Magox

I agree with about 50% of the things that Stiglitz says, this being one of them in regards to how the U.S dollar is hurting poorer countries. Commodity price inflation is much more damaging to these developing nations simply because food & energy make up a much larger component of their disposable income than it does over here, and since treasury or the reserve have little regard for maintaining a true "strong dollar" policy these countries will be the first to feel the pain of our weakening dollar. However, it is quite the connundrum, our best hope that we have is growing through exports and right now during this global developing world boom, there are many eager and new potential customers out there waiting to buy all sorts of products that we (and other countries) can produce, and having a weak dollar certainly helps us achieve that goal. As I've said all along, we will be living in a slow growth and uncomfortably high inflationary world for the forseeable future, and that is the best case scenario.

European style...

exactly

no, because he enables deficit spending "dipshit"

If anyone is wondering why their stocks are getting hammered this morning, it's simple, S&P just downgraded the U.S credit outlook to negative which means there is at least a 1 in 3 chance of the U.S losing it's AAA rating. Krugman is a dipshit, and those who follow him religiously are even bigger dipshits.

Both

You mimic everything you hear. I'm being serious here, I honestly don't believe I have ever seen you say anything that was derived from your own mind. Really

Right up Billy Bob's allie.

Do you feel that way about cigarrettes or alcohol? I mean, you do know that they tax the hell out of both of these right?

legislating body fat? You dont see that as an avenue to more restrictive legislation down the road? I do We talked about this before, not this specific topic but in how to motivate human and corporate behavior. I just dont believe that restricting forms of motivation is the most effective way to achieve results, I am more of a .... I think you know what I'm gonna say. incentive based person.

Your intentions are spot on! It's just that your means to this end is a pandora's box that would certainly bring about a not-so-free society.

I do not like to view things from a black or white perspective, because I think that is largely a flawed way to look at things. Sort of like when I hear Ben Bernanke ferociously defend his monetary policy as not being the reason for rising commodity prices and then you get the fiscal hawks who say that it IS because of his monetary policy of these elevated prices, where in reality, which no one seems to ever mention it is a combination of the two. Honestly I believe that unions do have a place in all societies, but the nature of a Union boss is to always ask for more, so whenever the tide is rising high, so does the pay and benefits but when things get slow, in most cases (other than this past historic downturn) pay doesnt match the downturn. I look to Ford 2006 2007, here's a company that had record sales and still was in the red by over a billion dollars annually, and when you look into the average line workers pay, with benefits it reached $90 an hour. I'm not going to entirely blame union bosses forour manufacturing down turn, because it's obvious cheap labor was the largest factor, but when you combine the ridiculous benefits and pay, its just logical that companies will look to move shop overseas. MInd you this is a private union matter that I'm talking about, the public unions in many cases are much worse. I mean the protection that is offered to workers is absurd, you basically could be in the bottom 20% of quality workers in your field and you would be afforded the protection of the Unions. Not ony that, union bosses have been in bed with politicians (so have CEO's of certain sectors) that they have struck deals that we the taxpayers are having to pay .. look at all the unfunded liabilities through benefits that many states have to deal with that will never be compensated, only through tough budget cuts, reduced pay, workers layofffs and higher taxes will those obligations be met. And whats ironically funny is that the same people who supported these absurd payouts look to blame the other political party for not continuing these unsustainable promises that are bankrupting states . Dont they see, that A large reason why state and local governments are laying off lots of workers is simply because of the deals that were struck between public unions and the politicians that they bought off. I'm not exclusivly blaming unions and politicians for this outcome, no doubt that the downturn created a loss in revnues, but in many of these cases they would of never have been able to meet these obligations even if things continued to move upward. Not just that, but as I mentioned earlier, when things were rolling with the housing market blistering higher the promises got bigger, and when the bubble bursted, these state and local governments were screwed. So whats the solution? Have the taxpayer bailout these ridiculous promises ? No, its obvious to me that they need to restructure themselves back to a more sustainable path. It's human nature to expect a whiplash reaction towards the unions much like what we are seeing in Wisconsin and Ohio. At the end of the day, the pendulum will swing again, and hopefully we'll find a solid middle ground.

when you say welfare, you mean the money they get to keep that they earned? I mean you do believe that in most cases it was earned right? I just find it rather unfortunate that a sector of just about every economy in the world looks to demonize those who have succeeded, the same ones that provide jobs for the very same people that attempt to caricature this productive group as a bunch of greedy bastards. Where the reality is that most of you that talk negatively up on this group don't even personally know these people, you'd rather just follow the words of the political masters you follow. Logic just seems to have an uncanny ability to escape people. Now I'm not suggesting that you are one of these people, but this is a pattern that I hear all too often.

You have to cut benefits thats the only way how. In Ryans plans he calls for cuts in benefits in both Medicare and Medicaid and gives the states more power through flexibility so it tailors more to their needs. In other words the Federal Government is saying "hey this is what you get, if you want to spend more or less thats up to you, but we're not footing anymore of the bill" . So if the states decide to want shoulder more of the cost that is their burden NOT the Federal government unless of course they ask for assitance and get a Federal Bailout. Which means that it would have to go up for a vote through Congress to get that assistance. This is what we call cost containment measure, his plan basically is one that allows the private sector to compete fiercely simply because they are competing for less dollars available. Efficiency would improve and it makes perfect sense, it is a plan that unleashes the private market and I guarantee you that if the plan were to go as written, that the costs of health care WOULD go down. The risks of this plan is that the quality of care would go down and that is a real possibility. You'd have to be a moron to not realize this. erm erm Peace

ummm, no it wasnt. In the second post of this thread I wrote a few posts later you posted So please, save it for the shmucks First off the block grants are "capped". Do you know what that means? It means that when you say "almost can't help but cost more" says that you don't jack **** about what you are talking about. Currently the Federal Government has a one size fits all shoe approach to Medicaid, it matches every dollar spent by the state on a one to one basis. Ryan's plan allows the federal government to set aside a set amount to each state and allows each state the flexibility to tailor it to their own liking. This is what you call cost containment. The risks of his plan has absolutely nothing to do with your above comments regarding Medicaid. Zero, zilch nada. As a matter of logic, the risks are actually 100% the total polar opposite of what you mentioned, which shows your incapability of not being able to understand what it is that you read. The risks are that the cuts are so draconian that the lower income earners go without medicaid services, not that the Federal government "create a ton more government bloat." Another part of what you said that was incorrect was There already are 50 state government medicaid oversight agencies you dumbass. One more thing which I let you slide by with the other day but I'll call you out on now. You said to RKFast that there wasnt any cuts to defense spending... Wrong!! There is. Also you talked about how it didnt address reduction of farm subsidies... Wrong again! There are approximately $30Billion worth of reductions in farm subsidies. But please keep posting, if I get the time like I did today, I'll make sure to continue to eviscerate your posts when you decide to talk out of your ass.

"typo" Ok BigCat

You are absolutely 100% correct. What most morons don't understand is that these fat asses are costing us all, literally. Fat asses do cause an extra burden on all our pockets, so when you get guys like Beck and Hannity who pretty much enable people to eat fatty foods in the name of preserving our personal freedoms and then claim to know what we need to do to lower health care costs, then sorry, I just can't take what they say seriously. I do believe in personal freedoms, and I dont believe it is the schools place to tell their students that they can't bring home bag lunches, but for !@#$s sake FEED YOUR CHILDREN PROPERLY!!! So yes, there has to be a serious investment from the government to educate people in how to eat properly and more healthy. ANd instead of taxing fatty foods, what you can do is give tax breaks to food providers for offering healthier foods and following certain federal guidelines that can help achieve healthier eating. Incentives incentives incentives. people get motivated by the proper incentive, it is just a matter of finding the right carrot to dangle.

The only thing random here are your words. WHat you just said about Ryan's medicare plan is almost completely incorrect. First off the current Medicare plan is an open-ended entitlement program. The one Ryan proposes is changing it into a system that makes fixed payments to participants each year, payments that would rise at a predetermined rate. Now how is that passing costs off? Let me make it easy for you to understand, because one of three things are happening here, either you aren't reading about whats going on here, or that your sources are incorrect or that you just simply aren't able to comprehend what it is that you are reading. So here goes; The government would provide a set dollar payment towards your health care premium, and you'd cover the balance of your health care costs. So the calculation that Ryan is making is that this will force consumers to shop more carefully for their medical services, which will create signicant price pressure demand from medical service providers. They the health providers know that there isn't an unlimited amount of dollars out there to pay for their services and that consumers (patients) will be on a much stricter budget, forcing prices to go down. This makes sense to me. The plan also raises the age for eligibility from 65 to 67 between 2022 and 2033. It also reduces subsidies sharply for upper income earners, The top 2% of Medicare earners starting in 2022 would get just 30% of the average payment, and the next 6% would get half the average support payment. Also the current medicare system increases the payouts by 7% annually, in Ryan's plans it is indexed to the rise of inflation. Which of course is MUCH lower than the current plan. I'm being serious here Peace, where do you come up with this ****? You just say **** that simply isn't true. Now tell me again, how this isn't "cutting benefits". I'm done with giving idiots explanations, that will be my last one with you. Learn to read up on things

I believe that the sooner that we as a nation accept and adjust to a uncomfortably higher inflationary environment with a lower than normal growth rate over the next 5-7 years or so the better off we will be. There is no magic bullett solution to our debt problem, any actions that address this issue will be painful, which entails cutting government jobs and services which of course has a residual effect on the economy and an increase of taxes. Also there is very little anyone can do to lower the price of gasoline or food during this time period and if prices do drop off significantly it wont be because of something good, it will be because some sort of bubble bursting that will create tsunami like ripple waves across the global economy.

I believe taxes for everyone should go back up to the pre Bush era sometime in the next 3-5 years. Ryans plan is a serious one because it addressed the long-term issue of Medicare, but it appears that Obama is willing to mix it up as well, and if this is the case that he also has a serious plan that deals with Medicare (and he better not use the health insurance reform bill as the plan) and S.S than I have to give him some serious points in addressing this matter heading into the 2012 elections. We'll see if it is a real plan or not. Back to the taxes again, if you guys dont believe that we also need to raise more revenues to effectively reduce our debt then you're blinded by your partisanship. There HAS to be an increase in taxes not just from substantive point of view but also from a political one. Do you really believe that the American public is going to allow there to JUST allow painful cuts while those "filthy" rich people get to keep more of what they earn? You have to know that this is how it is going to be framed and this argument WILL prevail because it is effective against the feeble minded. I dont agree with class warfare policies, so raising one level of income earners taxes over another in my view is nonsensical. Having said that, taxing those rich as part of the solution will play well even with a decent bloc of the independent votes specially considering all the concessions that Obama has given into over the past six months. Get use to it fellas, taxing those rich WILL be part of the end result.

That's because over half of them AREN'T American.

You know what else I love? That we are a nation of fat asses.... Yeah, I LOVE that.

It's simple, the reason why that ad is there is to target individuals such as Bobby. They understand their target demographics

You are correct on a few accounts, maybe a bit of an exagerration on others but for the most part you're near the ballpark. Trump is a cunning individual who calculates everything, he knows that the populist rhetoric regarding China and OPEC resonates with the American public and he also knows that the birther deal connects with a segment of the GOP voters which plays well for the primaries... It sort of reminds me of the current president, their campaign was mainly about two things "Bush Bad" and "Hope and Change". Look at all the suckers who bought into that slogan. There was no change and the hope? well... I think most rational thinking people understand that hope is not a good strategy, and alot of us knew that he was way in over his head before he even stepped into office.

Only the one's who run off of the social issues will push for it, which is about 1/3 of the caucus (Mike Pence comes to mind) the majority are concerned with fiscal issues, the proof is in the puddin, approximately 80% of the GOP voted for this last deal and they didn't get any of the social policies that the minority had hoped for. End results is what counts in my book the rest is just posturing and noise.