Down and down the market goes, and where it stops…
I’ve been polling some of my liberal friends who voted for Obama, asking their opinion about what’s been happening lately in the financial sector and his effect on the economy. Every one of them has responded in much the same way, by saying quickly that nobody knows what lies ahead and nobody knows how to fix it.
They don’t seem ready to blame Obama for anything yet, and I don’t know whether they ever will. This “nobody has a clue” mantra may be the wave of the future for some time to come.
But they look and sound shaky and stunned, with a frightened tension in their eyes. They sure don’t sound happy about the bills that have been passed so far, or about the policies Obama has been recommending next, or the precipitous drop in the stock market.
.
In forging ahead with his liberal/radical economic spending agenda in the midst of a serious recession, President Obama seems to be blithely ignoring the fact that every time he speaks the stock market falls. His declaration of war on the rich hasn’t helped much, either, nor has his definition of “rich” as households or businesses earning 250 thousand dollars a year.
I can’t escape the conclusion that Obama doesn’t care if the stock market keeps on falling and people keep being spooked. In fact, it benefits him, up to a point. After all, Obama can blame market declines at the outset of his administration on his despised predecessor Bush. What’s more, the lower the market falls now, the more room it has to recover under his watch.
In addition (and perhaps most importantly), the lower the market falls the greater the panic it induces, and an increase of fear and desperation is exactly what Obama needs to sell change with “the fierce urgency of now.” As long as his supporters are willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and blame others—and, if my friends are at all typical, they are still doing just that—he can ignore the falling market and concentrate on the social welfare part of the change we’ve been waiting for.
[ADDENDUM: If this is correct, maybe today will begin the big stock market climb we’ve all been hoping for. But I wouldn’t sit on a hot stove.]
I believe Obama wants this. All part of the “manufactured crisis”. It will be easier to create a socialist state with the country in turmoil and uncertainty.
Wasn’t it Rahm Emmanuel who stated that ‘You never want a serious crisis to go to waste’? Judging by this article, the ‘Mossiah’ wants to tread the same ruinous path of other big spenders.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2009/03/02/america/NA-FEA-US-Obama-Crisis-in-Opportunity-Analysis.php
Frankly I’m surprised you were able to have a level conversation with any liberal Neo. The one or two I deal with at work immediately lose all bearing and engage in hysterical rants about Bush, 911, Jeeeeeeewwws, aliens on Roswell…
Nobody can speak for Obama’s intentions except himself but I grant that it is awful strange set of events to watch.
He chided McCain for being eratic and not calm cool and collected.
It is my educated belief that if Obama did NOTHING and acted calm cool and collected that we would be fairing better today than after the actions Obama has taken.
That is my belief.
Neo, now is a good time for you to go back to that post of 2/10/09 in which you referenced Cloward/Piven and ask yourself that question once again. Do you have an updated answer?
I, for one, believe that Obama’s actions are fully intentional with malice aforethought. Read what he has written in the past. Look at his voting record. See who it is that he associates himself with both now and in the past, etc.
None of this should come as a surprise to anyone who has been watching.
Pat Buchanan writes today that what we are witnessing is a “statist coup d’é·tat”.
The Dow is down another 55 at the moment…
I just can’t express how f#cking pissed i am about this arrogant man unashamedly playing games with mine and my loved ones very lives.
We’re all teetering on destruction as part of this man’s calculated political strategy. How does this get sustained for 4 more months, much less 4 more years?
Pingback:Amused Cynic » Blog Archive » Raise your hand if you still think this “economic emergency” was just an accident…..
This is sad. Though I know (in spite of the comparisons) that this is no where near the conditions of the Great Depression, as a relatively young person, I’m shocked at the notion that things might not go on as always, that America’s days of glory may be ending.
I know nothing is certain, that recessions happen. I’m more worried about what is being done in the name of the recession.
Despite my best efforts my 85-year-old mother chose to vote for Obama because “we need a change.” After eleven days of his administration she graciously called me to apologize. There must be more buyer’s remorse out there. Perhaps it depends upon where one is — we’re from Houston and therefore, congenitally optimistic. Many of our New England friends are Marxists (Harvard graduates and their spouses). Most of our other friends wouldn’t have voted for Obama with a gun to their heads. We fall in the latter category.
I think Baklava is right; the best way for Obama to help the situation would be to do nothing and say little. I also think crazy horse is right; it ain’t gonna happen.
I still think Obama lacks the capacity for deep, long term planning. (See his entire life up to this). He does have a huge capacity for self-absorption and hubris. He will throw all this in the pot so he can show he is the one to remake the US, but he would have been just as happy to do it with smiling citizens. He cannot make the leap to the idea that his programs are causing the fear. So it must be Rush or Hannity or Fox or Republicans in general.
Sadly, the corrective response must come from Democratic congressmen revolting to save their do nothing jobs.
I can’t escape the conclusion that Obama doesn’t care if the stock market keeps on falling and people keep being spooked. In fact, it benefits him, up to a point.
the point is that he solidifies and gets to become permanent leader the minute we counter revolution and take to the streets. leftist protest is allowed, counter revolutionary protest will result in bullets into the crowd and scary actions by leftists on people at night.
CPUSA’s National Chair, Sam Webb, was quoted in the People’s Weekly World ,
“The ‘biggest challenge’ now, he told the meeting, is to ‘resist efforts by reaction and some on the left’ to advocate a break in the coalition that elected Obama and is now led by him. ‘We will have our differences but they have to be handled so as not to break the overall unity,’ he said.”
the quiet revolution has happened..
and the next bubble in a year or two will be the bond market… when the US prints too much money, and everyone uses it to buy bonds as there is nothing else to store the wealth in, they will suddenly be devalued by the very riots that will start from the policies. that is, the minute the states become unstable, the bond values do what?
everyone is still on the wrong page.
you are still REACTING not ANTICIPATING so by the time you realize and start to work from there, they are past you and one step ahead. why do you think that peopel cant reverse it?
the market will NOT pick up, because no one will pull their monehy out of bonds till they know whats nationalized or not. and they wont know that till they stop, and they wont stop, as each action causes decline that they then do more, and so on.
this is, as i described in detail and yelled at, is bleeding as a cure that kills the patient.
the end result is war… war will turn the civil problem away from the leaders, and to an external enemy… and there will not be a shortage of states in the exact same position willing to throw their people at each other rather than let them come for them.
It will be easier to create a socialist state with the country in turmoil and uncertainty.
see how little we understand?
we have been a socialist state since before 1900…
so he cant CREATE a socialist state, we are already that. so there is only one thing left to create…
see how the false dichotomy between socialism and communism works? we think that he is making a socialist state, and that is different than communist. so the closer we get to communist, the more we think he is making socialism, instead of full blown communism. and we can sit around and wait till its full blown communism, rather than respond to sociaism at every turn over the past 100 years.
and just so you all know that this is already at VERY serious levels, but the red scare hasnt sunk in yet as to what it is… when it does, thats when people will get cowed.
anyone note the firebombings against researchers using animals, in genetics, etc?
Broughton gets 10 years for animal rights attacks
Animal rights campaigner Mel Broughton has today been sentenced to 10 years plotting firebomb attacks against Oxford University.
The jury at Oxford Crown Court convicted the 48-year-old of conspiracy to commit arson.
Broughton was charged following the discovery of firebombs found at Templeton College in February 2007 and an attack on The Queen’s College sports pavillion the previous November.
US animal-rights extremists firebomb scientists’ home, car
arstechnica.com/old/content/2008/08/us-animal-rights-extremists-firebomb-scientists-home-car.ars
Militant campaigners have firebombed a pair of scientists in Santa Cruz in a show of opposition to their use of animals in research. Unfortunately, there remains a lack of any practical alternative to animals in the majority of cases
and if anyone wants state proof of the attitude cahnge and the extreme of it already when it hasnt even kicked up yet, then read this.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090301/OPINION03/903010308/1008/OPINION01
It was a tragic circus, a festival of ignorance that confirmed the No. 1 obstacle to Detroit’s progress is the bargain basement leaders that city voters elect. The black nationalism that is now the dominant ideology of the council was on proud display, both at the table and in the audience.
Speakers advocating for the deal were taunted by the crowd and cut short by Council President Monica Conyers, who presided over the hearing like an angry bulldog; whites were advised by the citizens to, “Go home.”
Opponents were allowed to rant and ramble on uninterrupted about “those people” who want to steal Detroit’s assets and profit from the city’s labors.
A pitiful Teamster official who practically crawled to the table on his knees expressing profuse respect for this disrespectful body was battered by both the crowd and the council.
When he dared suggest that an improved Cobo Center would create more good-paying jobs for union workers, Conyers reminded him, “Those workers look like you; they don’t look like me.”
Desperate, he invoked President Barack Obama’s message of unity and was angrily warned, “Don’t you say his name here.”
Dont use gods name in vain… eh?
‘The stock market crash’ is in most US history books. What is often left out is there was a second crash AFTER FDR was elected… and it kept tracking down at while he did the New Deal.
History repeats.
Right up to lefties not admitting the results of their policies (I’m not saying they are known already, but if the market and economy continue to tank I doubt the ‘Bush shredded the constitution’ crowd will blame Obama for any of it).
Yes, I agree, this is what he wants. He wants redistribution of wealth, and if that means nobody has any wealth (except, of course, him and his henchmen), well, so be it. There will be parties doing the Conga line at the White House while the people stand in bread lines.
M.E. and others,
I agree that Obama wants to ‘spread the wealth’ as he said as much.
I honestly do not know what Obama ‘intends’ and do not ascribe evil intentions to him.
I think he is so unaware of macro-economics 101 and does not know the consequences of the policies/solutions he is pushing.
Yes, his solutions and policies are hurting things and dropping our jaws.
Yes, he wants to spread the wealth.
Is he aware of the consequences of his actions and words.
I doubt it.
Am I too charitable?
Why do I think this?
Because I once was a liberal in 1991. I thought my views would help people.
It is a liberals intent to help people – they need to be reasoned with based on their “good-intentions” or we will LOSE the argument every time.
They know in their heart that they ar good.
It is Larry King’s question to Bobby Jindal over and over “but what if his policies work.” “What if his policies work”.
Like a broken record.
Bobby Jindal had perfect answers. He would never convince anybody by ascribing evil intentions to Obama.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D96MMP3O3&show_article=1
WAGING WAR ON PROSPERITY
http://www.nypost.com/seven/03032009/postopinion/opedcolumnists/waging_war_on_prosperity_157758.htm
PRESIDENT Lyndon John son’s administration was known for his War on Pov erty. President Obama’s will become notable for his War on Prosperity.
and in light of thomas
Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency was marked by an emphasis on recovery in his first term and class warfare (which he called “reform”) in his second. Campaigning for re-election in 1936, FDR famously declared, “I should like to have it said of my first administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match. I would like to have it said of my second administration that in it these forces met their master.”
Obama seems to have skipped the first-term FDR program and jumped right into the class divisions and warfare of the second.
and also for neo (the line about hie must know and doestn care).
Obama must realize that his tax hikes will dampen investment and consumer spending and prolong and deepen the economy’s woes – this is presumably why he’s postponing most tax hikes until 2011. But taxpayers, particularly wealthy taxpayers, are not dumb: They’ll know what’s coming, and look to secure the hatches in advance by sitting on their money.
But then, Obama must also realize that his stimulus package, with its massive growth of government, is going to kindle huge inflation in coming years. And he surely realizes that he can’t expand government health insurance as massively as he intends introducing rationing of medical services.
He must know, but not care.
Here is a president who would rather redistribute income than create wealth. He thinks it more important to grow government than to fight inflation. He believes that it is crucial to expand health care to the young and middle aged, even if it means cutting it back for the elderly. He’s more committed to effecting “broad change” in his first term than he is to winning a second one.
We have a president, in short, who will stand on his principles. Unfortunately, they’re bad ones.
and basically the argument as to everyone will take to forvive the 6 trillion draining..
ny2va11412 wrote:
I think we’ve seen how well the trickle down theory works. Face it. A rich man won’t help anyone else without the law, any more than a racist would let a Black person move next door to them without it. Decency, unfortunately, must be legislated in the USA. No matter how many country western stars sing about how great we are, this economic tragedy has shown just how bad we are. No one is placing blame where it belongs – with George Bush I & II, and Ronnie RayGun. They choose to use this opportunity to assure that this president fails, no matter what. The racist right would rather commit hari-kari on this land than allow a Black man to effectively lead them. You all will burn for that.
and
Let the conservatives run businesses and Democrats can run government and we all “get along”, because that is a philosophy that uses the talents and special skills of each group. When conservatives start trying to run government, problems are around the corner because they theselves admit to no understanding or faith in the implementation of government policies.
3/3/2009 1:57 PM EST
and how about this one?
This is the same bunk the Repubs said last time Democrats won the White House and Congress, and they gave us vastly lower unemployment, a balanced budget, and 8 years of unprecedented prosperity. The stock market gained 227% during President Clinton’s administration.
They were wrong then, and they’re wrong again.
RE the addendum… The rally lasted about an hour and a half. Perhaps a few progressive investors dumped some money over, but that didn’t last long. Market is back in the red for the day.
But hey, it might end up a good day. The drop may only be 1% in one day, rather than 5-10%.
It is interesting, since in these times even a little distraction is nice, to see O’s supporters getting a bit strained in insisting it’s all good.
Those are the ones who didn’t listen.
Then there are the ones who are trying to tell me that what’s happening ( i.e. gun control) isn’t really happening and they will keep at it until they think it’s okay to admit it was the plan all along.
But I’m closing in on the time when, on hearing a complaint, I can say, it was your vote, fool.
trolling through comments on this, and you will find that any hopes here of rational wakening are unfounded.
a PERFECT example:
Reckless Agenda ???
If I was President , the markets could sell off till the DOW drops to ZERO for all I care …
Then again I have no money invested in the markets so I guess I do NOT feel their pain .. – mindlessmissy
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idiotking
The only reckless part of the strategy so far is that it doesn’t go far ENOUGH, and it’s too timid with regard to ovehauling the financial system.
===========================
Augusta6
WE need to let everything do what it will?? I hear that the greatest amount of health care money, for instance, is spent on people in the last few weeks of their lives.and yet the inevitable is to happen
[so i guess here is one who is young enough to like disposing of the old.. until what happens later? thats how short sighted useful idiots are. while young, they will make laws to dispose of the old to their advantage, yet there is no cure for getting old, so they are digging their own early grave. i wonder if their attitude will change as they are wheeled inot a dark room and given sedatives and realize that they are not going to be cared for, but are to die]
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mpc2485
I used to be a Republican/Conservative. In fact, I am still registered as one, but it is this kind of narrowed vision of the world that has turned me away.
I wonder what solution Mr. Gasparino proposes to fix the problem? Just like Rush, he doesn’t seem to have the courage to be constructive- just complain.
Only one thing I know for sure, I believe in Barack Obama and I am behind my president!
I would hardly call government ownership of 40% of Citi nationalization. It’s more like the parent’s taking the car away for a while because the teenager drove drunk.
Mr. Gasparino, I am Main Street. I have worked in construction for 10 years and, seeing this credit crisis coming for the past 6-7 years as evidenced by abundant credit card offers and kinky mortgages, I got completely out of debt, invested into energy (renewable) and money markets and trained learned a new skillset that I knew would serve me well in the event of a bad recession. I didn’t get the new car or HDTV when the Jones’ did. I was responsible and guess what- I will still gladly give half of my money to the government for a few years (just as I gave 4 years of my life to the US Marine Corps) to help keep this great country that has given so much to me from going under. Do you and your Wall Street pals have any concept of that- of believing in something larger than yourselves?
Good luck to you and your Wall Street Pals over the next few years. You’ll need it.
PS- Please don’t refer to Wall Street as the new Main Street again. It embarasses those of us who actually live on Main Street.
[i wonder how he feels when no one wants to build or hire him in any skill set? i have eaten government cheese for 6 months… you try it. get 10 lbs of cheeze and live on that and bread alone for 6 months… do that, and you will never trust the state again]
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Sajwert
I don’t know very much about Wall Street other than my few stocks have gone across the river Styx apparently forever. I’m counting on Obama and his men to be doing the right thing even when I’m holding my breath to see if it comes out right.
If Gasparino thinks that Obama is making a huge mistake, it makes me wonder just how wonderful he and his friends would think life would be now if we had McCain and his dippy VP choice running the country.
============================
xbainx
The problem with all this talk is it’s been a month dude. A month. People like to write articles like “The Markets Hate Obama” but the truth is rich people hate taking any kind of loss. So they leave, buy some gold and flee the country, mafia style.
========================
The clowns in the investment world bought garbage because they were to lazy and too greedy to do their jobs right. And now we are supposed to listen to them? Sorry credibility is earned through history of actions. Funny how they always want to shift the blame to home buyers. The snowball effect of the last few years in the mortgage world could have been averted if the first couple of clowns trying to pass off these bad loans had been called out and denied. Oh, but that would have been work on the investors part, what am I thinking. And no kidding nobody is going to buy these assets, they’re worthless. Thanks for your comments Charlie, the new administration is trying to figure out how to deal with the steaming pile your friends left for the rest of us. Go away, you are not helping anything. Any idiot can say “this will never work”. Nothing Obama was going to do in his first month was going to swing this, commenting like he could is ignorant.
[i guess this person doesnt remember that when they refused to loan after doing diligence the acorn people yelled redlining and racism!! and so pumped the CRA to basically penalize a bank if it looked at the credit risk of a minority buyer. with this in place the ONLY force that would have stopped this, would have been the morals of the people seeking loans!!! but only bankers can get blame.. the oppressed are never to blame, and never to be punished.]
=================
Embers
I’m an “Obama supporter” and the plan doesn’t seem at all reckless to me. Reckless would be allowing things to continue as they were.
But I’ll concede that were I a lowest-common-denominator-seeking Wall Street serpent, this plan would upset me very much.
=================
the sad truth behind all this is that obama knows that if he puts things through fast, his cadre of morons will blame bush, and other things. they will not be able to see that it was his ‘heroic’ actions.
if he waited a longer period of time, it would be MUCH clearer tha he is responsible.
the posts above should show you that they are willing to EMBRACE communism. they are completely ignorant, and even more so, believe that there are actually saintly politicians, and they only reside on their side!
if there is such a disconnect as to this between workers and the peole that organize work for them.
then they will march into a death camp and will blame weimar not hitler
all the answers above explain why you can give 100 million dollars in lottery winnings to a random someone, and they will waste it and lose it, and not become a mover and a shaker.
THATS HOW BAD THE AVERAGE PERSON IS WITH MONEY.
you can give them 100 million to spend personally, and it dont last… they dont build much, and certainly lose most of it, if not all.
but i thought brewsters millions taught us that the rich dont lose money, that with enough, you never lose?
8 lottery winners who lost their millions
articles.moneycentral.msn.com/SavingandDebt/SaveMoney/8lotteryWinnersWhoLostTheirMillions.aspx
“Winning the lottery isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be,” says Evelyn Adams, who won the New Jersey lottery not just once, but twice (1985, 1986), to the tune of $5.4 million. Today the money is all gone and Adams lives in a trailer.
“Everybody wanted my money. Everybody had their hand out. I never learned one simple word in the English language — ‘No.’ I wish I had the chance to do it all over again. I’d be much smarter about it now,” says Adams, who also lost money at the slot machines in Atlantic City.
William “Bud” Post won $16.2 million in the Pennsylvania lottery in 1988 but now lives on his Social Security.
“I wish it never happened. It was totally a nightmare,” says Post.
A former girlfriend successfully sued him for a share of his winnings. It wasn’t his only lawsuit. A brother was arrested for hiring a hit man to kill him, hoping to inherit a share of the winnings. Other siblings pestered him until he agreed to invest in a car business and a restaurant in Sarasota, Fla., — two ventures that brought no money back and further strained his relationship with his siblings.
Post even spent time in jail for firing a gun over the head of a bill collector. Within a year, he was $1 million in debt.
Now he lives quietly on $450 a month and food stamps.
Missourian Janite Lee won $18 million in 1993. Lee was generous to a variety of causes, giving to politics, education and the community. But according to published reports, eight years after winning, Lee had filed for bankruptcy with only $700 left in two bank accounts and no cash on hand.
These sad-but-true tales are not uncommon, say the experts.
“For many people, sudden money can cause disaster,” says Susan Bradley, a certified financial planner in Palm Beach, Fla., and founder of the Sudden Money Institute, a resource center for new money recipients and their advisors.
“In our culture, there is a widely held belief that money solves problems. People think if they had more money, their troubles would be over. When a family receives sudden money, they frequently learn that money can cause as many problems as it solves,” she says.
“There are two sides to money. The interior side is the psychology of money and the family relationship to money. The exterior side is the tax codes, the money allocation, etc.”
“The goal is to integrate the two. People who can’t integrate their interior relationship with money appropriately are more likely to crash and burn,” says Bradley.
“Often they can keep the money and lose family and friends — or lose the money and keep the family and friends — or even lose the money and lose the family and friends.”
Bill Pomeroy, a certified financial planner in Baton Rouge, La., has dealt with a number of lottery winners who went broke.
“Because the winners have a large sum of money, they make the mistake of thinking they know what they’re doing. They are willing to plunk down large sums on investments they know nothing about or go in with a partner who may not know how to run a business.”
if you cant give a person 1 million and ahve that help them stay out of the poor house, how is state aid supposed to do that?
Art, lottery winners are self-selected to be lousy with money, or they wouldn’t have bought a lottery ticket in the first place.
I play the lottery every day–and I’ve never even bought a ticket!
My chance of winning the lottery on any given day is statistically equal whether I buy a ticket or not.
‘Cuz 1/30,000,000 is pretty darn close to 0/30,000,000.
Lottery is a tax on people that aren’t good at mathematics.
Only by destroying the nation can they rebuild it in their image….
Having said that, the next time a left wing nut tries to blame Bush II for the current economic decline, you may want to point out that when you factor out all other variables, the stock market seems to have started it’s slow motion collapse after The One was elected, and the trend seems to have only accelerated since His coronation.
On November 3, 2000 the DJIA was at 10,818.
On January 26, 2001 the DJIA was at 10680.
On September 21, 2001 – after the 9-11 attacks – the DJIA was at 8236.
Contrast that with the DJIA performance under The One.
On November 4, 2008, the DJIA was at 9625.
On January 20, 2009 the DJIA was at 7949.
On March 2, 2009, the DJIA was at 6763.
In other words, the market has looked at The Messiah’s words and actions, and those of his administration, and decided the situation now is worst than after the terrorist attacks in the middle of a recession were in 2001!!!!
Neither event had anything to do with Bush.
It’s also interesting to compare the DJIA during Bush’s initial
Art, lottery winners are self-selected to be lousy with money, or they wouldn’t have bought a lottery ticket in the first place.
ah yes… (there have been some wealthy winners who have put things to better use)
but my wife works in a deli, and its the same people who want welfare and such who put down 100 a week on lottery tickets…
in other words, the mentality that plays the lottery the most is the same mentality that wants a free handout.
most dont realize, EVEN IF YOU EXPLAIN IT TO THEM, that they spend the amount of money they were trying to win over the years trying.
that is, i have known people to plink down 200 a week, living low, and do so for more than 15 years. tell them that if they invested it, or put it into a business, or evne hid it in a matress, they would have the pile of cash they wanted (and they would be less likely to spend it)
lottery ticket winners are all kinds.
but if the maxim of the left were true, it wouldnt matter. once you had a pile of money, there would be no way to lose it, and it would always increase.
the point that none of them to my memory ever did anything like start a large company and create jobs in more than 50 years in so many lotteries and so many states… is saying something.
its a testement that even if you gave 1 million to each of the people who want it… the VAST majority of them would not even be able to retain it and make the hard choices… the thing they dont like about the wealthy is that the wealthy will make the hard choices… they will organise, and they will ahve self control.
all things the parasite class hates.. for if they could really develop it, they would not need a victim.
but occam.. i do agree with your statement… even if i wasnt clear on that part in my post.
I’m listening to Mark Levin on the radio right now, and he is saying that Obama is intentionally destroying the economy, which is what I’ve been saying for awhile now.
The purpose is to impoverish the American middle class, so we will go begging to the government to save us.
I’m with ya, Art.
Habitual lottery players are not only lousy at math, but also indulge in magical thinking to escape their financial woes, and fail to anticipate consequences of their actions – the very same traits that got them into financial woes in the first place.
In my dotage I think more and more that most people trace out internally-scripted trajectories that they follow with the totally foreseeable, but also totally inescapable, outcome of a Greek tragedy.
For that reason, it’s not possible to help someone unless and until he breaks his internal scripting, and it’s a waste of time to try. Without that sine qua non, even heroic efforts only postpone the inevitable. Detroit and subprime mortgagees please note.
rickl,
See my earlier posts.
As an ex-liberal (pre-1991) I cannot believe that. And…. we won’t be persuasive if that is our argument (in my humble opinion).
His policies for sure have job creators and investors bracing themselves, hanging on to as much as they can and figuring out ways to lower their expenses….. but does Obama understand that?
No. Obama is pretty clueless. I believe that Obama honestly has no clue. Somehow somebody has to get to him – lock him in a room for 12 hours straight and try to teach this man macro-economics 101.
It’s killing us until these Democrats (and Spector, Snowe, Collins) are relieved of their duties or become educated on this stuff.
Baklava: the question about Obama is whether he’s a liberal or a leftist. There’s a difference. I used to think he was the former. Now I think the latter.
I think you’re basing your evaluation of him on your experience of being a liberal among liberals.
I thought was a leftist, but a narcissist first, i.e. his instincts would be to head left, but slowly and carefully so as not to jeopardize his popularity.
I’m stunned by how fast and huge his moves have been. Perhaps his calculation/hope is that there will be enough recovery by 2010 and 2012 that he will be OK.
Baklava:
While I’m familiar with the saying, “Never attribute to a conspiracy that which can be explained by incompetence”, I just can’t imagine ignorance on so vast a scale. We’ve had decades of experience which show that socialist policies lead to poverty and misery.
I was still a liberal as late as 1995, so good for you that you woke up before I did. 😉
But the thing is, Obama isn’t a liberal in the mold of LBJ or Hubert Humphrey. He is a radical Marxist and has been steeped in that ideology since childhood. He is finally showing his true colors since the inauguration, and if anything, he is even worse than I feared he would be before the election.
It wouldn’t be so bad if it were only Obama. A good portion of the Democratic leadership seem to be radicals too.
You’re right in saying that his supporters won’t be persuaded by this argument. I don’t know what will persuade them, except cold hard experience; and I don’t even know that that would suffice.
I think I understand what you guys are saying.
But it’s depressing.
Thanks for acknowledging the persuasion argument in your last paragraph rickl.
I do not think Obama knows or understands enough about economics and finance to pull off a deliberate, full-on, complete destruction of the capitalist economy. First of all, folks, he’s a lawyer among lawyers. More than 90% of the Democrat congressmen and senators are lawyers. These are people who share a common academic training and outlook. Lawyers are rent-seekers. They are not entrepreneurs and are not professional investors. The vast majority of them have not studied finance and economics to some depth. Utterly clueless as to how wealth and jobs really are created. Most think as Obama does: they think government really is the driver of the economy. How can people who think this way have a clue as to how to DELIBERATELY sabotage the economy? They don’t.
This is mostly a blunder. Throw in hubris as well, as Obama really will govern from the Left, just as I predicted he would. I took some criticism from some people on neo’s blog for stating that months ago. I expect an apology from them, but maybe shouldn’t hold my breath on that one…
Today’s remarks by Obama indicate that he is not at all focused on what investors and savers think. He really believes his plan will bring the economy back. Being a Harvard man, he believes in Keynesian economics. They don’t teach anything else to those Ivy League folks. Obama really does not believe the equities’ markets are forward looking. He thinks they are focused on very short-term things.
I think he’s wrong. But what do I know. I’m not a Harvard man.
Roughly 20% of the U.S. can be accurately described at “Far Left.” Those people have skin in Obama’s game and they are in it to the end. You are not going to change those people. They know what Marxism is and they want it full throat. However, they are very good at hiding their ideological loyalties and use codes and “tells” for who they are, like calling themselves “progressives” and “liberals” they lurk in the weeds and draw in anyone who has any affinity at all for what they’re selling. This I learned from personal experience, since I refused to go along with the deception and stop calling myself a socialist or a Marxist.
The battleground is the Middle Muddle. This is where they have learned to be very coy. They are good at packaging their memes in such a way as to pick off people who we normally associate with being “moderates” and “liberals.” I think a fair number of these people are already experiencing buyer’s remorse.
I listened to Dick Morris yesterday on Fox…he says Obama’s popularity numbers are going down and will continue to drop, but that Obama does not care. It’s all about pushing his radical agenda through immediately.
In my view, it does seem consistent with the speculation that Obama has narcissistic personality disorder. If people like him, great, if they don’t like him, well you have to break a few eggs to get an omlet, etc. Either way, he does. not. care. Because he is motivated by power, not popularity, a mission of public service or anything else. He is boss now and will pursue his agenda at any cost.
I can only hope that our system of government protects us to some extent from what can happen when a malignant narcissist starts moving into despot territory.
Even though granted he will likely do irreversable damage even if he only serves four years.
I don’t think anything can stop him, because while we are focused on one thing he is playing three dimensional chess, and he does not care what we think – the Dems will not buck him at all, and in fact defend the indefensible.
I think you are right that he does not care, at all. He will have his, he is more involved with the pay to play stuff that we don’t even know about, and when he is done he will have multi-billion dollar book deals.
If there are any publishing businesses left. Oh, silly me, there will be liberal printing companies left, just no right-wingers.
FredHjr: Technically, Obama’s not a Harvard man. He’s a Harvard Law School man. Economics (Keynesian or otherwise) is not taught in law school.
On a totally different topic: could you please email me? I have a question I want to ask you, and I don’t seem to have your correct email address.
Neoneocon,
e-mail address sent.
Yes, you are quite right. Obama is not technically a Harvard man. However, many across the Ivies do share his outlook. In terms of culture, there is not a lot of difference between Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, Dartmouth, Brown, and Cornell.
That crowd believes they are the natural leaders and oligarchs of this nation and our economy. They do not give a rat’s ass about small company or small business people trying to build something. What I find most confounding is their stubborn, willful ignorance about how a vibrant economy runs.
Given a choice between destroying the lives of the poor and helpless and helping them out, Dems will always choose the cruelest path.
Obama is just the perfect proof of that concept in action.
LAwyer or not, a person is not made by law school, they are made by their lifes experiences. i can attend law school, but i would still be me. his ability in economics is purposefully bad, because these people hit negative strikes the way others hit positive ones. his premises he uses to choose and direct things are all from the advisers and groomers around him. and the placers of the post turtle too, cause he didnt get there without massive coordination out of nowhere.
I had heard that at some point today the Dow Jones Industrial Average had been up about 300, and after Obama’s remarks it went down absolutely on the day – minus 59. Every time this guy opens his mouth and says something, even if it it isn’t all doom and gloom, down she goes!
President Bush almost never gave remarks about the equities’ markets.
Every time Obama talks, he comes across as digging in his heels, and markets respond … appropriately.
A little while ago Savage said (paraphrased from my memory) “…if you are not paranoid about what Obama is going to do , then you are crazy…”
Not really a Savage fan, but turned it on when I got bored. I agree with him that Pres. Bush did a bad job defending “borders, language, culture.” He said Bush sorta stood up for culture- weakly.
Today Obama really messed up on finance terminology, and I think the market picked up on it.
He said “profit and earnings ratios…” There is no such thing. He must have meant “P/E ratios” (Price/Earnings) and probably heard it used in a conference meeting, never bothering to inquire what it was or what it meant. In any event, I almost never use “P/E” in my work. I use the more conservative and realistic ratio “Price/Free Cash Flow.”
P/E is subject to distortions like one-time events and accounting gimmickry. However, free cash flow is the true measure of what the business earns from its operations.
Generally, right now equities are a bargain. I read yesterday at Morningstar.com an article about how the SP500 is really only being dragged down by 10 large companies. They are both financial and industrial companies, but those 10 completely obviate the others that are either holding their own or are actually doing well all things considered.
Neo,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123180775460975639.html
>>>However, many across the Ivies do share his outlook. In terms of culture, there is not a lot of difference between Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, Dartmouth, Brown, and Cornell…
Wow!
Jamie Irons
Yale, 1969
Molecular Biology and Biophysics
I have to agree with Jamie Irons.
Go YALE!!!
Cute Backgrounds
Fred — Good post. Yes, I’m sure Obama is winging economics based on cram sessions.
People, even Warren Buffet, credit Obama far too much for quickness and intelligence. Obama’s real strength is conveying appearances.
50 posts in – too lazy to see if any one has said what I will. Plus since I’m not necessarily interested in doing anything more than firing off my thoughts here (it isn’t an internally coherent thesis but simply my thoughts) I guess that is OK. I normally try and read most comments but events for today I do not have the time if I want to comment on the blog post, read everything, and still get enough sleep for work tomorrow – ah well can’t have everything.
I disagree with what is said – I think Obama is desperately trying to get the market back on track. I think he understands quite well that if it tanks bad enough it will be near impossible for him to come out good later, he will have to hope for a miracle.
I think that Obama is falling back to what he knows how to do – that is be a community organizer for the poor and downtrodden. That is an admirable thing and he is quite good at it. Yet what we need now isn’t that.
Said community organizer already has the funds out there and it is *voluntarily* given to the poor and is subject to those tax cuts he wants to revoke. He never had to worry about where the money comes from. In fact since his whole experience with rich people is in them giving him money why is this any different? (well, we know why but I do not think he does)
He has never really had a hardship to over come. Yes, he had some really hard things happen too him but each time it wasn’t *him* that overcame them but an external factor. I do not think he understands why it isn’t occurring now – after all it only took him being himself before. This has always been my most major fear of Obama that he will not (or can not) understand that once there is no where “up” to go simply being “Obama” isn’t going to mean squat.
Lastly we tie the two together – that is in every case before hand what he is doing now has worked out to advance him. Yes, many of us here see that this was because of others hard work, yet there is no real reason for him too. Then there are those in Washington who are using that that and feeding him what he needs to hear – and well you get what we have today.
I still have hope he can learn, after all he hasn’t been hit enough yet with the clue bat for it to take effect against 40+ years of the idiot bat whacking him on the head. No one makes president without having *some* ability to recognize when the Clue Bat is hitting them (though Bush the Younger and Obama seem to like to miss it as much as possible – though in different places).
Obama may learn, though I do not expect it.
strcpy wrote, I think Obama is desperately trying to get the market back on track.
Then why the increase in the capital gains tax rate. Why not lower it?
http://www.amityshlaes.com/
I just heard Amity interviewed by Mike Gallagher.
She does not think it is purposeful.
She thinks like ME.
She thinks Obama truly is incompetent when it comes to macro-economics.
He is a community organizer and lawyer at heart. He simply does not understand investors, entrepreneuers like myself, owners, etc.
Amity is the author of the “Forgotten Man”. She was also relaying a story about laws enacted during the Great Depression.
One was about competition for instance. She told about the fact that people selling chickens had to randomly give the chicken. They couldn’t let the consumer pick and choose which chicken. The chicken you get is what you get.
A business was PROSECUTED for letting customers pick their chicken during the Great Depression era.
As this was radio I didn’t catch the name of the family that was prosecuted.
Now…. We could say that that is leftist. Totalitarian. I don’t care what it was.
I truly believe the people enacting these laws were doing what they thought would help people.
BUT THEY ARE INCOMPETENT. And they need to be opposed and people need to learn the dangers of these kinds of big government people.
Baklava,
I agree with you. I don’t think Obama is purposefully tanking the market. He’s just clueless. And does not get it that every time he opens his mouth about the market the indexes tank. If he was smart, he’s shut up about it. But he’s got to go and flap his lips…
Didn’t Obama tell us we couldn’t drive our SUV’s and keep our thermostats at 78? Didn’t Obama suggest leaders of private business make too much money? Isn’t Obama on pace to grow government by 26% in 4 years?
It is a form of denial to see his policies headed in this direction yet pretend his intentions are the opposite.
I agree crazy horse. In panic, a majority of Americas will gladly trade freedom for supposedly security; and not just Americans. How soon we forget what became of the Germans and Italians when they followed that course. We already see this administration setting up the enemies that they can blame for the economy. Now let’s see what FNC’s Glenn Beck finds out about the FEMA prisons’ rumor/urban legend, since that is the ongoing fear mongering from the far right on the Internet which predates Obama.
“But they look and sound shaky and stunned, with a frightened tension in their eyes. They sure don’t sound happy about the bills that have been passed so far, or about the policies Obama has been recommending next, or the precipitous drop in the stock market.”
Fascinating. It shows what I thought all along; that most Obama supporters followed him purely our of emotion. They’re caught up in a cult movement whether they know it or not. It baffles them that their god may have failed….
@Neo
Actually, depending on where you go, they are teaching the economic analysis of law in various capacities at several prominent Law Schools. I am a student at the University of Chicago, and Dick Posner, one of the main proponents of the Law and Economics movement, has tenure here. Additionally, all Law students (I am not one, I am an Economics major in the College) must take the Economic Analysis of Law as well as fundamental Micro and Macroeconomic theory.
Posner is a lawyer and judge who trained himself in economics (the right kind, not the fluffy leftist kind) and then wrote the book on economic analysis and its application to justice. It was a major rebuttal of John Rawls’ “A Theory of Justice” – which outlines the core theories of modern liberalism – by focusing on efficiency as opposed to equity or “fairness” (a nebulous term).
In short, lawyers can make great economists, but they need to know economics first. It seems that Barack Obama does not. Harvard is a bastion of leftist economic doctrine mixed with conventional Neo-Keynesian thought, which he probably lapped up easily, assuming he took an econ course. Personally, I agree that I think he portrayed himself as a Neo-Keynesian before, but its clear that he has no intention on stabilizing the economy based on his track record and his ideas on what needs to be done.
Neo-Keynesians are also less to be feared than leftists, as they actually believe in market efficiency. That line from Obama about market efficiency during the campaign is now seen as totally insincere based on his actions directed at markets.
Love it!
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