Keep this in mind – although the government sent you $600, they will be coming back with their other hand wide open asking for even more. Nothing is for free, they say”¦….

That is dead wrong. The Laffer curve and supply side economics have been abandoned by mainstream economists and have been for years. The CBO, Treasury, and the Council of Economic Advisors all disagree that tax cuts pay for themselves in increased revenue.

Why do people keep clinging to this idea?

the post was heavily pro-dem over tones, yet the dems have controlled the house and senate the past 3 years and no one on either side has been willing to stop spending even in though the sky is falling. even under clinton’s budget surplus (republican control house and senate BTW), which didn’t do anything to the national debt BTW, also made speculative assumptions that gave way to increased spending and never came to fruition either. let’s also consider that even with the budget surplus, the national debt to gdp was higher under clinton than it was under bush. war costs always seem to include the normal costs of having and operating a military and for some reason don’t deduct that amount, so i’m not sure what the true figures are, but so what? the govt spends money that companies get that employ 10′s of thousands of people, that goes back, etc, etc. govt spending is a large part of our economy. so what if the dollar is weaker overseas? no one was crying when the dollar was strong, although it made our manufactured goods more expensive. we can’t have our cake and eat it too. sometimes things have to balance out, let foreigners buy more u.s. manufactured goods for a change so u.s. gets the benefit. let foreigners come to the u.s. and spend their money on u.s. tourism versus americans spending on overseas tourism. it’s as if people think we should be spoiled forever. and to top it off, no one was complaining when the economy was doing oh so very well the past 7 years, just like no one was complaining up to the tech bubble either. here’s something, both sides could stop spending so there wouldn’t be a need to raise taxes. you don’t need revenue if you don’t spend. to think that if either obama or clinton get voted into office will change much in terms of federal budget (not much the pres can really do in real terms), military operations (why do you think the u.s. hasn’t been able to stop committing forces to the Balkans even after mr. clinton said we’d only be there for 1 year and we are still there 12 years afterwards?),

As far as Republicans being the party of small government, that’s a slight misnomer. Fiscal Conservatives (and libertarians) are for a small government, they tend to side more with Republicans than Democrats but that’s not to say that all Republicans are Conservative. In fact, the current crop of Republicans have proven themselves to be anything but conservative in many cases. GW included, but with no line item veto, people can always say things like “the transportation bill is desperately needed and that means we have to accept a bridge to nowhere to get it done.” With a line item veto, there’s no place to hide.

That being said, the Republicans are supposed to be the party of “small government” and “lower expenditures” – but look what they have done in the last 7 years. I am not sure a line item veto would have done anything, because a lot of the money that was spent was because of GW, not in spite of him.

True.

But why does everyone accept the “fact” that we have to pay more in taxes to “fix” the problem?

The problem is NOT the tax cuts, it’s the run away spending! Raising taxes will only serve to stifle economic growth, not limit government spending.

If the president (any president) had a line item veto, we could at least hold his feet to the fire for the pork that gets passed as part of the business (and spending) congress is actually supposed to enact.

Too many people just go with the herd and agree that we’ve got to raise taxes, instead of having an honest debate over what the role of the government should be and taking a hard look at the spending that doesn’t fall under that role.