I thought this was the sort of pretty cool use of the web which unfortunately will never been seen by all the people who need to see it.
I played with it and while I didn't make the same plan as you it still nicely illustrates that current discussion is generally about the disposition of the fleas on the budget rather than the elephants.
Maybe everyone in congress and the executive should have to fill it out and post a link. Yeah, that'd work.
"Maybe everyone in congress and the executive should have to fill it out and post a link. Yeah, that'd work."
That. That would be awesome.
(it really is a pretty good use of the web to enable people to really dig into what the tradeoffs are. And I really wish I could see a discussion in Congress where everyone defends their overall plan and checkmarks)
I would settle for one where they had to put down a plan rather than just saying "we will balance the budget through program cuts" and then when asked which say "top men are working on it... efficiency... look, a monkey!"
I actually only had to "look for" $4b in cuts. The rest was all things I thought were good ideas even if they didn't save money.
Plus, the NYT doesn't even allow us to select huge cuts that are available through things like repealing the Bush medicare changes, repealing Obamacare, and completely eliminating the home mortgage deduction.
The idea that it's difficult to fix the federal budget is simply false. It was true in 1980, perhaps, but there's been a lot of pork added since then - plus military needs are a lot lower now.
And, I just realized, I didn't need to find the extra $4b, as I would cut medicaid and other welfare that comes under "state aid", which I should have checked. But I decided I would tighten the social security disability eligibility anyway.
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Quick, tell all your friends who teach high school about it.
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I played with it and while I didn't make the same plan as you it still nicely illustrates that current discussion is generally about the disposition of the fleas on the budget rather than the elephants.
Maybe everyone in congress and the executive should have to fill it out and post a link. Yeah, that'd work.
Reply
That. That would be awesome.
(it really is a pretty good use of the web to enable people to really dig into what the tradeoffs are. And I really wish I could see a discussion in Congress where everyone defends their overall plan and checkmarks)
Reply
Reply
Plus, the NYT doesn't even allow us to select huge cuts that are available through things like repealing the Bush medicare changes, repealing Obamacare, and completely eliminating the home mortgage deduction.
The idea that it's difficult to fix the federal budget is simply false. It was true in 1980, perhaps, but there's been a lot of pork added since then - plus military needs are a lot lower now.
Edit: here's my version:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/13/weekinreview/deficits-graphic.html?choices=g12rb512
And, I just realized, I didn't need to find the extra $4b, as I would cut medicaid and other welfare that comes under "state aid", which I should have checked. But I decided I would tighten the social security disability eligibility anyway.
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