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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Steve Lokness who wrote (194222)	7/18/2012 10:50:33 AM
From: Metacomet	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543468

Most of those on the right see this trainwreck coming and want to do something about it before it is too late. But refuse to acknowledge that it is policies advanced by the right that set the train wreck in motion, unsustainable tax cuts and unnecessary, off budget wars for political "effect"...oh and repeal of that job killing Glass-Steagall law Nor do they exhibit the common sense that would be associated with a recovery by supporting policies that would keep the enterprise alive until a recovery could be engineered, you know like Roosevelt

To: Steve Lokness who wrote (194222)	7/18/2012 10:57:16 AM
From: epicure	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543468

Steve, I think most of us see the train wreck coming- but some of us would like a managed solution. Contracting spending heavily while on the cusp of a recession, or in a recession, is just stupid. That would throw us in to a depression. What we need to do is keep your level of concern when things are going well, and do something then. What were you saying in 2000? It's funny how most people get all angsty at all the wrong times, but it creates terrific opportunities in the market. However, in this case, if you really want to solve things, you'll look at the long game. Bring the government debt down when the economy recovers. Support the economy and prevent a depression, so the recovery can happen sooner, rather than later. Might we be taken down anyway, by Europeans who don't make good decisions? Absolutely. But still- we should try not to recreate the mistakes of the past. Let's at least try something different. We know how to recreate the great depression. Let's not do that. Might we still encounter a depression? Yes, we might. But at least we don't have to go running to it with our arms wide open.

To: Steve Lokness who wrote (194222)	7/18/2012 11:28:03 AM
From: Sam	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 543468

the issue most conservatives have is not spending on essential government responsibilities - BUT rather the reality that the spending path we are on is unsustainable. But, Steve, there is a lot of ignorance out there. Here, for example, is part of a post from one of the more vocal self-styled conservatives on SI: Being a conservative, I believe firmly that the one task of the Federal Government is to provide for the defense and offense of the nation....The defense budget is about 1 to 2% of the budget-------before decimating the defense budget let's look at the rest of the trillions in debt that has been created under Mr. Obama. I will leave her anonymous, but she is shrilly ignorant of the fact that defense is around 20% of the budget even if you only count what is in the official, "straightforward" DoD budget, and more like 35% or so if you look at the line items in other parts of the budget that are really for defense. And of course there was the piece below on how much the US spends on foreign aid. A lot of the hysteria you hear about the budget is grounded in complete ignorance. Which isn't to say that there isn't a problem, there clearly is, but.... American Public Vastly Overestimates Amount of U.S. Foreign Aid November 29, 2010 worldpublicopinion.org Questionnaire with Findings, Methodology (PDF) As debates about how to deal with the budget deficit have heated up in recent weeks, a new WorldPublicOpinion.org/Knowledge Networks poll finds that Americans continue to vastly overestimate the amount of the federal budget that is devoted to foreign aid. Asked to estimate how much of the federal budget goes to foreign aid the median estimate is 25 percent. Asked how much they thought would be an "appropriate" percentage the median response is 10 percent. In fact just 1 percent of the federal budget goes to foreign aid. Even if one only includes the discretionary part of the federal budget, foreign aid represents only 2.6 percent. This set of questions has been asked repeatedly since the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) first asked them in 1995, and it was subsequently asked by other organizations as well. Over the years the most common median estimate was that foreign aid represented 20 percent of the budget, most recently in a 2004 poll by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

To: Steve Lokness who wrote (194222)	7/18/2012 12:12:25 PM
From: Win Smith	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543468

Most of those on the right see this trainwreck coming and want to do something about it before it is too late. Not to pile on, because I think you're pretty honest about this, but do you see any evidence of anybody visible on the right proposing anything particularly reasonable on that front? Because all I see is constant reiteration of the need for more tax cuts for rich people first and foremost, with draconian cuts in everything but defense spending to finance it. Although the preferred method of finance is, as ever, the miracle of supply side economics, snort. Ok, there are things like Simpson-Bowles, but I don't hear Romney or much of anybody else talking about that. Instead, it's the Ryan budget. Sadly, in a Republican takeover, I'd guess that the tax cuts would be shoved through first and foremost, and the spending cuts would sort of crumble as popular resistance to the specifics bubbled up. And it'd be W all over again, except from a far weaker base. Every since Reagan and supply side aka voodoo economics came into vogue, Republican fiscal responsibility has been pretty oxymoronic, but compared to Reagan, the current GOP is totally off the deep end. Friggin' RINO, that Reagan. I actually respect libertarians a lot more than the visible GOP leadership, but I'm sorry, Ron Paul may have the inspired youth, but he has no apparent traction with or influence on the national party. Not to exonerate the Democrats, who remain, more than ever, Will Rogers' "no organized political party". Democrats muddling through don't inspire confidence, but given the alternative Republican dream of a return to a gilded age of no regulations, no significant taxes on rich people, and no brakes on whatever excesses Wall Street can dream up to enrich itself at the expense of people who actually do things, I'll go with the muddling. Far from an ideal solution, for sure, but we don't exactly have a rich menu to choose from here.