weaktwos | (no subject)

(no subject)

Check your economic data today, folks. The numbers just came in for September. The increase in jobs is not keeping up with population growth. We're still a million jobs shy from when Bush stepped into office.

Yeah, those tax cuts were worth it. Poor job market and hideous debt, both in the government and the average household. Mmm, good.

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I'm not arguing here (ok, in a philosophy class sort of way I am...) but this whole job/economy thing - you think this is strictly due to Bush's poor management/budgeting skills? None of it had anything to do with a massive terrorist attack on our country? Throw me a bone. How much of it is Bush's fault, and how much of it is due to a terrorist attack - and lets not start in that the terrorist attack was his fault too. I'm willing to bet it would have happened on anyone's watch, simply because up until that very second, despite what anyone said after the fact (remember, people can (and polititians often do) *say* anything) no one really expected a terrorist attack on americans on american soil.

Afghanistan was about the terrorist attack. The rest of it was about as incompetent as you can get. He doesn't finish the job in Afghanistan. They still aren't very stable, and then we start a War with Iraq, with incomplete information. Then Bush wants to continue cutting taxes while he's ramping up spending--necessary spending for our military--but given that we are in a bit of an economical slump, we're pouring billions in aid to other countries. We should have focussed on Afghanistan and left Iraq alone. Now we have two unstable nations, and a world that is pissed off with us. Iraq created a lot more problems for us than it has solved. And that is Bush's fault.

True, 9/11 could have happened to anyone, but smart leadership was key. Instead we got religious neocon zealots trying to build nations.

That's very part line of you. You still didn't answer my question. You said we went to afganistan because of the attack, I know that. I wanted to know how much of the job loss was directly related to the economic downturn that was taken as a direct result of 9/11, not because of any mistakes mad since. Around here, we call that "dodging the question". You may have a valid point, but you still didn't answer my question. This same habit is what makes me hate every politian that's running for any major (national) office right now, and most local politians.

Hell, I don't know precisely how much of the economy was effected by 9/11, per se. But I can tell you if we didn't invade Iraq, we would shave 200 billion off our deficit. That's fairly obvious. And when a president continues to favor the very wealthy taxwise when we have increased financial obligations by virtue of trying to play "let's build nations!" in Afghanistan and Iraq, that doesn't work well for us.

Some of the economic downturn was cyclical and due to the dot-bomb. Under Bush's leadership, however, we've diverted billions of dollars outside of this country. If we didn't invade Iraq, that would save 200 billion dollars when all is said and done. The impact of 9/11 cannot be ignored. Increased costs of doing business have not yet been fully realized. Diving head first into Iraq takes 200 billion dollars are sends it out from our country. Granted, some of it is going to Hallilburton, but they employ a lot of foreign workers, as well. And my main point, outside of 9/11, is that despite the optimistic estimates given, the economy isn't responding the way Bush believes it would: that easing up on taxes on the rich is better for the economy as a whole. Energy, security, and defense companies are having fantastic profits, but yet the middle class is shrinking, and more people are falling below the poverty level. Our military is being tapped, including our reserve forces. I think someone else could do better, honestly.

Do you have a citation for this? I would love to post it, but I want to have a link to direct people to.

I was working off this article: http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/10/08/jobs_numbers/index.html by UT Austin's James K. Galbraith. And James is a liberal economist, so take that as you wish.

That's a subscription site, though, but general news article can be found here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,1323224,00.html

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(no subject)

seriously...

Here's your bone!

Re: Here's your bone!

Re: Here's your bone!

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