Back to Obama though. My impression is that as impressions of the recent fiasco over the schedule of the great one's speech settle in , there is a growing impression of childish stupidity and shallowness eminating from the White House.
Perhaps as folks contemplate possible connections between the Presdident's lack of experience in running anything and his background as a "community organizer"; the curious preference he has for "leading from behind"; an evident inclination to brokering deals as opposed to championing central ideas; and growing impressions of his lack of engagement in the real issues confronting the country, compared to his fixation on the social/economic issues that catapulted him to office -- Obama may be setting himself up for a big disappointment in his forthcoming speech. If the centerpiece of what he has to offer now is merely a recreation of Fannie Mae, this time in the form of an Infrastructure Bank, thoughtful people will wonder if he has learned anything from the recent past, and has anything at all to offer the country for this last agonizing year of his term of office.
@georgeob1,
Quote:Back to Obama though. My impression is that as impressions of the recent fiasco over the schedule of the great one's speech settle in , there is a growing impression of childish stupidity and shallowness eminating from the White House.
HA! Obama as the little Prince, about 7 years old who tries to order people about (running government through regulatory decree), with no interest in playing nice with others as he is supposed to be the boss....when the rest of us do not agree he gets pissy and sulks and blames everyone else for not playing the game right!
The following Rasmussen poll for Obama's Strongly Approve vs Strongly disapprove index, I believe is showing an all time low point for him.
The only mystery to me is that it took this long to be this way and why have the Obama supporters been fooled this long?
@realjohnboy,
The football game is much more important than Obama's latest campaign speech.
@georgeob1,
Quote:his lack of engagement in the real issues confronting the country
But the "real issues confronting the country" are the "going" on which the chestnut nag was "in form" enough to win the race so it is hardly likely that such a winner will seek to change the "going".
Why Obama Grows Government and Creates Debt
President Obama's historic expansion of government at a time of great recession is attributed to his socialist agenda of "income redistribution." While Barack Obama did use these words in his campaign exchange with Joe the Plumber, in reality Obama's behavior is better explained as an expression of the political DNA he acquired from Chicago's Political Machine.
Obama comes from Chicago, which under the reign of Mayor Daley I (1955-1976) grew to be the last and greatest big city Political Machine in the US. Daley I perfected the strategy of filling City departments with political appointees, and giving lucrative City contracts to campaign contributors. The number of patronage workers in Chicago quadrupled from 3,478 in 1955, when Daley I first took office, to 15,680 in 1970. This enormous increase took place during a time when Chicago lost 10 percent of its population.[ii]
How can one best understand the purpose of the patronage system? As one Chicago politician phrased it: "The key to it is that the government is used to sustain the government in power by hiring."[iii] The growth of government in the city of Chicago, the County of Cook (Chicago is wholly contained within Cook County) and the state of Illinois is evidence of the ability of Mayors Daley I, II and the Democratic politicians who have run Illinois to recklessly grow patronage jobs.
Consider these facts: The state of Illinois has the largest number of government units (divisions of government from the small to large: library districts, townships, cities, villages, sanitary districts, etc) of any state in the US: 6,039.[iv] California has three times the population of Illinois yet can't compare to the number of government units. The Chicago City Council has 50 Aldermen, making it the largest municipal legislative body in the US.[v]
Cook County government has grown with public sector jobs as well. Cook County has 2,200 government agencies,[vi] more than some states' totals. The Circuit Court of Cook County is not just the largest County court system in the US it is the largest in the world.[vii] The Clerk of the Circuit Court controls 4,300 jobs.[viii] The Cook County jail complex is also the largest in the US, and Chicago refuses to privatize the prison guards, keeping those jobs under political control. To help pay for the legacy costs of this bloated patronage system, the seven county area of metro Chicago-land now has 1,450 taxing bodies.[ix] Thanks to these taxing bodies, Chicago now has the highest gasoline price of any city in the United States,[x] and the highest big city sales tax (10.25%) in the nation,[xi] as well as high property taxes, fees, permit costs, etc.
Today the average Cook County household owes the County (as County Treasurer Maria Pappas phrased it) $63,525[xii] to pay their unfunded Lotto-level pensions and benefit plans. And the figure grows daily.
All of this taxation and borrowing has created these economic effects:
In the one month of July 2011, Illinois lost the most jobs of any state.[xiii] In August 2011, Illinois and California had the two worst Fitch credit ratings in the US.[xiv] Residents of the state of Illinois now have the highest per capita debt of any large state.[xv] . In 2009 the City of Chicago had a debt of $23.95 billion while its operating budget of that year was $6.6 billion. [xvi] An annual debt to budget ratio of almost 4 to 1. These actions and results are now being seen at the national level.
Step One in the growth of the Chicago Machine was patronage job creation. Step Two was finding a way to pay for it. Because Mayor Daley I was instrumental in getting Presidents Kennedy and Johnson nominated and elected,[xvii] he was able to bring Federal program dollars to Chicago to supplement the city budget. When asked about sending program money to Chicago, President John F. Kennedy once quipped, "That's Mayor Daley's city. Give him what he wants."[xviii] Mayor Daley I started the Model Cities Program.[xix] The raison d'etre of this program was revealed by a 1972 investigation reported by the Chicago Tribune newspaper. It reported that half of the Model Cities Program money sent to City Hall was confiscated by Daley I and used to his own ends.[xx]
The first group of people built up by the Machine were the patronage workers. The second group, those living off of public benefits; the safety-net-dependent segment of the population. Daley I had the clout[xxi] to create the largest distributive political Machine in the country. For example, while in 1955 ten percent of Chicago's population lived in public housing, by 1970 that proportion had increased to twenty percent.[xxii] In the 2000 Census, of the ten poorest census tracts in the US, nine were on the black South Side area of Chicago. And tragically, this government-dependent group is ruled by two African-American Congressmen: Bobby Rush and Jesse Jackson Jr. In 2000 Chicago was still the most segregated city in the US; ninety percent of its African-Americans would have to move for it to be fully integrated.[xxiii]
The success of the patronage job system was measured by how many people owe their jobs (and therefore their loyalty) to the Machine. The same concept is applied to safety net program recipients: success is measured not by how many people leave the welfare rolls but by how many stay on them. This side of Machine-created dependency is why welfare programs don't succeed; they are not designed to. This is the second aspect of the "distributive" Machine tactic Obama has applied: make as many people as possible dependent upon the Federal government.
President Obama added 140,000 workers to the Federal payroll in his first 18 months of office.[xxiv] The number of Americans on food stamps went from 26 million before the recession to 46 million in 2011.[xxv] This is what Obama really meant by "distribute the wealth:" the Federal government uses its power to hire workers and expand a welfare population dependent on the Federal government, thus keeping the government in power.
The Chicago Machine financed its government job expansion with Federal money. But unlike Daley, Obama can't use Federal program dollars -- those are tapped out, he can't draw from that well. He must sell Treasury bonds or print money to expand the Federal government, a practice with long-term national and global financial ramifications. After 2 ½ yrs of President Obama's tenure, the US has seen its credit rating fall.
In the final analysis, President Obama cannot balance a budget because that would stop the expansion of Federal programs, and therefore require that he acknowledge a limit to his power. That goes against his core political beliefs and personal identity.
President Obama's penchant to grow government has its roots not in the writings of Karl Marx but in the government expansion and financing practices of the Chicago Political Machine. Karl Marx never wrote about growing a patronage army, expanding safety net programs, selling T-bonds, or quantitative easing. The Chicago Machine has no ideology[xxvi] other than to "do anything to acquire more money and power."[xxvii]
The only way to understand President Obama's management style is to see that it's the administrative strategy he learned from the Chicago Machine. Why were these machine tactics never discussed or exposed during his 2008 campaign? The answer is obvious: nothing from Barack Obama's past that would put him in a bad light was revealed by the media during his campaign.
@georgeob1,
georgeob1 wrote:
Cycloptichorn wrote:
It's not unnamed - it says right on the chart that it was 'prepared by CBPP using CBO data.' That stands for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
And the CBPP is a well-known Liberal think tank funded in major part by another Liberal group, The Democracy Alliance. A quick scan of the CBPP Board of Directors will reveal its political orientation. I don't offer this as a criticism, but rather as a caution to anyone who might suppose they are a widely accepted source of objective analysis.
Perhaps Cyclo found the chart during some of the searches through linberal propaganda that he apparently uses to spare him the effort of thinking for himself.
Your churlishness aside, the fact is that you were perfectly wrong when you said that the chart was unattributed. Just one of the many factual errors you make on a regular basis, not because you are stupid, but because you are lazy. You would have been better served to say 'you're right, I was incorrect when I said it was unattributed' then to go into a rant about the CBPP.
Instead of attempting to perform an Ad Hominem attack, perhaps you could show how their chart is incorrect. You claimed that it's provable that Rev was wrong when he/she claimed the driver of our deficit and debt was Bush's tax cuts, wars and spending. But you have not done so and you are apparently unable to do so. Can you do so? Or is it just to be empty assertions and character assassinations in lieu of argument, as is your customary line of attack?
Quote:Cycloptichorn wrote:
You are correct, though, that the chart - like any chart - doesn't prove anything about tax cuts and jobs. But, we don't exactly need a chart to show that tax cuts don't create jobs, do we?
It doesnt do much either to demonstrate what you claimed in that it contains actual data only for 2009 & 2010.
Bullshit. Here's what I said:
Quote:
Here's a nice graph projecting what is driving our long-term deficits, based on CBO estimates -
The chart did exactly what I claimed - showed a projection of the future based on CBO data. You are just lazy and inaccurate, as well as being unable to face the facts that the Bush tax cuts and Medicare expansion are THE drivers of our debt over the next ten years. You didn't respond with any substantive argument at all.
Quote:Serious people. however, actually think about the subject, and look for examples in history about the effects of excessive taxation and centralized regulation and control. There are many.
Why should anyone believe you are a 'serious' person? You do no scholarship or research on any issue, you can't be bothered to form actual, fact-based arguments (instead relying upon a constant stream of assertions), you don't have the guts to admit when you are wrong. What about that says 'I am a serious person?'
Your arguments re: taxation rely upon Appeals to Extremes to exist. Show me proof - of any sort - that allowing taxes to return to Clinton levels would harm job growth. Base your proof on historical examples of changes in employment after tax adjustments of 4-6%. You will be unable to do so, because the proof doesn't exist; and the counter-arguments are strong.
Cycloptichorn
@Cycloptichorn,
Cycloptichorn wrote:
Your churlishness aside, the fact is that you were perfectly wrong when you said that the chart was unattributed. Just one of the many factual errors you make on a regular basis, not because you are stupid, but because you are lazy. You would have been better served to say 'you're right, I was incorrect when I said it was unattributed' then to go into a rant about the CBPP.
I did miss the attribution, but my comments about the CPBB were factual, accurate and relevant to my point - not a rant at all. Not "perfectly wrong", just partly so.
Cycloptichorn wrote:
Instead of attempting to perform an Ad Hominem attack, perhaps you could show how their chart is incorrect. You claimed that it's provable that Rev was wrong when he/she claimed the driver of our deficit and debt was Bush's tax cuts, wars and spending. But you have not done so and you are apparently unable to do so. Can you do so? Or is it just to be empty assertions and character assassinations in lieu of argument, as is your customary line of attack?
It is worth recalling that Revelette's assertion to which I was responding was ;
"The evidence has shown that since the Bush tax cuts (which Obama extended) have been far more to blame for the debt of our government than spending."
Note the reference to government debt, presumably as it is , and not implausible long-range projections, based on unspecified assumptions. The evident fact - even supported by your weakly relevant chart - is that spending increases have far eclipsed the revenue decreases attributable to the tax cuts - and that is even evident in the tiny bit of the CBPP chart projection you pasted here that was based on real data. It is merely unfortunate that you didn't notice that before your careless (shall I say lazy) vague claim that this is "unproven".
Cycloptichorn wrote:
The chart did exactly what I claimed - showed a projection of the future based on CBO data. You are just lazy and inaccurate, as well as being unable to face the facts that the Bush tax cuts and Medicare expansion are THE drivers of our debt over the next ten years. You didn't respond with any substantive argument at all.
Odd that you also omit the growth of Medicaid payments and other side effects of the idiotic Obamacare bill i raising our deficit projections. Odd also in that you ignore the claims of serious historians and economists that excessive taxation could jeapordize the future growth of the economy and render the projections you use to support your case meaningless. Indeed that is precisely the problem we face now. In offering these projections you are not disproving the claims of conservatives that the tax & regulatory policies of the current administration will harm our economic growth - you are instead merely begging the question and demonstrating that if the economy does grow and wasteful spending does continue we will have a large increase in our deficits.
You say this is an argument to extremes and dismiss its relevance. And yet you offer nothing whatever to address the truly unusual features of our present economic crisis - namely the very slow recovery of our economy from a sudden and sharp recession, coupled with a crisis of government debt and economic stagnation that is affecting virtually the whole modern world. Moreover you ignore the counterexamples offered by countries that have escaped the wort effects of the recession and the stagnation that has followed it in (Canada and Germany are prime examples).
Cycloptichorn wrote:Why should anyone believe you are a 'serious' person? You do no scholarship or research on any issue, you can't be bothered to form actual, fact-based arguments (instead relying upon a constant stream of assertions), you don't have the guts to admit when you are wrong. What about that says 'I am a serious person?'
Most of the folks I know consider me to be a serious person, but ultimately what you think of me is your affair, not mine. This is a conversation, not a PhD dissertation, and you are guilty of as many lapses in "scholarship" (including several identified above) as you accuse of me - including repeated unproven and often implausible assertions of fact. Zealous pasting of excerpted materials from biased political blogs and institutions does not constitute either scholarship or convincing proof. It is even worse when the material you post does not address the issue being discussed - as was the case with your chart of projections.
Think ! The rule is "Ready, aim, fire - not ready, fire, aim.
@georgeob1,
Quote:The evident fact - even supported by your weakly relevant chart - is that spending increases have far eclipsed the revenue decreases attributable to the tax cuts - and that is even evident in the tiny bit of the CBPP chart projection you pasted here that was based on real data.
Totally wrong. Look at the chart for 2010 and tell me: which is larger, the debt calculated to be added by the wars and tax cuts, or the debt due to what you refer to as 'new spending,' which is the ARRA and fannie/freddie bailouts? The chart clearly shows that the impact of the wars and tax cuts is significantly larger than the other two combined. Then look at FY11 - the difference is even larger tilted towards the tax cuts and wars.
Even if you count the tax cuts only, and not the wars - which is stupid - the two are roughly equivalent in size. The words 'far eclipsed' are completely inappropriate to use there. And that's just for the last two years - in the current year, and going forward into the future, there is NO new spending which even closely resembles the cost of the wars and tax cuts. Not even close.
Here's the chart again, in case you need a reminder:
I can't lay it out any clearer than that.
Quote:Think ! The rule is "Ready, aim, fire - not ready, fire, aim.
Perhaps you should heed your own advice. You've now made two very lazy mistakes in a row - first claiming that the chart was unattributed, then claiming that the figures the chart showed were in fact the opposite of what they really show.
Quote:Zealous pasting of excerpted materials from biased political blogs and institutions does not constitute either scholarship or convincing proof.
You're simply incorrect here. ANY attempt to source or provide evidence for arguments in any fashion is infinitely superior to your absolute refusal to do so.
Cycloptichorn
@Cycloptichorn,
A very curious repetition of something I am begginning to see as a pattern with you. You have put yourself in a rhetorical corner, so you change the question and lash out in a new direction.
I didn't make ANY distinction between different types of spending and neither did revellette in the original post that started this. You are beating a dead horse.
You appear to be far more interested in scoring juvenile "gotcha" rhetorical points than in advancing what could be an illuminating discussion of a complex subject. Perhaps that explains some of your fondness for a failing president who exhibits some of the same defects.
It helps to make an effort to read and understand before you criticize.
Again it's "Ready Aim, Fire " : not Ready, Fire, Aim"
@georgeob1,
georgeob1 wrote:
A very curious repetition of something I am begginning to see as a pattern with you. You have put yourself in a rhetorical corner, so you change the question and lash out in a new direction.
I didn't make ANY distinction different types of spending and neither did revellette in the original post that started this. You are beating a dead horse.
Even so, your claim that 'new spending' dwarfs the cost of the tax cuts is factually incorrect. It just is. The chart is clear. You can't get around that by continued use of pompousness. I challenge you to directly address the fact that you are incorrect with your initial claim.
Quote:You appear to be far more interested in scoring juvenile "gotcha" rhetorical points than in advancing what could be an illuminating discussion of a complex subject. Perhaps that explains some of your fondness for a failing president who exhibits some of the same defects.
It helps to make an effort to read and understand before
This last sentence certainly is ironic now, don't you think? Perhaps you should take your own advice and read your posts before hitting 'post.'
More importantly, I don't believe for a second that you are interested in 'illuminating discussion.' You simply ignore all points that show you are incorrect, and respond with condescension to challenges to your assertions. There's nothing illuminating about that to anybody. Instead, what I believe you really crave is a platform for repeating - ad nauseum - a variety of falsehoods about both our economy, our nation's attitudes on a variety of issues, and our president.
Cycloptichorn
@Cycloptichorn,
Cycloptichorn wrote:Even so, your claim that 'new spending' dwarfs the cost of the tax cuts is factually incorrect. It just is. The chart is clear. You can't get around that by continued use of pompousness. I challenge you to directly address the fact that you are incorrect with your initial claim.
One more time.... Your chart shows at most two years of actual data. The rest is projections based on unstated assumptions. Even that data shows that recent spending increases (incliuding those associated with the wars) eclipse the magnitude of the tax cuts in terms of our current deficit.
As for the long term projections, even the CBO's own models for even shorter projections have repeatedly proven inaccurate. The essential point of conservative concern is that with continued high spending, increaing reculation and the proposed tax increases the economic growth implicit in your projections will not occur.
Think about it !
I did hit the button too early and it was amusingly ironic.
Obama, Obama's policies and Obama's democrats are all that stand in the way of economic recovery.
@georgeob1,
georgeob1 wrote:
Cycloptichorn wrote:Even so, your claim that 'new spending' dwarfs the cost of the tax cuts is factually incorrect. It just is. The chart is clear. You can't get around that by continued use of pompousness. I challenge you to directly address the fact that you are incorrect with your initial claim.
One more time.... Your chart shows at most two years of actual data. The rest is projections based on unstated assumptions. Even that data shows that recent spending increases (incliuding those associated with the wars) eclipse the magnitude of the tax cuts in terms of our current deficit.
No, it does not. It shows that the two are roughly equal, if you count only the tax cuts. If you count the tax cuts and wars, you are definitely wrong.
I'm beginning to question your ability to read a simple graph, George. Here it is a third time:
Let us examine year 2010. The cost of the 'recovery measures' is roughly 400 billion dollars. The cost of the 'Bush-era tax cuts' on that graph is also roughly 400 billion dollars. The two are equivalent. With the cost of the wars included, the tax cuts + wars are responsible for 550 billion in deficits - much more than the 'recovery measures.'
Are you somehow reading the graph differently?
Quote: As for the long term projections, even the CBO's own models for even shorter projections have repeatedly proven inaccurate. The essential point of conservative concern is that with continued high spending, increaing reculation and the proposed tax increases the economic growth implicit in your projections will not occur.
That's the same thing your bunch said in the 90's, and you were completely wrong. The
exact same argument has been shown to be wrong in the recent past. That is why your assertions are not taken as evidence that what you predict will happen, George! And spare me the bullshit about the 90's being special in some way. They were not.
Quote:Think about it !
I did hit the button too early and it was amusingly ironic.
I assure you, I have thought about it.
Cycloptichorn
I also wanted to add that the argument that 'new regulations' are killing business and jobs somehow has always been nothing but a false assertion; and indeed, actual attempts to discover
which regulations are so deadly to business are met with silence.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/09/01/122865/regulations-taxes-arent-killing.html
Quote: Politicians and business groups often blame excessive regulation and fear of higher taxes for tepid hiring in the economy. However, little evidence of that emerged when McClatchy canvassed a random sample of small business owners across the nation. […]
McClatchy reached out to owners of small businesses, many of them mom-and-pop operations, to find out whether they indeed were being choked by regulation, whether uncertainty over taxes affected their hiring plans and whether the health care overhaul was helping or hurting their business.
Their response was surprising.
None of the business owners complained about regulation in their particular industries, and most seemed to welcome it. Some pointed to the lack of regulation in mortgage lending as a principal cause of the financial crisis that brought about the Great Recession of 2007-09 and its grim aftermath.
I have often sat there wondering how you can claim the financial crisis wasn't an explicit call for additional regulation of the financial industry. The vast majority of Americans, in polling, agree that the industry NEEDS further regulation to avoid similar crashes happening in the future. It is popular legislation. However, you point to it as a 'job killer' and have repeatedly claimed that it was a foolish thing for Obama to do. Do you honestly believe this is true?? That there should have been nothing at all done about the lack of oversight that could have prevented the financial crisis?
Cycloptichorn
Obama admits that 'new regulations' are killing business and jobs.
In a statement Friday, Obama said he had ordered Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson to withdraw the proposal, in part because of the importance of reducing regulatory burdens and uncertainty for businesses at a time of rampant uncertainty about an unsteady economy.
@H2O MAN,
It bears repeating...
H2O MAN wrote:
the importance of reducing regulatory burdens and uncertainty for businesses at a time of rampant uncertainty about an unsteady economy.
The country will be better off after Obama is kicked to the curb and replaced with a conservative that's qualified for the job of president.
Nice, H20. Thanks for providing more evidence that all the Obama socialist crap you've been spreading for the last two years is just really rightwing groupthink with no basis in reality, and that he is in fact centrist, and on the sometimes conservative side of centrist at that.
@MontereyJack,
Nice MJackoff, Obama admits that his 'new regulations'
are killing business and jobs and you call him a liar, nice.
