Economic recovery package before Congress"would provide massive fiscal stimulus."

moreluck

golden ticket member
Every part of this so called recovery package should create jobs.......not happening! It needs to go back and get re-written by smarter people than Reid & Pelosi.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Glenn Jacobs (Pro Wrestler Kane) in an open letter to Robert Reich on his (Reich) appearance on CNN discussion of gov't economic stimulation.

An Open Letter to Robert Reich
[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Professor Reich:[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]I have some questions about some of the points that you brought up when you appeared on CNN’s The State of the Union show Superbowl Sunday. Although all my own training in economics is purely autodidactic, it seems to me that your arguments rest on faulty premises.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]When asked what is the fastest way for the government to create jobs (a question which itself relies on the erroneous presumption that the government has the ability to "create" jobs), you replied with a three-part answer, and first stated that "almost all economists agree" with you.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Whether almost all economists agree or not of no importance, but gives your answer an air of authority. Unfortunately, it is the policies of these same economists which have caused the mess in which America currently finds itself. While "almost all economists" may still possess authority in academia, their credibility on Main Street is sorely lacking. In addition, many economists do not agree with you. In fact, Austrian economists vehemently disagree with you.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]In any case, you said that the government’s first priority should be to expand the social safety net, which will cause money to go directly into circulation.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Historically, government welfare programs have been wasteful, inefficient, and corrupt. Private charities do a much better job of administering aid to those in need with the final goal of helping the unemployed get back to work. Government programs, on the other hand, lead to longer periods of unemployment by encouraging welfare recipients to remain on the dole as long as possible.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]I am also curious as to how you propose to fund these programs. There are only three ways that the government can raise revenue: taxation, borrowing, and printing (both the latter are actually forms of deferred taxation). All of these methods have dire implications for the economy. Direct taxation retards economic growth by punishing producers. Borrowing crowds out investment in the private sector. Printing money causes distortions in the market, misallocation of resources, and eventually destroys the purchasing power of the monetary unit. [/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]In addition, of what importance is "money in circulation"? You contend that passing money around will create jobs, but the fact is that passing money around is simply passing money around. What you seem to be proposing is that the government take money from some people, and then give it to people on welfare so that they can buy stuff from the same people that the government originally took the money from in the first place. How is that going to create jobs? Why not allow the people with money to invest it and build their businesses so that they can hire the people to whom the government is planning on giving their money?[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Professor Reich, it seems that you have confused money with wealth. The government can create all the money it wants simply by printing it. Wealth, on the other hand, can only be created through saving and investment.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]The government’s second priority, you said, should be to build infrastructure – putting people to work building roads, bridges, a new electrical grid, and a broadband internet system. [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]While we certainly need those things, how is this going to create jobs and why is it the government’s business to build them anyway? [/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Labor is not homogeneous. Yes, people can do many different jobs, but many jobs require specialized training and skills. While building a road may be a boon to the road construction industry, how does it benefit an investment banker who just lost his job? How does building a bridge in California benefit an aerospace engineer who was just laid off in St. Louis? Or running fiber optic cable in North Dakota benefit a real estate agent out of work in Florida?[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]While the government can create jobs in one sector of the economy, it can only do so by destroying jobs in another sector of the economy. Perhaps you are familiar with Frédéric Bastiat’s famous essay What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen. In it, Bastiat explains that when the government undertakes a project such as building a bridge we see the benefits it brings – the jobs that it creates. What we do not see are the things that are destroyed because of the project – the jobs that are not created because the government confiscates the resources needed to create them.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]You may also be familiar with the Nobel Prize winning economist friend.A. Hayek. One of the major themes of Hayek’s work is that the free market is a discovery process. Since none of us are omniscient, none of us has perfect knowledge of market conditions. Hence, no central planner can effectively allocate resources.[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]In contrast, the free market’s pricing mechanism provides us with the information needed to efficiently allocate resources, and rewards those who do so correctly and punishes those who do not. [/FONT]


Instead of relying on market signals to determine where to allocate resources, the government relies on political pressures. Most likely, roads and bridges will not be built where they are needed, but where the politicians think it will best serve them. The beneficiaries of these programs will not be the American people in general, but political patrons and special interests.

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]The government’s third priority, according to you, should be tax cuts. I wholeheartedly agree. Let’s eliminate personal income tax, property taxes, sales taxes, and corporate taxes, as well as the onerous regulations that have driven so many companies out of the country. Unfortunately, that’s probably not what you meant by tax cuts, is it? [/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]All in all, Professor Reich, it seems to me that your arguments defy logic and common sense. However, as a prominent economist, public policy expert, and opinion molder, I’m sure that you can explain what I am missing. I anxiously await your reply.[/FONT]

February 3, 2009

source: http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/jacobs3.html
 

moreluck

golden ticket member
Subject: Earmarks vs. Pork


“I am confident that by the time we have the final package on the floor that we are going to see substantial support, and people are going to see this is a serious effort. It has no earmarks. We are going to be trimming out things that are not relevant to putting people back to work right now,” Obama said.

The problem with political language is that it is designed to obscure, not enlighten. In this case, “no earmarks” does not equal “no pork.”
I blame the overall dumbing down of the American people. In order to try to pierce the thick of rational ignorance which surrounds most Americans, rational discussion is compressed into a brief code that fits into a ten-second sound-bite. Hence, “earmark” and “pork” become synonymous. Now, while it may be true that most earmarks are, indeed, pork, it is not true that all pork is also an earmark of some sort. This pig-meat bailout is a perfect example.
 

Sammie

Well-Known Member
Subject: Earmarks vs. Pork

“I am confident that by the time we have the final package on the floor that we are going to see substantial support, and people are going to see this is a serious effort. It has no earmarks. We are going to be trimming out things that are not relevant to putting people back to work right now,” Obama said. This pig-meat bailout is a perfect example.

Lets have some recipes with that Pork!

Imagine! A 451 page Cookbook on 700 Billion ways to do Wild Boar, Hog, and Pork!!

Got any good Luau ideas, More???
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
BTW: Thomas Woods new book "Meltdown" is a good expose of how we got to where we are in this mess.

Thomas Woods was on Beck's radio show

Part 1


Thomas Woods on Glenn Beck Radio part 1/2 2/9/09: Austrian Economics Predicted Economic Collapses

and Part 2


Thomas Woods on Glenn Beck Radio part 2/2 2/9/09: Austrian Economics Predicted Economic Collapses

Meltdown was just released and currently on Amazon is #14 overall and #2 in non-fiction.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Is Washington (both democrats and republicans) trying to pull a massive con job over the gullible American public?

Case in point.

February 09, 2009

Bernanke's own 106 percent credit boom

Posted by Michael S. Rozeff at February 9, 2009 02:51 PM
Federal Reserve credit extended (called Reserve Bank Credit on the FED's balance sheet) was $891,743,000,000 on January 2, 2008.
On February 4, 2009, Reserve Bank Credit is $1,840,746,000,000.
This is an increase of 106 percent in 13 months.
Now that's a credit boom!!!
Can Bernanke blame that on any of the long list of culprits he has publicly mentioned?

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/025230.html

Dr. Rozeff is a retired professor of finance from the University of Buffalo

Now where did Dr. Rozeff get his numbers you ask? How about directly from the Federal Reserve itself!

http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h41/Current/h41.pdf

Many (including myself) have long advocated for the elimination of the Federal Reserve as well as any central bank along with all legal tender laws. It doesn't take much to realize this won't happen quickly but the fact is that since the Fed. was created in 1913', this body has never been subjected to a complete and through audit by the Congress.

Folks, no matter where you stand politically or even economically, we should demand Congress perform a complete and thorough public audit of the Fed. so our leaders (and us) know exactly where we stand economically and they have as much information as to all the facts so that whatever they decide to do, they are able to do so knowing exactly where everything stands.

The Federal Reserve is granted exclusive monopoly of our economy and money supply that makes or breaks people's lives and their futures and the futures of their children. Is it to much to demand of our elected leaders to have a full accounting of just what this organization is doing, has done and what it's current true status really is?

An old saying that holds even more true today, to learn the truth, "follow the money!" Have the courage to demand just that from your elected leaders. Something is just not right here.

AUDIT THE FED!
 

Jagger

Well-Known Member
SENATE CHANGES MAKE RECOVERY LEGISLATION LESS EFFECTIVE

by James R. Horney and Chye-Ching Huang

The Senate today passed a version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (H.R. 1) that makes a number of changes in the House-passed bill. Contrary to their proponents claim, these changes — in Senate committees and on the floor last week, as well as by a group of Senators led by Ben Nelson and Susan Collins — have reduced the package’s effectiveness as economic stimulus. Though it costs modestly more than the House bill — $838 billion, compared to the House bill’s $819 billion — the Senate package would likely preserve or create tens (or possibly hundreds) of thousands fewer jobs.

The Senate has reduced spending, a fair amount of which was well-designed to stimulate the economy such as funding for state fiscal relief and school construction, and substituted new or expanded tax cuts that are not targeted and are unlikely to provide a substantial boost to the economy.

These changes fly in the face of the consensus of mainstream economists about how best to provide the boost in aggregate demand that is needed to help stem the current economic downturn and speed a recovery.

Read the rest of this excellent article at http://www.cbpp.org/2-10-09tax.htm
 

Sammie

Well-Known Member
Wonder why we never hear anything about financial and mortgage woes,
bank failures and bailouts in Canada.

What are they doing that we're not? Yeah, I've heard that their socialized medicine isn't the greatest, but the World Economic Forum ranked their banking system the best in the world. We came in 40th...:anxious:

Their housing prices don't go all over the charts. They don't hand out candy and balloons as incentives for people to buy more than they can afford; mortgage interest isn't deductable. If you buy a house you can't afford, you can't hand it back to the bank. You're stuck with it.

They have no inheritance tax and they don't tax food or other essentials.

They've had a surplus for over a decade. They restructured their national pension system and it's nothing to worry about. We have social security and we're worried.

Ontario, not Michigan, has become North America's largest car producing area.

Canada has no limit on skilled immigrants who move to their country. Based on education, work skills, age and language abilities, an immigrant can get a Canada Skilled Worker Visa, which allows them to become a legal permanent resident. And they don't have to wait a dozen years to get this ball rolling. They stay, they work, they pay taxes.

We turn away thousands of talented students who want to work and stay here. They train in our universities and we cut them loose. Guess where they go...

O's first international trip will be to Canada. I hope he takes good notes.
 

tieguy

Banned
Your party is not getting any sexier, Tie, because if the Rep's look in the mirror, their overgrown wastlines are preventing them from seeing their talley wackers as well..

Did someone just mention Ted Kennedy? See thats the problem with todays world. Economy is crashing , people losing their jobs and all a liberal dem can think about is whether or not the repubs can see their penises:happy-very:
 

tieguy

Banned
Every part of this so called recovery package should create jobs.......not happening! It needs to go back and get re-written by smarter people than Reid & Pelosi.

Question then becomes where can you get 5 billion people together for this meeting?:happy-very:
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Wonder why we never hear anything about financial and mortgage woes,
bank failures and bailouts in Canada.

What are they doing that we're not? Yeah, I've heard that their socialized medicine isn't the greatest, but the World Economic Forum ranked their banking system the best in the world. We came in 40th...:anxious:

Their housing prices don't go all over the charts. They don't hand out candy and balloons as incentives for people to buy more than they can afford; mortgage interest isn't deductable. If you buy a house you can't afford, you can't hand it back to the bank. You're stuck with it.

They have no inheritance tax and they don't tax food or other essentials.

They've had a surplus for over a decade. They restructured their national pension system and it's nothing to worry about. We have social security and we're worried.

Ontario, not Michigan, has become North America's largest car producing area.

Canada has no limit on skilled immigrants who move to their country. Based on education, work skills, age and language abilities, an immigrant can get a Canada Skilled Worker Visa, which allows them to become a legal permanent resident. And they don't have to wait a dozen years to get this ball rolling. They stay, they work, they pay taxes.

We turn away thousands of talented students who want to work and stay here. They train in our universities and we cut them loose. Guess where they go...

O's first international trip will be to Canada. I hope he takes good notes.

Interesting points about Canada you make. Prior to reading your above comments, ironically I read this over at Taki's magazine covering the almost exact same subject. Between the comments @ Taki's and your's, I did a quick search of Canada's banking and they seem in rather remarkable shape as you pointed out. Seems right now if anything, we (the US banking system and US gov't policy) left the door open and they caught a slight cold from our draft if you know what I mean.

Iceland's economy has collasped to the point mass protests have been taking place. Again at Taki's, a story covers the chaos that is happening over there as a result. Word is from some that England's banking and economy are about to follow Iceland and I'm not convinced that at some point we aren't far behind. If there is a lesson from our northern neighbor, it is to live our lives more within our means and more frugile a lifestyle. We use to do that but have let it slip away over the last few decades.
 

moreluck

golden ticket member
Heard someone on the news talking about the stimulus package, a Democrat. He said this bill will save or create so many millions of jobs. Obama said he'd create millions of jobs. In my mind, "create & save" are not the same thing.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Heard someone on the news talking about the stimulus package, a Democrat. He said this bill will save or create so many millions of jobs. Obama said he'd create millions of jobs. In my mind, "create & save" are not the same thing.

I thought a stimulus package was what in other industries they call a "fluffer"! :surprised::wink2:

I'm sure just like what the fluffer does, things will go "UP" for a short time, "CLIMAX" at their peak, but then come crashing down and no matter how hard you try, it just won't go up again!

Maybe gov't should treat economic law like sex and realize that at some point no matter how much you stimulate, you'll only end up will blisters on your.......uh......wel......ah hell you know!

:rofl:

Like sex, a proper diet and healthy lifestyle will bring back top performance quicker than any miracle cure. Why can't we apply the same rational to economics?
 

moreluck

golden ticket member
Bradley A. Blakeman
Republican strategist, consultant, entrepreneur: Secretary Geithner blew it big time.



The President at his press conference Monday evening announced that Secretary Geithner in a few days would make an important announcement as to the mechanics of going forward with a comprehensive plan to deal with our economic crisis beyond the $840 billion Recovery Bill that is working its way through Congress. The American People, Wall Street, and the World awaited this great announcement, this comprehensive and detailed plan.

Yesterday, the moment everyone was waiting for came, Secretary Geithner appeared and delivered a TelePrompTer speech looking like a deer in the headlights. He exuded zero confidence and his words were hollow. There was no detailed plan, instead, he spoke of doom and gloom and sacrifice and the failure to act. He talked in generalities and additional costs of money and financial guarantees of the government to the tune of over 2.5 trillion dollars. Wall Street responded to his speech with one of the largest one day declines in recent memory. Geithner was billed as the "financial whiz kid," and the "only one who knows what to do and how to get it done." Well, based on what we all saw and heard yesterday this guy is more like the Wizard of Oz than the Einstein of economics.

The $64 trillion dollar question is, what do we do now? I am not sure any one has the answer to that one. We have a new President that has high approval ratings but doesn't have the equally high caliber of people surrounding him that seem capable of solving or communicating with confidence the solutions to our financial woes. One thing is for sure, they are all good at painting a picture of despair and catastrophe. The President needs to regroup fast. He doesn't have much time before the catastrophe of which he speaks becomes a reality because of what he has done or not done to our economy.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
I thought a stimulus package was what in other industries they call a "fluffer"! :surprised::wink2:

I'm sure just like what the fluffer does, things will go "UP" for a short time, "CLIMAX" at their peak, but then come crashing down and no matter how hard you try, it just won't go up again!

Maybe gov't should treat economic law like sex and realize that at some point no matter how much you stimulate, you'll only end up will blisters on your.......uh......wel......ah hell you know!

:rofl:

Like sex, a proper diet and healthy lifestyle will bring back top performance quicker than any miracle cure. Why can't we apply the same rational to economics?

Speak of THE DEVIL and Mrs. Jones, you gotta just laugh at this one but it does point out the depth of the bottom (definitely no pun intended or is that no fun intended:wink2:) of where we now find ourselves.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/french/french106.html
 

moreluck

golden ticket member
Looks like Pelosi got her $30 million for that lousy salt marsh harvest mouse. I guarantee, if that mouse was in her house, she'd call an exterminator !!

Stimulus my :censored2: !! :angry:
 

Babagounj

Strength through joy
Looks like Pelosi got her $30 million for that lousy salt marsh harvest mouse. I guarantee, if that mouse was in her house, she'd call an exterminator !!

Stimulus my :censored2: !! :angry:
$5 B for ACCORN ?
Now every Disney character will be able to vote in all 57 states.
 

Sammie

Well-Known Member
One last take here on the "recovery package." And I'm not gonna beat
myself up any more over not having a "higher education".

Former Treasury Secretary and Citicorp advisor Robert Rubin,
Richard Fuld, the disgraced head of now bankrupt Lehman Brothers
and Franklin Raines of Fanny Mae, all made millions and left behind
companies that broke down and fell apart. They also had sophisticated
educations from America's best universities. 'Nuff said here. :dissapointed:

Nancy Pilosi attended Trinity Washington University. Obama, as is common knowledge, attended Columbia University and Harvard Law School. So being the uneducated person that I am, I completely understand Pelosi's recent comment that 500 million jobs a month will be lost until this stimulus package is approved. Although the current U.S.population is 300 million.

Only 20 % of the Pork Barrel will create jobs. What of the other 80%? (I would like to see all the lost jobs vs Obama's new job chart.)

Obama lashes out at those who stall on this package, calling any standstill "inexcusable". Yet no spending on this socialist stimulus will occur until 2010 or later.

So we have a 12 zero crisis based on cheating and greed and a remedy that will not bring into existence jobs for the 500 million people a month who are soon to be unemployed and we won't be able to help them until a much later date.

"From there to here,
from here to there,
funny things are everywhere."
Nancy & O.jpg
 

moreluck

golden ticket member
Are my ears hearing correctly ???

1400 pages and the vote will come and they won't have time to read the document ,but plan on signing it anyway. S-C-R-E-A-M !!! :grrr:
 
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