Comments on: Another Poll This Week Shows Republican Support At New Low

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Tue, 03 Nov 2009 03:06:10 +0000

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By: Eclectic Radical

Eclectic Radical — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 16:08:06 +0000

‘There is a certainly analogy to how Congress keeps future Medicare payments from showing up in budget calculations by fixing this on a year by year basis. There is also a difference. The Medicare spending at least does ultimately show up on the current year’s budget once the fix is made for the year.’

I’m sure that, if one really wanted to, one could find some of the contractor expenses of the Iraq War cited on the budget somewhere. They just wouldn’t be cited as part of the Iraq War. It’s much the same as the Medicare fix in that the annual Medicare fix is NOT cited on the Medicare budget, it’s cited separately in ‘general appropriations.’ I’m sure some of those costs are cited in ‘general appropriations’ without specifically being tagged as relevant to the Iraq War, so that the war costs themselves do not appear on the budget even though the money is there somewhere.

By: Ron Chusid

Ron Chusid — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 15:48:12 +0000

Yes, as Eclectic said, it doesn't make any sense to downplay the cost of a war which was largely fought off-budget by citing budget figures.

There is a certainly analogy to how Congress keeps future Medicare payments from showing up in budget calculations by fixing this on a year by year basis. There is also a difference. The Medicare spending at least does ultimately show up on the current year's budget once the fix is made for the year.

By: Eclectic Radical

Eclectic Radical — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 07:53:47 +0000

The various ‘trillions’ figures include costs that don’t go into the ‘obvious’ budget. Contracts with private corporations do not appear on the military budget, they appear in other portions of the budget or are not mentioned at all. It’s how it can be ‘cheaper’ to pay a private corporation to do for the military what the military used to do for itself at cost; it’s a shell game, like the yearly patch on Medicare compensation to doctors despite the budgeted Medicare payscale being much lower.

If the government spends 100 billion a year itself, then pays 100 billion a year each to Bechtel, Blackwater, Halliburton, and McDonald’s for various contracted services then you have a trillion dollars in two years. In four years you have two trillion. And so on.

By: Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m.

Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m. — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:43:17 +0000

I've gpt perhaps an even better source, Slate. http://slate.com/id/2183592/pagenum/all Which, if I read it correctly reports that Bush's budget made in 08 for the 2009 year militairy was 515B. This particular article I cite, also seems to want to make the point that the 515B is not really the only costs , but higher than that because of other militairy funding not included in that number.

By: Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m.

Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m. — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:10:57 +0000

Fritz- Are you sure about trillions of dollars pissed away in Iraq? I honestly don't know how reliable the following website is but: http://www.globalissues.org/article/75/world-military-spending Global issues reports U.S. military spending was at about 100 billion in 1999 and now up to 219 billion in 2008. So even at a pace of 200B a year it would be 5 years to reach your first one trillion. One could also argue that not every dollar in the militairy budget goes to Iraq. Korea, Europe, Afghaninstan, and maintaining state side bases also cost some of that budget. Are you referring perhaps to more than militairy spending? Perhaps economic aid and such for Iraq? Of course what is the cure to too much spending? More spending! What it takes the entire militairy to spend in 5 years, Obama can do in 5 months. Now with such a big mess to clean up, even sweeping changes and massive spending will take time to work. We know this from Roosevelt cleaning up Hoover's mess. Despite sweeping changes in the first 100 days of Roosevelt, it took 9 years to get the U.S. out of the depression. Oops, it wasn't Roosevelt's programs either, it was a world war that did it. I can just imagine a doctor warning a patient that they are morbidly obese and advising them to stop eating all those cheesburgers and start slamming down as much cheesecake as the person can. Just as a temporary measure, until they are healthy again, then they can move off the cheesecake to a vegan diet. Of course unless I write a book with a dozen cross references, I'm just speaking of cherry picking cheescake.

By: Fritz

Fritz — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 22:49:04 +0000

It’s a bipartisan, multi-decade pit. It might feel good to blame everything on Bush, but I don’t think that matches the history. Sure, Bush pissed trillions of dollars away in Iraq, which didn’t help, but that’s nowhere near the dollar total of misinvestment.
And now nobody wants to continue feeling the pain, so government is trying desperately to reinflate the housing market. I don’t think they will be able to do it.

By: Ron Chusid

Ron Chusid — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 22:28:29 +0000

I was responding to Mike re defending Bush.

In judging the economy I’m looking at its overall condition being better than expected, not any preliminary figures. That doesn’t mean we are out of the woods, considering how much harm Bush caused.

By: Fritz

Fritz — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 22:27:29 +0000

Defending Bush? I certainly hope you are not looking at me when you say that. The man was a disaster.
I wouldn’t put too much faith in the preliminary numbers for last month. I am not sure how you are getting “things are turning out better than expected”. Maybe you will turn out to be right, but I would hesitate to bet on it. OK, we are all sort of forced to bet on it, but I do not like my bet at all.

By: Ron Chusid

Ron Chusid — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 04:07:35 +0000

As I said, it is incorrect to equate what was expected after a recession of this severity with one cherry picked statement. This isn't "them" predicting. It is one statement at one time which was made before all the data was in on the severity of the recession.

In other words, you are just repeating another right wing distortion of the facts.

Surprised by negative consequences? So far things are turning out better than expected. Considering how terribly Bush policies turned out, it is rather bizarre to be defending Bush and attacking Obama with claims of negative consequences.

By: Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m.

Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m. — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 04:00:38 +0000

Yes, I read it. Media matters is even attempting to do more than debunk the afore mentioned projection, it also is trying to show bias and/or distortion of the L.A. Times reporting. I didn’t deviate from the subject to talk about LA Times, I didn’t deviate to get into the details of the excuse why they were wrong. The reason they were wrong according to the article was GDP contraction was far worse than they expected. If this excuse works for you, that’s fine with me. I think this administration is going to constantly be surprized as many of their programs are going to have unexpected negative consequences. Unexpected by them, not unexpected by me. Now I am going off on tangents and I admit it. It is a matter of record what the Obama administration predicted. I wasn’t confusing two different issues. I guess I’ll just have to take your statement about politicians of any party frequently b.s. ing, (which I whole-heartedly agree with) as some form of reconciliation between them predicting a lower number than what it turned out to be and you saying unemployment is doing a bit better than actually expected.

By: Fritz

Fritz — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:54:30 +0000

All I’m saying is that there are lots of quotes from the Obama administration predicting future (now past) unemployment numbers. And they are lower unemployment numbers than what we have now. So an assertion that unemployment is doing as well or better than could be expected sort of ignores what officials were expecting. OK, at least what they said they were expecting.

As to the actual state of the economy… As you know, these figures are routinely tweaked as more data comes in. My feeling is that it won’t look as good in a month or three.

By: Ron Chusid

Ron Chusid — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:19:08 +0000

Did you actually read the item from Media Matters? It debunks what you are saying.

I am talking about both unemployment and the economy. You are cherry picking one statement to make a false claim that unemployment was projected to be lower. In reality, unemployment is doing a bit better than actually expected.

By: Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m.

Mike Hatcher b.t.r.m. — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:05:49 +0000

My post today at 4pm I said unemployment numbers, at 7:57 job numbers, Fritz’s post: unemployment, The link I posted states Obama advisers predicted the unemployment rate would not exceed 8% this year but at the posting of the article it was at 9.4%. I’m not confusing two different issues. Are you trying to tell me when you said: “It is lower than expected, and lower than it would be without the stimulus.” that you weren’t talking about unemployment like I was, that you had switched to the more important question of the actual state of the economy? You can maintain that I’m wrong on the issue if you would like, but I can’t see how you can say I’m confusing two different issues when I’ve stayed on one.

By: Ron Chusid

Ron Chusid — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 02:06:21 +0000

You are confusing two different issues here. You are also confusing the statements you link to as expectations of how the economy would do. These are two different things.

If the question is whether public statements made by politicians (regardless of party) are frequently bullshit, then this is true.

If the question is the actual state of the economy, which I consider the more important question, then we have done much better under Obama than actually expected.