I completely agree our defense is out of control, as the pentagon is not auditable.  Some estaments put the defense including the pentagon close to a trillion dollars a year.

I would not tare down what we got, I think there needs to be rules of who can work for what and where. For instance, if you work for GE, you can't go regulate for GE. I think the biggest way to have a effect is also to do campaign finance reform.

Cut the defense budget and have public funded campaign finance, Put a cap on it and People/corporations only allowed to give $250 or less. This will make the politicians work for the people, not there corporate funders. Which we have a massive problem on both sides.

SS has not contributed, so no need to cut that. SS is already paid for and all you would have to do is raise the SS cap to 250,000 or higher to make it solvent.

Medicare part D that doesn't allow us to barter for drug costs,  is costing us  billions of dollars a year.

Yes we should have put bankers in jail just like Iceland. I don't have issue with the bailout as much as there was no strings attached to it. Like Splitting up the banks and more regulations. Which I know we disagree.

Iceland also raised tax's and cut costs. I agree that we have a spending problem. I think mainly in the defence budget. Thats what i would gut. Sorry But we only need so much.

If we do these things we should be good.

President of the united states.

I just note how some of these things theoretically could succeed, i just wouldn't want them to.

When it comes to economics... i'll put it this way.  John Manyard Keynes is touted as the big left wing economist of note.   If he were alive today he would be shouting at Obama that you can't raise taxes on anybody while the economy is so weak.   Essentially the current Obama proposal isn't based on any economic theory, not even the most left wing economic theory.  It's not based on any economics at all, but instead based on a sense of fairness, bad economic consequences be damned. 

As preivously stated, I would of allowed the banks to have failed, not exactly mainstream economic  matieral.  Or at the very least required regional breakups in return for the bailout funds.  I tend to think Modern economists focus too much on big numbers like Keynes famous Aggregate demand formula and forget that economies are made up of people... and that people change generationally.   Meaning that every crisis is going to be different, because every consumer group is different.  As such, the safest way to ride out downturns is to ride them out naturally with a modest increase in spending so that we can make sure that nobody is starving in the streets.  (but at a payout lower then unemployment, imagine a middle step between unemployment and welfare.)

In general, I think that an ideal kind of government looks a lot like New Zealands with a little more personal freedom mixed in... with an icelandic attidue of... if a bank fails, let it fail.

The problem is, you need to tear down, before you build up.  The US has so much worthless and wrongheaded regulations that rise the cost of compliance for companies and that's why you end up with massive too big to fail insitutions.

This is why the five US banks that held assets equal to 43% of the country's GDP now hold 56%.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-16/obama-bid-to-end-too-big-to-fail-undercut-as-banks-grow.html

The US does have a huge deficit problem, and deficits in general can only be solved via spending cuts, as tax raises time and time again have shown an increase in spending to go along with them, even when done for budget saving purposes.

A correct path would be to cut government spending practically everywhere, eliminate whole areas if need be, while essentially writing the countries regulations over from a blank slate.  Then watch the real economy grow.

Followed by a consolidation of welfare programs (as right now they are so split up the overhead is ridiculious) and work from there. 

In general, I would support libretarians (not regular conservatives for various social reasons) to gain control of the government for a good 8 years or so, to take down everything, then would hope they would be replaced for new more sane regulations, laws, and policies.   (Though i think i'd keep the negative income tax.  It seems far more efficent then what we do now.)

Well, that was a completely pointless off topic rant.  So... good show on that.

I mean, for one, the majority of the Bush era tax cuts went to the "not rich".

The difference between you and I is... I really don't have a political side I play for.

 I totally want to pay for shcools, roads, water ways, police, firefighters and defense. 

Though however not massive defense as that seems excessive... we could really afford to close down a lot of our military bases and military aid. 

While roads I think should be almost completely state funded.  More and more of our roadway burden is shifting on the federal budget and that leads to congressmen making every road deal they can think of just to get money to their state, even if it's completely worthess infrastructure like the many "roads to nowhere."

Schools.  Should be federally funded... but by done by private groups who have laws supporting full transperancy and who do student entrance by lottery if choice exceeds capacity.  Therefore better schools will keep going on and gain in prominence with their better teaching measures proving successful, and poor ones will be replaced.

Public schools should only be used as a "baseline" for areas where private schools can't really succeed, like rural montana and such.

As for the graphs i use... the difference is... i look into their methods.   As for why it might sway right wing... it's because well... economics are a rightwing dominated profession.  Right wing people just tend to be methodologically better at statistics.   It's like complaining that I cited a liberal for Sociology.  Sociology is predominantly liberal. 

I mean heck, your graph is supporting the bailout of wallstreet.  Which, usually people try and stick on to the right.  (Despite the voting record being the opposite) when in reality, the banks should of been allowed to fail, and the Tarp funds used to either strengthen banks who did the right thing, or directly help the people most effected by the problem.  

Oh, and as to what i would pay my employees.  I think i'd pay them pretty well.  I mean i have the job I have now mostly because I don't care about money.  Give me a couple million dollars and i'd stretch that out for life more or less.

To me, after setting up an ensured retirement, 50,000 a year would probably end up excessive based on my tastes.  I generally expect i'd set up some sort of profit sharing program after that... or just give the rest to charity.

Of course, that's what I would do.  I don't believe in forcing everybody to think and act in the same way as myself.

well in many debates we have had you don't support these idea's. So there is a lot  more common ground between you and I, than I originally thought. Yes I did go off on a rant, just as you did. Also I think you are not being realistic. Conservatives are not good with numbers. I'm sorry but that is just a joke. There are good and bad on both sides but to say there better with number is just not true. Conservatives Usaully lack education and back mythology. You got your wall st banker group on the republican side and the bat sh-t crazy I want to control womans productive organs, Yet I call myself a conservative. I'm guessing you fall in with the wall st types. So why do you agree with so much of the Tea Party?