RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
You can't spend your way out of a recession, you let the market correct itself which it would if politicians would allow it to rather than print money like it's going out of style further devaluing said money.
This wasn't true for the great depression and it isn't true now between Junior and Obama's spend spend spend til the cows come home mentality.
I think you need to check history on that one. Granted the situation is much worse this time around than any other recession since the big one, but cutting government spending would have resulted in more unemployment, higher welfare needs, less tax revenue to the government, and therefore greater deficits anyway. We're going to have deficits either way. The GOP should have gotten out of the way and allowed more infrastructure spending to be done (which Romney now claims to support... this week anyway). Infrastructure has to be maintained, and there's no better time to invest in it than when you need the jobs anyway, and borrowing is about as cheap as could possibly be. Then, as we come out of the recession, we have better infrastructure, an economy generating more jobs and creating more revenue for the government, which can pay down the debt.
We still need cuts and we still need tax reform. I think tax reform could be a nice overall boost for the economy if it can be dramatically simplified, but it's a tricky thing to do well. Of course then you'll probably have a ton of out of work tax attorneys and tax preparation folks, but someone always gets the short end.
RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
I have zero issue with raising taxes, but on the same hand in order to bring the deficit down and actually have a budget (something else Obama's ongoingly failed to have since day 1) you're not going to go anywhere.
Again, what's with this "Obama failed to" stuff? He came into a recession like we've never seen before, and the projections from economists that we were seeing at the time turned out to be too optimistic (which is really saying something, because those predictions were pretty dire already). So yeah, he didn't right the budget yet because to do so would kill the recovery.
RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
Personally I would rather see government get the fuck out of health care period, all they're going to do is fuck it up more and pass the costs onto us. You know this, I know this, Obama and Mittens know this.
We, as a country, refuse to simply throw people out into the streets when they are sick and need care. So like Romney says, they can call an ambulance and go to the emergency room. They'll likely get hit with a bill they couldn't pay in their lifetime, but that doesn't matter, because the rest of us end up paying those costs. It's the most retardedly expensive way to provide health care, but that's how we do it right now.
Obamacare cuts these payments to hospitals, as well as forcing insurance companies to take people with pre-existing conditions. This was ok with both groups because the hospitals wouldn't get nearly as many uninsured patients showing up, and the insurance companies would get millions of new customers. It's a start towards bringing overall health care costs down rather than continuing to pay vastly more than the rest of the developed world while only getting moderately better outcomes in some cases, and the same or worse outcomes in a lot of cases.
Romney knows this. He did basically the same thing in Mass. But since the issue was radioactive during the primaries, he had to pretend that he doesn't know why Mass went with that plan, but that for some weird reason it works. It just suddenly makes no sense to him.
RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
The GOP proposed cuts as well, the problem is the two parties can't agree on what to cut and how much due to completely opposite ideologies. That's where they need to meet in the middle and compromise, something I'm not sure is even in Obama's vocab.
I know they proposed cuts. That's all they proposed. It's not even so much that they can't agree on what to cut. It's that the GOP refused to accept any revenue increase at all (even closing tax loopholes, etc). The issue is that the GOP wants everything their way or no way. They were, after all, willing to do this sequestration deal rather than give an inch on revenues.
RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
I'm with you, I'd like to hear exactly what Romney's plan entails as well but I still find it better than the alternative of 20 trillion in debt and nothing to show for it after another 4 year Obama term. Because honestly, what do we have to show now? More debt, the same level of unemployment (more if you count those who just gave up looking) and very little progress on anything important that Obama said he would do.
I'd first like to know what Obama said he would do that you thought was important. Then maybe we can go from there. Of course unemployment is higher than it was. Jobs were still in free-fall when he took office and didn't bottom-out until later. It's definitely recovering though, and any shouting from the GOP about it being too slow is just utterly shameless.
RollinThundr wrote on Oct 30, 2012, 16:24:
Look I realize he came in during the biggest fiancial crisis since the great depression but it's been 4 years now since he took office. Time to stop blaming the last administration and take some damn responsibility.
And that's the biggest cop-out of the entire GOP message. It's like we decide to race, and then I shoot you in the leg. When you can't keep up, I tell you to quit whining about things that happened 5 minutes ago and just accept that you can't beat me. It's complete bullshit, but for some reason right-wingers buy into it.
The economy is recovering. All indicators are showing that. You just don't come out of a recession that deep in four years. Especially with all the crap going on in the rest of the world. So no, that's not actually an argument. It's the GOP trying to pretend that the world began when Obama took office and nothing before matters, and they had nothing to do with it. Just watch how Romney always refers to job losses or other statistics starting 4 years ago, not mentioning that the same indicators had already plummeted off the cliff during the previous administration. It's completely dishonest, which is why I don't believe Romney won't go right back to the same policies that got us into the mess in the first place. Since he seems to have forgotten anything before 2009.
This comment was edited on Oct 30, 2012, 18:03.
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)