will chop off unemployment benefits. Others say that 99% of us won't be effected. My thoughts is that even if we do nothing right now, we have the new congressional session to fix those things that everyone is saying will be awful. To me it's a big distraction from the real problems Congress won't address. I would like to go over the cliff to find out what really is at stake, what is bluff and what is chicken little.

If it tanks and stays down, lay offs will begin once again. I think we can afford to go over it, we can't afford to sit on the bottom for a couple of months.

which really won't kill anyone, there are drastic spending cuts that would go into effect. The cut to the Defense budget terrifies republicans and tickles most liberals. The end of the payroll tax holiday will hurt our lowest wage earners, which is a concern and 2 million long term unemployed will lose their unemployment benefits. Social Security and Medicare are not part of this "sequester"

Republicans allowed the "sequester" to go into effect because the fools honestly believed Obama wouldn't win a second term.... Once his chances began looking better they began twisting themselves into pretzels in an attempt to get rid of the defense cuts.... Since his reelection, they have been in such disarray they don't know whether to shit or go blind.

... real defense spending cuts will never happen, Republicans with the help of enough Democrats will pass a bill to keep the money train for nothing flowing.

There are, after all, a lot of jobs in the defense industry.

Republicans were dead sure Obama would not get a second term. After all, that was all they worked for in the last three years.
They were sure that 'happy days would be here again'. The people they represent would retain their free ride, the safety net could be unraveled and any remains of Social Security could be privatized and offered as a gift to their supporters.
Didn't work out that way.
Now; they are caught in their own trap and last weeks shanagins around Plan B shows that they are doing a fine job of gnawing off their own foot.
If they weren't playing with peoples lives it would be down right funny.

.... you are correct. If we do go "over the cliff", and I now think that is very likely, next year could be FUN FUN FUN!

that finds it funny even though the consequences, for some, will be dire.

The Republicans can raise taxes and there will be no fiscal cliff for the rest of us.

Remember. All they have to do is raise the marginal tax rates back to the level at which they were during the prosperous Clinton years.

My generation, now on Social Security, paid that tax rate -- higher tax rates than people are paying now for most of our working lives.

And they want to cut our Social Security benefits to fund the new, Bush-era tax cuts??????

Who are they kidding?

Makes for a good story for the drama-queens, but the economic forces of the "cliff" actually ramp up slowly, thus enabling Obama to roast the right-wingers over a slow fire until they cry uncle.

taxes for the 99% in January. Crafting a bill which lowers taxes for those who need it will ahve every Dem vote, adn the Republicnas will ahve to vote for it too after january 1.

there are some cuts which are probably not a good thing. In my opinion the whole recession tlak is not re4al. they say becuase taxes will go up a tiny bit, small business owners will, stop hiring.That is not real.

Obviously we need government spending to happen to keep the ecenomy going. but hat is another story all together, whihc has NOTHING to do with taxes going back to a normal rate.

Not sure where the idea has come from that Democrats are now in favor of tax cuts just like the republicans, but I want taxes raised on everyone, and then raise the taxes again on the wealthy people afterwards.

Think of the cliff as an amusement park ride, something fun, instead of something to fear --

They have deliberately set up the options here so that going over the cliff is merely the least horrible austerity option out of the carefully crafted range of horrible austerity options set before us.

It is Shock Doctrine disaster capitalism, pure and simple.

I' expect the "cliff" will have about the same impact on my life. Zip.

trash our economy. You can't win a game of chicken with crazy people.

Revenue will go up because taxes will increase. There will also be spending cuts. These things should help cut the deficet which Republicans claimed to be for until recently evidently. So I don't understand what the big deal is.
What I don't really understand is Republicans letting everything expire so that everyone, including the rich, will have to pay more taxes than Obama's deals.
I guess we'll see if increased taxes really stifles growth. The previous tax cuts didn't exactly promote growth.