Rekna

So was the name tea party chosen because of the Boston tea party? And is this the movements way of saying we need to overthrow the government?

Sun Tzu

I think only a fusion center would be able to answer that.

__________________
To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit.- Stephen Hawking

dippin

This is one of the problems with things like this tea party... It's all outrage, no math.

Ok, let's cut aid to foreign countries. I've no problem with that, since so much of it goes to things like weapons to Israel, Egypt and Pakistan, and plan Colombia. But all outrage aside, foreign aid is about one tenth of one percent of American GDP. In terms of reverting the current economic situation, that is pretty much meaningless.

Then we might require colleges to lower their tuition. Except that most federal monies that go to universities are tied to specific scientific grants, and except that virtually every college is facing budget cuts, increasing class sizes and letting faculty go. So this is another proposal that might make one feel good, but yet again is either meaningless or harmful. After all, either colleges that are already facing budget shortfalls have to go deeper into the hole and cut more spending, or we cancel stuff like funding for laboratories because they won't lower tuition.

And then we raise tariffs. And while people may argue about tariffs and trade during normal times, the first thing one has to keep in mind is that in the short term, prices go up, and cost of business goes up.


Won't disagree with much here, except that this costs a lot of money. In fact, that is the precise reason why I find the so-called tea parties ridiculous. It's all about "our money," "our taxes" and so on, but they ignore the basic math of the budget. There is no free lunch. Healthcare is already close of 20% of the budget. Defense is close to 21% of the budget. Soc. sec. pensions are another 18%. In fact, if you look at the three levels of government, education, pensions, military, public safety, infrastructure and interest on previous debt you are talking pretty much about 3/4 of total spending.

Does that mean that we can cut the other 25% and reduce our taxes? No. Current tax levels cannot pay for even that without running a deficit. In other words, even cutting all money to banks, all "pork projects," all welfare spending, all foreign aid, and running the government, elections, the court system, congress, regulatory agencies and etc. for free, taxes would still not be enough to pay for these things.

And so people get together, and work themselves into a fit over "our money," but the fact is, this is nothing more than a distraction. People love the things they get from government, and only in the minds of dishonest politicians can we run these things and get tax breaks.


Yeah, those bonuses sure do suck. But other than fuel outrage, it's really irrelevant. It is 1/1000 of the money being given to AIG. Of course, that doesnt mean that they are alright, but simply that, despicable as they might be, they don't change much.

Do I like the way the Obama team is handling the banking crisis? I've said again and again that no, I don't. But, as I posted above, it is simply dishonest to think that there is an alternative that doesn't involve public money. I've said what I had to say about this above, and since that didn't elicit a response, I am not going to repeat myself.


I don't know if polls matter of not, but the majority of the people, according to all polls, are still behind Obama.



Well, the bill has been available for a long time now and people still haven't read it.

So here you are either conflating the bailout with the stimulus bill, or you haven't read the stimulus bill.

Taking Apart the $819 billion Stimulus Package - washingtonpost.com

22% are tax cuts, so I guess that helps the average citizen. 11% is education, and since you said you are in favor of more education spending, I guess that also helps the average citizen. And on and on.


Pollster.com: National Job Approval: Pres. Barack Obama

Pollster.com: US: Obama, Stimulus (CNN-2/18-19)




Outrage is no substitute for a plan.

dc_dux

All of these, in some form or to some extent, are in the Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ERRA)


The largest investment in rebuilding the infrastructure in 50+ years is in the ERRA (not the cutting foreign aid part)

See the Making Home Affordable Program...that is pretty much what the program does.

Much of what you were asking for above as well is in other initiatives like the Making Home Affordable program


Despite all of the above that you want to see, you are highly critical ...calling it lip service after only 60 days.

Sorry, but IMO, that is an emotional response.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

roachboy

it's interesting the extent to which what the administration is doing is being buried beneath a chorus of calls for the administration to do something.
there appears to be a basic communication disconnect.
some of this obviously comes from conservatives---when i have the ambiguous fortune of seeing one nattering away on television, doing that thing that the right has perfected, which is talking in sound bytes--simple statements that work witin the constraints of an ADD medium---the dominant "ideas" are double: the obama administration should implement an entirely conservative economic agenda, despite the fact that such an agenda would do NOTHING to address ANY of the problems that the administration--and the rest of us--are facing down, coherently or not--and the flip is to say that unless an entirely conservative economic agenda is adopted, that nothing is happening.

or that what is happening is anathema.

which indicates that the framework which shapes conservative economic thinking is being outstripped by reality, but that the folk who invest in that framework still repeat it, as if it were adequate descriptively, as if it was able to generate coherent actions. but it can't do either, and you can watch this being demonstrated on any number of "fair and balanced" television presentations.

but i think there is another problem as well, but i'm not sure i have a handle on it exactly--but it seems to me that the administration does have an idea of the direction it intends, but that for some reason it is shy about coming out and saying it, preferring instead to present it piecemeal. this seems a tactical decision, but i am not sure i understand the rationale behind it. it's as if there's something to be gained by presenting the moves they are making as extensions of "normalcy" and therefore as ways "back to normal" when the fact is that that "normal" is in all probability finished.

there's a real gap between how this situation---the crisis if you like---looks at a transnational level and how it's being spun for domestic consumption. it's curious.

i take these tea parties as a meaningless gesture conditioned by the strangely myopic views of what's happening that emerge from domestic infotainment cycles, and the administration as having adopted information tactics that are geared perhaps too much around those cycles.

its a strange business.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

silent_jay

Really? You had a hard on for Obama since before the election, so I highly doubt you would have been willing to believe anything about Obama aside from that he's doing a shitty job in your mind. Remember those posts pan? The ones that turned into hate Obama and pity you threads? I sure do. Also I've been reading your posts with a Bush voice in my head, sounds pretty good, dubya could have written those posts.

__________________
Absence makes the heart grow fonder

dc_dux

They do have a catchy anthem:

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

dksuddeth

dc, those suggestions/recommendations are not put up there as a cure to fix the economy, they are there to prevent FUTURE occurrences of what we are no experiencing. A major portion of blame for this economic mess lies squarely in the laps of elected people/groups that have been there for YEARS and DECADES. Entrenched power often finds ways to bend, stretch, and then break the lines of ethics and morality for it's own convenience and enrichment, usually at the expense of those that put them there.

Our job as 'we the people' is to rein in and limit the governments power, not to praise it for doing the job we tell it to like it's our child.

---------- Post added at 09:48 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:42 AM ----------

The original boston tea party was not a call to overthrow the government. At the time of that 'party', we were still under english rule. The tea party was a tax protest, just like this one is.

One thing I'd truly enjoy seeing from alot of people entrenched in the left or right is to realize that protestation does not equate wanting to overthrow the government.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

roachboy

dk---i don't think you understand what's taking place--if this really is a mutation in the overall organization of capitalism (at the political level more than at the economic--and if you look at what's going in, things certainly appear to be heading in that direction) it follows that there is almost no likelihood that this sort of situation will repeat. so i don't understand what your motivation would be in preventing something that is impossible. but whatever.

it seems to me that your a priori fear of the state makes it impossible for you to think of anything that can or should be done in the present situation beyond allowing everything to implode. maybe that is your idea--such an implosion might be the greatest opportunity for the extreme right to creep out from total marginalization you'll see in your lifetime--but if that's the idea, you should be up front about it, and not pretend that you have something constructive to add if the question is what should happen, what the administration should be doing that it isn't doing, etc.

because your position about the state is rigidly a priori, and requires no new information to function, it follows that your position about taxation would also be rigid.

enjoy the teapartying then.
it may be fun theater, but it's not about relaying a coherent message.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

dksuddeth

rb, I really tried to read and understand your post, but it's completely impossible to take it seriously when you take something that is polar opposite of what you believe in, label it as an extreme opposite of what you believe in, slap the generalization that it's only being done because it's polar opposite of what you believe in and that those polar opposites don't have anything else to offer that agrees with what you believe in, and then dismiss it out of hand because it's polar opposite of what you believe in.

you and i are never going to agree on anything and that is fine. we're polar opposites and will continue to butt heads and i'm not even going to try to offer rebuttals to your labels of 'extremism on the right', because it will do no good.

you do your thing, i'll do mine.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

roachboy

dk---here's a simple version.

you oppose state power in principle. that's fair, right?
you have a problem with taxation because it is an expression of state power, right?
your view of the proper role of the state is of a piece with your interpretation of the constitution, which is that it says what it says and should not be interpreted (strict construction).

that's basically how i see your positions, from reading alot of your posts.

if that's the case, then i don't see what you could possibly support that could be done to address the ongoing economic crisis.

but let me ask you rather than try to derive things: what do you think can and/or should be done to address the situation we collectively find ourselves in?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

dksuddeth

we've had several threads where my views on the constitution are very plain. put simply, I do firmly believe that the constitution LIMITS government power and that those limits should be strictly enforced to protect the freedom and liberties of the people.

Every business/institution that found itself in trouble, for whatever reason, should have been allowed to flounder until they could recover or they finally failed. Lot's of people are of the belief that letting these companies fail would totally destroy our economy and shatter millions of lives, therefore we cannot allow that to happen, but did these companies (and us especially) learn anything other than the age old method of 'throw money at the problem'? No, in fact we learned absolutely nothing except that we should practice Einsteins theory of insanity.

Why do I think those companies should be allowed to fail, even if it destroys our own personal economies? Because it's the best damned way to learn to never do that stupid assed shit again. Failure and it's consequences are the absolute best way to learn from mistakes.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

dippin

My problems with the current "tax protest" is how completely unrealistic it is.

My point is simple: it is absolutely impossible to cut taxes permanently, or even to keep them the way they are permanently, without cutting either military spending, medicare, or social security pensions.

It is a mathematical impossibility, unless people project much higher growth rates for the future than what we've had in the past 100 years.

Unfortunately, the people sponsoring these tea parties are completely in denial over this, for political expediency. They get outraged over pork spending, bailouts (never mind that the alternative also includes public funds) and so on, but ignore completely that even if we spent nothing on these things, current tax rates would still be insufficient.

Sun Tzu

Enact the HR 833 bill, suspend all federal income taxes for a year, if not indefinitely.

---------- Post added at 09:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:53 AM ----------

What do we do in life that isnt taxed? Is that the way its supposed to be? Do you know how much the state wasted lasted year? How much is unaccounted for?

No one seems to have a problem on the hidden tax American's pay for assuming the Fed is part of the government and being in charge of the economy.

__________________
To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit.- Stephen Hawking

dippin

Absolutely none of this changes the fact that without cutting military spending, social security and medicare, it is simply impossible to have a permanent tax cut.

Derwood

How will that help our national debt problem again? How do we pay for anything?

pan6467

So the responses I got from Dippin and Dc were in a nutshell:

What you propose is spending too much....


Yet it's ok to give BILLIONS to the banks that raise credit card rates, fees and are truly doing nothing to help people.

If one proposes ways to help the country, they are foolish and it'll cost too much.

Give Obama time, trust him, this is different, in 60 days you expect too much

We don't have time. Trust him.... umm "change" means putting people in your cabinet that have been in power and are partially responsible for the mess we are in? How is this different.... if you speak out against Obama you aren't giving him a chance, you are hateful, emotional, led like a sheep, partisan and have no idea what you are talking about.... sounds exactly like what the GOP said about those speaking out against Bush and ummmmm they in the end were proven right to have spoken out. In 60 days I expect the man who said government will be more open, there will be a new way of doing business to uphold that promise.... yet in less than 60 days he has forgotten about all that. 24/48 hours to read the stimulus package with no debate???? That's open. All the pork and the AIG bonuses that were allowed PAID FOR BY OUR MONEY while we are hoping to just make another paycheck.... fake outrage and finger pointing when the bonuses are leaked out, excuses that "it's only 1/1000 of the TAXPAYER MONEY we are giving them". While Obama tells us we have to sacrifice, we have to lower our standard of living?????? We do it's called taxes. What does he sacrifice, what does Congress sacrifice, what are the banks sacrificing, what is AIG sacrificing?????

You're being emotional

Emotion comes when all other avenues have been tried and failed. Government has failed the people, they are full of extremists who are bought and paid for by the ultra rich and lobbyists. They spend our money and raise taxes as they please and damn the people.

We don't have time anymore. What are we supposed to give Obama 3 years while we flounder, put band aids on wounds that need serious stitches and surgeries and pretend everything is ok as our taxes are used to bail out the rich?

And all the while they take freedoms away, tell us who pay their wages and put them into office to sacrifice while they get whatever they want, guaranteed healthcare for life, guaranteed pensions, guaranteed expense monies they really do not have to be accountable for, to ignore the polls that show the majority wants tightened border security, a more representative tax system and so on..... and never visit their districts and talk to their constituencies to see how the people truly feel?

We are to continue supporting all this because of why?

And if we speak out.... we are wrong for any number of reasons, but primarily we are wrong solely because you are now in power and you don't want to give any of it away back to the people.

We have a president that laughs on national television about our crisis and is asked by the interviewer in amazement if he (the president) is punchdrunk... and that's ok? You want me to give him more time, to trust that??? If that had been Bush, Clinton, Reagan, Nixon, Carter, any other president there would have been outrage and people demanding his job.... but the press and extreme left make excuses and act like it's ok for him to laugh on national television at the American people and the mess we are in.

We are being taxed to death and it's not enough???????? How much more from us do they want?

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

dippin

Who said anything about being ok?

What I said simply refers to the math of it all. You can't solve math with emotion.

The banks that are failing are failing because they owe more than what they are worth. That is, the assets that they have are worth less than the obligations.

You want them to extend more credit at lower rates? Great, but to do so will require even more money from the tax payer. Whether they are "nice" or "greedy" doesn't matter.

Oh, so you then prefer to let them fail? Great, too, except that this will also require money from the tax payer.


The problem is not that we think what is being done is "ok,"

The problem is that the solution to this is not to propose mathematical impossibilities and then try to cover up that fact with outrage.

dksuddeth

I hear what you're saying, but the real hurdle that sits in front of us is not how much to cut taxes, but where to cut them at. Both sides have particulars in where they want to see tax cuts/budget cuts, but can't come to compromise on them.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

roachboy

what i really can't figure out is how exactly folk can simultaneously expect an expansion of state activity to stabilize the economic system as a system (and not so much as an accumulation of individual firms)---which it seems that folk want, one way or another, if they like the way of life that they have----and expect more tax cuts at the same time.

it really doesn't make sense.

personally, i think the biggest single area of wasted expenditure from the federal government is military procurement and by extension the entire national-security state...but that is a republican fave in terms of patronage so curiously seems not to be subject to significant rethinking.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

pan6467

Well, what is your solution, to blindly follow Obama and Congress and believe they have your or the majority of people's best interests at hand. That's just naive.

.

No, but you can take the ideas and work with the people and find ways to make it work instead of just throwing money to the rich and hoping it trickles down.

By the way, there was no new spending in the medical solution I gave just streamlining and forcing the pharms to be accountable and letting them control their patent longer.... why is that not feasible?

The banks are failing? Really? I guess that's why PNC was able to take their bailout money and buy a viable bank that was in pretty good shape. I guess back a few years ago government should have done something about leveraged buyouts instead of giving them green lights and turning blind eyes.

Bullshit. My Chase card went from 9.9% to 24.9%, never missed a payment always paid more than the minimum and 1 time I was late by 1 day, even called them a week before... too bad so sad. The bailout money should have been enough. Obviously it isn't obviously the banks who are getting TAX MONEY to bail themselves out would still rather kick people while they are down then work with them. So why are we bailing them out? Chase by the way took bail out money and bought WaMu and is not hurting.

Really, the banks are failing.... name one today that is hurting. How many executives are making over a million dollars in salary for running their bank into the ground? How much of this "bailout" money is going back to the tax payer?

They don't care if the mom and pop shop down the street go under. They won't help them out, unless mom and pop show that they can make a return to the bank. So where's the banks return to the taxpayer???????

No the problem is that you are ok with it because you refuse to try to find solutions and come up with tired old excuses not to even try.

You can't make the math work to fix healthcare or education but you don't care about the math to bail out the banks. You demand the auto industry do X, Y and Z and jump through hoops to get money while you just gave money to banks and AIG without questioning where it was going. You're getting ready to raise the deficit and spend like drunken sailors but if the taxpayers stand up and say, "wait, we don't want that, and question you. You tell them that their ideas and what they want will cost more??????? More than bailing out banks that are using that money to better the tax payer bailing them out, how? More than bailing out AIG who is using that money to better the tax payer bailing them out, how? More than a bridge in Alaska to nowhere, how? More than throwing money at schools as they raise tuition, how?

POWER TO THE PEOPLE enough of the hypocrisy and bullshit.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

Derwood

what the hell does POWER TO THE PEOPLE even mean? empty catch phrases don't solve anything

pan6467

Give true representation back to the people. Make government responsible to the people not corporate, lobbyist, media and so on interests.

It's only empty if you are closed minded to change and wanting a government truly representative and working for the people.

It's not just taxes, it's freedoms they are taking away from us. It's them telling us to make sacrifices but they won't they increase their spending, they give the nation to special interests, extremists and corporations to run and the average citizen is beaten down into submission because if he speaks out people belittle him, call him a kook, don't listen even if it makes sense because the government has it's own agenda and it doesn't include him except to pay for that agenda.

Power to the people is for those that have no voice to stand up and demand accountability in government. To force government to listen to their voices again and not the extremists or the lobbyists or those who have agendas not in the best interest of the whole, not just the select.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

dippin

I've already said what I would do, in this thread and in others. And at NO point did I ever say that the solution was to blindly follow Obama. But the alternative is certainly not to blindly follow someone else either.


And yes, maybe the government should have prevented all this over-leveraging and all, but until you invent a time machine, that is not going to do.

If you think that the banks are not failing, here is a free tip for you: buy their stock now, because everyone thinks they are failing, so if they are not their stock is extremely undervalued. Put your money where your mouth is.

And stop trying to say that I support this or support that. I've been clear in what I support, and in this thread I've just been trying to point out the extreme inconsistencies of the position that demands more from everything and everyone for less money.


But you know what? Go ahead. I am tired of this bullshit sloganeering and senseless name calling.

roachboy

yeah, see pan there are problems when you let yourself get too upset as you write--you start collapsing things into each other, setting up straw men, indulging empty slogans...not that a lyric from john lennon is other than empty when it comes to politics ("working class hero" anyone?)....you can't seem to separate when this fiasco started from where it currently is, you forget who did what, which administration did what. you've come to the SHOCKING conclusion that, without people knowing it, there's been a class war unfolding in the united states--but who the hell didn't notice it? it was the main feature of conservative economic policies...the largest concentration of wealth yet recorded anywhere ever...if that's not class war, then what the hell is?

so it seems to me that much of what you seem upset about is that you've suddenly discovered this class warfare which has been characteristic of the policies pursued by conservative neoliberals for many years, and all the more that this class war has had consequences which screw over people like you and me.

but where i get confused is in your reactions to this discovery or realization---and how you manage to collapse the whole of this onto the obama administration. which i am not an unequivocal fan of, btw. not at all--but it nonetheless makes sense to keep the factual dimension of things straight so that discussion doesn't endlessly get derailed on problems created at that level.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Derwood

Government can't listen to (and cater to) every single individual voice in society. The country is too big. Shit, EVERY country is too big for that. I understand your basic point, but you're never going to see a government construct where your senator is going door-to-door asking what each person would do in every situation. The entire point of Congress is that we vote for them to represent us.....the power is never in the hands of the people.

Now we can argue all day about whether most Congressmen are actually representing the will of their constituencies (many aren't, too often), but my point is that POWER TO THE PEOPLE is indeed an empty slogan in a country with 100's of millions of citizens

dc_dux

pan:

I honestly dont understand the "too late, too late" argument that appears to be, in large part, the basis of your dissatisfaction.

Is it really too late for the Making Home Affordable program that will potentially help millions of honest and diligent homeowners who pay the mortgage on time but now face hardship and possible foreclosure because of losing their job or their house being devalued? Or is it too little?

Is it really to late too late to start regulating the market for hedge funds, credit default swaps and over-the-counter derivatives as proposed by Geithner today? Or is it too little?

Is the $150 billion for infrastructure in the stimulus bill, the largest investment ever, too little or too late?

Is the increased funding in the stimulus bill to cover the shortfall in Pell Grants and providing a new higher education tax cut to millions of families too little or too late?

And finally,
Is 65 days too little time to honestly and objectively judge the performance of a new president facing the worst economic conditions in decades.

Giving him a reasonable period of time to put these programs and initiatives in place does not equal "loving" him.

Do you honestly believe POWER TO THE PEOPLE will address these issues more comprehensively or in a more timely manner?

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

pan6467

I'm just responding to your points. The you I am talking to is the you in the quoted portion... it's not personal in any way.

The only demands I want are those that government listen to the people. There is no inconstancy and I would gladly explain if you are confused in any way. Just tell me where.

Where have I called you names?

---------- Post added at 12:55 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:50 AM ----------

No, look back 5 years ago when I first joined I talked about an economic meltdown, so I didn't just jump on some band wagon.

No, there are posts here that I even stated "not necessarily Obama's fault", but as a senator he did vote pretty much with Dems to increase spending. Bush helped, Clinton helped, Reaganomics is to blame here also.

Obama inherited a mess but is continuing the mess and from what I see is not trying to truly stop it, just band aid it with more failed trickle down policies.

---------- Post added at 01:05 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:55 AM ----------

I said the "people" not the individual. I stated going with the majority not the individual.

Representatives should have mandatory townhall meetings bimonthly in their district open to the public, if that means that they have to fill a school football field then so be it. The Representative should then voice why he has voted certain ways, what exactly each bill represents and how it will affect the people of his district. Hell, with technology he/she could do it on a public access television station, on the radio or on the net. Congress right now is not answerable to the people and doesn't even try to be except in an election year then half of what is said is bold faced propaganda and who knows how true.

Senators should have mandatory state addresses similar to the Reps. only every 6 months.

Now, to say that is unreasonable is bullshit. The only true reason that would be "unreasonable" would be that Congress truly doesn't want to be that open.

The president and governors have to give yearly state of the union addresses.... why is Congress not upheld to similar demands?

That is POWER TO THE PEOPLE.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

Derwood

I think we need term limits on the Congress. You get one, six-year term as Senator, then you're out. Then we might actually get some of the "best and brightest" to devote a portion of their life to public service and solving problems. Career politicians can't help but become what they become.

genuinegirly

An interesting commentary that seems relevant to the discussion:
Seeing even liberal individuals taking a stand against President Obama's fiscal policy makes me wonder. I know little about economics or the current disaster. I know little of politics.

I enjoy reading the opinions of those who will share.

__________________
"Sometimes I have to remember that things are brought to me for a reason, either for my own lessons or for the benefit of others." Cynthetiq

"violence is no more or less real than non-violence." roachboy

roachboy

i think part of this is not a "failure of communication"--it's more that folk who take a casual interest in economic matters seem to have assimilated aspects of neoliberalism as if they were descriptions of the economy and not ideological statements that generate a particular image of it. so the edito can be seen as a guy who's assumptions are basically monetarist making a straight monetarist critique of a sort of keynesian approach---things that matter in the former, like deficit spending, don't in the latter in anything like the say way because the logic that situates the idea of state deficits is basically different in each of the two frameworks.

and i think it's symptomatic that the dude who wrote that piece above doesn't situate his viewpoint---he doesn't identify his own assumptions as assumptions--rather he acts as though his assumptions are somehow not assumptions at all, and proceeds from there to apply these assumptions in a mechanical way with predictable results.

thing is that i don't think this guy is isolated--i think that alot of the problems people are having with what obama is doing stem from the same thing. it's hard not to get pavlovian about the explanation for it---folk with no particular interest in or understanding of economics or political economy have been subjected to a regime of sustained repetition for many years and like the good spectators that we are. replicate what they've been effectively conditioned by---without even recognizing that this process has taken place.

and if you think about it, there isn't and hasn't been and likely will not be a coherent debate anywhere in the american press about the overall direction that was cowboy capitalism, what it caused, where we are, where we should be heading and what approaches might be the best way to get there. you'd think if the united states was even a shadow of a democracy that this debate would be happening---but it isn't. why is that?

another way: this disconnect is a direct result of the fact that we in the united states live inside an authoritarian media climate which we pretend is other than it is because there's some goofball separation of public and private ownership and another that authoritarian regimes have to originate with a state.

and very little is being done to alter the effects of this regime.
and the regime itself is still in place.

i don't mean to sound paranoid about this---i talk about regime in the singular because of the astonishing consensus that has run across television and print media that neoliberalism is a coherent view of the world, to the exclusion of alternatives. so there's a sense in which the singular is appropriate. one result is that i think americans are in the main terrified of uncertainty, in part because they're afraid of the political.

if that's right, then this is a **problem**--one that's way deeper than whether obama is or is not selling his approach to an audience conditioned largely along lines that cannot process that approach.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

pan6467

I know I buck the general popular opinion, but term limits are not the answer for congress. I believe it just gives the parties more strength, in that people would start voting solely by partisanship. It also punishes "we the people" by taking truly good men out. Plus, it will never happen. The GOP promised term limits would become law in 1994's Contract With America and once in power they failed to follow through.

People tend to vote for the incumbent, it is shown again and again in poll after poll that districts love their individual rep, but dislike Congress as a whole. No one wants to truly believe the man they voted to put into office, have bumper stickers for, had yard signs for, had given money to is not doing his best to help them. People did this with Bush for a long time. People did this with Kennedy, they do it with Bernie Sanders, Lieberman who changed affiliation, and so on.

The only true solution, IMHO, is townhall meetings to make them accountable to their district and state. This makes them accountable for what they do to the district, it allows them to see if the people are flourishing or suffering because of his/her stances. Townhall meetings would make them have to explain why they voted tax money away to build a bridge to nowhere in Alaska, why they won't truly do anything to fix healthcare, why they won't do anything about the border with Mexico until the drug warlords there have flooded our streets with drugs and have started killing innocent people. And so on.

The very last thing we need is for good congressmen/women to be booted out because of term limits..... and there are some good ones in there. They just get buried by the schmucks and partisanship bullshit.

Term limits sound good but it takes a minute or 2 to get a grasp on this great big country's picture and decide how they need to fix it. The vast majority don't take the time to do that and thus they just vote along party lines. Those are the ones that would get crushed in townhall meetings. That "like" and desire to protect their congressman would in essence disappear if in a townhall they couldn't answer questions as to why they voted for that bridge to nowhere, why they were silent about the AIG bonuses until it leaked, why they do what they do. Townhall meetings would force them to be more intelligent and aware of what is going on and they would be able to let us know.

The press has failed. Local news papers have either been bought by national conglomerates with their own agenda or are unable to financially stay afloat and have cut back on local reporters. Local television news is a joke because the conglomerate that owns them dictates what they report and again the finances to dig in to serious stories are next to nil. That's why sweep week it's always an in depth study of strip clubs. Sex sells even on the news. It's all about making money not in depth reporting of stories that truly affect the people.

So in order for the people to truly get an idea of what is happening in Washington, to hold Congress truly accountable, to get Congress to see outside the bubble that the party tries to blind them to.... we need townhall meetings. We need an accountable Congress not a Congress that every 2,4,6,8 years will be completely different.

Corrupt individuals will be corrupt in one term or 10 terms. Power that is not accountable for corrupts. Making one accountable for the power entrusted to them makes the chance for corruption a little less... if a congressman sees that a bill he helped pass because of party pressure hurt his district and that the people at home are asking him why he voted for it and he can only say because the party told him to.... he's going to have 2 options make it better or face defeat his next election. The party would suffer to. If the congressman states that was how the party told him to vote and he knew it was wrong but they threatened to silence him and take away other things he fought for for his district.... the party then looks bad.

It's a checks and balances deal. It gives the people more say into OUR government.

---------- Post added at 01:46 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:23 PM ----------

I find the article very right on. And it is very interesting that CNN is starting to even question Obama.

He brought up great points:

Why does Wall Street go down when Geithner brings about what is supposed to bring good news.

Then the Obama people say it's Wall Street and they are part of the problem until Wall Street does something they like... but then who truly does profit if the market goes up when the sell of toxic investments is what bounces it up?

The writer is right in his implication that we cannot have it both ways. His best point is this:

But he needs to also ask why Obama won't tell us. We know about the AIG bonuses what else is in there that makes Wall Street smile so much? And if they are part of the problem and they are smiling then it's not a good thing for the people.

Who told Dodd to put in the language.. we do know Obama's people knew about it and said nothing until it leaked and the people got mad about it.

I find this more of a criticism of Geithner than Obama. But it is a swipe at Obama and I think it is just the beginning.

BTW.... while politics and economics bring about heated debate and passion, they are necessary evils to pay attention to because they do affect everyone's life. I'm not suggesting you have to read books or make it your life.... I would prefer you didn't it'll drive you batty but learn what you can so that you know how much they affect you.

I thank you for starting one of the best political posts that have been here in a very long time. I think you are more aware than you let on.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

Anonymous Member

My experience extends beyond the halls of academia.

For most of 2008 I was self-employed. I definitely worked my ass off last year. Today I wrote a check for $11,200 to the United States Treasury for taxes still owed. I already paid $3000.

I would do some good in my own community with that $11K. As it happens, it is going to a corrupt, greedy, self-serving state bent on national suicide.

I am fed up. I am fed up with this government. I am fed up with playing the good citizen and getting bitch-slapped for my efforts. Had I worked less, not paid my mortgage, not saved, and not invested, this government would be bailing me out. Had I been in a corporate office preaching the virtues of capitalism, this government would be bailing me out. Had I taken a company and wrecked it, I would be getting billions. I am disgusted.

These tea-parties seem to be for people in my situation, although I don't see what difference they could make. Perhaps they will evolve into something bigger. Something no one can imagine now. Now that I think about it, I think I'll go.

dippin

As I said before, I completely understand people wanting to pay less taxes.

But the point remains: to avoid any tax increases, never mind getting actual tax cuts, one or all three of these budget items will have to be significantly slashed: medicare, SS pensions, military.

Anyone who talks about tax cuts without talking about that is misleading the people.

---------- Post added at 04:07 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:05 PM ----------

The problem is not that. The problem is that the majority of both sides know what they DON'T want to cut: military, healthcare, pensions.

Sometimes they genuinely don't want to cut it, other times it is simply a matter of political expediency.

But the fact is, no matter how much protest and outrage is out there, some tough decisions need to be made.

pan6467

As BILLIONS are being given away to banks who raise fees, to companies that lay off, renegotiate contracts to their workers but make sure those in upper management get millions in bonuses, it's really hard to say the government can't make cuts.

While bridges to nowhere are being built, money is handed to foreign countries that hate us and we have a generation trained not to work and they can live very nicely...... it is hard to say they can't make cuts.

When Obama in his campaign states he wants a community organization as strong as the US military that will cost billions taxpayer money, it is hard to say they can't cut taxes.

When we have illegals bankrupting south western hospitals the government has to help.... it is hard to say they can't cut taxes.

There is so much corruption, special interest and bullshit spending..... THEY CAN CUT TAXES. To argue otherwise is foolish.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

roachboy

but pan, it seems to me that you assume for some reason that the overall situation we're in is more or less normal.
it really isn't.

i'm a bit surprised that folk who object to expenditure levels on principle focus on social programs and not on the most costly and useless areas of state spending: procurement of cold-war style military technologies---and by extension the whole of the national security state.

on the other hand, it has been the case empirically since the reagan period that conservatives have used massive military spending to do their version of the same kind of thing obama is doing---prop up an economic sector through state spending because it not only buys political power, but also because it was functional insofar as neoconservative political goals were concerned.

so the fact that this area of waste--and it is waste---never seems to come up as a Problem is an indication that this is not really a problem about taxes, but rather a problem about conservative politics that is using taxation as a cheap and easy way to advance a version of the same agenda that landed us in this mess in the first place.


on the other hand, it's hard not to see in the tarp program a singularly ill-concieved attempt to prop up the financial system---but it is a conservative program. it is incoherent in significant measure because it was developed exceedingly quickly by people who are ideologically opposed to the idea of such programs and so seemingly had no idea how to do them. that it's developed into another wave of looting is not a surprise--conservative economic policy has enabled looting of most social sectors by politically favored sectors for a long time.

so there are problems with this tea party business that do not go away no matter how many times "power to the people" gets tacked onto them.

and we've had 30 odd years of conservative "power to the people"---it hasn't worked out so well has it? what make you think that this go-round is any different?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

dippin

Have you actually looked at the budget?

You don't seem to understand that even before any of these programs you decry are taken into account, the US is running deficits.

Can you understand that?
Whatever your outrage may be, it is a simple fact that even if you cut every single dime in foreign aid, kill off every illegal alien, let every single bank fail, cut every single pork project, and cut every single welfare program, the US will STILL run a deficit if it doesnt cut either military spending, healthcare, or social security pensions. And I am talking about cutting them without cutting the taxes related to them.

Do you get that? You can quote whatever John Lennon song you want, but it is a simple fact.

If you don't want to go look at the figures, here you go:

Projected federal tax revenue for 2009: 2186 US$ billion
Projected federal spending on healthcare for 2009: 724US$ Billion (425 of which go to medicare)
Projected federal spending on pensions: 712 US$ Billion (708 of which are old age pensions)
Projected federal spending on defense, excluding foreign military aid: 811 US$ Billion

Spending on healthcare+pensions+defense= 2247 $ US$ Billion




In other words, even if the US government doesnt spend a dime on education, infrastructure, runs every branch of government for free, cut everything you said, and basically defaults on interest payments for its existing debt, the US will still run a deficit. And this is for this year. While social security spending won't increase much more, medicare costs are expected to rise very fast, even without adding any new programs or coverage. And this is all with the projected defense budget, which in all likelihood severely underestimates actual spending.

Do you get that? Sing the entire John Lennon discography for all I care, but the fact is that either social security, medicare, or defense will be have to be cut if anyone is serious about cutting taxes.

robot_parade

So the original Boston Tea Party was about an unfair tax (or rather, standing up against the idea that taxation without representation is wrong). These tea parties seem to be a clever political stunt against Obama. They aren't specifically demonstrating against any particular part of Obama's plan, they're demonstrating against Obama himself. No one is complaining about a tax Obama is levying against them - these aren't millionaires out demonstrating, after all. What are they protesting against? Universal healthcare? Lower taxes? A balanced budget (eventually - probably not in his first term, but O'Bama is working towards one in a realistic fashion)?

I guess my point is, there's nothing really wrong with this, but it isn't particularly meaningful either.

pan6467

The US runs a deficit because there is NO FUCKING TAX BASE. You cannot tax the middle class more and they are losing wealth anyway. You cannot tax the rich much more, they have the means to leave the country.

You have no manufacturing, you have no textile industry, you have outsourced just about every job you can.... THERE IS NO ONE LEFT WHO CAN PAY TAXES. You have destroyed the tax base.

You tariff imports for 5-10 years, rebuild your industries, make sure they put money into R&D so that they'll be able to compete when those tariffs run out, and you start rebuilding the tax bases, you bring back jobs, jobs people work and pay taxes and within that time you will have increased tax revenue without increasing taxes and a made a solid tax base again, while the workers have some disposable income to work with.

If you continue to do what we are..... we'll just keep increasing cigarette taxes, then alcohol/sugar/ whatever the government deems is unhealthy to try to make up revenue. But when you do that you'll actually lose revenue because people will just create black markets for those goods and we'll continue to run deficits until every single penny of every single tax dollar goes to pay the interest.

The moral, time is short.... rebuild a tax base or we're a third world country and the game is over. Or we hold a revolution and we rebuild government and start a new.

The French revolution started not because Marie Antoinette said let them eat cake but because the government over taxed the citizenry and still went bankrupt. The people who got guillotined were not the bourgeois but the aristocrats who got greedy and stolle the money from the people.

The American Revolution started on a 10% tax of tea. King George had to pay for the French and Indian War that was also a part of the British and French 7 Years War in Europe.

The Russian Revolution started when the middle class were taxed beyond their means. Hitler rose to power when Germany's middle class could no longer afford to pay taxes for the repair of their country after WW1.... What rich there was in Germany had fled the country.

The point is throughout history, when government taxes the "middle class" too much and gives the money to the wealthy for whatever reason.... violence and overthrow happens. And for the exception of our country and our founding fathers wanting freedom not just autonomy.... EVERY revolution at first ends in Totalitarianistic regimes that kill off what wealthy are left in the country and find leaders who grasp extreme power and start wars with neighboring countries.

Scoff all you want but if we continue the way we are and the way Obama is taking us.... revolution is going to be the outcome. That or a fascist extreme government that is every bit as bad or worse than Hitler's and Stalin's regimes.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

dippin

You are all over the place here, so I won't get into the details. But the fact remains, any tax cuts without cuts on military, healthcare or SS is unsustainable in the long run and will be followed by tax hikes.


The fact that certain organizations like to pretend that that is not true is just a testament to their own hypocrisy and the political games they are playing, which publicly they like to decry.