That’s a lot of muck to swim in.

Please tell me this is some kind of joke.

No the obama team has come to the conclusion that the only way to get gooper votes is to buy them…. seems like business as usual.

Please tell me this is some kind of joke.

It is all over the idjit box this morning and, if it becomes fact vs. gossip/spin, progressives have been well and truly forked!

What’s your beverage of choice?

ALL PRAVDA USA -style…..puke

It’s being “bi-partisan” you know. Or would that be “post partisan”? Or anti partisan. Or something, something partisan which means NO CHANGE?

Good morning, BT.

Obama Eyes $300 Billion Tax Cut

A joke indeed.

The size of the proposed tax cuts — which would account for about 40% of a stimulus package that could reach $775 billion over two years — is greater than many on both sides of the aisle in Congress had anticipated.

This needs to be viewed in conjunction with Krugman’s editorial this morning:

Fighting Off Depression

Wherein our Nobel Prize winning economist states,

Here’s my nightmare scenario: It takes Congress months to pass a stimulus plan, and the legislation that actually emerges is too cautious. As a result, the economy plunges for most of 2009, and when the plan finally starts to kick in, it’s only enough to slow the descent, not stop it. Meanwhile, deflation is setting in, while businesses and consumers start to base their spending plans on the expectation of a permanently depressed economy — well, you can see where this is going.

A president too weak and timid to fight for anything at all is not exactly what we need at this critical juncture.

Harry Smith, whom I like to watch, told Bob Schieffer how he enjoyed the Dick interview…..Lies we love, I guess.

I haven’t seen the story but giving some pork to moderate GOPers to get things passed is ok provided that Obama does not water down his ideas.
If he waters down his ideas then we get Hoover type plans instead of FDR stimulus in which case yes the Dow will crash first, then the dollar then mass layoffs.
Don’t stand below any buildings on Wallstreet.

What happened to that patriotic to pay taxes thing?
363 hrs & 49 min

A president too weak and timid to fight for anything at all is not exactly what we need at this critical juncture.

You got that right

tax cuts tax cuts
this is nauseating.

You can join me in a toast in 363 hours. I will be doing the champagne thing.

Sometimes it is necessary to take a look back at where we’ve been.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWiXy55OHyY
363 hrs & 46 min

Holy Crap the Dollar will drop like a stone unless we get a stimulus package that puts people to work quick.
FDR raised taxes during the Great Depression interest rates might take longer but they will go up huge!
Where is Ian this is the kind of nightmare he is good at explaining.

Is Obama even going to cut military spending or will he cut social security like the GOP wants?

some pork

Unfortunately, the way it’s sounding right now, it’s a whole bloody hell of a lot more than *some*. :-((( Early days yet and I’m trying to maintain some degree of optimism……

at this rate, he’ll privatize social security

Is this a rumor? Maybe another GOP/Rahm, leak/trial balloon attempt to box Obama in?
I don’t see any economics adviser backing this except Chicago School Hacks this must be a political deal.

*G* Reminds me of election night when I took a sudden notion to call one of my veddy progressive cousins; she’d been thinking of my reaction at the same time and it was almost like we were sharing a virtual bottle of bubbly.

Gotta get ready to run a stack of errands that have been piling up; catch up with y’all later.

I remember back during the campaign when Obama was selecting his economic advisers and it became apparent that most, if not all, of them would be of the school of thought that got us into this mess in the first place. Given Obama’s apparent unwillingness to stand up for his supposed “beliefs” and “principles” I’m very afraid that Krugman’s worst-case scenario (or worse) will be realized. I think this is very, very bad news.

Someone yesterday mentioned that Virginia govenator Kaine is anti-choice, anti-gay and anti-stem cell research. Just the guy we need to run the D Party.

Gov Dean, would you be interested in forming a Progressive Party for the rest of us?

Could one say that the concept of a stimulus package is pork for all?
363 hrs & 37 min

Pouring all that money into the market will juice it temporarily if that happens I’ll wait for the bounce and then sell.
Without real numbers from the banks and hedgefunds we risk another imaginary bubble.
The SEC couldn’t catch that Ponzai scheme guy rich folks with money manager experts got took that means the average guy has no chance.

SD, I missed yesterday. Are you kidding?

Don’t know which is why I used terms like spin and gossip….it’s a new guy in town so it’s hard to gauge how he will use the media machine (or if he *is* able to).

These rumors turn out to be true it will be worse I’m sure Krugman never expected this!

Unfortunately, no. I’ll go back through the threads to try to find the piece.

Smith has been a chief WATERCARRIER/TOOL these past 8 years,,,5,000,000.00 salary and bonus is so worth the knobpolishing

This feels like Rahm I’m hoping its fake.

oy,well that will fix Wall Street….harumph

Obama promised a middle class tax cut. Although tax cuts for companies developing green energy would be okay, imo. I’m in a wait and see mode but after listening to Reid yesterday on Meet The Press, I’m not hopeful.

With regard to the Richardson thing - is this part of the USA firing thing?
They got rid of a dedicated prosecutor because he wouldn’t go after dems. Is that manuever now bearing fruit for the rethugs?
383 hrs & 27 min

i read this a few weks ago
INVESTORS pull out of Mutual Fundds

http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....nds07.html

gotta mattress?

It will cause another bubble like when Greenspan lowered interest rates short term at best a few good years.
Long term we will be worse than we are now.
Only the bubble will be in Wallstreet they will lose money and take down the entire market just like they did to housing.
Social Security though is popular there will be riots and poverty.

all depends on who he targets

Selling all the gold in Fort Knox would be a better plan that gold is just sitting there doing nothing.

I can’t find it now. That description was a link, too. Damn. Should have followed up on it when I had the chance. I’ll dig it up later.

im gonna scream now
WALL STREET IS COMPLETELY IRRETRIEVABLY CORRUPT ,,,period
rant over

But creating another bubble would cost them…well WallStreet is stupid as well as corrupt they have been buying the Chicago School spiel for years:(

Don’t expect any recovery to last beyond the 100 days of good will and hope that comes with a new administration.

Obi has the actual criminals on board to direct the recovery who created the disaster and are true believers in fractional banking, credit driven economies and asset bubble for wealth creation.

The first $700BB went straight to the accounts of the criminals who out the accelerant on the downward spiral of the economy.

Real unemployment in the USA is in excess of 20% (U6) not the reported BS of umemployment claims (U3), U3 was created to give the illusion of less unemployment.

With the team of criminals on board O is gonna finish off what W started. Bank on it.

somebody here said,i forgot who,tht rhe 700BILLION represented 23,000$ to every man woman and child…give that money to each individual THEY WOULD SPEND IT …poof no more depression…give it to WALL STREET FAT CATS…it dissapears to Cayman,and Chanel islands

Many thanks…have a good day. Cold and wet here, so is going to take a big push to get me outta here. Cheers.

Conservatism is rationalizing greed and short term profits/thinking.

Ha, found it. It’s over at C & L. Post by Nicole Belle, just below the Late Night post yesterday.

Wall Street is nothing more than trading bubble created assets. No bubbles - no trades - no wall street.

Robert Rubin is a smarmy miscreant imo

The trouble with tax cuts in a debt-ridden economy such as ours is that the money doled out to both businesses and individuals is likely to be used to rectify sick balance sheets rather than spent. This is why Krugman and others believe that the only way to truly stimulate our economy is public spending on public works. This would actually put people to work and creates a common public good. If 40% of the stimulus is expended on tax cuts, we’re going to be in deep doodoo.

ill up you one,cold ,wet…….FOG…….G

‘

think that’s off by factor of 10.

Decided I’m gonna try to get to work when I’m supposed to this year. Yeah, I know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Off to swim in the great (bwahahahahahahahaha) cesspool.

Be good to yourselves, and all other living things.

Namaste

What about the toxic assets? Why are they still hidden? What crimes lay in those bank vaults.. Mr Rubin?

This is the site you want to read about the economic madness we are facing:

http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/

AND COMPLETE SPECULATION AND rumor…used to do a lot of trading 8 years worth

There will be no bounce if these rumors are true. China Japan someone will refuse to buy T-Bills and then everyone will rush to the exists.
Hopefully Obama would back pedal then.
I’m still hoping for an FDR stimulus.
Maybe Obama is leaking this to show the GOP just how unpopular their plan is???
Because this is their plan no Dem Presidential candidate or politician was calling for this that I know of.

agree. but is there any source for this other than the wsj? could they be wrong?

thanks,werent my calculations,,,but still i trust the average person on the street far more than PaulsonsPugs

Booyah!!! I’m in!

The only hope with Obi is that he is a great poker player and has a very good hand to play when his turn comes.

But it’s not looking that good from this side of the table right now.

Off to the salt mines.

NYT is reporting it too, Selise:

Obama Plan Includes $300 Billion in Tax Cuts

LA Times has it too and judging from Google news, it seems to be pretty widely reported this morning. :-(

thanks. should have checked for myself. plead the necessity of making coffee. from your nyt link:

Although some tax cuts were always expected to be included in Mr. Obama’s economic package, his team disclosed the scope and some details of the plans on Sunday at a time when Republicans have begun voicing criticism of what they describe as an open-checkbook approach to spending. By focusing more attention on the tax cuts in the plan, Obama aides hope to frame it as a balanced, pragmatic approach.

Mr. Obama will use his public events this week to promise what one adviser called “radical reforms” to impose more control over the regular federal budget down the road. Among other areas, the president-elect will focus on changing Pentagon contracting and aid to corporate America, advisers said. He will also designate a chief performance officer and a chief technology officer on Wednesday to help make government more efficient, they said.

Still, Democratic leaders in Congress acknowledged that the economic package would not be ready for Mr. Obama’s signature immediately after his inauguration on Jan. 20, as they once hoped.

“It’s going to be very difficult to get the package put together that early so that it can have sufficient time to be reviewed, and then sufficient time to be debated and passed,” Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the House majority leader, said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Mr. Hoyer said a more likely goal would be mid-February before Congress leaves on a Presidents’ Day recess. “We certainly want to see this package passed through the House of Representatives no later than the end of this month, get it over to the Senate, and have it to the president before we break for the presidential break,” Mr. Hoyer said.

Jane, Christy, whoever. Can we get Gov Dean here and talk to him? We need to grab the bull by the horns and get some shit changed in our country. The fuckin’ Dems ain’t cuttin’ it.

Would it do any good at all to bombard the change.gov website with our objections?

Thought you were going to work? LOL.

LOL. I am but this Kaine from VA thing is drivin’ me up a wall.

Sayeth Krugman:

I’m the same. Should have left a half hour ago.

worth a read: Obama’s not so efficient stimulus plan from rebecca wilder at RGE monitor.

Thanks for this msmolly. Krugman has said this before too:

That said, there’s a problem with a public-investment-only stimulus plan, namely timing. We need stimulus fast, and there’s a limited supply of “shovel-ready” projects that can be started soon enough to deliver an economic boost any time soon.

and, frankly, I had forgotten about that aspect.

SEC Probed Madoff 8 Times, Came Up Empty

http://www.newser.com/story/47.....empty.html

Parting shot.

Dems = Snake Farm

hey you,how are the tigres?

The sky may or may not be falling.
I’ve never been the leader of the Obamaniacs wagontrain, but it seems to me that all has not been set into motion yet. Not being an economist, I don’t know, but personally I’d rather have a stimulated economy Before I get my tax cuts, household stimulation. Then, I could make better use of my money.

From Wilder,

I understand that investment in capital equals economic growth (anybody who has heard of Robert Solow would know this), but the economic growth path is based on technical innovation, i.e. productivity gains. And if long-term growth is the name of the game, why focus on inefficient domestic construction efforts?

Why? Because people our out of work, losing their homes, and the situations gets worse and worse every day. I certainly agree that we need to think about the long term as well, but given the desperate nature of our current condition, I think we need to do something about the short term as well.

I’m outta here. Will try to catch up with this later. Good morning, all.

my concern is not with construction projects per se - it’s with what the construction projects are (personally i’d like to see a big k-12 school building project to lower class size to 15-18). puts a safet net under construction jobs and makes it possible to hire a lot of new teachers. and invests in the future (via human capital of our nation’s children).

Some of my conservative friends keep bringing up the argument that it will be unfair for the government to help people who signed mortgages they couldn’t pay for, when others have to continue to honor their contracts and pay the mortgages they signed. I tell them that we are in very deep shit and need to do what we need to do to try to crawl out of it. Then we can go back to keeping neat little right/wrong, good/bad, books on each other. Now it looks like some of us are doing the same thing. I personally favored Obama as a pragmatist, following eight years of ideology. He needs to do what he needs to do, and I’ll judge him when I can tell how it’s turning out.

REQUIRED VIEWING in order to discern reality - in context:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded

overcome the propaganda.

I only skimmed the wsj article but there are apparently tax cuts aimed at fast-tracking what would have been future non-Bush write-offs for businesses to 2009 and tax cuts for businesses that KEEP workers on and INVEST in their own operations in 2009. This makes sense to my uninformed and ill-schooled mind ~ this seems to be moving pieces of the puzzle around where they are most needed. If this is Obamanomics in action, I’m not offended. It sounds like a powerful move. If there are going to be ”tax cuts” I’d also like to see what Obama does about off-shore tax evasion and other enforcement at the same time. He could probably cut some taxes AND still take in more than Bush was if he picked up a portion of the taxes being evaded by better and fairer management. He’d get the Rs onboard AND make taxation ”more progressive.”

Some of my conservative friends keep bringing up the argument that it will be unfair for the government to help people who signed mortgages they couldn’t pay for, when others have to continue to honor their contracts and pay the mortgages they signed. I tell them that we are in very deep shit and need to do what we need to do to try to crawl out of it. Then we can go back to keeping neat little right/wrong, good/bad, books on each other.

That’s a pretty good way to put it. I’d only add that we should differentiate between people who bought second homes they aren’t living in and those who really really need help with a mortgage on the house they’re living in. Cost to government for people thrown out on the street is probably much higher than cost to fixing a stupid mortgage. And, for people who really thought they were getting a home to live in for the long term there is every reason to believe they had some ability to pay for a decent mortgage. We ought to help them get there.