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President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, both addressed the nation to give their version of reducing the national debt and preventing the United States from defaulting on its obligations for the first time.
The President again reiterated what he has been saying for weeks, that he wants the crisis avoided, but again his rhetoric fails to meet reality. After months of debate and political rancor the President Obama routinely criticizes Republicans for the their stance on the federal debt, and there is merit to his argument, but what is lacking is that the President has so far failed to produce his own proposals.
As of right now, the President has failed to produce or submit his own proposal on what his plan is for reducing the federal debt. Even the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, Douglas Elmendorf, told a House Budget Committee in April after the President outlined a speech in an April 13 budget speech. "We don't estimate speeches," said Elmendorf. "We need much more specificity than was provided in that speech for us to do our analysis."
Since then nothing has changed. Again, like in the past, the President gives highly charged partisan speeches, highlighting the failure of the previous administration policy with regard to the federal debt, but fails to mention that his administration increased the debt by almost $5 trillion in just three years in office.
It's time for both parties to put aside election politics and start solving the countries. It's also time for the President to submit in detail his own proposal so that everyone will know specifically how he wants to reduce the federal debt, and stop blaming others for his lack of leadership.
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
Last week talks broke down between the Republican dominated House and President Obama, over reducing the federal debt in conjunction with raising the federal debt ceiling. Over the weekend both House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid are now planning to unveil competing proposals.
The question is, and I have raised this before; where is the President's plan on debt reduction? In his press conference on Friday, the President gave a stinging rebuke and placed the blame on House Republicans for the collapse of the talks, at one point stating, "Republicans can't say yes to anything."
The problem that has not been reported by the media is that the Republican controlled House has passed a budget, you may have disagreements with it, but at least they passed a budget. So far the President has failed to address the crisis in any meaningful way and only resorts to rhetoric and campaign politics.
The President's lack of leadership to take any recommendations from his own debt commission, failing to address entitlement reform, and failing to submit a reasonable budget has only made the situation worse. Even his own budget which he released in February failed 97-0 in the Democratic controlled Senate.
It's time the President submit his own plan for reducing U.S. federal debt, and with it his plan for raising the debt ceiling. The time has come for both sides to stop playing election politics and solve the problems facing this country. Too bad we have a President who lacks any presidential leadership!
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
"First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."--President John F. Kennedy, Joint Session of Congress, May 25, 1961
Fast forward to 2011, the United States will no longer be launching shuttle missions into space, but will rely on Russian, and possibly European, and Japanese capsules to place U.S. equipment into space. Budget cuts have grounded the shuttle program and will severely hamper the U.S. space program into the future.
Now it is time to take longer strides--time for a great new American enterprise--time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.
...Let it be clear that I am asking the Congress and the country to accept a firm commitment to a new course of action, a course which will last for many years and carry very heavy costs."--President Kennedy
Currently there is a lack of strategic vision on what role the U.S. will play with regard to its space program, much of the uncertainty emanates from the White House, who has given conflicting leadership direction on NASA's continued role. It's no wonder that NASA is in disarray when NASA Administrator stated on Al Jazeera in 2010, that President Obama told him before he took the job that he wanted him to do three things: inspire children to learn math and science, expand international relationships and "perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contributions to science...and math and engineering."
President Kennedy would shudder to think what happened to his beloved space agency!
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
A group of bipartisan senators called the "Gang of Six" have been crafting a proposal which would create $500 billion in savings, but require lawmakers in the coming months to reduce spending, overhaul Medicare, and Social Security, plus rewrite the tax code, generating close to a trillion in new revenues.
The bipartisan group of senators have been getting push back from members of their own parties, but the real question that has been missing during this entire debate is where is the President's own plan for reducing the nation's debt and raising the the debt ceiling?
The President has only given rhetorical speeches and condemned the other side, and so far has given little in the way of what is his plan for reducing the nations federal debt. Last December the President rejected input from his own debt commission, submitted a federal budget that increased the size of the federal debt, and failed to address any meaningful proposal for overhauling Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.
Once can dissect Republican plans to reduce the federal budget, but before the President gives flowery speeches criticizing the Republican plan he should submit his own proposal and then let the debate begin.
The nation needs less rhetoric from both Republicans and Democrats and start by solving the debt crisis they both helped to create!
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
The continues debate in Washington over raising the debate ceiling rages on with various proposals aimed at ending the impasse. Both sides agree that the debate ceiling needs to be raised, but are far apart on the details of raising taxes and reducing spending to go along with increasing the debt ceiling.
Last week, I wrote that one of the missing components of any deal is to increase revenue, and that means getting Americans back to work. You would think Washington would understand this concept, especially with last month's unemployment report, which showed that employment in America had stagnated with only 18,000 jobs begin created. This minuscule hiring increased unemployment to 9.2%, this after having the country has spent nearly $5 trillion dollars in the past three years.
If Washington wants to reduce the federal debt then it needs to get America back to work. The country can't afford to have around 14 million people unemployed, plus millions more unemployed.
Whatever economic policy Washington is currently operating under, it's clearly not working!
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
Yesterday, President Obama awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor to Army Ranger Sgt 1st Class Leroy Petry, for actions sustained in Afghanistan. In 2008, Sgt 1st Class Petry was shot in both legs and lost his right hand from tossing aside a live grenade during a 2008 firefight in Afghanistan's Paktia province.
Sgt 1st Class Petry is the only second living Medal of Honor recipient from Iraq and Afghanistan, the other being Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta.
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=Letter%20from%20Iraq%20Afganistan
The contentious budget negotiations have ramped up the partisan divide as both Republicans and Democrats hold fast to their positions on whether to raise the federal debt limit. The sticking points are more revenue increases, as advocated by the President, to go along with sharp cuts in federal spending, and spending reductions without tax increases.
The President for the first time signaled that he would be willing to accept reductions in entitlement spending, but very few details have emerged about what changes would be made to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The devil is always in the details!
The broader economic markets are still reeling from Fridays abysmal employment report, which reported that only 18,000 jobs were created, and May's numbers were revised downward to only 25,000 jobs created.
If Washington wants to reduce the size of the federal debt, then get America back to work. The nation can't afford 14 million Americans unemployed and millions more underemployed.
Washington and the President need to understand that small businesses are the real engine of job creation, but still they fail to understand this concept.
http://militarybriefingbook.com/topic.cfm?topic=U.S.%20Politics
