Sadly, it took only one President
Sadly, it took only one President to reverse all the economic gains of my administration
(Bill Clinton)
picture: dunno source, via our lol builder. lol caption: Dinky_Danger
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Sadly, it took only one blow job being revealed to destroy your legitimacy and legacy (although I’m sure you had hundreds)…
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Sadly, it only took one comment for HairySexyTroll to show what a firm grip (hehe) he has on the UTTERLY IRRELEVANT.
Well spank you very much. Now I need choke a lot.
Under my administration, I promise not to choke you or make you gag without your consent though accidents may happy if there is too much excitement.
President Nexus: A man of the people; for the people.
“…if there is too much excitement.”
i misread that as “excrement”, but.. given the few posts above it, guess it sorta fits.
just felt like sharing.
“accidents may happy”
This is the best freudian slip EVER.
Unless it was deliberate, in which case I bow to your comic genius.
Did I say I agreed with it? Hell no! I just said it happened.
And is probably still happening.
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“Economic gains” not so much; the dot-com bubble was within Bubba’s administration for example. I love Bill but he was not a great boon to the economy and he certainly wasn’t a very progressive president.
Depends on what your definition of Is, is…
Is ‘economic gains’ a euphamism for ’sexual ralations’?
Yeah he wasn’t perfect but come on…economic SURPLUS, anyone? o_O
Brought to you by Congressional republicans…oops.
And, what, when W got in, they all suddenly decided to do an about-face and start spending as much money as they could?
You are mistaken.
Um, no, he’s not mistaken.
Economic gains and losses are not immediate, and presidents are often given credit for the results of their predecessor’s economic policies and agendas.
Besides, given our current president’s spending habbits, an attempted joke about the Congress spending too much under our last president is, well, ignorant at best, but probably closer to laughably stupid.
By your own argument, then, the credit for the budget surplus goes to the Democratic majority in Congress prior to 1994.
Neither Clinton nor the congressional Republicans were responsible for the 90s surplus. It was simply a perfect storm of technological innovation and vast amounts of venture capital. Even so, when Bush entered the White House he had a surplus–it quickly evaporated when he decided to attack a country that had nothing to do with 9/11. Then he and the Republicans (yes, and a majority of Dems, I’m sad to say) went on a spending spree the likes of which this country had not seen since WWII. The “Republican fiscal responsibility” they like to tout is a myth. The current spending is intended to keep industries and our economy from going completely in the crapper. I may not agree with all of it, but I still think Obama has a better team in place than Bush when it comes to this matter.
I have to say, I agree with you on the majority of the points. However, Clinton’s budget (not Congress’s) contributed significantly to the surplus. If we hadn’t had Al Gore, who championed the spread of the Internet, the “Information Superhighway” used to read this message wouldn’t have spread much outside CERN, Palo Alto, Redmond, and NextStep computers, as some couldn’t find a follow-up to the great ARPANET shut down by Bush 41. Plus, we would have had much lower quality stuff if not for the spending in the Clinton administration.
I’ll say again – making comments about the Bush administration’s spending is laughable in light of how much the current president is already spending. I never denied that Republicans spent money, but pointed out that the Democrat’s spening is overlooked – so why spend time arguing standard information?
The issue is that people want to bash Republicans simply for the sake of doing so, all while ignoring the spending going on, right now, under Democrat leadership. Spening billions that we don’t have isn’t exactly creating a surples for us now, is it? I fyou have a point based on facts, fine, but to say that the current administration is more doing better with the budget just shows you’re arguing from a “we’re good; they’re evil” mindset instead of looking at the facts objectively.
Trillions. Many trillions. It’s unprecedented, but the result is sure.
Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnno. We didn’t elect Republicans to Congress and POOF!!! Economic gains. As you can see very plainly, the economy is the product of what’s been going on five YEARS ago or more. So, no.
You fail, please try again ^_^
A surplus that only existed on paper, and vanished instantly when the dot-com bubble burst.
This is why you shouldn’t make predictions (and spending plans) based on rosy-scenario economic forecasts… which is what Bush did with the tax cuts, AND what Obama is doing now.
And all the jobs existed only on paper right?
Whats wrong with you? Don’t you understand Bill Clinton fans are too stupid to understand when a downturn starts, only when it bottoms out? if they had brains they would not be “I lied aboout taking bribes for pardons, ala Mark Rich” Clinton.
Taking bribes for pardons?
Two words: citation needed.
I can’t imagine feeling insulted by someone incapable of putting together three coherent sentences.
Sorry, kid, but you’re simply not smart enough for this.
What about Bush and McCain fans denying the Subprime Mortgage Crisis?
(Well, at least in the election. Now they’re becoming a Party of No, admitting the crisis, but denying its causes, or solutions. No offense intended.)
Funny how people say that whenever anyone tries to credit Clinton for the economic upturn, but when we point at the economy under Bush, they go “harrumph” and change the subject.
UNLEASH THE POLITICALLY ALL-KNOWING AND SELF-RIGHTEOUS ARGUING MOB!!!!!!!
you beat me to the punch, sneaky sneaky
Yeah, agreed. My first thought was “Uh oh. This one is gonna have the righties severely up in arms in no time.” This is gonna be ugly.
I have to agree.
and enter die hard bushians in 3.. 2…
*hides under table with nefarious notepad with a straw, two sticks of dynamite and a goat*
this’s gonna fun (dont’ ask but it’s only legal in mexico)
eh, I was gonna say ‘misspelled posters with painfully obvious incorrect quotes’ and ‘hypocrites of the worst kind’, but whatever.
I think I’ll hide with you. As long as you use some baconlube on the dynamite before you do anything to that poor goat.
baconlube? why do i always forget the baconlube!!?
ah well, once the goat’s gone, there’ll be plenty of room. plus, i brought popcorn
baconlube=great butter substitute
Are you two friends with McGyver?
MacGyver uses baconlube? I did not know this about him.
You should see him with a straw and a goat!
Ditto that.
Sad thing is that after 8 years of Obama and progress, some Republican will get in and destroy it all.
Assuming he makes any progress, they will still fuss about it the entire time.
This is progress? Spending trillions we dont have. nationalizing banks and possibly auto makers while telling americans that they need to go out and spend money because “credit is the lifeblood of America”. The concept of this country is that the states basically run themselves and are bound together by a small federal government that has 2 primary jobs. 1) defend us from all enemies foreign and domestic and 2) pay off the national debt. Through about 100 years of progressive policies on both sides of the aisle we have gone from “dont tread on me” to “dont blame me”. We have more and more regulation and government control sneaking up on us under the guise of helping us out of another crisis. Basically think of it like this … picture any politician from either of the 2 major parties. Imagine then shaking your hand and then leaning in and giving you that politician style one arm hug. While they are shaking your hand and giving you warm fuzzy feelings they are stealing your wallet with their other hand.
“Spending trillions we don’t have” would be Bush’s lookout. Now they’re only trying to mop up before the whole country effin’ falls flat on its face. We’d probably have withstood the mortgage crisis a little better were we not *spending a BUTTload of money we didn’t have* on needless wars on 2 fronts! Ya prepare for the bad times during the good times–helllooooo? Those that think the bad times will never come are heartily sorry later.
orrrr…..if our democratic congress hadn’t, in all its infinite wisdom, decided to stop free trade negotiations with countries like south korea, columbia, and ASEAN, we would have seen an increase in our GDP. Yay protectionist.
and as for “two useless wars”, i couldn’t disagree with you more. Afghanistan has the backing of the global community, and as “bush-ist” as it sounds, we really could use more stability in the middle east.
If by “our GDP” you mean “their GDP”, then yes, I agree completely.
Stability in the Middle East is a pipe dream. It won’t happen. It can’t happen. These people have been fighting each other for centuries, and they’re sure as hell not going to stop now.
Fat lot of good Bush’s invasions did for our economy, by the way—we’re now in a crisis, in case you didn’t notice.
There may be need for stability in the Middle East, but it’s not up to the US to do that.
I am sick to death of people who think a higher GDP is automatically a good thing. If the bulk of that higher GDP ends up in the hands of 1% of the population, all it does is increase an unhealthy imbalance of wealth in our country. That in turn is probably the single most important cause of the boom and crash cycles that are endemic in our unregulated capitalist system.
Besides, if GDP is the single most important measure of a healthy economy, then the champion of our economy is the guy that crashes his Lexus driving from his cancer therapy to his divorce lawyer; personally, I think that’s just wrong.
“I am sick to death of people who think a higher GDP is automatically a good thing. If the bulk of that higher GDP ends up in the hands of 1% of the population, all it does is increase an unhealthy imbalance of wealth in our country”
Cannot agree with this statement more. However, I see the reason this happened slightly different than most. In the mid 90’s when the federal government decided that Banks just didn’t have enough money, they set us up to fail.
Basically, instead of expanding business and creating more jobs, most companies decided to cash in on the AAA rating scam and get rich quick (while still not paying off share holders).
In an ideal world, you are not part of the market unless you create a product, good, or service. Money is not any of those things. If you use money to create money, all you actually are doing is devaluing the dollar.
Reagan’s saving is one of the reasons why we had a surplus. Clinton had nothing to do with it. The dotcom bubble bursted at the end of his last term.
It is mostly Bush that screwed up, but Obama isn’t doing any better. Bush had many chances to help us back up and he didn’t. Obama is doing the same darn thing.
Reagan? Oh! You mean the trickle down theory that DIDN’T WORK.
“Trickle-down” is a term invented by the left to mock a form of economics that DOES work, and works very very well. You couldn’t hardly HELP making money in the 80s if you had the slightest inkling to work. It was an era of true upward mobility and a tide that lifted all boats. We have the richest poor in the world thanks to free market economics and the Reagan policies. As to the massive debt, that was the work of congress – in order to enact his policies Reagan had to make that trade-off. C’est la vie.
Make no mistake – the free market works as it is supposed to, every time. Tempered, as always, by common law. Your socialist redistribution? Never works, never will, never can. Sharing the misery equally is no substitute for equality of opportunity.
Nationalizing? I bloody WISH we could nationalize the banks and get it over with instead of having these zombies feeding on each other and us indefinitely. Take over the monster banks, clean up their bookkeeping, sort the good assets from the bad and sell off the pieces back to the private sector, with regulations in place to keep them from ever getting too big to fail again!
I agree. But rather than keeping them from getting massive, lets just cut them off, that way we won’t encourage all the moronic banks to make the worst loans possible, because they actually profit from making worse loans. Which is only becuase the government supports them.
They profited from making worse loans because of derivative bonds – the originators sold off the loan paper as fast as they could write it, to these bonding firms that lumped them into a pool, carved up the interests and sold bonds based on the debt pool. Wouldn’t be a problem except that by the time they were done concocting the bonds, nobody could tell how likely the underlying loans were to be paid – what the yield and risk actually was for each bond. So the rating firms slapped whatever label they wanted on the damn things. See Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” for details – unregulated bond writing and unregulated sausage making are essentially the same thing.
Sensible financial regulations – and regulators with teeth instead of the industry lap dogs we’ve had – are what can keep all this from cycling again. Until, of course, times get high and everyone forgets how important the regs are, like they did for the past 25 years.
Yeah, let all the banks collapse! What a brilliant idea! I always wanted to have another Great Depression.
gb2school
to quote Jefferson if I may “I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.” In other words its better to be free to be stupid than be under the thumb of tyranny and not be allowed to make mistakes. Your heart is in the right place but do you really think government will give up the power of controlling the banks once they’ve cleaned them up? And how long do you think it will take for a government backed bank to get cleaned up? A decade? two? ten?
“Mother, should I trust the government?” – pink floyd
Inadequate government regulation is the reason this crisis happened in the first place. Your point is invalid. Move along.
You, sir/ma’am, are just your spreading ignorance.
It was government regulation that required loans/mortgages to be given to people who couldn’t afford them in the first place (which, in turn, caused the market crash). The government will never regulate as responsibly as the free market will regulate itself.
You are spreading even more ignorance. The loosening of credit standards you referred to was at industry request because the investment market was growing an insatiable appetite for derivative bonds (collateralized debt obligations, remember hearing about those?). Loan originators were under pressure to produce ever more paper to feed the bond market, and they translated that into pressure on Congress to loosen up banking standards.
you’re correct for the wrong reasons. The reason the industry made that request was because Fannie and Freddie were doing it. “If they can why can’t we?”
You are so wrong, angels weep to hear you speak. Allow me to reference your errors.
[Link]
First, from Forbes magazine, on an article about Atlanta suing predatory lenders:
“Responsibility for the nation’s foreclosure crisis has fallen on banks and mortgage lending companies blamed for extending high-interest loans to borrowers with poor credit. Once the housing bubble started to burst and interest rates ballooned, those home owners were left carrying mortgages they couldn’t afford.”
I think we can all agree, Forbes isn’t a left wing paper, no?
[link]
Secondly, the organizations that are supposed to regulate the predatory lenders were complicit in allowing these abuses to occur. From CFO (Chief Financial Officer) magazine:
“In the new lawsuit, KPMG LLP is accused of not giving credence to lower-level employees’ concerns about their client’s accounting flaws and not finishing its audit work before giving its final opinion — an account the firm disputes. In 2005, for instance, a partner was said to have “silenced” one of the firm’s specialists who had questioned New Century’s “incorrect accounting practice.” The partner allegedly said, “I am very disappointed we are still discussing this…. The client thinks we are done. All we are going to do is piss everybody off.” “
[link]
Finally, even the appraisers were pressured to assist in this ripoff. From the Center for Public Integrity website:
“Tipton is among dozens of appraisers who have told the Center for Public Integrity that for years lenders across the United States have pushed them into inflating the value of homes to justify higher mortgages. Appraisers and lenders alike are demanding better oversight of the industry. In addition, the Center has obtained copies of lenders’ “blacklists” containing the names of thousands of appraisers; some appraisers say lenders used those lists to exclude those who refused to inflate home values.”
This bubble was orchestrated from beginning to end by neocon politicians and blue dog democrats, including but not limited to the Bush administration, former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan, and the entire DLC, as a way of redistributing wealth upwards. Now they, and you, want to place the blame on the backs of the victims. I simply don’t have the words to express how angry this makes me, without resorting to invective that would ruin my credibility. You, Sir, and your compatriots, are among the most vile and treacherous snakes this country has ever been faced with, and I hope you are among the first against the wall when the revolution comes!
(Whew!)
Okay, not really about the “against the wall” thing… but I stand by the rest!
I’ll stand by the ‘against the wall’ thing, man. You’re clean.
Don’t forget the bond rating agencies who were in bed with the bond writers, hardly even looking at the actual quality of the liars’ loans in the pools before putting their seal of approval on CDOs that were traded internationally with no clue as to their true worth. That allowed a few billions of bad debt to turn into a FOUR TRILLION dollar clusterfvck.
And then you follow it up with an Epic Smackdown. Proving once again why you’re Teh Awesome Mark!
*Blushes furiously*
Thank you so much beautiful lady!
ePants – I hope you have read all that Portland Mark and slan agat have posted. They speak the truth. I have been in the mortgage business since 1983 and government regulation DID NOT require mortgages to be given to people who couldn’t afford them. Although you would think that was the case if you only listen to Fake (Fox) News and right-wing radio.
No, the CEOs of the mortgage companies saw many a buck to be made by loosening their credit standards and making more loans. The worse the credit, the higher the fees that could be charged.
What government regulation DID require was that lenders not discriminate based on prohibited reasons (race, gender, national origin, religion, etc.) If you would make a certain kind of loan to a white anglo-saxon Protestant at a certain price, then by golly you’d better offer the same terms to any other borrower with a similar credit score, job history, debt-to-income ratios and savings history.
Do some investigating, don’t just take what Fake News tells you as gospel – they’re proved wrong every day.
Thanks for the inside verification, pcf. I’ve done some follow-up reading, but I owe my back-of-the-envelope explanations to NPR; it’s nice to know they’ve got it straight.
(I’m actually a Mark as well. Maybe it’s just something about that name…)
Mark = smart
You haven’t read your history at all, have you? We went through this with the S&L crisis in the ’80s [LINK].
While you’re looking, you might want to have a go at how exactly the FDIC does its job, sometimes in as many as five banks a week this year – moving in, setting up shop in an undercapitalized bank, putting the whole thing through a rigorously efficient audit, lining up a buyer, making depositors whole and re-opening the bank for business under new ownership, in the span of one weekend.
The core assumption of conservatism, that government is incapable of any job you set before it, is nothing but a corrosive myth. It’s been a convenient excuse to underfund and strangle good, workable programs for too long.
False dichotomy.
There are threats to our liberty other than “too much government”. The right wing media have been extremely successful in making Americans forget that fact.
But teh teroor!s!!!!!!!!
Hehe…the market sorts the good and bad assets – in creative acts of destruction like the crash of ‘08. That’s without bailouts of course. But by all means, let’s put it all in the hands of the least efficient and least ethical entity of all – bureaucracy. Let’s “properly socialize” it all so we can all live in misery together. At least we’d be “equal” right? HAHA
Progress is a funny word. It doesn’t always refer to an upward direction. In this case I’m assuming you mean progressing further towards the highest deficit ever in United States history. Our debt will be quadrupled within a decade under the current administration.
You know, I don’t know if I agree with everything that is happening under Obama at this point, but he’s having to act on problems that he inherited from Bush. Yeah, Obama and the government are spending money like mad right now, but he’s trying to do something about problems that were waiting on his desk weeks before he showed up. And yes, he’s trying to further his agenda as well. Of course he is. Duh.
yes you have it exactly right… hes furthering his agenda of more government control and hes using the Bush presidency as his crutch for doing so. Look at what reagan did in 82 when he took over. He cut taxes (didnt cut spending though), worked with the democrats on the hill, and turned the country around in a few months after 4 years of gas lines and stagflation. The answer is but 20 years old and the republicans have forgotten it. Now we will have to suffer through another 4 years of increasing debt and price increases everywhere if the cap and trade thing goes through or the EPA gets to regulate CO2 emissions the way it wants to.
Do keep in mind that the oath of office is that the president swears he will protect and defend the constitution of the united states to the best of his ability. Too bad that concept is lost on the last handful of them (clinton – obama).
What Reagan did in ‘82 was nothing short of disastrous. $900 toilet seats come to mind.
By the way, environmental regulations or something like them are vital to preserving not only our economy but all life on Earth. We’re all dead if it doesn’t happen. D-E-A-D. This situation is serious—human race goes extinct serious. It’s probably already too late to prevent that, but everything that can be done to stop it or slow it down must be done. Now is not the time for your “invisible hand” worshipping hogwash.
Now please stop voting so the adults can try to sort out the world’s massive problems. Thanks.
That $900 toilet was for the goddamn space shuttle. And since it had to be designed from scratch, to work in outser space where things we take for granted (like flushing) don’t work, of COURSE it’s gonna be expensive.
All prototypes are.
Reference?
You just made that up, kid. There are expensive toilets on the shuttle and the International Space Station, but the notorious $900 toilet seat wasn’t one of them.
Facts matter.
First of all, the toilet seats were $640, not $900. Secondly, when Lockheed was called on it, they adjusted the price to $100 and returned the overcharged amount.
One cause of the $700 hammer phenomenon is military specifications getting in the way of reality. If your specs are such that an under $10 hammer from Home Despot will conform, you order from Home Despot. If some silly bugger insists on different specs – a higher grade of materials, different weight or balance, whatever minor difference makes the damn thing “Military Grade” – you’re going to have to pay the set-up costs to custom order. The fewer of the item you need, the worse those setup costs are going to hurt, because you’ll have fewer units over which to spread out the overhead. (If setup is $75K, that adds less than a buck each to 100K units or $75 to only 1000 units.)
Military Grade is an interesting phenom. I used to drive Trident nuclear submarines, that’s the nuke carrying kind. Every single computer process on board could have been handled by a Pentium III (or so I was told). But there would be two problems with that.
1) A pentium three can’t survive a torpedo hit or flooding.
2) It’d be super bad if this happened:
Captain: Launch tubes 3, 5, 10, and 12
Fire Control: Uhhhhhh
Captain: what’s wrong?
FC: Got a windows error sir!. It’s asking me if “I would like to fire a missle, yes or no”
Cpt: Click yes!
FC: uhhhhh, now it says, “Trident Nuclear Missile could not be found. Please insert Windows start up disk or log onto windows.com to search for updated driver.”
Cpt: DAMN YOU VISTA!!!!!!!(shakes fist).
So all the “computers” on board are basically commodore 64’s that can handle a torpedo hit or flooding.
Also, when it comes to Milspecs, there’s also the little fact that the supplier is usually directly related to someone on the oversight commitee that is doing the research for the particular component in question either by blood or by cash.
If you ever want to see the super ugly side of milspec research and spending, rent The Pentagon Wars with Cary Elwes and Kelsey Grammer. The term “sheep spec” can sum it up for you quite well.
Wow, just a bit arrogant aren’t we? Who are you to tell people to stop voting? Further more, there is quite a bit of support for the fact that climate change is cyclic and not necessarily a derivative of what mankind does.
The Reps haven’t forgotten squat. They just prefer the way things are going over doing what’s right.
The deficit and the national debt have always concerned me (by the way, they’re two different things, and you don’t seem to be making the distinction).
But if you’re expecting the Republicans to save us from ballooning debt (or deficit spending), you’re completely ignoring history:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_public_debt
The Republicans have exactly zero credibility with respect to responsible federal spending over the past 40 years. Voting Republican to promote responsible spending would be like asking Charles Manson to babysit.
You must have heard the GOP’s new campaign slogan:
Fvcking Our Way to Virginity.
Oh, wait.. I read that as Virginia at first and went, “Right on!” (considering I live in Australia, that could be fun..)
A LOT of boat sex.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
*sings*
It’s the LOOOOOOOOOOOOVVVEEEE boat!
Apparently ship’s captains can (sort of) officiate marriages, even… get to consummatin’!
What a frickin’ farcial statement, O’man is doing a great job of screwing up on his own.
I’m really getting tired of the political commentary masquerading as humor. This isn’t funny in any respect of the word, and yet it still gets published here. Anybody read the name of these sites? Wonder what the first “L” stands for?
Not coincidentally, I believe, my *funny* LOLZ weren’t published because they made fun of Obama or a Democratic/liberal principle.
Go figure.
I’ve had the same feeling man… it just gets you attacked here so tread lightly (or not at all). You are essentially a republican working at NBC commenting here.
funny that – being a site that works off votes that the obama-bashing ones don’t seem to make it up.. wonder why.. hm… let’s think about this… popular vote went for obama, therefore there’s more obama supporters than anit-obama-types.. no, surely that can’t be it. must be a conspiracy!!
man, don’t democracies suck? i feel your pain, bro (well, not really, it’s about time we got back on our feet and got to setting ourselves straight and working with the rest of the world again instead of being an international bully with no control over corporate theft or law breakerage
besides, you do see ones that poke humor at obama and/or democrats, usually the light-hearted ones show up but the harsh “obama sucks!” ones get dropped.
And coincidentally, the ones that point to Bush as being an idiot make it up. I mean, yeah, he had a terrible approval rating, and I don’t agree with all (or most) of his policies, but c’mon guys. Give him some credit. 1) The man ended up being president through one of the most instable times, 2) We don’t know what long reaching effects his policies will actually have (most economic policies under a president take between 4 and 12 years to come into effect. Whats that say about Clinton?
) and 3) The jokes have all been done before, so lets try to be creative here 
I’m very happy to laugh at the person I voted for, but maybe thats because I’m Polish, and we actually know how to laugh at ourselves. Hell, its what we do best (and about all we do well, other than drink XD)
Q. Why do they throw shit on the walls at a Polish wedding?
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A. To keep the flies off the bride.
That sound you hear was the last of your credibility leaving the room.
Credibility is for the weak. A good speaker doesn’t need credibility. Just a few semi-automatic weapons. That’ll keep their attention.
Q. How do you make a one armed Pollock fall out of a tree?
A. Wave.
Why would Jackson Pollock be in a tree anyway?
Did you mean Polack, you nitwit? If you’re going to tell offensive jokes, learn how to spell.
A pollock is a fish, it’d suffocate sitting in a tree.
Spelling can be fun…in PK, anyway!
There’s a joke or a limerick lurking in here somewhere……
You can take a fish to a tree but you can’t make him …
A fish in a tree is worth two in the ….
A fish and a tree walk into a bar …
I’m no good at this, as is abundantly clear
” 1) The man ended up being president through one of the most instable times”
Well, to be fair, if he hadn’t insisted on having a good ol’ fashioned American war, they probably wouldn’t have been unstable times.
Heh, could well be. On the other hand though, this is about the first war that hasn’t generated a major boost to the American economy (Could actually be argued that it did, and offset the effects of 9/11 on the economy. But that would be a lot of work, and I’m still tired, so it isn’t going to happen).
Though I must say, I’m not actually a big fan of wars, unless absolutely necessary (Afghanistan has good argument for it. Iraq… Maybe. We’ll see in 20 years when this muddle clears).
Honestly, I think Obama-praising “L”OLZ get more votes because lazy, non-contributing types have more time on their hands while waiting for their government checks, and vote for them.
Actually, it’s while I’m surfing the net at the lab I work eight-seven hours a week for (waiting for all of those pesky environmental samples to digest so I can analyze them for contaminants, ‘n such) that I end up voting for “L”OLZ.
Blame the EPA’s latest version of “Standard Methods”- mercury and hexavalent chromium laced-soil takes *forever* to cook. :p
LOL. I’ll take your word for it.
that was his point actually. there are very very few that actually poke fun at obama. Go back through the last 25 pages of lol’s and see if you see any. I’ll wait….. hmmm hmmm hmm hmm….. *crickets*……… ok done? yeah you didnt find any really did you? Ive seen several dozen anti bush or anti republican lol’s make the front page but you dont see very many anti obama ones.
The site does work on votes but that doesnt mean that every republican or every democrat comes to this site. Even statistically speaking since this was originally a cat lover’s web domain the site is more likely to be filled with people who are a little more to the left than to the right. You wouldnt find too many people agreeing with you that obama is great on the sig arms web forums but they dont do LoLs either (an occasional joke but not like this).
Also obama won by a rather slim margin when you look at the final tally(65.4m vs 57.4m). Yes he won by a slightly larger margin than bush did in 04 (62m vs 59m), but the bulk majority of the media are 100% behind him where as they were calling bush a moron and a nazi from when he first started campaigning as the republican nominee to today. On election night 2000 I channel surfed over to cbs to see what they were saying since the race was so close. At about 11:30 or so there was a female anchor on and she said lets go now to the bush camp where the crowd is already dwindling. They cut to the scene and theres thousands of people there all cheering and holding signs. They did their piece on his electoral votes and went to algore’s camp where there was maybe a thousand people there, at most. It looked like about 1/4 of the size of the crowd bush had and they weren’t cheering or anything they were kind of milling about and murmuring to themselves.
There are still democrats on the far left who say bush stole both elections to this day. In 08 the republicans put up the softest weakest most anti republican person and he still got 46% of the vote. McCain lost and that’s fine with me because you wouldnt see much difference between what obama’s doing now and what he’s doing. About the only difference is that he wouldnt be out there in europe and at the un in nyc blaming america and apologizing for our strength. Oh and the media would be calling him a bush clone and a nazi and on and on. McCain believed (and still does believe) in cap and trade, open borders, and trying to work with those on the other side of the aisle. Obama said he believed in working with republicans but were not really seeing it on much of his trillion dollar legislation… or what they’re deeming “emergency legislation”. So even though he won by 6% of the votes he and the bulk majority on the left are acting like hes reagan and won 49 states. The race was close in almost every state but the bluest of the blue states (like Ny, Ca, Wa, and Or for example where he won 60/40 majorities).
So for being 6% more popular than our weakest candidate since bob dole we see nothing but praise for anything he does. Whether it’s here or on nbc, cbs, abc, cnn, or in the bulk majority of the news papers across the country it doesnt matter they are all supporting his massive spending bills that no one even takes the time (or is given the time) to read.
I can’t believe I actually took the time to read all that. I want the last couple minutes of my life back, please.
TL:DR
Spent 600 million dollars on his campaign.
Everyone hated George Bush
That’s all you need to know about why he won.
Kerry could have won this time round. Or Michael Dukakis. Or Geraldine Ferraro.
I shouldn’t have invited this.
ZOMG!! Kunspirocees!!!11!!Elebenty!
Don;t say it out loud! They’ll silence you and erase your identity!
whoever captioned this picture needs a little lesson in economics. the only reason clinton saw any financial prosperity was the explosive dot-com era. which subsequently died off as quickly as it started, taking many of the start-up businesses with it. clinton didn’t bring us prosperity, he brought us lies and deceit.
true that.
Thank you! Everyone seems to be so in love with Clinton and I can’t stand it. And I’m a “democrat”.
I…all this time…I thought I was the only one.
We really need a Clint-anon group
You are correct, good sir.
Wow, Democrats are delusional if they believe this.
not that the republicans were much better under bush but youre right. All you have to do is look at all the positive press he gets on any channel but fox to see that yes they are in fact delusional. GE owns nbc, cnbc and msnbc and Obama is pushing green energy (is that even constitutional?) of which they are a big player because they are the ones who make the vast majority of the wind turbines. Where did we see obama on earthday? Oh yeah standing in front of a GM wind turbine preaching about green energy. So yes they are going to believe it and call you a racist, environmental terrorist for not supporting him.
Wait…what? Why would the president proposing green energy development programs be unconstitutional? I’m not baiting you, I just don’t follow your reasoning there.
The quick answer is that it falls way outside the governmental powers enumerated in the Constitution. If its not in the Constitution, then according the the Constitution, the government cannot do it.
Oh, I see…you’re arguing for a line of constitutional interpretation that’s been rejected by the courts for most of the country’s existence. Clear now, thanks.
it hasnt been rejected by the courts for most of the country’s existence. It only came into debate in the early 1900’s when the progressives took over and started saying to ignore the constitution and just listen to judicial statutes and precedent. If you actually read the constitution and specifically article 1 section 8 and section 9 you will see that there’s nothing in there about 90% of the spending that goes on in washington. It doesnt matter what party they are from either. If you spend money on things outside the limits set by the constitution (which are essentially defense and paying of the national debt) then that spending is supposed to be deemed null and void.
A lot of the decisions that are made now are made without a judicial check from the supreme court on the other two branches. That stems from the court packing incident in 1937 I believe it was. Where FDR threatened to pack an additional 9 judges on the supreme court if they didnt stop voting down his programs in the new deal as unconstitutional. The supreme court then had 4 conservative judges, 3 liberal judges and 2 swing votes. So the swing votes voted to allow his policies in order to keep the supreme court in tact essentially.
If you dont believe me you can go to your local book store and pick up the book american progressivism. It will explain it a lot better than I can how the turn of the century progressive movement on both sides of the aisle tried (and some are still trying) to turn this country away from its founding principles and towards a large central government who is in control of almost every facet of our lives. They havent done so but they are pretty close wouldnt you say?
Edmund = Shinobi. I’ll make a note.
You are, however, wrong about the Supremes’ reaction to the court packing attempt. The public outcry, and how close FDR came to impeachment, was what kept the Court intact, not the swing votes suddenly deciding to play ball.
Obama burned 9000+ pounds of fuel on earth day on his trip from Washington to Iowa and back. Air Force One is a full-fledged Boeing 747-200B. Air Force Marine One (his helicopter) was also used during that day and it consumed a lot of fuel.
The guy could have at least used a Learjet or something smaller.
Obama is a Hollywood star and a puppet. Him and the rest of his administration are useless without a teleprompter. Or in the case of Robert Gibbs, just useless in general.
So you wanted The President to go out and spend money on a Lear Jet, just to save fuel? Or you’d prefer the leader of the free world to go buzzing about in a single engine Mooney? You, sir, are an idiot.
Call me an idiot, but it doesn’t change the fact that he is a hypocrite.
You sir are blinded by your love of Obama. I like the guy too, but it is completely hypocritical push these green solutions then hop on a 747. Why doesn’t he downgrade Air Force one if he’s so much behind being green? I couldn’t see a better way to encourage green technology than to actually stand for it yourself.
I work in green energy and I hope he continues his fight, but I can’t stand when someone pushes green on everyone else, but won’t live up to it themselves (a la Al Gore and his mansion that used more energy in a day than his entire city).
Everyone gets mad at big oil for lobbying in government, but what do you think these green companies are doing? My company does it, they’ll make bank if more regulations go through. Politicians can’t take money from big oil because it’s bad, but the green companies can do it all they want. Hypocrits everywhere.
Funny how you hold off criticizing the size of Air Force One until it’s not your guy in command…
The president – any president – travels with a sizeable staff at all times. He has to have the best secure communications equipment at his disposal at all times, military grade security, sensory and guidance, and the list goes on – each item necessary in the event of a crisis situation while he’s in transit. Packing all that into a lighter, more fuel efficient aircraft might not even be possible, never mind the expense – that’s exactly why the new Marine One fleet Bush ordered was drastically over budget, and why Obama and Gates killed the order.
I would agree, and I don’t necessarily begrudge the president flying around in a 747. I will say though that the president should really think about whether his trips are necessary before he climbs onto Air Force 1 and flies off to God knows where.
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Here in Australia the PM was critisized (and rightly so since he is a greenie) for flying to Japan to give a 6 minute speech, then fly home on the same day. He has been tagged with the nickname of Kevin 747 (even though he doesn’t have a 747.)
*applauds* thank you! I love how people don’t realize all the CRAP that has to go with the president. I mean, do you realize the amount of man power that has to be with him twenty four seven? There’s always at least twenty security guys around him at all times, not to mention aids, senators, technicians, black ops, the usual stuff, and the haul for the ship has so much communication tech and just so much grade A machinery that the thing is a flying tank almost. It’s insane. But necessary.
Oh yeah, downgrade airforce one, thus buying a new presidential jet…. So you can criticize him for ‘wasteful spending’ during a time of economic crisis?
What exactly should we do with the current jet? Who’s going to buy it? Nobody.
Actually Obama has access to a Lear, it’s called a C-21 and probably would have consumed a HELL of a lot less fuel than a 747. [LINK]
To add to this, he came to my town to celebrate the fact that 1.3 mill came in from the TARP to save the jobs of 27 police oficers.
Cost to the city for his visit?
1.2 million.
Thanks a lot douchebag. Anything for a photo op hunh?
You mean almost anything for a photo op. There’s some things he just won’t do.
Like pose next the Constitution the way vampires stay away from mirrors?
…which we got 8 more years of.
…but, a little dab’ll do ya’…
…a little dubya did ya’…
.. a little rub will do ya..
It’s funny because it’s outdated political commentary trying to look like a Lol image.
Yes, true, Bush ruined Clinton’s legacy, but c’mon, we all know that, and just putting it as a Lol caption doesn’t make it funny or clever. Try doing something new and hilarious for once.
Clinton’s legacy? The sub-prime loan approvals that he pushed into reality that caused the demise of the housing market? Quite a legacy…
Rampant greed in an under-regulated bond market caused the demise of the housing market; sub-primes were just a symptom. There was huge demand from derivative bond traders for the loan originators to produce more mortgages to slice and dice into derivative bonds, and the quality of the underlying loan did not matter to the bond traders. The quality of the loan didn’t matter to the loan originators either, because they could sell it off instantly and not be on the hook for the default. Worse and worse loans were being written because of the bond market’s hunger for more and more paper, regardless of quality.
you’re exactly right but I would like to add one other thing to your post. In 1995 the government passed a law that said fannie and freddie had to give out something like 48 or 46% of their loans to low income homes. That number was raised in 1998 to 52% and then again in 2005 to 56%. So that sort of added more risk to the pile. Then when you throw in mark to market accounting (which basically says if the stock value of the security goes down you have to devalue the object it’s securing) and you are just asking for trouble.
I’d appreciate a cite for where you’re getting those figures, particularly since the industry definition of “sub-prime” is “loan Fannie and Freddie won’t take.” I don’t question that some loosening of standards did occur, but I’d like to review the specifics.
The pattern that seems to be emerging here is the bond market pressured the loan originators for more paper, the loan originators relaxed their standards and pressured the regulators to loosen requirements, and (IIRC) the mortgage market started to get bottom heavy, so Fannie and Freddie came under pressure to take on more of the dubious stuff rather than just skimming the cream.
5:21 pm Seattle-area time and still no citation from shi0bi272 for the stats on Fannie and Freddie….how odd
I’m glad you’re in on this thread, pcf – direct industry knowledge and institutional memory mean more to me at this point than internet links anyway, given how much spin and distortion is out there. If you could throw some light on how Fannie and Freddie fit into the mess I’d appreciate it; it’s been mischaracterized so many different ways I’m not sure anyone here knows what the truth is.
Oh I thought it was the blow jobs that ruined his legacy.
If getting a blowjob ruins your legacy, then there aren’t gonna be many legacies in this world.
Mine is already, wait-for-it, not yet, blown.
Actually, a married man getting a blowjob from an intern is only second to lying about it, in terms of legacy damage.
But the piece of that formula you’re ignoring is: Everybody lies about sex. At least everyone who can’t claim some protective degree of anonymity, which is mighty difficult when you’re president.
Especially illicit sex, that’s what makes it so illicit and all.
Of course everyone lies about sex. You’re *supposed to* lie about sex because it’s PRIVATE!
I would actually have quite a bit of respect for a politician who answered any and all questions about who or what s/he sleeps with and how often with a stern and simple “None of your fvcking business!”
“more regulation and nationalization” zomgz, zomgz.
It’s only worked out great for just about every country that’s done it, but “NOOOOOO! my “freedom11″.. Have fun america.
As for Clinton I have to agree about the dotcom-argument. The amount of wars started also seems to have an impact on the economy. Expensive stuff for the people that forgot to buy shares in the companies rebuilding after the UN has sorted out all the people killing each other.
…and it’s only taken him 4 months.
win.
…the world saw the next president walking towards them, and decided to cross to the other side of the street…
sadly it only took one caption to completely disregard 9/11, the dotcom boom and subsequent bust, the bombing of somalia, yugoslavia, sudan, iraq, and afghanistan, the fact that clinton made “regime change” in iraq a federal policy…
.
bush / clinton / reagan / carter all of them are politicians and therefore all of them suck…
*cough*ignoring-the-Rwandan-genocide*cough*
Forgot to mention the sub-prime loan legislation he pushed through which has been the cause of the housing market crumble.
But don’t worry everyone, poor people got their houses (that they couldn’t afford) because it’s every man’s right to own a house!! Even if they can’t pay the mortage and the middle/upper class gets to foot the bill!!
Now now, Barney Frank just went back the other day and said that people don’t deserve to own their own houses if they can’t afford it (*gasp* *shock* *awe*). Maybe they should rent instead.
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Actually, Reagan was pretty much the anitpolititian. I agree on the other three, though.
Bzuh? Have you been hanging out with that guy in the other lol blowing all that doobage, or are you just too young to remember Reagan clearly?
I love how people go on the offense about Reagan so quickly. The media attacked him on an almost hourly basis, yet still, he got us out of a pretty hefty economic downturn. And in case you weren’t paying attention, he won by a landslide twice. You remeber the media rhetoric. I remember the actual substance and results of his administration. Why don’t you go look at the Dow starting mid 70s up to Desert Shield.
P.S. And while you’re at it, take a look at the inflationary graph for the same time period. I am sure you can figure out why the two would be related.
Mischaracterization fail. I’m not attacking Reagan here, I’m attacking your calling him “the antipolititian” (sic). He was the classic politician in about every respect. He knew how to play both sides against the middle. He knew how to energize his party base without alienating independents. He was an excellent rhetorician all around. He knew how to work within the legislative and bureaucratic systems, and he knew when to go ‘over the heads’ of the system and take his case straight to the people.
None of that is judgmental of his policies, pro OR con. But there is no way to call him “the antipoliti{c}ian” with a straight face.
Would you say that perhaps it would be possible to call Reagan the antipolitician if he was doing what he believed was the right thing rather than simply acting with intent to impress or convince? Reagan was very conservative. His party base is very conservative. Perhaps that is why they were energized. Also, maybe truth makes for better rhetoric. These are what I base my previous statement upon.
Sorry, my memory is too good to accept that premise. Look at the span of his career from just after the war to the presidency, and you’ll see a weird love-hate relationship with the social reactionary right wing. You’ll also see a bizarre about-face on Medicare (right about when he became eligible to use it!). You’ll see he raised taxes each successive year after the big cut of ‘82. You’ll also see a man who sold arms to fvcking Iran. And I’ll spare you the nitpicking about anecdotes he whipped up from whole cloth, statistics he pulled out of his arse, and a raft of other great-sounding misstatements, or we’ll be here all day. Yes, I remember him too well.
TL;DR: He had every bit as dodgy a relationship with truth and honesty as any other politician.
Our current President – Obama?
No, keep guessing little fella!
Here’s a hint: his name rhymes with “tush.”
And the euphemistic definition is a mere taint away from that location.
Don’t call Hillary a taint. It’s not nice.
…bushbaby!…
Well considering that on this very day it was announced that the current administration has set a record on having the earliest “Debt Day” ever, yes, the answer would be Obama.
from the article:
“…economist Josh Bivens, with the Economic Policy Institute, said Debt Day is more a “symptom of how bad the economy is.”
So, no, it’s not Obama. Probaly not entirely Bush either, though I like to blame him since I don’t much care for him. I think any problem we got today is a culmination of problems we’ve had for a while, Bush’s administration allowed existing problems to grow until we got what we got – the removal or oversight into many business and financial industries let things fester so that when the bubble exploded instead of bursting.
The current spending is, at least in my opinion, the current administration’s attempt to levy the damage and keep the country afloat.
Besides – he’s hardly been given a fair chance by the oposing party. Might have been a bit young first time Bush was there but during the second, I was unhappy he won but I wasn’t egging on for his failure at every opportunity. He is your president just as much as Bush was – give him a chance instead of just berating him. If you don’t like what he’s doing, write to your congressman instead of on a blog.
just saying.. also, ignore the typos, i’m blaming that goat that just exploded (long story).
Because Bush was given the chance from the beginning. Didn’t have tomatoes thrown at him at the inaugural or anything
Actually, he sort of was.
Al Gore could have personally halted the Electoral College vote by being the one senator needed to join several Representatives’ challenge to the Florida electors. He refused to do so – every Democrat in the Senate refused to do so at Gore’s request. That’s what’s known as a healing gesture and the country by and large took it to heart. By 9/11 GWB had huge approval numbers and people across about 3/4 of the political spectrum were in agreement that not going along with his agenda was a whisker away from treason.
That’s a hell of a lot of goodwill to piss away. It’s amazing he managed it.
It only took him 3 years to do so.
Eggs. They were eggs.
You have to go back to about 1993 when banks and AIG types started getting waivers from Glass Stegall.
That’s how deep the problem runs. To blame any Pres or Party is to blame all parties.
Yes. Obama has done more damage in the last 90 days than Bush did in 8 years.
You can’t be serious.
…writing history can be fun, Eric…
Apparently, so can writing historical parody.
…no, history…
…it is fun…
Comma abuse. You clearly meant “no history”.
newspeak wha?????
I have to agree with Josiah. As bad a Bush was, we never monetized 1 Trillion dollars worth of national debt.
Sad as it is to say, that’s infinitely worse that the creation of Homeland Security, Iraq and it’s spending, and having to watch him make speeches.
What?
“Legalizing torture, launching two unnecesary wars (and likely an illegal one), rolling back civil rights to an appaling degree, etc. etc. well it’s a bit naughty.
Spending money on liberal policies? OVER MY DEAD BODY!”
What the hell is wrong with people?
And don’t forget how painful those speeches were. Grammar was not his strong suit.
At least he spoke from the heart not from a teleprompter.
And that is a good excuse why exactly?
I don’t care if my leader has every line spoon-fed to them, how much head they like or anything but how well they lead. If, by my lights, a leader makes a nation a better place, then and only then do I approve.
All of the things can be undone that Bush did. Over time we can even mend fences in the Middle East.
But the monetization of 1 trillion dollars? That’s the kind of thing that can tank the country. We can be comepletely undone by this. And likely will.
I’m talking about the end of America as we know it. Our economic downfall is not far away.
That is, of course, complete bullshit, kid.
When you grow up, you’re going to wish you hadn’t trashed your reputation.
“grow up”? Thats funny. In 8 years you’re gonna wish your “savior” didn’t trash our country.
Oh and reputation? He’s already destroyed that overseas at the conventions.
I love how conservatives try to blame the mess NOW on Clinton.
Er, if Clinton messed up the economy, why didn’t Dubya and the Republicans fix it in the SEVERAL YEARS they dominated the government?
…
…
*crickets*
That’s what I thought.
Clinton left a mess all right. Too bad he didn’t offer to have it dry cleaned…
Bahaha!!!! I usually roll my eyes with the stuff you say here, but that was FUNNY!!
i love how dems completely take offense when someone talks smack on one of their heroes… nobody is blaming the current mess on clinton anymore than they can blame it on bush or reagan or nixon… the government as a WHOLE failed… if you blame only one person (especially one who is no longer in office) you ignore the actual problems that caused this economic downturn…
…and in the process, learn nothing, and thus — “meet the new boss, same as the old boss…”
Except the new boss has different political views, and different ways to screw things up. And as a side note, the economy is NOT as bad as it has been made out to be… I had to say it…
Tell that to my many family members who’ve lost their jobs.
It is the truth. And, for the record, I live in Texas, which is one of the places that was hit the least by the recession. And the reason I said that the recession isn’t that bad is because most of the damage done by the recession is in five states, and 35 counties represent the vast majority of the damage. So, while people all over the nation are going to be suffering, most of the damage dealt was localized to a few areas.
Yeah I think you’re living in a bubble. I’m unemployed. There is no work in my area. Even taco bell won’t hire me. My job expectations aren’t unreasonably high. I’m not entry level, but right now I’d take an entry level job.
I was laid off from my last job because of poor local economy, which was caused by our national economy.
And about those different political views. Do you know any of his views? Or are you still gaga about him? Break the infatuation and realize that Obama is screwing our economy worse than any president.
Bush gave Obama a bad idea with his bailout. Obama went nuts with the bailouts, and like most liberals, couldn’t stop hemorrhaging money. Our national debt will be quadrupled in 10 years.
1982 unemployment was higher, inflation was higher, and there was no economic growth (i.e. stagflation). This is not a worse economy than that. Its getting to be almost the same though. But its not the worst economy since the depression. Yes times are tough but you cant claim that its the worst economy since ever just becuase your local economy is bad and you’ve been laid off. I was laid off in july of last year, got a job a month later, then 2 months into that job got another job offer and took that job. Meanwhile my dad got laid off a month after being in a motorcycle accident and almost dying.
Bush gave obama a foot in the door to nationalizing the banks, a couple of large insurance companies, and an auto maker or two. Obama is talking about converting the government shares of preferred stock (which gets the tarp money paid back) to common stock (which doesnt but gives the government control over the board). Its backdoor nationalization… yaaaay fascism.
Yeah. But I don’t think that it’s going to get as bad as it did in 1982. Or, at least, I hope it won’t.
Um… I have yet to see a single thing that the “New Boss” has said or done that wasn’t already tried by mister Single Termer himself, President Carter, or any other SuperLeft liberals in politics. The only difference, it Obama is taking it all to such an extreme degree. Extreme spending, extreme government growth, extreme control over everyday life. What is coming down the pike, I believe, is bigger than many realize.
Because they didn’t have a large enough majority (60 votes in the senate) to pass legislation without the democrats for lack of a better term stonewalling them and holding up a vote. When the parties have to work together its amazing how much gets done isnt it?
http://uspolitics.about.com/od/usgovernment/l/bl_party_division_2.htm
Are you serious? The Republican minority in the Senate filibustered more in the last two years than either party in any ten year period in history.
It’s highly amusing to see the very same Republican senators who moaned and railed and threatened rule changes when Democrats filibustered under Bush now blocking everything in sight for any reason, no matter how spurious. (OLC appointment blocked over abortion? Really? Only relevant if they want to set up a clinic in the White House…)
Please see my post below, starting with “SERIOUSLY” it may be just for you!!! Really, I love my country and I want to help!!!
They made a half hearted attempt to reign in Fannie and Freddie, but then Fran Rains called them all racists and they had to back off.
No, I’m not kidding.
what the poster failed to realize is that GW Bush took over during a recession due to the Clinton administration…granted, it wasn’t as large as the one that Obama took over, but it was still a large decline…does anyone not remember the dot com bubble that burst?
Read all the above comments, mein little friend. And take a look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nasdaq2.png
It went up, then down almost as fast.
Even as a troll I do have standards, come on people, serious factual history, I can’t troll in this thread. BTW, the two party system is broken.
Yeah we should seriously wipe our current system and come up with one that works. We’ve gotten to the point where even a political humor website has just turned into a bipartisan skirmish grounds.
Josiah haz a point.
I actually think our entire governmental system is broken BTW. There’s just too many *AREAS* to please and not enough people to represent them. See, people view this as a shortage of representation of people, when actually, the difference in political ideals results from *regional* disparities in socio-economics. So in reality, our current setup of federal over state needs to reversed, so that we have a republic of states again vs. a large central government and states acting as provinces. Basically I propose we should go back to what Thomas Jefferson suggested as a role for the federal government; to deliver the mail and organize the states armies in times of war. Other than that, states would act on the actual definition of a state, which is essentially what the layman would call a country.
Just to clarify, I’m saying that politics should be regionally exclusive, to meet the needs of each region individually.
Very well put. I am pretty sure that maybe perhaps probably the founding fathers are spinning in their graves, knowing the extent to which the federal government has expanded.
Nope doesn’t work, politicians at the federal level would not make enough money to support their eccentric lifestyles. A smaller federal government would mean less control over huge sums of money therefore eliminating or hampering federal politicians ability to line their pockets with the holy dollar. In addition, without big business and looming federal controls, there would be no one or reason to donate/bribe huge sums of money to these politicians to avoid potentially financially devastating legislation over big business. It really is one giant racketeering scheme.
The point is there wouldn’t be a federal government. Everything would exist at the state level, thus eliminating 99.9% of the political troubles we have today.
Sounds good to me.
Also, its just one party pretty much at this point. Just two factions: Pro-Lifers and Pro-Choicers. That’s why I speak in terms of “Liberal” and “Conservative”. There are piles of Liberals in Congress, and a small handful of Conservatives. The reason, I believe, is that Conservatives are so disenfranchised, that so few of them run. I believe the United States is still basically Conservative, but Conservatism hasn’t been present on the ballot for 24 years.
BTW, Mit Romney and Mike Huckabee were somewhat close to Conservatism, but they split the Conservative vote and did us all a big disservice. I don’t think Obama would have beaten Romney.
For the love of all that is holy NEVER bring up Mitt Romney and the term Conservative again.
He is a Statist fvck, no better than Guliani or Obama
“ooooh Mitt Romeny’s a supergenius of finance, he totally turned Massachusetts around”
Boulderdash. Our monetary system is to finance what spousal abuse is to marriage. Guys like Geitner, Romney, Bernake, Greespan, and the rest of the Fed Res are nothing more than opportunists looking to make a quick buck.
And if you look at the state of Massachusetts, called Taxchussetts by the people that live there…well, here’s one story that should sum it up….
People in MA that live on or near state lines drive over them commonly for EVERYTHING. Groceries, smokes, liquor, and tires. MA is trying to implement a tax law that would allow them to tax tire service places in NEW HAMPSHIRE if the person getting new tires has a MA address. I want you to sit there and think about that for a second. So do they then have the right to make Mexico pay them taxes on every beer sold to tourists there? Or better yet, maybe people who leave MA when they go on vacation should be subject to a “vacation tax” since they won’t be spending their money in MA, depriving the state of their taxation?
Romney is not a conservative, or a liberal, or a Mormon, or anything short of a fvcking Statist politician that will do or say anything to be elected. to cite him in any political argument only shows that you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.
You realize you probably just gave them an idea they hadn’t considered before?
I was totally thinking of typing (whoops! just gave em a new idea) but it was getting long winded enough.
NOW GET OUT OF MY HEAD
And don’t you find it ironic that this occurs where the original Tea Party happened? How far we have come from what the founders envisioned.
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*leaves your head intact*
As a Constitutional Libertarian, I can tell you we’ve gone too far. And it didn’t start with LBJ, or FDR, we’ve been wandering off course since the industrial revolution and specifically Wilson and his administration which were all schooled in turn of the century Germany, just like Hitler, where Lenin’s 1890 “masterpiece” was required reading.
This is why I support HR 450.
I’m curious… you think that government on a state-based scale is ’small’ enough to be held accountable by the people?
I’m of the opinion that the legislation in place to enforce accountability, the degree of transparency in governence to allow public oversight, and above all a politicized, aware and motivated population drive these things. Big or small, if you turn your back on it any government will rob you blind.
“BTW, the two party system is broken.”
Clap clap clap clap
Is is 2001 again?
No its 1901 and the industrial age is back…we are ready for big business, low wages, long hours, and lots of manual labor on the farm. Soon I hope to be able to afford electricity, I would love to get me one of those new electric light bulbs so I can’t get my chores done ’round the house after dark. I just can’t get used to the smell of lamp oil burning, plus I’ve been dying to learn how to read. Oh, well, no time tonight, I’m hungry, need to go chop some wood to fire up the stove so I can boil me some taters. Sure wish I could just work for myself, maybe start my own wood choppin’ business. Thinkin’ I could afford that electric light bulb if I was able to keep most of the money I made. My friend though, he’s smart, says I ‘m a fool and unpatriotic, says I outta keep workin’ for big business and give most of the little I make to the govment, somethin ’bout a huge debt they gotta pay back for some people I don’t even know that bought a bunch of stuff they didn’t need and couldn’t afford. Then I remember he went on about somethin to do with if I did start my own business the govment gonna take so much money from me to pay that debt I don’t even know nothin about. So I tells him that, if I started my wood choppin’ business and that if the govment don’t take so much money I’d be able to afford to buy that stuff from the big business, plus they would would be sellin more stuff, makin more money and they would need to hire someone to replace me. They also be able to pay my replacement more so he can afford to buy my chopped wood. He says I should shush, I’m lucky to even have a job at all, and that I should do whatever the govment tells me to, cause after all they the boss of me. I just don’t understand why I gotta pay for all this other stuff when the only thing I want is an electric light bulb and a good book to learn to read while I eat my taters. Oh, well maybe some day, I’d even be able to afford some gravy.
SERIOUSLY…all of you listen up!!!! Stop bickering and blaming…we have a very successful free market that the federal govment should never medle with. It is congress (specificly the house of reps.), not
the president that effects our economy, and it was their medling with the credit markets, and poor consumer responsiblity that caused any econimic downturns. Most of you should be ashamed for not being
able to comprehend that the govment works for us, we pay them, we are in charge, we are the bosses. If you cannot understand this or are unable to be one of “the people” that made this country so great, then
please, step aside. If you’re to lazy to learn how our system of checks and balances works between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the govment and the duties and resposibilies of each,
then please stfu and learn. Way too many Americans are so spoiled and out of touch with reality they have no clue how anything can work outside their shallow meaningless lives. Most of you are living a
complete lie, you buy what you’re told to buy, you eat what you are told to eat, you vote for who you’re told to vote for, and you obey the laws you are told to obey. Your so lazy, and so pathetic you will do
whatever the salesman, politicians, and lawyers tell you to do, knowing all too well they are bold faced liars seeking nothing more than their own personal financial gain. Snap out of it, stop blamming and take responsibilty for yourself, start thinking for yourself, gain your individuality back, and just maybe you’ll earn enough respect and confidence for yourself to make better choices in your life. Because if you don’t, this country will tear itself apart with greed and corruption. Then when you realize there’s no food in the grocery stores or when a loaf of bread cost a weeks salary, and no water comes from the tap, you’ll know what really matters, and you’ll know who to blame, yourself. So go ahead, insult me, correct my grammer and spelling, and keep hiding form the truth. I have the strength and wisdom to endure even the harshest of times, not from birth, not from my enviroment, but by choice. The cycle of life on Earth will continue as it has for billions of years, you can’t lie to it, it does not listen, it does not care, it does not judge, it does not feel, all we can do is make the best of it while it allows to be here. Modern humanity is such a beautiful thing, please don’t waste it by allowing the salesman, politicians, and lawyers to ruin our lives, our country, and our free market, simply because too many have forgotten or chose never to learn who we are as a people, and the sacrifices made to get here. And yes, I feel better now, thanks.
All seeing eye – you apparently need sleep. I tried to read this but what with all the misspellings, “to” instead of “too”, run on sentences, incomplete sentences, it gave me a headache. Please try again after you’ve had a nap.
…evidently you missed the point of their argument, which I agree to. Our country is run by the people, for the people, and of the people. As said in one of my favorite quotes of all time, “People should not fear their government, government should fear their people.”
though I don’t agree with the rest of it >>
pcflamingo – you apparently need brains. I’m sorry if thinking gives you a headache, but learning is good for you. Oh, and a bit of common sense is good for you TOO. Maybe one day I will write a book just like all those other famous writers who completely ignore “proper” grammar for the betterment of creativity.
You have a lot of valuable stuff to say on keeping power in the hands of the people, holding those in power accountable for their actions and how the quality of a society is etermined by the individuals that compose it. Two criticisms:
People will ignore you if you don’t work to get them to pay atention It’s a sad fact, but true. If you want those great ideas to be read, apreciated and have an impact, take some time to put them across a bit better.
The free market is not some kind of panacea. It is actually the realized wet dream of all those ’salesmen’. It’s letting them loose to do whatever they can to improve their bottom line. It gave us mass poverty, horrifically unsafe working conditions, extortionate costs of living, 6+ day working weeks and no legal recourse. Personally I am strongly against these things, and it would do your argument good to take them into consideration before singing the praises of a free market as the answer to every problem. Maybe looking into the history of free markets might moderate your stance a little.
He’s actually saying ” I only has one Bannana! So get in line!”
I got a secret banana tree guarded with guns I hid from the new international gun control ban. I will trade you 2 bananas for a loaf of bread and a gallon of water. But you must not tell anyone about my banana tree, I’m almost out of bullets.
Goerge W, became unpopular because he didn’t stick his mug on t.v. often enough. Perhaps this was due to him not being the best public speaker and he was busy doing real president stuff. I liked him cause I digged the cool redneck belt buckles he wears. It really is this simple, Obama is more popular because he does stick his mug on t.v. often and feeds the masses the BS they wanna hear. I don’t like Obama cause he messes up my DVR recordings and now I really, really don’t like him cause he doesn’t have the stones to veto ridiculous bills and is a total pushover. Face it, the best bosses aren’t always liked cause they do what they need to do to get the job done, keeping the company in business so your paychecks will keep coming. So what it comes down to: do you choose a pretty, smooth talking boss that make excuses, never gives raises, but tries to make your workplace more comfortable or do you want a hard, serious boss that challenges you, takes the company higher allowing for your promotion, raise, and a more fulfilling career? Well with acorn’s help that choice was made by us last November.
While I disagree I do admit that your conviction is admirable. It’s always nice to see others as politically passionate as yourself, this country needs it. Without differing opinions the world and this nation would be a fallow and unseemly place.
Crack became popular because you smoke so much of it.
Oh, and the bank bailouts under the Bush admin, he said he didn’ t like it, but he didn’t veto it because it was the lesser of the evils to fix the melding done by congress under the previous administration.
While I would never defend Bush, I’m a little confused as to why people think that presidents are the sole cause of “the economy.”
Because the bankers had NOTHING to do with it. Nope. Nothing to look at here.
People living higher than their means? Nope. No way! We ALL are “supposed” to have all those nice things, and behemoth cars.
Investors betting on people losing their houses, and making tons of money off of it in a sort of “insurance” scam ? Nah. There’s no way they would encourage THAT.
Making paper planes with pretty pictures on them so people will have “enough money” to spread around? Nah. That paper is valuable, coz it’s munny.
Companies scapping expertise for a part-time workforce of people who have 2 and three jobs just to make ends meet? No way.
It’s all the president.
Imagine a man. With a bottle of Jack Daniels. Raising a toast at his desk.
Bush wasn’t that bad, people. Way better than Clinton, and yes, Obama. People get all mad he spent 6 Billion or something like that. Obama spent 3 trillion within his first 4 months. That’s like comparing 50 cents to $500.
Really, Bush was a good president at a bad time.
Your politeness is appreciated (really!), but I take issue with all of your claims. Yes, Obama has authorized a hell of a lot of spending, and there’s a really good chance that it will come back to bite us, but Bush’s spending does not by any stretch of the imagination boil down to “6 billion or something like that”. Bush’s spending was outright reckless, and the Bush tax cuts have to bear quite a bit of responsibility for the deficit that will be produced by Obama’s spending.
Reasonable estimates put the cost of the Iraq war alone at about $650 billion dollars. Reasonable estimates put the cost of continuing Bush’s tax cuts into the $4 trillion range over the next decade:
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=1018
Bush was not by any stretch of the imagination “a good president at a bad time”. He was, in fact, an awful president, though of course not as bad as his detractors claim (none of them are).
Should read: Sadly it only took one president to bring to fruition all the prosperity destroying excess my administration started, when I had been left with three administrations’ worth of tools to keep things going.
Actually he started a lot of it..
“Sadly, it took only one President to reverse all the economic gains of my administration”
Gains like Enron, Worldcom, Tyco, et al, the dot-com bubble, expansion of CRA, repeal of Glass-Steagal, etc.
Repeal of Glass-Steagal by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act is the only thing that competes with refusal to regulate credit default swaps as the #1 cause of the current clusterfvck. But please note that Gramm, Leach and Bliley were all Republicans heavily lobbied by the finance firms, and that the only resistance came from a distressingly small bloc of Democrats in Congress (9 senators, 51 reps). I do agree that Clinton was irresponsible to sign it, and I think Byron Dorgan (D-N. Dakota) should be given an important, prestigious job for having the foresight to speak out against it.
Bill Clinton deregulated credit default swaps along with some other Wall Street voodoo that lead to this mess, not Bush. Get your facts straight.
CDS’s were never regulated in the first place, but the decision not to regulate was made on Clinton’s watch. He gave in to finance industry lobbying and pressure from the Republican majority in Congress – it was a bipartisan failure.
What? He improved our country?!
Sure! He made the excuse “It was just a blowjob” acceptable..
It saddens me to no end to have not seen the following in this thread:
Clinton reduced the standing army by 1/3. The CIA by half. The size of government grew under him, it did not shrink.
So forget about the economy for a second, because they could not have collected anywhere near the taxes they are collecting today, not even percentage and account for inflation wise. Think of it like this: Exxon mobile has turned in more taxes than any other entity in the history of the world for the last 5 years. Over 500 billion. Their taxes alone can pay for the 2007 Social Security budget.
The real “surplus” was the money not being spent on the military. And it was not a surplus. Reason is simple, we still have a national debt. If it was truly a surplus, then the debt would have been paid and we would have had money left over. That’s the only way it could have been surplus. It was not used to pay the debt, the debt continued to grow after a two year period. If Clinton was so great, then why did only 2 of his eight years have a “balanced budget”? And no, you can’t go “TEH REPPUBLIKANZ!!!” as they weren’t in power in the Hill for all 6 of the other years.
Government spending went up under Clinton (as it has in every president since…..oh hell I don’t even know, easily predates LBJ), but was not so large that it overcame the 300 billion or so he saved by getting rid of a huge section of military. To make you understand how big 300 billion is to the budget….2007 taxes taken by the gov before any returns was 2.3 trillion, and you also have to figure that was 300 billion in 1990’s dollars.
if you were in the military during his years as I was, you’d know that thousands of military members with 15 years or more in the service were being given the option of getting out early with a portion of their retirement paid out. Some where simply “laid off”, specifically in the Army.
There was no surplus, spending was never “corrected”, and the budget was never balanced. He and the congress that served with him just had 1/3rd of the largest non-discretionary expenditure we had to play with.
And here endeth the lesson.
Once again you’ve confused me.
Are you seriously suggesting that cutting back on spending on the military in peacetime is a bad idea?
It’s fair to say that any unnecessary spending by government is deeply irresponsible – it’s not their money, it’s held in trust, and spending it poorly is a violation of that trust.
But surely needless spending on polishing guns that aren’t needed is at least as bad as unhelpful bureaucrats.
Oh brother, what a STUPID caption. Who voted for this sh*t?
how the hell is this even funny?
It’s not funny, obviously the liberal moderator is more concerned with insulting conservatives than posting lol’s. Eventually this site will fail, and when it does, they will expect a bailout.
Wow, I go away for two days or so and I come back to see ONE funny lol *not this one* and everyone bickering about… everything. God I missed this place.
Just watch how people mindlessly insult Putin, it’s not funny at all. Quite ignorant akshully. He was a great president, we should respect him, not slander him. This is why many people in the rest of the world don’t like us. Our (U.S.) world popularity is down because uneducated and ridiculing liberals have gained a majority. Don’t worry… ‘bama will apologize for you, he’s a great talker, so he must know everything. (ironically in real life, it’s good listeners that are smarter)
……….you’ve never read anything I’ve ever written on here have you? I’m a liberal. Well, more of a democrat with liberal tendencies, however. I’m well aware that Putin is given a bad rap, I was born and raised in Germany until around six, so I’ve seen how the other countries see us first hand as well as, gasp, how a socialist country can actually work. I’m offended both as a Liberal who is highly educated and never ridiculing, unless someones stupidity truly deserves the sting of my distaste, and also as a supporter of Obama. While I may not support the AMOUNT of money he’s spending I’m willing to give him a chance since he’s just only about a hundred days into office.
Really, for someone rallying against slander, you spread it around quite a bit.
You don’t get out much, do you? And you certainly don’t read or listen to any news sources outside the US.
US popularity is not down in the world since last year. It’s up. WAY up. Because we have a president now who listens, thinks and negotiates instead of stomping into a room and waving his dick around. Nobody laughed or jeered at the G20 when Obama took the Chinese and French representatives aside and talked them down from a dispute that could have soured the whole conference. And if you don’t think working on improving relations and cooperation with Turkey is important, you’ve never looked at a map of the Middle East.
I agree, completely. Though, a little off topic, I have a distaste for Turkey since they to this day refuse that the Armenian Genocide happened. Even going so far as to say that they did it to themselves or that they were in a war and grossly overestimated the numbers. >.< Sorry, friday was a touchy day for me last week.
Not to mention the legislation you passed in the 1990s and the Democratic congress and senate that brought those bills to Bush in the first place…
You miss the series finale to Prison Break, and the only way to know what happened is to jab a terrorist with a hot poker. Would you do it? I’d do it, and I’ve never even watched Prison Break.
So do liberals watch 24 and think Jack Bauer is the bad guy?
If innocent lives could be saved by harming an evil man, only a sociopath would object.
You were one of those kids that set ants on fire in elementary school, weren’t you?
Man, what a sh*t show.
How about this. Don’t buy a f*cking house you can’t afford. Period. Also, we have never seen a “good” president. They all suck and you all suck. :p
…and ANOTHER president to make it far worse.
I thought it only took the DotComs….
what economic gains? according to the treasury, there was not a “budget surplus” as the myth claims.
here’s a website that gives a briefing, with a link to sources
http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16
Too bad the current economic climate is all my fault. I make it OK to buy sub-prime loans. Seriously, Cause and effect people… Do the math.
The man ran the country in a direction we hadn’t seen for thirty years prior, (that’s “up” to those of you not paying attention,) he put this country in better standing with more countries than it had ever been in, and he got more ass than a toilet seat. If the best people can do is point to conspiracy theories about how the surplus didn’t exist and wave their dirty, controversy-stained, Republican fingers at his womanizing, then that’s pretty weak.
Bill was the man, he still is, and conservative pussies that still want to cry and blame him for Bush Jr.’s failures can suck it up and come back to reality.