Has anyone mentioned how China has the US by the balls now and how they have say over our defense spending now?

Looks like his groveling to China has paid off

9/16/2011 8:25:00 AM

Please explain how China has any say over our defense spending.

9/16/2011 9:15:53 AM

Shrike is tearing it up, but I don't see any part of that graph that is flat. There are knees at 1920 and 1980, though.

The natural tendency of fractional reserve banks is to inflate. Government regulation used to stymie this a little, but de-regulation and regulation made obsolete by more complicated financial instruments broke down this system. With that said, fractional reserve banking existed in the US and the world long before 1912.

9/16/2011 9:29:29 AM

Quote :

"The natural tendency of fractional reserve banks is to inflate. Government regulation used to stymie this a little, but de-regulation and regulation made obsolete by more complicated financial instruments broke down this system. With that said, fractional reserve banking existed in the US and the world long before 1912."

You're absolutely right that inflation has been going on for a long time, and it is due to fractional reserve banking.

You're not correct in your analysis that government regulation limited this pyramiding of debt. In fact, government has almost always been the entity to encourage debt. Even when we didn't have a central bank, the government would encourage banks to buy war bonds. They'd then allow banks to suspend redemption of gold/silver when the banks had overextended. This was the beginning of legalized fraud, which has been the basis for our current financial system.

Murray Rothbard (God, no, don't speak his name!) writes extensively about this in The History of Money and Banking in the United States, which is available here: http://mises.org/books/historyofmoney.pdf

Quote :

"Ok, obviously you're not smart enough to understand so I'll spell it out for you."

Very nice.

Quote :

"The Fed was created in 1913, and from there until the late 1970s, financial services as a share of our GDP experienced booms and busts along with the rest of our economy. They sank with every depression/recession and grew with every bull market. Perhaps "flat" was the wrong word to use, but if you look at the graph, their share of our GDP in the early 1900s and then in the 1960s is relatively equal. Call it "flat", "proportional" or whatever you want to call it, but the point is the same. Then, starting in the late 1970s, financial services began growing at an alarming rate, independent of any external market forces, continuing through today. The Fed was created over 60 years before that trend began, so what changed? Regulation of the financial sector."

If you're going to call something "flat," then it should be flat. Don't just start making shit up, genius.

What happened in 1971?

[Edited on September 16, 2011 at 11:59 AM. Reason : ]

9/16/2011 11:51:27 AM

the only anarchists anyone gives a shit about have bands.

9/16/2011 12:08:28 PM

Quote :

"Please explain how China has any say over our defense spending."

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/15/obama-rules-out-new-f-16s-for-taiwan/

Quote :

"Obama agrees to sell arms to Taiwan President Obama has decided to sell a new arms package to Taiwan that will likely include weapons and equipment to upgrade the island’s F-16 jets, according to administration and congressional officials. Congress will be briefed Friday on the arms package, worth an estimated $4.2 billion, said officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. A formal announcement is expected soon. “All we’ve been told is the president has made a decision, and I assume it will be for the F-16 A/B upgrade package,” said a senior congressional aide close to the issue. The president decided against selling Taiwan 66 advanced F-16 C/D model aircraft, despite several requests from Taipei and Congress, the officials said. The decision ends nearly two years of debate within the administration and Congress over whether to sell advanced strike aircraft. The White House declined to comment. Supporters of the sale say new F-16s, produced by Lockheed Martin, are needed to bolster Taiwan’s defenses against China’s growing air power and to produce jobs for the U.S. aerospace industry. China, which opposes U.S. arms sales, is expected to react harshly to the upgrade package. China's military cut off exchanges with the Pentagon in 2008 and last year after two arms packages were announced. The Obama administration has made its policy of seeking closer military ties with China a high priority, one reason that the president rejected new F-16s in the latest arms sales package, the officials said. China’s U.S. debt holdings also likely influenced the decision. In February 2010, Chinese military leaders called for punishing the United States for arms sales to Taiwan by calling in some of the $1.1 trillion in China’s Treasury debt holdings. [Who needs enemies when you have China on your "side"] A senior administration official said the decision not to sell new F-16s is a setback for officials in the administration who are concerned about Taiwan’s declining defenses. The opposition to selling the new jets came mainly from within the State Department, the official said. ..."

9/16/2011 2:38:21 PM

So your claim that they "have say over our defense spending now" is supported by "China’s U.S. debt holdings also likely influenced the decision. In February 2010, Chinese military leaders called for punishing the United States for arms sales to Taiwan by calling in some of the $1.1 trillion in China’s Treasury debt holdings."

Got it. So localized entirely with our dealings with the small island of Taiwan, one of the factors in deciding whether we give them weapons "likely" has to do with our debt to China. Sorry if I don't read "have say over our defense spending" out of that.

[Edited on September 16, 2011 at 3:37 PM. Reason : .]

9/16/2011 3:37:33 PM

I'm curious. If our government hadn't assumed the right to dictate who our weapons manufacturers can sell weapons to, would China still be upset with us when the Taiwanese bought new F-16s?

9/16/2011 4:32:50 PM

Quote :

"“Keynesian economists in the Obama administration and their supporters in academia and in the media have not provided an internally consistent theory that explains why the free market fails to deliver full employment. “Keynes’s book, The General Theory, did not provide such a theory. The book is difficult to read, internally incoherent, and inconsistent with a body of economic theory that has been widely accepted for at least 200 years. More important, it is inconsistent with the existence of the stagflation that we observed in the 1970s.”"

9/16/2011 5:16:25 PM

Quote :

"So again, we spent $1.3 trillion on tax cuts that DID NOTHING BUT MAKE RICH PEOPLE RICHER."

and, AGAIN, you deny the ACTUAL FACT that more money went to the non-rich than the rich. you have trouble with facts, which isn't a surprise, since you are a liberal.

Quote :

"I said, and I posted actual numbers proving it, that no one in the middle class benefited from Bush's tax cuts."

no one in the middle class actually got a tax cut? really? is that what you are saying? yet, somehow, more money went to the non-rich than the rich, yet no one who wasn't rich got a tax cut.

9/16/2011 6:28:47 PM

Quote :

"and, AGAIN, you deny the ACTUAL FACT that more money went to the non-rich than the rich. you have trouble with facts, which isn't a surprise, since you are a liberal."

What are the actual numbers again? Which link are you using to support you claim?

9/16/2011 7:04:06 PM

previous page. estimates of total payouts for the future are 3-1 or 4-1, non-rich to rich with an estimate of 2001-2010 of 2-1.

9/16/2011 7:13:24 PM

So middle class people getting $10/person versus super rich getting $1000/person is what you are claiming as "middle class got more"?

That is your argument?

9/16/2011 7:17:44 PM

not at all. my argument is that more of the money from the tax cuts went to the middle class than it did to the rich, over all. which should be expected, since there are far more people in the middle class than in the uber rich. either way, it's just liberal propaganda to say the tax cuts did nothing but "make the rich richer".

9/16/2011 7:24:46 PM

Well, you have individuals who are already stupid rich getting 100x more on an individual basis than someone in the middle class. It simply isn't hyperbole that the cuts made the rich richer.

9/16/2011 7:36:47 PM

it most certainly is hyperbole, especially if you say it only made the rich richer. The damn thing kept almost 2 trillion dollars in the pockets of the middle class, for fuck's sake

9/16/2011 9:29:14 PM

100x per person. You simply lose this point.

9/16/2011 9:35:34 PM

when they are paying 100x more in taxes, it isn't meaningful in any way. or are you honestly saying tht 150million americans only got 10bux back from the Bush tax cuts per year, for a total of 1.5billion a year, despite the fact that we KNOW it was at least a 2 to 1 spread. is that what you are arguing?

9/16/2011 9:42:16 PM

Quote :

"What are the actual numbers again? Which link are you using to support you claim? "

If you are talking about the bush tax cuts here are the actual numbers on extending them for 2 yrs.

463B for under 250k
81.5B for over 250k

http://money.cnn.com/2010/12/07/news/economy/tax_cut_deal_obama/index.htm

And please stop with the "rich get richer" shit. It is just tired nonsense. If you have a 10% coupon and you spend 10 bucks and save 1 dollar, I spend 100 and save 10, you would bitch that I saved more and it isnt fair.

9/17/2011 11:46:02 AM

Looks like some guy wrote a book bashing the Obama Administration, and the White House is "pushing back," according to Politico. Love the opening sentence of the article.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/63754.html

Quote :

"The White House launched an aggressive response to a forthcoming book that chronicles internal dissent and second-guessing of President Barack Obama by his own staff and presents Obama as a conflicted, sometimes wavering leader. Administration officials assert that “Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President” by Ron Suskind is infested with errors, both big (what they characterize as misquotations and distorted narratives) and small (several names, a birth date, a publication date, an employer, an unemployment rate, etc.) and gives a distorted and inaccurate picture of the White House under Obama."

9/17/2011 7:04:19 PM

what a bunch of pussies

9/17/2011 8:05:39 PM

^^ to be fair, what do you expect them to do? say "yeah, that guy is totally right! we completely suck!" if their "push back" is limited to press statements saying "his book is trash", then that doesn't bother me. if they send the FBI to his door, well, yeah, that's bogus

9/18/2011 3:04:58 PM

kind of like they did to S&P?

9/18/2011 7:01:56 PM

Liberals & Progressives plan to Primary the President.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/19/liberals-vow-challenge-obama-democratic-primaries/


Also, the only reason the Congressional Black Caucus isn't marching on the White House now is because the President is black.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/182209-cbc-chairman-if-obama-wasnt-in-office-we-would-be-marching-on-white-house


So much for changing the conversation of race in the country.

9/19/2011 3:47:39 PM

i was about to post that about the primaries.

good for the democrats though- they shouldnt stand by and watch some (likely) insane republican march into the whitehouse unabated.

this is their only hope-

9/19/2011 4:25:35 PM

ahahah right

yeah obama is doomed

9/19/2011 4:47:46 PM

i mean, im happy you have that mindset.

the "obama is cool because im an empowered college student" thing only gets you so far.

he wont be the next president- you should probably start getting serious about filling that seat with hillary unless you want a goddamn theocracy.

or the fucking wild west (paul).

9/19/2011 5:49:28 PM

of course he won't be the next president

he's constitutionally not allowed to be the next president

he's the president

he may only be two presidents from now, like Grover Cleveland

but he can't be the next president

9/19/2011 6:54:04 PM

only a weak-minded fool would type that much just to split hairs.

9/19/2011 7:34:51 PM

They should just rename this forum to ad-hom.

9/19/2011 8:01:13 PM

[Edited on September 19, 2011 at 8:06 PM. Reason : h]

9/19/2011 8:04:11 PM

john kerry proves that you have to at least need a viable candidate when no one could possibly otherwise re elect the incumbent

this republican cast is hilarious.

9/19/2011 8:19:02 PM

laugh it up, FUZZBALL.

9/19/2011 10:03:06 PM

Romney is basically Kerry.

Perry is a joke.

9/20/2011 12:35:15 AM

The Left is breathing a collective sigh of relief. The President has done the right thing and decided to ask Congress to pass a bill raising taxes in a recession because, let's face it, when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody. Especially for the President.

I'm glad he finally rejected his previous statements that you should never raise taxes in a recession, and that the private sector ("rich people") does (do) a better job at creating jobs.

9/20/2011 6:39:49 AM

Yeah, it's good that he rejected those, because they're rubbish absolute statements with no bearing on reality.

9/20/2011 6:58:45 AM

9/21/2011 12:52:13 PM

I don't buy into the conspiracy theories, but when has a U.S. President not been pro-Israel? That might as well be mandatory.

9/21/2011 1:09:17 PM

http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/09/20/7862290-barack-obama-joins-open-government-partnership-for-group-photo

9/21/2011 2:03:02 PM

9/21/2011 2:35:30 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissistic_personality_disorder#Diagnosis

Quote :

"The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders fourth edition, DSM IV-TR, a widely used manual for diagnosing mental disorders, defines narcissistic personality disorder (in Axis II Cluster B) as: A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following: 1. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements) 2. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love 3. Believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions) 4. Requires excessive admiration 5. Has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations 6. Is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends 7. Lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others 8. Is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her 9. Shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes"

9/21/2011 9:17:07 PM

his approval ratings are getting lower. right now thy are right at 40% and this is not good for reelection.

9/23/2011 1:41:39 PM

Here's Jacob Weisberg attacks Ron Suskind's book on Obama by saying he has been and continues to be a hack jorunalist.
http://www.slate.com/id/2304228/

I've only read a few articles by Suskind and his book "The Price of Loyalty" so I don't really have an opinion of him. But I just find it strange that Jacob Weisberg was able to hold his tounge about Suskind's "B.S." when it was directed at George Bush and only now finds the time to write a scathing review when it is directed at Obama.

Maybe Suskind isn't the only hack in that article.

9/23/2011 3:23:30 PM

So is he about to be guilty of inciting riots or

9/25/2011 11:07:17 AM

9/25/2011 11:33:11 AM

Obama has to be thanking GOD for the weak GOP field, even with 40% approval, all he has to do is win certain states he won last time and he get relected....I mean, if GOP is now all for Cain that tells you how weak the field is.

9/25/2011 3:10:30 PM

Quote :

"Obama has to be thanking GOD for the weak GOP field, even with 40% approval, all he has to do is win certain states he won last time and he get relected...."

Like Virginia, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania?

Quote :

"I mean, if GOP is now all for Cain that tells you how weak the field is."

Yeah, because only the Democrats will vote for the (half-)black guy.

9/25/2011 7:25:30 PM

http://www.infowars.com/ap-labeled-racist-for-accurately-transcribing-obama-speech/


LOL

9/27/2011 3:43:09 PM

Quote :

"Yeah, because only the Democrats will vote for the (half-)black guy."

Yes, actually. Did you completely forget the last Presidential election or this just another case of selective memory by the right? Let me remind who the people are that eventually became "The Tea Party".

http://youtu.be/fieGfc6DL7k

http://youtu.be/WD3p_g2jXh8

You think any of those folks are voting for Cain?

9/27/2011 5:12:09 PM

^^

Obama drops his gs for lots of his speeches. Someone I know that saw him when he was here commented on this actually. If that's the only time the ap transcribed it that way, that's suspicious.

9/28/2011 9:09:57 AM