• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Lilfe long Democrat can't believe how inept Democrats are in Economics

Do you believe that Bernanke/Obama's policies are destroying the American household?

  • Yes

    Votes: 9 42.9%
  • No

    Votes: 12 57.1%

  • Total voters
    21

richrf

New member
Joined
Nov 14, 2010
Messages
23
Reaction score
5
Gender
Undisclosed
Political Leaning
Undisclosed
It is so frustrating and embarrassing for me to watch Democrats as they fumble around with the economy. I am not sure whether Obama is just wet behind the ears and has no business being President (I voted for Clinton in the primaries because to me Obama was as ill-equipped as Palin or Bush) or whether he is just being a shill for his backers on Wall Street - especially Goldman Sachs.

The Democrats - Frank, Schumer, Pelosi - have all betrayed their constituency as the middle class is being destroyed by King Bernanke's "Let Them Eat Cake" policies. It is a disgrace and I still have to hold my stomach whenever I hear Frank shilling for Wall Street and the fat cats that he financed via Freddie and Fannie.

I hope that there is a new breed of Democrats that come along that have good knowledge of economics and can serve their constituency. It would be a breath of fresh air.
 
As long as people continue to believe that our economy is driven by spending, you are pissing in the wind, my friend.
 
As long as people continue to believe that our economy is driven by spending, you are pissing in the wind, my friend.

The point is that the election showed that people are sick and tired of spending of all sorts. And my guess is that there finally will be some changes in the government - finally. The only person who still believes in spending is Bernanke who feels that printing $600 billion dollars is just a extension of normal Fed Reserve policies. He is either a shill for Wall Street or a ignoramus. Take your pick.
 
It is so frustrating and embarrassing for me to watch Democrats as they fumble around with the economy. I am not sure whether Obama is just wet behind the ears and has no business being President (I voted for Clinton in the primaries because to me Obama was as ill-equipped as Palin or Bush) or whether he is just being a shill for his backers on Wall Street - especially Goldman Sachs.

The Democrats - Frank, Schumer, Pelosi - have all betrayed their constituency as the middle class is being destroyed by King Bernanke's "Let Them Eat Cake" policies. It is a disgrace and I still have to hold my stomach whenever I hear Frank shilling for Wall Street and the fat cats that he financed via Freddie and Fannie.

I hope that there is a new breed of Democrats that come along that have good knowledge of economics and can serve their constituency. It would be a breath of fresh air.

I don't understand how you could be a lifetime Democrat and NOT understand the difference between rebublicans and democrats in regards to the economy.

It is not that democrats are dumb when it comes to the economy, they have a different philosophy. You seem to embody more of a capitalistic or traditional republican approach. Democrats have historically used taxation as a means to fund government spending as a means of creating jobs. The Democrats lean more towards socialistic ideas such as the good of the community is more important than the good of the individual. They believe the government can make a system better and more efficient than the open market - but to do so they need money... They support pushing those behind forward over exceptionalism - that some companies are well run and some are not.

Their goal is not to destroy the middle class, rather they would like to enact a cry to "Spread the wealth." This class warfair takes people's eyes off their problems, and highlights other's success. This produces jealousy, anger, and dreams for the lower class and encourages them to vote. The lower class then feel that though voting and the right policies the benefits of those who have accumulated wealth will then be forced to "share" that success with everyone else... highlighting the benefit of the community over that of the individual.
 
I don't understand how you could be a lifetime Democrat and NOT understand the difference between rebublicans and democrats in regards to the economy.

It is not that democrats are dumb when it comes to the economy, they have a different philosophy. You seem to embody more of a capitalistic or traditional republican approach. Democrats have historically used taxation as a means to fund government spending as a means of creating jobs. The Democrats lean more towards socialistic ideas such as the good of the community is more important than the good of the individual. They believe the government can make a system better and more efficient than the open market - but to do so they need money... They support pushing those behind forward over exceptionalism - that some companies are well run and some are not.

Their goal is not to destroy the middle class, rather they would like to enact a cry to "Spread the wealth." This class warfair takes people's eyes off their problems, and highlights other's success. This produces jealousy, anger, and dreams for the lower class and encourages them to vote. The lower class then feel that though voting and the right policies the benefits of those who have accumulated wealth will then be forced to "share" that success with everyone else... highlighting the benefit of the community over that of the individual.

Thank you for an honest assessment. This is precisely right I think. Liberals tend to think in terms of the community as a whole while Conservatives tend to think in terms of the individual. My personal view is that we need a balance of both as too much of either can cause harm and misery.
 
Bernake was appointed bt GWB, and approved by the republican congress and senate,
 
Thank you for an honest assessment. This is precisely right I think. Liberals tend to think in terms of the community as a whole while Conservatives tend to think in terms of the individual. My personal view is that we need a balance of both as too much of either can cause harm and misery.

I think it's important to understand what defines conserverative and liberal beliefs. It seems that too often it is boiled down to one's views on abortion or war or taxes.

community vs individual
equality vs freedom
positive law vs natural law
new institutions vs traditional institutions

These are a few of the left vs right arguments. Keep that in the context of this thread, you see why the right feels the way they do and the left feels the way they do.
 
I don't understand how you could be a lifetime Democrat and NOT understand the difference between rebublicans and democrats in regards to the economy.

It is not that democrats are dumb when it comes to the economy, they have a different philosophy. You seem to embody more of a capitalistic or traditional republican approach. Democrats have historically used taxation as a means to fund government spending as a means of creating jobs. The Democrats lean more towards socialistic ideas such as the good of the community is more important than the good of the individual. They believe the government can make a system better and more efficient than the open market - but to do so they need money... They support pushing those behind forward over exceptionalism - that some companies are well run and some are not.

Their goal is not to destroy the middle class, rather they would like to enact a cry to "Spread the wealth." This class warfair takes people's eyes off their problems, and highlights other's success. This produces jealousy, anger, and dreams for the lower class and encourages them to vote. The lower class then feel that though voting and the right policies the benefits of those who have accumulated wealth will then be forced to "share" that success with everyone else... highlighting the benefit of the community over that of the individual.

You hit the nail on the head for how Dems think today. However, I'm not sure they were always so far left.
 
Thank you for an honest assessment. This is precisely right I think. Liberals tend to think in terms of the community as a whole while Conservatives tend to think in terms of the individual. My personal view is that we need a balance of both as too much of either can cause harm and misery.

Conservatives do think in terms of the individual. That benefits the community as a whole.
 
Conservatives do think in terms of the individual. That benefits the community as a whole.

sometimes it does, your right.
 
I think it's important to understand what defines conserverative and liberal beliefs. It seems that too often it is boiled down to one's views on abortion or war or taxes.

community vs individual
equality vs freedom
positive law vs natural law
new institutions vs traditional institutions

These are a few of the left vs right arguments. Keep that in the context of this thread, you see why the right feels the way they do and the left feels the way they do.

You did pretty well. Except for the op-ed that was the last paragraph, you were right on the mark. I disagree with the op-ed though.

One of the consistent failures I see conservatives committing when they discuss how liberals think is that they think there is jealousy (or a desire for class warfare, etc) of those who are more successful, when it is more about ideas about how society would be most functional and productive. To think about it as jealousy or envy is to bring it to the individual instead of community focus, which you yourself have already made it quite clear that there is a difference in views. Its more like fixing a broken machine than it is about harming a person.
 
Last edited:
To think about it as jealousy or envy is to bring it to the individual instead of community focus, which you yourself have already made it quite clear that there is a difference in views. Its more like fixing a broken machine than it is about harming a person.

It is human nature to be concerned with "What's in it for me." The Individual vs Community refers to how one views the solutions to problems. This is how freedoms are divided by both sides. Keeping within the context of this thread, I don't know anyone who thinks they don't pay enough in taxes. But as a whole, when looking at federal budget and deficit, collectively we don't pay enough in taxes. This is where the good of the community vs the good of the individual comes into play.

At some point we need to balance the budget. Do we cut services which will hurt the community, especially individuals who are already depending on those services and cutting jobs, but leaves individuals (not the government) free to the money as they see fit maybe people will make donations, or spending money to stimulate, or doing nothing with the money other than saving it so one day they are not relying on government services.... Or do we raise taxes which will have a negative effect on individuals freedom to make choices by limiting their purchasing power by leaving their pocket lighter, but the community as a whole benefits by having the services which would otherwise been removed. Also helping out those who do not have the means to help themselves, makes your city a better place to live and will lead to less crime, drugs etc.

Here, the discussion centers on who should be the one in control of the money. Individuals, or the community.

This is a different way to frame the debate. If you were a waiter would you rather pool your tips, and at the end of the shift everyone gets an equal share of the tip jar? Or would you rather go home with the tips that were given directly to you?

Community pooling makes the establishment a better place because everyone is there helping because they have a direct share in the benefits. However it also gives little reason to go the extra mile on your individual customers if you can coast by with little downside.
 
Last edited:
the household? no, the nation perhaps, but the causes for destruction of the household is usually closer to home...
 
I don't understand how you could be a lifetime Democrat and NOT understand the difference between rebublicans and democrats in regards to the economy.

I see no differences. Both parties are only concerned with keeping their benefactors (Wall Street) flush with cash, the only difference is that the Democrats seem to be a little more obvious about it, throwing trillions of dollars at Wall Street to save the speculators at the cost of the American household.

As for Obama, I believe he is actually clueless and Bernanke is just trying out some of his ideas from his old thesis days.
 
Thank you for an honest assessment. This is precisely right I think. Liberals tend to think in terms of the community as a whole while Conservatives tend to think in terms of the individual. My personal view is that we need a balance of both as too much of either can cause harm and misery.

I think that you might think like that but not the Democrats and Obama. When Bernanke prints money he is doing one and only one thing - devaluing the savings of the savers (large middle class and retirees). The cheap money he prints goes to the wealthiest segment of our society. So, really, the Democrats are only making the rich richer.

I will give Obama the benefit of a doubt. He knows nothing about economics. Nothing about business. Nothing about flow of money. He is clueless and should never been elected to the Presidency for the same reasons Palin and Bush should never be President. All are way over their head.

But Barney Frank and Schumer are of a different stripe. They know exactly what is happening and keep feeding the wealthy by the trillions with regard to the other 90% in our society. So don't kid yourself about altruism. The Democrats like Pelosi, Frank, and Schumer are wolves like the Republicans.
 
Bernake was appointed bt GWB, and approved by the republican congress and senate,

Bernanke was reappointed by Obama and barely made it though - only because of the full support of the Democrats. At the time the Republicans were under pressure because of the huge Bernanke bailout (huge is an understatement since we are talking trillions) of the banks and other Wall Street investment houses. This is totally on the Democrats shoulders.
 
I think it's important to understand what defines conserverative and liberal beliefs. It seems that too often it is boiled down to one's views on abortion or war or taxes.

community vs individual
equality vs freedom
positive law vs natural law
new institutions vs traditional institutions

These are a few of the left vs right arguments. Keep that in the context of this thread, you see why the right feels the way they do and the left feels the way they do.

I would define it differently. The Democrats feed lawyers, government workers, General Motors, and Goldman Sachs with the hard earned money of the middle class and retirees, while Republicans feed oil, banks, insurance companies, doctors and Bank of America. It is quite disgraceful how the hard working families in American are being denuded of their lifetime of savings but they threw out a bunch this election (good riddance) and am pretty sure they will do it again if this massive transfer of dollars to the wealthy does not stop.
 
the household? no, the nation perhaps, but the causes for destruction of the household is usually closer to home...

In this case, Bernanke's policies are designed to save the banks at the cost of the middle class and retirees. There is no interest paid on savings. The dollars is devalued. And there is imposed inflation. What's more. Bernanke's stated policy is for households to take more risk. As a consequence, once the bond bubble bursts, trillions of dollars more will be lost. The total cost to the average household (90% of Americans) is in the tens of trillions. Where did the money all go? Barney Frank knows. It went overseas where corporations and wealthy individuals are building plants using cheap labor. It burns me up to see this ongoing rape of America. If the Democrats keep this up they will be lucky to have but a few representatives left in Congress and certainly no Presidency. And my guess is that the condition will last at least one generation.
 
richrf asked This is a different way to frame the debate. If you were a waiter would you rather pool your tips, and at the end of the shift everyone gets an equal share of the tip jar? Or would you rather go home with the tips that were given directly to you?
I'd rather they compete to see who could make the most tips. Losers buy the drinks for the winner on Friday night.
Customers would get great service, all waiters would end up with more in their pockets than if they just split tips. ( depending on how many waiters and how much of a drinker the winner was):cheers:
 
Bernanke was reappointed by Obama and barely made it though - only because of the full support of the Democrats. At the time the Republicans were under pressure because of the huge Bernanke bailout (huge is an understatement since we are talking trillions) of the banks and other Wall Street investment houses. This is totally on the Democrats shoulders.

QE 2 you mean, what about QE1 which was about triple the size.

You should also realize that todays conditions are a direct result of the monetary and banking policies from the mid to late 90s's. The housing bubble was created not under the Obama admin or even Bernanke, but Greenspan, Bush and to a lesser extent Bush. The current admin was left with the biggest mess since the Great Depression, and had two choices, let things collapse and see massive civil unrest (Greek or french riots times 10 especially as americans tend to have more weapons) or try to limit the downside, which of course would weaken future growth. If a person did not know that QE was going to occur at some point in the US as far back as 2006-2007, then they were not paying attention to the economy, or to Bernanke's nickname (helicopter ben)

No politician in the US with the probable exception of Ron Paul would have taken the hard route, the last fed chairman who would have taken the hard route was Volcker. Greenspan was a horrible fed chair a serial bubble maker, and a man of multiple bailouts
 
I would define it differently. The Democrats feed lawyers, government workers, General Motors, and Goldman Sachs with the hard earned money of the middle class and retirees, while Republicans feed oil, banks, insurance companies, doctors and Bank of America. It is quite disgraceful how the hard working families in American are being denuded of their lifetime of savings but they threw out a bunch this election (good riddance) and am pretty sure they will do it again if this massive transfer of dollars to the wealthy does not stop.
You really have very little understanding of what you are discussing...

You seem very angry. May I suggest you take the time to read a comparison and contrast of the right and left wings in the american political spectrum and what actually defines them as right or left... Maybe read something by Burke... Maybe suck on a xanax while you think of all those people you just put into their nicely stereotyped box that you can blame for your problems.
 
richrf asked This is a different way to frame the debate. If you were a waiter would you rather pool your tips, and at the end of the shift everyone gets an equal share of the tip jar? Or would you rather go home with the tips that were given directly to you?
I'd rather they compete to see who could make the most tips. Losers buy the drinks for the winner on Friday night.
Customers would get great service, all waiters would end up with more in their pockets than if they just split tips. ( depending on how many waiters and how much of a drinker the winner was):cheers:

While philosophical debates are interesting (I participate in them all of the time), I am really speaking to a much more practical and real issue: The average American household is being creamed by Bernanke's policies that are supported by Obama. And the clear winners are the top 1%.

The richest 1 percent of Americans now take home almost 24 percent of income, up from almost 9 percent in 1976. And to add emphasis to the widening gap: From 1980 to 2005, more than four-fifths of the total increase in American incomes went to the richest 1 percent.

The references for the above information and much more can be found in this article which largely draws from a series of articles published in Slate Magazine.

The point is this: under both Republican and Democratic administrations the wealth gap continues to widen enormously. More so than at any time since the years prior to the Great Depression. It is happening as a result of the Federal Reserve under both Greenspan and Bernanke has given free money to the very wealthy (who else can borrow at 0%) while giving middle class households 1) 0% interest on their savings 2) a rapidly devaluing dollar (over 15% during the last few months), 3) and a tremendous amount of inflation to boot.

While Democrats apparently don't understand how wealth is being concentrated as a result of Federal Reserve policy (the Feds bought all of those junk mortgages from Goldman Sachs at full dollar value) which are totally supported by the Democratic leadership, the independents in this country who know what is happening to their savings voted en masse for Republicans this time around and if the Democrats don't get it - they sure will the next election.
 
You really have very little understanding of what you are discussing...

You seem very angry. May I suggest you take the time to read a comparison and contrast of the right and left wings in the american political spectrum and what actually defines them as right or left... Maybe read something by Burke... Maybe suck on a xanax while you think of all those people you just put into their nicely stereotyped box that you can blame for your problems.

I think it would be nice to get our heads out of academic books and talk reality. It does me know good to talk about some idealized view of the Democrats as some long departed author viewed them decades ago. One of the problems is that we have a naive academic theoretician running the Federal Reserve and has no idea (clueless in the words of the German finance minister) what he is doing. He just keeps feeding cash to the rich who apparently can't get enough of this clueless dunce.
 
QE 2 you mean, what about QE1 which was about triple the size.

QE1 was fully supported by the Obama administration. Basically it moved $1.5 trillion in savings from the middle class and retirees to the bankers, investment houses, and hedge funds.

You should also realize that todays conditions are a direct result of the monetary and banking policies from the mid to late 90s's.

Yes, the dismantling of regulations which kept banks from speculating with deposits began under Reagen, accelerated under Clinton/Greenspan and Bush/Greenspan (with the help of Barney and his Freddie/Fannie handouts to the banks), and is now reaching giddy proportions under Bernanke/Obama who are printing trillions of dollars and the expense of the 90% of the households who save money. The winners are the speculators (banks, investment houses, brokerage firms, hedge funds) who get to play with this money for free - and they are all playing overseas where they can get a much better return on their investments.

The housing bubble was created not under the Obama admin or even Bernanke, but Greenspan, Bush and to a lesser extent Bush.

Yes, let's give credit where credit is due. All Bernanke has done is wiped out trillions of dollars in savings by monetizing the Federal debt and has created giant bubbles in bonds, currencies, gold, silver, and now the stock market. The result will be grand catastrophe has apparently Bernanke has not learned that" 1) you cannot solve a debt problem by creating giant debts (something that homeowners loved to do during the last housing bubble, and 2) you cannot create wealth by printing money. This is so ludicrous it defies imagination. Only a clueless half-wit like Bernanke can believe and utter such things in public.

The current admin was left with the biggest mess since the Great Depression, and had two choices, let things collapse and see massive civil unrest (Greek or french riots times 10 especially as americans tend to have more weapons) or try to limit the downside, which of course would weaken future growth.

What they should have done was make the speculators take a haircut. Instead they made Goldman, Morgan-Stanley, JP Morgan totally whole. This left these wolves enough money to give themselves billions upon billions of dollars in bonuses. How nice that they should get a Bernanke bequeath bonus for all of their good work. And this entirely endorsed and accomplished under the Obama administration. Remember, Obama got a ton of money from Goldman and friends during the campaign.

If a person did not know that QE was going to occur at some point in the US as far back as 2006-2007, then they were not paying attention to the economy, or to Bernanke's nickname (helicopter ben)

I agree. Taleb and many others warned about the coming catastrophe. All that Obama did was reward the perpetrators for their good deeds. They did not lose one red cent.

No politician in the US with the probable exception of Ron Paul would have taken the hard route, the last fed chairman who would have taken the hard route was Volcker. Greenspan was a horrible fed chair a serial bubble maker, and a man of multiple bailouts

Totally agree. Obama because he has no idea what he is doing, gave the reigns of authority to Bernanke who is basically running wild, and Geithner who is doing what he needs to do to secure his future as a consultant on Wall Street just like Robert Rubin, Sec. of Treasury under Clinton and one of the brains behind the collapse of the Citibank. It all wreaks.
 
Back
Top Bottom