CommunistHater is one of the many people who don't understand economics and will likely push for the wrong way only to make things worse, like drilling a hole into your head to cure a headache.  Sadly, many of us haven't evolved from this caveman way of thinking.  Should have listened to economists with like Nobel Prize Laureate Paul Samuelson who said the Bush tax cuts would destroy our economy.  That was conservative economic's first attempt to stimilute the economy by handing out money to the rich and corporate elite. 

Economic growth, though positive, has not been sufficient to generate jobs and prevent unemployment from rising. In fact, there are now more than two million fewer private sector jobs than at the start of the current recession. Overcapacity, corporate scandals, and uncertainty have and will continue to weigh down the economy.

The tax cut plan proposed by President Bush is not the answer to these problems. Regardless of how one views the specifics of the Bush plan, there is wide agreement that its purpose is a permanent change in the tax structure and not the creation of jobs and growth in the near-term. The permanent dividend tax cut, in particular, is not credible as a short-term stimulus. As tax reform, the dividend tax cut is misdirected in that it targets individuals rather than corporations, is overly complex, and could be, but is not, part of a revenue-neutral tax reform effort.

Passing these tax cuts will worsen the long-term budget outlook, adding to the nation’s projected chronic deficits. This fiscal deterioration will reduce the capacity of the government to finance Social Security and Medicare benefits as well as investments in schools, health, infrastructure, and basic research. Moreover, the proposed tax cuts will generate further inequalities in after-tax income.

To be effective, a stimulus plan should rely on immediate but temporary spending and tax measures to expand demand, and it should also rely on immediate but temporary incentives for investment. Such a stimulus plan would spur growth and jobs in the short term without exacerbating the long-term budget outlook.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economists%27_statement_opposing_the_Bush_tax_cuts

OK Keynes, whatever you say.

Austrian mercantilism ftw.  Btw, in 2025 when the debt will be 200% of GDP you can tell me Xie xie.

That's a very bad analogy. Beer worsens the damaged liver case. This money is supposed to fix the economy, not damage it further.

As for Iraq war being a bipartisan effort, I never said it wasn't, but you can't be inconsistent with something like this. If you try to spread an individual's fault over a group for Bush, then you must do so for Obama as well, which would lead to both men not really being at fault. After all, the parties aren't (weren't) against it.

I also think it's kind of funny that you call me out on making "falacies of logic", when your own argument is far (very far) from perfect.

"supposed to..." and what it actually ends up doing aren't always the same thing.

Bush left Obama with a lot of crap on his plate. I mean there are 2 wars you can't just pull out of immediately and then there's the screwed up economy. I don't think it's fair to blame Obama for spending more...

I'm sorry, but you expect Obama to just sit by and watch unemployment rise? Isn't 10% a really high number? You're saying that they shouldn't even try because it might not work?

1. Popular opinion on both wars is very low. Obama was elected as being very left of center when it came to the wars, yet we have not pulled out. As commander in chief, he does have the lattitude to authorize these kinds of things.
2. Just because you have a screwed up economy doesn't mean you have to spend money. Look at the trillion dollars the government spent - both under Bush and Obama. What has it done for us? Unemployment is above their (Obama's team, not Bushes) projections even if we spent nothing at all. 
3. Stop using Bush as a scapegoat. Obama is almost on his second year now. Obama passed $800 billion in stimulus and it got us nothing. Obama made a ton of promises that have got us nothing thus far. How many years into Obama's presidency can you stop blaming Bush? 1 year? 2 years? 5 years?
4. If Obamas spending was justified, why is it that we're having to have another $200 billion jobs bill to get jobs back on track? Why wasn't $800 billion enough to 'fix' the economy? Do you realize that is more than $3,000 spent for every man, woman and child in the US and we still have worse unemployment now than we were projected to?

You assume that unemployment is being caused by the government not spending money. It is far from that. If the government could create jobs by spending money, then we should have less unemployment than ever, as the government has spent more than ever.

The government, instead, could change regulations, and encourage job growth by reforming various government regulations which stymie growth in various industries. The government could also reform tax laws which make our country unattractive to foreign investors. Finally, Obama could pressure China (who we have a huge trade deficit) into valuating their currency at actual value, which would help bring manufacturung jobs to America.

There are a lot of things that the government can do to help unemployment. Spending money by 'creating' jobs according to political district is hardly a way to spur growth. We had this collapse because of greedy, incompotent businesses controlling too much - rather than let them topple, we have propped them up.

I'm sorry, but you expect Obama to just sit by and watch unemployment rise? Isn't 10% a really high number? You're saying that they shouldn't even try because it might not work?

 

Well he could have employed the 15 million unemployed with a salary of 50,000 dollars for the trillion dollar price of his stimulus bill.  Instead he filtered all the money through gov programs to enrich his friends.  No second chances. 

My internet has been down the past couple of days, so I had to resort to "old-fashioned internet" (namely newspapers and magazines) and I came accross this article ( http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_45/b4154034724383.htm?chan=magazine+channel_top+stories )

The first graph really demonstrates what the stimulus has done ... The private sector continues to bleed jobs as the public sector balloons. The problem that most Keynesian economists don’t seem to understand is that the public sector is a parasite of the public sector, and if it becomes too large it will kill off its host; and in the process it will kill itself off. Right now the Federal government is going to run a $1.5 Trillion deficit in 2010 which works out to being (roughly) $15,000 per household in the United States; and further stimulus spending along with expanded social spending will only make this dramatically worse.

To make matters dramatically worse, most of the government debt has been moved to shorter and shorter term bonds (to keep interest payments low) and when the federal reserve moves interest rates higher to fight inflation the government deficit will explode due to carrying costs.

 
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Within the next 12 to 24 months the United States could hit an economic tipping point where interest rates and taxes simultaneously skyrocket, and any company with intelligent management will flee for "greener pastures" ... at that point who is going to pay for all these social programs?