Well now! Surprise surprise...

[MaggieMae]

I am often fascinated when terms are tossed out which I am not familiar with. Even more so when they are used to describe me.

So I often try to understand them, more often than not for my own amusement, but, sometimes I actually learn a thing or two.

In this case, it was for amusement.

So I searched ......... "Randian ideologies" ........... I didn't need to search the words used before them! lol

Here is my #1 result and I can honestly say I know nothing of this person.

The cult of Ayn Rand

The cult of Ayn Rand : The New Yorker


Mike

Well now you do. While her philosophies may have been better argued when the U.S. actually was at the top of the game in manufacturing and exporting goods, she falls flat in the here and now when the country relies so heavily on global trends.

you "at work" Maggie?

No. I "work" about 4 hours a day from my home computer (not this one). I'm semi-retired.

 

[MaggieMae]

Reports from journalists and the Government Accountability Office last month about problems with the data on Recovery.gov cast doubt on the site’s claim that more than 640,000 jobs had been created or saved by the Obama administration’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Meanwhile Obama upped the ante, putting the figure at more than 1 million. On Nov. 12, for example, in announcing this month’s jobs summit, he said that the stimulus had “created and saved more than a million jobs.”

Now some good news for the White House: According to the Congressional Budget Office, the actual number may be more than twice what Recovery.gov says, and as much as 50 percent more than what Obama has been saying. The nonpartisan agency found that:

CBO, Nov. 30: n the third quarter of calendar year 2009, an additional 600,000 to 1.6 million people were employed in the United States, and real (inflation-adjusted) gross domestic product was 1.2 percent to 3.2 percent higher, than would have been the case in the absence of ARRA.

Read ----> Stimulus Jobs, Re-revisited | FactCheck.org

LOL!

And the rubes keep right on buying this nonsense.

I didn't lose my job last month! President Obama SAVED it!

Then consider yourself fortunate. That's the part that appears to be waaaaaaaaaaay over your head.

 

[Foxfyre]

Recessions are a naturally occurring phenomenon in economics and are inevitable from time to time for various reasons. But when the American people are optimistic and confident, recessions will be mild and short lived, and the people themselves quickly begin to grow the economy again. The government generally needs to do nothing.

It's absolutely incredulous to me that seemingly smart people cannot grasp the fact that this is NOT a "normal" recession and that the country won't just pull out of it in short order like we have in the past. I keep looking for clean, unambiguous articles (preferably from a conservative point of view so as not to be accused of being a "socialist" or some other equally degrading label). If I can find the time to read AND ABSORB the wealth of information that proves your premise W.R.O.N.G, then I don't know why everyone can't. Let's try THIS one.

Is Unemployment the Worst Since the Great Depression? - US News and World Report

Yes this is a deeper and more prolonged recession than normal, but the principles involved remain the same. The government cannot fix it by trying to spend us back to prosperity. Even the more socialist European nations knew that and they are all pretty well recovered by now. Even the Mexican government got it more right than we have.

The Obama Administration and current Congress have not done what needed to be done to foster a less deep recession and a quicker recovery, and they seem to be oblivious that what they are doing is only making things worse. There are two rational conclusions to be drawn here. 1) They are incompetent or 2) They are intentionally sabotaging any recovery for their own purposes.

You pick.

 

[MaggieMae]

Rather than blindly trust the numbers the administration pumps out, consider the state of your own local economy and unemployment numbers. Businesses are closing down right and left around here....some that have been around for decades. Even law firms are collapsing. The economy is not improving rapidly or convincingly. Obama's claim to have "saved" any jobs is liberal gibberish...unless he refers to those he has chosen not to fire from his and Michelle's personal staffs.

BTW, liberals, I wouldn't count any of those as jobs created either.

There are some governors and state legislators who have not used stimulus money wisely. But some have.

“If we are going to help our friends and neighbors, farmers and innkeepers during this difficult economic time, we must spend one-time federal recovery funds on one-time economic growth initiatives,”

Press Release - Jim Douglas, Governor of Vermont

The Repubican governor of my state, as well as his predecessors (Howard Dean, a Democrat, and Richard Snelling, a Republican) have worked successfully side-by-side with opposite legislatures for years.

There is always the old cliche' too that even a blind squirrel will find an acorn now and then or that even the stopped clock will show the correct time twice a day.

That you can find isolated incidents where the stimulus money produced as advertised cannot erase the hundreds of billions of dollars, all borrowed money, all a drain on the economy for this and future generations, that have produced no jobs, no stimulus, no incentive to anybody other than those grabbing for whatever cash they can get to enrich themselves and/or their agendas.

How much more good could the Federal government have done, and how much less would the deficit have been, had it announced that the Bush tax cuts would remain in place after 2010, had it relaxed some unnecessary regulation and provided tax incentives for private industry to step up production, and had it provided incentives for local governments to step up infrastructure repairs and maintenance. I imagine all that would have produced measurable positive results for a far sight less money than has been spent or committed.

I'm sick of seeing that the deficit will be such a "drain on future generations." Funny, I've heard that all my life, and the USA is still the RICHEST nation on earth. And I'm sick to DEATH of hearing you people say that the expenditures to jumpstart the economy have been worthless. You obviously have your noses stuck in negative, biased reporting and do now allow yourselves to even look at evidence to the contrary. You continue to blissfully believe that the current disaster could be fixed immediately if the current administration would just take the country back to some magic point in history when everything was just swell. (I'd like to know when that was, actually.)

Back to the deficit, we will always have debt. That is a given. But the deficit can be reduced, as happened in the 90's. (You remember, back when a Republican Congress worked together with a Democratic President? Imagine that...) When Clinton took office, the budget deficit stood at $404 billion; when he left office there was a budget surplus of $127 billion. Which means that a lot of giving and taking was required to get the deficit situation within manageable range. I'm an optimist regarding this. You folks are nothing but naysayers predicting doomsday when that isn't even on the horizon.

 

[MaggieMae]

Recessions are a naturally occurring phenomenon in economics and are inevitable from time to time for various reasons. But when the American people are optimistic and confident, recessions will be mild and short lived, and the people themselves quickly begin to grow the economy again. The government generally needs to do nothing.

It's absolutely incredulous to me that seemingly smart people cannot grasp the fact that this is NOT a "normal" recession and that the country won't just pull out of it in short order like we have in the past. I keep looking for clean, unambiguous articles (preferably from a conservative point of view so as not to be accused of being a "socialist" or some other equally degrading label). If I can find the time to read AND ABSORB the wealth of information that proves your premise W.R.O.N.G, then I don't know why everyone can't. Let's try THIS one.

Is Unemployment the Worst Since the Great Depression? - US News and World Report

Yes this is a deeper and more prolonged recession than normal, but the principles involved remain the same. The government cannot fix it by trying to spend us back to prosperity. Even the more socialist European nations knew that and they are all pretty well recovered by now. Even the Mexican government got it more right than we have.

The Obama Administration and current Congress have not done what needed to be done to foster a less deep recession and a quicker recovery, and they seem to be oblivious that what they are doing is only making things worse. There are two rational conclusions to be drawn here. 1) They are incompetent or 2) They are intentionally sabotaging any recovery for their own purposes.

You pick.

Don't toss it back at me. I continue to ask the question, which no one answers, what do you think should be done (regarding unemployment only at this step of the question). Every post here talks about what should NOT have been done, but it's the same old story: Not a single soul has a viable alternative, except maybe to pray that left alone, the economy will grow--cuz we've been there before and it always did? Perhaps I would agree if there wasn't a constant DEMAND that something be done NOW, and what IS done NOW is criticized at nauseaum.

 

[Charles Stucker]

The government can't create jobs.

Really? Tell it to the astronauts, who wouldn't have their jobs were it not for the multi-billion dollar government program to get to the moon in 10 years. Tell it to the tens of thousands of people who work in private sector jobs related to space science.

While you're at it tell all the people in high tech fields who have jobs because the US leads those fields directly because of NASA.

 

[saveliberty]

It's absolutely incredulous to me that seemingly smart people cannot grasp the fact that this is NOT a "normal" recession and that the country won't just pull out of it in short order like we have in the past. I keep looking for clean, unambiguous articles (preferably from a conservative point of view so as not to be accused of being a "socialist" or some other equally degrading label). If I can find the time to read AND ABSORB the wealth of information that proves your premise W.R.O.N.G, then I don't know why everyone can't. Let's try THIS one.

Is Unemployment the Worst Since the Great Depression? - US News and World Report

Yes this is a deeper and more prolonged recession than normal, but the principles involved remain the same. The government cannot fix it by trying to spend us back to prosperity. Even the more socialist European nations knew that and they are all pretty well recovered by now. Even the Mexican government got it more right than we have.

The Obama Administration and current Congress have not done what needed to be done to foster a less deep recession and a quicker recovery, and they seem to be oblivious that what they are doing is only making things worse. There are two rational conclusions to be drawn here. 1) They are incompetent or 2) They are intentionally sabotaging any recovery for their own purposes.

You pick.

Don't toss it back at me. I continue to ask the question, which no one answers, what do you think should be done (regarding unemployment only at this step of the question). Every post here talks about what should NOT have been done, but it's the same old story: Not a single soul has a viable alternative, except maybe to pray that left alone, the economy will grow--cuz we've been there before and it always did? Perhaps I would agree if there wasn't a constant DEMAND that something be done NOW, and what IS done NOW is criticized at nauseaum.

Interesting that you assume government MUST DO something. Limited to your criteria, I would say three actions taken together should happen.

1. Repeal the income tax amendment and ALL other taxes.
2. Institute a national sales tax Constitutional amendment with a cap of 16%.
3. Amend the Constitution to require a balanced budget.

 

[Foxfyre]

It's absolutely incredulous to me that seemingly smart people cannot grasp the fact that this is NOT a "normal" recession and that the country won't just pull out of it in short order like we have in the past. I keep looking for clean, unambiguous articles (preferably from a conservative point of view so as not to be accused of being a "socialist" or some other equally degrading label). If I can find the time to read AND ABSORB the wealth of information that proves your premise W.R.O.N.G, then I don't know why everyone can't. Let's try THIS one.

Is Unemployment the Worst Since the Great Depression? - US News and World Report

Yes this is a deeper and more prolonged recession than normal, but the principles involved remain the same. The government cannot fix it by trying to spend us back to prosperity. Even the more socialist European nations knew that and they are all pretty well recovered by now. Even the Mexican government got it more right than we have.

The Obama Administration and current Congress have not done what needed to be done to foster a less deep recession and a quicker recovery, and they seem to be oblivious that what they are doing is only making things worse. There are two rational conclusions to be drawn here. 1) They are incompetent or 2) They are intentionally sabotaging any recovery for their own purposes.

You pick.

Don't toss it back at me. I continue to ask the question, which no one answers, what do you think should be done (regarding unemployment only at this step of the question). Every post here talks about what should NOT have been done, but it's the same old story: Not a single soul has a viable alternative, except maybe to pray that left alone, the economy will grow--cuz we've been there before and it always did? Perhaps I would agree if there wasn't a constant DEMAND that something be done NOW, and what IS done NOW is criticized at nauseaum.

I think maybe some selected reading is employed when one does not see anybody saying what should be done.

1. Make the Bush tax cuts permanent for the foreseeable future so that private enterprise will be able to plan ahead with confidence. Our President campaigned vigorously on promises to cut taxes on low end businesses and for 90% of the people. Had he done so, we would have had a far less deep and prolonged recession. Had tax relief been provided to all business, we would probably be out of the recession by now and would be thriving.

2. Reduce as much regulation as is reasonable to free up private enterprise to be able to innovate and compete in the free market.

3. Scrap this horrendous healthcare bill completely and adopt as many as possible of the practical and profitable proposed reform measures that can be done immediately and with good results.

4. Scrap the horrendous cap and trade bill completely and focus on helping American industry be able to be boldly innovative and competitively on the open market.

5. If we must go into deeper deficits, provide some low end mortgage insurance or refi that will make it attractive for under water property owners to avoid default and help them tread water until that market recovers. Couple that with scrapping all the stupid initiatives that encourage lending institutions to make high risk loans and reinstate regulation that prohibit lending institutions from risking anything other than their own assets in high risk loans.

6. Announce that the government will freeze spending as much as possible without defaulting on existing obligations, that it will cut spending as much as it can without creating unacceptable hardship, and Congress and the Administration will operate with bare bone budgets and staffs until the economy rights itself.

7. Revamp the tax policy so that everybody from the poorest to the richest shares proportionately and equitably in the burden and begin a slow and careful process of reducing and eventually limiting all forms of federal charity.

Do that, and we will not only recover much more quickly from this recession but we will regain our standing as the shining city on the hill and our economic standing in the world.

 

[Mr.Fitnah]

Depends on the meaning of what a job is.
Are you an inmate or a census worker?.Check
Are you on public assistance? .Check
Do you break legs for SEIU or acorn? Check
Do you live and work on a congressional district that does not exists? Check

 

[Liability]

Reports from journalists and the Government Accountability Office last month about problems with the data on Recovery.gov cast doubt on the site’s claim that more than 640,000 jobs had been created or saved by the Obama administration’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Meanwhile Obama upped the ante, putting the figure at more than 1 million. On Nov. 12, for example, in announcing this month’s jobs summit, he said that the stimulus had “created and saved more than a million jobs.”

Now some good news for the White House: According to the Congressional Budget Office, the actual number may be more than twice what Recovery.gov says, and as much as 50 percent more than what Obama has been saying. The nonpartisan agency found that:

CBO, Nov. 30: n the third quarter of calendar year 2009, an additional 600,000 to 1.6 million people were employed in the United States, and real (inflation-adjusted) gross domestic product was 1.2 percent to 3.2 percent higher, than would have been the case in the absence of ARRA.

Read ----> Stimulus Jobs, Re-revisited | FactCheck.org

LOL!

And the rubes keep right on buying this nonsense.

I didn't lose my job last month! President Obama SAVED it!

Then consider yourself fortunate. That's the part that appears to be waaaaaaaaaaay over your head.

Your general incoherence is showing again, Maggot.

The reality is, I was just making a joke. Like most everything else in the adult world, that too sailed waaay over your pin head.

The Obama Administration has not "created" any fucking jobs. It hasn't "saved" any jobs either. And my job is not depenedent-- one way or the other -- on the Obama Administration's efforts to socialize our economy even further.

Newsflash for you and other libtarded liberoidal lemmings: many of us already realize that we are fortunate. We are fortunate to live in America. The current unfortunate circumstances is that the foundation which MADE America a free and prosperous land is being deliberately undermined by the stupid policies of the moron we elected President and the fools in Congress who share his idiotic political inclinations.

 

[MaggieMae]

1. Make the Bush tax cuts permanent for the foreseeable future so that private enterprise will be able to plan ahead with confidence. Our President campaigned vigorously on promises to cut taxes on low end businesses and for 90% of the people. Had he done so, we would have had a far less deep and prolonged recession. Had tax relief been provided to all business, we would probably be out of the recession by now and would be thriving.

2. Reduce as much regulation as is reasonable to free up private enterprise to be able to innovate and compete in the free market.

3. Scrap this horrendous healthcare bill completely and adopt as many as possible of the practical and profitable proposed reform measures that can be done immediately and with good results.

4. Scrap the horrendous cap and trade bill completely and focus on helping American industry be able to be boldly innovative and competitively on the open market.

5. If we must go into deeper deficits, provide some low end mortgage insurance or refi that will make it attractive for under water property owners to avoid default and help them tread water until that market recovers. Couple that with scrapping all the stupid initiatives that encourage lending institutions to make high risk loans and reinstate regulation that prohibit lending institutions from risking anything other than their own assets in high risk loans.

6. Announce that the government will freeze spending as much as possible without defaulting on existing obligations, that it will cut spending as much as it can without creating unacceptable hardship, and Congress and the Administration will operate with bare bone budgets and staffs until the economy rights itself.

7. Revamp the tax policy so that everybody from the poorest to the richest shares proportionately and equitably in the burden and begin a slow and careful process of reducing and eventually limiting all forms of federal charity.

//////////

1. Tax credits were signed into law and became effective April 1, 2009. Here's a synopsis.

Individuals

$300 one-time cash payment to: Seniors, disabled people, and veterans.
$500 tax cut per invididual (for two years)
$1000 tax cut per couple (for two years)
$1000 tax cut per child–if you count as the working poor

$2,500 tax credit for college tuition
$7,500 tax credit for middle-class first-time homebuyers who buy by mid-2009

No taxes on unemployment benefits (a temporary suspension)

Businesses
Companies in the red can claim tax credits on profits of up to five years ago
Businesses buying plants and equipment get bonus depreciation
Small businesses can double the amount they’re allowed to write off for new equipment and capital investments

Energy
More tax credits for energy-efficient homes
$31 billion total tax credits for companies who increase production of renewable energy and boost their energy efficiency

In addition, he proposes further relief on capital gains tax:

Obama proposes no capital gains tax on qualified small business stock : Startup Company Lawyer

And more:
House Democrats Propose Tax-Cut Extensions - WSJ.com

There has been no decision yet whether to extend the Bush tax cuts. It will all depend on the state of the economy at the time they expire. But those cuts ALSO resulted in a dramatic reduction in revenue, which added to Bush's deficit problems. So therein lies the conundrum.

2. No. Exactly what "regulations" are so offensive to private enterprise, and if so, why didn't they complain before the Obama administration took over?

3. I'm guessing conservatives will get their wish on health care, and the subject will, again, just be allowed to fade away. There will be NOTHING, no Dem plan will get a single vote from Republicans, and any "good" stuff conservatives suddenly are willing to offer up when they are no longer in power won't happen either.

4. Ditto. Cap & Trade will not pass, which is not to say that a renewable energy plan in general will not. Just that particular requirement.

5. Regarding homeowner assistance, this also has already been done, and of course has been highly criticized. The Q&A details can be found here:

Obama Administration's Home Mortgage Crisis Fact Sheet - washingtonpost.com

and the home buyer's tax credit was just extended:

Obama Signs Homebuyer Tax Credit Extension | RISMedia

6. That's already a possibility, but highly doubtful. I seem to remember the 1994 showdown between Gingrich and Clinton over something similar, and Gingrich soon realized a spending freeze would cripple government.

Obama eyes domestic spending freeze - White House- msnbc.com

7. Regarding overhaul of the Tax Code, could we please wait a little longer than one year into office before Barack Obama tackles THAT daunting problem, which has also been tabled decade after decade? Check back with me sometime next summer, and perhaps it will become the hot topic du jour. But it makes no sense to take on something that stupendous at this point in time.

 

[MaggieMae]

Yes this is a deeper and more prolonged recession than normal, but the principles involved remain the same. The government cannot fix it by trying to spend us back to prosperity. Even the more socialist European nations knew that and they are all pretty well recovered by now. Even the Mexican government got it more right than we have.

The Obama Administration and current Congress have not done what needed to be done to foster a less deep recession and a quicker recovery, and they seem to be oblivious that what they are doing is only making things worse. There are two rational conclusions to be drawn here. 1) They are incompetent or 2) They are intentionally sabotaging any recovery for their own purposes.

You pick.

Don't toss it back at me. I continue to ask the question, which no one answers, what do you think should be done (regarding unemployment only at this step of the question). Every post here talks about what should NOT have been done, but it's the same old story: Not a single soul has a viable alternative, except maybe to pray that left alone, the economy will grow--cuz we've been there before and it always did? Perhaps I would agree if there wasn't a constant DEMAND that something be done NOW, and what IS done NOW is criticized at nauseaum.

Interesting that you assume government MUST DO something. Limited to your criteria, I would say three actions taken together should happen.

1. Repeal the income tax amendment and ALL other taxes.
2. Institute a national sales tax Constitutional amendment with a cap of 16%.
3. Amend the Constitution to require a balanced budget.

None of those things can be done with the sweep of a pen. They each take congressional action, and #3 requires 3/4 majority of STATE approval.

Will people ever GET IT that nothing can happen quickly? If you need to assign blame for the snail's pace of government, then blame the framers of the Constitution which specifically and consistently called for separation of powers.

 

[MaggieMae]

LOL!

And the rubes keep right on buying this nonsense.

I didn't lose my job last month! President Obama SAVED it!

Then consider yourself fortunate. That's the part that appears to be waaaaaaaaaaay over your head.

Your general incoherence is showing again, Maggot.

The reality is, I was just making a joke. Like most everything else in the adult world, that too sailed waaay over your pin head.

The Obama Administration has not "created" any fucking jobs. It hasn't "saved" any jobs either. And my job is not depenedent-- one way or the other -- on the Obama Administration's efforts to socialize our economy even further.

Newsflash for you and other libtarded liberoidal lemmings: many of us already realize that we are fortunate. We are fortunate to live in America. The current unfortunate circumstances is that the foundation which MADE America a free and prosperous land is being deliberately undermined by the stupid policies of the moron we elected President and the fools in Congress who share his idiotic political inclinations.

I got the "joke" funnyman. The fact that you were making it a "joke" is what really was funny. A job is a job is a job is a job is a job.

 

[saveliberty]

Okay, pick up your smock for McDonalds in the morning MaggieMae.

 

[MaggieMae]

Okay, pick up your smock for McDonalds in the morning MaggieMae.

I prefer Burger King myself. Worked there during lean times in the 80's and also cleaned houses for extra income.

 

[saveliberty]

Okay, pick up your smock for McDonalds in the morning MaggieMae.

I prefer Burger King myself. Worked there during lean times in the 80's and also cleaned houses for extra income.

Things I like about maggieMae's post:

A. Flame broiled rocks. Go MaggieMae.
B. Cleaning a house is noble work when done right. Good honest labor.
C. You have a sense of humor. Good job.

A job is a job is a job really isn't exactly true is it? Though any job is better than none. I assume that was your main point.

 

[Harry Dresden]

The government can't create jobs.

how did i and my fellow letter carriors get jobs with the PO?....who created those jobs?...just wonderin....

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

The government can't create jobs.

how did i and my fellow letter carriors get jobs with the PO?....who created those jobs?...just wonderin....

Public jobs come at the expense of productive private sector jobs.

 

[Harry Dresden]

The government can't create jobs.

how did i and my fellow letter carriors get jobs with the PO?....who created those jobs?...just wonderin....

Public jobs come at the expense of productive private sector jobs.

but you said..."The government can't create jobs.".....did not the US Govt establish the USPS...as per what the Constitution says....and create the Jobs within and hire accordingly?.....the PO has been around in primitive forms since the 1630's....and in 1775 the PO was established.....and people were hired to do the JOBS required to get the mail delivered....

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

how did i and my fellow letter carriors get jobs with the PO?....who created those jobs?...just wonderin....

Public jobs come at the expense of productive private sector jobs.

but you said..."The government can't create jobs.".....did not the US Govt establish the USPS...as per what the Constitution says....and create the Jobs within and hire accordingly?.....the PO has been around in primitive forms since the 1630's....and in 1775 the PO was established.....and people were hired to do the JOBS required to get the mail delivered....

And those jobs came at the expense of the private market, which means that real wealth producing jobs that would have been created by the market were not created.