'Bipartisan' US Debt Ceiling Deal Means 'Whatever Republicans Want'

Dr. Linwood Tauheed told Sputnik that the near-annual merry-go-round of budget wrangling only benefits Republican lawmakers.

At present, the debt ceiling bill still faces scattered opposition from congressional Democrats like Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and hardline Republican conservatives.

"The Progressive Caucus has continuously backtracked on things that they said they've been dissatisfied with with the Biden administration," Tauheed said. "On the other hand, the Freedom Caucus on the Republican side, their leaders are saying they are not happy with this because it didn't go far enough."

The academic accused Democrats of pandering to Republican demands during every budget stand-off during the Obama administration, from 2009 to 2017.

"We've seen the Obama administration focusing on bipartisanship, which eventually turns out to be whatever the Republicans want," Tauheed noted, and now "we are seeing it with [former US] President [Barack] Obama's [then-]vice president, Joe Biden."

The worst part of the deal was more stringent conditions for recipients of government welfare food stamps, the professor stresed. "It raises the age for it from 50 to 54 for those who can be exempt from a work requirement. But but is the worse because obviously it's going to put more people out of the the ability to to have food stamps."

Overall, the US is headed for a new round of austerity.

"We have a Biden administration that is touting the fact that they want to get into surplus spending. They want to spend less than they tax," Tauheed pointed out. "And then we have a Federal Reserve that's increasing interest rates that are guaranteed to cause a recession."

Americas

US Debt Ceiling Deal Won't Hinder Arms Shipments to Ukraine

31 May 2023, 15:32 GMT

Carmine Sabia told Sputnik the US could maintain military dominance for a fraction of the bloated Pentagon budget of nearly $900 billion a year — thereby balancing the budget and cutting the national debt.

"I like the idea of keeping the strongest military in the world as the strongest military in the world," he said. "But we could cut spending by quite a lot and still have the strongest military in the world.

"There's no country that spends even anywhere close, not even in the in the same universe as what we spend," Sabia pointed out. "And that's only what you know we spend. Never mind the black ops or behind the scenes stuff. That's getting spent on projects that you never know about and that are not in the budget anywhere."

The writer said the the Department of Defense budget is mainly used "to pay off those big companies, where these politicians have their friends who then contribute back to their campaigns, and then put them on the board of directors when all is said and done and give them stock and money."

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