Originally Posted by DosEquis I am sure there are a lot of programs that, if restructured to run more efficient, would save tons of money and provide the same level of service. They also need to restructure some programs to prevent abuse and corruption. I am sure they could save ...
10-19-2006, 11:15 AM
| #21 | ||||
| Dirty Liberal  Democrat South Jersey 
| Originally Posted by DosEquis Yeah if they passed a bill to get rid of pork spending perhaps. They should say that any and all legislation contained within a bill should be related. 
IE you can't add a bridge to nowhere on a bill to fund the Iraq war. and you can't tack on legislation banning internet gambling to a bill that addresses port security. They would probably get more done that way too since the bill to fund out troops would not be tied to anything else which people might object to. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 12:17 PM
| #22 | ||||
| Banned  Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by DosEquis I'm not defending them by any means...
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10-19-2006, 12:21 PM
| #23 | ||||
| Administrator  libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by ballz2wallz JFK pioneered "trickle down" economics. Reagans economic policy very much mirrored the cuts of JFK and they both worked well. After the assination of JFK and RFK the democrat party moved to the left and has continued that march.
So yeas 40 years ago the democrats were as economically conservative as republicans, maybe even more so. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 12:22 PM
| #24 | ||||
| Administrator libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by WickedLou9 Cut spending across the board. Piss everyone off. In a couple years it will be worth it. People will realize it was a good decision and things will be ok. Rudy did it in NYC and it worked well.
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10-19-2006, 12:26 PM
| #25 | ||||
| Banned Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by 6SpeedTA95 Not the same Democratic party I'm talking about
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10-19-2006, 12:29 PM
| #26 | ||||
| Administrator libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by ballz2wallz You said "ever" I pointed out the fact that they have indeed been on the right side of the economic issue. Mapping the democrat/republican party is fairly interesting. They've both flipped on economic issues several times in years past.
Turn of the century republicans were about higher taxes, democrats were not. The great depression happened and a flip in the parties happened. After the great depression beginning in the early 50s the democrats were for lower taxes across the board. This was true up until about the time RFK was assassinated. During this time Republicans were not wanting to lower taxes. Although the republicans started to come around in the early 60s. The parties have pretty much been unchanged the last 35 years on this issue. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 12:50 PM
| #27 | ||||
| Banned - Self Imposed  Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| Following WW2, during the Truman and Eisenhower years, tax rates for the rich were astronomical, thats 15 years of "soaking the rich" If someone wants to argue that we had terrible economic growth and were basically in a depression from 1945-1960, I'd love to hear it Also, as the US was becoming the world's lone economic super power into 1980, it still had very high tax rates on the rich So using democratic "soak the rich" policies, our economy exploded for 40 years Under Bush...jobs created? pathetic | ||||
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10-19-2006, 01:05 PM
| #28 | ||||
| Master Debator Election Moderator  Democrat Omaha, NE
| This is true that before 1980 the taxes on the upper 1% exceeded 50%. 39.6% under clinton was still 10%+ lower than anything previous to 1980. Including republican and democrat administrations. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 01:14 PM
| #29 | ||||
| Administrator libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by Thorgrim If you want to ignore a host of macro and micro economic factors surrounding this boom thats fine.
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10-19-2006, 01:41 PM
| #30 | ||||
| Banned - Self Imposed Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| Originally Posted by 6SpeedTA95 It's not me who is ignoring it, its the american voter, as I showed you before the Fox Poll that said Republicans/Bush weren't handling the economy well, and they disapproved
Funny, when Clinton was in office, the voters couldn't give him enough praise for the economy Maybe its because these "factors" you speak of don't really "trickle" down, they are a very light drizzle that no one really feels...except the millionares Have those rich guys buy another BMW and watch as more american autoworkers are laid off, thats a real way to have americans think the economy is being handled great | ||||
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10-19-2006, 01:43 PM
| #31 | ||||
| Braccae tuae aperiuntur.  Reform Party NJ
| When the Dems get in power they'll do whatever they want and blame the shortfalls on the Republicans. They've already managed to convinced Democrats and many others that our current state isn't working and is negative. And aside from the debt, they're wrong. Yet, I don't think most of America realizes that. They've convinced the public that Bush's tax cuts are evil and need to be done away with. They've convinced people that our markets are poor. etc etc. Once they get in power they'll already have the public looking for them to "fix" something that isn't broken. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 01:46 PM
| #32 | ||||
| Administrator libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by JaJae That pretty much sums it up.
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10-19-2006, 02:06 PM
| #33 | ||||
| Banned - Self Imposed Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| Originally Posted by JaJae Iraq, immigrations, the Taliban, North Korea, Iran, low job creation, poverty levels rising, outsourcing of our middle class jobs, skyrocketing healthcare costs, college education costs going through the roof...
Oh, I get it, that was just CNN brainwashing me, we're fine...sorry about that rant guys | ||||
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10-19-2006, 02:13 PM
| #34 | ||||
| Braccae tuae aperiuntur. Reform Party NJ
| Originally Posted by Thorgrim Iraq... is expensive. Sucks, but it's now our reality.
Immigrants.. Liberals spend more money on immigrants for votes than any other political party. Taliban... relation to thread? North Korea.. relation to thread? Iran .. Relation to thread? Low job creation... when unemployment is at record lows, this is what happens poverty levels rising.. yes, "I guess what happened last year was kind of similar to what happened in the early 1990s where you had a recession that was officially over and then you had several years after that of rising poverty," said Charles Nelson, an assistant division chief at the Census Bureau. outsourcing... Democratic economic principles send more businesses overseas.. they can't fix this. Businesses go overseas because it's too expensive to do business here. Democrats are the ones who love to tax businesses and the wealthy. healthcare costs.. partially due to outrageous lawsuits and claims as well as illegal immigration. again two things the democrats are helping to promote college education costs have been going up for a very long time. Spending on these institutions is up as well as federal grants. Democrats have never made education cheaper. We can go on and on selectively choosing ideals, fact is our economy is strong. People are doing well. There are more catch phrases to show the economy is doing well than there are to show it's doing poorly. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 02:15 PM
| #35 | ||||
| helluo librorum The Lab Moderator  Humanist Chicago Suburbs
| Originally Posted by JaJae It all goes back to the Republicans shortcoming, or appearance of, is the fault of the Democrats.
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10-19-2006, 02:16 PM
| #36 | ||||
| Braccae tuae aperiuntur. Reform Party NJ
| Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent What? The Dems have backed themselves into a corner. They have convinced America that our economy is poor. That's going to help them get elected, however, once in power they'll then have to do something. They'll have to "fix" things that aren't broken. And when they start mucking up things that are working they will blame the Republicans. Just like the Republicans would blame the Dems if they were in their shoes.
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10-19-2006, 02:43 PM
| #37 | ||||
| Banned Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by JaJae That's a good point; I never really thought about that much.
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10-19-2006, 02:50 PM
| #38 | ||||
| Master Debator Election Moderator Democrat Omaha, NE
| The economy is not great for everybody. The economy is great for those who have a significant amount of money invested in the market. Since americans are now saving negative money per year, the first time the great depression, people do not have significant amounts invested. People see that the jobs lost were replaced by lower paying jobs. Even if they have 10k invested their return could be alright, but that does not reflect on their checks on friday. They also probably had to tap in to it to make bills while they found new jobs. While bush's tax cuts MAY (to what extent is arguable) have helped get us out of a funk they were not responsible. Especially at a time when we elected to go to war with Iraq, elected to spend on 6000 pet projects, elected to spend 500 billion on a prescription drug plan, elected to increase the defense budget to 445 billion dollars. None of that spending were things we HAD to do. Iraq was no threat and we didn't NEED to go there. We dont NEED a jungle in Iowa. We dont need a drug plan that doesnt work well anyway. We already spend more than the world combined on the military..we didnt NEED to up the budget to 445 billion. Then we have unexpected expenses. The war in afghanistan, nobody knew we'd get attacked. Hurricane Katrina and the 80-100 billion to recover that area. Those are really nobodies fault, but if we didnt spend ridiculous amounts in other areas they could have been absorbed a lot easier. The tax cuts were not responsible. People wanted a war in Iraq and republican pork spending, now they get to pay for it. Democrats will blame the republicans for the tax increase they may pass... but they will be correct in the finger pointing. Last edited by DosEquis; 10-19-2006 at 02:57 PM.. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 03:11 PM
| #39 | ||||
| Administrator libertarian Oklahoma
| Originally Posted by DosEquis The economy is NEVER great for EVERYBODY
 what kind of argument is that? Are you honestly suggesting that no one ever lost a job or had to work min wage while Clinton was in office? The economy is doing well, because you have chosen to NOT invest for whatever reason is not a reason to tax those that have decided to invest. I invest heavily because in the long run it will pay off. It requires a LOT of sacrifice in the meantime. Median wages in real dollars are down about 1200 bucks from their peak. Coincidentally the tax cuts gave median wage earners about 1180 bucks back in their pocket. So "high paying" jobs aren't disappearing like you seem to think/suggest. I have a reasonably well paying job especially given the fact that I'm in Oklahoma. How did I get this job? Education and hard work, the same thing that would have gotten me this job a decade ago (had I been old enough). The last two years have been the best years for college graduates with the exception of ONE year and that was the year 2000. So to say things are bad is just flat wrong. Bush tax cuts pulled us out of the recession quicker than we would have otherwise. We would have come out though so you are right in saying they're not the sole reason for recovery. However, tax receipts are at record levels outpacing even the administrations "inflated" (inflated according to democrats in the last election cycle) predictions. You'll get no argument from me with regards to spending. I agree we're spending wayyyy too much on fluff, handouts and various types of welfare. | ||||
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10-19-2006, 03:39 PM
| #40 |
