This has been the Republican Platform for decades, but to see it laid out so brazenly is still somewhat chilling.
From Fox News Sunday. http://www.rawstory.com/...
CHRIS WALLACE: Let me just ask you one more question about the sequestration before we let you go, Senator. You know if we go into the sequester, the president is going to hammer Republicans, the White House already put out a list of all the things, terrible things that will happen if a sequester kicks in, 70,000 children losing Head Start. 2100 fewer food inspectors and small business will lose $900 million in loan guarantees and you know, Senator, the president will say your party is forcing this to protect tax cuts for the wealthy.
GRAHAM: Well, all i can say is the commander-in-chief thought — came up with the idea of sequestration, destroying the military and putting a lot of good programs at risk. It is my belief — take Obamacare and put it on the table. You can make $86,000 a year in income and still get a government subsidy under Obamacare. Obamacare is destroying health care in this country and people are leaving the private sector, because their companies cannot afford to offer Obamacare and if you want to look at ways to find $1.2 trillion in savings over the next decade, look at Obamacare, don’t destroy the military and cut blindly across the board. There are many ways to do it but the president is the commander-in-chief and on his watch we’ll begin to unravel the finest military in the history of the world, at a time when we need it most. The Iranians are watching us, we are allowing people to be destroyed in Syria, and i’m disappointed in our commander-in-chief.
So Graham's argument is we need to cut Obamacare which will continue and re-enforce the death
of an average of 45,000 Americans Per Year -
TEN TIMES 9/11/01 - who die from lack of adequate Health Insurance so that we can continue killing people from the sky and keep more Americans from being killed by Terrorists.
The Logic-Fail, it Burns.
Madam Lindsey says that people are leaving the Private Sector because of the increased Health Care costs of Obamacare, yet Federal Expeditures for Heathcare over the last two years have been 15% Less Than Projected.
According to the report, hundreds of billions of dollars in federal spending for Medicare and Medicaid are being removed from government projections as federal healthcare spending is now expected to be full 15 percent less than what had been initially budgeted for 2012. The surprisingly low spending projections come as the growth in healthcare spending has hit a new low for the fourth consecutive year.
IRS Ruling To Create Millions Of Uninsured Americans As It Undermines The Very Intent of Obamacare Rick Ungar Rick Ungar Contributor
...
Now, experts are beginning to recognize that the Affordable Care Act may, in fact, be contributing to the good news—a significant development as bending the cost curve was a primary goal of Obamacare.
So, yeah, let's
stop doing that because we've got people to kill. Even though the Sequestor only impacts
7.5 percent of the defense budget.
Broadly speaking, for 2013 the across-the-board cuts will mean about an 8.4 percent cut in most affected non-defense discretionary programs, a 7.5 percent cut in affected defense programs, an 8.0 percent cut in affected mandatory programs other than Medicare, and a 2.0 percent cut in Medicare provider payments.
This estimate, of course, was calculated before the Fiscal Cliff deal which downgraded the need for cuts from $1.2 Trillion, to
just $460 Billion per year.
Relative to what would have occurred if most tax and spending policies that were in effect in 2012 were continued, this legislation will reduce budget deficits in coming years.
If we added the estimated cost of the legislation and the related debt service to our previous baseline budget projections (which followed current law at the time), we would show additional deficits between 2013 and 2022 of roughly $4.6 trillion.
$4.6 Trillion divided by ten years is $460 Billion.
So with this in mind all those previous figures should actually be cut by nearly 2/3rd, meaning that the sequestration defense cuts will now only be about 2.5%.
Ouch.
Can we can handle it, particularly if we take Mitt Romney's almost bestest idea and close loopholes by setting a cap of $50,000 in tax deductions for everyone? That idea alone would cut that $450 Billion/Year In Half. So then we're taking 1.25% in defense cuts, and frankly, I think we can handle it. During the two terms of President Clinton we managed to reduce the entire Federal Workforce by an average of 15% (most of it within defense) without damaging the economy as it was accomplished from the bottom up using productivity improvements and attrition rather than draconian cuts. Simply finishing our draw-downs from Iraq and Afghanistan may accomplish the goal.
This is in addition to the fact that CBO continues to estimate that rather than saving money, repealing the ACA could cost an additional $109 Billion over the next ten years.
So how's that going to help pay for more defense spending? Do we really need that spare engine for the F-35? Perhaps another Aircraft Carrier with some J-DAMS will help us stop the next Benghazi-Style attack? We need a lean smart Military, not a fat dumb one.
I mean, Graham is already a laughing stock over his Benghazi Derangement Syndrome, now he's making himself sound like a parody of a deluded rube.
If this is how he thinks he's going to withstand a Tea Party Challenge in 2014, he's got another thing coming.
Vyan