see sarah palin...

(07-22-2010 04:45 AM)ctkatz Wrote:  

(07-14-2010 05:55 PM)UofL07 Wrote:  This is one reason why I think it is easy for conservatives to "prove" why government doesn't work. Making government work is a laborious effort - it takes compromise, effort, dedication, and a willingness to sacrifice political capital. However, making government not work is relatively easy. All a party has to do is make the political process as muddled and partisan as possible. Refuse to compromise on anything, threaten to filibuster every proposal sent to them, drag out appointments as much as possible, etc. Essentially, you are fulfilling your own prophesy (I will do my best to make government not work therefore proving my point that government doesn't work).

remember ronald wilson reagan's famous line, "the nine most feared words in the english language are, 'i'm from the government and i'm here to help'"? talk about self fulfilling prophecy. he gives that line, and instead of making government better, he makes it worse by hiring a bunch of idiot neophytes who know slightly more than i do about their job. it was also his economic policies which led to where we are today. reagan is a paean to the republican party but a peon to everyone else who had some sense.

manufacturing is the easiest way to spur on the economy. so why not write a new law stating that all manufacturing companies who employ x number of employees or operate y number of factories in the united states must list their official headquarters in the united states. any company found in violation will have all of their tax credits and federal subsidies revoked. and then at the same time impose duties on major manufactured goods imported into the country if a similar or same item is made in the united states. what that would do is encourage domestic manufacturing. if those multinational companies pull out, that leaves a vacuum for another enterprising american business to fill. and with the benefit of making stuff in america they get a built in price break compared to things from the foreign markets. and if those multinational companies comply, it would not only encourage domestic manufacturing but it would also bring in that tax revenue that is hidden in the cayman islands every year.

i'm no economist, but that's how i would perceive it playing out.

Your right that manufacturing is the best way to fix the economy. The problem is your solution to thats socialism to force companies to hire. The best solution is for us to buy American to build demand for American goods.

(07-22-2010 01:02 PM)animus Wrote:  Your right that manufacturing is the best way to fix the economy. The problem is your solution to thats socialism to force companies to hire. The best solution is for us to buy American to build demand for American goods.

I agree and if we really want to user Government power to bring some manufacturing jobs back, you want it to be incentivized not the other way around. There is some growth in the demand for American goods. People are growing tired of the God awful quality of many of the imported goods we consume. People are saying wait a minute when they see their apple juice is coming from apples grown primarily in 3rd World Countries. If there's one thing we are able to produce en masse its food. We're truly blessed to have so much suitable land for agriculture in this country. To me its about marketing the desirability of American goods effectively and people will start buying.

(07-13-2010 05:57 PM)animus Wrote:  Its easy for people point fingers and blama Obama and/or Bush for our economic failures. But its more than just who's President. Our economic problems are much deeper than that.

1. Get rid of the Federal Reserve. There is no reason for a private bank to set the Federal Interest rates to any level it please's at a certain time.

2. We need to change our entire economic system. This credit based society we currently have is lunacy. First it raise's the demand which drives up prices due to inflation. Look at home prices since the mid 90's for example. We must have a save first mentality. There is no reason for a kid to get a college education and be 50k(being conservative here) in debt before he/she even enters the workforce. And in our current economic times he/she may not even find a job in the field he/she wants. We as a society completely live outside of our means. I'm not advocating police going door to door to look at personal belongings. But there is no reason for a family of 4 to own 4 computers and 4 cell phones while your family debt continues to grow. Stop spending money you don't have.

If we have a safe first mentality. Then programs such as Social Security aren't needed. We'd have the people looking at IRA's first.

Other programs need to go, even if we think they are good. The American taxpayer cannot survive paying more taxes. And we we don't get rid of these programs the country will go bankrupt. Printing excess money, Taxation, and Inflation only helps out a little bit. Look at it this way, if our Government got rid of every Department and Programs it runs and keeps Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, our country will still be trillions of dollars in debt.

Whats good in Montana may not be good in Utah so to speak. If the people of Utah want a state run health care system, let Utah run it.


3. The next time the NYSE is ready to collapse. Let it. Stop saving the too big to fails at the taxpayer expense. In the 40-50 year long term a correction is much needed. Yes we'd have a 4-5 year Depression, if not longer. But if we keep saving the Market, when it finally crash's its going to be deeper and harsher than the original correction intended. A Depression might get us out of this debt first society we currently have.

4. Its time to bring all of our troops home. Our country cannot afford to keep its empire running abroad. We need to shut down the basis in Germany, Japan and everywhere inbetween.

Basic analysis, more State Power and less Federal influence on issues like education and healthcare. Stop spending money we don't have(citizens and government alike). Bringing the troops home.

Another side note: 46 States are currently bankrupt or about to be bankrupt. I don't care what any Bloomberg, CNBC, or Fox Business Analsyst tells me. I hate how they lie and say we're in recovery mode. Our economy is in worse shape than they are leading on, and needs a complete overhaul or we will be a 3rd Wold Country. Its apparent neither political party wants to attack the real problem at hand and they'd rather blame the other side of the aisle. Its a dirty shame.

Agree with pretty much everything you said here.

1. The Federal Reserve has been blatantly violating both its charter and the Constitution without anything being done against it. The idea of the Federal Reserve isn't wrong in principle, but given actual results, I'd favor ending it. (For the record, before it was created, inflation and deflation were about equal historically, since then, only periods of severe economic turmoil has there been deflation, this is something that benefits a growing government (since you need them) and people who would rather have you invest money than save it).

2. Our entire economy has been based on more debt for some time. All most of this debt is though is pulling forward demand. Instead of eating a hamburger tomorrow, we eat it today. Tomorrow we still have to pay for it and the interest though. Rather than paying though, we borrow money for another one.

That our government policies have made it easier to borrow money and easier to hide it (which is fraud, but is never prosecuted as such) has been a long term disaster. It's not going to get better as interest catches up with you. It's already caught up with the private economy (which finally has debt slowly decreasing as people/companies are forced to default), but the federal government spending at 10%+ of GDP is now there. Even with it though, we haven't seen any real recovery in the non-government sector. The point we see all the marbles drop is when the federal government can't do this spending anymore.

3. "Too big to fail" is one of the biggest lies out there. Anything that is too big to fail is too big to save. By supporting Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the debt has just been moved from money the creditors (mostly big banks) would have lost to money the taxpayers are now covering. It's also the ultimate moral hazard, as the short term benefits of doing stupid things (say buying and issuing mortgages that on average will lose you money), is great when you know you'll be bailed out in the end anyway.

Through the governments bailout mentality we have effectively moved the risk from individual companies to the government as a whole. Hoping to avoid a serious recession we have guaranteed a big depression (I see almost no way it isn't worse than the 30s Great Depression), and we now have the possibility of the once unthinkable, a political collapse. Before anyone laughs at that, think about just how badly Democrats are doing only two years after a massive sweep and imagine how things can go if things get a lot worse.

Also important to note, is just how wide the bailouts have been. Most are mostly backdoor. Bailing out AIG for instance, helps the banks big time as the credit default swaps they bought (often without even owning a property, a naked short in all but name and legal status) are worth full value instead of pennies on the dollar as they should have been.

4. I'm a little divided on bringing all troops home, but I might be able to go with this anyway. I would bring them home from Afghanistan immediately (the likelihood of any serious long term good there is slight to begin with). I'd phase out of Iraq as soon as possible too. I might keep something in the Middle East though, as a war there which shuts off oil would be devastating. I probably would also keep a little in Asia and in eastern Europe.

That said, I'm split in that sentiment. If the government loses the ability to borrow (which will happen suddenly, not gradually), those troops could definitely be in harms way. On the other hand, if we have a big war (and they often accompany economic collapses), I don't want us without close allies.

Finally I agree neither party is going to do what needs to be done. I think we are going to see the biggest economic collapse in the history of the country whether it takes a year or 10 years to recognize it as a fact. After that, things are very unpredictable and you could go back to less government or you could end up with something as bad as a totalitarian government.

(07-22-2010 07:44 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  The biggest problem that I see with our form of government is that being good at governing isn't a requirement for those who serve us. The only requirement they have is being popular, and popularity doesn't need or require competence...

I agree with your sentiment and your signature.

The only thing I'd say is a bigger problem is that the solution is always giving the government more power, more say, regardless of whether they were using the powers they already had anyway.

Ohio1317,

I look at it this way, if there is a war, we keep our noses out of it unless we're attacked. We seemed pretty good up until WW1 and WW2 of keeping our noses out of the worlds business and we could do it again. We have enough resources in our own country to survive and prosper. If we cut out the majority of our defense budget we can send every kid to college for free.

We were good at staying out of other people's business, unless they were among the people we were fighting here at home. We've always been good at finding somebody to shoot at. Look at our history...