Re: Hi Less!
 

it really is a great show, you should watch it, or at least watch for the mimes, which are probably mid to late part 2 or maybe part 3,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHaeWcs_E1M mimes at about 7:40

Re: The reddest states??
 

when I felt the quality of posts on the board I moderate was below what it should be I took proactive steps to improve it; I didn't insult my constituents.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Yes, but:


eta: This is not to say that I'm happy with Obama. He had at least three chances to do something very different. One, ensure the W tax cuts would terminate, and do that well before the 2010 elections. Two, having blown that, insist on a debt ceiling increase when he agreed to extend the tax cuts. Three, having blown that too, announce his plan very clearly, using the bully pulpit, with specifics and with a direct appeal to the American people to accept reality (tax increases, entitlement cuts) and make the Rs accept the compromises he was already making.

I believe he blew two largely because he wouldn't accept just how dangerous, irrational, and ideology-blind this crew of Rs is. One and three were failures of leadership.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

They're going to keep taking hostages. By dealing with each crisis as a one-off, he's encouraging more crises.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Bingo!

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

not crises, these are grand opportunities to take our country back.

for an insight into the Teaparty mindset here's the next meeting agenda of my local crew- a scholarly analysis of how Obama is paving the way to sharia http://teapartypatriotsofwestoakland...eneral-meeting

I can't believe any of you argued with me when i told you the whole crew was racist.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

How we got here.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

the fact of the last debt ceiling should have been a consideration when Pelosi sat up the stimulus bill and the HCR bill. What's the point of a ceiling if we just repeatedly ignore it?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

And the most recent continuing resolution (as we have no passed budget).

One of the strangest things is that everyone's okay with this being thought of as some sort of check on spending. It isn't. It's a short cut to avoid congress having to vote on every debt issue. Only Congress can authorize borrowing. It used to vote on each bond. Finding that tedious, it decided to say, "okay, Treasury, you do what you need to do up to X."

That makes perfect sense, but it's hardly meant to be a break on the spending the Congress duly authorizes (e.g., the spending in the most recent budget/continuing resolution).

Which is a long way of saying that raising the debt limit as needed should have been including in each past spending bill.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

It should have been a consideration when Congress (Republicans & Democrats) agreed to cut everyone's taxes last fall, heightening the need to borrow.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

I thought this is an interesting analysis. I have no idea if it is correct, but it sort of sounds like the type of thing Obama would do.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

what happened here is meaningless other than telling the two sides who'll bluff next time. What obama's people say happened is double meaningless. when do the tax cuts come up again? I hope in advance of the election.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

I really don't understand all the belly-aching. We are reducing the growth of spending by a ridiculously small amount over a 10 year period. Yet the sky is falling? I actually think Obama got a pretty good deal here.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

seriously? you don't understand why ggg or sidd or adder or ty isn't posting from a standpoint that accepts a position that isn't biased by their bias? really? after all these years of seeing them unable to have the least bit of compromise or criticism of the Dem position?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Interesting siting tonight that only this board MAY care about: Chris Matthews having dinner with Nancy Reagan.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

My complaint is process oriented. Boehner and Tea Party are taking hostages whenever they see the opportunity; those hostages are separate pieces of legislation that become vehicles for continually revisiting the budget process. In their negotiating, they disregard all collateral consequences and they run roughshod over the political process. There were no hearings on anything in the debt bill - I remember how loudly you, Hank and your other tea party buddies wanted years of hearings there, wanted bills published in full and in detail long before votes - what happened? Now you want dead of night deals to cut players to be identified later?

Of course, from here on out, it's all fair game. You guys say, fuck America, we don't care the consequences, we don't care if we debate whether or not this is even the right thing to do, we don't care how many times a year we revisit legislation already passed and debates already held - at the end, all the Rs seem to care about is whether Boehner gets those cuts he wants. That's what Hank said, right, Boehner was successful, all is good. Well, congratulations, now that you've pulled out that weapon, it will be used by the Dems as well. You've helped further break the system - you've gotten yourself major legislation with no hearing or public input process, no prior disclosure or discussion of the key elements of the legislation. Good for you.

I note the market is already missing the stimulus. Yeah, imagine that? Do you think if Congress had talked to a few economists before finishing this bill, or had, say, visited these budgeting issues in the budgetting process, they might have realized that business does indeed still need some stimulus?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Why on earth would any furloughed employee of the FAA continue to show up without pay to a Washington area airport to let members of Congress go home without having resolved the FAA issue? I don't really care about the underlying issues, but it seems that air traffic controler and runway safety types have an acute ability to show how important funding their jobs is.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Obviously, they must be Democrats.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

two quick thoughts: The market needs a government that understands how to get the economy going. Hopefully that will happen after the 2012 elections.

And second thought, Club, if you respond to this troll you do more harm to this board than HCR will do to your health care.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Oh wise and great Hank, how do you get the economy going from Washington?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Best case scenario is that this deal does limited harm. I guess that's a "good deal" in comparison to a deal that would have done a lot of harm, and yes, things could have been much worse. But that doesn't add up to doing much good.

And, as GGG says, it's worrying from a process perspective.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

it's all consumer confidence. Unfortunately for Obama and the Dems the country has decided they cannot "fix it."

and by the way, Obama won a good number of midwest states by promising to bring back manufacturing jobs, so whether or not things can be fixed "from Washington," we were told they can be.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

There was a bit in the New Yorker saying that the ceiling is an anachronism, from a time with the Pres had more control over spending and Congress wanted some check on it. So, it had a point but doesn't anymore.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Go check what I've been saying. I'm not the person who has been railing against any cuts. I wanted more cuts, particularly to entitlements, and I wanted tax increases.

Sorry for suggesting that you should take facts into account before making a personal attack on me -- I know you hate that sort of thing.


eta: I echo GGG's points on the process, which is the other part I've been complaining about. Once again, Boehner should have negotiated with Obama and forged a compromise that the center could support.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Why discussions among dems are often more interesting than those with Tea Party Trolls like Hank.

I disagree with the more cuts position (at least net cuts - there's some rejiggering I'd like to do) and would back more stimulus (hey, it was good for my clients - I saw the impact) instead. But there are rational discussions to be had on both fronts, and I see little rational about the cuts being made other than culling programs with the least current political support.

As an example, attempting to argue that cutting payments to providers is not cutting "benefits" is sort of cute, but then suddenly Gramma's nursing home lays off a quarter of the staff and we'll see what happens to care.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

So your hope for a government that understands how to get the economy going after 2012 is futile?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Boehner should have said "the ceiling is something that we have to adjust upwardly, because we have already committed those funds. the need for raising it shows we need to get spending under control. We will do that next budget cycle." We all agree that doing this hijack was harmful to the process, that's not a "point."

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

no. i think if there is a change the economy will pick up because the new guy will tell us he will fix it.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

2.

I remain deeply concerned about the level of public debt. And while I understand the argument for stimulus spending, the environment over the past few years -- starting with inheriting massive deficits even during good years (back in late 2008 I raised the concern here that W's spending/tax cutting binge left us unable to stimulate our way out of recession without incurring dangerous levels of debt), a fed govt so deeply divided that they cannot make decisions on any basis other than political support and pandering (you echo that concern as to how cuts are allocated, and I agree), and weak leadership (Obama has failed to use the Presidency to press for well-targetted spending, and the Dems have failed to support him in his efforts to do so) -- leaves me believing that the feds just aren't up to the task right now.

As noted, I agree about the way cuts are decided. Pathetic.

Also, note that my view for more cuts is not so much that they need to be immediate, but that they need to be more structural. Particularly with respect to entitlements, which Obama had the balls to put on the table and Boehner had the stupidity to slap off.


How is our favorite former fiscal conservative these days?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Way to dodge the fact that you lied about my position about cuts in order to make a personal attack.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Is there any conclusion other than Boehner chose political expedience over accomplishing a purported goal?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

The place where it's pretty clear something structural needs to be done is Medicaid/Medicare, and the problem causing that structural imbalance is actually in part its own success: we live longer, which means we linger with more expense at the end. And part of the problem is that we are increasingly solving this problem institutionally, by growing the hospital and nursing home industry.

I'm a big fan of doing this through reallocation rather than cutting, triggering, one hopes, savings in out years: I'd like to see more focus on support for keeping people at home as they age, including things like tax credits or medicare support payments for people caring for elderly in their home. There are elements of these alternative approaches in ACA, but I think the best bet is to see what starts happening after 2014 when payments will be increasingly outcome based. Accelerating ACA may do more to help here than anything else, since we'll accelerate key datapoints.

As to our favorite former fiscal conservative, I'm not talking to him until he finds me a nursing home that offers hookers and blow.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

A decade of virtual contact with Hank has taught me that it's very difficult to identify a person's motivation for behavior that is divisive, intellectually dishonest, counterproductive and obnoxious.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

McConnell to Larry Kudlow: Why yes, yes we will.


Or, as Jonathan Chait has put it recently, it's like someone taking your child hostage and as ransom asking for $100,000 plus your other child.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

But no one will agree with me that we need less Grandmas (or as you actually admit later on, less expensive care for Grandma).

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Look, man, not everyone has the courage to be an evolved Malthusian. Stop bemoaning the fact that you're in the vanguard on this issue, and grab a baton! Should be a heckuva parade.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

I'm not with you on the less Grandmas, but am with you on the less expensive care. Some of that answer is in sticking each of us with more responsibility for caring for our own parents. Enjoy, guys.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

This would be a good thing. Ever wonder what effect generous pensions have on driving down birth rates? Individuals no longer want lots of kids to ensure they are taken care of in their old age, and society loses the benefit of a large base of young working people.

Me, I'm from an Italian family. My parents downgraded from 8-kid families to a 4-kid family, so I'm covered. My brother will get stuck with my parents, who are 3000 miles away.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Can I just be my own death panel?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Actually, they do. Through both the Independent Payment Advisory Board and through comparative effectiveness research, both which are aspects of the health reform law.