Obama '08?

Spendius- Shlaes is the polar opposite of Galbraith. I will quote from Shlaes:

quote- p. 8 AND 9

""...Business decided to wait Roosevelt out, hold on to their cash, and invest in future years. Yet Roosevelt retaliated by introducing a tax--the undistributed profit s tax to press the money out ofthem. Such forays PREVENTED recovery and took the country INTO the Depression within the Depression of 1937 and 1938."

Unfortunately, it sounds like President Obama is taking the exact same road as FDR did.

Spendius--You may disregard Cicerone Imposter. I am sure that he thinks that Veblen and Galbraith were forwards in the NBA. Cicerone Imp oster has proved to me that he is a non-reader. We do have a great many of those in the States. That's why President Obama was elected. Most of his votes came from illiterates.

I had realised that a long time ago. Noisy illiterates too. Emotionally desperate as well.

So it's a revenge thing...kind of a "stick it to 'em" for the last 8 years?

There is NOTHING in that 1% that republicans would vote for (by a majority).

I love your rationalization though, if I can paraphrase, "if we worked together and eliminated some of this waste, they would just ask for more to be eliminated, so we're just not going to eliminate any of it, thereby not even trying to work together". Pelosi stopped debate on the bill (which is soooo reminicient of when the republicans controlled the house that she should be ashamed of herself).

You didn't attempt to get them Cyclops, not by a long shot.

If the stimulus bill that Obama is pushing is so good, why are the dems trying to get repub votes?
Why dont they just vote for it and pass it themselves?

It's not 'stick it to them.' Republicans and Democrats disagree on what we should be spending our money on as a nation. For years, Republicans have blocked certain things that Democrats consider necessary, important, and naturally some politically convenient ones too.

We're not looking to pass those things just to 'stick it to' the Republicans; but because they need passing.

I don't care if 'nothing' in there would be voted for by the Republicans, which I disagree with. Dems have solid majorities in both houses, it's not really a question of what they would or wouldn't vote for at this time. You may not like that situation but the voters put a ton of Democrats into office for exactly this reason - to provide a different view of government than the Republicans did. Sitting around all day crying if we don't get Republican votes isn't what Democrats got elected for.



I disagree that it's wasted, or that spending money on those line items - most of 'em anyway - won't have a stimulating effect.

The Prez asked to get the bill by the 14 of February. Which is why it had to be moved quickly out of the house; presumably we are in the middle of a financial crisis, remember?

You don't have to 'get' Republicans in the House, Maporsche. The Dems outnumber them by 75 or so. The Republicans can stand firm against as many bills as they like, they'll get passed anyway. They'd better learn how to go along to get along or it's going to be a rough decade for them.

Cycloptichorn

The Republicans have threatened to filibuster this bill in the Senate; this means the Dems have to hold tight and pick up 1-2 Republican votes. It would be nice if more would get on board instead of being obstructionist asses.

But I understand why; the political calculus only works for them if this plan fails and they didn't support it. Any other vote/outcome is a loss for them. Don't mistake political strategy for some sort of moral feeling about the issue.

Cycloptichorn

MYSTERYMAN. You are back! We wondered how you were faring in W KY. Any stories to tell?
I tried to send you an email last week sometime.

Yes, I'm back.
Our internet came online today, but we got our power back last sunday afternoon.

To save my reposting everything and boring everyone, go here...
http://able2know.org/topic/111721-584#post-3562035

We pretty much figured (over on the NFL thing) that you would end up being in the middle of the action. Well done, MM.

I think it might be instructive to remind everyone that Obama had a job questionaire sent to all prospective people that might work in his administration back in November. I had forgotten it until I heard someone mention it.

Here it is:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/national/13apply_questionnaire.pdf

It has questions about taxes (Section V), plus all manner of other types of questions about previous jobs, financial information, lobbying activities, etc.

So I have a question. How does anyone that had tax problems pass this first questionaire test? Did they lie on the questionaire, did they even submit one, did Obama ignore the information if it was honest? This is looking like one huge case of incompetence, or less than honesty on the part of prospective administration picks, or a case of Obama claiming he was going to vet the people but did not, or Obama ignored the red flags, who knows?

Okie- President Obama has shown that he does not walk on water. At present,he is trying to save himself from going under. Cyclopitchorn ( see his last post) is fooling himself. T he invulnerable Obama is losing ground fast. His organization is so impotent that they can't even do a proper vetting of candidates--Richardson, Daschle, Geithner,Killifer. If they can't do something this simple, how can they possibly be successful on something as massive and complex as the restoration of good business activities in the country.

Cyclopitchorn thinks that the Republicans are going to cave on their opposition to a phony bill which not only places hugh spending two and three years in the future(in which case it will do little good) but also is filled with pork for the Democrats who conceived it.'

I predict that President Obama will work with the Republican opposition to make the expense of the bill much smaller and to target tax cuts.

He and his staff already know that his popularity is dropping like a rock. Already(See Rasmussen) his approval rating has gone from the middle sixties to the mid fifties--AND HE HAS ONLY BEEN IN OFFICE TWO WEEKS.

As to your question about the job questionnaire, I am sure that some very smart lawyers helped answer the questions. Some can answer in ambiguous ways which straddle an issue

Geez, I don't think anyone knew that "Obama doesn't walk on water."

When and where did you learn this?

Re: okie (Post 3562203)
Okie- President Obama has shown that he does not walk on water or air!! At present,he is trying to save himself from going under. Cyclopitchorn ( see his last post) is fooling himself. T he invulnerable Obama is losing ground fast. His organization is so impotent that they can't even do a proper vetting of candidates--Richardson, Daschle, Geithner,Killifer. If they can't do something this simple, how can they possibly be successful on something as massive and complex as the restoration of good business activities in the country.

Cyclopitchorn thinks that the Republicans are going to cave on their opposition to a phony bill which not only places hugh spending two and three years in the future(in which case it will do little good) but also is filled with pork for the Democrats who conceived it.'

I predict that President Obama will work with the Republican opposition to make the expense of the bill much smaller and to target tax cuts.

He and his staff already know that his popularity is dropping like a rock. Already(See Rasmussen) his approval rating has gone from the middle sixties to the mid fifties--AND HE HAS ONLY BEEN IN OFFICE TWO WEEKS.

As to your question about the job questionnaire, I am sure that some very smart lawyers helped answer the questions. Some can answer in ambiguous ways which straddle an issue

Really, massagato? So why does Rasmussen say 62% approve of him today (2/4)when I just went to their website? http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/obama_approval_index_history

Actually, Cicerone Imposter- President Obama has only dropped 7 % points since the start of the year--from 69% TO 62%. At that rate, he will be undr fifty percent when his hundred days are ended.

I predict that President Obama will compromise with the Republicans in the Senate. This will cause an enormous back lash from the crazies on the extreme left who feel that the Socialist Utopia has arrived. I will check Rasmussen every day!!!

Do that. Notice that his approval rating has been pretty much constant since about two days after the inauguration. Notice too that it's higher now than it was during the three weeks or so after the election. Which appears to indicate that he's won over about 20% of McCain's supporters and they're sticking with him. So you're looking at the trend wrong, massagato, projecting the rate of increase since the election, 100% of the country will approve of him before the middle of 2010. And by the end of 2010, all of Canada too.

We shall see what his approval rating is after he agrees with the Republicans that the stimulus should be cut down and some of the pork removed. The left will go crazy that Socialism is not really coming to the USA!
I will check Rasmussen each day but if you have done so, you would find that in January, President Obama hit 69%, he has now sunk to 62%.

And, you are blowing smoke if you think he will ever get100%. You seem to forget that he did NOT win a majority of white votes in 2008.

Still irony challenged I see, massagato

Incidentally, no one on the left thinks Obama is a socialist or expected him to do anything socialistic. That's purely a right wing fantasy.