How in the world did the Federal government ever get so heavily involved in most of these to begin with? I say, go for it. When we're actually without necessary and essential services, we'll decide better what to put back in.

Cancelling an air show has nothing to do with Military Readiness and vice versa.

WOW Aksum01 you are one oblivious naive individual! Please make sure should you have a fire in your home, do not call your local fire department! Stupid is as stupid does....and if you have children, remove them from public schools and pay for private school.

Wow Nl Mom, they are just using scare tactics and your falling for it. The govt is too big and needs to be downsized, we can't afford it anymore

Instead of making cuts that harm children and education... why not cut even a portion of the billions we give out in corporate welfare?! - Start with the oil companies!!!

Aksum01 is spot on. Of all listed cuts, military is the only one that should be the federal governments responsibilty, and I'm quite sure it has become somewhat bloated since Washington crossed the Deleware. All of the rest should be handled locally, without us sending our money to the useless politicians in D.C.

It's time to cut spending
We can't go on with an open check book.
97 billion in debt for pension alone

SEQUESTER THIS,!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Cut all the perks, expense accounts , cars, staffs , of ALL THE ELECTED AND APPOINTED government employees first,,, Cut all the pensions of all the ELECTED legislators for life politicians,,,,,

$83billion! Big deal! What we need is less fed govt in our lives. Education will not suffer. The fed has one good law regarding ed, PL 94-142. It's been around since the 70's and it assures the education of special need students k-12. That's great, we need to help these kids. The the other intrusions by the feds into k-12 ed are gifts to the unions. All public ed k-12 should be run locally with local money and state aide as defined by IL Const. The reason why the feds are involved in local ed is simply because the urban areas of our once great nation cannot educate their undisciplined youth. Sorry Chicago and you other lousy cities, educate your own and leave the rest of us alone. As far as the Sequester is concerned, Repubs don't cave. Obama goes golfing, his family goes vacationing, the feds keep spending and borrowing, the Senate hasn't passed a budget in 4 years, the poor hate the rich, the blacks hate the whites, the employees hate the employers, blah blah blah. Aren't we all sick of it? Govt close the borders, protect from our enemies and help those Americans through no fault of their own need some assistance. As for the rest of us, get out of our lives.

I am just happy the federal government is finally cutting. It is to bad that it has to be done this way instead of working together to determine the best places to cut with the least amount of impact (pork barrel funding such as was in the fiscal cliff deal). Although I can see right through President Obama's claim that the sky is falling and it is not his fault, he does seem to be appealing to the public opinion. His strategy of sticking with the “fairness” theme throughout his 4 years is brilliant. The Republican's better figure out a way to change the perception he has created that they only represent the elitist.

It's god they're cutting expenses, it's too bad they're cutting the things they are. I agree with some of the other opinions though, the state of IL should be able to support itself. We've got to get on a budget and stay on it. Il has far too large of a tax base for me to believe that we need Fed. assistance on many things, if any. If anything, some of our tax dollars should be going to help lesser fortunate states with REAL poor people, and not so many people who really could do a job but don't want to. I wonder how much misspent welfare money there is out there that could be used to help pay for schools, etc. instead? I don't know, but my gut tells me it's a LOT.

Some obviously have their heart in the right place, aspiring to that lofty but elusive ideal of having an equal outcome for everyone in the world. I’m with you. But do you honestly believe that our Federal government is the way to achieve it? By the time a politician reaches the Federal level, he or she has corrupted every ideal they have ever run for office on, if they have ever had anything other than narcissistic self-interest as their ideal to begin with.

Here’s what I see: you send your tax buck to the Feds, you get back 25 cents in services and 50 cents of debt that will never be repaid, and you’re still short 25 cents. It doesn’t take too much edumacation to figure out that doesn’t work, unless you went to [school name withheld]. There are some things that the Federal government can and should do (constitutionally), but personally, I don’t think that equal outcomes for the world is one of them. You’re gonna have to go for a much larger revolution than the one we base our current government on.

I refer back to the original question at the beginning of this thread.

A quote from former President Truman,
It's a recession when your neighbours out of a job,
its a depression when you're out of a job.

The origins of Big spending and deficits as Cheney said " Reagan proved Deficits do not matter" and now after he and his co POTUS looted the treasury for the Cayman islanders we are going through the motions but all that is going on is we are being held hostage by the do nothing representatives of the same Cayman islanders who could care less due to gerrymandering their errand boys are safe it is called a lack of accountability. The loop holes in the tax laws will continue as will more suffering for those who can least afford it, the tax avoider flag wavers may not even have any more parades for the returning troops from the poppy fields because they may ask for more help in the PTSD or exposure to Uranium depleted ammo.That will be the end of the wing nut ideologues concerns and will not even mention Obamacare again, the for profit system that is working for the Ins and Pharmas has now been also working for the tax payers but nothing is in the media and in a more perfect world we would have been doing part E MEDICARE for ALL that would save more BILLIONS for the taxpayers.

Thank god for Obama! Not.

That expression on your savior's face is priceless!

Sadly, no none is asking why the lawmakers aren't being hit in their pocketbooks (like withholding ALL pay starting midnight tonite until a deal is struck), removing any guards they might have, taking away ALL government cars (let them use their own), all government issued credit cards frozen, yada, yada.

if they did that Paul the POTUS would do what he could a done since the deal was struck get rid of it! EVERYONE is full of it!

So, let me get this straight... LESS than 3% of our taxes go towards helping children, the disabled, and poor survive- but you want to vomit out the ignorant factually unsound cliches complaining about that, RATHER than educate yourself on the FACTS concerning all of the businesses that receive literally BILLIONS of our tax dollars in corporate welfare ..?! How anyone can want to purposefully do more damage to those in need, when THEY did NOT cause this deficit, is beyond comprehension to those of us rationally minded people who want real solutions founded on logic and fact!

We need to make cuts almost everywhere, there is too much waste almost everywhere. The only reason I made the comment about the abuse of the welfare system is because I've witnessed so much of it personally, that's all. When I go to the donut shop and the liquor store and see "link card accepted here" signs up, it kind of concerns me that this may not be the kind of "food" that these people really need, that's all, and when I have them offering to sell me these cards for a percentage of their value, and they are doing so on the streets wearing a higher value in clothing and teeth than my entire mortgage for 2 months, that kind of annoys me too. It's this kind of waste that I would like to see stop. It may be a small amount as a percentage of the entire waste but it bothers and probably affects my morale the most, I'd say. It also isn't fair to the people who really need welfare to allow this to happen. They could probably have a better chance to improve themselves if they didn't have to share all the welfare with these other abusive people.