New approach to correct budget deficit

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It is kind of pointless to argue about the value of spending in Iraq since that is money already spent. Biden just said he would not rule out a preemptive strike against Iran at some meeting in Germany, while Iran is still trying to say that the holocaust didn't happen (apparently just saying that is a crime in Germany). Now that could get expensive, not to mention surge in Afghanistan.

This is not about city vs, rural but a philosophical difference about the purpose and responsibility of government. I don't think it is the job of government to  bail out weak businesses (automakers), provide nationalized healthcare, tell executives how much they can earn, Corporate jets they can buy, or take wealth from those who earned it to redistribute to those who don't.

Newt Gingrich said it well with "private companies can't have capitalism on the way up, and socialism on the way down" They need to prosper and fail by the same rules. This is a variant on the more conspiratorial sounding "privatize profit and publicize loss".  We needed to intervene in the banking system since failure there would cause a world wide depression. How we "save" the banking system is conflicted with the need to not cause too much collateral damage.

I have friends personally suffering in the demise of old detroit, but the solution is not support for stronger unions and status quo bailouts. there is a reason GM is profitable in other nations and not here. Don't ignore the obvious.

Nationalized healthcare.. Oh boy, lets turn health care over to a post office mentality.  Way to make a flawed system worse. If anything government needs to dismantle the dysfunctional medical insurance cartel, that negotiates off sheet price discounts for medical services forcing individuals to pay several times more for identical services if not playing by their game rules. All the while these medical insurance firms isolate the medical consumer from their actual treatment cost/benefit decisions so free market forces have no sway on behavior. This will just get worse, under government supervision. Price controls on drugs will all but stop research into new drugs. I suspect this slowing has already begun due to long lead time for new drug discovery and the writing on the wall for future changes.

Micromanaging business by government is another recipe for failure. Does any small business owner reading this, want the government to second guess their decisions? I didn't think so.. Congress whines about some business retreat, as they have their own at taxpayers expense. The epitome of hypocrisy. When Obama sells air force one, I'll accept his criticism of corporate use of private aircraft to maximize work output from top management. 

Regarding capitalism vs. socialism, I don't interpret the last election as some national sentiment shift toward socialism. I read it as an emotional rejection of the last administration so strong that the election campaign was positioned against the man not even running. I figure the american people will wake up soon enough from this fantasy being sold them that government is somehow the answer, but there can be a great deal of damage done between now and the mid term elections. 

I agree that we need appropriate regulation, personal, and corporate responsibility. I don't feel the financial crisis was a failure of regulation as much as the unintended consequence of government meddling into free markets, and a lot of bad judgement, personal and corporate. As I've theorized before, the housing bubble was started by easy money generated by the government trying to soften the pain from the dot com collapse. Government compounded this using F & F and heavy handed oversight to push lending to people who couldn't afford to borrow, and the final factor that pushed this over the cliff, was everybody willing to look the other way as this derivative fueled game of musical chairs appeared to make everybody wealthy... everybody up and down the food chain, until that music stopped.

As the investigation into the failures of the SEC to catch even $50B ponzi schemes (after they were warned multiple times), I am not optimistic that government regulators will save any day. It seems fraud and illegal behavior increases during economic expansions, and gets revealed by the low water of economic contractions. If the government were able to prevent business cycles they would also prevent this cleansing process. I favor tolerating sharp but short economic contractions, over all this intervention, that if anything will buy cover for any frauds not yet discovered and support unproductive dead wood.

For any who think I sound like an anarchist, or abortion clinic bomber, back at you... I am resigned that this bill will pass in some fashion so that damage is done... I just don't think 2010 can come soon enough. This is worse than I thought it would be. And I'm generally optimistic.

JR
 
Not having cable, do any of the TV/cable shows make fun of things like?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8hMJVXt09E
http://www.nypost.com/seven/02042009/news/politics/pelosis_500_million_person_slip_153530.htm

OR

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2008/08/24/pelosi-on-natural-gas-fossil-fuel-or-not/

I wonder if the statements where on purpose?

They would be all over Bush etc.  Things like the above don't give me much hope for recovery.

Then I read 400 million for global warming research.  Does anyone one else see the title as leading?  If it was true research it would have a non leading title.  I have my doubts that GW is real at all,  look for the stuff that you don't find on the big news networks
I think that big glowing orb in the sky has more to do with the temperature on the earth

 
I think I mentioned this before

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0808/12764.html

Pelosi is not without self interest regarding energy policy.

Hold on it's going to be a wild ride, every time they can flip a couple senate republicans... I find it interesting that they enticed a strong republican out of the senate to run commerce, then almost immediately moved the census out from under commerce.. (bait and switch?). Perhaps to get their hands on the several $B of census pork they they included in the current spending orgy. These guys are slick.

But I have faith the public will notice the shenanigans going on and adjust in 2010.

JR
 
Yes and we import NG
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/us.html

and then have this mess.
http://blog.nj.com/njv_linda_stamato/2008/01/attention_delaware_and_new_jer.html

Off topicI have read windmills can throw ice built up on the blades and that a number of installed wind mills have defective blades

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,500902,00.html

http://www.windaction.org/documents/c50/

http://xray.rutgers.edu/~matilsky/windmills/throw.html

http://www.windaction.org/news/19734
 
AnalogPackrat said:
And the war in Iraq has cost us $500-600B (and counting).  So tack that big fat bill onto your gasoline costs over the past six years ($2000 per citizen).  We'll be paying for all of these follies for quite some time.

Regulation of certain aspects of the "free market" is essential.  If that isn't obvious by now.....

People (and corporations) need to be responsible for their actions.  We shouldn't reward failure, greed, cheating, etc. in any way.  That includes CEOs of bailed out banks, people who overstepped their ability pay their mortgage, and elected officials who enabled a lot of it.  This wasn't some sort of natural disaster or unforeseen accident--people caused it.  What has happened to personal responsibility?

A P

Correct me if I'm wrong, but what would happen if a large number of people decided to close their accounts with BoA and open new accounts at their local credit union???

How about changing the mantra "The people cannot do without the existence of Corporate America"

To........

What would "corporate America do without US"???


Seriously...I will be going to open up a new checking account at my local credit union this week if possible. ;)
 
Gus said:
Yes and we import NG
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/us.html

and then have this mess.
http://blog.nj.com/njv_linda_stamato/2008/01/attention_delaware_and_new_jer.html

Off topicI have read windmills can throw ice built up on the blades and that a number of installed wind mills have defective blades

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,500902,00.html

http://www.windaction.org/documents/c50/

http://xray.rutgers.edu/~matilsky/windmills/throw.html

http://www.windaction.org/news/19734

Right now the world is building up the infra structure to export/import LNG similar to crude oil. The same NIMBY crowd who opposes nuclear power plants are opposing these large coastal LNG depots.  Whatever.. let the free market sort it out. If they (we?) want to pay more for energy it's a free market choice.

Right now since NG is not fungible (supply/demand is not leveled around the world due to lack of shipping and receiving infrastructure), our domestic NG production is only consumed locally so subject to high volatility. These wild price swings, down at the moment because of cheap oil, and high investment during the oil bubble, discourages more investment for the short term.

Long term NG is somewhat cleaner than burning oil, so has a place in our total energy policy but is indeed a fossil fuel contrary to Ms Pelosi's claims otherwise.

One thing I will give the new administration credits for is acknowledgment that insulating houses better to reduce heat loss in winter, is some low hanging fruit we can jump on right now to reduce consumption. Not quite as silly as earlier claims about simply checking tire pressure, which is something we also should do. One of my tires was in the low 20's  when I checked it last week (those low profile tires are hard to eyeball).

++++++

The faulty windmill blades are pretty much from one company in India, that expanded a little too quickly to keep up with their quality control during the recent rush to alternative energy. One little tidbit few appreciate, is that a great deal of the photo-voltaic, windmills, etc are manufactured offshore.

While this shouldn't matter, so much of the current political discussion is about green investment magically creating local jobs.

We need to stop thinking provincially and just grow the entire pie... the better the world does the better we will, and so on.

JR   


 
Ooooh... -A tasty worm!!!

...On the end of a piece of string! 

Keith

I would like to kindly ask our esteemed moderator not to engage in the cryptic "drive by" responses he has chastised others for. The Emporer has no clothes.

Yeah, I missed you too ssltech...
 

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