SK I agree with the point you are making however this is not as much a draconian cut as you are making it out to be. I think we all get stuck on semantics a bit to much as well. We are told how low inflation is yet prices for food, fuel and water have been moving higher for several consecutive years and not in a trivial manner. We are told unemployment is at 11%, 8%, 9%… in the aggregate we all know it all still sucks out there and is very challenging. When you and I debated Obamacare in 09 my big peeve was not that we needed reform but that we needed much more time to come up with a program. You agreed but said we needed to pass what we have now because we would never get the political climate to ever pass anything. I feel we are in the same spot now, we will never get the political climate to pass any sort of spending reductions. So just do it now, regardless of the consequences. We will get through it.