Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire debt ceiling update

If the liberalize the thing in the Senate, it'll die and lay as a bloody pulp in the House. Same thing will happen to the Reid bill if he has the balls to actually put it on the table.

I'm telling you guys, neither side is gonna cave and the dictator's gonna pull his 14th amendment card out and raise the debt ceiling on his own.

He HAS to at this because he has literally painted himself in a corner. He has made this out to be economic Armageddon now. If the deadline comes and goes and he does act unilaterally, everyone will know his bluff.

This is some interesting theater. All I want for Christmas is about a dozen more Tea Party guys in Congress so we can make the libs' lives hell on earth.

I would nothing more than for that blackazz to dictate a raise in national debt. That would esculate the inevitable to a pace I want to see happen. By this time next month, I would love to see Wall Street Burn to the ground and the inner cities to crumble to dust. I want those pukes to know the feel of pure pain and agony.

Maybe someone can help me out here. I keep hearing about the senate / Reid putting up a bill of their own. If they refuse to discuss and vote on the house bill how can the senate trot out a bill of their own when all spending bills must originate in the house, according to the US Constitution.
I understand that the senate can vote and not pass a bill, make changes to the bill and then pass the revised bill and send it back to the house. I didn't know they could just say f your bill here's ours.

Ernie

Typical Keynesian. Gold/silver are MONEY, not commodities. The perceived "volatility" is a reflection of the rate of debasement of the paper product that supposedly defines the value of the metal. It is in fact, the opposite. The purchasing power of the metals is relatively constant, especially when compared to the ever decreasing purchasing power of government issued paper.

Of course, you, as a .gov leech, believe that the system set up by your employers is the best of all systems, even though your savings are being devalued at an ever increasing rate. You will live and die by that system, and you deserve to.

BTW, the Hunt Bros. were victims of the CME, the CFTC, and the Fed, changing/influencing margin rules. They were dealing in paper silver with those who issue paper for a living. They paid the price for doing so. If you deal in physical, you will not have that problem.

It's a bitch when the system upon which you've based your entire existence is in the process of dying ain't it.

Taking a big eraser and getting rid of everything below the bill number and the title is revising a bill and saying 'f you, here's ours'.

It's really sad to see comments like this..."bladkazz" what a racist comment.

The sad thing about all this is that if the debt limit is not raised it will hurt poor and middle class folks the most. Do you have any concept of how finance, economics, or business work at all? Based on your statement probably not..

Of course there needs to be plans put in place to deal with entitlement and tax reform, spending cuts, getting the heck out of Iraq and Afganistan but not increasing the Debt Limit in a thoughtful way is a disaster.

Things have a way or working out for better or worse, unfortunately comments like yours abound!

JorgeI, your posts are ridiculous. But perhaps the most telling is your insistence that your contract with the government must be honored, ie, your retirement must be paid, while saying we should cut entitlements, ie, SS. I have paid tons of money into SS with the clear expectation that I receive SS benefits when I retire. Is your claim more valid than mine?

I don't see how you could claim that the debt amassed by GW was $2.8 billion, when it was actually more than $6 TRILLION!!! Hello, pull your head out, McFly!!

here you go, Comrade Paddler, a little Friday night mood music.

enjoy, tovarich!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91kdwxFsthI

Not that I agree with the OP and his comments regarding the Great and Powerful Oz, but please inform those of us too ignorant to understand how paying for debt with more debt will harm the poor and middle class. Inquiring minds want to know.

Gold and silver are money? No, they are a commodity unless the asset properly assayed, weighed documented and stored to assure it value. Unless you (and the other person in the transaction) know the actual value of the asset (say, gold or silver), commercial transactions cannot take place. But, if you are agreeable, I have some perfectly shiny (14 ct.) gold bullion that I will sell you at the current market price of $1,602/oz. Heck, I�ll even weigh it on my bathroom scale so you know how many pounds you are buying. Now, that�s a deal!

At current spot prices, gold is valued at $1,602 per oz. or about $25,600/lb. If you buy a modest house in a major metropolitan area (Northern Virginia, for example), you�d pay about $650,000. That would require you to carry about 25 pounds of gold in your hands � not the most convenient method of conducting commercial transactions.

If you buy your gold as coins, you are paying a numismatic value for the intrinsic value of the coin. You are also paying a dealer markup for any gold, silver, soybean, or other commodity you purchase. As to the Hunt Brothers, I am confident that you are convinced that somewhere in DC, there is a secret buried bunker where the CME, the CFTC, and the Federal Reserve meet to plot against anyone that holds a commodity. The Federal Reserve (XXX) was alarmed at the silver bubble when they concluded that the Hunt�s were trying to manipulate the silver market and they did step in. See: http://www.investopedia.com/article...thursday-hunt-brothers.asp#axzz1TauWu0cg

Have you considered that when you buy any commodity (gold or silver, etc.), the seller seems to accept your US dollars for the transaction. If the dollar is so worthless, why would an intelligent dealer use dollars as the exchange medium? There must be some value in fiat currency, or maybe your sellers are as dumb as you consider me!

As for the .gov leech, I know a lot of them; some I work with and others I�ve known. Some of these guys are US Prison guards, some are Border Patrol officers, some a medical researchers, some are military and combat veterans, one was a astronaut that went to the moon (Apollo 14; BTW, you realize that every man who walked on the moon was a .gov leech, don�t you), and some have spend years in dangerous situations in foreign countries. I have a very good .gov leech friend who has been a warden at 2 Federal prisons, helping keep the slugs off your streets.

You may not know it, but there are 102 stars of unknown people on a memorial wall inside the CIA. Over the 20 years that I�ve entered the CIA headquarters for meetings, I looked at the wall to see if any more stars have been added. Frankly man, I am proud to be associated with these folks.

I don't believe that any military folks (and I know a lot of retired ones) ever signed a "contract" with a retirement clause in it. It is a law and can be altered by a revision, just as Social Security or other Federal programs can.

As to the National debt, on 9/30/2000 it stood at $5,674,178,209,886.86.
On 9/30/2008, it stood at $10,024,724,896,912.49 - an increase of about $4.4 trillion. (See: http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm

If we are going to reduce the deficit and the national debt, we need to make meaningful cuts, and ALL things are on the table.

As to a Budget Balanced Amendment I am not sure how this would work. Suppose the Chinese start a war, do we say "Now wait a year or so until we can fund a war. We need to wait for the economy to improve so we can raise the revenue for funding the war." (Recessions will occur regardless of who is in power)

Blah, blah, blah. Parroting your hero Ben Bernanke I see. If gold isn't money, and isn't worth anything except as a commodity, then why do ALL central banks hold it as a reserve? Why are CB's becoming buyers of gold, and divesting themselves of FRN$'s? Could it be that it constitutes real money and retains its value through time, as money is supposed to do?

You keep on believing that the promises of politicians and banksters are worthy of trust, and your retirement income may just buy you a loaf of bread.

There lies one of the dangers and why it must be written VERY carefully. There would absolutely be a clause in there for "time of war" or "natural disasters" where they can fund things outside the budget. Rest assured, even with a balanced budget amendment, the politicians will find a way to spend more money. In times of war, they will shift costs towards military operations and every time there is a fire, flood or earthquake, they would deem it a disaster area and funnel welfare funds to the local area. The good news is that there would at least be a cap on everything else.

I never said gold is worthless, but it is a commodity whose value rises and falls on demand (yes, it is going up now, but next week?) Central banks buy gold at a lot less per unit than you do; they pay no dealer markup, not assay fees, nor insurance fees and, they already have places to store it (I don't think Ft. Knox safes has sold many 48" wide safes to the Swiss government).

And, Ben Bernanke is not my friend, He was installed by GW Bush, so he should be more palatable to you than an original BHO appointee or, do you just hate everybody?

OK, I see your point, but how about circumstances in which the economy tanks (as it does periodically and government revenues fall. Many large contracts are long term, for example:

- Boeing receives a 5 year contract for FA-18�s and we need to balance the budget in year 3. Does the DOD just tell Boeing to forget it, or just shut down for a few years? See: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-...y-order-for-124-f-a-18-fighter-jets.html

- The Navy contracts for a new aircraft carrier ($10 billion) and 5 nuclear subs over a 10 years period at $8 billion each (see: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-...-more-than-navy-s-estimate-cbo-says.html ). Again, do we tell them to stop until we reach a balanced budget?
- The same situation exists for all programs. Medicare is a very expensive activity (too expensive), but do we just say to people who will die without medical attention �GO to your doctor and tell him society can�t afford it and will he just give it to them for free (cost of cancer - http://www.cancer.gov/aboutnci/servingpeople/cancer-statistics/costofcancer ).
- And so forth �

I know we cannot afford unlimited program expansion, but a meaningful courteous discussion of the issues and ways to conform costs is needed.

If gold is just a commodity as you assert, then why don't central banks hold other commodities such as oil, wheat, corn, etc. as reserves?

All the costs that you mention are part of the production cycle, and what we who hold metals put up with in order to have something that retains its purchasing power and has no counterparty risk, unlike your paper "equivalents". Government uses our tax money to protect their gold, and uses abusive taxation levels to discourage ownership and direct people to the assets which they control. That alone is telling.

As to my "hating" everybody, I don't hate everyone, I despise everyone who has a hand in destroying what was once a great country. Bureaucratic termites that reside in DC sucking tax dollars to perform "work" that makes it more difficult for the average citizen to enjoy the liberty endowed by our creator and pursue happiness are the people upon whom I direct my ire. I especially despise those who make apologies for the excesses of government and justify their existence as being necessary for the continued function of our nation. Your idea of what our nation should be, and my idea of what it should be are two very different things. You believe in government and I do not. That makes you my enemy. I don't hate you, but I do hate what you represent, and what you work to perpetuate.

Well, thanks for the kind words Mike. You don't even know what I do and yet you hate "what you represent, and what you work to perpetuate." without knowing what I do. Interesting and, ignorant.

And, your statement "All the costs that you mention are part of the production cycle" is not correct; these are not production costs, but maintenance costs (in the economic sense) and need to be performed over and over (have you ever sold gold at the true price and not the "dealer" price with markup?).

I know that you work in DC and that you are on this site constantly defending what is being done there currently. That's all I need to know.

maybe they'll up their pay while they're in there. Poor bastids having to work the weekends. No one said it would be easy to bankrupt the richest country the planet has ever seen.
Takes commitment, dedication and evidently the occasional weekend.

Wouldn't that be like someone thinking anyone from �mid TN� is an uneducated, uncouth hillbilly because they are from middle Tennessee? I met some of these folks when traveling through middle Tennessee, but I didn�t draw such universal conclusions.