Balta1701

On another note...Bonds fails steroid test (from his 2003 sample retest).

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 02:10 PM) I care how the govt acts, because they are supposed to be acting in a fair and just manner. And I have to ask, is this justice when you have 2 similar fact patterns that are treated almost completely opposite. Roger Clemens's testimony happened 1 year ago. That was him testifying under oath before Congress. Did he testify under oath before that? Bonds's Grand Jury Testimony happened in December of 2004. He was finally charged with a crime in November, 2007. That's a 3 year turnaround, nearly 5 years and we're still not at the trial. It was federal authorities who performed the DNA tests on McNamee's needles. They would not be performing those tests if there was not an active federal investigation in to the matter. As others have said repeatedly, perjury is a very difficult charge to make and prove. The government could be 95% sure a person had committed the crime, but if they couldn't prove it to 100%, then they would find bringing the case to be difficult. At this point, the same government that investigated Bonds for 3 years across 2 U.S. attorneys is currently investigating Clemens. Given all of the other complexities of a perjury charge, I think that is the greatest amount of fairness we could expect at this point. Also, here's an analysis of how those syringes would play in a potential perjury case. Frankly, if his DNA is actually on them and they can establish somehow where in the syringe they took the sample, I think it's only a matter of time before they bring charges. It'll be a fairly long time, because that's how those cases work, but only a matter of time.

Citigroup looking for ways to get out of it's 20 year, $400 million naming deal on the new Mets stadium.

Hmmm, interesting. Here's some data from an OECD paper a few years ago arguing that not only is the multiplication factor of government spending on GDP significantly larger than what you get from tax cuts, because tax cuts don't have any effect until people decide to spend rather than save the money, tax cuts are actually a less rapid stimulus than government spending. Not sure it's right, but that's data I haven't heard before. Interesting to note that its out there. Link

If you want evidence that either the Republicans don't know the first thing about economics or they're just fundamentally doing this in bad faith, here's Senator Kit Bond, reported by Congressional Quarterly today, saying that investment in mass transit isn't a stimulus. And the mass transit dollars should be moved to funding highways.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 01:14 PM) Perhaps they want the economy to fail now so that they could stay relevant. Can anyone dispute that the Republicans would be significantly better off in 2012 if the Economy was still a disaster than if it was well on the road to recovery?

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 12:14 PM) GOP in Senate manage to block the $25B addition of infrastructure funding. Two GOP'ers actually voted for it, Specter and Bond. But the Dems were missing a Senator (Kennedy), and Gregg ® didn't vote. Thing is, I think that particular $25B was better than some of the other garbage in there. Which I think was part of the point the GOP Senators were making - cut something else first. I agree with them. I am also getting the impression that Obama doesn't have the influence in Congress, with either party, that he was protrayed to have. He apparently hasn't figured out that game yet. I think Biden was supposed to be in this role. In 1994, the Republicans sent around a memo saying they had to oppose health care reform at all costs, because regardless of whether or not it was a good plan, if a national health care system was established, it would devastate that party.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 12:56 PM) I hope they consider Howard Dean to replace Daschle. He seems to have gotten the shaft in all of this. Nominate whoever they pick to replace Gregg in the Senate.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 12:28 PM) Has Clemens been charged with perjury for lying under oath? Because Bonds has, and to me thats being treated differently. Bonds's testimony also took place years before Clemens's.

QUOTE (daa84 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 11:09 AM) why didn't the yankees offer abreu arbitration? good for us should we land him btw abreu hits lefties pretty well....292/.370/.432 over the last three years Those #'s against lefties are dominated by the fact that he had a really good year against lefties in 2008 that was a statistical anomaly for his career (similar to Thome last year, for example). In 2008, he had an .865 OPS against lefties, .833 against righties. Alternatively, in 2007, he put up a .857 against righties and .678 against lefties. His career numbers are much more illustrative here; he's hit .308 against righties and .280 against lefties, but his slugging drops dramatically against LHP, .951 OPS against righties, .776 against lefties. His 2008 numbers were the anomaly and I'd be surprised if he repeated that; you should assume he's most effective as a righty-killer, so it'd be nice if we had another righty on the bench who could play the OF to give him time off against LHP (Anderson?)

I like the bill a fair amount as written. I think it strikes a decent balance between rapid stimulus in the form of the middle class tax cuts and includes enough to continue providing a stimulus through 2010, and it includes a number of important legislative actions that are much needed. A few things I would change: 1. Increase the size of the infrastructure spending. There are a number of avenues that have not yet been explored; things like additional rebuilding of the national park system, additional money to pay for the operation of current transit systems (i.e. getting Amtrak actually running closer to on time, adding GPS tracking), etc. 2. Significant additional funds for rail construction. (Order $15 billion or so) 3. Significant additional funds for alternative energy. Specifically, wind and solar generation, not just modernization of the power grid; actually buy the bloody things. The Senate bill is better on this than the House, but you could easily put another $25 billion in there over the next 2 years and still say it wasn't enough. 4. Scale back the generic business tax cuts. You might be able to talk me in to a one time repatriation tax credit of some magnitude, but only if I get that first $20 billion back, and some actual votes. 5. Add additional spending on targets that still run through mid-2011 to keep the foot on the accelerator. The danger with this package is not that it will be too big, if it's too big that's actually not a bad thing because it restores power to monetary policy. The danger is it will be too small or that it will be too watered down with tax cuts to actually make a dent.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 11:04 AM) Then put some of this stuff in a seperate bill. Have a 'global warming initiative bill' and such for the other stuff. I am against these big bills with everything under the sun stacked into it; stay with the bills intent. What exactly do you think stimulus is? It's money that is temporarily used by the federal government to juice the economy. You may not like a particular program, but saying "stay with the bill's intent" is just incoherent when the intent of the bill is to spend as much money as effectively as possible to make sure the downturn doesn't continue to spiral.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 10:42 AM) I think Kenny is starting to see the benefit of the addional draft picks due to a FA leaving. Even though OC probably wont give us an additional pick, its not a bad philosophy. I still think OC will sign with someone for cheap. Hard to believe he won't.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 10:39 AM) There's just too many Dems getting busted for not paying taxes, makes Obama look bad; especially when the Democrats were pushing a 'Paying taxes is patriotic' marketing slogan. And when you toss in Richardson...really, what the Hell was the transition/vetting team doing? Out of IIRC 30 or so nominees that needed to be confirmed by the senate, that's 4 who have had major problems and another who was dropped who I don't believe needed confirmation.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 10:36 AM) Well, Abreu does indeed solve the #2 hitter issue. If we do sign him, I am 95% sure that one of Dye or Konerko (probably Dye) is getting traded very soon. I understand that the market has changed for OF's quite a bit, but with Manny refusing to sign for anything anyone is going to offer, signing Abreu and moving Dye for a young pitcher has made sense for this team as constructed since it was first proposed. Even if we have to chip in a couple million. Another advantage of a move like this...let's say Abreu's on a 1 year, $8 million deal. Unless he gets hurt, you'd be happy to offer him arbitration next offseason, because if he accepted, you have him back for 1 more cheap year. If he's remotely healthy, you can therefore turn him in to a pair of additional draft picks. Which means you'd be taking JD, who might walk as a FA next season if we don't pick up his option and turning him in to a young pitcher and 2 additional draft picks. Long term, that's a hell of a move.

Hehe

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:59 AM) Nancy Killefer also withdrew for "chief performance officer" (what is this new position and was it really even necessary?) http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/03/per...inee.withdraws/ That makes three nominees with tax problems and one who had to withdraw over a corruption investigation. Best transition team eva!

Link.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:51 AM) Now, did Geithner actually get confirmed? If not, maybe we can get him to drop out too. Yes, he is already the Treasury Secretary.

Tom Daschle withdraws as nominee for HHS.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:28 AM) Many banks are already doing this voluntarily, using TARP money as an offset. Its one of the few things that TARP seems to work well for. I'm never going to find the source, but I believe I read somewhere a few weeks back that one of those big foreclosure relief plans the government decided to announce last year had so far worked with a whopping 500 people or so. The problem is that given how much these mortgages were chopped up and sold off, every single bank owning a part of it winds up having to agree to rewrite the thing. If some banks think it's easier to just take the write-down, then the rewrite of the mortgage doesn't happen. So far, the voluntary mortgage relief programs have just been epic failures because they've been volutary.

Sweet Quentin, I hate Chone Figgins rumors.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:17 AM) Lame. How is incenting people to buy homes via tax credits creating a bubble? Its not. I know. I'm not allowed a little kaperbole now and then? Anyway, actually forcing foreclosure relief on the banks would be a vastly more effective means of helping that market stay some of its losses. The reality in the mortgage market is that the overheated markets are going to decline until people can afford those houses based on the incomes that they have. And since a lot of those markets were dramatically overbuilt, that means that the prices are still going to decline an awful lot.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:15 AM) Large spending done in a timely manner, not several years down the road. If time isn't a concern, that would mean that every spending bill is a "stimulus." I would say that the key thing that makes spending in to stimulus spending is that it's happening during an economic downturn, and that the additional spending from the government is acting in opposition to that downturn. If you look at even the IMO vastly optimistic scenarios for this economy pulling out of this recession by 2011, there's still a gigantic hole between now and then. It's well established by a number of sources (The CBO, Moody's, etc.) that per dollar spent, public spending is the most efficient way to turn government spending in to economic growth, because you're actually creating jobs rather than just giving people money that they save (see; last year's tax rebates.) Aside from expansion of unemployment benefits and food stamps though, the disadvantage of public spending projects is that the do take time. If we're looking at a long, drawn out recession, and we follow the pattern of an even longer, drawn out job market recession like we've seen in recent downturns, then by the time the job market starts wanting to expand on its own, virtually 100% of this package will be out of the door. And another point...if the downturn is going to last until 2011 on its own, then it makes little sense to have none of the money's impact hitting in 2010.