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tands said:
Nonsense. Are you talking about the false flag the syrian rebels fighting assad (ISIS the people Obama armed) tried a year and a half ago, or is this Some Other Made Up Story? Link it.
Assad reportedly used Sarin and Chlorine gas. Isis reportedly used chlorine gas but ISIS in syria are a shadow of their former selves, Assad is on a push to wipe out the last of his opposition, while Turkey is uncomfortable with US supported Kurdish fighters near its border. It is entirely possible that some of Assad's tons of poison gas (supposedly destroyed)  was stolen by anti-government syrian rebels, but nobody has to work to make Assad look bad.
Well, I sure don't want my 'presence' softened.  :-*
apparently you do.
Except Constantly Expanding Entitlement Spending isn't intended to kill, but to improve the lives of the people of this country, not the lives of the rich who benefit from the killing.
the road to hell is paved with good intentions. As the iron lady (Thatcher) famously quipped, "eventually you run out of other people's money."
Eat the rich. No war but class war. These are not just slogans, but also policies that make good sense.
Slogans are not policies, but appeals to some lowest common denominator.  We have enemies actively working to stir up discord in all western democracies to weaken them. We are just now realizing how active they have been on social media the last few election cycles.

JR
 
JohnRoberts said:
the road to hell is paved with good intentions. As the iron lady (Thatcher) famously quipped, "eventually you run out of other people's money."

Let me just point out that the money for "entitlements" *is* our money, quite a bit of it literally our money through Social Security witholding.  I'd rather see my taxes go towards keeping old people out of the gutters than on another bomb.
 
Scodiddly said:
Let me just point out that the money for "entitlements" *is* our money, quite a bit of it literally our money through Social Security witholding.  I'd rather see my taxes go towards keeping old people out of the gutters than on another bomb.
As long as the federal budget is in deficit, we are using borrowed money for some fraction of that spending. Social security funds have been commingled in the treasury and consumed as general funds for years (not in a "lock box). 

When it comes to federal budgets the legislators are painfully short term. They just agreed to increase spending again, one of the few things both parties seem to agree about, ASSuming it won't blow up on their watch so they can escape blame. ::)  Rand Paul was the only senator with enough stones to object to the spending increase and he demurred shortly after.

I concede that the budget needs to be looked at in its entirety but most projections I see show entitlements growing unchecked to drown us in debt. If we can increase GDP growth sustainably that could offset spending and reduce debt, but that too is an unproved experiment (if the longer term GDP growth doesn't materialize the tax cuts will increase debt further). The recent tax bill is front loaded with short term stimulus (from earnings repatriation). Not to mention we are still unwinding the massive almost decade old experiment in governments buying their own debt. We have started unwinding the positions but the rest of the world is a year or two behind us. Bond markets are far from comfortable with this debt unwinding.

It is all too easy to be distracted by focus on individual components of the budget.

JR
 
JohnRoberts said:
Assad reportedly used Sarin and Chlorine gas. Isis reportedly used chlorine gas but ISIS in syria are a shadow of their former selves, Assad is on a push to wipe out the last of his opposition, while Turkey is uncomfortable with US supported Kurdish fighters near its border. It is entirely possible that some of Assad's tons of poison gas (supposedly destroyed)  was stolen by anti-government syrian rebels, but nobody has to work to make Assad look bad.

I don't see a link, so I guess you were just making those reports up earlier? Link it. If you can't do that, tell me why assad would use chemical weapons when it is the only thing that would, for sure, bring the us down on his head?

JohnRoberts said:
the road to hell is paved with good intentions. As the iron lady (Thatcher) famously quipped, "eventually you run out of other people's money."Slogans are not policies, but appeals to some lowest common denominator. 

That's me, the lowest common denominator. Cheers. All capital is exploited from the worker, so it's theirs to begin with.

JohnRoberts said:
We have enemies actively working to stir up discord in all western democracies to weaken them. We are just now realizing how active they have been on social media the last few election cycles.

Class conflict is inherent in capitalism, John, as we've seen.  ;D





 
JohnRoberts said:
The recent tax bill is front loaded with short term stimulus (from earnings repatriation).

I'm not an economist.... and actually I don't think you are either.  So some of the jargon is a bit difficult.

By "short term stimulus" are you referring to the tax cuts that overwhelmingly favor the already wealthy?
 
“Concern about inflation was most glaring on Friday, when stocks tanked after the January jobs report revealed the strongest wage gains since 2009,” reported CNN Money. “The immediate catalyst was the jobs report, which showed the strong United States economy might finally be translating into rising wages for American workers — a sign that higher inflation could be around the corner,” offered The New York Times.

...

And if inflation is coming, then the Federal Reserve is likely to raise interest rates to slow down the economy and cool off the inflation. When the Fed raises interest rates, bonds become more attractive, so people move money from stocks to bonds — and the stock market dives. It becomes harder to borrow, so businesses and homeowners have less capital to throw around. Profits get squeezed by high-interest payments. And as interest rates rise, the value of older bonds, which pay out a lower interest rate, goes down. So people are losing money all over the place. All because wages started to go up.

Everything in the structure of the economy, then, is geared toward making sure that wages never rise. And for nearly half a century, this task has been accomplished. Wages haven’t budged since the 1970s.

Capitalism’s reserve army has its ranks bolstered by a mechanism known as the “inflation target” or the “inflation objective.” The Fed currently sets the target at 2 percent, meaning that it doesn’t want to see inflation higher or lower than that. What it really means is that it doesn’t want to see inflation higher than that, as the economy hasn’t hit the 2 percent target in years.

But the target itself has meaning, since any little sign of wage growth is taken to mean that inflation is around the bend, so the Fed taps the brakes to keep everything under that target. When the Fed hits the brakes, people lose their jobs. That’s not an unfortunate side effect of tighter monetary policy — it is the intended effect. But the 2 percent target, argue people who want to see real full employment, is too low. The Fed is throwing people out of work unnecessarily — or, at least, for no sound economic reason.

...

That’s where the Fed comes in, he added, to “protect businesses from their own worst impulses of giving workers higher wages.”

It’s also what we’re likely to see the Federal Open Market Committee — the Fed’s policymaking body — do over the next several weeks as it moves to raise interest rates. For the first time since the late 1990s, the share of corporate profits being devoted to wages and benefits appears to be rising consistently. It’s still not high, comparable to where it was just before the recession. But it’s enough to make shareholders nervous. “It’s not irrational if you’re somebody that receives profits to feel concerned that profits are going to workers instead. That really is happening,” Mason told The Intercept.

The response from the Fed, to “cool down” the economy by raising interest rates, could be disastrous for workers. By disincentivizing investment, higher interest rates make it less likely for firms to hire more workers. That’ll mean more people out of work overall, creating a feedback loop whereby people spend less money because their paychecks are less certain, in turn leading companies to make less stuff and hire fewer people. That all serves to give bosses the upper hand. In a tight labor market, workers can demand more since it may well be easier for them to find a new job than for their boss to find a new employee. A looser labor market flips that dynamic, raising the risks for employees of getting fired — especially so given the 40 years’ running assault on organized labor.

more, good article

https://theintercept.com/2018/02/08/stock-market-crash-jobs-report-wages/

A teacher in Texas died because she couldn’t afford the $116 co-pay for flu meds. She had insurance, and a job. Anyone politician that still says, 'Access to' rather than 'Medicare for All' does NOT deserve your vote. This is a disgrace.

https://twitter.com/bourgeoisalien/status/962407016953196545
 

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Scodiddly said:
I'm not an economist.... and actually I don't think you are either.  So some of the jargon is a bit difficult.
no but I slept in a holiday inn once.  ;D
By "short term stimulus" are you referring to the tax cuts that overwhelmingly favor the already wealthy?
No "short term" refers to time duration of economic boost (i.e. for a short time). The repatriation of offshore earnings will be a one time boost of working capital that US companies are already sharing with their workers as bonuses and pay raises, and will likely increase dividends and stock repurchases, and capital spending. Longer term we expect GDP growth from reduced regulation and lower corporate tax rates, but this is hard to predict with any accuracy.

This will likely boost the GDP growth to a couple points above the anemic past <3% growth, but I repeat, this is a short term one time boost, so only time will tell if we get the longer term GDP growth boost needed to shrink our massive pile of debt ($20T) from the corporate tax reform.

The future has not happened yet so I cannot say with any certainty how this will play out longer term, with the several moving parts (like central bankers reversing sovereign debt purchases and increasing interest rates, that should slow economic activity. )

Anyone who tells you they know exactly how the future will turn out are full of sierra, but i can see what just happened and is happening right now.

JR
 
tands said:
I don't see a link, so I guess you were just making those reports up earlier? Link it. If you can't do that, tell me why assad would use chemical weapons when it is the only thing that would, for sure, bring the us down on his head?

That's me, the lowest common denominator. Cheers. All capital is exploited from the worker, so it's theirs to begin with.

Class conflict is inherent in capitalism, John, as we've seen.  ;D
I do not accept your homework assignment... the truth is out there...

JR
 
JohnRoberts said:
Does anybody think China or Russia will be better shepherds than us?

JR

Read your words, think, and read it again.
Syria, Iraq, Iran and even Russia don't need "shepherds"
PS: again: this forum is being read by people over the world. Alaska is not the edge of the world.  ;) Cheers.
 
ungifted said:
Read your words, think, and read it again.
Syria, Iraq, Iran and even Russia don't need "shepherds"
PS: again: this forum is being read by people over the world. Alaska is not the edge of the world.  ;) Cheers.
I know what I wrote.

The many lawless and weak regions of the world fall under one or another world power's influence. This is a very old power struggle and has been going on before you and I were born.

Russia more or less is one of the big three trying to be bigger by messing with our elections among other things. The real surprise is that anybody is surprised by this, they have been doing that forever too.

China is rising.

The US if anything has been in decline recently.

Sorry nothing personal.

JR

PS: I have a nephew living in AK... might have to visit him some time (in the summer when the sun comes out).

 
JohnRoberts said:
I do not accept your homework assignment... the truth is out there...

Uh yeah, and it doesn't resemble anything you insinuated, John.

JohnRoberts said:
Assad now sheltered under Putin's wing has reportedly used poison gas against his own citizens in Syria again (remember Pres Obama's red line?  ::) ).

I'd like you to back up this claim, if you can, or if you can't back it up, explain why you made it?
 
There seems to be a strong tendency for the kettle to call the pot black in these situations ,is this just an inevitabillity if you happen to come from the more powerfull nations ,a collective blind spot or brainwash towards your own nations failings while demonising the other side for doing exactly the same thing.

Maybe were  all better off checking our own collective underpants for skid marks rather than pointing the finger at the other side to deflect attention.
 
Thanks! Looks like the rebels and others are trying to involve us in their war with another false flag attack they blame on Assad. No one can tell me why Assad would do such a thing when it's the only excuse the US govt can use to get itself into another optional war with him. McCain is 100% right when he says we've seen this movie before, it's called Wag the Dog with Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNDmDZi05dY

Anybody want to get into an optional hot proxy war with russia to help ISIS instead of having single payer healthcare, raise your hand.  ::)
 

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Russia more or less is one of the big three trying to be bigger by messing with our elections among other things. 
John please do homework for me too...  ;)
I remember we've discussed reliable sources of information. Do you want me spamming with links to RT, Sputnik, Russia24 etc? You've blamed tands but doing in the same way. That's why I call for more weighted positions: we've already seen all these  "shepherd's games" ended up with bombing all "the many lawless and weak regions of the world" you've mentioned. Perhaps simply because of their weakness?
 
Ok. I'm trying to be objective as possible.
Does the link
https://edition.cnn.com/2017/04/13/middleeast/russia-unsc-syria-resolutions/index.html
is proving Assad poisoned his nation? No, I suppose.
Do US need UN resolution to start bombing anyone over the world? Again No. We've seen it. So we've heard John's opinion: US is worlds "shepherd".
Again. John says Russia is "messing with our elections among other things". I remember how it was discussed here, with links to CNN etc articles explainin "a man in the middle attack", etc etc. But again, no evidence. Is it so complex that we can get no evidence? Very secret reports no one ever seen?
No need to argue again. Opinions expressed. Everybody understands everything I think.
 
scott2000 said:
I think JR said "reportedly"........ meaning "to me" , it's being reported or investigated and not a real fact yet......

Not sure about the election thing....It's nice to hear that it's not a supported theory though......


That's why I want a link, casually dropping 'reportedly this happened' is a cheap and easy way of lending credence to an opinion, or in this case a formulation.

Quote from: JohnRoberts

Does anybody think China or Russia will be better shepherds than us? Assad now sheltered under Putin's wing has reportedly used poison gas against his own citizens in Syria again


John is careful to say 'reportedly', but he uses these two false reports to claim we should be 'shepherds' (go to war to get what we want), when the possibility of assad launching the gas attack is essentially zero. If John were arguing honestly, he would tell you that, but he doesn't, and he doesn't link. If I hadn't demanded a link, he'd have succeded in getting x number of people to believe that assad gassed civilians once before, but because Obama chickened out, assad went ahead and did it again, recently. Thereby implying something (war) must be done or assad will continue doing it. These are his claims. They are false. Pay attention and you may notice other instances of this tactic.

Then he resists providing a link, claiming someone is asking him to do something woefully arduous, 'homework'. Oh no.  ::)

Fake news. Propaganda. Either that or he only read the headline and is just winging it from there. Which again is why I want a link for this kind of thing. He's talking about the US Govt killing people instead of americans having health care.
 
Quit chopping my post into parts that omit my points if you want to pretend you're debating me.  ROTFL... ::)

scott2000 said:
"Essentially" zero??? Sounds pretty careful..... Got a link?  This one doesn't make me feel like it's essentially zero.....

Assad has held onto power against all odds for decades, thus he is not dumb.

Gassing civilians is the best excuse the US could dream up to attack him, a war he would not survive.

Since he's not dumb, he didn't do it. Either time.

It was those trying to get him out of power, to provide the US govt with an excuse, so we would attack assad for them.

What does that make you 'feel like'?



scott2000 said:
I must have missed where he said that.....

Looks like you'll have to start paying better attention.
 
scott2000 said:
This reminds me of trying to share my opinion on the Venezuelan situation. I have first hand encounters with many many many Venezuelans who have left their country because of the horrible conditions there. I make it a point to ask them what's going on there and it's not pretty. Some would argue that it's just an excuse for war and, although I can't say I know what the outcomes are or the intentions of some, I definitely can't stand there and ignore the fact that real human beings are actually talking to me face to face and telling me stories that are real. Unless it's some deep operation to convince the minds of all Floridians to support the Government's decision to help.......hmmmm
Venezuela has been on a path to totalitarianism for years, first under Chavez (with the help of Castro) and continued by his hand picked replacement Maduro.

They have been living off the fat from the local oil resources but first took a hit from the international drop in oil prices. The second hit is from mismanagement of the oil infrastructure they inherited (stole) from western oil companies. 

Right now it is a test to see if Maduro can maintain control as oil based dollar flow continues to decline, and oil output declines. Venzella is actually shipping less oil than their OPEC quota, because their oil infrastructure is in disrepair and getting worse due to under investment in basic maintenance.

This is hard to watch. One high profile opposition leader was recently killed by a police raid, while Maduro has armed some political supporters while not allowing regular citizen to have weapons. Maduro uses a cadre of Cuban operatives embedded in his security forces to help monitor and control opposition.

Maduro is slowly and methodically dismantling what is left of their democracy (he controls the judiciary and used them to thwart what's left of the legislature).

Venzella used to be one of the more wealthy SA countries thanks to the oil wealth, now it is impoverished, with citizens barely getting adequate food and medicine.  The exodus to FL is not a completely new thing. Young people with the ability to leave did years ago. Desperation in Venzella is probably increasing over recent years, so flow may be increasing to. 
It really makes me think about what "proof" really means . I guess I'll just trust the one in my alcohol from now on..... :p
I wouldn't expect to find a lot of truth on the WWW.  What passes for proof is pretty flexible, people are more willing to believe memes that agree with their preconceived notions.

Some think youtube is absolute truth, while others don't believe we landed on the moon. YMMV  ;D ;D ;D

JR
 

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