My God, you are an idiot.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Adder

I'm really having a hard time figuring out where you do all this driving to if it's just in idyllic, sparsely populated, exurbs. You just go around to each other's houses, without ever venturing near the entrance to the parking lot for a big box store?

The biggest are parents' homes and schools. I cannot remember the last time I went into a big box store. E-Bay delivers and there are good local liquor stores and restaurants.

This seems to be getting away from what was meant by the "congestion tax" to "I like cities or rural areas better". I hope most people like cities better.

[Adder]

For Hank, I think the news that we have successfully assassinated an American citizen based, so far as the public knows, only on his political speech is beyond troubling.

Maybe now that he is dead we will learn more about his role and this will become less troubling, but I haven't seen much yet. The Times quotes a "senior administration official" as saying they were "looking into" his operational involvement, which is pretty weak sauce. Rep. Peter King says he was more important operationally than OBL, but I think he has absolutely zero credibility.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

E-Bay delivers

I could swear that said Amazon when I read it earlier.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Adder

I could swear that said Amazon when I read it earlier.

Good to see my posts being studied with care. Amazon delivers, too.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

For Hank, I think the news that we have successfully assassinated an American citizen based, so far as the public knows, only on his political speech is beyond troubling.

Maybe now that he is dead we will learn more about his role and this will become less troubling, but I haven't seen much yet. The Times quotes a "senior administration official" as saying they were "looking into" his operational involvement, which is pretty weak sauce. Rep. Peter King says he was more important operationally than OBL, but I think he has absolutely zero credibility.

yep. if an American citizen is bad enough we just kill them- John Gacy, Jeffrey Daumer, etc. No trial necessary.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

yep. if an American citizen is bad enough we just kill them- John Gacy, Jeffrey Daumer, etc. No trial necessary.

Well, actively engaging in war against the United States is a bit different from just being really bad. The question, of course, is whether that's what he was doing and whether the executive alone gets to make that decision.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Good to see my posts being studied with care. Amazon delivers, too.

Well, it made more sense the first time as eBay definitely doesn't deliver.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

Well, actively engaging in war against the United States is a bit different from just being really bad. The question, of course, is whether that's what he was doing and whether the executive alone gets to make that decision.

We're at war in Yemen? Btw if we're at war with aq doesn't that mean the indefinite detainees are simply prisioners?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

We're at war in Yemen?

You saw where I used the word "question," right? What does that word mean to you?

Btw if we're at war with aq doesn't that mean the indefinite detainees are simply prisioners?

The administrations position has been no, they are not prisoners of war. I don't fully understand all of the implications, but personally, that status would seems to make a lot more sense to me.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

You saw where I used the word "question," right? What does that word mean to you?



The administrations position has been no, they are not prisoners of war. I don't fully understand all of the implications, but personally, that status would seems to make a lot more sense to me.

But if "we are at war" so Obama can kill them it seems like "we were at war so bush could detain them." sidd will make the cogent point that torture isn't justofied. But you all gotta back peddle on the bush detainees were wrong thing

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

But if "we are at war" so Obama can kill them it seems like "we were at war so bush could detain them." sidd will make the cogent point that torture isn't justofied. But you all gotta back peddle on the bush detainees were wrong thing

If we are at war so Obama can kill them, which I did not say, then Bush could detain them as prisoners of war, to whom the Geneva Conventions would apply, which would grant them certain rights that were not afforded to them.

The position of both administrations seem to be that we are at war in some circumstances but not others, and I'm criticizing both for that inconsistency.

Why must you try to force everything into a Obama good/Bush bad dichotomy?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

Why must you try to force everything into a Obama good/Bush bad dichotomy?

For 8 years Ty posted about impeachable offenses bush did 4 times a week. I'm trying to show he's a hypocrit plus I'm setting up to defend the next r president in case he also does impeachable things, because if w had blown up a us citizen Ty would have been burning up the Internet with outrage today.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Hey, look: It's a free lunch.

Delong

Would be curious to hear club or Hank respond to the substance (as opposed to the politics) of this.

This comment:

"In sum, on the benefits side of the equation: more jobs now, $500 billion of additional consumption of goods and services over the next two years, and then a $40 billion a year flow of higher incomes and production each year thereafter."

Sounds intentionally vague to me. Once the infrastructure is built, the gains from it will fade. It is a one shot deal - not unlike our original stimulus. We're not going to see that $40bil year in year out indefinitely, which is why Summers avoids offering any projection on its sunset (NPI).

Sounds like he's advocating paying $200 billion over thirty years to knock a point off the unemployment rate. That's not a bad idea. But it's not a game changer, or anywhere near the fix we need, either.

If his logic holds, why not a borrow a trillion and knock the rate back to 5%? Oh, that's right... We did that once already, and the positive effects were, predictably, temporary.

You realize Summers accidentally points out the problem with stimulus with this idea. It admits that artificially-created consumption can only provide a temporary solution because, by its necessarily temporary nature, the multiplier effects left in its wake tend to also be temporary.

...Which brings us back to Cowen, and the crux of the issue at hand: Where's the new private sector advance to bring us out of this mess for real? That's the only question that matters.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

This comment:

"In sum, on the benefits side of the equation: more jobs now, $500 billion of additional consumption of goods and services over the next two years, and then a $40 billion a year flow of higher incomes and production each year thereafter."

Sounds intentionally vague to me. Once the infrastructure is built, the gains from it will fade. It is a one shot deal - not unlike our original stimulus. We're not going to see that $40bil year in year out indefinitely, which is why Summers avoids offering any projection on its sunset (NPI).

It's not vague at all. He says it's $40 billion/year in higher incomes and production each year thereafter. Three sentences later, through the magic of lawyerly rhetoric, you change this to $0 billion/year thereafter. Nicely done!

eta: You've cut the two prior paragraphs, where Delong explains where the $40 billion comes from:

the $500 billion of extra federal infrastructure spending over the next two years would produce $1 trillion of extra output of goods and services, generate approximately seven million person-years of extra employment, and push down the unemployment rate by two percentage points in each of those years. And, with tighter labor-force attachment on the part of those who have jobs, the unemployment rate thereafter would likely be about 0.1 percentage points lower in the indefinite future.

The impressive gains don’t stop there. Better infrastructure would mean an extra $20 billion a year of income and social welfare. A lower unemployment rate into the future would mean another $20 billion a year in higher production. And half of the extra $1 trillion of goods and services would show up as consumption goods and services for American households.

In sum, on the benefits side of the equation: more jobs now, $500 billion of additional consumption of goods and services over the next two years, and then a $40 billion a year flow of higher incomes and production each year thereafter. So, what are the likely costs of an extra $500 billion in infrastructure spending over the next two years?

I think you're being chary. We all get that if private industry -- say, Chinese middle-class investors, suddenly empowered to invest in the US -- were to spend $500 billion in infrastructure, it would create jobs, which lead to more income here. The same is true if the government makes that investment.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

It's not vague at all. He says it's $40 billion/year in higher incomes and production each year thereafter. Three sentences later, through the magic of lawyerly rhetoric, you change this to $0 billion/year thereafter. Nicely done!

a lot of us are afraid to criticize obama here, what with his new policy of blowing up US citizens just because he feels they encourage dissent