Every facet of our government needs to sacrifice if we are going to survive the debt crisis. This does not mean that our government has to be less effective. It just means they need to start operating like a normal business. I like what our new Secretary of Defense had to say about defense cuts:
The greatest fiscal threat to the military is not declining budgets, Hagel warned, but rather “the growing imbalance in where that money is being spent internally.” In other words, money dedicated to health care or benefits is money that’s not spent on preparing troops for battle or pilots for missions. (militarytimes.com)It is good to see that a person at such a high level is finally saying the things that need to be said. Legacy costs are killing our budgets. If a respected and honorable community, like veterans, can take a hit on benefits, then there should be no argument for any entitlement to be spared. Certainly veterans deserve these things more than most others.
"A slideshow presentation shown to US Army Reserve recruits classifies Christians, including both evangelicals and Roman Catholics, as religious extremists, placing them in the same category as skinheads, the Ku Klux Klan, Hamas and Al Qaeda." http://hotair.com/archives/2013/04/08/army-reserve-training-material-evangelicals-catholics-are-extremist-groups/
ReplyDeleteThe army has also said that the Tea Party is a threat.
I don't like Hagel. He showed that he was completely incompetent at his confirmation hearing. Obama picked Hagel because Hagel wants to cut the military and because Hagel doesn't like Israel. Obama wants to cut the military so that the welfare state can be expanded. You cant have a large military and a large welfare state. You have to pick one. I think that the military needs to be cut to some extent and benefits for veterans need to be reduced as long as it is part of an overall reduction in the welfare state, but we don't need to be cutting the military and veteran benefits so that the welfare state can continue to grow.
The coming debt crisis/economic implosion is impossible to stop given the current political and cultural realities.
Japan will double its monetary base in two years by printing a massive amount of money. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-07/kyle-bass-japanese-retirees-will-lose-half-their-life-savings
ReplyDeleteThe military will comply with budget pressures because it is not run by the unions. Unlike the rest of the Federal govt. The least-well-paid, most patriotic will comply, as they should. The rest are scum who will not (generalizing of course!)
ReplyDeleteWhat Hagel says in your article ToeJamm must be said, but I also agree with 00139x that Hagel is a weak-kneed dove pussy ass clown that should never be Defense Secretary, so perfect for the Obama administration I guess.
The dollar is in trouble http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/10/the-dollar-is-on-the-brink-what-role-does-gold-play-in-the-new-world-economy/
ReplyDeleteYour savings are gone.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-11/carmen-reinhart-no-doubt-our-pensions-are-screwed
"SPIEGEl: You mean some kind of haircut?
Reinhart: Yes. But we are in an environment where politicians are very reluctant to do write-offs. So what happens is that money is transferred from savers to borrowers via negative interest rates.
SPIEGEL: In other words: When the inflation rate is higher than the interest rates paid on the markets, the debts shrink as if by magic. The downside, though, is that this applies to the savings of normal people.
Reinhart: The technical term for this is financial repression. After World War II, all countries that had a big debt overhang relied on financial repression to avoid an explicit default. After the war, governments imposed interest rate ceilings for government bonds. Nowadays they have more sophisticated means.[...]
Reinhart: The best way of dealing with a debt overhang is to never get into one. Once you have one, what can you do? You can pray for higher growth, but good luck! Historically it doesn't happen -- you seldom just grow yourself out of debt. You need a combination of austerity, so that you don't add further to the pile of debt, and higher inflation, which is effectively a subtle form of taxation …
SPIEGEL: … with the consequence that people are going to lose their savings?
Reinhart: No doubt, pensions are screwed. Governments have a lot of leverage on what kinds of assets pension funds hold. In France, for example, public pension funds have shifted money from shares (on the stock market) to government bonds. Not because their returns are great, but because it is more expedient for the government. Pension funds, domestic banks and insurance companies are the most captive audiences, because governments can just change the rules of the game."
This doesn't lead to good things. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-03-09/jim-rogers-were-wiping-out-savings-class-globally-terrible-consequence
"Throughout our history – any country’s history – the people who save their money and invest for their future are the ones that you build an economy, a society, and a nation on.
In America, many people saved their money, put it aside, and didn’t buy four or five houses with no job and no money down. They did what most people would consider the right thing, and what historically has been the right thing. But now, unfortunately, those people are being wiped out, because they are getting 0% return, or virtually no return, on their savings and their investments. We’re wiping them out at the expense of people who went deeply into debt, people who did what most people would consider the wrong thing at the expense of people who did the right thing. This, long-term, has terrible consequences for any nation, any society, any economy.
If you go back in history, you'll see what happened to the Germans when they wiped out their savings class in the 1920s. It didn’t lead to good things down the road for Germany. It didn’t lead to good things for Italy, which did the same thing. There were plenty of countries where it wiped out the people who saved and invested for their future. It’s usually a serious, political reaction, desperation in some cases, and looking for a savior and easy answers is usually what happens when you destroy the people who save and invest for the future."