Why are people thinking Obama can magically create jobs out of this air.

And you have never answered the question...

If his models and estimates were so bad, why did he continue to use them?
Why werent they revised to allow for more accurate information?

Yes; much of my education was Socialist, of the SLP flavor which essentially admits that industry should be governed... I am not idealistic, and I expect people will form the relationships that they desire and will work for them, and that they will make the best out of the forms they already have. .. Dr. Armand Hammer did not let his economic understanding keep him from using it to become a billionaire, and quite the opposite... Such drive to be rich beyond ones needs should be taxed as much to discourage it as to level the playing field... We should recognize that the only place where socialism has worked is everywhere... We have all come through socialism... The fact common to all primitive peoples is that they were both democratic and socialist; and they had no choice because social control over their resources was literally the only technology they had... Social control over their common defense was their only defense... They had the communism of necessity and of poverty... We could have the socialism of choice and of luxury; but not for long... This country is being taken and sold from beneath our feet, and we cannot expect the foreign owners of this land will not some day come for it... The soicalism we must endure, is the socialism of poverty, of mass transit, of publics schools, of potholed roads, and emergency room medicine... Of course people rebel at the thought of sharing what they have worked so hard for with those who have not lifted a stitch... Yet those same people support the rich for doing no more than the poor only because they have all the money...Such insane blindness as this nation suffers has doomed others who preceded us in greatness... It is killing us too, when to defend capital abroad we make enemies who suffer no want of intelligence and no inhibition in their quest for justice... Two things capital makes where ever it goes: Enemies and poverty...

I too was raised Catholic, but I do not look to Jesus for any inspiration to justice or Socialism... As far as I can tell, and I think it is true if you accept his God, that you cannot expect justice from God on this earth... There is nothing about Jesus to suggest that we cannot ask for justice from others, or even resonably expect it from others... The parable about the rich man and Lazarous is good for that... Even while smoking in hell the rich man thinks to call upon the poor man for relief...It is best for us to bear our own burdens, neither taking our rewards before death, nor waiting until after.. Seek only justice, and give it as well...And don't make a fetish of it...To live in society one must often suffer injustice, so be prepared; and yet do not make a habit of it either, for what you accept out of strength another may be forced to endure out of weakness...

I never knew Harrington but we used his book, The Other America, for a journalism course called Basic Issues in the NEws. The purpose of the course was to help the students as potential reporters to analyze texts. Reading that book had a profound and positive effect upon me.

There is another America, living on the margins, who do not exist because they do not vote, who have been neutralized by the fact that no matter who wins they lose... And I am becoming one of that number, not at this moment threatened with physical extinction as many are, rushed into an early grave leaving behind broken families unable to cope, or find visible means of support... I am not one of them, but who of us is far from it... How many lost paychecks would it take to ruin me??? And so many of us are staring ruin in the face, and they can be blown up with anger or puffed up with patriotism, or inflated with hope; but for the most part they are in a state of deflated demoralization... They are like people in a cattle car caring not what the future holds for them so long as they can escape their immediate reality... It is possible for great numbers to reach a pathetic sort of existence where they can wish their trouble onto others, but they cannot fight back... They have no moral legs under them and no moral back bone... They might be carried along but can go no where of their own volitition... And I am becoming on of them... I will still vote as the entire South of the US has always voted, against something, and against some one I hate... I no longer believe any good will come out of the parties and political system...

Look at the hope that invested Mr. Obama with office... That guy is half and half if you look at him; and one of the establishment... I see the guy as too too white, apeing the behavior of the English and Germans who once made the government for their purpose... Everyone else sees him as jet black, black from the soles of his feet to his eternal soul... I voted for him, but there is nothing about the way he has run his office to make me believe he does not think like on of them, having no more imagination and understanding than one of them... This country needed a hero, and it elected another politician... Too bad... There is trouble ahead...

The models weren't bad themselves, they were based on incorrect data. That isn't the fault of the people who created them.



They were. But this was somewhere around March of 2009; the Stim bill had already been passed and the news had moved on to something else, so you didn't read about it.

Cycloptichorn

It couldn't be that they think half the problem is confidence, and the other half is hope; and that if they blow enough sand up our assess we will start spending more money we don't have without the dream of being able to earn it???

All those economists missed the boat on GWB so they aren't a damn. Wall Street executives siphoned all the profits so that is where all the problems lie.

Yes... correct... Consider what they say: Nothing heppens without credit, and even the government depends upon it to get by... How did that situation develope that no one has any money but the money lenders??? We are being liquidated... Reverse mortgages, forclosures??? That is so much capital in the hands of small holders going up in smoke, becoming the property of the rich... The basics of economics are not hard to grasp... Only labor, and the action of nature can create value, and all the interest on every item of value is sucking the life out of this people...High profits are synonymous with glut, depression to you... Take too much out of a society through profits, rents, and interest and you have destroyed your market...

You can never tell a parasite they are killing their host... They expect to take too much because the next one is taking too much and move on, but some times the host drops dead and so does their easy pickins... They got their hooks into us, and they have their hooks into the government, and the government has its hooks into us... If we do not shed ourselves of government and money lenders we are finished...

It's just that, not long ago, Obama presented to us a speech about creating jobs. Yes, he spoke of building new and improved bridges, repairing roads, generally improving our infrastructure and education system. To my knowledge he hasn't brought the subject up again. Could that be because there is no money for such?

This is what he's up against. 24-7.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/05/us/05rail.html?_r=1&th&emc=th

When the Portuguese first sailed to India and began raiding and trading there, the Ottomans talked about putting a fleet in the Indian Ocean to protect their trade, but it was too late... They were old, and they were corrupted, and they were broke... The Turks hung on as a power for a long time out of sheer brutality, but they were done with conquest and receeding as a culture...

We can't hardly afford toilet paper, and yet we are out making enduring enemies of the world's population... Who can afford conquest??? Militaries, invasions, lines of communication are all incredibly expensive to maintain and food for nothing else, and those who push such adventures ought to be shot, and every one else should stay home... Bush had one thing right: Democracies do not attack their naeighbors... It is because democracy is a defensive form of social organization.... Our national adventures would not be possible if we were a democracy and the people could consider options and opportunities clearly in light of their resources...

Even the military wants to do more with less men, and more technology... The whole society is geared to laying off and having a robot sweep up; and the problem is that robots take money to buy, but add nothing to profit because they work for nothing and buy nothing... I am not saying we should go back to the old way, but anyone who thinks we can be a contintual market for goods without goods to trade is nuts... Anyone who thinks we can be a market without jobs is nuts... Anyone who thinks there will ever be markets sufficient for what this one country could produce if we were working is nuts... We have really reached a luxury age, where with little work we could all enjoy luxuries... Instead, a fraction of the people work themselves to death for little money paying too little to support the government which is forced to support all who cannot find work, and all for the benefit of the rich who absolutely refuse to support the government which supports their rights.

I think your observation about being unable to tell a parasite that he kills his host captures the crux of the matter.

I know that Obama will be a one-term president, in part, because of the economy. The irony is that there is nothing he could have reasonably done about it.

The parasites could have done something.

Fido wrote: "Take too much out of a society through profits, rents, and interest and you have destroyed your market...You can never tell a parasite they are killing their host."

Even Henry Ford understood that you can't sell cars if the people don't earn enough to be able to buy them.

BBB

What do you mean when you say 'no money?' There's plenty of money for that stuff - if we made doing so a priority.

I've seen Obama speak on this subject several times - and seen the Republicans in the Senate block efforts to make this happen. Are you sure you're blaming the right people?

Cycloptichorn

It is simply a fact that most of the money that was assumed would create "shovel ready projects" that would spike employment in the engineering and construction industries was appropriated in the form of grants to state transportation budgets. With state revenues from sales, use and property taxes as well as income taxes collapsing, and their short-term financing imperiled by the collapse of the commercial paper financial market, a very large fraction of the Federal money went to sustaining state bureaucracies with nothing to do. The principal effect of all this deficit spending was simply to delay a long overdue reform of state governments for a year or so.

I'm sure the administration's intentions were to do just what they said. Unfortunately for them - and for us as well - their government employee union supporters don't really have anyone's interests but their own in mind. I believe this is a good example of a government caught in the trap of itys own flawed political beliefs and propaganda.

Thanking the above for great responses to my very small post. Certainly, I am not blaming Obama, just recalling what he said in a speech. Perhaps it's time someone speaks to the populace using a different, and difficult, tact. Tell the people that parasites are killing the host. Tell them how. Put some punch in those speeches. Makes a serious person want to cry.

Obama ran his campaign on better education (building new schools & repair of those completely delapidated, government transparency, revamping the healthcare system, and ending the war. What a surprise when, before Obama took office it is simply announced that our country is not what most of us thought it was. It has crashed. George Bush should not have made the decision to sign legislation for the stimulous package. Maybe that could have been decided by the incoming Obama administration.

I don't know why people seem to be thinking Obama can magically create jobs out of thin air. So, what you are all saying is "he can't." People are confused and angry because, seemingly, nothing can be done.

I am not at all sure Obama expected to be elected. But, Hillary? Well, the people didn't want her as president. So, is it possible for any one man, or several hundred men (and women of course), to know even the first thing to do? One helluvashock, that's what it is. The whole damn world is reeling!

You are good at blaming the repubs, but they alone cant block anything.
Yes, they can use procedural tricks to slow things down (and the dems did the same when they were in the minority), but all the dems hace to do is bring it up for a vote.
The repubs do not have the votes to block anything if the dems bring it up for a vote AND all of the dems vote together.

Perhaps you should consider the possibility that Obama's campaign rhetoric was just that .. rhetoric and propaganda. If we assume his actions infer his real priorities and intentions, then it is fairly clear he wishes to please (1) Democrat health care and environmental zealots; (2) Labor Unions, particularly government employee unions; and (3) Black & Hispanic voters. I suspect the campaign calculus was that doing all this would get them a durable Democrat voting majority. Certainly many Democrat apologists have asserted this: even Cyclo asserted that the passage of the Health Care Act alone would get the Democrats a long-term decisive advantage with voters.

Unfortunately for them their calculus appears to have been wrong in several respects. Now months after its passage, opposition to the Health Care legislation is at least equal to support - and generally far more intense; the administration's environmental program is stalled amidst public concerns about their economic effects; and public concern about the rapid increase of public debt at the hands of an Administration that doesn't appear to be listening is growing apace.

Now surrounded by a rising tide of difficulties and growing public disenchantment, the Administration appears to be unable to either adjust its positions; deal effectiverly with the adverse effects on our economic recovery that have resulted from its own ill-conceived, ill-timed actions; or to explain their intentions in any way beyond repeating the tiresome mantra that they inherited a mess for which they bear no responsibility (never mind that Democrats controlled the Congress for most of the Bush years).

Not only can't Obama create jobs out of thin air, he can't even create them with billions of dollars of borrowed public money.

But, I don't think Obama's campaign was rhetoric and propaganda. He came across as being honest, sincere, and straight forward. That is why he is our president.

Unfortunately, he has to depend on a myriad of opinions from so-called financial experts when it comes to the economy. Pretty tough. But, if George Bush could finally pull off successful reading of speeches, Obama can re-write his speeches to spell out his own opinions and convince the people he knows what he's talking about. He needs to speak from his heart, let us know he cares and is in the corner of all people in this country. Face it, Obama thought all he had to do (as pres. of a booming economy) was be a little kinder to those in rotten schools, living in squander, or not receiving a proper education, or be killed in grotesque wars. Then, the bomb hit -- that, being the bank failures and inevitable falling dominoes in all directions. One course in accounting.

That would be like me, a communications arts student (way back when) taking on a job that was a rather high level of accounting. That actually happened and, no, they weren't willing to allow me time to learn, while their books went awry.

I think it matters more what leaders do rather than what they say. So far Obama's record of doing the things that the real situation before him calls for, as opposed to doing things that worsen it, is pretty poor. Pressing for comprehensive health care reform in the midst of a serious cyclical recession wasn't a good idea for the country's welfare. It may well have been the right or indeed the only moment for passing this controversial legislation from a political perspective - Democrat majorities such as exist now aren't likely to continue in the Congress - but from the perspective of the general good, it weas a serious error. I don't know what Obama really thinks or understands, however the facts suggest he is either a cynical politician; a committed progressive idealogue; or seriously lacking in an understanding of basic economics - or perhaps a bit of all three. The rather quick and dramatic shift in public perceptions should tell you something.


Alternatively perhaps the public is fickle and stupid, unable to detect a great leader when they see one. Tha, however, isn't a very sound idea for one who believes in democracy.