Is it Just Me?
January 26th, 2009 . by tgirschIs anyone else tired of hearing John Boehner wax philosophical on the irresponsibility of the proposed economic stimulus package? Don’t get me wrong, I want naysayers to be a part of the process, making sure that whatever package passes is a good one. But for Boehner to have suddenly “found Jesus” on budget deficits is laughable. It’s even more laughable to hear him complain about the debt we’re “saddling our children with.” Nice time to start concerning yourself with that, John Boy.
Even worse, Boehner doesn’t want a smaller stimulus package — he just wants one with less spending and more tax cuts. Guess what: Contrary to what St. Reagan may have told you, cutting the revenue side of the equation has a negative impact on the nation’s bottom line, just as increasing the spending side of the equation does. So it seems that Boehner’s objection isn’t to “saddling our children with more debt,” but with who benefits in the short term from our doing so.
Untold tens of billions of dollars vanished without a trace in Iraq — pallets of cash, flown in on C-130s. All gone.
Never a peep lo these many years from the wingnut chorus.
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Tgirsch, I understand what you are saying about Boehner suddenly getting religion.
But while it is true that tax cuts will create debt, as much as spending, there is a big difference about who is empowered. Spending empowers the government, while tax cuts empower the private sector. Now I know that as a Democrat, you love the government, but this country and all of it’s ingenuity was not created by any government. Jobs, long term jobs, are created by entrepreneurs and private sector investments.
For every dollar that your dear government spends T, it has to confiscate a dollar thirty.
A real stimulus plan would be a huge across the board cut in corporate taxes. But that ain’t happening, because even though it would really stimulate this economy, it would not shore up political support for the Democrats, whose goal is to shrink the amount of people paying taxes, and extend the welfare state, in order to further their political power.
Now I know that as a Democrat, you love the government, but this country and all of it’s ingenuity was not created by any government.
I know! And guys like you, who prosper in anarchy and upheaval should go somewhere where the tax rates are fairer! Iraq’s not the only place this is true — do your research, and I’ll do a bleg to get you moved, ASAP.
Sorry, but you need U.S. more than we need you, pal.
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Glen:
That’s an interesting statistic. Because according to most estimates, for every dollar the government spends, it increases the GDP by $1.40.
And I still would love to know how a huge, across the board cut in corporate income taxes is supposed to accomplish anything, other than lining the pockets of CEOs and fat-cat shareholders. Why would any sane corporation, given a windfall of tax savings, choose to invest that spending on making things in a down market, when people aren’t buying? Why would they spend on increasing supply when there isn’t demand for the current supply? (After all, you’re the one who insists that demand can’t be created, so if the demand is lacking, then there’s no incentive to try to meet nonexistent demand.)
The average Joe is strapped for cash, and would still be strapped for cash even if you completely eliminated the corporate income tax. So I’m just missing the magic of how a corporate tax cut, especially one with no strings attached, is supposed to stimulate anything.
The reason spending makes sense in a severe recession like ours is not because it injects capital into the system, but because it injects demand into the system. Spending on a roadway project (for example) creates demand for steel, concrete, construction workers, etc., and that demand propagates throughout the larger economy.
To put it your way, spending empowers the workers who are hired to carry out those projects, while the tax cuts you pine for empower people who are already wealthy and who need the money and empowerment the least. Now, propose a targeted tax cut, one which corporations only qualify for by spending on domestic employment, then maybe we can talk. But in the meantime, you’re using the underpants gnomes theory of economic stimulus:
1. Cut corporate taxes
2. ????
3. Economy fixed!
P.S. If you think that long-term jobs are the exclusive domain of the private sector, there are hundreds of thousands of government employees who would beg to differ.
A pretty unbelievably stupid statement. Do you really believe that in real dollars, you know the ones that account for inflation, a phenomena created by SPENDING, that your statement is true?
So you really think that allowing businesses, you know job creators, to keep their own money would have absolutely no effect on JOB CREA-FREAKING-ATION? Amazing. Speaking of the average Joe, does that guy not own 401Ks and IRA’s. Cut the corporate income tax and that wealth skyrockets tomorrow. Businesses that move off shore will come back. Foreign investors will flood this country.
Bullshit! Spending empowers the government. Spending empowers a bureaucracy. If you want do some real demand side Keynesian spending, then send everybody cash. Take 850 billion, divide it by every taxpayer and send out big checks. But no, you won’t do that either, because that would not empower the government bureaucrats. That would not empower the unions, and specific corporations, that Barack has to tend to. That would not help out his “green agenda”. No that would empower individuals. Can’t do that.
The most amazing thing about your Democratic logic, is that, while you oppose an across the board corporate tax cut, you support targeted bailouts to corporations that are failures. The fallacy of this discussion and most discussions of this sort is that people like me are portrayed as pro-big business. That is false. I am pro-free market. It is the Democrats that are pro-big business. They are the true fascists.
Btw, I would prefer that the government do nothing. No tax cuts, no spending increases. This economy is sick and it needs to sweat this fever out before it gets better.
What causes me the most amusement in this situation is that the GOP has no power to stop what is to come. They should embrace that, and hope like Limbaugh does that it fails.
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Limbaugh doesn’t hope “it” will fail. He knows that if these policies are implemented, they will most assuredly fail. What he hopes is that Obama fails to get them implemented.
But you’re right. We are about to see a huge transformation of the American economy, away from the Reagan Revolution, towards what we see in Western Europe where double digit unemployment is a way of life.
Glen:
You still haven’t answered the basic question of how tax-cuts-for-stimulus is supposed to work. Businesses won’t spend the money to hire people unless they think that doing so will make them money. But they’re not making money and current employment levels, and so are cutting jobs. How is giving the companies a no-strings-attached tax cut supposed to adjust the demand curve in a way that would justify them hiring more people.
As for why you don’t just divide up the money and give everyone cash, it’s for the same reason you don’t give blanket, no-strings-attached tax cuts: doing so wouldn’t be targeted, and you need to target the stimulus in the areas where it’s needed. If you create jobs — whether through tax cuts or through spending projects — you’re taking people off the unemployment rolls and putting them back into the workforce, and putting them back into the tax base in the process. So it’s not just about getting money out there, it’s about employing people. If the private sector were employing people, then there would be no need for a stimulus package.
But when you have liberal economist Dean Baker and a guy from the Heritage Foundation both basically agreeing that the economy is in terrible shape, and that an aggressive stimulus package is needed, that’s a pretty good indicator of the folly of hoping that the government will do nothing and allow the economy to collapse “on principle.”
Who gets to say where it’s needed? The freakin’ MARKET, that’s who. If a business gets a tax cut, and puts that revenue back into the business, then however they use it (hiring help, remodeling the CEO’s office, buying hookers for the top sales staff) that money is in circulation. Circulation of money keeps the economy moving. Right now, circulation is almost halted; people aren’t spending, companies aren’t buying (or selling), people are laid off. We’ve got to get money circulating again, and the best way is not by pointing to a certain sector and saying, ‘you, dig a new ditch here’.
Across-the-board corporate tax cuts and capital gains tax cuts, because..
We’ll see. This is the ultimate live test, isn’t it?
Got your money on your man?
Who gets to say where it’s needed?
Which party has both legislative houses and the executive?
I’d say elections have consequences. You need to be even more anti-American, and hope Obama fails. Else, continued irrelevance for you and yours.
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While JP is correct that elections have consequences, we’re fortunate enough to have one of those rare moments where Republicans and Democrats agree — the focus needs to be on job creation and job preservation. The only disagreement concerns how to achieve that goal.
If you give out a big corporate tax cut, and the corporations and CEOs pocket the extra cash, that doesn’t do a whole lot to create jobs or stimulate the economy. It’s even worse if they use the extra money to make foreign investments, because then you’ve bought zero domestic economic benefit with your cut.
Now, as I said to Glen, if you make the cuts contingent upon actually hiring people, maybe we can talk. But for whatever reason, tax cut proponents never want to put such conditions on the cuts. They just want to make the cuts and trust everyone to use the extra money in ways that actually help.
And still nobody has answered the question of why businesses would hire more people in the absence of demand. I think I know why not.
Finally, as for Rush and his ilk, their big fear is that a spending-heavy, tax-cut lite stimulus bill will pass and work. Because if it works, it blows their argument out of the water. (Even the tax cuts that exist in the current bill are targeted and focused on the working class, rather than the “trickle down” variety they prefer.)
I’ll respond tonight when not at work, but I will say that the problem is not demand, as the Keynesians have taught you, but a contraction of the money supply. Taxes are a business expense. Take away that business expense and that money goes into research and development and investment. Tax cuts grow the economy, and speaking of Keynes, he was not opposed to them. But like I said, I don’t have time to go too in depth right now. Meanwhile T, maybe you can justify these “targeted” bailouts. Like I said, the real party of big business is the Democrats.
Glen:
Maybe you should think about the ways in which the targeted bailouts prove that YOUR argument doesn’t work. After all, if the problem is that there’s not enough money available, and if companies — given a windfall of extra cash — would spend that money in ways that stimulate the economy, then why hasn’t the bailout worked?
The truth is, they haven’t spent their “found money” in that way at all, and that’s the problem.
To get the economy moving again, you have to put the money into the hands of people who will spend it, and who will do so in ways that stimulate the economy. Concentrating that money on people who are already wealthy and don’t really need it isn’t going to change the fact that nobody’s buying anything.
You’re right that Keynes didn’t oppose tax cuts, but he didn’t think they were the be-all and end-all, as you seem to. And I don’t think he ever argued that those cuts should be blanket cuts aimed solely at the top brackets, either.
tgirsch writes, “Because according to most estimates, for every dollar the government spends, it increases the GDP by $1.40.”
tgirsch, again you are mistaken. Why you fall for this I will never understand.
Learn something. Seriously.
Broken window theory:
The parable describes a shopkeeper whose window is broken by a little boy. Everyone sympathizes with the man whose window was broken, but pretty soon they start to suggest that the broken window makes work for the glazier, who will then buy bread, benefiting the baker, who will then buy shoes, benefiting the cobbler, etc. Finally, the onlookers conclude that the little boy was not guilty of vandalism; instead he was a public benefactor, creating economic benefits for everyone in town.
Okay, who can point of the fallacy of the broken window theory?
tgirsch, do you have your hand up?
Number 9:
That’s not the broken window theory. This is.
And the problem with the parable of the broken window, as you’re trying to apply it here, is that it doesn’t apply. In our current circumstances, there’s no concern that the shopkeeper is now unable to spend the money it cost to fix the window on something else, because we know that part of the current problem is that the shopkeeper isn’t spending money on anything, and neither is anyone else.
The other problem here is that you’re trying to draw a parallel between collective action taken by a legitimate, democratically-elected representative body (impacting everyone) and vandalism committed by one person against one person.
This underscores the problem with you libertarian types. You have no concept that macroeconomics are a completely different animal than microeconomics.
tgirsch, learn something.
The parable of the broken window was created by Frédéric Bastiat in his 1850 essay Ce qu’on voit et ce qu’on ne voit pas (That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Unseen) to illuminate the notion of hidden costs.
I know you think you are the decider. But not so. Bastiat’s parable is better known than the George L. Kelling column which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly. Also it preceded Kelling by 132 years.
Again, I am not a libertarian. But you wouldn’t know what a conservative is would you?
tgirsch writes, “The other problem here is that you’re trying to draw a parallel between collective action taken by a legitimate, democratically-elected representative body (impacting everyone) and vandalism committed by one person against one person.”
Why not just say socialism now? Your love for the collective is legend. Why not just say government is the solution?
Rather than claiming that only the enlightened understand macroeconomics and microeconomics why not just admit your team has no understanding of hidden costs and opportunity costs. You live in a fantasy world. Your team’s fantasy of everyone being dragged down to the same level can be read here:
http://instruct.westvalley.edu/lafave/hb.html
or seen here:
http://www.finallyequal.com/
So much of what I hear from social democrats is based on Tall Poppy syndrome.
We should have equal rights. Not enforced equality by dragging down people who can achieve. Someday Atlas will shrug. It is already happening. People who achieve are not mules to pull the wagon for those who are afraid to achieve or are too lazy to try.
The entire world is watching. Your team has the power the govern. Will they govern wisely? So far it appears not to be so.
tgirsch, learn something.
The parable of the broken window was created by Frédéric Bastiat in his 1850 essay Ce qu’on voit et ce qu’on ne voit pas (That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Unseen) to illuminate the notion of hidden costs.
I know you think you are the decider. But not so. Bastiat’s parable is better known than the George L. Kelling column which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly. Also it preceded Kelling by 132 years.
Again, I am not a libertarian. But you wouldn’t know what a conservative is would you?
tgirsch writes, “The other problem here is that you’re trying to draw a parallel between collective action taken by a legitimate, democratically-elected representative body (impacting everyone) and vandalism committed by one person against one person.”
Why not just say socialism now? Your love for the collective is legend. Why not just say government is the solution?
Rather than claiming that only the enlightened understand macroeconomics and microeconomics why not just admit your team has no understanding of hidden costs and opportunity costs. You live in a fantasy world. Your team’s fantasy of everyone being dragged down to the same level can be seen here:
http://www.finallyequal.com/
So much of what I hear from social democrats is based on Tall Poppy syndrome.
We should have equal rights. Not enforced equality by dragging down people who can achieve. Someday Atlas will shrug. It is already happening. People who achieve are not mules to pull the wagon for those who are afraid to achieve or are too lazy to try.
The entire world is watching. Your team has the power the govern. Will they govern wisely? So far it appears not to be so.
This whole debate is pointless.
The fact is, the U.S. is being run by criminals. Yes, that is even true today, under the Obama administration. There will be no change, except the lies may be more eloquent.
What is ironic is that we call suicide bombers “cowards” while we blow up wedding parties using unmanned drones.
People are so confused as to how the law and justice work that they are asking to be shown a piece of paper to prove that kidnapping, torture, murder, looting, and fraud are against the law. And I’m ‘unbelievable’!!??!?
This current U.S. is very similar to pre-WWII Germany. But Americans refuse to understand or believe this because the only thing they know about history is what they are fed by their overlords. All we need is some serious hyper-inflation (gee, ya think there’s any chance of that?) and we can goosestep our way out of our debts by starting a full blown world war. Who should we attack first for being so greedy as to hoard our oil? Iran? Russia? Why not Venezuela? Or even Mexico?
I vote for England. Heh. There’s “terrorists” there too, ya know.
If not, I’m sure we can count on MI6 to drum some up. Then we can hype the threat in the media to bang the drum for war. Oh wait, been there done that.
There’s pirate’s there, too. In fact, the whole place is run by pirates.
Just like here.
But of course, I’m the one who’s “crazy”.
Not the ones sucking down brews, watching the stupidbowl, arguing about which criminals should be running the government.
This current U.S. is very similar to pre-WWII Germany.
It is? Because?
But of course, I’m the one who’s “crazy”.
Not the ones sucking down brews, watching the stupidbowl, arguing about which criminals should be running the government.
So it is “crazy” to not grant rights to terrorists? And that makes the U.S. very similar to pre-WWII Germany?
We have a zero tolerance program in American schools but some feel that terrorists should have equal rights?
I don’t understand your logic. There should be zero tolerance for terrorism.
Number 9:
So it is “crazy” to not grant rights to terrorists?
See, there’s your problem. You’re behaving as if you know, for a fact, that they are terrorists, when in fact you do not. The only thing you know is what the government has told you, and you’ve chosen a very odd place to set aside your general distrust of what the government tells you.
Bastiat’s parable is better known than the George L. Kelling column which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly. Also it preceded Kelling by 132 years.
Setting aside which is “better known,” that doesn’t change the fact that the two are completely different things. “The Broken Window theory” and “the parable of the broken window” are not the same thing, yet you were using the names as if they were exchangeable. Precision of terminology is important.
Of course, you’re not doing yourself any favors by citing a parable that predates the study of macroeconomics. In fact, you’re underscoring my point by doing so.
But you wouldn’t know what a conservative is would you?
No, I wouldn’t, because every time self-described conservatives gain power and screw everything up, other self-described conservatives disown them and claim that the things they did weren’t really “conservative” in the first place.
Why not just say socialism now? Your love for the collective is legend.
I’ve long been on record with my belief that societies work best when socialism and capitalism both exist, in tension with one another, and that whenever either one gains too much strength, it’s bad. Over the last 28 years, the pendulum has swung too far in capitalism’s direction, and we need to correct that. I make no secret of that. You can call me a socialist if you want to, if you think that not reflexively objecting to all things socialistic as if they had cooties makes one a “socialist,” then fine, I’m a socialist, and so are the overwhelming majority of your fellow Americans.
Why not just say government is the solution?
In this particular case, I have said that. Repeatedly. Where have I ever argued anything different? That’s not the same thing as saying that government is always the solution — it’s not. I wouldn’t even say it’s the solution to most problems. Just that it’s part of the solution to many problems.
why not just admit your team has no understanding of hidden costs and opportunity costs.
Said the kettle to the pot. Again, I’ll take you more seriously when you seriously attempt to answer why private businesses will invest in expansion when nobody’s buying what they’re making and selling now.
We should have equal rights. Not enforced equality by dragging down people who can achieve.
We should have roughly equal opportunity, too, but we don’t. And you’ll excuse me if I don’t think that taxing a millionaire at a 39% marginal rate instead of a 35% marginal rate constitutes “dragging down people who can achieve.”
Your team has the power the govern. Will they govern wisely?
Well, they’ll have a hard time doing a worse job than your team did over the last eight years…
See, there’s your problem. You’re behaving as if you know, for a fact, that they are terrorists, when in fact you do not. The only thing you know is what the government has told you, and you’ve chosen a very odd place to set aside your general distrust of what the government tells you.
tgirsch, they were taken from a battlefield fighting against American soldiers not from Ithaca, New York.
Trust the government that these were people trying to kill U.S. soldiers? Yes I do. Why wouldn’t I?
they were taken from a battlefield fighting against American soldiers
There’s problem #2: Many of them were not. But let’s not let the silly facts get in the way of some good old fashioned demagoguery!
Roosevelt and Truman handled this differently. The Gitmo situation has been done in the past. Is it legal? According to whom? No one has cited anything to back up their unique opinions that there is a legal accord to grant rights to terrorists.
The point is that if you allow terrorists rights there will be more terrorists incidents. I get from this discussion you feel terrorists can be reasoned with.
Soldiers have rights for a reason. To encourage that warfare is conducted under certain conditions. Allowing rights for terrorists will expand terrorism.
No one has cited anything to back up their unique opinions that there is a legal accord to grant rights to terrorists.
What happened to erring on the side of liberty? Where’s the legal accord to deny those rights?
The point is that if you allow terrorists rights there will be more terrorists incidents.
And my point is that when you start thinking like that, what’s to stop the government from labeling anyone they want to as a “terrorist,” and bypassing the legal process? In case you haven’t been paying attention, it’s already happening, as the government has started using counter-terror legislation in wholly-unrelated areas like the War on Drugs.
And what’s to stop the list of Groups Undeserving of Basic Human Rights at just “terrorists?” You could argue that any number of groups are “too dangerous” to be afforded the basic rights we afford to everyone else. I’m not much of a slippery slope guy, but that’s a pretty damn slippery slope.
Anyway, as to the rights of Guantánamo detainees, see here and here (PDF).
Trust the government that these were people trying to kill U.S. soldiers? Yes I do. Why wouldn’t I?
Why would you?
Do you think the CIA is a bunch of nice folks looking after your precious security?
And you call other people childish?
There is no such thing as a “terrorist”. That is just a propaganda device.
Warfare is always about the same thing: people fighting over limited resources. It’s just that us peaceniks would rather share than kill.
But don’t fret brother. I am on your side. I am into Jesus peace, not hippie peace.
There is no such thing as a “terrorist”. That is just a propaganda device.
Actually, the word has a definitive meaning.
What slippery slope?
It is already happening.
Join up with a peace group and you will find yourself on a “terror watch list” faster than you can say “seig heil!”.
You see, peace activists are in diametric opposition to the interests of those that seek infinite wealth and power. Trust me, they can’t wait to be rid of that pesky Bill of Rights.
One more “terrorist” attack and we will have to give up the Constitution and move to a military dictatorship in order to have “continuity of government”. At least that’s what they claim. You would think, if this were a democracy,that the media would have been screaming WTF!!!!!!!! Nooooooooooooo!!!!! But no. Just deafening silence. Then a little awkward whistling and looking around.
We should all just wear T-shirts with the word “sucker” emblazened in large print.
The “war on drugs” is not only related to the ‘war on terror”, it’s the same thing.
Where do you think all those drugs come from? You think foreign drug lords are so sophisticated and smart that they outwit our intelligence and enforcement agencies to the tune of millions and millions? Please. State sponsored drug trade is par for the course. Just like false flag operations.
Will that be S,M,L, or XL?
[...] though, Tgirsch is defending the Obama stimulus plan, like a typical Democrat. But how in the hell can he defend this [...]