Thread: Neither Musk nor Vivek proposes a remedy to deal with Congress's annual deficits+

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Here is the newest example of a member of Congress pretending to want to end Congress from adding to the national debt, year after year. Representative Rudy Yakym introduced the latest Balanced Budget Amendment which would not stop Congress from adding to the national debt year after year. In fact, if adopted, it would effectively make it constitutional for Congress to avoid balancing the annual federal budget and allow Congress to continue to add to the national debt year, after year after year.

Yakym's so-called balanced budget amendment does not affirmatively meet essential criteria required to put an end to Congress adding to the national debt year after year, such as:
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• Does it allow Congress to raise all necessary revenue, including in times of emergency?

• Does it limit how Congress raises its revenue in a manner that is consistent with the United States founding principles?

• Does it allow spending as found necessary by Congress during the course of a fiscal year?

• Does it create a real and immediate moment of accountability for each State’s Congressional Delegation, when Congress borrows during the course of a fiscal year to meet its expenses?

• Does it contain an escape clause rendering the amendment meaningless or allow Congress to effectively add to the national debt, year after year?
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The bottom line is, Yakym’s balanced budget amendment causes the U.S. Debt Limit Alarm Bells to ring even louder, by confirming its members prefer to engage in a Kabuki dance, instead of ending Congress’s ability to add to the national debt year after year.

As previously pointed out, the only proposed balanced budget amendment which would effectively end Congress from adding to the national debt year after year is the Fair Share Balanced Budget Amendment.



Fair Share Balanced Budget Amendment with editorial comments:


“SECTION 1. The Sixteenth Amendment is hereby repealed and Congress is henceforth forbidden to lay any tax or burden calculated from profits, gains, sales, interest, salaries, wages, tips, inheritances or any other lawfully realized money.


NOTE: these words would return us to our Constitution’s original tax plan as our Founders’ intended it to operate! They would also end the experiment with allowing Congress to lay and collect taxes calculated from lawfully earned "incomes" which now oppresses America‘s economic engine and robs the bread which working people have earned when selling the property each has in their own labor, not to mention the amendment would end federal taxation being used as a political weapon to harass and attack political opponents!

"SECTION 2. Congress ought not raise money by borrowing, but when the money arising from imposts duties and excise taxes are insufficient to meet the public exigencies, and Congress has raised money by borrowing during the course of a fiscal year, Congress shall then lay a direct tax at the beginning of the next fiscal year for an amount sufficient to extinguish the preceding fiscal year's deficit, and apply the revenue so raised to extinguishing said deficit."


NOTE: Congress is to raise its primary revenue from imposts and duties, [taxes at our water’s edge], and may also lay miscellaneous internal excise taxes on specifically chosen articles of consumption [preferably articles of luxury]. But if Congress borrows and spends more than is brought in from imposts, duties and miscellaneous excise taxes during the course of a fiscal year, then, and only then, is the direct apportioned tax to be laid in order to balance the budget on an annual basis.

"SECTION 3. When Congress is required to lay a direct tax in accordance with Section 1 of this Article, the Secretary of the United States Treasury shall, in a timely manner, calculate each State's apportioned share of the total sum being raised by the agreed upon apportionment formula found in our Constitution, and then provide the various State Congressional Delegations with a Bill notifying their State’s Executive and Legislature of its share of the total tax being collected. [See: Chap. LXXV. An Act to lay and collect a direct tax within the United States, July 14, 1798]

NOTE: our founder’s fair share formula to extinguish an annual deficit would be:

States’ population

---------------------------- X SUM TO BE RAISED = STATE’S FAIR SHARE OF DIRECT TAX

Total U.S. Population


The above formula, as intended by our founding fathers, is to ensure that each state’s share towards extinguishing an annual deficit is proportionately equal to its representation in Congress, i.e., representation with a proportional financial obligation! And if the tax is laid directly upon the people by Congress, then every taxpayer across the United States would pay the exact same amount!


Note also that each State’s number or Representatives, under our Constitution is likewise determined by the rule of apportionment:


State`s Pop.

------------------- X House size (435) = State`s No. of Representatives
U.S. Pop.


"SECTION 4. Each State shall be free to assume and pay its quota of the direct tax into the United States Treasury by a final date set by Congress, but if any State shall refuse or neglect to pay its quota, then Congress shall send forth its officers to assess and levy such State's proportion against the real property within the State with interest thereon at the rate of ((?)) per cent per annum, and against the individual owners of the taxable property. Provision shall be made for a 15% discount for those States paying their share by ((?))of the fiscal year in which the tax is laid, and a 10% discount for States paying by the final date set by Congress, such discount being to defray the States' cost of collection."


NOTE: This section respects the Tenth Amendment and allows each state to raise its share in its own chosen way in a time period set by Congress, but also allows the federal government to enter a state and collect the tax if a state is delinquent in meeting its obligation.


"SECTION 5. This Amendment to the Constitution, when ratified by the required number of States, shall take effect no later than (?) years after the required number of States have ratified it.

JWK


"In matters of power let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution. ... Thomas Jefferson’s Fair Copy of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798

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See: Johnson backs away from go-it-alone debt ceiling plan
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01/14/2025
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"Speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday backed away from a plan to address the approaching federal debt cliff in a party-line reconciliation package, acknowledging several major challenges that may force Republicans to deal with the borrowing limit in bipartisan talks with Democrats."

And there you have it. The US Debt Kabuki dance continues in Congress.

When will one of our so-called "conservative" media talking heads, including those at Newsmax and/or Fox News, call for an effective balanced budget amendment being added to our Constitution to stop Congress from adding to our national debt, year after year? The U.S. Debt alarm bell has been ringing for quite some time.

JWK




“The borrower is a slave to the lender and the debtor to the creditor.” ___ Benjamin Franklin

Originally Posted by GaiaGoddess

In that short vid, he had a very creepy laugh, oh my

Much like Kamala?

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See Trump's Treasury pick Scott Bessent says 'spending is out of control'

Scott Bessent is expected to ". . . advocate for a balanced budget amendment. . . "LINK

JWK


We are here today and gone tomorrow, but what is most important is what we do in-between and is what our children will inherit and remember us by.

Originally Posted by johnwk

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See Trump's Treasury pick Scott Bessent says 'spending is out of control'

We will find out soon how this develops since the Trump Presidential Inauguration is only one day away

Originally Posted by GaiaGoddess

We will find out soon how this develops since the Trump Presidential Inauguration is only one day away

So far, things are looking pretty good for Trump since his inauguration. I'm impressed at the speed he is getting things done.

Originally Posted by johnwk

So far, things are looking pretty good for Trump since his inauguration. I'm impressed at the speed he is getting things done.

It's interesting.

I imagine what we're seeing is scripted so President Trump can bring in some wanted results, and at the same time, bring in some very unwanted developments like Project Stargate.

Originally Posted by GaiaGoddess

It's interesting.

I imagine what we're seeing is scripted so President Trump can bring in some wanted results, and at the same time, bring in some very unwanted developments like Project Stargate.

Are you talking about the friction between Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman? Musk questioning the value of the investment.

Originally Posted by johnwk

Are you talking about the friction between Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman? Musk questioning the value of the investment.

That would be an example

Elon Musk may have just staged a ‘21st-century coup’ at the Treasury Department. What could happen next.

Democrats say Musk, in shutting down USAID, is acting at China’s behest

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/el...earch_headline

Summary:
Elon Musk has reportedly taken over the Treasury Department’s central payment system, putting him in the position to unilaterally cut off federal funding to disfavored programs and setting off accusations that the U.S. is about to descend into a constitutional crisis.

The highest-ranking career official at the Treasury Department, David Lebrynk, was put on administrative leave by the Trump administration Friday, according to the Washington Post, after he refused to give representatives of Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency access to the department’s central payments system.