Obama plans “soak the rich” class-warfare economics
posted at 9:37 am on February 23, 2009 by Ed Morrissey
Those who do not read history are doomed to repeat it. And those who repeat failed policies of the past are doomed to failure themselves, and the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. We can apply all of these proverbs to what the Washington Post reports as the next phase of Deadbeatonomics, in which Obama will try the old populist “soak the rich” policies in order to close a deficit that he himself exploded in the past two weeks:
President Obama is putting the finishing touches on an ambitious first budget that seeks to cut the federal deficit in half over the next four years, primarily by raising taxes on businesses and the wealthy and by slashing spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, administration officials said.
In addition to tackling a deficit swollen by the $787 billion stimulus package and other efforts to ease the nation’s economic crisis, the budget blueprint will press aggressively for progress on the domestic agenda Obama outlined during the presidential campaign. This would include key changes to environmental policies and a major expansion of health coverage that he hopes to enact later this year.
A summary of Obama’s budget request for the fiscal year that begins in October will be delivered to Congress on Thursday, with the complete, multi-hundred-page document to follow in April. But Obama plans to unveil his goals for scaling back record deficits and rebuilding the nation’s costly and inefficient health care system tomorrow, when he addresses lawmakers and budget experts at a White House summit on restoring “fiscal responsibility” to Washington.
Yesterday in his weekly radio and Internet address, Obama said he is determined to “get exploding deficits under control” and said his budget request is “sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting, and lays out in detail my strategy for investing in what we need, cutting what we don’t, and restoring fiscal discipline.”
Take a look at the second paragraph again. Obama wants to jack up taxes to cut the deficit, but still wants “a major expansion of health coverage” — even with the entitlement meltdown rapidly approaching. If Obama cares about deficits so much, he should reduce spending, especially as he demands more from Americans’ paychecks to fix the budget hole.
Raising taxes in a recession is about the surest way to ensure its continuance. We’ve seen this over and over again in American history, including the Great Depression. With the budget deficits where they are, permanent tax cuts are almost certainly political suicide, but better to do nothing than to take capital out of the market. Yet that is exactly what Obama proposes, albeit perhaps a bit milder than some may have expected. The top marginal rate will increase from 35% to 39.6% for earners over $250K, and capital gains taxes will go from 15% to 20%, lower than the 28% Obama suggested in the debates last spring.
However, the capital-gains tax is crucial to the economy. Bush lowered it in the midst of the last recession and economic upheaval after 9/11 to prompt investors to put their money at risk. Raising the tax on investment gains will ensure that we see less investment at the moment we need more of it. Jobs get created by investors taking risks, and if the reward on risk taking becomes low enough, they’ll sink their money into safer havens instead of building job-creating businesses.
Obama wants to cut spending from 26% of GDP to 22%, which is a worthy goal, but it should be lower than that. However, he plans to make those cuts primarily in defense, and specifically in Iraq and Afghanistan. The former has settled down to where massive outlays should no longer be necessary and where costs should get budgeted normally, rather than as riders. But Obama insisted that he would fight the war in Afghanistan more robustly than the Bush administration, claiming that we had taken our eyes off the ball there. How does cutting the budget for that front in the war on terror make our effort more robust? We’re not going to win that war on the cheap, as we discovered after the Clinton efforts to do just that.
Basically, we’re going to get a replay of failed liberal economic policies in the next two years — nothing we haven’t seen before, but nothing that worked before, either. It’s the kind of populist nonsense on which Obama got elected, but still far milder than some of the lunatic economic policies we saw during the 1970s. When these taxes go up, expect the economy to slow even more and Obama to miss his targets for revenue, as he and his team have apparently never heard of dynamic tax analysis. When that happens, the GOP will be poised to win back control of the House in 2010.
Blowback
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It’s possible The One is an articulate incompetent.
If not, then he’s a deliberate architect.
Greg Toombs on February 23, 2009 at 11:22 AM
+1
whitetop on February 23, 2009 at 11:23 AM
Indeed. We need out to stop talking about Marxism here. Marxism is about truly abolishing the upper class and creating a dictatorship of the proletariat. This regime is closer to a Peronist regime. It is perfectly content to have an upper class that pays its bills and provides the funds for its perpetual campaigns.
Juan Peron attained and maintained power by winning over the lower classes, convincing them he was their savior, and making a big show of granting them more government benefits and issuing high profile punishments of a few of the greediest capitalists. But he lived grandly and so did his closest friends who remained rich and powerful.
rockmom on February 23, 2009 at 11:23 AM
Whoa here. Ya’ll do realize that Obama will couch this as “allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire”. Or better yet “removing old, failed tax policies from the previous administration that benefited only the wealthiest among us”.
You think people will be angry at that? Yes, the economy will be hurt by this move. And the markets will understand it and dig futher into the sand (btw- we should probably notice how the Nikkei index fared during there recession). But John Q. Democrat will figure that Obama is just making the “rich guys” suffer like he’s suffering, while simultaneously complaining because he can’t find a job from one of htose rich guys.
hawksruleva on February 23, 2009 at 11:24 AM
Check out the link upstairs titled “Santelli Mania”. Really worth a reading or two.
RepubChica on February 23, 2009 at 11:25 AM
I think we’ve all heard enough of his sermons to know where he stands. Even Dear Leader threw him under the bus. So, where do you draw the line?
Did our government create HIV to destroy blacks?
genso on February 23, 2009 at 11:26 AM
We’d all like to miss you as well.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 11:17 AM
She would miss us, considering that little by little getaclue has been drawn over to the right and is starting to believe less in the liberal bullshiite.
Bishop on February 23, 2009 at 11:27 AM
I feel loved. Great link to that Santelli clip on the other thread by the way, that guy is a tool.
It’s true. I don’t think people really get this. Obama won the popular vote by the largest margin of victory EVER for a non-incumbent President, including Reagan in 1980, 9.5 MILLION margin of victory. And while he was pretty vague about a lot of stuff
1. Obama ran on increasing taxes for the wealthiest Americans
2. Obama ran on healthcare reform and it’s not 1992 anymore.
The GOP is literally attempting to dust off a 20 year old playbook, good luck with that I guess. What you need to do is start joining up with anti-corporatist government outfits and work on expelling all members of congress who take wall street money via primaries. If it takes hardcore libertarians to win those elections in red states so be it, I’ll donate. Just need to get these GOP and Dem hacks out of congress.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:28 AM
Did you read the very post you are responding to?
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:29 AM
\
That’s true as far as it goes, but I still don’t believe that the people are unanimous in their support of Obama’s economic plans.
Is Rick Santelli in a minority? I don’t know. I do know that there is simmering discontent somewhere out there.
gryphon202 on February 23, 2009 at 11:29 AM
As an aside: Nice nexus between revenue raising and race, two big subtexts of this administration.
Maybe Holder was on to something when he called us a nation of cowards as it pertains to race.
moxie_neanderthal on February 23, 2009 at 11:30 AM
Yes, this is more crony capitalism than Marxism. FDR at least did not know what damage the punitive taxes would accomplish; Obama doesn’t have that excuse. He knows exactly what he’s doing, creating a permanent dependent class for him and his fellow elites to use and abuse.
Clinton raised taxes, but he also used restraint in the budget, thanks to a divided government.
Obama figures the rich and business will stay here because there’s no place else to go. Just wait…
PattyJ on February 23, 2009 at 11:31 AM
Forget about FDR and the New Deal. Most of you folks assume, like FDR, Obama loves America and has the best interests of America and the American people at heart.
Nothing can be further from the truth. This is not about ‘soaking the rich’; it’s all about enriching Obama’s fat cats and castrating the conservative rich and draining the swamp; it’s about following the Alinsky-Marxist template to destroying the American economy to manufacture such a major political and social crisis that Obama can use to justify his eventual goal of establishing a totalitarian regime and throwing the Constitution into the trash heap of history, and it’s all about making Obama the permanent President of the USA for the next 30-40 years, overseeing a repressive one-party state in the same mode as Castro and Chavez.
Don’t be sucked in by the normal elitist and academic class warfare BS. I’m not.
technopeasant on February 23, 2009 at 11:32 AM
Actually, this isn’t completely accurate, and it just serves as further proof of how the Left whitewashes its history in order to ensure a never-ending string of “useful idiots”. There’s a popular misconception that “communism” began with Marx, which isn’t true. The concept and practice of communal living has always been around. Marx’s claim to fame is in codifying it into a sociopolitical philosophy.
The US actually has a long history of flirtations with communism and socialism, from the pilgrims at Plymouth Rock to Robert Owen’s 19th century New Harmony community to counter-cultural communes of the 60’s and onward. And in every instance where real communism is attempted – meaning, collective labor and ownership – squalor and failure are the inevitable result.
Why did these ideas never gain a foot-hold amongst the general populace in the past? Simply put, people had too much common sense to fall for such pie-in-the-sky thinking. Oh, how the times have changed…
For an excellent read on this subject — and many others regarding the myriad failures of Leftist ideology — I highly recommend A Conservative History of the American Left by Daniel Flynn. It is illuminating, to say the least.
rvastar on February 23, 2009 at 11:34 AM
I’m genuinely curious, do a majority of posters around here agree that Obama wnts to establish a “totalitarian” state and “throw thte Constitution into the trash heap of history?” I mean….really? He really is JUST a politician who wanted to be President, like the rest of them and he has a set of beliefs that are more to the left than your average President. But totalitarian regime? I can’t take your side seriously when you take THIS kind of swill seriously.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:35 AM
I read it but don’t believe your answer. How can you listen to someone who is so insane on the one subject yet believe him on the other. You are being dishonest and without principles to follow someone and then pick and choose the message, especially in church. So, you are either lying about what you believe or you are clueless about what you believe.
And you want libertarians to rule? I don’t think they will take this country where you want to go. Your liberalism will not be allowed in a libertarian society.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 11:36 AM
Yes, it will still work, as long as he keeps a select few to share the wealth, as rockmom suggests. I don’t see this changing.
The radical left are wolves in sheep’s clothing. My personal experience living in a liberal state and as pariah in a liberal family is that they cannot distinguish between the two, and will either ultimately be eaten, or they must be moved by a stronger force to the right.
But don’t we really know this already? Our experiment with liberalism and unlimited voting, while perhaps nobly intentioned by many, has failed. Most won’t be able to see that, even as they succumb and lose their freedom.
Eh, the ball has been set in motion. There’s no stopping it now. Even if we do nothing, something big is going to happen. The only thing we know for sure is that it isn’t going to stay the way it was for any of us.
JiangxiDad on February 23, 2009 at 11:36 AM
More eloquently said than my statement, but you are right. Pretty soon when the election season begins for ’10, the Dems will begin their assualt on those who dare to speak against the expiration of these Tax Cuts. We can’t have that now, can we? The deficit is too huge to let them expire. I think that is one of the reasons why the Dems pushed this though so hard and fast.
And I seem to remember the “fair share” argument was used in the early 1900′s to get the 16th Amendment passed.
Ed is right,
JohnnyD on February 23, 2009 at 11:39 AM
All of this encompasses the social justice mantra Obama was spewing before.
I get the vibe he truly is not out to promote responsible capitalism or defend the Constitution.
He is doing what he has proposed doing all along in his ‘career’.
He wishes to make the bad rich people pay. Pay for the injustices done by them to the small poor people.
But more often than not, the small poor peasants he is referring to are in their predicament through their own actions or in-actions.
I am in my predicament bcs of bad operation decisions (like wanting to stay in business despite the fact that it is impossible to do so in the cattle industry-unless you’re a big agri-biz company) & just plain bad luck-i.e. like a drought that has persisted for the last 10 yrs, making feed costs soar, skyrocketing fuel prices (this kills us in ag).Etc.
But I really can’t ask for $$ from the rich.
I could just sell out everything, pay off the bank & then my husband would have to get a town job while we leased out our place to someone else.
We just love our way of life.
But we don’t have to do it.
It’s just a shame we can’t.
So I repeat Obama:
I do not need your social justice. I want true justice. Stop taxing everything & everyone. Wealth will be made far easier by us with little.
Badger40 on February 23, 2009 at 11:39 AM
OK…show us conclusively that Obama has no such intent at all, nor do any of his inner circle.
Raised on Frank Davis, Alynski, et al., and gaming the system for his rapid rise to power before any scrutiny, real scrutiny, could be applied…doesn’t make me at all sanguine that such is not Obama’s intent over the long run.
He may not be the next Duce, but he seems to be laying some pretty solid groundwork to make such a leap inevitable.
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 11:41 AM
Yeah… tell me little hussein doesn’t work directly for the enemy. He’s done more damage to this country in his first month than any terrorist could hope for. And his millions of followers are still blind as bats.
ErinF on February 23, 2009 at 11:42 AM
Then why did you ask the question at all?
Because I understand why alot of black men of his generation believe that, even if they are wrong. You may want to read a little book called Medical Apartheid. Wright is wrong about HIV-AIDS, but considering the history of scientific experiment on black people in this country his conclusion isn’t as “insane” as you want to believe.
I don’t know many people who do a little of the “pick and choose” thing when it comes to their religion. What’s the Christian divorce/adultery rate again? How often do right wingers formulate policy under the notion of “turning the other cheek” and “loving ones enemy as oneself” despite what their preachers might say on Sunday. I don’t think it’s saying anything radical to say that you don’t always agree with everything your pastor says. And seriously man, drop it? This topic is about Obama’s budget proposal.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:42 AM
You want me to prove the ABSENCE of something? Did you take basic logic in college? You’re the one making an accusation that has no basis in fact, the burden of proof is on you to prove that he wants to institute a “totalitarian state” not on mine to “prove he doesnt” doing the later is impossible.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:43 AM
I think every idiot who voted for this terrorist-enabler should pay for the anti-stimulus package. Why should McCain/Palin voters be stuck with this?
ErinF on February 23, 2009 at 11:43 AM
Ok, fine. Square you new found libertarian views on your Dear Leader’s economic plans. What he is doing, redistribution of wealth, is so totally against the libertarian philosophy that you should not be defending him. Or is this another example of picking and choosing? You have no leg to stand on as you waffle back and forth.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 11:46 AM
Obama knows shit about economics. He slaps a band aid on it via Nancy Pelosi (who knows even less about economics) and rushes off to his real forte. “Social Programs”.
GarandFan on February 23, 2009 at 11:46 AM
I didn’t say I agree with libertarians on economic issues (though I do on social/cultural ones) but they don’t support federal subsidies for corporations and they wouldn’t accept corporate donations, that’s enough to make them far better than the Dems or the GOP. I’m remarkably consistent you just refuse to break out of your GOP/Dem binary as if the two things are even substantively different.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:49 AM
Remember birds of a feather flock together and if you lie down with dogs you wake up with fleas.
Ronald Reagan had a change of heart and became a Republican in 1962 and henceforth renounced liberalism.
Obama has never renounced or denounced radical socialism. I therefore, will take him at face value.
In terms of what Denny Green, the ex-head coach of the Arizona Cardinals, “He is who we thought he is.”
The trolls on this site would like to pigeonhole me as a right-wing wacko but I take it as a badge of honor to be attacked-because I know I am starting to penetrate some gray matter out there.
technopeasant on February 23, 2009 at 11:49 AM
Marx attacks.
the_nile on February 23, 2009 at 11:50 AM
rvastar on February 23, 2009 at 11:50 AM
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:35 AM
I don’t take you seriously if you rule it out. Who knows what goes through his mind? You don’t. And he has carefully crafted that only the most rudimentary information about his life has been released. But from what i have read and seen so far, I AM disturbed. What also disturbs me is the fog we, as a nation, envelop ourselves in. We foolishly fail to study history because “its boring” then we make the same idiotic mistakes over and over. Carter was the last version of Obama and most of the fools who voted for Obama are too young to remember economic life under Carter. But who’s to say that he does or does not harbor some Chavez/Peron like ambition. the way to achieve that is to create chaos. manufacture crisis and get the public pliable to more extreme measures. Maybe his foolish economic moves are mere ignorance and arrogance, maybe they are not. We shall see. Maybe its racist for me to even question the man.
allahallahoxenfree on February 23, 2009 at 11:51 AM
I don’t know how you can believe anyone who is in favor of NAFTA is a “radical socialist” but…OK. Even if I were to conceede he has hints of socialism, where do you get the “totalitarian regime” part? A number of European nations have Democrat-Socialist governments and they aren’t totalitarian regimes. Or do you think Germany and Spain are totalitarian regime…the people in Spain have actually LIVED under a fascist regime, I think they’d know one if they saw one.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:52 AM
Just like a salad bar, pick and choose your delights, yet still support the One in his economic policy which is all in on the corporate payoffs. If you support the libertarian social views which are part and parcel to their economic views, then you should be here demanding Obama’s head. Instead, you merely attack the views here whatever they are. You don’t have a valid reason to be here except to be controversial.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 11:55 AM
This can be used to accuse anyone of anything. How do I know what goes through YOUR mind, maybe you’re secretly planning a murder spree. We’re not telepaths so we’ll never know and, technically, we can’t “rule it out
The hell, don’t we know as much about him as we did about George Bush? He’s been employed or in government from the moment he graduated law school. What more are you wanting?
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:57 AM
Now I have to justify wasting time on an internet posting board to satisfy you? Why are YOU here. What grand productive mission are fulfilling. Most likely, like eveyrone, you just like to jaw about politics/economics/social issues and the internet is a fun way to do that without any real social consequences. Please stop pretending that you’re here for high minded reasons, it makes you look pompous and silly. It seems you may need a couple of days break from this…it’s the internet man..chill.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:59 AM
Let’s put it simply, since I am in a gaming mood…
Let’s say your next door neighbor has made threats against you and your family. He is also has several priors for violence. He threatens to kill your dog. Next morning your dog is dead, hanging on your garage door. He then again threatens you with violence. Just threats. Never laid a hand on you. Has an alibis for the night the dog died. No proof of his intent. Just proof of his capacity to act on that threat.
At what point, in the absence of actual provable evidence he really really is going to hurt you do you stop disregarding the blatancy of the threat and take action against it?
A good circumstantial case can be made, on the evidence publicly available today, for Obama moving the center of gravity of this nation’s politic structure off even keel enough so that nationalized industry and banks, nationalization of key services, and forcing the dependency of the majority segment of the population on “government” for all their basic needs, and we are supposed to ignore this and go with “hope” that such does not happen?
Totalitarian dictatorships do not always come following a violent take-over. Most “successful” dictatorships come in to power with the urging of the masses. When the masses come to understand their personal salvation will be found only in support for a few changes to a law here or there, or that the possibility of “Whomever” becoming a dictator, after all, who can take him seriously, after all, that possibility is merely a knee-jerk reaction of the rich or fanatic conservative classes…then the “possibility” moves toward probability.
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 12:00 PM
Wait, I thought he was a radical marxist. Ah ha! Are you guys finally admitting that you KNOW Obama is not a radical socialist and that his politics are essentially corporatist they just aren’t AS corporatist as George Bush. Well, now we are getting somewhere! Why does your side feel the need to lie and slander and pretend he’s a “radical” when clearly you know, from your own words, that he’s not.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:00 PM
Brilliant – raise taxes in a recession, and cut military spending in the face of the biggest threat since Hitler. What could possibly go wrong with that plan?
/
Vashta.Nerada on February 23, 2009 at 12:02 PM
Well in the scientific community, proving the absence of something can prove or disprove hypotheses.
You can measure for the absence of something.
That’s not illogical.
Badger40 on February 23, 2009 at 12:04 PM
Goals of a TOTALITARIAN REGIME:
1) to confiscate all private guns to make the populace defenseless against the tyranny of government and its military
2)to control every aspect of a person’s life including what kind of light bulb to use, how far they can drive in their car, where one can smoke a cigarette, destroying personal initiative by not allowing individuals to keep the fruits of their labor and to foster the notion that collective wellbeing is more important that individual self-interst.
3) telling the states how to conduct government and what policies to implement.
4)controlling the entire economy by telling businesses how to run their business and rewarding those who support the government and undermining those who oppose the govenrment.
5)eventually wanting to discard the provisions of the Constitution, especially the First Amendment by re-imposing the Fairness Doctrine and using thug tactics to intimidate private citizens like Joe the Plumber and Rick Santelli.
Does this sum up the Obama regime? If you think it does not, please provide me the evidence to proof that it doesn’t.
technopeasant on February 23, 2009 at 12:05 PM
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 12:00 PM
Well said
allahallahoxenfree on February 23, 2009 at 12:09 PM
Stop right there. HERE is where I’d intervene. The threats themselves are illegal and with priors that’d be enough to press charges and probably convict. I’m curious how your little analogy plays out though.
Threats ARE illegal, so I don’t know. Only a weak willed p*ssy wouldn’t have taken action by now and no you wouldn’t threaten my dog….But what does this have to do with Obama?
1. Obama has not ONCE called for the nationalization of the banks. You know who has though, Ben Bernanke and Alan Greenspan two FED chairman. Also nobel prize winning Economist Paul Krugman, who we know you’ll discount because the Nobel Prize apparently now means you’re a liberal hack or some other such right wing echo chamber nonsense.
2. Obama’s “tax cut” is no different than Reagan’s institution of the EIC back in the 80s and his proposal to increase taxes would return us to Clinton levels. Now say what you will about the Clinton era but did that represent a significant change of political gravity that you could see a “totalitarian state” in the near future?
This is too insulting for words. The GOP lost the election and now in order to make yourselves feel better your describing Americans as sheeple handing over the power of their goverment to a dictator. No dude, they just kicked the GOP out of office and have moved slightly to the left in their embracing of Obama. The hyperbole is what makes you seem “knee-jerk” and “fanatical” not your political disfranchisement. I guess Charlie Christ and other GOP governors/mayors who support the stimulus bill are “down” with a totalitarian regime too? They’re just waiting to give up their constitutional rigths for permanent Obama reign. I think people like you imagine these scenarios because it’s easier to live in a fantasy world than recognize the failures of 30 years of conservative dominance.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:10 PM
What time tomorrow does Barry accept his award, thank his fellow commie homo lovin’ son of a guns, and remind us how ashamed of us our grandchildren will be?
Christien on February 23, 2009 at 12:11 PM
Obama and the leftwingnuts that support him underestimate the financial “savings” from pulling out of Iraq. We still have all those folks on the payroll, we still have to support and maintain all of our equipment and ordinances, we still have to keep the military active (training, practices, war gaming, etc.).
While the maintenance costs will be lower, and we won’t have the added expense of transporting goods long haul from Kuwait, we are not going to however many billions a month we actually expend over there–some of that is already part of the military’s cost to exist.
redfoxbluestate on February 23, 2009 at 12:13 PM
Useful idiots…a constitnuency then, a constituency now.
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 12:14 PM
There are many people out there who think like pigs and want their place at the trough. Look at the lobbyists in the Obama administration. Why so-called capitalists trust Obama, who has thrown so many under the bus already, is insane. A look at their stock prices will show this. Dear Leader is a radical and these people are merely his useful idiots. You are one too. Economic freedom and social freedom go hand-in-hand. You want to limit one thinking the other will be unaffected.
You cite Spain and and other socialist states like it isn’t a bad thing to be like them. You fail to acknowledge the effect that an economically free and stable US has on those nations. If the US does not remain powerful, Europe will fall to the Russians and the Muslims, simple as that. But that’s ok for your type because you either think it won’t effect you or that you will benefit from the effects. A free life and a free economy is, and should be, the natural order of things.
And I told you why I am here. To expose the infestation of liberalism from people like you who want to take freedom and money from all of us here.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:18 PM
Since your a liberal, we shall excuse your inability to do basic math.
1) Understand the difference between absolute values and percentages. Then adjust those numbers for the large increases in population since Reagan was elected.
2) Reagan was running against a sitting president. Obama wasn’t.
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:21 PM
Because Obama is an authoritarian. But don’t take my word for it.
Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 12:22 PM
I don’t know if you’ve been to Spain, but it’s a pretty awesome place. But besides that, my point was that Democratic-Socialist governments are not, by definition, totalitarian exhibit a and b being Germany and Spain.
And yet it is reality, it’s time for you to grow little buck and recognize.
How does a free market economic crash not then ALSO lead to totalitarianism. People being laid off does tend to lessen their economic freedom. I do so love when people who used to get offended at “elitist” anti-Bush people now savagely call their fellow Americans “useful idiots.” Who’s elitist now?
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:23 PM
You are and idiot of the first degree and do not support your statement with facts. Who supported the CRA and Fannie and Freddie? Who left the great surplus that was on paper only and decimated the military and SS? You sound like your make good arguments but they fail under the glare of the facts. More liberal rhetoric.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:24 PM
Has that been published in a peer reviewed journal? If so, which one, the citation didn’t seem complete.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:24 PM
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:26 PM
Economic freedom also includes the freedom to fail. Where in the Constitution does it say that government has the authority to guarantee against failure?
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:26 PM
For those on the left, fair share always seems to work out to:
Those who have more than me should pay for everything.
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:27 PM
Getting here late…perhaps this point has already been made. But how can you “balance the budget” during a recession by raising taxes?
If major corporations do not make a profit, then the tax rate can be as high as they want – the tax is still $0.
So, any corporation or individual in his right mind will do whatever it takes to minimize profit in the short term. Those with the means to do so can ride this out a while.
I guess that one way to do that will could stimulate spending on capital investments. But there are a lot of reasons NOT to buy now, as well. Such as the recession will cause prices to go down (in the short run).
connertown on February 23, 2009 at 12:27 PM
DTMH -
Why do you promote economic failure? Are you aware of the Unemployment rates of European Union?
I think the explanation is that you are willing to sacrifice prosperity in exchange for the ascendancy of your
libertarianlibertine social agenda.Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 12:29 PM
So…citing one useful idiot to cover for others is valid to you? We are now being led by theorists who have no practical knowledge of things. This is an experiment that has been tried before and failed and it will fail this time as well.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:30 PM
That’s what happens when you elect people bought and sold by corporatists to national office and marginalize those who are not as “marxists.” Good work there, thanks for our current system. It’s so great to have people like you defending wall street firms “free speech” in giving election contributions to our lawmakers while you simultaneously stand their bewildered and wonder they won’t let the free market just work by itself. Great JOB!
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:30 PM
And you argue this after your Dear Leader raised so much money? I think he is the definition of being bought and sold, not by corporatists, (which, BTW, is a made up word for all you propagandists) but globalists.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:33 PM
That’s it, like it was under Carter and Clinton. Those folks will not still be on the payroll, and training will be reduced to reading a book on the subject. Or maybe watching a film if the budget hasn’t been slashed too badly.
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:35 PM
I (barely) meet Obama’s definition of “rich”. I was in the process of remodelling my house. That process is on hold while we determine my tax liability.
At the present time, I’m sitting on the permits, and they’ll probably expire without a single spade of earth being turned or a single wallboard being nailed.
The money was destined for local builders, but may well be rerouted to the Government for someone else’s builders.
This whole stimulus thing is part of the reason why the economy is stalled. Nobody can do anything because tax rules can be changed in the middle of a year.
So we just sit. Waiting.
unclesmrgol on February 23, 2009 at 12:35 PM
OT: Be sure to read about ACORN’s Baltimore poster-child for opposing foreclosure.
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/02/23/document-drop-the-truth-about-acorns-foreclosure-poster-child/
Sorry. Unless a homeowner can establish a genuine hardship (and I’ll be the commonsense judge in my kingdom), that homeowner has to hit the bricks. When you read the post, make sure to ask yourself, “What did that woman do with the $200,000+ she received from a refinancing?”
BuckeyeSam on February 23, 2009 at 12:37 PM
30 years of conservative domination????
Now I know that you are truely delusional? Just when was this so called domination?
Was it the years that the Democrats completely controlled congress?
Was it the years that Clinton was trying to nationalize health care?
Was it the years that Democrats used the filibuster to prevent Bush from doing anything major?
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:37 PM
Are your really so ignorant of history that you don’t know what a Useful Idiot is? Oh, and your use of the word “savagely” is a wee bit hyperbolic, no?
/rhetorical questions.
LOL. Peer reviewed by whom? You?
Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 12:38 PM
But he’s a marxist? Round and round we go. I support Obama because he’s the most leftwing politician we’ve ever seen and because I was thrilled at the positive influence a black President could have on young black people, men especially. But don’t confuse it. I know what he is. A Dem politician who would never dream of actually pushing explicitly marxist policies. Now will YOU ever be honest? If you know for a fact that Obama is bought and sold by the same wall street firms and corporations that by and sell all of our Dem and GOP “representatives” why do you perpetuate the lie he is a radical socialist. And why don’t you call the nutjobs who think he wants a “totalitarian regime” what they are?
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:39 PM
And Obama is not of that ilk? He is pure as the driven snow, beholden to no man, to no organization. no union, no constituency?
When he started running for President many years ago, he paid for all of it by himself, accepting no favors, gratuities, made no deals with anyone, and any and all funding for his campaign was provided in a pure altruism?
It doesn’t have to be a corporation to corrupt a politician…it can be a major constituency…the so-called masses, or, in this case, a group of persons with their own agenda to sell.
In a free market a product sells or fails to sell based on its desirability, merit, and worth. So shall Obama. In a free country, that is.
Propping up that product, in this case, Obama, based on some nebulous notion that he is the Saviour, and any who oppose his policies are idiots, certainly isn’t exactly a strong sales point to get more people to buy that product.
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 12:40 PM
BuckeyeSam on February 23, 2009 at 12:37 PM
Crack, Sam. Crack.
Am I right?
PimFortuynsGhost on February 23, 2009 at 12:40 PM
Oy. A “peer reviewed journal” is just what you would call an official academic journal. This individual is a law student so I’m assuming she’d try and get it published in a “peer reviewed” law journal. Is it published in a law journal or not?
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:41 PM
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 12:30 PM
As always, in the world of the marxist, there are only two classes of people. Pure communists. Everyone else is some form of capitalist, and hence evil.
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:41 PM
Look around the world. From the UN to the Hague, globalists are Marxists.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:42 PM
These days most of those “journals” lean so far to the left they need a crutch to keep from falling down.
MarkTheGreat on February 23, 2009 at 12:43 PM
Actually, what I’ve read — over and over again — is Leftists like you CLAIM that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act caused the economic meltdown. Funny thing is, none of you ever gets around to explaining exactly HOW it’s to blame.
So, please…enlighten us.
Also, want to tell everyone what the Senate vote was on that bill? And the name of President who signed into law?
rvastar on February 23, 2009 at 12:44 PM
It seems that it’s lost on o that the market has been down 2 or is it 3 straight weeks. I suppose it’s hopeless to point out to him that his policies are going to keep it down. I suppose it’s also lost on o that it’s the middle class that has begun to lose in the market. I suppose it’s lost on o that as long as he insists on his idiot policies the market is going to thumb their collective noses at him–and there’s NOTHING HE CAN DO ABOUT IT. I suppose it’s lost on o that his precious ‘working poor’ and non-working whatevers will be the ultimate losers anyway.
jeanie on February 23, 2009 at 12:45 PM
People here who think Chairman ObaMao is dumb on leadership or economics or just following the typical liberal playbook or is not a Marxist/communistradical is wrong….dead wrong. It’s been said before but it bears repeating:
He has spent his entire life either surrounded by or seeking out socialists, Marxists and communists. His own mother, socialist. His grandmother, communist. 8 years with ‘Uncle Frank’, head of the US Communist Party. Radical Pakistani friends at Columbia, remember he sought out “the Marxist professors”. Ayers and Dohrn and Alinksy organizing in Chicago. Anybody thinking that this guy is just another Democrap politician is in the weeds. He’s been bred for this his entire life
He is an expert in Alinsky tactics. He taught them for pete’s sake. Everything happening now, that’s been happening since he took office is planned, part of their bloodless Marxist revolution. Just read ‘Rules for Radicals’
RULE 3: “Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy.” Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty.
RULE 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.” If the rule is that every letter gets a reply, send 30,000 letters. You can kill them with this because no one can possibly obey all of their own rules. (This is a serious rule. The besieged entity’s very credibility and reputation is at stake, because if activists catch it lying or not living up to its commitments, they can continue to chip away at the damage.)
RULE 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” There is no defense. It’s irrational. It’s infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions. (Pretty crude, rude and mean, huh? They want to create anger and fear.)
RULE 8: “Keep the pressure on. Never let up.” Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. (Attack, attack, attack from all sides, never giving the reeling organization a chance to rest, regroup, recover and re-strategize.)
RULE 11: “The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.” Never let the enemy score points because you’re caught without a solution to the problem. (Old saw: If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. Activist organizations have an agenda, and their strategy is to hold a place at the table, to be given a forum to wield their power. So, they have to have a compromise solution.)
RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)
Read these very carefully….it’s what’s going on right before our very eyes…..esp. Rule 8 – Keep the Pressure On. Why do you think all of this stimulus and porkulus and military dabbling and endless executives orders are happening right out of the gate. He and his string pullers know that we are not well organized and by the time we do it may very well be too late. It’s clear that they are hell bent on destroying this country. Look back on his campaign speeches….it was all laid out for us. Their sole goal is power, plain and simple. The greater the crisis, the better environment for power consolidation, vis-a-vis Chavez in Venezuela. And part of this plan is the destruction of our economy and if they go forward in letting the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expire and raise other forms of taxes through payroll or for socilized health care, cap and trade, etc…, then that economic destruction will be assured….and at that point, all bets are off.
TheAdmiral on February 23, 2009 at 12:45 PM
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:45 PM
It’s funny how the libs say that trickle down economics don’t work. I can tell you by exaple that they work in reverse the way they run the show. As a small biz owner my suppliers are getting squeezed on taxes and they pass it down. I have the memos to prove it. Oh, and I pass it along to the consumer…even to the libs that hate the rich and think they are getting their money.
pageram on February 23, 2009 at 12:49 PM
In November I voted on content of character, not the color of skin. Ruining our economy for the next several generations is a role model for what? An inspiration for whom? Making Americans, especially Black Americans more dependent not less dependent on government for their well-being is a good thing?
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 12:50 PM
Do you need glasses? Maybe you’re waiting for Obama to finance a trip to the ophthalmologist.
Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 12:52 PM
What I want to know is, whom and how many pulled that $550 Billion out of the market on Sept. 15, 2008 that sent us into free fall?
Does Obama know something we don’t? Will that $550B come back into the market later this year or early next year, so that he can say his plan worked? Was it all a set up?
JAM on February 23, 2009 at 12:53 PM
When Mayor Bloomberg starts talking sense against raising taxes on the rich, you know Obama is seriously on the wrong track. 40,000 people in NYC pay over 50% of the cities taxes….
BTW, how did Clinton’s “Luxury Tax” work out? Oh, that’s right. They had to REPEAL IT!!!
varnson on February 23, 2009 at 12:56 PM
TheAdmiral on February 23, 2009 at 12:45 PM
I have trouble giving him credit for being clever enough for all this. If he were clever, he’d be better at concealing it I think. More likely he’s just so in-experienced and ideologic that he can’t scope the mess he’s headed into. And he’s surrounded by so many kiss bottoms that even those who see it won’t tell him.
jeanie on February 23, 2009 at 12:56 PM
There was a lot of funny market activity during the run-up to the election. In addition to what you cited, there were many days when rallies were thwarted by huge sell volume in the last 15 minutes of the trading day. No one had ever seen anything like that before and gave no reason for it.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:57 PM
I’m going to use your — I take it you thought it was a substantive comment, but whatever — to emphasize the point that so many here are making.
It is precisely we conservatives who have the most personal stake in what President Obama is about to do. The social consequences which you imagine we avoid are, on the contrary, real and concrete to us. It is precisely for self-described liberals that this is all a textbook abstraction.
We are the entrepreneurs who start businesses and create jobs. Obama threatens our livelihoods. When President Obama flashed his little commie smirk and chuckled “ever heard of a plumber who makes $250,000?” you have no idea how that was felt by many of us at a visceral level.
That bastard has never held a job in his life, and thinks a man with a small business that pulls in $250,000 is rich. He thinks this because, like you, he is a theorist, an abstractionist.
The fact is, I have heard of a plumber who makes $250,000. Unfortunately, because small businesses are typically Chapter S corporations, that $250,000 is top line revenue. After expenses, payroll, and taxes, some plumbers might go a couple of months without paying themselves.
I guarantee you several small business owners on this board are nodding in agreement. Self-described “liberals” are destroying the backbone of this country. President Obama’s smirking attack on the plumber was a shocking admission of ignorance.
Yes, President Obama is incompetent. Far from being smart, he’s actually quite a fraud.
So, nuts if it’s all the same to you, old friend, but there are more social consequences for us than there are for someone like you.
I guarantee it.
jeff_from_mpls on February 23, 2009 at 1:00 PM
Exactly. One of the first things Bloomberg did as Mayor was hit the “rich” with an income tax surcharge.
Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 1:00 PM
George Soros.
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 1:00 PM
Wondered about the market during the campaign too–did act very differently than it had been doing. Still, with so much foreign investment coming and going, I wonder if such a thing is possible. Suspect not.
jeanie on February 23, 2009 at 1:00 PM
Sorry, I thought that was implied. ;)
genso on February 23, 2009 at 1:01 PM
I should have known that… :-)
coldwarrior on February 23, 2009 at 1:02 PM
If o were doing this, the natural thing to do now would be pump the market up to let us all know how successful his plan is out there and how many jobs we can expect down the line. This is not happening. Personally, I think the market sees no way to make money under o’s policies and is telling him so.
jeanie on February 23, 2009 at 1:04 PM
genso on February 23, 2009 at 12:57 PM
It was all manipulated for sure, but by whom? Soros doesn’t have that much $$ alone. There are many, many people/corps. involved. Was it just to get him elected?
Remember he sat in those meetings in the White House and said nothing. They noted that, specifically.
Paulson stopped the run on our money markets after about 3 hours that day and already 550B was gone. Where did it go? Why is Kanjorski the only congressman who has said anything about it?
JAM on February 23, 2009 at 1:04 PM
Ah it’s a paper in progress, i.e. it hasn’t been accepted anywhere yet. I’ll read it anyway since I happen to know something about Black Power and, based on the title alone, doubt this guy does.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 1:04 PM
Bingo. The people DTMH is likely to know (who aren’t members of a union, or collecting some sort of government check) are not entrepreneurs, but opportunists, like Michelle Obama who managed to get a big, fat raise after her husband earmarked oodles of money to her employer.
Buy Danish on February 23, 2009 at 1:06 PM
Why don’t you go over to the “Great news: Biden to serve as stimulus czar” thread and tell them how its not true.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 1:07 PM
Whoa, is it EVER a paper in progress. Did you not notice that there isn’t a single footnote on the first 4 pages i.e. no evidence to back up claims. I also loved the “INSERT HISTORICAL BACKGROUND HERE” marker as I do that in my own work..but not before I let people use it as evidence of anything. Let me know when it’s no longer a work in progress and there are some actual footnotes.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 1:08 PM
Yes, she believes it is a good thing that the unions are specifically designated stimulus jobs. Fair bidding from independent contractors and such, is not stimulative, doncha know. We taxpayers need to overpay for everything, especially union work…
JAM on February 23, 2009 at 1:10 PM
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 11:18 AM
The old “you didn’t x, so you can’t comment on x” argument. I never ate a sh*t sandwich, but I feel relatively certain that my comments that it would not be advisable would be fairly accurate. N’est-ce pas?
As to Obama’s wondrous plan – on the backs of the military, again, and from the pockets of the producers, again.
Change, indeed.
catmman on February 23, 2009 at 1:10 PM
Oooh here’s a gem from this “scholar” a little bit of telepathy as evidence of your argument. This is why being published in a “peer reviewed journal” is actually a standard.
One COULD see all kinds of things. Unfortunately to get published one HAS to have evidence for their assertions.
DeathToMediaHacks on February 23, 2009 at 1:10 PM
Two things. There was an article in a financial mag at the time (sorry, I don’t remember which) that showed how small trades could trigger a massive sell-off. As for the $500 billion, while Soros is neck deep in this, he can not stand alone against capitalism. He is a part of this but not the entirety of it.
genso on February 23, 2009 at 1:10 PM
Paranoia–yeah, but not at the market, direct it where it belongs, at o’s stated and enacted policies. Y’all are kind of spinning out of control?
jeanie on February 23, 2009 at 1:11 PM
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