000 boxes of Girl Scout cookies for every person in the United States.
And here is a youtube video to give a bit more explaination:
It is hard to wrap one’s head around this number. Take the above, multiply it by 11. Now you have our current debt. Next year, we’ll be adding around $2 Trillion to that number. And we will continue to add Trillions to the debt every year until we get this out of control spending in check.
The United States GDP was just over $14 Trillion in 2008. Yes, our debt is nearly as much as our entire GDP! The interest payments on this debt is the third largest item on our budget at over $412 Billion. Now, throw in that the Federal Government alone is slated to spend over 27% of our GDP this year. Certainly someone other than me has to see the obsurdity in this.
I know a lot of my readers are interested in the teaparties that have been occurring across our great neation. The Orlando Sentinel reports that 4000 people attended their tea party at Lake Eola on Saturday afternoon. The movement is going strong, and may grow stronger with yet another $1 Trillion bailout in the works.
How did the AIG bonuses get approved? It was approved by the members of Congress that voted to approve the stimulus package. The rush to vote prior to reading and understanding the bill is the reason the AIG mess hit.
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