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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

Zarf

I would only guarantee the FDIC deposits.  I'd have saved $300 billion by not bailing out Fannie Mae Freddie Mac.

Under my plan we'd be in for the full balance of FDIC deposits.  Once.  After that collapse of rotten banks, the banking public wouldn't tolerate trusting banks so much again.  So you wouldn't have those bastards around as bankers.

Under the Fed Plan, we are STILL on the hook for 100% of FDIC deposits, PLUS 100% of too-big-to-fail entities, PLUS 100% of bank rescues, every time the bankers sink their own industry.  And wtf not?  Nobody went away for the mortgage bubble.  They made beaucoup bucks, and they got federal guarantees of their entire industry. 

MF Global is the kicker.  MF Global took money out of customer accounts and spent it as general fund dollars.  Now, that's a conscious act.  That's a felonious act, and it's deliberate.  There's not accidental way to take money out of an account.  And MF Global had officers with a duty to prevent such crap.  But, one of them is a former Senator and former Governor of NJ, so, the FBI says nobody is to blame.  Which means the VIP is to blame, but, America has not yet sunk so low that an innocent flunky can be crucified to spare his guilty boss.  As yet, sparing the boss means sparing his pawns.  For now.

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

a timewarp to 2020 opened up
they solved the problems caused by bailouts
the czars and the Fed will be regulated
they will be regulated by judges
with hoverbikes
and authority to summarily execute bureaucrats
there is substantial opposition to the scheme
since hoverbikes have the carbon footprint of a small volcano
they are really harriers with no wings or tail and a motorcycle seat
many many concerned people think the judges could take the train

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

It would be pretty easy to cut the federal budget. The military costs are far too high:

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/us_defense_spending_30.html

A cut of 5-10%/year over a few years would help a lot.

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

How would that help a lot? We'd still have annual deficits exceeding a trillion dollars. And growing. Defense is hardly our biggest expenditure, and it's pensions/healthcare/welfare which are exploding as our population ages and more people accept living on welfare for generations as a lifestyle choice. They're pandered to, they vote, and they get taken care of.

There's no work-around. Our government spends too much. Our government wastes too much. Far too much. At some point not in the distant future we're going to max out our line of credit.

[I wish I could obey forum rules]

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

Kemp I've been INSTRUCTED that the human race will buy American bonds forever, because there's nowhere else to put their money.  Forever.  The entire human race is too stupid to stop bailing us out.  I can accept that as fact, or I can keep on spinning Tea Party fantasies of American decline.  No loyal American wants to believe it will happen, anyhow; if I'm a good American I'll think properly about it.

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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56 Reply by Altruist (edited by Altruist 22-Nov-2012 03:53:48)

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

Well, when I look at some tables and graphs, here only 2 with links:

Military spending:
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures

US debt:
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USDebt.png

Then I'd say several things seem to be quite obvious:

1) With the exception of WW2 it didn't really matter wether there were Republican or Democratic Presidents... the US-debt was rather low.

2) The debt started to increase at an insane rate in the beginning 80ies when Ronald Reagan cut taxes and at the same time military spending was enormously raised.

3) During the 90ies the US achieved an almost balanced budget. This was the presidency of Clinton. It was probably achieved mainly by good economic growth, no tax cuts and only modest raises in military spending.

4) Afterwards the debt skyrocketed. Similar to the 80ies a Republican President lowered taxes while at the same time raised military spending to an insane extent.

5) When Obama became President, the raise of the debt became even more steep (as difficult it is to imagine an even steeper raise).  The US was in 2 wars, military spending was/is insane and on top of it the biggest financial crisis since 1929 happened and is still going on and led to immense spendings to bail banks out.


I'd think it is obvious that the mix of tax cuts plus raised military spendings was the major reason of the US debt.

Another old bloodstained Harkonnen.

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

Except the revenues earned in the 1980s went up too, and they went up in the 2000s.  Outside of recession periods the govt earns more money. 
And in Clinton years he worked with Newt to force a structural change in spending.
Since the 1970s and double-digit inflation, Democrats demanded we increase social spending at 2x the rate of inflation to make sure people weren't pinched by inflation.
we beat inflation in the 1980s.
In the 1990s they limited it to inflation.  But still, they refuse to figure social spending as per capita.  That's the next reform to shove through -to end baseline budgeting, to allow the Congress to spend less in 2015 than they did in 2014 instead of saying "we have to spend 2014 levels + inflation"

Also Clinton got the benefit of line item veto.  Republicans allowed Clinton to veto specific programs instead of the whole budget.  Democrats sued and the Supreme Court said the President has to veto the whole budget or not at all.

The core joke of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is that of course no civilization would develop personal computers with instant remote database recovery, and then waste this technology to find good drinks.
Steve Jobs has ruined this joke.

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

well, good news everyone, the deficit is already shrinking:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/11/21/deficit_is_shrinking_at_its_fastest_pace_since_world_war_ii.html

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Re: Stock Market Reacts Negatively to Obama's re-election

Too bad it's still huge. And revenues should be rebounding more quickly, but our recovery is pathetic thanks to the overbearing tyrants in charge.

[I wish I could obey forum rules]

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