Debt supercommittee a flop?

[gimmethesimplelife]

Just read online that the debt supercommittee may be a total flop - a total waste of time - with no agreements as to what to cut, in what amounts, and if and how to raise revenue - meaning (I think) automatic spending cuts kick in. I just find this very disheartening, that these mostly quite well to do folks can't come to some kind of compromise yet mostly come from the well to do. Can't anything be simple or make sense anymore? UGGGGH! The world is not going to end on this one and life will sure go on, I just find this so disheartening, somehow even more so than the budget brinksmanship of this summer. Wondering what the take of others is on this.....Rob

[flowerseverywhere]

Did you see the 60 minutes piece on the no tax pledge?
http://thehill.com/homenews/house/192529-house-gop-lawmakers-want-out-of-tax-pledge
This is one of the problems, but certainly not the whole problem. Two unfunded wars are another.

But it is a bipartisan problem, and both sides need to compromise. Many of us have had to make compromises today. The world is not what it was ten or twenty years ago when they signed their pledge. Obviously, many big corporations have figured out how not to pay taxes. It seems every day you hear about welfare or medicaid fraud by individuals or corporations. And problems with bids for work or relatives on payrolls of local governments.

All I know is I have to balance my budget, and go without if I don't have the money. This problem starts at the local level, with local politicians, with our schools, and our post offices. At every level there are layers of people who need to be paid and have benefits and it mushrooms from there. There are programs at many levels which need to be funded.

On the other side of the equation, everyone wants their roads plowed, their trash picked up, their kids educated, and their social security. They want to call 911 and have police and fire show up at their door. Many rely on food stamps, on unemployment or on cash assistance and medicaid.

A balance needs to be found an no one seems grown up enough to do it.

I edited this to add this article which I find very interesting.
http://news.yahoo.com/top-0-1-nation-earn-half-capital-gains-172647859.html

[Zoebird]

I read/heard somewhere (can't find a link) that one of their solutions was to cut funding to servicemen/women and to vets!!!!!

I find this very idea offensive. God forbid we cut "defense spending" which is largely contracts to make machines of war -- lets instead cut the resources required for our service people!?!

This very idea is so disgusting to me.