Of course you can. You’re acting as if the two numbers are equal. We spend several times more than is taxed.

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(Our country would be put back into a deep recession) should our political leaders choose to make deep cuts in federal spending too soon in the process of attacking our budget problems

That’ baseless nonsense. Shoot, I’d settle for stopping the spending increases. How about back to 2008 levels? This issue isn’t cutting. The issue is or our so-called president to stop spending like a crazy man.

Obama should have stuck to his $200K number.

You ignore the fact that in 2011 in negotiating with Boehner Obama ofrfred
a grand deal which had 2 trillion in cuts for i trillion in increased revenue . You also ignore the fact that in recent negotiations, Obama offered another 800 billion in spending cuts for 1.2 trillion in new revenue and was willing to further negotiate. In bioth cases Boehner and ther House Republicans walked away from the deal. So it is not accurate in any fashion to claim that thee President is unwilling to make any cuts or that he doesn’t understand that the crisis can only be solved by increased revenue. Once again you serem to have a selective memory. This deasl is not designed to be the definitive solution. It is a stop gap measure to prevent immedaite harmful changes that have the potential for slamming us back into a recession. Of course there is more work to do. But until the Republicans get real and recognize that they can’t immediately, in one year, cut 1.5 trillion from the federal budget without calamitous consequence for our citizens and our economy and come to the table to give and take on those issues, nothing will get done.
The cannot and peopole will not suppiort eliminating the department of education, eliminating the epa, slashing medicaid in half, making people wait until age 70 to get social security, or turning medicare into a voucher system. There are ways forward. But the kind of slash and burn that many Republicans seem to want is not realistic and will not happen.

In a nation of over 300 million it takes a bureaucracy, whether you like it or not. That YOU believe this or that in the government should be “eliminated” is your opinion, that does not make it fact.

Budget cuts are coming. This is a one-step-at-a-time process. The GOP can help it along if they want to act responsibly. Or they can play the same old obstructionist games they’ve been playing for years and suffer the political consequences. That’s the route Reps. Bob Goodlatte, Morgan Griffith and Robert Hurt took in the latest fiscal-cliff vote.

It takes Democrats to bring spending back into line. Republicans have NEVER done it and they NEVER will.

As far as the actions over the weekend, I have listened to Obama talk about a “balanced” approach to the budget and deficit process since his re-election. A 41 to 1 ratio of new taxes to spending cuts is not balanced. I know many on this blog are Obama supporters, but please be aware that many are not . The example described above is why many of us dont trust him or see any real leadership out of him His rhetoric of “balanced” approach does not correspond with his actions. Why didnt he begin this process in a balanced way? Obama won this battle and by doing so became more polarizing to the citizens and Congress.

“Griffith Statement on Fiscal Cliff
Tuesday January 1, 2013 – Congressman Morgan Griffith (R-VA) released the following statement on the Fiscal Cliff:
“Tonight I voted NO on the Senate amendments to the House bill, H.R. 8. As many people know, I review every legislative proposal independently and work to make the best decision I can on behalf of the people of the United States and the residents of Virginia’s Ninth District. After reviewing all major aspects of the bill, I felt I could not support the Senate amendments.
“Reasonable people can disagree whether or not to support this Senate compromise. In fairness to those that voted yes, there are some good things in the bill. However, increasing spending for programs and paying for a two month delay of sequestration in part with new “revenues” were items that I could not support. In reviewing bills, I look at the short-term as well as the long-term consequences because they will affect our children and grandchildren for years to come. Passing a bill that raises revenues with only minor cuts is not a balanced approach, and is an approach that adds to the debt our children and grandchildren will be responsible for paying back.”

“BTW – where are we as a society when we call a group of citizens whose sole purpose is to decrease the size of government and spending “extremists”? How is giving up power extreme?”

Join the club, Eddie.

Have you actually read the comments I made on this topic? While I have said that the budget cuts proposed by Paul Ryan are too draconian, I’ve not said we don’t need to cut spending. I have said that cutting spending is the only answer. I’ve also said that people like me are going to get less from Social Security & Medicare that we were promised. I can take such reductions in benefits, because of my personal financial situation. Most folks of my age can’t afford those kinds of cuts.

Additionally, if you impose, immediately, the spending cuts some are proposing you will collapse our economy for a generation. Additionally, because much federal spending props up state level spending, even in Virginia, in such a way that most states would either have to increase taxes or shut down major portions of what they do. That’s a part of this mess that most of us have missed.

Finally, neither you nor any other economist nor anyone else say what growth rate the economy might have produced had the Bush tax cuts not been put in place. That’s a paper tiger the right wing likes to talk about, but can provide no data for. We know what the tax cuts cost us between 2001 & 2011. They may have cost us even more. We just don’t know & neither do you.

We have a spending problem because since the 1980s we’ve been operating on the philosophy that reducing federal taxes would produce a deluge of federal revenues due to increased economic activity. That hasn’t proved true and Republicans & Democrats continued to spend money like they believed it would.

So we know have to pay the bill for that mistaken belief. That will require both a reduction in the rate of federal spending and raising taxes to produce more revenue. Not just one or just the other.

Why did Obama XO the pay raises if he planned not to implement them? Games people play.