Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Thomas Sowell on President Obama
"Implicit in this narrative is a notion that the economy has no recuperative power of its own. It is only through these wonderful actions of President Obama that the economy has been able to recover. The reality, though, is that for the first 150 years of this country the government did absolutely nothing during economic downturns and the economy recovered every time. The hubris of those in Washington thinking that it's only them who can fix the economy is astonishing."
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I would add irrational as well as self serving. However, none of this really matters as the oligarchs are in full control, we are their serfs.
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"Implicit in this narrative is a notion that the economy has no recuperative power of its own. It is only through these wonderful actions of President Obama that the economy has been able to recover."
Noooo. Oh, of all the nonsense.
Thomas Sowell's straw man is so foul with gibberish it is a shame. For you to try to use his twaddle is comical.
Absolute laissez-faire does not work for people. The economic pain and agony experienced during the first 150 years of this country when the government did absolutely nothing during economic downturns showed governments the folly of allowing liars, cheats, and thieves to run 'capitalism' unchecked.
No one, except con artists pundits and their lackeys, claims "_only_" the government can 'fix' the economy. As you should know, the earlier economic down turns and up turns were very destructive to the working people and nations.
The current macro economic systems were developed and evolved to try to make the upturns and down turns less volatile and destructive. The system is one way; not the only way.
Ema Nymton
~@:o?
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Will: I am a Liberal but I think Sowell has a lot of interesting things to say (Especially about education.)...Here I find him wanting. Sowell fails to mention ANY Republicans.(At least in the quote you provide.)It is patently obvious that many, many Republicans believe that they and they alone can fix the economy inspite of the history Sowell himself quotes...and it seems that the Republicans are willing to take us over the cliff to prove it. Too bad. Sowell is a first rate academic but this comment seems to me to represent partisian BS coming from a scholar with some integrity. Any other stuff about "Oligarchs" can be dismissed as hyperbole. It doesn't help the the conversation one iota...
Ema dear, you know that I love you (and welcome back) but, again, your facts of history are thoroughly wanting. Yes, the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries were a difficult period (here and all throughout the world) for individuals. But that had absolutely NOTHING to do with capitalism and everything to do with the primitive state of science, technology, medicine, etc.. And the fact that those things eventually did get better was precisely BECAUSE of capitalism, entrepreneurialship, etc.. Guys like Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, and Carnegie provided much needed goods and services at a fraction of the cost and employed hundreds of thousands of people (Rockefeller and Carnegie also became 2 of the world's greatest philanthropists). And where do you think that all of those medical advances (drugs and other forms of technology) came from, Ema? Government? Come on, man.
Marcus, this is the video from which I took the quote (yeah, I kind of paraphrased a little). Feel free to watch it and judge for yourself (his reactions to the speeches by Mr. and Mrs. Obama at the DNC). Yes, the man is a conservative and, no, he doesn't like Obama - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X44zl5AzsuE
And, while I agree with you that both sides are culpable, I ask you to look at 3 facts here; a) The almost deal that Obama and Boehner had 18 months ago was 4:1 spending cuts to revenues (3.2 trillion to 800 billion). b) The opening offer from Boehner after the election was a 1.75:1 package spending cuts to revenues (1.4 trillion to 800 billion). And c) the opening offer from Obama after the election was a 1:4 package spending cuts to revenues (400 billion to 1.6 trillion) that wasn't even that good because it proposed additional stimulus spending (another 50 billion or so). Does that sound to you like President Obama's being the more reasonable of the two (though, yes, I also understand that a lot of Boehner's flock have abandoned him)?
The only straw man involved is Ema's mythical person advocating "absolute laissez faire". No one is doing so, and the reasoned and reasonable request that government back off some from its unprecedented, often pointless and unnecessary and very destructive meddling in the economy (often done out of pure arrogance and willful ignorance of cause and effect) isn't advocacy of laissez-faire at all.
I'd be happy just to get rid of Bernanke.
So would I Will. I'd be even happier if we got rid of the Federal Reserve all together.
Jefferson had it exactly right.
Dial 1-800-oli-garch for more BS.
Krugman is correct. We did have panics and downturns prior to the FED. But the two most severe ones in our history happened during the FED's existence and the third one (the panic of 1819) happened while we had the First National Bank, a philosophical fore-runner of the FED. So, yeah, I do kinda agree with you here.
The Fed is a sacred cow of those who believe that ignorant unqualified people (the ruling elites) have a special right to mess with the economy without any regards to the destructive results and livlihoods lost.
The FED played a huge role in causing the Great Depression (Friedman said that it was THE reason) and an even bigger one in the crash of 2008 (well, in my opinion).......This might actually be one area in which elements of the left, right, and center can come together.
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