BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: GUEST,JTS
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 01:59 PM

Its everybody's tax money. But it is being applied to a specific purpose. It is best only to apply the money to spending that furthers that purpose.

It was Bush's idea to give taxes back to those not in need. That plan drove up the debt to no avail and fueled the recent stock market and housing bubbles. The money needs to be invested long term in education, infrastructure and energy. We need to emerge from the Republican Depression stronger than when we went into it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Greg F.
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 10:31 AM

.....and bankrupting America for the next 80 years......priceless.
.
Hubby

The really amusing - or disgusting, depending on your point of view- thing is that these NeoCon Bushite types can't seem to grasp that the U.S. is currently bankrupt and in the toilet precisely BECAUSE of the agenda begun by the sainted Great Prestidigitator, Roonie Raygun and pursued by the NeoCon Republican administrations (and the liberal Republican administration of Bill Clinton) since.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 09:51 AM

The real "get in the ring and have an argument" question is whether governments can do any good. Right wingers think that individual decisions are always better, because the market is always better. The only area in which they think differently is the military, which is why they are so big on military spending (and in America it is the one social upgrading for the poor everyone seems to agree on).   

Where all the discussion points at the moment is that regulation is needed on the market. What is not being discussed is whether and when the pooling of money for the larger social good is not only good, but better than individual decision making. And clearly, there are huge ways in which pooling money for the common good is good for everyone -- schools, roads, public goods of all kinds, including and especially those things the market handles poorly -- like the environment.   

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Barry Finn
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 08:57 AM

"But I guess giving it to an artist who piles ham on a king size bed and call it "Art" is the right thing to do, afterall".

Hubby, you really have a good firm grip on the situation, don't you.

First off you are getting some of it, in tax cuts & rebates. You're also getting some of it in services, hopefully. Shcools & education will be in some form or another unless you want private schooling then you can spend from your own bank account.
I agree Peter about money's going to the military, I'd rather the bake cookies for sale & a fence from the Pacific to the Gulf along the border is a poor use of funds.
But Green Industry & a Climate & Enviormental direction within our manufacturing & industrial bases would be a giant leap in bailing us out aas well along with a push in the sciences, areas that the Bush people herded us back into the caves era with. Gene & cell developing is another place where we could drive a thriving business machine but also we've lagged there to & lost a lot footing money in, no thanks again to the Bushy bastard.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Susu's Hubby
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 07:14 AM

Here's a bright idea........

Give US the money.....Let US decide where it can best be used.......afterall it's OUR tax money!

If we want to give it to the arts then so be it.

If we want to give it to our children's schools then so be it.

If we want to use it to pay off debt then so be it.

Hell...we may even go off and buy a new car with some of it.

But I guess giving it to an artist who piles ham on a king size bed and call it "Art" is the right thing to do, afterall.


Shame on me for thinking otherwise.


Hubby

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 03:45 AM

While I think the stimulus package is a good idea, the problem with it of course is that it is a big whack of money, and with the bad bank package coming, there is going to be nothing else for anything for a long time. At some point, spending all this money has to be a big problem -- America didn't start out debt free. And they are pissing huge amounts of money away on the bloated military. None of this is good, economically.   It is not as if just jump-starting the economy is going to be enough. At some point this deficit spending on such a scale is going to be an even bigger mess.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 01:38 AM

One analogy that keeps coming to my mind makes clear our dilemma.

"When your house is collapsing, which end do you prop up first?"

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: GUEST,JTS
Date: 09 Feb 09 - 01:01 AM

Susu's hubby,

You need some basic education in macroeconomics. Basically the theory behind this stimulus package is if money is pumped into the economy, the economy will recover more quickly and everyone will be better off.

The money to the arts will put people to work right away and those people will buy coffee, gasoline, groceries and rent, thus allowing other people to keep their jobs.

Another feature of Obama's plan is investment in the future. Money spent on infrastructure such as highway and electrical grid improvements, education and energy efficiency will reap future economic and competitive benefits.

We need to spend a lot of money fast. Obama's priorities may not be perfect, but they are way better than any alternative I have heard.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 11:47 AM

"$350 billion that Bush gave out to the banks and financial institutions"

TARP:

The first $350 billion TARP money was primarily used to buy preferred stock, which is similar to debt in that it gets paid before common equity shareholders....
....The original plan that Secretary Paulson presented was for the government to buy up the troubled (toxic) assets in insolvent banks and then sell them at auction to private investor and/or companies. This plan was scratched when Paulson met with England's Prime Minister Gordon Brown who came to the White House for an international summit on the global credit crisis. Prime Minister Brown, in an attempt to mitigate the credit squeeze in England, merely infused capital into banks via preferred stock in order to clean up their balance sheets and, in some economists' view, effectively nationalizing many banks. This plan seemed attractive to Secretary Paulson in that it was relatively easier and seemingly boosted lending more quickly....

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 05:03 PM

"The Marine Ones and jets were ordered by the Bush Administration and were delivered, if memory serves, in January.

Time for some Aricept Amos.

Washington Post March 17, 2008:

The first five helicopters are due in 2010, a year behind schedule, although the White House made compromises on the requirements to cut costs and speed delivery. Twenty-three more-sophisticated versions are to follow, at which point the current fleet and the first five craft would be retired. But the most recent target date of 2015 for these additional choppers has slipped to an unknown date.

The problems with the second batch have prompted the Pentagon to issue a stop-work order until it determines what to do and Congress provides more money. The Pentagon conducted a review of the project and considered 35 alternatives, but "none of these options meet the full set of White House requirements," Young said.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 04:57 PM

Ebbie: Oh yes, that is very pertinent.

Back when America did not pay $700 million per year to oil rich countries, his action of turning the AC lower took more energy than Obama turning the heat up.

Now what is your assessment of the comparison of these two actions?

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 02:21 PM

It appears Mr. Obama has finally smartened up and got his own message!

"We can't expect relief from the tired old theories that, in eight short years, doubled the national debt, threw our economy into a tailspin, and led us into this mess in the first place," Obama said.

"We can't rely on a losing formula that offers only tax cuts as the answer to all our problems while ignoring our fundamental economic challenges." (Reuters today).

Now that's more like it!!!!!!

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 10:04 PM

The $350 billion that Bush gave out to the banks and financial institutions so they could make loans and get business running again? Nobody knows where the hell it went! They aren't making loans with it, they're giving themselves bonuses and paying dividends with it.

Molly Ivins used to say that Bush liked to throw parties for his friends, but I didn't know that's what she meant!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 09:58 PM

I'd a helluva lot rather see the National Endowment for the Arts get that $50,000,000 than give it out without conditions as Bush did, so the CEO of some mortgage company who managed to screw his company into the ground after screwing thousands of people out of their homes can use it to vote himself a bonus.

And as to global warming research, damned well about time!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 09:48 PM

From my post of "Date: 06 Feb 09 - 03:39 PM":


"In a nutshell, Japan's experience suggests that infrastructure spending, while a blunt instrument, can help revive a developed economy, say many economists and one very important American official: Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, who was a young financial attaché in Japan during the collapse and subsequent doldrums. One lesson Mr. Geithner has said he took away from that experience is that spending must come in quick, massive doses, and be continued until recovery takes firm root."

This can be translated into "get an enormous amount of money as fast as possible...before the suckers know what hit them".

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: GUEST,Susu's Hubby
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 09:32 PM

You know...I'm not opposed to the fact that Obama got new airplanes and helicopters and cars. That's what presidents are afforded.

I've got no problem with the money, however much it was, for the first lady to re-decorate the White House. It will be their home for the next four years. They should decorate it however they want and it should be at taxpayers expense.

What I do have a problem with is the fact that there is an $800 BILLION package sitting before the senate that is trying to be sold as a stimulus bill when anyone with half a brain can read through the lines and see that's it's nothing more than construction paper smeared with fecal matter of the democrats that dream this crap up.

Someone explain to me, please, how giving $50,000,000 to the National Endowment for the Arts, $400,000,000 for global warming research will make life better on a day to day basis for a family of four in middle America with the parents out of work. At the same time, please tell me how giving the Smithsonian Institute $150,000,000 is going to help purchase clothes for the kids during the rest of the winter.

Please show me the genius in providing $650,000,000 on top of what's already been spent to help in the switch from analog to digital TV.

And certainly, last but not least, how is spending an additional $600,000,000 on top of the $3 BILLION that is currently being spent by our federal government on official vehicles going to help John and Jane pay for their home, while trying to put their 2 kids through college?

This is shaping up like a bad mastercard commercial.....

I can hear it now.....


.....and bankrupting America for the next 80 years......priceless.



Hubby

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Bobert
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 08:22 PM

We're on the same page...

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 08:18 PM

I made that statement from my own opinions. I have no idea what the Republicans are doing right now and don't care. They have only about 32 votes remaining in the Senate if you weed out the RINOs.

I live in Nevada and hear alot about California since it is next door. I do know the debt these two states are facing and don't like the idea of letting thousands of fine people get fired in Nevada stare government while the fatbutt Feds look for make-work crap because they think they can get US to pay for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Bobert
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 07:38 PM

Well, actually pdq has made a suggestion that the Repubs are now trying to get out of the proposed package: aid to the states...

I agree with pdq... Face it, 45 states are now ind deficit and that isn't a good thing and can only bring about lay-offs of state workers... Part of stimulating is stopping the bleeding and shoring up the sate budegets could save a couple more million jobs from drying up...

The Repubs in Congress don't see it this way... They want every dollar to produce a "new job"... We are a long way from that pie-in-the-sky wishfull thinking...

Stopping the bleeding needs to come first...

Basics 101...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Riginslinger
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 07:32 PM

"...what do you propose as the solution(s) to our situation? Seriously."


                Get all the illegal aliens out of the country and start jailing bankers.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 07:16 PM

Looks like the ritual picking of the nits. Invent a nit, blow it up to the size of a brontosaurus, then bellow like a wounded buffalo.

The ritual picking of the nits occurs every four years following the presidential inauguration.

(Bloody great yawn. . . .)

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 03:44 PM

Sawzall, your regurgitation is showing. Your standards are lamentably low.

Quick question: Which takes more energy: Obama upping the thermostat to 80 (We don't know the actual degree) or Richard Nixon in the midst of a Washington DC summer turning the air conditioner so high a fire in the fireplace was comfortable?

Or is that not pertinent?

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 03:39 PM

I know it is too long, but try reading this. It is about Japan's federal spending which had the same intent as the current US "stimulus package"...even has Geithner in it:


Japan's Big-Works Stimulus Is Lesson

By MARTIN FACKLER
Published: February 5, 2009

HAMADA, Japan — The Hamada Marine Bridge soars majestically over this small fishing harbor, so much larger than the squid boats anchored below that it seems out of place.

And it is not just the bridge. Two decades of generous public works spending have showered this city of 61,000 mostly graying residents with a highway, a two-lane bypass, a university, a prison, a children's art museum, the Sun Village Hamada sports center, a bright red welcome center, a ski resort and an aquarium featuring three ring-blowing Beluga whales.

Nor is this remote port in western Japan unusual. Japan's rural areas have been paved over and filled in with roads, dams and other big infrastructure projects, the legacy of trillions of dollars spent to lift the economy from a severe downturn caused by the bursting of a real estate bubble in the late 1980s. During those nearly two decades, Japan accumulated the largest public debt in the developed world — totaling 180 percent of its $5.5 trillion economy — while failing to generate a convincing recovery.

Now, as the Obama administration embarks on a similar path, proposing to spend more than $820 billion to stimulate the sagging American economy, many economists are taking a fresh look at Japan's troubled experience. While Japan is not exactly comparable to the United States — especially as a late developer with a history of heavy state investment in infrastructure — economists say it can still offer important lessons about the pitfalls, and chances for success, of a stimulus package in an advanced economy.

In a nutshell, Japan's experience suggests that infrastructure spending, while a blunt instrument, can help revive a developed economy, say many economists and one very important American official: Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, who was a young financial attaché in Japan during the collapse and subsequent doldrums. One lesson Mr. Geithner has said he took away from that experience is that spending must come in quick, massive doses, and be continued until recovery takes firm root.

Moreover, it matters what gets built: Japan spent too much on increasingly wasteful roads and bridges, and not enough in areas like education and social services, which studies show deliver more bang for the buck than infrastructure spending.

"It is not enough just to hire workers to dig holes and then fill them in again," said Toshihiro Ihori, an economics professor at the University of Tokyo. "One lesson from Japan is that public works get the best results when they create something useful for the future."

In total, Japan spent $6.3 trillion on construction-related public investment between 1991 and September of last year, according to the Cabinet Office. The spending peaked in 1995 and remained high until the early 2000s, when it was cut amid growing concerns about ballooning budget deficits. More recently, the governing Liberal Democratic Party has increased spending again to revive the economy and the party's own flagging popularity.

In the end, say economists, it was not public works but an expensive cleanup of the debt-ridden banking system, combined with growing exports to China and the United States, that brought a close to Japan's Lost Decade. This has led many to conclude that spending did little more than sink Japan deeply into debt, leaving an enormous tax burden for future generations.

In the United States, it has also led to calls in Congress, particularly by Republicans, not to repeat the errors of Japan's failed economic stimulus. They argue that it makes more sense to cut taxes, and let people decide how to spend their own money, than for the government to decide how to invest public funds. Japan put more emphasis on increased spending than tax cuts during its slump, but ultimately did reduce consumption taxes to encourage consumer spending as well.

Economists tend to divide into two camps on the question of Japan's infrastructure spending: those, many of them Americans like Mr. Geithner, who think it did not go far enough; and those, many of them Japanese, who think it was a colossal waste.

Among ordinary Japanese, the spending is widely disparaged for having turned the nation into a public-works-based welfare state and making regional economies dependent on Tokyo for jobs. Much of the blame has fallen on the Liberal Democratic Party, which has long used government spending to grease rural vote-buying machines that help keep the party in power.

But some Western economists who have studied Japan's experience say the stimulus accomplished more than it is now given credit for. At a minimum, they argue, it saved the economy from an outright, 1930s-style collapse.

Moreover, they say, any direct comparison of Japan and the United States is inevitably misleading, because Japan has spent so much more over the years on infrastructure. Having neglected its roads, bridges, water treatment plants and more over the years, the United States is bound to generate a greater payback for such spending than would Japan.

Beyond that, proponents of Keynesian-style stimulus spending in the United States say that Japan's approach failed to accomplish more not because of waste but because it was never tried wholeheartedly. They argue that instead of making one big push to pump up the economy with economic shock therapy, Japan spread its spending out over several years, diluting the effects.

After years of heavy spending in the first half of the 1990s, economists say, Japan's leaders grew concerned about growing budget deficits and cut back too soon, snuffing out the recovery in its infancy, much as Roosevelt did to the American economy in 1936. Growth that, by 1996, had reached 3 percent was suffocated by premature spending cuts and tax increases, they say. While spending remained high in the late 1990s, Japan never gave the economy another full-fledged push, these economists say.

They also say that the size of Japan's apparently successful stimulus in the early 1990s suggests that the United States will need to spend far more than the current $820 billion to get results. Between 1991 and 1995, Japan spent some $2.1 trillion on public works, in an economy roughly half as large as that of the United States, according to the Cabinet Office. "Stimulus worked in Japan when it was tried," said David Weinstein, a professor of Japanese economics at Columbia University. "Japan's lesson is that, if anything, the current U.S. stimulus will not be enough."

Most Japanese economists have tended to take a bleaker view of their nation's track record, saying that Japan spent more than enough money, but wasted too much of it on roads to nowhere and other unneeded projects.

Dr. Ihori of the University of Tokyo did a survey of public works in the 1990s, concluding that the spending created almost no additional economic growth. Instead of spreading beneficial ripple effects across the economy, he found that the spending actually led to declines in business investment by driving out private investors. He also said job creation was too narrowly focused in the construction industry in rural areas to give much benefit to the overall economy.

He agreed with other critics that the 1990s stimulus failed because too much of it went to roads and bridges, overbuilding this already heavily developed nation. Critics also said decisions on how to spend the money were made behind closed doors by bureaucrats, politicians and the construction industry, and often reflected political considerations more than economic. Dr. Ihori said the United States appeared to be striking a better balance by investing in new energy and information-technology infrastructure as well as replacing aging infrastructure.

Japan's experience also seems to argue for spending heavily to promote social development. A 1998 report by the Japan Institute for Local Government, a nonprofit policy research group, found that every 1 trillion yen, or about $11.2 billion, spent on social services like care for the elderly and monthly pension payments added 1.64 trillion yen in growth. Financing for schools and education delivered an even bigger boost of 1.74 trillion yen, the report found.

But every 1 trillion yen spent on infrastructure projects in the 1990s increased Japan's gross domestic product, a measure of its overall economic size, by only 1.37 trillion yen, mainly by creating jobs and other improvements like reducing travel times.

Economists said the finding suggested that while infrastructure spending may yield strong results for developing nations, creating jobs in higher-paying knowledge-based services like health care and education can bring larger benefits to advanced economies like Japan, with its aging population.

"In hindsight, Japan should have built public works that address the problems it faces today, like aging, energy and food sources," said Takehiko Hobo, a professor emeritus of public finance at Shimane University in Matsue, the main city of Shimane. "This obsession with building roads is a holdover from an earlier era."

The fruits of that obsession are apparent across Shimane, a rural prefecture about the size of Delaware where Hamada is located. Each town seems to have its own art museum, domed athletic center and government-built tourist attraction like the Nima Sand Museum, a giant hourglass in a glass pyramid. The prefecture, with 740,000 residents, even has three commercial airports able to handle jets, including the $250 million Hagi-Iwami Airport, which sits eerily empty with just two flights per day.

In Hamada, residents say the city's most visible "hakomono," the Japanese equivalent of "white elephant," was its own bridge to nowhere, the $70 million Marine Bridge, whose 1,006-foot span sat almost completely devoid of traffic on a recent morning. Built in 1999, the bridge links the city to a small, sparsely populated island already connected by a shorter bridge.

"The bridge? It's a dud," said Masahiro Shimada, 70, a retired city official who was fishing near the port. "Maybe we could use it for bungee jumping," he joked.

Koichi Matsuoka, a retired professor of policy at the University of Shimane in Hamada, said useless projects like the Marine Bridge were the reason that years of huge spending had brought few long-term benefits here. While Shimane has had the highest per capita spending on public works in Japan for the last 18 years, thanks to powerful local politicians like the deceased former Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita, its per capita annual income of $26,000 ranked it 40th among Japan's 47 prefectures, he said. He said the spending had left Shimane $11 billion in debt, twice the size of the prefectural government's annual budget.

Still, local officials in Hamada warn that their city's economy will collapse without public works, though they recognize the spending cannot continue forever. They offered their own lesson to American communities in the Obama era: when you choose public works projects, be sure to get ones with lasting economic impact.

Among Hamada's many public works projects, the biggest benefits had come from the prison, the university and the Aquas aquarium, with its popular whales, they said. These had created hundreds of permanent jobs and attracted students and families with children to live in a city where nearly a third of residents were over 65.

"Roads and bridges are attractive, but they create jobs only during construction," said Shunji Nakamura, chief of the city's industrial policy section. "You need projects with good jobs that will last through a bad economy."

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 03:21 PM

Jan. 23 (Bloomberg) -- John Thain, the former Merrill Lynch & Co. chief executive officer ousted yesterday, spent $1.2 million redecorating his downtown Manhattan office last year as the company was firing employees, a person familiar with the project said.

Thain hired Los Angeles-based decorator Michael Smith, chosen by President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle to redecorate the White House, CNBC reported.

Obama today said the government should give more scrutiny to companies "that have received taxpayer assistance then going out and renovating bathrooms or offices or in other ways not managing those dollars appropriately." He didn't name any companies.

Smith's firm didn't return a phone call for comment. Merrill spokeswoman Selena Morris declined to comment. Margaret Tutwiler, who was Thain's spokeswoman at Merrill, said he wasn't available to comment.

Obama eats $100 a pound steak and turns up the heat in his office so high "you could grow orchids in there" while people freeze to death in Kentucky. Where was FEMA? Why didn't he show up in Kantucky like he did after Katrina for his campaign photo ops?

How long before the Mudcat Awakwning?

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:55 PM

Obamas tax dodging HHS pick:

"Make no mistake, tax cheaters cheat us all, and the IRS should enforce our laws to the letter." Sen. Tom Daschle, Congressional Record, May 7, 1998, p. S4507.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:45 PM

In a state like California, the government would get the whole $1 thous/per capita I proposed. They need that much to save the government from bankruptcy.

In a state like Alaska, the $1thous/per capita would be given entirely to the taxpayers as rebate checks.

Other states that need "some" help to balance the budget (say, speding at last year's level plus 4%) would get that much. The rest would go citizens through state-issued rebate checks.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:34 PM

That's not a bad idea, pdq. However, human nature being what it is... For instance, Alaska is a rich state with huge reserves. But it still is - and has been for many, many years - in there pitcing for their "fair share" of the billions being proffered.

I think it's disgusting. The difference between 'needs' and 'wants' has been lost.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:07 PM

If anyone really wants my suggestions, I say...

Give each and every state as much as they need to pay their current deficits. That will preclude massive lay-offs. Does it seem too simple and logical to keep trained government employees working rather than to lay them off while the Federal fatbutts create a 3.5 million unit "make jobs" program. Nevada only needs about $2.5 billion to keep everything "normal" this year. Major victims of the impending firings are teachers. What's yer problem, Obama.

California needs close to $40 billion to keep things going smoothly this year, but that state has 40 million people!

Figuring that the US government should spend $1 thous. per capita, give that in a cash tax rebate.

Just some ideas. Nobody is paying me millions to fix anything.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 01:46 PM

Thain didn't get criticized for hiring Michael Smith to redecorate his office. He was criticized for spending 1.2 million to redecorate his office. The Obamas are spending $100,000 to redecorate their entire living quarters.

Rumors, lies, and distortions are cheap and easy ways of scoring points, but they are still rumors, lies, and distortions, and they say far more about the people who spread them than they do about those about whom they are being spread.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Amos
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 01:25 PM

Sawz:

The Marine Ones and jets were ordered by the Bush Administration and were delivered, if memory serves, in January.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 01:22 PM

pdq, what do you propose as the solution(s) to our situation? Seriously.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: pdq
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 11:36 AM

It took President Reagan 8 years (1982-90) to raise the US National Debt by 1.6 trillion dollars.

Bill Clinton increased the same debt by similar 1.4 trillion during the 8 years for which he was responsible (1994-2002).

Obama was the driving force behaind the $700 billion "bailout package" and has more proposed. The new "stimulius package" is getting close to 900 billion and growing daily. He says that those who do not want his legislation passed are irresponsible.

Both parts of the "bailout/stimulus package" will totat 1.6 trillion dollars. Since we have "deficit spending" at the Federal level anyway, that 1.6 trillion dollars go directly on to our National Debt.

Great, Obama. You seem to want to top Ronald Reagan's 8 years of deficit spending and do it in a matter of months.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Barry Finn
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:42 AM

Well I must say Obama did make the jesture to reach across the aisle. No one wanted to take his hand. Now it's time to move on with out them.

Goodnight repubs, to put you to sleep

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Sawzaw
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 02:27 AM

America is going broke and Obama gets two new jets, but BOA gets criticized for trading in three small jets and a chopper for a single, more efficient small jet.

Thain gets criticized for hiring Michael Smith to redecorate his office when Michelle Obama hires him to redecorate their personal quarters.

And what did the new Obamamobile cost? Where is the transparency?

Obama's inauguration expenses are likely to be to the tune of over $150 million, overshadowing the $42.3 million spent on George Bush's inauguration in 2005 and $33 million on Bill Clinton's in 1993.

$11 billion for a new 23-ship fleet of Marine ones? Peanuts man, we gotta get this $900B stimulus package rammed through to get those hookers off the streets in Dayton.

Sameold sameold.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: DougR
Date: 06 Feb 09 - 12:41 AM

Obama is in WAY over his head.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 07:54 PM

These people will mumble to anything!

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 06:53 PM

I haven't looked further but surely, that wasn't Obama's prayer>? He is talking to the assembled group, not to a deity.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 05:48 PM

It appears Mr. Obama has belatedly discovered that bipartisanship is not going to work. He seems to have discovered that he is a Democrat and won the election and the Republicans are completely bereft of any ideas but tax cuts. On the job training or what.

Next stop: Israel and the Palestinians may have problems sorting out their difficulties?

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 01:32 PM

The focus has shifted on the "faith based" thing. It now includes secular organizations as well...

Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 01:01 PM

So we have all of these domestic and foreign policy issues, and the top level political leaders are standing around mumbling at their shoes.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 12:09 PM

This is the full text of Obama's prayer. Quite a bit of Niebuhr in it. It's kind of nice. It ain't Gettysburg. It doesn't exactly take the sting out of having a White House office of Faith-based initiatives, but it is something.....


Good morning. I want to thank the Co-Chairs of this
breakfast, Representatives Heath Shuler and Vernon Ehlers.
I'd also like to thank Tony Blair for coming today, as well
as our Vice President, Joe Biden, members of my Cabinet,
members of Congress, clergy, friends, and dignitaries from
across the world.

Michelle and I are honored to join you in prayer this
morning. I know this breakfast has a long history in
Washington, and faith has always been a guiding force in
our family's life, so we feel very much at home and look
forward to keeping this tradition alive during our time
here.   

It's a tradition that I'm told actually began many years
ago in the city of Seattle. It was the height of the Great
Depression, and most people found themselves out of work.
Many fell into poverty. Some lost everything.   

The leaders of the community did all that they could for
those who were suffering in their midst. And then they
decided to do something more: they prayed. It didn't
matter what party or religious affiliation to which they
belonged. They simply gathered one morning as brothers and
sisters to share a meal and talk with God.   

These breakfasts soon sprouted up throughout Seattle, and
quickly spread to cities and towns across America,
eventually making their way to Washington. A short time
after President Eisenhower asked a group of Senators if he
could join their prayer breakfast, it became a national
event. And today, as I see presidents and dignitaries here
- 2 -
from every corner of the globe, it strikes me that this is
one of the rare occasions that still brings much of the
world together in a moment of peace and goodwill.

I raise this history because far too often, we have seen
faith wielded as a tool to divide us from one another – as
an excuse for prejudice and intolerance. Wars have been
waged. Innocents have been slaughtered. For centuries,
entire religions have been persecuted, all in the name of
perceived righteousness.            

There is no doubt that the very nature of faith means that
some of our beliefs will never be the same. We read from
different texts. We follow different edicts. We subscribe
to different accounts of how we came to be here and where
we're going next – and some subscribe to no faith at all.   

But no matter what we choose to believe, let us remember
that there is no religion whose central tenet is hate.
There is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent
human being. This much we know.   

We know too that whatever our differences, there is one law
that binds all great religions together. Jesus told us to
"love thy neighbor as thyself." The Torah commands, "That
which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow." In
Islam, there is a hadith that reads "None of you truly
believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for
himself." And the same is true for Buddhists and Hindus;
for followers of Confucius and for humanists. It is, of
course, the Golden Rule – the call to love one another; to
understand one another; to treat with dignity and respect
those with whom we share a brief moment on this Earth.   

It is an ancient rule; a simple rule; but also one of the
most challenging. For it asks each of us to take some
measure of responsibility for the well-being of people we
may not know or worship with or agree with on every issue.
Sometimes, it asks us to reconcile with bitter enemies or
resolve ancient hatreds. And that requires a living,
breathing, active faith. It requires us not only to
believe, but to do – to give something of ourselves for the
benefit of others and the betterment of our world.   

In this way, the particular faith that motivates each of us
can promote a greater good for all of us. Instead of
driving us apart, our varied beliefs can bring us together
- 3 -
to feed the hungry and comfort the afflicted; to make peace
where there is strife and rebuild what has broken; to lift
up those who have fallen on hard times. This is not only
our call as people of faith, but our duty as citizens of
America, and it will be the purpose of the White House
Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships that
I'm announcing later today.   

The goal of this office will not be to favor one religious
group over another – or even religious groups over secular
groups. It will simply be to work on behalf of those
organizations that want to work on behalf of our
communities, and to do so without blurring the line that
our founders wisely drew between church and state. This
work is important, because whether it's a secular group
advising families facing foreclosure or faith-based groups
providing job-training to those who need work, few are
closer to what's happening on our streets and in our
neighborhoods than these organizations. People trust
them. Communities rely on them. And we will help them.

We will also reach out to leaders and scholars around the
world to foster a more productive and peaceful dialogue on
faith. I don't expect divisions to disappear overnight,
nor do I believe that long-held views and conflicts will
suddenly vanish. But I do believe that if we can talk to
one another openly and honestly, then perhaps old rifts
will start to mend and new partnerships will begin to
emerge. In a world that grows smaller by the day, perhaps
we can begin to crowd out the destructive forces of
zealotry and make room for the healing power of
understanding.   

This is my hope. This is my prayer.   

I believe this good is possible because my faith teaches me
that all is possible, but I also believe because of what I
have seen and what I have lived.   

I was not raised in a particularly religious household. I
had a father who was born a Muslim but became an atheist,
grandparents who were non-practicing Methodists and
Baptists, and a mother who was skeptical of organized
religion, even as she was the kindest, most spiritual
person I've ever known. She was the one who taught me as a
child to love, and to understand, and to do unto others as
I would want done.   
- 4 -

I didn't become a Christian until many years later, when I
moved to the South Side of Chicago after college. It
happened not because of indoctrination or a sudden
revelation, but because I spent month after month working
with church folks who simply wanted to help neighbors who
were down on their luck – no matter what they looked like,
or where they came from, or who they prayed to. It was on
those streets, in those neighborhoods, that I first heard
God's spirit beckon me. It was there that I felt called to
a higher purpose – His purpose.   

In different ways and different forms, it is that spirit
and sense of purpose that drew friends and neighbors to
that first prayer breakfast in Seattle all those years ago,
during another trying time for our nation. It is what led
friends and neighbors from so many faiths and nations here
today. We come to break bread and give thanks and seek
guidance, but also to rededicate ourselves to the mission
of love and service that lies at the heart of all
humanity. As St. Augustine once said, "Pray as though
everything depended on God. Work as though everything
depended on you."   

So let us pray together on this February morning, but let
us also work together in all the days and months ahead.
For it is only through common struggle and common effort,
as brothers and sisters, that we fulfill our highest
purpose as beloved children of God. I ask you to join me
in that effort, and I also ask that you pray for me, for my
family, and for the continued perfection of our union.
Thank you.   

##

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 11:39 AM

You're easily discouraged.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 11:21 AM

Absolutely the most discouraging thing I've seen in a long, long time.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 10:43 AM

"I'm not naive," President Obama says. "I don't expect divisions to disappear overnight, nor do I believe that long-held views and conflicts will suddenly vanish. ... But I do believe that if we can talk to one another openly and honestly, and perhaps allow God's grace to enter that space between us, then perhaps old rifts will start to mend and new partnerships will begin to emerge. In a world that grows smaller by the day, perhaps we can begin to crowd out the destructive forces of zealotry and make room for the healing power of understanding.
"This is my hope. This is my prayer."

February 5 Prayer Breakfast

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 09:19 AM

This morning Obama delivered what I consider to be a few brief remarks that were of Gettysburg Address stature and wisdom.

These remarks were made at the National prayer breakfast.
There was only one incidence of brief light applause.
I am left thinking if the audidnce was stunned, understood what was being said, or did not take in the truth of what was being said.

There will eventually be a transcript that can be posted here or elswhere, and then you may judge for yourselves the historical impact of those few words.

As for me, I heard the expression of all my feelings about religion condensed down to a sparkling gem.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ron Davies
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 11:43 PM

"...these zealots..."

More ignorance about politics. Seems to be a cornucopia of it.

Obviously Obama won't get the support of all Republicans.   But he doesn't need that.   Just a few--like Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, and a few others.   Just to put together a package which cannot successfully be filibustered.

Showing some interest in some people in the other party is big progress. Compare GWB's approach of preaching to the converted--stuff everybody else.

Good thing the originator of the thread has close to zero clout.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Ebbie
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 10:50 PM

You mean politicians don't like freshly baked cookies? :)

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Peter T.
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 03:41 PM

From the NYTimes today, comes this.... (there is a longer piece attached about the Republican guests and their bemusement at all this.....).

Now I am convinced Obama is toast. Does he really think cookies are going to warm up these zealots so as to forgo their idiotic grandstanding crap?


Obama Woos G.O.P. With Attention, and Cookies
By JEFF ZELENY
Published: February 4, 2009
WASHINGTON — Can the shrill tone of Washington be changed through a presidential act of contrition? Or, perhaps, an enticing platter of oatmeal raisin cookies?

This week, President Obama has already served up both at the White House.

To one set of visitors, a gathering of Democratic and Republican members of Congress whom he invited to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday, he carried around the freshly baked cookies as he mingled with his guests.....

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 02:57 AM

Number of days 'Honeymoon' the President should expect?








100

Subject: RE: BS: Obama Honeymoon lasts 3 days
From: Amos
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 01:51 AM

Sawz:

You're simply making false satements, not providing sources, and flapping your oversized mouh, as usual.

What proposition are you making, if any? What facts are you reporting?

Your unreason is beyond dialogue, honestly.


A