But maybe the only way Republicans will learn their limits is by crashing into them, as the Greeks did. Maybe they need to elect someone who will try what they’ve been longing for: a full throated, take-no-prisoners approach that doesn’t bother with compromise or concession. Like the Greeks, they’ll discover that this leaves them worse off, not better. If Republicans can't see that coming -- if they can't learn from Syriza's mistake -- then they will very likely learn their lesson from President Hillary Clinton.ADDED: McArdle did something I wouldn't do — submit to a cross-examination on the "meaning of life":
September 26, 2015
"Let's See What Republicans Learn From Losing Boehner."
A Megan McArdle column that ends:
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183 comments:
Let's hope the next Speaker of the House is a brawler instead of a bawler.
Boehner got rolled by the democrats over and over again. The republicans controlled both houses of Congress but Boeher and McConnell don't act like it. Time for McConnell to depart too.
"Does the caucus nominate a leader who will be itching for more such fights? This would be bad for America’s already dilapidated political institutions and civil society."
Yes Megan, just spread your legs, sit back and think of England.
"then they will very likely learn their lesson from President Hillary Clinton."
Yes, we need to moderate ourselves and be civil. Don't make waves. So that we can get a true conservative on the Supreme Court, like we did with Roberts...
What did you sell out for Megan? A better table a Martha's Vineyard? Closer to Oprah?
So when has Obama or the Democrats when they had control of both houses of Congress ever compromised or conceded anything?
Well, the Democrats elected someone who fits that bill and they've managed to transform the country into the one they wanted. I fail to see why it should be different for the Republicans. They may not crash into the wall, but rather break it down.
Let's see what democrats learn from an imploding Hillary. Start with her obsession with sex as we remember how she trashed Bill's sexual abuse victims.
The hate media Trump Team lead by Fox News' owner has suddenly found itself in a sure losing position and has turned to blowing smoke with "News" that Trump's support has fallen and his campaign is over now. Trump has driven them to early insanity like kamikaze the flyers that refuse to acknowledge Japan's defeat at Okinawa.
Karl Rove's Bush III plan is the only fallen candidacy whose campaign is over now.
She's generally wrong with her whole premise that the Republican position is similar to Greece's political position and also that compromise is available on every issue. She does make at least one good point.
"If I want outcomes closer to my preferences, then the primary problem is not the folks in office, but the preferences of the average American voter. Focusing your attention on politicians, instead of the hearts and minds of your fellow citizens, is like attempting to fix a faulty car engine by swapping out the dashboard gauges."
What Republicans need is leaders who will communicate with the American people and persuasively make their case through the media. Take the Planned Parenthood budget issue. Pass a continuing resolution without funding for PP (put the money into alternate women's health programs), let the President veto the resolution and shut down the government if he chooses, and then explain that the President is willing to shut down the government rather rather than give up funding for an organization that sells baby parts even though the budget gives the same amount of money to other women's health organizations that don't sell baby parts. If GOP leaders can't sell that, then what good are they? Let the Democrats own this.
If Congress passes a bill/budget/resolution (obviously with a majority) that the President then vetoes, the President has shut down the government. It's a very simple operation. If you can't make that case, what case can you make? But you do have to organize and get out in front of the American people and sell it.
In this case, McArdle would have the Republicans negotiate for PP to sell less baby parts, I guess.
"McArdle would have the Republicans negotiate for PP to sell less baby parts, I guess."
And in the spirit of compromise, she would come away with an agreement that they wouldn't sell babies as veal.
"No human veal in our time!" she exclaimed.
Hillary Clinton will not be President. She will be in jail in two or three years.
Basically the Republican party is protecting the seats of members of congress from more moderate to leftist districts that are vulnerable to Democrat challengers by moderating their positions, figuring that Republicans from conservative districts are safe because those voters are never going to switch to the Democrat party.
Republican leadership will say that they are doing this because pragmatism and we have to be realistic about what can be accomplished.
And there is an element of that, but there is also a very large element of the leadership not wanting to achieve the goals of the base.
This situation is nothing new, but in the past the party would occasionally throw the base a bone to make up for screwing them over. But the Democrat party has gone so far left that they don't think they need to do that any longer.
It amazes me how out of touch she is with the base. She thinks this is the first time we have heard "not the hill to die on" from the GOP?
I would rather let it burn than play this Establishment Party (E) game again. We sent you there to represent our concerns, and yet nothing has changed.
Where does McArdle live anyway? Gated community I bet. I'm going to buy up the houses around her and fill them up with illegal immigrants and ISIS refugees.
"But the Democrat party has gone so far left that they don't think they need to do that any longer."
What they still don't get is how many of us are willing to let it burn. And when everything falls, it won't be the Left that's the first to be lined up against the wall, it will be those that betrayed us.
The Republicans may well lose the next election, but I don't think Hillary! is Obama's choice to succeed him.
The Republicans may well lose the next election, but I don't think Hillary! is Obama's choice to succeed him.
Agreed. The FBI is investigating Hillary. Who controls the Justice Department?
The whole thing is a fight over who will control the party after Obama leaves office. And it looks like the Clinton faction is losing.
"What Republicans need is leaders who will communicate with the American people and persuasively make their case through the media."
Won't happen because the US media is the Guardian with less common sense.
Megan thinks "making a deal" is how governing works but it only works when both parties are reasonable. The Republicans have been dealing with a Democrat Party that has purged all its sensible members and gone full Jeremy Corbyn. We are all living on the accomplishments of a generation that is gone. The Baby Boomers decided that peace and economic progress are some sort of natural law. They can tear up the rug and destroy the furniture and the house will still be livable and they will always be warm and dry.
“Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded—here and there, now and then—are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as ‘bad luck’.”
– Robert A. Heinlein
She wants the Republicans to go Caitlyn Jenner.
"communicate with the American people and persuasively make their case through the media."
Through the MSM? Is she an idiot?
Maybe they need to elect someone who will try what they’ve been longing for: a full throated, take-no-prisoners approach that doesn’t bother with compromise or concession.
Why not? It worked for the Democrats.......
'What they still don't get is how many of us are willing to let it burn.'
Republicans, happily cheering on letting the country burn down.
Enjoy President Hillary. Burning the country down doesn't win elections.
Ms. McArdle is off her meds again. I prescribe a good dose of Nancy Pelosi.
"a full throated, take-no-prisoners approach that doesn’t bother with compromise or concession"
Right. GOP should learn that only works for Dems -- see ACA, Iran deal.
"If I want outcomes closer to my preferences, then the primary problem is not the folks in office, but the preferences of the average American voter"
Right. GOP should learn to respect voter preferences, unlike Dems -- see ACA, Iran deal.
"What Republicans need is leaders who will communicate with the American people and persuasively make their case through the media."
"Won't happen because the US media is the Guardian with less common sense."
Press conference after press conference. Of course our media is corrupt so the leaders have to get in front of the camera and make the case. Boehner was unwilling to do this.
Republicans, happily cheering on letting the country burn down.
Close...
Conservatives, willing to watch Democrats and RINOs burn the country down.
Republicans "going along to get along" have produced California. is that really what Megan wants the country to look like?
I made a comment on Insty once and referred to Megan as Pollyanna McGullible. Someone reported my comment as mean or something and it was deleted.
Fen said:
"It amazes me how out of touch she is with the base. She thinks this is the first time we have heard "not the hill to die on" from the GOP?
I would rather let it burn than play this Establishment Party (E) game again. We sent you there to represent our concerns, and yet nothing has changed. "
Ms. McArdle didn't realize she wasn't speaking of Republican vs. Democrat negotiations but Republican v. Republican ones.
And of course the insults are so helpful. It's been downhill since "YOU LIE!"
We are the Trump chumps
Fen- I believe she and her husband bought a home in a gentrifying area of the Imperial City.
"Of course our media is corrupt so the leaders have to get in front of the camera and make the case. "
Ask Romney about that. First, Stephanopolis asked a question that was not related to any issue being discussed, then Candy read a Barack talking point instead of moderating. I thought Fox did a terrible job with the first debate and I didn't see the second as I was in Europe.
"Debates" with 15 people don't work. Trump was the most media savvy and took over. It remains to be seen if any sense will come to the top. Reagan was the most media savvy president but was a thinker. Trump, not so much.
Last night we watched that Woody Allen movie with Colin Firth and Emma Stone in it. Pretty humdrum, if you ask me. But I watched it all the way to the end so it couldn't have been all that bad.
If I were properly incentivized, I think I could come up with a word to describe that absolutely bizarre phenomenon that hits me when watching a Woody Allen movie: The hot chick delivering those stilted lines no woman has ever uttered naturally in the entire history of the Earth and in my imagination I can see a younger Woody Allen on the screen instead of her. Fuck, I can even hear his voice.
It's disturbing.
Last night it happened only once, that I recall, which isn't so bad as it might be, I suppose.
It was pretty obvious that Colin Firth was taking heroic measures to hold himself out as the un-Woody Allen. I think he accomplished his goal, as well as any actor could, under the circumstances.
The foregoing has something to do with that Boehner guy, but I forget what it is.
Oh, well.
McArdle recently returned from a trip to a refugee camp in Greece and it seems to have driven her mad.
If McArdle thinks that Republicans should demonstrate responsible leadership by making a deal with Democrats when they control both houses of Congress, perhaps she could illustrate with a case when Democrats did that when *they* had control of both houses of Congress?
On what issues does McArdle believe compromise with Democrats is possible?
I cannot imagine a single one that is not trivial or strategic in pursuit of a non-compromising end.
Fen: Through the MSM? Is she an idiot?
That's the problem, she's not. She's a walking cautionary tale about what happens to intelligent people when they start mistaking the surface of their bubble for the limits of the universe.
To be fair, this article is no where near as eye-rollingly bad as the one she just penned on the refugee crisis in Europe.
Boehner is a savvy, practical politician. He doesn’t see any benefit to fighting battles that he knows that Republicans can’t win. With a lame-duck Democrat with nothing to lose in the White House, and not enough Republican Senators to override a veto, what a lot of Republicans want can’t be won.
The problem is, Republican voters aren’t savvy, practical politicians. They are pissed off at what Obama and the Democrats have been doing since 2008. They elected a House majority and then a Senate majority in order to stop what was going on. They expected the leadership in Congress to go to battle for them. Yet time after time, the savvy, practical politicians have refused to fight.
This is a major reason why Trump (and to a lesser extent Fiorina and Carson) has gotten so much support. Voters think he’ll go to battle and fight, fight, fight. I don’t think they’re worrying too much right now about winning or losing. They want a fighter, and they’re pretty sure that the career politicians won’t fight. That’s what Boehner and McConnell have taught them.
Personally, I wouldn’t have picked defunding Planned Parenthood as a fighting cause: Yes, PP does disgusting things, but it doesn’t really affect the lives of a large number of voters. Instead, what Boehner could have done, starting in January, was to pick half a dozen issues that a lot of Americans would consider important; he could have gotten bills on these issues passed through the House, and tried to get McConnell to pass them through the Senate even if he had to kill the filibuster. Of course Obama would veto them, but voters would know that Republican leaders were doing what they could to rein in Obama’s assaults on our economy and values.
If Boehner and McConnell had done this, Trump would still be the joke he really is.
"If Boehner and McConnell had done this, Trump would still be the joke he really is."
I agree and this cynical behavior reenforces the impression that we are dealing with a Ruling Class.
I think we are but Boehner and McConnell could try harder to hide it.
Democrats lock at the most successful politician in 30 years, Bill Clinton, and see his failures to deliver radical, Leftist policies -- with Congress against him -- as negative.
Bill Clinton was willing to compromise.
President Obama is unwilling to compromise. And the Obama presidency is proving to be the least successful presidency -- for the American people -- in history.
Lesson to be learned: Republicans should compromise? Bizarro world lesson.
look
Boehner is just a symptom of a bigger issue.
The GOP has to get better playing the long game across different platforms and issues, which is how the Dems have gotten what they have. This is not just about Congressional fights. Instead of giving Karl Rove a billion dollars for ads that end up paying the salaries of the liberal MSM, that money should go to buying and developing MSM properties to turn conservative.
Public schools are another bastion of liberal influence that has to be combated and reconfigured.
The gun issue is one conservative position where committed activists and money has mostly turned the society to the conservative position from a liberal position, even without the media supporting it. To affect more issues and accelerate change, conservatives need media/societal support and that requires an infrastructure to accomplish, not just fighting battles in Congress.
Another "concerned" liberal democrat "concerned" about Republicans being too conservative.
Yawn.
"Boehner is a savvy, practical politician."
Really? Then there should be some results you can point to...
Oh I know! He saved up all that political capital to push through a congressional pay raise! And got tofu added to the cafeteria menu.
[slow clap]
sane_voter: The GOP has to get better playing the long game across different platforms and issues, which is how the Dems have gotten what they have.
The GOP is already playing exactly the game it wants to play, and getting exactly the results it wants to get. How f*&^%ing thick can conservatards be that this hasn't sunk in yet?
This is not just about Congressional fights. Instead of giving Karl Rove a billion dollars for ads that end up paying the salaries of the liberal MSM, that money should go to buying and developing MSM properties to turn conservative.
Public schools are another bastion of liberal influence that has to be combated and reconfigured.
Toots, Karl Rove and his ilk are the GOP.
Step 1 of the "long game" you're advocating is to marginalize the GOP and start building a party that represents your interests.
Boehner is a quitter, like Newt.
A lot of commenters here clearly either didn't read the piece or didn't understand it. McCardle's point is that the GOP is only going to achieve it's bigger goals by selling them more to the people, rather than thinking better negotiating will somehow get them a better deal. This is in arguable--with a Democrat in the White House, the GOP simply can't pass anything with only GOP votes, so they need to either win more elections or sell their goals to the point that the Dems won't dare oppose them in the face of their voters. Maybe Pelosi doesn't have to worry about losing her seat by being too leftist, but red state Dems don't have this luxury.
Now some of these goals are already popular, at least according to polls. But tactics also have to sell--the ACA was pretty unpopular in late 2013, but shutting down the government was not. And the GOP has not yet figured out how to get the Dems to take the blame for a shutdown (after all, you can say that by refusing to sign a spending bill that doesn't include money for something Obama wants, he's as responsible for the impasse as the GOP).
I also think a lot of Republicans underestimate just how awful another Clinton presidency would be. We're going to be wistful of the Obama years when it's all done.
I like McArdle, but here she makes too much of the Zone of Possible Agreement, whose parameters are to some extent set by reality and precedent, and to some extent by sheer political will. Her counterexamples work so well precisely because they're not reasonable. It's begging the question to frame the issue as though the Democratic leadership's positions by definition set one boundary of the ZOPA, and the conservatives' positions lie outside it.
Is it within that zone for the Republicans to agree with the Democrats on funding Planned Parenthood? Sure, because the president can say he'll veto any bill that doesn't give him exactly what he wants, and the Republicans will shrink from getting the blame. Therefore both sides can agree on giving the president exactly what he wants, even though Congress in theory holds the power of the purse.
Is it within the zone for the government to simply spend exactly as much money next year as this year? No, because that would be a drastic cut. So someone like Paul Ryan, back in 2012, proposes a budget that gets government spending in line with funding around, oh, 20 years from now, because we have to be reasonable.
Were Obamacare or the Iran deal within the ZOPA with Republicans? No, and they happened anyway.
I keep making this point but congressional Republicans negotiate with this president the way this administration negotiated with Iran, and they garner about the same respect. Before negotiations begin they take off the table any consequence the other side would actually fear; they try to start out reasonable, and make concession after concession from there; they go back to the people on whose behalf they were negotiating and say, indignantly, Get real! You thought you were going to get ___? Well you never were going to get that! Our opponents would never agree to it!
As soon as you hear someone talking about a Hillary Clinton presidency you can ignore pretty much anything they say. To be so obtuse as to miss the overwhelming evidence that she is going down in flames is symptomatic of a complete lack of analytical acumen. I am surrounded by liberals and none of them like her, but more importantly Obama will make sure she's out of the picture before the convention. I doubt she'll do any time, but her political career is finished.
McArdle has convinced herself with the cleverness of her own argument. She's good at that.
A lot of commenters here clearly either didn't read the piece or didn't understand it.
I did read it, I did understand it, and I think she's wrong. I think almost everyone here can say the same.
Republicans would rather die trying than become Democrat-enablers. After all, what is the point of being Republicans if Republicans' function is to provide cover to pass Democrats' agenda? E.g. the ultra-secret Obamatrade, the Iran Deal. They couldn't even defund the baby-parts-seller. What good are they? Next compromise: legitimize Dear Leader's Amnesty to stuff the ballot box?
They did not compromise, they keeled over kissing Dear Leader's arse. The only people benefit from a Republican majority are professional politicians, not Republican voters. So let the Democrat-enablers die with Boehner.
Republicans did not lose Boehner, Boehner lost the Republicans.
Good riddance.
Why would anybody need to read McArdle's piece when it says the same things so many others have wrongly said.
Birkel said...
Why would anybody need to read McArdle's piece when it says the same things so many others have wrongly said.
Let me put it differently. This was a big step towards the election of either Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden as President.
sell their goals to the point that the Dems won't dare oppose them in the face of their voters. Maybe Pelosi doesn't have to worry about losing her seat by being too leftist, but red state Dems don't have this luxury.
The problem is, there are damn few of those troubled Democrats left. Most are already gone. The Dems left in the House are almost entirely from Gerrymandered safe seats.
That is one of the frustrations. Conservatives and the Tea Party have largely succeeded in winning the war. Our country is dominated by Conservative Republican governors and legislatures. The Democratic farm team is in as bad shape as the geriatric gang running the Democratic party today. Things are looking up everywhere.....except Congress and the national government.
Then have House Republican leadership apparently over-promise when they campaigned (or flat out lied to Republican voters) and govern while in office as appeasers to the establishment and the MSM, and people begin to get in the mood to go fiddle shopping.
If Walker can do what he has done in freaking Progressive Eden Wisconsin, we're supposed to believe that Boehner and McConnell can't even defund Planned Parenthood?
And if they can't even defund Planned Parenthood, what fucking good are they?
A private company is killing babies, and dissecting their bodies for parts, which they then sell. We have actual videotape of people admitting, no bragging, about this....
.....and not only can we not ban this practice, we can't even stop sending taxpayer money to them to subsidize their barbarism.
David,
Explain why this would be true, please. Be specific.
Gahrie,
McConnell has a long history of supporting Planned Parenthood.
"So when has Obama or the Democrats when they had control of both houses of Congress ever compromised or conceded anything?"
Why would they? They're essentially enacting a Republican agenda. (They're not John Birchers, though, which is what riles the lunatic base...and you guys).
If Walker can do what he has done in freaking Progressive Eden Wisconsin, we're supposed to believe that Boehner and McConnell can't even defund Planned Parenthood?
Obama can veto the legislation. The R's don't have enough to override. Obama is fully willing to ride out a government shutdown. The media will cheer him on.
In 2010, Walker was re-elected and both the Wisconsin state House and Senate flipped from D to R. The anti-union legislation came from that. Walker rode out the protests and recall efforts, but the legislation was possible by pure political math.
In truth, the current control of the US Congress by the R's has put a halt to further left-wing legislation, but we do not have the executive, and so rolling stuff back is not going to happen until we do. Obama's extra-constitutional power grabs are infuriating, but the best antidote to that is to put an R in the White House.
All this pathetic crying over broken promises and leaders who "won't fight" is driven by talk show hosts who know better stirring up the mathematically challenged in the Republican base. We're on an utterly stupid path to nominate a completely un-electable, non-conservative blowing our very real chance to de-fund PP and overturn Obamacare in about a year.
McArdle and the Pope are right. If you are unwilling to compromise you ought not be in politics. In fact, you ought not be in any relationship.
What did you sell out for Megan? A better table a Martha's Vineyard? Closer to Oprah?
Take your pick and/or add a whole new hundred item list at will. Everyone knows that Republicans have no values other than money and will sell out to the most available bidder. That's why their party's imploding and their front-runner with the most "grass-roots" appeal isn't even a conservative.
But there's no reason why we can't "diversify" the list of goodies a pseudo-conservative-libertarian would accept as graft. Maybe she got a Harley.
Or maybe she just exercised some independent thought. Always a no-no in the reactionary right.
and so rolling stuff back is not going to happen until we do
"Can't roll back x until we have y" has been the rallying cry of the Establishment Party (E) for several decades now. Not falling for it again.
Consider: The GOP could find Extraordinary Measures to get Trump to sign a loyalty pledge, but can't find Extraordinary Measures to defund Planned Parenthood? Which is not even a government agency. Bullshit. If they wanted to, they would have.
Megan thinks "making a deal" is how governing works but it only works when both parties are reasonable. The Republicans have been dealing with a Democrat Party that has purged all its sensible members and gone full Jeremy Corbyn. We are all living on the accomplishments of a generation that is gone.
Lol. Hahahahha. Republicans think that the lowest, near-zero trickle of immigration from Mexico ever is the biggest national crisis we face but the other party is the one that's living a fantasy. That's funny.
And I thought Republicans keep telling us that the economic accomplishments of the 1950s were due to a post-war Europe and Asia, not the result of policies implemented by a president much, much greater than Reagan ever was or could be: FDR.
Take your fucking pick. FDR was more socialist than any Democrat running for president through 2012, you idolize what he mobilized the nation to do, don't give him any credit for the recovery and post-war expansion, but think that starting a war with Iran will somehow change and solve all that. Talk about incoherent!
If you can't tell the difference between Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn then no wonder your "grass-roots" is confused enough to believe that Trump is some savior to conservatism. Get a clue!
Writ Small,
There was no anti-union legislation in Wisconsin.
And why should the threat of a veto be enough to thwart a majority of Americans?
Rhythm and Balls:
After FDR passed his legislation and three Justices switched their votes, the country dipped from recession to Great Depression. And you would give him credit for economic improvements 6 years after his death?
That's as stupid a thing as anybody has ever written, including "garage mahal".
McArdle writes "I’m not saying this to taunt my conservative friends; I agree with many of the things they want. But I recognize that there is a wide gap between what I (we) want, and what can be foisted upon the American public by its elected representatives."
Here's the fundamental problem -- what if she's wrong about their being a "wide gap" between what "we" want and what the American public wants? Surely elections mean something, and by the morning of November 5, 2014, it was clear that the Democrats have been slammed as no party has been slammed since 1964. Maybe there's nothing to be "foisted" on the American public, however hard the Washington and New York press will search to find someone -- anyone! -- who's been hurt by Republican-induced changes.
I'll go further than that. What if liberalism has solved nearly all the problems that can be solved politically? What if the problems that remain (70% out of wedlock births in the inner city, for instance, and the attendant high incarceration rates for young black men) are largely the fault of liberalism itself? What if global warming is a made-up "crisis" to give environmentalists something to agitate over (and well-connected Democrat party donors to get rich over) now that the air is no longer toxic and lakes like Erie no longer catch fire and burn? What if rolling back some of Nancy Pelosi's and Barack Obama's pipe dreams really is the solution?
US GDP increased at an annual rate of 3.9 percent in the second quarter of 2015. Almost certainly a better growth rate than China's. The US century will linger on for a little longer at least.
Bill Clinton was a great conservative President. The GOP rolled him in 1994, so Clinton passed welfare reform, cut spending, and prepared the way for cuts in income taxes.
Obama, by contrast, has been a left-wing nut. He has no interest in compromise and has led his party ever farther leftward, on the promise that demographics and a Greece-like polity will ensure permanent hegemony. Obama has got a lot of bad work done.
The next conservative President could come from either major party, but if he or she is a compromiser like Clinton, he'll get rolled like Clinton.
Writ Small: All this pathetic crying over broken promises and leaders who "won't fight" is driven by talk show hosts who know better stirring up the mathematically challenged in the Republican base. We're on an utterly stupid path to nominate a completely un-electable, non-conservative blowing our very real chance to de-fund PP and overturn Obamacare in about a year.
I hope you at least get paid to degrade yourself writing nonsense like this. Who's this "we" you're invoking?
"Talk show hosts", lol. Sheesh, do cucks these days even try not to sound like they get their trolling orders from Shitlib Central?
Gahrie said...
"Republicans "going along to get along" have produced California. is that really what Megan wants the country to look like?"
The progressives want Mexico. Rich corrupt people in gated communities with all the power. Poor serfs at the mercy of gangs living day to day.
AReasonableMan said...
"US GDP increased at an annual rate of 3.9 percent in the second quarter of 2015. Almost certainly a better growth rate than China's. The US century will linger on for a little longer at least."
General Electric is doing great. The Heinz family is doing great. George Soros is making a killing. The rest of us not so much. Progressives are making the wealthy influence peddlers like his bundlers at Solyndra more wealthy. The rest of us get to live with all the immigrants they are importing and the crime that comes with it.
"Hillary Clinton will not be President. She will be in jail in two or three years."
Matters not, Biden or Warren or whoever else will be just as bad or worse. It may be that the party strategists are just using Hill to take all the heat until the real favored choice swoops in when it's too late to vet him/her (as if there's any chance that would happen).
The reason conservative messages don't sell is not because they don't try; it's because math is hard.
All this pathetic crying over broken promises and leaders who "won't fight" is driven by talk show hosts
No..it is driven by thirty years of broken promises and insults from the Republican party leadership to the Republican Party base.
FWIW I don't think Hillary Clinton will be in jail in a few years, much as she ought to be. But I don't think she'll be nominee, either. If she is, it's solely because the Democrat greybeards want her to be the scapegoat -- instead of Obama -- for the shellacking that the Democrats are going to face on November 8, 2016.
Because it's worked so terribly for Obama.
I think most of us don't care what happens to the Republicans. We care about what happens to the country. Obama didn't care what happened to the Democrats and he got Obamacare passed.
If the Republicans didn't care so much what happened to the Republicans, we could do great things.
Robert Cook, 11:58:
"[Obama and congressional Democrats are] not John Birchers, though, which is what riles the lunatic base...and you guys"
If I may say so, I have long admired your disinclination to get insulting. You're better than this.
I could lay out a lengthy argument as to how I can simultaneously (a) despise the Birchers, and (b) deplore the direction in which the president and the congressional Democrats want to take the country, but really, why bother?
Instead, I'll just say again: It's a good thing the left's opponents are all such horrible people; else we might have to ask how well their policies work out. Of course, as you've done, we could simply redefine their failures as "essentially" Republican.
Those of you that keep trying to write off Trump as a "joke", well keep at it. That joke is going to wind up President.
Repubs tell their base "we can't do that or it won't work or the genie is alteady out of the bottle" etc.
Dems tell their base "sounds great or let's go for it" even though the Dem base has even dumber ideas that everyone knows won't work.
"A lot of commenters here clearly either didn't read the piece or didn't understand it. McCardle's point is that the GOP is only going to achieve it's bigger goals by selling them more to the people, rather than thinking better negotiating will somehow get them a better deal."
That's not what Hillary said to the guy from Black Lives Matter who tried to ambush interview her. She said you change the policy first, not people's hearts.
"You can keep the movement going, which you have started, and through that you might change some hearts," she said. "But if that's all that happens, we'll be back here in 10 years having the same conversation because we will not have all of the changes that you deserve to see happen in your lifetime because of your willingness to get out there and talk about this."
https://youtu.be/1eCraUvIq-s
"AReasonableMan" would have us forget about First Quarter GDP which was mentioned in the same article: 0.6%.
So on average this year is proving to grow at an annualized rate of just under 2.25%. And "AReasonableMan" says that is just wonderful. We should all celebrate because one quarter of economic growth was finally above the long-term, Post-WWII average.
Obama's average GDP growth is lower than any president since WWII.
After FDR passed his legislation and three Justices switched their votes, the country dipped from recession to Great Depression.
A nice display of the low information insanity so commonplace on the right.
And you would give him credit for economic improvements 6 years after his death?
Which of his policies were repealed by those 6 years? The 90+% top marginal tax rate? The strength of the unions? The industrial production levels that resulted from how successfully he prosecuted the war?
We should all celebrate because one quarter of economic growth was finally above the long-term, Post-WWII average.
Well, Burpel, once you Trumpify the economy by getting China to stop making funny money then I guess even the most ingenious Republican won't figure out how to inflate a bubble capable of rivaling the bubbles of the aughts.
But I'm sure you're on the case.
Rhythm and Balls:
So you want to claim all the positives that happened years after the fact but not one of the negatives that happened simultaneously? Hard to lose an argument when reality need not intrude.
I'll say the same thing here I posted to McMegan: talk all you want but the truth is that Boehner and McConnell didn't even have the balls to discontinue the CR and do their sworn duty to produce a budget BILL. That alone is why they need to go.
Just in case any right-wingers were interested in honesty, GDP and employment continued to decline throughout Republican Herbert Hoover's four-year term in office, well over the two year benchmark conventionally used to demarcate the definitional shift between recession and depression. Anyone proposing that the catastrophe on Herb's watch, following eight years of fellow Republican laissez-faire rule, was of FDR's making, is insane.
If he's referring to the transient rise in unemployment to above 20% after 1933 (quickly corrected, and following continuous, steep rises to get there under Hoover), then most economically literate people don't fault FDR for that since it's considered a lagging indicator anyway.
Rhythm and Balls: Just in case any right-wingers were interested in honesty-
Amazing that you still think you have any credibility here.
"Talk show hosts", lol. Sheesh, do cucks these days even try not to sound like they get their trolling orders from Shitlib Central?
He's just projecting. He gets his talking points from the likes of DU and other Soros orgs. So naturally he assumes everyone else does to. If John Stewart didn't tell him what to think, he wouldn't think at all.
"A lot of commenters here clearly either didn't read the piece or didn't understand it."
Did you miss where we actually quoted from the article? Are you stupid?
Amazing that you still think you have any credibility here.
How would you suggest I establish "credibility" according to a militant homophobe like you on a right-wing blog? Go on about how awesome Mitt Romney was? Talk about the incredible alternatives to Obamacare proposed by Republicans? Laud the incredible success of the mission to rid Don Rumsfeld's ally Saddam Hussein of WMD? Talk about how "safe" GWB kept America in September 2001? Berate every district in America that doesn't send a Ted Cruz clone to Congress? Raise Cain like Squirming Herman Cain? Complain about the female "murderers" who don't submit to a postpartum pelvic exam ordered by Big Government while being denied access to endocrine therapy beforehand?
I mean, there's a lot of great ideas right there on how to buddy-buddy-up to the Govern Norquists, Kochs and other geniuses and billionaires with too much money to know what to do with that control your minds and your party right there. But hopefully you'll let me in on a few more secrets on becoming a lockstep, goose marching, peon or even a private in the Army of the Republican Thought Police of your own. I'm sure you have a few, at least.
Mark said...
'What they still don't get is how many of us are willing to let it burn.'
Republicans, happily cheering on letting the country burn down.
Enjoy President Hillary. Burning the country down doesn't win elections.
9/26/15, 8:11 AM
Democrats- Happily drenching America with gasoline and throwing matches on her to fundamentally change the country.
Birkel said...
Obama's average GDP growth is lower than any president since WWII.
Yet, still better than all our major comparable competitors.
As ever, it is relative competitiveness that matters.
AReasonableMan said...
US GDP increased at an annual rate of 3.9 percent in the second quarter of 2015. Almost certainly a better growth rate than China's. The US century will linger on for a little longer at least.
9/26/15, 12:47 PM
Right, and next Friday afternoon, a press release will state "Figures for the GDP have been revised downward..." as they have for every positive number that has been announced by this administration. Wonder what the actual GDP is if they have think 3.9 is good.
As ever, it is relative competitiveness that matters.
But that's not fair. You (and other normal people) would go by real-life comparisons.
Your interlocutor would go by comparisons to fantasy situations.
Democrats play politics.
Republicans play a fantasy football version of politics.
Mid-Life Lawyer @8:22 AM: Press conference after press conference. Of course our media is corrupt so the leaders have to get in front of the camera and make the case. Boehner was unwilling to do this.
Very good point, and the press conference thing very good advice. That puts the politician in control, unlike sitting down with a Stephanopoulos or being in a "debate" run by a Candy Crowley.
The Feds easy money policies put in place to bailout the UK in the late 20's with the agreement of the French and Germans led to the stock market bubble and crash. The Hoover puts in place progressive policies (which FDR ran against) that took a deep recession and turned it into the Great Depression which was made worse by FDR's adoption of Hoover's policies and further amped up with progressive policies thus the depression lasting until 1941. Great work by progressives. Sound familiar with the policies of the last 20 years and particularly of the last six? So with for R & B's nonsense.
McCardle has a point; the RNC doesn't really want to win, that is as small government types. Smaller government is less rent seeking. Follow the money. Give the Democrats credit, the left goes for what they want even if it costs them an election here and there. There is no need for a kinder and gentler tax collector and administrator of the rent seeking welfare state a/k/a the national Republican Party. The Democrats can figure that out for themselves.
As for the shutdown,really? Does anyone actually care other than those who work in government or live off it? Are the Republicans so inept that they can't get out the message that Obama and the Democrats believe its more important to fund baby killing with your tax dollars than keeping the government open? if they can't do that minimal effort than frankly who needs them? Is it so hard that the government is shut down simply because the president chooses to do so?
"Which of his policies were repealed by those 6 years?"
Uh, ever heard of Taft-Hartley?
averagejoe said...
Right, and next Friday afternoon, a press release will state "Figures for the GDP have been revised downward..." as they have for every positive number that has been announced by this administration. Wonder what the actual GDP is if they have think 3.9 is good.
Complete BS. GDP figures have generally been revised up in the current environment. When you start to think everyone is out to get you it might be you that has the problem.
BN better still how about repealing the Wagner Act and the Davis Bacon Act along with passing a national right to work act?
So you are going to pretend 1936-1937 are Hoover's fault? Ok. You do that.
And ignore the fact that Hoover was as interventionist as he was. And ignore that FDR's policies continued Hoover's.
I will note that other presidents who expanded the federal government - LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Bush and Obama - all suffered the same bad luck. Coincidence, one presumes.
As for doing better than international competitors, who gives a rip? Economies aren't zero-sum, a fact collectivist cannot fathom.
cubanbob:
The Great Depression lasted until 1947. Revisionists like to point to 1941 because of the war. But, hey, why not pretend that a military build-up was the reason? Because then Leftists will claim government spending was the reason the Depression ended. And we should cede none of that argument.
AReasonableMan:
The idea that revisions have been up is demonstrably false. The quarter directly before, for example.
Just stop lying. That's all. Or, lie more believably, at least.
Birkel said...
As for doing better than international competitors, who gives a rip?
Anyone with any commonsense. In a flat or declining business environment being number one is still the place to be. If most of our major trading partners are in crisis, which they are, expecting the same results as when those same partners were all rapidly growing is just silly.
cubanbob, absolutely right. And that's not all either. But FDR!
Birkel said...
The idea that revisions have been up is demonstrably false. The quarter directly before, for example.
Just stop lying. That's all. Or, lie more believably, at least.
You are such a dummy, I didn't say every single one but the majority.
It is always easy to pick the stupid people, they lack basic reading comprehension and any mental subtlety. And, the dumbest ones always need to call people liars, it makes them feel better about being so stupid.
Birkel is right too. We fell right back into a recession as soon as the war ended. Policy changes by a Republican Congress elected in 1946 (yes, along with foreign markets opened by Marshall Plan) is what changed things. And the 90 percent tax rate was always bogus, put in more for graft opportunity than revenue or equality or anything else.
I just want to see Obama's veto pen put to good use. Just keep sending him stuff that needs to be vetoed. At some point someone may believe he's part of the problem. Not just the Republicans!
R&B: As Cubanbob explained, "rightwingers" -- i.e., people who understand economics -- don't praise Hoover's approach to the Depression. We do criticize Roosevelt for extending and expanding the same bad policies.
The idea that WW II ended the depression is one of the greatest lies in history. See Bastiat for starters.
AReasonableMan:
Be a good boy and add up the total revisions up and the total revisions down starting in Q2 2009 until present.
Go ahead. Count them. You are not only wrong but lying.
AReasonableMan:
I know you are wrong about America's relative position. And I know why you believe the things you do. You think economics is zero sum, like Leftists generally do. The good news is nobody thinks less of you in this regard. Or at least I do not.
That's not exactly a cause of celebration, of course.
Blogger Birkel said...
So you are going to pretend 1936-1937 are Hoover's fault? Ok. You do that.
And ignore the fact that Hoover was as interventionist as he was. And ignore that FDR's policies continued Hoover's.
I will note that other presidents who expanded the federal government - LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Bush and Obama - all suffered the same bad luck. Coincidence, one presumes.
As for doing better than international competitors, who gives a rip? Economies aren't zero-sum, a fact collectivist cannot fathom.
So what happens if, let's say, Trump wins the Presidency and 6 months in, we get an announcement along the lines of, "We apologize, but all these numbers are terrible. For the past 8 years, they've been fudging the numbers. We're starting an investigation, but they are just terrible. Inaccurate, lies, all wrong."
What happens then?
What happens if we go back to counting the jobless like we used to, and if we get rid of the metric "Created or saved" which started during the Obama administration?
" Almost certainly a better growth rate than China's. "
ARM not only believes Obama GDP numbers but calls those who know better liars.
It's OK ARM, you will live with the real numbers for the next 17 months. Romney would have set off a recovery like the 1994 Congress recovery. Look at the stock market numbers.
The world is in recession because almost all countries are run by the same weak Socialists that we have.
In other news, there are mental midgets who think just because you quote something that means you automatically understand it. Our education system, ladies and gentlemen! Apparently some children did get left behind.
So you are going to pretend 1936-1937 are Hoover's fault? Ok. You do that.
No. 1929 - 1933 is Hoover's and Coolidge's fault. 1933 to 1935 and 1938 to 1945 are FDR's credit.
But I understand. Underscore the trivialities of petty differences when you lose the larger picture. It's in your political genes.
And ignore the fact that Hoover was as interventionist as he was. And ignore that FDR's policies continued Hoover's.
FDR's policies massively expanded upon anything Hoover did and put them on steroids. Hoover was wrong for putting a band-aid on a hemorrhaging open wound. Although, to be fair to him, his approach was still much better than the modern "conservative" prescription of slashing open the wound further and putting leeches on it.
As Cubanbob explained, "rightwingers" -- i.e., people who understand economics -- don't praise Hoover's approach to the Depression.
"Rightwingers" must be code for libertarian anti-interventionists like Alan Greenspan, George W. Bush, Henry Paulson, Calvin Coolidge, and anyone else who noted how beautiful the upcoming icebergs looked from the deck of the Titanic.
You guys are all batshit wackos. GDP and employment rates went up under FDR (the mini recession of 1936 - 1937 excepted) whereas under Hoover they massively decreased. This is the same trick you played Obama - blaming them for taking a trend in the right direction not quickly enough while somehow completely absolving the Republican know-nothings who took those things in the WRONG direction entirely!
Again, people who can't help but to do things wrong make their complaints about the people who do things right as petty as possible. Republican policy advisors are about as helpful as microwave repair technicians at the site of a nuclear explosion. Love to criticize, can't help asking whether they have any good criticism.
But that's not the point. Power is the point. They're obsessed with it. Raw, unadulterated, partisan power.
They're fucking addicts. And they need rehabilitation.
A nice, long stay at the right facility.
One must ask:
1) Did Bush create ISIS and the current instability in the Middle East by going to war in Iraq?
2) Did Obama lose the peace in Iraq thereby doing more to cause the current crisis' than Bush?
I would say yes Bush increased instability in the Middle East by going to war in Iraq, however with the surge Bush chose a course of action that resulted in 2009 having better conditions than Iraq has now by many metrics, and had McCain been elected things would be very different throughout the region not just Iraq.
So instead of tears after-the-fact accomplishing nothing save on an individual emotional level, McCardle et al should just simply vote smart, and moral too. Then not as many people have to die, like they did after Leftists demanded we abandon our allies in and around Vietnam.
Obama's immorality exudes through "coolness," which is a signal he doesn't care about anything without figuring out where he should be politically according to the people who decide about such things with an impact. Gay marriage proponents voted for a man they thought was lying to them, because Obama was too cowardly to lead where his heart was. This pragmatism is seen as a desirable leadership quality to the Left. Perhaps those focused on social issues like gay marriage extrapolate demonizing political opponents to functioning in a world where many millions of people want to kill you because of your nationality.
This same delayed justice as from decades ago is still no justice. You can take your pragmatic approach, successful in domestic politics when 18T dollars of debt heading toward 22T by the end of the month is defined as a success, and reevaluate your assumptions.
*I've decided to continue with the anonymity as you people need me more than my dignity will suffer as a result of debasing myself in reaction to your snarky evil.
The Great Depression lasted until 1947. Revisionists like to point to 1941 because of the war. But, hey, why not pretend that a military build-up was the reason? Because then Leftists will claim government spending was the reason the Depression ended. And we should cede none of that argument.
Thank you for admitting that, for you, partisan ideology brooks no quarter to the fact of something that is and was 100% true.
"Why not pretend.... was the reason?"
Again, you prove that instead of taking facts and reasons for what they are, you "pretend" at them depending on the partisan gain to be gotten from it.
And that's what makes your ilk utterly incompetent to lead.
Who else would even think of phrasing their approach to understanding the political economy that way?
No one. Not even Putin. Just the power-addicted partisanship junkies of the RNC and their lackeys in the comments section. Again, there's a reason why a non-conservative is finally leading your pack. He's the only one (huge exaggerations for political effect notwithstanding) who even remembers what it means to hit upon a publicly stated reality every now and then.
And he's bought out all your bitches more richly than they could have bought off anyone else.
Ritmo is getting very old with his/her BS. Skipping large numbers of comments.
Rhythm: How would you suggest I establish "credibility" according to a militant homophobe like you on a right-wing blog?
Not lying all the time would be a good start.
You're a sophist. And one that's not as smart as he thinks he is.
Militant homophobe? LOL. That must be why I supported gay marriage....
Go back to eating your own filth. I've taken your measure several times now. I know what you really are.
At least I remember when to put nouns in my sentences, Leechmaster Michael K.
You're about as useless as a bag of urine.
It's projection all the way down.
I decline to debate or have a battle of wits with a man/woman/it that is unarmed. And that doesn't have a working knowledge of grammar.
Not lying all the time would be a good start.
You're a sophist. And one that's not as smart as he thinks he is.
How would an ignorant tool, who doesn't even know (or care) how little he knows, identify who is and isn't a "sophist"? That would depend on you knowing the difference between true knowledge and phony knowledge. But since you have almost no knowledge, you're disqualified from even making the judgment.
Militant homophobe? LOL. That must be why I supported gay marriage....
Who knows what you are any more? I think you were one of the ones going on the tear against repealing "Don't ask don't tell" after it happened. I simply have bigger things to care about than the many things about which you don't care - a number almost rivaled by the number of things which you don't know.
Go back to eating your own filth. I've taken your measure several times now. I know what you really are.
I'm a guy who called out Meade (and his master) before you even had the balls to accept what they were up to. And then you used your agreement with me (once you could no longer deny it) to lend credence to your position.
Listen, I doubt you're an evil person - you just seem like one of those crusty and excessively "duty-bound" types who just doesn't know enough about the world to know who or what is worth supporting.
But you can do better than just getting in the way of those who do.
It's like that saying: Lead, follow or get out of the way. And in the majority of these threads, you do none of the above.
I decline to debate or have a battle of wits with a man/woman/it that is unarmed. And that doesn't have a working knowledge of grammar.
So how did that second sentence demonstrate "a working knowledge of grammar?" By removing the subject?
As for the first sentence, it's good to know that not only do you let others do your arguing (and thinking) for you. You also let others generate proverbial rhetoric for you.
Just stick with the manual labor, MK. Anything involving thought leaves you sputtering. Try stronger anesthesia next time and stop fighting the intellectual operation that is being conducted upon you. Assuming you don't die of ideological infection, you will be much better afterwards. We will keep an eye on you each morning for the next several days, and page the medical intern if your temperature gets too high.
We will also offer to order you restraints if you keep feeling threatened and pull out too many feeding tubes and IV lines.
"mini-recession"
So "AReasonableMan" would have us believe that 25% unemployment was just a glitch!!
Oh boy, but that is just too good.
Michael K,
The fun in goading "AReasonableMan" is to elicit the comedy gold that stupidity reveals. I mean, my goodness! 25% unemployment was just a "mini-recession" is the sort of stuff neither of us could dream of saying. That sort of pure, unadulterated stupid is the pink ooze from Ghostbusters II, except it is generated by stupid and hatred, not evil and hatred.
Well, evil too, as revealed by this little nugget, "A nice, long stay at the right facility." Scratch a Lefist, find a fascist.
Tell us, "AReasonableMan", which president gets blamed for that 25% unemployment?
Otto is still insisting Aristotle is Belgian, it took government policy, crippling tariffs like Smoot Hawley, addition taxes and fees, to turn a typical downturn into a cataclysmic great depression, now TAARP and the ARRA was the RFC on steroids,
Well Michael K. You know what they say -
If you can't beat them, join -
I mean, run way. If you can't beat them, run away.
It's the honorable, Republican way.
?Birkel said...
AReasonableMan:
I know you are wrong about America's relative position.
Provide some evidence. Oh sorry, you are too stupid understand that the voices in your head bear no relationship to reality.
I mean, run way. If you can't beat them, run away.
It's the honorable, Republican way.
I forget...which party led 11 states to run away from the Union in order to preserve slavery?
Does the John Birch Society even exist any more? The last time I saw one of their magazines, The Firery Cross newspaper was advertising a Crossburning/Klan rally--like 1965. Some people are really stuck in the 60s.
yes, it's still around, they were too subtle in my view, we have a president who was mentored by an wannabe urban guerilla, a preacher who was a guest of the Castro and Qaddafi regimes,
he threw the latter under the bus, extends an olive branch to the former,
"The fun in goading "AReasonableMan" is to elicit the comedy gold that stupidity reveals. "
I don't consider him stupid. I think we are in an era when the two sides of the great debate are so far apart that they cannot see the grain of sense in each other. He rarely, in my own experience, descends to the level of Ritmo or a few other trolls.
"you are too stupid understand that the voices in your head bear no relationship to reality."
This is unusual and does not make you look better ARM.
Politics can make otherwise reasonable people say and do stupid things. And pretending that 25% unemployment is no big deal is pretty stupid.
The wrongness of your statement about relative economic strength is in thinking Americans give a fuck if we are beating our competitors. We don't. We care if we are doing better ourselves. And I'm inflation-adjusted terms we are doing worse under Obama, even with the Fed kicking in zero percent interest rates.
See, e.g. Japan, Lost Decade (27 years and counting)
Yes, the zirp, has made savings nearly impossible, and forced everything into an investment bubble, which will like explode, when rates 'naturally spike up'
Boehner is a big government Republican who didn't compromise, but cave. On everything. Frankly, he liked what the democrats were selling overall, even he disagreed about a few specifics.
It's always fun listening to two-time Bush voters discuss the economy. You guys have no shame, or self-knowledge, a bit like Cheney declaiming about what we should do in the middle east.
Michael K said...
"you are too stupid understand that the voices in your head bear no relationship to reality."
This is unusual and does not make you look better ARM.
Wait a second, this idiot called me a liar over a factual disagreement, where he was wrong. Stupid was too kind. If you want to play referee try to give at least the illusion of impartiality.
I think Bush's compassionate conservative bull shit was terrible. I think his handling of the growth of government was atrocious. And I went from a Republican registered voter to an independent because of President Bush, because he was wrong about the economy. Remember when Bush's numbers went upside down? That was when conservatives realized we were betrayed.
But do tell about my voting history. You amuse me, clown.
The next time you prove me wrong will be the first, "AReasonableMan", but do to on...
the problem is the difference between your typical troll, journolist, and white house policy maker is so narrow as to be irrelevant, jared bernstein was the second category, and he became Biden's sherpa on the ARRA.
I forget...which party led 11 states to run away from the Union in order to preserve slavery?
One that obviously doesn't believe the same things its successors believe today.
Remember when a president preserved on Mount Rushmore, Theodore Roosevelt, busted the monopolies and called himself a "progressive"? Yeah, me too. Good times.
Remember when Presidents put CEO's in prison for their insider scams, don't let them get off with effectively in kind contributions to the party, game, set, match,
actually atty generals, who of the big time players has served any jail time, Cassani, Mozilo,
Blankfein,
btw, 93 million out of the workforce, that's more than 25% of the population,
Remember when presidents (not Presidents) were competent enough to think that the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency should have better credentials than being a commissioner of the Arabian Horse Association? Remember when just the graft of knowing the president wouldn't have been considered enough?
Remember when we had presidents who felt that they were called into public service, and weren't just molded into playing the role by a guy like Karl Rove, who said, on the basis of people wanting to have a beer with his client, that he could "make him a president?"
Remember all that?
Of course not. The people calling themselves "conservative" in America can only remember as far back as the last news cycle. Or the last political "scandal".
Anything earlier than that is too taxing to their poor little minds.
" a bit like Cheney declaiming about what we should do in the middle east."
I guess I was wrong about you ARM. This is pure left delusions. I know you hate Cheney and he knows it and doesn't give a shit. He is one of the smartest people on the right I know of.
Me criticizing the politics of FDR is only "the last news cycle" as 25% unemployment is no biggie.
Gotcha!
nothing like putting the head of the subprime division of a major bank, as treasury secretary,
"I know you hate Cheney and he knows it and doesn't give a shit. He is one of the smartest people on the right I know of."
If only his poor little heart agreed. It kept going on strike against supplying enough blood to both brain and heart, and they had to implant a device (not that one that anyone pre-Obamacare would have received) that gave his circulation a continuous flow, rendering him pulseless. Like a vampire.
Which is ironic, as that's the very sort of humanoid a Republican would look to as a model of leadership. And it helped make sense of his personality.
Anybody got an intelligent comment ? None lately.
Birkel said...
cubanbob:
The Great Depression lasted until 1947. Revisionists like to point to 1941 because of the war. But, hey, why not pretend that a military build-up was the reason? Because then Leftists will claim government spending was the reason the Depression ended. And we should cede none of that argument.
9/26/15, 4:15 PM"
Let's put things in context: in 1945 the US was 45% of the world's economy. Also you had nearly four years of massive wartime employment with the salaries pretty much not spent due to wartime privations. Then there was the massive reduction in government after the war ended. Between the sudden rapid shrinkage of government and its share of the economy and the built up demand for goods after the depression and the war with the funding coming from wartime savings plus the fact we were the only game in town how could we not have had a stunning recovery? The left forgets that Keynes preached borrow and spend in bad times to spur demand but pay down the debt in good times. Which is what the US did after the war and throughout the fifties and into the early sixties.
Anybody got an intelligent comment ? None lately.
Certainly YOU don't.
It's so nice that Michael K can recognize his lack of contribution.
Other than his anxiety over not having an avatar attractive enough for Titus.
That's MK's contribution - Anxiety. Anxiety over an avatar that wasn't attractive enough for Titus.
Everyone's got their role to play in life. And that's MK's.
Give the guy a hand.
I don't know who this McCardle person is but she seems to not understand that scorched earth, no compromise, take no prisoners is the exactly the way Pelosi, Reid, Schumer and Durbin have always played it, yet, since Atwater and Gingrich the republicans have been afraid of their own shadows. Here's a nice litmus test. Why is it that the only SCOTUS justices that ever cross over are republican appointees while democrat appointess remain steadfast to their principles like a rock? Squishes like McCardle bring to mind the immortal words from Animal House "Oh we're afraid to go with you Bluto, we might get in trouble"
Rhythm and Balls said...
I forget...which party led 11 states to run away from the Union in order to preserve slavery?
One that obviously doesn't believe the same things its successors believe today.
Remember when a president preserved on Mount Rushmore, Theodore Roosevelt, busted the monopolies and called himself a "progressive"? Yeah, me too. Good times.
9/26/15, 9:27 PM"
Not to nit pick but from a consumers point of view just what was so bad about Standard Oil? If I recall correctly it was called Standard Oil because they sold a standardized quality grade of kerosene at prices cheaper than the competition so if I am correct what favor did TR do for the American consumer of that time?
Blogger narciso said...
nothing like putting the head of the subprime division of a major bank, as treasury secretary,
9/26/15, 10:16 PM"
That the Democrats are 100% culpable of creating the conditions that lead several times to these real estate banking crises does not negate the Republican culpability in failing to eliminate the the artificial circumstances that lead to these crises again and again.
Can one of you Boehner-defenders please explain to me--
The R's, having the majority in the House and Senate, can do either:
1. Nothing, on the excuse that the Senate will filibuster it, and if not Obama will veto it.
2. Pass stuff in the House, and make the D's in the Senate actually filibuster it. I'd dearly love to have CSPAN footage of Democratic senators defending the selling of baby parts; think how that will play in Middle America!
3. Pass stuff in the House, browbeat a few D's into abandoning the filibuster so things pass the Senate too, and force Obama to veto a bunch of stuff.
Really, is this hard? Give Obama a complete budget that funds everything except government support to the private entity Planned Parenthood. Think his veto will make the D's look good in all the swing states???
"McArdle and the Pope are right. If you are unwilling to compromise you ought not be in politics."
Dear G-d, sunsong, you know this condemns Barack "I Won" Obama right out of the gate?
I couldn't even get past the first few paragraphs of McMegan's article on refugee camps in Greece. Good grief, when these folks get to the coast of Turkey they are already out of any immediate danger! Getting into "black rubber boats that easily overturn" at that point is the height of insanity, if immediate personal safety is really the issue.
> Maybe they need to elect someone who will try what they’ve been longing for: a full throated, take-no-prisoners approach that doesn’t bother with compromise or concession.<
Someone like the team of Gingrich, Delay and Armey who following the 1994 capture of the House largely checkmated Bill Clinton insofar as domestic spending and HillaryCare were concerned, thus making "the Clinton economy" a relative success?
"...Cheney... is one of the smartest people on the right..."
If true, this is a damning indictment, whether one sees it as a gauge of the stunted intellects of the right, or as an illustration that a person (or persons) of intellect may still be bankrupt of all ethics, integrity, credibility, honor, decency, or humanity...that, in short, intellect does not guarantee against one being a lying brute and psychopath.
Robert Cook said...
a person (or persons) of intellect may still be bankrupt of all ethics, integrity, credibility, honor, decency, or humanity...that, in short, intellect does not guarantee against one being a lying brute and psychopath.
You are conceding a point that should not be conceded. Cheney is clearly not that smart. He is filled with a self-righteous pomposity that obviates even the semblance of good judgement. He is a vain coward ('other priorities', 'undisclosed location') who in medieval times would have been drawn and quartered in the town square for his failures. Sometimes the old ways are the best.
1933 to 1935 and 1938 to 1945 are FDR's credit.
Oh god!That's funny.
ARM, Cheney obviously occupies a large part of your head that might be more useful to you as brain.
He was a very effective chief of staff to Ford and his biography is a pretty good picture of politics in Washington for 40 years.
You, like most leftists, hate Bush and Cheney was seen as a dominant partner. Cheney was not concerned with his image on the left and that is infuriating to those who think their opinion should rule.
Why is it necessary for leftists to hate those whom they disagree with ? It makes me think of Robespierre who is really the godfather of leftism as we see it today.
"You are conceding a point that should not be conceded. Cheney is clearly not that smart."
Oh, I don't think I'm conceding that Cheney is smart. I merely say, rhetorically, assuming it true that Cheney is "one of the smartest people on the right," it damns the right in toto as being as dull and brutish a gang of clods as ever was.
Moreover, assuming it true (rhetorically) that Cheney is smart by objective standards, it illustrates only that "intelligence" can sit easily in the brain of a lying, cowardly, self-important bully and psychopath, that "intelligence" divorced from other human qualities (such as integrity, honesty, a commitment to ethical and humane behavior, etc.) is no quality at all.
What truly frightens me is the casual acceptance of lefties, from Obama all the way down to ARM, that the way to economic recovery is through war.
it illustrates only that "intelligence" can sit easily in the brain of a lying, cowardly, self-important bully and psychopath, that "intelligence" divorced from other human qualities (such as integrity, honesty, a commitment to ethical and humane behavior, etc.) is no quality at all.
Please leave Bill Clinton out of this !
Birk
the only thing more amusing is ARM lecturing us on things economic.
Big Mike said...
What truly frightens me is the casual acceptance of lefties, from Obama all the way down to ARM, that the way to economic recovery is through war.
A core belief of the left is that economics is a zero sum game and it is the government that drives the economy.
Not to nit pick but from a consumers point of view just what was so bad about Standard Oil? If I recall correctly it was called Standard Oil because they sold a standardized quality grade of kerosene at prices cheaper than the competition so if I am correct what favor did TR do for the American consumer of that time?
Monopolies are almost always bad from a consumer's point of view because they decrease competition and set prices without any concern for the pressure of a competitor selling something for less. And once the market's theirs, they generally direct their efforts into making it harder for potential competitors to even enter the marketplace at all.
What truly frightens me is the casual acceptance of lefties, from Obama all the way down to ARM, that the way to economic recovery is through war.
Which "lefty" is banging the drum for war as loudly as your average Republican is, if he is doing so at all?
Which "lefty" is promoting unnecessary military build-up as a make-work program for his district?
You ignore everything that the slate of current and past Republican presidential candidates has most ardently pushed for and pretend that the recklessness they embody is something that the opposite side of the political spectrum is pushing, instead.
Stop living in Bizarro World.
Cheney was not concerned with his image on the left and that is infuriating to those who think their opinion should rule.
Cheney was not even concerned at the image presented to his left ventricle by his coronary arteries.
I mean, at some point a guy can only scowl and writhe and grit his every sphincter in his body so much without it choking off even the flow of blood to his heart. I mean, I realize the guy's heart is about the size of a shrew's, but even he would need the organ to have some baseline level of function, I would guess.
"Rhythm and Balls" understands monopoly but cannot seem to understand why businesses want regulations from Big Government to raise entry costs from competitors. Neat-o!
Meanwhile, most monopolies are protected government rackets, like unions, which cannot be effectively challenged.
Follow the logic all the way. Give it a shot.
Remember when IBM had a virtual monopoly on computers?
Yeah. The marketplace solved that one.
And Standard Oil was solved by the states of Oklahoma and Texas, and the countries in the Middle East.
But let's not allow facts disrupt....
Remember when IBM had a virtual monopoly on computers?
Yeah. The marketplace solved that one.
But not the one that Microsoft "installed" afterward. To quote the judge ruling on their case, (who was nominated by RONALD REAGAN!):
"Most harmful of all is the message that Microsoft's actions have conveyed to every enterprise with the potential to
innovate in the computer industry. Through its conduct toward Netscape, IBM, Compaq, Intel, and others, Microsoft has demonstrated that it will use its prodigious market power and immense profits to harm any firm that insists on pursuing initiatives that could intensify competition against one of Microsoft's core products. Microsoft's past success in hurting such companies and stifling innovation deters investment in technologies and businesses that exhibit the potential to threaten Microsoft. The ultimate result is that some innovations that would truly benefit consumers never occur for the sole reason that they do not coincide with Microsoft's self-interest."
I realize accepting the limitations of your armchair internet legal and economic analysis degree, as personally gratifying as it must be, is difficult. But it's also necessary.
Neither of you understand antitrust law. The point is it's not forbidden to become or even to remain a monopoly. The point is that you can't then use that position to prevent competitors from entering the market. It's not a difficult distinction to maintain - unless you hate competition and run from it at every turn.
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