Dems cast Rush as spokesman for GOP

[Kulaf]

http://blogs.moneycentral.msn.com/topst ... &gt1=33009

Buffett said President Barack Obama needs to scale back his agenda, and congressional Democrats need to temporarily give up pet projects and stop actions that inflame the minority.

There's one of the most successful investors in the history of the world saying it. Obama needs to let some of this crap slide off the table and focus on recovery.

[Lurker]

What about opening up the transparency behind the TARP allocations?

I think they are being more transparent about TARP. They've posted a lot of info on the Treasury website.

There's one of the most successful investors in the history of the world saying it. Obama needs to let some of this crap slide off the table and focus on recovery.

If you are trying to say Buffett agrees with you that Obama shouldn't be spending money on his agenda, you'll need to try again. Buffett didn't say Obama should scale back his agenda in the context you are using it in.

What Buffett did say, and I strongly disagree, is that Obama shouldn't pursue his agenda because it would antagonize the minority party.

I disagree for several reasons. Obama is fulfilling his campaign promises for health care and energy investment and they are vital parts of the recovery. Also, the Republicans have proven that they have nothing to offer in the economic recovery debate. Tax cuts for the wealthy and federal spending cuts are, to paraphrase David Brooks, insane suggestions during this crisis. Who cares if they are antagonized.

[Ddrak]

Let's look at the facts for a minute, and use them to form an opinion about the success of Obama's economic policy.

Ok...

During the campaign, he pledged to limit earmarks to pre-1994 levels, yet he signed the omnibus spending bill with pork well in excess of that.
To be fair, he has zero control over that. Clinton attempted it with line-item veto but it's blatantly unconstitutional for the President to limit any sort of spending that congress passes without a straight up veto of the entire bill. On the flipside, isn't a stimulus bill supposed to be pork, at least in terms of capital works?

He promised to put a bill online for 5 days before signing it, but we barely got 15 hours for the stimulus bill.
Fair criticism. Balanced somewhat by the fact it was extremely well publicized in all forms during its progress through the house and senate. It's not like there were any real surprises in the final version that weren't in either the house or senate versions during passage.

He promised transparency in TARP fund allocations.. we still don't know what bank got what, and what strings were attached.
Again fair, but again mitigated by the fact that it's far more open than it was 3 months ago.

The Dow is working its way to 5000.
Not Obama's fault. Not even remotely. Until the full extent of the crisis is known, and we're still not at the bottom, you can't judge Presidential performance on a single indicator. I suggest you go and watch The Daily Show's segment on "The Dow Knows All" because it's pretty much right on the money.

One in five mortgages are "underwater".
And were so before Jan 20. Completely unfair.

No headway has been made in removing toxic assets from balance sheets... hell, they can't even value them yet.
Fair criticism. This is an issue that neither Bush or Obama have addressed and this should have been one of the primary goals of any recovery package. The fact that they're somehow hoping that throwing money at the banks will achieve the same thing is ludicrous. It's like saying that feeding someone enough food will cure that tapeworm...

Credit is still largely frozen, pumping a trillion dollars into banks/insurance companies has done nothing, yet he wants to keep doing the same thing and hope for a different result (hello Einstein and the definition of insanity).
Same as the prior statement really. Credit can't thaw until the toxic assets are enumerated.

Unemployment at 10%
Unfair criticism. Even in November it was predicted that unemployment would go past 10% no matter what anyone did.

700 applications for a janitor's job at a school.
Repeat of previous unfair criticism. In fact, we're getting a similar situation over in Australia and you can hardly blame Obama for that!

GM about to go belly up, despite the cash infusion they received.
Unfair criticism. Prior to January it was predicted that one maker would either go belly up or be bought by another through federal handouts.

Citigroup trading for less than a dollar (the same Citigroup Obama wants to give billions to)
Unfair criticism. The banking industry was tanking and was predicted to keep tanking through this year.

This is Lurker's definition of success.

You're mostly unfair in your criticism. It would be far more credible if you weren't listing things that sounded like a Hannity/Limbaugh list of talking points.



@Kulaf:

Interesting how a real news source rather than a blogger has a different take on Buffett's speech:

Buffett called on Democratic and Republican policymakers to set aside partisan differences and unite under the leadership of President Barack Obama to wage an "economic war" that will fix the economy and restore confidence in banking.

link
Dd

[Kulaf]

Yer right Dd.....he did say that. He also said this (my emphasis):

Another excerpt:

BUFFETT: Right. And, Joe, it--if you're in a war, and we really are on an economic war, there's a obligation to the majority to behave in ways that don't go around inflaming the minority. If on December 8th when--maybe it's December 7th, when Roosevelt convened Congress to have a vote on the war, he didn't say, `I'm throwing in about 10 of my pet projects,' and you didn't have congress people putting on 8,000 earmarks onto the declaration of war in 1941.

BUFFETT: So I think--I think that the minority has--they really do have an obligation to support things that in general are clearly designed to fight the war in a big way. And I don't think you should--I don't think before D-Day on June--on June 5th you ought to have--or June 1st, maybe, have a congressional hearing and have 535 people give their opinion about where the troops should land and, you know, what the weather should be and how many troops should land and all of that. And I think after June 6th you don't--you don't have another hearing that says, `Gee, if we'd just landed a mile north.'

So did Buffett mean what I said......or did he mean what Lurker said? He clearly is saying that Obama should focus on recovery only and not add on any of his pet projects (reforming healthcare), and the Republicans should support him in that effort.

[Ddrak]

Point taken.

Isn't Buffett seriously conflating the role of commander-in-chief (ie the President) and the role of guardian of the purse (ie Congress) there? If he's suggesting that Obama declare a general state of war and take control of the purse directly in complete disregard for the Constitution then maybe he's got something, but somehow I think his likening of the financial crisis to D-Day is just a touch nuts?

I think Obama sees health reform as capital infrastructure spending. I tend to agree with you that it should have been in a separate bill, but from the last decade of watching how the US government works, you'll need a serious change in house and senate rules before they wean themselves from omnibus bills that cover a dozen different totally unrelated projects just to get numbers to go through. If there's something that seriously needs fixing in the US government, that's it.

Dd

[Partha]

I realize that this completely upsets the authoritarian Republican/"Libertarian" folks in the house (and you know who you are, so the offended can leave the strawman at home), but Obama is not a maximum leader and does not have the ability to make Congress pass bills the way he likes them.

I will repeat: Obama can propose whatever he wants, but in the end, he has to get it past Congress. And if Republicans continue sticking to their 'filibuster threat forEVAH!' position regarding all bills, then they WILL be as "pork laden" as needs to be to get past 59 votes in the Senate, because Reps who end up voting for those bills are going to lard those bills even more than Democratic_Senator_49.

[Lurker]

Ddrak,
Nice posts, but you seem to be conflating the Recovery Act with the Omnibus spending bill in some of your comments. Omnibus bills always fund multiple areas of government, and health care investment for electronic records was part of the Recovery Act.

Kulaf,
Buffett was not making his comments in the same light you have been. He was not saying Obama should abandon his agenda because of the cost.

As for what Buffett did say, he's being extremely foolish and naive in this instance. The Republicans have nothing to add to the debate and they have no intention of working with Obama no matter how much he capitulated to their insanity. It would be really dumb to abandon the popular agenda that Obama campaigned on in the false hope of not antagonizing a regional fringe pary of nutballs, especially considering he feels his agenda will help with the recovery. The Republicans are going to continue acting like Beevis and Butthead (heh heh he said Beaver management heh heh) no matter what Obama does. They need to be ignored until they grow the hell up.

And to everyone,
The Omnibus was not a "pork ladden" bill. It had 9000 earmarks totalling around 6 billion dollars; much lower on both numbers than the prior year. Earmarks are directed spending, which does not equate to wasteful spending. It's likely that eliminating all earmarks wouldn't save a dime since the money would still be in the bill in an undirected form. Thanks in large part to Obama we know exactly who put in which earmarks.

[Ddrak]

Ddrak,
Nice posts, but you seem to be conflating the Recovery Act with the Omnibus spending bill in some of your comments. Omnibus bills always fund multiple areas of government, and health care investment for electronic records was part of the Recovery Act.

I was - thanks for the correction.

Dd

[Klast Brell]

The republicans are not interested in helping the economy right now. They know that anything they do to help fix the economy will be credited to the Democrats. So like the cynical bastards that they are they are following an agenda of "fuck the country as long as we can make the democrat's look bad". I predicted this in an earlier thread and now I can back it up with a quote.
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/house ... -for-dems/

“We will lose on legislation. But we will win the message war every day, and every week, until November 2010,” said Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., an outspoken conservative who has participated on the GOP message teams. “Our goal is to bring down approval numbers for [Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and for House Democrats. That will take repetition. This is a marathon, not a sprint.”

If the Democrats propose a solution they will trash talk it and try to block the legislation so they can call congressional democrats infective. The republicans are howling about all the earmarks in the bill. But the republicans themselves submitted 47% of those earmarks. McCain just stood on the senate floor blasting earmarks including one for a convention center in SC. That earmark was put in the bill by the Republican Senator from SC.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Klast -

You're absolutely right about Repubs making a grab for earmarks in lockstep with the Dems. Its sickens me.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

The republicans are not interested in helping the economy right now. They know that anything they do to help fix the economy will be credited to the Democrats. So like the cynical bastards that they are they are following an agenda of "fuck the country as long as we can make the democrat's look bad". I predicted this in an earlier thread and now I can back it up with a quote.

I saw that quote too, and to me it's absolutely disgusting. The GOP are acting like pouty children instead of leaders. Seems like all they are accomplishing (other than fucking us over) is to further marginalize their party more to the fringe then they already are. There's major ideological differences. Fine, but hopefully we are all after the same things.

[Lurker]

The republicans are not interested in helping the economy right now. They know that anything they do to help fix the economy will be credited to the Democrats.

You make it sound like the Republicans are holding back solutions. They aren't. Tax cuts and Hooverism are all they have to offer.

You're absolutely right about Repubs making a grab for earmarks in lockstep with the Dems. Its sickens me.

You are sickened by earmarks? Directed spending affects you to such a degree that you are sickened by it, even when we know that it doesn't result in more money being spent in most cases and that most of the projects are worthy? Even when we have transparency in the process? I think you need to reevaluate.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Lurker, you make it sound like you're all for spending just for the sake of spending. That's not the answer. Just because some spending is "directed spending", doesn't mean its wise spending, nor does it mean its necessary spending. The 7+ BILLION dollars of earmark pork is paid for by the taxpayers. Remember you spouting off about the Bridge to Nowhere? That was "directed spending" too. My, how your tone has changed.

[Lurker]

Lurker, you make it sound like you're all for spending just for the sake of spending. That's not the answer. Just because some spending is "directed spending", doesn't mean its wise spending, nor does it mean its necessary spending. The 7+ BILLION dollars of earmark pork is paid for by the taxpayers.

You said you were sickened and now are saying that all the directed spending is wasteful pork. That's absurd and dishonest. You are making yourself sick over something not grounded in reality.

Remember you spouting off about the Bridge to Nowhere? That was "directed spending" too. My, how your tone has changed.

Links please. I remember taking issue with Palin and McCain lying about her role and specifically saying that my issue was not about the money. It's also useful to point out that when Congress eliminated the earmark the money was still sent to Alaska and spent.

As for my tone changing, here's a post from 2007 on this subject.

I still don't understand some peoples obsession with earmarks. Most earmarks consist of money that has already been allocated - Congress is just specifying how that money is going to be spent - so eliminating the earmark provides no savings.

They are also such a tiny portion of the budget, even with the record numbers of earmarks pushed by the 'conservative' Republicans while in power, that even if you saved one tax dollar for every earmark dollar eliminated it would do almost nothing.

And finally, most 'pork' spending is not 'pork' or wasteful at all; they are for valid and useful projects. Yes, you can dig up absurd exceptions to this, but they are just that. . .exceptions.

My tone doesn't seem to have changed at all.

[Harlowe]

The ENTIRE issue most people had with the "Bridge to Nowhere" earmark were her repeated lies about it.

And looking at his 2007 post above, sounds like he's been singing the same tune.

[Embar Angylwrath]

He is...

I went back and searched his posts. He had a couple in there that had issues with earmarks/pork/unneceesay spending, but in regards to the Bridge, his main beef was her dishonesty about it.

That said... why would anyone defend those types of unnecessary expenditures. (Hope I didn't post something supporting it because I was drunk, thought Palin was hot, and could totally fantasize about her smoking my pole, that's totally within the realm of my shallow nature )

Anyway, now that we have a tall black man in office (sorry, just doesn't do it for me), my mind is clear. We should not be spending one dollar more of taxpayer's money than we have to, because eventually, the bill comes due. Lurker can frame it as "directed spending", but that doesn't mean shit. I can frame it as "unecessary spending". When we are trying to pull the economy out of a tail spin, aren't there better places to put the money other than multi-million dollar studies for pig smells and honeybee warehouses?

And Harlowe, so what if Lurker can thump his chest and say he never attacked the Bridge because it was wasteful spending.. he damn well should have.

[Lurker]

I'm all for eliminating wasteful or unnecessary spending, but that isn't the issue here.

It's pure ignorance when people say that most, or even a meaningful percentage, of earmarks are wasteful spending. And yeah, that includes the ones McCain thinks sound funny. McCain is a know-nothing gasbag and doesn't know if the earmarks he mocks are worthy or not. He doesn't check and he doesn't care.

That's dangerous when he's given a megaphone by the press to demagogue an extremely minor issue (directed spending via earmarks) as if it was the root cause of all our problems. People treating a minor problem as a huge problem that sickens them are incapable of solving actual problems. All they can do is mislead.

Eliminating wasteful spending requires transparency, which we now have. It also requires us to be honest about what constitutes wasteful spending. That takes more than mocking something because it has "beaver management" or "tatoo removal" in the title, both of which happen to be worthy programs and not at all wasteful.

We should not be spending one dollar more of taxpayer's money than we have to, because eventually, the bill comes due.

Exactly wrong. In our current economic crisis it's much better for the Government to err on overspending than to do too little to pull us out of this recession. That doesn't mean we should waste money on useless things. Of course, nobody has shown that we are to any meaningful degree.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Exactly wrong. In our current economic crisis it's much better for the Government to err on overspending than to do too little to pull us out of this recession. That doesn't mean we should waste money on useless things. Of course, nobody has shown that we are to any meaningful degree.

No Lurker.. this isn't an "oops" type of error. When Congress decides they are going to spend money, someone has to actually insert verbiage into the spending bill. Someone, or some group, has to actually define, codify, allocate and direct spending. So there are no "errs". All of it is intentional and calculated.

Do you disagree?

[Lurker]

I was replying to your quoted comment and speaking to the larger issue. To get out of this current crisis it's much better to overspend than it is to do too little. I wasn't talking about earmarks.

[Embar Angylwrath]

I was replying to your quoted comment and speaking to the larger issue. To get out of this current crisis it's much better to overspend than it is to do too little. I wasn't talking about earmarks.

Quit dodging. You are nominally better than Partha in addressing the issue at hand. Please don't give up that marginal distinction now.

I'm talking about earmarks. You have been addressing my comments about earmarks. That said, do you feel earmarks are necessary to get this economy rolling again? If not, why do you support earmarks as just the cost of doing business? Don't you expect more from your elected reps? Won't you demand more?