Obama's Performance (so far)
 

I did not really expect much change with Obama's presidency but he seems to be going overboard to keep business as usual. I am surprised that he threw in the towel so early on his campaign rhetoric of CHANGE. Perhaps his party schooled him on the way things really work in the executive branch.

He promised he would not raise taxes on the poor and middle class but the first bill he signed (SCHIP) gets 90% of it's funding from the middle class and lower income groups.

He promised higher ethics but three of his nominations were/are for people who cheated on their taxes. I don't believe the "it was just an honest mistake" bull, especially from the new head of the IRS.

He said he would not sign bills with earmarks in them but the so called Stimulus Bill seems to contain many items that would otherwise be considered earmarks.

I think if people expect radical change within 20 days, they will going to be sorely disappointed regardless of what takes place.

With regards to the tax cheats, the problems surfaced through the vetting process, so it is not like they were trying to hide that.

nothing in the stimulus bill is an earmark

Right... because STD Education is pivotal to the economic recovery? The whole thing is full of special interest pork.

Thats my biggest problem with the whole thing....it is 90% earmarks and pork passed off as economic stimuli. CCC-type programs are one thing, but these are getting a little out of hand IMO

i was arguing semantics. pork projects and earmarks aren't always the same thing. earmarks are spending projects that are tacked onto other unrelated bills at the 11th hour in hopes of having them passed without debate. the usual tactic is to have your controversial project tacked onto a crucial bill (like defense spending). everything in this stimulus bill is in the main body of the bill. i'm not defending the projects, just clearing up the terminology

Hey, it creates/secures jobs. And it sure beats abstinence programs.

In terms of "pork," this stimulus bill has significantly less than the bail out last semester. And while people often can find programs that make little sense, the key is that these programs a) make up about a couple of percentage points of the total package and b)any spending in a recession generates economic activity. Keynes famous example was hiring two crews, one to dig holes, the other to cover them up.

The key problem, however, is something that no one can do anything about now, just remember not to repeat in the future: do not run deficits during economic expansions, especially if there are signs of a bubble.


Ps: if anyone is interested in what the republicans consider "waste," here is a list
What GOP Leaders deem wasteful in Senate stimulus bill - CNN.com
add it up and see what share of the stimulus bill it makes up. The only republican who seems to be making sense these days is Greg Mankiw, and that is because he is an economist first. Other key conservatives writing worthwhile comments are Gary Becker and Richard Posner.

Sore loser say what?

I will love to see how he does, so far it is early, I do not love the new stimulus plan (i did not love the old one either), pork is an understatement and we the people have to pay in the long run.

I do have a interesting site that follows the obama campaign promises, I am sure people may contend certain promises whether fulfilled or not but it is interesting to look at.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/

lets see. we went from a message of hope to one of fear, again. a promise of no lobbyists, he hired 17 in 14 days. I'm not thrilled with the crap in the so called stimulis. It isn't looking good.

small thinking.

i think obama has moved quickly in some areas to push the bush period into a richly deserved oblivion---but on the economic situation, the unravelling is happening at such speed that it hardly makes sense to snipe at the various shortfalls in the stimulus package: i would think it makes more sense for folk to hope that it has positive effects, at least if keeping your job is a priority.

obama has been dealt a remarkably shitty hand after 30 years of neoliberal incoherence.
it's funny watching folk who still think about the world through the same framework that is responsible for the great unraveling struggle to process it.
what's not funny is that after 30 years of neoliberal ideological hegemony, folk here who are in that position are not the exception. you have the same problem in congress. you have the same problem in the administration.

so i think obama needs to go further to break with the sad old neoliberal legacy and everything it stands for. but it's unreasonable to expect that break to emerge full-blown in less than a month.

The reality is, Obama is testing keynesian economics for the very first time ever. Not even the post "great depression" war-economy boost was true Keynes--it was the boom AFTER the war that brought us out, the war-economy numbers were artificially high, and didn't reflect any real economic relief for the people.

This is a MASSIVE change in how economies are run. It can't possibly be overstated how huge a sea change this is. Not everyone agrees with it, I suppose, but that's politics. You can't accuse the guy of "not change".

I know it is early and he hasn't had much time to deal with the economic crisis but based on his campaign promises I would have expected him to at least try to be true to his word in the beginning of his administration.

- On raising taxes of the middle class and lower income groups:

He could have said "I know expanding SCHIP is a good thing, but go back to the drawing board and come up with funding that is not mostly taken from the lower income groups".

- On Ethics

He should say "anyone who has cheated on their taxes will not be a part of my administration, no exceptions". The fact that one of them is now head of the IRS borders on the ridiculous.

- On the Stimulus Package

I don't know what to make of this bill. It seems to have a lot of earmark type special interest items but I guess an argument can be made that even a bridge to nowhere creates some jobs.

The beneficiary of the SCHIP program are the lower and middle class income groups, even more so with 2 million jobs lost last year. The program's approval level is among the highest of any government program. The overwhelming majority of the public wanted it expanded after two Bush vetoes. And 4 million additional kids (one fifth of whose parents are probably smokers, using the general population stats on smokers) will be eligible for health coverage.

Its easy for anyone at any income level to avoid this tax "increase".....QUIT SMOKING. It will even have the side benefit of improving your health.

And the vast majority of tax relief in the stimulus bill is targeted to the lower and middle class income groups.

I think you're are nitpicking here....sloppy vetting does not demonstrate a lack of ethics.

No one likes the idea of a $800+ billion dollar stimulus bill.....the options are to do nothing, return to the failed supply side policy of creating stimulus through tax cuts favoring the wealthiest or attempting to stimulate the economy by spending on job creation. When you spend on job creation..that money is an earmark to a city/state or an industry.

Absolutely, there are questionable projects included...a very small percentage. And I agree that they should be removed. But again, nitpicking, IMO.

I think the fact that he was open to restructuring the stimulus bill so that it is now about 60% spending/40% tax cuts was a sincere attempt at bi-partisanship.....another change from the last administration.

I was also pleased to see:

the FOIA policy reversed with a return to a presumption for releasing documents rather than searching for any legal justification to withhold documents from the public.

the cancellation of Bush's recent "fire sale" of oil/gas exploration leases in proximity to national parks

the cancellation of the Mexico City gag rule on restricting health care aid through USAID

the signing of an equal pay protection law for women to "fix" a bad Supreme Court decision, a bill that Bush had threatened to veto if it came to his desk in his last days in office

stricter ethics rules for the revolving door between government and industry

the intent to close Gitmo and to hold the CIA more accountable for renditions....

But to make any judgement of the Administration after three weeks is premature.

Even the earmarks aren't as bad as other things he's trying to ram through Congress before the country realizes what's going on. As of today, this piece of shit (not my words--I believe it was a US Senator who said it) had the support of only 37% of the population, and the favorables become fewer every day. Congressional members don't even read the things they sign under NORMAL circumstances. Maybe they aren't aware of these amnesty provisions, but the public needs to know that:

Illegal aliens will be given legal status within 24 hours, even without a complete background check. No potential for terrorism there!

US taxpayers will pay for the attorneys to represent the illegal aliens.

"Temporary" visas can be renewed indefinitely (doesn't that sound like "permanent?")

Illegal alien gang members are eligible for amnesty (there are at least 30,000 of them).

The US taxpayers will pay for education and health care for Mexicans IN MEXICO.

Illegal aliens don't have to pay back taxes, but they ARE eligible for the EIC.

Fast track for SPP.

In-state tuition for illegal aliens, but not for US citizens.

Illegals get to cut in front of people who have applied to enter legally.

Amnesty for illegals who were ordered deported.

Learning English not required until the ninth year of amnesty.

This is why he selected Leon Panetta, Bill Clinton's chief of staff,to be the CIA director. Rahm Emanuel, a senior Clinton advisor, is the new chief of staff.

Then there's Robert Reich, Eric Holder (he of Marc Rich fame), Carol Browner, Susan Rice, and Rahm Emanuel (This is a gentle soul who once wrote in Campaign and Elections magazine that “the untainted Republican has not yet been invented” and who two years ago — according to a book about Mr. Emanuel (“The Thumpin’ ” by Naftali
Bendavid) — announced to his staff that Republicans are “bad people who deserve a two-by-four upside their heads.”

He also chose Hillary to be Secretary of State. No conflict of interest there with her husband's fundraising :orly:, but she could eliminate the deficit just by investing in commodities for the country. That, and organize a mass donation of used underwear to charity.


The cream of the crop, though, are Daschle and Geithner. Daschle, of course, "isn't a lobbyist," but he was paid millions to represent a lobbying firm that was paid $16 million by some of the most powerful health care interests. What better choice for HHS could there be?

Actually, Geithner takes the cake. A tax cheat in charge of the IRS. He didn't even pay all the taxes he admitted owing; just the ones couldn't get out of paying. That's classic.

In only two weeks, Obama has selected the most corrupt appointees in history. That's not the kind of "change" we were expecting. God knows what he can do with a month or two under his belt.

Perfect. Now I remember why I hardly come here anymore.

Can you please point me to the specific language in the bill for these "provisions"

Thanks!

Im with dc dux. Could you point to the specific bills/acts that provide for this?

Marv...you can find the Senate version on the Senate Finance Committee site

see:
Complete legislative text of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

Just give me a page number please!

i just waded through hundreds of pages of the senate package before my eyes went a bit squirrely and couldn't find anything like that list of sentences that marv posted either.
maybe i was looking in the wrong place, however, by reading the actual legislation.
who knows?

but yeah, pages please.

Glad to see you are holier than though on taxes. I trust you are equally mad at Sarah Palin who did the same thing as Tom Daschel but instead of Tom decided she just wouldn't pay those taxes (if you don't know what i'm talking about look into her use of the government plane/per deim for personal trips for her family).

Also Obama is the President not a Senator. He doesn't write the bills, he can apply pressure and in the end he can either sign or veto.

Finally Obama has already opened up the government a lot more and added a lot of transparency.

So instead of increasing their taxes directly he signed a bill that taxes a product which will result in 90% of the funding coming from the middle class and lower income groups. At the very least this does not seem to follow the spirit of his no tax increases on the lower income groups. This does not seem like the Obama we heard on the campaign. I don't understand why he did not require/insist that they fund this bill with money from the higher income groups. I did not believe McCain and the Republicans during the campaign when they warned the middle class that he would raise their taxes.

Also I believe he supported some of his nominees even after their tax dodging became widely known.

when he talked about not increasing taxes on the middle and lower classes, he was clearly and obviously referring to income taxes.

I would consider it an optional user fee that contribute directly to public health.....not a broken campaign promise.

I thought this was the kind of thing he was going to change. The kind of political trickery that says to the lower income groups, we won't tax you directly but we will pass bills that result in getting your money anyway.

flstf....there was no political trickery.

Obama's public position from the start of his campaign was that he would sign the SCHIP bill that Bush vetoed twice.....not change the funding....sign the same bill.

dc_dux....You are probably right. I guess I expected that he would use his political capital to target the funding away from the lower income groups, even sin taxes.

this is an obvious problem for anyone who actually wants to promote freedom and liberty. The government is not supposed to have authority to tax activities higher than others in order to prohibit one that isn't healthy. The power to tax is the power to destroy.

This is why the single payer health package and universal healthcare should be discouraged at all costs. It will only encourage nanny staters to increase taxes on unhealthy activities so as to prohibit them, thereby forcing others to live lifestyles that only they approve of.

You mean like owning and using firearms? They ask about that a lot on those health questionnaires.

I googled some of the phrases he quoted and found some blogs dating from 2007 with the exact phrasing. My guess is it's Limbaugh bullshit, but who knows...

flstf: would it help you any if I pointed out that Obama is still an active smoker, and so will himself be contributing to SCHIP's funding?

I'm thinking it sounds more like Michael Savage bullshit. When it comes to illegal immigrants, he makes Limbaugh look like a warm and fuzzy teddy bear.

A thought occurred to me this morning... and it may be material for another thread, but...

What kind of fucking monster looks at federal bailout legislation and says, "Make federal buildings energy efficient!? No way! Stabilize declining neighborhoods? Not on my watch!" I mean, how can anyone REALLY have a problem with the things the stimulus bill actually wants to pay for (which are, by the way, VASTLY different from the right-wing mythology of what's in the bill), and still be able to sleep at night? What the hell is government FOR if not things like that?

that's one.
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 08 : 12 : 53-----
mayhaps you should actually read the constitution first? It tells everyone pretty much just what the federal government has authority to do. you might find it 'illuminating'. but then again, you probably just think we're all monsters because we don't agree with you.

Must we really have "owning and using firirearms" brought into every poitical discussion here?

There is no gun control legislation hidden in the stimuls bill or the newly enacted SCHIP extension!

-----Added 9/2/2009 at 08 : 28 : 36-----
Here we go again...another dispute about Constitutional authority and, I assume, the general welfare clause. Congress HAS the authority....whether you agree with it or not.

Where we might agree is that many of the "extras" and "wish list programs" in the stimulus bill should probably go through the normal authorization and appropriations process rather than be tucked into the stimulus bill.

But its a judgement call. I can see how COPS program funding will create jobs (thousands of new cops on the street). Its more of a stretch for programs like neighborhood stabilitization, energy efficiency, or health/wellness.

the three elements dc highlighted above seem to sum up the thinking behind the package:
a) the COPS thing breaks with the militarized los angeles mode of policing and goes back to a more neighborhood oriented mode, which required more cops walking regular beats in communities. it has never been obvious that the l.a. even made sense---treating the population as an enemy, organizing around swat teams etc.---this reduces feedback loops that connect the cops and neighborhoods---and no number of television cop shows can sell that away.

b) neighborhood stabilization is self-evidently about trying to stabilize property values. if you think that the real estate problem is *the* driver behind this mess we're in---and personally, i think it was more a trigger than anything else, that the problems it exposed/set into motion are much bigger---then it is obvious that many things need to be tried in order to stop the freefall of real estate values---too much is tied to them, for better or worse---much of which has to do with a decentralization strategy (real or apparent) from the neoliberal right to shift power away from the state by channelling more revenues to localities via the "ownership society".

lowering interest rates on mortgages will help in some areas to generate velocity and so prop up prices---easing restrictions on refinancing will have a huge effect, far more than any tax cut....and programs like neighborhood stabilization in cities particularly. it'll require more, no doubt, but it's hard to know what does and does not work until there is something that is or is not working.

c) energy and the transformation of how it's consumed is a medium-to-long run priority for the administration, and is one of the areas that is good for them to have because it gives a direction to a package that is, to my mind, still too reactive.

but it's better than nothing. the right should really stop trying to redefine it's brand and start thinking about the problems that their own economic ideology (put into practice) has generated--and get out of the way.

that said, i am not at all sure that this package is either comprehensive enough, nor does it have an adequate design to it.
but freefall is ugly, and that's what's at stake.

and I don't believe that crompsin or I were bringing gun control up as an issue. What we DID bring up though, is the premise that professions like doctors and insurance companies are asking questions about gun ownership and basing their rates or medical diagnosis on that answer. It is just another form of societal manipulation through intimidation. Which is the same thought process as those who base higher taxes on disliked activities.


general welfare can HARDLY be thought of as anything less than something that benefits the general public as a whole and NOT someones pet projects. As to p utting more cops on the street, that is supposed to be a state responsibility, not federal.

just out of curiousity, what do you imagine the functions of welfare to be, dk?

Well, the issue of "sin taxes" and the issue of invasive questionnaires are different ones. And in fact as long as medicine is private and for profit, insurance companies and doctors will ask that, and they should. The only way to price insurance in a private market is to learn about all the risky behavior. If you don't like that they ask about it and price accordingly, then you shouldn't like it that they ask people about smoking habits, drinking habits, medical history, etc, etc. Soon, they end up without a way of pricing insurance, and therefore pull out of the market. Then the only solution becomes single payer healthcare system.

Now, I am all for universal healthcare and a single payer system. It seems like you are not. Just keep in mind that as long as its a private market, they have all the right in the world to ask those questions.

Despite the actuarially indisputable fact that gun owners are vastly more likely than non-gun-owners to be involved in gun-related injury?

I'm not personally pro- or anti-gun, but the fact is, if I'm an insurance company and I want to know what level of risk I'm taking on your policy, I want to know your likelihood of getting your head blown off and one way of getting at that is to determine your gun ownership. It's not politics or some tin-hat "societal manipulation": it's BUSINESS. You know, that thing you think is GOOD and will SAVE US?

I'm talking about insurance companies here. I don't know anything about the "doctors basing their diagnosis" part of your post. That sounds like a response to some anecdote I haven't heard.

keep in mind that the english healthcare system is only one option, and it's not the best one. check out the french system sometime if you want an example of a more differentiated, and far more effective, alternative to american-style barbarism on health care.

the 'general welfare' clause in the constitution would be things related nationally, like interstate highways and such. welfare, as commonly thought of as government assistance for below poverty income homes, is a state function and has no business being in a federal spending/stimulus package.
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 11 : 24 : 03-----
In free market, a doctors practice can certainly ask those questions, and I'm certainly free to find a doctor that doesn't consider it his business. As to the theory of insurance companies pulling out of the market because they can't price policies? not buying it. there will always be another company coming in to alter their rates and take up the business.

do you think in the universal system you are wanting, these questions will not be asked?

The one thing I truly do not understand is how do you justify raising taxes on something like tobacco products and expect more income from that?

You get people who will refuse to pay the prices and quit, thus in actuality lowering the revenue you counted on.

From there what? Do you continue to raise those taxes until you have totally abolished that revenue? And if you do, then what? Do you start taxing other things the government deems "unhealthy" into a black market and where no revenue to speak of comes from?

I question government's true agenda when things like this are done, because it does not help revenue in the long run, it seeks only to control behaviors through taxing. By trying to control behavior through taxation, smacks our forefathers in the face and takes away the civil liberties and freedoms that they risked everything to fight for in building this country.

Ah, but what did they know? Those principles and ideas are outdated. To me freedom is never outdated and taxing behaviors out of the hands of the people is no, not, never freedom. It is the beginning of tyranny and a self righteous government that will crush anyone who questions it.

That is about as relevant as claiming that car owners are vastly more likely to be involved in an auto accident than non car owners.

and as long as the insurance market stays free and open, gun owners will be free to find insurance companies that suit them by NOT asking those questions. Not so with a closed market under single payer.

since you're neither pro or anti gun and most likely do not follow that issue, I'm not surprised that you've not heard of it happening. It's simply not on your radar.

well, dk, things have changed since world war 1, like it or not.
it makes no sense to allow your strict construction position to run you in this direction on questions of social welfare.
at least with guns, i can see why you do it--but on this question--which i expect also extends in its basic logic to objections to national income taxation--you end up detaching from reality.

i suppose that underlying this strict construction business is another position that you've not explained--so what do you imagine the functions of welfare to be? what is your position in relation to it as a way of dealing with those functions? what alternative would you prefer to see?
this beyond the pseudo-legal response above please.

nice, no rhetoric involved there, eh?
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 11 : 37 : 50-----
so some things have changed....so what? when you apply your living and fluid desire for adaptability by heavily reducing constraints applied to the government by legal doctrine, you end up with an even bigger mess than what you had before. Look at us since 1929 and you'll see why. When this country had a rigid legal doctrine to work with and follow, we saw a lot less controversy over the minutest of things, but nowadays we are inundated with trivial arguments brought before a judiciary who are expected to rule on ever changing things. What kind of societal consistance does one expect from that? How does anyone ever know where one stands on an issue? It's real simple, one doesn't know....until they've found themselves afoul of the government or a community because they offended someone. It's totally ridiculous.

It has been well established that provision of insurance generally only takes place when they can estimate the risks associated with any person. As you can imagine, insurance companies are not mandated to ask any sort of questions. They do because that is how they can best operate in a free market. To defend a free market for health care and then complain about how it asks unfair questions is simply short sighted.

But let me make the argument more explicit for you. It is an argument that won a few economists the nobel prize: when you can't differentiate between people who are low risk and people who are high risk, you have no way of determining the adequate price each should pay. If they charge the "low risk" price out of everyone, they will go broke because high risk people will drive costs up. If they charge the high risk price, or even the "average" price, out of everyone, they'd be essentially overcharging low risk people, who would either migrate to a company that recognized their status as low risk by asking intrusive questions, or would forgo insurance altogether.

So you end up with a situation where the company that doesnt differentiate between low risk and high risk clients ends up with only high risk clients. That is why private healthcare advocates defend those types of questions. Otherwise, it really isnt a free market (which is why I find it ironic that you complain about that and defend private insurance at the same time. There is a reason all insurers ask that question).

And I have lived in countries with universal healthcare and visited many. None ever ask about guns, and generally only ask about lifestyle questions when its relevant.
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 11 : 51 : 25-----
I am curious as well. Any evidence of doctors changing diagnostics based on gun ownership? It is not on my radar, but it would be nice to have a concrete example at least, instead "it happens and I know because I am pro gun."

dk--i don't know what you're talking about above. could you explain it more please?
it looks like you're not answering my question and instead are repeating the outlines of a strict construction "problem" with everything that's happened legally since 1789.

as for the american health system as barbarism--actually it isn't particularly rhetorical. within this system, the lives of the children of the affluent are worth more than the lives of the children of the poor, if you measure it by access to basic health care, which is obviously a significant factor in determining quality of life. that's barbarism. nothing rhetorical about it.

In the universal single payer system I have, I'm not asked those questions. The state-funded healthcare system doesn't need to ask such things, because everybody qualifies anyway. Private insurance makes up the difference, paying for things like prescriptions. I have full coverage of my prescriptions with a $7 co-pay, optical and dental. I get all of this for peanuts -- $9 per week. When I applied? No questions about pre-existing conditions, no questions about firearms. Age, marital status, smoker or non smoker. Bam! Done.

A universal healthcare system makes a lot of the currently asked questions irrelevant. If your insurance company doesn't have to pay for the treatment of your gunshot wound, they don't give two shits about how many guns you own. Assuming you lot were to institute a system similar to ours, my thinking is that you'd get hassled less about your guns.

Just sayin'.

Roach, i've tried explaining things very simply to you in the past and have been met with pretty much the same answers you have given now. I don't know what else you are looking for except for maybe me to say you were right and I was wrong. What I'm saying now and have said in the past, is that you want every issue decided by government taking in to account where are times and situations stand at that precise moment in time and for them to arbitrarily decide whats best for all of us. That is not their job, in the 'strict construction' sense. We had that fluid system at one time and it was decided to break away from that and form a freer nation with government under our control. Going back to it is not something i'm willing to do.

the obvious fix to that is to open up the health care market instead of constraining it to a flowchart system of how to's with a limited and prescribed course of treatment/action. Medical prices are sky high now because health insurance companies rule the medical field, making decisions for doctors based on cost. This is wrong headed and has caused the 'barbarism' you speak of.

dk--to be clear, the logic of these responses from you is very simple and clear. so much so in the way of simplicity that i have a hard time imagining that you actually think this way---whence the responses from me. i'm trying to figure it out, how this position you occupy holds together. i don't think it does really, but that's a different matter, for another time or not as the case may be.

in the case of guns, your strict construction viewpoint is coherent because it is either a screen for or an aspect of a political viewpoint that is entirely outside the arguments that you make about the constitution---in that, you argue for the narrowest possible (tipping into the arbitrary) interpretation of the 2nd amendment because you are freaked out about change to it--and so are freaked out about the constitutional system in the name of the constitution.

so i assumed that there was something comparable on welfare programs, that the real issue for you is outside the argument that you're making, but shapes that argument by giving it a direction. my sense is that you don't want to come out and say why you oppose welfare programs, if you in fact do, on other than strict construction grounds--but i've found in general that's typically the case for folk who occupy that position on the constitution. it lets them argue against things without avowing where that argument's coming from, what animates or shapes it.

but it's hard to say the extent to which this is speculative (the motive business just above), so i just put it out as a reading of your sentences with no particular weight beyond that.

Another small but symbolic change:

A president who is not afraid to face the public and take tough questions....how refreshing!

I'm not sure where you got the notion or idea that i'm against welfare programs. I've known some very decent people who had the unfortunate experience to have to use them, in fact, i've come very close on occasion myself in the past. Welfare programs can provide a great temporary relief for those that find themselves truly in need and I think they should continue to be used.......but at the state level only where they belong. In my view, the general welfare clause in the US constitution does not authorize the kind of welfare we are talking about right here and now.
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 01 : 24 : 29-----
I look forward to seeing how this turns out. Hopefully the far left groups and politicians can avoid creating another joe the plumber.

i just wondered, dk, where you were coming from on this.
to go further would probably be a threadjack, so i'll leave it at this.

I used to work for Fedex in my early college days, a job which would take me as a delivery driver into some of the poorest parts of town. I was always amazed by the number of high-end $50k SUVs and late-model Cadillacs in the driveways, especially in the trailer parks. Those folks sure love them some Cadillac, with 2-tone Earl Sheib paintjobs and 22" chrome spinner rims you could see from orbit. I would see these same cars everyday, at the same time of day: mid-mornings and mid-afternoons.

As for Obamas performance so far, he's sure doing a lot of talking.

This just in, nice cars allowed in poor neighborhoods... Film at 11.

are you simply being obtuse? or are you really missing the point?

gee, what *could" powerclown's "point" be?
it is most mysterious, don't you think?

I really hope no one is insinuating that someone can afford a Cadillac with welfare checks

What? People who live in trailer parks and work evening jobs such as in restaurants and other service industries happen to be home during the day and like to drive Cadillac? (Wage and shift-work earners often don't do the 9 to 5 thing.)

Or that relatively few people who own luxury cars actually do without financing them, making them "affordable" so long as you have the monthly cash flow?

Maybe I'm obtuse....

What's the point?

Powerclown.

Please describe in detail who 'those folk' are,
what they look like, height, weight, complexion.
Pretend you are giving a description to the police, of one of 'those folk'

I dare you.

I'm not missing the point. Frankly, the point was fucking dumb. If Mr. Clown wants to make a point about the abuse of the social safety net, he should just do so, preferably without relying on useless "well I saw someone once who did something" anecdotes.

One would have to be pretty obtuse to think that the only people who own nice cars in poor neighborhoods are people who are cheating welfare.

oh, i get it. because someone didn't bring in signed affidavits, sworn on some sort of bible, testified in a court of law, broadcast it in the media, it obviously doesn't fucking happen. Because I see someone in a grocery store line using food stamps to buy milk, bread, and cereal while wearing more gold chains that Mr. T, leather jackets that cost as much as two months of my car payment, and load those groceries up in a Lexus to take home to a run down trailer park, I should just assume that they know how to manage their finances or some stupid shit. get fucking real for a change.

You people come fly in to Detroit this weekend and I'll take you on The Tour, as my ex-fellow employees used to joke about. Block after block of neigborhoods with cars worth 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of the houses they were parked in front of. I'm not saying they're all owned by welfare kings and queens; there's probably a middle manager or boss' kid in their somewhere...

My girlfriend works in foodstamps. Literally. She's a lead case worker for our county, personally administering over 500 food aid cases and leading a team of case workers who serve over 8000 households. I can promise you, from the many things she's told me, that your grocery store thug-caricature welfare cheat is a VAST outlier.

Forgive me, but I'll go with her anecdotal evidence over yours.

1- Ever hear of confirmation bias?

2- This idea that welfare recipients are somehow all swimming in cash is beyond ludicrous and poorly evidenced. Anyone who knows how much people on welfare actually get, and how many requirements and regulations there are for actually getting welfare, would know how cases of abuse of the system are so few and far between.
-----Added 9/2/2009 at 09 : 43 : 03-----
Unless you somehow know how many of these people actually are on welfare, or are paying for these cars with welfare checks, the ratio of car price/ house price is really irrelevant, unless you think it is your place to legislate how others spend money.

You don't need a signed affadavit, you just need the ability to recognize the usefulness of anecdotal evidence. Let me help you out: anecdotal evidence is useful for appealing to people on an emotional level. Beyond that it doesn't mean anything. You saw a poor guy with a nice jacket? So the fuck what? I saw a guy in a sports car use a racial slur-- I guess everyone who drives a sports car is a bigot.

If every time you happen to notice that someone who lives in a poor neighborhood has something nice you think to yourself "welfare cheat," then you are an idiot (and I'm not saying that you do).

You don't know what you're saying, because you're not really saying anything at all. You don't know anything about these people. From what I've heard of Detroit, most cars are worth 1/3 to 1/2 the price of an average house.

This is like the Cadillac welfare mama stories back in the 70's. A few people get caught collecting welfare under several names and the press picks up on it and it becomes mainstream that everyone living on welfare drives a caddy. I'm not saying DK's story's not true, hell probably is and the guy should be charged with everything possible. But after working with the gov'mint I'm with you they're VAST outliers.

Not sure about your wife's experience but in mine the people turning these cheats in are other program "customers." Partly I suspect due to jealously but largely due to, as one lady told me- "They're going to fuck it up for the rest of us! I'm doing job training from 6am til 3pm and then pumping gas until midnight just to keep my kids health ins. going. And that SOB is going to get this program shut down. Fuck that noise."

you people crack me up. If this was a republican president and republican majority congress, y'all would be ripping it up and down.

this makes me laugh.

poor petit-bourgeois conservatives, the ultimate victims....everyone takes advantage, and none more than those undeserving Others living in that lap of luxury that is welfare.

but no, this is not being made up: any one of us can go on a "see what you want to see" tour of detriot for "evidence" of what would otherwise be nothing more than a tiresome repetition of an old school far right canard, a limbaugh special, that kind of lovely stuff that makes racism seem respectable and class biais disappear. why that's just the way the world is and you, dittohead, are the ultimate victim of a malicious system gone mad. the good old days, that's what we want, when everyone knew their place and stayed there, "when the movies were in black and white and so was everything else," like gil scott-heron said once.

funny that this would come up in this particular thread.
it's hard not to wonder about the connections and what's really being said here.
maybe it's better not to think too hard about it lest things get ugly.

of course, since it's a liberal plan being railed against, it obviously makes me a whining conservative, regardless of the fact that my entire time on here would make any logical person see me as a libertarian and not a conservative. But i'm sure it makes it all good in your emotional mind that you can rationalize it as just conservative hatred and resentment, since that places your mindset on your own solid footing and not disturb the shifting sands under your feet. go with that and peace be upon you

Can't speak for "you people" but I know I've been ripping on the GOP's spending for years. They took tax and spend democrat and made it worse... borrow and spend GOP. Bush vetoed how many spending bills? Now we're in a shit hole and almost every recognized economist I've heard or read seems to think only the federal government has the power to stimulate the economy enough to pull us out of this nose dive.

Obama's been in office less then a month. I'm willing to give him a little time and support. And even though I supported Obama I would have been willing to support McCain and hoped he succeeded had he won.

Y'know, i go through Detroit often, and i have yet to see a really nice car in a poor neighbourhood. In fact, the number of vehicles is rather low. Parking is pretty easy, and not what you'd expect if everyone were driving fatass cars. Do you ever ride the bus in Detroit? I do, and i can tell you, by and large, who rides. It's people, who according to your view of things, ought to be riding the bus.
Does that comfort you?

The whole argument is absurd anyway. John Thain and his ilk were scamming you for millions and billions with the aid of yourveryownpreznitbush and you're worried that some sortafancy car in youridea of a bad neighbourhood belongs to someone who might be a Welfare Scammer? And how many Caddies could be bought with the money dumped down the shithole in Iraq and Afghanistan, money that would have been better spent on buying the whole country drugs -- the buzz being more real than any benefit derived from Iraq or Afghanistan adventures -- or even simply burnt in an immense potlatch?

I think people here are being fairly consistent. I think that the really inconsistent position has been the republican one (and Im no democrat), who, after 8 years of uncontrolled spending during an expansion, who, after requesting more pork to approve their own president's bail out plan, have suddenly remembered that they are against spending just as the economy takes the worst nosedive in 30 years, a nose dive that next month should reach levels not seen since the great depression.

I can't think of a worse timing for rediscovering one's own claims to fiscal responsibility.

dk...i wasn't addressing you in particular.

we all know what is being said here.

i'm just waiting for the mistake to happen.

NEWSFLASH: Some people who are on food stamps are making money via illegal means. More at 11

I can't even imagine a Republican president or Republican majority congress doing something like this.

Look, I'm not saying its a pandemic here, all I'm saying is I used to see it all the time. I don't know if they were scamming welfare, slinging dope, teaching history at UofM Ann Arbor, working the midnight shift on the line or doing corporate accounting on the 35th floor of the RenCen. You tell me how someone can afford a $50k car to go with their $75k house, or maybe thats why we're in the financial crisis we're in right now?

Car value/house value ratio as a measure of the economy?

Voodoo economics redux.

What sort of world do you live in where this question even makes sense to ask?

What does the value of a person's house have to do with the ability of someone living at that house to afford a quasi-luxury automobile?
-----Added 10/2/2009 at 12 : 59 : 59-----
Well, if you look at the car value/house value ratio in the years following the great depression you'd see that the New Deal only served to prolong the general economic malai-blahblaladsaghsds fsdajlfsdkgndaskgndsklgndsal;ngdslk;sdng.....

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the giant sucking sound continued.

Very good point .... SEE POST BELOW
-----Added 10/2/2009 at 02 : 50 : 25-----
???????sdrawkcab tuo gnimoc ereh epyt I gnihtyreve si yhW
-----Added 10/2/2009 at 03 : 02 : 54-----
hmmm must have been a bug. I work in the hood, the only people driving cars more than probably $10K are known drug dealers in the neighborhood. Even the Yuppies (if still called that) who own because taxes are low and housing was cheap, drive cheap cars because they know they will be stolen or ransacked.

So, I really would like to know how people in section 8 housing or wityh minimum wage jobs own houses worth $50K and drive $75K cars. Maybe we need to check welfare reform or enforce the laws.

I know my grandma lives in subsidized housing and rent is 1/3 of her income, plus interest from the bank, plus any property of value like a car or so on. If she shows a huge withdrawal (for her account) in a one years time they question her as to why. (She helped me at times during my addiction and helped me buy my pizza place) When she told them it was for a relative, they gave her credit for a certain amount but still charged her that year as though the rest was accruing interest. That was between 1994 and when she had given it all away to my mom, sister and I.

Yet, in the same elderly complex people would drive brand new Volvos and so on and pay very little, they would brag at card night on Mondays. Plus, some of the people on disability would be under 65 and have large screen tvs, very nice cars and so on.

Fraud is fraud no matter what class or level it comes from.
-----Added 10/2/2009 at 03 : 04 : 39-----
weird now posts are all screwy and out of order......

You seem to go from "it's everywhere!" to "I'm not really saying it's everywhere" rather quickly.

Ever think maybe there's a less evil explanation? I don't have any experience working with people in large urban areas but I do in rural Oregon. There it's not all that uncommon for people to live in a POS single wide trailer worth about 8-10K and drive a 35-40K truck. Complete with lift kit, sound system and custom rims. Maybe, just maybe, not all people have the same priorities when it comes to housing and the vehicles they own.

You people crack me up. If a republican uses fear tactics to borrow and spend it's the fuckin' end of society as we know it but if a socialist uses those fear tactics packaged differently to pass a 1 trillion dollar borrow and spend bill it's heavenly bliss. What the fuck? I guarantee if this was happening 6 months ago 90% of the people in favor of this bill now would be shitting their pants over this massive spending bill. On that note I think if everyone looked at things objectively instead of through glasses shaded either red or blue we might actually come up with something that will help all Americans instead of this bullshit pass it fast and spend, spend, spend and spend some more as fast as we can. If this is the best we can do then we are in deep shit. Unfortunately both sides are clinging to their pet projects rather than doing what's best for America. The Republicans are clinging to those tax cuts and the Democrats are clinging to expanded government meanwhile the middle class gets pinched.

If you looked at things objectively, you'd know Obama isn't a socialist; that the bill is just over $800 billion, not $1 trillion; that there is a lot of spending that will directly and indirectly help the middle class; and that many realize this is just one part of the overall solution, not "heavenly bliss."

And I think more people are after the Republicans (who aren't fascists, btw) about their history of war measures than they'd be after them about stimulus packages if they were still in power.

Do us a favor and go to sleep for another eight years, k?

How can spending TRILLIONS to stabilize Iraq be right and spending BILLIONS to stabilize America be wrong? Am I taking crazy pills?

WTF are you talking about?

You know, it's in the same alternate universe where we're all complaining about those mean republicans and their overspending, undertaxcutting stimulus plan.

Little testy today are we? Was there a need to get personal?

scout: looking objectively, what would you come up with?

A proposal that has a greater likelihood of success than the current Senate bill:

with 60% spending/40% tax cuts...most of it targeted and allocated relatively quickly.

that has removed more than $100 billion in pork and projects deemed not to provide direct stimulus

a CBO estimate of potentially creating 3-4 million jobs in 18 months

and that has the support of both the business community (US Chamber of Commerce, National Assoc. of Manufacturing) and the labor community

How slowly should we proceed with job loss at 500,000/month?

My choice would be even more spending but Obama is committed to reaching across the aisle with the inclusion of that 40% in tax relief.

I dont know anyone who likes any of the options and most objective observers understand that they are no guarantees.
-----Added 10/2/2009 at 10 : 29 : 07-----
I'm waiting for a better proposal from the Republicans who voted NO.

What I see instead is a strategy to dig in their heals, gamble that the program fails and then use that failure as the campaign issue in 2010.

1- you don't know what socialism is
2- It is not a scare tactic when the economy really is that bad. In terms of jobs lost so far, this recession is already as bad as any recession weve had since the great depression. And if february is anything like january, this will officially become the worst recession since the great depression.

Agreed.

Fear mongering with bogus charges of socialism is hardly a constructive proposal or solution.

Is it just me who thinks those opposed to this bill are playing partisan politics...

ace suggesting that we're just in your average cyclical recession that the free market can "fix" if left alone, with which very few economists across the ideological spectrum agree.

marv suggesting that its a citizenship and prosperity bill for illegal immigrants.

scout playing the socialism card

...rather than offering viable solutions.

I dont think its "too heated" to raise such a question.

you've obviously mistaken me for someone who approved of bush and his spending

Sorry, I know you're sensitive about vampires, it won't happen again. ;)

You ignore history, I don't.

The US economy has been through 15 or 16 recessions or depressions give or take depending on a few factors. the US economy recovered from each without massive spending in each prior to 1929. The depression in 1929 was made worse by government incompetence and the New Deal by FDR (massive spending programs) did nothing to stimulate the economy. WWII was the stimulus that got the recovery going.

Also, your assumption that I am wrong about my position on government "stimulus" spending is based on a failure to look at the costs of government spending. You ignore the impact of deficit spending, inflation and taxation. In my analysis, I don't.

isn't it just a little dishonest to compare this recession to any of the previous ones?

what analysis, ace? you don't offer anything even remotely like an analysis. you bite editorials from investor's business daily that resonate with your preconceptions. that's not research, and the results are not analysis.

and i can tell you that your claim to be attentive to history is ridiculous.

i've seen nothing from you that remotely approaches a demonstration of your claim that this is just a routine blip in the normal cycles of capitalism---it flies in the face of the empirical world---so is operates in a space between the counter-intuitive and the zany.

so put up or shut up, ace. show your research and maybe we can talk about that.