dagblog - Comments for "Two Santa Clauses or none?"

I'm not sure if your comment

LisB — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 06:54:26 +0000

In reply to Readers mistake the intent of

I'm not sure if your comment is addressed to me or to Stardust, so I'll just say that I lay the blame of everything under the sun on both politicians AND people. :) That was a joke.

G'night, Watt.

Readers mistake the intent of

Watt Childress — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 06:37:02 +0000

In reply to .

Readers mistake the intent of this post if they think I'm blaming Washington's piss-poor performance on citizens. The two Santa Claus theory preys upon a popular weakness. In effect, it is a predatory strategy for amassing or protecting political power.

Leaders of both parties should be ashamed of this deal.

.

we are stardust — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 05:07:09 +0000

In reply to LOL....thanks! Actually, I

I'll have to read again

we are stardust — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 05:06:19 +0000

In reply to Star, the bond market has a

I'll have to read again tomorrow, Oxy. Time for bed, and my brain is on Duh. ;o) Dylan Ratigan's campaign is interesting. I'll find it tommorow. Sleep well. But Moody's has an agenda; Hess, I think?

Star, the bond market has a

Oxy Mora — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 04:44:55 +0000

In reply to I appreciate what you're

Star, the bond market has a mind of its own with lots of cross trends including investors seeing the economy picking up so sell bonds and buy stocks. As far as the Moodys blurb, this to my mind is part of a tacit financial community alarmist narrative designed to feed into the deficit reduction cum cut SS movement. Granted the "package" will be driving up the deficit so that feeds the hysteria. I agree that the tax package potentially puts SS in the cross hairs of deficit hawks. But much will depend upon Obama's and Democrats ability to differentiate the arguments.

As far as SS is concerned the hysteria to fix it now is unwarranted. There is no immediate problem. Orzag himself calculated that benefit payments now are 5% of GDP. Guess what he projected that ratio to be in 5050?. Would you believe 6% of GDP?. Wow, a 1% increase in a half century. Now that's a real problem--compared to the war machine, a voracious health care industry and a finance industry which is most likely headed for another crisis and bailout. As Rob Johnson pointed out in an article for the Roosevelt Institute, Social Security is not a whale, it's a minnow.

Obama got himself, us, into a corner, I take that as a given. So the question now is how to get out. What's really needed is massive infrastructure spending and reform of the "oligopolies".I think this structural reform is going to be painfully slow. I dislike it. In fact I am pissed. But not getting this old economy moving one more time and thus allowing Republicans and tea partiers to take the Presidency again is a worse outcome.

LOL....thanks! Actually, I

LisB — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 04:02:12 +0000

In reply to It's also your way to have

LOL....thanks! Actually, I think that's a bad habit that many of us share. So, in turn, I'll let you have the last word, should you be so inclined.

It's also your way to have

we are stardust — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 03:49:59 +0000

In reply to And when things do happen,

It's also your way to have the last word; have it, on the house. ;o)

And when things do happen,

LisB — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 03:16:43 +0000

In reply to Fine to jump in. Lis, as you

And when things do happen, you tell me that they suck and we should've gotten more/better/bigger, etc. Hopefully someday we'll find a happy medium. :)

Fine to jump in. Lis, as you

we are stardust — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 03:09:37 +0000

In reply to You make an awful lot of

Fine to jump in. Lis, as you do, but that uyou can't make heads nor tails doesn't worry me much. That the DLC oftendecides which Dems to give buckets of moeny to in a primary matters greatly, and almost always determines the winner. Too many times the populist, with the approval of the most Dems in a state or district, gets aced out by the natonal Democratic Party. I'd guessed you'd know that, no offense intended. It's happened far too often in my state of Colorado, and other states: the Party got whom they wanted at the expense of whom the activist populist Dems preferred, then that candiate often lost the general. Which has meant, the Party is ratcheting ever rightward. No need to guess why, IMO.

I think you are much like Obama when you grant that he can do no more. It leaaves zero room for vision, for principle, for "I have a dream" rhetoric. You tell us what cannot happen instead. Feh!

1) I would let the tax cuts

moat — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 03:06:42 +0000

In reply to Hey Moat,1) In 2001 Bush had

1) I would let the tax cuts on the top bracket expire immediately. I would let the middle group keep the present rate until (if) the recession is over because they will actually spend that money and act as a stimulus to a market exchanging fungible goods. I recognize that we cannot permit ever expanding debt but until we can evaluate what the value of leveraged assets are, what does that accumulation of borrowed money actually represent? For instance, if taxpayers bail out a bank, isn't that paying for a certain kind of debt? But since taxpayer money is being used to stop that super leveraged debt from shutting down the system, why is the money borrowed to do that suddenly real money that better be repaid or there will be hell to pay while the assets being saved are mysterious beings only understood by 142 people? In other words, there is a double standard being used that should be the first thing to be addressed.

2) I agree with your #2 but think it has to happen before the issues in #1 can be based on the actual costs for what spending is being spent upon.

3) I wouldn't mind a flatter tax on personal income if corporate taxes were more related to how much or little investment of their profits are used to develop infrastructure/enterprise. If a company wants to send all their dough to a financial instrument, fine. Let Uncle Sam get a meaty chunk before they start playing. If we are going to have people pay for the actual cost for things, what that cost is becomes the central question, not paying off borrowed money as a condition divorced from everything else that is going on.