George Bush, Queen Elizabeth, and Vladimir Putin all die and go to hell. While there, they spy a red phone and ask what the phone is for. The devil tells them it is for calling back to Earth. Putin asks to call Russia and talks for 5 minutes. When he is finished the devil informs him that the cost is a million dollars, so Putin writes him a check.
Next Queen Elizabeth calls England and talks for 30 minutes. When she is finished the devil informs her that the cost is 6 million dollars, so she writes him a check.
Finally George Bush gets his turn and talks for 4 hours. When he is finished the devil informs him that the cost is $5.00. When Putin hears this he goes ballistic and asks the devil why Bush got to call the USA so cheaply.
The devil smiles and replies: "Since Obama took over, the country has gone to hell, so it's a local call."
What I like about Regan was his dedication to funding the military and the space program (two things I love dearly).
Now, I do believe that the space program is better off in the Private Sector (in these days, at least), but he helped in advancing military technology through space exploration. fuck yeah.
and, the whole cutting government spending in everything else, of course. Yeah, I have a problem with his drug policy, but I do for every other politician who is against drug legalization.
In all things considered, the fact that he was a president is already points off for him, since leaders suck usually. But he did do some good things. And really, that's all that matters.
What are you kidding me? I would love it. I was partying and having a good old time, I was in great shape, I was young and thin and didn't have any gray hair.... I would love it ;)
I'm almost certain Reagan had nothing to do with you not being old when he was president.
Wait wait, but I too have gotten older the longer Reagan has been out of office. So Joe and I show empirical evidence that Ronald Reagan being out of office makes you older in direct relation to how long he has been out of office.
They started the trend towards deregulation that gave ground for the housing bubble and deregulated derivatives trading (two of the biggest reasons for our current reccession/deppression) - They where the politicians that started these things, albeit they had much ideological help from Milton Freidman, Alan Greenspan, Ayn Rand and Thomas Freidman.
Who is the worst?
The one that encouraged people who couldnt afford to to buy houses when the housing bubble was at its peak. The one that encouraged people to "go shopping" while they should have been saving. The one that cocked up reasons to go to war and then tried to have CIA agents killed who dared to object. The one who while pretending to be for "the free market" gave more subsidies to private company´s (including Enron) than any other president in history.
Bleeding hearted liberals wanted everyone to own a house so Clinton and his crew started deregulating to make sure that everyone could buy a house even if they couldn't afford it. ;)
Sometimes I "attack" conservatives - but dont make the mistake to think that because of that I like the liberals. I think both parties serve the same master.
Deregulation can be blamed on both liberals and conservatives but surely the lending policy´s that instigated the housing crisis, happened under the Bush administration.
I dont mind you criticising the liberals. I just dont feel that it is fair that you criticize them for mistakes the party you follow made.
Ronald Reagan was an actor, and he acted like the kind of president his corporate overlords wanted him to act like. See, the corporate overlords understand the right wing doesn't want a president, they want a father figure, so again the right wing was duped.
I'll never understand how in one breath a conservative can talk about how evil Hollywood is, then worship their idea of who they think Reagan was in the next. It's ridiculous.
Anyway if you forgot, Reagan was the first to triple the national debt, he did raise taxes, and he began us down the road of less oversite for his corporate overlords which is part of the problems we are having now.
And that wall would have been torn down at about that time no matter who was president. Pretty vain thinking it had anything to do with the US.
We also had the Reagan adminstration illegally selling arms to Iran and funelling money to Nicaraguan contras... if you want to feel all nostalgic. If Reagan hadn't been showing early signs of alzheimers and a total inability to remember anything relevant when he was called to testify in front of the federal prosecutor after he left office we might have had the second ever case of a president having to pardon his predecessor to keep him out of prison.
Oh, and thank Reagan for financial de-regulation too. That worked out great.
And massive unnecessary budget deficits. He was great at producing those.
Ronald Reagan's budget of $110 billion deficit is nowhere even close to Obama's budget deficit of $1.3 trillion. Obama is very skilled at producing massive deficits.
And yes, I know what Obama's current budget deficit is. The problem is you clearly do NOT know what the budget deficit already was when he took office if you think he "produced" that deficit. His policies have had relatively minor impact on it, almost entirely as one shot short term fiscal stimulus measures needed to prevent the economy from imploding as it was in danger of doing when he took office.
I understand that you are BLAMING the budget deficit on BUSH and so is OBAMA and the media.
HOWEVER
1. On March 14, 2008, then Senator. Obama voted in favor of the 2009 budget which authorized $3.1 trillion in federal outlays along with a projected $400 billion deficit, which means the 2009 budget was almost exclusively approved by Democrats. His Party ramrodded the 2009 budget through Congress with virtually no Republican approval.
2. Obama, Biden, and Clinton all voted for the $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program as SENATORS.
3. President Obama signed the $787 billion stimulus bill himself
4. He did not veto the $400 billion Omnibus bill sent 4 weeks after the stimulus bill.
Obama approved every penny spent in fiscal 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010 either via his votes in the Senate or his signature as President. *Or you are incapable of understanding what the federal budget fiscal year is or who is approves of the budget.
One second the current deficit is all Obama's fault. The next minute a single guy in the Senate is who is actually responsible for deficits as soon as we start talking about Bush's deficits.
Give me a break.
Of COUSE they voted for TARP. It was that or a Depression. Which would you have preferred? Same goes for the stimulus. You really need to learn the difference between necessary and unnecessary spending. Spending to prevent a looming financial Depression? You need to DO THAT. Massive spending to give tax breaks to your rich buddies or bribe seniors before an election? Not required.
Same goes for the omnibus. It's like you have no ability to recognize economic contexts.
And the fact that you are STILL apparently are completely uncomprehending of what it means that the Federal Deficit was already projected to be at 1.3 Trillion dollars for 2009 before Obama was even sworn in and why it makes your "Obama is so great at running up deficits" remark asinine is just stunning.
Ok, to be fair, we are both right but on different plateaus.
For the 2009 Federal Budget, Bush projected 450 billion dollars of deficit for 2009 where the financial cost of the Iraq War and the War in Afghanistan are not part of the Bush's defense budget; they are appropriations whereas Obama is putting the cost of the War on the defense budget for the 2010 and so on. (Fiscal Year is every 1st of October to October).
So, What was added to the deficit and made it so high?
Well, it was TARP and the Stimulus Bill, respectably, $787 and $800 billion.
In terms of the omnibus bill, I understand what it was. It is federal budgets combined into one to same time and money, yet there was 8 billion in earmarks or pork, which made many people upset
That is why Obama's budget for 2010 and projected 2011 are so overinflated because he puts the expenses of the war on the budget's books.
I was just messing around with you.
I clearly know the difference between necessary and unnecessary spending and budgets.
Dude, what Bush projected for the 2009 budget deficit is irrelevent. Bush couldn't be trusted to project the sun will rise tomorrow. The CBO projected a 1.3 trillion on-budget deficit for 2009, and they're the ones ultimately responsible for providing those projections. That's what the state of affairs was when Obama was sworn in. And that was when the CBO still thought the economy was only declining at an anualized rate of -3.8% of GDP at the end of 2008. Then they later figured out it was actually declining at an annualized rate of closer to -6% of GDP, which means it was nosediving way faster than they had accounted for.
As for you just "messing around"... if you say so.
I am done arguing when I know I am right. For 2009 budget on October 1 2008, It was 450 billion projected deficit due to this 3.1 trillion outlays and 2.7 trillion receipts. [1] Please Note this is projections and estimates. Actual appropriations of 2009 budget are completed on the 1st of October 2009.
Chart explains why there is a 1.3 trillion dollar deficit with different colors. See the red, that is the original 450 billion dollar deficit. The pink is additional spending on some programs. Green is takeover or bailout of Freddie and Fannie. Purple is spent TARP money. Blue is spent stimulus money. [2]
This chart explains why we are on different plateaus
You mean the projections BEFORE all the fallout from the financial catastrophe were different than the ones from after that fallout was largely known. You're kidding.
Now explain why you keep insisting on calling attention to the old, since invalidated, projection as if it has any meaning?
What happened to understanding the difference between necessary and unnecessary spending? Of course the deficit is going up right now. Spending enough to dig the national economy out of the worst recession since the Great Depression will tend to do that. It's why the deficits of almost every nation on the face of the planet massively increased right about now. There was this little incident with the global financial system back in 2008.
When the economy is back on firm footing and growing at a sufficient and sustainable pace and the private sector is able to pick up the slack on the demand side of the economy... then you start getting serious about deficit reduction. Like Bush should have been doing for years during his terms when that was an entirely possible thing to do.
I still the understand the difference between necessary and unnecessary spending.
Yet, the fundamental difference between you and I is that you believe in high government spending at no matter what the cost while I don't as noted before. Our system is based on profit-loss system, not a profit system. No matter what industry it is, they are not entitled to government bailouts because of mismanagement. Wall Street was mismanaged, and they caused the problems. The necessary procedures were required to deter a global collapse, but I don't believe that GM and Chrysler should have received the bailout. Bailing out banks is different from car companies. However, Lehman Brothers was a major investment bank yet the government allowed them to fail.
There is no way to prove that if nothing was done, the economy would have collapsed, but it is better to be safe than sorry.
As noted before from Heritage Foundation, some of Obama's plans increase permanent government spending despite the a subsequent recovery.
I still the understand the difference between necessary and unnecessary spending.
Yet, the fundamental difference between you and I is that you believe in high government spending at no matter what the cost
If you understand the difference then explain why you're harping about THIS spending. Do you consider avoiding a Depression to be unnecessary?
And how do you get me harshly criticising unnecessary spending during times of economic stability as me believing "in high government spending no matter the cost"??? Do you even pay attention to my posts when you respond to them? Or do you just react to certain key words that jump out at you?
the cost while I don't as noted before. Our system is based on profit-loss system, not a profit system. No matter what industry it is, they are not entitled to government bailouts because of mismanagement.
Entirely agreed!
Of course the bailouts had nothing to do with "entitlements". It had to do with preferring bailing them out to letting them take down THE ENTIRE NATIONAL ECONOMY when they collapsed.
Same goes for the car companies on a smaller scale. They wouldn't have smashed the entire national economy flat if they'd imploded and dissapeared, but they would have taken a huge chunk out of the Great Lakes economies . Do you have any idea what the unemployment rates would have hit in Michigan if the car companies and al the businesses that supply them and get business from them went under? Bailing them out was an investment in keeping the regional economy functional.
Now yes, steps need to be taken to reform the financial regulatory system so that kind of thing isn't necessary anymore, but not doing it was not a sane option.
And yeah, they did allow Lehman to fail. Within a month the Dow had dropped 2000 points and it triggered a global financial crisis that almost caused the entire international system of credit to lock up. That was a hint they wanted to not do that kind of thing anymore.
There is no way to prove that if nothing was done, the economy would have collapsed, but it is better to be safe than sorry.
If you recognize it was better to do the bailout why spend the first half of your post complaining about doing the bailout?
And I don't care if government spending increases in the long term. Just saying "government spending increasing" doesn't mean anything by itself. I care if it's being spent usefully, and if it's paid for.
If government waste is increasing, I care.
If government is setting long term plans to just keep spending money it doesn't have I care.
I do not care if spending increases are offset by revenue increases that cover them, and if the spending increases is on something we want the government spending on.
However, that said, Obama has already spent considerable time trying to get the GOP to sit down on a deficit commission, that would have the power to make calls to CUT spending going forward to address the budget deficit, and it took him all year to get them just to finally agree to send anyone to sit on it... which they finally did a couple weeks ago. And they will now no doubt stall as long as possible to avoid actually doing anything because anything the commission accomplishes means something was accomplished during Obama's watch, and they refuse to cooperate in allowing that to happen no matter what the consequences are for the nation.
By bailing out the car companies, GM and Chrysler are going be to known as zombie companies, which is a company that needs constant bailouts in order to operate or they go of out of business. I never want to see people go unemployed, but the fundamental problem is those who were put in charge of those car companies were irresponsible and rewarded for failing and not adopting to a changing auto industry. They mismanaged the company. If they failed, a new company will arise. I would support tax breaks for this new company instead of bailing out a zombie company that is not going anywhere.
I care about money being spent wisely, and paid for, but the thing about America is that we want all of these government services, but America is clearly unwilling to pay for them. This is why we are $12 trillion in the hole.
Not sure why there needs to be a deficit commission in order to figure out what the problem is. The only way that the deficit and debt is going to be cut down is two options: Less spending or raise taxes. Large deficits and huge debt is sustainable for short term, but not for long term.
The Great Depression, like most other periods of severe unemployment, was produced by government mismanagement rather than by any inherent instability of the private economy. ---Milton Friedman
I'll give you NASA as unecesary. Important, but not necessary. But you don't think the FCC is necessary? I'm betting you're only thinking of the occasional meddlesome idiot from the comission that gets their panties in a twist about a wardobe malfunction on television or something, which is the only thing about the FCC that ever really catches the attention of the general public, and the fact that they are the regulators for things like the allocation of the entire electromagnetic broadcast spectum is not even on your mental radar. Do you appreciate what happens if we remove that regulatory apparatus and people are allowed to broadcast whatever they want however they want?
And you don't think we need a Department of Energy? How do you think we have a national power grid without a Department of Energy?
And GM and Chrysler are already paying back their bailout money. They are not zombies. Your concerns are a little out of date, that was the GOP talking point from last year.
I care about money being spent wisely, and paid for, but the thing about America is that we want all of these government services, but America is clearly unwilling to pay for them. This is why we are $12 trillion in the hole.
Actually, mainly Republicans are unwilling to pay for them, which is why they practically riot in the streets any time anyone says the word "tax".
And nobody needs a deficit commission to figure out the problem. You need it to reach common ground on the solution. It's all well and good to say "Duh! Don't spend more money then you're bringing in"... but then try actually doing it. Everyone agrees you need to reduce spending, but try putting that through congress or the senate and everyone agrees you need to reduce spending in someone ELSE'S district, sure as hell not in theirs. And bottom line is spending cuts aren't getting you there even if you miraculously manage to get some significant portion of them through. The deficit and the debt are too massive. Taxes need to be raised. But you can't even say the words" raise taxes" without half the country throwing a screaming tantrum. And instead of talking them down the GOP just whips them into a frenzy because that's their party base.
NASA is important but could be more effective in the private sector.
The FCC is an infringement on the first amendment, freedom of speech clause. Limitations on the freedom of speech is unfair regardless. If you think that something that is on air is inappropriate in language or taste, then just don't watch it. Simple as that.
GM and Chrysler are zombie companies.
GM is still $17 billion in debt whereas before the bailout it was $94 billion in debt, and the only reason for that is that the United States Treasury owns 60% of GM.
GM sale figures are down 30% just from 2008 to 2009.
11% of Chrysler is owned by Canada and the United States government.
Chrysler sales are down 36% from 2008 to 2009.
Well, it is the job of Senators and Reps. make make tough decisions on spending. This spending spree of the Congress must come to end. So, you think that taxes could be raised but never will because Republicans go into a frenzy.
Something's got to give. Either way. Less spending or more taxes. I prefer less spending.
Wow. Even after I pointed out to you that I was pretty sure you only had an awareness of one tiny portion of FCC responsibilities AND pointed out to you what some of the other ones were... you STILL based your argument entirely on the one trivial little aspect of their operation as if that's all they do. Bravo.
Being in debt or being partly government owned doesn't make a company a "zombie". Neither does sales figures being down DURING A GLOBAL RECESSION.
Less spending or more taxes. I prefer less spending.
Then you prefer staying in debt. It's that simple. This is not an "either/or" situation. It's both or we're not getting the job done. Spending is too high AND taxes are too low and they BOTH need to be corrected as soon as the economy is back on firm footing.
Yes. I know the FCC does that. I SAID the FCC does that. I also said that is not the ONLY damn thing they do. That is just the one thing they do that the general public pays any attention to so people THINK that's the only thing they do. What is remarkable is that after I've ponted this out to you three times now you STILL seem to think that's the only thing they do.
For one thing, like I said before, they are the allocators of the entire electromagetic broadcast spectrum. And like I asked you before, do you know what happens if we remove that regulatory apparatus and people just start being able to broadcast whatever they want however they want?
Just organizes and maintains itself with no regulatory body enforcing transmission protocols? That it just spontaneously happens and regulates itself? It stuns me how many people just drift through their lives with no idea how much work is being done in the background to keep everything they take for granted on a day for day basis running.
Are you STILL implying that you don't? Do you know that that chart I linked means? What the implications are for the nation if it doesn't exist and isn't enforced?
well, gco is doing pretty well on his own. But to highlight further what he's saying link
Even ignoring that it is pretty unfair putting the increased deficit on Obama just during the first year considering TARP was actually bi-partisan and written mostly before Obama took office. It wasn't until he was president that it suddenly became a bad idea according to conservatives. Ignoring that, you'll see in spite of Obama actually counting the wars, and TARP, the increase of the deficit in his one year in office is about equal to Bush's in any given year.
We really wont be able to make any kind of judgment about his policies' impact on national debt until at least the end of his first term, maybe his second (hate to break it to you, but he's gonna be reelected unless he develops turrets or something.)
All of that said, it is pretty ironic that the primary complaint about Obama here seems to be the deficit, and Reagan actually still has the honor of the only president to have ever tripled it while in office. Even Bush Jr only doubled it.
""I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and lived here, even though sometime back they may have entered illegally." - Ronald Regan 1984
