Unemployment Stays at 9.5%

Not that I care but if you are going to accuse someone of plagiarism and then cite Prof Davies as the true and rightful source, then please at least take the time to read your own link.

Thanks

http://www.snopes.com/business/taxes/howtaxes.asp

The only reason I bothered with this is because I remember hearing the same parable by another professor back in school. Nobody knows where the actual story originated from hence different people have been accredited over time. I think by now you owe someone an apology and maybe retract your comments.

 

Whether it's Professor Davies or whomever your just helping to prove my point that this is a regurgitated example that apparently many of us have heard before, provided without citation or link.

 

In your simplistic black and white world I guess this could be true, but like all GOP ideas when applied to real life it just falls apart. The crux of the example is that the business owner walks away leaving everyone to suffer now on their own. Professor Davies and whoever invented that example are apparently followers of Rand, parroting her beliefs about the "Men of the Mind" walking away because all of the rest of the "moochers." In Atlas Shrugged as well as in that rediculously simplistic analogy some real life facts are missing. Number one the business owners, lol "men of the mind" sorry I keep forgetting all rich people and business owners got where they are by their own sacrifice and hard work, are dedicated, incorruptible, and would never pollute, embezzle, lie, cheat, etc. Second where in your example or in Rands is the part about the government stepping all over themselves to offer tax breaks, grants, subsidies, to these business people? In Atlas Shrugged the government was forcing those poor business owners to give up their inventions for the good of the state. Funny I don't recall that happening in real life. But I do recall states fighting with each other over taxpayer provided subsidies to companies for promised jobs and then those companies backing out and packing up once their bare minimum legal duty was fulfilled.

Ultimately what this all culminates in is the simple fact that business owners have it very, very, good here in the US. They whine about taxes without mentioning their numerous other subsidies, or offshore tax havens. They are not going to pick up and walk away and form their own little society where they just trade back and forth with each other. Whatever pittance of money is given to the middle class just goes right back to those companies in the form of spending driving on the economy.

Here you go 4 of the top 10 are Waltons who INHERITED their riches from their Dad Mr. Walmart. David and Charles Koch also were fortunate enough to INHERIT a business from their father.

So that's 6 out of the top 10 right there. Sad thing is I agree with you, you CAN pursue higher wealth. IMO it's dead simple. Find a good company with a good 401K match start early and let compund interest and the market do their thing. But stop this crap about every millionaire is self made. That may have been true 30-50 years ago, but not now.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/09/30/forbes-400-gates-buffett-wealth-rich-list-09_land.html

 

Seriously? This is the level of your comprehension?

You took a story on taxation and then turned it into a tangent rant about Atlas Shrugged and Rand?

1) The original parable is about the class warfare tactics the pro-government wing or the leftist uses to create conflict among citizens.

2) The story is about the "rich" which could be anyone with a lot money and income not just businessmen like you somehow want to it be.

3) Finally, the point of the rich guy not showing up at end is not that the rich are going to leave the country but that they are going to halt capital investments in the country. See, the rich can always take their money, park it in 30 year treasury bonds, avoid all taxation and laugh in your face by not showing up at the dinner table. That is exactly what's going on when most of the capital in this country is sitting on the sidelines in safer investment vehicles because investors are terrified of the anti-wealth rhetoric spread by the current administration.

 

If you can't see how this fits in with Objectivism then you level of comprehension should be called into question.

The point of the GOP's arguement against the repeal of the Bush tax cuts or say eliminating the cap from SS is that it will hurt small business owners since they are the ones in the typical $250,000 and above salary range.

During this recession and the one before business pulled back. Go look up the numbers consumer spending is typically 70%, business 20%, government 10%. Every recession business pulls back and the government has to step up to fill the gap. Despite the Reagan and Bush tax cuts they continue to "halt capital investment."

 

MFW,

Based on your responses, I have to admit that I see you as the very epitome of what is wrong with this country: excessive greed. You are perfectly happy to engage in class warfare as long as your class is winning and receiving more from the government teat than the next guy. Your attitude is disgusting, your lack of social conscience is appalling, and I certainly hope that the entire country gets a taste of what your vision for America is because if they do, people who share your ideology will be voted out of office in droves.

I am not holding my breath on that last one, sadly there are plenty of people out there willing to buy lies and plenty of people like you willing to tell them as long as they can continue to get richer from the deception.

And you say it in such a flippant way as if that is just the way it should be. We have a progressive income tax, which means that if it were working the way it should, the rich would pay a higher percentage of their income in taxes than the middle and lower classes do.

Sure, we have the ability to pursue higher income, but income mobility in this country has been dropping dramatically (don't quote the Hubbard study, it has been debunked as hopelessly biased) while more and more of the country's wealth is amassed at the top.

I don't have negative feelings about people being able to get rich and availing themselves of this opportunity in America. I blame them for letting greed set in after they get there, greed which leads them to say things like "Of course as a percentage of income, the middle class pay more."

SS and Medicare exist so that we avoid having a society where a quarter of the elderly live in abject poverty as they did in the days before SS. The elderly in those times were the single biggest demographic of the homeless and I think that our society is better off not having millions upon millions of our senior citizens reduced to the status of beggars.

No, it doesn't.

Bob, the CEO, decides that he is paying far too much in taxes. Last year, he paid $170,000 in total taxes on his salary of $1 million while Joe and John paid $15,000 each on their salaries of $50,000. Steve paid about $6,000 on his $30,000 salary.

Bob says to the others, "look at the total dollar amount of the taxes I paid, it is more than all three of you made all year!" Instead of being thrilled that he brought home $830,000 (six times what the other three made), his greed makes him seethe about the fact that Steve's family got WIC to help out when they had a baby, that he got a small amount back on his tax return in EIC, and that he might receive more in Social Security benefits than he put in.

Bob doesn't seem to care or recognize that he makes his money on the backs of the people who work for him, that the rule of law in the United States helped propel him to his current position, or that the services the government provides have created a system where everyone has some opportunity to succeed while providing a safety net so that relatively few are forced to beg on the streets for their next meal, as is so common in India.

Bob has over 88% of the income in our little example, yet pays less than 75% of the taxes. However, by twisting and selectively applying the facts, he says "I paid almost three times the taxes that these other two guys did," leaving out several pertinent facts: that he is only talking about income taxes instead of the total tax burden, that he is paying a smaller percentage of his income in taxes despite enjoying a larger percentage of the wages, and that he would not have had as good a chance of getting rich in the first place if he had been in a country other than the US.

Now, not only is Bob making more than anyone else, paying less in taxes as a percentage of income than everyone else, but he has the audacity to say that he is due ANOTHER tax cut on top of the ones that Reagan and Bush gave to him over the course of the last 30 years.

This simplistic example also had the CEO making only 20X what his average salaried employee makes when today's percentage is closer to 400X. However, this example clearly points out the greed involved in the fact twisting anecdote you posted.

That's the thing, they won't go anyplace else because there isn't anyplace they could go to enjoy the opulence they do here at the unbelievably low rate of taxation we have. They didn't go anywhere when the top tax bracket was over 70% and they won't go anywhere once we raise that rate back up. There just isn't anywhere else in the world they would rather be, even if the top marginal tax rate doubled from where it is today.

A large part of the reason that there is such opportunity is government programs. SBA loans, loans and grants for education, roads and other infrastructure, our court system, and the biggest and most dynamic consumer market in the world are the direct result of the actions our government has taken to assure that the US is the country with the most opportunity in the world.

No, they couldn't. As you mentioned, there is a dearth of available, unpopulated islands, so they would have to go to another country. Other countries have higher tax rates than the US, so they would be paying a higher percentage of their income in taxes anywhere else they went.

That is the problem, they have the best of everything here, have had their tax rates lowered again and again over the course of the last 30 years, and they STILL whine about how they pay "too much" (in pure dollar amounts) in taxes.

In pure dollar amounts. If people like Warren Buffett paid the same 30% of their incomes in taxes, our fiscal issues would be pretty close to behind us. However, since they are greedy, they are willing and able to influence our tax code to make sure that they don't pay their fair share of taxes. This is their duty as they live in the lap of luxury that our system made available to them, but they shirk their duty because they are greedy.

I am not "crying" about the fact that I don't make as much money as they do, I am critical of the fact that people like you are so greedy that they are able to say things like "Of course as a percentage of income, the middle class pay more." Percentage of income is the only real way to compare the amount of taxes a person pays versus another.

This is the same reason that we use ratios to measure the performance of one company versus another in the same industry. This way, we can accurately compare company A with $1 billion in revenue to company B that had $20 billion. If both companies made the same amount of profit, it would be easy to look at the pure dollar figures and say that A and B are equally profitable until you look at the profit margin number and see that A had 20X the profitability.

I know you know all this, which is the reason that people like you piss me off so much. You are willing to selectively present and then further twist the facts to make your case based on greed.

Yes, through taxation, the rich have made it so that the transfer of wealth can only go from the middle and lower classes to the very top. What's more, they are trying to reduce their taxes even further so that they can get even richer on the backs of the middle class.

I haven't professed to "love" anything in this thread, but I will admit that I am happy about the results of SS and Medicare, programs that have kept our elderly from being even worse off than they are right now. I don't like a lot of the earmarks, but that is a total of less than 1% of the federal budget, so that one is little more than a straw man.

The pure fact is that this decline in infrastructure and schools on top of the exploding debt began after Reagan pushed through the first of the massive wealth redistribution programs in the '80s. That and spending on the military industrial complex are the biggest components of the declines I mentioned.

I would argue that defense spending mostly benefits defense contracting firms, you know, the ones owned and operated by rich people.

The wealthy benefit from the society that we have created, the one where the elderly spend their SS checks on their goods and services, where they have access to court systems that apply the rule of law so that people cannot rob or steal from them without redress, where people on the lower end of the income scale (and the elderly) don't have to spend all of their income on health care, leaving them some disposable income to continue to buy things that make the wealthy even wealthier.

No, I am telling you that your idiotic example is the equivalent of Marie Antoinette saying that the peasants should "eat cake" during a bread famine. Your twisted idea of "fair" would be laughable if I wasn't aware of how many people in the upper class share your opinion.

See, here's the thing, you don't know how good you already have it. You pay less than your fair share and have since Reagan played his tax shell game, decrying those programs that you will not share in while ignoring all of the other things the government does that helped you get to where you are. You also ignore the things that the government does that keep you where you are, have to omit and twist facts so that you can whine about how unfair the taxes you pay are, and actually have the gall to claim that it is OK that the middle class pays more of their income than the rich do.

I am actually paying for many benefits for which I enjoy few, if any, of the benefits. My local sales and property taxes pay for the police protection and the courts that I have not ever used. How about we get rid of those and see how long you keep your mansion, cars, and prized possessions. I pay a higher percentage of my income for these things, so I think it should be more up to me whether we have that safety net, one that the rich get far more benefits from than I do.

Yes, it is hilarious that you don't understand how a percentage of income is a better measure of a person's tax contribution than absolute dollars. That is "reasoning" that I would expect from Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck because I am fully aware that they are willing to lie and twist facts.

I agree, which is the reason the government exists in the first place, to protect We, the People from individuals and organizations who want nothing more than to get as much as they can out of the system, even if it hurts the country as a whole.

No, I don't, I recognize that I have as much capacity for greed as the next guy.

I am not trying to raise taxes to benefit myself. I expect that I will pay roughly the same percentage of my income in taxes as I do now unless I happen to get rich. I will pay my fair share into SS and Medicare as I am and have been employed full time for decades, so the rich are not going to pay my share there. Only a small percentage of the people who draw SS will ever see more than they put in over the years.

I have a job that pays my health insurance and have for the last decade, so nobody is footing the bill for my healthcare and won't if the rich get their taxes raised.

And should be the first line used when explaining why the government exists. People are greedy and will, in the absence of the rule of law, get what they want through any means necessary.

You don't know anything about me and yet you have the stones to say I am "leeching?" I make slightly over the median income and do not receive a single dime of government largess. Even when I was unemployed for six months back in the late '90s, I never got food stamps, we never qualified for WIC, and the only "benefit" I got was unemployment insurance.

Personally, I would put the top marginal rate back to a bit over 70%, which is where it was for the four decades following WWII, the period in our country's history that I would argue was the most productive four decade stretch in our history.

What is honest is that you don't even pretend to be fair, you opened up this lunacy by saying "Of course as a percentage of income, the middle class pay more." We are supposed to have a progressive system of taxation in this country, but the rich have gamed the system to the point that the opposite is the case. Not only that, but they have lied to people so much that some morons will try to claim that absolute dollars is a fair way to measure the tax burden.

Yes, I think it is moral to assure that my grandmother will not be homeless because some rich guy wanted to scrap Social Security. I think she should be able to go to the doctor when she is sick even though the rich would love to do away with Medicare. I think it is moral for everyone in the United States to have access to health care without going bankrupt from getting sick or saddling the rest of us with their bills when they cannot pay.

You don't have those morals because you are greedy.

When Warren Buffett pays 17% of his income in taxes and his secretary pays 30%, that isn't a progressive tax system, it is a regressive tax system. Your morals say this is fair, but that is the result of your greed.

The key thing here (and what p1sses me off the most) is the same type of self-entitlement people like you always exhibit. You are already benefiting from the existing system but you ask for more. It's kind of like when a guy who lives paycheck to paycheck, barely scraping by is approached by a rich guy who says "you don't pay as many dollars in income tax as I do, so I am going to work to make sure that your taxes go up and mine go down because I think I deserve another Mercedes."

Yes, yes you are.

 

I can't help getting a good snicker out of this one Sammy. I always do when it comes to you. I've never seen somebody who's so willing to concede pretty much every point and yet giggle like a 5 yr old school girl because he got a pot shot in.

I know it's a tall order for you Sammy, let's not dodge bullets any more. Is that above post true of false? Yes or no. And I'll entertain arguments like "yes, but" or "no however." And I will give it a good read and address every one of your points like I always do with your trash (though I often wonder why). In a world full of disappearing internet arguments (typically when they go against you, boggle the mind), no one on those boards give you as fair a shake in that regard than me.

Or do you just have a problem with the delivery medium? But then again, who's surprised. Worthless ad hominem attacks are the basis of your posts.

1. Let's get one thing straight, and it's important, tax cuts for the rich is not a GOP idea and quite frankly, I don't care much for (or couldn't care less about, whichever) the GOP. The whole issue of taxation on the rich far pre-dated the GOP and this country so let's not mingle the issue with the whole GOP as a way to discredit the idea.
2. There are certain facts in life, some of which I've already revisited:
a) People are greedy, stated already
b) There is a finite amount of finances/wealth growing very slowly
c) Because of the above, the easiest way to get ahead in life is grow, at the expense of somebody else. This is true for the rich and the poor, so let's not box it as if either the rich or the poor take advantage of that fact
d) Taxation is a shift/transfer of income
e) Unfortunately in order to meaningfully increase tax revenue, it will have to come from the rich
f) The rich constituted a small minority, hence in a democracy in which Official for Life A wants to get elected, he can fairly use them as a political punching bag without consequence
g) Because of the above, taxation is is a transfer of wealth from the rich to the poor

Those are some of the facts in life. As I've already mentioned, everything else you argued is your opinion/morals. Social responsibility? That's your morals/beliefs. Fairness has nothing to do with it. Charity work? That's your beliefs and morals. Fairness has nothing to do with it.

And the best part is, we're not talking about a society in which those things don't exist. The rich are already footing the bills, you think it's not enough. Once again, that's your beliefs and morals, neither fact of life nor fair. It's gotten so bad that the rich pay the taxes and still get blamed and are expected to contribute to charity just because. They've been beaten so much they're starting to agree. See case, Gate Sr., William H.

You know what I think? I think you should be grateful.

Where are you getting your numbers from? Try getting an update.

http://www.forbes.com/lists/2010/10/billionaires-2010_The-Worlds-Billionaires_Rank.html

The top 10 are:

1 Carlos Slim Helu & family Mexico 70 53.5 Mexico
2 William Gates III United States 54 53.0 United States
3 Warren Buffett United States 79 47.0 United States
4 Mukesh Ambani India 52 29.0 India
5 Lakshmi Mittal India 59 28.7 United Kingdom
6 Lawrence Ellison United States 65 28.0 United States
7 Bernard Arnault France 61 27.5 France
8 Eike Batista Brazil 53 27.0 Brazil
9 Amancio Ortega Spain 74 25.0 Spain
10 Karl Albrecht Germany 90 23.5 Germany

There isn't a Walton in the top 10. Of those that are, 7 are self-made. In the top 20 and 30, yes, due to the Waltons it's closer to a 50/50 split. But in the top 100 (in which there are 102, due to ties), there are 61 self-made vs. 41 inherited. And yes, that is including the Waltons and the Mars and all their spawns, which total 8 or 9 by themselves. In the top 500, it's even more skewed towards self-made. The world hasn't changed at all, except that more of them are coming from China.

And also like I said, in your opinion, if you aren't as wealth as somebody fed with a silver spoon, you're being screwed?

 

Pray, tell me my lies and deception. The rich don't pay more in taxes and those taxes don't benefit the less wealth? Interesting comment from somebody in Britain (I forgot who) on the new 50% top tax rate. "It turns out that people don't want to work half the year for the government."

And yet you are a leech and proud.

I'm saying that you are a leech and wants to leech more. See above.

So you are blaming your lack of ability to generate higher income on somebody else who can. That actually sounds about right. Probably right from the special interest group pamphlets.

SS and Medicare exist to help somebody who needs a helping hand, in other words, somebody who wasn't able to generate higher income. I do not necessarily disagree with that MORAL, but here you are, getting the benefit and asking for more, and yet you have the gumption to call the people paying for them greedy.

What twisted anecdote? Let me guess, you have a problem with Bob the CEO keeping, on a proportions basis, the income in which through his hard work, smart work and probably a bit of luck, HE GENERATED. In other words, you have absolutely no problem with punishing success despite the fact that he contributes the vast majority of the tax revenue through the income HE GENERATED, but you feel the guy who couldn't generate the income and is on WIC is getting screwed?

I think you are a little out of touch with reality. Contrary to your beliefs, while doesn't have the taxation, doesn't have one that is out of touch in the low end with other OEDC and developed countries.

Paid for by the rich, who would have all that, and more to keep if they were by themselves.

I'm not aware if you are aware. Something happened in the last 30 years. The Cold War ended. Government deficit WAS down. Then over the last 30 years, something else happened. Government spendings went up. Guess who were the spendings for? And who's paying for them?

In pure dollar amounts, if people like you paid ALL your income, and received almost nothing, fiscal issues would already be behind you. Instead, you are greedy and insisted on somebody else paying for you.

Disclaimer: Yes, extreme example.

Wrong. We value companies and their performances on a dollar basis, hence the use of NPV's and discounted cash flows. Cue Simpsons episode, I'll give you your 10 times your weight worth of bananas on the moon if you give me 5 times your weight on earth of...

No. Through the reduction in taxation, the rich got to keep a larger portion of income THEY generated, which wouldn't exist if they didn't generate them, and got to transfer less of it to you.

Check again, despite being outrageously high, military spendings on down from 30 years ago. The first thing that happened after the Regan years was that deficit went down, then it went up, due to spendings.

So, enforcing strategic interests of the United States (my way or the highway) did not benefit you?

You didn't create anything. You are taking from things they created.

You have absolutely no idea in what context Marie Antoinette said that quote now do you?

Once again, get it through your thick skull, the middle class and the lower class isn't paying more. If somebody is relying on middle and lower class tax revenue, they'd be starving.

Can't argue with delusions. There's no logic but their own.

That's absolutely great. I'm loving this. How about this then? I'll give you a wage of $1 a year. Next year I'll give you $2. Now shut up and quite b1tching about how you got no raise. I gave you 100%!!!

Corrections. The reach the government exists in the first place is:
1. To rule (let's not get all idealistic here)
2. So a subset of people or organizations who want nothing more than to get as much as they can out of the system can get those things from another subset of people or organizations who want nothing more than to get as much as they can out of the system.

Somehow I doubt it.

I have another idea, since you love percentages and don't think you're leeching. We tax the same percentage for everybody, with one caveat. The percentage that you paid ONLY benefit yourself. How's that? Everybody pay for themselves.

Welcome to the real world.

I definite the problem, I see nothing wrong with my deductions.

In a twisted world as yours, nothing is fair unless it's in your favour.

You say you are/have the capacity to be greedy but then call me greedy? Just wow.

Warren Buffet paid a lower percentage because the vast majority of his income come from investments, in which you have the very same opportunity to do exactly that. But you blame him that you couldn't generate enough income to invest.

If I choose to buy another Mercedes, it's because I choose to buy it with money I earned. You have the same options. Go ahead and reward yourself. Buy a Mercedes.

Look in the mirror lately. After the anal dildo reaming job I just did on you, argumentatively, this is just funny.

 

Wow big time fail. We are talking about millionaires in the US, not the world.

 

the above post? You mean gladiator andy's? I have no idea. It was way too long for me to read.

 

Chuckles. You really want to make that argument? There are 3 Americans in the top 10, Bill Gets, Warren Buffett and Larry Ellison, all self-made. There are 7 Americans in the top 20. Other than the aforementioned 3, the other four are the Waltons, as mentioned in a previous post. Also as mentioned in a previous post, as a result, the number in the top 20 is therefore skewed towards inherited, but pretty much in line with the world figures.

There are 12 Americans in the top 30. Other than those above, all others are self-made. As a matter of fact, the next American heir/heiress isn't until Abigail Johnson at 48.

In the top 100 there are 33 Americans, of which 24 are self-made and 9 are inherited. Those 9 that are inherited, other than the Waltons and Abigail Johnson, are Forrest Mars Jr., Jacqueline Mars and John Mars, tied at 52, as well as Ann Cox Chambers at 64.

Of interesting note, as mentioned, the Waltons and the Mars took up the vast majority of the heirs/heiresses in the U.S., so there really only are 4 clans of inherited riches in the U.S. in the top 100. Also as mentioned, the further down the list you go, the higher the proportion of the self-made riches.

As a matter of fact,if anything, there are a higher percentages of self-made top rich in the U.S. as compared to the world average. Where as it's a 60/40 split in the world average, it's a 73/27 in the U.S. Which is not to say that Americans are necessarily more entrepreneurial than other countries' citizens... except when compared to India, which is the country responsible for dragging down the ratio. Of the 8 Indians in the top 100, 7 are inherited and only the lowest on the list, Sunil Mittal, was self-made. Seems like the caste system is alive and well and India is almost perfectly incapable of generating self-made wealth.

But like I said, social mobility isn't a problem in these parts, the VAST MAJORITY of even the super-rich are self-made. Those are some pretty damn good odds.

So yes, highlight for me your argument. I must have missed it. Big time fail indeed.

Sammy boy, two words are too long for you to read.

 

MFM, you are a slave, and a tool, and you seem ashamed to admit any sense of class consciousness.

So I take it you are the in the school of "Keep taxes for oligarchs low 'cause one day I might be one." Having a small elite group of ultra-rich people who enjoy privileged protection from the IRS is good for the country HOW exactly?

I could give a rat's ass if someone's wealth is self-made or not. I'm interested in them paying their burden to society, like everyone else.

 

On the contrary, you are a moron and free-loader. Those people are already paying their burden to society, disproportionately so, that benefit free-loader like you. Except it wasn't enough for you. You would like to increase their payments while reducing your own. You would further like to reduce their benefits (of which they already enjoy very few of) from their burden while increasing your own.

Get use to the real worlds. The real world is, as I've mentioned, you're not living in Indian caste system. The old heraldry system/aristocracy/whatever is dead. Have been for centuries. Social mobility isn't an issue, also hasn't been for centuries. What you want though, is instead of earning your fast cheques, you want someone to hand it to you, at the expense of somebody else. And you unabashedly insult someone who actually knows better, as if you are entitled to them. Do I care if there are oligarchs out there? Hell no. As demonstrated, they've earned it. Some people out there still don't believe in punishing success, holy ****.

Look around you. See scores if people starving to death? No? Still happen in many parts of the world. The safety net in the U.S. is ALREADY pretty solid. They benefit people like you, paid for mostly by the rich. They allow you to enjoy consumptions you normally wouldn't be able (and in fact, isn't entitled) to enjoy. But it's not enough for you. You want this, that and the other thing, paid for by them. Instead of being grateful you're a greedy little *****. That's how bad it's gotten to, and about to get worse.

Nowhere in any of my posts did I imply my status in life. It isn't central and is in fact, irrelevant to the argument, except to question dodgers like you. I am pretty happy with where I am.

What I will say is that my wife enjoys designer clothing, expensive makeup, etc because she thinks they make her look better. And you know what, she's entitled to that, because SHE EARNED THE FREAKIN' MONEY.

 

New jobless claims rises to 500k. This should be good for unemployment numbers as more people will continue to give up looking for work :grin:

 

A lot of Census workers were let go last week.

 

Yeah, but I think this news is still worse than expected despite that.

 

I am sorry but it seems that the bulk of your arguments and observations are based on speculation and regurgitation of a victim's sentiment. It doesn't "seem" that you get it.

 

I saw Obama on the tube the other day. He was calmly urging patience on the economy. He said it would get better eventually as steps had been taken that would make things better.

Come on Obama. Do something. e.g. 1) temporarily stop the gasoline tax. 2) stop the payroll tax. 3) ease the food stamps restrictions or increaase them 4) try to extend unemployment or increase payments. 5) suspend student loan payments. 6) how about more cash for clunkers or clunker refrigerators or water heaters? 7) some more stimulus checks mailed to all Americans?

As a lawyer working with poor and lower income folks I talk nearly daily to folks whose unemployment benefits have run out and are desperate.

Act like it is an emergency and take it to the GOP. Show folks clearly who is on whose side. Let the media publicize it. Aside from alleviating suffering, there is still time to effect November. Let have some audacity or hope.

Why is Obama so afraid to take leadership on this rather than act like a wonk or a professor?

Is it the angry black man thing? Too much Ivy League exposure? What?