Tag: ek Politics

When Double Dippers become economic party poopers

By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer

Sat Jul 31, 11:11 am ET

WASHINGTON – They’re a minority, but a vocal one, and they’re hovering like storm clouds over a brittle recovery.

…

Are double dippers becoming recovery party poopers?

“If consumers are hearing a lot of bad economic news and they’re already scared, they might pull back some more,” said Nigel Gault, chief U.S. economist for IHS Global Insight.

There are 15 million people unemployed. “Employers might be willing to hire more if consumer spending was doing better,” Gault said. “But then maybe consumer spending won’t start doing better until employers start to hire.”

…

With such a mindset, warnings of an impending double dip-recession can hit home because “consumer behavior is driven by outlook, not only people’s present situation but their future concerns,” said Pew associate director Michael Dimock.

Magical thinking is the solution to everything!

Here’s a pair of interesting factoids from Think Progress–

The first is that 96% of the $9.1 BILLION in the special Iraq reconstruction fund set up with the proceeds from Iraqi oil sales can’t be accounted for.

96%.

The second is that Fox News viewers are 1.38% African-American.

Umm… in the polling biz we call that statistically insignificant because it’s within the margin of error.  It’s just as likely that there’s not a SINGLE African-American who watches Fox.

‘But ek’, you say.  ‘What about Michael Steele?’

If you were getting the kind of coverage Michael Steele is getting, would you be watching Fox?

Every time our policy elites whine about how hard it is to be them I just have to laugh.

What they mean is it’s hard to keep the lies straight in the face of the truth.

No more ‘me first’ mentality on entitlements

By Neel Kashkari, The Washington Post

Monday, July 26, 2010

Cutting entitlement spending requires us to think beyond what is in our own immediate self-interest. But it also runs against our sense of fairness: We have, after all, paid for entitlements for earlier generations. Is it now fair to cut my benefits? No, it isn’t. But if we don’t focus on our collective good, all of us will suffer.

Getting Lost in the Fog of War

By ANDREW EXUM, The New York Times

Published: July 26, 2010

Many experts on the war, both in the military and the press, have long been struggling to come to grips with the conflict’s complexity and nuances. What is the public going to make of this haphazard cache of documents, many written during combat by officers with little sense of how their observations fit into the fuller scope of the war?

Well that’s an excellent question Paul and I have no doubt my readers are fully capable of looking up the link themselves.

Indeed I expect they are generally familiar with the principles of Economics 101 and Keynesianism which along with Smith is really the foundation of macro economics to the extent it can be claimed a science and not astrology.

How is it the conservative point of view ignores the classics?

And yet they’re upset that we call them ignorant.

Golly gee, seems to be a big kerfluffle in DC as institutional Democrats finally start reading some polls and find out that Villain Shifting and Blame the ‘Thugs ain’t gonna fool none of the people none of the time this time.

Folks, you read it here years and months ahead.  ‘I told you so‘ schadenfreude is an unavoidable reaction.

Anyone who claims they care about ‘Electoral Victory’ is a liar.

Now that it’s too fucking late to do anything about bad policy what is going to stave off the inevitable defeat they richly deserve?

How about some firings Barack?

How about Rahm “Fuck You” Emanuel?  What about “Peter Principle” Timmeh and Larry “Always Wrong” Summers?

Do I want to see heads on pikes?

Metaphorically yes.  These people have failed so badly their firing is already inevitable and has been for months which is why they are trying to fluff their crash pads.  Why not before the election while you can get some bounce from it Barack?

We vote for change and we’re going to keep voting until we get it.

How do you make Dems care about the midterms?

Posted at 4:20 PM ET, 07/12/2010

The White House and Dems have made this case every which way: They’ve charged that Republicans will again rule as stooges of Big Oil and Wall Street. They’ve claimed that Republicans will rain a blizzard of subpoenas on the White House if they take control of Congress. They’ve framed the elections as a choice between the policies that got us into this mess and those that are getting us out of it. And so forth.

Yet rank and file Dems don’t appear to care that much. The latest polling shows that the “enthusiasm gap” remains the same, with Republicans far more excited about voting than Dems are. In other words, Dem scaremongering about the GOP takeover doesn’t yet appear to be revving up Dems to turn out this fall.

What if the only way to boost Dem enthusiasm isn’t to reveal how successful those awful Republicans were in rendering the Dems quasi-powerless, but to succeed in spite of this problem and do more to mitigate the crisis and the pain it’s caused?