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Some good points. I should note that I'm speaking from a point of view where I'm honestly not affected that much by this recession and won't be affected outside of a total economic collapse. I'm not as panicked as most because my livelihood isn't in trouble due to the stupid moves both on Wall Street and in the Federal Government. I can certainly see how people who are more affected than I are willing to pull any panic rope available, regardless of whether it's a good idea or not. |
well said.
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Flasch: I hope you've never linked to Paul Krugman.
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nope.
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herd mentality. have more articles that suggest people are swarming to buy cars and other products because "lagging economy results in mega deals to be had!". if everyone thinks everyone else isn't concerned and this is one of those "this too shall pass" kind of things, then yeah, consumer confidence isn't eroded. like i said - we *need* a bigger car. not want. we don't want to wait for an accident to happen in our small car with a baby in the backseat. now, because of all the sky is falling i read and hear i've told myself "yeesh, this really isn't a good time to add $300+ to our monthly bills". we've now decided to wait for our tax refunds and my wife's bonus to put more money down on the car and replenish our emergency fund. the negative press i've encountered has made me scared to do any major purchase, only because i see other people are hunkering down and "learning to live within their means". even a hokey headline like "retail stores are doing their part to offset a stubborn economy with fantastic price cuts". or "Black Friday: In February???...Stores offer deep discounts to move inventory". these are more positive headlines that don't make me tremble in my bed cursing myself for considering buying a new car after we've paid our old one off. |
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this too. i'm in mutual funds and we got some nice bargains and i wish i had some spare loot to invest cuz i'd do it right now and buy while prices are ridiculously low. i only started my 401k in january cuz my company changed their policy to immediate vesting and matching contributions dollar for dollar. i'm essentially getting free money that's immediately mine, whatever i put in gets automatically doubled. all that plus investing while prices are low (and not having any retirement funds wiped out since i wasn't doing 401k during the "good years") means i'm coming out ahead. things are looking good for me, retirement-wise. but to get back to the point i'd be jumping in this market with my cock and nuggets in my hand saying "woo hoo muthafucka!" the whole time. great time to be buying if you got the spare cash, which people probably don't LOL. |
i do but Ive been getting buzz cuts the entire way down so Im certainly not looking to be the first one in. Im invested just not 100%.
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we don't invest, which means we don't get to get rich like dot com millionaires, but on the same hand we don't have to worry about our life savings disappearing. the ole "can't lose what you don't gamble" mantra.
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Ron Paul has some interesting insight on the stimulus bill. |
RE: Ron Paul
Sounds like the criticism of the Patriot Act. Nobody actually read it, they just voted for a vague idea. |
Here's a really good article from Reaganite economist Bruce Bartlett on the lessons of the New Deal and why massive spending and the resulting deficit is appropriate now.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/02/12/sti..._bartlett.html |
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cool JPhil. Interesting find. |
Pretty funny snippit here. Evidently, NY RINO Chuck Schumer doesn't like some of the fine print in the bill he supported, which he likely didn't even read before he voted to pass it.......
Schumer's Second Thoughts (Or: This Is Why Reading Legislation Before Voting Is a Good Idea) - Kathryn Jean Lopez - The Corner on National Review Online Quote:
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? |
Do you even check anything before you post it?
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My apologies. I meant to say a Republican conductor of the Unicorn Express. |
RNEINO?
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I think I'm going to need to pull out my Rosetta Stone Politics software to get a translation here. |
R not even INO
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We'll just agree to disagree. Schumer is a far cry from the senator he used to be from what I've seen. Some of his comments of late have left me scratching my head. |
For God's sake man, check Schumer's party affiliation.
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He's such a disgraceful Republican that he even calls himself a Democrat. |
Schumer is to Republican as MBBF is to _____.
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I was gonna say "when the hell did the Senior Senator from New York become a REPUBLICAN?" I know us Yankee Republicans are a bit to the center and all, but damn, that's a hell of a centrist shift.
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This last flurry of posts has been hilarious! :D
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LOL.....I crossed Specter for Schumer. I'll take the dunce cap for the day (or any other day). :D
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To the substance of the link, I find it hard to believe that anyone in Congress had really read the whole thing by the time they voted for it, which is indeed disconcerting. How long was the whole thing and how much time did they have?
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Arlen Specter :)
Great Senator. |
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FWIW.....the campaign promise from Obama was that any bill would be posted on the internet for 5 days before a vote. At face value, I think that's a fabulous idea since it allows many watchdogs groups and constituents on both sides to peruse the document and find the crap that has gone through in previous administrations before being noticed after it was enacted. The problem is that they didn't do that with this bill. If ANY bill needed 5 days to be reviewed with a fine tooth comb, it's a big bill like this. BTW......I'm sure there are a lot of Americans who didn't see it as an oversight and we're happy to see those people get cut out of jobs. I personally find that to be short-sighted, but I know that 'America First' thinking exists. |
I don't think the President has the authority to tell Congress how to handle it's business. I also don't care whether or not each member of Congress has read the entire bill, that's why they have staff members. Now it is a problem when they don't have a grasp of the substance, but I don't think it's reasonable or necessarily beneficial to have everyone read each bill word for word.
That said, I hope the five day or something similar happens as I would like bills to be made public in their final form before they're voted on. For me the problem isn't lack of knowledge during the House or Senate versions, it's the negotiated reconciliation bill that's often the problem. It's pretty easy to hide corruption in a bill that only has hours between printing and final passage. |
I don't believe that any amount of staffers could have been able to cohesively read and report on this bill in the amount of time they were given. Those who voted for it did so because they were told to, and those who voted against it did so because they were told to. It's not Obama's fault, but it certainly speaks to the naivete of those hoping for change from politics as usual.
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Pretty sure I agree with this. I think Reid and Pelosi have been the bullies thus far. Obama likely would love to keep his campaign promise, but the Congressional leaders are pushing back and he's backed down to keep in their good graces. The problem is that Obama is the one who's taking the hit when it happens. I really wish we would have had a similar waiting period in the Bush and Clinton administrations. There was a lot of crap that snuck through in the same way. |
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The Republicans are no better. Their "hold the line" and all-vote-no policy is pretty transparent. |
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Might want to include my entire quote next time. I said the exact same thing later in my quote. You were disagreeing with someone who agrees with you. :D |
Not disagreeing per se, actually, but elaborating my point about everyone just being "whipped" into shape on this.
And upon reading your quote I don't actually see anything stating that, but whatever. |
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I mentioned all the crap in the Clinton and Bush administrations. For the most part, that was Republicans passing that junk through. |
Nah, I'm talking about Cantor and their ilk and the united front they've thrown up. While I'm sure there's some actually ideological disagreement there, the manner they've gone about it is very transparent.
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Exactly. They're mirroring the minority Democrat stance from the first 6 years of the Bush Administration. They've just changed roles. |
Is all-vote-no the same as all-vote-yes-without-reading?
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I suppose that voting for something you haven't read is worse than voting against something you haven't read, but they're both symptomatic of the same thing.
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Close, except the latter is a good thing! |
Interesting news coming out of FoxNews. They had sued to get all of the documentation on the initial $350B bank bailout. Here's the info.......
FOX Business Sues Treasury for Failure to Respond to Freedom of Information Act Requests - FOXBusiness.com They are reporting this afternoon that they won the lawsuit. This means a lot of documents detailing where the first $350B went will now be available for public consumption. It'll be interesting to see what is found in the fine print. |
wow - that's actually awesome!
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Hopefully that includes documentation on those hired to manage the bailout funds and their compensation. |
agreed, probably the best thing Fox NEWS has ever done.
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I think this is great idea and shows Obama's steadfastness towards transparency: Recovery.gov
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Unfortunately, in the small print Tax Relief is actually $165 Billion out of the $787 Billion. When you take away the Infrastructure and Science, Protecting the Vulnerable, Education and Training, and Energy, you're left with $165 Billion in Tax Relief. Infrastructure and Science (how are those really related?) get 76% as much as Tax Relief. I've glanced through the 400-some pages and for so many words, there's little detail in where this is targeted. |
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More power to them. If they could actually report it with a semblance of fairness, they could be a valuable watchdog on this. (You'll have to forgive me if I think there's a 0% chance of that happening) SI |
Hoooo boy! Another spending bill!
House Democrats propose $410B spending bill - Yahoo! Finance I'm going to stop feeling bad about my credit card bill. |
youre right, MBBF, Ive given up. We should never spend, ever. Not on the war in Iraq/Afghanistan, not on anything really. Where were you over the last 8 years.
You mustve loved Clinton and his ability to balance the budget right? Anyways, Ill bet the bill has some stuff I agree with in it and some i dont but in case you havnt heard, were in a deflationary cycle....kind shoulda been up in arms when were inflating like crazy, right? |
Every time Flasch mentions the deflationary cycle we are supposedly in I laugh out loud. If the recession doesn't cost me my job, he just might.
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