No Deal On Debt Deal

If anyone thinks that this deal fixes anything, they need to think again.

At best, in ten years, Congress plans on increasing the debt by $7 trillion instead of $10 trillion. The ‘baseline budgeting’ scam employed by our lawmakers has got to be scrapped. That’s nothing but fantasy economics. Time to get down to the same ‘real economics’ that exists in the real world outside Washington D.C..

That bill and the PR surrounding it is another way to kick the can down the road while making it look like something good was accomplished. It is unlikely to prevent a downgrade in the credit rating, which was what all the crisis-talk was about. The only good that came out of it is that at the very least, the conversation has shifted from expanding government to reducing it.

But this bill does nothing to reduce it. Because of that, the credit rating is still going to suffer. And the so-called cuts don’t even start until after the election in 2013.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) characterized it this way, ‘instead of running to bankruptcy, we’re walking to it.’

If the bill called for spending to be held at last year’s level, with no automatic annual increases as exist in this bill, then that would be worth signing into law.

To illustrate how ridiculous the smoke and mirrors on the budget gets under baseline budgeting, if this bill called for a spending freeze, that is to say with no increase whatsoever, the CBO would rate that as a 9 trillion-dollar cut. And that makes sense to who? Apparently it makes sense to too many people on capital hill.

UPDATE 8/6/2011: U.S. Loses AAA Credit Rating From S&P

Iraq Down, Iran Up

Guess whats been happening in Iraq and Iran? Haven’t you heard?

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta says Iran is increasingly being involved in supporting attacks on the U.S. military in Iraq.

During a surprise visit to Baghdad on July 11, Panetta blamed Iran for the spike in Shi’ite militia attacks on the U.S. military. Panetta said the U.S. military would act without Iraq Army approval to stop what he termed the Iranian campaign against American troops, Middle East Newsline reported.

In June, 14 American soldiers were killed in the deadliest month for the U.S. military since 2008 amid what officials said marked intensified Iranian training of Shi’ite proxies.

And Iraq is facing the prospect of secession by its minority Sunni community. The Iraq government “has lost control over much of the Sunni community,” particularly in the western province of Anbar.

Looks like the ‘debt ceiling’ and ‘default’ hysteria has succeeded in keeping the new trouble in the Middle East from being reported. And there is no one in the Obama administration, including the Commander-in-Chief himself, talking about it.