Balta1701

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 04:29 PM) I don't see Ozzie leaving Chicago any time soon. If this team implodes next year, there could be serious pressure for a move.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 04:21 PM) it didn't work. the economy and banking system would have been better without the bailouts; creative destruction. s***, a bunch of the banks just gave the money back because they didn't want the strings attached to the money. it was an epic failure. They gave it back because they were able to raise private capital to plug the holes in their balance sheet. They were able to do that because the new investors new that their money wouldn't be lost; the bank wasn't going to be allowed to go belly up. The money that the banks raised to pay back the bailouts was done with an implicit government guarantee that the money would not be lost. Had it not been for the bailout, the banks wouldn't have been able to pay back the bailout money (How's that for bizarre?)

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 04:20 PM) But according your market to market accounting, they are. Isn't it Mark to Market?

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 04:08 PM) how am i supposed to know? anyways, you were against the bank bailouts, then Obama wins and you totally change your tune. i would imagine you all of a sudden agree with the majority of the pro-bailout posts. They've been a terribly designed policy, they made a bunch of very rich bankers even richer. But the weird thing is...they also saved the banking system. It's been an enormous waste of money but it did its job; it allowed the credit markets to unfreeze because they understood that the government had basically given BofA, Citi, etc., the ability to back their loans with the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. It's a disaster in implementation and half the money has been wasted because we needed to make sure the bankers got their bonuses. It did have the intended effect though. So I'm just not sure how to look at that thing right now. I'm not going to sit here and insist that the credit markets are still frozen like they were last year, and that their unfreezing hasn't been a positive thing. Where we go from here depends a lot on whether or not we're willing to undertake legit regulatory reform. And so far, this administration isn't willing to do that.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 04:00 PM) those assets are f***ing toxic. but, if obama tells you they are good, you will blindly believe. unreal. How many times on this site have I been told that Toxic assets do not have zero value?

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 03:43 PM) 700 billion bank bailout? they have already paid out like3 trillion. And your numbers about Iraq are suspect http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/11/13/hidden.war.costs/ Bank bailout? terrible idea Iraq war? terrible move Bailout cost more. that is a fact. $1.6 trillion by 2009 = $2 to $3 trillion by the time it's done. That one is easy as can be. Your link proves my number is correct. So basically, you add in $2 to $3 trillion on Iraq, another trillion or so on Afghanistan, $750 billion on the Medicare drug and insurance company bailout act, and $2-3 trillion in tax cuts, and even before the bank bailouts the Bush Administration had put us on the line for something like $6-$8 trillion in additional debt. Not to mention the interest on their accumulated debt. The Money paid out by the federal reserve is not money that goes on to the government's balance sheet. The Fed started this mess with like a trillion dollars in assets at least, and has the ability to basically print money to cover its debts. The Fed has also received assets of some unknown value in exchange for much of it. Can't say exactly what they've done because there's no government oversight, but it's a mistake to count the fed's actions to expand the money supply out there as an increase in the federal debt. Edit: LOL, I see what you did there, when you changed from this link including the external costs of the war (i.e. veterans health benefits) to another link while I was typing.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 03:37 PM) Didn't CQ say that Walker was telling him to pull everything when he returned from the DL? Probably because he's playing on one leg.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 03:07 PM) those fancy wars are cheap compared to the complete blowout of spending we've seen in the past 2 years. Not if you do the math, actually. The $2-$3 trillion price tag for Iraq is still less than the $800 billion stimulus and $700 billion bank bailout and even the other things like AMT reform, SChip expansion, etc. put together. Of course, GWB alwo managed to cut taxes by well over $2 trillion over 10 years in his first 3 years in office as well. And added the $750 billion Medicare drug and insurance company bailout bill of 2003.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 02:20 PM) You mean the projections that were made at the top of the economic cycle? Depending on the best numbers on an era to make your arguement is pretty much the definition of an easy fix. And now that we're much closer to the bottom...we've still got 30 years, and even then, OASDI will still pay out a higher rate of benefits to retirees than it does today if the trust fund is allowed to go bankrupt, and even given that, the tiniest tweak makes the trust fund solvent on the infinite horizon. Social Security is a drop in the bucket in the long term budget. If you're worried at all about the future, Social Security should be the last of your worries. Cutting the rise in Health Care costs should be your first and only priority. The future budget problem is a health care problem. Plain and simple.

Linkity.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 01:57 PM) with a NTC and limiting himself to the LAD, and both color Sox, the Cubs are going to have a hard time moving Z I could actually see the Dodgers having some interest in that. Solid manager, stuff they're able to trade, coming off a top of the league season, need of a starting pitcher, likely ability to take on some salary. But like all deals...if you want someone else to take on the contract you should never have given out in the first place, you shouldn't expect much back in return.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 01:27 PM) Except that the report mentions someone specifically in the Obama administration... The Hot Air article? Do you mean Harry Reid or Orzsag? If you actually pay any attention at all to the numbers, the projections are worse now than they were in 2007. Why? Because the CBO didn't predict the complete implosion of the U.S. economy. The projections are worse now because the economy imploded. But that still doesn't suddenly mean that there aren't easy fixes. Raise the cap a little bit and the problem goes away. Adjust the output ratio so that payments don't go up faster than inflation and the problem goes away. Have growth over the next 50 years be similar to economic growth over teh last 50 years and the problem goes away.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 01:20 PM) They've stolen that money out of the trust fund long before now. But yes, like usual, you defend the government's actions as altrusitic and noble, protecting us from ourselves and all that bologna. The only way in which they've "Stolen" money from the trust fund is if the U.S. government decides to default on its debt. True, they treated the raise in social security taxes as a way to raise taxes on the working and middle classes so that upper class tax cuts and fancy wars would be more affordable. But the problem in our government is in no sense a social security problem. Minor tweaks and it goes away. Our government has a health care cost problem, and a "We're the lender of last resort for the banks" problem. Fix those 2 and the long term budget outlook is beautiful.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 01:10 PM) We aren't going negative in decades like was claimed by Democrats. We will have gone negative next year, and for the forseeable futures, which is at least 10 years sooner than has been predicted by leading Democrats. I hardly call that nothing to worry about. Democrats never, and I mean NEVER claimed we weren't going to go negative on there for decades And it's not Democrats; its the Social Security Trustees. They've always projected 2015ish as the date to begin tapping the trust fund; it's 2010 because of the banking collapse. Of course, it's also worth noting that they predicted earlier this year we'd tap it briefly in 2010, then it would turn around, and then we'd resume tapping it in 2016. And the trustees report still gives you nearly 30 years before the fund is tapped out in the pessimistic growth scenario (High-growth still makes the fund solvent for all time with zero changes). You're really, really, really off the mark on who you're blaming here and what you're blaming them for.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 11:57 AM) You are on a roll today of making up what I am saying... I never said there wasn't a trust fund. I said they were going negative. Yes, actually you did. The 50 year out date is the date for the exhaustion of the trust fund. The trust fund was always going to be tapped in the 2010's; that's what it's there for. You brought up the 50 year horizon; the only issue of concern on that horizon is the exhaustion of the trust fund if the economy doesn't return to growth and the income cap is never raised.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 11:37 AM) YOU LIE!!! So, by that standard, the only way that this could make you happy is for the federal government to ban abortion, because otherwise there will be some insurers that cover it.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 11:45 AM) Trusting the government? No, the difference between pulling more money out of the trust fund and having no trust fund.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 11:30 AM) So now it looks like instead of making it 50 years, SSI will go negative NEXT year. You should know the obvious error here.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:41 AM) No one who has held the office of President, even W, has been an idiot, or stupid, or anything of the like. Most are genius level intelligences. Bush is probably not in the rarified air of the smartest Presidents, but he is not a moron or anything of the like. Being elected President doesn't mean that you're necessarily intelligent. Maybe I'm using a more strict standard than you, but in my head, I've got GWB pigeonholed as a frat guy who got in to a fancy college because of his dad's money, who had no interest in learning anything he didn't need to learn (policy included), and who shuts down completely when you try to educate him about anything to the point where he can actually make an informed decision. I'm not exactly talking learning disability here, but I don't think anyone has put Palin at that level either. They're both in the same boat for me. Whether one is 5% less interested in national policy than the other doesn't strike me as mattering that much. Maybe it's a bit of Fuzzy math. There's an old saying in Texas, I don't know if it's in Tennessee but I know it's in Texas that goes fool me once, shame on, shame on you....(10 second pause)....fool, you can't get fooled again.

QUOTE (MHizzle85 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:41 AM) Tell Laz Diaz to go do his job. No one's here to listen to his thoughts. I almost got caught too.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:29 AM) Anti-intellectual, sure. But not an idiot by any means. Disagree.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:21 AM) Honestly, if they didn't abandon the nuclear program, I am all for Israel blowing it up, and us making it happen. This is of course exactly the problem. You see absolutely no negatives associated with military action. Or at least you see the negatives as so limited that it's not worth giving up our "Be a d**che" foreign policy. The negatives of any sort of military action are huge. Our media doesn't show the charred civilian corpses that come out when bombings happen, but that doesn't mean the rest of the world doesn't see them. Military action should be the very, very, very last resort. It shouldn't be the default we go to every time we find someone doing something we don't like. We ignored the consequences of military action repeatedly over the last few decades, and every time we've assumed that using the military will be clean, easy, and free of consequences, we've been proven wrong.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:24 AM) Usually anti-intellectual populist figures with a grasp on actual power are fairly intellectual themselves - having gone to good schools, etc. Palin seems to be a solid exception to that rule. George W. Bush.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 09:17 AM) Actually once we started negotiating we ended up rewarding both of them. You can throw NK into that same pile as well. There is no benefit to empowering people who want to commit genocide. I know you don't believe that, but I do. I note that you suggested zero alternatives other than turning up our noses and letting both happen.

Found this interesting and would welcome reactions.