Stimulus and unemployment

[enzfan]

How is that working out for people Barry? He said passing it would keep the unemployment rate from rising to 8%, this as we zoom past 10 to 10.2%. He fiddles while Rome burns. More concerned with continuing massive spending, campaigning for losing candidates, sales pitching the Olympics, and trying to kill the economy further with climate bills. Oh yeah, I forgot everything is Dubya's fault.

[SallyLightfoot]

Lots of people and economists on the left wanted a bigger stimulus (and a more effective one, but thank Congress for that). You can't really fill a 3 trillion drop in demand with less than a trillion stimulus. But Barry fancies himself a "trans-partisan" president, and he believes that it's pragmatic to accept watered-down legislation to get it through Congress.

The stimulus was predictably not enough to hold down unemployment rate. Lots of economists predicted that from the beginning. But hey, the Republican plan was for no stimulus and some tax cuts, a well-known recipe for tanking a stalling economy. Still think the GOP plan would have better results? At least Barry's half-assed stimulus produced 3.5% GDP growth last quarter (highest in 6 quarters) and a DOW that flirts with 10,000. You probably meant to mention that but it didn't fit your agenda.

Government spending is critical right now. Yes, deficit spending. Economic demand is seriously hobbled right now, and if the govt didn't pick up the slack, the economic downturn would become a spiral. The main reason we haven't seen mass firings of public employees, teachers and other spending-related job such as construction is because of the stimulus.

Taking everything into consideration, Obama's spending is still a small fraction of what Bush put on the nation's credit card. Thanks for spouting the talking points, though. You're clearly on the "everything is Obama's fault" bandwagon, rooting for the country to fail so you can score political points.

[Panorama]

Enz, You expect Obama to wave a magic wand in 11 months and fix the giant hole that GWB left us in... it takes time to fix, give it some time.

<HR width="185" align="left">
"Photography with a Vision"
http://www.cooganphoto.com

[enzfan]

The GWB blame game doesn't excuse this clown from getting next to nothing done to reverse this economic slide.

[SallyLightfoot]

He's done quite a bit-- far from perfect, but a far cry from "next to nothing."

You can't talk about the challenges faced by the current administration without taking the GWB legacy into account. If you recall a few weeks ago, I shared the following with you:

<a href="http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/06/what-caused-the-budget-deficit.php" target="_new"><img src="http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/deficit.jpg" height="300" width="415"></a>

There is a GWB blame game, but GWB deserves almost every bit of it. If only republicans and conservatives had railed against GWB policies [i]before[/i] we suffered the consequences. Then I'd be less dismissive of your fact-free anti-Obama bickering.

[SallyLightfoot]

(Video deleted...)

Wanda Sykes:

"I woke up and people were mad at Obama. I thought,'[i]Did I miss something?!?[/i]'

Did Obama start two illegal wars? Did he fly over a flood zone and just wave? Did he torture detainees in a secret prison? Did he start illegally tapping phones? Did he alienate the world and squander a budget surplus? [b]Because if he did any of that, we need to impeach that jackass[/b]."

[Bitter Almonds]

<p align="justify">As if the stimulus package dubya, cheney, and congress gave to halliburton, caci, kbr, and blackwater was excellent for the US[}:)]


________________________
<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v465/Nuwavghost/dij.gif">

[SwampThing]

[quote][i]Originally posted by XXX[/i]
<br><p align="justify">As if the stimulus package dubya, cheney, and congress gave to halliburton, caci, kbr, and blackwater was excellent for the US[}:)]


________________________
<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v465/Nuwavghost/dij.gif">
[/quote]
Speaking of Blackwater, their back in the news...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33850878/ns ... t_in_iraq/

<font size="1></font>

[SallyLightfoot]

[quote][i]Originally posted by XXX[/i]<br><p align="justify">As if the stimulus package dubya, cheney, and congress gave to halliburton, caci, kbr, and blackwater was excellent for the US[}:)][/quote]Yeah, talking about a [i]jobs[/i] program. For this year alone, the basic military budget + supplementals (i.e., wars) is ... [i]wait for it[/i] ... $651 Billion. And this figure does not include the budget for Homeland Security, FBI counter terrorism and a bunch of other items. All told, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States#Budget_for_2009" target="_new">2009 military-related budget</a> is 1.1 Trillion.

And people get pissed off about the cost of reforming health care for a Trillion, when that cost is spread over 10 years, and will be funded mostly by the premiums of those participating (and some by taxes on the mega-rich).

[Bitter Almonds]

[quote][i]Originally posted by SallyLightfoot[/i]
<br>[quote][i]Originally posted by XXX[/i]<br><p align="justify">As if the stimulus package dubya, cheney, and congress gave to halliburton, caci, kbr, and blackwater was excellent for the US[}:)][/quote]Yeah, talking about a [i]jobs[/i] program. For this year alone, the basic military budget + supplementals (i.e., wars) is ... [i]wait for it[/i] ... $651 Billion. And this figure does not include the budget for Homeland Security, FBI counter terrorism and a bunch of other items. All told, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States#Budget_for_2009" target="_new">2009 military-related budget</a> is 1.1 Trillion.

And people get pissed off about the cost of reforming health care for a Trillion, when that cost is spread over 10 years, and will be funded mostly by the premiums of those participating (and some by taxes on the mega-rich).
[/quote]

<p align="justify">Those who bitch and whine about socialised medicine should take a look at the efficiency kbr - a private firm - runs things in Iraq. We are literally being fleeced at the cost of our own military people's lives. That's one of the many things which is really pissing me off about obama's term so far - that the war in Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq have not been recalled and ended, and/or that none of those war profiteers have been tried for treason and summarily executed (pipe dreamin')[}:)]


________________________
<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v465/Nuwavghost/dij.gif">

[pellerman]

It seems as though Obama is simply continuing the failed policies of GWB and the blame shouldn't be placed on one or the other, but both of them. Bushobama. Obama hasn't changed course with the GWB economic polices and now seems to be continuing on with the same foreign policies of continual war. The focus should be on improving this country, and universal healthcare is a great example, since the U.S. is the only industrialized nation on the planet which doesn't have it. Anyone read any of the predictions made by the Trends Research Institute? These failed policies are likely to lead to bankruptcy and collapse.

http://www.trendsresearch.com/

[SallyLightfoot]

[quote][i]Originally posted by pellerman[/i]<br>Obama hasn't changed course with the GWB economic polices and now seems to be continuing on with the same foreign policies of continual war.[/quote]About 5 trillion of the 9 trillion deficit projected over the next 10 years is due to two Bush policies which were not funded at the time they were enacted: the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, and the Medicare Prescription Drug benefit. It would be very difficult to eliminate either of these-- raising taxes during a recession is bad economics and politically still-born (easier to let them expire on schedule), and pulling an entitlement for the elderly is politically impossible in this Congress.

The partisan gridlock in Congress forces every vote in the Senate to require 60 votes, making it almost impossible to get anything done, let alone progressive "change". The Health Care bill is projected by the CBO to reduce the deficit, and yet the self-proclaimed party of fiscal austerity is aligned against it.

As far as the war is concerned, it's unfortunate that Obama is trying to keep his campaign pledge. Unfortunately, his main democratic and republican challengers (Clinton and McCain) hold similar hawkish foreign policy positions.

"Obama's FY2009 performance is like a relief pitcher who enters a game in the fourth inning trailing 19-0 and allows another run to score. The extra run is nothing to cheer about, of course, but fans should be far more angry with the starting pitcher."
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/11/ ... ama-again/

"Recall the situation in 2003. The Bush administration was already projecting the largest deficit in American history--$475 billion in fiscal year 2004... But a big election was coming up that Bush and his party were desperately fearful of losing. So they decided to win it by buying the votes of America's seniors by giving them an expensive new program to pay for their prescription drugs."
http://www.capitalgainsandgames.com/blo ... -hypocrisy