Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Krugman's right to the extent that gov't spending is most effective over time when it's put into infrastructure. Hoover Dam and the Interstate system have been boons to the economy, much more so than cash for clunkers and other temporary one-off spending sprees.

This is why I would have been fine if they decided to dump whatever it was on the stimulus (700 billion?) or TARP or whatnot on the national rail idea or some other item to make us much more efficient.

Again, if you want to see the intentions, see the legislation. Stimulus and "health care reform"... piles upon piles of money placed into things not meant to help the economy... the only way the stimulus even works is if you assume all you need to do is to prime the system full of cash, then its OK to spend lots of cash, and while you're doing it you ought to help your political allies and let them have the first crack with that cash.

If you want to be intellectually honest, you'd say "that's the time you go for the big idea" to make the nation more efficient. Guess what, we all know that nobody other than the gov't has the means to pool an insane amount of cash for a cause nobody would pay for themselves.

I still say there's probably a dozen politically infeasible ideas out there that could make America either efficient or self-reliant but we cannot get things in order to make it happen. The most obvious one is nuclear... I'd have to imagine rail is next... though I'd love to see studies on freight and passenger movement efficiency... and I'm sure some quick work can come up with a few more.

The problem is that we got a president whose desires are largely, except for in relation to homosexuals, indifferent from the progressive movement's platform. Its a moralist movement, not a pragmatic efficient movement.

edit: the most hilarious thing about Obama is he could have been the president he campaigned to be just by the inertia of appearing as if he was a black version of Jed Bartlett... as soon as he stepped into the white house, Chicago moved in... but he had all the momentum to be that false dream liberals believe in (the problem is life doesn't behave as we like to dream it) and probably could have gotten almost anything he wanted.

 

[Tundra]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Congrats to Krugman on winning his Nobel Prize. But keep in mind that Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman have also won Nobel Prizes in Economics. So, his status as a Nobel Prize winner carries no weight with me.

Binder and Zandi think the stimulus worked, shocking.

IT carries no weight in congress either.

I'm not sure any Fed had practical experience before becoming Fed governor or that we should only do internal promotion or only hire Wall street boyz after they created and allowed the worst financial crisis since the great depression.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Diamo...4.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=1&asset=&ccode=

President Barack Obama nominated Diamond to the Fed in late April. But Senate Republicans have blocked his nomination, questioning his practical experience, as well as the conclusions of his research.

In the early 1980s, Diamond wrote a paper that found federal unemployment insurance helps companies land job seekers with the right skills by allowing the unemployed to hold out for the right opportunity.

Some Republicans argue that extending unemployment benefits -- as Congress has done on multiple occasions since the recession -- can actually make unemployment worse by taking away the incentives to finding work. Liberal economists dismiss that.

Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, has been blocking Diamond's nomination to the Fed for months. Shelby says Diamond lacks expertise in so-called monetary policy -- the setting of interest rates and other tools that are used to influence the nation's economic growth, employment and inflation.

"While the Nobel Prize for economics is a significant recognition, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences does not determine who is qualified to serve on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System," Shelby said Monday.

 

[Tundra]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

This is why I would have been fine if they decided to dump whatever it was on the stimulus (700 billion?) or TARP or whatnot on the national rail idea or some other item to make us much more efficient.

Well, $700billion has been mostly "paid back" (via Fed's backdoor TARP program of $1.7Trilion) so we could still do that.

I think they should just raise the gasoline tax to fund the infrastructure since people have gotten used to the $3/gallon and the economic effect of adding .10 to .30cents will make less impact as the price has risen so much.

 

[Bakunin]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Simply put, that cap is way too large to be the result of businesses sitting on the sidelines for fear of some new government regulation. And as far as banking goes, to be brutally honest, they deserve much more regulation - their poor assessment of risk is a major reason we're in the mess we're in.

Here is how you solve this problem: figure out the regulations, tax, and monetary policies and STICK WITH THEM. Randomly changing policies every year throws uncertainty into the mix, and businesses / markets hate that. If we could figure things out and stick to something for five years or more, that'd make life a lot easier for everyone - at least if they didn't particularly like the policies, they could adjust to them knowing that there won't be some other random change coming in six months.

As far as infrastructure goes, instead of adding new stuff, how about repairing the existing problems (roads and bridges are known to fall apart)? Rail is generally impractical in this country due to the spread out nature of the population - it will work fine for parts of the coasts and that's about it. Beyond that, we should spend to upgrade the power grid.

 

[Old Pio]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/campfin/stories/op080397.htm

So here's the Obama method: make unsubstantiated charges about "foreign" money flowing into the campaign--naturally on the other side. Send surrogates on the Sunday shows to make the same charges and assert that it's up to the people being smeared to clear their names. Sort of like "it doesn't matter if the documents are forgeries."

Try to imagine the reaction if the president making the allegations was named Nixon and the flunky on "Face the Nation" was named Haldeman. Oooooeeeeee.

Bob Schieffer of CBS was non plussed and the NYT has been critical. This we're getting from the "post political" white house, the administration of hope and change. Judging by the article I linked, this concern about foreign money is of fairly recent vintage. Anybody remember Charlie Trie, running around with shopping bags full of money from the Chinese to help Bill Clinton?

As Schieffer said to David Axelrod: is this all you've got? If it is, you got nothin'.

 

[blockski]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

As far as infrastructure goes, instead of adding new stuff, how about repairing the existing problems (roads and bridges are known to fall apart)? Rail is generally impractical in this country due to the spread out nature of the population - it will work fine for parts of the coasts and that's about it. Beyond that, we should spend to upgrade the power grid.

Rail is not impractical at all. You should take a closer look at a few maps.

No one is suggesting that we have rail from NY to LA or something like that. Instead, regional services along defined corridors and through defined regions is a proven model. Population densities are more than sufficient in most of these regions and travel distances are similarly palatable to high speed rail travel. It's not NY to LA, it's rail within each of the US's various megaregions:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megaregions_of_the_United_States

Those regions include about 75% of the US population and about ~90% of the US GDP.

Our country is very large, but the population really isn't all that spread out.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Our country is very large, but the population really isn't all that spread out.

And there's really not a huge demand for cross-continental travel. Fewer than 1,000 people per day go from LA to NYC, while 5 million per day use the NYC subway. There will never be sufficient demand to justify high-speed cross-continental rail (which would still probably take 24+ hours with stops), but that's a completely separate question from regional rail networks (which are a great idea).

You may as well say that we shouldn't bother having airplanes because it would take too long to fly to the moon...

 

[joecct]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Rail is not impractical at all. You should take a closer look at a few maps.

No one is suggesting that we have rail from NY to LA or something like that. Instead, regional services along defined corridors and through defined regions is a proven model. Population densities are more than sufficient in most of these regions and travel distances are similarly palatable to high speed rail travel. It's not NY to LA, it's rail within each of the US's various megaregions:

Our country is very large, but the population really isn't all that spread out.

Note how that pesky Great Lakes Region is encroaching on the Northeast. Only those pesky Allegheny mountains are in the way.

IF you can get affordable high speed rail to cut down the time between DC and Boston to around 4 hours, then the airlines and cars are in for serious competition. Right now I can drive faster from DC to Boston than to train it.

 

[amherstblackbear]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

This we're getting from the "post political" white house, the administration of hope and change. Judging by the article I linked, this concern about foreign money is of fairly recent vintage.

It's certainly subpar political. It doesn't even matter if it's true or not. Those who oppose the white house will circle the wagons, regardless. And those who support the white house, evidently don't give a **** about the issue. There's no positive to it. Good strategy.

They really should leave the xenophobia to the GOP. They're waay better at it.

 

[blockski]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Note how that pesky Great Lakes Region is encroaching on the Northeast. Only those pesky Allegheny mountains are in the way.

IF you can get affordable high speed rail to cut down the time between DC and Boston to around 4 hours, then the airlines and cars are in for serious competition. Right now I can drive faster from DC to Boston than to train it.

It can be done.

http://www.thetransportpolitic.com/...an-but-it-would-take-30-years-to-be-realized/

DC to NY in 96 minutes. DC to Boston in 3 hours flat (though I would note - DC to Boston is really pushing the limits of HSR to compete with air travel).

And you could probably get a decent-speed rail link on existing rail corridors through the Alleghenies. Would someone really take the train from New York to Chicago? Probably not.

But from NY to Philly? Yes.
Philly to PGH? Yes.
PGH to Cleveland? Yes.
Cleveland to Chicago? Yes.

The segments along each line that connect these regions all offer some compelling origin and destination pairs.

 

[Old Pio]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

It's certainly subpar political. It doesn't even matter if it's true or not. Those who oppose the white house will circle the wagons, regardless. And those who support the white house, evidently don't give a **** about the issue. There's no positive to it. Good strategy.

They really should leave the xenophobia to the GOP. They're waay better at it.

What President Nixon is counting on is that these wild, unsubstantiated, amorphous charges will inflame his base and get them trooping to the polls, complete with their billy clubs, to stave off what George Soros has called "an avalanche." So they better give a chit.

Reminds me of the Cosby routine where he catches his young daughter teetering on top of a step ladder, stretched out her entire height, reaching into the cookie jar that was put on top of the refrigerator to keep her from getting in to it. She sees her dad and explains she is dong this for HIM, because HE might want a cookie.

 

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

And there's really not a huge demand for cross-continental travel. Fewer than 1,000 people per day go from LA to NYC, while 5 million per day use the NYC subway. There will never be sufficient demand to justify high-speed cross-continental rail (which would still probably take 24+ hours with stops), but that's a completely separate question from regional rail networks (which are a great idea).

You may as well say that we shouldn't bother having airplanes because it would take too long to fly to the moon...

you know, I said all this, but I was under the impression that we could gain on freight being sent by rail... humans might be as well, but that would be done since the other would already be done by the same process.

 

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

DC to NY in 96 minutes. DC to Boston in 3 hours flat (though I would note - DC to Boston is really pushing the limits of HSR to compete with air travel).

Depends upon the price, depends upon the price, depends upon the price.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Depends upon the price, depends upon the price, depends upon the price.

It'll be like all other ventures like this. Subsidized by government because it's just too ****ed expensive.

 

[sagard]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

It'll be like all other ventures like this. Subsidized by government because it's just too ****ed expensive.

Yep. Pretty much just like our gas/oil. Massive subsidies.

 

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Yep. Pretty much just like our gas/oil. Massive subsidies.

Good, lets get rid of them then.

 

[Tundra]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

Yep. Pretty much just like our gas/oil. Massive subsidies.

That's why we should start doing automatic gasoline tax toward Europe/Japan petrol prices and remove domestic oil production subsidy. Something like 10-20 year plan. And not sell it as a green environmental initiative which is "anti-business" which makes republicans rabid, but to make rail more competitive and viable for long haul cargo and possible passenger traffic.

One problem I see is that we converted so many old rail tracks to trails that it will be expensive to convert them back to railroad.

 

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

That's why we should start doing automatic gasoline tax toward Europe/Japan petrol prices and remove domestic oil production subsidy. Something like 10-20 year plan. And not sell it as a green environmental initiative which is "anti-business" which makes republicans rabid, but to make rail more competitive and viable for long haul cargo and possible passenger traffic.

One problem I see is that we converted so many old rail tracks to trails that it will be expensive to convert them back to railroad.

What is the benefit?

 

[sagard]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

What is the benefit?

1. Less dependency on the Middle East oil states.

2. With reduced reliance on oil we could actually leave the "drill baby drill" cries to the next generation. We have screwed them badly enough, it's only right we leave them a hard asset.

3. Development of alternative fuels will be able to compete on a slightly more level playing field.

4. Less road congestion.

 

[Patman]

Re: Obama XVI: Muslin curtains in the White House!!!

1. Less dependency on the Middle East oil states.

That could also be aided with a move to nuclear.... cost to me... $0.

2. With reduced reliance on oil we could actually leave the "drill baby drill" cries to the next generation. We have screwed them badly enough, it's only right we leave them a hard asset.

Which we'll never use under the same arguments given by #2.

3. Development of alternative fuels will be able to compete on a slightly more level playing field.

Who defines level?

4. Less road congestion.

Will that improvement cover the costs of investment?