So, no matter how long it takes, Obama is going to take credit for the recovery? But, many experts believe that the economy would EVENTUALLY recover without all the bailouts so, is it all just a waste?

And what about this new health care plan? How is that going to help the economy? How is incurring more government debt and increasing government run programs going to help young graduates and small businesses? How is cap and trade going to increase jobs?

What is the Government thinking??? I wish Ron Paul were here!!!


All of a sudden, Congress is paying close attention to Ron Paul.

The feisty congressman from Texas, whose insurgent "Ron Paul Revolution" presidential campaign rankled Republican leaders last year, now has the GOP House leadership on his side -- backing a measure that generated paltry support when he first introduced it 26 years ago.

"In the past, I never got much support, but I think it's the financial crisis obviously that's drawing so much attention to it, and people want to know more about the Federal Reserve."

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/letters-to-the-editor/2009/06/25/ron-paul-and-auditing-the-federal-reserve.html

Whew! That should help. But, we're going to need a lot more than just one guy with common sense in Washington.


Mitt Romney: ""I think [we] have to stand up and make it very, very clear that we run the risk as a nation of having the entire world lose confidence in the currency of the United States and that would lead to something worse than a recession -- that would lead to an extraordinary slowdown globally that would hurt us more than any other."

"When the stimulus bill is wrong, when it wastes money and threatens the viability of our currency long-term, you have to stand up and say 'no.' When a health care plan says we're going to have the government take over health care which is roughly a fifth of our economy, [we] are going to have to say 'no' to that."

"The president's plan makes an enormous error by saying we're going to put government into the insurance business. We got everyone in Massachusetts insured and we did it without putting government into the insurance business. We said instead we're going to help people get private free enterprise kind of insurance they can buy from a number of different companies."

He said the system led to plunging premiums while offering a healthy choice of options for consumers.

"It's working well. We got 440,000 more people insured than when the plan was put in place, it costs less than 2 percent of the state budget -- it's a plan that's working, it's a good model," he said.

Romney also took issue with the climate change bill that passed the House of Representatives last week, saying it was corrupted by special interests.

"It's a lobbyists' delight and as a result it's a lousy piece of legislation. It should not have been passed, it's going to cost the American consumers a lot of money, it's going to cost us a lot of jobs. Yeah we'll create jobs making windmills and solar panels and that's wonderful, but were going to lose a lot of other jobs ... that are creating products that use energy," he said.


Of all the years of wasteful government spending, why now!!!???

I'm in the process of switching health insurance and I just got a quote yesterday. It'll cost me $130 a month to have a HDHP with a $2500.00 Anual deductable and I pay 0% for preventative care. In conjunction with a Health Savings Plan, that's a heck of deal!!! There's nothing wrong with Health insurance! That's less than the combined cost of my cable internet and my mobile phone bill. I don't know the statistics, but I'm willing to bet that most people in this country without health insurance, CHOOSE NOT TO HAVE ANY because they'd rather drive their nice car or have an iPhone or HD TV or whatever.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS COUNTRY? WHY IS IT THAT WE EXPECT EVERYTHING FOR FREE AND ARE WILLING TO LET POLITICIANS DRIVE THE US OF A INTO THE GROUND TO GET IT!?

*quality post. You might also like this video I posted recently called Hyperinflation Nation which addresses many of the concerns you've listed here.

One of the bigger issues no one is talking about is this concept from Obama that it's his responsibility to "create jobs". Why is it the government's job to create work for everyone? Where does it say that in the Constitution? How can that exist in a free nation? It cannot.

Currently, government jobs pay better than the private sector equivalent, and this direction is not sustainable. The private sector generates wealth whereas the government consumes that wealth. Eventually the pensions and the benefits and the money will run out. What then?

Sure, Obama can boast from his executive pulpit that "if the private sector's so great, why worry about a public option?" But, the private sector has to earn its money by creating productive and attractive goods or services that people want. The Federal government, however, in order to avoid being competitive with the private sector can run their printing press and create as much money as necessary, which further proves to increase inflation and lower the worth of the private sector's wealth!

They have an endless supply of money. The private sector does not.

Not to mention, on both the Federal and State level, the governments can arbitrarily increase taxes to pay for their services and goods. There is no way to compete with that. Imagine if the guy who owned the hardware store down the street threatened to hold a gun on you and lock you in a cage if you didn't come to his store and spend a percentage of your income on overpriced tools and supplies.

This brings up the next issue of sustainability. Although I'm sure most people in government jobs do care for the quality of their work, they still get paid and remain in business even if their work is substandard. Conversely, if the private sector creates a substandard service or good, then that business cannot compete in the marketplace and will most likely suffer because no one will pay for their services. The private sector is thus incentivized to do well in order to survive where the government is not.

This is because the private sector receives its money voluntarily from you. For instance, if you don't want to go to the movies, then you don't have to pay to support that industry. But, the government gets its money by either violently extorting it from you or by printing it out of thin air. So even if you don't want to pay for the crummy public school system or a baseless war, you have no choice but to pay for it.

Awarding deedub81 with one star point for this contribution to VideoSift - declared quality by blankfist.

Ugh, the Lies CSS is hard on the eyes. What's up with the italicized text? It looks like Arabic.

I feel for you, Bro. I briefly ran a small business out in Kommiefornia. The producers of wealth there are treated with utter contempt while the criminals and parasites are cuddled and rewarded. You can see the end result of all that liberalism: bankruptcy. California is the hood ornament on a juggernaut going over a cliff. No one on the left will admit what killed CA.

Obama doesn't give a fig about the American economy, his life is modeled on the tactics of sociopathic communist Saul Alinksy. It's an insult to narcissistic idealists who have no idea where wealth comes from to accuse Obama of being clueless about the economy. He knows the harm he's causing, but his concerns lie elsewhere.

Joe Biden represents the real soul of the taxocrat party. Take away Obama's honey-tongue and ass-kissing state-run media and you're left with the ideas and energy of Biden.

With no opposition, Obamunism will fail on its own. It's a rhino trying to walk on a giraffe's legs. The soviet union took 80 years to collapse. Let's hope Obamunism vanishes in 3 or less.

"EQUALITY OVER FREEDOM" RESULTS IN NEITHER.

As an aside, most people I know are against monopolies, but isn't the government the biggest monopoly of all? According to Wiki, a monopoly is when an "enterprise has sufficient control over a particular product or service to determine significantly the terms on which other individuals shall have access to it". Now, think of the public school systems. Think about the DMV. Aren't they a monopoly according to wiki's definition?

I beg your forgiveness for the state of my channel's CSS file. I'm not very good at that stuff.

How on earth are public schools a monopoly when private schools exist? And even the most extreme libertarian agrees that the government should provide regulation and public goods. Arguing against the DMV borders on anarchy.

I'm actually missing the 1920s right now. Even Coolidge and the Republicans then understood that government regulation can increase wealth and prosperity.

In reply to you, deedub, not everything is about job creation and wealth. And everything eventually recovers in the long run, but people are forced to live in the short run.

>> ^Fjnbk:
I beg your forgiveness for the state of my channel's CSS file. I'm not very good at that stuff.

Way to make me feel like a shithead. I was only saying that the text was hard to read - didn't know you were going to call me out on it. Sorry, wasn't trying to trash your CSS skills.


>> ^Fjnbk:
How on earth are public schools a monopoly when private schools exist? And even the most extreme libertarian agrees that the government should provide regulation and public goods. Arguing against the DMV borders on anarchy.

A monopoly doesn't mean you are the only competition, just that they must have "sufficient control over a particular product or service to determine significantly the terms on which other individuals shall have access to it." Even the private schools have to accept the terms of teaching education provided by the government. A private school cannot just teach however or whatever it chooses, therefore it's controlled by the government. Thus wouldn't you agree public schools are a monopoly?

Also, are you implying that if we didn't have the DMV there would be anarchy? I beg to know more!

Sure, public schools could be a monopoly, although they're not a very active monopoly, and private schools, especially homeschools, have a great amount of leeway in how they go about teaching. Of course there are regulations on schools, but at the very least, schools should be required to teach things that are actually true.

You misinterpreted my point regarding the DMV. It's not that the DMV is our only bulwark against anarchy, it's just that arguing against the DMV seems rather unnecessary and nitpicky, stuff that someone would do if they didn't want any government regulation whatsoever. Most people would be more offended by more meddlesome institutions like the Federal Reserve, the SEC, or Medicare.

I'll give a nutshell answer for the moment, and a more in-depth answer when I have time to do this topic proper justice.

The short answer is that only some 10% of the stimulus, aside from the tax cuts, have been put out into the economy, and the economists' equations pretty much said we'd need a $2 trillion stimulus to halt the decline in unemployment from the get-go. Unemployment did go up more than the Obama team predicted in the short run, but I can't recall any of the pro-stimulus economists thinking their prediction was anything but a best-case scenario.

As for the health care plan, the main point of it is to cut costs overall. Part of what makes the 20+ year budget predictions so bleak is the skyrocketing cost of medical care. The CBO recently came back with the scores on a bill with a strong public option, and it showed both a massive increase in the number of people covered as well as cutting the cost by nearly 50%.

>> ^Fjnbk:
It's not that the DMV is our only bulwark against anarchy, it's just that arguing against the DMV seems rather unnecessary and nitpicky, stuff that someone would do if they didn't want any government regulation whatsoever. Most people would be more offended by more meddlesome institutions like the Federal Reserve, the SEC, or Medicare.


My point was more about showing an example of government monopoly than anything else, though maybe a terrible example, because if a private business was set up to license people then no one would want that service. Only the government can create such a terrible service out of fear that the alternative would lead to anarchy.

I think we're getting off point of the Sift Talk post.

This is EXACTLY my employer's predicament.

Might I add that I'm sick of this "economic slowdown" being the reason for treating your employees like shit. I'm sorry, but that whole "be lucky you have a job" mentality was cute for a couple of months, but by now, as you start picking up more work, you can't afford to lose those skilled enough to stay on board during your layoffs. Because face it, if they quit you're probably going to have to hire somebody that you laid off to fill their shoes. And when the work does start coming in, you're performing with less of a skill level.

I don't care that "the company didn't do that well last quarter/half/year". I have never worked at a company that said "Hey everybody, we did great, now let's start giving our money in the form of raises!" You're going to end up losing your workforce and winding up with the fat that was trimmed during the slowdown.

Yes, but you have to agree that the Obama administration AND the Congress are completely missing small business and that they've picked a horrible time to increase the size of government and tighten environmental restrictions!

I just spent the last 3 hours (I just walked in the door) with Merril Lynch associates and had the whole economic mess explained to me in great detail. I think I get it pretty well now. I'm all good with the whole AIG bailout. I'm clear that the government's hands were pretty well tied there. I'm all for re-instating some of the restrictions that were loosened in the 90's and in 2004. I'm not so sure about bailing out GM, Cap and Trade, Health Care (horrible timing is just one reason), and no help for the small businesses.

Large corporations use auctions and corporate bonds to increase liquid assets, small businesses use credit card and bank loans. Because of the bailouts, large corporations and banks are starting to thaw and we're seeing movement and lending between banks. What we don't see is increased loans and cash flow to the lifeblood of America: small businesses.


My fiancee works in a doctor's office. Just today, the doctor saw a young boy whose mother had fake nails and a 'coach' purse. What insurance did she have? You guessed it, MedicAid. Basically, this means I am paying for this lady's fancy clothes and salon visits!!!???

How can you not see how terrible Obama's timing is? How can he promise that he won't raise taxes on people who make under $250,000/year with all of the government expansion that he's heading up? How can you not see that congress is out of control?

I feel like we've got a bunch of ignoramuses and corrupt punks running the show. They act in behalf of the highest bidder. They cheat on their wives, they cheat on their taxes, they lie through their teeth, and they're stealing food right off of my family's table!


>> ^NetRunner:
I'll give a nutshell answer for the moment, and a more in-depth answer when I have time to do this topic proper justice.
The short answer is that only some 10% of the stimulus, aside from the tax cuts, have been put out into the economy, and the economists' equations pretty much said we'd need a $2 trillion stimulus to halt the decline in unemployment from the get-go. Unemployment did go up more than the Obama team predicted in the short run, but I can't recall any of the pro-stimulus economists thinking their prediction was anything but a best-case scenario.
As for the health care plan, the main point of it is to cut costs overall. Part of what makes the 20+ year budget predictions so bleak is the skyrocketing cost of medical care. The CBO recently came back with the scores on a bill with a strong public option, and it showed both a massive increase in the number of people covered as well as cutting the cost by nearly 50%.

Well, it may be a little off topic, but this is important, too.

In Arizona, the MVD (Motor Vehicle Division) is a branch of the DOT (Department of Transportation). When I moved there (years ago) I had to wait in line for about 2 hours to get my license changed over from California. After I finished that, I had to get back in line for about an hour and a half to get AZ plates for my truck.

A year later, I mentioned to a coworker that I was going to be headed to the MVD to renew my registration. He told me about a PRIVATE company that had the ability to handle MVD transactions. It was news to me, but I decided to try it out. I went into this little store front office in a strip mall, waited in line behind one person, and was out of there in a little more than 5 minutes. What's the catch? I had to pay a $10 fee on top of the normal MVD fees. What's the bonus? They were able to take care of me more quickly and courteously....AND THEY AREN'T FUNDED BY TAX PAYERS!!! (*GASP*) How is this possible???


>> ^blankfist:
>> ^Fjnbk:
It's not that the DMV is our only bulwark against anarchy, it's just that arguing against the DMV seems rather unnecessary and nitpicky, stuff that someone would do if they didn't want any government regulation whatsoever. Most people would be more offended by more meddlesome institutions like the Federal Reserve, the SEC, or Medicare.

My point was more about showing an example of government monopoly than anything else, though maybe a terrible example, because if a private business was set up to license people then no one would want that service. Only the government can create such a terrible service out of fear that the alternative would lead to anarchy.
I think we're getting off point of the Sift Talk post.

More about the Merril Lynch investment bankers I met with today:

In short, they felt that we don't need to worry too much about inflation unless a few more things go wrong. As things stand, we shouldn't worry. Because of all the debt that is being absorbed and written off through the bailouts and the slack that has been created in the economy due to the trend toward smaller leveraging raitos, the amount of money that the government is creating is balanced out.

back in the good old days, economic policy protected the small businessman from being squeezed by giant corporations. Now economic policy protects the "too big to fail"

It's hard to explain to some people why government spending is harmful. But I will try and point out that government spending isn't helping anything. Yes, 50 jobs here, 80 jobs there. I give you that. A few thousand jobs in an economy that's lost several million full time jobs is a drop in the bucket.

Well if you aren't working for the government, or a giant corporation, your days are numbered until you are absorbed by the corporate political machine and you will work for the political status quo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Nazi_Germany

if you read that you will see that economy was so tightly controlled taht you had to...
In nazi germany, you could not quit your job without permission from your employer. Now that is a economy that you HAVE to participate in.

Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.
Thomas Jefferson

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.
Winston Churchill

Before I get into a more serious commentary, I just want to point out that blankfist, supposed proponent of Austrian economics, upvoted this comment:

>> ^deedub81:
More about the Merril Lynch investment bankers I met with today:
In short, they felt that we don't need to worry too much about inflation unless a few more things go wrong. As things stand, we shouldn't worry. Because of all the debt that is being absorbed and written off through the bailouts and the slack that has been created in the economy due to the trend toward smaller leveraging raitos, the amount of money that the government is creating is balanced out.

Which leads me to wonder, blankfist, why are you now upvoting someone who's using Keynesian theory to say inflation won't be a problem? You're supposed to declare that the Fed, and everything the government does leads to inevitable ruin!

>> ^deedub81:
I just spent the last 3 hours (I just walked in the door) with Merril Lynch associates and had the whole economic mess explained to me in great detail. I think I get it pretty well now. I'm all good with the whole AIG bailout. I'm clear that the government's hands were pretty well tied there. I'm all for re-instating some of the restrictions that were loosened in the 90's and in 2004.

This is good news. I'm not sure why you believe it when it comes out of Merrill's mouth, since it's government action that stands to directly benefit them, and not the governments' when it said the exact same thing, but I'll try not to look the gift horse of common ground in the mouth.

(I would quibble slightly about the necessity of bailing out AIG vs. bailing out their counterparties, but it's water under the bridge now)

I'm not so sure about bailing out GM, Cap and Trade, Health Care (horrible timing is just one reason), and no help for the small businesses.

I'm not so sure about GM either, but really the "bailout" is just government providing credit for them to go into Chapter 11, rather than having them be forced into Chapter 7. When you look at it that way, it makes a lot more sense. Fewer people lose their jobs, and lots of small businesses that supply/support the auto industry's infrastructure get to keep their businesses as well.

Health care is probably worthy of it's own full-length discussion thread, but here's the short version of why I think it's desperately necessary, and the timing is perfect for it. We pay more per capita for healthcare in this country than any other. However, our healthcare outcomes rank somewhere down below mid-pack for industrialized nations. In countries with a more intrusive government plan for healthcare, people never go bankrupt for the care they receive, and never have an incentive to avoid getting treatment or preventive care. There are lots of different systems out there, and all of them combine government and private programs in varying degrees (including ours). Most of what's different in other countries is that they have made explicit changes to try to keep a lid on costs, and to remove perverse incentives from the system (such as a profit motive for denying care).

The key pillars of the Democratic proposals are a) an employer mandate to provide insurance (small business excluded), b) laws against denying insurance coverage, c) a public option, where essentially the government sells medicare to people under 65. I bolded the word sells, because it will not be taxpayer subsidized. There would be a separate subsidy for people with low incomes, but they are free to purchase a private plan with the subsidy if they so choose.

This is already longer than I wanted, but lastly the reason why it's important now is because if we don't do anything, the costs will just continue to increase, and more and more people will lose their coverage as their employers drop their plans. Also, we have a huge number of people who've lost their jobs, and are unlikely to be able to afford COBRA payments for very long. There's also the problem with medicare and medicaid -- if costs keep rising like they are, we're headed for a huge set of tax increases in the future, or a huge cut in benefits (and no one will want either). If we fix the cost problem, we may have fixed our long-range deficit issues. There's also the matter of Democrats having the House, 60 votes in the Senate, and the White House, and who knows when there will be a better chance to finally get this done.

Cap and trade I'm worried about the timing on. The plan as it is now is very weak though, and most of the carbon "credits" are being given away for free. CBO says the current plan will cost people an average of $175/yr over the next 10 years. That's about the price of mailing a letter a day. In return it will reduce emissions by 20% by 2021. There's a bit of progressive wealth distribution going on in terms of who pays for it, the bottom 20% income group will receive a tax credit which should actually more than offset the costs of the cap.

As for small business, the American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act (the cap & trade bill), yours may not get special treatment, but there will be subsidies offered to businesses who will work on clean energy technology (e.g. carbon offsets, wind, solar, battery tech, etc.).

Personally, I think it's a shame we didn't put that in place 30 years ago, and I don't think we can put it off any longer, but the timing will definitely work against it.

Large corporations use auctions and corporate bonds to increase liquid assets, small businesses use credit card and bank loans. Because of the bailouts, large corporations and banks are starting to thaw and we're seeing movement and lending between banks. What we don't see is increased loans and cash flow to the lifeblood of America: small businesses.

Why do you think we aren't seeing that happen?

How can you not see how terrible Obama's timing is? How can he promise that he won't raise taxes on people who make under $250,000/year with all of the government expansion that he's heading up? How can you not see that congress is out of control?

I've already given my answer on timing, and the "out of control" bit too. The problem with the accusation of "expansion of government" coupled with concern about taxes is a bit misplaced. The goal with healthcare is to make it revenue neutral, and stave off large future expansions. Ditto for Cap and trade. We'll see if Obama can keep his tax promise, but remember, us under $250k people have had our taxes go down so far under Obama.

Knowing how this goes, Obama will almost certainly be accused of breaking that promise by 2012 (The "OMG, he raised taxes on cigarettes!!!" is already making the rounds), but I suspect that he's going to bend over backwards to keep it.

I feel like we've got a bunch of ignoramuses and corrupt punks running the show. They act in behalf of the highest bidder. They cheat on their wives, they cheat on their taxes, they lie through their teeth, and they're stealing food right off of my family's table!

So find better politicians and get 'em elected. In the meantime I would suggest that Republicans have Democrats beat on ignorance, corruption, influence peddling, cheating on wives, cheating on taxes, lies, and theft (from us and other nations).

^He's on the ropes when he must use my upvote for a comment as a leverage to try to win an argument.

Look over there! More straws for you to grasp for!

^Holy crap netrunner. I just don't have time to read this right now. Just having skimmed it, there is a major flaw in your arguement. Intentions are worthless. The proof is in the pudding.

I'll get back to it, though.


(You know, if you could squash some of the prejudice that you hold against republicans and conservatives, you could be a valuable asset to the entire country when debating social policy.)

oh there are jobs,if you want to make 6.50 an hr.
in 1971 america's largest employer paid an avg of 14.50 an hr,plus bennies and retirement.the american dollar was worth .78 on the dollar.
fast forward to now:
america's largest employer pays 8.50 and hr,no bennies,no retirement.the dollar is now worth .04-.07 on the dollar.
so not only did our parents make more,their money went many times further than it does today.
our forefathers had it right,labor is the strength of this country and its ability to manufacture goods.
by definition,America is a third world country.a total reversal of 50 years ago.
where once this country imported more raw materials than any other country,manufactured and exported more goods than anybody and lent money more than any other country.
it been a total 180 in the past 35 years.
take away our cell phones and cable tv and we are indonesia.
out of the top 100 richest nations,50 are corporations.think about that and weep.
this country does not need a bailout,nor another war..it needs a fucking enema.
power wishes only to concentrate itself with MORE power,be that a government or a corporation.
welcome to the united states of corporate america,can i take your bags?
those who hold the keys to OZ care not if you are a worker,a small business owner,a single mother or a student.they wish only to perpetuate a system where THEY benefit...we can go fuck ourselves.
call me when the revolution begins(which will only be when americans lose their cable TV)..ill be the guy selling black market cigs.ill bring the weed and the matches...
let the death be swift so we can clean up the garbage and start something good.
interesting how our forefathers had a pretty fantastic understanding about human nature and warned against such events:
http://www.foundingfathers.info/federalistpapers/fedindex.htm

http://www.usajobs.gov/