Atlasian Citizens for a Balanced Budget

[Ebowed]

x Senator Ebowed

[Ebowed]

Y'all deliver a plan that doesn't include gutting public services or the military and that you can get five senators to agree on, and I'll vote for it. Until then, sit down son.

That's exactly the problem; the inability to compromise.  You can't "gut" public services?  Fine, let's do a tax hike.  Or is that too controversial as well?

[Ebowed]

Yes, but that doesn't change the fact that asking for something without giving any idea with regards to how it's done is not helpful.  If a manager dictates to his employees what should be done, the manager should reasonbly be expected to be able to answer questions with regards to how he wants it done.

It may not be directly helpful, but there's nothing wrong with giving your opinion on an issue.  The West Atlasia secession that wanted voter reform didn't tell us what to do, but they made it loud and clear that they wanted reform, hence your rush to write a secret ballot amendment and reform bill.

We are Senators, after all, and if a constituent says it may not be a good idea to run away from the deficit, there's nothing wrong with taking that into account even if they don't have their own specific plan to offer.

[Ebowed]

But that's just it.  With the current budget requirements, there are no compromises.  Either we do enough major cutting or tax hikes to get under the limit or we don't.  There isn't any middle ground.  That's exactly why I want to remove the current requirement that we must have the deficit under a certain level.

We can either cut programs and spending, raise taxes, or a combination of both (the third option being the "middle ground").  Just because certain Senators don't want to do anything about it doesn't mean there's no middle ground.

[Ebowed]

Your proposed solution is probably palatable to even less people than just cutting programs.

What proposed solution?  I support DanielX's "chainsaw" bill and other program cuts if necessary.  I never advocated raising taxes, only that it's an option that some people don't recognize is there.

[Ebowed]

I think the Constitution needs its own round of 'cuts' in that case. It seems to be about as dynamic as a dead elephant.

The Constitution is fine, the Senators need to bite the bullet and start cutting some programs.

Yes!  I think we can get five Senators to agree to the chainsaw budget cuts (maybe PBrunsel and MasterJedi in addition to DanielX, TexasGurl, and myself).  Though apparently more will need to be cut.

[Ebowed]

The Native Americans have a special health service? Axe it.

Indeed.  I think the majority of the Senate can agree that extra programs based on ethnicity should go.