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Consequences of the Mass. Election
I was watching the election results from Mass. with some people who
know history better than I. None of us could come up with a historical
parallel to the development that took place this evening. This one is
going to go down as one of those ‘water shed’ events that you hear about.
The TV guys are all talking about what this could mean to the health
care legislation. At this point, I could care less. I thought it was
dead before and I think it is deader now. What I care about is what
this means for some of the other significant issues that we face.
In my opinion the vote in Mass was a vote against the status quo. It
was a loud enough vote for everyone in D.C. to hear. If there was any
doubt that Americans are sick of the "same old, same old", this was it.
The message was clear to me, “If you want to keep your job as an
elected official you have to do things differently.” This will force
changes across the board. Some things outside of health care that I
think may be impacted:
-The days where the Fed and Mr. Bernanke get to establish broad
economic policy without taking into consideration the mood of the
public is over. This is not to suggest that the Fed is going to jack up
rates anytime soon. But to me it means that the possibility of QE2 is
done. There was a time when you might have said, “The American people
don’t understand their monetary policy and have know idea how much debt
has been created in their name”. Well that was then and this is now.
Americans do understand how much debt there is. They are shocked,
dismayed and angered. They’re a lot of everyday citizens who are well
aware that the Fed printed 2 trillion in the last year or so. The vote
in Natick Mass showed their dislike and distrust of Fed policy. While I
don’t think this will result in Bernanke failing to get a second term
in the upcoming vote, it just got a bit more uncertain. In many ways
this election will tie Ben’s hands.
-There is has been some discussion on a second stimulus bill. Those
like me who see weakness before this year is over were pushing for
that. Some big voices in the public and private sector are going to be
disappointed. There will be no second stimulus bill. Not in 2010 at
least. There is no stomach for that any longer. There are many
Congressmen and Senators who are up for reelection in ten months. They
are not going to stick there neck out for something the White House
wants and they know the people don’t. I doubt the administration will
even ask for a stimulus bill after this shellacking.
-I read the election result as being dollar positive. Somewhere inside
this vote tonight is a call for fiscal conservatism. We are going to
hear rhetoric to that effect in the coming months and we will see
legislative steps that at least give lip service to the idea that we
aught to tighten our belt a few notches. To the extent that I am right
by calling this dollar positive, you have to also think that it is a
gold negative development. For those that love the yellow metal and
hate the dollar take heart. Any positive impact to dollar will be short
lived. The inability to put a second stimulus together will show up in
all of our numbers by midyear. At that point it will be more clearly
understood that the US is broke and there really aren’t any viable
options that don’t entail a lot time and pain.
-Tim Geithner’s ship went down in Massachusetts. I am convinced that he
now must go. The Administration will have to make changes after this
vote. They have to show that they are being responsive. The beating the
WH took tonight was biblical. So will their response be. It will take a
month, but changes and heads will roll.
-I am sure that all the stock pundits are going to read this evening’s
results good for the broad market averages. I have been skeptical of
this for a while. But not any longer. The stock market looks six months
ahead. It will soon be sensing the next economic slowdown soon. I would
not say the market is a screaming short. It is not, yet. It just got
closer however.
-I can see how some health care companies might see a pop in their
stocks for a few days. This group I would short. The absence of a
health care deal is actually bad for them in my opinion. Give that a
week at best.
-There will be no fix on Social Security this year. Mr. Goss who runs
that shop has said that the issues facing SS have to take a back burner
to finding a fix to health care. Well, we have not found that elusive
solution. And now it is farther away then ever. Mr. Goss will have to
wait at least another year. That will prove to be a devastating delay.
-There will be no significant steps to address the problems at the
mortgage Agencies; Fannie, Freddie and FHA. The reason is simple. If
you wanted to address the problems with these dogs you have to owe up
to the fact that it is a $500 billion dollar sinkhole. Who would want
to put that bad news on the table after getting your ass kicked in a
crucial election? The answer to that is that no one in Washington
would. And no one will. Having said that, I would not be at all
surprised to see an effort to cut the outrageously rich compensation
packages for the big shots at Fannie and Freddie. There may have been
some belief that these two companies were in the private sector where
salaries have no caps. But now there will be those in Congress that
want/need an election edge. What could be a better edge than to beat up
on a bunch of fat cat D.C. bankers?
-We have several states that are on the edge of a fiscal crisis. I
thought that there would be some form of Federal assistance for them
this year. That may still come, but it is now much less likely. You
can’t just help NY and Cali. Those States will simply have to cut their
deficits the old fashioned way, by cutting expenses. There is no way
the folks in Texas are going to let Federal dollars be used to bail out
TBTF States. And no one in Congress is going to stand up to that.
-If you were a TBTF institution you just hated this vote. This is bad
for the Citi’s and BoA’s, but it just downright terrible for the likes
of GS. The more successful you are, the more crap that you will have to
take. Washington knows that Americans hate their banks. Now Washington
is going to take sides with the people and lean on the TBTFs even
harder.
-The bailout mentality is over. If GM needed a handout today, they
would not get it. If a company runs into difficulty in the future they
will just go down. There is no will left for the bailout thinking. If
you are a legislator and you support a bailout, you will lose you right
to vote in Washington. The voters will take you out back and shoot you
on Election Day.
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Thanks to everyone for all of these great comments. My eyes are watering after reading them all. The election yesterday will change things. The fact that so many people are riled up tells me something. They are listening. They did get a message of a very broad base of dissatisfaction.
I make mistakes in these postings (ahem). I recently made a big gaff and confused the name of two people at the Treasury department. I was contacted by Treasury and asked to make the necessary fixes and post a correction. I did that.
I bring this up to let all of you know that what I write is being read by those that make choices for us. While I doubt they pay much attention to me, they most certainly are paying attention to you and what you write and how you express your anger and frustration.
I am certain that someone in D.C. is reading all that you wrote.
Bruce Krasting
Thank you, Bruce. You announced a party and we couldn't resist.
I can only have faith in my fellow Citizens and Patriots that those in positions of higher responsibility will remember the beauty and gift of the Constitution in letter and spirit. Protect us from the Destroyers.
But only one party is insane. I am assuming you meant the GOP.
Pubs and Dems are not the same; otherwise, the healthcare bill would fly through to passage.
Both corrupt parties? Yes, but only one party is insane.
I think many here are missing the point of Bruce's comments. The issue isn't whether the system is corrupt, or that the D/Rs are two sides of the same coin, or that this was a vote against the status quo, or that the Dems ran a poor candidate, etc.
Yes, those points are all valid/true. So what? What does that have to do with generating a sufficient level of wealth to ensure your family's personal safety & comfort in the coming collapse?
Since 1694, the debt-money system has relied on a very simple model: (a) a growing monetary base to service accrued interest charges on current debt balances; and (b) an expanding, credit-leveraged economic base to support the additional tranches of debt necessary to grow the monetary base to deal with (a).
Economic growth is entirely predicated on energy - both its supply & utility. It's no coincidence that there has been a nearly unending discovery of energy supplies and new technological adaptations (ie utilization) to these sources over the last 316 years to support an almost never-ending pyramiding of debt.
Those days are over. Even if we had steady supplies of energy, it only would preserve the status quo. We need ADDITIONAL growth (consumption/utilization) in order to expand the monetary base to cover accrued interest charges and finance new investment! How is that possible when practically all productive wealth is now siphoned off for both warfare/welfare programs? Where are the new discoveries?
So the whole enchilada comes down to correctly assessing "the top" - that is, the end of monetary expansion. Macko has posted Z1 reports on multiple occasions; it is declining, even with government entitlement spending. The Fed with its QE program was the last stop gap measure - like the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dike.
I see 1/19/10 not as Waterloo, but as Borodino. It was the true top - from then on, it was all down hill until the final denouement 3 years later. This is it fellow ZH space monkeys. The federal government had 9 mos to interfere with the markets. It's all over. The debt-deflation tsunami is awaiting its curtain call.
Plan & invest accordingly.
Amen! But what do I buy today? I just cashed my paycheck at a pay-loan shop.
They have pay-loan shops on small farms in South America?
What were people buying in March '09 before the government began to interfere? On a long enough time line ... history will show it was only a 10 month interlude. A wink of an eye, nothing more.
The time is ripe for selling - buying will resume at the bottom. Get out of debt. Horde marketable 'currencies', whether they be guns, whiskey, dollars, gold, etc. Be mobile, get along with other people (you can't believe the number of scores that are settled when authority is suspended/curtailed), and develop some basic skills.
It's gonna take a long, long time to crawl back to the top, if we ever get there. But if we do, it will be due to people like us.
Those who recognize Obama’s first year as essentially an extension of the Bush administration still often fall short of recognizing the fundamental issue here: This was practically meant to be. Look at what the Democrats have accomplished versus the public PR campaigns they have run. Record military spending, extensions of state power in violation of civil liberties, Bush/Obama bailouts for politically connect large corporations. The two parties hand power off to one another, but the essential political realities remain in place. Carol Quigley, the brilliant historian of the establishment(Bill Clinton's professor at Georgetown), wrote in
Tragedy and Hope
"The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to the doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can 'throw the rascals out' at any election without leading to any profound or extreme shifts in policy.… Either party in office becomes in time corrupt, tired, unenterprising, and vigorless. Then it should be possible to replace it, every four years if necessary, by the other party, which will be none of these things but will still pursue, with new vigor, approximately the same basic policies."
So now the people have shown their "anger" and voted the left hand of the puppet master out of office and voted the right hand of the puppet master into office. The head of General Dynamics, Blackwater and Glaxo Smith Kline are as content as ever. The CFR crowd wins again. The MSM will tell us how there has now been a huge tidal wave in American politics and the masses will be pleased with themselves for "shocking" the establishment…comfortably sedated by their courageuos revolution the people will go back to comfortably watching American Idol and the Super Bowl as the country continues to rot.
Oh! the hell with this nonsense.
We bought a farm in South America a few years ago, where the people never hear anything about this. Just their donkey and three square meals a day and yet they smile.
We are moving there sorrounded by trees, vineyards, beaches, sat TV and watch the whole US thing crash down to nothing.
Slavery follows, revolution after that.
Wake up America take your country back from both R's and D's.
Why don't you start a new party? "The Constitutional Party" Or "the Tea Party"? Start this November. Elect 4 Reps and 1 senator and keep going.
I bought a farm too, only in US.
Its amazing, how within a day or two, the financial mess we
are in leaves front and center of my frontal lobe.
Its the only time I am able to relax...Only there a couple weeks a year...
then its back to the madness....
Those who recognize Obama’s first year as essentially an extension of the Bush administration still often fall short of recognizing the fundamental issue here: This was practically meant to be. Look at what the Democrats have accomplished versus the public PR campaigns they have run. Record military spending, extensions of state power in violation of civil liberties, Bush/Obama bailouts for politically connect large corporations. The two parties hand power off to one another, but the essential political realities remain in place. Carol Quigley, the brilliant historian of the establishment(Bill Clinton's professor at Georgetown), wrote in Tragedy and Hope:
The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to the doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can 'throw the rascals out' at any election without leading to any profound or extreme shifts in policy.… Either party in office becomes in time corrupt, tired, unenterprising, and vigorless. Then it should be possible to replace it, every four years if necessary, by the other party, which will be none of these things but will still pursue, with new vigor, approximately the same basic policies.
So now the people have shown their "anger" and voted the left hand of the puppet master out of office and voted the right hand of the puppet master into office. The head of General Dynamics, Blackwater and Glaxo Smith Kline are as content as ever. The CFR crowd wins again. The MSM will tell us how their has now been a huge tidal wave in American politics and the masses will be pleased with themselves for "shocking" the establishment…comfortably sedated by their courageuos revolution the people will go back to comfortably watching American Idol and the Super Bowl as the country continues to rot.
Polls indicate (not exit polls, there were no exit polls) that the main reason
for this victory was national security. People were very pissed off that the
christmas day bomber was being tried criminally and not as a enemy combatant.
The CDB indicated that there were others like him and then took the fifth.
That is the primary outrage, although congress spending like drunken sailors
and healthcare ranked too.
Hopefully, this vote will be a wake up call for not only the dems, but the pubs too, for they also spent like drunken sailors.
But judging by Pelosi's comments today, she is too dense to get the message.
How did someone this STUPID get in such a high position???
Every time Pelosi opens her mouth, I just wonder to myself
how she ever became speaker of the House. I don't know what is more embarrassing to me as an American, Nancy Pelosi or the Jerry Springer show.....
unbelievable......
Every time Pelosi opens her mouth, I just wonder to myself how she ever became speaker of the House.
Think toilet, think floater.
Not to worry. We will be killing hundreds of millions of them eventually and many will be horrible painful deaths. In the meantime we will torture them in ones twos and threes. Admittedly probably not Pelosi or the millions who would vote for her. Those will just have to be cowed into submission.
Then Jesus and the consitution will be satisfied.
I don't understand why the Independents won't vote for an independent candidate. This country needs a third party.
This political flip flop in the admitted bastion of neoliberal Mass looks a lot like the whip saw volatility that one can see in the chart patterns of manipulated markets. Pump and dump. The time honored shell game that makes suckers out of investors and chumps out of the masochistic, gullible, ever credulous and foolish dupes of the American electorate. This prime time Punch and Judy show that is American electoral politics has people standing in line and paying admission to get a royal fleecing by the latest political pimp du jour. Must be all that fluoride in the water. One of the obvious and oft stated symptoms of insanity is the disability characterized by performing the same action over and over again to ones detriment and expecting a different result. You could not ask for a better definition of the prison house of the left-right paradigm. The bad cop works you over for a good while and then the good cop comes in and offers you a deal. Sound familiar? For those with any any brain cells left to support a functioning memory, hearken back to election 2008, and how conveniently it dovetailed with the engineered collapse of Lehman, Bear Stearns et al. Cui bono? The cabal of Goldman Sachs seamlessly interwoven within the previous and successive administrations. True continuity of government. Although some remaining vestiges of common sense have prevented the astute Krasting from abandoning himself completely to the same kind of folly which animated the legions of Obama lemmings, his musings reflect the same delusionary currents albeit shoved wildly into reverse. Or perhaps he forgets the feckless Bush. His reflections are obviously muddled by the same unfounded puerile "hope" for "change" which we are now experiencing the disastrous results of. On the other hand, Mr. Vyshinsky is one of the few posting who displays an intelligence seasoned by obvious experience and informed by an understanding of recent history. The foundation puppet Obama and his crew of "socialist" provocateurs are merely clearing the decks for the main event-iron clad right wing fascist dictatorship. One Senate chair on that deck of our ship of state Titanic is not going to forestall that giant iceberg waiting for its appointed moment in the looming darkness.
In the long history of democratic republics never has a party which has executive power, a solid majority in the lower legislative chamber and a huge majority in the upper chamber been declared powerless losers. Lewis Carrol would have never considered such a thing for Wonderland because it is just too absurd.
The world looks on in horror at the devolution of American governance and really if they are far sighted enough the end of democratic republics. Our libertarian friends look on in delight, directed from banking, insurance and media board rooms. Not quite getting that the road for those below leads to a Donner Party outcome.
The great moral arbiter William Bennett used to wax nostalgic about those plucky Donner Party pioneers wondering where those kind of people have gone? Into each other partly and it is generally accepted two of those were murdered for the opprotunity.
The point to remember, Anonymous 199201, regarding Brown’s position on Israel, is that it is not that important at the moment. It seems that Brown’s statement was written in order to get monetary support.
Brown won’t be able to hold the US Senate seat; there were only six Republicans in the entire Massachusetts’ state senate. With the Democrat registration in Massachusetts and the Massachusetts independent vote weighted to the Democrats, the chances of him holding that seat for the Republicans is very slim. The people of Massachusetts will want taxes, welfare, and everything else the Democrats want; Brown can’t deliver that unless he is an Olympia Snowe and I would think Massachusetts is a lot more liberal than Maine.
The race was about one single thing—health care. “ 41” was the chant—the 41st vote for the filibuster. The vote per se wasn’t about the Fed, about jobs, about the economy, about Wall Street; but health care. Brown’s message was--Obama health care is going to raise taxes, hurt Medicare, increase health costs across the board…
That said, health care has become a nationwide symbol of the economy, of a government whose spending is out of control and of the Democrat response, we’re going to push the spending through no matter what. It was the last spending straw. And the public said, Oh no you won’t!
Partisans are already trying to make the election results fit their agenda. Already this morning, Rush Limbaugh, the chief representative of big government Republicans and neocon war party activists, tried to use election results as a Republican Party victory. He is the Republican Party’s primary weapon against the third party movement. His primary issues are never Wall Street and investment bank crimes or Republican Party socialism; his main topic is always football-game-like campaigns against Obama, Reid and Pelosi. Is there no shame that the rush to war and the consistent support of the unbelievably disastrous policies of George Bush brought America huge Democrat majorities and the most socialistic president in history?
George Will’s description is that Obama fashioned his future and agenda around one issue—health care. And the more that people saw it and heard about it, the more they were opposed. NPR said this morning that according to polling, when Obama went into New Jersey and Virginia and Massachusetts it never increased the polling numbers for the Democrats at all.
If the Democrats get health care passage by paying off Voinovich, or another prostitute, it will reflect on the Democrats and they are going to suffer. People are tried of the “change” that the Democrats are giving us. Things have “changed.”
As for America’s political future, IMO, when you have the Obama boil, you have to lance it. This election was a game changer. The Tea Party movement was the edge of a general groundswell against politics in Washington. It opposed health care, but a major target seen over and over was “socialism.” Almost never did these activists call for a return to the kind of Republican policies of George Bush. Big government Republicans and war party neocons are just as much the targets of this 50-state movement as are Barney Frank and Harry Reid prostitutes. America was hurdling down the slope to destruction. This election has stopped that fall. The direction henceforth remains to be seen. But the news is, the slippery slide is stopped. I leave you with this line from an Irish song, Come By the Hills:
“The cares of tomorrow must wait until this day is done.”
+1
I was weak last night and watched MSNBC's take on it all - what vitriol. It was like watching reality TV and I couldn't look away. I can only imagine it was all hi-fives over on Fox. Very little content, lots of chemical weapons.
It’s entertaining how pundits and partisans always know what the results of every election mean…conveniently fitting the goals they’ve been emphasizing all along. Our local “progressive” station blamed a weak Coakley campaign and lukewarm support from Obama for their defeat. Yet Obamacare was probably the biggest piece of lead Coakley had in her backpack. On the right side of our local radio dial, the big government conservatives called the election a resurgence of the Republican cause.
Right. The one in every four registered Massachusetts Democrats who voted for Brown is now gonna switch parties? And Massachusetts Independents who most always vote for Democrats are likely to start pulling for the party of Taft? Huh-uh.
The reason for the huge increase in Independent registrations across the nation points to better chances for a third party--polls showed 49% of Americans pulling for Brown, about 34% for Coakley.
The Constitution states, “Congress shall have the power to coin money and regulate the value thereof.” This power has been abdicated to private bankers. Today, 99.99% of our money is created by private banks when they make loans. This includes the Federal Reserve, a private banking corporation, which orders Federal Reserve Notes to be printed, and then lends them to the U.S. government. Only coins are actually created by the government itself. Coins compose only about 1-10,000th of the M3 money supply, and Federal Reserve Notes compose about 3% of it. All of the rest is created by banks as loans, something they do by simply writing numbers into accounts.
Congress could take back the power to create the national money supply by:
(a) Nationalizing the Federal Reserve.
(b) Reviving the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, a government-owned lending facility used by Roosevelt to fund the New Deal. Rather than merely recycling borrowed money as Roosevelt did, however, the RFC could actually create credit on its books, in the same way that banks do it today, by fanning its capital base into many times that sum in loans. Assuming $300 billion is left of the TARP money approved by Congress last fall, this money could be deposited into the RFC and leveraged into $3 trillion in loans. That’s based on a 10% reserve requirement. If the money were counted as capital, at an 8% capital requirement it could be leveraged into 12.5 times the original sum. That would be enough to fund not only President Obama’s stimulus package but many other programs that are desperately short of funding now.
Many references are available which will be furnished on request. See generally www.webofdebt.com/articles.
Lessee, the boat is sinking, we need a bucket.
We got rid of the knitting needles and now have a flyswatter. Wow, that's progress.
The historical parallel is Newt and the 'Contract with America' and several flirtations with technical default in the mid- nineties. Here we go again, with more 'faith- based' policies and denial of the real problems.
With the government set on 'broken' and the economy lost in the wilderness, there is little to do but watch the entire US turn into Detroit. Somehow, Mr. Brown does not raise confidence that any new approaches are in the pipleline, which most people would dislike intensely, by the way.
As for the bailouts; the Fed/Treasury has but to push one of its zombies into the abyss and the panic will instantly appear. The Armageddon lobby will go straight to Capital Hill and receive whatever trillions they ask for. There are pleny of Lehman Brother analogs out there that would fill the bill; Morgan- Stanley? Citi? Wells Fargo/Wachovia offered me 5% on deposits last week. Why not Goldman?
Installing more of the 'business as usual' crowd into important administrative roles just puts off the time for needed reforms to the point where they cannot be enacted. Another lost year.
"...Tea Party folks are going to vote against ALL encumbents, this will give the Democrats a leg up on everyone else."
Really?
How do you 'splain Brown in Taxachusetts?
Coakley was not Ted Kennedy, and exchanging a senior Senator who can pull in the perks, for a freshman replacement leaves the door open. The market doesn't seem to like this, and we know why. They have been double crossed. Obama can tirade about the bankers all day long, everyone knows he is a phony, bought and paid for by Goldman Sachs, his Uber-contributor.
There are a couple scenarios, the most chilling is what I call "The Bottomless Bottom", the dead cat bounce that isn't, no V, no U, just the pratfall, and the flat line. All short sellers know the action, they fall fall fall, and then nothing. At that point the short seller can cover. It means there are no buyers at any price, and since Bernanke and company have been holding their raid on equity (aka the housing bubble), savings keep disappearing, which means there is no cash to put to work when the market bottoms.
The Fed could step in and buy the market, which is like the reverse split? Reverse stock splits also get the shorts salivating. Someone picks up the victim so you can punch them again.
And if the Fed backs the stock market with T bonds, those will be sold off as well.
The problem with healthcare has been the partisan divide, and the American people didn't miss that press conference where Republicans brought healthcare lobbyists in to help them defeat the HC bill.
Either way this election wasn't going to break the partisan gridlock, which increasingly looks like class warfare, although Republicans tend to represent poor and rural states, they can also do the deed with corporate fat cats.
Wall Street got one more victory (Healthcare stocks this time, but they lost the war) After twenty some years of downsizing to enhance profits, and outsourcing, while government reflated the various bubbles which kept the laid off workers, who are also consumers, buying their products. This moment was inevitable.
"republicans....they can also do the deed with corporate fat cats".
But democrats don'ts, eh? AIPAC is staunchly democrat organization. How much do you think they along with their other secular semites give to democrats vs republicans?
You need to refine your analysis.
Class warfare was more on target, and some of the wealthiest are George Soros, Warren Buffet, and Bill Gates----ALL worth together $100 BILLION--ALL voting for TheBamster and by extension Lord Blankfein, Goldman Sucks, and JP Morgan, ALL democrats.
impeach the Democrats,
imprison the Republicans
unless Brown repudiates his party, his is the problem not the solution
Brown has to be very careful of being absorbed by neocon
nutcase Republican corruptistas. We don't want him to
get too cozy with Mitt, either. The uber-ambitious
but no too bright Mittster has probably got Brown figured in somehow as his springboard to a Republican presidency.
The death of the Health Scam Bill,(if it really is DEAD) is HUGE.
But, Obama has end arounded the Congress on law making, and passing legislation.
With the EPA now in control of the enforcement, of Carbon Dioxide Emissions,buckle up.
The CZAR's, have been empowered to do the same.
The Health Care Bill,IF passed, would destroy the Constitution, and the entire BOR's, and Amendments.( it has things in it, that would boggle your mind),did mine.
This is WHY they ("O"),has done everything he can think of to get this passed.
Out of a form of a Democratic Republic of Gv't to Fascism.
If you saw the break down on the percentages of where the Parties stand with the American People.............
The TEA PARTY was the largest percentage wise...Dems, and GOP, were next to next to last, and last, respectively.
A referendum has been given.
But, "O", is not a Democrat, he is a Progressive, and he is NOT about doing what's best for Americans....it's about THE agenda.
Regardless, the amount of debt, and the number of states near bankruptcy, the commercial real estate sector debt, Fannie, and Freddie, the unfunded liabilities( 160T+ long term), and a dollar destined for the crapper, it will take a miracle to save this Republic.
It can be done, but it will take years, and sacrifice, and pain.
I do not have a optomistic view we can do it, nor the citizenry that will accept it.
After fifty years of being on welfare..............the SWHTF if it's cut off.
The Tea Party folks are going to vote against ALL encumbents, this will give the Democrats a leg up on everyone else.
So, we are basically just getting a breather. In my opinion............
Surely this is the scariest part. Millions believe it is their right to have food given to them just because they were born here. I understand the need to support those enduring hardship - but it's so that they can get back on their feet and produce!
The Democratic Party is aptly named: MOB RULE BITCHES!!! Although I hate discussing either party because both represent more sinister interests as you have pointed out.
I recently read that over 50% of the population get more money than pay in taxes. That is a recipe for more socialism as the leaches will not want their money cut off.
When the welfare / bailouts run out, and when the bankruptcies REALLY START (Illinois, California, etc.), then TSWHTF.
Unless they just print the money...
Can you imagine the handwringing Krugman is doing
today? Bwahahahahahahaha.
The market is signaling its thoughts on how a 59/41 Senate split will change things.
The odds of the US committing financial suicide just went down considerably - along with the price of GOLD.
The American psyche will not self destroy.
Yes, a deflationary wipe-out will be painful. And, in my view, asset prices correcting to pre-1980 levels is all but inevitable (ESPECIALLY real estate).
So the banks get wiped out, along with all those who can't pay their debts.
Government reduces its size and scope by 70% - and then the healing can begin.
The Mass election was a game-ender for the doomers.
Government reduces its size and scope by 70% - and then the healing can begin.
I'd really like to believe that, but it will never happen voluntarily, and never by legislation. The only way such measures can come about are under extreme duress. The dependency class and government employees in the U.S. still vote, and with their supporters and rent-seekers they are a clear majority. Now, any libertarian worth the name could easily come up with a 70% reduction in the US budget, no sweat, by lunch time tomorrow.
Idiotic....the deflationary doom will
now intensify and overwhelm the markets.
Vampire squids boyz are abandoning ship
with far less gubbermint hand holding now
being in the offing.
Not permitted to vote for anyone representing an authentic alternative to the Regime, the people of Massachusetts, thinking that they have registered a protest, have simply intensified the problems we face, not that the choice of Coakley would have been any better. In truth, a choice of Coakley over Brown had the same significance as a choice to join the Stahlhelm instead of the Sturmabteilung. The instincts of the Tea Party crowd are largely brownshirt, purely and simply, and like Hitler's reining in Ernst Roehm, the Republican Party will now embrace and envelope them. They are hyper-Regime, not anti-Regime, and they are the strongest political force going at the moment. Let there be no mistake here, Hitler envisioned his movement as a "national revolution" every bit as much as do the Tea Party goers. They have the same smell and the same feel.
did somebody just shoot Archduke Ferdinand?
"They have the same smell and the same feel."
Mein Kampf?!?!
Not me, baby.
These are well intentioned people who have allowed gangsters and warmongers to give their movement its direction. I'll bet dimes to donuts that the reality of the Tea Party will last just through the next congressional election, just long enough for the Republicans to make maximum use of it. And then will come the interminable nightmare, the year after year of 12-15% unemployment with no heart whatsoever for recourse to needed fiscal measures to staunch it. And then, perhaps, an authentic peoples' movement will emerge.
Very chewy, in a good way, today. I want to disagree, but this amorphous Tea Party/Independent/"Libertarian" (in quotes because Glenn Beck considers himself one; give me a break) movement is inherently weak because:
we are unlikely to see anything but more of the same unless we reach the point of general strike(s) - and that is when our society will be the most vulnerable to demagoguery; just like 30's Deutschland. I wonder if they will make comparisons between the Versailles Treaty and bailout legislation someday. Instead of paying for a war we're paying for bankers mistakes; which since 1913 go especially hand in hand.
While the Tea Party rejection of the bailouts is entirely sound, the business of deficit paranoia at a time of record unemployment is simply daft. It reads directly from the traditional Republican songbook and, with its stress on restricted government, kills off the possibility either of regulation or nationalization of the biggest banks. Not that I feel there would be any possibility of meaningful reform even with the marginalization of these folks, I don't, its just that they make themselves willing tools of the worst instincts out there at the moment, those most typically signified by the Republican Party as the clearest carrier of fascist, neo-conservative ideology, i.e. deregulation, imperialist war, support for Israeli ethnic cleansing and the like. The Regime will not be brought to its knees by a militancy that places stress on it most fundamental tenets, it simply will be strengthened. One must stand wholly outside the system to be of any value to the people.
The bias in your assessment of the Tea Party movement is revealed in your post above: the business of deficit paranoia at a time of record unemployment is simply daft. You are obviously one who believes in government as a positive power, and so the paradox is put to you: how to love the powerful government, while at the same time hating the extremes it goes to to achieve its aims?
He is Stalin's star prosecutor...
Shh!
"You are obviously one who believes in government as a positive power..."
Obviously, you say? That would be so only if one looks at government as itself the prime actor here and not the people that move it. Government, sir, contrary to the tenets of libertarian pseudo-religion, is not a moral agent. It is a sterile reality from a moral perspective, neutral, if you will. Only human beings possess moral agency and can render government positive or negative. There is no such thing as an intrinsically "positive" or "negative" government. Now, do I believe that government can be made to serve what are ultimately moral ends? Yes, indeed, I do. And do I believe dangerous a Tea Party phenomenon captured as it now is by a crypto-fascist, imperialist, neo-conservatism and domestically by an uncharitable, anti-deficit paranoia that places balance sheets ahead of unemployed, foreclosed-upon human beings? Yes to that question as well.
"... and so the paradox is put to you: how to love the powerful government, while at the same time hating the extremes it goes to to achieve its aims?"
Well, since it is the human beings behind government that are powerful and not the institution itself, there is no loving of government, as it were, and, therefore, no paradox, eh? Hope this helps.
There is no such thing as an intrinsically "positive" or "negative" government.
Well, since it is the human beings behind government that are powerful and not the institution itself, there is no loving of government, as it were, and, therefore, no paradox, eh? Hope this helps.
You may believe you have cleverly skirted the issue, using....cleverness, a common attribute among my Liberal friends who believe they have "won" when they work around an issue by avoiding it "cleverly". It shows disdain for those who disagree with you, as spoken from a perspective of self-supposed superiority. Is this also the purpose of the snarky "Hope this helps"? It is important to remind you that you will never convince anyone of anything when you begin by insulting them, even when in such an offhanded manner that you think they are too stupid to notice.
I disagree with your first statement above, vehemently. Freedom is always freedom from the government, however it is incarnated. Government is the negation of liberty, and as such is a negative force. Your kind of government reduces liberty to a bidding war, and me to a serf whose economic output doesn't belong to me but rather is bid upon by big government socialists and big government fascists.
Well, you know, strange as may seem to you, it never occurred to me that I might be in a kind of contest with you when dealing with the questions you raised above, SW, although it would seem that that's not how you had perceived the matter. You had asked me for a resolution of a paradox and, since you quite clearly hadn't devised one for yourself, I'd provided one, and along with it my very fondest hope that you'd somehow gained in the experience. Now I note that your reply doesn't deal with the content of my explanation but merely with your emotional state in reading it. One certainly hopes that bruised sensibilities won't get in the way of your eventually grasping the logic involved. And, if you'll permit me a further observation, it might it profitable to begin envisioning "freedom" in a context less confining than the merely political, since freedom isn't always "freedom from the government, however it is incarnated". There is a more fundamental ontological freedom that one can enjoy even in the teeth of political oppression, one that lends authenticity to human life. It takes all the sting out of hurt feelings, trust me.
Whatever your "more fundamental ontological freedom that one can enjoy even in the teeth of political oppression" is, I suspect strongly that it is a poor substitute for the real thing: genuine choice to order one's affairs in the manner one sees fit. All your replies in this thread seem to be made from a perspective of justifying or excusing overweening government. I really can't understand why you would do that, given the history of the failure of big government to do good, and its incredible capacity to do evil.
Your attempts to engender anger, or to claim to see it where it doesn't exist, adds nothing to the discussion and strike me as a bit pathetic. Come back to the subject, and let's deal with facts if possible.
While the Tea Party rejection of the bailouts is entirely sound, the business of deficit paranoia at a time of record unemployment is simply daft. It reads directly from the traditional Republican songbook and, with its stress on restricted government, kills off the possibility either of regulation or nationalization of the biggest banks.
In this statement, you bemoan "deficit paranoia" as "daft" and assign it to the "traditional republican songbook", restricted government, and the lack of "regulation or nationalization of the biggest banks". The most logical way for me to interpret this statement, especially in light of the vitriol that follows it, is as your opposition to the things you state the tea party supports: balanced budgets, limited government, bank failure rather than bailouts, etc. So, maybe you can tell me whether I have interpreted this incorrectly? Other socialists-in-drag I've encountered see the tea party movement in terms similar to yours, describing it the way Rachel Maddow would, unable to hide disdain. Other socialists-in-drag also have never been to one of these events and spoken to participants, so it is easy to assume they are republicans eager to aid the rise of the new demagogue and usher in a new fascism.
Certainly you can agree that we've been brought to this precipice by the failure of government and the failure of central banking; government and central banking cannot be the solution, unless of course you believe that government simply isn't yet powerful enough. The government has become a power unto itself, and for that the people have no one to blame but themselves. It's time to correct that. Are these dangerous times? Yes, moreso if you work for the government, as you might need to get a job actually making something.
Do you support deficits under any circumstances? All circumstances? Which ones?
What do you believe is the purpose of government?
What do you believe should have been done with the TBTFs?
Earlier you said that "rejection of the bailouts is entirely sound", but then go on to say the banks could have been nationalized or regulated. How can you regulate something that is actually bankrupt (dead)? Nationalizing them, functionally, is the same thing as bailing them out, as it keeps them in operation, only turning their business power over to....the government.
Which Libertarians have you been talking to? There is a palpable ferver, but if anything government is to be kept as small as possible or it becomes an immoral and oppressive agent, as we can see today. The solution?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQtMKGigFXQ