southsider2k5

Happy Birthday

More on Backman stuff.... http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/stor..._ray&id=1916267 An interesting number is that the DBacks are an estimated $300 million in debt. So I guess when you spend tons of money and win a world series, you make up all of those outlays later on with huge attendance gains and profits right? :rolly Just because you spend it, doesn't mean they will come. This organization is f***ed.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6416972/

Punchcard. And I checked for hanging chads

Far from everyone is looking for work. You have to subtract out the young, the elderly, the unemployable etc. But if nearly 2 million people a year are flooding into the bottom of things, they wouldn't be evident in unemployment, but they would show up in welfare, food stamps, and programs like that. And the growth of those programs isn't reflecting that. Either the numbers aren't that big, or they are working somehow, somewhere. Many immigrants work in cash industries, such as farming, as I am sure Tex could support me on. They don't show up as unemployed, but they are making money and functioning as a part of the economy.

Trust me, in my heart I know that tax cuts are always the way to stimulate the economy quicker. It gets the money in the system instantly (because it never comes out) and any gains that might be made by the government steering the money in the right direction is lost by the waste of government, and then some. Government might not be "real" economy, but with the government being the biggest landowner and employer in the US, their affect on at least the mental make up of the economy are undeniable. If the government doesn't step in to make sure that people are still spending money, the private sector doesn't see any end in sight. Go back to the mental make up of the markets then. The economy is 6 months into a recesion, the stocks are in a huge retreat as the biggest stock market run up, and creation of new money, in the history of the country has burst. Now you have the single biggest terroist attack in American history happen to the very center of our financial heartbeat. Remember 1 million jobs were estimated to have been lost in that very instant. Now if just the fed had acted after that, how much worse do you think the recesion would have been? We already know that at least 1.2 million more people would be unemployed right now, just from what we have talked about in this thread. How much more cutting would companies have done if they hadn't have gotten the tax breaks to cover up their losses? How much money wouldn't have been spent if those tax cuts had never been given out. Unemployment got up to 6.3% at its worst spot. down from 3.8% at its best. I don't think it is a big stretch that jobs losses could have been worse by a huge margin without the federal government stepping in to restore some confidence, in a scared and nervous post-bubble economy. And remember tax cuts were the only way the government spent. They did extend unemployment benefits 50% from 26 weeks to 39 weeks. They did add job retraining for people who's livelihoods were destroyed, or lost because of either the economy or terror. They rescued the airlines and picked up insurance claims, plus paid huge benefits to families who lost loved ones, comiserate with the amount of lifetime losses they were looking at. Now today is a really different story. I think the private sector has recovered enough to were the government needs to ease back and let the economy run free again. The one worry I have is energy induced inflation, but in my eyes much of the energy run up is artificial, and shouldn't be sustainable long term, so I am guessing that those prices will come back to earth, before having to adverse of an effect on the big picture. But I was really wasn't reflecting as much on today, as were we would have been today without the actions taken by the government. They are two completely different things. And as for consumerism, I do have a lot of faith in that. If recent history has bourne one thing to be true, it is that Americans will spend every stinking dime they have, and that is evident in our savings rates (or more accurately the lack there of) I am not quite sure why that would change? If a terror attack couldn't scare consumers, what will? BTW great discusion, I am really enjoying this

How come the unemployment rate hasn't exploded to reflect that number? There are only about 2.8 million people nationwide who are unemployed. That 7.2 million number doesn't make any sense with the data.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6415121/ Bush wins Iowa and the election is complete. The final tally in the electoral college is Bush 286 Kerry 252

As bad as the Nets looked opening night, the Bullys might have a chance at pulling his one off... Anybody want to make Bulls predictions for this year? I am guessing 15-67 and leading only the Bobcats in the Eastern Confrence.

Cardinals Bengals Chiefs Jets Panthers Steelers Redskins Giants Chargers Seahawks Broncos Patriots Browns Colts

It can be more than that, but then it has be approved by Bud.

Wow, didn't they just say that they were going to keep him in spite of all of that info? Talk about a flip-flop.

Actually I would argue the opposite. The fact that we are at 0 jobs is pretty incredible to me. Heck 9-11 by itself was directly responsible for the loss of 1 million jobs in one day. That took about 6 months of this year to get made up, all by itself. There is no doubt that the great depression was caused by economic mismanagement. There was simulatious raising of interest rates, coupled with government cutbacks. It was economic suicide that was committed on top of arguely the biggest bubble in the history of the country. If George Bush had acted by keeping the balanced budget the economy would have had two of those three factors happening again. Remember the job losses were already taking place, which meant that tax revenues were already shrinking. So instead of government spending increasing, or even staying stable, the reduction in revenues would have meant a reduction in outlays as well to stay balanced. So at the point not only do you have a private sector contraction going on, but also a government contraction of employment. The multiplier effect begins to take over at that point. Less workers=less spending= job cuts=less workers=less spending.... you get the picture. The question is, would fiscal policy alone (since we have ruled out government aid) have been enough to prevent depression? It would have helped to slow the bleeding, but there is no way it would have been more effective on its own, than with the government aiding in reviving the economy. And not only that, under the scenario in which you are suggesting, the government would have had a huge part in the contraction. As to the effectiveness of the tax cuts. I would argue that they have been hugely successful. The first thing you do when you get a huge cut, is to stablize the bleeding. The tax cuts were just that. Yes the huge majority of the monies from the tax cuts went to the upper brackets. They also pay the huge majority of the taxes, so to me that is logical. But what isn't being said, is that these are the people who hire people. Sure you could give a huge tax break to the poor, but are they going to hire anyone? No, of course not. One of the big differences between the depression and now is the emphasis on corporate profits. If companies aren't making money, what is the first cut a company will make? Jobs. Employees are the single biggest expense that most companies have. In this day and age if companies have declining stock prices they lay off workers in a heartbeat. After the stock market bubble burst, there was a huge rush to cut costs by these companies. Which meant there were huge job cuts coming. By institituting the tax cuts, you eased the pressure on plunging corporate profits, which meant that more companies were able to retain employees, by having their profits and ergo stock prices kept artificially high, until the economy had recovered sufficently to pick up the slack. The fact that the tax cuts helped to stablize the economy would have been a huge improvement over what the government staying out of it would have had. And don't think the poor were left out of the tax cuts. Remember the lower quintile of people pay a negative tax rate. That's right they don't pay any taxes, as a matter of fact, they profit from taxes. How do you give them a tax cut? That's where the cheesy $300 check idea came from. Yeah it wasn't a lot, but how much can you cut taxes for people who don't pay taxes? That's why there were also things like the expansion of the child tax credits, which served to push that bracket to a larger negative tax rate. As a sheer dollar total, the poor can't spend nearly as much money as the rich, that's why tax cuts with a larger dollar amount aimed to the rich, have a hugely larger effect on the American economy as a whole.

He had major surgery on either his elbow or his shoulder, I can't remember which. I don't know if he would be healthy or not.

To be honest I don't believe Rich Daley for one second when he saids he doesn't know what is going on during a scandel. He micromanages so much of this city, yet when a $500 million contract gets into the hands of a mob figure, all of the sudden he doesn't know anything. It doesn't add up to me. And I don't believe the Bush admin when they said they didn't know anything about Abu Grahd. It is the samething IMO.

The big difference is simple. Where do you see people writing that 56 million people who voted for John Kerry are some kind a of a human subspecies for their opinions? You don't.

Not welfare specifically, but entitlement programs in general, yeah that is the 2nd biggest expendature in the budget. Welfare, unemployment, food stamps, social security, medicare/caid.... you get the idea.

If you believe in a hands off government, that is fine. I totally respect that. And honestly I wish it was that way in reality. The problem is the government has taken on the role of economic baby-sitter, by setting up institutions such as the federal reserve, and by becoming the nations largest single employer. And you are definately right in that the fed reactions were exactly what they should have been. Greenspan was out screaming "irrational exuberance" years before the bubble got so huge that it would have destroyed the economy. The way the federal government has functioned since the New Deal, is that they are the employment safety net. They expand to cushion the economy when normal companies are laying off people and going bankrupt. I would argue that the federal government was never meant to do that, but we have about 75 years of history now, with the government acting in that role. The problem is that it can't exactly stop doing it now. And I have no doubts that if Bush hadn't have at least cut taxes, if not increased spending that we would have double digit unemployment right now in this country, and we would still be in depressions. The similarities of the late 90's to the late 20's are incredible. From a historical basis, there is no reason to believe that the economy would have reacted any differently if Bush had done nothing, or acted in a way to shrink government respective to decreased tax revenues equal to increases in unemployment.

Or like saying GWB should know what is going on in a prision in Iraq?

IMO Dean would have been a much better canditate. The guy would have provided a clear contrast to GWB, and he has a history of standing up for what he believes. I have no doubts if Dean would have survived the knives in the primaries, he would be our President-elect now.

And we are still smarter than Illinois?

It figures. It would have been a cool idea.

Daley doesn't deserve any political label except "mafia boss" The fact that he is still a mayor after all of the corruption that goes on around him, yet never quite seems to include him :rolly is a joke.

It must be deep seed resentment at not being good enough for a mreye party

So should the government have done nothing and let those 1.2 million people be unemployed? Should Bush have just let the Clinton recesion turn into a depression, like it would have if the fed and Bush hadn't interceded? I'd love to hear your solution to solving it.