I bring this to your attention because of something I heard from some Republican strategies a few years back. They were lamenting the fact that the Democrats and progressives had documentary filmmakers in their pockets (aka Michael Moore) and the Republicans had nothing. They saw the documentary as a good method for distribution of a propagandistic message. I suspect it will be a while before they get the bugs worked out. This thing will never see a theatrical release.I’d bet money on it. These folks do not understand how to do these things properly.
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All truth passes through three stages:
First, it is ridiculed
Second, it is violently opposed
Third, it is accepted as self-evident!
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
-s
Does this means we’re going to see a return of the obcenely cutefied/doctored Disney nature shows?
Ahh, there they go again…trotting out RR as their Great Hero president. One almost has to have a little sympathy for the poor Republicans…he may indeed be all they’ve got.
Lets seeeee!
ALL who think this happened in 2 years RAISE your dick?
Look down and admire it, as that is what you are.
NOW,
All those that think this is from 2000 Onwards, raise your RIGHT HAND…now SLAP yourself with it.
ALL those that think this has happened over a 15-20 period…Raise your left hand and pat yourself on the back..
#22 Faxon “But then, there could NEVER be any of THESE FOLKS in the liberal wonderland.”
You are getting out of your depth there Faxon. There are no more accomplished race baiters and bigots than Democrats.
In the words of their leader, “He’s young and inexperienced and he’s got a funny name. And did I mention he’s black?”
Cool! Reagan’s running again!
#18
Let’s get your brain out of the ideological propaganda of the 50s. The USSR was never a communist nation. No nation has EVER been communist. There will NEVER be a communist nation. It is a Utopian ideal that will not work in real life.
Just as there has never been a democratic nation. Democracy is also not fit for real life and a large population.
Now the USSR did not get downed by Reagan or his extra spending on defense. It was brought down by its own weight, despotism, corruption and policies of running its economy and handling its people. It was doomed to fail as all totalitarian states are. Especially when the ruling group is a bunch of old coots whom will die and be replaced by younger people whom will have new ideas and new challenges to face.
As for the documentary.
It is again another distorted view of making Reagan seem like a demigod and Obama like a demon. When the problem has been growing since the late 1800s.
To anyone still walking around with the dreamy naive idea that you can simply vote in a good leader and that one person can turn everything around to some idealistic interpretation of what “America” is supposed to be like; please put down the booze, wake the fuck up and stop.
The tools of government are bent, rusted and broken. You cannot build anything with bad tools. Until you replace them, nothing can be built.
Replace the tools. New government for a new nation. We are NOT the nation of 200, 100 or even 50 years ago.
Cursor_
So Obama is acting WAY TO MUCH LIKE BushtheRetard. Thats is in large measure a reflection of just how destructive Bush was AND just how damaging the Republican Party has been in trying to get any fix to work.
FFS. So, if Bush does something stupid, it’s Bush’s fault. If Obama does something stupid, it is Bush’s fault?! You wonder why moderates call the Democrat’s clueless?
Sorry, but the time for Bush blame has past. Iraq is coming to a close and all that is left is the war which Obama said we should have. It was Obama that chose to bailout automakers, not Bush. It was Obama that setup the mortgage bailout (which has pretty much been a failure) not Bush (btw, I’m not talking about TARP). Of all the things that Bush did that were so bad, what has Obama done to reverse them? Any of them?
Admit it, it isn’t that the problems facing Obama were too big to solve. It is that they were too big for Obama and his inexperience.
#38 said:
-try over a century
you can go back to slapping yourself in the face now.
what you do with you do with your dick is your own business. however, may i suggest using it to facilitate the above?
-s
Obama is a failure because he took away my freedom to not buy insurance.
Obama is a failure because he bailed out corrupt bankers and business that bet everything that he would.
Obama is a failure because he has even further entrenched us into debt that my great great great grandchildren will be paying off, and he has crap to show for it.
Obama is a failure because he is a tax-and-spend progressive who care more about his agenda than anyone or anything else.
Obama is a failure because he always pays off his cronies before he ever gives one penny to helping our economy.
Obama is a tool for the progressive movement. Nothing more. He used the democrats like whores, and now they will be paying the price for his agenda.
I cant really blame Obama though. He has absolutely no experience. He is an elite that has had no real life experience, and was pushed up the chain of command to be a puppet. His entire career has amounted to nothing but to further the progressive movement. They knew if he stayed in one place long enough, his actions would have pinned him down, so they rushed up the flag pole.
Spending trillions of China’s money to pay off his supports was disgustingly corrupt.
Obama cares more about his agenda then he does you.
#45
Same scenario except that once Obama takes the controls, he burns the rest of the fuel to go faster towards a star. Yep, all Bush’s fault. Obama couldn’t have changed direction or simply not accelerated. Nope, it was all Bush’s fault and poor little Obama couldn’t do anything about it even though he made it worse.
Thomas==well, since you took up the call out I feel “obligated” to respond. Of course, the space trip is an analogy only meant to highlight one issue. Once we go off that issue, should we debate the elements of the analogy or the “real” facts? I say real facts:
I say Bush left Obama in a certain position and you want to call that “fault.” I could go with that even though its a bit off but close enough.
My position is that when it comes to the economy, jobs, deficit there is very little Obama could do. Easy to say what he is doing is “wrong” but until you suggest what the better alternative was/is you are only braying. Sure, you have dogmatic positions but no logic, no balance of expert opinion on what Obama should do. I have my list, you may have yours.
I would have waged open war on the Pukes: rammed single payer healthcare thru, initiated a jobs program to rebuild infrastructure and develop green energy, bailouts linked to reform, reset Wallstreet to end the skimming and gambling, immediately submit bills to end tax support for outsourcing jobs, legalized drugs==ie, do what I think would actually turn the country around FISCALLY and if that made me a one term president then that would be the voters judgment. Sad to go down the tubes acting like Bush light.
Any your specific list to actually return America to a balanced budget in the future is what?
Reagan ran deficits and Clinton ran surpluses. The mind reels at the BS.
Clinton had the .com boom to prop up his numbers. Did Clinton create, support, or do anything that brought along the .com boom? Nope.
#49
My position is that when it comes to the economy, jobs, deficit there is very little Obama could do.
My position is that there is very little that the Federal government can do to stimulate the economy but there is no end to what they can do to make it worse. Their best recourse is be predictable in their course of actions, to make small decisive moves, to strive towards a balanced budget and to not make things worse through radically new legislation during a recession/depression. Obama has done just the opposite. His first mistake was going on a crusade for health care. His second mistake was not taking a leadership role in the drafting of that legislation until after six to eight months of Congressional bickering with no results. We all agree that something needs to be done to correct health care, but trying to do something about it right after the worst financial disaster in 70 years is a huge mistake. With radical reforms comes uncertainty which is the drags down the economy and thus was a political and leadership mistake. His third mistake was fostering the “too big to fail” mantra by bailing out the automakers. We already have a mechanism to deal with failed businesses: bankruptcy court. His fourth mistake was throwing good money after bad through the stimulus package. If it only had no effect, we’d be better off than where we are: with a significantly higher national debt and even fewer options to deal with our problems and all for no results. Had Obama done nothing, we would be in a better position than what he has done.
rammed single payer healthcare thru
Had Obama been able to convince everyone in his own party to follow him, he would have been able to do just that. However, he showed a serious lack of executive skills by first putting that task in the hands of the Senate and second by letting the entire process drag on for about a year. Still, the issue isn’t whether we think his health care ideas are good or bad but whether they are good or bad right now. The legislation itself was over a thousand pages of the worst legalese ever devised. That kind of unpredictability is what makes businesses slow expansion and hoard cash to see how things will pan out. I.e., the timing was awful.
initiated a jobs program to rebuild infrastructure
What infrastructure would that be? What needed infrastructure (e.g. high speed rail is not what I would consider needed) are we talking about that does not already exist in some form and whose costs should be paid by the Federal government and not the States or cities?
develop green energy
Obama can do that now. All he needs to do is to spend Defense money to research better and more green fuels for the military.
bailouts linked to reform
That depends greatly on what you mean by reform. IMO, the bailouts of the financial industry were absolutely needed but as far as I can tell, no reforms were made. The bailouts of the other industries were simply a waste.
reset Wallstreet to end the skimming and gambling
To some degree that has been done, but let’s not forget that much of the financial crisis were caused by government meddling in the first place. I’m not talking about regulation or deregulation. I’m talking about legislation that compelled, or highly encouraged, loan companies to make loans they would not normally want to make.
end tax support for outsourcing jobs
Sounds great but nearly impossible to enforce. Corporations can setup sister entities offshore which are effectively part of the same multi-national corporation. The real solution is to find the incentives and disincentives compelling corporations to move jobs overseas in the first place and correct those problems.
legalized drugs
On this one we agree. Again, the reaction from the Obama administration to CA’s Prop 19 has been just the opposite. Instead of encouraging the legalization of marijuana, he’s bring the hammer down on States whose populations want to legalize, regulate and tax it.
Thomas==well done. We mostly agree. Why was I so pissed at you over nearly the same issues on our last exchange?
I will still nit pick for the pleasure of it:
1. My position is that there is very little that the Federal government can do to stimulate the economy but there is no end to what they can do to make it worse. /// Logically possible I suppose but logic, common sense, experience, and your own words say just the opposite. Dogma.
2. ….and to not make things worse through radically new legislation during a recession/depression. /// So, after a tragic bus accident, you recommend only the application of fluids and band aids? Again, logically incoherent. The extreme disaster of a world wide economic meltdown does suggest an equally strong reaction to counter those effects. Think of Japan entering the doldrums. Thats why so many experts say the stimulus would be more effective if twice as large. ((I know, me too.))
3. His first mistake was going on a crusade for health care. /// No. Health care has needed serious reform for at least 20 years. How much of the GDP should be consumed by healthcare? What multiple of per capita expense should be spent on health care compared to the rest of the world with middling results? I know you can think/deal with more than one threat at a time. Obama’s recognition is that failure to reform health care inhibits so many other important issues as well. It is worthy on the merits and debatable only in terms of politics.
4. His second mistake was not taking a leadership role in the drafting of that legislation until after six to eight months of Congressional bickering with no results. /// I agree Obama gave too much credit to the Republicans. Even now I doubt he sees them clearly for what they are.
5. His third mistake was fostering the “too big to fail” mantra by bailing out the automakers. /// I don’t know, so don’t strongly disagree. Seems like a straight forward accounting exercise to me–which is cheaper==unemployment and welfare for all those involved or a bailout. I would use accounting rather than morality to decide this issue.
6. We already have a mechanism to deal with failed businesses: bankruptcy court. //// No. Bk does well with SINGLE Bankruptcies but I doubt that mechanism can most effectively deal with an industry failure on the scale we have before us. The notion of reforming the failed businesses though needs more recognition though. Had the bailout taken place in some sort of bk wrapping, then the bonus structure of wallstreet could have been dealt with rather than the BS about “honoring contracts” and what not. Again, to me while the morality may dictate “let them fail” seems to me the issue is one of self preservation and which route does the less harm to MYSELF (ie–America) and that is an accounting exercise for which no accounting actually exists. Only models, which are manipulatable for desired outcomes, and not proof.
7. His fourth mistake was throwing good money after bad through the stimulus package /// We don’t know that. Its an accounting question for which there is no accounting.
8. Had Obama done nothing, we would be in a better position than what he has done. /// Must be nice to know the future so dogmatically. Foolish.
Quibbles to small on the rest. I respect your analytical abilities/knowledge base. You only make one major mistake: you assume too much. Wisdom lies in ambiguity when ambiguity is truly present. Must be ignored if you have masters to serve who have an agenda about power rather than what is best for America.
What is best for America? Well, there’s a lot of ambiguity there, but not so much that it can’t be more carefully analyzed than we typically give.
Yea, verily.
I prefer no party, but I do find it ridiculous to look back and blame Bush. If he was elected president he was elected to fix it, not keep on breaking using the past president as an excuse. If he can’t then he should quit and let someone else who can give it a try.
Until we stop the blame we will never assume the responsibility and find a solution.
On the bailout I am a firm believer (and yes it may be my own DOGMA) in the market. We should’ve done NO bailout, and YES, sorry for the people that would be on the streets, but SUCH IS LIFE! Suck it up.
Dogma? Yes, admitting the problem is half the solution. Soldier on.
#54
So, after a tragic bus accident, you recommend only the application of fluids and band aids?
The converse analogy would be to try a radically experimental drug with a history of failure that could kill you instead of simply administering fluids and band aids which would help you heal on your own. Which would you choose? Businesses want predictability. We just endured the worse financial crisis in 70 years. That is enough turmoil for businesses; don’t compound it by trying push something else that would give them even more reservation. I’ll bet that if you ask his own party members that they would agree that Obama should have waited on health care reform.
The extreme disaster of a world wide economic meltdown does suggest an equally strong reaction to counter those effects.
That’s a gambler fallacy of following bad money. If your family suffers a tragic financial emergency, that is not the right time to take another financial risk on something else. “Maybe if I double down, I’ll make my money back”. Fundamentally, that is an error in risk assessment. Further, the actions they took had been tried, by the Japanese no less, and in the long run it ended in making things worse. Government spending makes it take longer to get out of a recession.
No. Health care has needed serious reform for at least 20 years
Whether health care reform was needed and whether it had to be done right then are two entirely different questions. On the first, I agree with you even if we disagree about the nature of the reform. My biggest issue is the timing. The biggest financial meltdown in 70 years had just occurred; that was possibly the worst conceivable time to try to pass radical legislation. How much GDP has been lost from unemployment? How much has been lost due to businesses holding off expansion specifically because of uncertainty about government action and direction? Even if you think Obama’s original ideas on health care were absolutely where we needed to be, he was completely incompetent with respect to leading people to get there. Government does not turn on a dime. He needed a more gradual approach that would give people and processes time to adjust. At the very least, he needed some variation of the system he wanted to implement with a track record of success in this country.
4. His second mistake was not taking a leadership role in the drafting of that legislation until after six to eight months of Congressional bickering with no results. /// I agree Obama gave too much credit to the Republicans. Even now I doubt he sees them clearly for what they are.
You do not understand my point. The President is supposed to be a leader. Senators and Representatives are meant to find compromise so that legislation can get past. Obama’s mistake had nothing to do with the Republicans; it has to do with leadership. If he wanted health care reform, then his administration should have drafted that reform from the beginning and presented that to Congress to haggle over. Instead, he let Congress spend eight months coming up with the legislation before taking a direct role. Instead, he let Hilary’s failure 15 years earlier cloud his judgment. Letting Congress draft a radical new direction for the country is a mistake.
No. Bk does well with SINGLE Bankruptcies but I doubt that mechanism can most effectively deal with an industry failure on the scale we have before us.
You do realize that bankruptcy does not necessarily imply complete implosion? GM could have gone into bankruptcy, renegotiated its UAW deal and debts and come out solvent. We’ll never know whether bankruptcy court could have handled the failure of entire industry, but I would have tried that before I even considered a government bailout. You keep bitching about CEO salaries and bonuses. Bankruptcy court would have solved that.
7. His fourth mistake was throwing good money after bad through the stimulus package /// We don’t know that. Its an accounting question for which there is no accounting.
Unemployment is anywhere from 10-20% depending on which figures you use. It was 8-15% last year. That’s fairly straightforward accounting. Oh and we now owe significantly more.
Must be nice to know the future so dogmatically. Foolish.
You make it sound like economics is some magic voodoo that has never been tried. Government spending to get out of a recession (without drafting half the country) has been tried by multiple countries and has yet to be long term success. The crowning example the Keynesians love to use is Roosevelt. However, there are legions of economists that made their PhD showing that Roosevelt (under Keynes direction) dragged out the recession longer than it needed through government spending and only made a small dent in unemployment.
I do not have to be Carnac to know that spending billions to have people fix a few highways or put off the firing of some teachers for a couple of months isn’t going to make any difference to the overall economy. As you hinted, Krugman, whom I think is completely off his rocker, thinks that the original stimulus package did nothing (on that we agree) and wants another 800 billion. Cause, if you piss away 800 billion once, you certainly wouldn’t do it twice, right? It is the equivalent of spending 50% of your yearly income on lottery tickets and then, when you don’t win, deciding to spend the other 50% on them again.
Well Thomas–we are back on our last thread: How do honest people “know” what is the right thing to do? I say we don’t know and you say we do. You say let the system fail. I say that brings great depressions and social revolutions including a few with guns. You say that risk is better than the known deficits that are resulting now. An intolerable unknown vs a known tolerable one–at least tolerable in giving us breathing time to make the needed changes to get our fiscal house in order. Sadly, I don’t see the justification for the deficit spending being tended to and that should be both our main complaint, not the milk that is on the floor.
So, many people caused this situation and in the main I see Republicans trying to stop solutions in order to make political gains. They are damaging America for their personal profit. In the main, they espouse your position. I feel more secure in supporting Obama BECAUSE OF the people and the arguments that are against him==they/you have no credibility. Doesn’t mean Obama/I am correct but it certainly speaks against your “certainty.”
So – who knows = and that brings us back to quoting Clarence Darrow and the rest. I do wish I had your certainty of Dogma, I’m just more honest than that.
Another question is how long are the progressives going to blame Bush?
It’s 20+ months later, and their only defense is “BUSH, BUSH BUSH.” As a point of reference, did G.W. Bush stand at ground zero 21 months after being sworn in and say “Clinton did this!!!” No, he didn’t.
I wasn’t a fan of Bush. But, damn, I wish he was back. Bush had a Democratic Congress when TARP was passed. So, stop blaming Bush for spending us into a deficit.
most of the comments are nothing but garbage from stupid people. bobbo and thomas are a couple of queers. The tea party movement is a massive homosexual group.
#60, we’ll work on our points being as poignant and articulate as yours