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Mr. Freeze

us government shutdown - it's happening

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two weeks until debt ceiling is hit and US defaults

grab your bug-out-bags and go innawoods

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Yawn. Federal government. Local government will still thrive. What will happen to army pay? People argue over Obama Care and yet WI has $3 state medical insurance.

IL's governor stopped payment to lawmakers because they couldn't settle a pension issue. >> http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130710/NEWS02/130719994/quinn-moves-to-halt-lawmaker-pay

Chicago's new mayor changed up a committee that met once a year who's members were paid $60,000 per year. They met once a year... so their pay was lowered to $1 per year. I tried finding the article, but well searching for Rahm Emanuel committee yields a ton of stuff.

Federal government has already been doing cutbacks like pulling free daycare for government employees and FBI agents no longer get paid for days off.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-budget-deficit-down-37-180057337.html

There is a lot of stupid spending everywhere.

Like how an inmate at Riker's Island costs $160,000 per year. Why? Pensions. "The Department of Corrections has substantial pension and salary responsibilities and significant debt-service payments. It says 86 percent of its operating costs go to wages; it employs 9,000 relatively well-paid unionized correction officers. "

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/9/30/report-finds-nycinmatecostalmostasmuchasivyleaguetuition.html

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So many people are convinced that the government is raising the debt ceiling so the government can pay its bills. In truth they are doing so because they can't. Why else would our government be raising the limit of debit it can hold? Raising the debit ceiling without fixing the underlying problems, is like paying off credit cards with credit cards. Sooner or later the government isn't going to be able to get another credit card and its the citizens who, once again, will be left to clean up the mess. If it can even be fixed this time. If the American people where smart they would grow a pair and force massive finical reform in their government. That is the only thing that will prevent the looming crisis.

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Satyr000 said:

So many people are convinced that the government is raising the debt ceiling so the government can pay its bills. In truth they are doing so because they can't. Why else would our government be raising the limit of debit it can hold? Raising the debit ceiling without fixing the underlying problems, is like paying off credit cards with credit cards. Sooner or later the government isn't going to be able to get another credit card and its the citizens who, once again, will be left to clean up the mess. If it can even be fixed this time. If the American people where smart they would grow a pair and force massive finical reform in their government. That is the only thing that will prevent the looming crisis.

It's too late to prevent a "looming" crisis, it's been in a state of crisis for several years now already. They've raised the debt ceiling without fixing the underlying problems dozens of times before, each time making the inevitable collapse all the more spectacular and damaging.

There's actually nothing to stop them raising the debt ceiling again, pretending a little longer that things are all okay and the game can go on. It sounds as though the only reason this hasn't happened again is that some people wanted to have a little protest about health reforms. But at this point the collapse isn't something that be prevented, only postponed.

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I'm not an expert in economics, but maybe someone else here is. Here's a hypothetical question. What if we suspended most, if not all of our social programs for a full year?

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geo said:

Zimbabawe went bankrupt and fired all of its government employees >> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8551616.stm


Amateurs. Greece is going bankrupt and has fired NO public employee yet*.

Spoiler

*caveats apply, depending on the exact definition of "public employee", and the type of contract they had.

Kontra Kommando said:

What if we suspended most, if not all of our social programs for a full year?


*shrug* according to the perception the average European pinko has of the US, nothing would happen, since you have no social programs anyway: people die on the street with no healthcare, cops fire on you if you don't have insurance etc. :-p

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Maes said:

Amateurs. Greece is going bankrupt and has fired NO public employee yet*.

Spoiler

*caveats apply, depending on the exact definition of "public employee", and the type of contract they had.



*shrug* according to the perception the average European pinko has of the US, nothing would happen, since you have no social programs anyway: people die on the street with no healthcare, cops fire on you if you don't have insurance etc. :-p


We would however save on medicare expense which makes up about a third of the annual expenditure. But yea though those people are getting pennies, and it will most likely collapse in the future, because of people living longer.

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Here’s another hypothetical question. If the U.S. government remains shut down, therefore ceases to exist; would the debt owned by the U.S. …disappear? Say the powers that be organize a peaceful coup, and therefore establishes a new republic with a clean slate. It’s basically the same people in charge, running the same institutions, in a “new” nation.

Btw, I know it’s ridiculous, and most likely would never happen.

EDIT: however, the USSR did cease to exist due to economic mismanagement. Who knows if the same thing could happen to the U.S. Moreover, what implications would that have for the rest of the world?

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Kontra Kommando said:

I'm not an expert in economics, but maybe someone else here is. Here's a hypothetical question. What if we suspended most, if not all of our social programs for a full year?


Nowhere near enough money there. You guys seem to waste most of your explicit government spending on military and security needs. The rest just goes in subsidies and tax breaks to large companies.

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Aliotroph? said:

Nowhere near enough money there. You guys seem to waste most of your explicit government spending on military and security needs. The rest just goes in subsidies and tax breaks to large companies.


That's more true for the United States prior to the 1930s; before the New Deal and FDR. However today, most of our funding does go to social programs.

http://cnnyourmoney.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/ybl_federal_budget_breakdown.png
http://yourmoney.blogs.cnn.com/2012/04/20/

Nevertheless, as I said about social security, the benefit to people is tenuous. I wonder how much of that funding goes to administrative salaries, and how much actually goes to the people its intended for.

But now since I've put it in perspective, the question should be, "what would happen if the U.S. shaved 80% of its annual budget expenditure for a full year?"

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Kontra Kommando said:

Here’s another hypothetical question. If the U.S. government remains shut down, therefore ceases to exist; would the debt owned by the U.S. …disappear?


Of course not. There's also a historical precedent: the taking of power by the Bolsheviks and the founding of USSR, with their unilateral repudiation of any and all debts incurred by the former entity -Tzarist Russia.

That obviously didn't go down too well with creditors, but in the state the world was at the time, there was not much they could do but suck it down. Nevertheless, there were people who held on those Tzarist bonds for nearly a century. Eventually, a -very small- part of it was paid back by post-USSR governments. So there's no positive indication that a sizeable debt would be easily "forgotten" in the short-medium term, especially if the debtor wasn't a big Red Scary monster like the USSR.

I know what would happen to Greece, if such a dissolution was to take place today: foreign powers would not allow such a "void of power" to be formed, and would quickly instate a"pro-debt" puppet government (a dictator, if need be) who'd continue pursuing the same policies that are pursued today towards repaying the debt, perhaps even harsher. If one or more "anti-debt" factions would form and part of the -former- country was under their control, then they would be declared as unlawful and the officially recognized "pro-debt" government would be armed and aided in crushing them (yes, with a civil war if need be).

Of course, Greece is a small and weak country and too close to its would-be enemies (in such a circumstance, pretty much ALL other EU, NATO and UN forces would suddenly be hostile, at least towards the "anti-debt" factions). The USA on the other hand is geographically isolated from the range of any power remotely able to harm it with anything other than ICBMs, and even if different states/factions would form, most if not all of them would remain in control of nuclear weapons....

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I like how they'll always find enough money to monitor and record all your emails and phonecalls though. Good that they've got their priorities straight.



If only it were true, heh. Spying is deemed "essential".

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Maes said:

Of course not. There's also a historical precedent: the taking of power by the Bolsheviks and the founding of USSR, with their unilateral repudiation of any and all debts incurred by the former entity -Tzarist Russia.

That obviously didn't go down too well with creditors, but in the state the world was at the time, there was not much they could do but suck it down. Nevertheless, there were people who held on those Tzarist bonds for nearly a century. Eventually, a -very small- part of it was paid back by post-USSR governments. So there's no positive indication that a sizeable debt would be easily "forgotten" in the short-medium term, especially if the debtor wasn't a big Red Scary monster like the USSR.

I know what would happen to Greece, if such a dissolution was to take place today: foreign powers would not allow such a "void of power" to be formed, and would quickly instate a"pro-debt" puppet government (a dictator, if need be) who'd continue pursuing the same policies that are pursued today towards repaying the debt, perhaps even harsher. If one or more "anti-debt" factions would form and part of the -former- country was under their control, then they would be declared as unlawful and the officially recognized "pro-debt" government would be armed and aided in crushing them (yes, with a civil war if need be).

Of course, Greece is a small and weak country and too close to its would-be enemies (in such a circumstance, pretty much ALL other EU, NATO and UN forces would suddenly be hostile, at least towards the "anti-debt" factions). The USA on the other hand is geographically isolated from the range of any power remotely able to harm it with anything other than ICBMs, and even if different states/factions would form, most if not all of them would remain in control of nuclear weapons....


,: http://www.facethefactsusa.org/facts/who-holds-the-note-look-in-the-mirror-infographic#sthash.T3rpMbV0.dpuf

These would probably be the biggest manipulators in regards to a pro-debt regime, in the aftermath of the U.S. gov't dissolving. But the biggest would be the United States itself; our private institutions currently own the most of the gov't's 16 trillion dollar debt. The pro-debt regime would be a non-violent takeover from plutocrats, and big business interests, aiming to totally eliminate the debt the as well as the welfare-state. Now that I think of it, ...this seems like a possible scenario.

The gov't purposefully commits suicide , and is then usurped by the people it owed money to.

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Cops are paid by local funds. Armies are paid by big funds. If we have no army then China might repossess Los Angeles.

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I have much more trust in US politicians and bureaucrats to work things out in the end and not unnecessarily send everything titties-up, than any Greek or EU politician.

What did they do last time (last year)? They just raised the debt ceiling, printed some more greenbacks and everything was fine and dandy for another year. They can do it this time too. The USA as a whole is too good a "thing going on" to just let it fail because of a formality. Even the EU's "leaders" wouldn't be that dimwitted.

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Aliotroph? said:

Nowhere near enough money there. You guys seem to waste most of your explicit government spending on military and security needs. The rest just goes in subsidies and tax breaks to large companies.


As far as our military spending goes, do the numbers critics use include money that goes to rather expensive soldier education and the cost of implementing the G.I. Bill? Do other governments provide similar benefits to their military?

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Here's a question.... how does money get from a mint to us. Where does a mint send money to? Does the mint pay itself?

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http://news.yahoo.com/obama-to-make-12-25-p-m--statement-134130294.html

this article sort of reminds me of a debut of a video game. Apparently, Obamacare is glitched, and requires to be be patched. lol

"Americans are attempting to purchase health insurance on Obamacare exchanges and are being met with crashing websites, missing price information, confusing forms and in some cases, exchanges that had to delay their start date because they aren’t ready yet," Issa said in a statement. "These ‘glitches,’ which the President is trying to brush off, reveal how totally unprepared the government is for this launch even with three and a half years to prepare. This is nothing, however, compared to the potentially irreversible damage the law threatens in the long term."

sort of reminds me of the Total war forums, in response to the buggy launch of Rome II.

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geo said:

Here's a question.... how does money get from a mint to us. Where does a mint send money to? Does the mint pay itself?


Among the other shock & awe propaganda people have to up with Greece, we've also been told the fairytale of literal "truckloads" or even emergency airlifted (!) crates of money being delivered to Greece by our kind creditors, and then stuffed into the banks' ATMs, so that we little poor people don't run out of cash and panic, causing bank runs.

IMO that's just as naive as believing in Santa or that there has ever been a real-life Scrooge McDuck literally swimming in the money bin.

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Does anyone else find the timing of this a little convenient?

http://rt.com/usa/campaign-donors-rich-usa-590/

The whole debt ceiling and healthcare sideshow is a smokescreen, drawing attention away from the real issues. Nothing being done to change the underlying causes of the debt. Nothing being done to bring the banks under control. Nothing to stop interest rates being kept artificially low to benefit speculators in the financial sector who manipulate markets and commit acts of fraud. Nothing to improve the situation in any way, shape or form.

And the people who donate the most to election campaigns wouldn't have it any other way. Because they're still making a profit in all this.

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This is the first thing that popped into my head upon hearing about this.



Now anyways, I could go on about how this is a bunch of BS and how congress is awful right now and Bob Loblaw, but it'd be pretty redundant at this point.

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Kontra Kommando said:

http://news.yahoo.com/obama-to-make-12-25-p-m--statement-134130294.html

"Americans are attempting to purchase health insurance on Obamacare exchanges and are being met with crashing websites, missing price information, confusing forms and in some cases, exchanges that had to delay their start date because they aren’t ready yet," Issa said in a statement.

A website crashed because of an increase of server traffic? STOP THE PRESSES

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