Stating reality is not a problem

[AllentownJake]

Ignoring reality or attacking those who talk about it because you like a certain politician is.

I think on most days, I can be pretty fair. I think FDL going after Rahm for something that allegedly happened 8 years ago is pretty stupid and getting in bed with Grover on that issue is even dumber. My point of view is if Rahm did something illegal back than, the Bush democratic crimes team would have him in a federal prison right now.

That being said, the economy sucks, and I think a lot of the things the administration has chosen to do aren't that helpful for regular folks. We are still on life support, and I really don't see where the jobs or growth are going to come when we pull the plug on government spending. Seeing the President negotiate new free trade agreements in Asia and Columbia despite the havoc the ones we have now have wrought scares the shit out of me.

I'm not happy that there was little fight for the Public Option which was supposed to be a cost control on mandated insurance, and I'm even more grumpy over the fact that mandates are included in the final bill without adequate cost controls for consumers like me.

Finding out that TARP was repaid by giving banks tax breaks through rule interpretations that were written in a back room by Tim Geithner's boys while the President is on TV fighting said banks bothers me.

Throwing $200 billion overnight into Fannie and Freddie on Christmas Eve with a news release and not much explanation troubles me. These firms are insolvent. Is this another backdoor bailout.

Being cold to the idea of putting back some of the restrictions in Glass Steagal to get banks to being banks and not casinos bothers me.

30,000 more troops in Afghanistan bothers me, particularly as more information comes out about the people who are in charge of the Central (if you can call it that) government there.

There have been good things done. However, on the big issues, the ones that effect a majority of Americans because of their economic situation, I'm worried at the direction this administration has taken.

[laughingliberal]

1. Kick nt

[ProSense]

2. "Ignoring reality or attacking those who talk about it"

:rofl:

[AllentownJake]

4. Gift Cards nt

[ProSense]

5. Here's some reality:

economy, ethics, health care reform, hunger, labor, poverty, open government and transparency.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

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[AllentownJake]

9. I think we need to stop the name calling

Picking Pro apart is easy using logic, just expect her to link to talking points over and over and over again.

[MercutioATC]

11. I believe it's appropriate.

A blind disregard for moderate views is an issue.

In have never seen you state that Obama has never done anything positive...yet a select few members choose to misrepresent what you post as "anti-Obama", as characterized by the post to which I responded.

This isn't "name-calling", it's accurate characterization (IMO).

[AllentownJake]

12. I agree with your sentiment

However, I think we need to take a higher tone to their spin. Calling them a name empowers them and gives them something to complain about. Fight back with logic.

[JTFrog]

43. Bullshit. And It's against the rules, but don't let that stop you.

From Skinner:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=5524913

* Any and all substantive criticism of Barack Obama and his policies is permitted. And by "any and all substantive criticism" we mean all of it -- no issue is off limits.

* Expressions of dismay, disappointment or disagreement with Barack Obama or his policies are permitted.

* But insults, name-calling, or other expressions of contempt toward Barack Obama or his supporters are not welcome.

There is a part of me that is a little disappointed (but not surprised) that this even needs to be said. Even if you don't agree with President Obama on a number of issues, I guess I kinda thought that everyone here would consider themselves -- on some level -- to be among his supporters. Or, at very least, I didn't think that any DUer would want to deliberately use the same type of language one would expect to hear from tea-baggers and Freepers.

[ProSense]

15. Logic like trying to misrepresent data from Harrisburg to spin economic gloom?

:rofl:

[AllentownJake]

17. I'm not the one trying to argue Christmas sales were good

and were based on Gift Card sales dear.

[ProSense]

13. "It's possible to both acknowledge progress while accurately accessing an overall negative"

Yeah, predicting eternal doom and gloom despite progress is an objective outlook.

Here's reality: The year started out with the country in one of the worse shapes ever, and it ended with real progress in many areas.

[AllentownJake]

14. 1 step forward 2 steps back

That is my position. The opportunities wasted are the 2 steps back.

[MercutioATC]

20. See, that's what I'm talking about.

Where is the "predicting eternal doom and gloom"?

The posts we're discussing address a situation based on current conditions. They're no more "predicting eternal doom and gloom" than a person working a minimum-wage job with $20k in credit card debt with an ailing spouse, driving a car with 200,000 miles on it who says "I'm fucked" is.

Both take a realistic accounting of their situations.

[AllentownJake]

21. Actually the OP she's talking about

Said Christmas sales were a bust, provided sales tax receipt data for December and that is it. It predicted actually nothing.

Online Sales, Gift Card purchases, and a few other funny things were given for why I was wrong.

Logic dictates higher unemployment from last year, reduced consumer credit, and increased in savings will result in less consumer spending.

The deny reality was actually quite stunning.

[MercutioATC]

25. Ok, so her posts in this thread don't even address this thread?

See what trouble we create when we get emotional and don't address the actual issue at hand?

On a more productive note, I think we're both gonna get our noses rubbed in it as long as they manage to keep the facade intact...but our assessments will prove accurate. If you admit that the era of excess fueled by increasing consumer debt is over, there's absolutely NO good place to go from here. We're in a new paradigm (a much more sane one), and that doesn't bode well for the accuracy of recent yardsticks. This economy scares the hell out of me.

[AllentownJake]

27. For 30 years we were doing stupid things

During the campaign, I had this feeling he got it, like FDR did. Now that he's elected, I think nope, you don't get it. The old system was broken and set for failure, so you are trying to put things back together for the old system.

It is like Health Care reform. Everyone knows that Insurance companies are about 50% of the problem with cost, so his solution, mandate everyone into Insurance companies. I guess I thought he got it back than, because he talked like he got it.

[MercutioATC]

30. My view on Obama:

He's a smart, well-intentioned guy who had no idea what he was really getting into.

Maybe it's self-serving, but it's easier to stomach than the idea that I was completely suckered.


I really think that since he's gained the office, he's seen a lot more than he realized before. He realized that instituting the changes he wanted would (however necessary they are for long-term prosperity) kill the economy...simply because of the way we've let the economy "grow" for the past 20-30 years.

[AllentownJake]

32. My view is a little harsher

based on the people he introduced quickly after November 4th 2008, that no one saw standing next to him in the two years prior.

[MercutioATC]

34. I'm a fan of this (figurative) scenario:

Obama gets sworn in and attends his first security briefing as President (as all new Presidents do). He sits down, the lights dim, and he's shown the JFK assassination...over and over for 10 minutes, from camera angles never publicly released. The lights come up and he's asked "Any questions?"

Yeah, it's a little dramatic, but I think that's kinda what he went through with the economic situation. He was told "It's going to completely collapse unless you put these people in these positions and let them mitigate the damage"...and he bought it.

[AllentownJake]

35. Larry Summers

Trust me, the guys in the Bill Hicks scenario would have picked someone a little more...presentable in public.

[Extend a Hand]

40. I think you often get unfairly maligned

Larry "I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly underpolluted" Summers was such an awful appointment. I really can't fathom it. I want to give the President the benefit of the doubt... I really, really do. But I'm in unemployed in Ohio and so far I'm missing this "recovery" that I keep hearing about.

[laughingliberal]

19. +1

[highplainsdem]

3. K&R

[sandnsea]

6. If that's what you think reality is

then I suggest you go out and get drunk because I wouldn't want to live in the world you see either.

[AllentownJake]

7. What did I put in the OP that hasn't happened nt.

[sandnsea]

38. For starters...

"the economy sucks" "aren't that helpful for regular folks" "We are still on life support"

"negotiate new free trade agreements in Asia and Columbia"

I'm not happy that there was "little fight for the Public Option"

"TARP was repaid by giving banks tax breaks"

"Throwing $200 billion overnight into Fannie and Freddie on Christmas Eve"

The complete insanity of all of this is almost too much to unravel. The economy was on life support for a few months last year, but what I recall from DU and the teabaggers was a crazy rant to let it all collapse. Now if that had happen - THEN you could say the economy currently sucks and is still on life support. As it is, every sign shows the economy improving, even Krugman has it improving.

The policies aren't that helpful for regular folks??? Well right, that extra $1200 unemployment, the unemployment extensions, the extra food stamps and energy assistance, all the state and school jobs saved, school construction, city public works, road work, medical research, COBRA, medicaid. Billions invested into alternative energy. All of the jobs programs and infrastructure investment that people on this board bitch about - has been done. I don't know why you choose to ignore it, but it's been done.

No fight for the public option? Really?? Then exactly why do you think this thing has dragged on all year? If the Administration didn't want it, it would have been dead in July and the Baucus plan pushed through.

Yes they made a tax exception. These banks were forced to step in and rescue failed banks. Yes they all participated in this scam, but some were worse than others. Is it wise to pressure these banks into buying the failed banks, and then bankrupting them with the loss as well? They were allowed to claim past losses instead of having to claim only current gains. That's very fair, considering the circumstances. This wasn't a traditional merger or buy-out. Yes it helped boost the banks' value which generated investment and enabled them to make the TARP payments, but they did not connive to pay back TARP with tax breaks. But anything to avoid admitting the TARP money wasn't just flushed down the toilet and that it did save our economy. It was the right thing to do and it's working, slowly, but it's working.

So you're mad they're doing nothing for regular folks and then turn around and complain about keeping Freddie and Frannie solvent. Who do you think that helps?

Just one long list of gripes with no real facts behind them, nothing but your own doom and gloom scenarios that you afix to non-existent problems.

For 6 years the people at this site have bitched about the economy. Unemployment at 4%, it's a lie and everyone is jobless. Now it's at 10% and we're "on life support". What would people here do if there was a real depression, with real 25% unemployment? It's ridiculous. People need to get a grip. It would be nice if we could just waltz into $20 hr jobs at will, but that's just not reality, never has been and never will be.

[AllentownJake]

39. That took you a while

Actually, it was slowness in the House and Senate process that made Health Care reform take so long. The President stopped talking so much about the Public Option as a necessity, right after the process started.
He wanted a bill by August. Remember?


The unemployment compensation stuff would have happened under McCain. The last thing he wanted was bread lines. Unemployment compensation is anestesia for the masses on reality.

He gave up his leverage on the banks for financial reform, because his advisers never wanted real reform to begin with. I don't want to hear you talking about how TARP was repaid, when you gave them the fucking money to repay it. That is dishonesty in its finest.

Oh on the depression front, the way we measure unemployment for the U3 number the media spouts, ensures that we won't reach 25%. We are at 17% now.

He's a disapointment, and a failure in my eyes for what he could have accomplished, if he actually gave a fuck.

As of right now, he did the bare minimum for me. I'll do the bare minimum for him in 2012, unless he gets his shit together.

[sandnsea]

41. McCain would have passed that stimulus??

Anybody who thinks McCain would have passed all of those benefits that were in the stimulus is just making it up as they go.

I don't know why so many want to hate the man, but they clearly do. You were griping about him when you said you were campaigning for him, as I recall. It's a choice you make. Only you know why.

[AllentownJake]

42. I said unemployment compensation

and my critique of 70% of the stimulus is well documented.

The first negative thing I ever said was about Rick Warren. I was on TV defending this guy in April.

Try the fuck again.

[sandnsea]

44. Well that's pretty desperate

if you have to reach for one thing you think McCain would have done just to have something to gripe about.

And no, you were complaining all along. Honestly, all you do is complain. If you went on teevee, it's because you got an opportunity for yourself, not because you cared about defending Obama.

[AllentownJake]

45. What the fuck?

"And no, you were complaining all along. Honestly, all you do is complain. If you went on teevee, it's because you got an opportunity for yourself, not because you cared about defending Obama."

That's why I turned down a chance to re-appear in September and suggested someone else who would do a better job, since I had no heart in doing it again.

Now you just make things up to attack me. That is weak, and sick. It is almost freepersih behavior, can't fight with a person's arguments attack them personally. Sick how you have to make this personal. I feel sorry for you that you have to resort to lying and character attacks to make your points, I really do.

[Name removed]

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[AllentownJake]

16. Welcome to DU

In a general election, I'll have little choice but to vote for the President again, unless there really is a viable 3rd party candidate that might do the right things.

[Name removed]

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[MercutioATC]

22. Sometimes, we vote for the lesser of two evils.

I'm a cynic and, still, I was taken in last year. I voted for "change" and I got "the lesser of two evils"...but he was still decidedly the lesser of the two evils.

I understand your frustration. I'm just encouraging you to remember the consequences of letting the greater of the evils gain power.

[AllentownJake]

23. Same result long term

Just a matter of buying time with the other choice, and hoping.

[MercutioATC]

28. I admit that I'm torn about this.

Vote for the guys that smile and throw you crumbs while they rob you or the guys that say "fuck you" while they rob you?


My honest appraisal is that we're well past the point of no return. The system is set up to slowly (actually, not SO slowly) bleed the populace dry...but that system is so systemically established that attempting to change it would create absolute chaos.

There's really no good way out.

[AllentownJake]

31. Shit will probably hit the fan sooner rather than later

We just took on a whole lot of debt saving the top 1% from their gambling, and we have a pretty large debt coming due over the next 20 years from a reasonable promise made in 1935 and 1965 to the other 99%. The funds received as tax collections of that promise was given to the top 1% over the past 35 years.

[MercutioATC]

36. Depends on your definition of "sooner"...

...and how long the general public remains fooled.


I'm giving it 8-10 years before it all falls down. People are generally pretty (willfully) dumb.

[AllentownJake]

37. There are fault lines appearing already

2 trillion dollar shortage in public pension funds, boomers are/will be collecting social security quicker than anticipated, Medicare patients being denied access to Health Care because of government reimbursement rates, Treasury Auctions have some interesting data, Foreclosure and Bankruptcy rates, media denial about the real world, trade deficit increasing, falling dollar, if there is any recovery oil prices will shoot up.

The crisis, sped it up.

I give it 4 at the most. I hope I'm wrong.

[pscot]

29. This was a good OP

Some things you posted at the height of the HRC furor made me think youhad basically written the President off. You seem to walk that back a bit in this post. I was an early critic of Obama's appointments and I pretty much agree with your points above. But Obama is the only President we have right now, and the Congress is going to be a less friendly place after the 2010 elections. If we spend 2010 fighting among ourselves we could turn trouble into disaster. However pissed we might be at the Prez, none of us want to see the Repukes back in the saddle. :thumbsup:

[AllentownJake]

33. They are coming whether we like it or not

My focus is protecting the Senate Seat and Governor's mansion in 2010 in my state. It is going to be a tough fight. I'm not looking to make any gains.

[Name removed]

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[MercutioATC]

26. I can respect that.

...and I may be with you this November.