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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/11/2004 10:27:31 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 89467

Bush's Republican Problem ______________________________ Even if George W. Bush wanted to reduce the budget deficit, his congressional allies would never allow it. By Robert B. Reich The American Prospect Web Exclusive: 11.10.04 George W. Bush's biggest problem over the next four years will be a Congress that's even more Republican than it was in 2000. Let me explain. In their heart of hearts, presidents don't like it when their own party controls both houses of Congress. It's the same whether the new President is a Republican or a Democrat. Why? Because when your own party runs Congress, you've got to help them pay off all the IOUs they've accumulated along the campaign trail from all their constituents and patrons and sponsors. You don't have the excuse that you can't help with the payoffs because the other party runs one or both houses of Congress. No, it's entirely your party. You’re stuck with the bill for it. Look at what happened to Bush over the last four years, with a Republican Congress. Non-defense spending grew by an average of 8 percent a year. Under Bill Clinton, it grew by an average of only 4.3 percent a year. Meanwhile, special-interest tax loopholes exploded over the past four years. The corporate tax bill the president signed last month was the biggest piece of special-interest pork in history. Yet tax loopholes increased only moderately under Clinton. Why could Clinton hold down spending and special-interest tax loopholes when Bush couldn't? Because for most of the Clinton years, Republicans and Democrats in Congress couldn't agree on much of anything. That meant Clinton could veto or threaten to veto even bills containing pet projects of leading Democrats by blaming Republicans for larding up the bills with too many favors. Over the last four years, Bush has signed every spending bill that came his way -- every morsel of pork for the folks back home in every Republican congressional district, every bit of corporate welfare for the big businesses that contributed to every Republican senator and every Republican representative. Total federal tax revenue is $100 billion lower this year than when Bush took office in 2001 but spending is $400 billion higher! Poor President Bush. Now he has an even larger Republican majority. And the budget deficit is already way over $400 billion this year. He doesn't stand a chance of reducing it. Every one of those newly-elected Republicans in the House and most in the Senate are carrying around huge IOUs from the election. And all those IOUs require more special tax breaks, more subsidies, more spending. It's enough to make a president downright depressed. __________________________ Robert B. Reich is co-founder of The American Prospect prospect.org

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/11/2004 10:48:18 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 89467

Shhh… Gold is in a bull market ______________________________ By: Gareth Tredway Posted: '07-NOV-04 12:00' GMT © Mineweb 1997-2004 JOHANNESBURG (Mineweb.com) -- John Hathaway, of Tocqueville Asset Management says gold’s bull run is only in its early stages and until many more people catch on it still has a long way to go. “I think we are very early in this whole thing,” The fund manager told Mineweb Radio, “Most people would not even know that we were in a bull market for gold, and most of the people in the financial markets are essentially clueless about this. Until many, many more people are aware of it, I do not think we are in much danger of it petering out.” Since early 2000, when it was trading around $260/oz, gold has gained over 66 percent, and is currently at over 16-year highs. On Friday the dollar gold price closed at $433.55/oz, its highest close since August 1988. But Hathaway says it has got more to go. One of Hathaway’s theories on why gold is set to go higher, is a comparison of the current dollar gold price to that of 1980 when gold peaked over $800/oz. He says that in 1980 terms the price is only at $200 currently, while the $800/oz price of that time is about $1,600/oz in today’s terms. “So for gold to be just where it was on an average price basis for the 1980s, we should be well north of $500 or $600,” says Hathaway. “Gold is simply tagging along in the slipstream of oil, copper and nickel,” says a note by Hathaway on Tocqueville’s website. He goes on to say that the dollar has run its course as the global reserve currency and for this reason gold will go up. “The transition to a new basis for international credit will be lengthy and difficult. The repercussions of a transition are not reflected in the financial markets. For this reason, gold is inadequately priced,” says the note. Therefore, Hathaway says the best strategy, under these circumstances, is to own as much physical gold as possible. He says gold mining shares will also perform along the way as well as derivatives, or paper gold. Hathaway says proof that the market has not caught on to the early stages of a multi-year decline in the dollar and financial assets is in the dollar gold price. “If it were otherwise, the dollar price of gold would not be $400,” says the note, “It would have at least three zeros before the decimal point.” The “stealth mode” that the gold market is currently in, will break as more and more recognition of this bull run takes place, says Hathaway. “The first step would be a recognition, on the part of the financial media, that a bull market has been in place for some time,” says the note, “The second step would be for the same providers of financial misinformation to predict more of the same and explain why.” But he says that an end to the bull run seems a while a away. “The essential component of a secular top for gold would be an equivalent low in financial assets,” says the note, “The peak in the current gold bull market will coincide with the end of the road for elitist social engineering, the government wish machine, and the hoax of unlimited dollar issuance.” mineweb.net

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/21/2004 4:50:30 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Absolute Power Erupts _______________________ By MAUREEN DOWD Columnist The New York Times November 21, 2004 WASHINGTON - They're fragile and frazzled, depressed and self-doubting. Trapped in their blue bell jar, drowning in unfulfilled dreams, Democrats are the "Desperate Housewives" of politics. The image of Republicans as the Daddy party and Democrats as the Mommy party came roaring back in 2004, with a chesty President Bush and Dick Cheney prevailing by making the case that they could protect America from vicious terrorists and uxorious gays better than the Brahmin they painted as a sissy. In politics, as on TV, political correctness is out and retro is in. Hillary's bid to be president suddenly appears more wobbly, and the class of new senators looks like a throwback - with half a dozen white male conservative Republicans front and center. At the Republican governors' conference in New Orleans, Ken Mehlman, the Bush campaign manager, answered the question, Who's your daddy party? "If you drive a Volvo and you do yoga, you are pretty much a Democrat," he said. "If you drive a Lincoln or a BMW and you own a gun, you're voting for George Bush." Of course, W. was swaddled by three strong women - Laura Bush, Karen Hughes and Condi Rice - who cleaned up after his political messes. Yet Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney boldly projected the image of confident - if overbearing - husbands who would guard the family home from intruders, while casting John Kerry as the feminized guy who couldn't get his sports references straight, the sort who would sashay about in Yves St. Laurent pajamas, dithering, whither-ing, and fetching bottled water for Teresa while the burglar alarm rang. Democrats were furious to learn last week that Mr. Kerry had squirreled away $15 million in primary donations that he could have spent turning out the vote in Florida and Ohio. Once more trying to have it both ways, Mr. Kerry wanted a nest egg in case of a recount or legal challenges - not exactly the killer mentality that Democrats need. Having gutted their opponents, Republicans are pretending to patch up divisions as they ruthlessly consolidate their gains. Democrats are turning the other cheek. At the opening of his presidential library, Bill Clinton assured the audience that Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry were "good people" who "just see the world differently." The Republican Visigoths are crushing checks and balances and driving Democrats (and moderate Republicans) into subservient, obedient roles, sticking antiabortion provisions into major spending bills. Even the suggestion that Congress has an advise-and-consent role on judges caused the Visigoths to slap Arlen Specter into stocks, until he whimpered he would do their bidding. The party of moral values deemed that crime pays, shielding Tom DeLay with a rule that someone facing a felony charge can still be a leader. The ultracreepy Mr. DeLay de-pantsed Democrats on Friday, sneering: "I understand the Democrat Party's adjustment to their national minority status is frustrating, but their crushing defeat ... should show them that the American people are tired of the politics of personal destruction." Well, yeah. Watching Bush supporters shred a war hero into a war criminal was tiring. This most secretive administration wants to stop the public from getting any facts that might challenge its story line. The Department of Homeland Security is making employees and contractors sign pledges barring them from telling the public about sensitive but unclassified information. Porter Goss has warned C.I.A. employees that they should support the administration and "scrupulously honor our secrecy oath" by letting only the agency's public affairs office and Congressional relations branch talk to the media and Congress. Senate Republicans have voted to allow Bill Frist, the majority leader, to fill vacancies on powerful committees, rather than abiding by the seniority system - a sword over moderates and mavericks. The White House says it wants greater harmony, but it's acting like the thought police. Having run into resistance in their bid for global domination, the president and vice president are going for federal domination, pushing out anyone with independent judgment who puts democracy above ideology. It's a paradoxical game plan: imposing democracy abroad while impeding it here. nytimes.com

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/21/2004 5:03:15 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Mr Greenspan was unequivocal about world interest rates, saying rises "have been advertised for so long in so many places that anyone who has not appropriately hedged his position by now is obviously desirous of losing money". news.ft.com

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/22/2004 12:14:44 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Traditional hedge funds limited to a select few chicagotribune.com Restricted by law to fewer than 100 investors, hedge funds often demand that clients pony up $1 million or more to get in the door. Hedge fund general partners -- the managers -- often invest their own money in the funds as well. Managers are typically paid 1 or 2 percent of clients' invested assets per year, plus about 20 percent of the fund's profits. The funds are designed to deliver results under a variety of market conditions and typically specialize in high-risk stock trading and short-term speculation on bonds, currencies and derivatives. (Derivatives, securities that derive their value from another physical asset, include stock options and futures.) Hedge fund companies sometimes revolve around a single investment strategy such as "fixed-income arbitrage," or taking advantage of price and yield disparities in the bond markets. U.S. hedge funds are exempt from Securities and Exchange Commission reporting requirements, as well as from regulatory restrictions concerning leverage or trading strategies. They cannot advertise or market themselves to the public, only to well-to-do, "qualified" investors. -- Peter Healy Copyright © 2004, The Greenwich Time

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (66833)	11/22/2004 3:10:53 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 89467

Greenspan's Hammer Bludgeoning the Dollar By MIKE WHITNEY Last Thursday's press conference was pure Greenspan. The shriveled Fed-master used his trip to Germany to deliver the roundhouse punch that many had expected for two years. He "warned that the deficit in US trade with the rest of the world could not be sustained indefinitely."(BBC) Really? Does anyone seriously believe that this "road to Damascus" revelation just came to Greenspan while traveling to Europe? He's obviously foreseen the impending train-wreck for months, but stayed quiet so that Bush and Co. could continue looting the treasury. Greenspan is every bit as culpable in America's financial holocaust as his crooked friends in the White House. The trade deficit alone is more than $500 billion in just the last year. That's more than 5% of the country's economy. (Argentina went through its "meltdown" at only 4%) Why does anyone waste their time listening to Greenspan? He spent the last three months soothing jittery investors; crooning romantically that the soaring deficits were no problem. His calming words were little more than a ploy to get his buddy Bush through the election. Now, he does a complete 180, warning that "at some point" interest in the debt-laden dollar will slow, and foreigners will start chucking greenbacks from the sinking ship. It was a con-job from the get-go. Did anyone believe that the laws of economics had been revoked by imperial fiat? Certainly, "number-cruncher" Greenspan knew what was in store; he could figure that $500 Billion deficits carry with them a hefty bit of pain. And, this is just the first bump in a rut-filled road. The worst is yet to come. Greenspan is a thoroughly shameful waste of protoplasm. At one moment, he's cautioning Clinton against "paying off the national debt, too fast", and in the next, he's deflating interest rates to facilitate a war in Iraq. It doesn't matter what the choice is, as long as it serves America's oligarchs, Alan's on board. Now, of course, there's very little "Maestro" (Bob Woodward's term of endearment) can do. The dollar is freefalling and interest rates will have to go up. All the zillions of dollars that have been navigated to the bulging pockets of Bush's friends (via the tax cuts) have done nothing to resuscitate the comatose economy. The nation will have to tough it out by savaging Social Security and slashing away at public services. ( a prospect that warms the cockles of Greenspan's neo-con heart) Even more tragic, the Republican House is voting on Monday "to raise the national debt ceiling by $800 billion to $8.2 trillion"; ensuring that the shackle of debt will be affixed to every American newborn for generations to come. (The increase is the third in as many years) The "moral values" crowd should be tickled to find out that their champions in Congress mortgaged their future at the same time they were saving the nation from the scourge of gay marriage. "I think there must be some spiritual immorality for children who are yet unborn to come into this world with a debt on their shoulders that their parents have no idea as to how it was accumulated," said Charles Rangel, top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee. Rangel was roundly derided by his Republican counterparts. "What a fuddy-duddy", they mocked. Even so, the borrowed billions should keep the country on life-support for the short term and leave the Bush-devotees believing that their messiah is making prudent choices. Maybe we should invest in some smelling salts for when the ugly truth rears up and shows that the Crawford cabal "took from us everything they could steal". (Thanks, Bob Dylan) The larger problem is the economic tsunami that'll hit when foreign investors start cashing in their dollars in reaction to the profligate behavior of the Congress. "Under the worst-case scenarios, the dollar would plummet, stock prices would plunge and US interest rates would soar, hurting US and global growth." (L.A. Times) No one doubts that a run on the dollar will send the world reeling towards recession or worse. A report in the UK Independent says: "Europe and Japan failed yesterday to persuade the United States to address the decline in the dollar, despite talks at a fractious meeting of the Group of 20 industrialized and developing nations The US insisted the dollar's decline was not on the agenda at the meeting, while European politicians have been anxious for action to stem the rise in the euro that threatens to bring their economy to a halt." In other words, dollar devaluation was all part of the Bush Administration's plan. It's one element in a broader strategy to pulverize the EU and force them make changes in their social structure. In fact, the neocons see the EU as their ideological adversary; a veritable spawn of the socialistic menace. A falling dollar is a calculated body-blow to corporate America's biggest rival; that's not an advantage they're likely to give up easily. Unfortunately, once currency begins a downward plunge it's not always possible to control the trajectory. It's a risky maneuver that sober people wouldn't attempt. As America's good fortune melts into a bottomless chasm of debt, Greenspan stands firm in his praise of the Bush tax cuts. It's truly astonishing. He can see the road ahead, full of deprivation and struggle for millions of his countryman, and yet, he dismisses it with a shrug of the shoulders. The only thing that seems to matter is that every last drop of blood and scrap of bone be transferred to the 1% on the top of the social dog pile. Now, that's loyalty. We should ponder Greenspan's prophecy, as circuitous and opaque as it may be: "Given the size of the US current account deficit, a diminished appetite for adding to dollar balances must occur at some point." The message is clear; the Fed's policies have driven a wooden stake through the heart of the dollar. A lot of people are going to be hurt by the aftershocks. ________________________________ Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can be reached at: fergiewhitney@msn.com counterpunch.org