Krugman: 'No, They Didn't, and No, It Isn't'
So has Mr. Obama learned from this experience? Early indications aren’t good.
For rather than acknowledge the failure of his political strategy and the damage to his economic strategy, the president tried to put a postpartisan happy face on the whole thing. “Democrats and Republicans came together in the Senate and responded appropriately to the urgency this moment demands,” he declared on Saturday, and “the scale and scope of this plan is right.”
No, they didn’t, and no, it isn’t.
- Paul Krugman, "The Destructive Center," today.
All in all, the centrists’ insistence on comforting the comfortable while afflicting the afflicted will, if reflected in the final bill, lead to substantially lower employment and substantially more suffering.
But how did this happen? I blame President Obama’s belief that he can transcend the partisan divide — a belief that warped his economic strategy.
After all, many people expected Mr. Obama to come out with a really strong stimulus plan, reflecting both the economy’s dire straits and his own electoral mandate.
Instead, however, he offered a plan that was clearly both too small and too heavily reliant on tax cuts. Why? Because he wanted the plan to have broad bipartisan support, and believed that it would. Not long ago administration strategists were talking about getting 80 or more votes in the Senate.
Mr. Obama’s postpartisan yearnings may also explain why he didn’t do something crucially important: speak forcefully about how government spending can help support the economy. Instead, he let conservatives define the debate, waiting until late last week before finally saying what needed to be said — that increasing spending is the whole point of the plan.
And Mr. Obama got nothing in return for his bipartisan outreach. Not one Republican voted for the House version of the stimulus plan, which was, by the way, better focused than the original administration proposal.
In the Senate, Republicans inveighed against “pork” — although the wasteful spending they claimed to have identified (much of it was fully justified) was a trivial share of the bill’s total. And they decried the bill’s cost — even as 36 out of 41 Republican senators voted to replace the Obama plan with $3 trillion, that’s right, $3 trillion in tax cuts over 10 years.
So Mr. Obama was reduced to bargaining for the votes of those centrists. And the centrists, predictably, extracted a pound of flesh — not, as far as anyone can tell, based on any coherent economic argument, but simply to demonstrate their centrist mojo. They probably would have demanded that $100 billion or so be cut from anything Mr. Obama proposed; by coming in with such a low initial bid, the president guaranteed that the final deal would be much too small.
Krugman amplifies the point that's so frustrating to me: Obama made some really, really bad choices, and the Republicans picked up the ball and ran with it. This isn't just a matter of railing against the Republican Senators - these were serious strategic errors on the part of Obama and his administration, at a time when we can't afford much delay.
And rather than push back hard on the wrong strategy, far too many Democrats seem to think this is a time we should shut up and sit down, lest we hurt the new president's feelings.
I'm still predicting that the Republicans will attempt to impeach Obama within his first term.
I'm always polishing my crystal balls
I suppose it's a fetish with me.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
a few Dems would grow some, crystal or not.
I lick mine.
...but I already saw an "Impeach Obama" bumper sticker up here in North Georgia before the man even gave the oath of office.
I wouldn't put it past them to try. And
But your Ball can't read that story because the Dems have no balls to read.
Steny Hoyer, Rahm Emanuel, Harmon, Wiener and all the rest of the same cabal of hard-liners who gave Bush such a helping hand for the last 8 years are likely working behind the scenes for Obama's demise.
Condoms didn't get into that carefully scrutinized House stimulus bill, by accident.
Reslugs ruin the country over the last eight years and now think they have a better plan. Just more of the same. Reslugs are just Obstructionists and bedwetting, cry babies.
That's because a GOPer is always a GOPer but a DEM is sometimes a GOPer (i.e., Blue-Dog-Dem is an oxymoron) so even when the GOPers weren't solidly in control of the Congress the really were.
The only thing holding the republican party together right now is their shared desire to stand in the way of everything the Democrats try to do. This could be at their own peril. I don't think Americans have the stomach for political games and shows right now.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
I agree with you except I think America will pay before the re-Thugs do.
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The republicans have paid in the past two elections. How much more can they afford to lose?
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
n/a
Oposition to stay relevant. Every child knows that trick.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
And apparently so does every elected republican politician.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
WE MUST ATTACK REPUBLICANS TO REPEL THEIR ATTACKS ON AMERICA........................
Republicans are practicing forms of demagoguery and guerrilla obstructionism with the intent of destabilizing our economy for purposes of political exploitation. Republicans AREN’T making a sincere effort to stop the bleeding their incompetent leadership and failed policies created. Instead, they are using conflicting economic theories as a smokescreen to conceal their real agenda, which is to undermine President Obama and cause him and Americans to fail. Republicans are laughably professing that their disgraceful political whoring had nothing to do with the banking, real estate, stock market and employment catastrophes that resulted. Republicans are brazenly trying to hamstring Democratic governance, which is a concerted effort to further damage America, rather than undo or fix its problems. Republicans are offering up subjective controversial arguments they know no one can agree on in order to disrupt and deny constructive change. They want political gridlock for PARTISAN POLITICAL purposes. That’s how they gained power and that’s how they’re trying to retain it. I don’t see them as being the LOYAL opposition. I see them as the ENEMY WITHIN whose political ambitions have distorted their moral and ethical standards to the point that treachery and betrayal are their preferred political strategies. It’s one thing for Republicans to stand up for their conservative beliefs; it’s another thing entirely for them to sabotage our government because a successful America would not be vulnerable to the fears and hatreds that produced and sustained Republican extremism under Bush.
I like the way you think and I sure do agree with your comment.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
I'm curious... can the Republican'ts be charged with treason by trying to shutdown the government in this schoolyard efftard way they're doing? I can't believe they're behavior after all their vitriol against the Dems behavior when King George and Prick Cheney were running the show. I'm looking forwrad to the repubs continued temper tantrums landing them in jail.
who will do that? Kucinich? Conyers?
{All is emptiness}
It's the one constitutionally defined crime and it's pretty clear (for a legal document).
I feel that I can agree too. :/
I found a republican video trashing democrats saying they actually caused the collapse, sighting the bbc and different web sources. I would like to cut this video apart and put real truths, if there are any, with in and re-upload with a much better music track, jeez.
Anybody working on that?
Any 1 have a list published to do this, jpg's?
I love the term you use - "guerrilla obstructionism" -- I hope some of the pundits pick up on it.
*
I don't believe it is exactly. What it is it? It is Democrats doing exactly what they want to do, not what you, their supposed constituents, want. It's not weakness. It's not cowardice. It's not "bad strategy". The strategy is to be as one with same old inhumane program while making you think they aren't. They're doing a great job of that.
The point:
Democrats = The Washington Generals
Republicans = The Harlem Globetrotters
The job of the Democrats is to represent liberal/progressive interests badly and to lose, lest someone comes along and represents them well. As long you allow them to represent you badly everyone in charge, the people who are really making all the decisions that matter, needn't worry about an actual liberal movement agitating for real change.
This is why, despite their majorities and control of the White House and most governorships they can do nothing. On issue after issue after issue they lose, lose, lose. It's a good cop / bad cop routine. It's the Generals vs the Globetrotters. They lose becuse that's what they're paid to do (and I'm not talking about their nominal salaries). They both work on the same team. Each has role. The Generals (the Dems) are in charge of losing and keeping a lid on "the left". We are all being played.
-ep
you are exactly right. Its the Rushpublicans and the Demorats versus the US public. Obama did nothing to mobilize support. He could of gone to the people using his bully pulpit and asked the public to flood the oppo with emails and phone calls. He has millions of people registered on his website he could have mobilized too and he did nothing. It's one big scam folks. You are being plundered to a state of ruin by your own leaders.
They're all on the same team, keeping up appearances while we get the shaft. We're being played to think there's some struggle and diplomacy going on here when the entire game is rigged. Just LOOK at who these people are.
We can quietly quit and save our rational minds toward the survival issues we now face.
is absolutely correct in his article!! Obama screwed up tremendously and as a result this "stimulus package" will have little affect to improve the lives of the American people. I'm not sure Obama will get another shot at this, so it would be wise for the House to shut down this bill and write one that will actually get the job done, regardless if there is any Repub support!! Let the bastards filibuster and face the outrage and scorn of the American people....
.
...but that's not how Dems operate. That's something they would do if they were trying to win. But remember how they acted when they had the now-invincible power to filibuster. Remember how they acted when the had the ability to pass a popular bill and force Bush to veto it to the scorn of an outraged public. They passed every time and, instead, decided not to fight, keeping their powder dry to not fight another day. This is what they do. This is what they are.
-ep
...
Both parties are implementing a strategy to collapse the American economy and both parties are playing from the same playbook. They are doing this at the behest of global financial interests who want to consolidate power and implement a "New World Order" -- as described by the likes of Gordon Brown and France's Sarcosi (mis) -- where a very few have almost absolute power and the rest of the planet lives in third-world poverty. These same global financial powers who caused all this trauma are seemingly getting a free pass. For example, Bloomberg reports that execs of the "too big to fail" banks will not have to respect the exec pay cap signing statement Obama issued last week, and the Fed has refused to tell Congress what assets they got for the money they issued to the failing banks, stating that they basically don't have to in order to protect "trade secrets."
I voted for Obama and really hoped he would turn things around, but right from the getgo he has reversed most of his campaign promises and brought on a whole host of Clinton retreads which screams status quo to me. He seems to be a new face on the old policies albiet with left cover.
Increasingly it seems the role of politicians is to create bluster and distration to mislead voters into focussing on issues that are unimportant in order to cover the real agenda which is to re-engineer America into a third-world nation in the interests of global financial interests.
Failure to address that reality allows that agenda to go forward unabated.
Well said.
And here's this to back you up:
http://therealnews.com/t/index.php?option=com...
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Which campaign promises has he reversed?
"I mean Romney is the most conservative on illegal immigration and I don't think Ronald Reagan could get elected in California today."
Ann "Clipped" Coulter
My understanding is that Obama promised to get us out of Iraq in "16 months" and the day after his Inauguration the military brass came to The White House and said, "We're going to need two years ...(or longer) works better for us...."
Obama promised some kind of nationalized health care. My understanding is that the leadership of the Democratic Party has tabled healthcare "for the time being" as an agenda item. Google it.
He promised "CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN" and instead he's surrounded us with Bill Clinton left-overs like Larry Summers. Larry Summers is the same guy who helped create the economic mess we are now in when he helped overturn the Glass-Steagal Act. And now Paul Volcker has been given a high level position related to the economy.
He promised to close Gitmo "El PRONTO!!!!"...Oops. Can't do that. WHY THE F NOT???? HE'S THE F'ING PRESIDENT, RIGHT??? If I were POTUS I think, if I wanted to close Gitmo, like, ummm, NOW, I could surround myself with enough lawyers and policy wonks to make it happen.
He said, "NO LOBBYISTS IN THE WHITE HOUSE" etc....Well, I'll be. I do declare there are quite a few lobbyists he has brought on in Cabinet positions.
Come on ricky. You seem to be a relatively sharp cookie. Maybe you need to wake up and smell the coffee. Just do a TAD of research and you won't find yourself asking such silly questions.
No offense intended.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
"I voted for Obama and really hoped he would turn things around, but right from the getgo he has reversed most of his campaign promises and brought on a whole host of Clinton retreads which screams status quo to me. He seems to be a new face on the old policies albiet with left cover."
President Obama hasn't even been in office a month yet. As far as reversing campaign promises...what has been reversed? That goes with the territory anyway. There sometimes is no other recourse because candidates don't see what the sitting President sees. This country is in more of a mess than any of us will ever REALLY know. Some people seem to think that President Obama can just sign a bill or an executive order, or just snap his fingers and everything will be all rosy again. Remember those two guys Dick & George? What took them eight years f**k up beyond all recognition is going to take decades to fix.
Government + the Federal Reserve = organized crime
A) Iraq withdraw will be reviewed a year from now ... doesn't sound like a pullout to me. In fact, Obama has stated now that he is in office, he has a greater appreciation of the Bush policies.
B) More troops for Afghanistan and possibility of going into Pakistan "to get Osama." This doesn't seem like more peace to me.
C) No investigations of the war crimes and torture policies of the Bush administration. In fact "harsh interrogations" will continue.
D) Bailout for the super rich to continue -- in all fairness he has never said he was against that.
In fairness again, beyond "hope" -- which always has to come tomorrow, it is a future concept -- Obama was vague on specifics throughout his campaign. All he needed to do was say he was change personified and given the beating Americans had already taken under the Repugs, he was a shoe in, especially next to the fallguy candidate McLame.
The real betrayals -- the attacks on social programs -- are coming, and Obama has spoken about the new social "responsibilities" we all must take on. (Not the banksters, note, but the average American.)
And if you are so cynical to say that breaking election promises is just part of the game, then you are allowing the fraud to continue. If we are not going to hold our elected officials accountable especially at a time like this, then this country is dead, dead, dead.
dry up their income.
I hope they feel our heat as well...
was thinking he could get any cooperation from the repugs.
Remember?
Not looking good for anyone but the shareholders. The republican base (and I work with a lot of them) are critical of Obama, but for all the wrong reasons ("socialist!"). They will win the PR battle (with help from the media), but they have no clue as to why. Obama is in the wrong place at the wrong time, with the wrong approach.
But it takes no more than to look at who his campaign's biggest contributors were to understand why this is not working.
The people of privilege will always risk their complete destruction rather than surrender any material part of their advantage." J.K. Galbraith
Who are they? I keep reading comments repeating this but no links.
Barack Obama's billionaire backers
New president has a wealth of tycoons advising — and funding — him http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28695378/
This tidbit of real news takes the shine off the quasi-religious rhetoric -- what the fuck does "hope" have to do with the establishment, maintenance and functioning of a framework (a.k.a., constitution) for self-governance? -- of Obama and his acolytes. To me, much of this is a smokescreen to keep a significant number, even majority, of the teeming unwashed in a state of suspension so that the power brokers/failed elites (Rockefellers, Mellons, Carnegies, etc.) can continue their corporatist/fascist/secretive deals to accumulate wealth and retain power. In short, Obama, albeit a seemingly decent, intelligent and compassionate man, is, at base, another dupe for the real lever-pullers. Any serious and substantive changes to US policy (e.g., health care, reduction of military spending) that he pushes for will either be sabotaged or he'll be taken out (impeachment, plane crash, bullet).
"Secular humanism -- a fearless, realistic world view replete with doubt and scepticism that attempts to attain an unachievable state of equilibrium between and among the human qualities of reason, intuition, imagination, memory, ethics and common sense.
But at least he tried and that demonstrated that his effort was sincere. Now the Republicans are throwing a hissy fit instead of acting like mature concerned adults. The American people are watching.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
But Dennis Kucinich also has some interesting things to say...
Dennis Kucinich Explains Our Current Economic Situation
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2864...
Get a multitude of intelligent opinions and analysis. Krugman and Kucinich both deserve places at the table of debate.
Dennis Kucinich States His Intention To Take back control of our Country's Currency
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-r_-QRKyu6g&eu...
Dennis the Boy Mayor of Cleveland Promises to walk across Cuyahoga?
"I mean Romney is the most conservative on illegal immigration and I don't think Ronald Reagan could get elected in California today."
Ann "Clipped" Coulter
Yes but how, now do we replace Obama with Kucinich, even in 4 years, that never happens. You think republicans will come up with an even "cooler" white guy to beat Obama?
Even if Kucinich won the way the congress has been acting, I doubt he could have done much, except for maybe a few veto's.
Maybe we can get Kucinich to be our General and lead us to conquer A small section of Canada. Then we could set up a really nice country. Just take Toronto hold the city for a few years, then expand. :P
isn't the way the game is played these days. A short time ago the most desireable candidates were located at the bottom of the list and knocked off with Kucinich's senate seat emergency, and that dee-licious sexual professional ruin of Edwards. Nah, they won't allow us a desireable candidate.
So WE have to collapse the whole game. Put 'em out of business.
Krugman's an economist, not a politician. This is as good as he could get and it's good start. More will follow and the GOP will be seen as increasingly obstructionist. Which is how the majority of American see it.
Saying "You should have gone for more" is like saying "You should stick to principles when that will fuck you up."
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/02/09/gall...
While Keith Olbermann is no Paul Krugman, the fact that this little bug faced "economist" is ubiquitous and is spewing opinions as if they were ordained from the oracle make me sick. I have had enough of Krugman and he could afford to shut his little bearded pie hole for a while much in the same way Keith olbermann needed to shut up no matter what he was saying. The punk like sanctimony is sickening. God is dead or does not exist. If God did, God would be bigger than the wimp that is Krugman. Krugman will soon be irrelevant like his little resemblance wimp punk Richard Dreyfuss.
was for you and you alone. She told me I would fall in love with Olbermann until Rachel was the One.
"I mean Romney is the most conservative on illegal immigration and I don't think Ronald Reagan could get elected in California today."
Ann "Clipped" Coulter
but she is staring to become more of a cheerleader than a voice of objectivity. Obama can do no wrong in her world. Time will tell if she is truly objective or an adminsitration sycophant for MSNBC hoping to become for Obama what Fox was to Bush Co.
Obama, wake up, the republicans are clueless and you are weak...
and we are doomed...
You've given yourself away. Thanks for playing.
You go have fun destroying the Matrix :-)
I love Keith. His sanctimonious preaching is HUMOR, just like Ann Coulter's or Stephen Colbert's. He's just better at it, and he actually practices what he preaches :-)
our president heard the Cocoa Cola song one too many times. Remember, "I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony."?
Yeah, nice.
Now, Mr. President, with all due respect, get your head back on straight and out of the clouds of HOPE and become a realist. Your idealism is not working with a bunch of treacherous rats who want our country to fail.
Help out the little guy, fire the people around you who never think of us and get mad and get even.
You will have our support.
as the bullies who sent him home crying when he was a kid because he was "different."
he knows exactly what he's doing. Note the thugs and bluedogs filling up the gallery of his cabinet.
Obama said he would listen to people like Krugman.
So he lied to us.
*
He said he would listen. He didn't say he would do everything Krugman and others suggested. Maybe he's taking some information from other economists too.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
He also said he would listen to Republicans. They just didn't have much useful to say. And Krugman, for all his good advice, has been down on Obama since early in the primary season.
"I mean Romney is the most conservative on illegal immigration and I don't think Ronald Reagan could get elected in California today."
Ann "Clipped" Coulter
Krugman will be marginalized.
n/a
I sure hope these were strategic errors. The Machiavellian in me worries that they weren't. One thing this whole process has done is expose to business interests just how far the Republican party is from having its "policies" aligned with their interests. Voters might blame Democrats at first when the inadequate stimulus fails to work, but business interests are never again going to support Republicans the way they used to. As a political matter that may be worth some short term retribution from the voters, even though as a policy matter it would be grossly irresponsible.
If the White House strategy is to first drive a permanent wedge between business interests and the Republican party and only secondarily if at all to care about the best interests of the country then, in all likelihood, Mission Accomplished! But I retain hope that Obama is merely strategically inept rather than willing to sacrifice the nation's welfare for political gain.
personally part of obama's message during the campaign that gave me "hope" was his intentions to establish bipartisanship. to be different than the authoritarian BUSH administration. that's what he is attempting. maybe this is a challenging time to establish that relationship. as far as Obama making huge/many mistakes i don't see it yet. Obama has been handed a crisis that NO one is clear on what to do to reduce/resolve it. from these compromises that make up a small percentage of the entire stimulus i want ot believe we are going to get something for giving something. having said that we will need to be heard. to say Obama lied is totally over the top.
As George Carlin said:
"The word bipartisan usually means some large-than-usual deception is being carried out."
He was a sharp fella, so I will take this whole bipartisan bullshit with a grain of salt.
... than a "centrist" seeking "bi-partisanship"? The utter lack of independent thought behind such a framework boggles the mind.
We are talking about people who believe that
Soloman'sSolomon's idea about splitting the baby was actually a very good plan. Not because therein the true mother would be revealed, but because such a thoughtless framework presupposes that the best solution will always be between the two arguments presented.The right has always found such sheep to be the most easily guided. For, wherever the Right's desired result might be, they need only extrapolate from the Left's position and their desired result to determine which far-right position to take.
The "centrists" will never dismiss them for being too extreme - or even for being completely wrong. They will simply use their "centrist" framework to achieve the result the Right had always intended.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
being a democrat, i am tired of the gop bullying,
but i am even more disgusted and frustrated that
the democrats in washington dc elected to represent
the winning party's promises, have just laid down
for a beating and have even given the gop the
whip to beat them with......why are the democrats
volunteering to put their own balls on a railroad
track?
bipartisanship does not work with the gop...grow up!!!
Obama, wake up, the republicans are clueless and you are weak...
and we are doomed...
Maybe if you repost this message a couple dozen more times, Obama will heed your advice.
really is the guy with all the answers, why isn't he doing something about this ordeal, besides writing columns in a newspaper? If the economy tanks, and he does nothing more than write about it, even his income will suffer. Afterall, he is a Dem. Get at it and stop yapping. Being a Dem I am sure that he would have the ear of the majority in Washington, which according to the last election, are the ruling class right now.
Obama is well aware of Krugman and his views. He said as much. He said he would listen to his ideas.
If he has, he has not deemed to follow Krugman's advice.
What's Krugman supposed to do? Try to get in the back door of the White House to pitch?
Obama is caught in a mesh of his own making.
is an important Dem face. Dems worship him. Even Washington will know this. I'm sure he has alot of say in the Dem party circles. He should have. He's a DLC, free trade, new global trade supporter. Fits right in with the new Clinton administration. I'm starting to think that all these people are nothing more than media window dressing. Preplanned political babblers. Nothing more.
They were the kids on the playground that grabbed you while you were on the monkey bars....
Playing fair? True bi-partisanship? That party hasn't sniffed that since Eisenhower's days...
In fact, the Republican party died with Eisenhower. Nixon/Reagan/Busheviks made the GOP into a corporatist/neo-fascist outfit...and married the 'religious' right...
Dems, one more time.... Your attempt at 'bi-partisanship':
You (Dems) - Charlie Brown, Rethuglicans - Peppermint Patty pulling the football away....
We don't inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children - Native American proverb
If being cold means there's no such thing as global warming, does being full mean there's no such thing as world hunger?
Give up the struggle and fascination. We end up with nothing (open again and read in 4 years).
Besides, I agree with Family Guy - Peppermint Patty was a lesbian or bisexual-to-be. No wonder she was my favorite character!
and he's playing the Republicans. And he will win. Big deal if the Dems don't get everything they wanted in the recovery act the first time around, for 2 reasons:
1. They knew the Repugs would piss and moan about certain items, so they deliberately out them in in order to have something to "give in" on. Makes the administration look magnanimous. And they can, and will, have separate legislation for those items later.
2. The Republicans have lost a lot of supporters through their selfishness, people who always voted R and are now jobless will probably not be so fast to pull the lever for them in 2 years. All the obstruction is in the favor of the rich, but the poor vote too. 2010.
Obama has been kissing up to Republican crap-heads since forever.
He thinks Reagan was just terrific.
He campaigned for "Joe"(Lieberman).
You are expecting something different now?
Wall Street backed him as much as they backed McCain.
Now they're getting their payback - or should I say paycheck.
Are the netroots and grassroots and the dreckroots still crowing that they elected this guy?
The truth shall set us free, not our beliefs or convictions.
The truth is they are playing all of us like bad violins. We could stop this in a heartbeat if we faced the truth, but too many people want to just take sides, like this is a football game. As long as my dictator is in power, I'm happy!
They are building prison camps on old military bases, they are not rolling back any of the draconian legislation like the John Warner Defence Act, Patriot Acts 1 and 2, or the FISA bill which Obama voted for even during the election. They tell you one thing with one hand and then do something completely different with the other.
They are both on the same team. Example: McCain and the Clintons vacation together.
They're all dealing us from the bottom of the deck. Each and every time.
Patsys, Fall Guys, Stupidos.
This Krugman piece was up yesterday, here, I think. It was in the NYTime's yesterday.
Made me think something even worse went down today.
Given that he's unable to see the obvious, someone in the White House should let Obama know that the Republican party is intent on knee-capping him at every opportunity. You can't compromise with them, and you shouldn't bother -- they're going to argue nonsense unless they get their way regardless of what they do. So, for example, when Richard Shelby and John McCain say the stimulus plan is too big/won't work/harms our future, Obama should say, "I'm sorry Senators Shelby and McCain aren't interested in the well-being of Alabama and Arizona. I am, and we're not going to let our citizens suffer because of poltical gamesmanship." Call them out -- tell the public exactly what they're doing and why they're doing it when they're doing it. He also needs to start citing the facts regarding their previous errors. If Shelby says, "Well, this package will doom America, you say, "Senator Shelby, along with every other Republican in the Senate, voted against former President Clinton's budget in 1993, saying it was going to doom the country. It didn't, and we had some pretty good years. He was wrong then, and he's wrong now."
The Republican party is incapable of bipartisanship. You should simply say that, and wait for them to come to you. If they filibuster, so what -- do you think anyone wants to see a bunch of old, bloviating millionaires crying in the well of the Senate. Let them do it. Force them to do it.
Obama should have never tried the bipartisanship thing. Strong arm them!
Obama got a bad start, right out of the gate. Now he knows what he's up against -- and he should VETO this train-wreck of a bill.
THEN he needs to stand up in the Bully Pulpit and start jaw-boning some actual facts. Put some spine in his democrats, and maybe shush the minority party.
C'mon, Obama -- get up on your hind legs and OWN this goddamn thing! You're gonna own the fucker anyway, so it might as well be what you need and want. Time for some Presidential gumption.
The damage we are now seeing is the inevitable result of decisions we as a society made a generation ago. We bought into this idea of everyman becoming an "investor". Contrary to the wisdom of all the ages since the invention of money up until our time, a wisdom gained in the failure of "investment" bubble after bubble, we bought the idea that this generation was going to see the dawn of a new era in which the laws of economics, common sense and common decency were all going to be repealed so that we could all become rich off of our money working for us. We were all going to be little capitalists.
Well, guess what? Capital doesn't work for you, it works for itself. It likes to gather itself into pyramids, drawn there by the high return on "investment" that is available in markets for things, like stocks and hedge funds and CDSs, that have no underlying value. The lack of a tether to any underlying value means that these nebulous assets are free to rise in price as more and more money, drawn by the ROI created by all that money pouring into the market, pours into the market. The process feeds on itself until no more new money is available to come into the market, at which point prices level off, at which point the ROI in that market begins to suck, at which point the smartest money starts to leave the market, at which point everyone else loses everything.
Too many people have bought into these markets, and are the proud owners of "assets" like stocks that are entirely fraudulent paper wealth, for us to just stand back and watch a bonfire of the vanities that is in its earliest stages, without doing everything possible, however vain, to save the edifice of lies. So we have a bailout plan geared entirely, and a stimulus plan geared largely, even before the centrists got to it, to reinflating every bubble out there. It's not going to work. There isn't enough tea in China, or rather, money to lend us in China, to make it work. The junk "assets" are too leveraged. By report, we've got 70 trillion in CDSs on home mortgages out there, but we've only got 6 trillion worth of home mortgages. We could sell everything real in this country, and fall well short of enough money to keep the value of the fake assets up.
But we're not going to stop trying to reinflate every bubble, and make every "investor" whole, until the whole damn edifice of lies has collapsed so completely that the average member of the "investor class" has accepted that all that paper value is gone with the wind, beyond all hope of recall. The more we try to do while still having to pretend that all that Monopoly money that you and you and you have tied up in your kid's college fund isn't already gone, the more that any stimulus or bailout we do will only feed the beast, and just stack the pyramids higher. Almost half of this stimulus package is tax cuts, mostly for people who will "invest" what they save in crap that just adds to the problem, or schemes like the $15K they're handing out to keep the gas in the housing bubble. Worse than useless.
No, I don't say that we should walk away even from this turkey of a stimulus package. It has a lot of needed govt spending, and a US economy restructured to work for us instead of Capital, is going to be moving in that direction. But this is about as good a deal as we are going to get before a lot more of the edifice has collapsed. The spending ought to be part of the permanent restructuring of how our society spends what's left over after we pay for the consumption of necessities, and so should go into the regular budget process anyway. So we have whatever turkey of a package we can get through now to get some recovery going, then let the next budget contain the heavy lifting. Yes, that'll be months from now. But maybe we'll have had a moment of national clarity by then, and be ready to do what needs to be done, rather than throw more money trying to rescue what's already gone, and never really existed.
You seem to have a grasp on reality. Thank you
It seems we have two parties hell bent on destroying our country by different means that equal the same result.
Democrats = Stimulus Plan = Large Goverment run by Corporate Influence = Socialism = Inflation = Debt Slavery
Republicans = Stimulus Plan = Small Government run by Corporate Influence = Fascism (corporatism) = Inflation = Debt Slavery
When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. Benjamin Franklin
The bailouts and stimulus packages were always a bad idea and now it would appear Krugman gave himself an out for being wrong.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
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