- via Hyscience
Sarah Palin blasts Obama for defending the QE2 in her new post titled “Obama’s Clever Way to Punt the Tough Calls: Driving the Dollar Down”:
In his press conference on Monday, President Obama responded to critics of the Federal Reserve’s decision to start a new round of quantitative easing – a fancy term for printing money out of thin air. He claimed this move would drive up U.S. growth rates. He also warned that “the worst thing that could happen to the world economy, not just ours but the entire world’s economy is if we end up being stuck with no growth or very limited growth.”
The latter is certainly true. It would be a global disaster if the U.S. economy remained permanently stuck in the mud. But the same cannot be said of his claim that the Fed’s experiment in pump priming would automatically lead to increased economic growth. By the time this experiment is over, QE will make us queasy.
Will driving the dollar down in this way do anything to boost U.S. exports? The short answer is not really. A weaker dollar will temporarily boost exports by making our goods cheaper to sell; but inevitably other countries will respond in kind, triggering the kind of currency wars economists are warning us about. It’s precisely to prevent this scenario that World Bank President Robert Zoellick recently came out in favor of some new type of gold standard or “international reference point.”Will QE2 then at least boost domestic investment? No, again. As I explained in my speech in Phoenix, the reason banks aren’t lending and businesses aren’t investing isn’t because of insufficient access to credit. There’s plenty of money around, it’s just that no one’s willing to spend it. Big businesses especially have been hoarding cash. They’re not expanding or adding to their workforce because there’s just too much uncertainty created by a lot of big government experiments that aren’t working. It’s the President’s own policies that are creating this uncertainty.
And Peter Schiff notes that Palin is right in his video blog yesterday. Take note of the rising numbers for staples…as Glenn Beck predicted:
Oil this morning hit a two year high before closing negative on the day but some commodities managed to hold their gains, the CRB did hit a new high today, it is making, again, a string of successive new highs, new all time high for cotton, sugar hit a contract high, soy beans…soy beans were up over 50 cents a bushel closing at 13.29 a bushel. We actually have beans in the teens. I’ve never even seen this in my adult life, I think it was the rallying cry in the 1970′s bull market. It’s back and I think today was just a reversal Tuesday. Look at the bond market tho, look at the yield on the 30 year bond rising to 4.25 this is the highest yield on 30 year treasuries in six months. And as I mentioned before I think the bond market is slowly eroding, certainly at the longer end of the curve. The 10 year was weak today but I think all our longer term interest rates are moving up as Quantitative Easing is already backfiring on the federal reserve. It is producing higher, not lower, interest rates.
~~~The world is throwing a lot of criticism on the fed now for QE2. I think the harshest criticism is coming from Germany. Germany, which understands inflation quite well, called Ben Bernanke clueless. I’ve used that word too so maybe the Germans are paying attention to some of my writings. The Russian central bank was critical.
Obama was in India, I think he’s still there, and he made a speech in which he’s trying to defend the fed. And this is really kinda funny because first of all he said that he doesn’t want to comment on fed policy because he doesn’t want to compromise the independence of the fed, well, there isn’t any independence left to compromise. The irony of it is that normally when its the fed acting tough, you know removing the punch bowl, unpopular, raising interest rates, that’s when you don’t want to bash your central bank because you don’t want to create the impression that the government is putting pressure on the central bank to be too easy. Or to be easier. To not be be tougher. But when you have people asking Obama to criticize the central bank for being to easy! I mean that’s when he should be criticizing them because the federal reserve is acting really in concert with the government to facilitate government debt, to monetize government debt, that’s exactly when it should be criticized. I mean the whole thing is ridiculous.
But also Obama basically said that the fed has a mandate to grow the economy.
Well…where do you figure that out? Where did you get that mandate?
I mean there’s a dual mandate now for price stability and maximizing employment. But where is growing the economy? It’s not part of the mandate. And the fact is the fed can’t grow the economy. You don’t grow the economy by printing money but the fact that Obama A – thinks the fed has a mandate to grow the economy and B thinks they can grow the economy shows how clueless he really is. That the Germans were right.
He goes on to completely tear Bernanke a new one for his reasoning behind QE2…creating another stock market bubble. Plus he sends praise Ron Paul’s way. Paul is a nut, that’s for sure, but I can’t fault ALL of his idea’s and critique of the fed.
Instead of putting money into the economy more directly by cutting taxes our government is using the fed to print money out of thin air and making a bad situation worse.
It’s going to get pretty damn bad.
Let the ponzi scheming begin.
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Sarah is right on target! Who knows how many more times the Obommunists will print another half a trillion or so to destroy the Dollar as a respected world currency. The Chinese Communists most probably launched a rocket from a submarine right off Catalina island to “send us a messaga that we can understand” regarding the Obama plan to devalue ourselves out of our debt obligations. This is going to get ugly real fast! We need a REAL C.I.C. in the White House and Sarah Palin will do just fine!
Is this where we’re heading?
Approximately the amount of Deutschmarks it took to buy a loaf of bread in 1923 Weimar Germany.
http://i979.photobucket.com/albums/ae277/RAPH6969/weimar3.jpg
I’m curious to find out what Sarah Palin will have to say about the Debt Commission’s recommendations.
Funny what Obama is saying out the Debt Commission’s recommendations:
The president will wait until the bipartisan fiscal commission finishes its work before commenting.
He respects the challenging task that the co-chairs and the commissioners are undertaking and wants to give them space to work on it.
These ideas, however, are only a step in the process towards coming up with a set of recommendations and the president looks forward to reviewing their final product early next month.
- White House spokesman Bill Burton
heh
Obama throws the two co-chairs of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility under the bus!!!
Their ambitious plan will be tackled by the other members of their own commission, rther than by Obama.
The recommendations were a long series of trial balloons.
And Obama left them twisting in the strings.
Other members of the fiscal commission are already attacking the report, and since the politics of the deficit are currently dysfunctional, none of this looks likely to see the approval of either Congress or the full commission.
Since the US Constitution demands Congress has the pursestrings, this commission was an end-run around Congress anyway, so I doubt they will be interested in holding O’s feet to a fire he set himself.
They will set their own plans for making cuts.
What a chicken this man is!
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Of course Obama is not serious about fixing the economy. He’s a comrade-in-arms of George Soros. The Soros backed far left’s goal is to crash the economy of this nation. SOP. as Soros has done four other times before. And they have been helped by the profit blinded “free trade at all costs” GOP leadership, all of whom have done more to destroy the United States’ ability to manufacture more than any foreign enemy could have dreamed possible. Massive loss of jobs and wages as whole industries have moved overseas. Huge entitlement programs to break the bank. Turning the nation into a non-producing service economy. Now we are beginning to monetizing our debt, just like the Wiemar Republic and Argentina did, which means we can very soon expect to see inflation hit the economy.
Who can argue with the economic musings of the former half-term governor of a small, federally dependent state? I mean, geez, Obama should not be following the lead of the GOPer head of the Fed, he should listen to the journalism major who attended four colleges in five years!
Yes, it is clear that Obama is NOT SERIOUS AT ALL about the economy! If he was really wanted to know whether to support quantitative easing, he would be listening to the reality TV star, NOT the Fed chief with the fancy “doctorate” in economics and decades long experience teaching, analyzing and managing US monetary policy!
Obama is a total fraud, trying to destroy this country! Which is why our international competitors are trying to help us out and save us by opposing QE2! We should throw our lot in with China (and Palin) and oppose this monstrosity of an economic plan Obama and Bernanke are jamming down our throats!
More evidence that the conservative side has lost the entire deficit reduction argument:
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/253040/debt-commission-endorses-obamacare-james-c-capretta
My favorite quote:
Think about that. A con writer, writing in the con Bible, The National Review, thinks government controlling its costs is a BAD THING. Government should not be saying “we will pay $200 and no more”, but should pay $600, $550, or $900 if “the market” demands it. What ever happened to the classical economic concept of a purchaser getting the best price he or she can for services and goods? Cons toss that out the window because Obama endorses that penurious path.
But I think I am coming around on this. The real opposition is not that Obamacare will destroy the health care industry; it’s that it will actually lower the per capita cost to government! You cons call it “rationing” dollars; the rest of us call it “negotiating a better price.” Yes, cons really fear that Obamacare will work! Which is why they insist on trying to destroy it before it gets a chance to actually CONTROL COSTS. Hence the writer’s incredulous title “The Debt Commission Endorses Obamacare.”
The Debt Commission chairs KNOW Obamacare will lower government’s costs and that acknowledgement not only (a) frosts the cons, but (b) pretty much eliminates any possibility that the cons will be successful eliminating Obamacare.
Another sane conservative speaks.
http://www.nationalreview.com/exchequer/253058/real-deficit-reduction-vs-theoretical-deficit-reduction
Cons, this deal is about as good as it is going to get. If the GOP gets behind it, enough Dems will peel off to pass it. The question is, though, whether cons are serious about deficit reduction; I say they are not. The other question is whether teabaggers hate Obama so much that they will not get behind a proposal that they SHOULD love; I say they won’t.
The UK has the fifth highest cancer death rate for women among the 27 European Union countries but spending on health is lower in Britain than other leading economies.
Only Poland, Ireland, the Czech Republic and Hungary had worse records for deaths from cancer among women.
The figures came in the latest Social Trends report from the Office for National Statistics, which included detailed comparisons of Britain’s position within the rest of Europe. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/8126510/UK-cancer-death-rates-for-women-are-among-the-worst-in-Europe.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Federal officials are conducting an unusual review to determine whether the government should pay for an expensive new vaccine for treating prostate cancer, rekindling debate over whether some therapies are too costly.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which dictate what treatments the massive federal health-insurance program for the elderly will cover, is running a “national coverage analysis” of Provenge, the first vaccine approved for treating any cancer.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/07/AR2010110704932.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The number of patients waiting months for tests to detect cancer and other killer diseases has almost doubled since NHS waiting targets were scrapped, according to the Government’s own figures.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8082923/Numbers-waiting-months-for-cancer-tests-have-doubled-since-NHS-targets-scrapped.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Scrap ObamaCare completely then pass piecemeal bills based on what is sharply defined and read by all concerned and debated and agreed on and tested as to Constitutionality.
More from Germany about Obama’s ideas to impose fixed limits on trade as a way to keep the USA afloat longer….
Merkel:
“I believe that free trade should be our focus; that the competitiveness of individual market players should not be undermined by political limitations.”
The idea of such limits had been floated by US President Barack Obama, whose import-dependent country is sliding deeper and deeper into debt, due in part to its trade deficit.
“Countries like Germany that export, benefit heavily from our open markets and us buying their goods,” Obama said, adding that helping the US recover would be in the interest of the entire world economy.
Instead of the cap advocated by Washington, G20 leaders are expected to discuss what negotiators called an “early warning system,” designed to recognize when a country’s surpluses or deficits of trade or capital reserves start to get out of control, so that action could be taken if necessary.
“We can still talk about imbalances in the world,” Merkel announced late on Thursday. “What we can’t do is limit a country’s competitiveness to a specific number. We believe that would be counter-productive. And I think that everyone has now given up on this idea.”
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,6219683,00.html
The whole world is seeing Obama as a lame duck or empty suit, whichever.
Obama Bows Again!
At the G-20 there were many photos taken of Obama meeting men representing other nations.
You can see a few of them here.
http://www.daylife.com/photo/09OW1mL7p64Qf
But in only one photo is Obama BOWING.
Guess who he was meeting in that photo?
Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal.
What’s with him????
@ Nan, #9:
I don’t get why we should scrap the whole thing and go back to square one. It’s taken decades to break the log jam on healthcare reform and try to accomplish something comprehensive. Now that that’s done, why not focus on whatever specifics require fixing?
The problem with the piecemeal approach is that every d-mn point becomes a political and special interests battlefield. It’s the same problem that has kept us from taking any truly effective action on chronic deficits and the national debt for decades.
As with health care reform, maybe we should just bite the bullet and dynamite the log jam. Following the Debt Commission co-chairs’ draft recommendations might do that. Congress could fine tune the specifics later.
Gee, I dunno Greg…. You had an engine problem in your GM. You bought a new engine and installed it instead of troubleshooting and replacing the most likely parts, piece by piece. And now you want to know why you need to troubleshoot your new engine, which ain’t performing up to snuff??
Now what if you had the chance to give that unnecessary new motor back, and actually troubleshoot the original engine problem, part by part, instead of trying to fix the new engine that don’t work? Not to mention all that wasted cash.
Get the drift?
But Mata, think of all the union jobs we save by replacing engines instead of trying to troubleshoot the problems on a piecemeal basis. Replacing engines is just another way of spreading the wealth around. Of course, there will have to be provisions for ensuring that some people (friends of the administration) won’t really have to have their engines replaced ALL the time, because that would be too expensive for the privileged few. The rest of us will have to have our engines replaced or else pay a hefty fine if we try to let the local mechanic troubleshoot our cars (or, God forbid, try to fix our cars ourselves or just live with the annoying rattles, etc.)
The analogy possibilities are endless!
Jeff
My only comment on Curt’s original blogpost is this:
Whether or not “quantitative easing” (i.e. printing money out of thin air to put more dollars in circulation) is a good thing or a bad thing, it’s important to understand that the goals of the Fed and the goals of the “stimulus” were one and the same — to inject more capital into the economy to stimulate economic growth. Printing money out of thin air is the exact same thing as borrowing money and increasing the national debt. The precise reason why Bernanke printed money out of thin air is that he agreed with Krugman that what was needed was a larger stimulus and that there was no political way possible to have another round of “stimulus” in the current political climate.
Now, whether Bernanke is right or is wrong, one thing is certain. Bernanke is no “socialist.” He’s a Republican, appointed by a Republican (“W”). And he agrees — 100% — with Obama’s approach to job creation, which is to inject more money into the economy by borrowing money (which is what printing money out of thin air is), to inject into the economy to grow the economy and to grow jobs.
Again, Bernanke may be wrong. Krugman may be wrong. Summers may be wrong. Obama may be wrong. But NONE of them are “socialists.”
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
Larry, I will only add that you’ve hit upon the real problem:
You wrote, ”….one thing is certain….”
Yup, that’s the biggest problem of all of Obama’s supposed attempts at solutions.
There is NO CERTAINTY.
If there is one thing that businesses thrive on it is CERTAINTY.
Knowing a tax rate will remain the same for the next year or so; knowing health insurance premiums will be ~ the same over the long haul, knowing this, knowing that…..
That’s what’s missing from ALL of Obama’s attempts.
He is not business friendly nor business savvy enough to give them what they NEED to get moving again.
@ MataHarley, #13:
I’m not sold on the idea that the new engine was a bad idea. We haven’t even had the car out for a ride around the block yet.
With health care reform, my thinking parallels that of Kevin D. Williamson regarding deficit reduction. The quote is from that article B-Rob linked up in post #8:
Nobody ever seemed to get around to troubleshooting and replacing the problematic parts of our health care system, piece by piece. I saw no indications that they ever would.
If republicans can come up with a clever way to remedy the full range of problems “Obamacare” addresses while simultaneously reducing costs, I’ll be only too happy to hear about it. Until then, I’ll be happy to hear about any ways the recently passed legislation can be improved.
Larry, again I must call you delusional. Obama is a flaming socialist. That is not even debatable any longer. Only those obama-drones suffering from pathological denial of reality like yourself say he isn’t a socialist.
@Hard Right
Do you know what a socialist is?
Tell me what successful companies in the US have been forced into nationalisation simply because (as an apparent socialist) Obama wishes to see public ownership of the means of production?
Saying Obama isn’t a socialist isn’t denial of reality whilst those like yourself who say he is a socialist is simple ignorance of what the term socialist means.
I knew some moonbat would make the claim that because obama has not been fully successful at his socialist efforts that he isn’t a socialist. You want to play word games. Just because he hasn’t made an across the board push no matter what, you want to pretend he isn’t what we know he is-socialist.
BTW, I know the definition of socialism better than you, obviously. You see, nationalization of industry is but one facet of socialism. You undertsand it that far, and think you’re clever to mention it. Problem is, you have to ignore all the other parts of socialism that prove your theory wrong. I expect that from you.
Gaffe, you are in the same class as b-rob, rich w, and john ryan. The zero credibility class. You are a leftist and incapable of facing reality. This is all the time I will waste on you since you aren’t capable of understanding.
There are probably dozens of different versions of “socialism” being practiced in the world today. To debate the meaning of the word is futile, because it misses the point that conservatives are trying to make. It’s probably better for conservatives to say “we want the minimum federal and state governments that meets the minimum frameworks necessary to fulfill the charters of federal and state Constitutions.” Anything more than that is seen as a slide toward a more socialistic form of government. Sometimes, it’s just easier to say we don’t want socialism. We want free markets and minimum government bureaucracy. Of course we realize that some limited amount of government is necessary to protect the country as a whole and individual citizens from external and external threats to our civil liberties, to maintain a cohesive standard of laws, and maintain a common currency, and we see the need to pay taxes to accomplish these objectives.
Most importantly, we conservatives see that corruption in government AND in big business has hurt the country greatly, and we believe the government has expanded in size, scope, and cost far more than is in the best interests of a free people. We’re tired of government subsidies, trade agreements, and other manipulations that artificially boost one segment if the economy while harming others. All of these instances of excessive government involvement make the country look more “socialistic” than we feel it ought to be.
And I think most liberals understand that this is what we mean, but it’s just too tempting for them to belittle us for misuse of the term. It’s a diversionary tactic at worst, and at best it shows that maybe liberals really don’t understand our concerns. Either way, debating the use of the word “socialism” is counter-productive, and as I said at the beginning of my reply, I think it’s utterly futile (unless getting into a prolonged debate over semantics is your cup of tea.)
Jeff
You mean the third highest productive state in the nation, of which Palin was Governor, Billy Bob? You know, the same argument and snobbery you tried to bandy about on another thread, and decided to dodge the issue and start another BS tangent?
And speaking of “federally dependent”, the highest producing “state” is the DC beltway. Reconcile that with your twaddle. heh
You can’t retain sheeeeet, can you, bubba?
I’d say that gives Palin quite a bit of credibility in economics… far more than a community organizer who’s pretty much sponged off of those around him, and lived on college grants and campaign donations most of his adult life.
What’s with the “successful” companies forced into nationalism bit, Gaffa? Is it any less socialist to force UNsuccessful companies (i.e. GM/Chrysler) into nationalism?
How about nationalizing student loans which, prior to this, had been handled in the majority by private lenders?
Here’s one for you to ponder. Does Obama think the solution always lies with government? What kind of mentality does that suggest to you?
Greg, the car has been started, warming up, and missing like an SOB without even being put into gear. Give you a clue? Timing is off… and I mean waaaaay off… like passing this off as deficit reduction in the middle of a recession that’s likely to be a double dipper. That, my friend, is a political talking point pipe dream. If you haven’t looked around, already businesses and insurers are passing along the costs that will kicked into gear in short order to the consumer. Meanwhile treating a cat bite with a tetanus shot and soaking a hand in soapy water still racks up a $350-$400 bill at your local clinic.
Go look at some of the graphs in Ezra Klein’s WaPo article a year ago. Compare the costs of equal treatments/physician fees/scans between the US, US Medicare (government option) to Spain, Canada, France, Netherlands and UK. And most especially check out the pharma differences there.
For a real eye opener, here’s the 2009 price comparison report. More charts that will make your eyebrows raise. Why are we paying so much more?
Forget that the government is paying the bills via absconding the cash from taxpayers in those countries. Regardless of whether the bill is paid by the government, or a private entity, why the spread in the costs in apples to apples treatment? Why are costs so inflated here?
Then why don’t you explain to us how O’healthcare is going to do anything about bringing those costs down?
When you figure out what the real problem is, you may look at O’healthcare differently.
The math on this never worked. Projected revenues never accommodated for economic conditions that resembled reality. Pretty rosy view of what they think they will reap with corporate and cadillac taxes. You can’t base our future revenue on the past 10 years numbers. Can you say serious downhill slide here?
Then there’s the $500 bil they’re cutting from Medicare, with $300 bil of that getting dumped into state Medicaid programs to add more to the rolls. Dumping more people into the system with current levels of medical facilities and professionals, combined with doing nothing to curb the runaway costs, is not a prescription for savings.
Exchanges can be a good idea… as long as they aren’t government portals with mandates and dictates as to who can participate, and how much the premiums are allowed to be. In the private sector, it’s called price fixing and it’s illegal. Lending Tree and Orbitz are two examples of competitive portals that work… all without government mandates and/or federal and state funding. Good idea, implemented badly as part of a government grab. Done by the private sector, it’s likely to be superior in implementation, a job creator, and doesn’t put the taxpayer on the hook for higher national debt.
Electronic records is a smart thing for any business to do to cut down on their overhead. But government mandated electronic records, and provided to government agencies for their perusal? What’s up with that, Greg? If the stinkin’ aroma surrounding that idea ain’t hitting you, you need some nasal spray, guy. Suggest you shop in Canada or Mexico, where it’s cheaper to purchase.
Dump it all. Each and every 2407 pages of the original bill, plus the 150 pages of the reconciliation bill needs to be shredded. And that includes sneaking in the nationalization of student loans.
Then we can pick out the few good ideas that were implemented badly, and controlled by government, open it to the free market as a business opportunity. That will save we tax payers beaucoup cash.
Most of all, start addressing the problem of the exorbitant costs in the US to do the same treatment done elsewhere. Must be a way for providers to band together to bulk buy supplies and save on everything from state of the art equipment to drugs, don’t you think? Isn’t it cheaper to buy from a big box store than the mom and pop, who buys in smaller quantity?
Yes, Greg… it needs to be piecemeal, and part by part. You go for where you see the biggest waste and ways to cut the cost most, implement something, and see how well it works and how it affects other parts in that engine. With each change, that motor will respond, and other fixes may be more clear. Redesigning the wheel is simply an Obama/Pelosi/Reid fantasy meant to satisfy their delusions of legacy grandeur. That wheel just needs some whittling to make it more round.
Mata, you obviously have no grasp of the facts. You said:
Are you even aware that this was a FEDERAL STUDENT LOAN PROGRAM where the government PAID THE PRIVATE SECTOR to administer the program? By taking it in house, we don’t pay a “socialistic” subsidy to business anymore. It is done by the feds cheaper than the subsidy cost. That is why it was included in Obamacare because (drumroll please!) it SAVES TAX DOLLARS DOING IT THIS WAY!
Yeah, when you cons rail against “the government taking over student loans” you always forget to add that little tidbit — that it is a friggin federal student loan program that was costing too much money the way it was. Ditto Medicare Advantage — another subsidy to the private sector that was too dang costly for what we got in return.
Again — if you cons are successful getting rid of Obamacare, where are you going to find the money to restart those two expensive subsidized programs? Who are you going to tax? Or are you going to just keep borrowing from the Chinese?
@Hard Right
Ok tell us what are the other facets as implemented by Obama which fit the definition of socialism. Hmmm?
@JVernie
Out of interest – did the size of Government and spending go up or down under Reagan?
Also if Bush was for free markets why did he put high tariffs on foreign steel? http://www.atimes.com/global-econ/DC08Dj01.html
Amusing how politicans (right and left) say one thing and do another.
So rather than misuse the term – which is a diversionary scare tactic in itself – why don’t the right simply not use the term?
@Mata
So does that make Dubya a socialist too – because Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were effectively nationalized? Or how about when he nationalized airport security and created the TSA? And under Reagan there was the government owned Resolution Trust Corporation, under Ford – there was Conrail, under Nixon there was Amtrak. Does that make them all socialists too?
@Nan
Here’s some stats when comparing health in the UK compared to the US…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/mar/22/us-healthcare-bill-rest-of-world-obama
So the US spends well over twice as much – yet has a lower life expectancy.
@guffa: With regard to US versus British longevity. The UK has a healthier lifestyle: more exercise; less obesity. The UK also has universal health care. So, up to age 65, you Brits have less mortality.
But what happens AFTER age 65 (when Americans also have universal health care)? Surprise, we outlive you, despite our greater obesity and less exercise.
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/04/news/la-heb-death-rates-20101104
Why is this? Our health care system is BETTER than yours! British cancer mortality rates (life expectancy AFTER cancer diagnosis) are, by comparison, dreadful, for example. The problem with the US health care system is access.
In the USA, we lost 3,000 people in a one off terrorist attack, which was fixed not by fighting what will end up being a $3 trillion dollar war in Iraq, but by locking the cockpit doors on airliners. But we lose 45,000 people a year, because they don’t have health insurance. But after age 65, things are different. All Americans now have access to the best medicine in the world, and the results speak for themselves.
And here’s the kicker: The great health care system which takes care of over age 65 Americans costs less than the private health insurance system which is in effect for those under age 65 and delivers greater consumer satisfaction. Were it not for Medicare, how would the elderly get healthcare? Working people would pay less in taxes but more in insurance premiums for their aging parents.
I don’t have the energy to get into Mata’s misleading and simplistic analysis of ObamaCare. But I can’t resist taking the golden opportunity she’s offered relating to Obama’s policies being “Socialistic.”
Over and over, on this blog, I have asked for the top three positions of Obama’s Presidency which are “socialistic.” I have received no answers. Mata now does offer up the following examples:
So we – FINALLY! – have two examples: (1) The GM/Chrysler bailouts. (2) “Nationalizing” student loans.
First, the bailouts. These were the idea of Dick Cheney, who told George Bush that, were Bush to let the auto companies go under on his watch, he’d forever be remembered as a 21st Century Herbert Hoover. You (Mata) pegged the GM/Chrysler support given by Bush to be $17 billion. The taxpayers will never see a nickle of this back. Obama came in, examined the problem, and made the decision to rescue the US auto industry, for a lot of reasons, including the fact that GM is a vital defense contractor. Just as an aside, the space station is getting a new robot, which will greatly diminish the need for astronaut EVAs. This is GM technology But I digress.
Rather than just GIVING the money to GM, Obama INVESTED the money. Temporarily, the USA became the majority stakeholder in GM. As majority stakeholder, we got to call some of the shots. The most important decision was to sack the CEO and replace him. The result is that GM got its act together. The US government is in the process of divesting and, at this point, prospects for a return of the taxpayer’s money spent on GM by Obama look to be very good, although, again, the $17 billion Bush gift is probably gone for good. So who was the better steward of the taxpayers’ money?
With regard to “nationalizing” student loans, this is a very misleading statement. It’s not like the banks were lending their own money to the students. Rather, the banks were lending the taxpayer’s money, and collecting a cut of the action. A team of analysts determined that administration of this loan program was sufficiently straight forward and simple that it didn’t require middlemen. So the middlemen were cut out; the government directly lends money to the students and the students directly repay the money to the government.
Now, maybe you consider the federal student loan program to be “socialistic.” But this wasn’t Obama’s program. I have no idea when this program got started, but I borrowed federal money to go to medical school and my kids borrowed federal money to go to college and postgraduate school and, hopefully, all of us will have not only paid back the loans but provided a good return on the investment of the taxpayers into our respective life’s work. If it’s a socialistic program, it’s a program which has done a whole lot of good.
But what, again, did Obama do? He just decided that the program was supposed to be a loan program to students and not a government make-work program for the bankers who were the former middlemen. This saved money, allowing more of it to go to the students, for which the program was intended.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@openid.aol.com/runnswim:
Really Larry?
Really?
Now, you and I both know that is not true now don’t we?
The truth is that Mata went to great lengths to answer your query here.
You even acknowledged that she answered you here and stated that you would respond to her “in the future.”
Furthermore, Bees & HR pointed out to you that Mata had answered your questions….
Sorry, your claim of having “received no answers” is pure, 100% unadulterated dog squeeze.
Fact is, the answers were given. You just chose not to address them.
Mata –
The reason it is cheaper for the federal government to do the federal student loan program than to pay the private sector to do it should be obvious. (1) there is no advertising/marketing kinda costs for federal government the way there is for the private sector; (2) the federal employees are not led by a cadre of $400,000 to $1.5 million “officers” whose salaries flow through as administrative costs that have to be bourne in the price charged; and (3) federal employees can be multi-tasked to do other jobs, such as processing student loans AND processing small business loans; no so for stand alone student loan companies . . . which is how they were structured.
Contrary to what cons always claim, privatization is no panacea. I know . . . because I have worked with school boards who were considering privatization of non-teaching functions. Indeed, in Ohio we saw the downside of privatization when the military tried to privatize certain military financial functions, including payroll for soldiers. The only way the private sector folks “won” the competition initially was when the “judges” assigned a higher overhead figure to the federal employees than they actually incurred. When you assign the ACTUAL OBSERVED overhead costs (for the GSA managed buildings, for heat, power, administration, etc.) the federal employees won. And why was the privatization even in question? Because unlike the Social Security Administration, the private sector had a consistent pattern of f-ing up military payrolls — not paying people, paying the wrong amounts, etc.
Larry wrote –
I disagree with the claim that “our health care system” is better than GB. We have, as it was once described, islands of excellence in a sea of mediocrity. Our best docs, our best hospitals, our devices and our pharma compare with no one. But there are vast vast areas of this country where quality health care is non-existent, spotty, or inaccessible for the people who need it most — the uninsured, the underinsured, and the just plain rural and urban working poor.
This is the irony: a good friend works in a VA hospital. She is an a brand new surgical suite and is able to use world class techniques to restore sight to veterans suffering from various injuries and diseases. World class care, there. Ditto my sister, a VA doc who is a noted liver specialist. They offer World class SOCIALIZED care to the soldiers and vets. Similarly, Medicare and Medicaid (to a lesser extent) provide access to top care. All socialistic programs that work very very well.
If you look at the numbers, though, British life expectancy is higher than ours even though their old folks appear to get worse care after age 65. Why is that? Because our people UNDER 65 are getting no care or poor care, and dying long before comparable Brits. Infant mortality is the perfect example of this: we are not even close to our comparator countries on that measure.
We COULD provide world class care to all; we just don’t value it as much as some other things, like having more 100 plane aircraft carriers, a million man army, a space program, farm subsidies, pork for the National Museum of Country Music, etc. It is not a matter of possibilities, but priorities that keeps us from having infant mortality numbers and life expectancy numbers as good as, say Canada. We put a man on the moon and sent probes outside our universe. We have the know how and the money to have the best top to bottom medical care system. We just don’t want to.
@aye: In Mata’s reply to me, which you referenced, she wrote that she thought I’d write a rejoinder, but that she wouldn’t be around for awhile, to respond, in kind. Out of courtesy, I waited until she returned, which she just did.
Very well.
Since no one has ever offered anything beyond what Mata wrote, I’ll take Mata’s response as being the official Flopping Aces brief against Obama as a socialist/Marxist.
Socialism
Marxism
Here’s Mata’s case for Obama having pursued socialist/Marxist policies during his Presidency:
Yes, Obama would like Medicare for all and so would I. But Medicare is not “socialized” medicine. It is single payer medicine. Socialized medicine is the UK system, where the government owns the hospitals and clinics and the government pays the doctors a salary. By your definition of socialized medicine, we have a “socialized” national defense industry, because we also have a single payer (the US government). The federal highway system is “socialized,” because the government picks up the tab for the Interstates. This was a program started by Eisenhower, by the way. Certain things work better and more efficiently when there is a single payer. At a time when health care is beginning to bankrupt the nation, we need the health care system to work better and more efficiently.
But, regardless of what may be in Obama’s heart of hearts, Obamacare was originally proposed by GOP Senators Grassley and Dole in 1993 and was put into place by the GOP’s Romney in Massachussetts several years ago. Obamacare is built on the exact same principles and whether it goes further, in ten years time, will be something for the voters to determine, at that time, because Obama will be long gone.
Conclusion: Obamacare is not “socialized” medicine and it is certainly not Marxism!
Mata anticipates this argument, and goes on to state:
To repeat, there is nothing in Obamacare which in anyway resembles true socialist (i.e. UK-style) health care. And … Marxist (!?) … in who’s universe?
Mata continues:
I discussed the GM bailout in #26. You obviously haven’t had any experience with a corporation teetering on financial insolvency. I have. In my case, there was no option for a government bailout. We had to work with the private sector (venture capitalists and other investors). Their terms were basically take it or leave it. Fire your CEO; take your marching orders from the CEO we hire for you. Cheerfully accept that your financial position in the company has been gutted. Or else don’t accept it and just die. “Screwed the bondholders??” Absent the bailout, the bondholders would have had nothing at all. Nor any of the shareholders.
There was never any intention to assume permanent ownership of GM. Bottom line, they saved an iconic American corporation. They saved 1.5 million jobs. They saved an important defense contractor. And the US taxpayers have a great chance of recapturing most or all of their temporary investment.
This isn’t socialism and it sure isn’t Marxism.
Mata then goes on to argue otherwise:
No. The government didn’t “seize” GM! What a bunch of malarky. GM’s management and shareholders had the option of not taking any government money. Ford didn’t take any money. Ford, therefore, wasn’t “seized.” The use of the word “seized,” in this context, is a distorted use of the English language.
Mata:
The nation bailed out all of the states. California for years has sent much more to Washington than it’s received in return, unlike, for example, such well managed capitalist states, such as Wyoming and Alaska (#1 and #2 on the Federal dole). It’s not “socialist” to pay public employees like law enforcement and teachers and prison guards. Is the police department or sheriffs department a “socialist” enterprise? Are public schools “socialized?” If so, then all states are socialist states. All cities. The vast majority of Republicans support public schools and public ownership of law enforcement agencies.
How about the US government borrowing money to finance tax cuts? How is that less “socialist/Marxist” than borrowing money to finance fiscal shortfalls for state and local governments, to pay for legitimate government programs which are supported by probably 90% of the entire electorate?
Mata:
The blueprint for the mandates came from GOP Senators Grassley and Dole. The model was put into place by the GOP’s Romney.
“Arizona’s immigration?” Border security and immigration policy is and has to be a federal responsibility. You like the AZ immigration policy, because it seems to be more strict than the federal policy. What if the State of Maine or Michigan or Washington or California decided that they wouldn’t require passports for passengers landing in their airports, ports, or crossing international borders? It’s not “socialist” for a Federal government to assert that it has the authority to make laws regarding requirements for foreign nationals.
Mata:
The above is poppycock. Mata is referring to a brilliant move by Geithner. Had the US government retained a passive equity position (i.e. preferred stock position, as opposed to common), none of the banks would have returned any of the money. It’s precisely because of the (entirely legal) threat to convert preferred to common that they all rushed to repay the taxpayers. There was NEVER any intent to nationalize banks, and Mata knows this very well. It’s simply good stewardship of public funds, as in the case of the GM “investment.”
I think that only 20% of all student loans were entirely private, previously. The rest were all government guaranteed. The burden of college and professional school tuition is crushing, as it is. It’s a huge national problem. It’s in the national interest to solve this problem. The government can reduce educational costs to the students by subsidizing their educations or they can reduce the cost of borrowing. If private lending institutions can make money available to the students at lower rates than can the government, then they can and should do it. I think that they’ll always be some market for private lending, as the government loans have a lot of limits, regarding parental income, etc. But we are falling behind in education and it’s more important to allow our kids to get educated than to avoid stepping on the toes of private lenders.
I’ll give you (Mata) partial credit for this last one. It’s the government competing with the private sector in student loans. But the private sector is supposed to be so much more efficient, right? In this case, the private sector won’t make most of these loans without a government guarantee. So it’s not really private enterprise, is it? We aren’t, therefore, talking about a government “takeover.” It’s more an adjustment of a previously existing public/private partnership, necessitated by a true crisis in education and international competitiveness.
Mata:
Oh good grief. Gerald Ford signed into law a similar (in concept and magnitude) housing tax credit in 1975. I bought my first house in 1975, helped out by this tax credit. No one ever called Gerald Ford a socialist, much less a Marxist.
Let’s get rid of all the tax credits in the tax code, shall we? Want to go through the list of corporate tax credits?
P.S. (11:07 AM PST): I just noted that I didn’t respond to your comment about taxpayers subsidizing irresponsible borrowers. As you doubtless know, virtually NONE (1% or less) of the mortgage defaults (by dollars) were for the community reinvestment act borrowers. Of the remainder, the majority were people who would have qualified for conventional, fixed, lower rate mortgages, only they were steered into higher rate subprimes by a national army of mortgage brokers, working on commission. Even at that, the majority of defaults are not people who can’t afford to make payments, but are “strategic defaults,” by individuals who don’t see the sense in continuing to make payments on property which has fallen in value to much less than they paid for it. I personally think that this is immoral, but large, respected business corporations do this also. They take out loans to buy large commercial buildings, including skyscrapers and shopping centers and, when real estate values plummeted, they just walked away, rather than making payments on a bad investment. Now, the HAFA “bailouts” couldn’t succeed when a large part of the problem was people who didn’t want to be bailed out (the strategic defaulters) and where another part of the problem was lenders who found it financially more advantageous to foreclose than to modify loans.
http://www.stlouisrefinancinggroup.com/st-louis-mortgage-news/st-louis-home-loan-report-says-foreclosures-more-profitable-than-loan-modifications
So, while, yes, this was one particular program which has not succeeded, neither was it any more “socialistic” than the original TARP program initiated by Bush and Paulson.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@Mr. ParaLegal2 wrote:
Ah yes…the “higher infant mortality” meme… That never grows old on the left, eh?
The only problem is that the stats are not based on apples/apples comparisons.
Didn’t know that did you?
Well, here’s another batch of edumakashun for the guy who likes to think of himself as the smartest guy in the room [snicker].
Of course, no one really expects you to understand any of this.
You’ve shown over and over that you’re confused on the very basic elements of factual reality such as referring to Alaska as a “small, federally dependent state”…when, in reality Alaska is the LARGEST state in our nation unless, of course, your boy-kings’ list of 57 includes something larger.
Mata –
Must you ALWAYS be so obtuse? I called Alaska “small” because it IS SMALL — in population. That’s why it only has the bare minimum number of representatives in Congress (three). Alaska has about a third the population of Brooklyn, New York. It has fewer people than the eastern half of my county, and fewer residents than my state capital, Columbus. Rhode Island, a state smaller than my county, has almost 50% more residents than Alaska. It is rinky dink small.
Surely you do not quibble that it is federally dependent, do you? The feds provide huge transfers to that state, for the Native population, for roads, for bridges to no where . . . . I saw a stat (which haven’t confirmed yet) that a third of Alaska’s population is employed by the federal government. I would hate to see what percentage is on welfare.
And I notice you still have not given a link showing how “productive” the state is. That’s ok. I know you pulled it out your colon.
Larry, your rebuttals are rather weak. However, I’ll let Mata go at them without getting in the way. I have popcorn to eat as she guts your arguements.
aye –
You trotted out the same excuse for poor infant mortality numbers that all cons trot out.
But a simple question: can you show me ANY DATA, restated however you want, that would show our infant mortality as really LOWER than Canada or Great Britain or France? No, you can’t. Why? Because they have cradle to grave health care for everyone. A poor girl in Canada or Britain or France who thinks she is pregnant simply goes to the doctor. In the states, if she is from a working poor family, she has a serious problem. In addition, for many health insurance policies here (probably the vast majority), the pregnant teen would be covered under her parents policy, but her baby, when born, would not be. Think about THAT for a bit.
You can always quibble with how Zimbabwe defines mortality or live births, but the bottom line is . . . our numbers suck. You see nothing wrong with this, or with our lower life expectancy; I do. For you, having the best health care system in the world (and we don’t) is not important; for me, it would be a priority. You like things the way they are — whether with our second rate public education system, or our misconstructed health care system. Hell, I bet you even oppose the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction report, don’t you?
That is where you and I simply differ — I think this country can and should be the best in EVERYTHING. You are content to be mediocre. Luckily, I think more people think like me than think like you. They are troubled that our schools suck and our health care system is hydebound and they are looking for change, not the same old same old.
Larry –
Do you notice that cons NEVER want to discuss the REAL socialized medical care offered by the U.S. military, the VA, or the federal public health clinics in, say, West Virginia? Notice no con senator ever complains about the care they get at Bethesda? Notice none of them ever propose doing away with that most socialized of care? Nope, not ever. And that is as pure a socialized medicine you can get: government employees providing care in a government owned facility.
For better or for ill, that could be the model for our system IF Obama really wanted a socialized system. But he never proposed that, never supported that, and actually signed off on a program that stabilized the non-profit and for-profit insurers and hospitals. That is why the hospitals and the insurers SUPPORT Obamacare (soon to be renamed something more palatable to cons . . . like Federal Romneycare). If Romney is the nominee, mark my words, he will try to take credit for all the good stuff in Obamacare . . . “We did it first in Massachusetts” blah blah blah.
Whoops!
G-20 Refuses to Back U.S. Push on China’s Currency
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/11/12/g-refuses-push-chinas-currency/
Is this a message that the Economic Illiterates in the Current Regime heard above their Own Talking Points? Nope. The Recession/Depression continues unabated.
OT, I like the way you phrase Recession/Depression for we are are only a few clicks away from a full depression; however, Obama’s Recession/Depression might be more appropriate, since he is Hell bent on making the situation worse.
Aye is absolutely correct about the infant mortality statistics. Here’s how I explained it in a 2002 debate on a Usenet international discussion board. (rec.sport.swimming was supposed to be about swimming, but it often drifted to an international gang tackle of me defending US politics. My role was defending the US system against the gang tackles by Brits, Frenchies, Aussies, Canadians, and others. Just the opposite of here on F/A; which shows that one person’s liberal is another person’s conservative).
From: RunnSwim
Sep 26 2002, 10:47 am
In article , “Paul Gormley” (nb: a Brit)
writes:
>Duh, so babies deserve to die because their parents can’t afford to buy
>adequate food and medical care! Your attitude makes me sick. Thank goodness
>Martin is out there so I don’t have to think that all americans are so
>self-centred and oblivious to poverty as you appear to be.
Martin Smith adds:
>>I’m sorry, how do infants bring mortality on themselves?
[Larry replies -->]
Since infant mortality seems to have emerged as exhibit A in the
indictment of the American system, perhaps we should make the
effort to understand what it is that the data really do show:
Paediatr Perinat Epidemiol 2002 Jan;16(1):16-22
Registration artifacts in international comparisons of
infant mortality.
Kramer MS, Platt RW, Yang H, Haglund B, Cnattingius S,
Bergsjo P.
Department of Pediatrics, McGill University Faculty of
Medicine, Montreal, Canada. michael.kra…@mcgill.ca
[nb: The "differences in registration practices" constitute what is recorded as a live birth, which, in the USA, is any baby which takes one breath when it comes out of the uterus. In many other countries, babies must live for a day or more, before they are considered to be a live birth. My editorial comments were as follows] –>
Now, several points (besides the obvious) must be made:
Firstly, infant mortality among US whites is significantly
less than among Norwegians (overwhelmingly white, in
a health care system overwhelmingly socialized). Secondly,
the relatively high infant mortality among blacks has been
attributable to higher rates of drug and alcohol abuse among
pregnant women. This may be an indictment of something,
but it is not an indictment of health care. Thirdly, infant
mortality is hardly the “gold standard” yardstick of a healthcare
system which it has been assumed to be. Fourthly, infant
mortality rates are affected by additional social and factors, such
as frequency of abortions.
We now move to another study which sheds light on these
issues:
Br Med J 1992 Sep 19;305(6855):687-91
Social class differences in infant mortality in Sweden:
comparison with England and Wales.
Leon DA, Vagero D, Otterblad Olausson P.
The conclusions are, that, considering differences in
reporting methodology and other factors, differences
between infant mortality among industrialized nations
are largely attributable to individual lifestyle choices
of the parents, over which the state has little control.
Certainly, there is nothing at all in the infant mortality
data which can in any way be used to condemn the
the US health care system or to support the alleged
superiority of the European welfare state as far as
providing for the health needs of its most vulnerable
citizens.
- Larry Weisenthal
>>>>
P.S. @B-ROB:
You ask: “But a simple question: can you show me ANY DATA, restated however you want, that would show our infant mortality as really LOWER than Canada or Great Britain or France?”
See the study above, from McGill University (in Canada, by the way), which showed that, comparing apples to apples (white Americans to Norwegians), American infant mortality was significantly lower than Norwegian infant mortality. You simply can’t use international infant mortality statistics to make any meaningful comparisons between the efficacy of different health care systems, without accounting for the very large differences in methodology (definition of a live birth, versus a still birth, where still births are not counted in the infant mortality statistics) and without accounting for important differences between populations.
P.S. I do agree with everything you wrote in #35
Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
@B-Rob,
By what stretch of the imagination is the VA system “socialistic?” Just because it is tax-supported? Can anyone in the nation get health care at VA hospitals? Of course, the answer is “NO.”
The VA system is part of he benefits that veterans receive, and these are the members of the “defense” provision of the U.S. Constitution. I dare say that most of the conservative respondents and bloggers on this site believe the VA system is a reasonable use of our taxes (I would have used the term “fair use” but I don’t want to sound too, well, you know.)
My father and several uncles and cousins have made use of the VA system, and overall they have been pleased – except for the screw-ups that happen with alarming frequency. This is the general consensus of many others I deal with in my contributions to websites for people who, like me, are dealing with severe, intractable pain. The VA offers inexpensive care, but you often wait far too long to be seen, have to deal with a number of interns who had to “settle” for VA hospitals because they didn’t get matched with the hospitals they had hoped to match, and many times have to accept prescriptions for older, cheaper drugs that are considered by the bean-counters as equally efficacious, without regard for the relatively nastier side-effects of the cheaper drugs.
Don’t get me wrong; these vets are still grateful to have such low-cost healthcare available to them, but the VA system is far from what I would call a shining example of socialized medicine.
As for the availability of facilities like Bethesda and Walter Reed to nonessential government personnel, I know that’s been criticized, because I’ve been harping about it. Did you notice how nobody in the MSM bothered to raise this issue when Obama and others pushing for universal health care kept saying that everyone should have access to the same care that they have? Do you really think they meant that every citizen of the US should be able to walk into these facilities and be afforded the same “move to the front of the line” service that they receive? Hell no, they didn’t.
It’s so easy to bait and switch for the members of the privileged, ruling class, in order to garner support for policies they want to enforce or votes they want to receive. There’s no way these jerks would ever really consider giving up their perks, yet they want everyone else to “share the pain.” They prove time and time again how out of touch they are with the realities of life outside of their champagne and caviar circles. It’s no wonder grief counselors had to be called in, because so many people who thought they had cushy jobs for the next two years realized abruptly that they’d have to live under the same set of rules that the “unwashed masses” have been forced to accept.
Jeff
About VA health care:
http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2007/12/10/gvsa1210.htm
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2005/0501.longman.html
I know something about the VA system, having worked at three VAs (Ann Arbor, Washington DC, and Long Beach, CA — the latter for 8 years).
First, read the above two articles.
Second, regarding the comment that veterans
NOTHING could be further from the truth!
99% of the VAs offering internship and residency training programs do so in conjunction with University Medical Schools:
Here’s a list of the VAs and their affiliated University programs:
http://www4.va.gov/oaa/oaa_affiliations_list.asp
As you’ll see, these include literally the most prestigious, competitive residency programs in the USA. When I worked at the Washington DC VA, the oncology care was provided by fellows from the National Cancer Institute (me being one), supervised by NCI attending oncologists — this being the most competitive oncology training program, probably in the world. Here in Southern California, the San Diego VA is staffed through the University of California San Diego. Long Beach through the University of California Irvine. Sepulveda through UCLA and USC. These are all first rate, highly competitive residency programs.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
As Mata appears to be busy, I’ll start off the shredding.
1) Larry, regardless of who proposes a socialist policy or program, IT’S STILL SOCIALIST! Party is irrelevant. So is when it was proposed or approved.
2) You like Gaffe UK make the silly claim that because obamacare isn’t single payer that it isn’t socialist. That is like saying that because you stabbed me with a 7 inch knife and not a 10 inch knife, you didn’t stab me!
Obama understands he can’t do it all in one fell swoop and that he is setting the foundation.
3) You ignore obama’s own comments about wanting to expand obamacare and other socialist plans. IIRC he also wanted single payer. Again, he understands he must move somewhat gradually to turn America socialist. You on the other hand want to remain blind and critcize those of us who can see what he is doing. Europe didn’t achieve the deeply entrenched, hardcore socialism it now has in a day. It started gradually…like obama is doing. Being a liberal I’m surprised you don’t get the nuance.
4) Nationalization of student loans is a socialist move. They took over the industry-removed it from private control. It’s amazing people like yourself demand proof of obama’s socialst policies. We present it to you, and you merely claim it isn’t socialism. Yes you try hard to spin it, but that is exactly what it is by the very definition you presented above.
5) In order to support your beliefs you want us to ignore his past words, associations, and actions. Sorry Larry, it’s all part of the big picture and I will not erase those parts to accomodate your fantasy.
This next part is rather debatable to me. In the socialism definition, the word “seized” could mean something other than what you assume it means. GM would be a good example. Yes they agreed to take the money, but the government took over and to my knowledge, are still the majority shareholders. Was there not a different way that obama and crew could have handled it without becoming the “owners?” Just because GM wasn’t taken by force or against GM’s will, is it no less a seizure of the company? The end result is fairly the same.
I’m guessing Mata may argue the fact that they wanted to take over at all as proof of obama’s socialist tendencies. I’m inclined to agree.
Really what it all boils down to, is that there are degrees of socialism. We see the potential for what obama is doing to spread as appears to be his design. You Larry, want to say it isn’t socialism until we are like Europe.
Here is an excellent example of why we oppose big govt.–Google the history of the department of education. Make note of what they say about it’s original incarnation in 1866!
@hard (#41).
Duly shredded, I yield. You got me, partner. You got me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSlkO41Y9I4
- Larry Dubya/Surf City
Larry,
The VA system has its positive attributes and its flaws. I have no doubt that you have worked with many fine practitioners within the system, but like many doctors, you may not see the patient side of things. My twin brother is a doctor (pediatric intensivist) who has seen the good and the bad in the VA system, and it was he who told me about his fellow classmates moaning on Match Day of how they “ended up” matching with VA hospitals. On the other hand, one of my cousins (actually my ex-wife’s cousin) is a nurse who started out at a VA facility, and she had mostly positive things to say about the staff with whom she worked. I still support the system as a benefit to our veterans, and feel it is a reasonable use of tax dollars. I think even more should be done, especially in the pharmacological treatment area, so newer drugs with fewer undesirable side effects are allowed if the physicians feel they provide the best outcome. Our vets deserve to be treated with the utmost dignity for the sacrifices they made or were willing to make.
I doubt you’ll find many conservatives at FA who think we should eliminate the VA system, even if it might have similarities to socialized medicine. It should still be run efficiently, and should not be used as a trophy OR lightning rod for political purposes.
Jeff
@JVerive: I don’t know how old your brother is (speaking of his “fellow classmates” who were disappointed at matching with a VA hospital). I suspect that this was in the somewhat distant past. I don’t know how many standalone VA residency programs still exist, if any. Today, virtually all of them are part of University residency programs in which the intern/resident physicians rotate between a university hospital and a VA, a university hospital/private hospital/VA, a university hospital/public city or county hospital/VA (this latter being the arrangement for my own residency (University of Michigan Med Ctr/Wayne County General Hosp/Ann Arbor VA). Therefore the image you create of VAs staffed by “disappointed” residents who couldn’t match elsewhere is certainly incorrect or at least out of date.
I agree that things look different sitting on the examination table than they do from behind the white coat. But this goes for all medical facilities. Problems which occur at VA hospitals quickly become public knowledge. Problems which occur in purely private hospitals are covered up. You’ve heard that old adage about doctors burying their mistakes, but occasionally a whistle blower leaks a scandal to the press, and this occurs at the so-called “best” private hospitals in the nation, e.g. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/16/us/16radiation.html. Here’s an eye-opening table (I can’t vouch for its accuracy; I merely Googled “iatrogenic deaths,” and this was the first thing which popped up): http://www.ourcivilisation.com/medicine/usamed/deaths.htm
In any event, absolutely no one — not even Dennis Kucinich, much less Obama, is proposing a British-style system of socialized medicine (where the government owns the hospitals and the doctors receive a salary from the government).
As I’ve explained elsewhere, the fatal flaw behind the fanciful notion that traditional fee for service healthcare provides the best and most efficient care is that, in medicine, the sellers make the purchase decisions for the buyers and it’s in the self-interest of the sellers to provide as much service as possible, which means, in the case of medicine, providing as many procedures as possible, as doctors are generously compensated for providing procedures but are virtually not compensated at all for solving problems and counseling patients.
One potential solution is to put all doctors on salary (which is happening at an accelerating rate), but this presents problems of its own, in a system which still rewards procedures over outcomes. One of the vitally important features of Obamacare is its emphasis on shifting physician rewards from procedures to outcomes. This delights primary care physicians but infuriates some specialists. But there is no doubt that this is the only way to control costs, while improving outcomes, long-term.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
Larry,
My brother graduated from med school and started his residency around 12 1/2 years ago, so residnets’ attitudes may have changed during that time. The attitudes he expressed were also possibly unique to the graduates of University of Illinois at Chicago Circle Campus. I admit they are not necessarily representative of all residents’ opinions of residency at VA hospitals.
As for containing costs, you said:
I disagree. It is definitely one way to effect cost containment, but there are many others. For the last several months I’ve been listening to doctors on satellite radio (ReachMD and other programs) offering suggestions, such as increasing the use of physician assistants and nurse practitioners for routine, noncritical cases, allowing doctors more time to follow up with other patients via telephone or email.
In addition, I don’t see how starting in 2011, banning Health Savings Accounts from reimbursing individuals for non-presription drugs (section 9003 of HR 3590) is supposed to save consumers money or reduce health costs. For a Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, where is the patient protection or affordable care in this section? Only the costs for prescription drugs and insulin are going to be allowed (I thought insulin was a prescription drug, but maybe that depends on locale.) Does it make sense to force people to see their doctors for a prescription for Tylenol and Tums? Or is this a sneaky way to whittle away at the benefits of Health Savings Accounts (because only the “rich” can afford them?)
Jeff
JVerive –
Both the VA and the military hospital systems are socialistic because (a) they are government programs providing a service that could be provided by the private sector; (b) it involves the provision of those services in a government owned facility; (c) with the service provided by government employees. There are few programs that would so closely fit the definition of “socialism” or “socialistic.” The fact that “not everyone” can use them does not make them any less socialistic. That just makes them socialistic and exclusive.
If cons truly opposed socialism, they would be proposing that the military hospitals and VA hospitals be closed. The military hospital care could be contracted out in war zones the same way Halliburton provides food services in Iraq. In non-war zones, such as Germany or South Korea, the government could contract with local hospitals to provide the care. Or it could be offered to the private sector, too. There is no need to have the VA hospitals, either. It might be cheaper to just put veterans into the federal employees’ health insurance program, or buy a Blue Cross/Blue Shield policy for each vet.
In short, there are private sector options for providing services to soldiers and vets, yet you NEVER hear cons propose them. Why? It is very simple . . . when all is said and done, these socialist programs work VERY WELL. Soldiers who receive VA care are very appreciative of the care and there is an ease and simplicity of soldiers using the military hospital system — everyone speaks English, there is less “pass the buck,” etc.
Cons who truly oppose socialism could/should be the first ones calling for the elimination of these programs. But I notice that con opposition to socialism is quite selective, both as to WHEN they decry socialism (only when they lose the White House or Congress, never when they control it) and WHICH “socialistic programs” they hate (always programs for the benefit of the general public, and never programs that benefit business or the military).
Larry –
In my town, the VA is a training hospital for Case Western Reserve University. In Boston, Harvard Med students work at that VA. Great med schools, both.
As someone who uses the VA sysem, I can honestly say I have no complaints about the doctors there. The one I go to has interns from Loyola and they are very competent. The VA staff itself however gets mixed reviews. When I came back from Iraq the second time I almost walked out of the facility. The first individual I dealt with would ask me a question and then chastised the answers I gave her. Then I had to listen to a couple of others tell me about what a piece of shit George Bush was and how great Barack Obama was. It’s also an example of what’s in store with the new healthcare law. I have a service connected disability and every single medical person who has looked at me says the condition is far worse than the lay people bureacrats at the VA say it is. Based on my first hand experience with this practice, allowing the government to make medical determinations as opposed to medical personnel is a step in the wrong direction. When the government makes medical decisions for people, what else can one call it other than a form of socialism?
I completely agree with Sarah on this important issue. Palin in 2012 looks like it could happen if she keeps up this type of attack on Obama and his radical agenda.
@B-Rob,
Honestly, you’re as adept at making up false facts as Biden. Maybe politics is in your future.
Have you even considered researching to see if any proposals have been made in recent history to privatize some or all of the VA hospital system? The answer cannot be “Yes,” unless your connection to the Internet is highly filtered to keep out anything but hearsay and innuendo. For example,
Granted, it takes more time to actually research something than it takes to react and spew, but some things are worth the effort. You should try it some time. Of course, as soon as Republicans talk about privatizing even parts of the VA system, Democrats charge that Republicans want to “take away the VA system” and leave vets to fend for themselves. Poppycock? What was Chet Edwards’ response to Bill Flores’ idea of partial VA system privatization? I’m not going to post it here; you can find it quite easily on the Web. I think.
Besides, do you really think that if Obama were to announce that in order to cut costs, his healthcare plan was going to solicit bids for private industry to take over all or part of the VA system, there would be no bidders?
And you seem to think that the VA system is running efficiently and cost-effectively. If that’s the case, why did Obama want to bill soldiers’ private insurers for injuries received in combat?
And then there’s the proposal by federal officials in 2003 for $1 billion facility to improve upon the efficiency of the VA system:
There are many other examples to be found, B-Rob. Can you do your own homework? We’re getting tired of having to do it for you.
Jeff
For some reason, my links aren’t showing up. Here they are in plain old text form, so you’ll have to copy-and-paste them into your browsers. Sorry to all.
http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2003-09-12/news/0309120222_1_veterans-memorial-park-baldwin-park-veterans-affairs
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2009/03/proposal-to-have-soldiers-pay-for-war.html
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2003/12/06/plan_urges_1b_va_hospital_in_hub/
Jeff
@Jeff (#45)
I addressed the HSA/over the counter drug issue elsewhere on this blog.
Here’s what I wrote:
>>>>>
I know a bit about this; I’ve got an HSA, myself.
The list of tax deductible HSA items is very generous, and even includes things like abortion (and this was GOP legislation), contact lenses, lasik surgery, etc.
No private health insurance pays for self-prescribed over the counter medications, such as those listed in the initial post. There is no reason that the government should subsidize these purchases, either. The HSA law remains very generous: one is perfectly free to buy any OTC drugs one wishes to buy, only it won’t be tax deductible unless there’s some type of professional certification that it’s necessary. So, on your next doctor visit, you’ll tell the doc that you’d like to lay in a small supply of OTC drugs to keep in your home medicine cabinet for emergencies. Antihistamines, Tylenol, Advil, whatever. And then you’ll still get a government subsidy.
What’s the big deal? There is no big brotherism involved. You are still free to buy all the OTC drugs you want. Only, if you want a tax deduction, you’ve got to jump through a very small hoop.
It just prevents abuses. For example, let’s say that I’m in the 28% tax bracket and I go out and buy $1,000 worth of Tylenol and re-sell it at a garage sale for a price less than they charge at Wal-Mart. That sort of thing.
Much ado about nothing, this complaint is.
I’m waiting for the screams about public money (which is what Tax Deductions are, in effect) being used to subsidize abortions.
Why don’t social conservatives feel that abortions should be excluded from being HSA deductible medical services? How can you support candidates who voted for this law?
>>>>
You also stated:
“As for containing costs, you said:”
[quoting me]
>>One of the vitally important features of Obamacare is its emphasis on shifting physician rewards from procedures to outcomes. This delights primary care physicians but infuriates some specialists. But there is no doubt that this is the only way to control costs, while improving outcomes, long-term.<
You counter:
>>I disagree. It is definitely one way to effect cost containment, but there are many others. For the last several months I’ve been listening to doctors on satellite radio (ReachMD and other programs) offering suggestions, such as increasing the use of physician assistants and nurse practitioners for routine, noncritical cases, allowing doctors more time to follow up with other patients via telephone or email.<<
Jeff, with all due respect, you are talking PEANUTS. Of course, PAs and NPs will be (and are) required, to take up the burden of what is a national shortage of primary care physicians. But this is truly peanuts. Primary care is chump change. What's bankrupting the system are the surgical specialists and the medical subspecialists and Big Pharma. As I wrote, there is a truly fatal flaw with the concept of fee for service medicine working as efficiently as other sectors of the capitalist marketplace. The fatal flaw is that the sellers make the purchase decisions on behalf of the buyers. The system handsomely rewards procedures but provides no incentives for good outcomes. All the incentives are for providing services. No incentives are for improving outcomes.
That's the real reason why we need a national health insurance plan. We need to totally re-tool the health care system to reward (generously) favorable outcomes and to reduce the incentives for providing services which do not contribute to favorable outcomes.
Can you think of any other service, beyond medicine, where you could go to a vendor with a problem and the vendor makes the problem much worse and still gives you a bill which threatens your personal financial solvency? Where the vendor was the one who picked out everything that you were required to purchase? Well, maybe lawyers. But doesn't that really make my case?
The reason the majority of Americans are happy with their health insurance is that they don't need the things for which health insurance is required. We don't need health insurance to pay for $150 doctor visits. We don't need it to pay for $500 emergency room visits. We don't need it to pay for $1,000 per year in prescription drugs. What we need health insurance for is when we get colon cancer and need to get Avastin at $10,000 per month and Erbitux at $15,000 per month and $50,000 worth of surgery and stuff like that. Most people don't get colon cancer in a given year; so they are happy. But health catastrophes in people with insurance is the number one cause of personal bankruptcies. From my point of view, the single greatest benefit of Obamacare (beyond covering the heretofore uninsured and thereby saving 45,000 lives per year which are currently being lost) is the elimination of the lifetime cap in coverage benefits. People think that they’ve got great health insurance — until they get a really bad health problem and their medical expenses exceed their coverage limitation.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
JVerive: hi, ON your 50, I just look on all 3 of your links and they came up fast and clear,
BYE
openid.aol.com/runnswim: hi, THAT was good humor link. we are discovering
this side of you, humor is very CONSERVATIVE. bye
@Greg: #3
“I’m curious to find out what Sarah Palin will have to say about the Debt Commission’s recommendations.”
All that needs to be said is that Obama appointed it. Those with open minds would have known ahead of time what the suggestions would have been.
@ Smorgasbord, #54:
Obama set the process up. The commissioners weren’t appointed by him. The republican commissioners were selected by John Boehner and Mitch McConnell.
There have been negative partisan reactions to the co-chairs’ draft recommendations from both establishment republicans and democrats–the very people who always let their partisan ideologies get in the way of common sense solutions.
If nothing else, their reflexive partisan reactions to a list of logical proposals that would actually work highlight the reason why nothing truly meaningful ever gets done.
As soon as the actual Commission comes up with a report upon which 14 of the 18 can agree (thus forcing Congressional debate) then this issue will be worth paying attention to.
Until then, it’s just another episode of Kabuki theater.
This co-chair draft trial balloon bull crap that was released last week is just that…a trial balloon filled with bull crap.
The whole thing is designed to lure people into taking the first offer that is laid upon the table.
Anyone with any negotiation skillz knows that you never, ever, ever take the first offer.
Ever.
Back to the drawing board boys…your first attempt was not nearly good enough.
While I don’t usually listen to Rush, he nails it on the phony reduction plan the commission threw out.
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_111110/content/01125106.guest.html
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/What-Am-I-Missing
Seeing as how it is bogus, I’m not surprised the lefties are all for it.
Oh and larry, thanks for proving me right yet again. Between your response to my post and Mata’s all you did is prove that no matter what proof is offered, you are incapable of seeing the truth. You claim you can be persuaded with proof, but I have NEVER, EVER seen you change your mind or admit you are wrong. Like I said, you are definitely a liberal.
@ Hard Right, #57:
I just read through the entire transcript of Rush Limbaugh’s Debt Commission rant.
Bullsh-t, Rush. Capping federal spending and revenue at specified percentages of the GDP is not a round about authorization for spending and revenue to go that high. It’s setting upper limits that must not be exceeded, where no upper limits currently exist.
His argument that we’ve seldom exceed the proposed limits in the past is an exercise in deliberate misdirection. We have in fact reached those limits before and have frequently come close. We’re exceeding them at present. More importantly, it has been projected that if spending isn’t curtailed and revenue isn’t raised, in only ten years we’ll reach the point where deficits will represent 68% of the GDP. That’s why making a clear commitment to upper limits is both central and essential to any meaningful and effective deficit reduction plan.
Limbaugh repeatedly says the plan should be ignored. “Don’t get caught up in debating any of the minutia or the aspects of this thing,” he advises. Better not to read it or think about it or listen to anyone who’s talking about it.
Why the hell not? The minutia and the aspects of any serious proposal are the only things that actually matter. They’re exactly what you’ve got to consider to decide if something truly addresses a problem and might actually work, or is just another bogus, totally ineffectual smokescreen.
You really need to proof read what you type. He said “seldom.” That means it has happened and he understands that. Do you?
Rush, like I do feels we need to keep the tax cuts in place, cut some other other taxes, and slash govt. spending to take care of the debt lefties like you stuck us with in spite of us telling you not to. That takes care of revenue and helps reduce the deficit.
I also take his “minutia” comment to mean that overall it’s just a CRAP proposal that won’t help solve the problem. Like obamacare, the whole thing needs to be tossed out, not tweaked.
You have some gall talking about thinking for ones self when you often fail to do so yourself. Your posts on that video the other day made it clear you are beyond reaching. As Dr. Sanity would say, you sufer from deep pathological denial of reality. When reality doesn’t fit your world view, you bend reality and not your view.
@ hard Right, #59:
Ignore Rush’s warnings. Read the proposals. Spending cuts are a big part of the plan. The proposals include government pay freezes; a 10% reduction in federal employees; a progressive reduction in discretionary spending; phased-in cost containment measures addressing Social Security and Medicare; rational cuts in defense spending… Many such things that actually save predictable amounts of money. And yes, some tax increases. Because without both, the problem can’t be fixed. That’s where the compromise comes in. Everybody has to bear part of the burden or nobody will agree–in which case we keep digging ourselves a deeper hole until the walls finally cave in on us.
What are the details of the alternative plan to slash government spending? Thusfar, none. Republicans have had trouble even coming to a firm commitment to forego earmarking–which, even if totally eliminated, would have a negligable effect on the overall deficit. (In 2008, earmarks accounted for around $18.3 billion–down from the $23.6 billion record set in 2005.)
Until an equally detailed alternate set of deficit-controlling proposals is put forward, attacking something that could actually work gives me reason to doubt the attackers’ sincerity about fiscal responsibility. It’s not enough just to blow a lot of hot air before an election. Do they actually want to get to the problem or not?
@Greg (#58): Debt/GDP is already over 68%.
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_debt_chart.html
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html
http://www.neurosoftware.ro/finance/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/d7d83_National-Debt-GDP.gif
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
The problem with setting statutory maximums for government spending is that government seems to have a problem with underestimating anticipated expenditures and overestimating projected revenues. Very few government programs of appreciable magnitude come in “under budget.” Then someone laments on how the “government experts” were wrong. Again. Unexpectedly. How many times have we heard our government’s experts being “surprised” over the last two years?
The Deficit Commission’s proposal is big on generalities and small on particulars, but given the make-up of the commission, could we expect anything else?
Spending is easy for politicians to do, and it’s a helluva lot more rewarding. If BigPharma is one of your Party’s biggest contributors and they send a lot of perks your way, are you not going to write or approve legislation that emphasizes drug treatment over invasive surgery? If you so much as threaten to do anything that someone in the AARP lobby thinks is going to reduce benefits for seniors, are you going to want to deal with their harassing phone calls, or are you going to take their lobbyists’ advice and say you’re not going to throw seniors out in the streets, even if you believe means testing (for example) is the fiscally responsible thing to do?
It’s not so much that everyone wants someone else’s benefits to be cut, but it’s the special interest groups that put undue pressure on our legislators – because the power is really in the hands of the lobbyists. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. Yes, by and large, we Americans have become less frugal than our grandparents, and we have come to expect our state politicians to bring home the bacon. A lot of this is because we feel that the federal government has taken more than it needs to operate efficiently, and seeing our state officials get as much as possible back is the only solace many of us see.
We MUST return to a much smaller federal government, with a budget of MUCH less than 22% of GDP. Instead, we should be requiring our government to work more efficiently every year, cutting spending by, say, 5% of the previous year’s budget (or 2 – 5% less than the previous year’s revenues) until spending is cut to a more reasonable 15% of GDP (these are just pulled out of thin air, but I think a reasonable starting point.) There’s no doubt that we can’t possibly pay off debt until we stop increasing deficit spending.
If we stripped our federal government down to its smallest possible size and returned to the states the power to deal with much more at the state level, think of the budgetary savings we’d realize by not sending money to the feds just to redistribute it back to the states, with the administrative “skimming” that occurs as it changes hands in both directions. Additional savings could be realized by eliminating many of the grants and subsidies that artificially distort markets and contribute to huge amounts of waste at the hands of individuals, corporations, and special interest groups who have figured out how to game the system. The smaller the system and the fewer dollars available to be scammed, there will be an attendant reduction in gains to be made through corruption and manipulation. This should be reason enough to let people control as much of their own money as possible. We will always have people who will cheat the system for their own illegitimate gains, so why make it easier by adding layers of obfuscation? If I am in control of the vast majority of my earnings, I will strive to make the best decisions I can. If I believe that the government is always going to have a safety net for me, no matter how unlucky or foolish I have been, it’s human nature for me to be less careful.
I don’t need a nanny, I don’t want a nanny, and I especially don’t want government telling me that I have to pay for a nanny that I neither want nor need.
Jeff
@JV (#62):
Finland used to have the world’s largest incidence of cardiovascular disease.
Not anymore.
When I moved to Southern California in 1979, there was a virtually omnipresent thick brown haze, covering the entire LA basin. Not anymore.
The waters around Manhattan used to be filthy. Now there are regularly held swimming races around the entire island.
Airplanes and bars used to be hazardous to employees and obnoxious to the smoke averse.
In the 1950s, 80% of males smoked and virtually no one used seat belts. As a boy, I used to take naps on the back window ledges of my family’s autos, often while my mom was smoking a cigarette with all the car windows rolled up.
Many people drove without auto insurance.
On and on.
I hope that New York’s Bloomberg and Farley succeed with their banning of salt in prepared meals. Restaurant food (and packaged food in general) has enormous amounts of salt. It is the easiest thing in the world to add salt to anything (for those who like it). It’s impossible to take salt out of food, once in.
I can’t think of a single “nanny state” regulation which presents an unreasonable burden on anyone’s liberties, motorcycle helmets included. Seat belts included. Complaining about such things trivializes the sacred meaning of “liberty.” It conjures up images of someone willing to die to preserve his/her inalienable right to be stupid.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach
@Greg: #60
Please name one liberal program that turned out the way they “promised.” Do you actually believe that they will give you a tax cut?! They even have a habit of naming their bills the opposite of what they will actually do.
Obama is on a hiring binge in Washington DC. If you want a job, move to DC and work for the Federal government. Plus, the number of Federal employees earning over $150,000 per year has doubled since he took office. Only liberals can go on a mass hiring binge at absurdly high wages, then reduce it by 10%, and call it a reduction.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-11-10-1Afedpay10_ST_N.htm
Remember how the liberals said George Bush wanted to cut either Medicare or Social Security benefits (I don’t remember which one) because his INCREASE was less than their increase. That is a case of an INCREASE being a DECREASE in the liberal mind.
HardRight: hi, YES, that is the way to go, THEY are responsible for much of the spendings,
CARELUSLY, so IT’s for them to be cut off drastickly, not the AMERICANS again;
NOBODY but them, has to pay for their spending,
IT’S not right to impose to AMERICANS such a BURDEN, on top of what they have because of again, their mistaken short VIEWS of how to run an AMERICA WHICH is the best of the WORLD.
bye
@ JVerive, Excellent post! Thank You!
@smorgasboard (#64): You left out something important, with your reporting that Obama has doubled the number of Federal workers earning over $150K per year.
From your link:
I calculate that George W Bush increased the number 5 fold in 3 years, while Obama only increased it 2 fold in 2 years. This means that Obama has actually slowed the rate of growth of the high end of the federal bureaucracy, even during the period of maximum stimulus to save the country from the Bush economic disaster.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
Are you basing that solely on who was in office, Larry? Curious as to what numbers you are making calculations with.
@Hard Right: I’m just making the old point about lies, damn lies, and statistics (regarding the misuse of the latter). The reason for the increase in the money civil servants make is that promotions and pay increases track with seniority. We have an aging work force in all sectors, including the federal government. The Big Recession presented, serendipitously, a golden opportunity to jettison older, more expensive workers in the private sector. The public sector (being less efficient in many ways — no argument with this), did not have a similar opportunity. The biggest reason that so many of the private sector jobs aren’t coming back is that the private sector has increased efficiency and has no need to rehire the expensive, older, laid off workers. The job market will improve shortly for the newly graduated, young workers, but not for the oldsters.
Anyway, look at those numbers: 10-fold increase in the last 5 years, including a two-fold increase in the last 2 years. This is not to say that the civil service payroll went up ten-fold in 5 years, including 2 fold in the last two years, but simply, in recent years, the number of workers crossing the $150,000 per year pay threshold went up 10 fold in 5 years, including 2 fold in the last 2 years.
Let’s say that there are 1,000 federal workers currently making $150,000 per year (to make the math easy). This means that, two years ago, there were 500 (if it doubled in two years). But we know it went up ten fold in the past 5 years, or since 2005. So, in 2005, there were only 100 workers above $150K. So this means that the number increased from 100 to 500 under Bush (went up 5 fold in 3 years) but went from 500 to 1000 under Obama (went up two fold in 2 years). 5-fold in 3 years is a considerably more rapid rate of growth then two-fold in two years.
Anyway, it’s 100% obvious that these increases had nothing at all to do with fiscal policies of either Bush or Obama. This particular little piece of statistics was just an attempt to make statistics lie to create a political gotcha.
Both Republicans and Democrats do this sort of thing, with depressing regularity.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
I figured that is what you were saying after I looked at the info.
I did notice that the biggest increase was among those that had been employed for 15-24 years (as you also noted). That would mean they predated either admin.
@ Smorgasbord, #64:
The most obvious would be Social Security and Medicare, which have provided successive generations of American workers with financial security in their old age, and have extended their lives by providing access to medical care that they most often wouldn’t otherwise have. Both programs have been resounding successes, and will continue to be so long as a commitment to our collective social responsibilities remains.
People who complain about those programs often ignore the fact that without them, they’d be directly and personally responsible for providing for most of their parents’ and grandparents’ old age needs, while simultaneously putting back enough to take care of themselves in their own later years. For the vast majority, sharing the predictable risks and burdens through social insurance programs produces far more security and a far better outcome.
Medicare and foodstamps have also been successful, assuming we don’t believe disadvantaged people should die because they can’t afford medical treatment, and don’t believe that disadvantaged adults and their children should starve.
These core programs have accomplished and continue to accomplish what was promised. No one ever promised that they wouldn’t have to be paid for. The fundamental problem is that some people resent the fact that they’re expected to help pay.
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: #67
The first time George Bush 2 ran for office I voted FOR him. The second time I voted AGAINT the other guy. Bush is one reason I don’t belong to any political party. He only vetoed one bill. The rest of the time he gave the liberals every spending bill they asked for. We all have been paying for them ever since. A huge part of the extra spending came from the democrats, Bush only approved them.
Either way you look at it, Obama is being irresponsible to keep hiring Federal workers, taking all the expensive trips, printing billions of extra dollars, and throwing all of the parties he does while we are in a recession and inflation is predicted.
@ Greg, neither are solvent. Just because you can write checks that does not mean that you have money.
You still just don’t get it. With 600 Billion Dollars in next to worthless currency printed, those are checks. Still the bank account is empty. Can you say Overdraft? Or do you have some Confederate Money stuffed in your mattress?
The Interest on the Debt is staggering as well. You get an F in Econ 101. The Current Regime is paying Credit Card bills with Credit Cards!
@smorgasbord: You blame Dems for spending legislation that Bush signed. No. The GOP controlled Congress for the first 6 years of the Bush administration and the Dems did not have close to a filibuster proof Senate majority for the last two. The President prepares the budget. The budget prepared by President Bush was pretty much what ended up getting passed, for his entire Presidency.
@Trooper: Medicare was on the verge of being insolvent, before Obamacare was passed. Why was it having solvency problems? Because it’s more expensive and less efficient than private health insurance? No; Medicare is the best health insurance system in the world. It delivers the best outcomes and the best consumer satisfaction for the least money. Why isn’t private health insurance insolvent? Well, health insurance premiums more than doubled under Bush. Medicare payroll taxes went up much, much LESS. Blue Cross proposed a rate hike of 39% at a time (last January, after Scott Brown’s election) that Obamacare was looking dead in the water. Can you imagine the outcry were Medicare payroll taxes to be increased 39% in one year?
Before Social Security, the majority of the nation’s elderly lived in poverty. Social Security gave the Greatest Generation, who not only WON WWII but who PAID FOR WWII (91%, then 70% marginal tax rate; 48% capital gains tax rate), the, well, security they so richly deserved. As for the rest of us, we weren’t burdened by paying for either health care or retirement of our parents. We could focus all our efforts on our careers and on growing our own personal economies, which meant growing the nation’s economy.
There are very easy fixes for Social Security. Increase retirement age. Means test. Keep Social Security trust fund in a true lock box, as proposed in 2000 by Al Gore. Don’t cap out payroll tax in the current regressive fashion. For Medicare, move away from a system which rewards doctors and hospitals for performing procedures to a system which rewards clinical outcomes, and, therefore, serve as a model for reforming the rest of the health care system (as will be done under Obamacare).
Bottom line. Both Social Security and Medicare did exactly what they were designed to do. They have worked brilliantly and, with some economic tweaks, they’ll go on doing so for the next century.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
@ Old Trooper 2, #73:
The account is overdrawn simply because we’ve chronically collected less money in taxes than the government has spent, creating annual deficits. The cumulative result over 30 years is a national debt that’s now pushing $14 trillion.
Had taxes been higher all along, there would be no problem. Had spending been lower all along, there would be no problem. Had both been adjusted through rational compromise, there would be no problem.
A solution can be achieved only through one of those same three approaches. Only one of the three is actually politically possible.
@ Greg, Wrong. We have Foolishly overspent and placed the Currency and the US Bond Rating at Risks. Do you understand any of that or am I wasting my time here? Obama got Punked at the G-20 and the Current Regime does not get it either. Come January or February the Dollar may be replaced as a premier currency in the World Market. The Chinese will keep the Dollar just stable enough to keep some of their Bonds at some value.
Have you been overseas lately? The Currency Exchange rate for the Dollar has dropped. Is this something that troubles you? You probably are looking at this like a Cow watching a passing train. Do you produce a US made Product that is Marketed Overseas, from a Business that You Own? I do. My product is not sold to Third World Clients. They can’t afford it. It is sold to Folks that have money and can afford it.
Until you have an investment in the Nation’s Success, have Your Own Enterprise that You took risks to build, quite frankly you do not understand how a strong Economy functions. Taxing me more does not raise your boat. It could make me hold onto my assets, not hire, raise my prices and clowns like you will wring their hands and wonder WTH happened. Killing the Goose that lays Golden Eggs is your style, not mine. You just don’t get it and most likely won’t until bread is $50.00 a loaf and you only get electric power or running water for 12 hours a day and wonder why.
@ openid.aol.com/runnswim, If you believe that business about SS and Medicare surviving without cuts or ever becoming solvent without additional taxation, I don’t know what to say. No COLA for the past two years on SS. Medicare costs will threaten some State Budgets that are in peril right now. Continuing to discuss this without a respect for reality is patently absurd for me.
@trooper:
You are talking in slogans, and paying no attention to numbers.
You said:
The marginal tax rates were 91% under Eisenhower and then 70% from Kennedy through Carter. Capital gains taxes were 48%. This resulted in decreasing the debt ratio from 150% down to 33%, while the economy grew brilliantly. Then Reagan massively cut taxes and nearly doubled the debt ratio. Then Clinton raised taxes and the debt ratio went down. Then Bush cut taxes and the debt ratio went up. I’ve provided links for these data many times.
The reason we are turning into a banana republic is because of our debt. The reason we have most of this debt is because Reagan and Bush borrowed massively to finance tax cuts (including during war time!) to spare us the necessity of paying for our own government with our own money — cutting our taxes while massively burdening our children with the debt to finance these tax cuts.
Our parents successfully coped with dramatically higher tax rates than it would take to restore financial solvency for all necessary government functions, including Social Security and Medicare. We would be penny wise but pound foolish to eliminate these brilliantly successful programs to take care of the nation’s elderly, who can’t work any longer, owing to advanced age.
Practically speaking, what we need is precisely what the co-chairs of the debt commission have proposed. Shared sacrifice. Spending cuts/tax hikes (to levels far below those which existed in the non-socialist past).
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@trooper (#77):
The reason that Social Security is NOT a Ponzi scheme is that beneficiaries die and no longer need to be paid. Many people have studied this problem. It’s pure numbers. The debt commission offered simple, tolerable suggestions to ensure the solvency of the program. These were very gentle suggestions, at that. Means test (don’t give checks to rich people who don’t need the money). Raise retirement age (not reaching 69 until the year 2075!). Raise or eliminate the limit beyond which workers are exempt from payroll taxes (or self employed taxes). Don’t put any social security surpluses into the “general government fund,” as it has been done for decades.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@Greg: #71
Galveston County TX has the best idea for retirement. More about that after this:
You picked two of the worst examples.
SOCIAL SECURITY
(1) There are illegals getting a higher SS check each month than I am, and I paid into it all of they life, they paid nothing.
(2) Certain people, including children, can get SS payments.
(3) The SSA is paying out more than they are taking in.
(4) There is no SS account. It was kept in the general fund so the politicians could “borrow” from it to fund their pet projects. Neither party has made any effort to put SS in a separate account and only go to the ones who paid into it. It was supposed to be a RETIREMENT account.
MEDICARE
(1) ObamaCare will cut funding by $500,000,000,000 over 10 years. I just got on Medicare and I am concerned about this.
(2) There will be an estimated additional 43,000,000 people on ObamaCare because everybody will be covered. Less funding and more patients means RATIONING any way you look at it. How do you add 43M people, reduce spending by $500B and be able to treat everybody as they are needed?
(3) Some doctors are refusing to take on new Medicare patients. Medicare pays only 90% of the cost. ObamaCare will pay less, so doctors are not taking on new patients. Good luck finding a doctor that will treat you. I am concerned about this too.
Galveston County TX opted out of SS and there retirees are getting from 50% to 300% more in retirement than they would have with SS:
• Workers making $17,000 a year are expected to receive about 50 percent more per month on our alternative plan than on Social Security – $1,036 instead of $683. [See the Figure.]
• Workers making $26,000 a year will make almost double Social Security’s return – $1,500 instead of $853.
• Workers making $51,000 a year will get $3,103 instead of $1,368.
• Workers making $75,000 or more will nearly triple Social Security – $4,540 instead of $1,645.
• Galveston County’s survivorship benefits pay four times a worker’s annual salary – a minimum of $75,000 to a maximum $215,000 – versus Social Security, which forces widows to wait until age 60 to qualify for benefits, or provides 75 percent of a worker’s salary for school-age children.
• In Galveston, if the worker dies before retirement, the survivors receive not only the full survivorship but get generous accidental death benefits, too. Galveston County’s disability benefit also pays more: 60 percent of an individual’s salary, better than Social Security’s.
@smorgasbord:
Relax about your Medicare. It’s going to do just fine by you.
http://blogs.forbes.com/rickungar/2010/09/25/does-obamacare-really-cut-medicare-benefits-to-senior-citizens/
As far as Social Security goes, as I wrote, it’s been a brilliant success and did exactly what it was supposed to do. For every “illegal” who fraudulently collects SS benefits, there are probably three illegals who pay into social security but who will never collect a dime. Anyway, any huge program will always have fraud and abuse. The whole US tax code is riddled with loopholes providing hundreds of billions of dollars annually in money lost to fraud and abuse.
The Galveston model is very useful; it’s a government mandate, though, with the government garnishing your wages, not giving you access to your money until you retire, and the government making the investment decisions.
The biggest difference between the Galveston model and Social Security is that Social Security was never allowed to invest the surplus which it had every year. This money all went into the government general fund.
Remember Al Gore’s “lock box” proposal in 2000? This is essentially the guts of the Galveston model. Lock up social security’s surplus and put it in some sort of investment.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
@Larry,
Some government regulations are necessary, and most of those you cite are examples of government protecting citizens (and/or the environment) from damages caused by others who don’t care about the health of others or the environment. Government’s duties should revolve around protecting the lives and civil liberties of the citizenry.
Seat belt laws have helped save lives without imposing undue restrictions on personal liberties, though I support the laws because they improve a driver’s control of his vehicle, thereby protecting the lives and civil liberties of that driver’s passengers and the occupants of other vehicles. We don’t have laws that make it illegal to jump in the deep end of a pool if you can’t swim, it’s not illegal to use a knife to get a slice of bread out of an electic toaster while the toaster is plugged in, etc. Laws that are designed to prevent me from my own stupidity are never going to keep me from doing something stupid. If the government is always going to step in and provide a safety net, no matter how lazy and stupid I am, what’s my inventive to provide my own safety net?
The government isn’t doing all of this just to save us from ourselves either, in my opinion. When was the last time you heard government or even the media stressing the importance of saving? For at least the last decade, our government officials have promoted the consumption model as a way to keep bubbles inflated. They’ve tacitly urged us to live beyond our means, stressing competition with the Joneses and promising that Social Security will never go away. A huge portion of the population sees Social Security (along with Medicare) as its retirement account, despite many of them knowing that it’s not enough. By keeping these safety nets available to those who would otherwise have the means to save for retirement if they were to make better decisions, the safety nets have lulled many into believing they are entitled to these benefits regardless of their moral responsibility to be more frugal.
Excessive government handouts reward laziness. This is the law of unintended consequences in action. Necessity is not just the mother of invention; it is also gives birth to the incentive to get one’s lazy ass off the couch and get a frickin’ job! We stop spoon-feeding children when they start learning how to feed themselves, not when they’ve mastered the eye-hand coordination of a Ninja.
We could just seize everybody’s assets and wealth, and then redistribute them equally so that absolutely nobody lives in poverty. Eliminating or reducing poverty cannot be the sole rationale for redistributing wealth, can it?
Jeff
@ Smorgasbord, #80:
SOCIAL SECURITY
(1) There are illegals getting a higher SS check each month than I am, and I paid into it all of they life, they paid nothing.
If so, they’re doing it by way of fraud. Applicants are required by law to establish their citizenship or legal resident status when they file for benefits. The Social Security Administration verifies the authenticity of the documents submitted as evidence with record custodians. That sort of fraud isn’t easy.
(2) Certain people, including children, can get SS payments.
Yep. If a young worker dies, his or her minor dependent children can qualify for survivors benefits. Orphaned children being left without a means of support is one of the things a young worker’s FICA tax is insuring against. FICA taxes are actually an insurance premium. Social Security is an insurance system.
(3) The SSA is paying out more than they are taking in.
That sometimes happens with social insurance programs. It’s a predictable matter of demographics. Everyone has known for years this would be a result of the post-WW2 baby boom. The effect is transient, as we are all mortal. Program adjustments must be made as we go along to compensate for such things.
(4) There is no SS account. It was kept in the general fund so the politicians could “borrow” from it to fund their pet projects. Neither party has made any effort to put SS in a separate account and only go to the ones who paid into it. It was supposed to be a RETIREMENT account.
Does it make sense to remove trust fund dollars from the active economy? If anyone suggested any private pension system should lock their dollars up in a safe and leave them untouched until the retiree is 62 or 67 or whatever, they’d be laughed out of the room. That said, I completely agree that trust fund holdings should not be used as an accounting gimmick to make deficits appear to be less. That is in fact a deception. Both parties are guilty of using it.
MEDICARE
(1) ObamaCare will cut funding by $500,000,000,000 over 10 years. I just got on Medicare and I am concerned about this.
The cost cutting is necessary, if we want a balanced budget. We should be concerned to make sure the cuts are achieved responsibly–through increased efficiency of the entire system, through cost controls on things like prescription drugs, through tort reform to lower provider costs, and through preventive measures to make the population healthier. The Obama adminstration has been ridiculed for trying to figure out how to take on the obesity epidemic, how to reduce sodium intake, for targeting tobacco, etc. There are very sound reasons why they’re doing that. The things being targeted are inflating national health care costs enormously.
(2) There will be an estimated additional 43,000,000 people on ObamaCare because everybody will be covered. Less funding and more patients means RATIONING any way you look at it. How do you add 43M people, reduce spending by $500B and be able to treat everybody as they are needed?
In addition to attempting to reduce the service demand through preventive approaches and by increasing overall system efficiency, there are provisions intended to increase the number of health care providers.
Achieving better health care availibilty for some by denying 43 million people access to the system doesn’t sound like a good system to me. What that actually describes is our current rationing system. Surely we can do better by everyone.
(3) Some doctors are refusing to take on new Medicare patients. Medicare pays only 90% of the cost. ObamaCare will pay less, so doctors are not taking on new patients. Good luck finding a doctor that will treat you. I am concerned about this too.
This situtation already existed for Medicare patients. It has been very common all along with Medicaid patients. There are doctors who are selective about what private insurance they will accept.
No one has suggested that the health care reform bill was perfect. It’s a start, but provisions will need to be modified and fine tuned as problems come to light. Reform is an ungoing process, not something that can be accomplished all at once.
@JV (#82):
You say:
Precisely. We don’t have laws about using toasters and jumping into pools and you agree that seat belt laws are a good thing. So why not give me an example of a nanny state law with which you don’t agree and maybe we could discuss that.
This is a straw man argument. I am not in favor of excessive government handouts. What is the example of an excessive government handout, in your opinion? We can then discuss that.
This is another straw man. Give me an example. Obama was crucified as being a socialist for saying something which has been outrageously misinterpreted. During the 2008 campaign, he made an offhanded remark about “spreading it [meaning prosperity] around.” What he was referring to was the following:
In 1980, before the “Reagan Revolution,” the top 1% of people held 9% of the wealth. Today, the top 1% holds 24% of the wealth. There were few, if any, gains for the average American during this period of time. The debt ratio increased from 33% at the end of the Carter administration to about 76% at the end of the Bush administration. This was after being reduced from 150% to 33% because of the fact that my parents’ generation were sufficiently responsible to tax themselves at a sufficiently high rate to pay the nation’s bills (91%, then 70% marginal tax rate!).
http://www.neurosoftware.ro/finance/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/d7d83_National-Debt-GDP.gif
So we borrowed a generation’s worth of wealth to greatly improve the lot of the very top of the food chain, while handing the tab for this to the nation’s children.
What Obama is proposing is not a “handout,” but a very slight adjustment to the tax code, to bring it back to the levels of the Clinton administration, which is still less than half the tax rates which existed before Reagan.
You, like Trooper, are offering slogans with which neither I nor Obama would disagree. You are preaching to the choir. Free enterprise is good. Socialism is bad. But even Adam Smith recognized the benefits (and fairness) of progressive taxation.
If you want to argue that we should get rid of social security and Medicare, then I wish that you’d convince McConnell and Boehner of this. Let’s have the GOP try to do this and the great political blood bath of November 2010 will be totally reversed in 2012 and will be two-fold worse for the losing party.
But let’s remember to keep this real. We aren’t talking about a return to a 70% marginal tax rate and a 48% capital gains rate. At these levels, which existed until Reagan, the nation paid off its massive WWII debt and grew the economy dynamically. Everyone’s boat was floating, right up until the time when we went tax cut crazy and borrowed massive amounts of money to redistribute wealth UPWARD!
P.S. Just one last comment — about doctors leaving Medicare. Medicare is a very well managed program. It is administered not by bureaucrats but by private regional contractors (insurance companies) who bid to become the Medicare contractor, for example for California/Nevada or Pennsylvania. Reimbursement rates are locally determined. Doctors in New York City get paid more than doctors in Laramie, Wyoming. Any doctor has the right to opt out, if he/she isn’t making enough money. The vast majority of doctors don’t opt out and Medicare patients have, by far, the greatest choice of doctors and hospitals for any major insurance plan. Plus, the patient can go straight to a subspecialist and doesn’t have to go through a primary care gatekeeper. Doctors and hospitals who don’t opt out remain in Medicare because they can and do make money on Medicare. If too many opt out, then reimbursement is increased. If no one opted out, Medicare would be overpaying. It’s just supply and demand management. Medicare (through its contractors) tries to get services for the best price and, by any objective measure, has succeeded very well in this.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
JVerive: hi, I think that, the money that has been spent liberaly at the expanse of peoples,
who paid in it all there working years, should have been kept for those payers,
that was a busisness deal made by GOVERNMENT,who did not provide their end by spending it.
I’m sure that they fraud the payers, doing that, what else you want to call that action.
IF the workers would have kept that money ore invest it themself they would have get it back when the time arrive, and further more IT was done to redistribute the people’s money,
that is SOCIALIST in a CAPITALIST COUNTRY.
no wonder the people cant trust the GOVERNMENT anymore. and the blame is on the ACTIONS
of spending what is not their own,
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: #81
I don’t know anything about Forbes magazine, so I don’t know if it is liberal or not. It seems that all of the media are liberal and go along with what Obama says, even lying.
George Bush wanted to slowly switch over to private investment where the individual would decide how to invest it, but the democrats said no. Remember how they condemned bush for wanting to privatize SS?
If we could have invested our retirement money the way we wanted, there would be no fraud because it would go into OUR account. Our beneficiaries would get the money if we died, but the politicians, republican and democrat, have gotten to the point that they feel it is THEIR money to do with as they please and they don’t want to give it up.
SS was just another way for the politicians to get more of your money. If a person could keep track of how much they pay into SS and compare how much they would be getting by investing the money in a retirement account, there would be a huge difference between them.
Clark Howard said that if your 15 year old would put $2,000 per year in a Roth IRA for only 7 years and never put any in again, they would have about $1,000,000 in the account at age 65. This assumes a 9.4% average gain annually, which has been the average return on the stock market since 1926. If parents teach their kids to invest like that instead of spending it on fancy cars and other stuff, the kid would be set up for retirement at age 22.
http://clarkhoward.com/liveweb/shownotes/2010/10/12/19493/
@Greg: #83
It’s almost like you are trying to be appointed to King Obama’s court. I am going to activate my “wrestling with a pig in the mud” rule and not comment on this subject any more.
@smorgasbord (#86): The Dems will ALWAYS oppose privatizing social security, and so will I.
Let’s look at the Galveston model, trumpeted by you, above. You said that the people did better on the Galvestion model than they would have, under Social Security. This was true for the average worker, but not for everyone. People who withdrew money along the way did worse than they would have, under SS. So Galveston County changed the law and the people no longer had access to their money, until retirement. The only difference between the Galveston model and social security is that Galveston county invested the yearly surpluses on behalf of the citizens and this investment income made a profit. Social security couldn’t invest the surpluses that it ran for decades, because, every year, the so-called Social Security trust fund was raided by the bureaucrats to spend on other things.
The best thing about social security is that it is secure. It’s as secure as treasury bonds, which are considered to be the most secure investment in the world. When you allow people to manage their own money, it’s not secure (as the Galveston County experience shows).
Assumes a 9.4% return annually? Show me where I can get that in a secure investment and I’ll put everything I have into it. So would most people. But there are a ton of baby boomers out there who’s 401Ks have taken a tumble, just as they were gearing up to retire. There are many experts who claim that there is still a stock market bubble and that it’s going to go down again.
I’m old enough that, every year, I get a statement from the government telling me every last nickel I’ve put into Social Security and also telling me the monthly payout that I’ll be entitled to, upon retirement. I can easily calculate what sort of a return I could have gotten on the money I put in since my first FICA-paying job, in 1963 (started out as a theater usher at 70 cents an hour, after 4 years as a newspaper boy, where I didn’t pay into SS). There’s no way I’d have ended up with as much as I’m likely to collect from SS, considering the various and sundry financial challenges I had along the way. My Dad retired at age 65 and he just celebrated his 97th birthday. He’s hale and hearty and he could live for another 10 years, perhaps, and his social security benefits will always outlast him. That’s not necessarily the case with a private investment portfolio.
But what’s the problem with just letting everyone take care of themselves?
Because all too many people WON’T take care of themselves. That’s the situation which existed before SS, when the majority of the nation’s elderly lived in poverty.
But if the GOP wants to privatize the situation, more power to them. Just don’t plan on winning too many future national elections.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
Okay Larry, how much wealth distribution is enough? Do we raise everyone out of poverty, and if not, who gets to choose the beneficiaries? It’s not a straw man to take something to a logical conclusion, even if you don’t agree with the conclusion.
The problem with wealth distribution is that it’s never enough, and it can’t possibly meet everyone’s definition of “fair,” because the word means different things to different people. What do you think is the best way to elevate people out of poverty? Remember that you’re going to have to satisfy people who life in high cost-of-living areas as well as people who prefer to live in less expensive areas. Do you give more to the people who want to live in high cost areas and less to those in other areas? How do you control costs if people in the low cost areas then decide they want to live in the more expensive areas?
You can’t just give people a way of life. Didn’t you ever hear people say that you appreciate something more if you’ve earned it rather than had it given to you? Surely not everyone is going to agree with that moral principle, so do you discriminate based on moral principles? It’s so easy to say you want to bring people out of poverty, but it’s not always easiest – or best – to do the work for them.
Excess government handouts DO encourage laziness. Ask anyone who works in personnel how many times they’ve heard “I’m not going to settle for less than my ideal job as long as I can get by on extended unemployment benefits” or other things to that effect. It’s a real phenomenon, and because you don’t want to acknowledge it, you call it a straw man. That’s not going to wash, Larry. There’s an entitlement mentality that has ruined much of the work ethic in this country.
Jeff
@ JVerive, Every Liberal/Progressive wants to redistribute wealth as long as it is not Theirs.
Class Warfare garners votes amongst those that have few achievements or want the Free Lunch.
That is why I discount the credence and validity of some posts here. If it is Other Peoples Money, full speed ahead, but if it is Yours…different tune…different drummer and no juice there.
@OT2,
Of course, but sometimes you have to go to painstaking details to explain it, and even then it doesn’t resonate in the minds of those who want “fairness.” All of the politicians advocating wealth redistribution are wealthier than the average Joe Blow, and they have a distorted sense of reality and purpose. So many are of the “social engineering” school that teaches that the concepts of “fairness” and “equality” can be enacted through legislature as long as the right people are doing the legislating. Of course, they believe themselves to be the right people, disregarding all the other self-appointed “right people” who have tried and failed at the same task. These legislators also expect to be revered and treated as nobility because they have somehow divined the right way to redistribute everyone else’s money!
There will always be those who will work, and those who will not work. There will be those who take other peoples’ “excesses” and claim that everyone deserves a “fair share” of the fruits of other peoples’ labor.
Commune-ism can work on a moderate scale if everyone is willing to work to the best of their abilities. The morals that lead people to want to work hard are, I believe, related to the morals that drive people to help the less-fortunate than themselves. The obvious problem is that there are enough people wanting to take short-cuts while others do the majority of the work, and so many of these are the first to cry that they don’t have as much as everyone else.
In a free society, you cannot force people to work to their full potential (it may not even be reasonable in other, less-free societies,) and there will always be those who are not willing to do their “fair share” of the work. Wealth re-distribution that takes from those who produce and gives to those who refuse to produce is hardly “fair.” Oddly enough, those who complain the loudest about “leveling the playing field” and “fair-share distribution” are looking to game the system in their own favor at the expense of others. How can that possibly be fair? Trying to create a system that hundreds of millions of people will all agree is “fair” is a losing proposition. Because of that, it seems most reasonable to encourage people to succeed on their own merits, prosecute those who actively engage in practices that prohibit others from succeeding on their own merits, ensure that all people have access to the education and training of their own choosing to pursue their own dreams, and let the people decide how best to care for their less-fortunate neighbors. When government gets involved in determining which charitable causes people must contribute to, there are always the crooks who game the system to direct a disproportionate amount of resources away from those who need them the most.
Jeff
OLD TROOPER 2, I want to also mention that anyone working or having a busyness, always encounter those times of uncertainty along the monetary road to some improvement done or for another reason: BUT the only one who never see those anxious moments are the
one who know the check is coming for their welfare, they know when and where it will come like a clock: AND this is where the unfairness of the 2 societies: THE ones who earn their money
are never sure of the certainty of their job same as the busyness owners who even more live at some times the same anxiety of the future.
just a thought. bye
Wealth Redistribution was a rallying slogan for Lenin and Mao. When you promise the homeless, factory workers, and criminal parasites that they can all share in the land homes and gold of the farmers, land owners, and people who have accumulated even a minor measure of wealth, the lazy, stupid, and indigent will flock to you and why not, you have promised them a life of comfort when they have nothing. Forget the fact that they could gather up nothing on their own; their lot in life is to take the property of others through theft and then liquidate or kill all those with ability. Then sit around in a Dystopia and watch culture and society devolve into chaos and mayhem. That is Marxism my friends, this is the promise of Obama and his Marxist czars.
@ilovebeeswarzone: #92
The Fair Tax takes care of the poor. I thought this was stupid when I read it, but it is fair for everybody. The creators of the Fair Tax came up with the idea to take the poverty level, divide it by 12, and give that amount to every legal citizen. The poor will get enough money to survive, plus, they can now earn any amount of money they want without it affecting their government checks because they only pay taxes on new things they buy. A tax system that is fair for everyone. No wonder the politicians don’t like it.
To me, the ones who created the Fair Tax are brilliant.
@ JVerive, #91:
Are you suggesting that the distribution of wealth in America is a direct reflection of the willingness or unwillingness of people to work?
Consider this chart.
It tells us that the bottom one-half of American households collectively own only 2.5% of the nation’s total wealth. Is this because one-half won’t work?
The distribution chart makes me wonder why the rich feel they need more tax cuts. Why do they feel they’re being treated so unfairly, when they haven’t had effective tax rates this low since 1950?
The Bush tax cuts were, plain and simple, a mechanism for the redistribution of America’s wealth. UPWARD.
Looking through all 15 of the charts on the Business Insider page is a real eye-opener.
@ Greg, You get “Ownership of Wealth” through hard work, prudence, wise investment and not spending more than you make, not Gummint Programs or Class Warfare. Successful Businesses Hire Employees that are willing to work, intelligent and ambitious. They are promoted on merit.
You just continue to astound me. Get off the Kool Aid, the Stupid Pills and start from there. Charity is Voluntary, Not Mandatory. Read the posts that you comment on. Stop posting Socialist talking points. You are obviously living in the Never Never Land that consumes more that it produces and part of the problem, not part of any solution. There is no Free Lunch unless you stole it from someone.
@Greg,
You didn’t read my whole response, or if you did, you chose to ignore what I said about people taking care of those who are less-fortunate (unable to work.) The concentration of wealth is far from being a simple matter of who is willing to work and who is not, but it is clear that the more industrious an individual is, the more likely that individual is to amass his/her own piece of the wealth pie.
Many of the ultra-wealthy have acquired their wealth through corruption and connections, especially the connections that are simply unavailable to those in lower- and middle-class. I don’t need to be wealthy, and I don’t particularly disdain those who have acquired wealth, particularly if they have inherited wealth that was acquired through less-than-legitimate means. There is still plenty of currency circulating in the markets for anyone who is industrial enough to work for it.
I tire of hearing the same old canard from the left of the wealthy keeping everyone else from having their fair share. The loudest voices come from the unions, and I’ve had enough personal contact with unions to know that the vast majority of union workers receive pay that far exceeds non-union pay for the same jobs. I don’t disagree that unions had their place in America, and may still have their place in certain areas. But they have become the largest private interest groups in American politics, and their influence is at the behest of the few union execs who push for policies that distort free markets. Some of the union leaders are so out of touch with the desires of the rank-and-file members that we almost need intermediate unions to protect the rand-and-file members from corrupt union bosses.
I’ll say it again. Social Security may have helped those who would not have been able to help themselves, but it has grown beyond a simple safety net for the truly needy into an entitlement system that has induced people to forgo frugal living and careful retirement planning. The BEST thing the government can do is to announce that they will be phasing out Social Security and allowing individual workers to plan for their own retirements, passing on the savings to individual workers by not raiding their paychecks. When people have control over the greatest possible amount of their incomes and consume what they need (and a little more for fun and life enhancement,) the demand for goods will drive the market to supply goods at reasonable prices. Subsidies for producers and consumers alike are detrimental to a free-market system, plus they make savings and retirement planning more difficult by hiding the real costs of goods. More often than not, when the government tries to fiddle with the economy with subsidies and other manipulations, they almost always end up favoring one aspect of the economy at the expense of others. This is NOT how a free market system should operate.
Jeff
@Smorgasbord,
I’m not following you. When you said
Why are you dividing the “poverty level” by twelve? Is that supposed to be a monthly income? Where does the money come to pay for this? Besides, the actualpoverty level is highly influenced by the cost of living, which is higher in upscale (generally densely populated urban) areas and lower in more rural areas. No matter how you slice it, it sounds like you still want to take money from those who were industrious and give it out to others without regard for their needs or contributions.
Socialism works fine for very small groups, such as your average family. The parents work to earn salaries, and the kids are expected to pitch in to the extent that they can. Assuming that the parents don’t play favorites, they are likely to hand out allowances and other “goods” to their children based on need. Of course, many parents also reward their children for good grades, good behavior, etc. (and punish for bad behavior and poor grades earned by children who weren’t working to their abilities.) So even in a family setting where redistribution of wealth occurs, the incentives typical of capitalistic societies often produce the best results. There’s no doubt that as the populations of any group grow, the economic models may require tweaking, so that very few successful societies are truly strictly socialistic or strictly capitalistic. It seems to me to use the components of both models that are the least intrusive upon civil liberties and allow the greatest freedoms for individuals to enjoy the maximum amount of the fruits of their labors.
Jeff
@JVerive: #98
I forgot to add “…each month.” The idea is to take the minimum amount it would cost in one year to survive (the poverty level), divide that by 12 months, then give every legal citizen in the USA that amount each month. It will be adjust as needed. The Fair Tax doesn’t make any allowances for the different area’s cost of living. I thought of that too when I read it.
The easy solution would be to figure it on the highest cost of living area and give that amount to each legal citizen. Since EVERYONE still gets the same amount it would still be fair.
@ JVerive, #97:
I agree with all of the above. I’ve observed, however, that many of that bottom one-half can work all of their lives, live within their means, save as much as they can, and still find a Social Security check the only thing that’s standing between themselves and poverty in their old age. I figure the productivity and wealth of the nation result at least as much from the efforts of those people as anyone else’s, so they’ve got at least that coming to them. It offends me when those higher up on the pyramid suggest that those lower down are predominantly deadbeats, moochers, and a useless drag on the entire system–as if the top of the pyramid somehow floated in the air entirely by its own virtue.
I think the accelerating upward concentration of wealth over the past three decades is symptomatic of some sort of systemic dysfunction–particularly in light of the fact that the national debt has grown apace. When real wages and personal wealth have been moving in reverse for the middle and working class for a decade, and when some are actually talking about the dismantling of progressive social programs that most of them at some point must rely upon, I think we’re obviously headed for trouble. It never ceases to amaze me that some don’t or won’t see that.
Take my word for it: The top of the pyramid will not float if the base gives way.
@JV: You are still arguing with slogans and not numbers or examples. The only concrete government program or policy which you have offered by way of example is social security. Look again at the chart linked by Greg. The bottom 50% of Americans hold 2.5% of the nation’s wealth. We previously had the experiment of just leaving Americans on their own, with respect to retirement, and the majority lived in poverty, a burden not only on themselves but on their children, who were not free to focus on building their own nest eggs.
@trooper: You say:,
That’s not true and it’s personally insulting. For the majority of my working life, I’ve easily surpassed by Payroll/Self Employment tax “cap” and I advocate removing this “cap” as part of the formula for assuring the actuarial solvency of social security. The greatest advocates of the inheritance tax include some of the richest people in the world, such as Bill Gates. So your statement (above) is simply not correct.
Progressive taxation is not the same thing as socialism. The idea of the “self made man” is a myth. I’ve been self employed for 23 years. I owe my career to tens of billions of Federal medical research dollars, to billions of California state education dollars (which paid for the educations, through university, of my employees), to the Federal air transport system and the interstate highway system (which makes it possible for FedEx — which delivers tumor biopsy tissues from the patients I serve — to operate its business) and on and on. Mark Zuckerberg and all the other dot com success stories owe their careers to the Federally-initiated Internet, as do many of the tech hardware and software entrepreneurs. Big Pharma owes as much of its success to Federally financed basic research as to their own R&D. And on and on. People at the top of the food chain should pay more not only because they have more but because they OWE more of their success to the government.
I don’t understand how a minimal safety net is a “handout” but all other government investments and services are not “handouts,” especially when we, ourselves, are not paying for these “handouts,” but, instead, are borrowing money which we will never ourselves pay back to finance these handouts.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
SMORGASBORD: hi, YOU mention “give to legal citizens”.
NOW here I come again with this ” WHY NOT FIRST OF ALL CLOSE THE BORDERS”
THOSE ILLEGALS ARE STILL COMING AND CAN MAKE THEMSELF LEGALS THROUGH LOOPHOLES
IN THE SYSTEM ALREADY IN PLACE”; This is the number ONE PRIORITY,
DON’T ANYONE SEE IT?. bye
openid.aol.com/runnswim: may I point out about AMERICA’S ANCESTORS which create the wealth of AMERICA where SELF MADE MEN for sure, because they only use their brains and needs and
CREATIVITY to ACHIEVE the end product of wealth.
ALONG WITH HARD WORK Alone
You folks are wasting your time. No mater what evidence you produce, Larry is not capable of seeing facts or admitting he is wrong. He may not be a flaming moonbat, but he is a liberal and he has a lot of his own ego invested in his beliefs. You are rationally trying to get someone to see differently when they did not arrive rationally at their conclusions.
WE ALSO know that BILL GATES and some other very rich alike, will distribute their own money themself TO organisations in need that they choose,
not by giving it to THE GOVERNMENT, to do that charity.
SO why not trusthing the rest of AMERICANS to do their own charity of their choice?
instead of giving it to GOVERNMENT to distribute the wealth of the NATION.
@Larry,
I shouldn’t have said “ALL,” and it wasn’t meant as a personal assault. The point is that so many politicians and Hollywood elite are glaringly hypocritical when they make impassioned speeches about distributing the wealth but not living by example. Sure, Bill Gates is very philanthropic, but he can afford to be. But would he live on $100K a year to bring the destitute out of poverty? How many of our government officials would give up their government perks and voluntarily live under the same rules and conditions they want the rest of us to accept?
As for arguing “slogans” and such, surely you don’t demand statistics for every discussion, do you? Jesus used parables to emphasize the points he was trying to make, so why can’t we discuss principles without having to supply statistics? Do you not believe that large sections of our government have become bloated, inefficient, and unnecessary? Have you not lived in urban areas and heard people comment on how they’d love to get a government job so they could get great benefits and not have to work at a “real” job? I have lived most of my life in “blue collar” areas, and I’ve heard it easily hundreds of times. I’ve also spent a large portion of my career interviewing and hiring people for entry-level positions in food service and in technology, and have been appalled at the people who have willingly and happily told me that as long as they get their unemployment checks, they’re content to sit around and wait for their ideal job. That’s my first-hand experience at how safety-nets become handouts.
Regarding how you’ve benefitted from government spending programs: are you saying that private industry wouldn’t have resulted in the same progress and benefits? Government’s focus too often seems to be on results at any price, whereas private industry strives for efficiency. Besides, how much of government’s progress was built on top of individual and private enterprise foundations? There’s no doubt that government spending has produced results in many areas, but it’s naive to believe that the same results would not have come out of individuals and private industry. And given the bureaucractic and multiple administrative layers that excessively large government adds, do you not see the waste involved? There are very few things that government does that can not or are not already done by private industry at lower cost.
Our founders believed in a minimally-sized government that maximized and protected personal freedoms, and most conservatives today agree with that notion. The government we envision also removes the artificial barriers that prevent anyone willing and able to be industrious to build a better life for themselves, keep the greatest amount of the fruits of their labors for themselves, AND retain the right to give as much as they wish to charities of their own choosing. I don’t accept the defeatest notion that certain people are destined to remain in poverty despite their maximum efforts to escape said poverty. A great many individuals have escaped those very same conditions, and they will tell you that the key to escape is fostering the right attitude. People who believe they cannot improve their own lot do not work as hard (as a group) to improve their circumstances as those who believe they can. This country was built by people who had nothing but the shirts on their backs, yet they made their lives better. My grandfather was a dirt poor, illiterate migrant farmer from Italy who instilled in his children the importance of education and hard work. Those of his children who worked hard were successful, and the couple that didn’t just complained about how little they had.
I’m glad you are successful, but I think you overestimate the value that government added to your foundation. If you really believe that without government’s existence private industry would not have been able to provide the same foundation upon which your success was built, then maybe it IS pointless to discuss the issues of unnecessarily expansive government with you.
Jeff
JV, from past experience numbers won’t sway Larry either. He is very wedded to his liberal views.
@JV: Firstly, my “personal insult” remark was directed at Trooper and not you. He said that all liberals and progressives like to spend other people’s money and not their own.
With regard to the essence of your most recent post, above (#106):
Yes, of course. But we can’t have an intelligent discussion unless we have specific examples.
My favorite Jesus parable is the Good Samaritan, by the way. The one and only time where Jesus is asked, point blank, what must I do to be saved. He doesn’t say “believe in me” (that would be Paul — my least favorite New Testament guy); he says (using the Socratic method) be like the Samaritan (Samaritans being pretty much viewed as heretics, faith-wise; but this particular guy behaved much better than the guys who allegedly had the better faith (the Priest and the Levite) who ignored the suffering of the poor, wounded traveler by the side of the road. The Samaritan dressed the wound, loaded the traveler on his own donkey (or whatever), took him to an inn, and paid the innkeeper with his own money.
Now, individual charity is wonderful, but without comprehensive government programs, there will be huge cracks and a lot of deserving people will be left behind. I’m for universal health care, for sure. 45,000 people die in the USA each year because they don’t have health insurance. I view this as a national disgrace.
There will ALWAYS be people who rip off the system. Whatever system. People get so bent out of shape over individual examples of poor people bilking the system out of peanuts, but there is no outrage over the hundreds of billions of dollars in tax fraud by people at the top. I don’t fear being audited, because I don’t cheat on my taxes. I would add legions of IRS agents to have more audits and catch more tax cheats.
I don’t believe in punishing the deserving needy because of abuse by the undeserving needy. Again, however, without specific examples of specific programs, we can’t discuss it intelligently.
You raise unemployment checks. In the past 18 years, I’ve hired about 40 people for a small business which employees 10 people, including me. I only had to fire two people; this led to an increase in my unemployment assessments, but I thought it was fair, considering everything.
Here’s where I really disagree with you. Private industry virtually never invests in basic research. The molecular biology revolution which led to the cloning of the human genome grew out of Richard Nixon’s “War on Cancer.” Pharmaceutical companies invest relatively little in drug discovery, compared to what they spend on marketing and on developing drugs which are basically knock offs of existing drugs. Most true discovery-type research is government funded. When private industry invents something, it puts up road blocks to discourage competition. The NIH is a national treasure and defunding the NIH would be a national tragedy. Same thing for the NSF.
But the essential role of government in the success of entrepreneurs goes way beyond R&D. As I wrote before, government educates the workforce. Government originated and proved the value of the Internet. Government built the highway system and the air traffic control system. Government gives us clean air and clean water, public safety and parks, which makes our communities desirable places for our workforce to live. It goes on and on. The combined benefit of these is multiplicative, as one rises up the economic food chain. Those at the top owe much more of their success to government than do those at the bottom. Even in the case of a truly independent, “self-made man,” (e.g. let’s take an artist), he owes his livelihood to a critical mass of people with the financial resources to purchase his art, and they owe their resources to their educations and to all the other things which government does to create an environment in which they can earn a good enough income so that they have discretionary funds to buy art.
No, without government’s existence we would not have the foundation on which individuals can achieve their success.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
Oh, crumbs. Made a boneheaded/absent-minded, scientific mistake. We’ve never “cloned” the human genome; what we did do was to sequence the human genome (#109, above).
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@ilovebeeswarzone: #102
I don’t know how the political system works in Canada, but down here it is all about money and votes. The republicans want the illegals so that the businesses that donate to their reelection campaigns can have cheap labor. The democrats want the illegals so they can make them citizens so they will have more votes. The republicans caught on to that idea and don’t want the illegals voting for democrats, so they are for allowing illegals and giving them amnesty and making them citizens.
Down here politicians always wind up at the bottom or near bottom of every survey of the most respected occupations. They and the lawyers keep fighting for the least respected spot.
To be and stay a politician down here you have to throw away things like, “Do the right thing,” “Put the country first,” and “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country” out the window and replace them with things like, “Me first,” “Where’s the money,” “Anything to get elected.”
@ilovebeeswarzone: #105
The rich don’t usually donate to organizations or start their own because they like to help people. They do it to keep from paying 70% in income taxes. If they earn enough, that is how much the government takes. The way the tax laws are written is that they can donate to tax exempt organizations or start their own. I am guessing they get a better break if they start their own organization or they would just donate to one.
Bill Gates got more in tax breaks than he paid to the United Nations, so he came out ahead on the deal.
@ Smorgasbord, #111:
Who currently has an income tax rate that’s anywhere close to 70%? The highest personal income tax rate is currently 35%, which applies to that portion of annual taxable earnings exceeding $357,700.
If the Bush tax cuts expire without any subsequent changes being made, the highest personal income tax rate will be 39.6% on that portion of annual taxable earnings exceeding $384,860.
@JVerive: #106
The government programs that Larry referred to that helped create wealth are just the opposite. Businesses creating wealth and needing more material, more workers, and expanding to other areas caused the need for roads, bridges, tunnels, etc. Without the capitalists creating more wealth there wouldn’t be a need for an Interstate system or other government projects because there wouldn’t be any expansion. They are the RESULT of wealth expansion. The government isn’t in the habit of building roads to places they hope will develop. The development has to be there first. Two exceptions are the road to nowhere and the bridge to nowhere.
@smorgasbord: So tell me how private wealth expansion gave rise to the Internet. Tell me how it built schools in low income areas. Tell me how it discovered Taxol. etc.
And even where private sector development was the stimulus for something, e.g. the Interstate highway system, the presence of infrastructure (human and material), once put in place, made it possible for an exponential number of new businesses to arise and thrive.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
Nobody is saying that tax monies haven’t resulted in beneficial discoveries, schools in poor areas, etc. The fact that government CAN collect taxed and spend them on beneficial programs, but whether government SHOULD do so, particularly at the federal level.
For example, the federal government may have a constitutional duty to ensure educational opportunities for all citizens, but that doesn’t mean that the federal goverment has to fund public education. Duties like these are handled more cost-effectively at the state level. The federal government can even mandate minimum requirements, but we could save a lot of money by cutting out the bureaucracy and administrative functions at the federal level. States could then let their citizens decide on the appropriate level of funding for public education. Education is just one example of the many areas in which the federal government injects excessive costs where they just aren’t necessary.
Of course I understand the reasons given for the federal government’s role in education, primarily that by pooling all tax revenues into one fund, regions with lower incomes (and therefore lower income tax revenues) can’t afford to spend as much per student as regions of greater affluence, but that is always going to be the case unless private schools are outlawed (good luck getting legislators to agree to send their students to public schools, where the unwashed masses and unsophisticated inner-city folks send THEIR children.)
If government control of revenue and spending was the solution, states like California, New York, and the Prarie State of Illinois (that I call home) should be gleaming examples of how things should be done. Instead, they are glaring examples of how things ought NOT be done.
Jeff
@JV: There’s primary and secondary education and there’s college, post-graduate, and professional education. I’ve been blessed with a large number of excellent University of California (Berkeley, UCLA, San Diego, and Irvine) science graduates, without whom I’d have been dead in the water, long ago. The University of California system is a shining example of what a partnership between state and federal (to the tune of more than 3 billion dollars a year) governments can do. Berkeley has had 66 affiliated Nobel laureates. The presence of major, federally-supported research universities, both public and private (e.g. Stanford; the “anchor” of Silicone Valley, also receives generous federal support), is an important component in the founding and successful operation of many of the nation’s businesses, both large and small. Few technology businesses could survive and thrive without a well educated workforce.
A large problem behind the current problems of California (beyond the recession) is the citizen legislative initiative process. Many of the most important spending decisions end up being made by the voters, and the voters do not always make good decisions.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@Greg: #112
The 70% came from someone I though knew that stuff, but was wrong. Thanks for correcting me.
@OpenID #116
But when the voters realize their mistakes they tend to correct them. Examples: The 2002 elections when many Republican’s jumped on the deficit spending band wagon. And of course the 2008 elections and their resultant “change” which was not the “change” the voters expected or were promised.
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: #114
“So tell me how private wealth expansion gave rise to the Internet.”
The Internet was created by the military. Al Gore was on the committee that created it, so, in one sense, he did create the Internet. The military knew that as computers were being use more and more that us having ours at one place was an easy target to destroy. They decided to have computers in different parts of the world and connect them all together so that if one or more were destroyed we could switch over to others. Later on it was incorporated into civilian use.
When you take the earth and draw lines connecting all of the computers it looks like a web, thus the term “World Wide Web” and the reason for the “www” at the start of each Internet address.
Wealth had nothing to do with the creation of the WWW. It was created to survive attacks.
“Tell me how it discovered Taxol.”
You remind me of my mom and ex wife. Whenever they knew they couldn’t win an argument they changed the subject. How does building infrastructure “discover” anything? A link to the subject would have been helpful.
“And even where private sector development was the stimulus for something, e.g. the Interstate highway system, the presence of infrastructure (human and material), once put in place, made it possible for an exponential number of new businesses to arise and thrive.”
As I mentioned earlier, the government doesn’t usually build infrastructure to a certain place just so it can be developed. The development usually comes first. Maybe you are thinking of things like this being done to attract businesses:
MidAmerica St. Louis Airport
http://chblog.ozarkattitude.com/2010/01/22/illinois-airport-featured-on-nbc-fleecing-of-america-2.aspx
A similar airport was built to relieve traffic at O’hare in Chicago. I couldn’t find a link to it. Maybe someone else can. The last story I saw on it many years ago told that not one plane has landed there and there was only one business there that had nothing to do with the airport. They just wanted the space.
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: #116
There you go changing the subject again.
@Smorgasbord: The technologies from which the Internet was developed came almost entirely out of federally-sponsored research and the Internet originated from connections between university labs and not the military. It wasn’t until mid-1975 that the internet was turned over to the military (completely supported by tax dollars), which managed it until 1983, when it started to be made available for more general use. The World Wide Web was developed by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) — did you not read Dan Brown’s “Angels and Demons? It was not “created to survive attacks.” You can easily read about all of this stuff on Wikipedia. “History of the Internet.” “History of the World Wide Web.”
You accuse me of “changing the subject” and give an example of an airport gone bad. I wasn’t trying to argue whether government-built infrastructures are original eggs or whether they are chickens which hatched out of the eggs. This distinction is not important to my argument that government infrastructure (from roads and the like to education) is essential in spawning and growing business and creating wealth and that the people at the top of the food chain owe a disproportionate amount of their personal success to this infrastructure and therefore should pay more to support it and “pay forward” with the development of new infrastructure.
With respect to your complaint in #120, I had made the absolutely correct point that most successful business owe their success to a workforce largely educated with public funds. JV then objected that the federal role in education was non-essential and could be better managed at the local level. While I was originally referring to public education in general, I reminded JV of the essential role of the federal government in the development and maintenance of the nation’s great research universities, including the great private universites.
With regard to Taxol, I did not explain that Taxol (and about half of the total anti-cancer drugs currently marketed by private pharmaceutical companies) came directly out of NIH research, which still plays a central role with respect to drug discovery infrastructure. http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/nci/drugdiscovery The NCI has, for 50 years, maintained a massive screening program which has tested millions of putative anti-cancer drugs since the 1950s, many of them being natural products derived from materials collected and submitted from around the world, including soil samples, marine samples, leaves, tree bark (e.g. Taxol), and so forth. The NCI maintains a mammoth repository of such materials and has made a major effort to collect and preserve especially endangered plants, animals, and marine life. Once discovered at the NCI, development of these materials is then turned over to the private pharmaceutical industry, which symbiotically uses the various NCI labs for biological testing of compounds originating from or modified by the pharmaceutical companies themselves. It is in every way an important cancer drug discovery and development infrastructure. There are few people in the USA who have not had relatives or friends treated with one or more of these drugs.
- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: #121
I’m going to leave the whole thing this way: You ain’t going to change my mind and I ain’t going to change yours, so lets please drop the subject. I’m sure others are tired of reading about things that have nothing to do with the original post and I am too.
Smorgasbord; hi, I know the richs do save on tax by giving to charity, It’s an old saying in CANADA ALSO, BUT IT REMAIN A GIFT FOR CHARITY, and they choose to do it
with smart way also as I found on GOOGLE LATELY, just choosing who will get it by
asking a free comment from AMERICANS TO WHO DO THEY THINK THEIR GIFTS SHOULD GO TO, I liked that way of doing ,because all AMERICA WAS COUNTED, AND THE MONEY COULD BE GIVEN TO EVERY WHERE IT’S NEEDED BEST.
BYE
Smorgasbord; hi, I know they save tax by giving to charity, but it’s still a gift no matter
the why to give, It must be appreciate as so, that’s my opinion, bye