It’s the Stupid Economy!

 

I’m a small businessman. I was flush with cash during the Clinton years. Eight years of Bush has almost ruined me. Did I mention that I live in New Orleans?…thanks for your Katrina response to nowhere, Bush.
I have 3 great stores that could easily produce 1.3 million dollars in revenues during the type of economy we enjoyed during Bill Clinton’s administration. For my net, adjusted, taxable income to rise above $250 thousand, I would need to be operating in the consumer driven economic expansion, the largest in 35 years, that we saw with Clinton in office. He also reduced the welfare rolls, the number of abortions, and the wealth of America’s largest sector; the middle-class. He exercised fiscal responsibility which left us with a healthy surplus. During that economic expansion, the country saw a significant increase in jobs, and a major increase in tax revenues because more people were working. Real wages increased and so the middle-class became more wealthy. During the last eight yeas, around a million Americans a year fell into poverty. This was due to a loss of jobs, which offset job growth during that period to dismally low numbers. (New jobs were added, but lay-offs and downsizing was too great). And I’m talking about the working poor, not the “lazy” people that Republicans (who are intellectually lazy) are always talking about.

I would love to help spread the wealth. If Obama wins this election, he will cut taxes for 95% of us, while allowing the tax breaks to the very rich, given under the Bush administration, to expire. I know i will pay less taxes under Obama, and will be able to once again afford health insurance. if his public works programs are implemented, they will help rebuild our infrastructure and produce a new, green energy sector while producing new jobs and encouraging innovation and competition. If my revenues go back to where they were headed under Clinton, then I will hire more people, perhaps open more stores, and gladly pay another 3% for the privilege of living in an intelligently run and prosperous country, once again.

Sarah, You Betcha! Doggone It

So Palin had enough prepared notes to avoid sounding like a community college dropout on drugs. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Unless you’re running for the second highest office in the land.

Let’s see what some journalists had to say.

She subverted the whole purpose of the exercise by merely repeating the key points of her running mate, Sen. John McCain and ignoring questions that called for more specific answers.

…Palin’s answers in the debate were more about herself than about the policies of McCain or George W. Bush or even the country’s current economic crisis.

MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow, one of the fastest-rising and most enigmatic personalities in talk television, listened patiently to Buchanan’s praise for Palin’s presentation and responded, “Boring but right versus exciting and wrong — that’s America’s choice?” Commentators on many of the networks marveled at Palin’s insistence on avoiding substantial comment on issues and on simply ignoring questions she couldn’t answer convincingly.

Palin basically stated early in the debate that this would be her strategy. She said she wasn’t necessarily going to respond to the questions of the moderator or charges from Biden, but instead, “I’m gonna talk right to the American people.” Since this was billed as a debate, not a speech, her remark came across as arrogant, and as an admission she would duck tough questions.

By Tom Shales Friday, October 3, 2008; Page C01Washington Post

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Palin, in her 90 minutes on the stage Thursday night, left the firm impression that she is indeed ready to lead the nation — with an unnerving mixture of platitudes and cute, folksy phrases that poured from her lips even when they bore no relation to the questions asked.

“Let’s commit ourselves just everyday American people, Joe Six-Pack, hockey moms across the nation,” she proposed when asked about the mortgage crisis. (HUH?)

“I want to go back to the energy plan,” she said when asked about the federal bailout plan.

“I want to talk about, again, my record on energy,” she said when asked about bankruptcy.

At other times, her answers defied comprehension, as when Ifill asked about her trigger for using nuclear weapons. “Nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people in too many parts of our planet, so those dangerous regimes, again, cannot be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, period,” she answered. (WTF?)

When backed into uncomfortable terrain, such as defending the Bush administration’s economic record, she exploded into cliche and non sequitur: “Say it ain’t so, Joe. There you go again pointing backwards again. . . . Now doggone it, let’s look ahead.” Before finishing her answer, she mentioned her “brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here’s a shout-out to all those third-graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate.”

By Dana Milbank Washington Post

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My Gal: On sarah Palin’s speech patterns. Satire

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2008/09/22/080922sh_shouts_saunders?currentPage=all

by George Saunders September 22, 2008 The New Yorker magazine       

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    The End Is Near

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/georgepacker/2008/09/ill-always-thin.html?yrail

Posted by George Packer September 29, 2008 The New Yorker magazine

Bush’s America: Is America Becoming Fascist?

This essay is worth reading.

Is America Becoming Fascist?

by ANIS SHIVANI

http://www.counterpunch.org/shivani1026.html

Deathbed Repentance?

So now George Bush seems to finally believe that the US should be involved in brokering peace beween Israel and the Palestinians. Five years ago he refused to consider talking directly to the pricncipals in that conflict, just as he refused to talk to North Korea or Iran. Now he’s back from hopping around the middle east, hoping to improve his legacy, or create one that transcends simply being our worst and stupidest President ever. As Bill Maher put it, for five years lives were lost, while Bush was getting on the job training.

But is this new attitude really a result of Bush having actually learned something or is it comparable to a deathbed repentence in which he will try to repudiate the sins which has caused his approval ratings to crash? “Too little, too late” doesn’t begin to characterize his ingenuous posturing.

Likewise, he announced his intention for an economic stimulus package. This is an issue that has bi-partisan support, and any viable package will be crafted by legislators on both sides of the aisle. He ruined our economy with his stubborn ideologies and his ill-advised deployment of our military. Now, he wants to take credit for issuing the prescription needed to treat the malady created by his own incompetent policies.