Some afternoons you gotta go coffee and donut

Doll Is Mine wrote:

phatj wrote:Playing Devil's advocate - if you stipulate the premise that the country would be much better off under conservative government, then I think it makes a certain amount of pragmatic sense to try to make things worse temporarily to (hopefully) ensure that the liberals are out of power as quickly as possible so that the healing can begin.

I suppose it'd be much easier to accomplish if the country hadn't actually seen it happen quite unsuccessfully for 6+ years when Bush was elected in 2000.

Point being, people who prioritize getting the Dems out of office aren't necessarily doing it out of spite, but possibly for reasons of #patriotism and #CountryFirst.

phatj wrote:Playing Devil's advocate - if you stipulate the premise that the country would be much better off under conservative government, then I think it makes a certain amount of pragmatic sense to try to make things worse temporarily to (hopefully) ensure that the liberals are out of power as quickly as possible so that the healing can begin.

It's a fair point in theory, but I think it breaks down in the light of reality.

First, conservatives' current views on economic policy would carry more weight if there were any evidence that those policies were effective. But, whether you call it Supply-Side, Laffer Curve, Trickle-Down or anything else, there's no evidence that greater and greater concentration of wealth in the top 1% results in sustained economic and job growth. In fact, there's plenty of at least circumstantial evidence that a broader distribution of wealth results in greater prosperity for the American economy.

As for the efficacy (or lack thereof) of austerity policies, we need only look at what's happening in Europe to those countries which have adopted severe austerity measures. And, for an example closer to home, but further back in time, we can look at FDR's ill-fated decision to cut spending after the initial government increases in spending had slowly begun to turn the economy around after the beginning of the Great Depression.

Secondly, we're talking about the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans. To actively aid and abet a poor economy for years and years in the hope that one day you'll be able to implement your own policies seems to me to be the height of irresponsible government. Again, if there were evidence that Republican economic policies worked, it would be one thing. But when those policies were tried as recently as the W. Administration AND tax rates are already at the lowest they've been in decades, the responsible thing to do would be to allow for at least the possibility that other policies might be the better route.

Finally, although I'm sure there are many, maybe even most, conservatives who honestly believe the premise that their economic policies would result in a stronger economy. However, although that may be one motivation for actively refusing even to try other policies, the fact is that all too many Congressional Republicans are simply tools of their wealthy masters, whose primary motivation is to see policies enacted which extract as much as possible from those less fortunate in order to increase their own wealth. And those wealthy masters often tend not to care much about the unintended consequences of those policies so long as they get theirs. In other words, yes, there is a class war, but it started from the top down.

In short, to let hundreds of millions of Americans suffer for years because of an apparently delusional belief that your policies might someday yield That Great Come-and-Get-It-Day if only you could get back in power, strikes me as both intellectually dishonest and malfeasant governing.

I'm not defending this position.

Understood. I don't mean to attribute those views to you.

By the way, the more I think about it, the more that sort of governing sounds only one step removed from anarchy.

it's crazy to me that since 2008 (read: since the pres came into office), no republican has broken the party line that the economy is getting better (because it's not, or, not fast enough! they'll say) despite month after month of slow but steady improvement in the jobs #s and the economy. like, not even a grudging nod that things are at least looking up. everything is doom and gloom

td11 wrote:it's crazy to me that since 2008 (read: since the pres came into office), no republican has broken the party line that the economy is getting better (because it's not, or, not fast enough! they'll say) despite month after month of slow but steady improvement in the jobs #s and the economy. like, not even a grudging nod that things are at least looking up. everything is doom and gloom

We're becoming Greece.

ppth

I'm told there are some around here who prefer Greek.

<----------------- Greek

Supreme is going to take two cases dealing with marriage equality--one is a challenge to DOMA, and the other is a challenge to CA's prop 8.

The unemployment rate dropped because while 122k fewer people were employed, 229k fewer people were unemployed on the household survey. Enough people dropped out of the labor force to make up for the decrease in people who were employed to bring the rate down to 7.7%.

Additionally in the payroll survey, the job growth numbers for September and October were revised down.

This is apparently nitpicking and by pointing out reality it means you want the country to fail so we can win elections (when there isn't a federal election for another 23 months).

Republican top priority, above jobs and helping the economy, was getting Obama out of office. Those were McConnell's words, I believe.

Also, McConnell filibustering his own call for a vote. LOL.

jerseyhoya wrote:The unemployment rate dropped because while 122k fewer people were employed, 229k fewer people were unemployed on the household survey. Enough people dropped out of the labor force to make up for the decrease in people who were employed to bring the rate down to 7.7%.

Additionally in the payroll survey, the job growth numbers for September and October were revised down.

This is apparently nitpicking and by pointing out reality it means you want the country to fail so we can win elections (when there isn't a federal election for another 23 months).

I've been telling you til I'm blue in the face not to give much credence to labor statistics; they're cooked beyond all comprehension, regardless who's in charge.

And yet you persist.

When you're pointing at monthly labor statistics, you're not pointing out "reality", because you'd actually need to be pointing at numbers that anyone should give much weight to.

Yesterday people were saying the report might say just 22k new jobs were created. that's right, twenty-two thousand (no 'hundred' upfront), that due to Sandy. Prediction: these numbers will get one heck of a revision or two over the next few months.

The discussion about the jobs numbers went: a liberal celebrating them, a liberal knocking Republicans for nitpicking them, a liberal drawing a line from this to Republicans rooting for America to fail, a discussion about Republicans hating America, me pointing out why people were 'nitpicking' about them, me getting yelled at for talking about the job numbers.

Holy hell

sorry, JH. It's not your fault your party has gone crazy. Sometimes these things just happen.

Also, McConnell filibustering his own call for a vote.

LOL

democracy is back on in egypt.

yay^ except that so many opposition members resigned because of these moves and were replaced by Muslim Brotherhood members that I'm not sure it matters much.

So, some republicans in PA, OH, VA, and MI are mulling trying to get legislation going to allocate electoral votes by congressional districts. hmmm, wonder why those states?

if gerrymandering works just fine in PA then this'll probably get by