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You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / One Word: Plastics

One Word: Plastics

by John Cole|  August 22, 20104:30 pm| 161 Comments

This post is in: Domestic Politics

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Actually, two words- the economy.

I know DougJ is talking about politics and messaging in his previous post, but really, the reason Democrats are going to lose seats is the simple fact that the economy sucks and really, even if we were to have another stimulus, it looks like it is going to suck for a long time. If unemployment were at 5% and the DOW was humming along and we could still fool ourselves into thinking we had it good because we were using our houses as ATM’s, we wouldn’t be talking about messaging and the Obama economic team. As it is, there is really nothing that government can do to bring that back, and we’re dealing with a day of reckoning that was a long time coming.

And no, I don’t see things changing too much by 2012, either.

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Previous Post: « Five hundred days of Summers
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Reader Interactions

161Comments

  1. 1.

    kdaug

    August 22, 2010 at 4:35 pm

    I think plastic was part of the problem, not the solution…

  2. 2.

    MikeJ

    August 22, 2010 at 4:35 pm

    Add to why the Dems will lose seats: The party in power *always* loses seats in midterms.

  3. 3.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 4:37 pm

    if we were to have another stimulus, it looks like it is going to suck for a long time.

    On the other hand, new water and sewage systems, electrical grids, bridges and railways that aren’t a century old in some places. So we’d have that going for us.

  4. 4.

    Martin

    August 22, 2010 at 4:42 pm

    @MikeJ: Not always. But considering how many seats the Dems have over the GOP, not losing seats would be a rather tall order.

  5. 5.

    Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle

    August 22, 2010 at 4:43 pm

    @MikeJ: So what? What are the Democrats doing to minimize the losses? That’s the whole point, really.

  6. 6.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 4:43 pm

    It’s easy to say “Nothing can be done!”, and then head for exit, Stage Left.
    It’s also bullshit.

  7. 7.

    pablo

    August 22, 2010 at 4:44 pm

    As usual, it’s all Gibbs fault!

  8. 8.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 4:46 pm

    If unemployment were at 5% and the DOW was humming along and we could still fool ourselves into thinking we had it good because we were using our houses as ATM’s, we wouldn’t be talking about messaging and the Obama economic team. As it is, there is really nothing that government can do to bring that back, and we’re dealing with a day of reckoning that was a long time coming.

    This example and “Oh Well” are not the only two points on the spectrum.

  9. 9.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 4:49 pm

    Government can try to mitigate the damage (suffering), however. And try to chart a path toward some new pattern.

    If there’s one real sense in which this is a fundamentally conservative country, it’s this: changebad. We’re apparently losing our marbles at the moment over the prospect of change.

  10. 10.

    Liberal Sandlapper

    August 22, 2010 at 4:51 pm

    I am much more optimistic about the prospects for 2012, myself. The Recession from Hell will be history by then and things will be in general recovery mode by the end of next year.

    What kind of insanity will take place between now and then is something I have no confidence about whatsoever.

  11. 11.

    Napoleon

    August 22, 2010 at 4:51 pm

    Even if they passed a stimulus bill today by the time it would start kicking in we would be into the second quarter of 11. They were morons to design the stimulus so that it s effect would be waring off before the election but not long enough in advance to do something about it if the economy was not coming back.

  12. 12.

    azlib

    August 22, 2010 at 4:52 pm

    I agree — the economic trumps all. What puzzles me is why the Dems did not push harder to both educate and push programs which would help the current sour economic environment.

    I am one of those folks who will vote for my Blue Dog Dem because the Republican alternative will in all likelyhood be total crazy. Be interesting to see if voters when it comes done to it will vote in the crazies which will be great for political blogger, but not so great for the country.

  13. 13.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 4:53 pm

    Gosh, if only the President had the power to do something about the economy.

  14. 14.

    lacp

    August 22, 2010 at 4:56 pm

    A big stimulus (1-2 trillion) probably would be a game-changer; trouble is, it wouldn’t get through Congress.

  15. 15.

    John Cole

    August 22, 2010 at 5:01 pm

    Gosh, if only the President had the power to do something about the economy.

    Oh joy, another one of these wankfests.

  16. 16.

    cleek

    August 22, 2010 at 5:01 pm

    it’s like they didn’t expect there to be elections in 2010.

  17. 17.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:02 pm

    So “nothing could be done” seems to be the latest defense of Democratic governance the past 2 years. I suppose that’s possible, but it is not a winning message. If “everyone” knew “nothing could be done,” the Dems should have spent the past 2 years making the GOP block everything, so they could blame this all on the GOP. Things were pretty “post-partisany” for 2009 at least. Some one messed up, either on policy, or politics, or both.

  18. 18.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:03 pm

    The Shining City on a Hill has been foreclosed till further notice.

  19. 19.

    matoko_chan

    August 22, 2010 at 5:04 pm

    the ONE WE CAN DO…..the one thing we have control over, is GTFO Iraq and Afghanistan.
    pay our soldiers and jobless american humans to teach kids and build roads and solar panels and Volts ….fucking build ANYTHING.
    why are we pouring money down a rathole in Iraq and Afghanistan?
    its meaningless. we already lost.
    why should Afghans have infrastructure built for them when Americans need infrastructure?
    the Afghans dont want it…..fucking missionaries GTFO.

    Can we go home NAOW?

  20. 20.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 5:06 pm

    @John Cole: You should read the Judis piece (if you haven’t) it’s really about how Obama’s weak-tea politics failed to drive adequate economic policy.

  21. 21.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:06 pm

    @John Cole:

    Why you would complaint about this wankfest when you know, as everyone knows, that your post is inviting such a wankfest.

    What precisely is your point? That this economic state was inevitable, ergo we knew the Dems would get their asses kicked in 2010?

    I thnk cleek presents the relevant question – did they NOT know there were going to be elections in 2010? Of course they did.

    What you want to pretend is that everyone knew this, when it is obvious,indeed, more flattering to them, to say that the Obama economic team was caught by surprise by the economic situation.

    Otherwise, they are simply incompetents both as policymakers and politicians.

  22. 22.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:07 pm

    @MikeJ:

    The party in power always loses seats in midterms

    I think this is a slightly different case, though, because 2006 and 2008 left us pretty close to Peak Democrat. There were bound to be losses because it was a hell of a winning streak, and regression was inevitable.

    That said, there’s also the issue of why the economy is still bollocks. For that I chiefly blame the “centrists” in the Senate, but the president always catches heat for the economic climate regardless of whose fault it really is.

  23. 23.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:07 pm

    @shep:

    Yep. It is how failed politics led to failed policies.

  24. 24.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 5:09 pm

    @shep:

    Gosh, if only the President had the power to do something about the economy.

    I don’t understand this comment. Does it mean that the President does have the power to do something about the economy? Well, it’s limited power, surely. He (in this case) cannot make currently-profitable companies begin hiring again, for example. He cannot force research and development into new green technologies, not without public-private partnerships in place, and he cannot make that happen by fiat. And so on.

  25. 25.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:11 pm

    @BTD:

    the Dems should have spent the past 2 years making the GOP block everything, so they could blame this all on the GOP. Things were pretty “post-partisany” for 2009 at least.

    I don’t think letting/making the Republicans block everything in order to have someone to blame sounds like a good electoral strategy, and it sounds like an atrocious way to go about actually trying to help real people in despair.

  26. 26.

    John Cole

    August 22, 2010 at 5:11 pm

    I’m not saying nothing can’t be done to make life less difficult for people. I’m saying that in the big scheme of things, I think the economy is in a transitional stage and I expect things to just suck for a while.

  27. 27.

    J sub D

    August 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    And no, I don’t see things changing too much by 2012, either.

    It’s always difficult to predict two years down the road (ask Geithner and Bernanke) but I don’t see 3% GDP growth or 8% unemployment by then either. We have to take our housing fiasco medicine, something nobody likes the taste of, before we can even talk about recovery. Housing prices have not hit bottom yet, nor have foreclosures peaked.

    Blame Bush and the GOP or blame Obama and the Dems for this bipartisan “let’s put everybody in a home, what could possibly go wrong?” market meddling depending on your team affiliation. There’s blame enough to spread around.

  28. 28.

    Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle

    August 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Exactly, it’s like Quarterbacks in football. They get more credit and blame then they deserve, but it comes with the position. Which means if you want that position of power, you gotta accept what comes with it.

  29. 29.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    @parsimon:

    Well, it’s limited power, surely.

    See: “The New Deal”.

  30. 30.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    @John Cole:

    Oh joy, another one of these wankfests.

    It was never to be anything but. Think I’ll go clean the bathroom. And thanks for a shot of much needed reality.

  31. 31.

    jeffreyw

    August 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    One Word: Meatballs

  32. 32.

    Chyron HR

    August 22, 2010 at 5:14 pm

    @parsimon:

    Apparently you haven’t heard of a little something called “recess appointments”.

    No, wait, not that, the other thing. Bully reconciliation?

  33. 33.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:15 pm

    @parsimon: I know that polls keep showing that people want The Government to do something about jobs. Does anyone ever poll on what that something is supposed to be? I’m still confused about why the direct hiring method is supposed to be beyond the pale, but, apparently, it is.

  34. 34.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 5:16 pm

    @General Stuck:

    Do you ever not kiss Cole’s ass? Really now.

  35. 35.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:16 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    It sounds like a bad one – but the only one to adopt if you take the view, that JohnCole does in this post, that nothing could be done.

    In short, the Dems should have been preparing to run against GOP obstruction for the 2010 election starting on January 20, 23, 2009, if you accept the Cole theory of “nothing could be done” about the economy.

  36. 36.

    Maude

    August 22, 2010 at 5:17 pm

    @matoko_chan:
    you are on the wrong blog. the one you want starts with an e.

  37. 37.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:19 pm

    it looks like it is going to suck for a long time. If unemployment were at 5% and the DOW was humming along and we could still fool ourselves into thinking we had it good because we were using our houses as ATM’s

    Pretty sure we’d also be screaming about scary mosques and immigration and deficits and facing losses in November.

  38. 38.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:20 pm

    @John Cole:

    And yet, and yet, improving trends ion the economy would allow Dems to argue what they were doing was working, ergo, vote for us.

    And the truth is that Obama economic AND political teams expected to be able to make that argument.

    They were wrong. Why is it so hard for John Cole to admit that?

    Now what might have been the consequences of getting it right? Well, perhaps they would have tried for more economic stimulus. Also perhaps, they would have laid the ground for the political arguments to be made.

    Instead the White House planned for “Recovery Summer.”

    I mean, it is a fucking bad joke.

  39. 39.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:20 pm

    @shep:

    Gosh, if only the President had the power to do something about the economy.

    Yes, things are harder when you’re not a dictatorship.

  40. 40.

    John Cole

    August 22, 2010 at 5:20 pm

    In short, the Dems should have been preparing to run against GOP obstruction for the 2010 election starting on January 20, 23, 2009, if you accept the Cole theory of “nothing could be done” about the economy.

    The Dems should have been running against GOP obstruction regardless what theory about the economy you have.

  41. 41.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 5:21 pm

    @shep:

    This is not explanatory in itself.

  42. 42.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:21 pm

    @BTD:

    And the truth is that Obama economic AND political teams expected to be able to make that argument.

    Everybody did…and then came the European Debt Crisis and the Gulf Oil Spill.

  43. 43.

    fourmorewars

    August 22, 2010 at 5:22 pm

    ONE thing could sure f’ing change, and that’s if the elite media were at least to suffer one of their more prominent denizens pointing to the neoliberal economic model and saying at long last, ‘The emperor has no clothes.’

    Needs to be a moment when someone like Walter Cronkite pauses in the middle of the nightly news, like he did one evening in 1968, and says, ‘It has become increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out is to recognize that the gospel of the neoliberal free market has led us into this disaster.’

    Too bad we’re not gonna see anyone like Walter Cronkite again, and Paddy Chayefsky knows why.

  44. 44.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 5:22 pm

    @Chyron HR:

    Oh, I don’t say that the Obama administration has done everything right.

  45. 45.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:22 pm

    @Bob Loblaw: I’ve been saying pretty much what Cole said in this thread for months now, and fighting mostly by myself with wankers like you and others. It ought to be common sense except for people looking for blame and ponies, our economy and our mindset have been deconstructed for thirty years by right wing philosophy. Did anybody really think that deep structural cancer would be turned around in 19 months and a few billion in stimulus. I mean what fucking jobs are you going to create when the best middle class ones have done gone to the 3rd world? And STILL are.

    And if you think I “always’ kiss Cole’s ass, then you weren’t around for my prima donna one man drama play earlier this summer. Umphh! he got the Mercedes Benz.

  46. 46.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 5:23 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    I don’t think letting/making the Republicans block everything in order to have someone to blame sounds like a good electoral strategy, and it sounds like an atrocious way to go about actually trying to help real people in despair

    Ok, I guess the alternative we could shoot for is to not actually help people in despair and let them figure it out for themselves who to take it out on.

  47. 47.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:23 pm

    @Nick:

    I did not. I’m pretty sure Krugman did not. I’m pretty sure ROMER did not.

    I’m pretty sure Summers, Geithner and Emanuel did.

    Your “everybody” is rather broad.

  48. 48.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:24 pm

    @BTD:

    If “everyone” knew “nothing could be done,” the Dems should have spent the past 2 years making the GOP block everything, so they could blame this all on the GOP.

    You mean like the 9/11 health bill? Yeah that worked out great for the Democrats.

  49. 49.

    D-Chance.

    August 22, 2010 at 5:25 pm

    If unemployment were at 5% and the DOW was humming along and we could still fool ourselves into thinking we had it good because we were using our houses as ATM’s, we wouldn’t be talking about messaging and the Obama economic team.

    If this were the case, there would be no Obama economic team because we’d be grousing about President McCain.

    Obama won for one reason and one reason only… Bush repudiation. If the economy hadn’t tanked, McCain would have won. Make no mistake about history: Obama didn’t win; Bush’s Third Term lost.

  50. 50.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:26 pm

    @BTD:

    I did not. I’m pretty sure Krugman did not. I’m pretty sure ROMER did not.

    Krugman didn’t predict the economy would slow down like it did, he predicted it would grow gradually and the stimulus wouldn’t be enough for a quick rebound.

    No one predicted what happened in Europe…no one.

  51. 51.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:26 pm

    @BTD: Well, there are different meanings of “nothing could be done.” Saying nothing could be done to fix a deep-seated underlying condition isn’t the same as saying nothing could be done to stop the bleeding.

  52. 52.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 5:26 pm

    @Nick: Or if you’re a pathological centrist…or if you surround yourself with aristocrat sycophants…or if you completely misjudge the economy…the mood of the public…your adversaries…

  53. 53.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:26 pm

    @John Cole:

    Well, when assholes like me were critical of Obama’s postpartisan schtick, we were not thought well of by some posters and commenters on this blog.

    Glad to see we now all agree that the postpartisan idea was not a good political move once Obama became President.

  54. 54.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 5:28 pm

    @Nick:

    The oil spill has nothing to do with anything. Do you protect-the-shield types ever not have an excuse on hand?

    Any economist with anything resembling legitimacy did in fact refuse to join the green shoots brigade last winter. Because the only way the growth numbers looked like they did that quarter was because of an inventory readjustment coming out of an all-time low in capital investment in 2008 and the majority of demand was as a result of pull-forward tax credits. Neither of which was remotely sustainable. Nor is the current budget situation of the overwhelming majority of US states without prolonged federal assistance. And Europe’s problems had been known since the Lehman collapse. Exports were never going to work as a way out of this recession without serious dollar depreciation, which won’t work against the Eurozone’s various iniquities and Chinese mercantilism.

    There was never going to be a Summer of Recovery. You got it wrong. Again.

  55. 55.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:29 pm

    @BTD:

    Glad to see we now all agree that the postpartisan idea was not a good political move once Obama became President.

    I still give him a lot of credit for trying. The country isn’t a better place because it didn’t work, it’s a worse place.

  56. 56.

    Allison W.

    August 22, 2010 at 5:30 pm

    @parsimon:

    this is where the FDR comparisons come in along with calls for fireside chats and podium thumping – all while completely ignoring how the public, media and congress have changed since then.

  57. 57.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:31 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Well, explain it to me, because if the argument is nothing could be done to save us from being in the precise economic condition we are in now, or thought stimulus is just some type of illusory issue having no real effect on the economy, I have to question the economic literacy of the post.

    The stimulus issue, and its efficacy is critical to how many people can get jobs when the economy “improves, the ability to reduce government debt in the medium term, the ability of the nation to project power in the world.

    One of the more telling comments I read in this thread is that “FDR did nothing till 1935.” The is a whole lot of ignorant. FDR did a lot of stimulating of the economy, even when the programs were not the best.

    Anyway, nononecouldhavedone is the new mantra I see and I’ll just move on now.

  58. 58.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:31 pm

    @shep: or stuck with a Senate, media, and population obsessed with centrism that pounces on you like a hungry pack of wolves the moment you do something remotely partisan. Or that too.

  59. 59.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    I still think it’s stupid to say “the stimulus wasn’t big enough, they sure screwed the pooch on that one,” rather than “things got worse since then and it looks like we need more stimulus.”

  60. 60.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    @Allison W.:

    The chances of Obama being compared to FDR now are pretty slim.

    I agree, we can stop talking about that now.

  61. 61.

    Montysano

    August 22, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    @John Cole:

    I’m not saying nothing can’t be done to make life less difficult for people. I’m saying that in the big scheme of things, I think the economy is in a transitional stage

    Well, one thing Obama could do that would help would be to tell people the truth: that wherever we’re going, we’re not going back to where we were. Sorry, but we’re just not.

    Or, he could just be photographed drinking a Colt 45 and smoking a Black and Tan in the Oval Office.

    The result would be the same either way.

  62. 62.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    It ought to be common sense except for people looking for blame and ponies, our economy and our mindset have been deconstructed for thirty years by right wing philosophy. Did anybody really think that deep structural cancer would be turned around in 19 months and a few billion in stimulus. I mean what fucking jobs are you going to create when the best middle class ones have done gone to the 3rd world? And STILL are.

    Thanks, General Stuck. Though to be fair, Clinton helped global free trade and corporatism along. Even though we came out of it with a surplus rather than a deficit, it was a brief moment in time, a transition, not sustainable.

  63. 63.

    Dill

    August 22, 2010 at 5:33 pm

    If, by “Plastics,” your message is that the populace is once again at fault by virtue of the extensive use of credit as ‘payment,’ why then have Democrats (certainly along with the Republicans) vigorously supported the use of credit, directly and indirectly, both by commission and omission in legislation. The use of credit so abundant on the internet being a prime example (can we say “Sales Tax Moratorium” here? Along with the decimation of Brick and Mortar businesses?).

    Utter bullshit if that was the larger part of your message, I hear no voices from DC regarding the relentless movement towards a cashless/checkless country. Indeed the push is towards payment via phone, and anyone who is honest will have to admit people won’t be carrying forward their new account balances after making that phone purchase.

    The denial, and absence of commentary on this matter is stunning, particularly on the internet.

  64. 64.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:34 pm

    @Nick:

    Actually, yes, he did. So did Romer. So did a ton of people.

    I suppose we can forget that the Obama team projected a top of 8% unemployment, but who’s really paying attention to this stuff anyway?

    I really am moving on now.

  65. 65.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:35 pm

    @BTD:

    One of the more telling comments I read in this thread is that “FDR did nothing till 1935.

    who the hell said that? FDR didn’t institute any of the Democratic agenda until 1935 because he spent the first two years trying to stabilize the economy.

  66. 66.

    KG

    August 22, 2010 at 5:36 pm

    If I were a Democrat, the person I would blame (assuming I was unhappy with the last couple of years) would be Harry Reid. Obama has led pretty well. Pelosi has done a decent job in the House, as well. But Reid has done a fairly poor job, I think, in managing his caucus. I think he’s also done a terrible job dealing with the minority in the Senate, which has led to so many things dying in the Senate.

    But at the end of the day, the republic, like the economy, is like a large ship, it takes a lot of time to change direction and speed. The federal government was (and I think still is) at a point where it can build a statutory scheme so that this kind of collapse doesn’t happen again. But pulling us out of the recession is much more difficult – other than being a market actor, there just isn’t much the government can do.

  67. 67.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:38 pm

    @Nick:

    Even better, “dealing with the economy” was NOT the Democratic agenda for FDR? Surely you jest.

    Dammit, I wanted to move on.

  68. 68.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:38 pm

    @BTD:

    I suppose we can forget that the Obama team projected a top of 8% unemployment, but who’s really paying attention to this stuff anyway?

    or how Krugman initially agreed with the $800 million pricetag, but whos really paying attention to that stuff anyway?

    It matters that the consensus kept going up by like $50 million a week, but that was supposed to be an easy sell to the public because………..

    …….yeah.

  69. 69.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 5:39 pm

    @General Stuck:

    And if you think I “always’ kiss Cole’s ass, then you weren’t around for my prima donna one man drama play earlier this summer.

    Actually, I think it proves my point doesn’t it? Who gets so upset over an emotional attachment to a blog proprietor? You have a perpetual need for validation and when you don’t get it, you lash out and make a fool of yourself.

  70. 70.

    Comrade Luke

    August 22, 2010 at 5:39 pm

    It’s all ball bearings these days.

  71. 71.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:39 pm

    @BTD:

    “dealing with the economy” was NOT the Democratic agenda for FDR?

    I think you know what i meant. FDR didn’t institute any major programs until 1935.

  72. 72.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:41 pm

    @KG:

    If I were a Democrat, the person I would blame (assuming I was unhappy with the last couple of years) would be Harry Reid. Obama has led pretty well. Pelosi has done a decent job in the House, as well. But Reid has done a fairly poor job, I think, in managing his caucus.

    It’s important to point out that Reid has kept the caucus together more often than LBJ did. The difference is Reid can’t get Republican votes while LBJ did.

  73. 73.

    Montysano

    August 22, 2010 at 5:42 pm

    @BTD:

    Well, explain it to me, because if the argument is nothing could be done to save us from being in the precise economic condition we are in now, or thought stimulus is just some type of illusory issue having no real effect on the economy, I have to question the economic literacy of the post.

    The corruption and greed and insane lack of regulation that brought us here are still with us; nothing significant has been fixed. The only fix that I can see is to get real: flush the system clean and start over. It will be painful. But right now, there seems to be a belief that we can leverage and swap and bundle our way out of this. We cannot.

  74. 74.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:42 pm

    @Nick:

    I knew that is what you meant. And you were wrong. The idea that the government could actively intervene to stimulate the economy was one of the most important innovations of the FDR tenure.

    And it was part of the “Dem agenda.”

  75. 75.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:42 pm

    @BTD: It sounds to me like John is saying that our current economic conditions are the result of the chickens coming home to roost, and since Democrats had the misfortune of holding the hot potato when the music stopped, they were bound to suffer some degree of electoral punishment. So the thing that pundits have to do a better job of sorting out is the degree to which Democratic losses will be _deepened_ by specific policy and political failures.

    Thus, the boom was unsustainable to begin with, and “nothing could be done” about that; but that’s not the same as saying that “nothing could be done” so why bother to try. The patient can have a terminal disease, hence “nothing could be done” to make him well again; but that doesn’t mean his doctors shouldn’t try to palliate his pain. Likewise, “nothing could be done” to bring the boom back, but that’s not the same as saying “nothing could be done” at all.

  76. 76.

    Alwhite

    August 22, 2010 at 5:43 pm

    headline:
    The American middle class is on the verge of disappearing, while the United States, itself, is in danger of becoming a third world country
    http://www.presstv.com/detail/139522.html

    Why is it so obvious to everyone except the people who could change it?

  77. 77.

    Allison W.

    August 22, 2010 at 5:43 pm

    @BTD:

    awww, that’s too bad. We’re not even going to compare FDR’s Japanese internment camps with Obama’s detainee policies?

  78. 78.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 5:44 pm

    @parsimon: Fair enough. The President’s power to enact serious policy change is directly tied to popular support. Popular support is determined by the politics of leadership. When Obama failed to get on the right side (our side) of the now raging class war, he failed to lead and lost popular support and his power to affect significant policy change. Had he rallied the public against our criminal oligarchy, things might have gone differently. Judis points to Republican (and Blue Dog) capitulation on the stimulus once Obama started using more “us-and-them” rhetoric as evidence that it works to move more progressive policies but that Obama has been inconsistent, at best, with that framing. Combined with actual policies that kept the Kleptocracy whole and seeming indifference to millions of unemployed and he left the perfect vacuum for “conservatives” and Teatards to demagogue him from the left. Essentially, he ceded his power to make change on the alter of bi-partisan centrism.

  79. 79.

    Allison W.

    August 22, 2010 at 5:44 pm

    @BTD:

    awww, that’s too bad. We’re not even going to compare FDR’s Japanese internment camps with Obama’s detainee policies?
    Or is that another part of FDR’s presidency that liberals choose to gloss over?

    My point: no politician, no president fits the guy we see in the movies. So yeah, no more freaking FDR comparisons.

  80. 80.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:45 pm

    @BTD:

    I knew that is what you meant. And you were wrong. The idea that the government could actively intervene to stimulate the economy was one of the most important innovations of the FDR tenure.

    No, no, you didn’t know what I meant. What i meant was new programs, permanent change. FDR didn’t do a damn thing in that regard until 1935, in part because he didn’t have the votes and needed an economy recovery to get the political capital to do it. I have a certain Senator from Louisiana to back me on this.

  81. 81.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 5:45 pm

    @Nick:

    or how Krugman initially agreed with the $800 million pricetag, but whos really paying attention to that stuff anyway?

    Link please.

  82. 82.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:45 pm

    @BTD: So, this is a real question: what happened to the notion that the government could hire people directly? Because that became an unthinkable thought at some point, and I’m not sure how it happened.

  83. 83.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:47 pm

    @Allison W.:

    I guess we could. Since I defend and support Obama’s indefinite detention policies and abhorred FDR’s, I see no comparison.

    But knock yourself out.

  84. 84.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:48 pm

    @shep:

    When Obama failed to get on the right side (our side) of the now raging class war, he failed to lead and lost popular support and his power to affect significant policy change.

    Maybe it’s me, but I don’t consider trying to trigger a class war, or any type of war, leadership, otherwise the only leaders we have in this country are Republicans.

    Judis points to Republican (and Blue Dog) capitulation on the stimulus once Obama started using more “us-and-them” rhetoric as evidence that it works to move more progressive policies

    This is funny because here I thought Obama capitulated to the Republicans and Blue Dogs on the stimulus…not the other way around…who’s being inconsistent now?

  85. 85.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 5:48 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Yeah, John was not saying that before.

  86. 86.

    Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle

    August 22, 2010 at 5:48 pm

    @John Cole: Or as Krugman would say, we are turning Japanese:

    The Vapors – Turning Japanese

  87. 87.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:48 pm

    @Bob Loblaw:

    Actually, I think it proves my point doesn’t it? Who gets so upset over an emotional attachment to a blog proprietor? You have a perpetual need for validation and when you don’t get it, you lash out and make a fool of yourself.

    LOL, Some pretty good mental gymnastics there bobaloo. It is completely consistent with your particular brand of bullshit.

    First make an ignorant accusation, then when proven wrong, invent another out of whole cloth. And so on. That’s why we call it wanking.

    You have a perpetual need for validation and when you don’t get it, you lash out and make a fool of yourself.

    Judging by your performance in this thread and in general, looks a lot like projection to me. But I don’t shrink heads as much as knock them.

  88. 88.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 5:50 pm

    The postpartisan shtick has done nothing more than rehabilitate the Republican brand with the public. All the kowtowing and tip o the caps to Reagan have led to a sub-differentiation between R and D branding.

  89. 89.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:52 pm

    @shep:

    “conservatives” and Teatards to demagogue him from the left.

    Um, when did this happen? Because most of the teabaggers I see on the news are still all worked up about socia1ism, and the _last_ thing they want is for the government to help the little guy, because that’s redistribution of wealth and all that. They don’t want economic justice at all. They say they want less taxation and to be left alone. I don’t see anything populist about the Tea Party except for the idea that they are the true, authentic common people.

  90. 90.

    J sub D

    August 22, 2010 at 5:52 pm

    @BTD:

    The chances of Obama being compared to FDR now are pretty slim.

    I dunno. If he stretches this recession out six more years, he’s got a shot.

    Of course he’d have to get unemployment above 10% for the whole time to pull an FDR.

  91. 91.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:52 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Shorter Corner Stone – besides, Obama sucks, and always has. Hilllllllllllary!!

  92. 92.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/stimulus-math-wonkish/

    Nov 10, 2008

    I wrote this morning’s column partly because I had a hunch that the Obama people might be thinking too small on stimulus. Now I have more than a hunch – I’ve heard an unreliable rumor! So let’s talk about stimulus math, as I see it. Actually, before I get to the math, some concepts. Nearly every forecast now says that, in the absence of strong policy action, real GDP will fall far below potential output in the near future. In normal times, that would be a reason to cut interest rates. But interest rates can’t be cut in any meaningful sense. Fiscal policy is the only game in town.
    Wait, there’s more. Ben Bernanke can’t push on a string – but he can pull, if necessary. Suppose fiscal policy ends up being too expansionary, so that real GDP “wants” to come in 2 percent above potential. In that case the Fed can tighten a bit, and no harm is done. But if fiscal policy is too contractionary, and real GDP comes in below potential, there’s no potential monetary offset. That means that fiscal policy should take risks in the direction of boldness. So what kinds of numbers are we talking about? GDP next year will be about $15 trillion, so 1% of GDP is $150 billion. The natural rate of unemployment is, say, 5% — maybe lower. Given Okun’s law, every excess point of unemployment above 5 means a 2% output gap. Right now, we’re at 6.5% unemployment and a 3% output gap – but those numbers are heading higher fast. Goldman predicts 8.5% unemployment, meaning a 7% output gap. That sounds reasonable to me. So we need a fiscal stimulus big enough to close a 7% output gap. Remember, if the stimulus is too big, it does much less harm than if it’s too small. What’s the multiplier? Better, we hope, than on the early-2008 package. But you’d be hard pressed to argue for an overall multiplier as high as 2. When I put all this together, I conclude that the stimulus package should be at least 4% of GDP, or $600 billion.

    I was wrong, Krugman initially thought it should have been SMALLER than what it was.

  93. 93.

    Comrade Luke

    August 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm

    @Corner Stone: And even on this blog the notion that Obama just got stuck being president when the economy went bad is taken as fact.

    The economy was in the shitter long before he was even elected, yet somehow the Republicans are getting a free pass there.

  94. 94.

    Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle

    August 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm

    @Nick: Have you not noticed what’s happened the past 30 years?

  95. 95.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm

    @General Stuck:

    And if you think I “always’ kiss Cole’s ass, then you weren’t around for my prima donna one man drama play earlier this summer.

    Heh.

  96. 96.

    Comrade Luke

    August 22, 2010 at 5:54 pm

    @General Stuck:

    Shorter General Stuck: Yea, things might be going bad and yes the Democrats might be partially…look, an eagle!

  97. 97.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 5:55 pm

    @General Stuck:

    Actually, you just said you cried and ran away from a blog for three days. Hardcore. Real headknocking stuff.

    Though I can’t say I’m surprised that your level of introspection is nothing more than “Nuh uh, you are.”

  98. 98.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I flame everybody, even myself.

  99. 99.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    @Corner Stone: Except that everyone still hates the Republican “brand,” which is why we have to hear about the “Tea Party” as though they’re something else, like when Firestone decided to call itself Bridgestone after that giant recall.

  100. 100.

    KG

    August 22, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    @Nick: True, but the political landscape when LBJ was Senate Majority Leader is quite different than it is today. The parties were more diverse, or at least less guided by ideology, than they are today. But your point is taken.

    Perhaps it’s just a matter of perception. Reid has always struck me as an ineffective leader.

  101. 101.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    @Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle:

    Have you not noticed what’s happened the past 30 years?

    you mean the gradual decline of our nation in part because we elect dividers and place haloes over their heads?

  102. 102.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    @Nick:

    Maybe it’s me, but I don’t consider trying to trigger a class war, or any type of war, leadership, otherwise the only leaders we have in this country are Republicans.

    Hate to break it to you but “the war” is ongoing (what are you, like eleven?). The problem is that only the aristocrats and their lackeys (Republicans, Blue Dogs and other “conservatives”, along with a handful of liberals) are engaged in the fight. Though I’ve heard that the rank-and-file are arming themselves.

    This is funny because here I thought Obama capitulated to the Republicans and Blue Dogs on the stimulus…not the other way around…who’s being inconsistent now?

    Judis is just telling the history of it. Perhaps it’s “inconsistent.”

  103. 103.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:57 pm

    @Comrade Luke:

    Yea, things might be going bad and yes the Democrats might be partially…look, an eagle!

    I said no such thing.

  104. 104.

    John Cole

    August 22, 2010 at 5:58 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Thank you.

  105. 105.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 5:58 pm

    @KG:

    True, but the political landscape when LBJ was Senate Majority Leader is quite different than it is today.

    and yet Obama, Reid and Pelosi are expected to deliver with the same ease as Democrats did back then.

    you don’t compare climbing Mount Everest to the Rosslyn subway steps.

  106. 106.

    morzer

    August 22, 2010 at 5:59 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Only if you ignore the fact that the public in the polls generally dislikes the GOP somewhat more than the Democrats. Voter enthusiasm is what matters, and that’s why the problem of poor messaging by the Democrats and Obama, combined with a sour economy, is going to cost them this November.

  107. 107.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 5:59 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Except that everyone still hates the Republican “brand,” which is why we have to hear about the “Tea Party” as though they’re something else, like when Firestone decided to call itself Bridgestone after that giant recall.

    This is simply untrue.
    And if you can’t admit that Obama has lent credibility to R members of Congress at every turn then you’re being a little delusional.
    Judd Gregg anyone?

  108. 108.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 5:59 pm

    @Bob Loblaw: Yea, well, I took a break, mostly from being driven crazy by numbnuts like you, that lie with every breath. How many times have I knocked your pretty head since, and you always run away at some point. LOL. tough guy.

  109. 109.

    morzer

    August 22, 2010 at 6:00 pm

    @Alwhite:

    Isn’t that Ross Douthat howling and shaking his fist? The resemblance is striking.

  110. 110.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 6:00 pm

    @shep:

    Hate to break it to you but “the war” is ongoing (what are you, like eleven?). The problem is that only the aristocrats and their lackeys (Republicans, Blue Dogs and other “conservatives”, along with a handful of liberals) are engaged in the fight.

    Gee, too bad we didn’t have a leader who could work to end “the war”

    Republicans, Blue Dogs and other “conservatives”, along with a handful of liberals

    so basically the entire country.

  111. 111.

    Davis X. Machina

    August 22, 2010 at 6:01 pm

    @Nick: Times 2. Stimulus package proposals were always based on 2 year payouts.

  112. 112.

    Corner Stone

    August 22, 2010 at 6:01 pm

    @morzer: Alright, let’s judge by outcomes then. I think that’s what you’re saying.

  113. 113.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:02 pm

    @shep: Thanks for a fuller response; I appreciate it. I’m going to have to read the Judis piece in full. As it stands, the terms you use puzzle me a bit, as I don’t understand how the stimulus bill was a failure to get on the right side in the class war.

  114. 114.

    Napoleon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:02 pm

    @BTD:

    Even better, “dealing with the economy” was NOT the Democratic agenda for FDR? Surely you jest.

    It wasn’t, just like it wasn’t for Obama. It is something he had to address but it was not a party objective.

  115. 115.

    Bob Loblaw

    August 22, 2010 at 6:03 pm

    @John Cole:

    Which would seem to be inconsistent with your crawling through broken glass to vote routine. Either you’re a fatalist or your not, you can’t be a quasi-fatalist.

    If you have no expectations and are simply voting to keep a far worse governing outcome from coming to pass, why the random chest-puffing some days and not others?

  116. 116.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:04 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Really? Never hear a Teatard talk about the Obama (or Democrat) “bailouts”? I’d tell you to get out more but you’re probably safer right where you are.

  117. 117.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 22, 2010 at 6:04 pm

    All I know is that this country was so much better off when FDR was ramming his bully pulpit down our throats!

  118. 118.

    Napoleon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:05 pm

    @Nick:

    or how Krugman initially agreed with the $800 million pricetag, but whos really paying attention to that stuff anyway

    That is not what I recall. He may have said $800m was fine it it was well designed to have the maximum multiplier effect (which the plan proposed did not). At no point did he support what was actually proposed.

  119. 119.

    morzer

    August 22, 2010 at 6:07 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I am saying that polling has generally shown that, although both parties have all the appeal of the common cold, the Democrats have been slightly less unpopular. Equally, polling on voter enthusiasm has shown that the Ferengi GOP voters are generally more enthusiastic. Given the fact of some solid achievements legislatively by Obama and the Democrats, logically one has to attribute their upcoming troubles to a) bad messaging b) a bad economy.. in whichever order you prefer. FWIW I think the bad messaging has been exacerbated by the failure of the Democrats to build anything institutional with which to counterattack the shitspreader Wurlitzer cranked up by the GOP every time John Boehner’s pet hamster stubs its toe or Sarah Palin thinks she sees a happy American from her house.

  120. 120.

    General Stuck

    August 22, 2010 at 6:07 pm

    @Bob Loblaw:

    Which would seem to be inconsistent with your crawling through broken glass to vote routine. Either you’re a fatalist or your not, you can’t be a quasi-fatalist.
    If you have no expectations and are simply voting to keep a far worse governing outcome from coming to pass, why the random chest-puffing some days and not others

    What does this even mean? Cole simply stated it will take time to fix this mess, and you idiots concoct every sort of bullshit meme to characterize it. But then that’s what 11 percenter firebaggers do. It is all you do.

  121. 121.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 22, 2010 at 6:08 pm

    @Bob Loblaw:

    Which would seem to be inconsistent with your crawling through broken glass to vote routine. Either you’re a fatalist or your not, you can’t be a quasi-fatalist.
    __
    If you have no expectations and are simply voting to keep a far worse governing outcome from coming to pass, why the random chest-puffing some days and not others?

    I thought we had this discussion on Friday? Twice.

  122. 122.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:08 pm

    @Nick:

    Gee, too bad we didn’t have a leader who could work to end “the war”

    The complaint is that we didn’t have one who would fight it – or at least be seen as trying.

    Also the math works out something like 99% us vs. 1% oligarchy. Though you can always count on a lot of people being confused about it. And, apparently, not just the Teatards.

  123. 123.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 6:09 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    And if you can’t admit that Obama has lent credibility to R members of Congress at every turn then you’re being a little delusional.

    You were talking about the “Republican brand,” which is something else. I was referring to things like the approval ratings for Congressional Republicans, which continue to suck and IMHO do not show that Obama has “rehabilitated the Republican brand.” See this graph from FiveThirtyEight. Yes, Obama has reached out to Republicans many times, but I haven’t seen any evidence that that makes the American public like Republicans any more than they did already.

  124. 124.

    Davis X. Machina

    August 22, 2010 at 6:10 pm

    @BTD: Rep. Obey, Fiscal Times, 7/16/10

    “The problem for Obama, he wasn’t as lucky as Roosevelt, because when Obama took over we were still in the middle of a free fall. So his Treasury people came in and his other economic people came in and said ‘Hey, we need a package of $1.4 trillion.’ “

    “His Treasury people” —the evil Geithner—and “his other economic people” —the virtuous Romer—working together?

    Unpossible.

  125. 125.

    Napoleon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:11 pm

    @Nick:

    What he was talking about was not a plan that something like 1/4-1/3 was the AMT fix and including the AMT fix fully 1/2 was tax cuts, “spending” with the worst multiplier effect.

    He was always against what was actually proposed.

  126. 126.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:12 pm

    @parsimon:

    I don’t understand how the stimulus bill was a failure to get on the right side in the class war.

    I didn’t say that. I’ve mostly been referring to his political leadership. But, in a nutshell, the stimulus failed because it bailed-out our masters (with our money) but not us.

  127. 127.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 22, 2010 at 6:14 pm

    @shep:

    But, in a nutshell, the stimulus failed because it bailed-out our masters (with our money) but not us.

    I think you’re getting the stimulus mixed up with TARP, which was passed before Obama took office.

  128. 128.

    KG

    August 22, 2010 at 6:15 pm

    @Nick: just to be clear, I’m not among those who thinks they can or should deliver with ease. My opinion is that the system has gotten fucked up to the point that no one is going to accomplish much with ease.

  129. 129.

    Napoleon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:15 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    like when Firestone decided to call itself Bridgestone after that giant recall.

    FYI, actually they got bought by Bridgestone, the Japaneses company.

  130. 130.

    BTD

    August 22, 2010 at 6:16 pm

    @Davis X. Machina:

    Yep. And someone forgot to tell the President. Obey is talking about Romer dude.

  131. 131.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 6:18 pm

    @shep: Yes, they bitch about the bailouts. They bitch about them _from the right_, because they see them as “socia1ism.” They certainly do not advocate any economic-populist policy. They might hate banks and Wall Street in a _tone_ that harmonizes with lefty critiques of the same institutions, but they are dead set against social welfare and economic justice, so calling it demagoguery from the left is wishful thinking. I mentioned on the other thread that the whole Rick Santelli thing about tea parties arose from his being pissed off about having to help pay for losers’ mortgages. That doesn’t sound like an attitude held by the left.

  132. 132.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    @shep:

    The complaint is that we didn’t have one who would fight it

    Ah, and thats where we differ. You want to fight a class war, I really don’t.

    But no one is stopping you for picking up a pitchfork. The other side doesn’t wait to “leaders” to fight the war for them

  133. 133.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    @arguingwithsignposts: Right you are, I was thinking TARP. Though, inasmuch as the stimulus kept the economy from going off the cliff but still failed to provide adequate stimulative effect (bringing down unemployment), it had the same effect of keeping the oligarchy whole (stock values, etc.) while leaving the rest of us sucking wind. It’s why it’s so easy to lump it in with the rest of the “bailouts.”

  134. 134.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    @shep:

    But, in a nutshell, the stimulus failed because it bailed-out our masters (with our money) but not us.

    That sounds like you’re talking about TARP.

  135. 135.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 6:21 pm

    @Napoleon: Right, there was a merger or acquisition or something, not just a straightforward name change. Still, they switched all their commercials and signage from Firestone to Bridgestone after the wave of terrible publicity, which I think is analogous to Republican -> Tea Party.

  136. 136.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 6:22 pm

    @Napoleon:

    He was always against what was actually proposed.

    Because by the time it was actually proposed, he had moved on to $1 trillion +

  137. 137.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:22 pm

    @Nick:

    Ah, and thats where we differ. You want to fight a class war, I really don’t.

    We don’t really differ much (I don’t much like wars of any kind). I just understand what’s going on in the world around me.

  138. 138.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 22, 2010 at 6:23 pm

    @shep: It had a stimulative effect. We just still need _more_ of a stimulative effect.

  139. 139.

    constantlurker

    August 22, 2010 at 6:24 pm

    @BTD: if only…..

  140. 140.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:25 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Yup.

  141. 141.

    tib

    August 22, 2010 at 6:35 pm

    @Nick: Two months later, as Obama proposed his stimulus, it was clear that the economic situation was at least twice as dire as the November numbers suggested. By January 2009 Krugman and everyone else revised their estimate of the output gap from $1 trillion to over $2 trillion, and Krugman correspondingly doubled his estimate of the stimulus required to $1.2 trillion:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/09/opinion/09krugman.html

    Jan 9, 2009

    To close a gap of more than $2 trillion — possibly a lot more, if the budget office projections turn out to be too optimistic — Mr. Obama offers a $775 billion plan. And that’s not enough.

    Which, we now know, matched the administration’s private estimate in December, from CEA chair Romer:

    http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/10/12/091012fa_fact_lizza

    The best estimate for the output gap was some two trillion dollars over 2009 and 2010. Because of the multiplier effect, filling that gap didn’t require two trillion dollars of government spending, but Romer’s analysis, deeply informed by her work on the Depression, suggested that the package should probably be more than $1.2 trillion.

  142. 142.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 6:43 pm

    @shep:

    Right you are, I was thinking TARP. Though, inasmuch as the stimulus kept the economy from going off the cliff but still failed to provide adequate stimulative effect (bringing down unemployment), it had the same effect of keeping the oligarchy whole (stock values, etc.) while leaving the rest of us sucking wind. It’s why it’s so easy to lump it in with the rest of the “bailouts.”

    Sorry, shep, but I find this somewhat of a lame reply. Confusing TARP with the stimulus bill is the same significant error too many Tea Partiers — and now the Republican party whole, in its bandwagonism — is making. TARP passed under Bush, with the widespread support of the Republican party establishment. To whatever extent it represents a propping up of our masters and overlords, the Republicans share the blame.

    The stimulus bill is an entirely different animal. While I myself feel that Obama is overly corporatist, I also understand that he doesn’t have a lot of choice in the matter right now; we’re owned by the financial industry at the moment. With time, and regulation, we might be able to get away from that, but we’re way deep into it now. Failing to keep stock values at some sort of even keel would have been disastrous.

    This will all be moot come the aftermath of the midterm elections.

  143. 143.

    shep

    August 22, 2010 at 6:50 pm

    @parsimon: Sorry, shep, but I find this somewhat of a lame reply.

    Sorry to disappoint you. Too much multitasking, I’m afraid.

    As far as the rest, yes, there’s plenty of blame to go ’round. Yet, there’s only one PoTUS. You know, leader of the free world.

  144. 144.

    parsimon

    August 22, 2010 at 8:22 pm

    Dear shep, next time try not to confuse the TARP and the stimulus bill when you suggest that the current POTUS has failed to support the right people in the class war. It would be better to acknowledge that you made a mistake, and to reconfigure your criticism, rather than falling back on “well, they’re all bailouts.” Fail.

  145. 145.

    Southern Beale

    August 22, 2010 at 8:53 pm

    If unemployment were at 5% and the DOW was humming along and we could still fool ourselves into thinking we had it good because we were using our houses as ATM’s, we wouldn’t be talking about messaging and the Obama economic team.

    No, we’d be talking about terra terra terra and there would be a tape from Osama and there would be lots of pants-wetting about how we’re all gonna die.

    That’s what all of this mosque-fear is anyway … A more subtle terra terra terra messaging.

  146. 146.

    Brachiator

    August 22, 2010 at 9:05 pm

    @shep:

    I didn’t say that. I’ve mostly been referring to his political leadership. But, in a nutshell, the stimulus failed because it bailed-out our masters (with our money) but not us

    As others have noted, you seem to be confusing TARP with the Economic Stimulus.

    And here is some of the major spending categories for the economic stimulus (The Stimulus Plan: A Detailed List of Spending)

    Aid to People Affected by Economic Downturn, $36,910,807,000
    __
    Aid to State and Local Governments, $58,355,000,00
    __
    Business, $870,000,000
    __
    Education, $48,420,000,000
    __
    Energy, $41,400,000,000
    __
    Health Care, $18,830,000,000

    And this doesn’t include some individual tax credits over the past two years. How do you think the money should have been spent?

  147. 147.

    Nick

    August 22, 2010 at 9:45 pm

    @tib:

    Two months later, as Obama proposed his stimulus, it was clear that the economic situation was at least twice as dire as the November numbers suggested.

    yes, I’m aware, but we had already sold a smaller stimulus.

  148. 148.

    DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective

    August 22, 2010 at 10:25 pm

    From the mediablogosphoria that gave you, just short of three years ago, the great Presidential Race between Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani, today … predictions about 2012!

    Wait, let me get a pencil, I am going to want to remember this.

  149. 149.

    mclaren

    August 22, 2010 at 11:52 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    It’s easy to say “Nothing can be done!”, and then head for exit, Stage Left. It’s also bullshit.

    So give us concrete specific workable solutions to:

    [1] The endless offshoring of American jobs;

    [2] Computer automation that now replaces white collar college grad high-skill high-wage jobs with computers;

    [3] Global wage arbitrage;

    [4] America’s heroin-like addiction to a bloated military-industrial complex as a weird dysfunctional jobs program;

    [5] The decay and collapse of major freeway-car-culture-driven states like California and Michigan built on unsustainable $1-a-barrel oil back in the 50s;

    [6] The unsustainable bubble in college tuition costs;

    [7] The tendency of the internet to eat every industry and destroy it, including the newspaper business, the radio business, TV networks, book publishers, etc.;

    [8] The unsustainable systemic out-of-control exponentiation of health care costs in America, caused by a chain of greed and collusion and corruption and sweetheart contracts and non-disclosure agreements all the way from the medical devicemakers who use bribes to lock care providers into using only their device, to the fee-for-service doctors, to the for-profit hospitals, to the giant monopoly insurance cartels;

    [9] The seemingly endless debt spiral in individual states, where the erosion of the middle class courtesy of globalization crushes tax revenues, so the states cut basic services, which causes white flight, which in turn leads to further erosion of the tax base (rinse, wash, repeat).

    These seem like hardwired systemic problems. If you have any practical workable fixes for these problems that are compatible with today’s political realities, please let us know.

  150. 150.

    Dill

    August 23, 2010 at 12:18 am

    Dear John,

    I posted a comment earlier which took 20 plus comments later to post (though it was posted with a timestamp of the time I posted it versus the time it was posted, and inserted between posts which were visible far sooner than mine was), while the posts following mine were clearly being posted more rapidly, given that many of those posts were responses to comments which succeeded mine.

    If your posting system takes far longer to post some comments than others, that should be noted clearly somewhere, as, in retrospect, someone reading through the comments will get a thoroughly different feel for the conversation when it is not written in the sequence it occurred in, with some comments possibly being unread because they are posted retroactively among comments submitted (and posted in a much more timely manner) in the same time period.

    While my comment was by no means earthshaking, it was, nonetheless, relevant. To read over the comments after the fact, a person might think it was considered too irrelevant to respond to, when the fact of the matter is that most of the posters posting during the same time period in which I posted, most likely never read it, as it was posted over twenty comments later than it’s showing as having been posted.

    Thanks in advance for any attention you may be able to give to that problem, hopefully it’s a first time post issue only.

    August 23 12:18 AM EST

  151. 151.

    tib

    August 23, 2010 at 12:50 am

    @Nick: Well, as I pointed out the transition team knew by mid-December, before Obama started selling anybody anything, that a stimulus of $1.2 trillion was the conservative effective estimate. Obama went with what Summer’s called, in his December memo to Obama, “an insurance package against catastrophic failure” (from the New Yorker article) instead.

    As for convincing the public, we were watching half a million jobs disappear every month, everyone was aware that we were entering a huge crisis.

  152. 152.

    mclaren

    August 23, 2010 at 2:14 am

    @Liberal Sandlapper:

    I am much more optimistic about the prospects for 2012, myself. The Recession from Hell will be history by then and things will be in general recovery mode by the end of next year.

    That’s the general consensus among Washington beltway economists and pundits. This is just another recession, we’ll bounce right back, everything’s going back to normal, Joe Sixpack’s house will be worth $600,000 again by spring 2012 and gasoline will be back down at $1.75 a gallon and everyone will be driving their SUV to the big box store to load up on giant-screen TVs and sofas and ottomans and air conditioners for that nice new playroom they just added to their house with that raise their boss gave them.

    Some of us have been pointing out this is delusional.

    This isn’t just another recession. We’re unwinding thirty ears of crazy unsustainable debt and we’re tipping into a deflationary spiral. The economy isn’t bouncing right back and the stats show it. Joe Sixpack’s house will never be worth what he paid for it in his lifetime. Gasoline is never going back down to $1.75 in our lifetimes — more likely, it will head back up past $5.00 a gallon. People are going to be abandoning their SUVs by the side of the road because they can’t afford to pay for the gasoline and no one wants to buy ’em. Giant-sceen TVs and sofas and ottomans and air conditioners and ATVs and boats and jet skis are toys for the upper middle class and they’re history. Joe Sixpack’s boss isn’t going to give him a raise, he’s going to fire all his U.S. workers and move his operations overseas.

    This kind of bland thoughtless business-as-usual mindset has settled around the beltway like invisible nerve gas. Don’t worry, be happy. Everything’s fine. We just need a few tweaks to the system and it’ll hum along great.

    Everything isn’t fine. The system is broken. Tweaks won’t fix it. Things can’t go on like this, but the people inside the beltway don’t see it.

  153. 153.

    FlipYrWhig

    August 23, 2010 at 2:32 am

    @tib: So the reason it wasn’t $1.2T or whatever the magic number was had nothing to do with the way that a small number of persistently irritating “centrist” Senators like to demonstrate their “centrism” by saying no to spending? Because I guaran-damn-tee you that there was no way, no how, that ONE TRILLION DOLLARS was ever slipping by the goalie of Beltway conventional wisdom. You could tell Olympia Snowe and Ben Nelson that the world was on the verge of turning into a Boschian hellscape and they _still_ would say that ONE TRILLION DOLLARS was more than they could in good conscience approve. Yes, it’s stupid, it’s just a number, and all the numbers are big. But that’s what we’re dealing with, and without them, nothing passes.

  154. 154.

    Anne Laurie

    August 23, 2010 at 4:28 am

    @Dill: You’ll probably never come back to read this, but — One of the drawbacks to WordPress is that all new commentor names, and/or new commentor addresses, are automatically “moderated”. They get out of moderation when Cole or one of his underbloggers (DougJ, Tim F, me, Mistermix, Randhino, Kay, E.D. Kain) has a chance to look at the ‘dashboard’ and click the Accept button. Since this is an all-volunteer operation, that may happen quickly or very slowly indeed, depending on everyone’s schedules. But, to the best of my knowledge, blog policy (as set by Cole) is to “accept” all comments that are not obviously spam.

  155. 155.

    Yutsano

    August 23, 2010 at 4:29 am

    @Anne Laurie: I will admit, though, that his post regarding the huge spam pile ensued some great hilarity.

  156. 156.

    Dill

    August 23, 2010 at 7:03 am

    Thanks for the response Anne, good to know that it was only a first time post issue.

  157. 157.

    tib

    August 23, 2010 at 8:51 am

    @FlipYrWhig: Congress passed a $787 billion stimulus, which was almost exactly what Obama proposed. Yes, there was last minute symbolic horse trading in the Senate at the end of the process, but the Senate was going to pass what the President said was required to address the crisis.

    And it did address the crisis, Obama pumped enough money into the system to arrest our economic collapse. If this were a typical recession that might have been enough to get economic growth back on track. This is not a typical recession, and Obama ignored those who argued that a typical response would be inadequate.

  158. 158.

    frankly0

    August 23, 2010 at 9:29 am

    This is a truly depressing comment thread, commenced by a truly depressing post.

    The sheer non-rationality of the opinions expressed is quite completely demoralizing, beginning with John Cole’s entirely ungrounded claim that essentially nothing could have been done to pull us out of our current slump. Why does he believe this? If he’s offered up an actual argument, it has escaped my attention.

    Look, people, economics isn’t magic; it’s a science. Keynesians have a clear remedy for a recession such as ours — just as it did for the even much more serious downturn of the Great Depression. That remedy is called a stimulus, which makes up for the output gap in a recessionary economy. If we rightly credit FDR for bringing us out of the Great Depression employing basic Keynesian economic principles, why is it impossible that a like remedy would work in this case?

    Does anyone here believe anymore in “reality-base” for their opinions? Has progressivism so declined in its aspirations to intellectual integrity that no care is given to whether an opinion holds up rationally?

    It’s almost impossible to read these comments as anything more than still more apology for Obama. Why otherwise the nearly perverse refusal to engage rational, scientific argument on a matter that is scientific in nature?

    Reading commentary like this makes me lose hope for the future of the progressive movement. The worst of it is that people who call themselves progressives were likely always like this, and I just didn’t notice.

  159. 159.

    chopper

    August 23, 2010 at 9:47 am

    Look, people, economics isn’t magic; it’s a science.

    economics isn’t science. at all.

  160. 160.

    frankly0

    August 23, 2010 at 10:10 am

    @chopper:

    The point is not whether economics, in its current state, is a science exhibiting the same order of certainties one might find in, say, physics. The point is rather that the subject matter of economics is one in which there are objective facts of the matter, subject to scientific laws, which we may or may not yet fully understand.

    If you want to have a rational discussion as to whether a stimulus can bring us out of our current downturn, and what the required size of that stimulus is, you are required to invoke some scientific principles and scientific evidence. You can’t just put your finger in the air as does John Cole, declare you don’t like the way the wind is blowing, and conclude that there’s just no way to get to prosperity from here.

    That is to treat economics as magic, not as comprehending a scientific subject matter.

  161. 161.

    shep

    August 23, 2010 at 11:34 am

    @parsimon: Dear parsimon: when I see the millions of unemployed being put back to work and the ubber-rich paying a reasonable share for government (rather than 18% real unemployment and arguing over more tax cuts for the rich), I’ll correct my “mistake” vis-a-vis the government action and the class war.

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