The 2012 Presidential Election Discussion Thread

When they live by the conservative talking points of less taxes without looking at how that will destroy this country, it explains why they never look into the rhetoric of their party leaders. There's no cure for stupid. When the federal deficit continues to grow, we will end up like Greece, Spain, Italy, Ireland, and Portugal; bankrupt. We don't have a Germany to bail us out.

Liberal extremist and their talking points manipulate the dumbasses.

I'm not saying McCain was the best the right has to offer, but a McCain presidency would probably have been much, much better than the growing oppression of Obama.

i'm of the opinion that this was the doomed presidency no matter who won, i still have this weird little part of my brain that sometimes entertains conspiracy theories, that makes me think the republicans threw the election on purpose by nominating mccain/palin, because this presidency was a no win situation for the victor

Do you think him more oppressive than the last president???

I think that, if the jobs condition keeps improving each quarter Obama will be unbeatable.

The republicans don't have a single candidate to put up against Mr. Obama... That is their weakness...

The New York Times
April 1, 2011
Job Growth Alters Playbook for Obama and His Critics

“If the economy continues to improve over the next year, the fact is it will strengthen President Obama’s political position,” said Geoff Garin, a Democratic pollster. “And,” he added, “if the economy slows down in the next year, the Republicans put themselves in a position to take a good share of the blame for that, because now a good case could be made that the president had the jobs numbers moving in the right direction until the Republicans pushed through their own fiscal policies.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/business/02obama.html?adxnnl=1&ref=barackobama&adxnnlx=1301753012-VcCDv0bmeptqJDLJeXiIig

They're going to run on the same message; "cut taxes." It'll work too, because most Americans are struggling with added fuel and food costs.

The Wall Street Journal
March 31, 2011
When Spending Cuts Raise the Deficit.

Proposed Republican cuts to the Internal Revenue Service‘s budget would be “potentially devastating” to the country’s tax system that could increase the federal deficit and lead to fewer taxes being paid, the commissioner of the agency told a House panel Thursday.

Testifying at a hearing of the House Ways & Means Committee, IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman said the proposed $603 million cut to the agency’s budget could impact the deficit many times worse than that.

Shulman said the proposed cuts would lead immediately to the IRS collecting $4 billion less in taxes. He also warned that it could lower longer term compliance by Americans. “I’m hopeful we don’t have those cuts,” Shulman said.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2011/03/31/when-spending-cuts-raise-the-deficit/tab/print/

Fido wrote:

Do you think him more oppressive than the last president???

Yes.

Quote:

The republicans don't have a single candidate to put up against Mr. Obama... That is their weakness...

How much more of a weakness do you need? That in itself is enough.

They also have no single major issue to attack Obama on. He inherited a severely damaged economy and, to some extent, recovery efforts have been slowed by factors beyond his control, such as the European debt crisis, and they may continue to be slowed by issues related to the aftermath of the Japanese tsunami and the current unrest in the Middle East. That Republicans continue to blame Obama for the slow rate of economic growth fails to take into account the fact that the U.S. economy does not exist in a vacuum--it is very much influenced by global events which certainly affect a still fragile recovery and which may obscure the positive gains of policies put into effect by this administration.

The unemployment figures are lower than they have been in the past two years, the stock market is rebounding nicely, and Republican claims that government spending is impeding economic growth, and their current demands for deeper budget cuts, may actually serve to weaken economic growth, particularly if they push the government into a shutdown within the week.

Quote:

The New York Times
April 1, 2011
Job Growth Alters Playbook for Obama and His Critics

“If the economy continues to improve over the next year, the fact is it will strengthen President Obama’s political position,” said Geoff Garin, a Democratic pollster. “And,” he added, “if the economy slows down in the next year, the Republicans put themselves in a position to take a good share of the blame for that, because now a good case could be made that the president had the jobs numbers moving in the right direction until the Republicans pushed through their own fiscal policies.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/business/02obama.html?adxnnl=1&ref=barackobama&adxnnlx=1301753012-VcCDv0bmeptqJDLJeXiIig

The Republicans need a good candidate, yes, but they also need salient issues and proposals that are more than simply attacks and empty rhetoric.

Quote:

They're going to run on the same message; "cut taxes." It'll work too, because most Americans are struggling with added fuel and food costs.

But the Republicans are also attacking the deficit, and advocating tax cuts isn't exactly consistent with the need for the government to increase revenue. And, some of their proposed budget cuts, such as to the I.R.S., might actually interfere with collecting some of that revenue.

Quote:

The Wall Street Journal
March 31, 2011
When Spending Cuts Raise the Deficit.

Proposed Republican cuts to the Internal Revenue Service‘s budget would be “potentially devastating” to the country’s tax system that could increase the federal deficit and lead to fewer taxes being paid, the commissioner of the agency told a House panel Thursday.

Testifying at a hearing of the House Ways & Means Committee, IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman said the proposed $603 million cut to the agency’s budget could impact the deficit many times worse than that.

Shulman said the proposed cuts would lead immediately to the IRS collecting $4 billion less in taxes. He also warned that it could lower longer term compliance by Americans. “I’m hopeful we don’t have those cuts,” Shulman said.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2011/03/31/when-spending-cuts-raise-the-deficit/tab/print/

I'm also not sure that it would bother most Americans if taxes were increased for the very wealthy--those earning $250,000+ a year--rather than have tax cuts which might wind up increasing the deficit.

firefly, What the GOP is advocating is extremism. They believe they have solutions to our deficit by cutting back on everything, but what they are actually doing is destroying this country by reducing funding for our schools and infrastructure. Both are needed for any growing economy. That's Econ 101.

I think that, if the jobs condition keeps improving each quarter Obama will be unbeatable.

The job of the right wing is to foind ANYTHING they can and try to make OBAMA the owner.
Guys like spurt dont have anything intelligent to say so they spit invective. Fortunately Obama is showing results, even the rich are reluctantly being quiet with their negatives cause , on hos watch, the stock market has turned about and is doing pretty good. 6% firts years, 15% last year and 5 % already the first quarter.

There is a lot more than just 85,000 jobs to tread water; most of those jobs will never provide enough income to buy big ticket items like homes and cars to keep our economy at present levels. Consumer confidence is down, not up. Most Americans are now struggling to buy food and fuel, and one-third are underwater on their mortgages. Those asshole CEOs and officers of companies earning millions of dollars on stock options are greedy SOBs who are being supported by the conservatives to pay less taxes. This combination of our current economy will continue to deteriorate our already weak economy, and the growing national debt is going to be our greatest downfall. It's an event facing us today, and it's only a matter of when.

The dollar continues to lose against the Euro, and the message is clear. Even with so many Euro countries already bankrupt, the US is in worse condition when it comes to monetary policy.

Those Euro countries with loans are paying as much as 7% interest; guess what's in the future for the US dollar? When that happens, inflation is going to hurt everybody now struggling. The top 10% don't care.