Pick Your Poison

[huntindude]

The way the republicans have gone after Obama for his stimulus plan it only leaves two way for this to end, the economy improves and Obama can coat the conservatives in egg, or the economy fails and they can say I told you so.

Today there are more and more economist jumping on the bandwagon that we may have hit bottom, we re seeing a little improvement even if it's only for a second.

So to get the dems out you need a worse economy, if it stays the same Obama can claim he kept it from crashing, if it gets better Obama is golden. so if you're an Obama hater it's hard to win.

Myself I hope the economy improves, and I hope the conservatives come up with a plan to help rather than just obstruct, this would get us back to some degree of balance. otherwise it's an all or nothing bet the republicans are putting down. that scares me as much as the economy, if the dems win this one they'll be unstopable and that's not a good thing for anyone. no Nemont I'm not saying we're out of the woods by any means, I expect it to get worse , but there are some who disagree. the stakes are high.

 

[NeMont]

LAST EDITED ON Mar-12-09 AT 01:34PM (MST)[p]HD,

First question is what have the republicans obstructed?

Who are these economist saying the bottom is here? Obama only has to make it look good enough to get reelected, he can probably spend enough to keep us afloat for the next couple of years. Getting reelected is all any politician really cares about.

Republicans don't have to hope for the economy to get worse. That is a democrat talking point. That is using the same political attack as saying the democrats wanted our troops to fail in Iraq and only by losing in Iraq could they gain politically. It didn't really work out that way. Things improved in Iraq and the dems still won.

I don't know a single Republican that hopes for a worse economy. The Republicans are certainly on their heals and it may be a couple of election cycles before they find their voice. That doesn't bode well for the country because total democrat control will be as damaging as total republican control was but the American people decide who to elect and if they continue to elect people who are going to give them everything then that is certainly their right.



Nemont

 

[202typical]

Well said as usual Nemont.

Dude the Reps can't obstruct a thing, they do not have the votes to obstruct. All they can do is make noise. Besides who wants a congress that gets along. There has got to be debate and fighting to hopefully get things done right. That is why we are not a dictatorship McFly. It is a healthy thing for obstruction/debate/fighting ect....

 

[kilowatt]

Did you know that President Obama signed his stimulus package at the same desk where President Clinton got his package stimulated

 

[wetmule]

Same desk as the Cuban cigar crises?

I really have to wonder what party qualifies as obstructionists! The DEMS ram the stimulus bill through congress not allowing any amendments or revisions and very little GOP input. They put the final bill out at midnight and vote on it a few hours later before anyone including themselves has a chance to even read it let alone comprehend what's in it. What's the motive there?, If you have two oars in the water, anyone can see they didn't want anyone to know what was in it or where and who the money was going to - and the fact that it has very little stimulative effect - and most of the spending will come possibly after the economy has recovered. Who's the Obstructionists?

 

[huntindude]

I didn't say the republicans were being successful at obstructing, I said that's all they have to add. if you see anything else coming from them please do tell.

Did or did you not just watch what happens to a party who can't deliver? to even suggest that the republican's want the economy to improve when the only hand they've had in it is whining about every move Obama makes you're pretty funny. if the economy isn't noticably better by the mid terms who wants to bet the republicans take some seats back? you're not fooling anyone, the conservatives are banking on failure as their ticket back in.

It's politics, I'm not holding it against them. I'm just saying would you rather have dem leadership for at least 8 years or a good economy? it really is that simple.

Nemont search it there are several economist saying things are looking better, no not great but better, Jon Najorian for one says he sees a better attitude in the market. myself I'm still bearish, I think it's going to get worse before it gets better. but I'm not going to play down what little good news we get just to prove myself correct.

 

[NeMont]

HD,

Jon Najarian is hardly an economist, he is a trader and market analyst but not an economist.

What other role is there for Republicans, the minority parties role is to play loyal opposition. That was the case when Harry Reid declared that the Iraq war was lost. It was the case when all the Democrats who hated GWB still and railed against him at every turn yet voted for his every request.

I don't think the only choice is to have a good economy or eight years of Democrat rule. I think it is way to early in the game to say what is going to happen in the political world between now and the midterms. Alot depends on the economy of course but just wait, this thing is not done yet. Look at how desperate the market was for just any good news, what happens when the bad news starts pouring in again?

I am curious why you are now worried about Democrat rule?

To say the Republicans are hoping for a bad economy is not correct. I think the Democrats are more worried about owning the whole thing then the Republicans are about seeing further economic pain. That is a two way street, if it does improve and the democrats can crow then didn't they basically prove themselves right? Who cares about the long term consquences of their actions as long as the economy is "good" on election day. That is the approach so it may work for the short term but long term it is bad.

Nemont

 

[huntindude]

Najarian handles more money than most so called economist, so I value his opinion as much as someone with a chunk of paper saying they're an expert. besides he isn't the only one with a more upbeat attitude, nobody is saying we're out of the woods they're saying maybe things are not going to get as bad as we thought. shame on them.

I'm no more worried about democratic rule than I ever was, I don't like either party having too much power. it worked poorly from 2000-2006 and I don't have anymore confidence in the dems to be responsible than I do the republicans. as I've always said I'm not a fan of the dems, I just felt the republicans needed spanked, they were, now lets get balance back.

You can talk until you're blue in the face and you'll never convince me the republicans are wishing Obama luck on the economy, com'on now. they've taken their stand and that stand is Obama is wrong on everything, if by some freak chance this thing turns around they're screwed. I'm not saying it will, but the battle lines are clearly drawn.

To add to the republican problems now Steele is in hot water again. he let it slip that he thought women have a choice, and once again he's in damage control mode. it's a shame because I think he would take the party in a direction I could identify with if morons would just leave him alone.

 

[bwnco]

WetMule well said!!

Yes very well put WetMule, and glad you pointed that out. So HD, why do you think this administration that was bragging about ending bi-partisan politics, virtually slammed the doors on the GOP in the making of this stimulus package.
Also, GOP dont have the votes to obstruct anything anymore. I hate Obama and his cabinet, but i damn sure don't want him to fail and i think 99% of GOP feels the same way. As usual HD is throwing down on GOP and Conservatives. It would not matter what they did.

 

[eelgrass]

LAST EDITED ON Mar-13-09 AT 09:32AM (MST)[p]Before the porkulus bill, all the bail outs and the latest budget, Pres. Obama was talking gloom and doom and how we may never recover. He was tearing down big corporations and greedy CEOs, etc. Now that all that is signed, he's talking about how bright the future looks and how important capitalism is, praising free markets and private enterprise. He is a master BSer, I'll give him that, just like all the rest of them.

Like Rahm Emanuel said, never let a serious crisis go to waste.

 

[NeMont]

RE: WetMule well said!!

LAST EDITED ON Mar-13-09 AT 09:49AM (MST)[p]HD,

You said a lot of economist are saying things are better. I can find all kinds of analysts who have totally different opinions of the direction of this economy.

I try to read both liberal and conservative economic pundits and economists. In the end alot of it is opinion and not science however I cannot understand that Keynesian theory of government spending and borrowing is the way out of economic problems. I subscribe to the Austrian school of economics I am afraid Geithner and Bernanke went to the Zimbabwean school of economics.

Do I think Republicans are cheering on Obama and his economic team, no. Do I believe they are hoping more American people are put out of work and lose their homes, I don't believe that either. I think that there many, many moderate democrats who fear all this borrowing and spending. Those democrats in vulnerable seats or red states may be particulary unhappy with the it.

It is a far different thing to oppose and even hope policies don't work then hope for more hard times. There may be some Republicans who hope this but it is not the majority, any more then the majority of democrats hoped the surge in Iraq would fail. There were obviously some democrats who openly wanted the surge to fail but it was not the majority.

Again if the economy picks up and everybody is satisfied doesn't that mean that the Democrats were right and deserve to be reelected?

I am curious what you would have the Republicans do? If they rubber stamp everything that Obama wants to do then what is the point of them holding their seats?

In the end Obama is going to get passed about anything he is willing to invest his political capital in. Congress is going to go along him with or without the Republicans.

Nemont

 

[piper]

RE: WetMule well said!!

I think things will turn around on the economy, and I hope the republicans find their way back from where they were a long time ago, I also hope Obama follows through with the important part of his talked about economic policy, and does his best to address the big underlying problems in the budget, thats where the bought and paid for congress is going to cause lots of trouble

 

[huntindude]

LAST EDITED ON Mar-13-09 AT 09:52AM (MST)[p]Nemont I didn't say the economy was better. many experts expect it to get worse before it gets better, no question, but there are a few things that could signal a possible improvement sooner than we expected. I'm not saying it's a done deal I said it could happen.

What have the republicans put in front of us as a better plan than Obama has? have they pushed for it as hard as they could and been shot down? if the answer is nothing what possible reason would voters have for rewarding them if the economy improves? you're dreaming if you don't think the republicans future rides on Obamas failure.

Need I remind you who started the first of the bailout plans? if the republicans had a better idea that would have been a great time to break it out. they have nothing, they're just betting even their own policies will fail. place your bets.

 

[NeMont]

LAST EDITED ON Mar-13-09 AT 11:11AM (MST)[p] I know where bailouts started and back then the price tag was about $700 billion. That was an incredible number to me just a short 6 monts ago. Wasn't right then and it still isn't right now. Since Obama has been in office there has been another $780 billion in Stimulus and Geithner has proposed $2 trillion more for the banks and Pelosi is already talking stimulus round two for this year. Not to mention that they are probably going to throw more money at AIG. The Fed balance sheet has been dotted with another $2 Trillion is swaps, credits and structured agreements since Obama became president. GWB double our debt in 8 years, Obama has increase the large debt he inherited from GWB by 50% since he took office. The democrats cannot continue to say that they are just reacting to what they inherited, forever.

There are many in cogress both Republicans and Democrats who think that the market has to be allowed to work.

I want a pox on both their houses but to demand anything from the Republicans at this point in time is kind of funny because they are not allowed to participate in the process. They are getting their nose rubbed in it just like they did to the dems. It will end once people figure out that borrowing and spending and destroying wealth are bad things for the overall economy.

The democrats are having a good old fashion spending party in DC right now. Their favorite projects are getting money and their friends are being taken care off. The problem is that when the bill comes do they will be already too drunk with power to believe that they are really going to have to pay. As you say majority rules in this country and we are stuck with those the majority elected. The majority is not always right because there are a whole bunch of idiots in Washington.

I still say we would have been far better off in the longer run to suffer through the recession rather then prop up companies that are failing. The market is the only efficient way to allocate resources. The government cannot do it, period. The government will always misallocate resources at least that is how it has worked as long as there has been recorded history.

Keep believing that Republicans want this country to suffer. That is nothing more or less then a Democrat talking point.

Nemont

 

[piper]

Im sure in most ways the markets are the best ways to allocate resources, but I think government needs to play a guiding role many times, the banking industry is one example, the gas guzzlers and overall energy policy, environmental protection is another where free markets need governmental oversight, consumer protection and food safety, and health care is a glaring example of where the market has failed to deliver, and we are just coming to grips with that one,Im sure you will say its the gov regulations and laws regarding patients that are the problem, but I think its more complicated than that. Also the market has misallocated a lot of resources in the past, its true somebody pays for that but its still wasteful

 

[NeMont]

Piper,
There is no free market in health care. Health Care is a glaring example of the uninteneded consquences of government intervention. Regulation of health care is an area that I happen to believe the government must play a role but to say up to this point that government has helped the health care issue is wrong.

Gas Guzzlers, if the government was serious about getting gas guzzlers off the road then why do they continue to subsidize their purchase by allowing them to be depreciated in the first year. The government helps subsidize getting more gas guzzlers on the road.

There was no free market in the banks because they all knew that the Federal Reserve would never allow them to fail. That meant that they got a wink and nod from the Fed. to engage in Casino Capitalism but that wasn't free market capitalism because they knew they could exercise the Greenspan put.

Government has a role to play in making sure transactions are as transparent as possible and that bad actors who distort the system are put in jail. No problem with that at all. There has always been a role for government to play. Food safety, I like have healthy clean food supply; Environmental rules and clean up, I like having a clean environment.

The problem comes when the government steps into the free market place and instead of regulating it, it takes it over or severly distorts it.

It is absolutely wrong to say the free market failed in the banking industry because there was not a real free market. When Alan Greenspan bailed out Long Term Capital Management in 1998 and started all the "to big to fail" bailouts, the people in charge of the investment banks knew that they would always be bailed out. Had Greenspan let LTCM fail then Bear Sterns and Lehman Bros. probably would still be in business today.

Nemont

 

[3blade]

I do expect the economy to come around by next yr and probably achieve a 1 to 2% growth rate.....with double digit unemployment and double digit inflation. If thats enough to get rid of hussein that remains to be seen, most Americans are pretty damn dumb and would probably vote for him again any way.

my .02

 

[huntindude]

Nemont , Pelosi said there isn't any second stimulus in the works. you have to remember politians walk a tight rope of what they say sometimes being as important as what they do, indicating more money was possible can have effects in either direction just by saying so.

Once in a while 3blade brings up a good point, how much improvement will it take to keep the dems in full control? it wouldn't surprise me if people are dumb enough to think if they don't see their stock accounts back at or above what they peaked out at then Obama failed. you do have this going for you, what rational peole would call pulling out of a depression and what Americans expect in instant gratification are two different things.

 

[piper]

NeMont- I see a Princton economist wants to require congress to go to school and learn economics, he says most don't have a clue. In my opinion our system of health care is a failure, utter and complete, and it has less governmental involvement than all the successes there are out there in all the world, and there are a bunch of fairly successful health care systems, the reports on American heath care that are coming out in view to the American people are pretty damning to the industry, I don't expect real reform to come for many more years, we will first have to go through this experiment with propping up the Insurance companys, and when that proves to be an incredibly expensive disaster, we will probably change. My point is the markets look at things short term, because gas is cheap right now, its more profitable to build big expensive gas guzzlers and promote their sales, than it is to build less profitable mizers, its the way the market works, maximum profit for the coming quarter is the name of the game. Some of the bankers are talking about how they were under all this market pressure to compete in the mortage industry, competition was fierce, the market demanded results, and things got compromised. It seems to me that the markets cannot regulate themselves well enough to avoid these massive boom bust cycles. I guess like most things, its a matter of finding the right balance

 

[NeMont]

Again when easy money distorts the market and a bubble is created by the Fed then of course there is only short term profits in mind. Like I said that was not free market capitalism that is casino capitalism. Go read Adam Smith and Wealth of Nations, capitalism has a moral component to it, free market capitalims too often is associated with greed, that isn't free market either.

If a free market had existed in the banking industry there never would have been a housing bubble because there would not have been artificially low interest rates.

I am not certain about how you think the health care industry doesn't have very heavy and very intrusive government involvement in it. Already our government acounts for nearly one half of every dollar spent.

Government's role in a free market system is to keep everyone honest and make transactions transparent. Our government won't even tell us which banks they have doled out $2 trillion of your and my money to. In addition every time government has "helped" it has added huge costs without any measureable improvement in coverage or quality. I think at this point the system has been so hopelessly destroyed by government intervention that it has to be scrapped. I just don't have any faith in our government to get it right. The last thing they touched, medicare Part D, was a disgustingly wasteful cluster.

Don't confuse casino capitalims with free market captitalism.

Nemont

 

[huntindude]

How do you have true capitolism in a world economy where your competition doesn't play by the accepted rules of capitolism?

If a car is sent into the US it gets a 2% teriff, if we send a car to China it will have a 22% teriff on it and it will take a a lawyer to get it licensed. don't even get me started of the unfairness that US ag contends with.

You can't be the only player in a game playing by the rules and win. we either have to level the field or lose, make a choice.