Obama General Discussion, vol. 3

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Major deregulation during the Reagan and Clinton eras was a major factor in the economic collapse that we're riding out over the next couple of years. How is your superfree market working out for everyone, Indie, beyond the super-haves, speculators, and bankers who made off with the cash and left the rest of the taxpayers and business owners holding the bill?

Are you really arguing that phone service was better when AT&T had a regulated monopoly?

Are you really arguing that the public was better informed when radio & TV operated under the Fairness Doctrine?

Deregulation is working fine in the airline industry. Natural gas is one of the few areas that is providing new jobs in this "economic collapse." Others energies are doing well except were government continues to over-regulate (state specific blends of gasoline, EPA stopping refineries, coal and nuclear plants from being built, nonsensical limits on drilling, etc). Or maybe you weren't around for gas lines in the 70's or remember how expensive airline travel used to be.

Works fine in banking when government regulators are doing their job instead of watching porn. When the Fed isn't playing politics with artificially low interest rates. When the government isn't mandating banks into less stringent credit and down-payment requirements.

Or are you arguing that government sponsored Fannie and Freddie was the exemplary example in the nefarious home mortgage market?

And if you think we have a "superfree market" here are all 50 volumes of the Code of Federal Regulations. You can look up the state regulations.

Title 1: General Provisions
Title 2: Grants and Agreements
Title 3: The President
Title 4: Accounts
Title 5: Administrative Personnel
Title 6: Homeland Security
Title 7: Agriculture
Title 8: Aliens and Nationality
Title 9: Animals and Animal Products
Title 10: Energy
Title 11: Federal Elections
Title 12: Banks and Banking
Title 13: Business Credit and Assistance
Title 14: Aeronautics and Space (also known as the Federal Aviation Regulations, administered by the Federal Aviation Administration)
Title 15: Commerce and Foreign Trade
Title 16: Commercial Practices
Title 17: Commodity and Securities Exchanges
Title 18: Conservation of Power and Water Resources
Title 19: Customs Duties
Title 20: Employees' Benefits
Title 21: Food and Drugs (administered by the US Food and Drug Administration and the US Drug Enforcement Administration)
Title 22: Foreign Relations
Title 23: Highways
Title 24: Housing and Urban Development
Title 25: Indians
Title 26: Internal Revenue
Title 27: Alcohol, Tobacco Products and Firearms
Title 28: Judicial Administration
Title 29: Labor
Title 30: Mineral Resources
Title 31: Money and Finance: Treasury
Title 32: National Defense
Title 33: Navigation and Navigable Waters
Title 34: Education
Title 35: Reserved (formerly Panama Canal)
Title 36: Parks, Forests, and Public Property
Title 37: Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights
Title 38: Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief
Title 39: Postal Service
Title 40: Protection of Environment (administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency)
Title 41: Public Contracts and Property Management
Title 42: Public Health
Title 43: Public Lands: Interior
Title 44: Emergency Management and Assistance
Title 45: Public Welfare
Title 46: Shipping
Title 47: Telecommunication (also known as the "FCC Rules", administered by the Federal Communications Commission)
Title 48: Federal Acquisition Regulations System
Title 49: Transportation
Title 50: Wildlife and Fisheries

You can keep trotting out the right-wing line about unregulated free markets as long as you like, because you present it like religious ideology and leave common sense and historic fact far behind in the dust.

This should make you happy; dust is regulated by two federal agencies, EPA and OSHA.
 
Are you really arguing that phone service was better when AT&T had a regulated monopoly?
You'll probably get a few posts from angry AT&T customers who can't get service in the middle of downtown San Francisco :D

Are you really arguing that the public was better informed when radio & TV operated under the Fairness Doctrine?
Yep, but then again I think conservative talk radio and Fox News / MSNBC are all terrible, reducing the political discourse in the country to black and white hatred with no grey areas, and feeding the loyal viewers whatever they think they will want to hear to keep listening/watching. American broadcast media has been on a steady decline since the early 90s. OJ was just the start of the tip towards ridiculousness where we now find ourselves.

Don't even get me started about Clear Channel Communications or essentially monopolies such as Live Nation.

Deregulation is working fine in the airline industry. Natural gas is one of the few areas that is providing new jobs in this "economic collapse."
You might want to ask the folks with flammable tap water how all that deregulation is working out for their well-being and property value.

Don't tread on me, indeed!

Or are you arguing that government sponsored Fannie and Freddie was the exemplary example in the nefarious home mortgage market?
Greenspan's er, let's say misguided opinion on the American dream "everyone should have houses they own themselves, and a second mortgage!!" is well documented, of course.

Title 1: General Provisions
Title 2: Grants and Agreements
Title 3: The President
Title 4: Accounts
Title 5: Administrative Personnel
Title 6: Homeland Security
Title 7: Agriculture
Title 8: Aliens and Nationality
Title 9: Animals and Animal Products
Title 10: Energy
Title 11: Federal Elections
Title 12: Banks and Banking
Title 13: Business Credit and Assistance
Title 14: Aeronautics and Space (also known as the Federal Aviation Regulations, administered by the Federal Aviation Administration)
Title 15: Commerce and Foreign Trade
Title 16: Commercial Practices
Title 17: Commodity and Securities Exchanges
Title 18: Conservation of Power and Water Resources
Title 19: Customs Duties
Title 20: Employees' Benefits
Title 21: Food and Drugs (administered by the US Food and Drug Administration and the US Drug Enforcement Administration)
Title 22: Foreign Relations
Title 23: Highways
Title 24: Housing and Urban Development
Title 25: Indians
Title 26: Internal Revenue
Title 27: Alcohol, Tobacco Products and Firearms
Title 28: Judicial Administration
Title 29: Labor
Title 30: Mineral Resources
Title 31: Money and Finance: Treasury
Title 32: National Defense
Title 33: Navigation and Navigable Waters
Title 34: Education
Title 35: Reserved (formerly Panama Canal)
Title 36: Parks, Forests, and Public Property
Title 37: Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights
Title 38: Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief
Title 39: Postal Service
Title 40: Protection of Environment (administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency)
Title 41: Public Contracts and Property Management
Title 42: Public Health
Title 43: Public Lands: Interior
Title 44: Emergency Management and Assistance
Title 45: Public Welfare
Title 46: Shipping
Title 47: Telecommunication (also known as the "FCC Rules", administered by the Federal Communications Commission)
Title 48: Federal Acquisition Regulations System
Title 49: Transportation
Title 50: Wildlife and Fisheries
That indeed is quite a lot. So, in your libertarian, deregulated world, should I have to relocate to a state with decent regulatory laws if I don't want a cellular company to build a cell tower 100ft from my property line / kids' bedrooms?

What do you suggest cutting back on? Should we merge some departments to simplify things? Indians and Parks, Forests, and Public Property, that would work. We could mash-up Public Welfare and Shipping to get some jobs for those lazy urban dwellers.
 
Natural gas is one of the few areas that is providing new jobs in this "economic collapse." Others energies are doing well except were government continues to over-regulate (state specific blends of gasoline, EPA stopping refineries, coal and nuclear plants from being built, nonsensical limits on drilling, etc). Or maybe you weren't around for gas lines in the 70's or remember how expensive airline travel used to be.
Spoken by someone whose state isn't getting destroyed by the natural gas industry. Our education system and our environment in Pennsylvania are suffering terribly, directly because of natural gas.
 
Spoken by someone whose state isn't getting destroyed by the natural gas industry. Our education system and our environment in Pennsylvania are suffering terribly, directly because of natural gas.

Locals cash in on natural gas boom in Pa. - Washington Times

I can find all kinds of articles about the booming economy in those areas, a rare feat indeed in these times. Naturally there are some pissed off politicians that have yet to figure how they can get their hands on all this money.

And the fears over fracking can only be described as non-science hysteria.
 
Obama United Nations Picture: President Blocks World Leader's Face With Hand (PHOTO)


OBAMA-HAND-FACE.jpg


To be fair, someone had just asked, "Who still believes in Keynesian economics?"
 
Obama United Nations Picture: President Blocks World Leader's Face With Hand (PHOTO)


OBAMA-HAND-FACE.jpg


To be fair, someone had just asked, "Who still believes in Keynesian economics?"

The US is being left behind in the economic boom the rest of the globe is experiencing thanks to austerity.
 
Locals cash in on natural gas boom in Pa. - Washington Times

I can find all kinds of articles about the booming economy in those areas, a rare feat indeed in these times. Naturally there are some pissed off politicians that have yet to figure how they can get their hands on all this money.

And the fears over fracking can only be described as non-science hysteria.
I don't even feel like making an effort if you're going to quote the fucking Washington Times. Just take it from someone who lives here and is directly impacted by it everyday.
 
The biggest donor to Tom Corbett? Terry Pegula, natural gas tycoon.
The only natural gas rich state that doesn't tax natural gas companies at all? Pennsylvania.
Biggest cut in PA budget in 2011? Education. $900 million.

If we taxed natural gas, even a little bit, we could afford to put all that money back in education. We could actually get something out of being a state with a big resource. Instead, we have the most expensive state schools in the country in Penn State and Pitt. Instead, we're laying off teachers everywhere, just so the billionaires can line their pockets. How many jobs would really be lost if we taxed them? Barely any. How many people are suffering from not taxing them? Everyone under 23 in the state.
 
The biggest donor to Tom Corbett? Terry Pegula, natural gas tycoon.
The only natural gas rich state that doesn't tax natural gas companies at all? Pennsylvania.
Biggest cut in PA budget in 2011? Education. $900 million.

If we taxed natural gas, even a little bit, we could afford to put all that money back in education. We could actually get something out of being a state with a big resource. Instead, we have the most expensive state schools in the country in Penn State and Pitt. Instead, we're laying off teachers everywhere, just so the billionaires can line their pockets. How many jobs would really be lost if we taxed them? Barely any. How many people are suffering from not taxing them? Everyone under 23 in the state.

I think you can tell how evil an energy company is by how aggressive it's being with it's advertising.
I can't tell you how many times I've seen the bullshit "Fracking is completely safe" ad. It's being run all of the time.
 
Locals cash in on natural gas boom in Pa. - Washington Times

I can find all kinds of articles about the booming economy in those areas, a rare feat indeed in these times. Naturally there are some pissed off politicians that have yet to figure how they can get their hands on all this money.

And the fears over fracking can only be described as non-science hysteria.

well it's certainly a good thing all those people have jobs with health care for when their drinking water bursts into flames.
 
Yep, but then again I think conservative talk radio and Fox News / MSNBC are all terrible, reducing the political discourse in the country to black and white hatred with no grey areas, and feeding the loyal viewers whatever they think they will want to hear to keep listening/watching. American broadcast media has been on a steady decline since the early 90s. OJ was just the start of the tip towards ridiculousness where we now find ourselves.

How old are you. Maybe not old enough to remember the rules broadcasters had to live by back then. In a nutshell, they avoided any opinion or controversial subjects. Too much hassle.

So whatever you may think of Fox news at least freedom of speech is much healthier.


That indeed is quite a lot. So, in your libertarian, deregulated world, should I have to relocate to a state with decent regulatory laws if I don't want a cellular company to build a cell tower 100ft from my property line / kids' bedrooms?

The whole point of rebutting your post is you shouldn't blanket label all deregulation as bad and not think that they're aren't outdated, redundant, contradictory, ineffective, cost prohibitive and just plain stupid regulations out there that are costing jobs, wasting resources, restricting competition and stifling innovation.
 
The US is being left behind in the economic boom the rest of the globe is experiencing thanks to austerity.

Pretty sure I remember German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejecting President Obama’s plea for other nations to follow America’s lead of greater fiscal spending to stimulate their economies in April of 2009? (I'd post a link but some here take offense if I reveal an article that contradicts what they've been told to think)



Anyway, if I had to describing our $3.75 trillion budget, $1.5 trillion deficit and $14.7 trillion national debt, pardon me, but austere is most likely the last word I'd use.
 
Pretty sure I remember German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejecting President Obama’s plea for other nations to follow America’s lead of greater fiscal spending to stimulate their economies in April of 2009? (I'd post a link but some here take offense if I reveal an article that contradicts what they've been told to think)



Anyway, if I had to describing our $3.75 trillion budget, $1.5 trillion deficit and $14.7 trillion national debt, pardon me, but austere is most likely the last word I'd use.

Agreed here. The rest of the world regards the US's response to the financial crisis as unduly profligate, if anything. It has set up an unfortunate "beggar-thy-neighbour" policy response from other countries.
 
I think you can tell how evil an energy company is by how aggressive it's being with it's advertising.
I can't tell you how many times I've seen the bullshit "Fracking is completely safe" ad. It's being run all of the time.
i don't know, there must be exceptions to the rule. i don't remember ever seeing an mlgw (memphis light, gas, and water) commercial but they're pretty fucking evil. very corrupt.
 
i don't know, there must be exceptions to the rule. i don't remember ever seeing an mlgw (memphis light, gas, and water) commercial but they're pretty fucking evil. very corrupt.

Oh, I mean as an inverse to the intensity of what they are advertising.

I'd love to go on, but I'll stick to Obama in this thread.
 
When governments can no longer bribe people with their own money, the scam ends.

From a mostly non-partisan outsider, I can assure you, there is little evidence of bribes in US politics. Certainly not involving 'the people'. It's entirely an auction, and 'the people' have absolutely nothing to do with it. Pesky.
 
$1 billion to elect a President, either side. Some percentage of that for whatever other position or office. All candidates on both sides with both eyes on that prize above all else.

It's bought. You're broken. Both sides.
 
A debate, of sorts, between Melissa Harris-Perry at The Nation and Joan Walsh at Salon over how to make sense of apparent differences between black and white liberals in level of discontent with Obama.

Black President, Double Standard: Why White Liberals Are Abandoning Obama - Dr. Melissa Harris-Perry
The 2012 election may be a test of another form of electoral racism: the tendency of white liberals to hold African-American leaders to a higher standard than their white counterparts. If old-fashioned electoral racism is the absolute unwillingness to vote for a black candidate, then liberal electoral racism is the willingness to abandon a black candidate when he is just as competent as his white predecessors.

The relevant comparison here is with the last Democratic president, Bill Clinton. Today many progressives complain that Obama’s healthcare reform was inadequate because it did not include a public option; but Clinton failed to pass any kind of meaningful healthcare reform whatsoever. Others argue that Obama has been slow to push for equal rights for gay Americans; but it was Clinton who established the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy Obama helped repeal. Still others are angry about appalling unemployment rates for black Americans; but while overall unemployment was lower under Clinton, black unemployment was double that of whites during his term, as it is now. And, of course, Clinton supported and signed welfare “reform,” cutting off America’s neediest despite the nation’s economic growth. Today, America’s continuing entanglements in Iraq and Afghanistan provoke anger, but while Clinton reduced defense spending, covert military operations were standard practice during his administration. In terms of criminal justice, Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, which decreased judicial disparities in punishment; by contrast, federal incarceration grew exponentially under Clinton. Many argue that Obama is an ineffective leader, but the legislative record for his first two years outpaces Clinton’s first two years. Both men came into power with a Democratically controlled Congress, but both saw a sharp decline in their ability to pass their own legislative agendas once GOP majorities took over one or both chambers.

These comparisons are neither an attack on the Clinton administration nor an apology for the Obama administration. They are comparisons of two centrist Democratic presidents who faced hostile Republican majorities in the second half of their first terms, forcing a number of political compromises. One president is white. The other is black.

In 1996 President Clinton was re-elected with a coalition more robust and a general election result more favorable than his first win. His vote share among women increased from 46% to 53%, among blacks from 83% to 84%, among independents from 38% to 42%, and among whites from 39% to 43%.

President Obama has experienced a swift and steep decline in support among white Americans—from 61% in 2009 to 33% now. I believe much of that decline can be attributed to their disappointment that choosing a black man for president did not prove to be salvific for them or the nation. His record is, at the very least, comparable to that of President Clinton, who was enthusiastically re-elected. The 2012 election is a test of whether Obama will be held to standards never before imposed on an incumbent.

Are white liberals abandoning the president? I don't see evidence - Joan Walsh
I couldn't find any polls measuring "white liberal" support for President Obama, but it's safe to say many white liberals are disappointed in the president. I think Harris-Perry is wrong when she generalizes about two things: that white liberal disappointment is due to "the tendency of white liberals to hold African-American leaders to a higher standard than their white counterparts" (which she calls "a more insidious form of racism"), and that it's likely to lead to white liberals "abandoning" Obama in 2012.

...[H]er Clinton-Obama comparison, while provocative and sometimes interesting, has a lot of practical problems. It's sad, for many reasons, that we don't have a more recent Democratic president whose support we can examine. But using Clinton means we're reaching back 15 years to his reelection, and 20 years to his first campaign...t's hard to usefully compare the attitudes of a hard-to-define demographic group--"white liberals"--across a span of 20 years, factor in the specific ups and downs of two presidencies, and come to any fair political conclusions. It's especially hard given the enormous difference in the economy during their two presidencies. Clinton presided over one of the strongest economies in American history; Obama inherited the worst mess since the Great Depression. Clinton probably gets more credit than he deserves for the economy, while Obama gets too much blame. But it's nearly impossible to compare voters' opinions of the two presidents given that stark contrast. With a booming economy, Obama would be riding higher with all voters, of every race.

In the absence of reliable poll data about white liberal opinion on Obama and Clinton, we at least need some specific anecdotal evidence. I understand why Harris-Perry didn't want to single out any particular individuals, but it's hard to know this is happening, let alone debate why, unless we can identify representative white liberal constituencies and individuals, and compare their support of Clinton and Obama. At different times and on different issues, liberals and progressives, whites included, howled over Clinton's decisions, from DADT to welfare reform to the reckless behavior that led to his (absolutely outrageous and politically motivated) impeachment. If we take Congress, two white liberal lions of the Senate, Ted Kennedy and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, crusaded against and voted against what was, for liberals, Clinton's most disappointing policy, welfare reform. Most white liberals in Congress voted against it. (His white Health and Human Services deputy, Peter Edelman, left the administration over it, calling it "the worst thing" Clinton had ever done.)...On MSNBC, liberals Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews helmed a lineup that was hugely critical of Clinton (today Matthews is one of Obama's leading defenders, while Olbermann, once a passionate supporter, has left both MSNBC and the Obama camp). The New York Times editorial pages, helmed by white liberal Clinton critic Howell Raines and featuring (once-liberal) Maureen Dowd and Frank Rich, savaged Clinton and Al Gore. White progressives at The Nation attacked Clinton harshly on NAFTA, welfare reform and his Wall Street-friendly economic policies, while defending him from impeachment, much like Salon. ...Obama critic Michael Moore was also a Clinton critic, who famously supported Ralph Nader over Gore in 2000.

It's also problematic to compare Clinton's reelection numbers with Obama's midterm approval ratings. What people tell pollsters in times of disappointment, and how they then vote, can be two very different things...Barring more major trouble with the economy or a big misstep by the president, I expect Obama's support by all demographic groups to be higher at the ballot box than it is in opinion polls today.

...The difference between Clinton's booming economy and today's broken one creates political problems for Obama in another way: He was largely elected due to Americans' fears that we were headed into an abyss, and their faith that he would bring the economic change he promised. Like a pilot taking over with a plane in a nose dive, Obama kept the economy from crashing, but he hasn't lifted it into smooth skies. Maybe it makes me an unrealistic and entitled white progressive--that's pretty much what black author Ishmael Reed called Obama's white critics--but I think it's clear that even with a recalcitrant Congress, the president could have done more than he did to dismantle the rigged system that let Wall Street destroy the economy, as well as more to help its casualties. ...Many politicians share the blame: Democrats and Republicans let the financial sector rig the rules to enrich itself and impoverish the rest of us for the last 30 years. They've gotten increasingly rich by lending us the cash we didn't get in raises since wages stagnated in the 1970s, after the Democrats began running away from economic populism (but that's another, longer story you can read about in my book next year). But given the political opening to challenge that system in 2009, Obama essentially left it intact. As I wrote last week, Obama appointed the Clinton economic-team veterans most friendly to Wall Street--most notably, Tim Geithner and Larry Summers--while excluding and/or marginalizing the Clinton vets most critical, like Robert Reich, Laura Tyson and Gary Gensler. And whether it was the Volcker rule getting commercial banks out of speculative, proprietary trading, or efforts to sell shady derivatives on "exchanges" for the sake of transparency, or a contingency plan to force the toxic behemoth Citibank into bankruptcy, Obama let important reforms either die on the vine or be diluted into ineffectiveness. He had a rare window to change the system radically, and it's now closed. Meanwhile, over the last decade, progressives--of every race--have become far more sophisticated, and outraged, about the naked control Wall Street and corporate America exert over politicians, including Democratic politicians.

...I acknowledge that [Michael] Moore's recent comment, "I voted for the black guy and what I got was the white guy," betrays some racial ickiness, but so did Cornel West's insistence that Obama fears "free black men" because he's half-white.

There is one point on which I agree with Harris-Perry, at least partly. She argues that much of white liberals' disappointment with the president "can be attributed to their disappointment that choosing a black man for president did not prove to be salvific for them or the nation." I think there's some truth there; I've written it about myself, right after the election. I wrote that one reason I was skeptical of candidate Obama in 2008 (apart from the fact that, correctly, I considered him an economic centrist) is that I looked to him to be a transformative, Martin Luther King Jr. figure, rather than a politician, and that I was "scrutinizing his every move not only for political efficacy but for moral, political and racial justice. It was too big a burden to place on our first black presidential nominee, and now, on our first black president. I also came late to the realization that Obama represents an advance beyond King in terms of our foreordained roles for African-Americans. We want them perfect, we need them to be the country's conscience, to make us better than we are. It's been very hard to simply view a black politician as an American leader." ...And yet, the president bears some responsibility for expectations that he'd be "salvific." His dreamy "We are the ones we are waiting for" campaign encouraged projection.

...As long as we're looking at the president's racial support, let's look broadly. While white liberal support for Obama has almost certainly dropped, so has his support within every group. Why are Latinos abandoning Obama? Two-thirds of Latinos voted for the president in 2008; the Gallup tracking poll showed Latino support dropping to 44% at the end of August, though it jumped up above 50% this week...And while black support remains strong, it's declined, too. Obama won 95% of black voters in 2008, and his approval rating hovered in the 90s for most of his first two years. This week, it's at 82%, and it's been steadily in the 80s since February. That's still high, but it's not the enthusiastic, near-unanimous support that elected him. The president himself acknowledged the rising volume of African American discontent in his speech to the (increasingly critical) Congressional Black Caucus Saturday night.

...Finally: Looking for racial motives to explain white liberal disappointment with Obama, in the face of so many economic reasons, seems unnecessarily divisive. It's hard not to notice that despite our admirable 40-year crusade to purge racism, overt and unconscious, from Democratic politics, most Americans, of every race, have grown worse off–-and meanwhile, the same proportion of African Americans live in poverty as when Dr. King tried to launch a Poor People's Campaign. As progressives have focused on the real and corrosive legacy of racism against minorities, one American minority has done very well, and that's the richest 1%, who now earn a quarter of the nation's income, up from 8% of it under Jimmy Carter. ...I believe we need to pay much more specific attention to the grinding disadvantages of class as well as race if we want to undo the economic disaster of the last 30 years. Those of us who believe in economic justice must work harder to define a new vision, and a new language, of inclusion and prosperity for everyone. Blaming racism for a diverse assortment of white liberals' diverse complaints about the president won't get us there.

I almost cut everything preceding the bolded part out of Walsh's response, because while she does an excellent job laying out why liberals in general might be dissatisfied with Obama's economic policy, none of that really addresses the specific question Harris-Perry is asking, save for the point that "white" voter support is not the same thing as "white liberal" voter support. What Harris-Perry identifies as the "ineffective leader" complaint and what Walsh identifies as the erosion of "salvific" "projections" may be, I think, the same thing. You could perhaps subdivide that into different kinds of "projections" (I rather doubt MLK is the right characterization for whatever totem Michael Moore had in mind), regardless, having seen several exchanges like the above play out between friends and students of mine, my sense is that this is the factor most likely to be left unsaid.
 
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