kapkomet

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 11:26 AM) That CDC stuff has no place in any "stiumulus" package. B B B B B B B B B B B u t we have to have this NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

QUOTE (Texsox @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 10:47 AM) So why not release the best evidence? They have to disclose what they have to the person on trial eventually. Because the impeachment is not a criminal trial and the evidence doesn't have to hold the same level.

QUOTE (Athomeboy_2000 @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 10:21 AM) Obama to DC Schools: Grow Some Nuts... Dont Cancel School!! :headbang He's going to tell everyone how to do everything, isn't he?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 07:44 AM) The interesting thing they have never touched that would end the "crisis" in a heartbeat is the reserve requirements. Maybe they are saving that for the personal credit side. Because like I said, if that goes, that's going to make the housing bubble look nice and rosy.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 08:18 PM) And one way to prevent that...of course...is an appropriately arranged and very, very large fiscal stimulus policy from the federal government, which pushes people back in to work and cuts off the cycle of job losses leading to credit collapses. Yes, and no. LIke I said, I don't think anyone knows what's really going to happen because we've never seen anything like this before.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 08:12 PM) So then I ask again...why exactly should we be supporting it if that support gives us zero influence over their behaviour? Now I'm confused. I think the argument was if we DIDN'T support them they would just blow everyone up. They don't (therefore we have influence in their decisions) because we are giving them all their money. What did I miss?

I think because there's so much money being printed, inflation will come back faster then either one of the two recessions they are looking at. Which could result in stagflation, which is really a bad deal. Truth is, I don't think ANYONE knows what's going to happen, but I will say that to me it's a huge mistake to have the government take over every damn industry in the US. And that's practically where they are. Automotive, steel, energy, healthcare, banks, financial, service sector regulations, home builders, where the hell does it stop?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 08:06 PM) So basically you're saying that Israel is more suicidal than Iran under Ahmadinejad ever could possibly be considered to be? Basically you're saying that if the U.S. pulled back its support, Israel would decide that the appropriate response would be to take the rest of the middle east with it. Why in the world would we want to support people who are blackmailing us with their own suicide? Because Isreal doesn't care about anyone or anything except staying right where it is.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 08:02 PM) The problem with your whole line of thinking though is that it assumes that the recession is going to end on its own rather than move in to a spiral. So far, we are in the liquidity trap spiral stage. Right now, if every single person makes the rational spending decision for his or her family, and every state makes the rational decision to cut back on spending, and every business seeing its sales drop cuts back on spending, and the federal government also cuts back on its spending, then there will be absolutely no reason for the recession to end. As people, businesses, and governments spend less, that provides incentive to continue cutting back, which provides even more incentive to spend less. In a typical environment, the federal reserve can cut interest rates enough to make it a rational choice for people to resume spending because they can once again turn a profit by doing so if money is cheap enough. But given that interest rates are essentially sitting at zero, all of that ability to make it a rational choice for someone to spend more has gone away. If you don't do this, then there is no reason for those estimates of when you're pulling out of the recession to be right, because there will be no reason to pull out of it. Right now, everyone making the rational economic decision winds this country up in a depression. The only one left who can spend money irrationally is the federal government. Wow, you're thinking too short term, me thinks. Which is interesting. Money will be spent again - because people are inherently greedy. Sort of. I understand what you're saying but I think you miss the point of what they are really trying to do - and that's disguise long term programs behind the "stiimilus" word, and that's wrong, because the effects can be devastating 5-10-25 years out.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 05:40 PM) Not going to deal with all 10...but there's a few really, really blatant ones in there. What's being left out there is the path that unemployment actually took. They give you the numbers for where government spending starts and finishes...they give you the number that unemployment finishes at...but they don't tell you where unemployment starts at. They leave out that unemployment started at what, 25%? And then declined at 1.5% a year to get to 14.6% within 7 years? A 1.5% drop in unemployment per year is pretty darn good in most times. And in particular, it's worth noting that the big surge in government stimulus was between 1933-1936, after which, the President started listening to the Republicans and tried to balance out the federal budget. The actual unemployment rate declined from 24.9 to 14.3% between 1933-1937, and actually jumped back to 19% when the budget was moved closer to being in balance. In other words, the New Deal stimulus programs, which happened before we even had Keynes's manuscripts, dropped the unemployment rate by about 3% a year until they were scaled back. That is really awful data manipulation. One more I totally agree with this and I think most economists in the world probably would in some fashion also agree that the main monetary instrument to deal with short-term economic problems should be the Federal reserve, and that the government should work on the longer term issues. The problem is...in this case, the fed is already out of ammo. The fed dropped interest rates to nearly zero in December. It has run out of ammunition. Failing to understand why that makes this recession different and why this puts us on the border of a true deflationary spiral is a huge mistake. Re: your last point, I think that's not too bad of thinking. I don't think the Fed is totally out of ammo yet, because I think there's some other things that they can do. I hope they don't have to go much further then they have, but I get the nasty feeling that they will... the part that hasn't even been TOUCHED yet is the personal credit slide (forget the housing slide - personal credit makes the housing market look like a pimple on an elephant's ass - and that's the next major meltdown.) When that hits, look the f*** out because there's not a hell of a lot that will survive.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 07:44 PM) Do you actually realize what kind of limb you're going out on here? The CBO report on the actual package essentially undercuts every single element you're trying to go after. Also, after some slight checking...that 64% number is not the end of 2010, it's September 30th of 2010. By the end of 2010, it's actually up to 79% of the package, $477 billion. The remainder consists of a few tax credits, which btw I'd be more than happy to get rid of in favor of additional infrastructure spending, and more long-term projects, like upgrades to highways and the electrical grid which simply take longer to complete than 2 years. And also, the CBO assumes that the package is passed in the middle of this year, which at this point seems too cautious, given that it's likely to be done in Feb. But even with that, I'm going to fire back at you the...well, the CBO analysis. On the contraceptive plan...that is actually a good plan, and it's the sort of plan that saves money in the medium term by you know, having people have fewer unplanned pregnancies. But that's being pulled after the usual pattern of Republicans complaining and having the bill made worse because of it so that they can say that government doesn't work. LMFAO. Are you serious? And then you call this a stimulus bill, just like Obama, right? Holy s***. That's just f***ed up. It's a SPENDING bill, not a damn stimulus. They are ramrodding everything they can of their pet projects, all while standing up front of the American people saying we need this NOW! What a crock of s***. Oops. Didn't see southsiders post when I typed this.

Ice storms suck. Especially in Texas.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 03:39 PM) First, its not "the Democrats", its "the great majority of both parties". Second, that last sentence... WTF? No, you're right. Our government wants control of it all. It's not about party anymore. Second, think about it.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 03:31 PM) Actually, it could well be different this time. A fiscal stimulus in a typical recession, one that is expected to be short and in which the federal reserve has sufficient ammunition left in its clip would follow that definition exactly. One could in fact argue that by continuing the fiscal stimulus in the form of deficits after the 2002 recession, the exact negative result he predicted was created. A true liquidity trap recession on the other hand, where one reaches the point that there is nothing left that the federal reserve can do with monetary policy and where one is expecting the recession's length to be measured in years rather than months is truly a different beast and must be understood that way. But you can't throw so much money at it that you can't see the s*** on top of your head for the next 50 years. There is a fine line... one that the Democrats don't want to think about - this is all about HOW BAD IT IS so that they can get their giftwrapped s*** forced down our throats. This isn't about "stimulus", this is about getting money back to China and Saudi Arabia.

QUOTE (Cknolls @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 02:49 PM) Before he was appointed to be the head of the White House’s National Economic Council Larry Summers wrote (thanks to The Atlantic for the link): Poorly provided fiscal stimulus can have worse side effects than the disease that is to be cured. This suggests close attention to three issues: … Third, fiscal stimulus, to be maximally effective, must be clearly and credibly temporary – with no significant adverse impact on the deficit for more than a year or so after implementation. Otherwise it risks being counterproductive by raising the spectre of enlarged future deficits pushing up longer-term interest rates and undermining confidence and longer-term growth prospects. But now, it's all different. The Democrats have to save us all.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 09:37 AM) Citi is not in the business of purchasing ridiculously expensive French jets. Who are you to tell their executive team how they will and will not travel, when it is an industry norm?

Ugh. I realize that "BAILOUT" is the word of the day, and that it's taxpayer funded... but they have no right to tell them how to do business.

QUOTE (Steff @ Jan 26, 2009 -> 03:34 PM) Hey, it's good enough for me, it's good enough for her. Since forever ago I can't fall asleep without the tv on. Thank God for the timer function. Alissa asks for the radio if we forget to turn it on. And since it's so noisy with her playing, Alaina is just used to noise all the time and when it's perfectly quiet, she's fussy. Kind of funny how you get used to something.

QUOTE (Steff @ Jan 26, 2009 -> 03:24 PM) This X10000000. Bri has been hearing loud noise since day 1. She's slept at Sox games, Bears games, Bulls games, movies, the grocery store, the mall at Christmastime, etc, etc... I have yet to find a venue that when tired enough she wont sleep at. At nap time and night she sleeps with a radio tuned to static and if I forget to turn it on she won't sleep! Yea, I can relate to that. Of course this means that we are raising kiddos who will have sleeping disorders when they grow up if they live in a quiet neighborhood.

Wow. That's pretty much unconstitutional.

That's pretty funny.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 24, 2009 -> 03:06 PM) So in other words its not a "report" because it wasn't published for public consumption. Notice they don't dispute any of the facts IN the report though, right? That was my point.

This is a bulls*** article. The "plan" changes every day.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 05:16 PM) Uh oh, Obama regime kills 18 in pakistan. http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090123/D95T436O0.html warmonger Obama. no blood for oil! Even for you, that's a little over the top.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 01:11 PM) Yes, I too hope all shady activity by our government never comes to light! QUOTE (lostfan @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 01:14 PM) No that's not the reason. Certain things are just not meant for public knowledge (I'm in no way advocating torture here btw). Exactly.