Matt Schneider wrote “As intelligently noted at Hot Air, defaulting on one’s debts is not exactly “fiscally conservative,” not to mention the wisdom of following this advice is doubtful given that a Republican-induced economic collapse…”
A few questions for Matt: can you please elaborate on how not extending the debt ceiling is “defaulting on one’s debts?” More specifically, on what partifular debts will be be unable to *avoid default* if the debt ceiling is not raised? For example, if we commence bringing the troops home right now and close a bunch of overseas bases, will that save enough money such that we don’t need to increase the debt ceiling in April (I believe that is when it is expected to be reached). How about if we abolish the Departments of Education, Energy, HUD, etc.? If we make drastic cuts to such government entities, are we STILL going to default on anything? Or is the threat of default simply a concept to hide behind for those who want to continue unsustainable spending?
Take a look at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_federal_budget
Using 2010 as a baseline, we brought in 200 billion more in revenue than what is described here as “mandatory” spending. That suggests after mandatory spending, we could use the remaining 200 billion to operate the Federal Government. Further, I bet a bunch of what is listed as Mandatory Spending in the Wikipedia link is not really that. There’s about 600 billion of unspecified “other mandatory spending” in there, much of which is probably hooey. And commencing the restructuring of Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid would similarly provide more headroom. So, the Dept of Education disappears? So what? The Dept of Ed we have totday didn’t exist before 1979. Did the country collapse without it? No. (In fact, Education was both better and cheaper.) Same with the Dept of Energy. Will the country collapse without the Dept of Energy? No. They don’t produce any energy. Same goes for 90% of our bloated government. We need courts. We need defense. (Though we’d be fine with a fraction of what we spend on defense now.)
Hard cuts are just that. HARD. Does not mean they don’t need to be made.
If the approach to a “debt ceiling” is to raise it every time it is reached, it’s not a debt ceiling at all. It’s a fat guy who gets fatter every day, with a legal commitment in writing to start a diet tomorrow. Always tomorrow.
What is more evil? Making hard cuts while we (perhaps) still can? Or kicking the can down the road to GUARANTEED PAINFUL, GUARANTEED COLLAPSE?
When two laws conflict, how are they reconciled? If we have a law that obligates us to spend, and a law that says we can’t spend any more, why is your default resolution that the “don’t spend any more” law is the one that must yield?
Curious to hear what you think.
Regards,
MC
So Christmas has been and gone. Are you now facing the New Year and wondering how you can keep up the Christmas spirit and goodwill for the coming year? Well, it certainly helps when you know how to do so for free from your own home.
There are so many simple ways to volunteer or donate to charity by giving up a small amount of your time or re-purposing some money you would normally have spent. So here’s a list of five of the best quick and easy ways to volunteer or donate to charity. Bookmark the list of charities and use it to do the rounds weekly!
Skip1.org
This is a great concept — it’s a site which makes you think about how much money you waste on frivolous things. You nominate something which you will give up, say a lunch or newspapers for a month. Then you donate that same amount of money to feeding a hungry child.
Yes, you’re handing over money to charity, but it’s money you would have spent anyway. It’s also easy to share news of your donation with your friends via social networks, and hopefully convince a few of them to skip something for charity too.
Free Rice
Free Rice has been around a while, but it’s so good it’s worth making sure it’s on this list. Play a simple, addictive trivia quiz and Free Rice will donate rice for each of your correct answers. This is a free and simple way to give whenever you have a free moment. Read more on FreeRice here.
Causes
There are a number of things you can do using Causes, including raising awareness for your chosen charity and helping to raise funds for them. By far the easiest way to donate money with Causes is to set up a birthday or holiday fund. This way, instead of receiving presents from friends and family, you simply ask them to donate the money on your behalf. It takes about two minutes to set up, since you can log in with Facebook Connect – just choose the charity and you’re set!
Charity Gifts
Here’s another easy way to spend your money on charity instead of something you were already going to pay for. Instead of giving gifts to your friends, give them the knowledge that you have donated to charity on their behalf. The Donation4Charity website searches all the big charity gifting sites (such as UNICEF, WWF and Oxfam) and lets you search the gifts according to how much money you have available to spend. Buy a goat for charity for about the same price as a modest gift!
Sparked
Spend 5-10 minutes donating your expertise to charity: Give website feedback, brainstorm fundraising ideas or help design an awareness campaign. This is what they need help with – if you can spend a few minutes working on it then you’ve made a difference to a real charity with just a moment of your time. Read more on Sparked here & get going!
And many, many more!
There are so many great ways to donate your time to charity — the sites listed above are just a few. Here’s some more great articles which introduce many more you might like to try.
- Introducing Jumo – The Social Network for Social Good
- How To Easily Coordinate Volunteers Using Volunteer Spot
- 5 Crowd Funding Websites To Support Your Favourite Charities, Bands & Projects
- Find Volunteering Opportunities Near You with VolunteerMatch
- 10 Search Engines To Help The Environment
- 5 Cool Edutainment Games You Can Play and Also Donate To Charitable Causes
- 5 Websites To Lend A Hand & Make A Difference To The World
What are your favourite sites for donating your time to charity? Do you appreciate charity gifts given on your behalf? Let us know in the comments!
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