The Democrat Thread

[kapkomet]

Don't necessarily agree with everything he says, especially on the bank bailouts, but I think the President's speech today is a solid argument.

Yea, I agree. We are too stupid, us Americans, by saving and the government needs to rescue us by spending the money we should be spending. Or something.

 

I still do not believe you can "spend" your way out of a recession. Not long term. Of course this "stimulus" will give us some short term GDP growth but it will not be sustained and at some point, double digit inflation has to take hold. Then what?

 

At least in the 1930's there was production to back up some of the spending - in other words, the market could finally take hold and produce something. What do we have today? China makes everything we have, and what is going to replace this government spending? Answer: nothing.

[Balta1701]

The Times tomorrow is running an expose on the smuggling of guns across the Mexican border.

[BigSqwert]

What an enjoyable read today in Glenn Greenwald's blog.

 

Some highlights:

 

Tuesday April 14, 2009 14:42 EDT

The ultimate reaping of what one sows: right-wing edition

 

...

 

When you cheer on a Surveillance State, you have no grounds to complain when it turns its eyes on you. If you create a massive and wildly empowered domestic surveillance apparatus, it's going to monitor and investigate domestic political activity.

 

...

 

So what's the problem? As the National Review/Bush-following-Right has been telling us for years now, there's nothing to worry about if you've done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide. The first duty of the Government is to protect us all -- keep us safe and warm from all the scary things out there, like a Good Daddy does -- and if they need to trample on some lofty privacy ideals and so-called civil liberties concerns and supposed Constitutional safeguards, well: that's just how it is. It takes a real paranoid hysteric to think that federal government officials have nothing better to do than target domestic political opponents. And besides, what good is the Constitution if we're all dead at the hands of domestic McVeigh-like Terrorists? After all, the Constitution isn't a suicide pact. Remember all of that? I certainly do.

 

This is all as laughable as it is predictable. Just a couple months out of power and they have suddenly re-discovered their fear of the Federal Government and their belief in the need to limit its powers. As I wrote in February about the Glenn Beck Movement that is taking over the Limbaugh/National Review Right:

What wa

s

mo

s

t remar

k

able about thi

s

allegedly "anti-government" movement wa

s

that -- with

s

ome i

s

olated and principled exception

s

-- it completely vani

s

hed upon the election of Republican George Bu

s

h, and it

s

tayed invi

s

ible even a

s

Bu

s

h pre

s

ided over the mo

s

t extreme and inva

s

ive expan

s

ion of federal government power in memory. Even a

s

Bu

s

h

s

eized and u

s

ed all of the power

s

which that movement claimed in the 1990

s

to find

s

o tyrannical and uncon

s

titutional -- limitle

s

s

, unchec

k

ed

s

urveillance activitie

s

, detention power

s

with no over

s

ight, expanding federal police power

s

,

s

ecret pri

s

on camp

s

, even ma

s

s

ively exploding and debt-financed dome

s

tic

s

pending -- they mee

k

ly

s

ubmitted to all of it, even enthu

s

ia

s

tically cheered it all on. . . .

 

But now, only four wee

k

s

into the pre

s

idency of Barac

k

Obama, they are bac

k

-- angrier and more che

s

t-beating than ever. Actually, the mere threat of an Obama pre

s

idency wa

s

enough to revitalize them from their eight-year

s

lumber, awa

k

en them from their camouflaged, well-armed

s

uburban cave

s

.

[lostfan]

Also: spending is bad if you raise taxes to pay for it, but ok if you lower taxes without lowering spending and create a gaping hole in the deficit. Until a Democrat takes over, then the actual cause of the deficit is irrelevant.

Edited April 15, 2009 by lostfan

[StrangeSox]

Also: spending is bad if you raise taxes to pay for it, but ok if you lower taxes without lowering spending and create a gaping hole in the deficit. Until a Democrat takes over, then the actual cause of the deficit is irrelevant.

 

Isn't that basically what Reagan did?

[kapkomet]

What an enjoyable read today in Glenn Greenwald's blog.

 

Some highlights:

What does this have to do with anything?

 

[kapkomet]

Also: spending is bad if you raise taxes to pay for it, but ok if you lower taxes without lowering spending and create a gaping hole in the deficit. Until a Democrat takes over, then the actual cause of the deficit is irrelevant.

Spending is bad when you spend like there's no tomorrow and you don't have the money to pay for it. The 800 lb. gorilla waiting is health care and other social programs that have no way in hell to pay for it. If you want programs like that, you better cut some spending somewhere else. Obama is like a kid in the candy store who will shoplift anything "to fix all that ails", neverminding the fact that sometime, somehow you have to pay for all this.

 

I also think it's interesting to note: one of the bigger reasons that 1930's were also different is that you had people paying us (Europe, see WWI), well, until everyone defaulted.

 

Funny how no one else around the world wants to spend their way out of a recession.

[lostfan]

Spending is bad when you spend like there's no tomorrow and you don't have the money to pay for it. The 800 lb. gorilla waiting is health care and other social programs that have no way in hell to pay for it. If you want programs like that, you better cut some spending somewhere else. Obama is like a kid in the candy store who will shoplift anything "to fix all that ails", neverminding the fact that sometime, somehow you have to pay for all this.

 

I also think it's interesting to note: one of the bigger reasons that 1930's were also different is that you had people paying us (Europe, see WWI), well, until everyone defaulted.

 

Funny how no one else around the world wants to spend their way out of a recession.

Kind of beside the point I was making.

 

Lower taxes + reduced spending = good

 

Lower taxes + same basic budget as a Democrat - a couple of earmarks for the day's news cycle = destructive, hypocritical, borderline retarded

 

Today's GOP leans much closer to the second (even if they swear they don't) than the first. And actually has for pretty much my whole life.

[lostfan]

Isn't that basically what Reagan did?

Yeah, pretty much.

[kapkomet]

Kind of beside the point I was making.

 

Lower taxes + reduced spending = good

 

Lower taxes + same basic budget as a Democrat - a couple of earmarks for the day's news cycle = destructive, hypocritical, borderline retarded

 

Today's GOP leans much closer to the second (even if they swear they don't) than the first. And actually has for pretty much my whole life.

Which is why they got their asses handed to them, and deservedly so. I wish for once that they actually had some balls and stuck to their calls for reduced spending. If they would do that and lower taxes, they would stay around a lot longer. But no, they get greedy, lie through their teeth, act like they're principled when they have no intention of being so, and get thier ass kicked, which paves the way for more bloated government thanks to Democrats. Gotta love that cycle playing out over and over again.

 

[lostfan]

Which is why they got their asses handed to them, and deservedly so. I wish for once that they actually had some balls and stuck to their calls for reduced spending. If they would do that and lower taxes, they would stay around a lot longer. But no, they get greedy, lie through their teeth, act like they're principled when they have no intention of being so, and get thier ass kicked, which paves the way for more bloated government thanks to Democrats. Gotta love that cycle playing out over and over again.

Bottom line, I don't trust either party when it comes to paying the nation's bills.

[kapkomet]

Bottom line, I don't trust either party when it comes to paying the nation's bills.

Neither do I. That's why I'm so damn cynical about our entire government. And when someone wants to make it bigger bigger bigger, I don't give a s*** what party you are, it's out of control. The government was never meant to provide all this s*** for us. f*** a "living and breathing" constitution. I want a government that was envisioned by the forefathers with the necessary constitutional amendments when called for. There's a reason there's only 27 amendments (and why they are so hard to get through)... and not this judicial / legislative / executive tango to circumvent it.

[BigSqwert]

What does this have to do with anything?

It was an interesting read that I wanted to share with my fellow Democrats in the Dem Thread. Next time I want to post in here I'll run it by you first.

[southsider2k5]

Also: spending is bad if you raise taxes to pay for it, but ok if you lower taxes without lowering spending and create a gaping hole in the deficit. Until a Democrat takes over, then the actual cause of the deficit is irrelevant.

 

Both parties do it. Heck a year ago the Dems were outraged over a $400 billion deficit, now they are looking at about a two trillion dollar one this year. Things change when you are in or out of power.

[HuskyCaucasian]

GOP Senator proposed "run on the banks" to his wife:

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) says when the financial crisis began he encouraged his wife to withdraw all the cash she possibly could from their local bank.

 

During a speech on the economy [Monday] night, Burr related his immediate reaction the week the crisis began.

 

"On Friday night, I called my wife and I said, 'Brooke, I am not coming home this weekend. I will call you on Monday. Tonight, I want you to go to the ATM machine, and I want you to draw out everything it will let you take," Burr said, according to the Hendersonville Times-News. "And I want you to tomorrow, and I want you to go Sunday.' I was convinced on Friday night that if you put a plastic card in an ATM machine the last thing you were going to get was cash."

 

Nothing like a little fear mongering and a run on the banks to help an already bad situation.

[lostfan]

How can one person run on a bank?

[southsider2k5]

The Times tomorrow is running an expose on the smuggling of guns across the Mexican border.

 

Federal agents say about 90 percent of the 12,000 pistols and rifles the Mexican authorities recovered from drug dealers last year and asked to be traced came from dealers in the United States, most of them in Texas and Arizona.

 

One of the key "facts" was debunked long before this article was written.

 

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/elections/...number-claimed/

 

The Myth of 90 Percent: Only a Small Fraction of Guns in Mexico Come From U.S.

While 90 percent of the guns traced to the U.S. actually originated in the United States, the percent traced to the U.S. is only about 17 percent of the total number of guns reaching Mexico.

 

By William La Jeunesse and Maxim Lott

 

EXCLUSIVE: You've heard this shocking "fact" before -- on TV and radio, in newspapers, on the Internet and from the highest politicians in the land: 90 percent of the weapons used to commit crimes in Mexico come from the United States.

 

-- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said it to reporters on a flight to Mexico City.

 

-- CBS newsman Bob Schieffer referred to it while interviewing President Obama.

 

-- California Sen. Dianne Feinstein said at a Senate hearing: "It is unacceptable to have 90 percent of the guns that are picked up in Mexico and used to shoot judges, police officers and mayors ... come from the United States."

 

-- William Hoover, assistant director for field operations at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, testified in the House of Representatives that "there is more than enough evidence to indicate that over 90 percent of the firearms that have either been recovered in, or interdicted in transport to Mexico, originated from various sources within the United States."

 

There's just one problem with the 90 percent "statistic" and it's a big one:

 

It's just not true.

 

In fact, it's not even close. The fact is, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the U.S.

 

What's true, an ATF spokeswoman told FOXNews.com, in a clarification of the statistic used by her own agency's assistant director, "is that over 90 percent of the traced firearms originate from the U.S."

 

But a large percentage of the guns recovered in Mexico do not get sent back to the U.S. for tracing, because it is obvious from their markings that they do not come from the U.S.

 

"Not every weapon seized in Mexico has a serial number on it that would make it traceable, and the U.S. effort to trace weapons really only extends to weapons that have been in the U.S. market," Matt Allen, special agent of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), told FOX News.

 

Video:Click here to watch more.

 

A Look at the Numbers

 

In 2007-2008, according to ATF Special Agent William Newell, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Close to 6,000 were successfully traced -- and of those, 90 percent -- 5,114 to be exact, according to testimony in Congress by William Hoover -- were found to have come from the U.S.

 

But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes.

 

In other words, 68 percent of the guns that were recovered were never submitted for tracing. And when you weed out the roughly 6,000 guns that could not be traced from the remaining 32 percent, it means 83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S.

 

So, if not from the U.S., where do they come from? There are a variety of sources:

 

-- The Black Market. Mexico is a virtual arms bazaar, with fragmentation grenades from South Korea, AK-47s from China, and shoulder-fired rocket launchers from Spain, Israel and former Soviet bloc manufacturers.

 

-- Russian crime organizations. Interpol says Russian Mafia groups such as Poldolskaya and Moscow-based Solntsevskaya are actively trafficking drugs and arms in Mexico.

 

- South America. During the late 1990s, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) established a clandestine arms smuggling and drug trafficking partnership with the Tijuana cartel, according to the Federal Research Division report from the Library of Congress.

 

-- Asia. According to a 2006 Amnesty International Report, China has provided arms to countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Chinese assault weapons and Korean explosives have been recovered in Mexico.

 

-- The Mexican Army. More than 150,000 soldiers deserted in the last six years, according to Mexican Congressman Robert Badillo. Many took their weapons with them, including the standard issue M-16 assault rifle made in Belgium.

 

-- Guatemala. U.S. intelligence agencies say traffickers move immigrants, stolen cars, guns and drugs, including most of America's cocaine, along the porous Mexican-Guatemalan border. On March 27, La Hora, a Guatemalan newspaper, reported that police seized 500 grenades and a load of AK-47s on the border. Police say the cache was transported by a Mexican drug cartel operating out of Ixcan, a border town.

 

'These Don't Come From El Paso'

 

Ed Head, a firearms instructor in Arizona who spent 24 years with the U.S. Border Patrol, recently displayed an array of weapons considered "assault rifles" that are similar to those recovered in Mexico, but are unavailable for sale in the U.S.

 

"These kinds of guns -- the auto versions of these guns -- they are not coming from El Paso," he said. "They are coming from other sources. They are brought in from Guatemala. They are brought in from places like China. They are being diverted from the military. But you don't get these guns from the U.S."

 

Some guns, he said, "are legitimately shipped to the government of Mexico, by Colt, for example, in the United States. They are approved by the U.S. government for use by the Mexican military service. The guns end up in Mexico that way -- the fully auto versions -- they are not smuggled in across the river."

 

Many of the fully automatic weapons that have been seized in Mexico cannot be found in the U.S., but they are not uncommon in the Third World.

 

The Mexican government said it has seized 2,239 grenades in the last two years -- but those grenades and the rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) are unavailable in U.S. gun shops. The ones used in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Monterrey in October and a TV station in January were made in South Korea. Almost 70 similar grenades were seized in February in the bottom of a truck entering Mexico from Guatemala.

 

"Most of these weapons are being smuggled from Central American countries or by sea, eluding U.S. and Mexican monitors who are focused on the smuggling of semi-automatic and conventional weapons purchased from dealers in the U.S. border states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California," according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

 

Boatloads of Weapons

 

So why would the Mexican drug cartels, which last year grossed between $17 billion and $38 billion, bother buying single-shot rifles, and force thousands of unknown "straw" buyers in the U.S. through a government background check, when they can buy boatloads of fully automatic M-16s and assault rifles from China, Israel or South Africa?

 

Alberto Islas, a security consultant who advises the Mexican government, says the drug cartels are using the Guatemalan border to move black market weapons. Some are left over from the Central American wars the United States helped fight; others, like the grenades and launchers, are South Korean, Israeli and Spanish. Some were legally supplied to the Mexican government; others were sold by corrupt military officers or officials.

 

The exaggeration of United States "responsibility" for the lawlessness in Mexico extends even beyond the "90-percent" falsehood -- and some Second Amendment activists believe it's designed to promote more restrictive gun-control laws in the U.S.

 

In a remarkable claim, Auturo Sarukhan, the Mexican ambassador to the U.S., said Mexico seizes 2,000 guns a day from the United States -- 730,000 a year. That's a far cry from the official statistic from the Mexican attorney general's office, which says Mexico seized 29,000 weapons in all of 2007 and 2008.

 

Chris Cox, spokesman for the National Rifle Association, blames the media and anti-gun politicians in the U.S. for misrepresenting where Mexican weapons come from.

 

"Reporter after politician after news anchor just disregards the truth on this," Cox said. "The numbers are intentionally used to weaken the Second Amendment."

 

"The predominant source of guns in Mexico is Central and South America. You also have Russian, Chinese and Israeli guns. It's estimated that over 100,000 soldiers deserted the army to work for the drug cartels, and that ignores all the police. How many of them took their weapons with them?"

 

But Tom Diaz, senior policy analyst at the Violence Policy Center, called the "90 percent" issue a red herring and said that it should not detract from the effort to stop gun trafficking into Mexico.

 

"Let's do what we can with what we know," he said. "We know that one hell of a lot of firearms come from the United States because our gun market is wide open."

[StrangeSox]

How can one person run on a bank?

 

I bet George Soros or Warren Buffet could sink a few banks if they wanted to.

[kapkomet]

I bet George Soros or Warren Buffet could sink a few banks if they wanted to.

IMO George Soros tried last week by screaming how bad everything sucks in the world. You know this guy is short and has lost a s***load of money on this runup. He wants a loss so he can reap his short position.

[HuskyCaucasian]

How can one person run on a bank?

Its the idea he told his constituents: "I didnt trust the banks and wanted all my money in cash". Not good.

[kapkomet]

Its the idea he told his constituents: "I didnt trust the banks and wanted all my money in cash". Not good.

On Sept. 17, we saw a run. If that was the only information you had, you would do the same... and it's past tense. But that's ok, GOP fearmongering sucks, Dem fearmongering = ok.

[southsider2k5]

How can one person run on a bank?

 

Ask Chuck Schumer.

[BigSqwert]

 

Glenn Reynolds today pens an op-ed hailing the "tea-party" "movement" as a post-partisan, spontaneous uprising of ordinary folks against the establishment of both parties. He makes no mention of Pajamas Media's heavy investment in the events, nor Fox News' endless touting and endorsement of them, but he does point to FreedomWorks' coordinating website. I'm sure, of course, that it's a mix of both: some grass roots enthusiasm, coopted in some part by Republican party operators. But it seems odd to decribe this as anything but a first stab at creating opposition to the Obama administration's spending plans, manned by people who made no objections to George W. Bush's. The tea-parties are as post-partisan as Reynolds, one of the most relentlessly partisan bloggers on the web.

 

But the substantive critique must remain the primary one. Protesting government spending is meaningless unless you say what you'd cut. If you favor no bailouts, then say so. If you want to see the banking system collapse, then say so. If you think the recession demands no fiscal stimulus, then say so. If you favor big cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, social security and defense, then say so. I keep waiting for Reynolds to tell us what these protests are for; and he can only spin what they they are against.

 

All protests against spending that do not tell us how to reduce it are fatuous pieces of theater, not constructive acts of politics. And until the right is able to make a constructive and specific argument about how they intend to reduce spending and debt and borrowing, they deserve to be dismissed as performance artists in a desperate search for coherence in an age that has left them bewilderingly behind.

 

LINK

[kapkomet]

 

 

 

LINK

You cannot sit there with a straight face and say that Obama's spending binge is "better" then GWB's spending binge. Obama's is just beginning.

 

And all these campaign appearances by the Messiah were pretty much the equivalent of the "tea parties". But let's not ruin a good chance to bash right-leaning Americans.

Edited April 15, 2009 by kapkomet

[BigSqwert]

You cannot sit there with a straight face and say that Obama's spending binge is "better" then GWB's spending binge. Obama's is just beginning.

I can because he's investing in more green technologies and mass transit. For that alone it softens the blow for me.

 

And do I need to fly down there and help you start a business in order for you to stop lurking in the Dem thread?

 

*awaits snide remark that Obama tax plan would prevent Kap from starting a business*

Edited April 15, 2009 by BigSqwert