Cynical Nation

The team sports approach to politics is pretty pathetic.

The post-Gingrich GOP abandoned many of the core Supply Side principles that Gingrich established.

Since 2007, the Bush administration cooperated with the Keynesians on a failed "comprehensive immigration ("SHAMnesty") Bill, an ill-conceived "stimulus package" this past spring and the current bank bailout that didn't even stipulate that the bailout money be used for lending ONLY.

We've had a Keynesian government since Januray 2007.

Again, the Misery Index over the most recent Keynesian period (1970 thru 1980) had an average annual Misery Index of 14.2, while the most recent Supply Side period (1995 thru 2006) had an average Misery Index of 7.6!

We've also had the "Irish Miracle," recently - the Irish economy went from basketcase to one of the most vibarant in Europe when it cut its Corporate tax rate FROM 42% (at the time the highest in Europe) to 12% (one of the lowest in the world, THE lowest in Europe).

I'd like to see an Obama administration govern like the Supply Sider, pro-Free Trade, pro-Welfare Reform Clinton administration, rather than the star-crossed Carter administration.

By 2010 we'll certainly know the direction and the early results, as well.

Hi Barry and JMK!

Love the idea Barry.Hopefully this sentiment can grow but until the anger boils down to a simmer (5 stages of gloating?) of the previous administration, it may take a while. LOL

JMK..my mum told me that she almost had a fit. Ireland planned to cut health care to the senior citizens! I almost blew a gasket, too!

But as this explains it , hopefully will die a quick death:

"Ireland is having tough budget times. But austerity measures put forth by the ruling party Fianna Fail went too far for some citizens. The government was forced to reverse its proposal that called for cutting health care benefits for seniors."

Yeah, don't mess with me mum!

LOL...um..are the guy with the paper held up containing the word'cynical' in the letter, Barry? LOL

DO I win a T-shirt? Not one with the c-word on it, preferably :)

Btw..talking about nausea and bumper stickers an' all..I saw one that said, 'Jesus was a community organizer'.

Yeah...the second coming...

Yeah Jane, the credit crisis has hit Europe and most of the rest of the world even worse than here.

The UK, Ireland included has been hit very hard.

Which goes a ways toward explaining why the U.S.dollar has gotten stronger (relative to other currencies) since the credit crisis hit.

Oh yeah, and I left out a line above, "The post-Gingrich GOP abandoned many of the core Supply Side principles that Gingrich established.

"Since 2007, the Bush administration cooperated with the Keynesians on a failed "comprehensive immigration ("SHAMnesty") Bill, an ill-conceived "stimulus package" this past spring and the current bank bailout that didn't even stipulate that the bailout money be used for lending ONLY.

"We've had a Keynesian government since Januray 2007.

"Again, the Misery Index over the most recent Keynesian period (1970 thru 1980) had an average annual Misery Index of 14.2, while the most recent Supply Side period (1995 thru 2006) had an average Misery Index of 7.6! It's NOT Party, it's ideology that's important. There are many Conservative Dems who are more Conservative than many Republicans...that's always been true."

Good to see you around Jane!

>LOL...um..are the guy with the paper held up containing the word'cynical' in the letter, Barry?

Heh, close but no cigar. (I noticed that dude too.) Mine hasn't been uploaded yet. :-)

I have no interest in putting an "OBAMA IS NOT MY PRESIDENT" sticker on my car, or in spending the next 4 to 8 years in a mindless, sputtering rage because the election didn't turn out exactly the way I had hoped.

I can't seem to find where I said any of that...

If they don't want me to "pigeonhole" them as being part of the same team, they might start off by not using the same tactics.

>I can't seem to find where I said any of that...

You never did, my friend, and I didn't intend to imply otherwise. What I mean is I don't intend to mirror the tactics of the hard left during the Bush years. I don't think the right will do that, generally speaking. Not really our style. We shall see.

I actually got teary-eyed with that. Thanks, Barry.

I am with you. This was my response to the election outcome.

I don't like those libertarians who act as though there's something wrong with the world or their country because policy has not been customized to fit their personal preferences.

America is my country, and Obama is my president. Those libertarians and conservatives who seek to behave like the unhinged anti-Bush segments have acted these past 8 years will find no sympathy from me.

Hee! I saw the beer one before I saw this post. Is that you?

Sure ... Limbaugh and Hannity have already labeled this the "Obama Recession". I'm sure we can expect nothing but co-operation from the rabid right-wing nutjobs like JMK.

I wouldn't have it any other way. Their wailing and whining is music to my ears.

"The Obama Recession?"

I think you read too much David Brock (pssst, between you and me....did you know he's a racist? Yeah he slimed Anita Hill....And did you know he now claims to be gay? Seriously, no shit) anyway, I looked for some transcripts and did find one for Limbaugh.

Of course, it seems as though he's being a little tongue-in-cheek, as he said, "The Obama recession is in full swing, ladies and gentlemen. Stocks are dying, which is a precursor of things to come. This is an Obama recession. Might turn into a depression. He hasn't done anything yet but his ideas are killing the economy. His ideas are killing Wall Street..."

Seems like he's merely poking a little harmless fun and not making any serious economic or political commentary.

As I said, the President has absolutely no control over the federal budget.

The joke goes, "The easiest job in any Cabinet is Budget Director...the veritable Maytag Repairman of any administration."

Congress controls tax policy (ALL tax policy), Congress controls federal spending (ALL federal spending), because Congress controls the government's wallet.

Yes, Presidents can offer SUGGESTIONS, they can even threaten to veto budgets they feel are particularly egregious, but Congress is in CONTROL.

Bill Clinton found that out after winding up on the floor after butting heads with Newt Gingrich - who proceeded to force massive federal spending cuts and a huge 33% slashing of the Capital Gains rate on a reluctant Clinton.

Thank God Newt DID! Those spending cuts are most responsible for some of the lowest Misery Indexes in 4 decades, BUT they created all those budget surpluses later on.

Sadly, those were also the LAST real federal spending cuts we've seen.

All I can say is WHY?

I believe you could lop off a third (at least a quarter) of the federal budget today, with little if any ill effects.

As I've noted many, many times, there has never been a Carter-recession, Bush-41 recession OR Clinton-recession. There HAVE been the "Carter-era recession," the Bush-41 era recession" and the "Clinton-era recession."

I initially didn't understand your confusion over the not so subtle distinctions there, but I often fail to realize I'm dealing with a fellow who posted a chart (I just LOVE this story) that showed H-1B Visas going from just UNDER 50,000 in 1992 to just OVER 1 MILLION by 2001 and claiming that that showed G W Bush was responsible for the explosion in H-1Bs. Then of course there's RICO...and many, many more, but sometimes I have to remind myself of that.

Suffice to say, ALL those recessions had ONE THING in common. Three guesses...

OK, I'll ruin it and tell you, they were all the result of failed Keynesian (big government interventionism)!

Carter presided over the WORST U.S. economy since the Great Depression, due to a culmination of Keynesian depravity.

Bush-41 abandoned what he saw as Reagan's "Voodoo economics" by cooperating with the always inebriated Ted Kennedy to break his "Read my lips" pledge, resulting in him being only the 2nd post-WW II American President to preside over 4 years of double digit Misery Indexes!

Remember the Clinton-Gore lie about Bush-41? "This is the WORST American economy since the Great Depression!

Actually it was the SECOND WORST. Carter's 16.5 average annual Misery Index was indeed far larger than Bush-41's 10.5.

Clinton, ironically enough, DIDN'T engage in many Keynesian policies at all, and NONE when Gingrich was in office. The Tech Bubble bust and all those business scandals (Enron, Tyco, Worldcom, etc.) that flourished in the late-1990s and were "brought to justice" in the summer of 2001, were the result of the same thing that's victimized Bush-43 - an SEC asleep at the switch.

Arthur Levitt (Clinton's late 90's SEC Chief), like Christopher Cox (Bush-43's SEC Chief) both failed in their oversight duties.

Levitt failed to rein in the out-of-control IPO market of the late 1990s and Chris Cox failed to oversight of the highly leveraged and over-valued CMOs that wound up tanking the housing and ultimately the credit markets.

The ONLY two things that Bush-43 did well were (1) confronting global jihadist state-sponsored terrorism on a military level, AFTER the criminal justice method failed and (2) enacting across the board tax cuts that INCREASED both income tax and Cap Gains revenues every year since they've been passed.

The latter, has masked the costs of a lot of oppressive government spending since.

There's a pattern there - Keynesian Liberalism fails and Supply Side policies are needed to clean up the mess.

In the current case, we have a situation VERY similar to the late 1970s - a Keynesian (Moderate) Republican is handing over an economy in crisis, weighted down, not only by years of reckless spending, but by some toxic regulation (Sarb-Ox has made jobs creation much more expensive for major companies, and the re-tooled CRA that forced banks to make tons of subprime loans still exists) AND some incredibly HUGE bailouts, TO a very Keynesian Democrat.

In fact, although both Carter and Obama ran as independent, moderate outsiders, Obama's rhetoric is far more committed Left than Carter's ever was.

In 2010 the tax cuts expire and what does raising tax rates do, Fred?

Yes, they LOWER revenues, by incentivizing savings/deferring income.

Will that make Keynesianism's failures that much more evident?

I'm betting they will.

I agree with you, i kinda like the quester of the site. And if the liberal illuminati follow through with their bipartisan agenda (that they pitched to us // i have my doubts) this sight will mean even more!