Japan's lost decade--proves Stimulus is the wrong thing to do.

[oreo]

We are right now a carbon copy of this lost decade: Same economic problems, same economic circumstances that brought us to this economic collapse.

Japan in the 1980's had the stock market of all time. Property values were also sky-rocketing, selling vacant land at about $50,000.00 per sq. foot. Of course, their stock market crashed & property values dropped to 5% of their prior value. Bank loaning practices were as bad as we have seen with Freddie/Fannie--they too were lending to people who could not afford to re-pay the loans.

The government of Japan--threw billions in spending back into the economy. IT DIDN'T WORK.

It lasted for 10 years, each new Prime Minister kept throwing government money at the problem in new spending bills to re-vitalize it. Finally a conservative Prime Minister, told the truth to the citizens of Japan--that they were going to go through some pain. The government stopped throwing money at the problem & the economy RECOVERED.

Barack Obama's theory is that Japan did not act fast enough in throwing money at the economy to revive it. That's why he is determined to rush this bill through.

Many other economists disagree--stating that when the government stopped trying to solve the problem by throwing billions at it, is finally when Japan's economy came back.

DID YOU KNOW: The United States also had a lost decade. It was called the Great Depression. President Hoover a republican & President Roosevelt a democrat, both threw billions at road, bridge & dam projects. They didn't work. It was WW2 that eventually brought us out of the Great Depression.

 

[Munin]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

 

[editec]

Japan's lost decade--proves Stimulus is the wrong thing to do.

No it doesn't.

All it proves is that it didn't work for Japan.

The USA is not Japan.

In fact, even Japan of today isn't Japan of yesterday.

Economies change and thinking that one can apply the same economic solutions to different problems is just plain old DUMB.

Do YOU apply the same solutions to EVERY problem?

No?

But you imagine that every economy is a consistent thing (with simple rules for how it works) which can easily be understood year after year, don't you?

If the solution to the problem was as obvious as you think it is, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with, would we?

Come on now, Oreao, think it through logically and you'll have to admit that I'd right.

The economic system we had had morphed into something entirely different than it was even ten years ago.

The solutions that you think have to work, because you think people really understand how the economy works MIGHT work...or they MIGHT not.

Uncertainty in chaotic systems...it's what social scientist have no choice but to understand that most propellorheads simply cannot wrap their every problem has a solution oriented minds around.

Economics isn't rocket science...in fact it's far more complex than rocket science.

Get used to it.

 

[toomuchtime_]

Japan's lost decade--proves Stimulus is the wrong thing to do.

No it doesn't.

All it proves is that it didn't work for Japan.

The USA is not Japan.

In fact, even Japan of today isn't Japan of yesterday.

Economies change and thinking that one can apply the same economic solutions to different problems is just plain old DUMB.

Do YOU apply the same solutions to EVERY problem?

No?

But you imagine that every economy is a consistent thing (with simple rules for how it works) which can easily be understood year after year, don't you?

If the solution to the problem was as obvious as you think it is, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with, would we?

Come on now, Oreao, think it through logically and you'll have to admit that I'd right.

The economic system we had had morphed into something entirely different than it was even ten years ago.

The solutions that you think have to work, because you think people really understand how the economy works MIGHT work...or they MIGHT not.

Uncertainty in chaotic systems...it's what social scientist have no choice but to understand that most propellorheads simply cannot wrap their every problem has a solution oriented minds around.

Economics isn't rocket science...in fact it's far more complex than rocket science.

Get used to it.

Japan's experience provides dramatic evidence that stimulus alone won't revive the private sector economy. A decade of massive government spending ran Japan's national debt up to 180% of GDP, and while it did give Japan a 3% growth rate, all of it was dependent on government spending at a level that was unsustainable. When Japan finally dealt with the financial crisis that gave rise to the recession by buying up the bad assets that had frozen the banks, the private sector began to recover within a year, businesses were able to invest and soon exports began to grow again.

Like our recession, Japan's began with a real estate bubble that burst. Sweden also had this experience, but unlike Japan, Sweden never bothered with a stimulus program but immediately began recapitalizing the banks and within a year Sweden's economy began to recover.

At his press conference, Obama acknowledged that he expected the stimulus bill to only slow down the rate of job loss and that it would not revive the private sector economy, that to do that we needed to unfreeze credit so that businesses would be able to borrow what they need to meet their payrolls and pay their suppliers and to invest in future growth and consumers could borrow what they need so they can spend us out of this recession.

The administration has been less than honest with us in calling this an economic recovery bill. There is no basis in history or logic for believing this bill will lead to an economic recovery. It is an economic aid bill that will ease some of the pain while the administration either fixes the financial crisis or allows us to slip deeper and deeper into recession.

 

[midcan5]

Japan's lost decade | Business | guardian.co.uk

"As the world frets over the three-day delay before US Congress meets again to debate a bail-out plan for Wall Street, it is worth remembering that it took Japan's government several years to rescue its stricken financial institutions.

....Helped by toothless regulators who turned a blind eye to their losses, the initial reaction was to simply do nothing while banks creaked under the weight of unrecoverable loans."

and
"The Great Depression, to 1935"

"But Sweden would recover faster. This was the result of both a liberal monetary policy and public spending. A reduction in taxes for the average wage earner gave him more money to spend. A raised minimum wage increased the ability of low-income people to spend money. The government increased investments in public works. Federal money was pumped into unemployment insurance, medical care and old age pensions. The government willingly created a deficit, believing that it was emergency spending that would be paid back after the recovery. And with recovery being rapid and revenues increasing as a result of the rising economy, the deficits were quickly overcome.

Government participation in the economic life of Sweden had increased. The government supported farm prices and protective tariffs for farm products, and giving aid to the unemployed in farming areas helped to slow migration from the countryside into the cities. The Social Democrats gave labor the right to strike, but Sweden had a board that settled worker-management grievances, a board in which labor and management had confidence. And peace between labor and management benefited the economy.

Sweden's industrialists were disgruntled over higher taxes on their personal incomes, but they did not feel threatened to the extent that they withdrew from participating in the economic recovery. Manufacturing was to remain over 90 percent in the hands of capitalists, and business profits were left untaxed in order to stimulate rapid reinvestment. By 1936, industrial production in Sweden was 50 percent above what it had been in 1929 and unemployment had returned to 5 percent."

The Great Depression, to 1935

Summary

 

[rayboyusmc]

Like I said before, anyone on these boards who says they have the answer and they alone are fools:

To understand the Great Depression, it is important to know the theories of John Maynard Keynes (rhymes with "rains"). Keynes is known as the "father of modern economics" because he was the first to accurately describe some of the causes and cures for recessions and depressions.

In a normal economy, Keynes said, there is a circular flow of money. My spending becomes part of your earnings, and your spending becomes part of my earnings. For various reasons, however, this circular flow can falter. People start hoarding money when times become tough; but times become tougher when everyone starts hoarding money. This breakdown results in a recession.

To get the circular flow of money started again, Keynes suggested that the central bank -- in the U.S., the Federal Reserve System -- should expand the money supply. This would put more money in people's hands, inspire consumer confidence, and compel them to start spending again.

A depression, Keynes believed, is an especially severe recession in which people hoard money no matter how much the central bank tries to expand the money supply. In that case, he suggested that government should do what the people were not: start spending. He called this "priming the pump" of the economy. Indeed, most economists believe that only massive U.S. defense spending in preparation for World War II cured the Great Depression.

After its success during the war, almost all free governments around the world became Keynesian. Its policies have dramatically reduced the severity of recessions since then, and appear to have completely eliminated the depression from the world's economies. (More)

Events of the 1920s
The Roaring Twenties were an era dominated by Republican presidents: Warren Harding (1920-1923), Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) and Herbert Hoover (1929-1933). Under their conservative economic philosophy of laissez-faire ("leave it alone"), markets were allowed to operate without government interference. Taxes and regulation were slashed dramatically, monopolies were allowed to form, and inequality of wealth and income reached record levels. The country was on the conservative's preferred gold standard, and the Federal Reserve was not allowed to significantly change the money supply.

The fact that the Great Depression began in 1929, then, on the Republicans' watch, is a great embarrassment to conservative economists. Many try to blame the worsening of the Depression on Hoover, for supposedly betraying the laissez-faire ideology. As the time line in the next section will show, however, almost all of Hoover's government action occurred during his last year in office, long after the worst of the Depression had hit. In fact, he was voted out of office for doing "too little too late." The only notable exception to his earlier idleness was the Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930, whose minor impact we shall explore in more detail later on.

But much more importantly, the economy was clearly turning downward even before Hoover took office in 1929. Entire sectors of the economy were depressed throughout the decade, like agriculture, energy and mining. Even the two industries with the most spectacular growth -- construction and automobile manufacturing -- were contracting in the year before the stock market crash of 1929. About 600 banks a year were failing. Half the American people lived at or below the minimum subsistence level. By the time the stock market crashed, there was a major glut of goods on the market, with inventories three times their normal size.

The fact that all this occurred even before the first act of government intervention is a major refutation of laissez-faire ideology.

The Great Depression

 

[rayboyusmc]

For ever no there is a yes.

In recent weeks, numerous media figures have cited Japanese fiscal policy during the "lost decade" of the 1990s to criticize a plan announced by President-elect Barack Obama to launch a large-scale economic stimulus plan that includes extensive spending for public works. These media figures ignore evidence that, according to prominent economists, economic conditions were improving in Japan before the Japanese government temporarily abandoned stimulus spending in an attempt to reduce the deficit. Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, for one, points to Japan's fiscal stimulus packages as having "probably prevented a weak economy from plunging into an actual depression."

Media Matters - Media cite Japan's "lost decade" to criticize Obama's economic stimulus plan, but economists disagree

 

[rayboyusmc]

You will also find as many articles saying WWII wasn't the cure as saying it was.

With the uncertainty of what the real course is, why would Obama or the left follow what the right tells them when it goes against their own beliefs?

Bush tried his stuff for 8 years and we are now a festering pile of fecal foundering. If Obama uses the same approach Bush used, he would be rather poorly advised.

 

[del]

You will also find as many articles saying WWII wasn't the cure as saying it was.

With the uncertainty of what the real course is, why would Obama or the left follow what the right tells them when it goes against their own beliefs?

Bush tried his stuff for 8 years and we are now a festering pile of fecal foundering. If Obama uses the same approach Bush used, he would be rather poorly advised.

you're absolutely right.

bush combined increased govt spending and tax cuts to bring the country to the brink of bankruptcy.

obama's smart enough to realize that a combination of tax cuts and increased govt spending is the only answer.

 

[Munin]

You will also find as many articles saying WWII wasn't the cure as saying it was.

With the uncertainty of what the real course is, why would Obama or the left follow what the right tells them when it goes against their own beliefs?

Bush tried his stuff for 8 years and we are now a festering pile of fecal foundering. If Obama uses the same approach Bush used, he would be rather poorly advised.

you're absolutely right.

bush combined increased govt spending and tax cuts to bring the country to the brink of bankruptcy.

obama's smart enough to realize that a combination of tax cuts and increased govt spending is the only answer.

Here is a decent review of the Bush mistakes & the mistakes of the democrats during the Bush term.

The Bush Economy - WSJ.com

You re not able to spin this, the spending of Bush does not equal to the spending of Obama in any way. You ll see that the answer to every economic problem from the Bush government is TAX-CUTS and not spending. After the stimulus (tax-cuts), the FED (under the control of the Bush government) had failed miserably in keeping the economy under control (stable money).

It is not the spending or the tax-cuts themselves that are the problem, it is the way the government spends or gives tax cuts.

Let me explain it to you in a way you will certainly understand as a republican: Tax cuts & Spending are a tool, a tool that can be used in a good way or a bad way just like a gun is a tool that can be used in a good way or a bad way. If you use the tool in a bad way, then it will give you bad results. Does this mean that you need to prohibit the tool that created these bad results? Or do you need to prohibit the way this tool is used (when it created those bad results)?

It is kind of funny how republicans seem to think that the tools are the problem, this way they throw away all their tools they have and all that is left is small government and a laisez-faire policy.

"the government is not part of the solution, it is part of the problem"

 

[xsited1]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

Comparing excess government spending to Nazi Germany?

That's great!

 

[Munin]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

Comparing excess government spending to Nazi Germany?

That's great!

Yeah, I know: Nobody dares to use that as an example to prove that government spending can be "efficient" (german lol)

Pussies

 

[xsited1]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

Comparing excess government spending to Nazi Germany?

That's great!

Yeah, I know: Nobody dares to use that as an example to prove that government spending can be "efficient" (german lol)

Pussies

I think it's great! Makes you wonder what the Keynesians are up to.

 

[Munin]

Comparing excess government spending to Nazi Germany?

That's great!

Yeah, I know: Nobody dares to use that as an example to prove that government spending can be "efficient" (german lol)

Pussies

I think it's great! Makes you wonder what the Keynesians are up to.

Fucking bastards (Keynesians), they and their evil theory are the ones who are responsible for WWII

 

[editec]

Japan's lost decade--proves Stimulus is the wrong thing to do.

No it doesn't.

All it proves is that it didn't work for Japan.

The USA is not Japan.

In fact, even Japan of today isn't Japan of yesterday.

Economies change and thinking that one can apply the same economic solutions to different problems is just plain old DUMB.

Do YOU apply the same solutions to EVERY problem?

No?

But you imagine that every economy is a consistent thing (with simple rules for how it works) which can easily be understood year after year, don't you?

If the solution to the problem was as obvious as you think it is, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with, would we?

Come on now, Oreao, think it through logically and you'll have to admit that I'd right.

The economic system we had had morphed into something entirely different than it was even ten years ago.

The solutions that you think have to work, because you think people really understand how the economy works MIGHT work...or they MIGHT not.

Uncertainty in chaotic systems...it's what social scientist have no choice but to understand that most propellorheads simply cannot wrap their every problem has a solution oriented minds around.

Economics isn't rocket science...in fact it's far more complex than rocket science.

Get used to it.

Japan's experience provides dramatic evidence that stimulus alone won't revive the private sector economy?

Not exactly..


Japan's recent experience provided dramatic evidence that in the case of Japan of the recent past the econmic stimulus that they tried did not work in Japan as phoped.

Do you actually know anything about that stimulus?

For example, did you know that while Japan was opening up the purse strings and building something to stimulate the economy, it was also increasing taxes which have the exact opposite effect on the money supply?

I'll bet you didn't. But even if you had it wouldn't matter because apparently you think that Japan's economy and ours are similar enough that you can draw inferences from their experience to apply to ours.

That's the kind of a mistake that I am sympthetic to because I once beleived that sort of dislogical thing, too.

I no longer do

A decade of massive government spending ran Japan's national debt up to 180% of GDP, and while it did give Japan a 3% growth rate, all of it was dependent on government spending at a level that was unsustainable.

Then you have proved exactly nothing accept that you think Japan's economy and ours are the same animal.

They're not. Not remotely.

When Japan finally dealt with the financial crisis that gave rise to the recession by buying up the bad assets that had frozen the banks, the private sector began to recover within a year, businesses were able to invest and soon exports began to grow again.

Japan economy is still rather lame, FYI. Their economy not anywhere nearly so healthy as it was two decades ago.

Like our recession, Japan's began with a real estate bubble that burst. Sweden also had this experience, but unlike Japan, Sweden never bothered with a stimulus program but immediately began recapitalizing the banks and within a year Sweden's economy began to recover.

Great...we recapitalized our banks, too. So why can't we speak Swedish?

At his press conference, Obama acknowledged that he expected the stimulus bill to only slow down the rate of job loss and that it would not revive the private sector economy, that to do that we needed to unfreeze credit so that businesses would be able to borrow what they need to meet their payrolls and pay their suppliers and to invest in future growth and consumers could borrow what they need so they can spend us out of this recession.

Bully for him. That sounds like a a plan.

Damned shame neither you nor he nor I nor anyone else will KNOW what that will do except for the most obvious things like if you give some people money they will have some money. But what they will do with it, and what effect it will have on the economy, and how those effects will play out on other people, and what they will do, and when they do what other people will do when they hear of it, and how the world will react and what the weather on that day will be and how that will effect the price of tea in china...(pant! pant! pant!)..

NOBODY KNOWS!​

The administration has been less than honest with us in calling this an economic recovery bill.

I concur. I think they ought to call this plan the:

"Holy Shit!!! We broke capitalism again!

Quick! let's throw taxpayers' money at it and hope the people don't rise up and kill our class like we so justly deserve." plan.

Now THAT would be a more honest description of what the heck's going on, I think.

There is no basis in history or logic for believing this bill will lead to an economic recovery.

There is no basis in history or logic for believing that anything anyone has suggested WILL lead to economy recovery.

It's a freaking leap of faith, is what I am attepting to explain to you.

There is no reason to believe that we can KNOW what it would take to have economic recovery AT ALL.

It is an economic aid bill that will ease some of the pain while the administration either fixes the financial crisis or allows us to slip deeper and deeper into recession.

I totally agree...that's what it is... a plan that they HOPE will relieve SOME pain.

A plan that may or may not fix anything or may make it worse, or may not do something so unbelievably unpresidented and unexpected that nobody could possibly have imagined what would happen.

And FWIW you can take MY statement of complete uncertainty to the bank.

 

[oreo]

Japan's lost decade--proves Stimulus is the wrong thing to do.

No it doesn't.

All it proves is that it didn't work for Japan.

The USA is not Japan.

In fact, even Japan of today isn't Japan of yesterday.

Economies change and thinking that one can apply the same economic solutions to different problems is just plain old DUMB.

Do YOU apply the same solutions to EVERY problem?

No?

But you imagine that every economy is a consistent thing (with simple rules for how it works) which can easily be understood year after year, don't you?

If the solution to the problem was as obvious as you think it is, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with, would we?

Come on now, Oreao, think it through logically and you'll have to admit that I'd right.

The economic system we had had morphed into something entirely different than it was even ten years ago.

The solutions that you think have to work, because you think people really understand how the economy works MIGHT work...or they MIGHT not.

Uncertainty in chaotic systems...it's what social scientist have no choice but to understand that most propellorheads simply cannot wrap their every problem has a solution oriented minds around.

Economics isn't rocket science...in fact it's far more complex than rocket science.

Get used to it.

Japan's experience provides dramatic evidence that stimulus alone won't revive the private sector economy. A decade of massive government spending ran Japan's national debt up to 180% of GDP, and while it did give Japan a 3% growth rate, all of it was dependent on government spending at a level that was unsustainable. When Japan finally dealt with the financial crisis that gave rise to the recession by buying up the bad assets that had frozen the banks, the private sector began to recover within a year, businesses were able to invest and soon exports began to grow again.

Like our recession, Japan's began with a real estate bubble that burst. Sweden also had this experience, but unlike Japan, Sweden never bothered with a stimulus program but immediately began recapitalizing the banks and within a year Sweden's economy began to recover.

At his press conference, Obama acknowledged that he expected the stimulus bill to only slow down the rate of job loss and that it would not revive the private sector economy, that to do that we needed to unfreeze credit so that businesses would be able to borrow what they need to meet their payrolls and pay their suppliers and to invest in future growth and consumers could borrow what they need so they can spend us out of this recession.

The administration has been less than honest with us in calling this an economic recovery bill. There is no basis in history or logic for believing this bill will lead to an economic recovery. It is an economic aid bill that will ease some of the pain while the administration either fixes the financial crisis or allows us to slip deeper and deeper into recession.

Right--Obama did in fact admit that jobs are best created by the private sector. It's the unfreezing of small business credit & a lower tax rate to business that will stimulate this economy into sustained private sector growth.

During the Great Depression the mistake was--that a spirt in employment gains normally resulted in tax hike increases, which then lead to another long term recession.

We have two factors in this, not only tax hikes. But the cost of gasoline. Both are capable of sending any employment gains, back into recession.

I don't believe this current administration is capable of lowering business taxes which are currently at 39%. In fact the second highest in the world.

 

[rayboyusmc]

Check out what the business taxes are that are actually paid and post a link.

The Japanese did just like FDR, they listened to the conservative nay sayers and slowed down the spending during the process which in turn worsened their economy.

If this stimulus starts US back on a road to recovery, will you still deny it worked. Even Obama has said this is only a start.

 

[rayboyusmc]

High Corporate Tax Rate Is Misleading

IF YOU SAY SOMETHING long enough and loud enough, there's every chance people will come to believe it's true, especially if your opponents tire of rebuttals.

This time-honored political strategy has been working overtime of late, as Republican presidential hopefuls romance the richer Florida retirees with appeals for cuts in corporate taxes.


You may have heard: U.S. corporations face one of the highest income tax rates in the world, though the mention of "rate" is often enough excised, so that what comes through is the assertion that corporations pay too much in taxes. This is simply untrue if your basis for comparison is the developed world. The truth is that while the 35% corporate income tax rate is high indeed, the creativity and global reach of U.S. corporations make them among the most lightly levied.

Between 2000 and 2005, U.S. corporate taxes amounted to 2.2% of the GDP. The average for the 30 mostly rich member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development was 3.4%.

Why the disparity given the high federal rate, which rises to 39% counting state taxes? Part of the answer is that big U.S. companies have become expert at hiding profits in tax havens overseas. And many of the smaller ones simply pass through their income to owners who then report it on their personal returns.

According to one analysis, if so much corporate income hadn't moved to the personal tax rolls over the last 20 years, U.S. corporate taxes would account for 3.2% of the GDP, still a bit below the OECD average. "Usage of pass-through forms of business organization can be viewed as a form of 'self-help' corporate tax integration," writes Peter R. Merrill, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The income not squired away overseas or channeled to the personal returns still enjoys protection in the form of various tax breaks that depress the effective rate to 27%, according to the Treasury Department. Such breaks are expected to cost the Treasury $1.2 trillion over the next 10 years, reducing the corporate tax revenue by 25%.

Meanwhile, there's growing evidence that, despite the occasional crackdowns on especially creative tax accounting, routine corporate tax dodges are way up by historical standards, as multinationals play an increasingly profitable shell game.

High Corporate Tax Rate Is Misleading at SmartMoney.com

After taking how many billion for US taxpayers, Haliburton will now move overseas. Fucking crooks.

 

[glockmail]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

One sign of a good manager is that he plans before he spends. This bill is basically a compilation of all the crap that the Democrats wanted in the last administration and didn't get, emptied from member's hard drives into a huge list. Obama has no idea what's on the list, nor does he car. Its all about buying votes for 2010 and 2012.

 

[Sinatra]

Nazi Germany also did government spending (during the great depression): They created the biggest military monster at that time as a result of government spending.

My point: government spending can have both good and bad effects. Spending is investing, you can do good investments and bad investments. You have both good managers (who do good investments) and bad managers (who do bad investments).

It is too early to say if Obama is a bad manager, the failure of hiss bills have not been proven up to this day and the opposite is also true: the success of this bills have also not been proven yet.

One sign of a good manager is that he plans before he spends. This bill is basically a compilation of all the crap that the Democrats wanted in the last administration and didn't get, emptied from member's hard drives into a huge list. Obama has no idea what's on the list, nor does he car. Its all about buying votes for 2010 and 2012.

Glockmail is wise and shows allegiance to the one true Bond...