Disgusted with obama administration - Part II

• BoatShoes

  majorspark;1397018 wrote:I am just going by what the president said would happen. Are you saying president Obama is not level headed? Are you saying President Obama is lying to the American people?

  President Obama is using political theater to try to get the public to support his policies...with that comes a bit of drama and hyperbole in order to try to demonstrate to the public why they might agree with him i.e. "Boy, I don't want to wait in longer lines at the airport...that already sucks....better not support the sequester."
  
  Will that happen? I'm not sure.
  
  But, I don't suppose you expect the President to put on his reading glasses at a press conference and drone on, "The CBO projects that the sequester will result in higher unemployment and slower economic growth while imposing relatively arbitrary cuts in domestic spending as opposed to more efficient cuts".
  
  I think Obama goes too far sometimes (especially lately i.e. Sandy Hook kids) but attempts to be persuasive beyond pure analysis and to try to make the effects of policies have emotional resonance with the public have a place in politics. It's really no different than when QuakerOats says "that's debt being placed on your grandchildren!"
• BoatShoes

  Manhattan Buckeye;1397000 wrote:"So reducing the deficit more is desirable even if it increases unemployment, slows economic growth and worsens our actual debt problem as our growth rate approaches being lower than the awesomely low interest rates at which we can borrow"
  
  Bold unintended.
  
  It is preferable to raising deficits that will also lead to more unemployment, slower economic growth and worse debt borrowing now that China has more or less bowed out.
  
  Face it. The Keynesians lost, what's left is a statist faction crying that we have to keep paying them more and more or else......well or else what? Public employees aren't a protected class. And the Obama/Biden administration has proven how horribly we can spend a "stimulus." Do we want to keep throwing more money down the toilet?
  
  At one point I would question the intellect, but at this point I would question the sanity of anyone supporting the Obama administration/Fed/Bernanke with respect to any type of economic decisions.

  Where have keynesians lost? What happens on March 1st, at the federal level, is what was tried in Europe and they are worse off than we are which you yourself always say! And even to this point savings desired in the private sector and at the state government level mean we should've had much larger deficits than we have been running at the federal level. Everything fiscal hawks have said for half a decade: imminent spike in interest rates, imminent inflationary pressure, has been wrong.
  
  And no, public employees aren't a protected class but they should be fired and/or have their pay reduced during the boom and not the bust when they can be absorbed by the private sector when it demands their labor...i.e. 2003-2007 when we were doing the wrong things like adding another federal agency (DHS).
  
  The deficits we've been running have been what has allowed us to have better unemployment statistics, faster growth and more sustainable long run fiscal outlook than the European countries who did what we're going to do on March 1st!
• sleeper

  

  Perhaps Obama could explain why he would veto any bill that didn't contain a sequester but now that the sequester that he signed into law has arrived; he blames the Republicans for not stopping the sequester. :laugh:
• BoatShoes

  Con_Alma;1397002 wrote:No, I don't think it's desirable. I am telling you I desire it. It's desireable not regardless of consequences but rather because of consequences.

  Even if those consequences are bad and undermine the original goal? I.e. actually worsening the long run fiscal gap?
• BoatShoes

  sleeper;1397048 wrote:Perhaps Obama could explain why he would veto any bill that didn't contain a sequester but now that the sequester that he signed into law has arrived; he blames the Republicans for not stopping the sequester. :laugh:

  Agree. Very dumb on his part.
• Con_Alma

  BoatShoes;1397052 wrote:Even if those consequences are bad and undermine the original goal? I.e. actually worsening the long run fiscal gap?

  To a limited extent yes, but we will disgaree that the long run fiscal gap will be worsened.
• BoatShoes

  I mean gee, spending $800 billion spaced over three years...a time period when the U.S. economy produced $45 trillion worth of stuff is hardly worthy of stimulating depressed aggregate demand in an economy this size.
  
  spending all of 2010 arguing about what types of contractionary policies we should engage in...tax increases, spending cuts or a mix of both...while unemployment was still above 8% is not keynesianism!
  
  Passing Huge supply-side healthcare reform while demand is disastrously low is not keynesianism.
  
  Raising the Payroll Tax rate in January 2013 while unemployment is barely below 8% is not keynesianism.
  
  Trying to find ways to get supply-side tax reform in the midst of an unemployment crisis is not keynesianism
  
  Talking about not raising the debt ceiling is not keynsianism.
  
  Federal Deficits that are shrinking every year while the private sector pays down debt and State governments balance their budgets or run surpluses (even liberal california is on a path to a budget surplus!) is not keynesianism!
  
  The only person doing anything remotely expansionary called for by keynesian models is Ben Bernanke!
• BoatShoes

  Con_Alma;1397065 wrote:To a limited extent yes, but we will disgaree that the long run fiscal gap will be worsened.

  Ok that is fine...agree to disagree on that as we haven't seen it here yet in the States. That is the evidence from Europe however. So, if the meager sequester goes through perhaps we can come to a conclusion here.
• Con_Alma

  BoatShoes;1397070 wrote:Ok that is fine...agree to disagree on that as we haven't seen it here yet in the States. That is the evidence from Europe however. So, if the meager sequester goes through perhaps we can come to a conclusion here.

  The "meager sequester" is hardly enough to provide such evidence.
• gut

  BoatShoes;1397069 wrote:I mean gee, spending $800 billion spaced over three years...

  Except that's not what happened. It was supposed to be a one-time extraordinary expense, yet somehow the budgets kept going up. So it's been more like $800B a year EVERY year for four years (that's how you get form Bush's $400B deficits in 2007 to Obama's annual ones on $1.2T+)
  
  And the worst recovery in modern history. Some bang for your buck. Like I said, the build-up of deficit spending is crushing the economy
• Manhattan Buckeye

  "The deficits we've been running have been what has allowed us to have better unemployment statistics, faster growth and more sustainable long run fiscal outlook than the European countries who did what we're going to do on March 1st!"
  
  Being less sucky doesn't mean we don't suck! And BTW, have you ever answered my question, would you pay out of [possible] deficits for our citizens to dig holes and for other citizens to fill them up?
  
  Answer?
• gut

  BoatShoes;1396900 wrote:Sigh.. we already have massive unemployment and slow growth..

  Ding ding ding after YEARS of $1T+ deficits. Where is all this positive impact and growth from all this deficit spending you keep advocating? It doesn't exist because we've gone past the tipping point where flushing money down the toilet is costing us growth and jobs.
• gut

  Manhattan Buckeye;1397000 wrote:
  At one point I would question the intellect, but at this point I would question the sanity of anyone supporting the Obama administration/Fed/Bernanke with respect to any type of economic decisions.

  Krugman the puppet master
• gut

  BoatShoes;1397047 wrote:Where have keynesians lost? What happens on March 1st, at the federal level, is what was tried in Europe and they are worse off than we are which you yourself always say!

  You continue to parrot this BS regardless of how often you've been corrected. A 2.5% clip in the annual increase (not even a cut technically) is not remotely comparable to the investor-imposed austerity in Europe. Apples and oranges is an understatement.
• BGFalcons82

  

  gut;1397079 wrote:Except that's not what happened. It was supposed to be a one-time extraordinary expense, yet somehow the budgets kept going up. So it's been more like $800B a year EVERY year for four years (that's how you get form Bush's $400B deficits in 2007 to Obama's annual ones on $1.2T+)
  
  And the worst recovery in modern history. Some bang for your buck. Like I said, the build-up of deficit spending is crushing the economy

  This.
  
  The stimulus has indeed occurred every year. If anyone says they don't see it in the budget......what budget?
• BGFalcons82

  

  Manhattan Buckeye;1397082 wrote:
  Being less sucky doesn't mean we don't suck! And BTW, have you ever answered my question, would you pay out of [possible] deficits for our citizens to dig holes and for other citizens to fill them up?
  
  Answer?

  Don't forget...Friedman questioned why they even used shovels if the singular purpose is to "create jobs". He said if jobs were the goal, then they should use spoons.
  
  http://www.humanevents.com/2012/07/31/milton-friedman-and-the-economy-of-spoons/
• Cleveland Buck

  

  BoatShoes;1396998 wrote:It is a deflationary spiral.

  Can you show me one instance of this in the history of the world?
• queencitybuckeye

  BoatShoes;1397039 wrote:President Obama is using political theater to try to get the public to support his policies

  I hate euphemisms. He's lying.
• HitsRus

  

  President Obama is using political theater to try to get the public to support his policies

  
  ...but when Republicans do it, it's called 'grandstanding'.:laugh:
• QuakerOats

  Even Bob Woodward calling out obama for his "madness".
  
  http://www.businessinsider.com/bob-woodward-obama-sequester-white-house-reporting-price-politics-2013-2
• BoatShoes

  gut;1397079 wrote:Except that's not what happened. It was supposed to be a one-time extraordinary expense, yet somehow the budgets kept going up. So it's been more like $800B a year EVERY year for four years (that's how you get form Bush's $400B deficits in 2007 to Obama's annual ones on $1.2T+)
  
  And the worst recovery in modern history. Some bang for your buck. Like I said, the build-up of deficit spending is crushing the economy

  It doesn't seem like you've learned anything in all of these discussions we've had. The reason deficit spending went up automatically without new congressional appropriations beyond the stimulus spending was because of our safety net (medicaid, food stamps, etc.) automatically rising as more people became unemployed. Part of the irony is that that had to happen as state governments brought their budgets into balance and the private sector desired to save. Do you not understand that the private sector, the state governments and the federal government cannot all run surpluses/balanced budgets at once??
  
  The wealk one time stimulus was indeed that. Had it been large enough we might have had enough demand to stop the automatic stabilizers to kick in as it were.
• BoatShoes

  Manhattan Buckeye;1397082 wrote:"The deficits we've been running have been what has allowed us to have better unemployment statistics, faster growth and more sustainable long run fiscal outlook than the European countries who did what we're going to do on March 1st!"
  
  Being less sucky doesn't mean we don't suck! And BTW, have you ever answered my question, would you pay out of [possible] deficits for our citizens to dig holes and for other citizens to fill them up?
  
  Answer?

  The question is why are we less sucky and they more sucky? The fact that we didn't pursue austerity.
  
  And, as far as the Shoveling Hole's thought experiment goes you totally do not understand the point which is not a surprise. You have brought this up multiple times as if that is what he actually advocated for. The point is that something even as asinine as digging holes and then filling them back up and paying people to do it or having them dig down to get gold for which to spend was better than cutting expenditures or raising taxes during the bust. The point being to put more money in people's pockets so they spend because a depressed economy suffers from an overall lack of spending.
  
  So personally, in this day and age, we could just have Ben Bernanke credit bank accounts or actually find socially useful/valuable and productive projects to hire people to do but nevertheless, if we must bury money and have people dig it out to get it to spend that is still better than your proposals that would cause even less spending in the economy.
• BoatShoes

  BGFalcons82;1397105 wrote:This.
  
  The stimulus has indeed occurred every year. If anyone says they don't see it in the budget......what budget?

  No it hasn't. Budget spending still rose on automatic stabilizer spending because actual spending that would've paid compensation for services rendered as opposed to transfer payments was not large enough.
• BoatShoes

  gut;1397091 wrote:You continue to parrot this BS regardless of how often you've been corrected. A 2.5% clip in the annual increase (not even a cut technically) is not remotely comparable to the investor-imposed austerity in Europe. Apples and oranges is an understatement.

  I brought up the UK which has had ZERO investor imposed austerity as they're borrowing at record low rates. Try to follow along.
• gut

  BoatShoes;1397469 wrote:Do you not understand that the private sector, the state governments and the federal government cannot all run surpluses/balanced budgets at once??

  LMAO. Why not? You've been bukkaked with keynesianism.
  
  Obamacare => +$6.4T added to future deficits. But, no, there have been any spending increases.
  
  Still doesn't answer the question - $800B+ a year in higher spending and STILL we've had a subpar recovery, to put it mildly. Where are all these magical benefits of keynesianism you keep pontificating about?