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Taxes, the Deficit/Debt, and the Fiscal Cliff


HeloDude

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2 hours ago, HossHarris said:

Pipeline training and aetc was mission essential last time 

 

Is this time as well. Formal training is also exempt. Our Technicians are furloughed, will report Monday with expectation of being sent home if agreement isn’t reached. Us AGRs are business as usual. 

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9 hours ago, NKAWTG said:

No clue what mission essential actually means.  Do we recall folks from SOS and upgrade at the FTU?  Do contract maintainers show up Monday to preflight aircraft?  

Most government contracts, like aircraft mx, are paid quarterly, so they'll continue...

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On 1/20/2018 at 1:18 PM, Right Seat Driver said:

That is a great question. AFAIK, SOS and FTU guys are good. Unknown about contract maintainers. Some were furloughed in 2013. The DoD did not seem prepared for this shut down based on the vague guidance they've released.

Not true on the SOS part. We're being told to expect to be sent home on Monday if a spending deal isn't passed. That's coming down from the AETC Deputy Commander Maj Gen Brown.

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8 hours ago, Boomer6 said:

Not true on the SOS part. We're being told to expect to be sent home on Monday if a spending deal isn't passed. That's coming down from the AETC Deputy Commander Maj Gen Brown.

That’s unfortunate, how will they cherry pick the 1-2 year group’s HPOs if they don’t finish SOS in a timely manner? 

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8 hours ago, Boomer6 said:

Not true on the SOS part. We're being told to expect to be sent home on Monday if a spending deal isn't passed. That's coming down from the AETC Deputy Commander Maj Gen Brown.

That would be full retard.

Don’t doubt it for a second.

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4 hours ago, Boomer6 said:

Yeah, we're being told to expect to check out of the dorms at 1600 today if a deal isn't reached. The taxpayer gets to pay 700 captains to travel back and forth to Montgomery.

And a couple hundred SNCOs along with hundreds more NCOA students.  Nothing like an easy million dollars spent because there isn't funding :)  Can't wrap my head around that one. 

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This is my favorite part when people claim the military "still works" when these things come along.

Sure, overseas we're still bombing people.  But it's a long logistics arm back to CONUS, and there's a significant amount of that that's no longer AD.

Imagine if they actually closed the CDC and Youth Center all the way.  Guess CC's will just direct folks to execute those Family Care Plans...

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This is my favorite part when people claim the military "still works" when these things come along.
Sure, overseas we're still bombing people.  But it's a long logistics arm back to CONUS, and there's a significant amount of that that's no longer AD.
Imagine if they actually closed the CDC and Youth Center all the way.  Guess CC's will just direct folks to execute those Family Care Plans...


Tammy Duckworth getting in front of cameras to having a “don’t lecture me!” Session was completely BS. Like if anybody sitting in Congress knows what this is doing by simply turning off The continuous cycle of force generation it’s you. You were a LtCol... you sat at the head of the table during battalion staff training calendar development. You know exactly what you voted for when you said “no, I’d rather we shit it down.”

The same dipsticks that were months ago screaming about why we didn’t have more help into Puerto Rico are now fine with the guard losing two training days off the Calendar to make a political statement. Guess when the guard in particular trains... the weekend. Guess who we call on to fill sandbags, put up aid stations, and drive aid convoys when the first line is overwhelmed... the guard.

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On 1/24/2018 at 4:09 PM, Lawman said:

 


Tammy Duckworth getting in front of cameras to having a “don’t lecture me!” Session was completely BS. Like if anybody sitting in Congress knows what this is doing by simply turning off The continuous cycle of force generation it’s you. You were a LtCol... you sat at the head of the table during battalion staff training calendar development. You know exactly what you voted for when you said “no, I’d rather we shit it down.”

The same dipsticks that were months ago screaming about why we didn’t have more help into Puerto Rico are now fine with the guard losing two training days off the Calendar to make a political statement. Guess when the guard in particular trains... the weekend. Guess who we call on to fill sandbags, put up aid stations, and drive aid convoys when the first line is overwhelmed... the guard.
 

 

I can't agree with you more.  "Don't tell me what the military needs!"  Well, Ma'am, what the military needs is their paychecks and the support of all the civilians that keep the mission running at home while we deploy for the 6-9th time.

Also, love "shit it down".

 

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How mad were you about the 17-day shutdown in 2013 compared with the 69-hour shutdown this year? I’m genuinely curious without looking to open a huge can of worms.

And FWIW I’m generally not a supporter of shutdowns of any length. I want our country’s government to function well and am less open to arguments about why it should be made to stop than you might imagine.

Does it make a difference whether or not the shutdown is perceived to have happened because of a policy position you support?

My recap of the two situations:

This year’s shutdown was generally seen as happening because the GOP controlled Senate needed Dem votes to pass a spending bill and the Dem senators wanted a deal on protecting the “Dreamers.”   BL: full GOP government, Dems withheld votes as the minority to get something they wanted.

The 2013 shutdown was generally seen as happening because the Dem controlled Senate and GOP controlled house couldn’t agree on a spending bill. Ted Cruz in the Senate and several GOP house members wanted to defund parts of the ACA and Cruz held a brief talking filibuster and the GOP house members withheld their votes from their own Speaker’s proposed bill to try to force the issue. BL: split government, minority faction of the party controlling the House and one Senator withheld votes on and filibustered a negotiated compromise spending bill to get something they wanted.

Finally, +1 to the use of “shitdown” for labeling this year’s debacle

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The biggest difference I saw with the last shutdown was you didn’t have an asshole administration trying to make the shutdown as intrusive and painful as possible for the public. Fencing off open air monuments in 2013 was a real dick move, and I think it says a lot about the character of the last administration.

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8 hours ago, nsplayr said:

This year’s shutdown was generally seen as happening because the GOP controlled Senate needed Dem votes to pass a spending bill and the Dem senators wanted a deal on protecting the “Dreamers.”   BL: full GOP government, Dems withheld votes as the minority to get something they wanted.

I agree--the GOP should have suspended the rules and allowed for a simple majority vote.  That being said, based off the Senate election map this year, the Dems got played by the GOP...

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2 hours ago, HeloDude said:

I agree--the GOP should have suspended the rules and allowed for a simple majority vote.

So you’re ready for just pure majoritarian rule in the Senate huh? Would you expand that policy to all votes or just to specifically spending bills?

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45 minutes ago, nsplayr said:

So you’re ready for just pure majoritarian rule in the Senate huh? Would you expand that policy to all votes or just to specifically spending bills?

Tread lightly, it wasn't the GOP that started that.

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I’m just asking questions. I can see the merits of either way and I remember how both parties have taken advantage of rule changes when it suited them.

Obviously it’s natural to want majoritarian rule when your preferred side has the majority and you appreciate the merits of the senate’s somewhat more drawn out process when your preferred side is in the minority.

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21 hours ago, nsplayr said:

So you’re ready for just pure majoritarian rule in the Senate huh? Would you expand that policy to all votes or just to specifically spending bills?

So you blame the GOP for having a small majority in the Senate and not being able to avert a shutdown, yet you're against a small majority in the Senate from being able to avert a shutdown.. .

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See above. I can see it both ways.

And yes, under the current system it is the responsibility of the majority in both Houses to produce the votes they need to govern, whether that’s solely from within their caucus or from across the aisle. If they need to reach across the aisle, it’s standard ops for the minority to want to include a policy priority of their own in the bill in exchange for their votes.

The President should also be a leader on the “making the government work” front, but as we saw in both 2013 as well as this year, that sounds easy from the cheap seats but it can be hard to pull off when you are on the field.

Just as a citizen, not a partisan, it’s frustrating when the government doesn’t work. The again I do have partisan interests on policy, and when you’re in the minority you’re often glad you have more levers to pull in the Senate than you do in the House.

What do you think? I was asking you originally after all. Do you go to 50+VP for all Senate business? Do you exempt some spending bills but maintain the legislative veto for other type of legislation? This is an issue with nuance and both sides have been in on sides so I’m interested to hear different arguments for/against changing the current Senate rules. 

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"words, words, words, government shutdown wasn't that bad...more words...who should we blame..."

It's on par with a 500 pound morbidly obese man arguing how getting off the couch and walked to the refrigerator should count as a workout so he should be allowed more food.

The government failed at it's basic function: operating.  How long has it been since congress passed a complete budget?

The system is thoroughly broken.  We should not be measure inches of failure here, we should be demanding success.  But seeing how excellence in any form is frowned upon now, I'm pretty sure that's a lost cause.

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I'm with Lord Ratner. I love slow glacier like action/change from government. We have seen that quickly reacting to situations has unforeseen (sometimes even foreseen) negative consequences (e.g. 14th amendment, 17th amendment ...many others). The intent might have been good with many of our laws, but the followthrough has been terrible.

On the budget front: Getting a budget settled should not be that difficult. Fund what is obligated and then maybe drag out/fight over the other stuff. Holding the complete forgiveness of illegal entry to your country as your bargaining chip, is not reasonable.

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