Whiner In Chief

As a backdrop, take a listen to famed investor Jim Rogers on what the US credit rating REALLY is:



So what did our fearless leader have to say about all this last night?  You guessed it, not much.  It was a partisan political assault aimed at swaying feelings rather than winning an intellectual argument.  He used a prime-time address to the nation in an attempt to rally his base, which is already leaving him in droves, and he did so at the expense (and to the disgrace of) the office of the Presidency.  He maligned President Reagan by using this quote:

“Would you rather reduce deficits and interest rates by raising revenue from those who are not now paying their fair share, or would you rather accept larger budget deficits, higher interest rates, and higher unemployment?  And I think I know your answer.”

Yes, Reagan uttered those words in 1982 when the "Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act," or TEFRA was going through Congress. The gist of TEFRA was that there would be $3 of cuts for every $1 of tax increases.  The Democrat Congress never gave a dime's worth of cuts and Reagan later regretted his support of TEFRA as one of the "biggest mistakes of his Presidency."  For the full transcript of his speech and some good observations alongside, go to Maggie's Notebook and read all about it.

John Boehner's speech which followed was pretty political too.  It was not the snaggle-toothed-knuckle-dragging-Tea-Party-polemic that some on the left tried to say it was.  It was a very frustrated man attempting to tell the country that he's tried everything he can, but nothing is good enough and he had tired of the goalposts being moved.  Out of respect for the office of the Presidency, he avoided the juicy assaults that I only dreamed of:

1. The President is lying.

Well, that would about cover most of it, so we'll leave it there.

Hat tip Bill Whittle

So where does that leave us?  As I have shared previously on these pages, the debt ceiling was hit last May.  The Treasury Department and the White House are lying to us, period.  There is enough revenue coming in on a monthly basis to pay the interest on the debt, fund Sosha Security and pay for critical services (like the military).  Reality is, we've already defaulted.  We've defaulted in allowing increased entitlements to cloud our thinking, producing several generations of Americans now dependent on the Federal Government - good little lefites who pay no taxes all getting fat out on the Liberal Plantation.  We've defaulted in allowing a tax code to evolve that in the name of "fairness" leaves 48% of the population untouched but grousing at the "rich corporate jet owners" to pay more.  We've defaulted on electing a man man-child  whose mantra of leadership is "it's worse than I thought" or "it's my predecessor's fault."  Last night's performance affirmed him forever as the Whiner-In-Chief.

The rest of the world, as Jim Rogers points out, knows the truth about our fiscal house.  They are counting on a great people to rally and restore this nation to greatness...they weep when they see the "leader of the free world," act like Che Guevara.

Rumble on!