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Title: Dumbest Proposal Ever?
Source:
NY Observer
URL Source: http://www.observer.com/2009/politics/dumbest-proposal-ever
Published: Mar 11, 2009
Author: Joe Conason
Post Date: 2009-03-11 10:23:14 by war
Keywords: None
Views: 183
Comments: 14
If President Barack Obama’s response to the economic crisis is imperfect, as he acknowledges, and if the Congressional Democrats leave much to be desired as well, then Americans can at least be thankful that the nation’s fate has not been consigned to the frozen minds on the other side of the aisle. Things are bad, and seem very likely to get worse—but the Republicans seem determined to plunge us into a real depression, gambling that catastrophe would return them to power. The leaders of the Republican party simply ignore flashing red warnings from the unemployment offices, whose reports now indicate that joblessness in this recession will soon surpass the worst of the 1981-82 slump. They complain about “earmarks,” a miniscule portion of the budget, and they suggest policies that would either have no effect at all or make matters much worse, even according to many of their own most venerated economists. From those Republican politicians often deemed most thoughtful, such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, comes a droning chorus for tax cuts on capital gains. This is the conservative panacea in good times and bad, but it is of little relevance to the problems of the moment. Investors are not fleeing the markets because they worry about enormous returns that will be subject to punitive taxation; they are abandoning stocks and real estate because those assets are deflating like punctured balloons. Until there is a real prospect of capital gains, cutting taxes on them will scarcely affect investment and jobs. Descending the intellectual scale brings us to the House minority leader, John Boehner. He responded to the frightening February data on job losses—more than 650,000 laid off in a single month—to demand a “freeze in government spending” and a presidential veto of the $400 billion continuing budget resolution. While Mr. Boehner said he understood that the mass firings meant worsening economic conditions, he seems more worried about “wasteful pork-barrel projects,” a problem that concerned him not at all when his party ran Congress. To him, an unemployment rate surging past 8 percent is a signal that the government should impose a spending freeze “until the end of this fiscal year.” A spending freeze, of course, is precisely the opposite of the policies pursued by the Republicans during the last recession, when their own political butts were on the line. So is Mr. Boehner suddenly crazy? Is he just economically illiterate? Or is he convinced, like the would-be revolutionaries of the Depression era, that the worse our general situation becomes, the better for his party? All three could be true at once, but his motivation matters less than his ideas, which would be ruinous to everyone if enacted. What makes someone like Mr. Boehner important and potentially dangerous is not that anyone takes his stupid advice seriously, but that he and his caucus can block or stall policies that might rescue us from the worst consequences of the bust. The fundamental issue not only in America but in the world economy is a crisis of demand. As the Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz has explained—most recently at a panel in New York City sponsored by The Nation magazine and the Nation Institute—average wages have fallen for more than three decades. Among the results of that invidious pattern was rising indebtedness, as banks extended usurious credit to working families struggling to maintain their living standards. Years of rising inequality has upset the equilibrium that resulted in rapid and sustained economic growth for most of the postwar period in this country, and created a prosperous, well-educated and optimistic middle-class society. Back when America worked well, the gaps between the top and bottom of the income scale were far smaller, the public sector was more robust, the labor movement protected living standards and the rewards of work were more fairly distributed. There is only one way to stop the downward slide and begin to restore that proven pattern of economic dynamism with a wage-led recovery. Public spending, even unto additional trillions, is the only instrument available to prevent a global depression, assuming that we have not already forfeited that chance. The stimulus bill and the Obama budget are only first steps. We will need another strong shot of stimulus before the summer—not a spending freeze—and we can only pray that the president and the Congressional Democrats will have the guts to push the Republicans out of the way.
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#1. To: all (#0)
The "dumbest proposal ever" would be a proposal to pay any attention to the "cures" of people like Joe Conason and Obama. They both know about as much about economics as a monkey knows about calculus.
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. Nah...too easy...
Wrong. "Stop making things worse" is the only instrument available to prevent a global depression. For once, Government should do the right thing. Let companies go bankrupt. Cleanse the system and stop propping up zombies. Let talent be recycled and let the executives who made bad calls wind up working at the McDonalds drive-thru. Get out of the way and stop putting up barriers. Lower taxes and fire half the Government employees. Put up enterprise zones. But, who is fooling who? They won't do the Right Thing because then they would realize that they are irrelevant. They'll make things worse instead.
Recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Atlas is now shrugging. The problem is there is no such thing as a company going bankrupt without it affecting 10 other companies. The economy has become so vertically integreated that it's all the same supply chain.
Dear Republican Leaders: The Republican Party has become the party dedicated to sabotaging the American future. Check out the sermon I just delivered about the Republican Party on CNN when being interviewed by D.L. Hughley - You Republicans are the arsonists who burned down our national home. You combined the failed ideologies of the Religious Right, so-called free market deregulation and the Neoconservative love of war to light a fire that has consumed America. Now you have the nerve to criticize the "architect" America just hired -- President Obama -- to rebuild from the ashes. You do nothing constructive, just try to hinder the one person willing and able to fix the mess you created. I used to be one of you. As recently as 2000 I worked to get Senator McCain elected in that year's primary. (McCain and Gen. Tommy Franks wrote glowing endorsements regarding my book about military service, AWOL.). I have a file of handwritten thank you notes from Presidents Ford, Reagan, Bush I and II. In the 1970s and early 80s I hung out with Jack Kemp and bought into his "supply side" myth and even wrote a book he endorsed pushing his ideas.) There's more, but take it from me; my parents (evangelical leaders Francis and Edith Schaeffer) and I were about as tight with -- and useful to -- the Republican Party as anyone. We played a big part creating the Religious Right. In the mid 1980s I left the Religious Right, after I realized just how very anti-American they are, (the theme I explore in my book Crazy For God). They wanted America to fail in order to prove they were right about America's "moral decline." Soon after McCain lost in 2000 I re-registered as an independent in disgust with W. Bush. But I still respected many Republicans. Not today. How can anyone who loves our country support the Republicans now? Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan defined the modern conservatism that used to be what the Republican Party I belonged to was about. Today no actual conservative can be a Republican. Reagan would despise today's wholly negative Republican Party. And can you picture the gentlemanly and always polite Ronald Reagan, endorsing a radio hate-jock slob who crudely mocked a man with Parkinson's and who now says he wants an American president to fail?! With people like Limbaugh as the loudmouth image of the Republican Party -- you need no enemies. But something far more serious has happened than an image problem: the Republican Party has become the party of obstruction at just the time when all Americans should be pulling together for the good of our country. Instead, Republicans are today's fifth column sabotaging American renewal. President Obama has been in office barely 45 days and the Republican Party has the nerve to blame him for the economic and military cataclysm he inherited. I say economic and military cataclysm because without the needless war in Iraq you all backed we would not be in the economic mess we're in today. If that money had been spent here at home on renovating our infrastructure, taking us toward a green economy, putting our health-care system in order we'd be a very different situation. As the father of a Marine who served in George W. Bush's misbegotten wars let me say this: if President Obama's strategy to repair our economy, infrastructure and healthcare fails that will put our troops at far greater risk because the world will become a far more dangerous place. So for all you flag-waving Republicans who are trying to undermine the President at home -- if you succeed more of our troops will be killed abroad. When your new leader Rush Limbaugh calls for President Obama to fail he's calling for more flag-draped coffins. Limbaugh is the new "Hanoi Jane." For the party that created our crises of misbegotten war, mismanaged economy, the lack of regulation of our banking industry, handing our country to rich crooks... to obstruct the one person who is trying to repair the damage is obscene. Just imagine where America would be today if the 14 to 20 million voters -- "the rube base" who slavishly follow the likes of Limbaugh -- had not voted as a block year after year thus empowering the Republican fiasco. We would have a regulated banking industry and would have avoided our current financial crisis; some 4000 of our killed military men and women would be alive; over to 35,000 wounded Americans would be whole; we would have been leaders in the environmental movement; we would be in the middle of a green technology boom fueling a huge expansion of our economy and stopping our dependence on foreign oil, and our health-care system would be reformed. After Obama was elected, you Republican leaders had a unique last chance to send a patriotic message of unity to the world -- and to all Americans. You could have backed our president's economic recovery plan. Since we all know that half of our problem is one of lost confidence and perception, nothing would have done more to calm the markets and project resolve and confidence than if you had been big enough to take Obama's offered hand and had work with him -- even if you disagreed ideologically. You had the chance to put our country first. You utterly failed to rise to the occasion. The worsening economic situation is your fault and your fault alone. The Republicans created this mess through 8 years of backing the worst president in our history and now, because you put partisan ideology ahead of the good of our country, you have blown your last chance to redeem yourselves. You deserve the banishment to the political wilderness that awaits all traitors. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frank-schaeffer/open-letter-to-the-republ_b_172822.html
I read this and it explains why I left the GOP in 1994 and why I openly root for its destruction even if it comes via the hand of the democrats.
Had to be a freakin' crackpot who wrote this. Obama is just another member of TEAM 'CON THE MUGS' a member of the establishment. The only real difference between him and someone like McCain is his color (which is obvious). "...If anybody is wondering why he says he is overwhelmed by all the work at the White House,just look at his Senate record for the explanation. He's not used to doing anything at all. Other people do all the work for him,and he takes the credit. "The ultimate Affirmative Action creature." sneakypete
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. He is speaking truth. The Republican party is a disaster and their goal is to eliminate the middle class. The only people who are crackpots are those who refuse to see what is happening. Does that mean Obama is not one of the elite neocons? No. But it does mean while you whine about somebody who has been in office less than 100 days you ignore the fact that that goal of the Republican party has been the destruction of America.
And that is the same goal that Obama and the other wing of the evil bird of prey have in common with the dastardly R's. Only blind partisans (like you and war) can't see it. Courtesy ping to war because I mentioned you. I no longer reply to any of your foolishness so you can keep that in mind if you want to make some absurd comment.
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. don't waste my time with blind partisan crap. The person wrote that the Republican party is not what it used to be and has caused America to start to crumble. If that is too tough for you to figure out then that's you're problem.
You're the one who is a partisan, not me. I am not an Obama fan and never voted for him. Neither did I vote for Bush (or his daddy or Clinton--they all suck, something you have yet to figure out). The only decent man who has run in the last 20 years or so is Ron Paul.
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. Sounds like you don't know the meaning of the word partisan. Maybe this will help you. 1par·ti·san Listen to the pronunciation of 1partisan Listen to the pronunciation of 1partisan Variant(s): also par·ti·zan Listen to the pronunciation of partizan Listen to the pronunciation of partizan Èpär-tY-zYn, -sYn, -Ìzan, chiefly British Ìpär-tY-Èzan Function: noun Etymology: Middle French partisan, from north Italian dialect partizan, from part part, party, from Latin part-, pars part Date: 1555 1: a firm adherent to a party, faction, cause, or person ; especially : one exhibiting blind, prejudiced, and unreasoning allegiance 2 a: a member of a body of detached light troops making forays and harassing an enemy b: a member of a guerrilla band operating within enemy lines
Sounds like you can't understand plain English. I already told you that I know that, for all practical purposes, there is only ONE party in the US. It is like a big gang where the members fight for the figurehead position of leader of the gang. No matter which one wins they are still scumbags. Hope that clears things up for you just a little bit. Or not. If you can't understand something that simple you may be beyond help.
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. Only because Government puts up barriers to entry such that economic power is concentrated in the hands of a few.
Recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Atlas is now shrugging.
Lord Acton
#2. To: James Deffenbach (#1)
They both know about as much about economics as a monkey knows about calculus.
#3. To: war (#0)
Public spending, even unto additional trillions, is the only instrument available to prevent a global depression
Depression is when you lose your job.
Recovery is when Obama loses his job.
#4. To: mirage (#3)
#5. To: war (#0)
#6. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#5)
#7. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#5)
Now you have the nerve to criticize the "architect" America just hired -- President Obama -- to rebuild from the ashes. You do nothing constructive, just try to hinder the one person willing and able to fix the mess you created.
Lord Acton
#8. To: James Deffenbach (#7)
(Edited)
#9. To: bush_is_a_moonie, war (#8)
Lord Acton
#10. To: James Deffenbach (#9)
#11. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#10)
Lord Acton
#12. To: James Deffenbach (#11)
#13. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#12)
Sounds like you don't know the meaning of the word partisan. Maybe this will help you.
Lord Acton
#14. To: war (#4)
The economy has become so vertically integreated that it's all the same supply chain.
Depression is when you lose your job.
Recovery is when Obama loses his job.
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