The Democrat Thread

[mr_genius]

 

[Balta1701]

I'll see your Steve Wynn on economic policy and raise you by a Google.

AMANPOUR: Everybody says that confidence is the name of the game, that the economy and consumers are not going to start buying, businesses are not going to start hiring again, unless they feel a period of confidence and stability, producing the kind of confidence that's necessary for a hiring binge.

 

SCHMIDT: The economy is today stuck behind the power curve. It needs a lot of encouragement. It needs not just something like the jobs bill, but also significant government stimulation in terms of buying power and investment. Otherwise we're set up for years of extraordinarily low growth in the economy and no real solution to the jobless problem.

 

But you say significant stimulus. Obviously this is a political environment where the only real conversation is about cutting. Do you see any expectation or possibility of a climate for more stimulus?

 

Well that's a political question. But the current strategy is ludicrous. You have a situtation where the private sector sees essentially no growth in demand. The classic solution is to have the government step in, and with short-term initiatives help stimulate that demand. If they do it right, they'll invest in income and growth producing things, like highways and bridges and schools.

....So this is a pretty dark picture that you're painting. Add to that no confidence from consumers, and businesses sitting on something like 2 trillion worth of profits, which they're not going to spend apparently. Does the president have a material problem with the business community?

 

The real problem is not the business community. The real problem is: the Democrats and the Republicans fight for one point or another in a political sphere, while the rest of us are waiting for the government to do something concrete and predictable. What business needs is predictable, long-term plans. We need to know: Where is government spending going to be, what are the government programs going to be? And off we go.

 

Business can create enormous numbers of new jobs in America. All we need to see is more demand. What's happening right now is: Businesses are very well-run, they have a lot of cash. They're waiting for more demand. At the moment, business efficiency allows them to grow at 1 or 2 percent, which is what we're seeing today. They don't have to hire more people. And until we solve the problem, people are going to sit idle. And it's a real tragedy.

[mr_genius]

I'll see your Steve Wynn on economic policy and raise you by a Google.

 

how much free money do i get? i promise i will buy stuff with it. stimulate the economy.

 

 

[VictoryMC98]

how much free money do i get? i promise i will buy stuff with it. stimulate the economy.

 

If you're not a "job creator".. aka Rich, we can't give out free money.. but if you are.. you tell DC what you want, and they deliver.

[StrangeSox]

 

It's great because it works on so many levels!

 

or because it distills all political cartoonery down to its true essence, its purest form.

[BigSqwert]

SMH

 

"By the time I feed my family, I have maybe $400,000 left over," - Rep. John Fleming (R-LA), in an interview on MSNBC, on why as a small business owner he can't afford a tax increase.

 

via

[StrangeSox]

I'd say that can't be serious, but I've seen similar things before. "Well after I pay my two $800/month luxury car payments, the mortgage on my $1m home, save for our $10k luxury vacation, I only have $2-3k (around what the average person brings home total) left over each month in discretionary income!"

[StrangeSox]

I know #firstworldproblems is a tag used to make light of the difficulty of some of the problems Americans face compared to third world problems eg chronic starvation problems, this tag is a good one for Fleming's statement:

 

#plutocratproblems

[Balta1701]

I'd say that can't be serious, but I've seen similar things before. "Well after I pay my two $800/month luxury car payments, the mortgage on my $1m home, save for our $10k luxury vacation, I only have $2-3k (around what the average person brings home total) left over each month in discretionary income!"

One thing that's been discussed is that this type of statement is the type of statement you expect in a country where the income distribution keeps becoming more and more top-heavy.

 

Yeah, he's taking home $400k a year. But all the guys who walk into his office to lobby him are making $5 million a year. His investment guy makes $8 million a year. He occasionally hangs out with guys worth billions. And when they're buying multi-million dollar private jets and yachts, and spending nights in hotel rooms that cost $25k a night, and plating their NYC apartments with gold and Picassos, he just doesn't feel wealthy.

[StrangeSox]

#plutocratproblems

[Balta1701]

#plutocratproblems

You may ridicule it...but that doesn't mean that a person taking home $400k a year in this economy feels wealthy.

[StrangeSox]

You may ridicule it...but that doesn't mean that a person taking home $400k a year in this economy feels wealthy.

 

I don't care if someone who is making more than 99.99% of the world "feels" wealthy, it's still a really, really stupid thing to say and shows how divorced he is from the reality of most people.

 

edit I don't disagree with what you're saying there, just that ignorance isn't a good excuse.

Edited September 19, 2011 by StrangeSox

[VictoryMC98]

You may ridicule it...but that doesn't mean that a person taking home $400k a year in this economy feels wealthy.

 

Tell that to Joe the plumber who makes 50k a year...

[Balta1701]

I don't care if someone who is making more than 99.99% of the world "feels" wealthy, it's still a really, really stupid thing to say and shows how divorced he is from the reality of most people.

 

edit I don't disagree with what you're saying there, just that ignorance isn't a good excuse.

What you should realize is that the problem here is the existence of the hyper-rich.

 

When you have the hyper-rich class, the people taking $400k a year home are going to feel poor. That's just how the psychology would work. These people don't feel rich and telling them that they are won't make them feel rich.

[StrangeSox]

I make significantly less than $400k and I don't feel poor because I'm not an idiot.

[BigSqwert]

I make significantly less than $400k and I don't feel poor because I'm not an idiot.

[StrangeSox]

To be fair it's a matter of perspective as Balta points out. I'm typically interacting with people in the same socioeconomic realm as myself. If I were dealing with millionaires every day, perhaps I'd feel economically inferior.

[southsider2k5]

To be fair it's a matter of perspective as Balta points out. I'm typically interacting with people in the same socioeconomic realm as myself. If I were dealing with millionaires every day, perhaps I'd feel economically inferior.

 

I have dealt with millionaires for pretty much all of my professional life. I think my self esteem is hanging on just fine.

[StrangeSox]

Another point for the "don't feel poor because I'm not an idiot" side, then!

[southsider2k5]

Another point for the "don't feel poor because I'm not an idiot" side, then!

 

+1

[StrangeSox]

I don't remember which thread we were discussing the FBI and Muslims but here's a relevant article:

 

FBI Teaches Agents: ‘Mainstream’ Muslims Are ‘Violent, Radical’

 

 

rest of the article

 

More great quotes here

 

FBI Trainer Says Forget ‘Irrelevant’ al-Qaida, Target Islam

The best strategy for undermining militants, Gawthrop suggested, is to go after Islam itself. To undermine the validity of key Islamic scriptures and key Muslim leaders.

 

“If you remember Star Wars, that ventilation shaft that goes down to into the depths of the Death Star, they shot a torpedo down there. That’s a critical vulnerability,” Gawthrop told his audience. Then he waved a laser pointer at his projected PowerPoint slide, calling attention to the words “Holy Texts” and “Clerics.”

 

“We should be looking at, should be aiming at, these,” Gawthrop said.

[StrangeSox]

Sullivan on Greenwald's article regarding Padilla and the recent decision to vacate his 17-year sentence because it was too leinient:

 

I can't improve on Glenn Greenwald's piece on the vindictive, brutal decision by far right judges on the 11th Circuit - so go read it. An American citizen, seized and tortured for four years, is eventually given a trial where all evidence of his torture is withheld, and where the original charges - being involved in a "dirty bomb" plot - were completely dropped by the government. His 17 year sentence - on top of four years of torture that reduced him to a shell of a human being - is nonetheless too lenient for the Republican right. So the men who authorized his torture go on The View, and the victim of torture gets extra punishment.

 

Look: Padilla is a bad guy, who got involved in Jihadist circles, but was never pinned to any actual terror plot. He deserves to be in jail. But no US citizen deserves to be tortured without a trial - and then all but framed by the rules applied to it, and now doubly punished by what can only be called judicial cruelty. And no US citizen deserves to have the label "dirty bomber" attached to him by CNN and ABC News when no such charges were ever brought against him, let alone proved.

[BigSqwert]

The Chinafication of America. Edited September 20, 2011 by BigSqwert

[StrangeSox]

It also touches on the decision today to deny Troy Davis any further legal action, meaning that Georgia is going to go ahead with executing an apparently innocent man.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/15/t...s_n_963366.html

[BigSqwert]

It also touches on the decision today to deny Troy Davis any further legal action, meaning that Georgia is going to go ahead with executing an apparently innocent man.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/15/t...s_n_963366.html

Somewhere Rick Perry is doing back flips.