Okay, you're right, this is incredibly stupid. But props to Lee for being one of the only if not the only Congresscritter to vote against the Iraq AUMF.

One, I hate this woman.

Two, someone should tell her to go fuck herself.

Three, to above poster, nothing noble comes from this woman...nothing, noble at all.....

http://dailycaller.com/2011/03/02/congressional-bosses-from-hell-sheila-jackson-lee/

If Lee votes against a resolution of war, it's only because she's pissed that defense contractors aren't offering her bribes.

Her constituents must be so proud.

No doubt racism factors into some people's opposition of Obama. But it isn't a meaningful proportion of the population. And racism certainly isn't the reason a deal is so hard on this. That a member of Congress, whom one must presume is (or should be!) aware of the real issues in the negotiations (Obama wants revenues with cuts, Cantor and the Tea Party members adamantly oppose any revenue increases, Boehner would deal but can't control his caucus, particularly Cantor who wants to be Speaker), made this sort of accusation is moronic, and testimony to her lack of fitness for the office.

I am so sick of these pompous A-holes always blaming race. Race is the only reason that idiot sits in the white house. And Lisa. How old are you, your pungent ideaism reeks of immaturity.

Sheila Jackson-Lee is a disgrace to humanity; an imbecile, and a race hustler.

In her world, there is never a justifiable reason to question the motives of a black man.

I can lay this out in terms even she can understand: we cannot raise "revenue" - there is no more money left to take out of the economy. The only thing left is cuts, and not the paltry 2 billion that Obama's proposed. We need cuts in the TRILLIONS, and now. We need a balanced budget now, and going forward. Cutting back from borrowing 43 cents of every dollar spent to borrowing 39 cents is not going to help.

We don't need a scalpel, or an axe. We need to take a 24" chainsaw to the budget. Now.

Lisa - if you think that voting against the Iraq AUMF was a good idea, I'd be interested in how you would have begun to solve the islam problem.

Lisa - if you think that voting against the Iraq AUMF was a good idea, I'd be interested in how you would have begun to solve the islam problem.

So spending a trillion or so dollars, sacrificing thousands of American lives (and if you count them, countless thousands of Iraqi lives) to install a fractious Islamic republic cozy with Iran, who lacking an enemy on its border was empowered to invest freely in nuclear weapons and bankroll Hezbollah and other charming groups, was solving the Islam problem? If that is the case, I'd say not solving it was the better option.

I can lay this out in terms even she can understand: we cannot raise "revenue" - there is no more money left to take out of the economy. The only thing left is cuts

Just to be clear on the facts.

Federal taxes, both in terms of marginal income tax rates, and as at a percentage of GDP, are at or near historic lows. Federal taxes are predicted to be less than 15% of GDP this year, significantly lower than the 18-19% that has typified the postwar period. Obama has lowered taxes on most working Americans through the payroll tax deduction.

Deficit reduction measures have historically combined increases in revenues and cutting spending. Even Ronald Reagan raised taxes when needed. In 1982 he signed what was at the time the largest peacetime tax increase in history. He raised taxes 7 times during his presidency.

Perhaps you know these things and still think cutting spending is the only solution. But those are facts.

To address our fiscal problems, spending cuts and entitlement reform are needed. But it's simply not correct to state that we are under some unheard of tax burden. We are not.

@brian:
two errors in your post:
strike 1:
there is no more money left to take out of the economy,
I heard that the wall street bank did so well that the bonus of the traders that put the real economy in the **** got multiplied by two last Christmas, and GE still hasn't paid any tax (and is not poor), and those are only two example: bank and GE, I am not sure how well is doing the oil companies and how much tax they pay, but that would be interesting to know (or depressing)... And please, in your response don't confound capitalism and corporatism. Also do not start saying that under libertarian-ism A and B, because the country isn't libertarian.

Note: before cutting down medicare, don't forget to send flower to your mom.

note 2: thank Christopher to add comment 8 while i was writing this one.

strike 2: Can you define "Islam problem"? the Iraq problem created by Bush senior, by Bush junior, or the one saddam that was friend with Reagan to kick the ass of iran? Or is it the taliban problem created with the CIA money to kick the ass of the russian in Afghanistan?
Unless you meant the muslim problem as the muslim people?

To tell you the truth, the islam problem can be solved only by two methods:
a) we get out of there, and we do a real effort to not need oil, you know like in INDEPENDENCE , which mean fracking, nuclear, wind and solar, saving energy, and whatever else, but not saudi oil.
b) we remove out of the earth one billion people, and good luck with this option.

The country is handout-itarian.

Compared to libertarian ideals, I suppose so. Compared the social safety nets of other advanced democracies, not so much.

Well by all means raise taxes you morons. I do not care, I am unemployed for the first time in my adult life and that black Nero in the white house continues to fiddle. I won't be paying it anymore so some dumbass illegal can actually get a credit for money never paid. Oh, btw, I averaged 170k a year and paid an average of 30k in taxes for the last 20 years, so cry me a Fucking river about not being taxed enough. Now add state and local taxes and tell me how taxes are at lows. Last time o checked ca taxes are at an all time high. You want to pay more, fill free to write a checki

Ronc, I'm sorry you are unemployed. That has to suck.

That fact, however, does not change what I think are the needed policies to get control of our long-term deficit, which must entail a combination of spending cuts and revenue increases. You are in your rights to disagree, and you are not alone. Your policy position on this doesn't make you a moron, nor mine, me.

I think a cuts-only approach will be lead to another recession (shades of 1937), and think both cuts and revenue increases need to be phased in over time so as to not trash an weak and slow recovery while the economy deleverages.

There is no getting through this situation without pain. I think our country is capable of doing the work; I am not at all sure our political leadership - from either party - is up to the task.

Another Great Depression is coming, no matter who gets into the White House in 2012.

Christopher - I said "start to solve the islam problem". I didn't say they didn't fuck it up. The US has had an islam has been a problem since the 1790s. Like it or not, Iraq was the ideal place to begin draining the swamp because they weren't an islamic republic. We screwed the pooch on that one by letting them write their own constitution. Instead of handling Iraq like post-WWII Japan, we handled them like the USSR -- twice (once in 1991, again in 2003-2008).

Also - the reason that tax intake is so low is because we have about 20% REAL unemployment. You can't get blood from a stone.

nico - if you want to know why GE pays no taxes (not that any corporation really does) you'll have to ask Obama -- he hired Immelt to one of his czar posts.

You're also quite wrong about the traders tanking the economy. It was all the doing of the government and their continued support for socialism.

Corporations do not pay taxes. They pass those on to their customers - which is us.

And when I say there is no more money, I mean it. Obama's increased spending by more than the GDP. Our economy cannot produce enough money to cover government spending at a 100% tax rate.

What's needed is a massive shrinkage of government - like by 50-75%.

There is only one thing you will get if there are more tax increases during a recession - a full-blown depression. We're already seeing it happen here in CT. The unions decided not to give anything back, and there's going to be thousands of layoffs in the public sector. And there's no private sector growth, so those people will be joining the ranks of the long-term unemployed. And since we've just had a 3.5 billion dollar tax increase, we're going to see massive out-migration of businesses and individuals.

So the idiot Democrats did the same thing they always do -- raise taxes -- and got the same result they always get -- a shrinking tax base and a collapsed economy. Either they're too dumb to learn from history, or they like it this way.

christophe, you know why tax recipts are at an all time low? because nearly half the country gets more from the fed then what they pay in.

Once people are paying more to the fed then they get back from entitlement programs tax recipts will rise - even when staying at current rates.

Personally I think most americans would be willing to pay more in taxes if it accttually went to paying down the debt, and not to bailing out compnaines and jailing minor drug users and paying 99 weeks of unemployment insurance so the lady down te street with the 12 acre ranchette 5 horses and three 3d plama screen tvs felt comfortable enough to turn down 3 job offers that didnt pay 'enough'

"I heard that the wall street bank did so well that the bonus of the traders that put the real economy in the **** got multiplied by two last Christmas, and GE still hasn't paid any tax (and is not poor), [...] I am not sure how well is doing the oil companies and how much tax they pay, but that would be interesting to know (or depressing)..."

nico, according to CNN Money, Exxon Mobil paid $7.7B in U.S. federal taxes last year. True, GE paid no tax (thanks to its coziness with Obama). But you're talking about a few billion here and there, which would not have a significant impact on the problem. It's been pointed out (I'll have to find the article) that, using the IRS's estimate of about $500B for the total assets of the country's top 5% income earners, even if we confiscated every last dime, it would only cover a quarter of this year's deficit. You're engaging in exactly the kind of thinking Crid was talking about... the belief that there are a few fat cats somewhere who have essentially infinite wealth and could easily pay for everything that everyone would ever want and not miss it, but they don't do it simply because they're a bunch of meanies. You may as well believe in the tooth fairy.

"Federal taxes are predicted to be less than 15% of GDP this year, significantly lower than the 18-19% that has typified the postwar period."

Christopher, the problem is that government has suddenly ballooned from about 20% of the economy to over 25%. Since government doesn't tax itself, the tax base as a percentage of the total economy has shrunk. So while the 15% number is true as far as it goes, it is misleading to say that the private sector's tax burden has lessened. In fact, I suspect that, if you remove government spending from the total GDP, federal taxes as a percentage of all economic activity has probably gone up. Remember, bracket creep causes tax rates to go up due to inflation, even when income in terms of constant-year dollars hasn't changed.

Christopher, the problem is that government has suddenly ballooned from about 20% of the economy to over 25%.

A lot of that is due to the huge collapse in GDP I would suspect., and also to short-term Keynesian stimulus.

Now that the stimulus is winding down, I suspect government's proportion to shrink. It does not seem to be the case that the government has added a huge number of employees in the Obama years:

http://www.businessinsider.com/size-of-the-federal-workforce-under-obama-2011-7

it is misleading to say that the private sector's tax burden has lessened.

Its present burden has lessened, or remained the same. Due to deficit spending, the future burden has certainly increased.

Negro, please. Republicans aren't trying to stymy the business-as-usual raise-the-ceiling ploy because Obama is black.

They're doing it because he's a Democrat.

Power wants more power, that's all. The guy in the White House could look like a weeping orange boner and whoever was in opposition would grandstand and moan about saving the country (at least until it was their guy at the helm).

Oh, FFS.

Congress, not the President, has 100% of the money. Read your Constitution.

The President doesn't even have to come up with a budget. The President cannot pass a bill to affect spending or revenue.

If you speak of the President as if he DOES have control of your tax dollars, you're simply wrong.

No wonder the controversy is going on and on and on...

No one has attended a class in civics. Hold the feet of your moron in the House to the fire. Make him/her drop the intern and get to work.

"The President cannot pass a bill to affect spending or revenue."

The President can issue debt-free currency, though, at his own behest. Lincoln did it (greenbacks), Kennedy did it (silver certificates).

Both of them were shot dead and the debt-laden currency reinstated faster than you can say "please, Mr. Banker, may I have another".

Who owns America? You do the math.