Debate #2

[buckman]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

I cannot recall the last time I saw a debate moderator take it upon herself to come to the rescue of one candidate. It was ridiculous.

And after she shuts off Romney twice and Obama says "show him the transcript " she waves it in the air !!!
A sure wtf moment......
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[Fly Rod]

Obama was quick to shut down Romney when it came about Obama's investments.....he acts like he is not a millionaire

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Fly Rod

Obama was quick to shut down Romney when it came about Obama's investments.....he acts like he is not a millionaire

He's a millionaire several times over. But much like the Hollywood crowd, it's OK to be in the top 1% if you are liberal. Or an actor. But if you struck it rich on Wall Street, or as a small business owner, well then you must have left a path of devastation in your wake during your selfish rise to the top.

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by buckman

And after she shuts off Romney twice and Obama says "show him the transcript " she waves it in the air !!!
A sure wtf moment......
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

I saw that. I can't help but wonder why, as a moderator, she had that transcript handy. I can only think of 1 reason, and that is that she wanted to use it to help her preferred candidate.

I also love when Obama says he "created 5 million jobs", which conveniently ignores the 5 million jobs he lost during his first 18 months. Unemployment was 7.8% in January 2009, and it is 7.8% today. In total (and that's the only fair way to measure it), he has had zero net job gains. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Bupkus.

I mean, if I lose $5 million at the casino on Monday, and win $5 million at the casino on Tuesday, would Obama claim that I'm $5 million richer? Because that's what he is saing about his "job creation".

It's such a blatant lie, and no one calls him in it.

[spence]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

I also love when Obama says he "created 5 million jobs", which conveniently ignores the 5 million jobs he lost during his first 18 months. Unemployment was 7.8% in January 2009, and it is 7.8% today. In total (and that's the only fair way to measure it), he has had zero net job gains. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Bupkus.

It's a critical metric when you take over at the very tip of a massive purging of jobs. Without the job creation the unemployment rate would be in the teens...

Nobody can turn the economy around overnight and considering the depth of the recession even in a few years...can't be done in a global economy.

Today, unemployment is backing down, personal savings is up, the housing market is starting to recover and corporate profits are looking pretty good. I've read that the improving housing market could drive better than expected performance overall in 2013.

Romney is promising his policy will create 12 million new jobs, except they're already projecting 12 million new jobs under the current trajectory set by Obama's policies.

I hate to break it to you, but it's working.

-spence

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by spence

It's a critical metric when you take over at the very tip of a massive purging of jobs. Without the job creation the unemployment rate would be in the teens...

Nobody can turn the economy around overnight and considering the depth of the recession even in a few years...can't be done in a global economy.

Today, unemployment is backing down, personal savings is up, the housing market is starting to recover and corporate profits are looking pretty good. I've read that the improving housing market could drive better than expected performance overall in 2013.

Romney is promising his policy will create 12 million new jobs, except they're already projecting 12 million new jobs under the current trajectory set by Obama's policies.

I hate to break it to you, but it's working.

-spence

"Nobody can turn the economy around overnight "

True. But not everyone is incompetent enough to add $5 trillion to the debt in 4 years, and all we have to show for it is a net gain of zero jobs and lower wages.

"I hate to break it to you, but it's working."

Zero job growth, lower wages, higher health costs, higher gas prices, anemic GDP growth...and $5 trillion deeper in the hole.

If that's 'working' to you, you are entitled to that opinion. But we can do better.

[spence]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

True. But not everyone is incompetent enough to add $5 trillion to the debt in 4 years, and all we have to show for it is a net gain of zero jobs and lower wages.

It has nothing to do with incompetence and everything to do with larger trends.

Obama inherited a trillion + defecit and given the reduced tax revenues, war expenditures and pre-planned spending there's little a McCain president could have done to avoid adding similar debt. Sure, there's the gamble that stimulus spending was unecessary but I'm willing to wager it helped keep us slipping into a worse situation.

Zero job growth, lower wages, higher health costs, higher gas prices, anemic GDP growth...and $5 trillion deeper in the hole.

If that's 'working' to you, you are entitled to that opinion. But we can do better.

So you agree that nobody could turn things around overnight but the fact that things are getting better still isn't good enough, it's not fast enough for you. We could always sprinkle some magic dust on the US economy...that would fix the EU and China as well...right?

The problem right now isn't Obama, it's a political system that can't agree on even the most basic steps forward. Sure, there is plenty of blame to go around but either party would be well served to compramise with whomever is elected.

We know how the GOP responded to Obama's win.

-spence

[scottw]

you need some new talking points

Election 2012 Likely Voters Trial Heat: Obama vs. Romney


hey, looks like some of the 47% are smartening up

apparently no candidate at 50% in a Gallup poll in mid October had ever lost...things ARE getting better Spence!

[Raider Ronnie]

Originally Posted by scottw

you need some new talking points

Election 2012 Likely Voters Trial Heat: Obama vs. Romney


hey, looks like some of the 47% are smartening up

apparently no candidate at 50% in a Gallup poll in mid October had ever lost...things ARE getting better Spence!

I don't know,
Read on FB a little while ago, Bigfish Larry is going to vote for the 1st time in his life.
He's voting for Barack Hussein Obama

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

It has nothing to do with incompetence and everything to do with larger trends.

Obama inherited a trillion + defecit and given the reduced tax revenues, war expenditures and pre-planned spending there's little a McCain president could have done to avoid adding similar debt. Sure, there's the gamble that stimulus spending was unecessary but I'm willing to wager it helped keep us slipping into a worse situation.

It has everything to do with a central government acting like a giant corporation with top-down directives on how the underlings will conduct the business. It has everthing to do with the "directors" of this giant corporation irresponsibly gambling with the earnings of the underlings and assuming unpayable debts that are transferred to some of the underlings who must sacrifice more and more of their earnings not only to pay down the unpayable debt, but to allow the "directors" to irresponsibly gamble more and accrue more debt. It has everything to do with the "directors" pitting enough of the underlings, who are allowed to pay less or nothing toward the gambling and debt accruing, against the underlings who must pay more, thus keeping enough "happy" with the gambling and debt as they are brainwashed into believing that they benefit from the gambling and unpayable debt and will have to pay less or nothing to sustain the unsustainable.

And as for those who believe that all will be, somehow, better if the "directors" would just act "responsibly," they willingly, or ignorantly, miss the point that the irresponsibility does not lie in the gambling or debt accruing, which the "directors" believe is necessary and proper and totally responsible to achieve the goals of government benevolence according to the dictates of the "directors," but the irresponsibility is in doing that which the Constitution never intended for them to do. The irresponsibility can only be corrected by the dismantling of this illegal giant government corporation, and by returning the power and responsibility of creating an "economy" to the people, in whom the Constitution originally vested such responsibility.


So you agree that nobody could turn things around overnight but the fact that things are getting better still isn't good enough, it's not fast enough for you. We could always sprinkle some magic dust on the US economy...that would fix the EU and China as well...right?

Sprinkling fairy dust, as you so often do, over the actions of our central administrative and unelected bureaucracy, in whom you have a magically unwarrented trust, will merely continue the "irresponsible" spending.

The problem right now isn't Obama, it's a political system that can't agree on even the most basic steps forward. Sure, there is plenty of blame to go around but either party would be well served to compramise with whomever is elected.

The problem is a political system that is run by a constitutionally unintended fourth branch of the federal government--the nearly 400 regulatory agencies that are responsible for most of the new, annual, regulations that fill the 80,000 new pages of the Federal Register every year. No one person, not the President, not the congressmen, not the judges, not any of the bureaucrats, reads all 80,000 pages per year. None know the totality of what's in those pages. And we are bound, as underlings of this giant corporation, to obey those regulations and run our lives and businesses accordingly. And the new regulations keep coming, and more agencies are created. And the problem is a political system that has been transformed from a limited central government to an all-powerful one that can create these agencies, and can tax at will, and spend at will, and the only barrier left to defend us against that directorate, is the uncompromising bickering among the "directors." Heaven help us if they all finally agree on how to run our lives.

We know how the GOP responded to Obama's win.

-spence

Just as political parties have always responded.

[Clammer]

Ronnie ,

No problem ......... But don,t think age has anything to do with it .

I,ll argue anything EXCEPT polotics [SP] & religion both are no win battles .even if millions of people have been killed over the centuries over both ><><.

I believe each individual has their own right to their opinions & religious beliefs. .

So much so >I was married 36 years to a a wesome woman ........... we always voted .......one election nite we were talking & somehow it came out who each of us had voted for ..for some office ......... yep we each voted for the opposite person .

THE only Bitch I have is .......... you have allllllllll the right in the world to bitch about whatever & whoever you want in this country .................... BUT in you do BITCH & you don,t vote >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>IMO your worse than any of them & should shut the F uck up

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by spence

It has nothing to do with incompetence and everything to do with larger trends.

Obama inherited a trillion + defecit and given the reduced tax revenues, war expenditures and pre-planned spending there's little a McCain president could have done to avoid adding similar debt. Sure, there's the gamble that stimulus spending was unecessary but I'm willing to wager it helped keep us slipping into a worse situation.




So you agree that nobody could turn things around overnight but the fact that things are getting better still isn't good enough, it's not fast enough for you. We could always sprinkle some magic dust on the US economy...that would fix the EU and China as well...right?

The problem right now isn't Obama, it's a political system that can't agree on even the most basic steps forward. Sure, there is plenty of blame to go around but either party would be well served to compramise with whomever is elected.

We know how the GOP responded to Obama's win.

-spence

"It has nothing to do with incompetence "

That's your opinion. In my opinion, 4 years is a lot of time, and $5 trillion is a lot to flush down the toilet, if all you have to show is zero jobs created and lower wages. A huge majority of business owners said the passage of Obamacare would hurt them, but Obama did it anyway. That's a big part of the 'larger trend' yuo describe, and that effect lies right at his feet.

Spence, there are states that are growing and adding jobs. They are overwhelmingly red states. Pure coincidence, I supose.

"Obama inherited a trillion + defecit "

(1) Inherited from whom? Obama and Biden were members of the US Senate, and they were in the party that controlled Congress from 2006-2010. In our country, the legislature controls the legislative agenda and the purse strings. So I'm not sure I give Obama a complete 'pass' on the mess he claims to have 'inherited'. He didn't walk in off the street. He was there. I'm not saying it's all his fault. But I'm saying he bears some responsibility for what happened.

(2) He promised to cut that deficit in half.

"there's little a McCain president could have done to avoid adding similar debt"

Wrong. McCain would not have passed Obamacare, and he wouldn't have implemented a stimulus that did nothing except delay public sector layoffs for one year.

"you agree that nobody could turn things around overnight "

Agree 100%. But I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who could have mis-managed the crisis worse than Obama has.

"the fact that things are getting better "

It's not a fact that things are better. $5 trillion added to our debt. That means that every living American is now $16,667 deeper in debt than when he took office. That works out to $67,000 for a family of 4, and the interest is now accumulating. What does that family of 4 have to show for that $67,000 IOU Obama gave to the Chinese on their behalf? Zero jobs created, and wages that are $4300 lower than they were 4 years ago. Higher healthcare costs. Astronomically higher fuel prices. How you can claim that it's a 'fact' that things are better, I simply cannot fathom.

We're not bleeding jobs like we were, that is a fact. But at what cost? And what kinds of jobs are being created - part time jobs with no healthcare. Whoop-dee-doo.

"We could always sprinkle some magic dust on the US economy"

You think that's a fair assessment of what McCain would have done, or what Romney is proposing/

That's you in a nutshell, right there, that post. You bend over backwards to heap praise on Obama, and yuo dismiss those who disagree with him as proposing to 'sprinkle magic dust'. That's very dishinest, and it's what we have all come to expect from you. I;m happy to honestly debate the merits of what Obama has actually said and done. You cannot bring yourself to do that with my side, because you know you can't reject these ideas on their merits, so all you can do is dishonestly dismiss them.

I cannot fathom that you work in finance, I can only pray that your DNA isn't on anything that will ever impact my family.

[scottw]

you two would never make it very far as foxhole buddies...

.....I did say "foxhole"......

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

"It has nothing to do with incompetence "

That's your opinion. In my opinion, 4 years is a lot of time, and $5 trillion is a lot to flush down the toilet, if all you have to show is zero jobs created and lower wages. A huge majority of business owners said the passage of Obamacare would hurt them, but Obama did it anyway. That's a big part of the 'larger trend' yuo describe, and that effect lies right at his feet.

It may be argued that Obama is extremely competent in accomplishsing HIS goals, not yours. When you argue back and forth with Spence on what are "better" economic methods and solutions, you are playing in his sandbox (and, apparently, yours) in which the problem is merely competence within a system of government that allows bureaucrats to do what they do, rather than the original sand box that would not allow such shenanigans. When arguing about competence within the parameters of the status quo (the central government's right and responsibility to control and create the "economy"), you are accepting that status quo. And it is that status quo, that system, which allows the competence or incompetence, to be the argument of who will be "better" rather than whether the federal government even has that right and responsibility

Spence, there are states that are growing and adding jobs. They are overwhelmingly red states. Pure coincidence, I supose.

There will always be sectors that will do better or worse. That's the beauty of federalism--the States being the laboratories of social, political, and economic experiments. But only insofar as they are allowed to do so. The more centralized that government becomes, the less will be the diversity of those experiments, and the more static society, the "economy", and the relationship between the citizen and the government becomes. The overall "economy" if left to the control of a central government will be diverse and evolutionary in the most limited way--only at the hands of a unitary directorate, and only change course within those limited parameters when parties can convince the electorate that their director is more competent than the other party.

"Obama inherited a trillion + defecit "

(1) Inherited from whom? Obama and Biden were members of the US Senate, and they were in the party that controlled Congress from 2006-2010. In our country, the legislature controls the legislative agenda and the purse strings. So I'm not sure I give Obama a complete 'pass' on the mess he claims to have 'inherited'. He didn't walk in off the street. He was there. I'm not saying it's all his fault. But I'm saying he bears some responsibility for what happened.

(2) He promised to cut that deficit in half.

Yes, you're absolutely right (there are absolutes, Spence). Obama bears some responsibility for the inheritance he helped to create--as do all the other members of Congress, and other Presidents and judges. And, as well, We The People bear some of that responsiblity, not only for electing them, but allowing them to transform the Constitution into a system of government that makes us underlings instead of masters.

"there's little a McCain president could have done to avoid adding similar debt"

Wrong. McCain would not have passed Obamacare, and he wouldn't have implemented a stimulus that did nothing except delay public sector layoffs for one year.

McCain would have helped to maintain the present administrative system of government, perhaps with a smaller growth in deficits and national debt. But the system would have been maintained, perhaps advanced to another level, and would be there for future mischief by bigger spenders and controllers.

"you agree that nobody could turn things around overnight "

Agree 100%. But I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who could have mis-managed the crisis worse than Obama has.

Again, depending on what Obama's goals are for fundamentally transforming this country and its system of government, he may be considered to have managed very well.

"the fact that things are getting better "

It's not a fact that things are better. $5 trillion added to our debt. That means that every living American is now $16,667 deeper in debt than when he took office. That works out to $67,000 for a family of 4, and the interest is now accumulating. What does that family of 4 have to show for that $67,000 IOU Obama gave to the Chinese on their behalf? Zero jobs created, and wages that are $4300 lower than they were 4 years ago. Higher healthcare costs. Astronomically higher fuel prices. How you can claim that it's a 'fact' that things are better, I simply cannot fathom.

See, that's the progressive sandbox in which you are playing. Arguing about how much rather than should they even be able.

We're not bleeding jobs like we were, that is a fact. But at what cost? And what kinds of jobs are being created - part time jobs with no healthcare. Whoop-dee-doo.

When the blood has drained so much, there is not as much left to be drained. It would have been mathematically impossible to maintain the higher number of jobs lost, but the rate at which they are presently lost in comparison to how much "blood" is left, may be as high or higher. Again, is it the Federal Government's responsibility to create jobs?

"We could always sprinkle some magic dust on the US economy"

You think that's a fair assessment of what McCain would have done, or what Romney is proposing/

That's you in a nutshell, right there, that post. You bend over backwards to heap praise on Obama, and yuo dismiss those who disagree with him as proposing to 'sprinkle magic dust'. That's very dishinest, and it's what we have all come to expect from you. I;m happy to honestly debate the merits of what Obama has actually said and done. You cannot bring yourself to do that with my side, because you know you can't reject these ideas on their merits, so all you can do is dishonestly dismiss them.

I cannot fathom that you work in finance, I can only pray that your DNA isn't on anything that will ever impact my family.

Finance, the "economy," jobs, health care, etc. are very important issues. The question (and answer) is whether the Federal government should be responsible for those things.