American Politics

[Spidy]

...And your insistence that the Dems have done a better job than the Reps is very poor rationale...

It isn't my "insistance" that gives Dems the notable edge in producing better economic results than Repubs. It's the data.

You have any quotes or examples for your accusations about what I assert when there is a gain for Repubs and all that? I suspect I provide plenty of substantiation for what I assert about what

actually happened and why. But I am willing to review your linked quotes to give it some consideration. ...

Yep, I've said it before, about the "bothsidesist". The dude does not put in the work, to provide support to substantiate any of his claims / arguments. Next he'll tell ya to go read "book xyz" from "Joe Author", that'll explain all my "say so".

And now he's piggy-backing and riding on Tiny 12 "data / evidence" coat tails, and pawning off the work, as if its his own findings, as if he did the work.

[Spidy]

I don't see where you're disagreeing with me ....

BTW, I will say this however, you do, do the work and unlike the arch "bothsidesist", you do provide actual evidence, data and information to substantiate, support or refute said opinions / claims.

[Spidy]

I don't see where you're disagreeing with me, except to say the Spidy and Tooms tribe is always clearly right. Well, someday Joe Biden is going to say that all the Democrats will be raptured and go to heaven. And all the Republicans will stay behind on earth. And he's going to set a date. And all the Democrats are going to say Biden is clearly right. And when that day passes and you're still here, I wonder what you and Tooms are going to say. It's going to be the Democrat Tribe's "January 6 moment. " I can't wait!

What are you talking about??? Not that there is anything wrong with being a right-wing evangelist, but that rant just sound like one. Just saying!

Look just because any BM here, in this discussion/opinion forum, is in disagreement with the arguments you put forth, be it, a Dem, Repub, QAnon, Bothsidesist, left, right or otherwise, is not a case IMHO about being "right".

Any political discourse, counterpoints or information I present is meant to frame and/or support my POV. I don't really care if you think, I'm simply trying to be "right".

You, Tiny 12 and the arch "bothsidesist", who stands for nothing and falls for everything, seem to think, we somehow need to accept/agree the arguments you put forth. WE DON'T!

Let me put it to you like this:

One BM here, thinks Donnie "the Devil" J. Dummkopf (aka. the 45th pres. aka.Agent Orange) is a god, meanwhile I personally think he's a devil.

Is he right, I am I right? He'll continue to provide whatever opinions/evidence to support his claims and so will I.

While I may find his opinions/claims distasteful, I reserve the right for him to make them. The only "right(s)" that I'm concerned with is, equal rights, people's rights, human rights, civil rights, voting rights...etc

For me it's that simple. I am not here to be "right", as you see it. I'll provide my counterpoints, arguments and opinions and let them stand or fall on their own.

If you have an opinion on said topics and provide arguments to support your POV and not just here to BM bash or bash America, then I welcome your input.

[EihTooms]

So you honestly think that Democrats are the Party of small government and lower taxes? In the words of our Commander In Chief, "Come on man!"

For every article you trot out from a left of center New York Times opinion columnist arguing for the superiority of Democratic governance, I could trot out two from right of center Wall Street Journal columnists if I weren't so damn lazy. When Leonhardt writes off Congressional control as a factor he loses credibility in my eyes. And when you look at his list of presidents, the top one, FDR, came to power in the aftermath of the worst depression in modern USA History, while the person in last place, Trump, had the misfortune to be in office when COVID hit.

At the risk of sounding immodest, my post #10362 in this thread makes more sense and is less biased than Leonhardt's article.

Oh, sorry, but if you don't like FDR (or JFK / LBJ, Carter, Clinton, Obama and now Biden) getting credit for pulling us out of serious economic downturns and catastrophes, the fix is for the American electorate to prevent the Repubs that preceeded them from producing serious economic downturns and catastrophes.

And from all available historic evidence the only way to prevent them from doing that is to vote all Dem down every ballot every time. Once in, Repubs apparently can't help but produce those results. And a vote for a Third Party candidate or not voting typically results in Repubs winning. So those last two are not options for America avoiding the next Great Repub Depression / Recession, Massive Jobs Destruction and Catastrophe.

Hoover famously exacerbated the Great Repub Depression with his Smoot-Hawley Tariffs and his Classic Repub mistake of providing Supply-Side / Trickle-Down government aid and spending on the exact wrong people. The Great Repub Depression didn't just "hit" or "happen" on Hoover's watch.

Coronavirus was another endemic viral spread that very likely could have been contained or at least significantly damage reduced had the leaders of the proven Pandemic Prevention and Response teams not gone missing where they were needed most for more than a year by Trump contrary to all expert warnings not to do something so dangerous and stupid. And especially had Trump not compounded that disastrous decision by spending critical year 2020 doing, lying and saying everything a World Leader could do, lie about and say to make sure it would become the historically deadly economy and global supply-chain-destroying and Inflation producing Trump's Pandemic it became.

Those were Trump economic decisions. Trump's Pandemic didn't just "hit" or "happen" on his watch.

[Tiny 12]

I forget, did Hitler cut taxes disproprotionately high on the top income margins / the wealthy, give shit tax cuts to the middle and lower income margins to help pay for those top margin tax cuts and ignore or cut regulations, particularly on banks and financial institutions and have a Department of Thrift Supervision in his Treasury Department that didn't supervise or monitor a damn thing while billions in Liar Loans were being floated for years like notable USA Repub presidents did to produce their Great Repub Recessions and crap economic results?

If so then Hitler's great economic success was indeed a unicorn. But if not, then no wonder he produced better economic results than most Repubs of the past century.

Actually, reading your link I see Hitler most definitely focused on creating jobs, improving conditions for workers, utilizing government spending to stimulate the German economy and create even more and better jobs.

So even a lunatic like Hitler can produce better economic results than Repubs as long as he avoids like the plague duplicating the idiotic economic policies of the Repub Party.

Then the beauty of Dem leadership is you get the superior economic results without invading Poland and creating the Holocaust.

LOL. Great post and link! Thanks for that.

Here are tax cuts from the Republican's 2017 TCJA, calculated as (1- (marginal rate after tax cut)/(marginal tax rate before tax cut)), for single filers at particular levels of income:

$30,000 - 20% tax cut.

$50,000 - 12% tax cut.

$100,000 - 14% tax cut.

$250,000 - 6% tax increase.

$400,000 - 6% tax increase.

$1,000,000 - 6. 5% tax cut.

https://taxfoundation.org/historical...ates-brackets/

The tax cut was not disproportionately directed to higher income earners. In fact, it made the tax system more progressive.

I take issue with your statement: "Then the beauty of Dem leadership is you get the superior economic results without invading Poland and creating the Holocaust. " Strictly speaking this is true, as no Democratic President has invaded Poland. Yet. However, please see my post below about the correlation between Democratic Presidents and major wars. The Democrats are a bloodthirsty lot, disposed to sacrifice many lives so they can juice the economy and get more votes come election time.

Disclaimer: I actually don't believe this, the part about bloodthirsty Democrats. This is part of an intervention, to try to help Tooms recognize spurious relationships and Double Think, and to cure his Stockholm Syndrome.

HOWEVER, In general, GDP growth during wars and their aftermath when Democrats were president was very good -- there were a few years with 18%+ GDP growth. Does this deserve consideration if you're trying to show that Republicans are worse than Hitler at managing the economy? Why of course not.

[EihTooms]

So you honestly think that Democrats are the Party of small government and lower taxes? In the words of our Commander In Chief, "Come on man!"

For every article you trot out from a left of center New York Times opinion columnist arguing for the superiority of Democratic governance, I could trot out two from right of center Wall Street Journal columnists if I weren't so damn lazy. When Leonhardt writes off Congressional control as a factor he loses credibility in my eyes. And when you look at his list of presidents, the top one, FDR, came to power in the aftermath of the worst depression in modern USA History, while the person in last place, Trump, had the misfortune to be in office when COVID hit.

At the risk of sounding immodest, my post #10362 in this thread makes more sense and is less biased than Leonhardt's article.

Yes, Carter's reduction of the Capital gains tax from 35% to 28% along with his guidance to require companies to offer the tremendous tax-deferred long term retirement investment advantage of 401 k accounts to their rank and file employees and not just their top executives and Clinton's exemption of $500,000 for marrieds and $250,000 for singles on the equity of their primary residence sale every few years, just to name two, were far and away greater "wealth generating" tax and economic policy results for many, many more Americans than all of the piddling Repub 3-5% marginal tax cuts dangled over the heads of middle and lower income margin earners while those utterly useless disproportionately high tax cuts for the wealthy stood by slack-jawed stupid and useless during the following next Great Repub Recession and Massive Jobs Destruction.

You know, the Great Repub Recessions that always require a huge influx of deficit spending, government intervention and government expansion to pull us out of them because those brave free market top marginal income "job creators" who got the big tax cuts can't be coaxed out from under their beds without it?

Of course, that comes right before "smaller government" Repubs start repealing decades long precedent Rights To Privacy in order to invade our bedrooms, bathrooms, up asses, vaginas and around penises to outlaw sex for pleasure and restrict it for the purpose of procreation only.

[EihTooms]

My goodness! You have Stockholm Syndrome! Ryan, McConnell and Trump cut the federal corporate income tax and regulations on business. That increased the after tax income of the companies you own through your funds. Biden on the other hand wanted to increase the corporate tax and, depending on your tax bracket, increase the federal tax you pay on dividends to as high as 43.4%.

I hope you haven't already "drunk the Kool Aid. " I shall pray for you, and do what I can in the way of intervention.

I already posted the link and report for what those Spineless Ryan, Moscow Mitch and Traitor Trump tax cuts accomplished; costing American taxpayers $2. 5+ Trillion just so corporate executives could buy their own company stocks.

Other than that, nothing. That is a Classic Repub tax policy result going back to Coolidge / Hoover. Well, that is, if we generously ignore the infrastructure projects, real jobs creation, border control and crime prevention investment opportunities lost by flushing all that money down the shitter as another Classic Repub tax and economic policy "accomplishment. ".

Yes, that helped keep Trump's stock market record afloat. So what? The stock market is not "the economy. " The reason the stock market also performs notably better under Dem stewardship than Repub stewardship is precisely because of those numbskull Repub tax and economic policy and agenda decisions and results that no Dem did nor should have supported and voted for.

[Tiny 12]

If you take some time to look up the definition, you should be absolutely know how the term "bothsidesism" is used.

There are those lazy posters/BMs that want to equate all of American politics from both sides of the aisle, as all the same "shit". Nothing could be further from the truth (as EihTooms, neatly explains below). Hence my use of "bothsidesism", to identify a group of lazy poster(s) and thinkers that believe and think accordingly.



Well said, EihTooms! I'll add one important detail that is key to the definition of "bothsidesism" and that is the following:

"When a person tries to make you believe that both sides are equally responsible for something even though one is really, clearly, at fault."

Worth repeating: "...even though one is really, clearly, at fault"

Sanctimonious rant aside, I use it as a term of endearment, much like the use of "Dems" or "Repubs", when addressing those posters/BMs, who "fit the bill", with whom I'm sharing my opinions/arguments.

So "bothsidesism" much like the word "neoliberalism", perhaps one should take the time to understand these words being used, without the sanctimonious bluster.

I don't see where you're disagreeing with me, except to say the Spidy and Tooms tribe is always clearly right. Well, someday Joe Biden is going to say that all the Democrats will be raptured and go to heaven. And all the Republicans will stay behind on earth. And he's going to set a date. And all the Democrats are going to say Biden is clearly right. And when that day passes and you're still here, I wonder what you and Tooms are going to say. It's going to be the Democrat Tribe's "January 6 moment. " I can't wait!

[Paulie97]

If you take some time to look up the definition, you should be absolutely know how the term "bothsidesism" is used.

There are those lazy posters/BMs that want to equate all of American politics from both sides of the aisle, as all the same "shit". Nothing could be further from the truth (as EihTooms, neatly explains below). Hence my use of "bothsidesism", to identify a group of lazy poster(s) and thinkers that believe and think accordingly.

Well said, EihTooms! I'll add one important detail that is key to the definition of "bothsidesism" and that is the following:

"When a person tries to make you believe that both sides are equally responsible for something even though one is really, clearly, at fault."

Worth repeating: "...even though one is really, clearly, at fault"

Sanctimonious rant aside, I use it as a term of endearment, much like the use of "Dems" or "Repubs", when addressing those posters/BMs, who "fit the bill", with whom I'm sharing my opinions/arguments.

So "bothsidesism" much like the word "neoliberalism", perhaps one should take the time to understand these words being used, without the sanctimonious bluster.

The term is clearly used by individuals like Tooms as an ad hominem against those who aren't on board with his cherry picking and Dems are light / Repubs are darkness interpretive framework. Online definitions of the term involve the accusation that one is unjustifiably giving equal validity to two sides of an argument, but such an error hardly of necessity follows from questioning some of Toom's simplistic, dubious and blustery claims or his far left sources. Tiny is correct, responsible economic and historical analysis is more complicated than "Democrat good, Republican bad. " End of story.

[Spidy]

I don't know what the deal is with "bothsiderism" here. I'm not sure what it means, but suspect it's a derogatory term used for people who aren't tribal. You've got to join up with the Trump tribe or the Sanders tribe, and heaven forbid you think for yourself.

If you take some time to look up the definition, you should be absolutely know how the term "bothsidesism" is used.

There are those lazy posters/BMs that want to equate all of American politics from both sides of the aisle, as all the same "shit". Nothing could be further from the truth (as EihTooms, neatly explains below). Hence my use of "bothsidesism", to identify a group of lazy poster(s) and thinkers that believe and think accordingly.

As I use it, "Bothsiderism" is only a derogatory term or a pejorative if one sees being identified as "pro-Repub" as an insult. Bothsiderism and False Equivalencies are generally meant to elevate the slackers, bring them up a notch or two, and denigrate the performers, bring them down a notch or two so as to suggest "both sides" are more or less "equally" responsible for good or bad outcomes. Sure, that can be a fun exercise. But it can be quite damaging when it comes to elections and who is handed the levers of control for serious matters like money, jobs, national security, etc. ...

Well said, EihTooms! I'll add one important detail that is key to the definition of "bothsidesism" and that is the following:

"When a person tries to make you believe that both sides are equally responsible for something even though one is really, clearly, at fault."

Worth repeating: "...even though one is really, clearly, at fault"

Is that how it works? If so, God help us. I fear that's what's happening to America.

Sanctimonious rant aside, I use it as a term of endearment, much like the use of "Dems" or "Repubs", when addressing those posters/BMs, who "fit the bill", with whom I'm sharing my opinions/arguments.

So "bothsidesism" much like the word "neoliberalism", perhaps one should take the time to understand these words being used, without the sanctimonious bluster.

[Tiny 12]

Interesting that your 1 and 2 reasons for favoring Repubs are among the many reasons I favor Dems and have only voted for Dems without voting for a Repub since Reagan's first term in office. I don't vote based on repeatedly unfulfilled campaign promises. I vote based on what actually happens when each of the two major Parties is in the White House. Factoring in the Repub penchant for never meeting an opportunity to plunge America into a Great Recession they didn't embrace, those piddling tax cuts for the vast majority of Americans they dangle before us on the campaign trail and sometimes plant into legislation pale in comparison to the massive jobs destruction, skyrocketing debt and deficits spent during and to pull us out of them that must be paid for by somebody eventually.

Yes, that pattern began even before FDR. But it didn't stop there. It continued right through to Trump less than two years ago. Even Trump's pre-Trump's Pandemic years underperformed on "greater prosperity" if prosperity has anything to do with jobs creation, earned income and GDP growth and "smaller federal government" if by that you mean less government spending with virtually nothing to show for it. And, of course, by the end of Trump's disastrous four year economic stewardship it is certain more people and businesses did not find themselves with "more money in their pockets".

Now, I didn't live, work, invest, buy things and pay taxes in Switzerland, Singapore or any of those other countries. So while it is interesting to note how they did over time, what matters more to me in terms of those very 1 and 2 factors you mentioned as well as many others is what happened in the USA over time.

Why Are Republican Presidents So Bad for the Economy?
G.D.P., jobs and other indicators have all risen faster under Democrats for nearly the past century.
Feb. 2, 2021


https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/02/o...s-economy.html

So you honestly think that Democrats are the Party of small government and lower taxes? In the words of our Commander In Chief, "Come on man!"

For every article you trot out from a left of center New York Times opinion columnist arguing for the superiority of Democratic governance, I could trot out two from right of center Wall Street Journal columnists if I weren't so damn lazy. When Leonhardt writes off Congressional control as a factor he loses credibility in my eyes. And when you look at his list of presidents, the top one, FDR, came to power in the aftermath of the worst depression in modern USA History, while the person in last place, Trump, had the misfortune to be in office when COVID hit.

At the risk of sounding immodest, my post #10362 in this thread makes more sense and is less biased than Leonhardt's article.

[JustTK]

Now I know what Tooms response will be. "So what, Trump killed a lot of people with COVID." Well, yes, he killed about 370,000 people with COVID, until he left office.

Right! And why? Why does everything need to be a dick measuring competition against the Reps? Why can't a performance simply be assessed for what it is? If the Dems did shlt, saying they did better than the Reps, does not excuse them.

[Tiny 12]

Here are the total number of USA Casualties in the 20th and 21st centuries, in major wars that Democratic Presidents chose to enter. I'm defining "major" as any war that resulted in more than 50,000 USA Casualties:

World War I: 320,518.

World War II: 1,076,245.

Korean War: 128,650.

Vietnam War: 211,454.

Total: 1,736,867 casualties.

Here's the total number of casualties in "major" wars started by Republicans, in the 20th and 21st centuries:

0.

This shows that Democratic Presidents have a very callous attitude about the lives and well being of our servicemen.

Now I know what Tooms response will be. "So what, Trump killed a lot of people with COVID." Well, yes, he killed about 370,000 people with COVID, until he left office. But Biden killed more, 700,000 so far! and he's still killing 500 a day! There's no telling how many people Biden's going to end up killing with COVID.

Disclaimer: While my numbers are correct, I don't believe this. Democrats aren't any bigger war mongers than Republicans. This is part of an intervention, to try to help Tooms recognize spurious correlations and Double Think, and to cure his Stockholm Syndrome.

[Tiny 12]

As I use it, "Bothsiderism" is only a derogatory term or a pejorative if one sees being identified as "pro-Repub" as an insult.

Bothsiderism and False Equivalencies are generally meant to elevate the slackers, bring them up a notch or two, and denigrate the performers, bring them down a notch or two so as to suggest "both sides" are more or less "equally" responsible for good or bad outcomes. Sure, that can be a fun exercise. But it can be quite damaging when it comes to elections and who is handed the levers of control for serious matters like money, jobs, national security, etc.

For example, there is no reputable source of economic data or spin on it that can or has shown that over the past 100 years or so, right up to Trump, it was Repubs and not Dems who were better at producing prosperity, increasing GDP growth, creating jobs, putting money in pockets and businesses, paying down the debt and deficit, averting or avoiding major economic downturns, recovering us from major economic downturns and so on. None.

So by rights Repubs ought to by now have no more than, oh, maybe a 5% fluky chance of ever winning any election for any office ever.

However, thanks to the magic of "Bothsiderism" and "False Equivalency", their chances are often raised to as much 47-50%! That is quite an improvement for those folks. And if MSM and other "Bothsider, False Equivalency" practitioners do a bang up job of demonizing some relatively insignificant sucker social issue here and there, the Repubs' chances improve to as mush as 52% or so and, bingo, we're saddled with another Repub economic steward bent on finding whatever new and unprecedented way to crash the USA economy and wipe out millions of jobs is out there to be embraced by them.

See, it is only an insult if you think that is a bad thing for which to be a proponent.

Understood. I don't think Bothsiderism is appropriate for what you're describing. I prefer Double Think, as it's more descriptive of what we're talking about, and the word has a rich literary history, having originated in Orwell's 1984. So, if you see me use the word "Double Think", please realize it translates to "Bothsiderism" in the Tooms vocabulary.

[Tiny 12]

Tiny, I do not mean to shoot down your guy Captain Midnight but the importance of M1 to M3 markers were of huge importance in the 1980's and I think it was Milton Friedman who brought their importance to the public. That said, how often do you use cash these days? Not much right? What freezes the market is not a lack of cash but a lack of credit. Banks can lend 5 to 10 X the amount of cash they have on hand. The bonds and stocks they own can easily be liquidated into cash. The stock market is down 10 trillion and the bond market is probably close to the same since the Fed started raising rates. M1 is $20 trillion, and that much has been lost in the stock and bond market in the last six months but more importantly potentially 10 X that amount has been taken out of the liquidity market.

The CEO of Landry's restaurants was on CNBC and he confirmed the obvious. The credit markets have dried up. Everyone is looking at credit markets these days versus money supply because the credit markets are so much bigger. And the reason everyone talks about the Fed is that they pretty much set the rates on the credit market.

But that is the demand side, and the Fed can control that by restricting the amount of credit there is out there. When you look at supply, we were already having issues just keeping up with the post-Covid world. Then you look at the war in Ukraine and there has been and will be tightness with fertilizer, oil, gas, and food as both Ukraine and Russia were huge wheat exporters.

Thing is if you look at all those things the only one the USA does not have is the potash type fertilizer but we rely on friendly Canada for 83% of our needs of it. The rest of it the USA has in abundance and in particular Texas. China, Europe, and Japan are hugely dependent on exports for all of those things. I do not see anyone coming up with solutions for the loss of Russian oil and gas for at least 3 to 5 years, and food and fertilizer have really not been hit to the extent they will be.

People call inflation in housing stick but to me this is the most sticky of them all. Demand for food and energy is pretty much inelastic. Mankind will solve the problem, however the incentive for that solution will be higher prices.

So everyone thinks the dollar's move is due to its reserve currency status and the Fed raising rates, but I think a huge part of it is how much the world is going to have to buy our stuff and how much it is going to cost.

And Texas has it all: food, fertilizer, natural gas, gas pipelines, refineries, and oil.

I know very little about macroeconomics Elvis. And overall your argument makes sense. That looking at the supply side more inflation is in store. The Fed Funds rate is 3% to 3. 25%, and YoY inflation is 8. 3%! That also seems like a recipe for continued and perhaps higher inflation.

I don't have a strong view on this one way or the other. However, in the interest of being a good little bothsider, I shall quibble. M2 "is a measure of the USA Money stock that includes M1 (currency and coins held by the non-bank public, checkable deposits, and travelers' checks) plus savings deposits (including money market deposit accounts), small time deposits under $100,000, and shares in retail money market mutual funds. " M3 includes M2 plus CD's and the like.

It seems to me like higher money supply would result in higher inflation. Maybe for a while it wasn't because Americans were saving a lot of what they made, during COVID. But that's not the case any more. See this graph, which represents personal income that people save rather than spend on consumption.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PSAVE

This is the same series expressed as a % of GDP.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PSAVERT

After the massive helicopter drops of money by Biden, Trump and the Democrats during COVID, when personal savings were high, people appear to be back to their spendthrift ways.

You also have the wealth effect. As you more or less say, instead of keeping their savings in cash, people are more inclined to invest in the market or their houses or whatever. And they can borrow against their home values or sell their stock to fund consumption. Well, with stock prices going down and home values leveling off in recent months, that's going to reduce people's propensity to spend.

As to the supply side, good points. I hadn't really thought about that so much.

I'd disagree with you about the vulnerability of the USA The USA Current account deficit, which includes the trade deficit, is running about 3. 9% of GDP. This is the worst it's been since 2009. It means we're buying more from the rest of the world than we're selling to it. We're dependent on China, directly and indirectly, for rare earth elements, and Korea and Taiwan for higher end chips. We are now roughly self sufficient overall in the combination of oil plus petroleum products. Total exports and imports are about equal. However if the Progressives get their way, we'll go back to being net importers. If Sanders or Warren had been elected president and had fulfilled his or her campaign promise to end fracking, we'd be in the same shape as Europe this winter. And Schumer and other Senate Democrats recently reneged on their agreement with Manchin to lighten up on permitting for pipelines and the like.

Getting back on inflation and supply, the trend towards de-globalization along with supply chain glitches isn't helping things. When you have to go build new factories to replace production from China and other places, prices go up.