62 replies to this topic

[AmScray]

Thoughts?

[Skeleton Jelly]

AmScray, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 9:27 AM, said:

Thoughts?

I think this is the topic that led to the hblask vs. SilentSnow cage match.some discussionI voted A.

[ShakeZuma]

I voted A, but my preference is e: where we don't pass the debt ceiling, the economy collapses, leading to all sorts of government shutdowns, including a couple of medical research facilities, which leads to a super zombie virus being released into the population, and I get to ride around shooting zombies. that's my preference.

[Skeleton Jelly]

I think people who want to shoot zombies are a little unbalanced. Imbalanced? No, I think it's unbalanced. Mentally.Anyway, what's the appeal of zombie shooting? Two things: 1) They're dead already, so it alleviates the natural guilt associated with killing. 2) They're in human form. It must speak to a deeper desire to hunt the most dangerous game. What if the world was being taken over by zombie llamas? Pretty meh I'd say. Unless those zombie llamas transmitted their zombiness through their spitting. That would add an interesting element to it. Llamas spit, right? Or is that camels? So, in conclusion, Shake wants to kill humans, but doesn't want to go jail so he yearns for the freedom to kill without repercussions.Or does all that go without saying?

[ShakeZuma]

yeah that's about the long and short of it

[LongLiveYorke]

Here's what I don't get:Say the debt limit is reached, so we can't borrow more money and go further in debt, so we can't pay off our current obligations. Can't we then just print money? That wouldn't increase the debt, and we could use it to pay people. It would cause inflation, sure.

[SilentSnow]

LongLiveYorke, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 10:03 AM, said:

Here's what I don't get:Say the debt limit is reached, so we can't borrow more money and go further in debt, so we can't pay off our current obligations. Can't we then just print money? That wouldn't increase the debt, and we could use it to pay people. It would cause inflation, sure.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think the debt limit refuses to let us print any more money. Otherwise it would be completely meaningless. Also, there is a decent chance that the debt limit law is unconstitutional since it requires you to break other laws.

[El Guapo]

LongLiveYorke, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 10:03 AM, said:

Here's what I don't get:Say the debt limit is reached, so we can't borrow more money and go further in debt, so we can't pay off our current obligations. Can't we then just print money? That wouldn't increase the debt, and we could use it to pay people. It would cause inflation, sure.

The term "printing money" doesn't mean physically going to the printing press and making more cash. It's the act of selling new issuance of treasuries. If the debt ceiling is reached, it means we cannot issue more treasuries, thus not receiving cash from investors or other countries to finance our government activities.

[hblask]

Reaching the debt limit does NOT cause default. Politicians making bad decisions *could* cause default, but I think even the most cynical politicians would not play that game.Reaching the debt limit *could* cause a bunch of useless agencies to shut down.The long term threat of default from an unsustainable debt load far outweighs any short term concerns about having to send bureaucrats home for a few weeks.

[LongLiveYorke]

El Guapo, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 1:50 PM, said:

The term "printing money" doesn't mean physically going to the printing press and making more cash. It's the act of selling new issuance of treasuries. If the debt ceiling is reached, it means we cannot issue more treasuries, thus not receiving cash from investors or other countries to finance our government activities.

Aren't there other ways of "printing money?" For example, during the recent rounds of quantitative easing, we weren't simply selling treasury bonds. Actually, we were buying them. We got the money to buy them by simply "printing money" electronically, which usually meant artificially increasing bank's reserves.I don't really know much about this, but I read this:http://www.telegraph...ast-resort.html

[LongLiveYorke]

hblask, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 1:52 PM, said:

Reaching the debt limit does NOT cause default. Politicians making bad decisions *could* cause default, but I think even the most cynical politicians would not play that game.Reaching the debt limit *could* cause a bunch of useless agencies to shut down.The long term threat of default from an unsustainable debt load far outweighs any short term concerns about having to send bureaucrats home for a few weeks.

This says a lot about your political philosophy in a nutshell.

[El Guapo]

LongLiveYorke, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 11:06 AM, said:

Aren't there other ways of "printing money?" For example, during the recent rounds of quantitative easing, we weren't simply selling treasury bonds. Actually, we were buying them. We got the money to buy them by simply "printing money" electronically, which usually meant artificially increasing bank's reserves.I don't really know much about this, but I read this:http://www.telegraph...ast-resort.html

Hmmm. I would like to hear from MK on this, now I am actually not sure. But I know the Federal Reserve hold a huge amount of liquid capital for overnight loans to banks. The also use it to increase and decrease the money supply, but I have never heard that they can just all of the sudden type in "1,000,000,000,000" into a ledger and now they have that much more money.

[LongLiveYorke]

El Guapo, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 2:11 PM, said:

Hmmm. I would like to hear from MK on this, now I am actually not sure. But I know the Federal Reserve hold a huge amount of liquid capital for overnight loans to banks. The also use it to increase and decrease the money supply, but I have never heard that they can just all of the sudden type in "1,000,000,000,000" into a ledger and now they have that much more money.

Wouldn't that be sweet, tho

[hblask]

LongLiveYorke, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 12:08 PM, said:

This says a lot about your political philosophy in a nutshell.

That I care more about the long term financial security of the country than short term political gamesmanship? I'm just finding myself a bit shocked to find there are so many people who would say the opposite.

[mrdannyg]

hblask, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 3:31 PM, said:

That I care more about the long term financial security of the country than short term political gamesmanship? I'm just finding myself a bit shocked to find there are so many people who would say the opposite.

lol, no, that you consider the workings of the federal government to be "useless agencies." Nice try though.

[Skeleton Jelly]

I think you're both oversimplifying to try to make the other side look silly.Ron Paul

[El Guapo]

Thats a pretty good article

[Roll the Bones]

Skeleton Jelly, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 3:54 PM, said:

I think you're both oversimplifying to try to make the other side look silly.Ron Paul

Well, yeah, Ron Paul is silly.

Quote

If the government defaults on its debt now, the consequences undoubtedly will be painful in the short term. The loss of its AAA rating will raise the cost of issuing new debt, but this is not altogether a bad thing. Higher borrowing costs will ensure that the government cannot continue the same old spending policies. Budgets will have to be brought into balance (as the cost of servicing debt will be so expensive as to preclude future debt financing of government operations), so hopefully, in the long term, the government will return to sound financial footing.

The loss our AAA rating will raise rates and costs us trillions upon trillions due to high rates in virtually every aspect of the economy aside from just new debt. Every car loan, home loan or any loan will have a higher rates thus slowing the recovery even further if not thrusting us into a depression. No foriegn country would feel safe in investing in the US further and would turn to other countries like China. If a foreign power threatened to do this (weaken) our economy and threaten the stability of our country, Republicans would want to go to war.

[brvheart]

Skeleton Jelly, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 2:54 PM, said:

I think you're both oversimplifying to try to make the other side look silly.Ron Paul

I love Ron Paul sooooo much.

[Roll the Bones]

brvheart, on Wednesday, July 27th, 2011, 4:54 PM, said:

I love Ron Paul sooooo much.

I'll never get the infatuation with Libertarianism. The answer is always, "The free market will fix it". Well, how? Well, it just will!No, how? How will it fix things?It's the free market! It will fix everything!:facepalm: When people like Ron Paul talk about beliefs, it's very Ayn Randian and comes off like scripture, like it's holier than thou and like Ayn Rand, anyone that criticizes it is not worthy of your attention. Nothing short of "radical" capitalism is even worthy of discussion and the whole house of cards is based on the idea that our nature is selfish, competitive and greedy despite factual evidence from evolutionary psychologists and anthropologists that humans have a dual nature, that the other side of us makes us altruistic, cooperative and charitable. To form a society that espouses those later traits as evil is simply beyond my comprehension.