The attention whore needs attention...

9/2/2011 6:42:43 PM

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/us-debt-held-public-tops-10t-1st-time-mo

9/2/2011 8:42:23 PM

Quote :

"Wow, I knew that eventually he'd throw my people under the bus. Looks like that day has arrived. What makes this truly sad is that this isn't even about climate change but rather plain and simple clean air. Now if someone pulls up these smog rules and shows that this was a cover for limiting CO2 then I will agree that this should be shelved for now, but how could anyone be against putting less nasty and dangerous toxins in the air? "

An election is coming up, he needs those donation$.

9/2/2011 9:14:53 PM

Obama is becoming a DINO.......slowly but surely...

[Edited on September 2, 2011 at 9:28 PM. Reason : w]

9/2/2011 9:28:28 PM

Quote :

"The problem is the opposition that calls him a socialist, uses terms like "cut and run", engages in outright warfare against science, and basically fear mongers their base into voting against their own interests."

True for both parties...let me rephrase:

The problem is the opposition that calls him a socialist racists, uses terms like "cut and run" partisan bickering, engages in outright warfare against science fact, and basically fear mongers their base into voting against their own interests.

Except in the case of Obama, he has the mainstream media to back him up.

9/3/2011 9:03:10 AM

^exactly. Like the "success" tour he took over the auto bailouts. How many tens of BILLIONS did we lose on that shit?

9/3/2011 9:18:00 AM

Quote :

"http://cnsnews.com/news/article/us-debt-held-public-tops-10t-1st-time-mo "

9/3/2011 9:53:33 AM

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/us-debt-held-public-tops-10t-1st-time-mo

U.S. Debt Held by Public Tops $10T for 1st Time—Up 59 Percent Under Obama

9/3/2011 10:43:25 AM

^ That’s FAR less than it would have been had a Bush-esque president remained in office:


I figure you’d be thrilled that Obama seems to have done a good job paring away at the massive deficit Bush created.

But… who needs facts or reality? Not Conservatives!

[Edited on September 3, 2011 at 11:01 AM. Reason : ]

9/3/2011 11:01:23 AM

Quote :

"Up 59 Percent Under Obama"

Thanks to the Bush Depression.

9/3/2011 11:27:13 AM

^^The deficit starts declining when we get to "projected" spending. Pretty crafty, but all that means is that Congress hasn't gotten a chance to rack up deficits for those years yet. There will undoubtedly be some crisis that will be used to justify excess spending.

9/3/2011 12:37:05 PM

^ we’ll see.

He’s still got Bush beat regardless.

9/3/2011 12:57:45 PM

keep posting this one pryderi.

i dont give two shits about bush numbers- i hated him too.

what matters is it keeps going up once it turns blue.

9/3/2011 7:28:28 PM

Quote :

"i dont give two shits about bush numbers"

Bullshit. You supported him then and you're a teabagger now. Posting stories from cns proves it.

[Edited on September 3, 2011 at 8:52 PM. Reason : ...]

9/3/2011 8:52:14 PM

The teabaggers do not realize that by supporting Perry (Bush clone, no wonder all the teabaggers love him, talks like Bush, looks like Bush, just doesnt have the Bush last name....ala Jeb Bush) that he is unelectable in the general and this will be a gift for Obama and result in a second term for him.

9/4/2011 3:17:51 PM

Quote :

" The teabaggers do not realize that by supporting Perry (Bush clone, no wonder all the teabaggers love him, talks like Bush, looks like Bush, just doesnt have the Bush last name....ala Jeb Bush) that he is unelectable in the general and this will be a gift for Obama and result in a second term for him."

Ahh...it's good to see another liberal displaying the ignorance we conservatives understand them to possess.

9/4/2011 7:32:48 PM

20.87%
14.31%
10.96%
7.52%
6.59%

3.43%
5.79%
9.03%
7.41%
7.49%

-6.93%
-3.82%
5.49%
14.55%
11.76%
6.69%

9/4/2011 8:05:50 PM

Quote :

"Bullshit. You supported him then and you're a teabagger now. Posting stories from cns proves it."

what are you doing in my country? bag of shit



[Edited on September 4, 2011 at 10:58 PM. Reason : delroy lindo]

9/4/2011 10:56:38 PM

some of the logic that is used here to deflect ANY blame is comical.

Go out and spend MORE money than you have ever earned and then blame your boss that you were planning on earning a ton more than you actually did that year, so it isnt your fault, but your employers.

"Im 400k in debt but earn 40k a year and spend 80k. It isnt my fault I spent this much, by my projections I was supposed to be earning 500k a year by now. And asking me to cut spending is cruel and racists and avoids the real conversation that I should have been earning 500k by now and we should have flying cars..."

9/5/2011 9:28:53 AM

The response to that will be that Bush started the deficits, and that Obama had no choice but to ramp up spending to "save the economy."

This line of thinking is idiotic for a variety of reasons. One is that the President is not the one making the budget, it's Congress. Talking about things like "The Bush Economy" and "The Obama Economy" is buying into the Red vs. Blue spectator sport, rather than seeing things as they truly are - two parties that don't give a rat's ass about budget deficits.

It's also an absurd point when you consider that Obama has not cut substantially in the areas where he has power to do so. He has created more departments, more bureaucracy, and adopted a more aggressive foreign policy. If this guy is the Democrat's golden boy, then it looks like it's time for some serious intra-party debate, just like has been going on in the GOP for some time now.

[Edited on September 5, 2011 at 1:03 PM. Reason : ]

9/5/2011 1:02:42 PM

you can't possibly be referring to the tea party movement as part of some "intra-party" debate going on in the conservative corner.

i mean, i'll agree that obama is not liberal enough for my tastes, but that's hardly his fault, as he never made himself out to be that far left to begin with. but until there is a more liberal alternative, people like me will have little choice but to support him.

and don't give me that ron paul bullshit, there's a reason why he's aligning himself up with republicans rather than democrats, and i'm just flat-out uninterested in your "more departments, more bureaucracy" complaint.

9/5/2011 3:22:43 PM

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/09/05/jimmy_hoffa_at_obama_event_on_gop_lets_take_these_son_of_bitches_out.html

9/5/2011 3:41:34 PM

I'm convinced that people who don't believe "more departments, more bureaucracy" haven't worked a job at a large corporation.

9/5/2011 4:19:15 PM

why i was always told that anything privatized automatically has streamlined efficiency with zero red-tape!

9/5/2011 5:41:07 PM

Private industry is just and bad an inefficient as government. Bad companies can, however, go out of business. That's the main difference.

All it takes is a little but of experience at both types of organizations to see that there is very little difference. They all basically employ the same people, so there is a real limit on how much better a private organization can be.

Big vs Small vs medium organizations is another dimension. Which works the best depends on the industry.

Again, at least we can get rid of failing companies.

9/5/2011 8:08:24 PM

Quote :

"why i was always told that anything privatized automatically has streamlined efficiency with zero red-tape! "

Been paying attention to the Post office news lately?

THe private sector has to evolve to be more efficient to stay open as competitors will. Govt doesnt face those same pressures. Just as the post office will get a shitton of taxpayer money so it can keep business as usual.

9/5/2011 8:23:12 PM

^the post office being inefficient doesn't make large private businesses any more efficient. the two are unrelated.

9/5/2011 8:43:12 PM

As someone mentioned, government agencies don't really "go out of business." It doesn't matter how inefficiently the bureaucracy operates, because there's very little chance of that department/whatever being abolished.

A business can and will go out of business if operations become so inefficient that they cannot A) Hire workers or B) Sell their product at a competitive price. This forces a business to make cuts when necessary.

9/5/2011 8:46:07 PM

http://www.france24.com/en/20110906-ford-building-1bn-manufacturing-complex-india

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2011/09/05/ford-at-greater-risk-strike-after-avoiding-bailout-money/

nice relationship here- maybe it belongs in a different thread.

feel free to move it.

9/6/2011 11:38:55 AM

they should just fire everyone and move. then people will see what theyre doing wrong. biting the hand that feeds and makign everyone poor and trying to get rid of the rich.

9/6/2011 11:43:29 AM

Quote :

"exactly. Like the "success" tour he took over the auto bailouts. How many tens of BILLIONS did we lose on that shit?"

See, this is my major problem with the Obama administration. They allow outright lies like "the stimulus was ineffective" or "the auto bailouts failed" to be continuously perpetuated without coming out and fighting them guns blazing. 10 years later, Cheney is STILL defending the decision to invade Iraq, while Obama simply rolls over and lets people slander the real successes his administration has had. The bailouts and the stimulus not only saved the US auto industry from completely folding, they are also turning their first full year profits in nearly half a decade and have repaid almost all the money the Fed invested in them, with interest. It was an incredibly good deal for the American tax payer, no matter what Fox News article you're reading says.

9/6/2011 11:50:45 AM

Do you think the government can run a company better than a busnessman? Do you think that public jobs are actual jobs?

9/6/2011 12:00:11 PM

so your major problem with the Obama administration is that theyre smarter than you?

they know if they come out and say what you just said they would get crucified by fact checkers.

youre calling Obama chicken instead of accepting the reality that some shitty Fox News article might just be right.

as self-aware as Obama is do you really think he would let anyone slander his real successes if he had even an inkling of proof that stated otherwise? if what youre saying is true trust me, Obama would be reminding us CONSTANTLY.

he would interrupt wrestlemania with a speech-

the GOP might be evil, but at least theyre competent politicians that dont squander their power when they seize it. democrats are just a bunch of spineless, idiotic worms by comparison.

republicans get voted out of office when they seemingly overstep their bounds and everything goes to shit as a result of their "powertrip." but after they get voted out people want them back because they seem strong and decisive.

democrats on the other hand get voted out of office because people become disenchanted with a bunch of ineffectual weasels that are plenty happy with the "slow bleed" going on right now. the republicans look batshit crazy by comparison but people at least know there is a hit or miss shot that theyll hit a homerun.

and fuck dick cheney- what happened to all his heart problems? slip him some potassium.

[Edited on September 6, 2011 at 12:10 PM. Reason : -]

9/6/2011 12:10:01 PM

i think he will lose by alot and so will all his senators. the democrats can only win wierd states like vermont.

9/6/2011 12:27:39 PM

What fact checkers? If people were actually interested in looking at facts and evidence instead of just nodding their heads at talking points, we wouldn't have a problem. Here are the facts: pre-bailouts and stimulus, Ford/GM/Chrysler were bleeding money and on the verge of shutting their doors for good. Post-bailout they are turning regular profits, paying down their debt, building new plants, and hiring new workers (not to mention for the first time in about two decades, building cars people actually want to buy).

So what exactly are you suggesting? That they would have been fine on their own? That the nearly 1 million jobs that would have gone down with them wouldn't have made a bad situation worse? Or is it just that federal bailouts are "unconstitutional" and should be avoided no matter the cost?

[Edited on September 6, 2011 at 12:38 PM. Reason : :]

9/6/2011 12:34:44 PM

its a distortion not to let that happen. a busness closes and the people that work there go find a new job. they "sell their labor" to someone else in exchange for their wages. thats the free market.

YOU DONT HAVE A RIGHT TO STAY AT A JOB OR BUY A CAR OR FORCE A UNION ONTO SOMEONE.

9/6/2011 12:36:39 PM

More proof that, yes, it really is all the Republicans/Tea Party fault. They want Obama, and by extension America, to fail so they can win in 2012.

9/6/2011 12:41:09 PM

Quote :

"Or is it just that federal bailouts are "unconstitutional" and should be avoided no matter the cost?"

there is no cost.

competition takes up the slack.

ford was doing much better than chrysler or GM. in the event they got fucked, ford would obviously benefit.

but the problem with people like you is you dont want winners or losers. ford shouldnt benefit from having a better corporate strategy. youre the kind of person that puts your kid in one of those little league soccer teams that dont even keep score.

same goes for the banks or anything else- its simple really.

before i judge you too much though, where do you see us right now if nothing had been done? banks failed? auto industry screwed? at the very least we dont have any of the deficit dollars directly related to bailouts, so lets start there.

[Edited on September 6, 2011 at 12:46 PM. Reason : all i see there is the MINORITY trying to put the brakes on a radically wrong president]

9/6/2011 12:45:25 PM

Quote :

"ford was doing much better than chrysler or GM. in the event they got fucked, ford would obviously benefit."

Ford wasn't doing any better. They were bleeding money just the same as GM and Chrysler, laying off workers, and selling off parts of their business. The only difference was they had already borrowed the necessary funds to maintain liquidity years earlier because they saw the crash coming. They would have still been equally fucked if people didn't start buying new cars again.

Quote :

"before i judge you too much though, where do you see us right now if nothing had been done? banks failed? auto industry screwed? at the very least we dont have any of the deficit dollars directly related to bailouts, so lets start there."

So you're asking me where do I see us if the entire global banking and automotive industry had failed in 2008? Do I really have to answer that question?

9/6/2011 1:01:56 PM

PROVE IT!!!!!!! RAWWWWRRRR!!! Right here, on the internet.

9/6/2011 1:39:01 PM

immediately

9/6/2011 1:42:54 PM

Why should I prove or explain anything when I can just throw out easily digestible talking points like "Don't punish success!" or "Don't turn us into Cuba!" instead. If only the left's position could be boiled down into one or two lines.

9/6/2011 2:06:54 PM

^don't forget, "government can't do anything right!"

That's gotta be my favorite argument that is made. Nobody ever bothers to challenge this position.

9/6/2011 2:17:22 PM

It's hard to fit everything that the government does right on a poster.

9/6/2011 2:36:04 PM

they're actually having this conversation "failing banks" on the Di-aaannnnnneeee Rheeeeeeemmmmm show right now.

9/6/2011 2:45:00 PM

the government isnt evil but "its my money and i need it now"

9/6/2011 3:01:05 PM

http://goo.gl/dWvEh

What Democrats can do about Obama - Matt Stoller - Salon.com

From the debt ceiling fiasco to the recent rescheduling of a jobs speech at the behest of Speaker Boehner, it has not been a good summer for President Obama. Like Chinese water torture, Gallup's daily tracking poll has shown a steady and unrelenting drip of bad news. He has been in and out of the high 30s for his approval, and in the low to mid-50s for his disapproval.

George W. Bush's approval rating didn't drop this low until Katrina hit. And on the economy, 71 percent of Americans disapprove of how Obama is doing his job. Even among reliably Democratic groups -- union households, women and young people -- he's now unpopular.

No one, not even the president's defenders, expect his coming jobs speech to mean anything. When the president spoke during a recent market swoon, the market dropped another 100 points. Democrats may soon have to confront an uncomfortable truth, and ask whether Obama is a suitable choice at the top of the ticket in 2012. They may then have to ask themselves if there's any way they can push him off the top of the ticket.

That these questions have not yet been asked in any serious way shows how weak the Democratic Party is as a political organization. Yet this political weakness is not inevitable, it can be changed through courage and collective action by a few party insiders smart and principled enough to understand the value of a public debate, and by activists who are courageous enough to face the real legacy of the Obama years.

Obama has ruined the Democratic Party. The 2010 wipeout was an electoral catastrophe so bad you'd have to go back to 1894 to find comparable losses. From 2008 to 2010, according to Gallup, the fastest growing demographic party label was former Democrat. Obama took over the party in 2008 with 36 percent of Americans considering themselves Democrats. Within just two years, that number had dropped to 31 percent, which tied a 22-year low.

Of course, there are many rationalizations for Obama to remain the nominee. He's faced difficult opposition. He's passed major legislation. His presidency is historic. The economy is hard to resuscitate. But all such rationalizations evade the party's responsibilities to actually choose the nominee best suited to win votes. If Obama looks unlikely to get enough votes to win, he should not get the nomination.

If would be one thing if Obama were failing because he was too close to party orthodoxy. Yet his failures have come precisely because Obama has not listened to Democratic Party voters. He continued idiotic wars, bailed out banks, ignored luminaries like Paul Krugman, and generally did whatever he could to repudiate the New Deal. The Democratic Party should be the party of pay raises and homes, but under Obama it has become the party of pay cuts and foreclosures. Getting rid of Obama as the head of the party is the first step in reverting to form.

So why isn't there a legitimate primary challenger to Obama to make this case? Forty years ago, primaries were instituted in the Democratic Party as a response to party insiders having too much influence over nominations. These reforms were implemented before the prevalence of money in politics was as extreme as it is now. At this point, primary challenges are so expensive that a serious 2012 campaign would ironically require support of party insiders for viability. The party, inflexible as it was in 1968, is perhaps even more rigid today. As a result, no candidate has stepped up to challenge Obama in a primary, even though 32 percent of Democratic voters want one.

This is an institutional crisis for Democrats. The groups that fund and organize the party -- an uneasy alliance of financiers, conservative technology interests, the telecommunications industry, healthcare industries, labor unions, feminists, elite foundations, African-American church networks, academic elites, liberals at groups like MoveOn, the ACLU and the blogosphere -- are frustrated, but not one of them has broken from the pack. In remaining silent, they give their assent to the right-wing policy framework that first George W. Bush, and now Barack Obama, cemented in place. It will be nearly impossible to dislodge such a framework without starting within the Democratic Party itself.

In other words, party inflexibility has a price. If the economy worsens going into the fall, and the president continues as he has to attempt to cut Social Security, Democrats might be facing a Carter-Reagan scenario. Reagan, at first considered a lightweight candidate, ended up winning a landslide victory that devastated the Democratic Party in 1980. Carter wasn't the only loss; many significant liberal senators, such as George McGovern, John Culver and Birch Bayh, fell that year.

Today, it's clear that certain Democratic constituency groups -- unions especially -- are on their deathbed. A reinvigoration of debate over the nature of the American workplace is desperately needed, yet labor leaders seem to prefer supplicating quietly to politicians who betray them. This is not inevitable. People can show dignity.

So what can party leaders do? History offers one model. In 1892, the Democratic Party nominated Grover Cleveland, and with sweeping majorities in both houses, Democrats had control of the federal government for the first time since before the Civil War. Then a financial crisis, plus Cleveland's stubborn allegiance to banking interests, turned his presidency into a catastrophe for Democrats.

When taking state candidates into account, the 1894 midterm elections were comparable to the 2010 wipeout; Cleveland was disliked so ardently that party leaders pushed him out of running for reelection. Instead the Democrats nominated William Jennings Bryan, who introduced many populist themes into the party and began the ideological transformation that would culminate with the election of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932.

History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme. If a few of the key constituency groups in the Democratic Party publicly wondered whether Obama should run for reelection, rumblings would start. Some organized constituency groups -- say some components of the AFL-CIO -- would need to announce that their support is up for grabs, based on a clear set of criteria. Given the Obama administration's rampant anti-labor policies, this wouldn't be an unreasonable posture. And then a senior politician, like, say, a Tom Harkin, would need to decide that he would want to encourage robust intra-party debate about the party's future.

Harkin could run as a "favorite son" of Iowa, and encourage people in the caucuses to send a message to the party and to Obama by choosing him. Other candidates could then emerge in early primary and caucus states, as a way of repudiating Obama's leadership. Candidates wouldn't have to pretend to be running for president or be presidential quality; they could simply stand in as favorite sons or daughters of their own geographic area. This would immediately fire up a highly aggressive and needed debate about the direction of the Democratic Party and the country at large. It would build a new set of leaders, and elevate others who would like to distance themselves from the Obama policy agenda.

In a few months, we'll know better if Obama still looks like a loser next year. If he does, that does not mean the Democratic Party must follow him down the path to oblivion.

For Obama, the die is cast. He has put forward his economic program, and it will work to return jobs and income, and get the votes, or it won't. Knocking on doors won't change that, nor will a donation in a $6 billion election season. What can change the reality of 2012 is if Richard Trumka, the president of the AFL-CIO, begins to take his job of representing workers seriously, and one or two establishment Democrats who remember liberalism decide to model courage for the younger generation. Then a robust debate can happen. Only by shaking up the current political order will solutions emerge.

Such debates tend to create institutional reforms -- the vibrant antiwar blogosphere of 2002-2006, and eventually the Obama campaign itself, emerged out of such a series of debates. Such a debate would also force the Obama campaign to come up with some answers to questions it would prefer to defer until after the election: Where are the jobs, and what is the plan to stop foreclosures? It would allow millions of Americans who have been hurt -- and who have benefited -- from administration policies, to have their say.

I wish I could say I was optimistic that party leaders will step forward and start the debate Democratic voters need. As for many, the last few years have shattered my faith in the political process. Obama has basically endorsed every major plank of George Bush's administration, yet Democrats still grant their approval. What we're finding out is that Obama's pathologically pro-establishment and conflict-averse DNA was funded by party insiders and embraced by liberal constituency groups in 2008 for a reason.

Political parties need to be flexible enough to allow for new ideas to come into the process, or else third parties or civil disorder are inevitable. All it would take to provide this flexibility are well-known Democratic elders who understand that rank and file Democrats deserve a choice, and a few political insiders who realize that they can increase their own power by encouraging a robust debate. I don't think this will happen. But just imagine if it did.

[Edited on September 6, 2011 at 6:08 PM. Reason : embolden width]

9/6/2011 6:07:56 PM

I was trying to find some context of Matt Stoller, so I searched around the internet for other articles he has written, to see if he was a true fan of Obama who, like many many many others, had became disaffected with him.

Here's an awesome article I found from a website Matt Stoller created. I'll highlight some of the more ironic parts.

http://mydd.com/2006/10/22/why-barack-obama-should-run-for-president

Why Barack Obama Should Run for President - Matt Stoller - Mydd.com

Though you probably know me as someone who's not a fan of Barack Obama, I do want the Senator to run for President in 2008. I think it would be good for him, good for the party, and good for the country. I'm big on process, on public debate, on public deliberation, and we need his voice in the fray. We need to hear from him, what's his vision? What are his principles? What kind of America does he support? How will he stand up to pressure when he is debating other Democrats? In other words, what, exactly is his voice? Is he the Barack Obama who criticizes our political system for its smallness, its lack of vision, as he puts it in his stump speech? Or is he the Barack Obama who praises George Bush, and goes along and gets along in the Senate, ruffling no feathers and making sure that the smallness of our system is what he embraces? Or is the Barack Obama that thinks that this country is not ready for the sacrifices he knows are coming, and so will revel in his symbolic emptiness?

I think there are two keys to understanding Barack. The first is to look at his formative political experience, the seering loss to machine politician Bobby Rush in the Democratic primary in 2000. Before Brand Obama emerged, the Senator got destroyed by bucking the system. Losing to a machine, as Cory Booker also did, does strange things to idealistic-appearing hyperambitious politicians. It makes them a lot more wary of picking fights and making enemies, and it makes them a lot more inclined to cultivate chits and work within a system they know isn't working.

And Obama knows America is broken. He knows it, he gets it, and that's why he is so aggressively dismissive of progressives. He feels that he is one of us, and so we should understand why he has to have contempt for us. Here is, for instance, what he wrote on Daily Kos: (Unless we are open to new ideas, and not just new packaging, we won't change enough hearts and minds to initiate a serious energy or fiscal policy that calls for serious sacrifice.)

Barack Obama knows we must change, but he also knows the penalty for fighting for change. This internal contradiction comes out in his sickening praise of Bush, whom he praised today on Meet the Press, or in his embrace of bipartisanship for him and his Senate buddies. It comes out in a strong disdain for progressives, be it random sneering insults towards liberals or pandering to an authoritarian pagan right-wing evangelical tribalism. He doesn't like that we make him revisit his loss to Bobby Rush, because the last thing he wants to think of himself as is a loser, and because we make him make choices. You know, like the choice he made to not go to Connecticut to campaign for Ned Lamont, which we will remember as the unprincipled betrayal of the Democratic Party that it is. We want to hold him accountable for the dreams that are invested in his persona, and he doesn't want to be responsible for the hope of millions, though he does want to sell a book called The Audacity of Hope.

So why, after all of this, do I think he should run for President? It would be good for everyone if he did. For the Democratic Party, we would be able to engage our hero in a debate over policies and ideas, and we'd be able to take him down off a pedestal and actually grapple together with common challenges. That would make us as a party stronger. For the country, all Americans would be able to move beyond the rock star persona, and get to the substance, and that would be good. Public debate is better than rock star adulation.

And for Obama? Well, Obama is scared. He hasn't had to make choices for a long time, and he knows he has a limited timeframe in which to capitalize on the brand he has out there. His brand has a shelf-life, and running for President would force him to clarify what he wants to mean beyond gorgeous ambitiion. That would be good for him as a politician, and as a man. We haven't yet seen what a Barack Obama would fight for in a public debate, and it's something I'd like to see. I'd like to see him enter the contest, and in all likelihood get crushed for being a go-along-get-along politician. Only then can he become a great Senator or President, after he realizes that it's not about being liked by everyone, it's about being a principled human being.

And I guess I'd finally say that I know it doesn't seem like it, but he's running out of time. Sooner or later, he's going to run smackdab into another brand, say, an Eliot Spitzer, who is good at fighting for his principles. And in that choice, when Obama has to face his first round of negative ads, and his first real negative campaign on a state or national level, does he really want to face the charge that he's a pretty face and an empty suit? Is that what he wants to be known as? I hope not. That's not what I want for this incredibly talented and brilliant man, and that's not what I hope for our Democratic Party. That's not what we need as a country, and we're going to get something more than that in the next twenty years.

Or at least, I'm audacious enough to hope that we will.

9/6/2011 6:40:57 PM

oh look, pryderi posts bogus graphs again in another thread. what a shocker

Quote :

"That’s FAR less than it would have been had a Bush-esque president remained in office:"

ahhh, the old sample-size of one fallacy. claim what would have happened if things weren't as they are, and then act like it has any actual validity.

Quote :

"The deficit starts declining when we get to "projected" spending."

bingooooooooo, something I pointed out in another pryderi bullshit post in another thread.

Quote :

"They allow outright lies like "the stimulus was ineffective" or "the auto bailouts failed" to be continuously perpetuated without coming out and fighting them guns blazing."

the stimulus did pretty much fail. it's failed so bad they are contemplating new ones. if that's not the definition of failure, then I don't know what is. Unemployment when way past where they said it would have gone with the stimulus, hell, past where they said it would go without it. AKA, it failed hard. And what's your metric for success for the auto bailouts? If you go by pure numbers, it failed, as it lost billions of dollars. If you go by the dubious statistic of the car-makers still being around, well, then, it didn't.

but, really, the car companies paid back all the money plus interest? REALLY?
http://www.thecarconnection.com/news/1060907_gm-chrysler-bailout-loans-could-cost-taxpayers-up-to-16b
and you accuse 'pubs of not accepting fact

[Edited on September 6, 2011 at 6:57 PM. Reason : ]

9/6/2011 6:56:19 PM

http://detnews.com/article/20110816/AUTO01/108160428/Treasury-hikes-estimate-of-auto-bailout-losses-to-$14.3B


For those actually interested in the actual numbers of the "success" of the auto bailouts. Looks like the loss is over 14B now.

As for the post office here is a good article to read. Sure they will prob drop saturday service, close some offices, and layoff some people (despite the fact the union will sue bc they have a contract for no layoffs...geez) the real issue is their legacy costs much like GM before them. GM, like the post office, will get our money and the beat goes on. Despite losing 8B last year and this year, politics will play a role in this as union democrats will oppose the layoffs (despite people using less mail) and rural politicians will oppose them closing their offices which are losing money.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/business/in-internet-age-postal-service-struggles-to-stay-solvent-and-relevant.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

"At the same time, decades of contractual promises made to unionized workers, including no-layoff clauses, are increasing the post office’s costs. Labor represents 80 percent of the agency’s expenses, compared with 53 percent at United Parcel Service and 32 percent at FedEx, its two biggest private competitors. Postal workers also receive more generous health benefits than most other federal employees."

Now guess which 2 actually EARN money and which one operates at a loss?

9/6/2011 9:58:44 PM