Isn’t It Ironic – Don’t Ya think?
With apologies to Alanis Morissette.
This particular story ain’t really new, or news. TAH has already covered parts of the debacle that is the ongoing neutering of our country’s defenses. At all levels really – from our back doors to the international arena.
Panetta, Dempsey List Consequences of Sequestration
One paragraph from the link rattled my cage just enough to bring it to your attention:
“This is not something that should be done as a way to blame the other party for what happens,” Panetta said. “This is going to hurt the United States and hurt our defense.”
I’m at a loss here. It seems to be the PC mindset writ large. I reckon both parties in a rape are at fault? The store owner who shoots a robber pointing a gun at him while demanding the money from the register is part of the problem? Shutting down Head Start could save billions, but it is a (failed) well meaning program. The list of PC things that I can’t seem to understand grows everyday.
Folks, I dunno where this will end… Well, I AM kinda old and paranoid so maybe it is just me?
February 9th, 2013 at 3:03 pm
No, it’s not just you.
February 9th, 2013 at 3:36 pm
Anytime you want massive failure, ineptitude, waste, and incompetence, just add Politicians and bureaucrats!!!
February 9th, 2013 at 4:09 pm
Neither age nor paranoia are the answers. It is not just you.
It is the complete lack of common sense on display by people in charge.
February 9th, 2013 at 6:14 pm
Why didn’t Panetta lie like he usually does? It almost seems like he realizes the People recall the Sequestration came from only the White House.
Bipartisan = Democrats are in deep sh*t. McCain, Graham and Rubio will save them.
February 10th, 2013 at 12:59 am
Standing by for zombie apocalypse …
February 10th, 2013 at 3:04 pm
Notwithstanding Bob Woodward’s attempt to establish Conservative bona fides through a slanted “analysis” of the debt ceiling, the ENTIRE blame for the Budget Contol Act rests solely on the Republicans. For the first time in history the Republicans decided to use what was a routine vote as a means to blackmail the Democrats into getting something they could not obtain through the electoral process. Whether the sequestration was President Obama’s idea or not, the reason it exists is because of Republican hostage taking. Blaming President Obama for the sequestration is like blaming the surgeon for Gabby Giffords condition rather than the gun or the shooter. Oh, wait, i don’t want to give you any ideas!
February 11th, 2013 at 8:18 am
Wow… Just wow. I feel the blame for this lies on both sides of the field politically, Insipid. And the president is responsible for LETTING this happen. You are telling me that ONE house of congress is responsible for everything that has gone wrong with sequestration? What about the Senate? Oh wait, they’re Democratically controlled, so no blame there! But that’s okay, because you have your ‘juden’ to blame, don’t you Insipid?
February 11th, 2013 at 3:16 pm
Really? Hollocaust comparisons? Really?
First off the entire point of this article, which you seem to have NO PROBLEM WITH is to blame the sequestration ENTIRELY on Obama. That’s the entire point of the rape analogy, to proclaim that the Republican’s are just poor little innocent victims of the black “rapist” (i guess i should be happy that he’s not being compared to OJ as he has in the past- but don’t you DARE suggest anyone is racist!). While the Sequestration may have been President Obama’s idea, the only reason he had it is because the Republican “rapists” had a knife to Obama’s throat.
To carry the “clever” rape analogy further, if the rapists drops the knife, and the intended victim takes the knife and cuts off the rapists pecker whose fault is it that the rapist doesn’t have a pecker? I’d say the rapist, but apparently you folks can’t grasp the concept of cause and effect.
So this “both sides responsible” mantra you have going is just your cynical way of trying to deflect the truth. What I said was entirely factual. Debt ceiling increases have been routine for the past 100 years. It was done 8 times under Reagan and 7 times under George W. Bush. For the first time ever one party decided to use it as a blackmail device. That was the Republicans in the house. Laying responsibility where it belongs is not the same as… I’m not even going to finish that sentence because if makes me sound as stupid as you.
Also, Republicans can’t have it both ways. Right after the bill was passed Boehner got on the TV and proclaimed that he got 98% of what he wanted. Now that the sequestration is beecoming a reality he’s proclaiming the SAME bill is ALL Obama’s fault. Republican bullshitting and finger pointing at its finest.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:24 pm
I look at it this way, sippy–who is the person LEAST inclined to negotiate or compromise?
Now please tell me how getting barely 50 percent of the vote entitles him to get 100 percent of what he wants.
This, dear boy, is exactly what the Founding Fathers were aiming to avoid.
Please explain to me how a party in charge of 1/2 of 1/3 of the federal government is somehow responsible for 100 percent of your butthurt. Oh, and nice deflection on how you chose to ignore Obama’s own statements regarding raising the debt ceiling when he was a Senator. Do tell, indeed.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:27 pm
The Dem Senate hasn’t passed a budget (which they are required to do by law) for years now, but sure the Republicans are the irresponsible ones.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:30 pm
Insipid #8: Dang… I’m kinda honored that you could read so much into my poor effort. And a bit annoyed as well.
Ya see I pointed NO fingers at any person or group, but was simply talking about how political correct behaviors prevent resolution.
The first step in problem solving is to correctly define the problem.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:47 pm
Bullshit NHsparky. President Obama is a centrist and has governed as one. The reason he hasn’t gotten Republican Votes was because of a strategy the Republcans had, not because of any radicalism on his part. The health care bill was a Republican idea- and a good one. Stimulus was largely tax cuts, the same kind of stimulus that Paul Ryan championed and voted for many times- when Bush was President:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bv1yWrAsCAc
Furthermore, let me explain to you how the game is played. We work on the basis of the ELECTORAL COLLEGE. If it went by popular vote he’d of driven up the vote in population centers like California and New York and he’d have a greater percentage than the 51% he actually got. By the way, BOTH percentages of popular vote victories were FAR greater than either victory by George W. Bush. But the game is played by electoral votes and he got 126 more electoral votes than Mitt Romney. When Republicans were predicting a Romney victory they were proclaiming that a 332 margin was a landslide:
http://brobrubel.wordpress.com/2012/11/13/gop-pundits-say-obama-win-was-a-landslide/
Plus where do you get the chutzpah to proclaim that it should be 50/50? You lost the Presidency, you lost Seats in the Senate and you got more than a million less house votes. Even Republicans admit that the only reason your holding on to the house is sequestration.
That’s not to say that I’m buying into your bullshit that President Obama is proclaiming that he should get 100%. He’s willing to talk more spending cuts provided there’s some more revenue. That’s being reasonable. It’s the Republican’s that are digging in their heels.
Either way you’re dodging the truth. The sequestration happened because of Government blackmail.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:53 pm
“President Obama is a centrist…”
Only if you’re left of Ghandhi.
February 11th, 2013 at 3:54 pm
@11- So you lament Panetta going on the TV proclaiming that we shouldn’t “blame the other party” and your response is:
============================================================
I’m at a loss here. It seems to be the PC mindset writ large. I reckon both parties in a rape are at fault? The store owner who shoots a robber pointing a gun at him while demanding the money from the register is part of the problem?
=============================================================
So if you’re likening one side to a rapist or robber how is that NOT proclaiming that one side is to blame? Are you saying that rapists and robbers are not responsible for their actions? That society is to blame? I would never of thought such a profoundly Marxist thought can come from this board? I disagree with this but i’ll have to re-think my views of this as a right-wing site.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:01 pm
Bullshit NHsparky. President Obama is a centrist and has governed as one.
BWWWWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….
(wheeze)
BWWWWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….
Holy fuckin shit, sippy, that’s the funniest shit I ever read right there. Obama’s a centrist but Romney was an “extremist conservative”??? Oh, shit, there’s no fucking possible way you could believe that. NONE.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:12 pm
Insipid #14: Aha… now I understand. Seems my using the word “IRONIC” a part of the title is where you got confused.
Irony: “the use of words to convey a meaning that is the opposite of its literal meaning”
February 11th, 2013 at 4:12 pm
Average cents borrowed per Federal dollar spent, 2001-2008: 10.47
Average cents borrowed per Federal dollar spent, 2009-2013: 37.10
The problem is obvious.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:32 pm
Hondo,
I heard Nancy Pelosi said there is no spending problem…honest. You nailed the problem right on the head, we just weren’t borrowing enough during the Bush years…
/sarc
February 11th, 2013 at 4:46 pm
Old Tanker: Nancy P doesn’t have a spending problem. It’s not her money she’s spending, so for her there aren’t any consequences for overspending.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:51 pm
@13- Here’s a true story that reminds me so much of today’s Republicans.
My favorite piece of music of all time is Beethoven’s 9th Symphony (Ode to Joy). Since I’m sure most of your musical development stopped at Hee Haw here’s a truncated version of it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBaHPND2QJg
Of course you all might HATE that version because it actually reflect the values manifested in the song of coming together in universal brotherhood. I’m sure Wagner would be more your taste in composers (See? I can make stupid Hitler references too!).
Here’s a version of the song that today’s GOP could really get behind:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpcUxwpOQ_A
Now THAT’S a perfect representation of Republican values (ME!) set to music! And of course wrecking the place at the end is a perfect illustration of modern Republican governance!
Oh! Story! The thing with that symphony (as the last video demonstrated) is that it is easy to make a jingle out of it. You can pretty much put any one or two syllable word to that tune. About 20 years ago or so there was this Starz TV commercial set to the music of the 9th Symphony in which they sang the word Movies, over and over again to Beethoven’s wonderful tune.
At this time my sister and law was visiting us for Passover. I was in the kitchen, cleaning some dishes humming Beethoven’s 9th. My sister heard this and said “I LOVE that Starz commercial.”
I said, “That’s not a commercial, that’s Beethoven”.
I swear to god, this was her response: “I HATE Beethoven!” And she maintained her hatred of Beethoven through the rest of the evening despite her admission that she loved the commercial.
So when the SAME song was done by a stupid, nameless jingle writer, she loved it, but as soon as i applied the name Ludwig Von Beethoven to it she hated it.
The modern GOP is acting just like my sister-in-law. There’s a long list of ideas formerly loved by Republicans that they now proclaim to hate once President Obama is for it. These include the dream act (though your ass-kicking in the last election is magically making you for it again) cap and trade, the individual mandate, the Auto industry bail out, end of life counseling, Campaign financial disclosures these are all things republicans either thought of or championed and now you howl that this is pure Communism
This is an insane way to do politics and though it got you seats in 2010 it’s hurting you in the long run. The smarter strategy would of been to play politics the way the Republicans did under Bill Clinton and the Democrats did under Ronald Reagan. In fact the way Politics has pretty much ALWAYS been played. Work together and claim credit. Yes, Reagan won in a historic huge landslide in 1984. But the Democrats won with him. And the Republicans won in 1996 as well. More importantly, it was good for the Country.
But this game of annihilation politics that you are playing is gonna destroy the GOP (and believe it or not, i WANT the GOP to be a viable party) if you don’t stop playing. What happens if Obamacare is as popular nationally as it is in Massachusetts’s? If you played politics the way it has ALWAYS been played you could of taken the credit for it. “See? If you stupid ass democrats had listened to us we could of had this passed in 1996!” And that would actually be a good point. But now you’ve spent the past 3 years demonizing it you’ve eliminated the possibility of taking any credit when it succeeds.
If you’re going to play “winner take all” politics you have to consider the possibility you might lose it all. As you nearly did in 2012! It’s best just not to play.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:56 pm
@16- I understand irony. The irony you SEEMED to be conveying with the use of the rape analogy is that Panetta, along with his party, is the “rapist” or “robber” saying that no side is to blame. That’s certainly not an unreasonable context to draw from the rape metaphor. In fact, i’m not even sure what other context is there. Unless if you’re confusing “making no sense whatsoever” with irony.
February 11th, 2013 at 4:59 pm
Wow. Just WOW!
Guess I need some schooling somewhere on reading between the lines and a few other things. Zero, somebody just proved that paranoia thing to be well founded.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:08 pm
Insipid #21: Honestly… You seem erudite enough that it must be me that is in error. I will try to learn to be clearer.
With “I’m at a loss here.” I thought I’d established a premise that explained what followed.
Let me leave with YOU one of my favorite quotes from old Willie:
“My liege, and madam, to expostulate
What majesty should be, what duty is,
What day is day, night night, and time is time,
Were nothing but to waste night, day, and time;
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief. Your noble son is mad. . . .”
February 11th, 2013 at 5:14 pm
@20 Oy. Where to begin, where to begin.
First of all, thanks for the music clips. For what it’s worth, I like classical music, although I prefer Chopin to Beethoven.
I have a tender spot in my heart for Hee Haw, so can’t say anything bad against it.
I’m a conservative who has renounced the Republican Party. My personal opinion is that if they don’t get their act together in time for the next election cycle, they’re done. Will they? I doubt it.
Bottom line. I don’t give a rat’s ass who started what. If it works, great. If it doesn’t, quit pointing fingers and either fix it or get rid of it. I am a realist first. I believe in pragmatics. It will be the political maneuvering and pandering on both sides that’s going to shove this country right over the cliff. We’re headed for another DEPRESSION. Not a recession–that’s where we are now. I’m not an economist, so can’t debate the facts and figures with you, but the end result will be similar to Germany after WWII: a wheelbarrow of money for a loaf of bread. WE’RE SPENDING MORE MONEY THAN WE ARE TAKING IN. WE BORROW A THIRD OF THE MONEY WE SPEND, AT INTEREST. Who did this, and why, is a moot point. When the government takes the last dollar, we will get handed the bag. It’s just that simple. When our nation runs out of money, and it will at the rate it’s going, what then? You don’t think the Chinese lend us money out of the goodness of their heart, do you?
It’s a little like a plane crash. What went wrong is important, but for the people on that plane, it’s a case of analysis not making any of them any less dead. And my point is this: we’re alll on that freakin’ airplane.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:19 pm
Ok, I guess i’ll ask it outright: what was rape/robbery the meaning of the rape/robbery metaphor for if it wasn’t to say that Democrats were the “criminals”? I’m willing to admit i took it the wrong way judging from your reaction, but what is the right way to take it?
February 11th, 2013 at 5:21 pm
I didn’t think it was possible, but I’m even less interested in Sippy’s music criticism than I am in his mendacious political analysis.
P.S.-Sippy, I’m sure your sister’s sainthood is assured given her willingness to withstand your presence for any amount of time.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:23 pm
@24- I like Chopin too! Come together! Right now! Over me! Oh wait that’s Lennon (the Beatle, not the commie).
February 11th, 2013 at 5:25 pm
@26- there was no music criticism. Just a story to illustrate what you guys seem like to me. Along with a little light-hearted ribbing.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:26 pm
I got curious, so I checked a few other rather well-known eras in the 20th Century to see how much of each Federal dollar spent was borrowed during each:
Great Depression (FDR, 1933-1940): 36.29 cents per Federal dollar spent
World War II and demob (1942-1946): 52.73 cents per Federal dollar spent
Korean War (1950-1953): 2.17 cents per Federal dollar spent
Vietnam War (1965-1972): 6.03 cents per Federal dollar spent
Carter (1977-1980): 11.58 cents per Federal dollar spent
Reagan (1981-1988): 18.88 cents per Federal dollar spent
Bush (41) (1989-1992): 18.29 cents per Federal dollar spent
Clinton (1st term, 1992-1996): 12.27 cents per Federal dollar spent
Bush (43) (2000-2008): 10.47 cents per Federal dollar spent
Method was simple: sum the receipts for the period, divide by sum of outlays. This gives the percentage of each Federal dollar spent that was funded by receipts. Subtract from one to get the percentage borrowed.
A couple of take-aways from the above that I found interesting:
1. The last time we had this level of sustained deficit spending during a peacetime economy was the Great Depression (1933-1940) under FDR. And as Morgenthau noted in 1939: it didn’t work particularly well to get the economy back on track then, either.
2. Proportionally, Bush(43) was actually more fiscally responsible than Carter, Reagan, his father, or Clinton during his first term. Proportionally less of the Federal dollars spent during Bush(43)’s 8 years in office (2001-2008) were borrowed than any of the above.
Source data: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2013/assets/hist01z1.xls
February 11th, 2013 at 5:32 pm
Kind of ignoring the fact that the deficit has been going down virtually every year of President Obama’s presidency and that it is likely to be under 1 trillion this year if there are no fiscal shenanigans.
Anyway, is this in response to me Hondo? Cause you seem to be going off in left field, here.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:32 pm
Splinky, learn to spell, will you, you smug, overbearing little warthog?
Vladimir the Communist’s last name was spelled LENIN. That’s L-E-N-I-N OKAY???? Geez!!!
And just so you know, John Lennon did NOT steal ‘Come Together’ from anyone. Period. And per Paul’s own statements, Yoko Ono had little or nothing to do with the band breaking up. It was already on its last legs.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:39 pm
Insipid #25: One noteworthy additional item to leave you with: I am a registered Independent. Really!
February 11th, 2013 at 5:39 pm
@31- man, you REALLY need to take a chill pill. The Lennon line was a joke. See, you guys are always accusing me of being a communist, get it? For what it’s worth, i’m aware they’re spelled differently, but since it was a JOKE i didn’t feel the need to explain it. Plus, who the fuck doesn’t know “Come together” is a Beatles song? And i didn’t mention Yoko Ono, but I actually like her as a person. Though her singing sounds like a tortured cat.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:40 pm
@32- Fine, my bad. I appologize. I still don’t get the metaphor.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:44 pm
Uh, Sippy – not really. I never go off in left field. (smile)
Sequestration is a symptom of a larger, structural problem. Arguing who’s responsible for sequestration is merely putting a 3/4″ wide band-aid on an amputation to try and stop the arterial bleeding.
The basic problem is that (as Steve Winwood put it years ago) the percentage we’re paying is too high a price, ’cause we’re living beyond all our means. And we have been for at least 4 decades.
If you weren’t blinded by ideology to the point you’re more interested in scoring transient political points than in fixing the real problem, I wouldn’t have to explain this to you. The fact that you obviously couldn’t figure this out for yourself is rather telling.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:45 pm
Insipd = not very good at making jokes of any kind; has to explain all jokes to be understood.
John Lennon was anti-war. He had a bed-in with Yoko in New York, where the two of them did a video of “Give Peace a Chance”. There is no evidence that he had any political inclinations of any kind, which is why he wrote “Imagine”. So when you mix his name with Vladimir Lenin, the Bolshevik who founded the Communist party, you’re just making a REALLY, REALLY BAD JOKE.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:46 pm
And dont’ start that crap line of yours that ‘Imagine’ is the epitome of Marxist thought.
It ain’t.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:50 pm
@35- No, i disagree with you in the “large structural problem” i’m a Keynesian. The New Deal was working great until the deficit scolds went to work in 1937 and fucked things up. When Keynesian policies went back into effect after WWII we had unparrallelled sustained economic progress until Ronaldus Reagan came in and fucked up everything.
Either way, the point of the thread (i thought)was laying blame for the sequestration. Now i haven’t a clue.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:51 pm
@35- No, i disagree with you in the “large structural problem” i’m a Keynesian. The New Deal was working great until the deficit scolds went to work in 1937 and fucked things up. When Keynesian policies went back into effect after WWII we had unparrallelled sustained economic progress until Ronaldus Reagan came in and fucked up everything.
Either way, the point of the thread (i thought)was laying blame for the sequestration. Now i haven’t a clue (gosh, i’m putting my chin out for you to make fun of me over and over and you’re NOT taking it at all… I give and i give, Hondo).
February 11th, 2013 at 5:56 pm
Hilarious-Keynes predicated a lot of his thought on the idea that governments should save during good times, which absolutely fails to take into account that politicians have almost no incentive ever to cut off the flow of free stuff in order to save.
“I haven’t a clue” were the truest words in that post.
February 11th, 2013 at 5:58 pm
Honestly ex-ph2, you seem to be a raving lunatic. I didn’t say ANYTHING about Yoko, the song Imagine or anything derogatory about the Beatles. I like the Beatles too! Really. The joke was NOT comparing Lennon to Lenin but to parodize the way many on this board think of me as a commie. If you think it a bad joke, fine. At this point i’m inclined to agree with you simply because i’ve spent WAY more time on it then i think it deserves. But this idea that I was making this full-on attack of the Beatles is just false. I didn’t attack them at all, in fact.
February 11th, 2013 at 6:05 pm
Yo, Insipid #20 “The smarter strategy would of been to play politics”
That should read “would have”. See, it’s a “contraction”…
February 11th, 2013 at 6:13 pm
Thanks for the tip, Curt. Too bad i can’t edit on this blog. There’s a Lennon joke i’d LOVE to delete. By the way ex-ph2 I’m saying i want to delete the joke, NOT John Lennon who absolutely did NOT overthrow the Czars in a blood coup, who protested for peace and had a bed in with Yoko Ono (who is also totally awesome and not AT ALL to blame for breaking up the Beatles) and who wrote many AWESOME songs, including “Instant Karma”.
Which, in keeping with the thread title, IS ironic because “Instant Karma” is exactly what i feel like i’m experiencing right now.
February 11th, 2013 at 6:14 pm
Me? Raving lunatic? Oh, that is rich!
Splinky, I’m so used to your verbal diarrhea and self-important self-promotion, it’s become increasingly difficult to follow your train of thought, or to even find your train of thought. You have a well-known habit of sidetracking if you lose an argument, because you just don’t like to lose…even though you lose on a regular basis.
You can’t even figure out simple prose. I did not say you ‘attacked’ the Beatles. I warned you NOT to attack them. Got that?
Learn to read for content.
February 11th, 2013 at 6:29 pm
Let the games begin.
February 11th, 2013 at 6:45 pm
I think President Truman said it best in that, “The buck stops here.” When you are the leader of the free world and it’s tanking, you should take that responsibility and the blame that goes with it. He could fix this if he wanted to. Don’t blame 1/3 of the branch beacuse someone says something you don’t want to hear or doesn’t agree with you, and you end all talking points on everything. Remember the words, “Sequestration is not gonna happen.”
February 11th, 2013 at 9:30 pm
@44- So your method of preventing an attack on the Beatles that I was never going to make was to imagine (AWESOME song, totally NOT Communist!)an argument that i was not going to put forward and do not believe and then rebut it? And I’m the one who “sidetracks” and has a difficult train of thought to follow?
Fine, i am hereby warning you NOT to attack baby monkey:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_sfnQDr1-o
Baby monkey is NOT the monkey responsible for the transmission of the Aids virus. Baby Monkey is a baby, he was not even born when the aids virus came into existence. And do NOT tell me that baby monkey is responsible for tearing that woman’s face off! That was a chimpanzee, this is a baby monkey! And baby monkey is NOT brutalizing the pig! The pig LOVES being ridden as much as baby monkey loves to ride! And baby monkey is NOT scheming to irradiate Fort Knox to increase the price of HIS gold. That’s Gold finger, a James Bond villain that does not even exist! This is baby monkey! And Baby Monkey doesn’t even HAVE any gold! HA! So why the fuck would he want to irradiate Fort Knox anyway? Just leave Baby Monkey alone!
What’s that you say? You were never going to insult baby monkey? Well, Melba, my Ketteh sees through ALL your scheming schemes!
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8096/8396354995_82fe9c40d6_c.jpg
Beware, i am onto you! And so is Melba!
February 11th, 2013 at 10:08 pm
Christ, sippy–meds. You. Dosage. Increase. NOW.
February 11th, 2013 at 10:32 pm
What?!?!?
Whatever you do, splinky, don’t do that stuff at work. Your employer may question your sanity.
Good grief!
February 11th, 2013 at 10:32 pm
Sparky, help! Oh. My. God.
February 12th, 2013 at 2:02 am
Oh God, please save me from humorless Republicans.
February 12th, 2013 at 3:35 am
i was going to write a long instructional lecture for insipid, but then i realized that s/he doesnt have the educational back ground to grasp any of it. what started out with quasi-organized thoughts, went out the window with “regan screwed it up”. clearly someone has never touched a book on modern american history or studied the Carter admin. FDR’s new deal prolonged the great depression by over a decade, had it not been for WW2, the great depression would have continued even longer. carter nearly created another depression, and Reagan saved the day! i have heard so much about “the worst recession since the great depression” but clearly these people choose to ignore the Carter years and how bad it got then.
you may want to go back and check your facts on the debt ceiling raises under bush and reagan, your numbers are way off. never before in the history of our country have we had to debate a debt limit increase every year or had our spending this far out of control. you claim that the debt has decreased each year under obama, yet the projected deficit this year according the the CBO is 1.2T! dems complained it was unpatriotic to have a 500B deficit under Bush, Obama hiimself tried to block the debt ceiling increase under bush! read some history that hasnt been revisited by public educators. how many times did bush raise the debt limit? the answer is less than 3, ill give ya 2 guesses.
i would like to give ya some advice that i love to give students with large government ideals, read George Orwell. any of his works are worth picking up, 1984 and animal farm are musts!
as for the idea of obama as a centrist, you are either greatly deceived or lack basic understanding of the word centrist. conservatives hav NEVER championed government expansion or trampling of personal freedoms. the whole idea of conservatism is keep the government out of as much as possible, or as a great man once said “the government does very little well, so make the government do very little”
February 12th, 2013 at 4:51 am
Well, if your long “instructional” lecture was anywhere near as error filled or as fact free as your “short” lecture than I’m glad you saved yourself the trouble. You’re wrong and you’re ignorant. The debt ceiling was raise 7 times under George W. Bush, 4 Times under Bill Clinton, 4 times under Bush sr. and a record 17 times under Rondald Reagan:
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/moneymatters/tp/5-Presidents-Who-Raised-The-Debt-Limit.htm
The unemployment rate when Reagan took office was 7.5 percent over the course of the next few years, thanks largely to his policies, the rate rose to a peak of 10.4% then he managed to bring it back down to 7.3%. Pretty much exactly where he started.
Reagan’s “recession” was not nearly as bad as Obama’s near-depression and furthermore his solution was Keynesian economics:
http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/rec1980.htm
Also, let’s review some VERY basic history: FDR was elected in 1932 and came to power in March of 1933 (there was a longer waiting period prior then). World War II started for the USA on December 7th 1941. So if you do the math you’ll see that Roosevelts policies were in effect for only 8 years and 9 months prior to the event which- by your own admission- ended the great depression. So how the fuck could his policies have extended the depression over a decade when he wasn’t even IN office a decade? It couldn’t, you just pulled it out of your ass.
The New Deal WAS working, which is why Roosevelt kept getting reelected along with Democrats. The one bad year was 1937 when he listened to the deficit scolds of his day and decided to cut. However even if i were to buy your argument that it was WWII that got us out of the Depression (which i don’t) that’s STILL an endorsement of Keynesian economics of spending to stimulate a depressed economy. Your also ignoring the 40 years of prosperity AFTER WWII where all presidents, even the Republicans, were dominated by Rooseveltian policies. That lasted right up until Reagan’s policies fucked everything up, ruining our industrial base, our banking industry, increasing wealth stratification to levels higher than the great depression and turning us from the largest creditor nation to the largest debtor nation.
Also the idea that George Orwell was a libertarian is laughable. He was a Social Democrat whose politics were much closer to mine than yours. He wasn’t against all government, he was against totalitarianism. So not only do you suck at history, you suck at literature.
February 12th, 2013 at 7:44 am
Sippy: sure. Well over 7 years of economic “recovery” under FDR gave the country an unemployment rate of almost 14.5% in 1940. That’s really . . . wonderful. And that’s U1 – they didn’t accurately measure U6 in those days.
By any rational definition of success, that royally sucks. Even Morgenthau, FDR’s Treasury Secretary, admitted in 1939 that FDR’s deficit spending policies simply hadn’t worked worth a damn to end the Great Depression. He’d be in a position to know.
February 12th, 2013 at 8:37 am
No, sippy–the New Deal was working to buy votes, and that’s about it. You know, “Tax and tax, spend and spend, elect and elect.” Oh, who was it who said that? Oh yeah–Harry Hopkins.
Even the uber-liberal SCOTUS had to smack down a lot of FDR’s programs because they overreached so far. And when the taxes (or whatever the FDR administration called them that day to dodge legal challenges, much like the Obama administration did with Obamacare) kicked in early in FDR’s second term, that’s when you saw the economy start to take a major shit in the 1937-38 timeframe. Gee, raising taxes slows the economy–who fuckin knew?
Finally, might I suggest picking up a copy of FDR’s Folly? You might be surprised just HOW negative an impact FDR’s policies had throughout the 1930′s. Consider that by 1935-36, Europe was pretty much over the Depression. Granted, they were ramping up for WWII, but their economic state certainly never matched ours during the late 30′s.
February 12th, 2013 at 8:58 am
Yes, considering over half the banks in the country had failed and that he started with unemployment at over 20% reducing it to 14.5% is pretty good.
Also, if this world were “rational” you Conservatives would shut the fuck up and hide in shame. But apparently the party of “personal responsibility” won’t take it. It was Republican laissez fare economics of bank deregulation and wealth stratification that caused the first Republican great depression in 1929 and it was the exact same policies that almost caused one in 2009. The only reasons we’re not in a great depression now are 1. the remnants of the new deal that prevented it and 2. the amazing leadership of President Obama and the Democratic Congress.
But that’s what ALWAYS happens. Republicans get put in charge and take a massive dump on the economy. Then when Democrats are in charge you complain that we don’t clean up your shit fast enough.
The fact is that considering the massive devastation caused by Hoover and Coolidge’s policies Roosevelt did an amazing job. Unemployment was declining as fast as it did during WWII except for that one period in 1937 when he disastrously listened to the austerity junkies of his day and tried debt reduction.
The same is true for Obama. His job performance has been amazing considering what he was given. There is no President- certainly no Republican President- that could of cleaned up the pile of dung that GWB left for President Obama. That’s why he was re-elected. That’s why he’ll go down as one of the great Presidents in history while Reagan will fall to the dustbin of the mediocrity.
February 12th, 2013 at 9:11 am
Things/people that are (or were) funny:
Carol Burnett
John Belushi (dec.)
Jack Kennegy (dec.)
Red Skelton (dec.)
Wile E. Coyote & Roadrunner
Burns & Allen (dec.)
Bob Hope (dec.)
Jim Gaffigan http://www.jimgaffigan.com/
Kittens with a toy
Will Shakespeare
Things/people that are NOT funny:
Recession
Inflation
Jimmy Carter
High gas prices
Traffic accidents
People who take themselves too seriously
Insipid’s looney-tune ramblings (although they could be almost funny if rewritten just a tad)
February 12th, 2013 at 9:22 am
You have it backwards, as usual Sparky. The economy took a “shit” in 1937 because of austerity policies. Slashing spending in the midst of a depression is a BAD idea.
Also the court “Smacked down” six of the eight provisions of the New Deal between 1935 and 1937. Roosevelt’s first supreme court appointment was Hugo Black in 1937. The Supreme Court that overturned the New Deal was a REPUBLICAN Supreme Court. They were appointed by Harding, Coolidge and Hoover. So not only was the court NOT “uber liberal” it was Conservative. Most of the “smacked down” provisions were later instituted under different names after FDR was able to appoint his own justices. Thank god for that, i can’t imagine how bad of a depression we’d be in right now if it weren’t for the safety net of the new deal.
February 12th, 2013 at 9:40 am
Sippy: keep drinking the Kool-Aid, fella. It’s working to keep you completely disconnected from reality.
By the way, you’re dead wrong about the “unemployment declined as fast during the Great Depression as during World War II” claim. The largest single year drop in unemployment during the Great Depression were those between 1933 and 1934, and betwen 1936 and 1937. Both changesx were -3.2%. The largest single year drop during World War II? -5.2%, between 1941 and 1942. The drop between 1940 and 1941 (beginning of pre-World War II military expansion) was -4.7%.
The best 2 and 3 year drops are also large during World War II.
Those drops are in absolute percentage terms of estimated or actual U1. If you calculate that as a reduction in the percentage unemployed the previous year, it’s not even that close.
The best single-year percentage decline in unemployment (as opposed to absolute decline) during the Great Depression occurred between 1935 and 1936, when U1 declined from 20.1% to 16.9% – a drop of (16.9 – 20.1) / (20.1) = -15.92%. Every year-to-year percentage decline in unemployment between 1940 and 1944 (e.g., 40-41, 41-42, 42-43, and 43-44) was at least twice that, and two (41-42 and 42-43) were over 3 times that [ (1.9-4.7)/9.9 = -52.53% and (1.9-4.7)/4.7 = -59.57%, respectively.]
In short: you didn’t know what you were talking about and pulled it out of your ass. Again.
February 12th, 2013 at 9:44 am
For completeness: here’s the U1 data on which the above is based:
1933 – 24.9%
1934 – 21.7%
1935 – 20.1%
1936 – 16.9%
1937 – 14.3%
1938 – 19.0%
1939 – 17.3%
1940 – 14.6% (note: major military expansion began in 1940 and continued through WWII)
1941 – 9.9%
1942 – 4.7%
1943 – 1.9%
1944 – 1.2%
1945 – 1.9% (note: World War II demobilization began this year)
February 12th, 2013 at 9:58 am
Sippy–lemme give you a little hint.
Who ran Congress starting in 2007? I mean, if you want to blame the GOP for the shit we’re in now, meaning you want to blame Congress now for the mess we’re in, it’s only fair you blame the people in charge of Congress then for the mess that started in 2007-08.
But you just pretty much stated what you REALLY wanted in your previous post is for us to just STFU. Criticism not allowed, dammit, or you’re a racist–or worse! Nevermind that between 2001-09, “protest is patriotic”, and “speakinig truth to power” were memes bleated repeatedly by the left. What’s the matter, sippy? Facts kicking your ass again? Don’t like the fact your policies DON’T and HAVEN’T worked?
If this economy is in such great shape, why are we on the verge of another recession, with one quarter of negative GDP, and one more coming just to make “Obama’s recession” official? You’d think after four years of maxxing out the credit cards we’d be on cloud nine, but funny how we’re just sputtering along, isn’t it?
Newsflash for ya–it isn’t GOVERNMENT spending that drives the economy. It’s CONSUMER spending that drives it. Look how the latter is doing, how the latter did during the recent Christmas season, and tell me that the economy is coming back. What’s that you say? Unemployment is coming down? Sure, the U-1 is, but consider for ever job added, 3-4 people have been giving up, leaving the workforce. If you had the same workforce participation rate as you did in 2008, U-1 unemployment would be closer to 12 percent, not 7.8.
I could go on all day, sippy, but what you and your ilk will never even begin to understand is that when you have fewer and fewer workers supporting more and more of the idle masses, eventually the scales will tip. Even now, we have 49.5 percent of the US population which has either zero or a negative tax burden. People are leaving high-tax states in droves. To oversimplify, it’s people “going Galt.” What’ll the looters and moochers do THEN?
February 12th, 2013 at 10:05 am
Unemployment is a lagging indicator. Furthermore the unemployment numbers at the time does not include recipients of jobs from the PWA and others that benefited from the Welfare state. AT its peak 20 million were receiving benefits 1 out of 6 Americans. The economy was well on its way to a recovery until Roosevelt made the mistake of instituting austerity measures in 1937. Once the depression hit bottom in 1933, the US economy started on four years of expansion that was the biggest cyclical boom in U.S. economic history. For four years, real GDP grew at a 12% rate and nominal GDP grew at a 14% rate. There was another shorter and shallower depression in 1937 caused by renewed fiscal tightening (and higher Federal Reserve margin requirements).
Oh, how did Romney’s winning the last week in a Reaganesque manner work out for you, Hondo? Worked out GREAT for me, and the country.
February 12th, 2013 at 10:11 am
NHSparky: not sure I’d even agree that U1 is “going down”, amigo. It seems to have essentially quit declining nearly a year ago. For the last 11 months it’s held pretty steady at 8.0% +/- 0.2%. And it went up a bit last month vis-a-vis Dec 2012.
The labor participation rate has similary stagnated for the same period at about 63.65% +/- 0.15%.
In short: we’re stuck in neutral. But after 4 years, we ought to be improving substantially – and we’re not.
February 12th, 2013 at 10:15 am
The Bottom line Insipid, is that you seem to think that this is an attack by the republicans on the democratic party and that it is all the republican’s fault. And that the President is not at fault at all. I call B.S.
Where does the buck stop if not the president? This is HIS government, and has been for the past 3 years. And from what I have seen, he is not doing anything to promote anything resembling a Bi-Partasin movement. The Budget is NOT being balanced, he hasn’t made the senate pass a budget in 3 years in a DEMOCRATICALLY controlled house by the way.
I understand that cutbacks are necessary, and money is tight, (or should be). The Military is getting gutted,but no OTHER organziation is being called on to make the sacrifices that the military has. Not Social Security, not the entitlement programs, none.
It is thanks to this, that we will not be able to project power when diplomacy fails. And when the country needs us again, the military will be unable to answer the call.
You laugh at this,I am sure. But it WILL happen, and the people who will have suffered from it will be the soldiers and marines who will pay the final price because of political expedience.
I don’t care whose fault it is at this point, I don’t care about the pointing fingers. I want a politician who will place the COUNTRY’S needs above his political career and get the Budget fixed and the country back on track, Period. And from what I see of this president, that is not the type of person he is.
February 12th, 2013 at 10:28 am
Sippy–it’s real difficult to grow the economy at double-digit rates when it was damn near zip-point-shit to begin with.
Yet here we are, four years into the Obamanation, and how much has GDP improved from 2008? Seriously. Look at GDP in 4Q2008, and compare it to 4Q2012. Here, let me help:
Dec 2012: 15.83T
Dec 2008: 14.27T
Dec 2004: 11.59T
Dec 2000: 9.71T
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/data/GDP.txt
So, we have an increase from 2008-2012 of 10.9 percent, or about 2.5 percent per year. But from 2004-08, it increased 23.1 percent, or about 5.3 percent per year. For the period 2000-04, we’re looking at an increase of 4.5 percent per year or a total change of nearly 19.4 percent.
What were you saying about that “awful Bush economy” again?
As much as you’d like to piss and moan that he had anything to do with it, it was much more the housing bubble and near collapse of the banks along with it that was the real catalyst of the 2008 recession. Now how did we get there in the first place?
Can you say, “Community Reinvestment Act”?
Finally, there are people who would disagree with you that unemployment is a lagging factor. Yeah, not so much when you consider long-term unemployed, sippy:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/38125080/Unemployment_Is_No_Longer_A_Lagging_Indicator_ElErian
February 12th, 2013 at 10:48 am
Changing the subject because you can’t argue facts, Sippy? That
s the typical tactic of a fool who knows he’s stuck with a losing argument. But from you, it’s also completely predictable.
PWA jobs were paid work, and were therefore indeed included in U1. Wrong there, bucko.
You’re probably thinking about the CCC, which employed a maximum of 300k persons at any one time. They may not have been counted in U1; I haven’t been able to find a definitive answer for that.
Moreover, “welfare benefits” aren’t productive work and are thus a non sequitur in any discussion of unemployment. Even you aren’t dumb enough not to know that, proving that your bringing up the point was merely another clumsy attempt to obfuscate.
We’ll see what the numbers say about your latest claim a bit later today, when I’ve had a chance to analyze them.
February 12th, 2013 at 5:53 pm
Finally had a chance to look at the numbers, Sippy. And yes – you again appear to be, well, wrong. Again.
But in this case, you’re not quite as badly wrong as usual. Here you’re maybe 10% correct.
Maybe.
The 4 year period from 1933-1937 did post an impressive 4-year gain in GDP – a cumulative gain of nearly 63% in 4 years (from $56.4B to $91.9B). And it did have a relatively high 1-year gain in GDP: 17.02% between 1933 and 1934.
However, that 4 year run was followed by two lackluster years – 1938 and 1939. The former actually showed a contraction, while the latter had a mediocre gain in GDP. The 6 year gain is thus a much less impressive 63.5% – or the equivalent of an average annual GDP growth rate of roughly 8.5369% (1.085369 ^ 6 is approximately 1.635).
In contrast, the periods 1939-43, 1940-44, and 1941-45 each show much higher cumulative GDP growth – 88.04%, 115.40%, and 116.77%, respectively. So FDR’s Great Depression “recovery” is hardly the best 4-year run in our history on that score.
Moreover, the period 1933-1937 is not unique in having an unusually high one-year percentage gain in GDP, or in having several (3) consecutive years of double-digit GDP percentage gains. 1950-51 showed a one-year gain of 15.53%; and of the 9 years between 1973 and 1981, six showed double-digit percentage gains in GDP – including the 4-year period from 1975-1979.
Finally, you should note that GDP growth is a relatively meaningless indicator of general economic “wellness”. The 4-year periods 1974-1978, 1975-1979, 1976-1980, and 1977-1981 all show excellent 4-year GDP growth, having cumulative 4-year gains of 52.97%, 56.45%, 52.81%, and 54.02%, respectively. Not quite as good as that during the 1933-1937 FDR “recovery” – but damn close. So that must also have been a time of “great economic recovery”, right?
Wrong. I lived through those times, and remember them well. Economically, those years absolutely sucked the big wazoo – they were frankly considerably worse than today. Not only did you have high unemployment, but you also had simultaneous high inflation.
In contrast, the late 1990s all showed 4-year GDP gains in the mid-20% range. Clinton’s foreign policy was naive and foolish, but his willingness to work with the GOP Congress during his second term did this nation a world of good.
Well, it did the nation good for a while. Then the Dot.Com bubble burst and the ticking time bomb left behind via Clinton Administration regulatory abuse of the Carter-era Community Reinvestment Act led to the real-estate collapse a few years after Clinton left office. The real estate collapse that resulted was a primary factor (if not the single biggest factor) in the 2008 financial crisis.
And, yeah – that real estate collapse is indeed traceable to the CRA and risky lending forced by Clinton’s regulatory abuse of same.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w18609.pdf
Still, I have to give you credit here. 10% correct is a whole lot closer to accurate than your norm of 100% bullshit.
February 26th, 2013 at 12:25 pm
Some of the names are ‘Haridra’ which means ‘the yellow one’, Aushadhi, Gauri and Kanchani (the golden goddess).
In the photo (just above) that change color over time.
The turmeric herb has been shown to help prevent cancer in all stages and protect the
heart from disease.