The Deficit could be the main issue in 2012

[rebeltarian]

The way to deal with deficits is by raising taxes and massively cutting military spending. Will the republicans ever do that? We would also need to reconcile the rising cost of healthcare, another thing republicans just aren't willing to do. Seriously what else will you cut? Anything you try to cut that hurts our economy won't be acceptable to our creditors.

As for the current stimulus spending....I hope republicans understand what will happen if we do stop it and the bailouts. And it's their trusted market fairy that will sh**t itself if these actions are taken currently. If Obama goes out there tomorrow and announces he is stopping the stimulus the dow will drop 500 points easily.

The stimulus and the bailouts are reactionary government interventions to attempt to correct the faults of....government intervention!!  Our entire economic crisis is the result of a government-controlled monetary system.  Ever since this country went off the gold standard, we've been going through these boom-and-bust cycles and neither Republicans let alone Democrats have done anything to address this flawed currency system.  The way to deal with a deficit is to put a cap on spending (military and domestic) and learn to live within our means.  When are Obama and his Democrats going to realize that raising taxes, creating inflation (the hidden tax) and spending like mad is only going to drive us deeper into debt (not to mention backed up behind ever bigger, authoritarian government)?  We're in a hole and the heavy spending is only digging us down deeper and the higher taxes/inflation is the dirt being poured on us.

[rebeltarian]

I actually do not have a solid opinion one way or the other on the gold standard vs. fiat currency, but either way, something needs to be done about the rabid printing of money and manipulation of interest rates every time the bubble bursts.  When we had the gold standard, government couldn't micro-manage monetary issues to their favor, for instance, during times of war.

Indeed, Bush screwed up badly by cutting the corporate tax while simultaneously waging 2 wars and governing like a rockefeller republican on domestic issues.  But whether it's domestic programs or foreign wars, it's still the same government with the same problem.  In addition to scaling back the military and ending the wars, I would have the welfare state gutted--spending on education, social security, bureaucracies, economic intervention packages, corporate bailouts, etc.  After scaling down the "welfare-warfare state", we could go to a low, flat tax, and lower taxes have great value, not just for business, but for customers in, for example, the housing market.