Everyone, it's going to be OK: George Knows. - Page 9

I did a quick scan over some articles and it seems to be around a two year lag. Go figure that one out. Pfft.

So there is a lag, lets say it is about a year which would place the peak number of jobs (where job growth began to go south) exactly one year after the recession began. Tax cuts occured in mid-2001 and mid-2002... So one year after mid-2001, and we see the job growth has flatlined which of course is better than going south. One year later it still is flatlined... Tax cuts aren't bringing about job creation. :/
Buisness cycle would actually do better than what this country is doing now. :/ :/
Edit: Even with a 2 year lag, we should have been seeing real job growth since the middle of last year (like back to the normal slope before the slowdown)...

Edit2: In any event, the Bush administration's Economist should know this... why do they keep over predicting the job growth???

keep tat in mind for future arguments. Most economists that I hear or read say growth is happening. What has it been six months (or was it quarters?) of consecutive job growth...

As an aside, I see help wanted signs here everywhere now, which is strange at this point in the season. So it appears that here any way hiring is picking up dramatically.

Is that like "4 out of 5 doctors use Trident?"

How does the saying go? Don't take financial advice from a poor person?

You are so boringly predictable.

Or there is a particularly nasty winter/early spring in the North East?

Jobless recovery is the term. It is like ridding a rail though, a tumble to the wrong side could send our economy reeling back to recession...

One other thing, the economy normally grows at about 150000 jobs per month. A flatline isn't a healthy economy a slow growth say 20000 jobs/month isnt a healthy economy....

And you are so terribly amusing.

Hey, I have a question: have you ever been right about anything? Seriously. Have you?

One last thing:

Bush's tax cuts should have been helping for a while now, and nothing he did helped us out of the recession if the two year lag is true (since it ended in 2001, which would mean Clinton policies made this recession particularly shallow). What the graphs seem to be indicating by the two year "rule" is that everything Bush has done in office has had absolutely no positive effect and only deliterious if comparing to normal economic growth times.

yeah, my first impression of you was right, If you forget search my posts for what it was. So far most I have talked with agree.

he is right wing...that's something

Yeah, you really poked holes in my "theories" there. So what are you then if you're not a Rep? I mean, you could have fooled me the way you jumped into the discussion to defend SDW and to attack "liberals". In fact you kept mentioning "liberals" time and time again like it's an obsession.
I'm tempted not to disagree with you on that one.
Funny. What I hear and read is more along the lines of the Democratic party moving to the right if anything.In fact I've heard and read the "Bush lite" adjective thrown around quite a bit.Haven't you?
In your usual oversimplification of arguments everyone who disagrees with you is branded a 'liberal" which you seem to equate to being a Dem.So you're saying all Dems are "liberals"? The way you have used the word "liberal" in a demeaning way in past posts, a-la Limbaugh kinda hurts your credibility. Which class are you referring to by the way? Your Pat Robertson class?

I skipped over it? That's funny considering I actually QUOTED it ANDcommented on it. Hint hint...check the last quote of the original post. Maybe you should work on those reading skills? Too funny.

lol Good one. Been taking drama lessons or something? Come on, don't be so sensitive Naples, you're breaking my heart there. Not that I care one bit, but maybe you should read your own posts again. Seems that what you're accusing me and others of, is something you do quite well. Spin at will!

http://www.gallup.com/content/Default.asp?ci=10942&pg=1

Check out the Gallup!

Giddy-up.

It's funny how Naples can criticize the chart... without what it is addressing. (Krugman did not create the data it is from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Economic Reports of the President, 2002, 2003 and 2004.)

Bush says "my tax cuts will create X many jobs" he gets the tax cut and.... tadaaa... nothin'.

"we need more tax cuts! and we'll really stimulate the economy and create more jobs!" he gets it and... wahoooo! Nothin'. No Bounce... not big jobs spurt... naaadaaaa.

So guess what Bush is saying now... "Make my tax cuts permanent and..." Except those permanent cuts won't even kick in for about what? I think its 5 or 10 years... so how is that going to create more jobs THIS YEAR?

It won't, that's why he's already ran away from his 2.6 million jobs prediction.

Oh, come on chu_bakka. We had a very healthy 21,000 new jobs last month. Two point six million is just around the corner. At that rate we'll be there by 2014, so take that!

hehe yeah that's true... 21,000 new GOVERNMENT created jobs... maybe Bush is a socialist and we have him all wrong.

Geez! Will you as teacher learn to READ!

Show me where I said Bush caused the recession!

Also I explained how Clinton turned the economic upswing of the cycle into a really stellar bull market.

If you're going to complain about what I've said take your Bush blinders off and learn to read!

Fact: There are more people employed in the US today than in January 2001. We have NOT lost 2,000,000 jobs. Go look up the number at the BLS. 2,000,000 jobs? Well yes....it's about 2,000,000 GAINED.

And really...as far as economic policies go: There is no disputing that the recession at least got its start BEFORE Clinton left office. There is no possible way, billybobsky, that you can say "Clinton's policies made the recession less severe". That's utterly nuts.

We started coming out of recession at the end of 2002 and beginning of 2003. By then, Bush's policies had time to take effect along with the natural business cycle. Cutting taxes works. It always has. It worked for Kennedy. It worked for Reagan, It worked for Bush.

And giant, I'll thank you in advance for not including the content of private messages in public postings. That's really inappropriate. As for the issue at hand, I'll give you the one regarding about Representative who made the comment you mentioned. He was obviously very wrong to say that. However, I don't see Republicans in general making those kinds of references. A lot of the things you posted in your private message (which I won't quote, because it was....wait for it...PRIVATE) are terms used in jest and you know that very well.

That's something you should cite so others could confirm.

Any of those added jobs part of Bush's new "hey! Let's give illegal immigrants legal work status!" program?

N. Gregory Mankiw is an/the economic advisor to the president.

He held the same "post" in the Clinton administration.


I would advise all here to rewatch the Simpsons episode when aliens take over Bob Dole and Bill Clinton's bodies during the '96 elections.

Do any of you REALLY think that you can shift the course of a gargantuan buracracy with the window dressing of one Chief Executive?

Look, I think you are wasting both of our time here, trying to label me as a liberal hater, I am not. I am simply pointing out how divisive the "Democrat" talking points are. That is the way I see it. Apparently you see it different. That is OK though, because we are all allowed our opinions.

When I said you skipped I meant contextually, You broke my whole comment into small pieces and then used my words against me, when in context of the whole comment the entire argument is clear.

I did not contradict myself. I corrected your misrepresentation of my original post and intent. If you read the post contextually, you would understand that and discontinue your attempts at labeling me. That is, if you were actually interested in civil discourse.

I worded my post fairly carefully and indicated that I was talking about the "Democratic Party" in general, not just you. I was hoping, maybe I was misguided in that, that you would have figured that I was implying that you are falling in, lock step with them. Did I overestimate you? Or are you here to argue, just for the sake of arguing, or are you trying to impress someone by your superior analytical prowess or is it for another reason?

I am not sure, but I know this, you are not seeking any kind of compromise or any common basis for discussion. If you were, you would turn down the angry tone and rhetoric and stop marginalizing everyone that says something that is different from your view. How do you learn anything with that approach? This is a discussion forum, not an "Argument Forum".

Both sides seem to do it when arguments get heated, but I see the left, at least here seems to start off hateful. The title of this thread shows that clearly.

I don't understand the mentality of people that seem to need groups of like minded people that also need confirmation. I personally try to steer clear of those kinds of things. That's me. Maybe I'm unique.

Wether you like it or not, without SDW or myself interjecting, this would have been a democratic "I hate Bush" -fest. Now I want you all to know that if I happened across a group of people relentlessly attacking you, I would jump in and help you fend them off. I saw that going on here, so I felt compelled to comment.

I don't think Bush is perfect, however I also don't think he is as bad as the extremists that frequent these forums do either. As a matter of fact, SDW seems to feel the same way, so I don't think we are the neo-cons that you try to label us. So why don't we all relax and try to make some sense out this crazy world together, what do ya say?

That's actually a very good point. Two things:

1) The Bush admin has a habit of NOT LISTENING to their advisors. See the Esquire profile of DeIulio (who was later forced to recant his LONG comments about the inner workings of this admin's "policymaking"--which he says doesn't exist.

2) Before Bush, before 9/11, before this particularly combative generation of conservatives took control of the government, I'd have agreed that the president is window dressing. But this admin seems to have done what few before them have been able to do.

I really do. You have to remember that Bush is one person, but his administration is a lot larger. And yeah, administrations generally "shift the course" of things. That's what they do.

You do realize that saying the opposition is being divisive is a way of being divisive without seeming to be so, right? Riiiight?

The economy has created 2,000,000 jobs...

but you fail to recognize the number of NEW people entering the job market. So what every measly gains over the last 3+ years have been... it's not nearly the rate it should be. So with layoffs and high school and college grads entering the workforce... it's easy to see where the 3 million in job losses comes from.

Do you think everyone is making the JOBLESS RECOVERY up?

The outsourcing of jobs to india and asia is massive...

Or are any of the jobs hamburger " manufacturing "?

I forgot about that!!

Not sure that is true but we should be gaining roughly 1.8 M PER YEAR given prior trends...


Certainly I can claim that since it is well accepted (evidently) even by you who have claimed that it takes three years for the economy to respond to changes at the top. That means since Bush only came into office in early 2001 there is no way in hell his tax cuts in mid-2001 were working one year later ending the recession. It is simple logic that the system had to have been in place from the Clinton administration to make this recession shallow. Or it could be completely unrelated, but you can't legitimately claim that Bush was successful at stopping the recession early because we should have seen normal job growth by this point... Recessions are a part of the normal business cycle, so blaming them on a president actually makes no sense, the rapidity of a recovery is dependent on the president and we are not recovering at even a decent clip some 2.7 years after these supposedly wonderful tax cuts.

DMZ you are a wize man IMO.

You bring up an excellent point. I have tried to go down this road several times before with no luck. Let me expand:

Let me preface this with the fact that I think there should be term limits for congress. I mean Sen. Kennedy, need I say more?

A president has a lot to battle with to make any kind of progress at all. He/she has to win support of a whole range of people from all parties. Being too rigid will get him/her nothing. The president needs to provide leadership so that everyone will follow his lead or at least consider going along. Compromises are made on all sides, including the president. (This is precisely why the whole "Bush lied" theory does not fly. IMO) This is how washington works. I think we all know that. That bureaucracy will be there long after bush and/or kerry are gone.

I think Massachusetts is quite happy with the service of Kennedy and Kerry...

That's why they keep getting re-elected.

How long were Helms and Thurmond in office? I would have loved for them to have gotten tossed out DECADES ago... but those states saw fit to keep them around.

I'd take Kennedy over Helms anyday,

How, exactly, are we supposed to compromise on the question of whether the Bush administration deliberately mis-represented the intelligence about Iraq in order to lead the country to a war that it believed to be crucial to US interests in the region, and a war which has, so far, resulted in at LEAST 500 US casualties?

How do we compromise on this, again?

If you actually beleave what you say here, then let's get of Bush's back, he is doing what he can to help. Let's drop it as a talking point. I agree with you that it is just normal cyclic movement of the economy. So let's move on.

Tenet was up on the hill testifying today about intelligence and how the administration used it.

some real golden nuggets in there... this is just a portion of the article.

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/8145154.htm

But under sharp questioning by Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., Tenet reversed himself, saying there had been instances when he had warned administration officials that they were misstating the threat posed by Iraq.

"I'm not going to sit here and tell you what my interaction was ... and what I did and didn't do, except that you have to have confidence to know that when I believed that somebody was misconstruing intelligence, I said something about it," Tenet said. "I don't stand up publicly and do it."

Tenet admitted to Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the committee's senior Democrat, that he had told Cheney that the vice president was wrong in saying that two truck trailers recovered in Iraq were "conclusive evidence" that Saddam had a biological weapons program.

Cheney made the assertion in a Jan. 22 interview with National Public Radio.

Tenet said that U.S. intelligence agencies still disagree on the purpose of the trailers. Some analysts believe they were mobile biological-weapons facilities; others think they may have been for making hydrogen gas for weather balloons.

Levin also questioned Tenet about a Jan. 9 interview with the Rocky Mountain News, in which Cheney cited a November article in the Weekly Standard, a conservative magazine, as "the best source of information" on cooperation between Saddam and al-Qaida.

The article was based on a leaked top-secret memorandum. It purportedly set out evidence, compiled by a special Pentagon intelligence cell, that Saddam was in league with al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. It was written by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith, the third-highest Pentagon official and a key proponent of the war.

"Did the CIA agree with the contents of the Feith document?" asked Levin.

"Senator, we did not clear the document," replied Tenet. "We did not agree with the way the data was characterized in that document."

Tenet, who pointed out that the Pentagon, too, had disavowed the document, said he learned of the article Monday night, and he planned to speak with Cheney about the CIA's view of the Feith document.

...

Yup. Kennedy is doing a fine job.

The whole linear nature of time really isn't all that complex. You know, the single dimension thing.

It's so sad how far in denial you are. Hell, I have literally thousands of examples of hitler comparisons to dems and liberals.

It's a copyright issue, and under fair use I can publish a brief quote so long as it is non-commercial and correct attribution is given. And there are extra points for using it in the context of a relevant discussion, academic or journalistic work. It's not personal information so your privacy has not been violated.

Furthermore, maybe you didn't notice, but PMs on AI are inherently NOT PRIVATE. There's a big ol' button on the bottom that say "Forward to Buddies." What do you suppose that might be for?

But I have a solution for you: don't harass me through PMs

Politics is a hyped up version of the old high school popularity contest. Bush has to "sell" every measure or action he puts forth. The fact that he may have put more emphasis on some fact over others, or mentioned things that seemed to support his argument is an indictment of the bureaucracy and not of Bush. Wether he did this or not is what you seem to want to argue, I ask why would the president even have "sell" such important things in such a way. Some new blood in congress would be an extremely good thing.

You will never get the "Bush lied" thing to get any traction. Too many of the people that embraced the war are the same ones making that outrageous claim now. If he lied they did too. It really is that simple.

It's really not that simple... but keep thinking that.

More jobs analysis. But more related to re-election chances.

On pure jobs performance... G Dub is in the worst shape of the last 4.

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/commen...ential_jo.html

No. It's not. Politics is a vision of the way the world ought to work, and sometimes, like now, the stakes are high. While this may be a game for all of us on this board, it's hardly so for your someone who's lost a manufacturing job in Pennsylvania or a tech support job to someone in India. It's hardly a popularity contest for the kids in Iraq right now. Bush has a vision of the way the world ought to work; I disagree.


Are you really trying to argue that if he lied, it's not his fault?


It's not what I "seem to want to argue." It's the CRUX of the thing. Either he lied or he didn't. It's that simple. Why would he have to "sell" this? Because he was trying to yoke together an apple (9/11) and an orange (Iraq), and no one bought it until they got months and months of headlines and carefully placed phrases so that 9/11 became synonymous with Iraq in their minds.


I agree only insofar as I do not like it when one political party dominates all three branches of government.


You'd better not watch him get questioned, then. I hate to tell you this, but it's already GOT traction.


So your argument is that even if he lied, he wasn't alone? Everyone else was doing it? They were all misled by the evil CIA? Take others down with him, that's the argument? Or is your argument that it's not his fault?

No, sir. If Bush lied, the implications are staggering, since there are indications that the he politicized the intelligence itself. Everything he touched was tainted.

If he lied, he fries all by himself.

And this hasn't even begun yet.

My God, here we go again. Get it out of your system: Disagreeing with Bush DOES NOT equal hating him.I think that's being a bit extremist. By the way, I don't think anyone was "attacking" SDW. Stop jumping to extremes. I also think he's old enough to "defend" himself.

You were doing so well up to this point but you had to go back to labeling people with differing opinions "liberals"(a word you love to use in an uncomplimentary and demeaning manner) and "extremists". Pot, meet the kettle.
Completely unrelated. You and SDW both sound the same. I know you just said that Bush isn't perfect, but the way you defend him and his admin. at all costs proves otherwise. About the neocon label....if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...So are you gonna answer the question? If you're neither a Dem or Rep, what are you? I have the dramamine ready.

Both these points are nothing more than your personal opinion and cannot be substantiated by any facts whatsoever.

What am I "in denial" of exactly? The fact is that there are not masses of Republicans in the streets carrying "Kerry=Hitler" signs. There aren't widely known conservative outlets that equate to Moveon.org which post ads comparing Kerry to Hitler. They just don't exist. I'm not talking about obscure right wing fanatics here...I'm talking about the mainstream. MAINSTREAM Democrats have made unreasonable and outrageous attacks on the President. You cannot deny this.

As for PM's: I was trying to keep the conversation appropriately private. Conflicts like that should be solved off the board. But since you won't do that, we'll solve it your way. You don't argue facts and opinion, you argue your opponent's intelligence. Comments like "do a google search, genius" have no place here. That's a direct violation of the posting guidelines.....