2010 Election Results Are In 1530
The election results are in, and there are one trillion web pages now up helping you find out what happened. The short story is that the Republicans cleaned up, although the Democrats maintain a one-seat majority in the Senate. The GOP now has 239 seats in the house, giving them a huge lead over the Dems' 183.
The real winners (Score:5, Insightful)
Fear & Ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
According to many polls, the number one concern this election was the economy. Somehow in the minds of many, the economy is the fault of the Democrats, in spite of the fact that the 2008 candidates left the campaign trail to focus on the rapidly failing economy.
The Republicans couldn't have timed it better. Pillage the economy, let it fail just before the Democrats take office, and two years later when the Dems have halted and begun reversal of the worst economic disaster of all time, the Republicans come in, blaming the Democrats.
Somehow people buy that rhetoric. I guess angry shouting will beat out reasonable discourse nearly every time.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course it does - gridlock means that less laws get passed.
The primary purpose of laws is to either to expand the public sector or else to advantage one group in the private sector at the expense of another group so less laws is automatically better for the economy.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
pollsters got it right! Despite cell phones!!!! (Score:1, Insightful)
Politics sucks, but (Score:4, Insightful)
A divided congress is probably a good thing for people who don't like random horseshit one-sided laws.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
That's just it - they haven't done anything to reverse the disaster.
The voters collectively know that, despite any propaganda you get out of the media. If the economy was actually improving the voters would not have voted as they did.
Now the Republicans will not do anything different - they are just as beholden to the white collar gangsters in New York as the Democrats were.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Historically, the economy has always done well with a Republican congress and a Democrat president...
http://beforeitsnews.com/story/245/982/Divided_we_make_money:_Why_the_stock_market_wants_a_Republican_victory.html [beforeitsnews.com]
A more data-based representation:
http://cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm [cedarcomm.com]
I halfway agree. The economy just seems to do pretty well with a Republican congress, but to be fair, it was slightly better under Clinton with a Repub congress than Bush with a Repub congress. I say that because the current Democratic congress has been a disaster, regardless of which party controls the WH.
My prediction: Expect the economy to improve and Obama take the credit. I believe we are about to see a repeat of the Clinton WH after Newt became Speaker of the House. Recent history has shown that the president has little effect on the economy. It's all congress.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
The real test will be what Boehner does now...will he obstruct, or will he work?
This can be applied to Obama as well.
Gridlock FTW (Score:5, Insightful)
Something most people don't realize. (Score:2, Insightful)
I think many people are putting too much emphasis on the Republican takeover of the House. Yes it will mean that it will be difficult for Obama to get his agenda through for the next two years, but it's not like Republicans will be able to do much either. The democrats still have control of the Senate and veto power. However, since every House member goes up for election every two years, it could easily sweep back the other way then.
As much as people like to focus on national elections, it's the governor and state legislature elections that I think are the bigger deal. Republicans had very strong showings there as well. The reason this is critical is that we just had the once every ten years census. That means states are going to be up for redistricting. With the large gains republicans made, they'll have a huge advantage in gerrymandering. This could make a very significant difference in the 2012 election and for that matter every election for the next decade. It will be much harder to undo that than it will be for Democrats to recapture the House.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
My prediction: Expect the economy to improve and Obama take the credit. I believe we are about to see a repeat of the Clinton WH after Newt became Speaker of the House. Recent history has shown that the president has little effect on the economy. It's all congress.
Even if it's "all congress" -- the Democrats can still claim responsibility for upswing. They already do: more jobs added in the last two years than during Bush's entire reign, most banks repaid their bailouts with interest, GM on firmer financial footing than it has been in many years, etc. Even much of the health care reform bill is considered a good idea by both sides: elimination of rescission, improved coverage for children, etc. They have much to crow about, and if the Republicans play it badly in the next two years, expect the Dems to make a comeback in 2012.
Balance (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, finally we have some balance where people have to work together instead of claiming to work with the other guy and then doing what you wanted to anyway.
That goes for both Democrats and Republicans...
This is actually really a great benefit for Obama as he will now seem much more moderate merely from him not being able to get many things passed that he would like.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:1, Insightful)
a little better under clinton than bush? we're talking about W? clinton left with a balanced budget and more job creation than in the 40 previous years combined and W doubled the debt and left us with an almost great depression are you fucking joking "slightly"?
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:4, Insightful)
While Obama was a wide eye idealist on the campaign trail he actually tried to grapple with complex issues in a very sophisticated and relatively practical way. He didn't always do the right thing IMO, but he at least was on the right path and realized that empiricism ultimately trumps ideology and he paid dearly for it. The Tea Party found that selling platitudes about government without actually offering any sort of specifics was the best way to win. Why not offer specifics? Because the Republic leaders realize that the US is a country of McWatts.
For those of you who have never read the book "Catch-22":
a) why the hell not?
b) McWatt was a character whose philosophy on government spending came down to this, "All government spending that does not benefit me is bad"
c) why the hell haven't you read it yet?
If the Republicans/Tea partiers actually outlined a plan to actually reduce government spending in any meaningful way there would have been revolt because the two biggest pigs are entitlement programs which the largely elderly base just absolutely loves, and the military which Republicans just cannot get enough of. Instead if they offer any specifics at all they go after safe, but relatively low value targets like the dept. of Education or the National Endowment for the arts, who, combined, make up only about 1% or so of the current deficit.
d) why not?
People want fear, not facts (Score:4, Insightful)
What little of the campaigns and activity I saw, there was a lot of FUD and a lot of astro-turfing. For the masses, it's about hype and fear. Substance and reason are worthless. We truly live in an idiocracy. I blame the gradual deterioration of our minds on pop culture and TV advertisers... and advertisers in general.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
There's no recovery on the horizon. In fact, shortly after all these new members of Congress get seated the inflation from Ben Bernanke's recent dollar devaluation will work its way through the supply chain and start ravaging family budgets.
Re:first? (Score:4, Insightful)
At least you didn't say "the people have spoken" or "the American people made their voices heard" or some such bullshit. Many of last night's races were incredibly close, like Toomey/Sestak in Pennsylvania, where the Republican got 51% of the vote and the Democract got 49%. But to hear Boehner and others, votes like than are "the voice of the people" supporting Republicans. Hardly. It's just democracy in action: winner takes all, for a time.
Re:Not surprising (Score:3, Insightful)
FTFY
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the thing that pisses me off about Boehner...when he speaks in an "unofficial" capacity (i.e. not at a press conference), you can tell that the guy has a real solid head on his shoulders. I think he'll make a great Speaker, and I think he's a good person to have "leading" the Republicans.
The only problem is that any time he is talking in an "official" capacity, his entire vocabulary consists solely of talking points. I know this is part of his role, but still...he nearly literally speaks only in talking points when speaking to the press.
If he is true to his word and extends an olive branch to Obama, I think great things can happen. I'm just worried that he'll try to coat that branch in poison before trying to gift it.
Re:Did anyone notice.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
>Of course it does - gridlock means that less laws get passed.
Gridlock means that less *federal* laws get passed. It also means that the states have more power.
Also in this case, the House controls plenty of things related to spending that don't have to go through both chambers.
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:3, Insightful)
*Reform in name only. Does not contain any actual reform. Void where prohibited.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like the same old bullshit to me. Compromise to the Republicans is the Democrats doing what they tell them to do.
Re:Did anyone notice.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah I noticed that little oddity too.
Then it occurred to me that a foreign national news source is likely to contain less bias/spin than an american one, but I have yet to read the article and confirm that.
Still, as a Canadian it gave me a chuckle. :)
Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:5, Insightful)
Boehner ... is more than willing to work with President Obama ... on ... what he and the Republicans want
The Republicans, especially the Tea Party wing, want the United States government to spend less money. President Obama wants to end what some analysts have called an unwinnable war in Afghanistan. But are Speaker-elect Boehner and his Republicans willing to cut defense spending?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
The economy was fucked when the banksters initiated the largest embezzlement scam in human history in the form of the housing bubble. They just managed to cover up the theft until about 2006.
The reason that there has been no recovery is because the Democrats were not willing to bite the hand that feeds them by allowing the insolvent institutions to fail and allowing criminal prosecutions of those responsible.
The Republicans will continue this policy, so the economy will continue to suck.
OK Republicans, (Score:5, Insightful)
you've got two years to fix everything starting... now.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if it's "all congress" -- the Democrats can still claim responsibility for upswing. They already do: more jobs added in the last two years than during Bush's entire reign
Really? The unemployment rate in November of 2008 was 6.9%. Today, it's at 9.6%. So are you telling me that -2.7% is ADDING jobs? Were you a math major?
Oh, and like I've said... Bush had very little to do with the economy. Obama has little to do with the economy. It's congress. From 1995 to 2007, Republicans held the House. In that time, unemployment went from 5.6% to 4.6% with a low of 3.8% and a high of 6.3% (unemployment climbed form 9-11-2001 to June 2003 before dropping off again). The party that held the WH had little effect. It wasn't Bush's fault and it's not Obama's.
Numbers don't lie. Source:
http://www.miseryindex.us/urbymonth.asp [miseryindex.us]
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:3, Insightful)
Not much of a reform if costs just keep going up as much as they always have, is it?
Especially when the opposite was promised repeatedly.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't turn the economy around in 2 years.
Changing the economy involves creating new companies, and re-employing massive amounts of people in new sectors.
If you expect your government to do a magic trick which will make it all better, then I suggest drugs or alcohol. In the real world, however, we stopped measuring the economy just by the stock market which can make or break the economy in the course of a single day. We slowly start looking at the real economy. And fact is, that the American real economy mostly takes place in China nowadays.
Blame Obama for it all you like... it will take more than 2 years to fix this.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
While not giving the left everything they were after, he rapidly increased federal spending with little transparent oversight, pushed the federal government to buy stock in private entities, enacted "Obamacare" in a nearly completely partisan vote with little to no real input from the right, and has not compromised on any bill placed in front of him to sign.
From the perspective of a conservative, his is THE most left-leaning and partisan Presidency to date. GWB had a record of reaching across the aisle even with a majority (NCLB is the big one there, written by Ted Kennedy).
Re:Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:5, Insightful)
Woah, woah, woah. Boehner, and the Republicans in general, want to cut taxes. When have they ever cared about cutting spending? What's that even got to do with it?
Re:Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:2, Insightful)
No. They want to make more people in our local economies unemployed They want defense spending higher because it helps them and their friends the most. And let's not forget that it is largely a needless support of Israel that massive amounts of money is being wasted on. There are certain things they just won't talk about of course.
We do need our defense spending -- not saying we don't. We need to gear up for the [hopefully] cold war with China and conserve our resources so that we are not so spread out. This crap in the middle east needs to end. There has been nothing good come from making enemies of those people.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine you run a business and the shit hits the fan; revenue is down 50%, your customers aren't buying because they don't have any money, and you can't afford to pay the bills, let alone the payroll. What are you going to do if you want to keep your business running? Fire a lot of staff? Negotiate a short term loan with the bank? Negotiate a payment plan with the people you owe money to?
Now imagine it's 3 years later and revenues are back up, not to what they were before but they're getting close and trending upward. So now what are you going to do? You'll hire some staff back, doubtless, but during the past three years you've been forced to find ways to make your business works with less staff so it won't be as many as you needed before the bad years. Not to mention you're still paying off all those high interest debts and payment plans, even with revenue up you can't afford to take the risk of hiring someone you don't 100% need.
This is pretty much exactly the position my wife's work found themselves in; revenues are up, workload is up but what should be discretionary cash is going toward paying off their old debts. Meanwhile they can't hire those two new staff persons (increasing from 4) they really need to support that revenue because the money isn't there. It'll be a at least 6 months, maybe a year before the debt is paid down and they can start hiring again, despite that fact that they have more customers than ever.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah. I can always understand people hating Democrats and trying to vote them out of office. But to do it by voting Republican?! The solution to large and intrusive government is larger and more intensely intrusive government?! The solution to debt is higher debt? The solution to us losing our freedoms, is to eliminate more freedom?
Tea Party guys, I really am halfway with you. I like the beginnings of a lot of your speeches. But somehow it always goes psycho. I'll believe you guys are sincere when you tell the Republicans to fuck off. Until then, you're the enemy that you're preaching against.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
You could at least try to be reasonable.
There was a LOT of seeking input, and a good bit of compromise offered, but the only input that was ever given was either "No", or "Lets make it even better for insurance companies wishing to cherry pick their clients".
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
That's absolute bullshit. They could have closed the bankrupt TBTF institutions and prosecuted every single responsible individual under RICO, releasing non-violent pot heads to make room in the prisons for all the white collar thugs.
Instead the rest of the economy is being bled dry to prop them up and cover for their theft.
Re:Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:5, Insightful)
"But are Speaker-elect Boehner and his Republicans willing to cut defense spending?"
Not as long as their are military-industrial jobs programs in their districts. Which is why the Democrats aren't willing to do it either.
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe you missed the memo - the majority of the country opposes the healthcare reform that got passed. Many of them are the people who just did they annual enrollment and discovered how much more their premiums went up because of it.
You should re-read the memo a bit more closely.
1) When looking at individual parts of HCR, most people approved of them.
2) Many who oppose the current version of HCR wanted single payer. Do I oppose it? Yes, but not because it went too far.
My premiums went up, but actually at a smaller rate than previously.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
they haven't done anything to reverse the disaster... If the economy was actually improving the voters would not have voted as they did.
U.S. GDP growth 2006-current [tradingeconomics.com]. Obama assumed office in January 2009. At the time growth was around -7%. Since then it rose to 5% and dropping back to 2%. Whether you believe Obama may or may not be wholly or partly responsible for this is debatable, but the turnaround in the figures after his election in early 2009 is clear.
If the economy was actually improving the voters would not have voted as they did.
Voters never vote against the incumbent party when the economy is growing?
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:4, Insightful)
What the Dems did accomplish was to prevent a panic, which may be the best anybody can really expect of government in this kind of crisis. Republicans probably would have focused on lowering taxes, so big business could take that money and use it for overseas jobs.
Maybe we all need to consider that American politicians just are not able to fix this problem.
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:5, Insightful)
They like each part of it. But for some reason when you group them together and call it Obamacare, talk about death panels, scream "socialism" every chance you get, and mention big govt waste over and over and over, people didn't end up liking it.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:2, Insightful)
Are you kidding me?
TARP - clearly helped the economy, and before you parrot the tea party lies, we have gotten almost all the money back, with interest. Bush signed it, Obama extended it. Much to my surprise, TARP turned out to be a good thing. Yet everyone 'blames' TARP on Obama ignoring who initiated, who extended it, and that we will get our money back, plus interest.
The economy IS actual improving, by all factual ways of measuring it. It's not margin, it takes time. That said, it's been on of the fastest recoveries for a economic downturn of this size.
All this in spite of the republicans spending 2 years as obstructionists. A bunch of pouty brats.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
mod parent up!
almost any law these days is an unnecessary law! bought and paid for by special interests.
modern (recent) laws have done nothign to 'help people live better or safer'. they are ENTIRELY 100% bought and paid for by PACs.
so yes, I'd agree! stalemate is good. it stops the bastards from lining their pockets with even more stupid corporate-backed laws.
(OT: anyone else think the idea of 'keep passing more and more laws' is not scalable? shouldn't we CONDENSE laws and make things more general and not more and more specific? ever look at a lawyers bookshelf? how on earth can anyone think this is manageable! its not. we need to repeal laws and 'age them out' instead of just adding TO the pile of shit we call laws. I propose a 'reference count' and if a law has not earned its keep (after review) it should be gone!)
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:1, Insightful)
If you are going to link to a graph, you might actually want to look at it in detail first. Notice how almost every year it starts low in January, jumps up in the summer, and then in January it drops back to roughly the same spot it was the previous January? Notice how in 2009 that didn't happen? The summer gain was very, very small, and then the winter drop is way lower than the previous january? Now for 2010 we see that the summer gain was much bigger, pretty much on par what it has been almost every other year (other than 2001 and 2009). So that's a positive indication right there that at least things have stabilized. Yes, employment is dropping, but that's the normal cyclical adjustment. We won't be able to tell for a few more months (probably closer to 6 month) whether things overall are better, worse, or about the same.
Re:Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:5, Insightful)
But will the working class get a break? Nope. As the Fed cuts various programs, states will be forced to raise taxes and guess who will pay them.
Re:HUGE mandate! (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, turns out people liked it and voted more of them in.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
According to many polls, the number one concern this election was the economy. Somehow in the minds of many, the economy is the fault of the Democrats
What disheartens me is the number of people who seem to think that the largest economy in the world should handle like a sports car and not like a super-tanker. According to what you hear from countless economists, we narrowly avoided another great depression, and the last one took a decade to recover from. And now we've got voter revolt happening over: 1) shock over the price tag of the stimulus (ie, Dems are spending too much trying to revive the economy) and 2) the slow recovery (ie, the Dems aren't doing enough to try to revive the economy). Well, which is it?
During the 2008 campaign, I was actually a little worried that Obama wasn't making clear that it was going to take years to recover from this mess. It seems that every economist I was reading at the time was saying it. Granted, Obama wasn't saying that we'd recover quickly, but he also wasn't doing anything to disabuse the public of this notion that the recovery was going to be speedy. It struck me, at the time, that he could be setting himself up for this very kind of thing that we saw on Tuesday. Alas... perhaps his analysts, during the campaign, concluded that to utter things like "multi-year recovery" would lose him the election. It probably would have, but he should have, at least, started getting that message out very early on after his win.
As someone who stands to make out like a bandit from 0% tax on an inheritance (that I did nothing to earn) and on capital gains (that I make even while I'm sleeping or golfing), I'm getting pretty tired of voting against my personal financial self-interest for the benefit of other, less-fortunate folk who can't be persuaded to vote for their own interest.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Most of the "seeking input" was done my Obama, true, but there was NEVER any done from the Dems in the Senate or House - remember all the "closed door" sessions after a particular promise from Pelosi to have everything on CSPAN and out in the open?
Didn't happen. There were a few bones thrown our way, but there was NO HSA expansion (actually contracted); VERY little in the way of high-deductible plans; NO ability to cross state lines to get a different health care service (which, admittedly, could be done at the state level). It was also comprehensive and ridiculously long, rather than dealing with one issue at a time.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:2, Insightful)
FALSE. the Tea parties scream about it and lie about it. But the MAJORITY of Americans want health care. Stop Fucking Lying.
Jeez, the health care premiums for some people went up as much as they where going to go up anyways. Shocking. You twit.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
The primary purpose of laws is to either to expand the public sector or else to advantage one group in the private sector at the expense of another group so less laws is automatically better for the economy.
Really? The laws that enforce the terms of contracts are automatically bad for the economy? The ones that establish the fed's ability to monitor the monetary supply in an attempt to mitigate fluctuations in valuation are automatically bad for the economy? The ones which establish fire departments, roadways, and the international negotiations which provide protections for domestic businesses doing business with international companies are bad for the economy?
You know what you have without laws? Anarchy. By Definition you have anarchy. Anarchy is a terrible state within which to attempt to conduct business.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
You realize that the health care that was enacted was totally different than what was originally on the tables BECAUSE it was a bipartisan attempt from Obama to reach across the aisle, right? People were 70% for it until it got demolished to basically something entirely different. Then everyone was 70% against it.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
enacted "Obamacare" in a nearly completely partisan vote with little to no real input from the right
That's not quite the way it happened.
"We considered 287 amendments. 161 of those...accepted were Republican amendments. You can vote against the bill if you want, but don't suggest to me that this process denied people a chance to be heard, to be involved, and to be engaged. " - Chris Dodd
The fact that Republicans got 161 amendments added to the health care bill and they still didn't vote for it doesn't indicate to me that they're interested in engaging with Democrats in any meaningful way.
Oh, I thought you said science (Score:2, Insightful)
Turns out they are just worried about climate change legislation, which by now as we all know has nothing to do with science and instead with lining the pockets of companies that build alternative energy equipment.
Re:Take over at state level is more important (Score:5, Insightful)
I think your comment is the accepted convention wisdom, which will get play in every office and news outlet in America, but its pretty wrong.
First off, the appeal to the wisdom of crowds is faulty. If this was just a warning to Democrats then why was someone like Russ Feingold, a well-loved non-partisan who has been fighting the good fight for Wisconsin for a long time, ousted by a high-school drop-out who married into money and had no platform other than "Lets fix things with Tea Party principles." No plan to cut entitlement programs, no plan to cut military, and really no concrete plan at all. He's the epitome of the empty suit millionaire who will vote in anything to help his other millionaire friends.
The message you won't be hearing is about the Citizens United ruling which led to unrestrained campaign spending this year. The Dems were outspent 7 to 1. That's right, 7 to 1. This election was shamelessly bought. Oh, and Feingold was a big supporter of campaign finance reform which the CU ruling nullified and suddenly he's gone. Seems to me that he's gone because Wall Street wanted him gone. The negative ads that ran in Wisconsin were of a scale never seen before by groups like "Moms for American Business" and other groups that never have to reveal who they are or where their money comes from. Funny that.
Yes, jobs and economies are important, but Americans also know that when Obama took office the jobs we were losing were around 800k a month. Now we are gaining at least 60k in jobs a month. Americans know that Bush and his cronies brought us to this level, but they voted in R and Tea Party regardless - because they get their views and opinions from TV commercials and media outlets legitimizing the Tea Party. Suddenly they were told that economy isn't good for them, and death panels are coming, and Obama isn't a citizen, and Reid/Pelosi are liberals and fat cat Wall Street gangsters who want to give your home to a random Mexican family, etc.
In short, this was the first election with unrestricted spending in a long time - the results - corporatists with no concrete positions who are selling out their constituents as we speak. Turns out campaign finance reforms are important. The conservative majority in SCOTUS gave the GOP this election with its CU ruling. Any other analysis really takes backseat to how the CU ruling sold out this election.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
You are trying to reason with a rabid Tea Party member... It's like reasoning with a 3 year old, be careful he does not try to stomp on your head.
MY wife explained all this to me from her economics classes.
The president does not do SHIT for the economy.
Congress cant do SHIT for the economy.
What "fixes" the economy is the people. if you tied up every single politician and held them captive in a prison for 5 years the economic recovery would be just fine.
What congress can do, make laws that put CEO's and board members of banks and businesses that pull the crap that caused an economic collapse. but we keep voting in idiots that are either rich guys that dont like putting rich guys in jail, or they are friends of these scumbags that cause the problems.
Want to fix the economy.. make sure that the government can not get anything done. split senate, repub house, dem president.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
You wholly fail to address GP's point. Really huge job loss is much worse than job growth, even if job growth can't (yet) keep up with job demand.
This is just as true whether you look at ratio of new jobs to employment demand (as you suggest) as it is if you just look at raw numbers (as GP does).
Failure to completely recover in 2 years from the Republicans screwing the hell out of the economy doesn't mean they were doing nothing to help the economy. If they hadn't worked so hard, the 9.2% unemployment rate we have now would look more like 20%.
In July of 2008, the US national unemployment rate was 6%. By January, it had reached 8.5% (a 41% increase). The job loss momentum was incredible - 0.42% increase per month. The next 6 months, the Democrats had managed to slow this to less than half that rate of change - 0.2% increase per month.
The following 1.5 years has been relatively stable. It's not where we want to be, but on the whole, the rate of unemployment has managed to stay relatively stable. Economies don't turn on a dime. Even if they could, very rapid change in any direction is extremely unhealthy in the long run. It takes time to slow then stop job loss, then start job gains.
I'd much rather have a party in charge who keeps a level unemployment rate than one which has a dramatically increasing unemployment rate. Somehow though, "You didn't clean up after us quickly enough" is a reason to vote back in the people who made a mess in the first place. Surely THIS time around they won't make a mess!
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
enacted "Obamacare" in a nearly completely partisan vote with little to no real input from the right
You are aware, of course, that "the right" was invited to many meetings. They didn't show up and then told the press "the left" was unwilling to compromise. If the Republicans weren't willing to even enter the room, they were the ones who left themselves out of the conversation.
and has not compromised on any bill placed in front of him to sign
I guess you haven't read any bills. The health care bill, for example, was a huge compromise. Without the compromised it wouldn't have passed at all.
From the perspective of a conservative, his is THE most left-leaning and partisan Presidency to date.
Only a misinformed conservative. There are Republican presidents in recent history who were more "left-leaning". Obama didn't pass anything as big or as influential to our society as Social Security, Medicare, or the interstate highway system.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately, I fear whatever data we've collected since the early 90's pretty much needs to be thrown out.
The mid 90's saw an explosive growth in technologies that fundamentally changed the human condition and drove the economy to dizzying heights. By 2000, the associated huge stock bubble burst. But everyone had a taste of prosperity, and looked to the dream of Home ownership, like Japan in the late 80's. A second prosperity bubble formed around real estate in the 2000's, which burst in 2008 or so.
Al Gore aside, none of these things had anything to do with which party was in power. I'm not saying that who controls what is irrelevant, just that most of the data collected since Bush #1 probably needs to be thrown out as being unfairly prejudicial. And since the parties today are very different than the parties from the 70's and 80's, the relevance of "Dems are better for the economy!" or "Republicans are better for the economy!" when looking at this one point of data seems like a form of rooting for Baseball teams.
Re:Cut spending on Vietghanistan (Score:5, Insightful)
The working class works, that's what they're there for, someone needs to produce something of value for the rich, err sorry, the "middle class" to exploit.
The rich get richer and the poor get children. It's not just a line from a book but a way of life that must be maintained (whether the poor like it or not).
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
From the perspective of a conservative, his is THE most left-leaning and partisan Presidency to date. GWB had a record of reaching across the aisle even with a majority (NCLB is the big one there, written by Ted Kennedy).
NCLB's first generation is arriving in college and they're shockingly unprepared. Never in recent history have entering college students been so inept at writing papers and discussing ideas. They still seem skilled at filling in bubbles, at least. The kids from wealthier or better schools haven't suffered much because their programs exceed the minimum requirements and still cover all the same material. The rural and urban kids, however, are being taught in such a way to ensure funding that's contingent on standardized tests. When a college student has never heard of a bibliography or encountered the idea of writing a paper based on research, I die a little inside. Then I stop whining and try to fill in the gaps.
NCLB was indeed a broad bipartisan effort and it should be a reminder that when the idiots on the left and the idiots on the right agree on something, it might just be due to its overwhelming idiocy.
ObamaCare (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
As a day trader you know shit about the real economy. The economy will be improving when people start making money doing real work, instead of just shuffling money around.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
The federal government is borrowing and spending 12% of GDP and all they can manage to do is barely keep things stable? Do you realize how insane this is?
Despite this massive amount of deficit spending the economic fundamentals are deteriorating.
What could possibly go wrong?
Re:HUGE mandate! (Score:3, Insightful)
Which is what got them elected... (amusingly enough, because the people thought congress wasn't doing anything to fix the economy)
Re:The real losers (Score:1, Insightful)
Of course the real losers in all of this are us: the idiots who keep voting for Democrats and Republicans while believing the platitudes pounded into our heads
No kidding. Reading the posts in this topic is like reading people talking about sports teams or something. The emotional baggage outweighs by ten orders of magnitude the substance of the discussion.
Actually there isn't any substance that I can discern. Besides the meta-observations and commentary, it strongly seems to me that nobody knows what they're talking about at all about anything under discussion here.
What's that phrase... "A bunch of idiots talking about a bunch of liars."
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Out of curiousity, why couldn't they agree with a bill that was mostly built on Republican ideas in the first place?
e.g., "Obamacare" looks an [i]awful[/i] lot like "Romneycare". Or, one might examine ideas John McCain had previously put forth on healthcare. Or, one might examine the ideas the Republicans put forth on healthcare during the Clinton administration. Etc.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
A more data-based representation: http://cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm [cedarcomm.com]
What worries me about a lot of the graphs on that page is that they either use numbers which aren't even adjusted for inflation, or they adjust for inflation but don't compare them to GDP. He gets it right in a few places, but most of the graphs aren't useable. Looking at the un-adjusted debt principals, yes, the numbers will tend to climb.
What I'm much more concerned about is debt as it relates to GDP. After all, if you owe $10 in debt, that's a serious problem if you only make $1 per year, but it's inconsequential if you make $1,000 per year.
So, look at debt-as-a-percentage-of-GDP here: (http://zfacts.com/p/1195.html [zfacts.com]). You'll see that:
I do agree with the webpage about trickle-down not working and that, for a steady economy, we need to get back to the higher taxes on the rich, like the 70%-90% on the highest tax brackets which were helping us pay down the WW-II debt consistently over 35 years until Reagan took office.
Re:Gridlock FTW (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, go ahead and moderate this post as funny, but... he's right.
The best years that this country had recently was when Clinton was in the whitehouse, Gingrich was controlling the House, and they failed to come to a budget agreement [wikipedia.org]. We actually managed to reduce the federal deficit for a short while!
As a pro-life, christian libertarian, I too voted for stalemate & gridlock!
Re:Some things that I can get behind that may happ (Score:1, Insightful)
2. So Obama won't get the rest of his appointments that the Republicans have been blocking. Nice.
3. Which add $2 Trillion dollars to the deficit and not create one single job! Don't take my word for it, Alan Green Span and Reagan's budget director and 10 years of Bush's tax cuts have all demonstrated that tax cuts DO NOT CREATE JOBS.
FYI Regan taxed ALL income the same.
4. George W Bush pushed Fannie and Freddie to take on more risky mortgages. Republicans pushed for more lose regulations on lending.
5. Conservatives have ideas? Wasn't their healthcare paper they presented to the press, empty....lacked any specifics.
6. The insurance mandate in the HEALTH CARE REFORM ACT was put there by the HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY. The HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY complained to Obama that they could not insure sick people, it would cost them too much money, so they needed to have healthy people be forced to buy health insurance to offset their cost of insuring sick people.
You want to rail against the insurance mandate, complain to the HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Not really. The mandate was never on the table, and that was pretty much a deal killer for ANY conservative. Most of the "seeking input" was done my Obama, true, but there was NEVER any done from the Dems in the Senate or House - remember all the "closed door" sessions after a particular promise from Pelosi to have everything on CSPAN and out in the open? Didn't happen. There were a few bones thrown our way, but there was NO HSA expansion (actually contracted); VERY little in the way of high-deductible plans; NO ability to cross state lines to get a different health care service (which, admittedly, could be done at the state level). It was also comprehensive and ridiculously long, rather than dealing with one issue at a time.
And all we've heard from Republicans in recent weeks is how they're not going to compromise on their principles, yet Democrats are demonized for trying to stick to theirs. Nice.
Republican health care ideas might have lead to some savings in some areas, but they aren't going to fix the real problems.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
So the solution is to vote in the people who created the mess in the first place?
What could possibly go wrong?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Voting "no" when you know the deal is going to pass is purely for appearances for the folks back home. That mandate will bring in more money than a Saudi arms deal. I doubt a single politician was actually against this massive windfall.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Does anyone remember history more than 3 months back anymore? The collapse started in 2007 and really blew up in 2008.
Re:Some things that I can get behind that may happ (Score:4, Insightful)
You have a multi-trillion dollar deficit. You have huge unemployment numbers, especially among the lower-middle class. You have a falling median wage. In short, you have no revenue. And yet the Tea Party and, by extension, the Republicans don't want to cut the three big programs (Social Security, Defense, Medicare) because that's what the old folks consider sacred.
You are going to have to raise taxes, especially on the "rich". Cutting anything else is peanuts, so unless you're planning to back-stab the old white folks that voted in this congress you are going to have to raise taxes.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually so far, TARP has profited 8.2 percent [bloomberg.com] netting taxpayers $25.2 billion.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:1, Insightful)
You seriously think this whole house of cards the existed in the financial industry causing the current economic problems only started construction in January 2008 and collapsed a mere 9 months later? Sorry, but it took a decade of negligence from all parties involved.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Inflation due to rising incomes and margins is entirely different than inflation due to currency devaluation.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
Republican "opposition" to the bill was as phony as a three dollar bill. Everybody in both houses was already counting the money months before it passed.
Re:Obama should just call for elections (Score:2, Insightful)
I am all for helping others and what not but I just can not grasp this whole health care as a right position.
Forcing another to perform labor and / or commit resources is a direct violation of your actual rights.
You're right, let's lower taxes and start wars! (Score:2, Insightful)
That'll fix that deficit spending, just like the last time the GOP ran the government.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
GDP numbers can be manipulated.
Do you have any evidence that the United States Bureau of Economic Analysis is producing fraudulent GDP figures?
People know with certainty if they have a job or not and how much it pays.
Yes, but what they don't know is why they can't find a job. If the economy declines and jobs are lost, then so is consumer and market confidence. In that environment, employers may be less likely to invest in new staff, even though they are seeing business pick up. The growth needs to be sustained for some time before business leaders will feel confident enough to begin taking on new employees.
Something like 86% of voters listed the economy as their first concern.
This means nothing - the economy is always the main concern of voters except in extreme situations (e.g. war). Remember the Democrats call of "It's the economy, stupid" [wikipedia.org]
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
How? What mechanism will make incomes go up? A larger percentage of the population is out of work than at any time in the last 20 years. Companies have no margin with which to raise wages and commodity inflation is going to make this worse, not better. Average income except for Wall Street hasn't risen for the last 10 years, so how is inflation helped you?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Enough with the subtle "it was because of poor people" arguments. The housing bubble was largely caused by *upper* class borrowers treating skyrocketing housing prices like another stock market. The Wall Street shysters knew what they were setting up. I'd say Alan Greenspan was one of them. You'll notice that interest rates drop sharply in the naughts, and rise at almost the same rate. I saw a graph (too lazy to find it) in I think the Washington Post where the rates over time looked like a shallow 'V'. Get people hooked on those volatile loans, then set up the collapse for your buddies.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
We don't need government divided for it to get nothing done. Just look at the past two years.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
They did shit
All while insurance premiums continually increased, leading to either a) higher employee premiums, eating up any salary improvements, or b) more employers deciding not to provide health insurance. Any way you look at it, that's bad for the Public and bad for Business .
The Republicans were more interested in tax cuts for special interests and wasting time & money trying to impeach Billy boy for getting his wangdoodle slobbered on by an intern. They even prevented medicare/medicaid from acting as a group to negotiate drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies. (That's just not rational).
That's what the Republican priorities were.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
The health care mandate does not "bring in" money. It is simply a forced redistribution from the people to the insurance companies.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
It's all a depressing look at the short-sightedness of America's current culture. We've got a huge set of financial problems that have resulted from a decade of bad decisions compounding and turning into a huge global mess, and then we pitch a fit when a couple hundred people can't turn it all around in a year and a half.
And then to show our displeasure, we give power back to the same bunch of idiots that caused many of the problems in the first place, even though they have offered no real plan to fix things any better than these other guys managed to.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean the bailout of the auto-industry which was actually under George Bush? Yeah, a lot of conservatives automatically assume that was Obama.
enacted "Obamacare" in a nearly completely partisan vote with little to no real input from the right
What nonsense. The Republicans wanted to drag their feet over everything, and then complain that Obama wouldn't compromise so that they could simultaneously stopping anything from happening and blame the president. Remember the "public option"? Oh right, Obama compromised on that, but FOX News has somehow painted the picture in all the sheeple's minds that Obama wouldn't compromise.
and has not compromised on any bill placed in front of him to sign.
WTF are you talking about? Get your news from a real news outlet rather than the mouthpiece of the Republican propaganda machine.
From the perspective of a conservative, his is THE most left-leaning and partisan Presidency to date.
*EVERY* Democratic President is automatically labeled the "most left-leaning and partisan president" by the right. Just pay attention to the attack ads during every presidential election and you'll realize that this is the perpetual refrain of the Right.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
How can a condition be "pre-existing" if everyone has to have healthcare. Pre-existing what? Or are you just trying to say you want the Health Insurers to be able to drop people when they get sick? Good idea. If the insurance companies never have to pay for any healthcare, then premiums will be very low and the companies will still make an enormous profit!!!
Everyone wins, right?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
How, exactly, could the right torpedo the plan when the Democrats had a huge majority in the house and a super majority in the Senate? Sorry, but I was paying attention too, and the democrats own that mess lock, stock and barrel.
I want the health care system improved in this country as well, but being forced to buy over-priced insurance or have the IRS fine me $2000 is not what I or most people had in mind.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
So why did they take those Republican amendments? This is why voter turn out from young progressives was so poor. They realized they couldn't count on Obama to fight for anything.
Obama should have brought the public option to the table, pushed it through, and lost. THEN started to make compromises.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not that relevant if your are in the upper middle class or above but for the families that are barely scraping by increasing food and energy prices will absolutely crush them, just like it did last time.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
And, like it or not, Americans are center-right, and don't tend to like many pushes left.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Please, don't try to give Clinton so much credit. Other than being there when the computer/internet thing really took off, he did very little. In fact he tried to impede it with the clipper chip and DMCA and export restrictions. And most of that "growth" you saw was only on Wall Street paper. The only growth Main Street saw was in consumer debt.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
So
That mandate will bring in more money than a Saudi arms deal. I doubt a single politician was actually against this massive windfall.
Have you been that brainwashed, or are you just trolling? The bill is not a windfall. It adds enormously to the deficit, piling on ever more debt. The bill costs wildly more money than it takes from tax payers, even after it snuck in things like new sales taxes on your house, new IRS involvement in small business transactions, etc. That you would characterize the thing as a windfall indicates your complete mis-apprehension of the reality of what the last congress, with Obama, did when they forced that nonsense through.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
No. People were "for" it for as long it remained a nebulous "reform" that promised impossible things. This is why Pelosi characterized it as something that had to be passed first, so that people could find out what was in it, after the fact. She knew that being clear about the bill's contents up front would just hurry along the pace at which it lost support. As soon as people started to see where it was headed, support for it dropped through the floor. All the more so when people saw what the left was willing to do to ram it through, against the wishes of the majority
Re:Gridlock FTW (Score:2, Insightful)
As a pro-Idon'tgiveafuckwhatyoudoorbelivein, I voted entirely against the two-party system remembering that Einstein said "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results".
Now that the show is over, they will all go to their lavish back rooms, have drinks and laugh at what fools we are for buying their bullshit. On us...
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean the 2008-2009 where the Dems controlled Congress? That one? I'll be glad to blame the ones in charge at the time.
Funny. Now maybe you can explain precisely what the Democrats managed to pass in those two years that caused a complete economic meltdown. Somehow I don't think you're going to find a real answer for that, because that's not what actually happened.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
I honestly can't help but think destroying the health care insurance industry was a feature not a bug. It's the perfect excuse to come in and "rescue" us with a fully government-financed health care system.
It's the only explanation that makes sense, because despite constant assertions to the contrary (including from me), members of Congress are not _that_ stupid.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Insurance only works when the costs of the ill are distributed among the well, if you have only sick people buying it then it gets very expensive very fast because the cost is slightly more than the average cost of treatment for policyholders.
So then, wouldn't make sense to force all those healthy people who refuse to get insurance until they're very sick to buy it? Those are the vast majority of people entering the insurance pool...working-class people like waiters and cashiers who are young, healthy, but either don't make enough to buy insurance or choose not to.
It seems to me this whole thing was a plan to drive health care costs up even more so that the government would be in a better position to promote a single payer system.
Please. The reform is forcing healthy people to buy insurance, which will increase the pool of healthy clients, driving the overall costs down for insurance companies. Americans already pay the most for health insurance and get the least back out of any first world country, and this bill won't change that much. But it's tough to argue it's going to be a net loss for the insurance companies.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it's the other way 'round. No one would bother to get health insurance until they got sick. Look what happened in Massachusetts. It was cheaper to pay the fine than pay for insurance. That's some real genius thinking there.
The whole "pre-existing condition" mandate only makes sense when you are already covered. They lamely patched that hole by going completely off the reservation and forcing citizens to purchase health care coverage which is so unconstitutional it makes my kidneys hurt. At least if you don't interpret the "welfare" clause and the "interstate commerce" clause to mean "Congress has the power to do any damn thing it wants", which is the current interpretation.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Buying insurance over state lines, incidentally, would be 100% guaranteed to increase the size of the federal government significantly if implemented. I'm just saying.
Not really... going from "thou shall not" to "thou may" has pretty much the same amount of regulatory burden. Where it gets heavy is "thou may IF AND BUT..." There's no reason to assume that merely allowing people to buy across state lines would have to mean that the government would say that only these groups of people may do it and only if they buy these types of policies.
Instead, what we got, was a deeper lock-in to the existing problems. Now, we not only have to continue to buy insurance only from our in-state approved providers and whatever mandates the state say they have to cover, but we're FORCED to buy insurance policies we don't want or else we suffer a monetary penalty on top of it.
Over the last few years, I've opted for no insurance and saved about $30,000 while spending only $115 on medical bills. I really want to buy catastrophic only coverage, but my state won't let me, demanding I either buy a cadillac plan that I don't need or become a ward of the state. In fact, that's why they don't want me to be able to buy from another state, because it forces me to either spend $10k+ a year or become dependent upon the state. Just as mega-corps love lock-in, so do bureaucrats and they can abuse you just as easily, if not moreso.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Some things that I can get behind that may happ (Score:3, Insightful)
2. It's NOT about appointments, it's about the regular staffing-type jobs that have been going on as of late. Public employees make a significantly higher amount than private. Let them retire/quit and don't replace them.
3. How did the massive expansion of business in the 1980s happen then? How did companies afford to hire more employees and bring us from 10%+ unemployment on down? Look at the marginal tax rates during the era - 70%+ cut down into the 30s. More private industry kept more of their own money, and we had more millionaires created at that time than ever before - and inflation was LOW. Tax cuts were a HUGE part of that, and the tax rate has stayed at about the same level since.
4. GWB was wrong to do so, but to his and the Republican's credit, there was a push for reform of Fannie and Freddie at the time. Those two agencies are bleeding cash at astronomical levels, and have no business in what they're doing.
6. I'll go with you there - far too corporatist a bill. Doesn't mean that the mandate is Constitutional - or even right. Of course, seeing as there really wasn't a free market for health insurance either before or after...
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
Note, for the record, that if the Military Budget were reduced to ZERO tomorrow, the Deficit would still be nearly $1 trillion per year.
Fact is, we're barely taking in enough in taxes to pay Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, and interest on the debt.
With current tax revenues, we'd have to shut down basically the ENTIRE Federal Government (other than Congress, the President, and the Offices that manage SS/Medicare/Medicaid in order to balance the budget.
Note that in order to increase tax revenues to erase the deficit, we'd have to increase ALL tax rates by about 60%. Yes, your taxes, mine, everyone's. Not just the "rich".
Note also that if we raised taxes to 100% on the "rich", we'd not have enough to zero the deficit.
Face it, we've been living beyond our means for almost 60 years (the last time the National Debt decreased was in 1951, when my father was still a boy).
And there are NO simple solutions. Cut the Military budget? Sure. Cut ALL Federal spending but SS/Medicare/Medicaid? Sure. Raise ALL taxes? Sure. Collectively, that might erase our deficit (without letting us actually reduce our debt).
Alas, our economy couldn't handle the tax increases required, and the country wouldn't tolerate the spending cuts.
Your turn - how would YOU fix the problem?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
NCLB was indeed a broad bipartisan effort and it should be a reminder that when the idiots on the left and the idiots on the right agree on something, it might just be due to its overwhelming idiocy.
Or that the only way to compromise is that make sure the legislation doesn't actually do anything.
Without casting aspersions (even if deserved) and without speaking from my own point of view, the real problem is not so much that the parties are putting politics ahead of policy (they do), or that they will do anything to sabotage each other including sabotage the bills they write (they do), but that so many of the principles of the left and right are incompatible with each other.
You can't compromise on mutually exclusive ideas and too many of the principles guiding the right and the left have become mutually exclusive.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
So wait, you are saying you want federal rights to supersede state rights? That's very democrat of you, I thought republicans were for smaller government.
HSA and High Deductible plans do not help anyone.
What about public health care, you guys thoroughly kicked that out of congress, it was a strong contender.
Increased budget, all he's really passed that would increase budget is the SECOND set of bailouts (after your great and powerful leader GWB passed the first), and Obamacare which the one passed is kinda shit on a stick because he was trying to appease your caucus. If you ask me he should have reigned control over the democrats and forced a vote through with a real bill instead of trying all of this bi-partisanship crap. Shit would have actually happened in the last two years.
Almost everything he has tried to do has been fought tooth and nail by the republicans even when they said "We will support this". This whole election has been like nails on chalk to me, the republicans blaming Obama for the fact that it's raining outside even though they said that raining would be good for the economy. I'm so sick of this, how can you really fall for it? I would also like to point out, because of GWB's action and continued action by Obama (supported by the republicans, remember STIMULUS fucking championed by the republican party till it didn't do so hot, then it was all democrats) that our unemployment numbers have leveled out and employment is on the rise. I'm just ready for something new and the republicans are still giving the new GOP cut taxes, up spending, increase debt; or well in this case they are saying pay down debt but cut taxes that is a logical fallacy since they aren't going to touch HHS or the military which makes up for 60% of our national projections, and interest makes up another 15%. That's 75% and the other 25% is fairly needed to, so you tell me how are we going to pay off our debt? (BTW, HHS + Medicaid is ~850billion while DoD is ~600billion, it's been awhile since I've looked at the numbers but memory seems to be serving me that those two are right, I do know HHS and Medicaid is much bigger then DoD)
I honestly don't give a fuck if I'm modded troll for this, I'm your a-typical conservative but I can't stand the incredible level of bullshit spewed by the republicans and the fucking pussy ass pandering the democrats did. I'm so tired of this, give me something real.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
How, exactly, could the right torpedo the plan when the Democrats had a huge majority in the house and a super majority in the Senate?
Supermajority? What supermajority would that be? You mean the 60 votes to required to overcome a filibuster and force cloture? Yeah, they had those 60 votes if you include 2 independents. They had them all the way from July 7,2009 when Al Franken was sworn in, up until August 25, 2009, when Ted Kennedy died. Yep, damn those democrats for not predicting Kennedy's death and rushing a health reform bill through in the 50 days during which they had complete, unobstructed control.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
People have always been adverse to complexity. We just want simple explanations. Even intelligent people fall prey to this without realising it.
The real problem is a fundamental break-down in campaigning. It has gone to a new low, and corruption is rife. Conservatives in Canada and Australia are following the GOP model of lying ruthlessly, emotively, and staying "on-message", with the help of big media. There is a systematic effort to create cognitive distortions, so that middle-thinking is repainted as extreme thinking.
Democracy's chief assest is checks and balances that ameliorate unbridled lust for power. Democracy is failing in light of modern marketing technology, and the GOP is leading the way.
Re:"Obamacare" (Score:3, Insightful)
Now on to answer your questions:
What not to love, The requirement to give 1099 forms to any business a company does 600 dollars worth of business with in a year. Imagine you are an independent truck owner - you drive around the country delivering goods. You fill up on diesel at various stops along the way buying 2-300 dollars worth of diesel at a stop. You are responsible for figuring out which companies (realize the gas stations are usually private small companies owned by local franchises) you bought 600 dollars worth of gas from, what their business location is (No - it isn't cheveron, and probably isn't on the receipt) and delivering the documents to them annually. How much will this paperwork cost you, what happens when you make a mistake (really, did you know that some guy owns a gas station in florida and north dakota for some unknown reason?) - what does this have to do with the delivery of health care anyway?
What not to love, The requirement to pay for a product merely for being alive in the country. As an older American, insurance is a great deal - I will spend more than 10-15K in healthcare costs a year. As a young single male, well - lets just say if I see a doctor this year, it is unusual, I am wasting all of my premium. I am forced to pay for this just for being alive in the country now
What not to love, All of the mandates on what coverage has to include. Let me guess, you add required services to a bid, you expect the price to go up. Seems normal to me
What not to love, All of the wheeling and dealing that went into getting all 60 democrats in the senate to vote yes, if you want "good" insurance that covers a lot of things, so it costs 10K a year - you have to pay extra (unless you are in a union). If you happen to live in a few states with smart senators that hold out, your state gets a break by not having to implement things that are required of the rest of the country (so we are all paying for Nebraska now - wish I lived there, or better wish my senator wasn't such a tow the party line guy that they didn't have to pay him off to get a yes vote out of him)
I could go on for a while... next time someone wants to vote on a 1500 page bill, lets give people enough time to read 1500 pages (3-4 days? I mean it would be your full time job) so we can actually know what is in the bill before it is voted on.
Re:OK Republicans, (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, the Democrats didn't get two years.
You are correct, sir.
They got four.
Fuck, am I the only one who remembers the 2006 elections? You know, the ones where the Democrats swept into control in reaction to Bush's epic fail? What the hell is wrong with you people? Are you not taking your ginkgo biloba? Have I slipped in from a parallel Earth? What? What?
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:1, Insightful)
And the democrats took their shares and hide them in the freezer.
Re:"Obamacare" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
Ummm.... From the conservative point of view it's just the other way around. Take a look at this site for an example as it's very liberal. Any conservative voices are modded as trolls. Yeah, liberals around here really want to compromise and meet people half way. They claim to be paragons of tolerance but instead they attempt to shut down any and all discussion and dialog and engage very regularly in ad hominen attacks . Even known facts which were first reported by liberal media sources are modded as trolling when brought up here.
So, when the main liberal community has this attitude why should we expect their leaders to have a different attitude? I haven't seen one. I see Obama calling those who disagree with his legislation enemies. I see Pelosi saying bills must be passed so they can be read. I see Obama giving himself the ability to deny US citizens due process. I see Obama giving himself the ability to assassinate US citizens with absolutely no due process. Yeah, real compromise and reaching out. A real effort on his part to preserve and protect the constitution, which is part and parcel of the presidency. He swore a public oath in which he promised to do so, and has violated it again and again.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
So, that's a big old "I'm gonna obstruct," then. Super.
So, anyone who disagrees with the way you want to do things is an obstructionist?
There was a very clear mandate given to the Republicans by the citizens of the US last night. If they don't act on it they will have lost all credibility in the eyes of their constituency and they know it. The voters said, no more Obamacare. No more ramming bills through congress without understanding them. They also said, follow the constitution. Cut spending. Create a political climate that isn't anti-business. Cut taxes. Reduce the size of government
In other words, the voters repudiated everything Obama has stood for and the way he has gone about doing things. If Obama doesn't listen he's the obstructionist.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
Wrong. Bush did a small temporary bailout to keep the car companies from going under. Then after they pissed away that money, Obama flat out used government money to BUY the damn companies.
As for Republicans dragging their feet? That's because, unlike many of the Democrats who got booted yesterday for voting for Obamacare, the Republicans were listening to their constituents. A large group of Americans (not just Republicans, but also plenty of Democrats) looked at their plan which would achieve two things for sure - higher taxes and more government control over your life - and said DO NOT WANT!!
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:5, Insightful)
Any conservative voices are modded as trolls.
Generally it's because they're actually trolling, or moderation ultimately sorts it out.
If you put up a reasoned post here and try to back up your arguments with fact, no matter your viewpoint, it probably won't end up modded down.
If you post one sentence that regurgitates someone else's logical fallacy of a talking point, yeah, that tends to get modded down.
Re:OK Republicans, (Score:3, Insightful)
you've got two years to fix everything starting... now.
They still have a Democrat dominated Senate and a Democrat president. They're not going to be able to undo what's been done without some Democrat cooperation.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
How can a condition be "pre-existing" if everyone has to have healthcare.
What doesn't seem to be really discussed much passed finger pointing stage, is how everyone is to have insurance. The bill states that either you purchase an insurance policy with the minimum coverage, such as OB/GYN visits for a male single policy holder, or you pay a fine/added tax.
What has people concerned is if the fine is less then the insurance policy, then why not just cancel my insurance policy (or not buy it at all) and pay the fine. Then when I need it, such as you contract a disease or some other issue that you have no way of paying for the care, the insurance company can't make you pay more or deny any of your claims.
So we end up with; you pocketing the difference between the fine and the policy until you needed it, Uncle Sam getting your money while you pay the fine, and the insurance company has a bunch of sick people they're paying millions of dollars in claims for while only recouping a few hundred thousand in premiums.
I can't see what the problems with that is
On a side note, be warned. There is a straw man in people's arguments today about pre-existing conditions. The rhetoric that's spewed makes it sound like insurance companies don't support pre-existing conditions, and if you switched jobs, and thus switch policies, the insurance companies will deny your claims. Too lazy to lookup the law but at some point of time it was actually made illegal for an insurance company to deny a claim on a pre-existing condition, if that person had insurance that covered the condition before. There's some added leway with switching jobs and Cobra that makes it even more difficult for them to deny.
So basically the only way a pre-existing condition will be denied is if you don't have insurance, get digosed with something, THEN go get insurance and have them eat the costs. That and the children that are born with conditions that the insurance companies will see as being a drain (as in, I'll forever be paying more in medical costs then I'll ever see them paying back in premiums).
Wisconsin, I am disappoint. (Score:3, Insightful)
As a former resident who grew up in WI and has voted for Feingold in the past, I seriously have no clue WTF was going on there.
He has given back millions in tax payer money given to him to run his office and thousands in salary he didn't need/want. He was the ONLY Senator to vote against the PATRIOT Act and tried a few times to introduce legislation that neutered it (since there's no way it will really go away). He visited every county in the State of Wisconsin each year to hear what people had to say. He refused to run attack ads even though the (R) challenger Ron Johnson, a high school dropout (granted he is a college grad), CEO with rich buddies and millions he got from his rich wife. The guy even admitted he didn't think he was smart enough to run.
Feingold was incorruptible. I once heard him decline an offer to buy him a beer. He didn't want people to think they could buy him off. HE TURNED DOWN BEER TO REMAIN IMPARTIAL. I could never... (/s for the nitwits.).
It truly shows that the masses of this country are brain dead.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
If you post one sentence that regurgitates someone else's logical fallacy of a talking point, yeah, that tends to get modded down.
Here's where you're 100% wrong. Completely logical people who start from opposing basic premises end up at completely opposite ideas as to what is right, or wrong, on many different specific issues. Thus to mod someone as troll just because in your eyes their point of view is illogical means you often want to shut down those who have started from an opposing basic premise but are completely logical and have a valid point of view.
Here's a very good example. Obama has made it legal for him to assassinate US citizens with nothing more than an accusation and the citizen is given no opportunity for due process. It's a fact. It was first reported by a couple of liberal reporters. This is a serious breach of the constitution as it basically deprives US citizens of the right to life. It means that any president from now on can order the assassination of his political enemies by doing nothing more than making the accusation that they're a terrorist. That should have every US citizen up in arms, and the media putting intense pressure on both Congress and the President. Yet, very little was said about it, and it's accepted here on /. without any reaction other than to mod any mention of it as trolling. Why is that? Is that party politics over reality? Is that party politics over freedom? Is that party politics over the constitution? That's exactly how I see it.
It's this type of thing, as well as tax and spend, that gave rise to the Tea Party. What did they get from the entire left? Mocking, name calling, insults, false accusations, etc.... However, they showed that they are going to make a difference, and they acted with far more restraint and civility than their opponents. They were faced with hatred and responded with civility. That showed me a lot about the character of both sides.
Probably because nobody wanted it (Score:2, Insightful)
Just like nobody wanted it this time, yet Obama and the dems went clear against the desires of the country and passed it anyways.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:2, Insightful)
And to be fair, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus just as the constitution allows him to "...when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it."
Actually that section comes under Article I, which describes the powers and limits of the Congress, not the Executive. POTUS has zero authority to suspend or otherwise ignore habeas corpus.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:4, Insightful)
So that means we can blame the democrats completely for everything we didn't like about the Bush administration, right? Because he passed everything that democrats hate without a filibuster proof majority. By your argument they were completely able to stop it and didn't
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
There is no government subsidy of ER visits. The unfunded ones get paid for by the funded, hence the cost. When you see your doctor you get billed pretty reasonably, I think the 10x cost difference you stated is pretty close.
My problem is with the assumption that government health care will both cover more people and bring costs down, it can't unless the actual expenses of health care decrease. An actual doctor visit is pretty inexpensive, your co-pay in fact is a sizable ammount of the expense. Such as a $10 co-pay on a $50 visit. When you start seeing specialists or need treatment that's where it gets expensive. My son broke his arm and the cost of setting the bone and putting it in a cast was $2000. Now why is it so expensive. We pay for a building plus utilities, then for an hour of the Doctors time, for the other staff, then for the use of the tools and supplies used, but that's not the expense. We then pay for the malpractice insurance of the doctors, and then the cost of litigation for anyone who supplied anything for the procedure. In the end something that should cost a few hundred dollars costs a couple thousand. Now we want to start giving this same broken coverage to everyone?! Drugs are cheap to make, research is expensive, but the real cost is the threat of a class action lawsuit 20 years down the road. Drug companies don't want to go bankrupt, so the charge high prices both to limit the demand and to make up for any subsequent lawsuits. If you take this out of the equation then you have much cheaper drugs.
But nobody wants to tackle the costs. Everyone wants to be the hero that gives free health care away and anyone opposed wants kids to die. As it's been brought up before, both sides have pushed different health care reforms to this end, but nobody wants to make it so that individuals can afford to pay for treatments themselves, or so that insurance can be cheaper by making medicine cheaper. Instead they all want to magically make the money appear to pay for a system that is unsustainable.
What I'm asking for is actual health care reform that both brings down cost and also provides cost transparency. I have no problem with hospitals providing ER coverage to the uninsured, but since the federal government mandated it they should pay for it! Yes that means you and I paying for it, but it also means that it's part of the budget that we can see instead of a hidden part of the cost. Get the trial lawyers under control. If a drug company or a doctor is negligent or otherwise malicious then they should be charged with crimes not litigated so that the cost is dropped on us. And on another note, if there are two treatments, one costs $1000 and the other $10,000 I should get to chose which I have and have some cost upon me even if I'm insured, because most doctors are going to go with the better of two treatments even if it's only 5% better because they are fearful of litigation if something goes wrong.
Sorry for the rant, but the way this issue gets tossed around like a tennis ball without addressing the fundamentals really burns me.
Re:Should be good for the economy (Score:3, Insightful)
There was a lot of talk about the Republican filibuster for various bills, but there was never actually any filibuster.
In the strict classical sense, you are correct. However, that's not how the Senate works anymore. If the minority party threatens to filibuster, the majority simply does not bring the vote to the floor, unless they know they have 60 votes. Basically, both sides have become so damn lazy that they won't even fight for their bills and call the other side's bluff. Yet more evidence that the two-party system sucks.
Re:Fear & Ignorance (Score:3, Insightful)
Your turn - how would YOU fix the problem?
You fix it in government the same way you do at home. You cut back what you can and pay down one credit card at a time until they're all gone. You do NOT go out and spend on gigantic splurgey things like entire car companies and free health insurance for everybody.
Knowing how to write and vet sources (Score:3, Insightful)
To be fair, research papers and bibliographies are totally fucking useless for 99% of careers. I really don't understand the purpose of requiring them for anything other than a purely academic career.
I dunno, but knowing how to write and knowing how to vet sources both seem like important all-around skills to me... (Though, admittedly, simply writing research papers with bibliographies alone is not enough, as it requires decent teachers willing and able to go through the whole process and explain the importance of each step.)
Cheers,