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Discuss the US Presidential Election & the Economy
A number of folks have been submitting topics that indicate that they want to have a serious discussion on the issues surrounding this election. Since we're under a week now, I've decided to run a series of discussion stories to give you guys a place to discuss the issue. So here's the first one: The Economy. It's the biggest topic these days, eclipsing even war as the most important issue to most Americans. But how will that affect your choice next week? And why?
Well, for those of you that might think to argue in favor of "conservative" liberals or Reaganomics, check out this interesting graph that illustrates National Debt by president. While it's not always true that the president can control spending (it's mostly congress & senate proposing them), it sure does nullify any idea that Republican presidents spend less than Obama.
They're both going to spend the hell out of our money. The only difference might be whether it comes from us or gets put on our nation's maxed out credit card.
Neither of them are going to solve the economic problem. This economic downturn is too deep and complicated for it to be put down as Bush's fault or for either of them to solve. So it's not going to affect my vote, what's done is done. How they propose to handle it sounds fairly similar--more preventative regulation. And I'm pretty much all for that. Who's the dumbshit that was allowing institutions to hand out loans to people without even checking their income level? Yeah, laissez faire is great and all but in its purest form idiots will ruin things. Need a happy middle ground.
My work here is dung.
I'm a small government person. At least that's what I would prefer. However, we haven't seen anything like that with this Republican administration and I see no reason to believe that we would see it with another one. In addition to that, we've just effectively taken ownership of several incredibly large entities and in effect, nationalized them. Because of these reasons, I see no prospects of smaller government from either party. This removes my one philosophical reservation about voting for a democrat. Therefore, Obama.
-JWR
The media have been at best negligent in reporting on the economic issues at hand. At worst, they have been complicit.
The causes of the housing bubble and meltdown aren't a secret. The identities of the people that have been calling for investigation and oversight aren't secret. The names of the people that have blocked every attempt to address the problem for the last 5 or 6 years aren't secret.
Why does the news media consistently accept the bald lies of the people responsible? Why don't they bother telling people the truth?
Does anyone really believe that if the roles of the parties were reversed there wouldn't be serious investigation?
See that "Preview" button?
The Canadians seem to know something: during the Great Depression not a single Canadian bank failed. This time around, at least so far, the same thing.
Most people are sick of the Bushes, the Amadinajhads, the Limbaughs, O'Rilleys, etc. of the world making irrational decisions and offensive statements based on the good book of their God and their hunger for power without doing much of anything to protect, maintain, or elevate the quality of life of the common person.
Here in the US, the reason we have the right to bear arms is because the founders of the Constitution essentially said "If we fuck up, take us out." - point being, the government should act in your benefit only, as that is the way it was intended when it was founded.
Conservatives have proven time and time again they don't think about consequences, and they assume what is good for them is what is good for everyone. I don't know about you, but when I vote, my vote is supposed to count for ME and what benefits me, but also what benefits everyone else around me and everyone else in my country. (Side note: A healthy economy and NOT pissing off the rest of the world with military occupancy is good for my country)
After hearing all this neocon rhetoric over and over and being disgusted (Ann Coulter especially comes to mind), I can't say with any kind of conviction I can morally support anyone with opinions like that.
They've made irrational choices, they've been WRONG plenty of times, and they've outright LIED to us to further their own agendas. Not that liberals don't have some folks who are downright nuts, but by and large the conservative movement has proven itself to be untrustworthy on several fronts and, quite frankly, un-American.
(Disclaimer: Discussion thread. The preceding is my humble opinion.)
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
What you need to watch out for is a candidate who /presumes/ to know /exactly/ how to resolve the situation and who justifies this with a reference to some ideology or other. Chances are such a candidate is much more interested in carrying through his ideology rather than in actually solving any problems.
That is why I will walk to the somberly walk to the polls with head bowed and pull the lever for McCain. My head and heart are with Bob Barr, but there is reality to contend with.
Both houses of Congress are controlled by a Democratic majority. Obama has voted 97% of the time with the Democratic leadership, and nothing I have heard about or from him has led me to believe that he is anything other than a warmed over 60's style activist acting as a mouthpiece for a socialist agenda. History has shown that when one party has control of the entire legislative and executive branches of our government, the economy suffers. A president that will walk lockstep with a Congressional leadership that has shown it has an axe to grind (re: Nancy Pelossi's partisan speech right before the Bailout Bill was to pass the first time) is not what this country needs...now or ever.
An Obama presidency with a rubberstamp Congress, or a Democratic Congress with a rubberstamp Obama presidency, either way you want to look at it, will be disastrous.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
I'm against Obama's plan to give tax rebates to people that do not pay federal income taxes. I'm sorry, but, if you get a rebate for something you didn't pay for, that isn't a rebate, it is welfare and income redistribution.
I don't like how Obama is planning to turn Social Security into a progressive pay system like income taxes. This is a major retooling of the system. He wants lower income people to start paying less of a percentage (possibly down to a zero point?) yet still recieve full benefits. This is an interesting article describing what BHO is planning to do with SS.
On the other hand, with McCain, he's wanting to start taxing heath benefits on employees rather than let them pay those premiums pre-tax. That BLOWS.
Why can't they just cut wasteful, federal spending....and let ALL tax payers keep more of their own money?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The historical data shows that government spending goes up with Republican administrations, and stays constant or goes down with Democrats. Don't look at what they say-- look at the graphs.
It's not often mentioned, but a huge part of the current crisis is runaway government spending, which spiked to record levels under the Bush administration (much of it due to the war, of course-- "this war will pay for itself," they told us).
The Republicans criticize the Democrats for "tax and spend" policies, but the Republican policy, going by what they do (instead of what they say) is "spend spend spend spend spend." They don't bother to tell us, but spending money isn't a "tax cut"-- what it is is a tax on the future.
Anybody remember the surplus under Clinton?
Ummmmmm. No, they weren't. I worked for a bank for nearly a decade, and amazingly enough didn't get caught up in the subprime fiasco. I do not know where this lie started. Banks are required to make a certain percentage of their loans in depressed areas, and are required to prove that they are not discriminatory in lending. This does not equate to the massive spate of 125% LTV loans, no proof of income loans, and blindly purchasing portfolios of loans.
Please stop letting Rush and Fox news think for you.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I find it somewhere between hilarious and deeply disturbing that People can get up there and call Obama a socialist for wanting to tax rich people, while at the same time supporting the buying of banks by the federal government, which actually is socialist
You're actually right, but its the kind of socialism first described by Alexander Hamilton, rather than Karl Marx.
The dirty secret of American capitalism is that America has always been a socialist country when it comes to home ownership via central banks. Republicans and Democrats have created a system that is inherently socialist at the top and privately owned at the bottom. Like many things American, it anticipates some social ideas, and is a compromise that is ugly on the surface but works very well.
Everyone gets to own their own home, but the government gets either the benefit of property taxes and stability back, or, in the worst case, assumes the risk of the mortgages. Democrats want to bail on the bailout and this basic economic crisis and their role in it, and, if anything finally proves that Bush is an idiot, it was his utter failure to see that if he had claimed responsibility for this mess, then he could have also claimed responsibility for its successes, thus accepting the social goodness of putting 50 million people into homes.
I mean, really, after 30 years of putting people into their own homes, the government is only on the hook for a trillion dollars. Let's, see, a trillion dollars and a few tough weeks on the stock market for pulling people out of the slums and into nice little houses. That's a damned good deal compared to some other stupid stuff we've spent a trillion dollars on.
This is my sig.
Sticking to the economy. I don't think either candidate gets "it". A few things that need to happen IMO for the economy to not only make a rebound but to also be strong fundamentally
1) Outlaw sub prime loans(i.e any loans that have significant bumps in the interest rate or require a significant down payment on those loans.
2) Pay down the national debt. High debt devalues the dollar and increases inflation.
3) Of course we have the distressing situation of American automobile manufactures cut jobs faster than new industries can replace them. Much of this is self inflicted. They should have been converting current vehicle line ups to to hybrids a long time ago. I like the idea of moving to a "green" economy where new jobs a re created in the search and production of cleaner and more efficent products.
It is with some hesitance I say this I am a Republican(albeit a liberal republican) and veteran of the USMC. I think we need to cut our defense budget as much as possible. Close all bases overseas Korea, Okinawa, Japan, those native people don't want us there we pay a lot of money to be there and the actual people who serve there don't like it there either(with some exceptions of course). We have the technology and ability to quickly moves forces to any location on the globe from the US.
Of course I am still in favor of combing the through other branches of the government to look for instances of fraud, waste and abuse and looking for way to make things run more effiecently.
Regarding Social Security we should get rid of the 92K cap. and consider raising the age benefits take effect.
One last thing regarding National health care, I am not opposed to the concept in and of itself I only worry about the tax implications. If it can be done with minimal effect on taxes then it should be done.
That's my take.
"To Err is Human To Forgive is Divine neither of which is Marine Corp Policy"-My SNCOIC
I read a lot on Economics because I intend to go back to school and get a PhD so I can teach during my retirement years. Paul Krugman, recent Noble winner, wrote a book called, "The Accidental Theorist." Now Paul is surely a Democrat, critical of right-wing politics, and inclined toward a liberal government, but he still sounds like a conservative when he talks about Economics. Why? Because there exist some discovered economic principles, proven over time, that even the most liberal Economists don't dispute. The problem is, neither Congress nor the Executive Branch listens to Economists. In the past, when they listened to Milton Friedman we got taxes taken from our paychecks, and when they listened to Alan Greenspan we got pretty good money management. Score: 1 1.
(To ward off a minor distraction; it was Congress, not Alan Greenspan, who dictated the "easy money" policies for sub-standard mortgage loans which precipitated our current situation.)
This election, is probably better analyzed by Sociologists than Economists. The models of crowd behavior certainly show what's going on better than any analysis of public economic opinion. Most of the population is woefully ignorant about even the most basic Economics principles. So, by pandering to the crowd's superstitions, candidates get elected on the size of their fans, not the issues. Here is a nice little article for those with the motivation to read it:
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa594.pdf
For those of you who would criticize me for being a libertarian (small "l"), you might like to look at this chart:
http://blog.createdebate.com/2008/04/07/writing-strong-arguments/
There is a link on this page to the original article by Paul Graham.
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
Enforcement is good. Selective enforcement is of course wrong.
The many allegations were officially made by the campaign of Hillary Clinton, and they are far worse than any allegations I have seen against Republicans.
Did I say voter fraud? No, I don't believe I did. I guess this kind of fraud is okay with you though, as long as it serves your purposes.
The real question: will CONGRESS listen to the people? Remember all the president has is the veto in these cases. Keep in mind it is still the same majority that has been there for the last two years and I, frankly, haven't noticed too much difference from the previous 6 years. So far I am not too impressed by the leadership(either party) in either house. The financial crisis was precipitated by carelessness and special interest influence. Responsibility can be attributed to members of both parties over the last 15 years.
More regulations, judiciously applied, would have prevented this crisis.
Which regulations? Give details.
I'd personally be interested in regulation like "You can't offer to insure someone for $x or to borrow $x from them unless you keep y*$x on hand to pay them off if necessary. And yes, this applies to anything that will make you similarly financially liable to them, whether you call it 'banking' or 'savings and loan' or 'insurance' or a 'CDS' or a 'rose by another name'."
Sell people a specific argument like that and you might get surprising agreement - I'll bet you can even get some of the "No! Regulation evil!" libertarian types to insist that y should be 1.0 unless the customer signs a contract stipulating otherwise.
But the vague word "regulation" just tells people: "We need more economic decisions to be made by people who have no financial stake in making them correctly, and who just agreed to give hundreds of billions of your dollars to people who made them incorrectly." You can probably convince lots of people of that argument, too, as long as you phrase it more obscurely than I did. But you still won't be able to make it into a good idea.
You should probably watch the second debate, then. Compare the two candidate's answers the following question (trimmed for space, full text of debate here:
Brokaw: There are new economic realities out there that everyone in this hall and across this country understands that there are going to have to be some choices made. Health policies, energy policies, and entitlement reform, what are going to be your priorities in what order? Which of those will be your highest priority your first year in office and which will follow in sequence?
McCain: I think you can work on all three at once, Tom.
[...]
[W]e can do them all at once. There's no -- and we have to do them all at once. All three you mentioned are compelling national security requirements.
Obama: We're going to have to prioritize, just like a family has to prioritize. Now, I've listed the things that I think have to be at the top of the list.
Energy we have to deal with today [...]
Health care is priority number two [...]
And, number three, we've got to deal with education so that our young people are competitive in a global economy. [...]
Note which candidate prioritized and which one didn't.
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