Pres. Obama: I will not renegotiate raising debt ceiling

[Pretzel_Warrior]

Take that, naysayers.

I am happy Obama is our President. Say what you will about his style--he gets things done.

[gateley]

1. To hell with the naysayers (there's always the next outrage). Take that, REPUBLICANS! nt

[Pretzel_Warrior]

7. Booyah!

[sheshe2]

2. I have no problem with his style, Never have never will!

Yeah Obama!

[ellisonz]

3. Teahadists are plotting now.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

9. I agree. But they are targeting GOP.

Should be a bloodbath in 2014 Repuke primaries.

But for now....basking in victory.

[ellisonz]

11. The GOP turning to shit doesn't really help us.

We only got this because McConnell threw Boehner under the bus. If Cantor launches a successful coup all bets are off.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

15. And DNC will make sure it is known as the Kantor Debt Default

He will let us default which will kill the GOP even more as things gear up for 2014.

[ellisonz]

18. I think you overestimate the level of news consumption of the average mid-term election voter.

Also, you really should consider the electoral map. It's not great. Kicking the can without a debt ceiling deal could be a fatal mistake.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

21. You seem to be confusing debt ceiling and deficit reduction deal

Debt ceiling limit will happen in Feb. larger deficit reduction deal is a separate matter.

When the new aspects of Obamacare kick in, it will change deficit picture a lot. For the better.

[ellisonz]

23. "When the new aspects of Obamacare kick in, it will change deficit picture a lot. For the better."

Math please on this magical rapid un-projected by anyone budget deficit miracle that is somehow relevant to the major unresolvedfinancial crisis questions such as sequestration and the debt-ceiling?

Deals made: 1/3. We're done here.

[Volaris]

36. And if he (Cantor) screws that coup up by even a 17 vote threshold,

that Gavel goes back to Pelosi, most likely. And then they (the GOP House Majority) really WILL get nothing for the next 2 years.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

38. This is my hope

Oh boy.

[Recursion]

4. "You get nothing"

Once Boehner had nothing on him, Obama became a legitimate hardass. This will continue.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

8. I agree. Reelection done. Hard ass Obama is here!

This time it's personal!

[madokie]

79. That's how I see it too

[global1]

5. But He Said He Will Not Negotiate With THIS Congress Again On The Debt Ceiling......

He won't be able to negotiate with this Congress again because it ends in a day or two and a new Congress takes their seats.

















OK - don't flame me - I'm just trying to be funny.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

28. ; ) good one!

[coldbeer]

31. In a day or two and a new Congress takes their seats.

That was great global1!!!

That Russert kid needs to realize that. He seemed to
be trying to make an issue of it. He said the 112th
congress did what they set out to do - "block Obama!"

Hey Luke. The 112th is finished as the worst house ever
thanks to Ba-lock Obama!

[BlueCaliDem]

56. I was thinking exactly the same thing when I heard it!

And yes, I knew you were making a funny and it made me smile.

[railsback]

57. Typical lawyer

ROFL!

[postulater]

6. Yes, the war expenses have already been incurred.

Let's pay those back. That alone can probably handle the deficit.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

12. Exactly.

[TXDem72]

10. Then why wasn't the debt ceiling increase part of this current bill

I will believe he gets things done when they actually get done.

[Cha]

13. Love his style..

http://theobamadiary.com/

[Recursion]

14. I DRINK YOUR MILKSHAKE (nt)

[Pretzel_Warrior]

16. Lol. Love that photo.

[sheshe2]

19. Cool, Calm and Collected! That's our PBO.

Oh sure let's throw in his dry sense of humor too!

He's telling the GOP to suck it up in that pic!

He's the best!

Thanks Cha!

[Cha]

26. AND, he's sayin'..

[font size=21pt]"U MAD?" [/font]

[PoliticAverse]

17. So what's he going to do instead ? n/t

[Pretzel_Warrior]

22. Let them default or watch them shut up and

Do their job. If they choose the former, he will remind the American people every day.

[Report1212]

20. "I will not extend Bush Tax cuts for 250k and above"

nt

[Pretzel_Warrior]

24. Really?

He said exactly that quote?

[mzmolly]

29. Full context:

Carney also left the door open to the idea of raising the threshold for extending the Bush-era tax cuts to $500,000 or $1 million. Obama drew the line at $250,000 in his proposal.

"He is not wedded to every detail of that plan," Carney said, when asked specifically if Obama would be willing to raise the limit.

Bush's cuts are gone for those making over $400K.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/13/obama-bush-tax-cuts_n_2124324.html

[Pretzel_Warrior]

30. Thanks for the context

[mzmolly]

71. You're welcome.

[SunSeeker]

44. Link(s)? nt

[bowens43]

25. LOL!! He has caved on nearly every issue he has faced and you take his word on this?

make no mistake he is already in full negotiation mode and that means cuts to medicare and social security.

How many times to you have to be pissed on before you notice that it isn't rain?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

27. Social security? Untouched. Taxes? Raised.

You don't think very clearly.

[uponit7771]

35. Some folk don't do reality well

[OldDem2012]

58. What color is the sky on your world? nt.

[CranialRectaLoopback]

32. You really believe he won't negotiate?

Despite the buzz, this is not an entirely new position for Obama. He vowed publicly in July to veto any bill that extends the Bush-era tax cuts for individuals earning more than $200,000 and families above $250,000.

"I would veto it,"Obama said when asked by New Orleans local affiliate WWLT-TV.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

33. Provide full quote

Thanks in advance.

[CranialRectaLoopback]

42. Too much effort

But let's not pretend he didn't campaign on that. Please. It's only been two months since the election.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

43. Campaigning on and offering that as his opening

Position is definitely ot the same as promising to veto any bill retaining Bush era tax rates for anyone above $250K.

[Skittles]

50. see it is NOT a PROMISE

it is an opening position!!!

[Mosaic]

34. Debt ceiling is the next corporate media buzzword

And they'll milk it for everything they can, like they did fiscal cliff, which did turn out to be a mole hill as David Corn predicted.

[Skittles]

51. oh yes

the debt will be the mountain

[blkmusclmachine]

37. Work for the WH much?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

41. Never have. Would like to

[Iggo]

53. WhAt's wrong with working for the White House?

Are they the enemy now?

[BlueStreak]

39. Nonsensical rhetoric

He will negotiate. He has no choice.

The choice he DOES have is to not unilaterally take off the table the idea of shutting down government. But the idea that he will just stick his fingers in his ears and not negotiate is beyond absurd. The GOP will try to cut programs. In the unlikely event that Obama grows a pair in the next two months, he will counter with a revenue and spending proposal more like what he campaigned on. And then he will dare the GOP to shut down government.

There is absolutely no scenario where there is simply no negotiation, and it is complete foolishness for anybody to take that seriously. It is just bravado -- bravado that he has not backed up in any of his past negotiations.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

40. That is bullshit

He doesn't have to say a word to them about it. Raise borrowing limit and be done with it, losers.

That's pretty easy equation.

You are mixing up reelection Obama with not yet elected Obama.

He has nothing to fear.

[humbled_opinion]

45. Nothing to fear but a 22 trillion dollar legacy....

that he leaves for the next sucker....

[Pretzel_Warrior]

47. Again, that is obviously not on him

But thanks for showing your true colors.

[humbled_opinion]

49. Not on him... than on who?

He can't go 8 years and say oh you know that doubling of the national debt thing that wasn't my fault. If he doesn't deal with it, it certainly is on him, this debt is unsustainable any fool can see that.... it doesn't make me a rightwinger to point it out it makes you putting your head in the sand part of the problem though...

He can addresss this is very progressive ways but he isn't and I don't get it.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

54. On Bush, GOP House, and a giant recession

What super super progressive ideas for lowering national debt did you have in mind? Keeping in consideration the fact that it must pass the House and a Senate where DLC centrist corporatists rule supreme?

[JDPriestly]

70. The government cannot attack the debt by itself.

If the government cuts government spending, a lot of people lose their jobs and the overall economy shrinks. The debt, even if it remains the same as it is now in dollar amounts, becomes bigger in proportion to the dwindling economy. So just cutting government spending will not work.

The private sector has to invest in the American economy, in American jobs above all.

There is plenty of money in the private sector to do that. They prefer, however, to invest overseas and import cheap products here to sell for prices high enough to permit them to deposit their enormous gains in tax havens around the world.

My solution is to create jobs and find sources of revenue that we have not explored.

I think that import taxes would help bring jobs back here because it would make American products more competitive in price and they have always been of better quality than most of the imported stuff (especially the stuff imported from the third world).

Cuts will reduce demand and that is why they will further reduce employment and thus tax revenues.

If private industry would really start to invest, it would be great. But again, that won't happen unless people feel pretty certain that the government will not cut spending too much, will not lay people off too much.

Big business will disagree with me. The greedy CEOs and their boards of directors think about their immediate profits, not demand for their products. So they think that if only the government would take less out of the economy (which the government does not do; the government shifts money around), they could take more. That is not true. It never has been. They do not understand the government's role in the economy which is to provide social and infrastructure certainty. The job that is not properly being done is private investing in the US. Investing that creates jobs. And one of the reasons for that is that the wealthy do not want to work with employees of the high quality of the American workers. The wealthy look down on working people and think that one worker with no work ethics or good work habits can do the same job, produce the same quality and value as a worker who has no idea what he is doing or how to work.

The Clinton tax increases boosted the economy. Profits rose. The Bush tax cuts enriched the already rich, but the economy crashed. If you look at a chart of taxes over the 20th century to today, you see that the lower the tax rates, the more likely the economy is to crash.

Government spending is needed to keep the economy healthy. In particular, our economy is not doing well. It is as likely to worsen as to improve, and big cuts in government spending would be terrible for it.

We can't go on raising our national debt, but the government can't lower that debt unless private wealth is invested in businesses that make America self-sufficient and strong and create jobs.

[JustAnotherGen]

72. I think so too

I think that import taxes would help bring jobs back here because it would make American products more competitive in price and they have always been of better quality than most of the imported stuff (especially the stuff imported from the third world).

July 4th 1789 - Tariiff Act. For about 100 years it was a chief way to raise revenue - think Louisiana Purchase was paid for with Custom's revenue.

Take quality of the product out of it - if folks want to buy it in he US - let them. But at a price that reflects a fair Tariff on those goods.

I have five interconnected duties in my current position. Import/Export Controls is one of them. The import classification tables are about three inches thick. Let's make it six inches by adding a few digits to every single that is not raw materials. Raw materials stay the same so we can make something with those materials here.

We haven't even begun to tap into the revenue potential that was intended at Customs implementation and was in place for 100 years. And it could be used to bludgeon Founding Father's worshippers who insist they never intended to collect taxes at all, ever, from anyone, at all times, etc etc.

[BlueStreak]

74. I agree with all of that. And the time to have done that was during "the cliff"

Obama has been talking about these things fro years. "The cliff" was his point of maximum leverage, unless we win back the House in 2014. That was the best chance to do anything. And what did he do with that one best opportunity? He threw in a laundry list of "housekeeping items", and included not a single item that showed any vision or boldness -- not even infrastructure spending that would clearly drive hundreds of thousands of private sector jobs in 2013.

It is really remarkable how unimaginative this whole thing was.

[BlueStreak]

73. Absolutely, and he just screwed up his best opportunity to deal with in ways that are consistent

with Democratic values. By making virtually all of the Bush tax cuts PERMANENT, Obama and Norquist just teamed up to lock us into structural deficits forever.

Obama is going to try to get more revenue through loopholes and such, but he couldn't even get the oil repletion or corporate jet loopholes ended. He will not get any significant revenue from those who are taking the most wealth out of our economy. The opportunity for that just passed us up. Norquist is a very happy man this morning, because he sees the road ahead.

Norquist knows that:

a) Obama doesn't want to have $22 trillion legacy with his name on it, and now that 4 years have passed, he really can't blame any of this on Bush. Obama had his chance to end the wars. He had is chance to reverse the Bush tax policies. he had his chance to address the unfunded drug benefit. Obama has had a fair chance to deal with all of the big Bush items that but us into this deficit situation.

b) There will be no significant revenues. The opportunity for that was "the cliff". And as it worked out, nobody voted for any tax increases, so Norquist is still in business.

c) There will be no cutting Pentagon budgets, and health care costs will continue to rise faster than inflation because Obama did not take on the biggest cost explosion factors in health care.

That means Norquist and the Republicans will be trying to slash everything in sight. And remember the "good stuff" in this agreement is mostly temporary while the bad stuff is permanent.

[humbled_opinion]

77. You are definately paying attention...

I feel exactly the same as you... there are many new revenue sources that this President could have presented

VAT
Transaction Tax banking or Wall St or both
Firearms annual tax
Wealth tax
Real rate increases on the rich not going back to the Clinton rates and somehow claiming that is fair share.

but no he floated chained CPI now if you don't think that is now the GOP low bar for debt ceiling negotiation you got another think coming after this brave new bipartisanship that was just demonstrated, I mean even republicans working with this President just imaging how its going to be when they come for the spending cuts start waving around the debt as a weapon of mass destruction...

But hey don't tell the Pollyanna's on this board that, they think the President got the best deal possible.....

[BlueStreak]

78. And tighter rules on tax shelters

That alone could be $2 trillion over 10 years.

[SunSeeker]

46. Open up a can of 14th Amendment on their ass! nt

[Pretzel_Warrior]

55. Haha.

Yep!

[humbled_opinion]

48. I have no problem with style but I do wonder

Why he never stands up for the truly progressive type of reforms.... and seems to attack the problems on GOP terms...

[Pretzel_Warrior]

52. Probably so he can get something done

Do you know there are some on here who thought Obama would just keep re-upping Bush tax cuts? Didn't happen.

[jsr]

59. I fully trust President Obama to do the right thing

for Republicans in both parties.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

62. Such as Banning insurance companies from denying coverage

To people with preexisting conditions? Yes, that was straight out of the Heritage Foundation.

[JDPriestly]

60. I hope he sticks with that statement.

Our country needs to focus on building our economy, safeguarding our infrastructure and creating jobs. We don't need all these Republican games.

There is no reason to go through this ridiculous economic brinksmanship game again.

Republicans can't complain about business not having the certainty it needs if they constantly create uncertainty with their hysterical anti-American campaigns.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

63. EXCELLENT POINT

Certainty should be clear. Obama is our president. Obamacare is here to stay. He is done playing games with the far right nut jobs in the House of Reps.

Let's be a BUILDING country-not a country of financial shenanigans.

[YayArea]

61. Honestly, does anyone take this statement seriously?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

64. Yes. They had him over a barrel in 2011. Not now.

He just flipped them the bird and gave them a wedgie.

You are now looking at "untouchable" Obama.

[budkin]

65. Translation: "I will renegotiate raising the debt ceiling."

[Pretzel_Warrior]

67. He'll negotiate taxes and sequestration--but not debt limit

You people. It gets annoying.

[HiPointDem]

66. what does that statement mean? It seems to me it means he won't try to raise the ceiling the

next time it comes up.

what do you see it as meaning?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

68. He will let the repukes threaten to default on national debt

And will not be forced into tying spending cuts or any other legislative items to whether or not repukes will increase government borrowing limit.

[HiPointDem]

69. can you link me to something? that's a lot of reading into, if it's all based on the first short

statement.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

75. He shouldn't...

He literally should not return phone calls from anybody seeking to "negotiate" on the debt ceiling.

Congress passes appropriations bills that include debt. If Congress doesn't want to raise the debt ceiling, then they should not be passing these bills.

It is entirely and EXCLUSIVELY the job of Congress to manage the country's finances. It's up to Boehner and Reid to strike a deal -- the POTUS should be on the sideline, impatiently drumming his fingers on the desk in the Oval Office waiting to get sign the deal.

Simplistic? Yes. But it seems to me that Congress never had a problem raising the debt ceiling until the mean black man got into the White House. If the President isn't involved in any negotiations, maybe Congress will do its job with 50% less drama.

[99Forever]

76. Might be a stupid question, but here goes.

Exactly how is it that he won't "renegotiate raising debt ceiling?"

Has something changed in the powers the President has at his disposal? I've heard countless times how he isn't a dictator stated as the reason he couldn't get a myriad of things accomplished. What's different now?

If so, wonderful. If not, ...

... well, just how much good does an empty threat do?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

80. It works like this. Repukes say "we won't raise debt ceiling unless

You accept cuts x,y, and z".

At which point Obama tells them to fuck off or pound sand or whatever.

Then the Republicans either allow the country to default or they do not.

It's really that simple.

[99Forever]

81. Thanks for explaining ...

... absolutely nothing.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

82. Eyes you have but you do not see

Ears you have but you do not hear.

Speech you have, but like Yoda you do not talk. Or was it Grover.

[99Forever]

83. Wowzer...

.. and a deep philosopher too!

[Pretzel_Warrior]

84. Yes