Quote:
Originally Posted by saden1
LOL...long winded and unnecessary rant that really goes nowhere, talk about inefficient speech. I want universal healthcare and I'm willing to make the sacrifices necessary to get it...that includes raising taxes, negotiating better drug prices and health services costs through the power of sheer numbers of patients. There is no reason to believe the government can do this. I'm willing to cut the budget and dispense with wasteful spending, the problem is though you and I disagree on what constituents wasteful spending and where cuts can be made. The federal discretionary budget for 2009 was 1182 billion. 799 billion (67.6%) of that went towards military spending and 383 (32.4%) billion of it went towards non-military spending. Guess where I'd like to start saving money?
I know you hate numbers but you really aught to stop digging and move on.
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Ok, using your numbers as a base, not including any additional cost for the addition of universal healthcare -
The current debt = 11,600 billion dollars.
The current discretionary budge is 1,182billion dollars.
assuming we cut 25% from the military, and do not increase non-military spending (a VERY generous, highly improbable assumption) we could pay down the debt at a rate of 200billion/year
11,600/200 = 53 years.
now of course we don't need to get it to 0, but of course we aren't dealing with 0% loans either. Nor is the discretionary budget really a valid number, since it assumes borrowing in order to spend that. So if you add in the projected deficit of 400billion this year, even by cutting 25% of the military spending - which again you and i atleast could probably find an agreeable way to do that - we would not be subtracting 200billion, but adding 200billion to our national debt.
so, again, I will say, how does a person who scoffs at the reliance of others on mystical creations, find it in his ability to rely upon the mystical wallet of government.