Why Barack Obama could be America’s last big government president

[KoTeMoRe]

I understand. Being called on your BS and hoist on your own petard is never fun. Your lashing out in response is not unexpected.

My bull****? Heh, until further notice I am not the one going ape**** about some dark-skinned guy being president of my Nation. Not do you see me having issues understanding the meaning of words and policies. You know like calling the present POTUS socialist and what not.

As I said, you lot do such a great job thinking this over, yet none of you runs for Congress or some Community Organisation. Why is that, being the political studs you are? Lemme guess...

[California Joe]

Arguing over taxing the rich is irrelevant and only a distraction to keep US citizens playing the party shill game.

The real problem with the US is that those owning the shills in office are in a war for survival and that anyone holding the dollar has become their b1tch fueling said war. Have you ever cornered a wild animal or been in a life or death struggle? You will do anything to stay alive as will these interests to remain in power. The party and its masters are far from giving up this fight and they will go on taking other peoples wealth and time to increase their ability to ratchet down on ever more license until either the constitution is eliminated or US citizens dismantle the mono party and rebuild.

You can’t even begin to argue taxes until the managerial elite is purged and oligarchs brought to heel and even then, one shouldn’t even discuss US taxes in the current structure as it’s so rife with license, favor and social engineering that it must be radically wiped away and reformed.

I'm a big fan of your work.

[Ought Six]

My bull****? Heh, until further notice I am not the one going ape**** about some dark-skinned guy being president of my Nation.

LOL! Playing the race card. Now it is *really* desperation time.
----------

Not do you see me having issues understanding the meaning of words and policies. You know like calling the present POTUS socialist and what not.

Interesting, because last time I checked, social democracy was a type of socialism, and Obama's policies are largely European-style social democracy ideas. But perhaps you really know this little about political science.
----------

As I said, you lot do such a great job thinking this over, yet none of you runs for Congress or some Community Organisation. Why is that, being the political studs you are? Lemme guess...

You know nothing whatsover about me, but typically you do not hesitate jump right in and make baseless, self-serving assumptions from pure ignorance. I am in fact quite active in the Libertarian Party of Washington State. I help where I can. I have not run for office because I am completely unsuited for politics, and have a full-time job already.

Of course, your crap on this topic is once again just a diversion from the actual subject here. You cannot refute what I said, so you turn the ad hominem and try to impugn my character. What a cheap, sleazy little rhetorical dance. If you decide to return to actually addressing the issue, I will be here. But if you have nothing more to offer than this sort of sh1t, then you are wasting our time and have de facto ceded the debate.

[Dirtydiaper]

So.... by that standard George W. Bush was a socialist?

The MMA and all....

[Ought Six]

So.... by that standard George W. Bush was a socialist?

The MMA and all....

The Medicare expansion was definitely a social democracy-type bill. Taking GWB's record in total, I would say he is more of a corporatist big-government neocon than a social democrat. It takes more than a single bill to define an eight-year presidency. Looking at Obama's overall record, on the other hand, he is pretty consistent in promoting social democracy plans and ideas. His voting record as a Senator was even more so.

[Dirtydiaper]

The Medicare expansion was definitely a social democracy-type bill. Taking GWB's record in total, I would say he is more of a corporatist big-government neocon than a social democrat. It takes more than a single bill to define an eight-year presidency. Looking at Obama's overall record, on the other hand, he is pretty consistent in promoting social democracy plans and ideas. His voting record as a Senator was even more so.

While I do agree his domestic policies share a lot of similarities with the European social democracy, calling him a socialist is stretching it to fit one's own narrative. Just as I think calling the Scandinavian countries socialist because we've adopted some socialistic policies, which the US have too by the way, is kinda ridiculous.
Then, seen to his foreign policies, he has been more hawkish then even the previous administration, and haven't really been that socialist peace-loving fair and share humanitarian some people made him out to be (especially in the Nobel committee, which gives me great joy ).


I'd consider my country as much socialist as I consider the US a plutocracy. Which isn't a lot.

[Ought Six]

While I do agree his domestic policies share a lot of similarities with the European social democracy, calling him a socialist is stretching it to fit one's own narrative. Just as I think calling the Scandinavian countries socialist because we've adopted some socialistic policies, which the US have too by the way, is kinda ridiculous.
Then, seen to his foreign policies, he has been more hawkish then even the previous administration, and haven't really been that socialist peace-loving fair and share humanitarian some people made him out to be (especially in the Nobel committee, which gives me great joy ).


I'd consider my country as much socialist as I consider the US a plutocracy. Which isn't a lot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy

[Dirtydiaper]

Great rebuttal.

[Ought Six]

Great rebuttal.

Read and learn.

[Dirtydiaper]

Read and learn.

An even better rebuttal. I guess George W Bush was a commie too then.

[Ought Six]

An even better rebuttal. I guess George W Bush was a commie too then.

Since you are just being disingenuous now, do not expect me to waste any more time on you. The explanation of what social democracy is, and that it is a type of socialism is quite clear. How the definition applies so well to Obama's policies is obvious. But you apparently just want to play dumb and snipe. So be it. Bye-bye.

[joethesixpack]

Who adjed thr question - "How many people are better off today than 4 years ago?". Still needs to be answered.

[Dirtydiaper]

Since you are just being disingenuous now, do not expect me to waste any more time on you. The explanation of what social democracy is, and that it is a type of socialism is quite clear. How the definition applies so well to Obama's policies is obvious. But you apparently just want to play dumb and snipe. So be it. Bye-bye.

I'm not the one painting one man's political affiliation through the courses of only a few, selected parts of his actions. That is the disingenuous part of this discussion. But whatever. Bye-bye to you too, dear.

[That One Guy]

Ahh, so 'unrestrained capitalism' was to
blame. I see. And as we know, capitalism is free markets working
without the dead hand of massive government intervention.

Thanks for the dispatch from the land of make-believe. Here's
reality: Powerful business interests in America continually rely
on a powerful state to intervene on its behalf. The very last
thing they want is un-sheltered exposure to "free" market forces.
No, they want a powerful state to force open foreign markets,
create favorable conditions for trade, subsidize R&D costs, hand
out nice contracts (no-bid preferred), and bail them out with
public money when they lose big—amongst other vital services. Of
course, they pretend to have a hostile relationship with the the
government because they sure don't want the general public cutting
in on their action. So, they promote the myth of mutual hostility,
but it's simple, self-serving propaganda. They have way too nice
an arrngement going on for themselves in regard to the
government. That's especially true now that they practically own
the thing.

Let us examine the other causes of the
crisis that you conveniently failed to mention. How about the fact
that people like Charlie Rangel and Barney Frank made it their
crusade to see that 'everyone could achieve the American dream of
owning a home'? They extorted banks and big lenders into writing
mortgages for poor people who never should have qualified for
them. They told banks and lenders that they would investigate them
for 'racist lending practices' if they did not make these bad
loans. And ACORN worked with Rangel and Frank, picketing and
calling for boycotts against any bank or lender who would not
write mortgages for the totally unqualified.

Another huge factor was Freddie and Fannie. They went in and
bought up or insured bad mortgages as fast as lenders could write
them. What lender would not write all the bad loans they could
when they had a pseudo-private government corporation buying up
all the risk, leaving them with zero exposure? By the time the
crisis broke, more than half the mortgages in America were owned
or guaranteed by Fannie or Freddie. Is this your 'unrestrained
capitalism'?

Duh, the government had its hand in it too, big time, which is
exactly what one would expect. After all, the government is
thoroughly infiltrated by investment bank alumni. It's like
there's a revolving door between the government and the banks
straight across party lines and successive administrations. Also,
bribery in its myriad forms is rampant. Wake the f*ck up, because
it's in the news every day.

As for F & F, they were semi-privatized a long time ago, so you
can stop pretending they're government-only entities—not that it
really makes a difference any more. By the way, in 2006, the banks
started frantically unloading crap mortgages and mortgage-backed
securities onto F & F because they sure as hell didn't want to be
one last ones standing when the music stopped.

Ahh, so 'unrestrained capitalism' was to
blame. I see. And Ahh, so 'unrestrained capitalism' was to blame.
I see. And No, massive government intervention in markets is what
created the huge overburden of toxic debt. The Glass-Stegal repeal
allowed the use of depositor funds to create SIVs, but those SIVs
would not have collapsed were they not made of government-created
toxic debt. The government created the collapse. Wall Street and
greed certainly played its part, but placing all the blame on Wall
Street and 'unrestrained capitalism' is simply an ignorant
viewpoint.

Glass-Steagall maintained vital partitions between the business
functions of commercial banking, investment banking and insurance.
This was done to eliminate the obvious conflicts of interests that
would arise were those functions allowed to merge within single
commercial entities. The banks lobbied relentlessly to get Glass-
Steagall repealed. They succeeded in 1999, and then it was off to
the races.

That's exactly why you now have criminal banks like Goldman Sachs
and Morgan Stanley pitching garbage investments to their own
clients, and then turning around and short-betting to profit from
the failure of those same investments once they've off-loaded them
onto the suckers. And those banks straight up paid the privately-
owned ratings agencies to confer triple-A status on the shakiest
of investments. The same rating given to US treasury bonds!

It's also why local mortgage loan originators—who would formerly
have had to hold onto those loans themselves—could now turn around
and sell them to investment banks to be pooled and securitized.

I remember those days well. The banks were emphatically NOT forced
against their will by the government to make bad mortgage loans.
They frantically and relentlessly marketed such loans. They
marketed the sh*t out of them! And that's because they actually
made more money off of people with bad credit. Those people had to
pay higher interest, and that resulted in securities with higher
pay offs and more profit. They no longer had to hold the loans
themselves, so what did they care if they eventually imploded?

What you said is funny though. You hold up private enterprise as
the very model of natural virtue that needs to be freed from the
fetters of the government to be fully vital. Then, you turn around
and say that the private banks can't be blamed for perpetrating
scam and fraud if the government simply lets them. LOL!

The whole thing about banks being "forced" by the government is
utterly laughable!

So New Deal massive overspending kept
unemployment levels at the highest level in American history for a
decade, but they were a 'success'? And you really believe that?
Then I can see why you think that Obama's stimulus is something of
a 'success', and would be much better if we just threw even more
taxpayer money down the same rathole.

The source of the quote is not Fulsom's
text. The source of the quote is a transcript of private meeting
at the Treasury Department, May 9, 1939, that exists in the F.D.
Roosevelt Presidential Library. Do the math, professor.

As a liberal, of course he would feel
that way.... which proves absolutely nothing other than he was a
liberal.. >*obvious*<
----------Not liberal enough for you?

Okay, let's say the Morgenthau quote is real. So what? FDR's
cabinet wasn't monolithic in its outlook. Morgenthau was the
resident deficit hawk. It's not exactly surprising he'd say
something like that. Of course, you see him as a "liberal," but to
you Mussolini was probably a liberal, so that doesn't mean a whole
lot.

Regardless, it's emphatically NOT true that unemployment was
higher during FDR's administration. Go check the figures while
getting yourself a cracker, professor parrot. In fact, at the
administration's actual 8-year mark (1941), unemployment had
declined 87.9%!

I will stick with accepted popular usage
instead of your self-serving manufactured 'definitions', thanks.

It was corporate welfare, plain and simple. Deal with it.

I may call your argument dumb, but I have
not called *you* dumb. That is the difference between fair debate
and ad hominem.

I didn't say you were dumb. I said, in effect, that if you believe
in dumb things then you are dumb; there's a slight difference.
But, c'mon, your incessant need to rely on labels like "liberal",
and your overuse of emoticons speaks for itself.

Get a tissue if you need one.

<b>Laissez faire capitalism is what
created and built America.</b> Now, as we have ever-increasing
government intervention in markets, and massive overspending
sucking the very lifeblood out of our economy, not surprisingly we
are in an extended recession that is in danger of becoming a
massive economic collapse. History and current events put the lie
to your silly claim. Free markets with minimal regulation are the
only thing that has ever worked.

That was closer to being true back in the 1770s, when the country
was sparsely populated and agrarian. But the idea that would be
viable now is a complete joke. We've seen an industrial
revolution, a digital revolution, globalization, and the rise of
multinational corporations since then. It's a different country
and a different world. Maybe you need a kiss from a handsome
prince, sleeping beauty?

Only American-Taliban types hankering after a long-gone,
imaginatively-idealized past could think that such an arrangement
would work now. The corporations certainly don't want that, and
they're the ones calling the shots these days.

Tell us about all the centrally planned
economies that have been so successful. This oughta be good.

Instead, let's cut to the chase and take a look at those places
where there is truly no government involvement in commercial
activity whatsoever—places like Waziristan and Somalia. If you
think places like that are so great, then why aren't you living
there?

Otherwise, all modern, industrialized societies have heavy
governmental involvement in most aspects of commercial activity.
The only thing that's ever really contested is the question of how
democratically responsive those same governments are their general
publics.