Political Punditry Beyond 11/6/2012

[kishnevi]

As promised, a new thread for US post election politics.

Discussion of the 2012 election itself seems to be thriving on Snyprrr's thread here
http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/topic,21125.0.html

[DavidRoss]

We are fucked. More than half of the electorate has again demonstrated that they are incredibly slow learners and incapable of simple math. They have chosen to keep the entire United States on the California path to fiscal ruin. Our only hope is that the majority Republicans in the House stick to their guns and refuse to approve any of the Dem's counterproductive tax measures until AFTER serious reform of entitlements and other spending has been implemented.

I doubt that will happen, however. The lunatics are running the asylum, and between driving us over the fiscal cliff like Thelma & Louise, and appointing more Supreme Court justices who oppose the U.S. Constitution they're sworn to uphold, I'm afraid we we soon cross the tipping point after which recovery will no longer be possible.

I'm reminded of William Butler Yeats's painfully prophetic vision:

THE SECOND COMING

    Turning and turning in the widening gyre
    The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
    The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
    The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
    The best lack all conviction, while the worst
    Are full of passionate intensity.

    Surely some revelation is at hand;
    Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
    The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
    When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
    Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
    A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
    A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
    Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
    Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.

    The darkness drops again but now I know
    That twenty centuries of stony sleep
    Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
    And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
    Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

[Mirror Image]

Get a grip, Dave. Sheesh...what was that shit you were telling me about staying away from political forums? Oh yeah, this:

Apparently you've never visited the political or religious threads. Believe me, they're best avoided ... unless you're one of those who enjoys basking in the hate-filled atmosphere of self-righteous bigotry.

Apparently, you can't follow your own advice.

[DavidRoss]

Get a grip, Dave. Sheesh...what was that shit you were telling me about staying away from political forums? Oh yeah, this:

Apparently, you can't follow your own advice.

You are characterizing my post--and my character--inaccurately. That's nothing new.

[Mirror Image]

You are characterizing my post--and my character--inaccurately. That's nothing new.

No, you told me to avoid political/religious threads because of your alleged reasons for staying away and now you're on here. I'm not characterizing anything. Just pointing out how hypocritical you appear to be.

[Brian]

Get a grip, Dave. Sheesh...what was that shit you were telling me about staying away from political forums? Oh yeah, this:

Apparently, you can't follow your own advice.

To be fair, he wasn't hate-filled or bigoted, just panicky and kind of depressive-sounding. Well except the lines about math and lunatics I guess.

Anyway, looks like this thread won't last long. 

[Todd]

I missed this until just now.

¡Viva la Revolución!

[Mirror Image]

Brian, Dave gave me some what I thought was well-intentioned advice which was to stay away from political/religious threads for the reasons he outlined: self-righteous bigotry. I don't really like to get into deep political discussions with anyone for the simple fact that I don't think a friendship can thrive off something that people can feel so differently about. It's better to find common ground I think. Music is, in the truest sense, a uniter amongst people. We have this much in common. What I don't understand is how a person who gave me this genuine advice can turn around and say the very things he just said when he warned me of people's so-called "self-righteous bigotry." That's what I don't understand. I disagree with everything he said by the way. I can't help that California elected Schwarzenstupid as their governor. Another example of a Republican running a state into the ground.

[Florestan]

Music is, in the truest sense, a uniter amongst people.

Witness the HIP debate thread... 

[Mirror Image]

Witness the HIP debate thread... 

There will always be disagreements in music, but ultimately, we all enjoy music and love talking about it and when we listen, with other people, there's a connection that is made not only with the music, but with each other as well.

[kishnevi]

Temper, temper!  Or I will lock this thread for a bit....

In answer to DavidRoss--
The Republican program can be simplified to two propositions
--only employers can be considered productive
--if you treat the employers well, the employees will automatically benefit

The view that the only person worth considering in a business is the person who signs the paychecks--more broadly, the investors/owners who provide the capital--is really the reverse of Marx's theory of value (in which the only value came from the labor of those who actually produced the product) and just as off base.  And the idea that one need not worry about the employees as long as you take care of the employers runs counter to most of human history, in which the employers, under one title or another,  did very well, and the employees, again under one title or another,  did extremely lousy.

And since the Republican remedies for the perceived ills of the country amount to making the employees pay more for things like health care that they already can't afford,  it's hardly surprising that half the people in this country reject them.  It's only surprising that half the country accepts their flawed premises.

[not edward]

We are fucked. More than half of the electorate has again demonstrated that they are incredibly slow learners and incapable of simple math. They have chosen to keep the entire United States on the California path to fiscal ruin. Our only hope is that the majority Republicans in the House stick to their guns and refuse to approve any of the Dem's counterproductive tax measures until AFTER serious reform of entitlements and other spending has been implemented.

If I can attempt a liberal cynic's response to this:

We were fucked some time ago--right now I don't believe there's any good way to keep the budget deficit down. Either you try to spend your way out of the recession and hope that the increased tax intake offsets the expenditure somewhat, or you go into an austerity program and--like much of Europe is doing right now--watch the reduction in tax base eat up all your budgetary savings and more.

I just hope that once things are better that people remember the less-well-known (and often electorally unpopular) side to Keynesianism: when the economy is strong, you pay down your debts and you damp the economy to avoid excessive speculation and price bubbles. A good example of the success of this is the way that Canada has, comparatively speaking, held up quite well in recent years, due to Paul Martin's obsession with paying off the national debt. (He may have been lucky in that his time in the Finance Ministry coincided with the complete meltdown of the Progressive Conservative party, so that he didn't need to worry too much about the electoral effect of doing this rather than cutting taxes or increasing government programs.)


On another note, because I'm a politics nerd, I was looking over some of the exit poll data over lunch. This one, from Fox's exit poll, really jumped out at me:

Should most illegal immigrants working in the United States be:
Offered a chance to apply for legal status: 65%
Deported to the country they came from: 28%

[kishnevi]

Why do the Canadians always seem to do things better than us Yanks?

[Gurn Blanston]

Why do the Canadians always seem to do things better than us Yanks?

Because there aren't as many of them, and they aren't as culturally diverse as we are. Also, they weren't necessarily taught that anarchy is the only reasonable lifestyle from earliest age. Our philosophy is that individual freedom = screw everyone else, foreign or domestic. The Canadians aren't quite as bad as we are on that front, eh.   

[DavidRoss]

No, you told me to avoid political/religious threads because of your alleged reasons for staying away and now you're on here. I'm not characterizing anything. Just pointing out how hypocritical you appear to be.

Now you are characterizing that previous post inaccurately. And slandering my character as well. Again, there is nothing new in this behavior from you. The occasions when you deviate from it are nice, however.

[DavidRoss]

In answer to DavidRoss--
The Republican program can be simplified to two propositions
--only employers can be considered productive
--if you treat the employers well, the employees will automatically benefit

False.

[Brian]

I think I found the rudest possible retort for this thread!

[DavidRoss]

This is what needs to be dealt with. Americans are living in deep -- and destructive -- denial.

[Todd]

This is what needs to be dealt with. Americans are living in deep -- and destructive -- denial.

I'm not sure 'End of the American Dream' offers a honest actuarial view.  Much better to take a look at the CBO's 2012 Long Term Budget Outlook from June.  (I've just started in, and it's over 100 pages.)  The abstract may be enough for most people.  From the abstract:

Under the extended baseline scenario, which generally adheres closely to current law, federal debt would gradually decline over the next 25 years—from an estimated 73 percent of GDP this year to 61 percent by 2022 and 53 percent by 2037. That outcome would be the result of two key sets of policy assumptions:

* Under current law, revenues would rise steadily relative to GDP because of the scheduled expiration of cuts in individual income taxes enacted since 2001 and most recently extended in 2010, the growing reach of the alternative minimum tax (AMT), the tax provisions of the Affordable Care Act, the way in which the tax system interacts with economic growth, demographic trends, and other factors; revenues would reach 24 percent of GDP by 2037—much higher than has typically been seen in recent decades—and would grow to larger percentages thereafter.

* At the same time, under this scenario, government spending on everything other than the major health care programs, Social Security, and interest—activities such as national defense and a wide variety of domestic programs—would decline to the lowest percentage of GDP since before World War II.

That significant increase in revenues and decrease in the relative magnitude of other spending would more than offset the rise in spending on health care programs and Social Security.


In other words, if nothing is done, taxes will go up significantly, with the AMT snaring ever more middle class workers, government spending (and associated control) would increase, and everything else would wither.  I'm sure it doesn't need to be pointed out that military research and spending has been a huge driver of the economy, and it will be forced to shrivel under this scenario, and I'm sure foes of the US will be most understanding of the fiscal dilemma and won't be mean.  The federal government would become little more than a transfer payment machine.  And this is the rosy scenario of the two they present.  (The other is an extension of the policies rather than the laws, and basically ends up with debt loads greater than Japan's.)  My guess is that this scenario doesn't appeal to many "liberals" only because some cuts in government programs would be necessary.  For them, it would probably be better to raise taxes even more and offer even more hand-outs, in perpetuity. 

[Brahmsian]

Because there aren't as many of them, and they aren't as culturally diverse as we are. Also, they weren't necessarily taught that anarchy is the only reasonable lifestyle from earliest age. Our philosophy is that individual freedom = screw everyone else, foreign or domestic. The Canadians aren't quite as bad as we are on that front, eh.   

Not sure that Canadians are less culturally diverse than Americans.  In fact, I thought Canada was the most culturally diverse country in the world. 

Reason is:  There is no Canadian culture.  Well, our culture is a mish-mash of all cultures.

Perhaps you can elaborate a bit more on what you meant by the culturally diverse statement, Gurn?   

Edit:  Hockey, curling, maple syrup and back bacon is a 'purely' Canadian culture thing - that's about it.  Oh, and the word 'Eh!'