Once again, Obama proves he's a jerk.

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   mikelongposted 14 years ago

   "Seriously, read history.  Back when governments were smaller, those businesses used the power of government to force wars to get Indians out of the way to build the railroads.  Without Federal troops it never would have happened that way."<--Led
   
   
   Exactly...I agree absolutely.... I don't see how we contradict each other on this at all.
   
   
   "Progressive ideals"...indoctrinated? Do my cited sources here demonstrate this?  Or just your rhetoric?
   
   I know what happened in Detriot, as I know what is happening here in California...labor pools have suffered and been left behind....and I know why that is.....
   
   My state is going bankrupt because the system was built haphazardly...selfishly, largely by private interests seeking to maximize the profits within their regions and economic niches...using the government, like the L.A. City Council, or its predecessor, the Chamber of Commerce, to enable public funds to provide private land developers and others to draw their own lines....
   
   Another piece of "indoctrination" literature:
   
   

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   ledefensetechposted 14 years ago

   So if public funds going to private business is the problem, why not take away the ability of public offices to raise that money?  Although I'd say that giving tax money to private business means that that once private business is no longer private but public.
   
   Private business raises capital in a few select ways.  One, through the accumulation of profit.  Two, through the sale of stocks and bonds.  Three, through the acquisition of loans.  Taking "public" money is the same as being granted a budget from the state. 
   
   Detroit has suffered because of taxation and unions.  By making it too expensive to work and live in the city, people left.  The only ones left at this point are pretty much the ones who can't leave.  I call CA Progressive because all the welfare programs of the state do is perpetuate a growing underclass of people who do not contribute to the economic life of the state.
   
   As for The Fragmented Metropolis, does the author look at the effect of the Interstate System in beginning the flight from the cities and dividing cities up into sections?  It may be that we both agree that a union of business and government is a bad thing, but you place the blame with business while I place the blame at the feet of government.  I wonder if you can guess my reason why.

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   mikelongposted 14 years ago

   I'll let you read it Led........it is a wonderful book.  Many find it boring...but I don't see how.
   
   I was citing public land transfers to private interests (selective ones) to make a larger point Led...no one was complaining (except the Native Americans who no one was listening to) when the government was giving away land......no one was calling this "socialist"....or "welfare"....
   
   Back then, that was "Progress"....where "Progressive" gets its root.....
   
   Selective progress.....based on the whims and biases of a very few "Americans"....not "the people."

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      ledefensetechposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      The nature of public land transfer has changed over the centuries in this country.  About the best transfer law I've ever seen was the Homestead Act.  If that were still in force today, we'd never have had stuff like the Teapot Dome. 
      
      Research Progressivism a little more.  I read a pretty good history of the West recently, the title of which escapes me, but in the final chapter the authors chronicle the rise of what became known as the Progressive movement.  It's interesting to see how and why they emerged.  Since that time, the natures of public land has been one associated with the government.  That's an erroneous assumption.  When the government owns the land, all they do is transfer it to those who are politically connected.  Corruption by any other name is still corruption.
      
      I have a rule.  Anything that a government says it's going to do, I assume the effect will be the opposite.  The CRA was supposed to provide everyone who wanted a house with one, regardless of ethnicity.  The CRA was the basis for subprime loans and we all know how that ended up.  We now have many more homeless than we did before the CRA began being enforced in the late 1990's.  The stimulus bill was supposed to jump start the economy, it did the exact opposite, we're still shedding jobs.  I've found that little trick to be useful in evaluating government proposals, perhaps you will as well.

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   Madame Xposted 14 years ago

   A few points-
   
   The term "indian" was used by Columbus because he was looking for the east indies. He originally thought he could sail west to get there.
   
   Our Constitution was a combined effort on the part of our founders and the Iroquois of our northeast, who provided the basic concepts of personal sovereignty and unalienable rights.
   
   The only reason CA is (going) bankrupt is because of the a**hole democratic legislature who thinks taxing businesses out of existence to clean up their own mistakes is an acceptable way to run a government, or a state.
   
   Just saying . . .

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      Brenda Durhamposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      I agree.
      And Arnie compromised his principles to make his liberal wife happy.

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         Madame Xposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Why anyone voted for him is a mystery to me - and when I heard he had been elected I was ashamed of my fellow statesmen
         
         only in California

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            Randy Godwinposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            Hmmm, I wonder who you favored?

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         Ralph Deedsposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Maybe she shut him off, so to speak??

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            Brenda Durhamposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            She did!  At least that's what he said on the news!
            
            I thought the Terminator was stronger than that! lol

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   mikelongposted 14 years ago

   Tell that to QTWW....What of the businesses of Palo Alto...
   
   Businesses are here, and many are doing well...  But the reasons behind the massive boostering of people to come here....for manufacturing jobs and military service, are not capable of handling what has been created....
   
   The private business creations like Lakewood...turning perfectly good farmland into private cities (absent the services of police, fire, and other "unnecessary" costs.....and of course, the same people building the homes were the same people building the shopping centers...the creation of the box store...all right here in Calfornia, specifically Los Angeles County...
   
   The largest county in the nation...
   
   We have problems here because private interests like "bigger is better"...kind've like the Titanic...and the iceberg was the pulling of the labor plug...

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   mikelongposted 14 years ago

   Led...I was playing with words...  But, it still shows how "progress" ideations shifted...
   
   I agree with you completely about corruption, and that business and government are interchangeable in this category, or at least can be.
   
   Regarding the CRA...the forces behind redlining do whatever they can to find a way to keep their actions going...
   
   Yet, I'd have to read into it more...there have been lots of changes over the past few years that I am not versed on...
   
   Or indoctrinated on...I suppose, eh?
   
   Regardless, it is good to exchange with someone who articulates responses...as opposed to those like TK/Sab Oh...who waste space and time..

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      ledefensetechposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      To be honest, I'm glad to have someone "on the other side" who is willing to talk too.  Believe it or not, I was once where you stand.  After all I spent my early educational years being educated in California. 
      
      Redlining is a joke.  The CRA created what were called NINJA loans.  No Income, No Job or Asset loans.  It is true that many minorities don't qualify for loans.  That's not because they are actively discriminated against, it's because they don't have the ability to pay the loans back.  Minorities also tend to have unskilled jobs because new arrivals here, for the most part, don't have any savings, skills or education to get a running start here.  If they got that stuff back home, they'd not immigrate here.  Immigrants have the same choices here as everyone else.  Better yourself if you want to make more money.
      
      One thing that is true about government that is not true about business is that the money always flows no matter what actions the government takes.  A business has to be careful in what it does because if it offends people, they lost customers.  No so with taxation and government spending.  That is why government services are, for the most part, inferior to that of business.  Otherwise why not just nationalize everything and be done with it?

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   cluenseposted 14 years ago

   My Grandmother always said “When it comes to politics, you always have to pick the lesser of two evils!" However, she never instructed me on what to do in a situation where the candidates were equally evil!

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      Ralph Deedsposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Which candidates, in your opinion, are equally evil? Surely not Bush and Gore or McCain and Obama, neither of whom I would call evil, Gore, McCain, Obama. Bush was lazy, not very bright and accepted advice from some people who were really evil (Cheney, et al).

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         A Texanposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Those dumb Yale graduates, almost as stupid as a Harvard man!

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8. 59

   mikelongposted 14 years ago

   Led, but redlining was so much more.
   
   Denying loans/investment to entire regions of a city based on "race" is huge...plus, how does that lack of investment relate to the job or jobless rate of those particular areas?
   
   Yet, at the same time, the job base...the production jobs (here in the San Fernando Valley alone..the GM plant in Van Nuys)..that provided upward mobility for minority populations vanished...
   
   The trucking industry...which provided wages enough to send kids to college through the 1970's disappeared through the Reagan pushed deregulation of the entire trucking industry...with owner-operators now being a large percentage of the trucking pool...which, on a whole, has hurt specific sectors of the trucking industry...like drayage...
   
   As we see, there are big issues, and some room for contention...but again, at least here we can discuss something substantively...and then "we the little people" can potentially find some answers for ourselves and not be reliant on trusting someone else....
   
   If only...

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      ledefensetechposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Come on man, are you serious?  Banks only make money when they loan money out to people.  That's how they get paid.  There is an incentive to not discriminate.  Only the most idiotic bigot would refuse to lend to 12% of the population, in the case of blacks, and even then he probably wouldn't keep his job very long once his bosses found out that he was costing them money.
      
      If banks won't lend to a region of a city, well that tells you something about the risks involved, doesn't it?  I doubt people are lining up to invest money in South Central LA or Oakland.  Why?  Not because of race, but because the place is overrun by gangs.  Would you risk your livelihood by investing in a place overrun by gangs?
      
      That's why I'm glad to see the Chicago Gun Ban come before the Supreme Court.  Should that law be struck down, citizens will not have their right to own firearms abridged in any way and citizens of South Central will be free to protect themselves and their homes.  That will do more than anything else to combat the gang crime problem in South Central.
      
      You have a point about production jobs, but those jobs leaving is due mainly to the American worker being priced out of the labor market.  You also complain about the trucking industry hurt by "deregulation".  I'm not sure of the details, but people are usually incorrect when the use deregulation in talking about something.  The rolling blackouts CA experienced a few years ago were not due to deregulation, but to CA putting price caps on what utilities could charge.  Once the cost to provide electricity reached those caps, utilities stopped producing power.   If CA had gotten rid of those caps, prices would have fluctuated with demand and people would have used less electricity; thus lessening demand on the system.  The gas shortage of 1979 is another example of why price caps are a bad idea.
      
      Now as for trucking, sure what you might say may be right.  I haven't studied the issue but I'll take your word for the fact that in the 1970's you could afford to send your kid to college on what they made.  Have you considered that at that time, Silicon Valley didn't exist, well at least not as a high tech industrial powerhouse that it is today.  Over the last few decades an entire industry has grown up over there in a totally new field.  People who work there, even the peons, certainly are able to send their kids to college like those truckers once were.  The only difference is that you need to train different skills to work in Silicon Valley than you do as a trucker, but the fact remains that you are still free to do so if you choose.
      
      So while the trucking industry may not offer the same benefits it once did, there are entirely new industries that offer the same benefits or better benefits than driving a truck once did.  Nothing remains static nor should it do so.  The only time I can think of that had a static economy was the Middle Ages.  5% at the top, maybe 5% in the middle and 90% little better than slaves.  It wasn't until trade reopened with the East that the lives of your average "little person", as you like to call them, got better.  That's a very significant point that I think a lot of people miss.

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9. 65

   Ralph Deedsposted 14 years ago

   Here's a candidate for thinking Tea Baggers--America's best governor, Mitch Daniels of Indiana--
   
   Set a group of plugged-in conservatives to talking presidential politics, and you’ll get the same complaints about the 2012 field.
      
   Mitt Romney? He couldn’t make the voters like him last time ... Sarah Palin? She’d lose 47 states ... Mike Huckabee? Better as a talk-show host ... Tim Pawlenty, Jim DeMint, Bobby Jindal, David Petraeus? Too blah, too extreme, too green, and stop dreaming ...
   
   But murmur the name Mitch Daniels, and everyone perks up a bit. Would he win? Maybe not. But he’d be the best president of any of them ...
   
   “I’ve never seen a president of the United States when I look in the mirror,” Daniels remarked last week, after officially inching the door ajar for 2012. You can’t blame him: At 5’7”, the Indiana governor wouldn’t be the tallest man to occupy the White House, and he’d be the baldest president since Dwight D. Eisenhower. If Romney looks like central casting’s idea of a chief executive, Daniels resembles the character actor who plays the director of the Office of Management and Budget — a title that he held, as it happens, during George W. Bush’s first term.
   
   Since then, though, he’s become America’s best governor. In a just world, Daniels’s record would make him the Tea Party movement’s favorite politician. During the fat years of the mid-2000s, while most governors went on spending sprees, he was trimming Indiana’s payroll, slowing the state government’s growth, and turning a $800 million deficit into a consistent surplus. Now that times are hard, his fiscal rigor is paying off: the state’s projected budget shortfall for 2011, as a percentage of the budget, is the third-lowest in the country.
   
   But Daniels hasn’t just been a Dr. No on policy. His “Healthy Indiana” plan, which offers catastrophic coverage to low-income residents, aspires to eventually cover 130,000 people, about a third of the state’s long-term uninsured. He’s pushed targeted investments in kindergarten programs, the police force and the child welfare office. And he’s been a pragmatic free-marketeer, rather than a strict ideologue. His controversial decision to lease the Indiana toll road reaped $3.8 billion for the state. But when an attempt to outsource welfare enrollment went awry, Daniels yanked the system back into the public sector.
   
   If this portrait sounds suspiciously glowing, keep in mind that I saw the governor last Monday, in between the CPAC gathering of movement conservatives and the White House health care forum. In both cases, the contrast made Daniels seem particularly appealing.
   
   Unlike the politicians who spoke at CPAC, Daniels eschewed triumphalism about conservatism’s prospects. “I think a lot of Republicans are over-reading all of this,” he said. “They’re a little ahead of themselves, a little too giddy.” What his party still needs, and doesn’t have he said, are the answers to “the ‘what’ question — what are we about, what are our answers to the obvious problems the nation has?”
   
   Unlike the Republicans at the health care summit, he balanced criticisms of Obamacare with candor about the problem of the uninsured. “This is a very real issue, and we were determined to have a constructive approach to it — but one that would be affordable.” Healthy Indiana, he went on, is “incredibly popular with the people who are a part of it. I get tearful hugs from people who just want to tell me that it’s brought them peace of mind.”
   
   And unlike both CPAC-goers and his party’s leadership, Daniels was blunt about the challenges of deficit reduction. “There’s been some very healthy hell-raising going on in the country,” he said of the Tea Parties. “But to my knowledge, nobody’s gotten up in front of those rallies and explained what’s going to have to happen.” His ideal approach to the deficit would look like Paul Ryan’s fiscal roadmap, all spending restraint and no new taxes. But one way or another, deficit reduction “has to be done” — even if “you have to take the second- or third-best method.”
   
   All this honesty might evaporate on the campaign trail. And if it didn’t, would Daniels have a prayer? He’s admired by elites, but unknown at the grass-roots level. He’s a social conservative, and his gubernatorial campaigns have played the populist card successfully — but he lacks the built-in constituencies of other candidates. And his years’ carrying water for the Bush administration’s budgets would doubtless be used against him in the battle for the Tea Partiers’ affections.
   
   For a Daniels candidacy to catch fire, what’s left of the Republican establishment, currently (if reluctantly) coalescing around Mitt Romney, would have to decide that he’s the better pick. That would mean gambling that the best way to defeat the most charismatic president of modern times is to nominate a balding, wonky Midwesterner who reminds voters of their accountant.
   
   Stranger things have happened.
   
   
   
   
   
   http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/opini … amp;st=cse

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    freddykruegerposted 14 years ago

    obama fixing what bush and mccain did to the u.s. during the bush years sorry obama tells it like it is

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       Sab Ohposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       No, Obama tells it like he sees it and he demands that others see it the same way. That's why the dems are gonna get slapped around in Nov. and Obama will slink out the back door of the White House in 2012.

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    Ralph Deedsposted 14 years ago

    Let's lighten up a bit with a little humor from this morning's NY Times with "The Unbearable Lightness of Leading" by John Kenney--
    
    Kenny's op-ed provides some snippets from this weeks MSM on President Obama's recent annual physical exam--
    
    Here's the first one--Katie Couric on CBS evening news--
    
    KATIE COURIC (in studio): “What’s the president hiding?” This question from senior members of the Republican Party, who are outraged tonight at what they’re calling the president’s “purported” weight. In a hastily called news conference, the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, said he would call on Congress to convene a bipartisan panel made up entirely of Republicans to investigate the president’s weight:
    
    MITCH McCONNELL (at news conference): This president claims to weigh 179.9 pounds. How do we know that’s true? He wore shoes and workout pants and a jacket and a T-shirt and some kind of presidential undergarment. What is that garment? How much does it weigh? How do we know that he wasn’t wearing long underwear to add bulk to his delicate frame? Why is this administration so secretive when it comes to its own weight? — “CBS Evening News”
    
    Click on this link for the remainder of the hilarious spoof--
    
    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/opini … amp;st=cse

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