I am so sick and tired of the phrase “fiscal cliff”:
A rising number of manufacturers are canceling new investments and putting off new hires because they fear paralysis in Washington will force hundreds of billions in tax increases and budget cuts in January, undermining economic growth in the coming months.
Executives at companies making everything from electrical components and power systems to automotive parts say the fiscal stalemate is prompting them to pull back now, rather than wait for a possible resolution to the deadlock on Capitol Hill.
Democrats and Republicans are far apart on how to extend the Bush-era tax breaks beyond January — the same month automatic spending reductions are set to take effect — unless there is a deal to trim the deficit. The combination of tax increases and spending cuts is creating an economic threat called “the fiscal cliff” by Ben S. Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve.
Until recently, the loudest warnings about the economy have come from policy makers and economists, along with military industry executives who rely heavily on the Pentagon’s largess and who would be hurt by the government reductions.
But more diversified companies like Hubbell Inc. in Shelton, Conn., have begun to hunker down as well.
The American public was chucked over a fiscal cliff in 2007, and no one in government or industry gives one shit. In fact, the reason we are approaching this new “fiscal cliff” is because the Chamber of Commerce and big business spent billions electing the wingnut Republican congress who is responsible for all this nonsense. They’re the ones who trashed out credit rating with their idiotic grandstanding. They are the ones who refused to do anything other than cut taxes or gut the social safety net, leading us to this deal. They’re the ones who have passed umpteen anti-abortion measures and voted 30+ times to repeal healthcare, but have blocked any and all efforts to revive the economy.
So, Galtian overlords, quit whining about the god damned fiscal cliff. You’re the ones who hired the idiots pushing you over it.
Linda Featheringill
I suspect the whining is an effort to pressure the liberals into being more cooperative.
But I’m tired of living in fear. Phooey.
Hungry Joe
And they’re the ones who’ll devise a “fiscal safety net.” For the worthy, i.e., them. To be paid for by the unworthy, i.e., us.
PeakVT
Silly Cole. Only Democratic policies create economic uncertainty. Republicans are the victims here.
raven
This is one hell of a soccer game.
Punchy
Rich executives, eh? Cant imagine which of the 2 parties they’re affiliated with, and the obvious end game here.
Where do I buy the pitchforks? Oh, Walmart? Really? OK, screw the pitchforks.
raven
GOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLL!
Hill Dweller
My future wife Alex Morgan just scored.
reflectionephemeral
Our long-term debt problem diminishes precipitously if we just get to full employment. Maybe we should take all that free money everyone wants to lend us to get ourselves there? Would that be possible?
Mark S.
I thought if we balanced the budget the economy would improve for some reason. Isn’t the federal budget exactly like a family budget?
General Stuck
“fiscal cliff” is just another way of saying Obama sucks, look what he’s done to you. And the media for their own reasons walk on by, and then ask democrats what their plan is to destroy life on earth as we have known it.
I don’t know what the answer is, for this deathgrip the GOP has on the country, the economy, and a lot of its voters. I think Obama is ahead and will likely eek out a win, and with a little luck we hold on to the senate by a seat or two. But that is way short on what the numbers need to be for us to have any chance of saving our own asses into the future.
raven
@Hill Dweller: These sexist anti-americans don’t care about no girls soccer.
Mark S.
@reflectionephemeral:
You’re never going to get invited to a Village dinner party with that kind of talk. Where’s the talk about sacrifice?
Davis X. Machina
@reflectionephemeral: No. Debt is sin, macroeconomics is a branch of moral theology, and depression is a choice.
Hill Dweller
@raven: Their loss. That was an amazing match.
Is it me, or has the US women’s team become more skilled? I realize some of the younger players like Heath have a lot of skill, but even some of the veterans seem to be improving technically.
scav
@raven: Not enough pictures in this thread is my bet.
Elizabelle
When this story appeared on NYTimes website front page this morning, it had headline about “Partisan Impasse.”
When I see “Partisan” in a NYT headline, I know they actually mean “Republican” but won’t go there, for fear of offending readers or advertisers at the cost of truth.
Sequestration, bitchez. Bring it on.
kdaug
Nothing to add.
ETA: Reckon I’m on a post-Mars thing – probly’ll get back into the grit in due course.
Redshift
We’re in this situation because the teabagger Congress refused to compromise on the debt ceiling, leading to the “supercommittee” deal. Then they refused to compromise on the supercommittee, causing it to fail and the country to suffer the exact consequences they voted for if it failed.
The phrase “fiscal cliff” isn’t the one that bugs me here. It’s the phrases “paralysis in Washington,” “fiscal stalemate,” and “Democrats and Republicans are far apart.” The problem isn’t that they’re “far apart,” it’s that one side is willing to deal and the other one isn’t, that they believe, in the words of the teabagger Indiana senate candidate, “bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.”
Tax increases and spending cuts in a recession would be bad for the economy, sure. You know what would be worse, “industry executives”? Trying to cut the deficit without tax increases, which is the only thing your yahoos will accept. So either convince them to raise taxes and pay your fair share, or convince them to abandon prioritizing deficit reduction over jobs and growth, or both.
If you don’t, you’re either too economically illiterate to run a business, or you’re just playing us, and we’re not putting up with that crap any more.
trollhattan
Amongst my boatload of bidnez and econ classes, I never once learned “eliminate uncertainty” as a guiding strategy. But that was in the days of diesel typewriters, so what did we know?
maya
Ilene Dover, cellist, of the Phizcal Cleff Quartet, says that after taking a long, hard look at her economic future she is now open to the idea of playing for food vouchers and grocery coupons.
“It really looks terrible down there.”
Chris T.
It’s not even much of a cliff, because (a) as you already quoted, defense companies are pulling back now; (b) that’s just a decline in the budget, not necessarily a decline in actual spending; and (c ) any decline in actual spending will occur over time.
It’s a Fiscal Hill, not a Fiscal Cliff.
quannlace
Other words I could go the rest of my life without…
‘Job-Creators,’ ‘Veep-Stakes,’ and ‘Class Warfare.’
*********
The word we don’t hear enough of, at least directed toward the Repblicans:
Liar, liar , liar, liar!!
BGinCHI
Beltway is wired for Republicans.
The DC Coward Patrol wants a Master to tell them what to do and not a pragmatist who tells them there is work to do.
YellowJournalism
Let’s just push them over an actual cliff.
Lev
At this point, I don’t even care. Since nobody’s going to do anything to bring us to full employment anyway, why not just take the hit on a tax hike in 2013? It’s as good a time as any.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
But spending cuts are magic like tax cuts and lift the economy!
General Stuck
And the Pentagon is a huge sucking money pit, that is and has been so fucked up on budget and spending, that the GAO long ago classified it as un auditable, with at least a trillion dollars vanished that no one account for. I don’t know what the wingnuts could possibly do more to tell the country that the one and only thing they care about is protecting the rich, the big corporate, and are willing to starve a sizable chunk of the poor to achieve their mission in life. It is a barely polite fascistic mentality, that comes signed sealed and delivered from the bowels of the previously not so much conquered southern way of aristocratic, life with a two class system minus the slaves, for now. Dressed up in a costume of patriotic jingoistic mumbo jumbo for preservation of the union, all the whilst whispering Dixie on the down low.
Redshift
@trollhattan: It amazes me that anyone takes “uncertainty” talk seriously. It’s been obvious it was BS since the GOPers were blathering about it at the same time they were threatening to default on the debt.
The only “certainty” these business execs are looking for is having their tax cuts made permanent. We have a lack of demand, not a lack of certainty.
BGinCHI
If we really ran the government like a business, this is the kind of thing that would cripple us.
What the fuck do they teach in MBA programs, anyway? Table etiquette?
Mark S.
Dick Morris claims he’s seen the “real polls” and predicts Romney will win 350 electoral votes. Apparently Dick’s new to the Internet and doesn’t know how to link to these “real polls,” but we should trust him because he’s Dick Fucking Morris.
Redshift
@Chris T.: It’s not even a hill, at least not a downward slope. The defense cuts are cuts in the projected level of defense spending, meaning cuts in how much it was going to increase, not actual reductions. The only difference between this “massive” defense sequestration and what we actually need to do is that it has an extra dose of teabagger stupidity — the cuts are equally spread across everything, rather than allowing any intelligence to be applied to the process.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Mark S.: I think Dick Morris has contracted a brain infection from sucking a few too many hookers toes.
scav
heh, real
polesPolls? They are running on thin retreads.Oddly enough, Jump Fuckers! works as well on a cliff-face as off a tall building. (but that’s just me being mean and going for sheer personal pleasure.)
trollhattan
@Redshift:
The smart ones know our problem is only resolved by reenvigorating the middle class, but as a group can’t get themselves to say so out loud. Bold leadership, my arse.
Interesting piece in the Washington Monthly about Michael Sherraden’s theories on lifting people out of poverty, and into the middle class.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/julyaugust_2012/features/michael_sheraddens_compounding038411.php
Commie.
Redshift
@Mark S.: No doubt “real polls” come from the same source as Rove’s “THE math.”
What amuses me is that these pundits and strategists seem to honestly believe that if they can just convince people they have some secret knowledge of what voters believe, it will magically change actual votes.
It’s almost as funny as the belief that the numbers reported about the economy influence the election, rather than people’s actual experience of the economy.
pragmatism
@trollhattan: it’s not even uncertainty. it is perceived uncertainty. that bar is set beneath the ground.
Maude
The only certainties are death and taxes. How about both for the heads up their butts businessmen?
Mark S.
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Hey, Dick’s powers of prognostication are unrivaled!
Ben Franklin
@Maude:
No deal. They would rather die than pay taxes..
jl
I don’t know what to make of it. But, then my head cold turned out to be first stages of really bad flu, so everything seems surreal right now.
I was so befuddled that I thought that post that Romney would not announce a veep until Oct was for reals and turned on the news to hear about. Took a few minutes to sort things out.
I do not understand the statement in linked article that this ‘fiscal cliff’ is so much more real than previous ones. In a lame duck session, GOP and corporate Dems holding balance of power. And GOP and corporate Dem constituencies (e.g., DoD) up for big cuts.
The corporate titans are so sure there will be no compromise or finesse of this thing?
BillinGlendaleCA
Now I’m confussed, aren’t the Job Creators* getting the big bucks cause they take risks and shouldn’t be taxed too much. You know as Dubya Mitt(now powered my Windows ME) said, get a loan from your parents, start a bidness, take a risk? Isn’t uncertainty a part of risk? So many questions.
* Job Creators is a registered tradmark of the Republican National Committee.
Liberty60
Why is it that the deficit is a “OMG DISASTER” that will kill us all, which means we must accept austere budget cuts;
But raising taxes and budget cuts to narrow the deficit(budget cuts like say, oh, to the defense budget) in a recession is a “OMG FISCAL CLIFF”
This is bullshit; this is the phantom menace, of provoking a crisis trying to stampede the gullible and stupid into budget cuts, but only to things the powerful don’t give two shits about in the first place.
cathyx
There’s an easy fix to this fiscal cliff. Just cut medicare and social security.
Caz
Cole, it’s as if you’re not even paying attention. You sound like a totally uneducated, brainwashed high-schooler. The dems were in charge of everything for the first two years Obama was in office and they did absolutely squat. The Senate still continues to do squat – they haven’t even passed a budget. You’re either lying or just totally brainwashed, and neither would surprise me.
Haydnseek
@Hill Dweller: I agree, they are getting better. Don’t get me wrong, I’m overjoyed at their victory, but that hand ball in the penalty area was an iffy call at best. It would have been a better no-call in IMHO, but I wasn’t down on the field-the ref might have had a better angle/view. At any rate, a fantastic game and a great win. Poetic Justice that they get to play Japan in the final.
Cluttered Mind
Maybe what Dick Morris actually meant was that there are currently operations underway to steal enough elections in enough states to total 350 EVs for Romney. I’d believe that.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@jl:
Well who do you think funded the tea baggers campaigns in the House? These captains of industry have been these Republicans personally and that is why they are utterly terrified of what the Tea Baggers might do the country.
Martin
Yeah, the fiscal cliff is bullshit. Sure, it’s a cliff, but only in Calvinball rules. The GOP have said that we need to cut the deficit – well, it does that in spades. Revenues way up, spending way down.
The GOP say we need to cut discretionary spending. Well, a quarter trillion in cuts there.
The GOP say we need to cut entitlement spending. Well, another quarter trillion in cuts there.
So far we’re golden per GOP economic rules. Except for the tax cuts expiring. Of course that’s heresy, but it does get the deficit down even faster, which is what the GOP say is the largest drag on the economy. So, they should be good.
And who is calling them on this in the media? Yeah…
BillinGlendaleCA
@Caz: Two problems:
How were the Dems “in charge” for the first 2 years of Obama’s term?
Do you understand the phrase “I’m not a member of an organized political party, I’m a democrat.”
[snark]
Also Cole doesn’t read his blog, but it seems his mom does.
[/snark]
scav
Did the Divinely Inspired Writers of the Constitution have much to say about the right to bear and wield patents? I’m sure there’s some profit-strangling red tape and enforcement savings to be wrung out of that illegitimate wing of the overlarge govt.
Cluttered Mind
@BillinGlendaleCA: That’s my favorite stupid argument ever. Yeah, they were in charge for the brief time between when Franken was finally sworn in (after being delayed for half a year) and when Ted Kennedy died (barely a few months later). And by “in charge” we mean “had 60 votes if you could get Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberman, Blanche Lincoln, Max Baucus, Claire McCaskill, and Dianne Feinstein all on board without ending up passing something that looked like a piece of Republican legislation anyway”. Yeah, those were the best two months the Democrats ever had, right?
daverave
@Caz:
I’m gonna assume that my Snark-O-Meter is busted…
HyperIon
re
Have you see the clip of the shouting/talking-over-each-other spat wherein the R member of congress whines and the administration official just keeps saying basically “Republicans did this. Why are you whining?”
Both people looked childish but I was happy to hear the administration guy give as childishly as he got. I mean, what else can you say? The Rs chose to go down this road and now they are reconsidering.
jwb
Just a new way of threatening to go Galt. They’ve added a mafioso twist: nice country you have there. Shame that something should happen to it.
Patricia Kayden
The Republicans voted along with the Democrats to sequestration cuts. Now all of a sudden, the Republicans are trying to back out of the deal, per their usual modus operandi.
Let’s see this fiscal cliff. I bet the Republicans will back down once they realize that the Democrats aren’t going to allow them to weasel out of the sequestration deal that both parties agreed to.
Anways, big businesses seem to be doing okay if you look at the stock market, so I’m not sure exactly who is whining. Seems more like they’re trying to make as much profit as they can so they avoid hiring people.
Ash Can
In general, I can’t say that I blame industry decision-makers for reacting accordingly to a situation where a group of Republicans have expressed unhesitating willingness to crash the entire domestic and world economy in order to get their way. HOWEVER, the fact remains that if these industry executives are backing said Republicans, then they’re too fucking stupid to stay in business regardless of what kind of shape the overall economy is in. Even another 90s-style boom won’t save them. And if they aren’t backing the Republicans, then they need to start speaking the hell up about what’s going on and stop being afraid of their own shadows.
Todd
@Caz:
60 votes became required. Standard principles of governing shifted, all because the sheriff was near, and your assholes (including Addison Mitchell McConnell, the shitstain closet case who senates from my state) are, at their core, a degenerate bunch of trust fund racists.
lonesomerobot
@Caz: It’s a great time for the Senate to pass a budget in an election year with a House of Representatives that will vote down anything with even a dollar in it that goes to any organization that possibly employs someone that once thought the word ‘abortion’.
Kinda like that 5 year farm bill the Senate passed, only to see the turdburgling tealickers in the House come up with their own “temporary” BS bill that did nothing for anybody except cover some teaturd behind before they went on break.
But only someone with a high school mentality wouldn’t understand that.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Cluttered Mind: Actually the Dems never had a 60 vote majority, Holy Joe and Bernie Sanders aren’t Dems.
MikeJ
Wow, even Rasmussen has Obama ahead now. Sliver says Rasmussen is typically +5R.
SBJules
Meanwhile, poor Mitt got his CA Property tax reduced!
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-romney-property-tax-20120806,0,4926772.story
TenguPhule
I do. But it would be uncivil and rude to some of our commenters to state it plainly.
Just Some Fuckhead
@John:
Many were warning about the huge deficits Republicans were running up back when, but Cheney checked with Zombie Reagan and said he was cool with it.
TenguPhule
Better to find a physical one to start chucking them off of.
We can start a new Olympic Sport: CEO tossing!
TenguPhule
If we add dropout to this description, its CAZ to a T.
Hill Dweller
@Caz: No mention of Senate Republicans shattering the filibuster record and bringing the confirmation process to a grinding halt?
TenguPhule
That can be arranged.
Heliopause
December 16: Congressional leaders announce that negotiations have reached a total impasse and that there is no chance of avoiding the “Fiscal Cliff” prior to the holiday break.
December 17: Colorado election officials declare that the fifth recount has failed to resolve the winner of the state’s presidential electors. The Supreme Court agrees to hear arguments in Romney v. Obama.
December 18: Samuel Alito organizes a hastily called press conference to announce that he is the new Reichsobersterrichter, Reichsrichter Scalia and Reichsrichter Thomas by his side. Nobody can seem to locate John Roberts. Romney v. Obama has been fast-tracked and has been decided by a vote of 3-0, with six “recused”, in favor of Romney.
December 19: Herr Generalfeldmarschall Petraeus appears at the podium with Alito, Boehner, and McConnell and announces that Congress has just passed the Enabling Act of 2012. For the good of the homeland Chancellor Romney will shortly speak to the nation.
December 20: Chancellor Romney speaks to a camera in a small, draped booth with an oversized microphone in front of his mouth. Nobody can see his lips move. The words say the “Fiscal Cliff” situation will be resolved on Monday the 24th.
December 21: For some reason there is no sunrise.
cathyx
@Heliopause: December 21:Mayan Calendar ends. No?
Downpuppy
The AP is dumping on Social Security again – Shocking!
I did a rundown, but the short version is that somebody tipped a hack onto an old study & he conveniently “forgot” to mention to adjustments done to contributions, and some other stuff.
Linda Featheringill
Just got back from supper at one of the local churches. Also in attendance were the police, three of them, complete with guns and vests. What the hey?
This is a very mainstream church, at least 3/4 “white”. Population in this town is about 150,000.
Very strange about the cops.
chuck butcher
People keep talking about the “system” being broken. I don’t think so, it seems to me that it is functioning exactly as desired by the operators.
jayboat
@YellowJournalism:
I like the way you think.
cathyx
@Linda Featheringill: Are you in Wisconsin? Maybe they got some death threats.
Linda Featheringill
@cathyx:
Ohio. NE Ohio.
ETA:
This is the rust belt and we do have our share, at least, of various white power groups.
Ruckus
Every time I hear/see cliff and Greasy Old Poops mentioned in the same sentence I want to shout:
Jump You Fuckers, Jump.
I’m just always hoping that the cliff is high enough to cause the proper adjustment to the malfunctioning item.
WaterGirl
@Linda Featheringill: I got this message from the Southern Poverty Law Center today. Maybe some of the police departments around the country are finally looking at the video and information about skinheads after getting the wake-up call in Wisconsin.
jefft452
@Ben Franklin: “They would rather die than pay taxes..”
then they should hurry up and do so
mclaren
@TenguPhule:
Post of the day!
Triassic Sands
I think the correct year for that was 2001 — the Bush tax cuts. Then, the second round of tax cuts amounted to a lead life preserver thrown to a drowning country — drowning in debt. All done in the name of absolutely pathetic job creation during the Bush years.
WaterGirl
@Triassic Sands: So did you and wonkie finally connect (about the kitty) via email? Last I heard, he had been trying to reach you.
El Cid
@Just Some Fuckhead: Cheney meant that deficits weren’t a political problem for Republicans.
The economy? He didn’t give a fuck one way or the other what “deficits” would do to it. Fuck the economy.
The point is to take power, and use it as long as possible to grab whatever you can and stick every pike in the ground on the way so that no one can get in your way of grabbing more.
xian
@Redshift: it used to kinda work that way, by driving coverage. I honestly believe there were times in ’08 when, had Nate Silver not been around, certain “good news for John McCain” analyses may have actually taken root and affected the outcome.
xian
@daverave: no, he’s really that stupid
Mnemosyne
@Caz:
If Dodd-Frank was “doing squat,” why have your guys spent the past two years frantically trying to block, repeal, and de-fang it every chance they get?
xian
@Mnemosyne: seriously, he is too stupid to understand how tranparently false his delusions are. but they give him a white-hot burning sensation of blame that he is stuck on.
lori
Hell no. Since when can you borrow to get yourself further into nonsecured debt. The government made a debt to income ratio for fiscal responsibility that they would never apply to their “magic money”economics. That’s where you create money out of thin air.