Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

[Kepler]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Also, the issue space that parties occupy morphs over time, so it's not just that there are few data points, but as you increase the time interval the states being compared lose coherence.

The prophetic rule of American politics is: when times are good incumbents do better than when times are bad. As revelations go, disappointing.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Simply put, the data sample is too small if you limit it to 1976-2008.

And yet, you're completely willing to believe your 2-sample model of 90s:good, 00s: bad, and therefore the Democrats* are clearly superior when it comes to running the economy.

My "model" is tongue in cheek, and really was just intended to prove the exact point that you've just articulated. The economy follows much longer trends than Presidential and midterm elections, and neither party is a silver bullet that will fix it, despite what you or Plante26 say.

*read: a Democratic President.

 

[amherstblackbear]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

The natural tendency of the country is to elect a Republican President, and only when times are bad are we desperate enough to try something else and/or send a message.

Good Lord, you took Rover to task for curve-fitting?

Mainstream political science couldn't solve a mystery if the fate of the world required it, but it's pretty okay at stuff like this. There's a world of research out there on prospective/retrospective voting, both U.S.-centric and cross-national, and it's only a scholar.google search away.

edit:

checks batteries in sarcasm detector....

 

[Plante26]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Lynah - Who is Bush III? Do you know something we don't? Anyway, your theory is also dumb as Bush II inherited a stellar budget and blew a hole in it. Again a fact you righties try desperately to cover up.

Plante - Obama has been in office a little over a year. Lets give it some time, shall we, as it took your boy Bush 8 years to destroy the economy.

The economy when Bush took over was entering a recession, one which was magnified by 9/11. The Clinton budget was all smoke and mirrors in that he kicked the can down the road on numerous issues. In fact, the Clinton Administration was borrowing money to create those surpluses. Which is a fact you libs try DESPERATELY to cover up.

Anyhow, I was only applying your broken logic to the sitting president. In essence, your flawed course of reasoning says, "I'm so very smart when I get to decide what we are and are not talking about."

 

[Rover]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

And yet, you're completely willing to believe your 2-sample model of 90s:good, 00s: bad, and therefore the Democrats* are clearly superior when it comes to running the economy.

My "model" is tongue in cheek, and really was just intended to prove the exact point that you've just articulated. The economy follows much longer trends than Presidential and midterm elections, and neither party is a silver bullet that will fix it, despite what you or Plante26 say.

*read: a Democratic President.

Lynah, are you in favor of balanced budgets or not? Because if you are, then 90's=good and 00's=bad. That's the starting point of the discussion. Now, why were the 90's good and the 00's bad, in terms of budgets? Both had recessions and up times. However, only a total idiot would say that the policies pursued in the 90s were similar to the ones pursued in the 2000's, but they produced a vastly different result. If you do believe that, please let me know and I'll know how to categorize you for my purposes.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

However, only a total idiot would say that the policies pursued in the 90s were similar to the ones pursued in the 2000's, but they produced a vastly different result.

Let's assume for a moment that I am an idiot (I know, I know - not that big of a stretch! ). Could you please explain to me these radical policy changes that Clinton enacted that resulted in the surging economy? And please, extra attention on the latter half of the 90s, during the few years when the budgets were balanced. What, exactly, did Clinton do?

 

[huskyfan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

IMHO. the seventies were a time (something like now) - bad bad economy, mired in war. we were losing jobs overseas. inflation. unemployment. the causes of the great boom of the eighties and nineties were the Reagan tax cuts on capital gains and the developing computer / cellphone industries. Clinton I give a lot of credit to - he didn't ******* with it. I'm hopeful some new technology is waiting out there for us.

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Bush II inheriting a strong economy (well, okay - you got me, should have said "artificially inflated by the dot-com bubble") fits perfectly with my theory. The natural tendency of the country is to elect a Republican President, and only when times are bad are we desperate enough to try something else and/or send a message. In 2000, times were not bad, so we went back to our natural inclination and picked the Republican.

Its called aging baby boomers. With the exception of Nixon (due to his promises to get us out of war), our inclination in the 60s-70s was Democrat. Expect the Republican bias to change in 10 years...as boomers give way to immigrants.

the causes of the great boom of the eighties and nineties were the Reagan tax cuts on capital gains and the developing computer / cellphone industries.

And unabashed deficit spending...and the resurrection of Nixon partisan politics. Reagan had some recognizable strengths but he helped usher in poor governance practices that we're struggling with today.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Mainstream political science

This makes me think there is fringe political science, holding secret parties where all the hot girls go.

 

[huskyfan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

This makes me think there is fringe political science, holding secret parties where all the hot girls go.

guess you could argue all political science is fringe ...

 

[amherstblackbear]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

This makes me think there is fringe political science, holding secret parties where all the hot girls go.

Okay, I didn't want to be so blunt as to say "Americanists."

 

[Rover]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Let's assume for a moment that I am an idiot (I know, I know - not that big of a stretch! ). Could you please explain to me these radical policy changes that Clinton enacted that resulted in the surging economy? And please, extra attention on the latter half of the 90s, during the few years when the budgets were balanced. What, exactly, did Clinton do?

1) '93 balanced budget act, which - true to its name, raised the $$$ to balance the budget.

2) Free trade (NAFTA, etc)

3) paying down the deficit instead of massive tax cut or spending giveaway.

Now there's more than this of course, but these are the big ones. Get your financial house in order and businesses start expanding, and capital flows into the country instead of the other way around. That creates jobs, expanding tax revenue, etc. That economic climate had not existed since at least the 60's, and hasn't existed since.

husky - I always love the "Reagan made this happen" argument. It reminds me of a "How to be a good conservative" joke that went around at the end of the 90's. One of them was "Must believe that current economic boom is due to policies put in place by Ronald Reagan 20 years ago, but yesterday's gas prices are all Clinton's fault!".

 

[pirate]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

MinnFan? Is that you?

The problem with your theory is its like the "when the NFC wins the Super Bowl we elect a Republican" theory. Simply put, the data sample is too small if you limit it to 1976-2008. Why? Well, you're only including changes of power, thereby eliminating re-elections/holds. That gets rid of 4 events (84, 88, 96, 04), leaving 5. Might I suggest the GOP for a good deal of that time (roughly 1968-1988) was just better at winning elections regardless of the state of the economy? Likewise, given that Dems have won more votes than the GOP in 4 out of the last 5 Presidential elections, might we also consider that Dems are now just better at winning than the GOP (including Clinton win in good times '96 and Obama win in bad times '08)?

Pirate, discussing this with you is like talking to a GWB supporter back in their heyday. Remember when being obtuse was all the rage, and if you told someone that rain is wet, they'd tell you no it isn't now prove it? That's sorta like you with the weather=economy schtick.

No, you've chosen to focus on a throw away comment about the weather to deflect from the fact that you read that article and called it fair and balanced and I read it and called it BS. We both can't be right.

I'm not going to argue forecasting methodology with you...your bias prevents you from being objective so this will just go in circles.

So, it has nothing to do with weather, failed psychics, name calling etc...if you think that methodology is sound then so be it. As they say, ignorance is bliss...far be it from me to disturb your bliss.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

1) '93 balanced budget act, which - true to its name, raised the $$$ to balance the budget.

2) Free trade (NAFTA, etc)

3) paying down the deficit instead of massive tax cut or spending giveaway.

I can live with NAFTA, but I'm not sure it had a massive stimulating effect on the economy.

1 & 3 are the same thing. The Balanced Budget Act wasn't until 1997, when the budget deficit had already dropped to $23B. That's some strong leadership out of Clinton - deciding that it was high time to balance the budget after it pretty much had already balanced itself due to stronger than expected revenues. Oh, and it was sponsored by Rep. John Kasich [R] of Ohio.

The '93 act that I assume you're actually referring to was the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, which was pretty much a straight-up class warfare volley to increase taxes on the rich to appease the Democratic base after the 1992 elections, requiring not one, but two tie-breaking votes by Al Gore. (aside: how'd that work out for the Democrats in '94?) If tax increases are so great at stimulating the economy, why wasn't Obama in front of Congress last year pushing for tax increases? The fact is that the economy in the late 90s would have been roaring with or without the OBRA because of the dot-com boom. That roar is what fueled the surpluses, not OBRA.

So you: a) pushed tax increases as a way to stimulate the economy, and b) tried to take credit for a Republican bill that basically ended up doing nothing anyway. What else?

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

What, exactly, did Clinton do?

Clinton set up leadership for the country...even if it was passive. General confidence (both business and individual) get a serious boost when there is a comfort level with how the country is being run...and it doesn't like conflict.

This is obvious in the strong start under Reagan, the softness of Bush sr, the steady smarts of Clinton and the erratic conflicts of W. Some may not be happy with the general nature of this relationship...but its very real.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

The '93 act that I assume you're actually referring to was the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, which was pretty much a straight-up class warfare volley to increase taxes on the rich

Oh for Pete's sake.

Here's what OBRA did. The top marginal rate moved from 36 to 39.6 percent. Yeah, that's confiscatory.

BTW, does this mean that every time the GOP lowers the top marginal rate that's class warfare?

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Oh for Pete's sake.

Here's what OBRA did. The top marginal rate moved from 36 to 39.6 percent. Yeah, that's confiscatory.

BTW, does this mean that every time the GOP lowers the top marginal rate that's class warfare?

Oh no.

Another 40,000 gone every million. Whatever will they do?

The oppressive socialists sure won that round.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Oh for Pete's sake.

Here's what OBRA did. The top marginal rate moved from 36 to 39.6 percent. Yeah, that's confiscatory.

BTW, does this mean that every time the GOP lowers the top marginal rate that's class warfare?

I said "volley" not class thermonuclear war (and said nothing about confiscatory). Clinton knew that's all he could get away with - and just barely at that - but felt he had to do something for his base.

So I guess the difference between genius-level, groundbreaking, amazing economic leadership and complete buffoonery has been measured and has been found to be 3.6%. Good to know, good to know.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

Did anyone else catch that today is "Draw Mohammed Day"?

Where everyone is supposed to draw Mohammed in public as much as possible. Hilarious.

There's a story on cnn about it.

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/05/20/my-take-everyone-chalk-mohammed/?hpt=C1

 

[Priceless]

Re: Obama XII: The shine is off the glass slipper

I draw like crap. You can't tell if my stick figure is Mohammed, Jesus or the guy next door...