Silver breaks down the house political spectrum and the difficulty of *anyone* creating a majority to pass *anything.* Pretty sobering analysis: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/21/in-house-of-representatives-an-arithmetic-problem/#more-37974 From the blog post:
2008 and the LIBOR crisis have barely made a dent. I actually think there should be a greater amount of change, but investors seem stuck a bit in static, and the words of credit rating agencies that were proven disastrously wrong a few years ago won't change much. It would have to be a generational change. It'd require a total rethink of how the world is operated financially for America to start truly declining in international investment opinion.
So ABC and CNN now reporting that major setback in talks: dems won't budge on republican insistence that they change the way SS increases are calculated. Blargh.
It's worse than that on the Repub side. While the majority of Repubs may not be official Tea Party folks, they are scared of being challenged by TeaPers, so they vote like them. I doubt there are 30 Repubs that would vote with Dems on any issue outside of naming the Peoria Post Office.
Makes sense - Dems will eventually give in on Chained CPI, but they are going to use it to extract a hell of a lot more than this mini-agreement on taxes. They can win the tax battle on Jan 2, if it comes down to that, so there's no reason to negotiate anything major away just to do it a few days earlier. I suspect the Obama bill will come up to a vote tomorrow in the Senate, pass there (GOP won't filibuster), and then set a stage tomorrow evening in the House for an unpredictable vote.
Well a first step is considering the way the world is working now-- such things as how international bankers and their support staff manipulate interest rates such as LIBOR, stock market trading rules, tax rates on capital gains; "free" trade agreements, bribes or campaign contributions to politicians to make capital mobile, manipulate immigration rules and use military force to suppress unions in third world countries etc. One should consider how these folks make quick profits by overlending to countries such as Greece or overextended/ low wage home buyers in the US. You should consider how once these folks can't make what they thought they basically overule the elected governments of entire countries. One should think about whether we want that in the US and want to accept a powerlessness to resist this as basically accepted in the posts above by Major. One should think about who these rules and policies benefit and whether that this whole present economic system is really like the law of gravity or something that could be changed by humans to benefit more than just the folks at the top.
I was actually trying to explain the libor issue to my brother in law 2 days ago. Guy is an engineer, married and a 30 year old homeowner. He had no clue. At all. Depressing. Thank you Xbox, facebook, fantasy football, movies [prolly p0rn 2] & booze for turning even half way smart people into complacent idiots.
Not only do they face a tough primary challenge, but decreased funding and support from the RNC and leadership. This is why politics sucks so much.
To be fair, there are several institutions and shadow institutions that the financial industry deliberately obfuscates. I can sort of grasp the pictures and graphs I've read on it, but I'd be totally lost if I were to regurgitate and answer questions about it. If I had more time, I could probably build and read up on it like the 08 meltdown, but my focus is devoted on other things within my control....
This is true. Complacent idiot is the wrong way to describe it & I would apologize to my bro-in-law for that statment. You're right. I often avoid certain conversations here & in public merely because some issues are as you put it, not within my control. This whole cliff issue is just exasperating.
It's hard to argue with people who just make up figures and act like they are fact. Regardless, 401ks aren't the only investments out there. Every pension fund in the country is affected by the market. All those union households and government employees that have pensions for retirement would be affected. You simply have no idea what you're talking about when it comes to anything regarding the economy or how it functions. Yes, but it requires actually knowing something of what you're talking about first. And you clearly have no idea. If you want to discuss economics in the future, stop making up BS and then using it to justify your arguments.
Politicians being politicians. Shocking! <iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/nM_A4Skusro?feature=player_detailpage" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Hey I hear you. One of the reasons I quit engineering many years ago was the general ignorance or unconcern by engineers about anything beyond their tech jobs, family life and entertainment. It might be more of a contented decent paid American thing. You find engineers from other countries often times not so limited in perspective or concerns.
Obama giving in is one of the least surprising things ever. I'm for the cliff. Anything else at this point is garbage. Actually it's all garbage, since DoD already got a "get out of jail" card. ****ing idiots.
Me too! Seriously. What is this about DoD getting a free pass? Link? That makes me want to riot in the streets.
