I was recently in Liverpool and they've resorted to using disposable plastic signs for Penny Lane -- except for one remaining painted one that Paul McCartney signed during his Carpool Karaoke, which they've covered with tamper-resistant Lexan.
America is Healing ❤️🩹
- Thread starter mcmurtry66
- Start date
I get it and I'm trying to separate the art from the artist here but he's making it really ****ing difficult.
I was reading a X post today and someone brought up a good point (IMO). Why do they keep calling what they are finding fraud? If it's fraud, that's a crime, no?
Aren't they looking for spending waste?
Let us hope America isn't "heeling" as in caving into the whims of a master.
One thing to understand as this goes forward: the status quo has a lot of people who, one way or another, are very heavily invested in it. And many of these people are powerful and influential. They're not going to just sit idly by while somebody turns over their apple cart -- whether it's Elon Musk, Donald Trump, or anybody else.
They know our national finances are unsustainable. They aren't stupid. And, yet, they've done nothing to rectify this. What does that tell you? We can chalk it up to political survival instincts. And there's no question this is a big part of it. But, if it were solely that, you'd think they'd welcome the idea of somebody else taking all the arrows that are going to have be taken in order to right the ship.
That they aren't welcoming to that tells us something else.
So, yeah, this undertaking is being made really difficult. But are you sure that Elon Musk is the guy to blame for that?
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Yeah, I don't think they've uncovered any fraud. I've had the same issue with how they're characterizing this. It's dishonest -- and deliberately designed to ratchet up the angst.
I had the same thought about all those Senators who were demanding Tulsi Gabbard answer "Yes or No" to the question of whether Edward Snowden was a traitor.
The only honest answer is "No." Because treason is a specific crime, and he's never been charged with it -- let alone convicted of it.
Craze, did you ever consider there are people who didn't want the federal government to become financially sound and looked forward to the day when it would have to be completely rebuilt?
They are currently telling us the collapse is inevitable and we have the right people in the right place, so now is the time to rebuild.
No, tbh, I haven't considered the prospect that there are people who deliberately want the federal government to implode under its own weight. They may well exist. But I don't see how this would serve anybody's best interests.
Saw a likeable and articulate gentleman on C Span this morning advocating how we don't need government rules and regulators.
He sees the day coming soon under Trump when the marketplace will regulate itself. For example, a grocery store selling bad food would simply go out of business.
In other words, consumers can exercise common sense and along with the free market our best interests can be served.
On top of that, think of the trillions of dollars we spend in taxes thanks to big government protecting us. Also the high cost of products and services for suppliers to meet the unnecessary rules and regulations.
I'm a pretty libertarianish guy. And I'm a very strong proponent of the "invisible hand" view of economic behavior. But what this caller is envisioning is...well...it's no more reflective of human nature than socialism is.
I've always loved Lincoln's great quote about the "legitimate object of government." The last line sums it up so well.
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves—in their separate, and individual capacities.
In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.
The desirable things which the individuals of a people can not do, or can not well do, for themselves, fall into two classes: those which have relation to wrongs, and those which have not. Each of these branch off into an infinite variety of subdivisions.
The first—that in relation to wrongs—embraces all crimes, misdemeanors, and non-performance of contracts. The other embraces all which, in its nature, and without wrong, requires combined action, as public roads and highways, public schools, charities, pauperism, orphanage, estates of the deceased, and the machinery of government itself.
From this it appears that if all men were just, there still would be some, though not so much, need of government.
This is some terrific insight from Honest Abe. And we all know that, alas, all men are not just. Far from it. People are primarily motivated by their self-interest -- and, while most people mostly serve their interests via just means, some people sometimes serve them in ways where justice isn't much of a concern.
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Love what musk is doing. It’s long overdue. But re consumer protection you don’t want to become too relaxed. Lots of vital regs from gov. Tort lawyers can’t do it all….
Excess admin is I suspect what we’ll find across the board
No, Elon isn't to blame for a our current financial situation nor the inaction and impotence of the Congress critters.
But.
He doesn't have to be as divisive as he is. He's blaming ONE SIDE for the problems when we both know that's bullshit. Just keep a leash on him in that regard. Of course, nobody can nor will.
The Dims will continue to attack every day - just like always. Extreme lock boxes on steroids. Death by 1,500 cuts, a couple of impeachment filings per year, as many pejoratives as possible, a triple-down on identity politics. Division as wide as the Trump Canyon and Gulf of America out together.
And Trump will gleefully give them ammo with new-league record efforts to claw back pseudo-legislative power from Congress (which will result in reactions similar to a crack head losing his crack) and react to every single slur.
Someone needs to contact @mcmurtry66 ’s psychiatrist - he smells healing. I smell street battles leading to generalized riots,
I highly doubt we'll see things solely relying on the marketplace. There are farm industries that are heavily subsidized and without those subsidies, meet, dairy, eggs, etc would be almost unaffordable for most families.
Yeah..., with Maxine Waters leading the Dims and others among them calling for fighting "in the streets" I don't see any "healing" on the horizon...
All true. And I agree. I've been touting the bipartisan nature of our F'd up situation for a long time.
But I'll also say this: the vast majority of people I've come across who seem at all interested in paring the costs of government strike me as Republican voters. Those Democrats who are engaged on the issue seem to think we can largely, if not entirely, tax our way out of our pickle....as if the problem has been a diminishment of tax revenues rather than a growth of government spending.
The problem has not been a diminishment of tax revenues. Tax revenues comprise virtually the same percentage of GDP today that they have since the end of the war. They bounce around a bit, but not with a terribly large sigma. It's the growth of spending that has put us on a path to ruin.
I'm open to any ideas how to get that back on a sustainable path. And I'm not even generally opposed to tax increases. But it's beyond time for Democrats to engage in this debate...instead of just throwing temper tantrums about Elon Musk.
We should do less pointing fingers of blame for how we got here, and more engagement about what our best solutions are.
Run that by the wife.......
Oh really...
One question for you then. Keep the FED or abolish it?
I think we should keep the Fed -- and replace FOMC's decisions with a sensible algorithm to remove the human/political element of it.
There's nothing inherently wrong with a central bank. The problem is when the people who run them act in ways that are unsound due to extraneous motives and influences.
You want permanent impoundment? As in the President gets to veto all Congressional spending decisions without vetoing the bill or can go around a 2/3 majority?
That is NOT a stance consistent with Constitutionalism.
Yes, that's how our system was designed. If you want to change it, fight for an amendment.
Yet it was a reality from our founding until 1974.
Here’s MMM on the wisdom of restoring presidential impoundment, which I agree with:
When a pro-solvency Congress and president are elected, they would be well advised to reinstate the power of impoundment, to spend less money than Congress has made available through appropriations. Stop and think: In what other context in life does an enterprise lock itself into spending money it does not have?
In the hands of an administration willing to use it aggressively, some version of impoundment authority would produce billions in savings immediately. Impoundment ought to be part of an urgent strategy to bring the beast back to a size the nation can afford.
Impoundment can be limited--for example, by providing opportunity for a prompt congressional disapproval vote before each reduction took effect. Or the authority could be granted on an emergency basis; our current debt condition certainly qualifies as one. But the degree of surgery required to bring the federal budget back within even hailing distance of balance more than justifies the use of this tool.
So what Constitutional provision do you think prohibits presidential impoundment? And how was it able it exist for almost 200 years?
Read Train v. City of New York. It's 9-0. Not directly on point, but it will give you sense of where a court would go. The entire opinion assumes that Congress must state if it's giving the Executive discretion not to spend.
Your prudential argument is not one a Constitutionalist with a heavy bent on textualism would ever support. Of course, you've assumed an answer negative to the one you're proposing here by saying we should "restore" presidential impoundment (through Congress no less!). One doesn't "restore" something that is already in the Constitution.
Re the constitutional provisions, it's really simple. Article I gives Congress the power to spend. Article II, Section 3 includes the Take Care clause. Not faithfully executing laws is grounds for impeachment (yep, Biden too for not enforcing immigration laws).
Train was a statutory interpretation. So, yeah, I’d say that it’s not entirely on point.
When I say that it needs restored, I’m acknowledging that Congress has the power to curb it as they did in the ICA (which was enacted in response to Nixon’s use of impoundment to effectively kill an initiative passed by Congress).
And with that acknowledgment, I think Congress should either repeal the ICA or overhaul it to give more power to POTUS to impound funds.
I do not think there’s anything in the Constitution that prohibits impoundment. And the Train court didn’t explicitly cite anything to that end, either.
One huge benefit for Congress in doing this is to aim all the political heat for cuts at POTUS. It would be perfect for a lame duck president…even better if he was an independent.
You're contradicting yourself. If the ICA is constitutional, you're assuming the President only has the power to "impound" if Congress grants it. No one is arguing that Congress can't delegate discretion to the President. It's what I've been arguing here since the beginning, and why I mentioned Chevron from the get go.
But the notion that the President can just ignore constitutional appropriations and essentially enact a line-item veto on spending legislation (after a previous President did not veto it!) is absurd. There are subtler methods to achieve this goal--slow rolling payouts, underfunding the depts who do it, claiming an emergency, etc.--but flat out stating "I don't like that law, I'm not going to follow it"--isn't one our constitutional system is designed to accommodate.
Finally, yes, I just cited the constitutional provision that prohibits the President from unilaterally permanently impounding constitutional appropriations: Article 2, Section 3.
Congress never granted it to POTUS. It existed for 173 years because Congress hadn’t acted to curb it - and because nothing in the Constitution prohibited it.
Congress is empowered to restrict it, which they did in 1974.
What was the statute Congress passed to give presidents the authority to impound funds, beginning with Jefferson in 1801?
And, yet, it happened fairly commonly for 173 years…without any explicit Congressional delegation of authority.
I’m not arguing that it is. I’m saying that, prior to the passage of the ICA, presidents were empowered to give budgetary haircuts by sitting on certain appropriated funds. Because they did.
And I’m saying that Congress has the power to curb this power, as they did in 1974. And I think they should undo that.
Theory as to why the Train court declined to cite it when given the opportunity to — and as to why impoundments happened unimpeded by the courts for 173 years prior to this?
Again, you're contradicting yourself. We have a separation of powers under our Constitution. Congress cannot legislate and restrict the Executive on executive powers--that's exactly what the administration is arguing about with impoundment right now.
Further, historical events do not establish textual support for a constitutionally delegated power. There are other potential explanations for those events.
After asking for the constitutional provision that prevents your theory, you now are just ignoring it despite me providing it to you twice (with a cool video even!), so I'm not sure where else this conversation can go.
Also, I’m not saying they can permanently impound funds going into the future. I’m saying they (prior to the ICA) could impound funds in any particular appropriation.
The argument in Train had to do with the language of the statute dealing with appropriations and the disbursement of funds (which explicitly said that POTUS was disallowed in that instance from spending anything less than the funds allotted) and that Nixon’s impoundment amounted to a de facto veto of the program itself.
So you think both Congress and the courts ignored repeated violations of the separation of powers for nearly 2 centuries?
Again, why do you suppose the Train court declined to cite Article 2, Section 3? They could have.
Also, I’m *not* arguing that POTUS has a plenary power of impoundment.
I’m arguing that nothing in the Constitution prohibits presidential Impoundment. But Congress does have the power to limit it, as they have.
So I don’t know why you think I’m saying that POTUS has this power, irrespective of what Congress does or doesn’t do.
Something you are missing in Train v. City of New York is that SCOTUS recognized a limitation on the impoundment power that was distinct from the ICA. Namely, that the President could not use impoundment to frustrate the will of Congress. Or, as Brad put it, the impoundment power does not extend so far as to give the President an effective line-item veto.
When Jefferson declined to spend the funds appropriated in 1801, he justified it by noting that the purpose for which Congress had appropriated those funds was accomplished before they were spent; they were no longer necessary. When Nixon was sued, it was because it disagreed with Congress on policy, and attempted to use impoundment to essentially override the override on his veto. I'm guessing the reason it took until Nixon for Congress to legislate these restrictions would be because other instances of use of the power before Nixon would have much more resembled Jefferson's actions.
I'm not missing that. If I didn't mention that aspect of Train, I should have. So, yes, they were objecting to Nixon's action as effectively an end-run around their veto override. And another important aspect of the ruling is that it relied on the statutory construction -- which explicitly prohibited any expenditure less than that which was allocated. In other words, the bill that was passed over his veto included its own anti-impoundment language.
And I think the court got it right.
What they did not do, however, was find that Nixon's actions violated any Constitutional text. And that's pretty key here, don't you think?
Would that explanation have mattered in Jefferson's case, if in fact impoundment was prohibited by Article 2? Such prohibitions don't exactly lend themselves to situational explanations.
"OK, Tommy. We'll let it pass this time...since the funds are no longer necessary. But don't let us catch you doing it again!"
The Constitution allows presidential impoundment, absent any statutory restriction saying otherwise. And I have 173 years worth of history saying that it does. Jefferson was hardly the only president to do it prior to Nixon. And each and every time it was done, it was done without any explicit delegated authority.
Congress also has the power to limit impoundment as they have done. And I think it would be very helpful for us, as Gov. Daniels said, for them to loosen those reins.
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