The Porkulus bill reminds me of a Tool song

[Jerk]

One party here is the government and our generation, the other is your children and their children. You decide which is which. Thanks, you young whippersnappers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5sIXUbMgF0&feature=related

[bluedogok]

I was thinking more along the lines of Stinkfist

07pLGIgyfjw

[KC//CRIMSON]

Maynard James Keenan is a Democrat.

[Jerk]

Maynard James Keenan is a Democrat.

As weird as he is that wouldn't surprise me.

[Okla-homey]

Is just about a done deal. The Prez gets to sign it on Monday.

I hope it helps, but I fear its mainly bread and circuses.

[King Crimson]

so why is it that you "conservative" types have recently discovered "bread and circus" as a dismissive term? honestly, it's a workable concept...but the new fascination with it is interesting.

[King Crimson]

I'll go ahead and post my next response:

"and this is somehow different from what?"

[Jerk]

so why is it that you "conservative" types have recently discovered "bread and circus" as a dismissive term? honestly, it's a workable concept...but the new fascination with it is interesting.

We've known about it for years and years. It comes from a quote from Tocqueville', does it not? It made sense to me when I first heard it at age 15, and it still makes sense today.


I have been told that the welfare reform done under Clinton and Gingrich has been pretty much wiped out by this legislation.

[OUHOMER]

$40b out of $800b for road construction is not enough, $13 dollars a week i might see wont improve my life style. I am pretty sure with 401k and state tax it will less.

maybe these numbers are to much for me to comprehend.

[Okla-homey]

so why is it that you "conservative" types have recently discovered "bread and circus" as a dismissive term? honestly, it's a workable concept...but the new fascination with it is interesting.

No dark conspiracy here. The expression simply fits. Spending national treasure to fund new entitlements is one of the oldest tricks in the political survival insurance book. As you are probably aware, the term is derived from various Roman dictators' practice of literally giving free "bread and circuses*" to the folks in order insure their political survival by strengthening their support among the lower classes. The other commonly used but generally less effective ploy is to create a national distraction by drumming up a foreign enemy.

As a friend of mine in Tuscaloosa recently opined, "I keep envisioning new stone walls and shored up trails in national parks. And maybe a big north-south highway through west Alabama. But I know what I'm gonna see is hand outs to women with 8 kids, each with a different daddy. The big highway, if its built, will be a toll road. And those trails and stone walls will continue to wash and crumble, with nobody hittin' a real lick of work."

* as in the ancient hippodrome and mass entertainment venues located in Rome.

[bluedogok]

I for one could care less what an artists political affiliation is. For me it doesn't affect the art they make....

[Vaevictis]

Spending national treasure to fund new entitlements is one of the oldest tricks in the political survival insurance book.

So is coming up with pretext and banging the drums for war. Same coin, different side.

Some people fall for one, others the other.

(Which is not to say that I don't agree with a sizable portion of this bill being bogus. I just find it amusing.)

EDIT: Now from the department of redundancy department! (Yeah, you already said that heh.)

[Jerk]

I for one could care less what an artists political affiliation is. For me it doesn't affect the art they make....

+1 unless they're just downright annoying like Green Day.

[King Crimson]

The other commonly used but generally less effective ploy is to create a national distraction by drumming up a foreign enemy.
.

and that's never been done by the GOP.

Hell, we have people on this board who would give each other "high fives" and shout "Wolverines" about the invasion of Grenada because it "made us feel good to be Americans" and crank the Outfield on the car stereo.

[Jerk]

I think what no one is talking about is that the inflation is going to push us all into higher tax brackets, which is probably what they want to happen.

Anyway, after the reset button gets pushed, we're going to put in an amendment that says if you receive welfare, you can't vote.

[JohnnyMack]

and that's never been done by the GOP.

Exactly. Homey had no problem supporting W when it was time to spend how much again on Iraq? At the end of the day at least the cake we're spending under this plan stays here in the U.S. as opposed to it being pissed away in some far off desert.

[King Crimson]

Exactly. Homey had no problem supporting W when it was time to spend how much again on Iraq? At the end of the day at least the cake we're spending under this plan stays here in the U.S. as opposed to it being pissed away in some far off desert.

big government sucks and government subsidies are socialism, public education and teachers unions are evil, but as long as it's paying our military health insurance rah rah rah.

[Jerk]

Exactly. Homey had no problem supporting W when it was time to spend how much again on Iraq? At the end of the day at least the cake we're spending under this plan stays here in the U.S. as opposed to it being pissed away in some far off desert.

If we would have stolen their oil, which was the real motivation according to you guys, then it would have been free. FREE!!!!

[King Crimson]

bread and circus is a term that usually refers to buying off the lower classes with rewards or spectacle for political, nationalistic favor.

i don't see how Reagan is exempt from this term.

[tommieharris91]

I think what no one is talking about is that the inflation is going to push us all into higher tax brackets, which is probably what they want to happen.


No one is worried about inflation right now. I personally think the Fed should just leave bags of money outside its doors to stem deflation.

[Jerk]

No one is worried about inflation right now. I personally think the Fed should just leave bags of money outside its doors to stem deflation.


You're right until the bond bubble burst or other nations stop buying our t bills.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601080&sid=apzdvnGxFlSE&refer=asia

[Jerk]

http://d.scribd.com/docs/1rlcpq1asoh57jolj6sj.pdf

It's a .pdf file and the lines through the text are so you can't quick search through it. Let's see one of you enlightened f***heads defend that.

Wonderful. I thought Obama and the Democrats were all about 'openness and transparency.' What a joke that was.

People who voted to give them full control of the government are fools and their children will foot the bill.

4.1 Billion to ACORN. What a f***ing disaster.

[47straight]

Jerk,be nice. It took some staffers hours and hours to convert that to an unsearchable PDF from plain text, and here you go tearing them up. You're so un-American.

[Jerk]

Jerk,be nice. It took some staffers hours and hours to convert that to an unsearchable PDF from plain text, and here you go tearing them up. You're so un-American.

Even the British weren't so rude to us before we started shooting them.

[47straight]

Exactly. Homey had no problem supporting W when it was time to spend how much again on Iraq? At the end of the day at least the cake we're spending under this plan stays here in the U.S. as opposed to it being pissed away in some far off desert.


Yeah, **** the brown people in Iraq! Cut off funding!

[Vaevictis]

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1:

Click on one of the versions of the bill. (Probably Public Print)

Hey, all the parts with lines through them in your PDF seem to be labelled "struck out" on the website. I wonder what that means.

[Vaevictis]

Not to mention that after I went to the House website and dug around for like 2 minutes, I was totally able to find the bill in plain text.

[soonerscuba]

If we would have stolen their oil, which was the real motivation according to you guys, then it would have been free. FREE!!!!This one of my biggest gripes about Iraq. We should have stolen their oil, there is zero tangible benefit to us being there, at least we could point to something if we would get cheaper gas.

[Jerk]

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1:

Click on one of the versions of the bill. (Probably Public Print)

Hey, all the parts with lines through them in your PDF seem to be labelled "struck out" on the website. I wonder what that means.

Oh thanks! That's much easier to read through!

[Vaevictis]

If you just click on my link (which may expire soon), select the public print, and then select the printer friendly display link, you'll have the whole thing in text. Easy peasy.

(If the link expires, start here: http://thomas.loc.gov/home/c111bills.html , then find House Bill 1, it'll get you back to where my link is supposed to take you.)

[Jerk]

I want to search the whole thing for key words because I'm trying to figure if they threw a certain peice of legislation in it (HR45). I admit you got me and I over-reacted, the ACORN thing sent me through the damned roof, and no one had enough time to read it so it only made sense that they'd pull something like that.

My bad. oh well.

[Jerk]

This is all I get

http://d.scribd.com/docs/1rlcpq1asoh57jolj6sj.pdf

[Vaevictis]

Usually I find that, when in doubt, it is good policy to go to the original source :O

;)

[sitzpinkler]

"**** your God, your lord, your Christ"

that line doesn't bother you?

that's one of MJK's

[1890MilesToNorman]

But Oprah said.....

[mikeelikee]

Strike up the printing presses, boys. This is so damn big, the only way to deal with the debt is to monetize it. Get ready to pay $10 for a loaf of bread. Damn liberals.

[Okla-homey]

Exactly. Homey had no problem supporting W when it was time to spend how much again on Iraq? At the end of the day at least the cake we're spending under this plan stays here in the U.S. as opposed to it being pissed away in some far off desert.

You people will never understand why Saddam had to go, so its not worth trying to explain it all again. I for one do not consider the establishment of the only functional democratic government in an Arab state in southwest Asia to be "pissing." And that is most definitely not the same thing as additional handouts to people and industries whose time has passed. Especially when said handouts require an already cash-strapped government to go deeper into hock. Let's just wait and see if it helps. I guess we'll know in a year or so.

Meanwhile, The Times of the UK isn't impressed. This from the Sunday edition.


RONALD REAGAN started it, Bill Clinton finished it and last week Barack Obama was accused of engineering its destruction. One of the few undisputed triumphs of American government of the past 20 years – the sweeping welfare reform programme that sent millions of dole claimants back to work – has been plunged into jeopardy by billions of dollars in state handouts included in the president’s controversial economic stimulus package.

As Obama celebrated Valentine’s Day yesterday with a return to his Chicago home for a private weekend with family and friends, his success in piloting a $785 billion (£546 billion) stimulus package through Congress was being overshadowed by warnings that an unprecedented increase in welfare spending would undermine two decades of bipartisan attempts to reduce dependency on government handouts.

Robert Rector, a prominent welfare researcher who was one of the architects of Clinton's 1996 reform bill, warned last week that Obama’s stimulus plan was a “welfare spendathon” that would amount to the largest one-year increase in government handouts in American history.

Douglas Besharov, author of a big study on welfare reform, said the stimulus bill passed by Congress and the Senate in separate votes on Friday would “unravel” most of the 1996 reforms that led to a 65% reduction in welfare caseloads and prompted the British and several other governments to consider similar measures.

Though some researchers have questioned the true impact of Clinton’s “workfare” reforms, they were wildly popular with millions of US taxpayers tired of subsidising what many saw as a generation of slackers.

Despite dire warnings that reduced benefits for single mothers and deadlines on entitlement would create a social calamity – one liberal senator warned at the time that children would be “sleeping on grates” – the 1996 reforms cut welfare rolls from more than 5m families in 1995 to below 2m a decade later without a discernible increase in hardship.

In the American political lexicon, welfare has since become a dirty word – often referred to as the W word – and nothing arouses US tabloid ire more than the hint that taxpayers’ money is being wasted.

When it emerged that Nadya Suleman, the mother of octuplets born in Los Angeles last month, was a “single mom” with six children already and was relying on welfare assistance, she was transformed overnight from fertility goddess to the target of death threats.

Obama argued last week that his bill was essential for reviving the US economy and protecting victims of the credit crunch. Yet his Republican rivals have seized on the billions lavished on new welfare spending to stir the conservative faithful from their postelection misery and reunite the opposition.

“If you like government dependence, you will love the plan they are jamming through Congress,” declared Michael Steele, the new chairman of the Republican National Committee.

Rector, a senior scholar at the conservative Heritage Foundation, argued that Obama’s spending proposals in effect encouraged individual states to add more families to their welfare rolls; the more Americans sign on to the dole, the more state budgets will benefit from US Treasury payouts.

“They have completely overturned the fiscal and policy foundations of welfare reform,” Rector complained.

Supporters of the bill argue that the current crisis is so grave that intellectual quibbling about the nature of welfare has to take second place to the upheaval transforming millions of American lives.

“How can you tell someone who has lost his income to look for another job if there aren't any more jobs?” asked one Obama backer.

While some scholars are beginning to suspect that Clinton’s welfare reforms were fatally flawed – or at least viable only during an economic boom – Republicans are not alone in fearing that Obama’s hastily concocted package is the first step towards the creation of a quasi-socialist welfare state.

Even Mickey Kaus, a prominent liberal blogger, has denounced what he describes as the “get more people on welfare” provisions of Obama’s bill. Writing at Slate, the political website, Kaus said: “Lack of jobs isn’t a reason to loosen work requirements . . . Have the Dems never heard of ‘workfare’?

“Give recipients useful community service work, and if they do the work, then they get the [welfare] cash.”

Returning to Chicago for the first time since his inauguration last month, there were other pressing matters on Obama’s mind – not to mention the minds of millions of Americans still enthralled by his every move. Where would he take his wife Michelle for a romantic Valentine’s dinner? How much time would he spend in the gym? Would he fit in a game of basketball?

Opinion polls last week showed that for all his administration’s errors in his first three weeks in office, the new president has lost little of his personal appeal. He continues to enjoy an average 64% approval rating.

Yet after another fracas over the withdrawal of the Republican senator Judd Gregg as Obama’s choice for commerce secretary – the second time a nominee has given up the post – Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, was obliged to insist that it was not “amateur hour” at the White House.

Obama also stumbled over a curious claim that his stimulus plan would enable Caterpillar, one of America’s leading manufacturers of heavy earth-moving equipment, to start rehiring workers. He was promptly contradicted by the company’s chief executive, who said he had no such intention and was planning more lay-offs.

The dangers are beginning to pile up for the novice president and his struggling economic crew. Tim Geithner, his treasury secretary, tripped up with opaque attempts to explain how the administration would fix the banking crisis, while from every corner of the country there were alarming indications that increased government intervention in the lives of ordinary Americans could prove an invitation to waste.

In Wisconsin, the state that forged a pioneering path in welfare reforms in the 1990s, residents were astonished by a newspaper investigation that disclosed that a $340m (£236m) programme offering taxpayer-financed child care to low-income working parents was riddled with fraud and expensive loopholes.

In one case, a family of four sisters who had 17 children between them put all of them together, took it in turns to babysit them and over the past three years claimed $540,000 (£374,000) in perfectly legal state childcare subsidies.

Examples like that fuel American suspicion that so-called “big government” invariably turns out to be inefficient, expensive and easily exploitable. And there has been no bigger government action in the US than the stimulus package presented by Obama.

Few dispute the need for some kind of stimulus, but has Obama got the details right? The Republicans do not think so and, led by Gregg, they are already shunning the president’s bipartisan overtures.

Perhaps more worrying for the president is that some of his natural liberal supporters are not feeling all that confident either. In a telling commentary last week, Paul Krugman, the 2008 Nobel prize-winning economist, declared that Obama’s stimulus victory “feels more than a bit like defeat”.

Krugman added: “I’ve got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach – a feeling that America just isn’t rising to the greatest economic challenge in 70 years.”

[Mjcpr]

You people will never understand why Saddam had to go, so its not worth trying to explain it all again. I for one do not consider the establishment of the only functional democratic government in an Arab state in southwest Asia to be "pissing." And that is most definitely not the same thing as additional handouts to people and industries whose time has passed. Especially when said handouts require an already cash-strapped government to go deeper into hock. Let's just wait and see if it helps. I guess we'll know in a year or so.

Except that the "Saddam had to go" montra was not what led us in to Iraq, it was the "there are WMD's there" montra that lead us in to Iraq which has obviously proven to be false and the reason why a lot of people believe it is a false war, although, from lessons learned in Vietnam, they fully support the soliders who are there to fight it.

And I think most folks would agree that "one of the only functional democratic government(s) in an Arab state in southwest Asia" is a reach. I hope it comes to be true, but IMO, right now, it ain't. It may ultimately be that the right thing to do was to take out SH, but I can't see that now; and you can't see that the right thing to do is to NOT back Obama's plan. You see, in the end, it is always a political "thing" with people like you and it always will be even if you throw in a a few "y'alls" and moreovevers" and what not.

[Vaevictis]

Yeah, let's see what happens before we celebrate having another democracy in the region.

Remember, the Palestinians elected Hamas.

And the other democracy in the region that existed? Yeah, we helped the Brits overthrow it. All because they didn't like that democracy's plans to nationalize oil production.

[Okla-homey]

see below. And look, give me some time. I'm a capitalist. I was at the flippin' Barnes & Noble tonight and spied a Newseek on which the cover proclaimed "We're All Socialists Now." It's gonna take old guys like me a bit of time to get used to the notion the folks voted for that and that's the kind of country we're bound to have. At least until it proves to be a failure here just like it has everywhere else. I guess I should just take comfort in the fact I'm all set and not just starting out in life hoping to "make it" under this new paradigm.


Except that the "Saddam had to go" montra was not what led us in to Iraq, it was the "there are WMD's there" montra that lead us in to Iraq which has obviously proven to be false and the reason why a lot of people believe it is a false war, although, from lessons learned in Vietnam, they fully support the soliders who are there to fight it.

Mantras notwithstanding, every western intelligence agency believed he had WMD's at the time, particularly since he had gassed his own Kurdish people long before we went in. Further, I'm not convinced they were'nt evacuated to Syria or Jordan just ahead of us.

And I think most folks would agree that "one of the only functional democratic government(s) in an Arab state in southwest Asia" is a reach. I hope it comes to be true, but IMO, right now, it ain't. Honestly, how can you make such a statement given the facts? How many free and fair elections do you need to see? How much more does violence and terrorism in Iraq need to drop?


It may ultimately be that the right thing to do was to take out SH, but I can't see that now; and you can't see that the right thing to do is to NOT back Obama's plan. I'm confused. You're saying the right thing to do is "NOT back Obama's plan?" If that is what you're saying, I'm with you 100%.

You see, in the end, it is always a political "thing" with people like you and it always will be even if you throw in a a few "y'alls" and moreovevers" and what not. Party affiliation has nothing to do with it. Opposition to undoing what Reagan and Clinton did to profoundly reduce the welfare-class in this country does.

[Mjcpr]

see below.

Everyone believes and knows SH gassed his own people but that is not why we invaded. We invaded under the assumption he had WMDs which we believed to be nuclear or dirty bombs.

Free and fair elections don't matter to me when half the delegation is getting blown up. However, i will agree, that when LEGIT elections are held, it can only be a good thing. But when those elections are marred by bombs and other bull****, I can't help but think the idea sucked.

Party affiliation has everything to do with it and it's why I, NORMALLY, avoid political threads at all costs. You including Clinton and Reagan's accomplishments together all of a sudden when your ilk believed Clinton was a HUGE disgrace is a hoot.

[SanJoaquinSooner]

I sure miss Stimulus Bill from the old days

http://img.timeinc.net/people/i/2006/startracks/061023/bill_clinton.jpg

[Crucifax Autumn]

I'm with the congress...I don't wanna read all that either!

[Crucifax Autumn]

This thread sucks...

[AlbqSooner]

I'm with the congress...I don't wanna read all that either!

I didn't want to read all that crap in my college textbooks either, but that was my job. When I didn't do my job I often found that I was F****d.

[Okla-homey]

see below. Additionally, WJC was a lot of things, but he does get credit for finally ending welfare as we had known it for fifty years. That's apparently being undone now.


Everyone believes and knows SH gassed his own people but that is not why we invaded. We invaded under the assumption he had WMDs which we believed to be nuclear or dirty bombs.

I'm sorry, but you're wrong as to the nature of the WMD we believed Saddam possessed. "Weapons of Mass Destruction" was then, and remains, a categorization that includes nuclear as you point out, but also biological and chemical weapons. That's why in military circles, at least during the two decades I was in, "WMD" are more often referred to as "NBC" weapons. We believed he had stocks of chemical (nerve agents and mustard), biological (weaponized anthrax) and was on the verge of developing a primitive nuke.

This, in the single most strategically important region of the world. You may recall Saddam didn't deny he had such weapons either, and the UN had essentially given up trying to find them because Saddam refused to cooperate with the inspections.

That is also why the troops we deployed into Iraq initially did so in chemical suits, despite the fact there isn't much more you can do to degrade a soldier's performance than to put him in a damn chemical suit. They had also undergone the series of anthrax immunizations necessary to protect them from that threat.

[captain_surly]

and you can't see that the right thing to do is to NOT back Obama's plan.

You have always been and will continue be one of my favorite posters on this board but I am shocked by that statement. To me, it is absolutely intuitive that this stimulus plan is wrong and will make our economy worse off when implemented. Making it easier for people to get by without even trying to work can't possibly help. If you can't see that this bill will lead to more welfare programs at the expense of a shrinking base of taxpayers you're not looking closely enough.

Having said that, I understand why you choose to stay out of most political threads. It's too common around here for people to get worked up to the point of making or taking the political views of others personally. So, on a lighter note:

That was a heck of a basketball game yesterday. I suprised my wife by waking her up early and telling her to get ready to go to Norman for the game. I had made arrangements to board the dogs so we took off at 7 a.m., dropped them off, stopped for breakfast in Sallisaw and got to the arena about 11. We had a couple of Bloody Mary's in the parking lot (if you haven't tried Zing Zang mix you should) enjoyed the game then checked in at the new Hilton in Norman. I predict it will be a ****hole in two years. Lousy service, breakfest trays in the halls everywhere and a general lack of maintenance. We then proceeded to Tarahumara's for dinner (Chile Colorado) then back to the hotel for cocktails and butt secks.

I understand that beauty is in the eye of the beholder but I may have accomplished a feat new to SoonerFans. I started on topic, highjacked the thread and then highjacked my own post and even paragraph.

(Sooner04) Thank you for your time.

[fadada1]

my ignorant take on this:

republicans - i ain't votin' for that bullsh*t no matter what you tell me. i'm a stubborn a**hole and could give two sh*ts about the poor folks because i make 300K a year and get plenty extra in kickbacks.

democrats - hey you asshats, has your brain been on vacation for the past 8 years???

my stance: i'd rather fail with trying something, than fail with doing nothing. republicans in congress seem to think everything will take care of itself. at least the democrats want to take a chance. fact is, there is no right or wrong answer. just my $.02.

[Jerk]

my ignorant take on this:

republicans - i ain't votin' for that bullsh*t no matter what you tell me. i'm a stubborn a**hole and could give two sh*ts about the poor folks because i make 300K a year and get plenty extra in kickbacks.

democrats - hey you asshats, has your brain been on vacation for the past 8 years???

my stance: i'd rather fail with trying something, than fail with doing nothing. republicans in congress seem to think everything will take care of itself. at least the democrats want to take a chance. fact is, there is no right or wrong answer. just my $.02.

I'm going to write a long take on this, so I wouldn't be surprised if no one reads it.

At first I thought it was the housing bubble and the CRA that caused this, but I think that is only one of many problems.

Here is why I think we're in the mess that we're in: We all have credit card debt, mortgage debt (which bubbled), second mortgages, home equity loans, new car loans, that national debt, the annual budget deficit, the state's budget deficits, the county's budget deficits, the city's budget deficits, credit lines, so on and so on. All this adds up to trillions and trillions of dollars...which is actually not a bad deal so long as we can make the payments.

Then along came 2007 and gas hit $5 a gallon. People started to become unable to pay their mortgages....the first one's naturally being the CRA loans, but that was only the beginning. It began to snowball into a death spiral. Banks began to fail. The next thing to fall might be the commerical real estate, then ARM loans, then something else..who knows. Housing construction is non-existant which put those guys out of work, and they aren't paying taxes. They quit spending and put the retailers out of work, creating empty commercial properties that no one will buy, which will cause more banks to fail. This is like a black hole and no one knows where the bottom is.

Your stimulus bill is an effort, at best, to have us crash land into the trees, instead of the mountain.

The quick way out of this would have been to let these banks and business fail, and start working on the recovery now. Now we are going to prolong it for God-know-how-long and your children will foot the bill with an unbearable tax burdern.

Now that we have the return of endless welfare, we have the moral hazard, which will stop people from even looking for work.

The system we were in was unsustainable. Gov't spending now is unsustainable.

It will work itself out but there is going to be some pain involved. But...

We could very well end up being a 3rd world country in 10 years if the wrong decisions are made.

eta - the way out of this would be to start living off of savings instead of debt.

[JohnnyMack]

see below. And look, give me some time. I'm a capitalist. I was at the flippin' Barnes & Noble tonight and spied a Newseek on which the cover proclaimed "We're All Socialists Now." It's gonna take old guys like me a bit of time to get used to the notion the folks voted for that and that's the kind of country we're bound to have. At least until it proves to be a failure here just like it has everywhere else. I guess I should just take comfort in the fact I'm all set and not just starting out in life hoping to "make it" under this new paradigm.

At least have the common sense to admit that the road to this new paradigm was paved by those who came before Obama. I'm certain you'd love nothing more than to lay this entire mess at the feet of the new administration but take a deep breath, look at the decisions W made in terms of spending and be honest with yourself.

[Harry Beanbag]

At least have the common sense to admit that the road to this new paradigm was paved by those who came before Obama. I'm certain you'd love nothing more than to lay this entire mess at the feet of the new administration but take a deep breath, look at the decisions W made in terms of spending and be honest with yourself.


I think we should all be honest and admit that all politicians must die.

[JohnnyMack]

I think we should all be honest and admit that all politicians must die.

That's sounding better and better all the time.

[Vaevictis]

The quick way out of this would have been to let these banks and business fail, and start working on the recovery now.

Herbert Hoover thought this too. Bank failures were a huge part of why the Depression was as nasty as it was. A small fraction of the banking industry failing is okay, but if you let it get ugly, it spreads to other industries as their access to credit declines and deflation kicks in.

You have to be very, very careful when you talk about letting banks fail.

[Jerk]

Herbert Hoover thought this too. Bank failures were a huge part of why the Depression was as nasty as it was. A small fraction of the banking industry failing is okay, but if you let it get ugly, it spreads to other industries as their access to credit declines and deflation kicks in.

You have to be very, very careful when you talk about letting banks fail.


Either way it's going to suck. How many trillions of dollars will it take to keep them solvent? I can't remember where I read it but supposedly it is a LOT more than Tarp 1 and 2 AND the Porkulus. How many generations of Americans will it take to pay it back? Should they be liable for our failure?



Anyway..if China decides to stop buying our treasury notes, the game is over. Done.

I thought I heard someone on the radio say that Britian and Japan are buying T Notes with money that they're printing (I'm not sure of that, though, I was in a semi crossing three lanes of traffic)

Even if they keep buying the T notes, interest on the debt is going to consume that annual budget 'pie'

[Vaevictis]

I'm not saying that you don't let banks fail, I'm just saying you have to be very careful doing it.

The main trick is not keeping banks solvent so much as it is to keep them lending and keeping demand up enough for them to continue lending. If they stop, the money supply starts to shrink. You don't want the money supply to shrink too much because deflation will kill your economy if you let it.

The alternative to this, if you want to keep deflation in check, is to effectively print money -- but then you have a rubber-band effect when banks start lending again because the banking system as a whole effectively multiplies the amount of money in the system by 1/(reserve rate), and as the economy recovers, the banks will decrease their reserve requirements.

[Jerk]

I'm just saying that one way or the other, this is the end of a debt-based economy. It will go down like communism as one of those things that 'doesn't work.'

eta- hope I'm wrong.

[royalfan5]

Either way it's going to suck. How many trillions of dollars will it take to keep them solvent? I can't remember where I read it but supposedly it is a LOT more than Tarp 1 and 2 AND the Porkulus. How many generations of Americans will it take to pay it back? Should they be liable for our failure?



Anyway..if China decides to stop buying our treasury notes, the game is over. Done.

I thought I heard someone on the radio say that Britian and Japan are buying T Notes with money that they're printing (I'm not sure of that, though, I was in a semi crossing three lanes of traffic)

Even if they keep buying the T notes, interest on the debt is going to consume that annual budget 'pie'
Now that the US savings rate has turned positive and consumer spending has slumped. The United States may be able to finance a good chunk of the stimulus package through our own savings. And given that China is so dependent on exports, they will either need to fund our spending to keep exports going, or shrink their savings rate to sop up that export capacity with internal consumption. Also, China's excessive savings rate had a substantial impact of the creation of the some of the more exotic debt instruments, as need those excess savings needed to be funneled somewhere. Without creation of those new exotic debt instruments and the underlying consumption there will still be plenty of money floating around to sop up treasury notes. At least in the short term. Especially with the excess cash that is on the sidelines currently.

[Vaevictis]

It's gonna take old guys like me a bit of time to get used to the notion the folks voted for that and that's the kind of country we're bound to have.

This is just the completely, utterly predictable overreaction to the Republicans trying to push things too far.

Give it about 8 years, we'll see a completely, utterly predictable overreaction in the other direction once the Democrats inevitably try to push things too far.

[Vaevictis]

This sort of stuff is why I was complaining about Bush's expansion of executive power, the Senate's rumblings over messing with the filibuster, etc.

The pendulum swings in both directions. If you expand your own power today, you're expanding the other side's tomorrow. Try to keep that in mind.

[Jerk]

Give it about 8 years, we'll see a completely, utterly predictable overreaction in the other direction once the Democrats inevitably try to push things too far.

I'd like to believe that's true but after Rahm Emmanual gets done with the Census and the Democrats amnesty in 12 million new voters it will be over.

[Rogue]

It's a .pdf file and the lines through the text are so you can't quick search through it. Let's see one of you enlightened f***heads defend that.

Wonderful. I thought Obama and the Democrats were all about 'openness and transparency.' What a joke that was.


Here Jerk, try this link instead (http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1/text)

Seems to be fully searchable.

[Chuck Bao]

Now that the US savings rate has turned positive and consumer spending has slumped. The United States may be able to finance a good chunk of the stimulus package through our own savings. And given that China is so dependent on exports, they will either need to fund our spending to keep exports going, or shrink their savings rate to sop up that export capacity with internal consumption. Also, China's excessive savings rate had a substantial impact of the creation of the some of the more exotic debt instruments, as need those excess savings needed to be funneled somewhere. Without creation of those new exotic debt instruments and the underlying consumption there will still be plenty of money floating around to sop up treasury notes. At least in the short term. Especially with the excess cash that is on the sidelines currently.

I would have completely agreed with you last week, royalfan. But, I'm not so sure now.

In the short-term, there will likely continue to be a flight to quality - to US Treasuries. However, that money needs to go into the real sector or there is no chance of an economic recovery.

China is making noises about diversifying its foreign reserves and I suppose it will to some degree and hopefully in an orderly fashion.

I was shocked last week by several brokers' reports hailing the strength of the Chinese economy.

Previously, I had assumed that China was heavily dependent on the export market. The January trade data showing a 17% yoy decline in exports and a very disturbing 43% yoy drop in imports seem to confirm that view.

However, one economist is saying that the collapse in Chinese exports would shave only 1.2 percentage points off of China's GDP growth this year, which is still expected to come in at around 7%.

China is launching its own stimulus package worth $585bn and it can afford to with public sector debt of only 18.5% of GDP, a balanced budget and foreign currency reserves of $1.95 trillion.

I think my point is that China really isn't as dependent on the US to import its goods as we had previously thought.

Obviously, it is still in China's best interest to not to pull out of US treasuries and see interest rates rise in the US further endangering the US economy.

I think US interest rates will rise in the medium and long-term. The key question is when and how much.

[Okla-homey]

Wait, this may not be the biggest discretionary spending bill evar. FDR worked out a deal in 1941 with Japan to get us all out of the Great Depression. I'm sure that had a price tag on it, and continued well through the lengthy Marshall Plan, which was Phase II.

Yep, the Spectacular Presidential Economic Recovery Miracle (SPERM) is prolly number two in the all-time "public sector attempts to fix the private sector economy" schemes. ;)

[Jerk]

I'm just copying and pasting this...not saying I disagree or agree.

Gerald Celente

In 2009 we’re going to see the worst economic collapse ever, the ‘Greatest Depression’, says Gerald Celente, U.S. trend forecaster. He believes it’s going to be very violent in the U.S., including there being a tax revolt.

RT: The fragile U.S. economy has been met with bank bailouts and stimulus plans. So what’s to come in 2009? Joining me now to answer that question is Gerald Celente, founder and director of the Trends Research Institute. Thank you for joining me.

Gerald Celente: My pleasure.

RT: How would you define the economic trend that you have forecasted for 2009?

G.C.: We’re going to see the economic collapse the likes of which the world has never seen before. It’s not only in the United States; it’s going global. At the end of 2008 we saw Christmas retail sales: women’s apparel down 23%; home furnishings and electronics off 27%; luxury items down 35%. These are Depression Era collapses. We saw major bankruptcies, such as retailers Circuit City and Linens and Things. One bankruptcy after another. Then we saw store closings. Starbucks, Home D&D Power and down the line.

The question becomes who is going to take all of the vacant retail space? Who is going to rent it? The answer is - nobody. Now we look at the financial collapse in 2008, we saw the Merrill Lynch mob go under the bed and the Lehman boys went bankrupt. You saw bond companies, brokerage firms, and banks go belly up. Who is going to rent all the vacant commercial business space that they used to occupy? The answer is - nobody. The commercial real estate collapse that’s going to happen in 2009 is going to dwarf the residential real estate collapse.

RT: You use the Great Depression as an analogy, as a comparison. During the Great Depression unemployment was 25%. Now it has increased, it’s I think over 7.2. Is that number going to get much, much bigger?

G.C.: We have to look at the real number. There are two sets of books that the government keeps. When they measure up unemployment they don’t add in the people who are no longer looking for jobs because they have become discouraged since they cannot find employment after looking so long. And they don’t include part-time workers. When you put that number into it, the number is 13.7%. And that’s a government number. And this is just beginning. And again, current events form future trends.

What did we see? We saw in one day some 61,000 jobs evaporate off the map. You’re going to see Great Depression numbers. Because, as I mentioned, with this commercial real estate collapse, all of these retail stores closing, like Starbucks and Macy’s, you go down the line. You look not only at people who work for these places that no longer have jobs, but how about all the supportive industries - the advertising, the manufacturers, the products. They’re going to be laying off people as well. We’re going to see Great Depression numbers. In that effect, this is going to be worse than the Great Depression.

RT: What are we going to see happening to the society, to people’s day-to-day lives in terms of how they treat one another, how they behave, crime?

G.C.: When I say it’s going to be worse than the Great Depression, we call it the Greatest Depression. By the way, to be using 1930s models to get the U.S. out of this is really stupid. Back then when we first crashed most people didn’t have homes. There was no such thing as home equity loan. And back then, people didn’t have credit cards. The consumer wasn’t 14 trillion dollars in debt. We had a manufacturing base that built the world out of the Great Depression following World War Two. We no longer have that.

Now people are at the edge. They’re stressed out. Look, the Americans are the most depressed nation on the world already. They take more antidepressant drugs than anybody, plus the other kinds of drugs that they are taking. You’re going to see crime levels in America that are going to rival the third world. Welcome Mexico City. You’re going to start seeing people being kidnapped in this country like they do in other underdeveloped nations. So it’s going to be very violent in America.

RT: You’re not exaggerating?

G.C.: I’m not exaggerating, the facts are there. I have a saying: when people lose everything and they have nothing to lose, they lose it. You’re going to see people saying, off with their heads. There’s going to be another revolution in this country.

RT: When will this revolution that you have forecasted in your Trends journal happen and what will ignite it?

G.C.: It’s going to be a tax revolt. We’re going to start seeing a tax revolt in the United States. People are one job away from losing everything. We’re seeing more and more closures, people are being laid off. People are stretched to the limits. And what do they do in New York State? Some130 new taxes are being proposed, they’re raising sales taxes. There’s going to be a tax revolt in this country from property taxes first and school taxes second. That’s what we’re going to see start to happen.

RT: Do you feel people are not hopeful that Obama will make a difference?

G.C.: People are hopeful, they are desperate and they are fearful. And they’ll hang on to anything. Let’s look at the facts. A man of change, who did he bring into Washington? You know they say by their deeds you shall know them. Let’s look at his Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, former Robert Rubin from the Clinton administration, the former president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank. Change? How about Larry Summers, the former Clinton Secretary of Treasury? I mean, I’ve been around a long time. I never remember a newly elected president bringing in basically the national security team from the last administration who happen to be from another party.

RT: Do you not think Obama’s different in any way?

G.C.: By their deeds you shall know them! If I bring in a baseball hitter that strikes out every time and I want him to play in the World Series is he going to hit the ball over the fence? They brought in Larry Summers, Timothy Geithner. Look at the crew. Look who they are. They’re strike out artists, every one of them. The only thing that they know how to do is not to get their finger nails dirty.

RT: There was a sentence in your report, the Trends Journal, that really caught my attention. You wrote: ‘On 9/11, those who listened to the authorities and returned to their offices went down with the towers.’ So are you saying that Americans should not be listening to the officials who are saying the Stimulus Plans are going to make everything better? Is that the analogy?

G.C.: Read my lips. No new taxes. I didn’t have sex with that woman, Monica Lewinski.
I smoked but I didn’t inhale. Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al-Qaeda. Why would anybody believe these people?

RT: So what are Americans supposed to do if they’re not supposed to trust their leaders?

G.C.: Personally, I buy gold. And I’ve been talking about gold since the Trends Journal 2001. We peg the bottom and we said it would start going up at 275. Number two, you don’t spend a dime you don’t need to spend.

RT: What would be the good jobs to benefit from in this year?

G.C.: Anything having to do with health. Anything. It’s going to be a growth industry. And fortunately a lot of them are going to pay a lot of money in that field because a lot of that is going to be care for the elderly. And the other thing really is anything having to do with conservation engineers, anything that’s going to prove technologically sound and smart to save money and to make money.

RT: What about geopolitics, what trends are we going to see in terms of the relationships between the United States and the rest of the world?

G.C.: Well the rest of the world is very hopeful, using the word ‘hope’, with the Obama administration. And again, we’re going to have to see what transpires, but so far, and again, by their deeds you shall know them.

Obama, when he first started to run, he was going to be out of Iraq. As soon as he became president he was going to start bringing soldiers home. Now they won’t be out for 16 months and now their reports say they’re going to bring upwards of 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan. He was also talking about preventive strikes in Pakistan. So it really doesn’t look like it’s going to be much of a smoothing of geopolitical relations.

The one factor we’re looking at, at a time that could only be the worst time for it to happen, is what’s going on in the Middle East, in the Israel-Gaza war. Israel, as they said, they were trying to do as the reports have come out, if they attack Iran at any level, it will begin World War Three. Because if this war spreads beyond Gaza, it’s going to inflame the Middle East. It can cause an oil crisis as we saw in 1973, that’s what ended the Arab-Israeli war when they embargoed oil going into the U.S. That’s our major concern. We’re also seeing, and we’re going to wonder, if Obama continues with putting the so-called missile defense shield in Poland and in Czech Republic in Eastern Europe and if they keep pushing more and more into Georgia. If that keeps happening we’re going to see a reignition of the Cold War.

RT: You have been trend casting since 1980, more than two decades. How do you compile your information and why do you believe you’ve been so spot-on most of the time?

G.C.: Current events form future trends. You can see what’s going on. A great scholar said, “In today already walks tomorrow.” So we say current events form future trends. But when people look at the trends, they colour them or shade them with their own ideology, their own beliefs. It’s what they want, what they hope for, what they wish for.

I’m a political atheist. I look at things for the way they are, not the way I want them to be. I don’t colour them or try to change them because of an ideology. The other major factor that we do differently at Trends Research Institute than anywhere else is we look at over 300 different categories on a global basis. So we’re looking at economics, we’re looking at politics, we’re looking at changes in the family, we’re looking at geopolitics. We’re making connections between different fields continually.

RT: How can America get out of the situation?

G.C.: All you have to do is to look back to the 1990s when America entered into a recession. We had 7.2 unemployment rate in 1993. What got the U.S. out of the 1990s recession was something called the ‘internet revolution’ that had a productive capacity. Products were invented, designed, manufactured, marketed and serviced. So you’re asking about new jobs, ask about alternative energies. Anything that’s going to advance the U.S. into the 21st century in an intelligent way. That’s where the job opportunities are going to be.

RT: Gerald Celente, founder of the Trends Research Institute, thank you very much for taking time to speak with us.

G.C.: My pleasure.

[I Am Right]

fall on face time.

[bluedogok]

I still feel that the loss of manufacturing jobs and later technology jobs with "off-shoring" is going to be the downfall of this country. Once a country starts getting rid of the roots of manufacturing (whether mechanical or technological) you erode the foundation of the country. Too many corporations and shareholders seem to view themselves as an autonomous entity, what they don't seem to realize is what they do affects others, it is the same "trickle down" effect on the trip down that it can be on the trip up. When you start swapping decent paying jobs out of your country those typically get replaced with lower paying jobs, as a consumption based economy this erodes the buying power for all of those widget that need to be sold to keep companies going. If EVERYONE sends those jobs out of the country,, then there aren't going to be enough people around to buy all of those widgets. I am nowhere near a socialist but when you have such a broad spread between the people running businesses and their workers you have a disconnect of major proportions and with the "professional CEO's" running things they are even more detached from reality than the "entrepreneurial CEO's" that used to run things.

[Octavian]

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/9195/b5a6bae70b614fda9c0a52fvm8.jpg

[JohnnyMack]

I still feel that the loss of manufacturing jobs and later technology jobs with "off-shoring" is going to be the downfall of this country. Once a country starts getting rid of the roots of manufacturing (whether mechanical or technological) you erode the foundation of the country. Too many corporations and shareholders seem to view themselves as an autonomous entity, what they don't seem to realize is what they do affects others, it is the same "trickle down" effect on the trip down that it can be on the trip up. When you start swapping decent paying jobs out of your country those typically get replaced with lower paying jobs, as a consumption based economy this erodes the buying power for all of those widget that need to be sold to keep companies going. If EVERYONE sends those jobs out of the country,, then there aren't going to be enough people around to buy all of those widgets. I am nowhere near a socialist but when you have such a broad spread between the people running businesses and their workers you have a disconnect of major proportions and with the "professional CEO's" running things they are even more detached from reality than the "entrepreneurial CEO's" that used to run things.

Well put. Also I would like to note for the record that that my friends is entirely the fault of one Barack Hussein Obama. Clearly.