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Special Report
Don’t Blame Us
And especially not Obama, for the state of the economy — when we know it’s all the doing of a right-wing conspiracy.
When it comes to the weakness of our current economic “recovery” (a term we must use loosely given unemployment only 1% lower than at its worst), liberals are determined to blame anyone other than the Obama Administration, using arguments both false and reprehensible.
Keynesian-in-Chief Paul Krugman, in his latest conspiracy-under-every-rock article for the New York Times, argues that “rentiers” who own large quantities of U.S. government bonds (which is to say who have done Americans the favor of loaning cheap money to our government) benefit from the low interest rates that usually accompany a weak economy.
Therefore, according to Krugman, this “Pain Caucus” works to “protect the interests of creditors, no matter the cost.” One would think that a Nobel Prize-winning economist (though Nobel’s shine has lost some luster given its awards to Yasser Arafat, Al Gore, and Barack “maybe I’ll earn this one day” Obama) would know better than to offer such claptrap. Or maybe he does know better but assumes — probably correctly — that most of his readers don’t.
Let’s consider whether any among the large holders of our federal debt would actually favor persistently very low interest rates — and keep in mind that very low long-term rates generally require investor expectations of economic growth too weak to cause inflation, and perhaps weak enough to allow deflation.
• The Federal Reserve, as the largest holder of U.S. debt, has the “dual mandate” of managing inflation and encouraging employment, meaning it must focus on economic growth that would eventually cause a paper “loss” on its bonds, but one that it will probably never realize because it can hold the bonds to maturity rather than selling them.
• China and Japan are the two largest foreign holders of U.S. debt, with oil exporters (in the aggregate) coming in fourth. Exporters to the U.S. care far more about the ability to sell us their stuff, and about the value of the dollar (both for exporting and for the value of their investments) than they care about the nominal prices of the bonds they hold.
• U.S. fixed income investors would be able to invest future cash flows at higher yields if interest rates rose. Furthermore, most investors are diversified in asset classes like stocks, real estate, and commodities that often don’t correlate with bond prices.
• Banks profit primarily by lending. Persistently low interest rates signal a low demand for loans. Thus whatever they are “making” on a bond portfolio is being offset by a lack of activity in their real businesses. Most banks would gladly give up very low rates in order to see a return of customers.
Krugman’s argument is therefore based on a ridiculous assumption that the levers of power are held, directly or indirectly, by people who own bonds, nothing but bonds, and care about nothing but nominal bond prices. No professional investor or sovereign wealth fund (the investing arm of a government) is that stupid.
Paul Krugman is trying to create another “evil foreigner” or “greedy banker” bogeyman, a financial “man behind the curtain” willing to sacrifice all else for the purposes of boosting a bond portfolio while the world burns around him. It’s a pathetic paranoid argument by a man desperate to counter the nation’s rational (if overdue) turn against Keynesian economics.
Paul Krugman’s article is nonsense, but at least it ascribes a semi-benign motivation to the policy makers themselves: Politicians who don’t understand economics very well “assume that what’s good for the people you hang out with, the people who seem so impressive in meetings — hey, they’re rich, they’re smart, and they have great tailors — must be good for the economy as a whole.” Krugman at least gets this right; most members of Congress have little understanding of economics and can be manipulated, not least by Krugman himself.
It’s one thing to say politicians make poor decisions due to being uninformed or manipulated. It’s another thing entirely to claim, as Yahoo Finance’s Dan Gross does, that Republicans are “trying to do everything they can screw the economy near term so that they can retake the White House and keep their jobs.” That at least was the summary of Gross’s view by his TV partner, Henry Blodget; Gross called that description “slightly hyperbolic” but then proceeded to say that “the political incentives… for the Republicans are for things to go badly in the economy.”
He followed up by arguing that Republicans would prefer the stock market down, economic growth down, and unemployment up to help their electoral chances, concluding “it then stands to reason that if you have the ability to have a role in policy, that you would engineer policy to get that outcome.” The helpful crew at Yahoo put a subtitle on the screen during Gross’ gross remarks: “Is the GOP trying to sabotage the economy in order to win the White House?”
It’s one thing to say that better economic and employment growth would help the prospects of the incumbent party, which happens to be Democrats today. It’s another thing entirely, even in these politically cynical times, to say that the out-of-power party would intentionally harm millions of Americans in order to garner extra votes.
The logic behind Gross’ remarks is not unlike Krugman’s confusion: they both believe that weak economic performance is not due to Democrats’ big-spending policies but rather that government simply hasn’t taxed and spent enough. The wisdom of “If you find yourself in a deep hole, stop digging” is apparently lost on them.
About the Author
Ross Kaminsky is a self-employed trader and investor and is a senior fellow of the Heartland Institute. He is the host of The Ross Kaminsky Show on Denver’s NewsRadio 850 KOA at 11 AM on most Sundays. You can reach Ross by e-mail at rossputin(at)rossputin(dot)com.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (202) | Leave a comment
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oldfart| 6.20.11 @ 6:36AM
It is really scary when 'educated idiots' start believing their own propaganda. And/or they believe we are so stupid we believe the bovine excrement they spew as facts. Too bad these people are so 'smart' they never felt it was necessary to study history.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 11:01AM
How much "education" is required to say: "It's Bush's fault."
Stan Redmond| 6.20.11 @ 11:30AM
A harvard edumacation.
Occam's Tool| 6.20.11 @ 6:16PM
Indeed. Now, Krugman actually won his Nobel Prize in economics, not Peace, and his research was thought to be solid.
However, this has nothing to do with his political philosophies, which are universally repugnant. Fortunately, he has no children, and adopted none...
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:10PM
I was wondering who would notice that the Nobel Prize recipients I named weren't for economics, but I still think those guys tarnish the entire Nobel "brand."
Leave it to you, Occam, to be the noticer. (sorta like the "decider")
Alan Brooks| 6.20.11 @ 4:34PM
"How much 'education' is required to say: 'It's Bush's fault.' "
That is it exactly; again:
since Bush wasn't rightist, he cannot be held culpable for being part of a rightwing conspiracy.
Bush was as innocent as Carter in that respect!
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 12:54PM
Well, the modus operandi of liberals is to make reality fit their vision of the world, and if the two disagree, it's reality that gets the boot (e.g., we can "will" our way to making alternative energy sources economically viable).
That is at the root of all of our disastrous policies over the last 75 years.
Fortunately for liberals, they never look at the outcomes of their destructive initiatives. From the New Deal to the Great Society to the Fannie and Freddie debacle, liberals look at the ruins of our society and conclude that, since their intentions are noble and selfless, it must be that they just haven't done enough yet.
Margie| 6.20.11 @ 3:03PM
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
[1855 H. G. Bohn "Hand-Book of Proverbs 514"]
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 3:14PM
When you consider Barney Frank and his Fannie boyfriend I wonder about good intentions. The elite always do pretty well in the environments they create. The fact that they don't look at results is evidence that their motives may be less than pure.
Alan Brooks| 6.20.11 @ 4:30PM
RIGHTwing conspiracy? don't you mean RINO? who in 2011 still thinks the eight long years of the Bush administration were anti-statist in any way whatsoever?
Darin| 6.20.11 @ 6:50AM
Like children, liberals are never responsible for their own actions. It's ALWAYS someone elses fault. Even when caught in the act, there is no ownership of responsibility. Look up the word "leadership" and check out the antonym. Such is a good definition of modern liberals.
wodiej| 6.20.11 @ 11:55AM
that's it exactly.
TrueBlue| 6.20.11 @ 2:57PM
And unfortunately they've been grooming our kids to have that same attitude via public schools, making it even harder to turn things around.
jolizoom| 6.20.11 @ 4:08PM
Wow, "subordination". A good definition indeed.
Alan Brooks| 6.20.11 @ 4:38PM
"liberals are never responsible for their own actions"
What of RINOs? are they to be held accountable for anything but choosing the ghost writers to help them do up their over-priced/under-illuminating memoirs?
Melvin| 6.20.11 @ 7:24AM
To invoke the famous phrase of Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke. "What we have here, is a failure to communicate."
Well, we naturally expect the Democrats not to communicate with Conservatives, but the Republicans?
The only thing that the Country Club Blue Bloods are communicating is, "We must win, we must win, we must win." So where does the Country fit into this grand scheme of the Globalists. The main miscommunication is, we don't. The Republican Country Club Blue Bloods have always been a gutless bunch, and they do not have the stones to tell the Conservatives. "We don't really need you guys until the elections to give the illusion of a Representative form of government. So just go back to your bibles and guns and be quiet would you?"
People.... I don't care how you cut it but we haven't a Representative form of government anymore. Czars, dropping bombs and entering into a European Union War on a sovereign country without Congressional approval!
Then that little tin pot dictator for a President, thumbs his nose at Congress, and says, "Don't you know who I am?"
Instead of immediately cutting off funding for the Libyan War, the tanned one, John Boehner goes on a tax payer funded multiple golf outings.
I wanted to give John Boehner the benefit of the doubt. But we are into the 2012 elections and we still don't have a budget as the Constitution prescribes and both the Socialist Democrats and the Country Club Blue Blood Republicans don't seem to much in a hurry either.
You know, (hypothetically thinking) it would be great to storm Congress and jerk out every single Country Club Blue Blood Republican and crucify them on the Washington Mall. Just like the Romans did. To be an example of what happens when they don't follow the Constitution.
There is no more check and balances the three branches of government have merged into one self-serving tyrannical dictatorship.
Michael Tomlinson| 6.20.11 @ 7:58AM
House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, last week said Congress could cut funding for U.S. military involvement in Libya, ratcheting up pressure on Obama.
The House Republicans passed a budget http://budget.house.gov/fy2012budget/, but it was your Democrat pals in the Senate who have failed to do their job.
As for your fantasy I find it interesting your ire is against Republicans, but not Democrats who caused our current predicament. You must be a Democrat, because you refuse to hold them accountable for their actions or Obama's policies.
Jack Olson| 6.20.11 @ 8:14AM
Paul Newman didn't say that, Strother Martin said it to Paul Newman.
Conspiracy theorists are generally among the losers in a competitive economy or democratic political system. When there are enough of them, they represent a political constituency big enough to be exploited, like the Birthers, the Truthers and the JFK conspiray buffs. Fortunately, the exploiters of the paranoiacs cannot build a lasting movement. They always fetch up against the realism of the majority and end up discredited, like the House Select Committee on Assassinations, Mark Lane, and Jim Garrison. If you would like to make a buck off the delusions of the losers, it's best to plan in the short term because you aren't likely to have a long one. Kind of like Paul Krugman, whose newspaper is in such dire straits that before long he'll be back in academia where being an economist means never having to admit you're wrong.
David| 6.20.11 @ 9:29AM
Thanks for drawing a line in the sand here - to use one trite phrase. Yes, movements like the Tea Party tend to crop up in bad times - witness the same kind of groups that emerged during the Great Depression.
And the Tea Party will have about the same longevity as Father Charles Loughlin did.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 10:19AM
A more perfect incomprehesion of the Tea Party movement could not have been expressed.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 10:38AM
Redstate, don't hold it against him. He missed the days when Code Pink was grabbing the headlines. All he has now is a expired membership in the "Coffee Party"
David| 6.20.11 @ 10:48AM
As usual - serve up the insults, fail to engage.
*sigh*
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 10:56AM
David.. you feel you've been insulted? Really?
I'm not going to waste time explaining things to Liber-uls and are self-evident. The Tea Party is trying to save this country and they're decent people and it peeves me Liber-uls never comment on the Fact that when Tea Party people hold a Rally, they consistently leave the place cleaner than they found it while the complete opposite happens when Liber-uls hold a Rally... Right there is a telling example of the quality of the people in the 2 movements.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:04PM
And how did you measure the cleanliness of same? Seriously?
And were these the same people who showed up with a witch doctor poster lampooning Obama? The same folks who staged a skit with an Obama figure whipping a white boy? The same folks who believe Obama = white slavery? The folks holding the poster that said "The American Taxpayer are the Jews for Obama's Ovens"? The folks holding the poster of Obama as "The New Hitler" The folks holding the poster of an Obama-like figure cutting the throat of Uncle Sam?
That's the best you got - The Tea Party is tidy? Okay, The Tea Party is for clean grounds and filthy ideas. Granted.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 12:31PM
I know, right. I mean the left never portrayed Bush as Hitler, or Satan, or hung him in effigy, called him a war criminal, etc. They are so much classier.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:56PM
Stick to the subject, DS. The subject was the tidiness of the Tea Party versus the cleanliness of its ideas.
Does the Left have bad taste as well? Sure. Stick to the subject. Unless you don't have a rational response? Then you could just acknowledge that too.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 1:52PM
"And were these the same people who showed up with a witch doctor poster lampooning Obama? The same folks who staged a skit with an Obama figure whipping a white boy? The same folks who believe Obama = white slavery? The folks holding the poster that said "The American Taxpayer are the Jews for Obama's Ovens"? The folks holding the poster of Obama as "The New Hitler" The folks holding the poster of an Obama-like figure cutting the throat of Uncle Sam?:
You started it.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:12PM
I am never short of amazement when posts are read through the ideological equivalent of beer goggles here.
My point was that redstateboy was more concerned about who cleans up after themselves better - the Tea Party or everyone else. I'm more concerned about the content of the Tea Party's positions and claims.
I also remain curious how redstateboy determined the level of cleanliness after a Tea Party even versus anyone else's event.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 2:23PM
So you replied to redstates cleanliness post by remarking about all the people insulting or making deragotory remarks about Obama (which had nothing to do with cleanliness), I point out the left's exact same actions in opposition to your post and yet I am the one with beer goggles on? You have been informed of the Tea parties positions and claims yet, you only spout and believe what the left claims their motives are. You M.O. is becoming increasingly clear. Your a professional agitator (read shit stirrer) who post verbal attacks or ask for specifics while never giving any of your own and becoming offended when someone attacks you back. I would reply more but your not listening anyway, you just want to keep the shit pot simmering.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:54PM
I'm not the one making the grand generalities started by Mr. Kaminsky. But okay, ya wanna know what I believe? Here goes.
Life - politicial, social, and economic life - is complex. Its problems are complex and its solutions are complex. (Stick with me. I know you're already slathering.)
If solutions were easy, they'd have been implemented by now. And whoever came up with those solutions - Left or Right - would be taking credit.
I believe the Constitution is one of the greatest documents us humans have ever penned to regulate our affairs. I believe that Constitution is an alive, dynamic framework that has proven amazingly resilient and applicable to changing times. I do not agree with the Supreme Court justice who dismissed the Constitution as "dead, dead, dead."
I believe the Bill of Rights added essential rights. I believe the Supreme Court's ruling last year on the 2nd amendment was an abomination even though, as a gun owner, I've not yet found a solution to gun violence/control that's acceptable. I believe fewer handguns in the world is preferable to "concealed carry" or "constitutitional carry" or any other kind of carry. I really am not looking forward to a Wisconsin where anyone can carry a handgun into a bar at any time.
That said, American government has evolved and responded to the needs of the body politic over time. However, "government" is not a monolithic thing - good or bad. There's city/village government, township, county, and state government, and the federal government. You have to be specific.
Like life, government - its responsibilities, its limits, its powers - is complex. I believe government best serves as a referee - a disinterested third party - to the affairs of people. But, hell yes, human activities need to be regulated. I am not naive enough to rely on the tender mercies of the "free market" or the benign intentions of anyone. I've only asked capitalism to work for me twice - once in assuring our savings for our son's college education was secure and dependable and once for my retirement. I've been disappointed both times but I'm willing to take my chances otherwise.
The excesses of any special interest - union, business, religion, whatever - must be restrained. Right now, the restraint is left up to government. Anyone who wants to believe in the inherent goodness of people to self-regulate their behavior is free to do so but that contradicts all of my life experience.
I believe in equal opportunity unfettered by government (or unions or businessess or any other special interest) unless and until there are demonstrable reasons to do otherwise. And there have been plenty of demonstrable reasons in history. Take Bob Dole's Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) - a courageous exercise in compromise and legislative insight on his part in my view.
I believe men and women are equal in all matters political and economic. My wife is my partner, period. Are men and women different? is an absurd question. Of course, they are. That's not the point. The point is that my wife should earn a dollar just like I do and not the current 85 cents on average.
Although a Quaker, I believe the men and women of the military require respect and dignity for what they've contributed. No, I don't believe in giving every veteran everything he/she has ever asked for just because of that status. The treatment of wounded vets at Walter Reid was a travesty and a national embarrassment. I believe the National Guard, Reserve and regular forces deserve the exact same benefits when they're in combat.
I believe combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan must stop - NOW. I believe we need to honor the dead and heal the wounded. I believe that war is rarely, if ever, the answer.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 3:10PM
Finally, now oddly enough we agree on most things. Except one and it is a important one.
"The excesses of any special interest - union, business, religion, whatever - must be restrained. Right now, the restraint is left up to government. Anyone who wants to believe in the inherent goodness of people to self-regulate their behavior is free to do so but that contradicts all of my life experience."
Do I take it you then think it is best for the goverment to provide the restraint? If so, we disagree, yes people/groups sometimes do not show restraint. That is called freedom. Sooner or later the action will be self-correcting, that is called life. Goverment should be limited in it's scope less it become all-powerful. Then you eventually have anarchy. The world is a complicated place and not everything will be solved by any one side. That being said, I believe a goverment that gets the hell out of the way is best within limitations of saving life/limb or the specific duties outlined by our founding fathers. Man should be free to make choices for himself, even if they hurt him in the long run.
David| 6.20.11 @ 6:06PM
" ... even if they hurt him in the long run." I think this is the phrase that separates us (and probably always will).
Example: Land use regulations. Recently, a realtor told a prospective buyer of a lot adjacent to our 7 acres that it was perfectly okay to have a car repair and a collision center. Under your dictum, this would be okay although it would greatly impair MY use of MY land (smells, noise, limit hunting of pheasants, deer,etc.) and perhaps threaten MY well (improper or careless disposal/use of paints, oil, and chemicals). Fortunately, this became a non-issue as the township has zoning that presents this kind of potential mess.
How would this be "freedom" and/or "life" as you said? I'm not tauting, seriously, this is a great thought and I want to explore it.
I believe it was the poet e.e. cummings who penned, "Your rights end at the point where your fist intersects my nose."
W| 6.20.11 @ 3:38PM
The solutions are not complex, they are simple but difficult. Complex is not the same as difficult. As for your beliefs, you sound like a Democrat, but i am curious:What about Libya? As a Quaker, i assume you are then against abortion, don't fudge and say you are personally opposed but anyone can get an abortion. Why do you have a gun? It is not fewer handguns that we need, it is fewer criminals who will use guns, knives, bats, axes, whatever is handy. To say the Court's decision on the Second Amendment is an abomination shows some sloppy thinking and poor history. You should do more reading on the Second Amendment and Bill of Rights.
David| 6.20.11 @ 6:15PM
Hmmm. Complex is not the same as difficult and very likely not the point in a political arena. You can make a difficult decision based on oversimplifying a complex issue. You can make a difficult decision based on make a simple issue too complex.
That said, life is complex, W, and it isn't prone to reducing to bumper stickers or bromides.
Hunh? The rest of your post is a pastiche of incorrect information, leaps of illogic, and other words.
I am a Democrat only to the extent that I despise what Bush/Cheney did to this country for eight years. Right now, I loathe both parties.
And what about Libya?
What does being a Quaker have to do with a position on abortion?
I have five guns, actually, because I enjoy hunting. Is it such a stretch that a liberal can hunt? If you would stop stereotyping constantly and look to the complex, you'd see people. I assume that there are conservatives who don't and won't own a gun. I haven't met any but I am open to the idea that there are some.
As for "sloppy thinking and poor history," do cite some authorities that will educate me.
W| 6.20.11 @ 8:34PM
David, it seems you are easily stumped and confused.
1. As a Quaker, you are against killing, what is your position on killing the unborn? clear enough for you?
2. As a liberal, are you supporting obama, your liberal, on the Libyan war? clear enough?
3. Gun control. by your comments you seem to favor gun control. you must believe then that passing another law to prohibit guns will cause criminals to obey this law. We already have numerous laws prohibting murder, rape , robbery, etc, and yet people seem to violate these laws. So if we pass another law prohibiting gun ownership (which is unconstitutional) why would everyone obey this law? You must think a murderer will stop and say "gee I can't use this gun to kill because I can't have a gun,so I must use something else.
Are you the David who admitted being part of the mob at the capital in Wisconsin, exercising your rights under the First Amendment?
David| 6.21.11 @ 11:08PM
W,
I'm going to assume that you're asking honestly and not just taunting. I'm also going to assume that unlike the W who was in the Oval Office you're able to process a complicated explanation. I also don't have a faith-based answer so I don't know if you're going to reject this upfront.
Abortion is a moral problem for me. The problem, as I see it, is that the U.S. - "we" in the loosest sense of the term - has three competing sets of rights.
There is society and its set of rights, there is the woman and her rights, and - surprised? - the rights of the fetus.
If you don't agree at this point, then, fine go back to your conservative Fortress Amerika and we'll meet again on another battlefield.
Assuming you do, look closer. Society has the right to determine, by consensus, what is right and what is wrong. Just like society agrees that we drive on the right hand side of the road, that we have the right to vote, that all persons are equal under the law, etc.
A woman has the right to control her own body. She is not a pawn or a possession of the men in her life. She is a genuine and unique person capable of deciding her fate and future. And the fetus has the right to be wanted.
I struggle with the simplistic concept that birth begins at conception. Religious considerations aside, my best understanding is that conception is not an event, it's a process with 20-plus steps over a period of time.
I have evolved from an early viewpoint that a fetus is nothing more than an "insensate lump of cells" as a feminist put it to me in the mid70's. Again, because I respect genuine science, I know that isn't necessarily true.
So, no, I don't have a dogmatic, definitive answer for you.
As a Quaker, I start with the position that my goal, like George Fox', "is to walk gently over all the world and greet that of God in everyone." I can never automatically endorse any war, regardless, as your imputed taunt dares, "my liberal" is involved with.
Gun control - I'm going to ignore your taunting and simply repeat what I've written in these spaces any number of times - I think fewer handguns in the world is a good thing. I think "concealed carry" or "Constitutional carry" or any other carry is not a good idea. I just haven't seen any scheme that will do reduce gun violence without endangering the principle of private ownership of guns. No, just passing another law is not going to solve much. See, W, there are middle positions. I know it's difficult for persons of a lockstep frame of mind as you reveal here but try.
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 4:08PM
Your fatal mistake is that you don't believe in the "benignity" of the free market, but you believe government can act as an impartial observer.
You might as well believe in the tooth fairy.
It is not possible for the government to be impartial, and it is not remotely the purpose of modern government in the US to be impartial; the purpose of government is to grow larger, and you do that by doling out ever-increading goodies to your constituents. To the extent government has any other purpose it is solely the redistribution of wealth at the point of a gun. It is raw, naked coercion.
The prime directive of every bureaucracy that has ever been created is to grow itself, to increase its budget, to add people such that its power to perpetuate and grow becomes unchallengeable. A bureaucracy's purpose is NEVER to solve the problem it was created to solve. If it does that, it will be out of a job.
I do not understand this blind trust in government - particularly given endless demonstrable, empircal evidence that it is anything but impartial, and that government control never, ever works. Look at the trillions we've thrown into education in the last 45 years. Yet test scores continue to decline and it's a shambles - which has only accelerated after we conjured up the Department of Education, a sucking maw of money with an insatiable appetite.
Why is that? Show me how making eduation a huge bureaucracy has been a success. Show me how the war on poverty was a success - it institutionalized poverty and destroyed the black family. How is minimum wage a success? It has succeeded in perennial unemployment among the lowest rung of workers. How is the ethanol debacle a success? It's a net negative at every link in the value chain. How is the welfare state a success? Medicaid? Medicare? Social Security? These are boondoggles that have jacked the cost of living up for all of us.
How can you conclude that government is ipso facto beneficent - when we see time after time that it is just the opposite - a malevolent force.
Not to mention that whenever anybody has the opportunity to spend other people's money, they spend it like sailors. Ever know anyone on an expense account? When it's somebody else's dime, it's champagne and caviar and limos everywhere. When it's our own money, it's peanut butter and jelly and the 10 year-old Toyota.
Free markets work; you cannot empower a centrally planned government to take the place of the millions of individual decisions that comprise the free market. You cannot assign artificial values to goods and services, as Obamacare tries to do. It never works. Why are so many doctors getting out of the Medicaid game? Bause they cannot afford to get paid 1/3 or 1/4 or what their services normally command. Of course it's always the OTHER guy who is greedy; but you and me? We DESERVE whatever we think we deserve.
Look at the Soviet Union - was it an impartial referee? Were its price controls successful? It has the largest unbroken tract of arable land on the planet perfect for growing wheat, and yet they couldn't put bread on store shelves. Why? Somehow, though, the Communist Party elite had gorgeous dachas on the Black Sea and lived like sultans. Why?
As the saying goes, if liberals were put in charge of the Sahara desert, in five years it would be out of sand.
And before you talk about the evils of unbridled capitalism and monopolies, consider that we haven't had anything approaching a true free market in this country for over a century. Back before we allowed regulations to strangle the free market, our so-called "monopolists" were guilty of the crime of delivering goods and services hitherto unimagineable to the non-rich such that, for the first time in history, non-wealthy people could enjoy the benefits of oil (Rockefeller), transportation (Vanderbilt, Ford) and steel (Carnegie). These people were robber barons? Really? They made the middle class living standard attainable for the largest swath of non-elites in the history of the world.
And please don't cite the health care industry as an example of capitalism's evils; that is a debacle authored directly by government's heavy hand - that is 100% of the reason health care is so expensive today.
The truth is, virtually all so called "crony capitalism" is the result of government interference, not free markets. Goverment is not an impartial observer - it is a partisan, and a tendentious one that is able to tilt the playing field to its own advantage at will.
There is nothing so intractable, nothing so formidable, nothing so autocratic, as threatening to you and me, as a low-level bureaucrat who is able to wield the power of the state with the touch of a button.
But the liberal mind never, ever learns.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 4:15PM
"Not to mention that whenever anybody has the opportunity to spend other people's money, they spend it like sailors."
That would be Drunken Sailors, hence my moniker, in tribute to our Congress
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 4:26PM
I apologize, Drunken Sailor - upon rereading my post, I caught the omission. :-)
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 4:25PM
The bottom line is this: Our government has become a metastasized Leviathan with an insatiable appetite; it has usurped the market's role of making decisions based on economics and replaced it with a sclerotic, bloated, Byzantine hierarchy that makes decisions based NOT on economics, but on politics.
In these instances, it never ends well, and it will not end well for us.
I hope Obama does get reelected, frankly, and that Republicans lay down and let him do whatever he wants. Maybe after he completely obliterates all of the wealth in this country destroys what's left of our culture, people will realize that the tooth fairy doesn't exist. That we do in fact live in a causal universe.
Until then, though, the magical thinking of liberals will continue to feed the false consciousness upon which our entire edifice precariously rests.
David| 6.20.11 @ 6:41PM
Where to start, where to start?
No, I don’t believe in a benign free market. In my experience, there is no such thing.
No, I didn’t say government was an impartial observer. I used the word “referee.” I used the word intentionally.
Your brush is much too wide and brutal. I’m positive the good farmers and merchants who make up our county board would strenuously object (those who stayed awake through an entire meeting or could read) to your characterization. I’m sure my town chairman, who’s also my neighbor, would wonder what wealth it was that he was supposed to redistribute, with or without a gun.
I didn’t say I trusted government but, given the choice of trusting the good intentions or the fair conduct of a corporate bank, a large corporation, or a money manager – I’ll go with government, thank you.
That’s quite a litany of social woes. The one bright spot is that finally I’ve heard or read someone on the Right acknowledges Social Security to be a – duh – social program. On the other hand, I’m hard pressed to understand how Social Security is a boondoggle.
I’m not even going to go into your scree about the minimum wage. That debate is long over.
And I agree with you about ethanol. What do you make of that? I agree with you.
I could ask you the question in reverse – How can you conclude that a “free market” – if there was EVER such a thing - is ipso facto beneficent?
I don’t believe that I endorsed self-perpetuating bureaucracies by wanting government to be a referee.
And you betray your own class envy by dissing everyone who has used an expense account – someone like me, for example. And you diss my boss – an ardent Republican - by thinking that he’d let me or anyone else get away with the extravagances you list.
True - You cannot empower a centrally planned government to take the place of the millions of individual decisions that comprise the free market. That’s still not what I said.
“You cannot assign artificial values to goods and services …” Oh please. That’s just ignorant. Insurance companies do it all of the time. When I worked for a Wisconsin insurance company, there were 27 separate decisions involved in applying various codes and schemes and decisions – many of which are PRIVATELY spawned. Nope, sorry, based on personal involvement and experience, government is hardly 100% responsible for the cost of healthcare.
Don’t use the Soviet Union as a stalking horse. Nobody at any part of the political spectrum mourns its departure. All totalitarian regimes – regardless of the lipstick you put on a pig – are exactly as you describe. How is “living like a sultan” with dachas any different from a John McCain who couldn’t even remember how many homes he owned? And, btw, I am a homeowner – paid for – so there’s no envy on my part.
Wow – great re-writing of history by ennobling the “Robber Barons.” That’s also so ignorant that it doesn’t bear response.
True - There is nothing so intractable, nothing so formidable, nothing so autocratic, as threatening to you and me, as a low-level bureaucrat who is able to wield the power of the state with the touch of a button.
“But the liberal mind never, ever learns.” And the Right Wing mind does?
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 10:05PM
Don't strain yourself, old boy: it doesn't take a genius to respond to arguments with chestnuts like "that's long since settled!" and "you're ignorant." It is you who are ignorant, my blind, foolish friend.
Why is the Soviet Union a stalking horse? It was invented to impart social and economic justice onto the oppressed masses - and what is our government but a thousand little departments of social justice? All socialist goverment start out with the same ideological fervor of buiding a fair society. And all collapse in a rubble because socialism doesn't work, human nature cannot be changed and corruption invariably infects the corridors of power.
And if your county has the capability of imposing taxes - which I assume it does - it is de facto involved in redistribution of wealth - by coercion. Unless property and other taxes are optional where you live. If so, I want to move there. And where I live, you have to get the friggin township's permission to put an addition on your home. But nah, that's not coercion.
I believe that government should be our servants, not the other way around.
And what of the farmers in California's Central Valley who've been deprived of the water they need for their crops because some EPA administrator decided he was going to elevate an insignificant fish - the Delta Smelt - to Godlike status and force those farmers to pound sand if they don't like his ruling. Yeah. Fair.
Oh - and I'm guessing that you once embraced ethanol - and loved the fact that goverment was forcing people to use it - until even the environmental whack jobs could no longer deny it was bad for the environment. Ooopsie. Oh well, we're only stuck with a trillion dollar boondoggle that benefits a few connected farmers and Big Agra companies like ADM.
But you know what? Because it's a government program and because there's an entire artificial economy around it, it will never go away. Neither will wind or solar power. I'm waiting for Obama to force us to use Unicorn tears and pixie dust in our gas tanks.
I don't have time to atttack all of your sophistry, but let's just take minimum wage. That issue is long since settled? Yes, it is. And the verdict is not in your favor if you read beyond the Center for American Progress and the Huffington Post.
You logic falls apart quickly: If $7.50 minimum wage is good, wouldn't $10.00 be better? And if $10.00 is good, wouldn't $20 be better? Heck, if you made it $100 an hour, we'd all be living the dream, right? And if that logic falls down - and it most certainly does - kindly explain to me why. I'll tell you - economic reality.
You don't seem to understand where the money to pay these wages comes from. 80% of all businesses in this country are small businesses - mom and pop shops and modest establishments of just a few dozen people, and many business are just eeking out a living; many profits are plowed back into the business and, where I live, you have to have a hole in your head if you want to start a business because you have a multi-year gauntlet of bureaucratic rings you have to kiss and regulations that put government's fingers at every level in your pie before it's even baked. Why be an entrepreneur under such conditions? Many don't; in my state, nobody wants to start a business anymore, and who can blame them? So buildings sit empty and unemployment rises.
If you are forced to pay workers $7.50 an hour plus another $3.00 in benefits, and, given that worker's skill level he only provided $8.50 worth of value to your company, you aren't going to hire him. It's really that simple. It's math.
But I'm ignorant. Perhaps you can tell the authors of the following studies that they're ignorant too.
The minimum wage reduces employment.
Currie and Fallick (1993), Gallasch (1975), Gardner (1981), Peterson (1957), Peterson and Stewart (1969).
The minimum wage reduces employment more among teenagers than adults.
Adie (1973); Brown, Gilroy and Kohen (1981a, 1981b); Fleisher (1981); Hammermesh (1982); Meyer and Wise (1981, 1983a); Minimum Wage Study Commission (1981); Neumark and Wascher (1992); Ragan (1977); Vandenbrink (1987); Welch (1974, 1978); Welch and Cunningham (1978).
The minimum wage reduces employment most among black teenage males.
Al-Salam, Quester, and Welch (1981), Iden (1980), Mincer (1976), Moore (1971), Ragan (1977), Williams (1977a, 1977b).
The minimum wage helped South African whites at the expense of blacks.
Bauer (1959).
The minimum wage hurts blacks generally.
Behrman, Sickles and Taubman (1983); Linneman (1982).
The minimum wage hurts the unskilled.
Krumm (1981).
The minimum wage hurts low wage workers.
Brozen (1962), Cox and Oaxaca (1986), Gordon (1981).
The minimum wage hurts low wage workers particularly during cyclical downturns.
Kosters and Welch (1972), Welch (1974).
The minimum wage increases job turnover.
Hall (1982).
The minimum wage reduces average earnings of young workers.
Meyer and Wise (1983b).
The minimum wage drives workers into uncovered jobs, thus lowering wages in those sectors.
Brozen (1962), Tauchen (1981), Welch (1974).
The minimum wage reduces employment in low-wage industries, such as retailing.
Cotterman (1981), Douty (1960), Fleisher (1981), Hammermesh (1981), Peterson (1981).
The minimum wage hurts small businesses generally.
Kaun (1965).
The minimum wage causes employers to cut back on training.
Hashimoto (1981, 1982), Leighton and Mincer (1981), Ragan (1981).
The minimum wage has long-term effects on skills and lifetime earnings.
Brozen (1969), Feldstein (1973).
The minimum wage leads employers to cut back on fringe benefits.
McKenzie (1980), Wessels (1980).
The minimum wage encourages employers to install labor-saving devices.
Trapani and Moroney (1981).
The minimum wage hurts low-wage regions, such as the South and rural areas.
Colberg (1960, 1981), Krumm (1981).
The minimum wage increases the number of people on welfare.
Brandon (1995), Leffler (1978).
The minimum wage hurts the poor generally.
Stigler (1946).
The minimum wage does little to reduce poverty.
Bonilla (1992), Brown (1988), Johnson and Browning (1983), Kohen and Gilroy (1981), Parsons (1980), Smith and Vavrichek (1987).
The minimum wage helps upper income families.
Bell (1981), Datcher and Loury (1981), Johnson and Browning (1981), Kohen and Gilroy (1981).
The minimum wage helps unions.
Linneman (1982), Cox and Oaxaca (1982).
The minimum wage lowers the capital stock.
McCulloch (1981).
The minimum wage increases inflationary pressure.
Adams (1987), Brozen (1966), Gramlich (1976), Grossman (1983).
The minimum wage increases teenage crime rates.
Hashimoto (1987), Phillips (1981).
The minimum wage encourages employers to hire illegal aliens.
Beranek (1982).
Few workers are permanently stuck at the minimum wage.
Brozen (1969), Smith and Vavrichek (1992).
The minimum wage has had a massive impact on unemployment in Puerto Rico.
Freeman and Freeman (1991), Rottenberg (1981b).
The minimum wage has reduced employment in foreign countries.
Canada: Forrest (1982); Chile: Corbo (1981); Costa Rica: Gregory (1981); France: Rosa (1981).
Characteristics of minimum wage workers
Employment Policies Institute (1994), Haugen and Mellor (1990), Kniesner (1981), Mellor (1987), Mellor and Haugen (1986), Smith and Vavrichek (1987), Van Giezen (1994).
Oh, and by the way: I work for an insurance company - a Fortune 100 company. Given the fact that you made no point whatsoever in your talk about decision making, I don't know how to respond except to say that insurance companies make decisions based on competitive market realities unless otherwise dictated by government. As I'm sure you know, the top 7 insurance companies last year made less in profits than the total that was wasted in Medicaid.
But liberalism is a religion, and I understand that, while facts are easy to refute, religion is an article of faith.
David| 6.21.11 @ 11:13PM
Impressive collection of citations. Good job. But I note that virtually all of your citations are 1994 or earlier. As I'm sure you'd agree, economic conditions change. Anything recent?
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 10:09PM
Oh, and I'm still reeling from your cogent argument against the robber barons - how did you put it? "That’s also so ignorant that it doesn’t bear response."
Wow. The facts you present simply amaze. Guess you showed me!
You remind me of uneducated people who stare slackjawed at something someone just said that they don't have a prayer of understanding, but they know they have to come back with something so as not to lose face. So, invariably, they come back with, "you're ignorant!"
Just out of curiosity, do you know what the word "ignorant" means?
Die Fledermaus| 6.20.11 @ 6:12PM
Confirmed by park police in interviews along with those of business owners.
The left wing jerks vandalize, break windows, throw trash anywhere they like and just leave.
Rallies on the right by Tea Party folks or anyone (Glenn Beck rally vs. Comedy Central rally) always leave the place cleaner. They even pack their trash.
Evidence is in many stories, articles, news reports and PICTURES!!!!
One idiot at a Tea Party with a racist poster does not paint the entire party. Frankly, at the rallies I've been to, only one idiot like that ever showed up and we asked him to leave. He got beligerent and when the police showed up and checked is ID we found out he was a local left wing agitator there to get photographed by some left wing so-called journalist so they could write "Tea Party Racist" and give useful idiots like you something to whine about.
As to the other differences, it's the left that has the monopoly on viral hatred. You complaining that some Tea Party guy compared Obama to Hitler is LAUGHABLE when you don't equally notate that was SOP when protesting Bush.
Say "hi" to Soros for me when you get your next check.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 2:09PM
will someone shoot this bananahead that U-tube Vid. of the Liber-ul counter-rally in Wash.DC. to the Beck Rally?! You'll see all the Communist Flags flying... The vendors selling Communist this and Communist That and the Moutains of Trash that littered the Mall and Finally.... For an Obamatoid... with a straight face - to blather about supposed Tea Party signs when we had to suffer everything from the Left from George Bush assasination Movies, to Plays, to the most disgusting signage of hatred directed of Dubbya is ludicrious and hypocritical.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:16PM
That's your answer? I already acknowledged there is equal fault on the Left for signs and plays and movies that are, at best, in poor taste.
As for the "supposed" items, go look on yahoo or google or some of the "lamestream" media sites you hate so much. I didn't make any of those up - it's too bloody ludicrous to make up. Or ask your friends and fellow travelers - I'm willing to bet the authors would be pleased to share.
jolizoom| 6.20.11 @ 4:16PM
Have you checked out AT today? There's an article about Obama's new brown-shirts (TSA) terrorizing people at a FL bus station. Whose filthy idea was that?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 11:04AM
"And the Tea Party will have about the same longevity as Father Charles Loughlin did."
That's your idea of engaging?
jolizoom| 6.20.11 @ 4:11PM
Was there something of value to engage with? Missed it.
David| 6.20.11 @ 10:51AM
Then do explain the basis for the projected longevity of the Tea Party.
Succinctly and without insult, please.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 10:58AM
David... the Tea Party will continue to exist, grow and flourish as long as this Federal Government continues to lead this Nation over the financial cliff. We - Tea Party members - Refuse to be Lemmings.
irish19| 6.20.11 @ 1:15PM
Actually, it was Fr. Charles Coughlin.
irish19| 6.20.11 @ 1:15PM
And, David, what is your solution?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 1:53PM
David, only demand we post solutions for him to pick apart. To the best of my knowledge has not posted his theories to be discected as of yet.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:06PM
You're right. My apologies. It's Coughlin.
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 2:20PM
Don't you mean Father Charles Coughlin?
But I fear you are right. If this country somehow defies the laws of economics and miraculously returns to true fiscal growth, the gravy train will once again kick into high gear faster than you can say "John Maynard Keynes."
Every day will be Christmas day, and politicians will once again don their Santa Claus costumes, doling out goodies to credulous constituents, corporate cronies, corrupt contributors and various and sundry other crooks and charlatans who will be only too happy to bleed the middle class dry in order to keep the elites in power.
Democrats' two-part answer to everything on earth is 1) Government can fix this; and 2) all we need is a lot more of YOUR money going where I want it to go.
The irony for liberal parasites is that their ultimate success is the death of the host organism - followed quickly thereupon by their own demise.
It's a small consolation, but I'll take it.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:55PM
Wow, Griz, you and I agree - well up to your last sentence. See? It can happen more than once.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 3:23PM
Could you go over your agreement in detail. Mr. Grz has indicted you and you agree? You even recognize yourself as a parasite? The only thing you disagree with is that there is no consolation in the parasite killing the host and then meeting its end. You are a deep thinker David. Very deep. Grzmlyk, great analysis as usual.
jd| 6.20.11 @ 9:20PM
Sorry, David, but Grzmlyk beat you hands down. That't the beauty of how his mind works.
Great job as usual, Grzmlyk
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 10:25PM
Thank you, JD. Mucho appreciated.
I think David is a tad confused. I know a foolish inconsistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, but this is ridiculous. :-)
Skippy| 6.20.11 @ 8:44PM
Actually Jack, Newman as Luke did say that. Once.
They were the last words his character ever spoke. The Man with No Eyes shot him dead as the mocking phrase spat from Luke's lips where he was cornered.
BTW, good post otherwise.
Occam's Tool| 6.20.11 @ 6:22PM
"What we have here is a failure to communicate." That was a phrase said TO Paul Newman in the movie, by the sadistic captain of the prison guards. (Played with incredible brilliance by Strother Martin.) It was later said BY Newman, but it is Martin's enunciation that is forever remembered.
The quote in full: "What we've got here is failure to communicate. Some men you just can't reach. So you get what we had here last week. Which is the way he wants it. Well, he gets it. And I don't like it any more than you men."
Occam's Tool| 6.20.11 @ 6:23PM
By the way, Newman repeated the line with "is a failure" as opposed to "is failure."
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 6.20.11 @ 7:28AM
Krugman is the Emperor with no clothes. His arguments are ridiculous and his existence is only ensured by the fact that the New York Times staff regularly deletes any comments from Mr. Krugmans' article which are perceived as making Mr. Krugman look like a fool. Some of the comments which can be read before they are removed are well documented. That is in opposition to Mr. Krugman's comments which are general in nature and not based on facts.
It's not startling or unusual to see liberals use these tactics. It's Alinksy practiced well.
Their only goal is to delude as many people as possible so that Big Government can succeed.
They don't care about the Constitution or anything resembling freedom. They are a spineless lot and as the election drones on, they will prove formidable.
Grzmlyk| 6.20.11 @ 2:29PM
Careful, Bill: Krugman is a member of the Ivy League Elite; therefore, his word is as good as gold - er, well, fiat currency - er - well, QE 1 - er, well, QE2 - er, well, what Keynes said!
You're such a square, Bill: Reality is only for those who don't genuflect before the twin false gods of moral vanity and hypocritical greed.
Honestly, if you stand on your head, everything Krugman says will appear to be right-side up.
Frankly, I wish Krugman would go back to his real job as a garden gnome. That's where his talents lie.
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 6.20.11 @ 2:59PM
That comment reminds me of the movie "Being There" with Chauncey Gardiner.
Michael Tomlinson| 6.20.11 @ 7:58AM
I wonder if Krugman files a standard 1040 tax form to raises his taxes?
Michael L. Hauschild| 6.20.11 @ 8:19AM
Please go read this.
http://www.americanthinker.com.....cared.html
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 6.20.11 @ 3:42PM
Thanks for the link. Excellent article.
SonOfSam| 6.20.11 @ 8:21AM
Just out of sheer morbid curiosity, but has Krugman ever been RIGHT about ANYTHING? How the hell does this chowderskull get to be taken seriously?
JohnC| 6.20.11 @ 8:24AM
The key to a vibrant U.S. recovery is to employ traditional conservative principles: these are lower and flatter tax rates for all, less onerous regulations on businesses, reduced spending and strict banking laws to curb the gambler banksters from causing another crash. But even all this will not work unless we revert back to becoming a sovereign and self-reliant nation -- self-reliance is the hallmark of conservatism.
The American economy will never recover without a vibrant manufacturing base and a strong middle class. We thus need to pull out of the corrupt WTO, Clinton/Gore’s NAFTA and the rest of the suicidal free trade giveaway, especially those to communist China. Giving entire factories and hi-tech plants that have been nurtured and bred by American workers to hostile powers under the guise of free trade is insanity and the root cause of our economic malaise.
Today our whole economic system is now teetering because socialist Greece may default, thus once again we may have to bail out the global banksters for gambling and buying risky Greek debt. Multi-national corporations and banks that have zero loyalty to this country need to be phased out -- American companies only. In addition, we need to employ policies that will eventually forbid foreign powers to fund our debt or buy USA real estate; this is why communist China owns us -- alas we are no longer free.
David| 6.20.11 @ 9:10AM
Well said, After a first sentence when I thought this was just another Right Wing scree for economic and social chaos (all for one and all for one!), thank you, John C., for bringing the discussion to where it should be - what are the genuine wellsprings of economic health and sustainable prosperity?
While I'm a little leery of the isolationist tone, yes, we need a vibrant manufacturing sector and a strong middle class.
So, instead of the blame fest, what are the policies and actions needed - specifics, please! - to ensure this?
Indiana Alex| 6.20.11 @ 9:30AM
Low taxes, free markets, protection of property rights and a stable currency.
And you cannot determine what an economy will produce by government fiat. As the "green energy" efforts show, when the government attempts to determine what "we should be doing" the drags to productivity lead to lower living standards for everyone, hurting the poor and working class the most. The crony capitalists benefit from this.
You can determine one's economic ignorance when they throw out nonsense like "we need manufacturing jobs". Why? Because you say so?
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:06PM
That's just ignorant. The government - city, county, state, and federal - picks winners and losers all of the time.
Indiana Alex| 6.20.11 @ 1:00PM
Your faith in government is terribly misplaced. The problem with government attempting to pick winners is that there are no consequences for being wrong.
People, on the other hand cannot continue to try something over and over that is a miserable failure, as that cold hearted villan, the market, will simply not allow for that.
Government however excells at this nonsense which is easily seen on a global scale as bankrupt entitlement schemes are blowing up everywhere they have been attempted.
David| 6.20.11 @ 1:09PM
When will you read what's in the post instead of what your ideology informs you?
I never said I agreed that government - any government - Russia, U.S., Greece - picks winners and losers - I just said it does.
Slacker| 6.20.11 @ 12:40PM
We do not need a manufacturing base to recover (which is good because it isn’t going to happen anyway).
First, who do you expect to buy the stuff we manufacturer? Germany and Japan have the US market to sell to. We have no similar export market. When the US consumer has a choice they wisely choose to the import. Face it: A few best of brand companies aside we mostly manufacturer crap. Nobody wants to buy our junk. Don’t tell me it is patriotic to buy junk. Buying junk is always stupid. Anyone has the right to believe their Chevy is as good as a Honda but, don't expect me to join in this delusion.
Second, manufacturing jobs were not too good. Most plant jobs entail slogging away for 40 years at a monotonous repetitive job only to retire poor and broken. Observe how many blue collar types drink themselves into a stupor every night out of boredom and misery. Dad and granddad’s jobs sucked by today’s expectations. Sure they got a pension but, how long did they really get to draw on it?
Are you telling me life would be better without trade? Besides being unworkable and stupid, what you would get is very poor quality goods, less freedom, and some crappy jobs.
We probably will never recover from this mess. Killing trade will only make things much worse.
jolizoom| 6.20.11 @ 4:43PM
So you don't think we need to be able to manufacture anything? Then what exactly do we "trade" that is not the product of manufacturing? Services are not exactly exportable, unless you're talking about telephone support--and India already has a lock on that market. Or maybe you were thinking of other types of, "ahem", services. I hate to inform you, but such services for profit are still illegal in the US.
You seriously can't imagine any circumstance in which we are completely cut off from our importers and unable to receive any manufactured goods from overseas? That is what I would call a failure of imagination.
Oh, I just "got" my error, Slacker. To actually have manufacturing in America might mean that you would have to WORK!
Slacker| 6.20.11 @ 7:31PM
I suppose we could be cut off from all imports. We could also watch half the planet starve.
What t0 trade? Anything: Agriculture, mining, natural resource extraction, intellectual property, financial services, professional services, and the list goes on forever.
Joke about my work ethic all you want. The Chinese and Arabs actually hire me on occasion (professional services). Sure an Indian or Pakistani is willing to work for less, and when they catch up, I’ll move on to something else. I’ll be just fine in a globalized world, as will most of us.
Sorry, but we are competing with the entire world. Profitable Americans are not going to be able to carry water for their uncompetitive counterparts. Patriotism collides with survival. Get over it.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:16PM
Those of us who support economic liberty must STOP allowing the left (and morons on the right -- or who claim to be on the right -- like Trump) to get away with the bogus claims that America doesn't manufacture stuff anymore.
The US share of world manufacturing in $ terms has been pretty steady for two decades.
Manufacturing as a share of GDP is declining in every western country as we move toward more services.
And just as happened with agriculture, we're able to manufacture just as much with fewer people...and that's something we should be happy about.
Mike | 6.20.11 @ 8:33AM
With corporations sitting on a trillion dollars in cash and interest rates at historic lows, Paul Gigot said on Meet the Press, without a hint of irony, that the reason unemployment is so high is because government spending is hogging the capital for needed for private investment. His solution: more cuts in government spending and, of course, lower taxes. Those with modicum of knowledge about economics know what the impact of cutting government spending will be on the employment rate, consumer confidence, and consumption. And, why will corporations who are not investing the money they have be inclined to spend more money under these circumstances?
Pecos Pete| 6.20.11 @ 8:46AM
"Those with modicum of knowledge about economics know what the impact of cutting government spending will be on the employment rate, consumer confidence, and consumption."
Yep, employment will increase, consumer confidence will improve and consumption will increase. Is this what you meant?
Mike | 6.20.11 @ 8:55AM
Pecos,
I'm talking about economics. You are talking about theology. Want to see something interesting? Google how corporations used the money they re-patriated in 2005. Hint: they did not use the money to hire people - part of the reason for anemic employment number during the Bush administration.
Pecos Pete| 6.20.11 @ 9:12AM
Mike, see RedStateBoy's comment below. Enough said.
David| 6.20.11 @ 9:13AM
Proof, please. I'm not at all confident as a consumer relying solely on the largesse, beneficence, and foresight of the private sector.
Well said, Mike. We need a way to persuade the private sector to move that cash into the economy. And, oh please, do not haul out the old regulatory burden argument unless you cite specifics as in This regulation caused this response from these companies. Other than that, just have a chuckle amongst yourselves on the Tea Party Express about how right and perfect your views are.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 8:58AM
Mike.. Ya can't be That Obtuse... Is that your understanding as to why Corporations are harnessing their Cash Reserves?? It's Obamacare and the certainty of Uncertainty that reigns in this whacked-out Regimes of incompentents.
Mike | 6.20.11 @ 9:14AM
Corporations are moving their capital and business overseas. I guess they will return when American workers are earning as little as their foreign competitors and have the same protections and benefits - that is, none.
Look at "jobs creation" and wage/ benefit packages in Texas for a preview of what is coming for people who used to be middle class.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:12AM
Mike,
You are demonstrating quite a lack of understanding of economics or business.
If the issue were that Americans are wildly overpaid, then these companies would have far fewer jobs here than they do. That's not the case, for two primary reasons: First, we're very efficient, so you can't just compare hourly wages; you have to compare what gets done on an hourly basis. Second, since many things are sold in the US, those products made here have a substantial transportation cost advantage, esp. in these days of high fuel costs.
Furthermore, if Texas were so bad a place to work, why would people be flocking there, and why would Texas have generated something like 1/3 (or more) of all the net new jobs created in America in the past few years? Are people being forced to move to Texas to take crappy jobs they don't want?
In short, Mike, every single problem you complain about and blame companies for is a failure of GOVERNMENT.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 11:06AM
Why do businesses so assiduously seek government contracts? Why do they fight so hard to keep the advantages written into the tax code? Do corporations consider these a failure of government? Do the people working for those corporations see this as a failure of government?
As for Texas: 23 states have a lower unemployment rate than Texas. From 2007-2010 the number of Texan and those flocking to Texas for work who earned minimum wages or less increased by 150%. Texas and Mississippi are the two states with the highest percentage of minimum wage workers.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 11:13AM
I forgot to add that while the national unemployment rate remains high, the rate in Texas is increasing. Care to comment on Perry's budget woes?
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 11:44AM
Mike continues to argue for the patron corporatist shake down techniques that have failed everywhere they have been tried. Well let me check that. They are successful as shake down techniques and in blowing the money they steal. Like a parasite Mike and his clown friends are in danger of killing their host. Check that. Mike and his clown friends are parasites. Mike thinks he has earned his position by thinking he is smart. Progressives need full time exposure of their follies until they don't think they are smart anymore or at least until a large majority of the electorate think they are idiots. Thanks to Mike's openness we have made a lot of progress on the second option.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:07PM
"Truth to Power" - wonderful. Borrowing a Quaker phrase to spew vitriol.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 12:15PM
Don't be such a sissy David. I learned everything I wanted to know about Quakers from Ben Franklin. Sticking a mirror up in front of your face is a public service, certainly not vitriol.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:24PM
Ummm, Truth, if you learned everything you wanted to know about Quakers fromBenjamin Franklin, well them Franklin would have been very surprised. Franklin was many things, including one of the greatest American thinkers of all time and a huge proponent of religious tolerance, but he wasn't a Quaker.
Sorry, resident of Pennsylvania, certainly. Quaker, no. The family attended the old South Church, the most liberal Puritan congregation in Boston, where Benjamin Franklin was baptized in 1706.
So you're going to have to add historical error to your sad record of baseless namecalling.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 12:33PM
No, but Ben had some interesting things to write about them and much of it pointed at their hypocrisy. He lived around them and saw them for the losers they were. You are such a moron. You are very good with Wikipedia though.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:46PM
Ya know, the polite thing would be to acknowledge that you were wrong. It's also interesting that if Franklin had such a problem with the Quakers, why was he head of the abolitionist society in Pennsylvania?
What's more interesting is that you turn your error around until it fits your world view. A psychologist friend (oh, and he's a Navy vet so please no attacks on his person) defines that behavior as "delusional."
And, as a Quaker, I would appreciate your citations for Franklin's writings on Quakers as hypocrites. As I doubt you can, let me head off some of the more obvious attempts - were some Quakers hypocrites for owning slaves? Undoubtedly although the faith didn't officially take a stand against slavery until the 19th Century. Were some Quakers hypocrites for being behind much of the American whaling industry? Certainly.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 1:38PM
Read his autobiography moron. Gosh you are an idiot. Wikipedia or a google search can only take you so far. Are you really a Quaker or just another liberal pretending to be a Quaker? Gay Quaker maybe? Gay whale Quaker? Gay slave owning whale Quaker? You reveal too much of yourself. Delusional Quaker is where my money is.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:21PM
I'm really a Quaker. And I'm really a liberal. And I'm really amused by the namecalling. I think you're about at the limit of your abilities here.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 2:23PM
You know I thought David was an unlikeable idiot and then found out he was a Quaker. Down two more notches. By the way I am a vet also and I will attack (verbally) whomever I please. Maybe your friend was trying to give you a subtle hint about such an obvious fault of yours. I have a problem with your friend though. He tries to give subtle hints to his less than gifted friends which you just demonstrated is a large waste of time. On the other hand maybe he just has a wicked sense of humor.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:25PM
"Down two notches." So now you've added religious bigotry to your other features? Wow. I'd defend my religion but when you simply discount it, I wonder how you stand on the rest of our cherished freedoms.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 2:31PM
Recognizing Quakers for what they are is not bigotry, friend.
David| 6.20.11 @ 6:51PM
And what is it that you think Quakers are?
And you think by adding the usual Quaker tag of "friend" at the end lends you any kind of credibility?
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 7:42PM
I was just trying to be ironic, friend and don't desire credibility with you. I think you are free loading parasite of course. I thought I already said that. I am not convinced you are a Quaker. "Lefties telling stories" is not exactly an uncommon trait amongst American Spectator trolls. I guess I am willing to accept that you are after all; who would brag about such a thing? Quakers are those that agonize over war and then look the other way when 50 million babies get murdered. They have nothing to say when our cities are turned into fatherless ghettos as long as they paint themselves as having good intentions on the compassion gauge. They think that spending other people's money is a sign of their compassion. In other words they are part of the dumb liberal class. The smarter ones realize that their various approaches are stupid and try to enrich themselves and their friends. In other words you are not at the bottom of the moral barrel but that requires you to be very stupid.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 12:58PM
Patron corporatist shakedown techniques.
You may want to run this by The Club for Growth. I'm sure they will be amused.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 1:29PM
Mike,
Having been involved with the Club for Growth from near its beginning -- which is to say for far longer than most people have even known of it -- the idea that they support "crony capitalism" (a term which I don't like because it is anything but capitalism) is ridiculous.
You are right that corporations seek not just gov't contracts (which isn't such a bad thing to the extent that gov't needs to buy certain goods and services) but also seek to use gov't to crush competition, we should all be outraged regardless of political party.
Perhaps the reason that Texas' unemployment rate is middle of the pack despite adding so many jobs is that they are gaining population so fast. Indeed, Texas is gaining FOUR congressional seats because so many people have moved there. I do realize that part of the population growth is people who stayed there after Hurricane Katrina, but that's only part of it.
All in all, would you rather be Texas or CA?
http://www.kdhnews.com/news/story.aspx?s=47879
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 1:45PM
The fact that many corporations have taken money from Obama, Reid and Pelosi should be very obvious unless you have had your head somewhere where light doesn't penetrate. Some of that money comes back in the form of donations to party and individuals. If you're interested in putting a stop to it you would be right to listen to the Club for Growth. Somehow I think you don't have a problem with the shake downs and kick backs. You are just a parasite and want a promise of your share.
emo| 6.21.11 @ 7:33PM
But none of the big states do. The states that do are states like NH, SD, ND, NE etc. VA probably has the lowest unemployment rate of the "larger" states. VA is also consistently rated as the most business friendly state in eh country, even more than TX
David| 6.20.11 @ 9:15AM
Solutions - concrete, step-by-step solutions, please. I can get this kind of intellectual analysis on a bumper sticker.
Gee - I hate to trot out such a bumper sticker but if you ain't part of the solution, you're part of the problem.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 11:46AM
You are not a serious person and only deserve to be mocked.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:09PM
And you are serious? So then, professor, do educate me.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 12:17PM
You are not capable of education and only deserve to be mocked. You are the bad example by which others might learn.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:26PM
I'm incapable of education and you don't even know that Benjamin Franklin wasn't a Quaker? Great leap of faith, however. Resident of Philadelphia = Quaker? That's like Tea Party = intelligent. Wow. Hypocritical as well as ill-tempered and ill-informed.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 12:36PM
Gosh you are a moron. I am learning how you think though. Strike think and make that react.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:47PM
And your posts are something more than reactions? Explain the difference.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 1:48PM
You are a mindless troll who repeats talking points. Case closed. I on the other hand am mocking you for being a mindless troll.
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:23PM
Wow. Cuz you say something is true, it's true. That's extremely impressive.
Gee, Truth, since that's the case, why don't you just fix the ills of society instead of thinking up new insults? It's gotta be way more satisfying.
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 2:26PM
You are getting what you deserve sissy boy. Nothing more. Curing the ills of society should only be taken up with serious people not talking point repeating fools.
David| 6.20.11 @ 6:58PM
Wow. Was "talking points" today's phrase on Fox News Channel? So be serious, Truth. Cure the ills of society.
(I double dog dare you.)
Truth to Power| 6.20.11 @ 8:03PM
You are doing a lot for conservative morale, friend. Your efforts might well lead to the reforms that will cure society. There can be no doubt about your role in the 2010 elections. May they be equally effective in 2012.
Indiana Alex| 6.20.11 @ 9:24AM
Actually, there is verifiable historic evidence that cutting government spending has a powerful and highly positive effect on overall growth and productivity, which has lead to lower unemployment.
Unfortunately, most people who believe that government spending is the key to economic prosperity really don't have a modicum of knowledge about economics.
Businesses are clearly not investing because it is very difficult to determine the rates of return on investment in the current tax and regulatory environment.
Welcome to the command and control economy, where the government is more than willing to use its heavy hand to "reward friends and punish enemies."
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 11:48AM
Indiana,
Verifiable historic evidence. If you are arguing for Supply Side economics, you are wrong. If you are arguing for what happened after the government successfully primed the pump during previous recessions, you are right.
Indiana Alex| 6.20.11 @ 1:02PM
Well it's sure doing a hell of a job this time!!
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 1:19PM
The housing bubble masked a great deal, not the least of which was anemic employment numbers during the Bush administration in spite of tax cuts and the tax holiday for re-patriated corporate profits. For those who appreciate irony, the bill was named the American Jobs Creation Act.
Indiana Alex| 6.20.11 @ 3:30PM
It's amazing how you people become actual caricatures of yourselves. You yell as loud as you can that government spending is the key to a healthy economy so you support a huge government spending program becuase you are so sure that this is "what works", then when it predictably fails miserably you say, "well it would have worked if Bush hadn't been so bad".
Wow
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 1:31PM
Mike,
I defy you to show any evidence of "pump priming" that worked.
By the way, Germany, which is on a moderate austerity program including cutting gov't spending by 4% in one year, how has an unemployment rate 2% lower than the US's. Historically, I'm sure you know, it was persistently higher.
Gov't spending crowds out businesses and distorts everything in the economy. Anybody who still thinks that Keynesian economics is credible is simply not paying attention.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 7:57PM
Ross,
In the eight recessions since 1950 it appears that fiscal policy was too little, too late to maximize the positive effect. Monetary policy has been more successful.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:18PM
Mike, the fact that fiscal policy failed leaves you in a very weak logical position if your fallback is just that the gov't spending should have been bigger and earlier. Nothing in history supports your implication, either here or anywhere else.
emo| 6.21.11 @ 7:35PM
Cutting spending as a % of GDP was a major factor in the boom of the 1990s. Federal spending fell from 22% in 1993 to 18% by 2000.
hardcard| 6.20.11 @ 8:43AM
What would aweiner do ?
David| 6.20.11 @ 9:16AM
What would someone with a brain do - besides useless taunts?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 10:24AM
Ironic
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 8:53AM
The arguments in this article are too narrow in focus.. let's not forget the other excuses Hussein and the Slave Party has been employing: the European Debt Crisis, the Earthquake/Tsunami in Japan, Nationally Inclement Weather, He "Inherited" it, the Dog ate my homework and planes are leaving late from Cleveland.
David| 6.20.11 @ 11:00AM
Since you identify yourself as "redstateboy," maybe you can help me to understand why red states (defined for this purpose as the states that went for W in 2004) have higher murder rates - even adjusted on a per-capita basis - than blue states (defined for this purpose as the states that went for Kerry in 2004)? And please no snotty comments like people in red states shoot straighter than in blue states.
Similarly, why do people in blue states tend to live longer than those in red states?
Similarly, with the exception of Utah, why is infant mortality in blue states significantly lower than in red states?
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 11:11AM
For one... who cares? How bout these statistics.. Blue States are losing population, jobs AND Representation to these Eeevile Red States. We're Right-to-Work States and though nothing's perfect.. I enjoy that "personal freedom" and "personal liberty" is still not a dirty word.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 11:18AM
Have you ever lived in a blue state? If so, maybe you can share with us how your personal freedom and personal liberty were so viciously crushed.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 11:42AM
Yes, and the answer is taxes. Part of my state (Cook county) has the hightest taxes on gas in the US. Don't like that one, how about gun laws? Illinois does not allow concealed carry, you must have a FOID (Firearm Owner Identification) card just to buy ammo, and Chicago is still trying to make owning a firearm illegal. That's just a start.
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 11:58AM
Gas tax. This is a consumption tax, the kind advocated for by the Fair Tax crowd. To the degree I have control, I find this kind of tax more palatable than an income tax.
Gun control: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,... It never ceases to amaze me how the best legal minds in our country just can't make hind nor hair out of those words.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 12:09PM
Your right, it is a consumption tax, but Illinois is one of those rare examples where not only the state can tax you on it, but so can the county, and even townships. Not exactly what the "Fair Tax" crowd had in mind. More like a "Fair tax" and a "VAT" tac combined. And the way some of it is taxed it is actually taxing the tax. A democrat wet dream. From the Chicago Tribune of all places.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/.....2832.story
And as for the gun control, The Supreme court ruled you remark in affirmation of keeping this fundamental rights, though the left will keep trying to remove them using just the same argument you just made, that only the milita or law enforcement should own them.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....02134.html
Mike| 6.20.11 @ 1:06PM
Sailor,
I am aware of this Supreme Court's ruling, as well as the rulings of previous courts; hence my comments about the best legal minds. My comment was a little disingenuous insofar as the language of the previous ruling did not prohibit any state control over the sale of or the requirements for the ownership of guns. Your final clause is a red herring. The goal is sensible regulation, not outright prohibition.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 1:57PM
Ok, I'll bite. Sensible as defined by who? Put it up to a popular vote and I'll live with the outcome.
W| 6.20.11 @ 5:59PM
Mike, What does this mean to you?
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 11:58AM
I'm a refugee from the People's Republic of New York.. Ya know.. the Highest Taxed State in the Nation. I watched Buffalo/Niagara Falls collapse economically and the two common denominators?? Run by Liber-ul Democrats and Unions for decades.. As for personal Freedoms??! How bout this!? A Private Establishment - a Bar - and the Owner permits Smoking but No, No, No!! The People's Republic comes in to their Own Business and tells them what's allowed... Bar's Closed.. some in the Family for Generations and what Smoke Nazi's could care less!! Here in Tenn. they did it right.. if it an Establishment that caters to people over 21, then (Gasp!) the OWNER decides what goes and Not some NannyState Bureaucrat..
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:12PM
That's your response - who cares? That's it? C'mon, redstateboy, I hope you can do better than that. I never called a red state evil; that's your presumption and misspelled to boot. And how do you get from murder rates, high infant mortality, and longevity to "personal liberty"?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 12:35PM
How do you get higher murder rates, higher infant mortality (which I bet if you add abortion rates in the blue states jump way ahead) and lower rates of longevity to a state being red? Apples to Oranges.
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:49PM
Just measuring the statistics, DS. Ya know, like facts. And it's not apples to oranges. Even in Tea Party Logicland.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 12:56PM
"Lies, damned lies, and statistics"
Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke (1843–1911).
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:27PM
And your point? Cite specifically a credible source.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 2:41PM
And your point? Cite specifically a credible source?
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 3:00PM
That's right...! Who cares?!? Don't you get it?!!? You espouse some virtues of Blue-Statism... They're Failing!!! Blue States Are Failing and Why? Cause they practice what you espouse - Liber-ulism. There's No Jobs! People are Leaving! They're being Taxed to Death! NY, CA, IL - ALL of New England!! Your Cities: Buffalo, Detroit, Kill-a-delphia, Wash.DC., LA., St. Louis - All failing - law and order breaking - Human animals running in the streets and you wanna come on here and tell us Great Liber-ulism is?? Wake Up! "When I was a child I thought as a child, I spoke as a Chile but when I became a Man I put away childish things."
David| 6.20.11 @ 7:01PM
No, I asked you how you account for the differences.
Fair approximation of the Biblical quote - you get that from the movie "Hackers"?
jolizoom| 6.20.11 @ 5:00PM
I can answer the last one: infant mortality rates are higher in red states because they actually allow the infant to be BORN. Abortion statistics don't count under infant mortality.
I'll admit, I'm being snarky.
David| 6.20.11 @ 7:02PM
Interesting. That's an interesting point. I'll have to see if I can find statistics on abortion and see how that affects the tally.
emo| 6.21.11 @ 7:36PM
Its actually Blue people in Red states who commit murder and live shorter lives....BTW what the hell is a "Red State" "Blue State"
Martin Owens| 6.20.11 @ 9:06AM
Dr. Krugman's sovereign remedy, for everything from shaky finances to foreign policy to gophers in the garden, is and has been: "more government spending".
Why doesn't someone ask him, publicly- how much more? $10 trillion? $50 trillion? $100 trillion? What comes after a trillion? And how do we possibly begin to pay for such an orgy? But please, somebody, get him to cop to an amount...
Petronius| 6.20.11 @ 9:17AM
Neither the Collective, nor the Plutocrats, will do the one thing that will facilitate economic growth. Quit interfering! Let us do what we want with OUR Money. Quit taking so much of it. Quit wasting what you take. Quit telling employers who to hire, who to promote, insure, and how much to pay. Above all, let people make money and keep it. But they won't. Have a nice depression and call me when the black market opens.
JimP| 6.20.11 @ 9:50AM
The Repubs have controlled the House since January 2011. Six months. But the GOP is responsible for Obama's policies not working? LOL I know there are idiots out there that will buy this nonsense, but I don't think a majority will believe it in Nov. 2012.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 10:27AM
The repubs are only in charge of the house. And yes spending starts there but if the Senate doesn't pass it (Dems) or the president (Dem again) veto'es it then there isn't much the repubs can do is there? Hence, the Dems are repsonsible for these disastorous policies created by them. Not the Repubs that inherieted this mess. Isn't that the argument Obama uses, he inherieted this mess?
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 10:50AM
Isn't also wonderful how Liber-uls blather on about the Economy under Slick Willy................... and ALWAYS convenviently fail to mention he had a Republican House and Senate.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 11:06AM
Don't forget the dot com boom, which of course turned bust when Bush was in office but they don't mention that either.
Redstateboy| 6.20.11 @ 11:27AM
further they always conveniently fail to acknowledge the job growth, the record revenue and GDP growth from 2000-2007 under Dubbya.
Appleby| 6.20.11 @ 11:45AM
Not to mention the effect on the country of 9/11/01 and thereafter. Nobody ever mentions that.
canuckistani| 6.20.11 @ 3:24PM
Do you mean the devastating effects of Junior on everything he touched?
I mention it all of the time.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 4:17PM
BDS
Jay Pitsby| 6.20.11 @ 10:35AM
"It's another thing entirely, even in these politically cynical times, to say that the out-of-power party would intentionally harm millions of Americans in order to garner extra votes." Intentionally harming millions of Americans in order to achieve political gains is precisely what Democrats are doing.
PolishKnight| 6.20.11 @ 10:49AM
I read a similar article on the blogosphere by a leftist who acted as if it was his own idea ("The right is out to destroy the USA economy to win the 2012 election and gain power!")
I am honestly confused as to whether he's a useful idiot or engaging in a sophistric bit of projection. It's the left that wants to take down the USA in order to open up a power vacuum that western socialist Europe can fill. They feel frustrated, and worried, that the economy of Western Europe is starting to collapse and that they could see USSR fall 2. This is a race: Which falls first, the USA in a culture war between left and right OR Western Europe where they're in charge, much like in the USSR, but their economic and cultural agenda's instabilities will naturally take it down?
It's rather funny that when I point out to them that Reagan won the cold war they retort that the USSR's economic system collapsed on it's own so Reagan deserves no credit. So at some subconscious level, they realize that their dream is only possible if they can get rid of the competition much like Tonya Harding. The USA _has_ to come down!
So they're enraged that even as the USA is coming down, as planned, that two things are happening (or not happening)
1) It isn't getting them the socialist state they dreamed of when Obama was elected. This is NOT Sweden 2.
2) Their attempts to burn down the villagers' homes and then win election for mayor based upon them blaming their opponents isn't working either. Damn those voters! They're too "stoopid" to see how they're being "helped!'
The conspiracy theories of the left make Dale Gribbles' black helicopters seem rational by comparison: That the media is "right wing" and trashing Obama. The lack of education funding is causing young people to be poorly educated and reject socialism. That high energy prices are due to a conspiracy by the right and have nothing to do with their no-drill oil and gas policies and gas taxes.
It's hail mary time for them. If Greece and the EU falls and ultimately Sweden, what would be the point of their cool aid party?
JohnC| 6.20.11 @ 11:28AM
Mr. Kaminsky, you cannot absolve multi-national corporations for this economic morass we are in. These are the same corporations that screamed for a TARP bailout when their corrupt and reckless behavior came back to haunt them. It is they who lobbied a corrupt congress for outsourcing our vital manufacturing base for slave labor to Third World countries under the guise of free trade.
Our Founders would have been dead set against this. These corporations own both Parties by their lobbying money. And pointy-head economists like Milton Friedman, as one poster noted, is for no borders and so-called free trade. Big corporations are also fighting E-verify because the love foreign slave labor.
A high school kid can see that libertarian (not conservative) economic globalism is a race to the bottom -- it is really a redistribution of wealth from our once-productive America to ruthless and lawless Third World countries; thus it is corporate / government International socialism.
Our Founders were for healthy competition WITHIN OUR BORDERS under laws (including trade laws) and that is the business model that our government should foster.
Big-time tariffs on imported goods would be a good start. Donald Trump is right -- we are the laughingstock of the world.
Slacker| 6.20.11 @ 12:53PM
Actually libertarians are the only ones making any economic sense these days.
People of your mindset said essentially the same thing when manufacturing moved from the Midwest to the South. Race to the bottom, you say? Compare Michigan to South Carolina and tell me who hit bottom.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 1:33PM
I criticize big companies frequently for being too cozy with government. It's not going to get better until we start removing from government the power and willingness to choose winners and losers.
Donald Trump is an idiot when it comes to free trade. Your suggest that tariffs "would be a good start" just makes me glad you're not in a position of power. Ask Smoot and Hawley how those same brain-dead ideas worked for them.
axbucxdu| 6.21.11 @ 1:14PM
The mercantilist Chinese government has found nothing wrong with tariffs. They simply maintain their official exchange rate below the Purchasing Power Parity for the RMB, and voila!, effectively a tariff in everything but name.
There's also nothing wrong with capturing the difference between a foreign sovereign's official exchange and PPP, and tranferring that flow to Leviathan. It would keep him off my back. Nor am I any fan of his banker, the Fed, but when it comes to global central banks, it truly is just Us and Them.
Rick| 6.20.11 @ 12:09PM
Your a rasist!
David| 6.20.11 @ 12:28PM
And you can't spell! So how's the bigger idiot?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 12:58PM
"And you can't spell! So how's the bigger idiot?"
Matthew 7: 1-5
Jesus said to his disciples: "Stop judging, that you may not be judged. For as you judge, so will you be judged, and the measure with which you measure will be measured out to you. Why do you notice the splinter in your brother's eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me remove that splinter from your eye,' while the wooden beam is in your eye? You hypocrite, remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter from your brother's eye."
David| 6.20.11 @ 2:27PM
And you'll start applying that standard to yourself when?
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 2:45PM
While I have mispelled, I do not recall calling you a idiot and not getting it right. Shouldn't that have been "So who's the bigger idiot"? Besides I thought that way how liberals argued. What splinter have I noticed in your eye? I argue ideas and assumptions (though I did call you a proffessional shit stirrer) I have done that on occasion but only in good fun and I am still a amatuer shit disturber.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 3:13PM
See now I am babbling. Should have been "Besides I thought that WAS how liberals arugued. And I am still a amatuer but I am learning.
Margie| 6.20.11 @ 3:17PM
Haha, you are one likeable character, DS.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 3:22PM
Thanks. Momma always told me to be humble. I like your post as well.
David| 6.20.11 @ 7:04PM
I'll keep stirring and you keep disturbing, DS. That's called democracy.
Handy| 6.20.11 @ 12:44PM
Government bonds are goofy. No one has ever made any real (after inflation) money owning them. Nominal interest rates are meaningless. Yields are what determine bond prices, however even these are misleading, because the issuers control inflation.
A brief aside, if you don't mind. That currency in your wallet is also a bond: A Federal Reserve Note. It is not money!!! The US Treasury engraves some fancy artwork on high quality paper and "sells" it to bearers of these notes. It's a "I promise to pay you, if you promise to pay me" proposition. There is no underlying value, unless one values the lies on both sides.
Sure, there are lots of considerations to be made in pricing bonds, but, when the rubbers meet the road, everyday people are the ones who end up being screwed on "Loaner's Lane." Buy that treasury security at par and hold it 'til maturity. You will be repaid in dimes, not dollars. Or, keep those Fed Notes in a savings account until you need a loaf of bread. That loaf will cost you $25.00 by then.
Does this matter to either the "lenders" or the "borrowers?" Of course not. Merely debits and credits to them, but when you look back on your own life, you will see just how much they robbed from you.
Reading Krugman is a waste of valuable time. Responding to him is doubly wasteful.
To paraphrase the protestors of yore, "What if they held a government bond sale, and no one showed up?"
JohnC| 6.20.11 @ 2:23PM
Well I guess the Founders were idiots too for they were big on tariffs. And free traders always trot out the Smoot Hawley canard. Mr. Kaminsky, you are on the same side as free trader globalists Clinton, Gore, John Kerry, George W. Bush and Obama so that should give you pause.
Moving factories and hi-tech industry to foreign powers, including hostile ones, is not even trade, which is a movement of goods. In addition, when manufacturing leaves America the engineering and even R & D eventually follow.
Once a country loses its ability to make things it is worthless -- rich only on paper, but at the whims of foreign powers and events, which the first crash and now Greece are perfect examples. The reason the Founders were protectionists is because they had the wisdom to know this. They wanted to protect the sovereignty and independence of their beloved America and not make us beholden to foreign powers.
So despite what the so-called conservative media says protectionism is conservatism and outsourcing our national treasure is libertarianism, which is destroying our industrial engine of growth and middle class and reducing us to a service sector economy.
Slacker| 6.20.11 @ 5:23PM
To suggest libertarians are the problem facing this country is so ludicrous, so entirely stupid, so baseless in fact or logic, it almost defy response.
Libertarians are insignificant and have never had any real power. Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Bush and Obama are (all) libertarians? Really? Even libertarians might call for a prohibition on whatever it is you’ve been smoking.
Would those of you who think “real” wealth only comes from “making something” please explain why it is agriculture, mining, construction, financial services, consulting, etc. don’t produce real wealth.
Losing the ability to make things is entirely different than deciding it make sense to buy goods from foreign sources. We could make everything we need but, really why bother? So some schmucks can persist in believing middle class only equals a union card and lifer job down at the plant? Why should Americans make shoes and garments? Those jobs suck. Let the third world have the crap jobs.
It is crazy to think manufacturing the goods sold at Wal-Mart is our path to prosperity. Favor the sector in which we are least completive? That should work out wonderfully.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:20PM
Please show me your evidence that America has lost the ability to make things.
Is it in declining US manufacturing in $ terms? No.
In terms of share of world mfg? No.
In terms of share of GDP versus other advanced nations' shares of their GDP? No.
Your argument about our declining manufacturing is the lovechild of a bogeyman and a strawman.
canuckistani| 6.20.11 @ 3:34PM
Perhaps someone can explain to me how raising taxes on the rich is a problem if they refuse to invest in the country that made them rich?
Do they not get deductions when they actually use the money for domestic investment? Can they not deduct wages and costs for new employees? Can they not deduct heavily for capital equipment costs?
Would not a higher tax rate stimulate MORE investment if appropriate incentives were introduced? i.e accelerated depreciation, or double credits for hiring skilled workers in under serviced areas, loan guarantees for brownfield rejuvenations, and similarly EPA waivers.
If the goal is jobs jobs jobs, as the GOP has a habit of proclaiming every 30 years, then where are the incentives to invest if the wealthy can just take their net tax savings out of the country?
Al Adab| 6.20.11 @ 4:35PM
The argument as you posit it is specious. It is their money, not ours to dispose of, as we or some elected or appointed elite, think more proper. It is their property and cannot be taken from them without due process. All the class warfare nonsense notwithstanding.
"That some become rich means that others may become rich." A. Lincoln.
Their success should be an example for us all of the potential of people to find the hapiness (if such it is) that we are endowed by right to pursue.
Handy| 6.20.11 @ 4:04PM
Dear Mr. Kaminsky,
Stop making sense. The libs are crazy enough already. By giving credence to Krugman and these other nudnicks, you risk your own sanity.
Ignore canuckistani, for example. Or make her show you her breasts, at least.
As the warning says "...don't feed the trolls."
Al Adab| 6.20.11 @ 4:38PM
"We now know that FDR's policies likely prolonged the great depression because the economy never fully recovered in the 1930s and actually got worse in the latter half of the decade."
Paul Rubin
Yet the current administration pursues failed policies under the rubrick that if they didn't work at first we just need more of the same.
Drunken Sailor| 6.20.11 @ 4:54PM
But, But, FDR is a liberal god! He can't be wrong because that would mean Obama is wrong. Your going to make liberal heads explode!
Handy| 6.20.11 @ 5:07PM
FDR is God. LBJ was his son. Ask any lib.
David| 6.20.11 @ 7:06PM
I thought you guys believed that FDR was actually a Jewish bastard orphan named Rosenfeld?
Al Adab| 6.20.11 @ 5:30PM
I suppose that means that Conservatives are heretics, at least in the world of the secular/humanist state sponsored religion.
Die Fledermaus| 6.20.11 @ 6:00PM
Demoncrats always tell you what they are doing when accusing others. They have serious transference issues.
It is they that continually want a bad economy, and work to that goal, to get themselves elected.
Proof? Just look back to every presidential election since 1976. Their #1 play in the book is attack the "bad economy" no matter what. Even if it's doing well and getting better like 1984 and 1988.
And remember how they conned Bush 41 (not hard to do) to raise taxes to get lies about cuts in spending ala Reagan in 1982 and 1983. They then spent a full year ginning up how bad things were because, wait for it, "cable prices were rising".
Yes folks, that horrible depression of 1991 caused by evil telecommunication companies who were raising cable bills. Mostly to get the capital to vastly expand their customer base and add more channels (in which they have to pay money to far left wing executives that run the entertainment business and created the networks) to increase the value.
But nope, it was the "worst economy since the depression" and "it's the economy stupid" rhetoric of the Clinton campaign that was used to get people worried about the economy.
The "recession" of 1991-92 was like catching a cold. The Obama recession is like getting lung cancer.
David| 6.20.11 @ 7:07PM
Then you'd best get back under your rock lest you catch something. And then who would there be to say ridiculous things?
Al Adab| 6.20.11 @ 7:53PM
This recession (depression by now) is three years old. To sucessfully treat the problem governmnet must:
1. lower government spending
2. reduce taxes
3. allow wages to seek their natural level
4. encourage investment
Which of these are the administrations top priority? Anyone?
emo| 6.21.11 @ 7:47PM
GOLF
shipley130| 6.20.11 @ 7:55PM
Sure, it was all a plot by republicans so our America goes down in a ball of liberal flames. GOPers are just that smart, I guess. I guess Obama and his merry circle of crooks are taking all the credit for the actions of their enemies.
shipley130| 6.20.11 @ 7:59PM
Keynesian has not become a sufficiently dirty enough word in the world, yet, I guess. Somehow, we are going to have to make it super filthy so we stop paying these economy games.
Ross Kaminsky | 6.20.11 @ 10:21PM
Thanks, everyone, for the vibrant discussion. It's this sort of "conversation" that makes me enjoy writing for AmSpec so much.
weddingdresses | 6.21.11 @ 5:37AM
Keynesian has not become a sufficiently dirty enough word in the world, yet, I guess. Somehow, we are going to have to make it super filthy so we stop paying these economy games
E. Stone| 6.23.11 @ 4:12PM
That Obama's economic team has all resigned and gone back to academia, and Ben at the Fed is perplexed at the failure of the economy, reminds me of the physicist who bet the horses and always lost even though he used the most sophisticated analytical models. Seems there are no perfectly spherical horses when you need them and people cannot be molded or forced to behave to fit economic models; models that worked so well over sherry in the never critical echo chamber of the faculty club.
Charlie | 6.25.11 @ 3:58PM
I find it interesting that you give accurate facts but conveniatly omit others. Three trillion of the debt is caused by Bush inthings left off the budget and not paid for in addition to the 16%. The war and the medicare D. Even worse is the balance of wealth change(that the dems are always accused of when in actuality the Rep have done more than once) When this balance is disrupted as it is now our ecomomy suffers and our revenue declines. While the rich spend the spread of those dollars is concentrated creating less jobs or exactly the opposite of the very argument for lower taxation on the rich.