Graphic courtesy of Gateway Pundit.
So what the hell was the Stimulus Package for anyway, besides wasting taxpayer money?
Where are the jobs, Mr. President?
UPDATE: From The Heritage Foundation:
The unemployment rate is already one-fifth higher than the Administration predicted. It is now expected that the peak of unemployment rate will be one-fourth higher than their predictions. Even worse, the promised job creation that was expected to lower the unemployment rate in the upcoming months has not materialized.
-Bruce (GayPatriot)
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/06/09/business/economy/20090610-leonhardt-graphic.html
What “Stimulus”?
I haven’t seen any sign of “stimulus” projects or funding in my area since since the Obamessiah was sworn-in. No roads have been repaved, no bridges rebuilt, foreclosures are actually rising and local construction is dead.
Yet the speculators and the ‘money-changers’ are pocketing record profits.
I’m figuring the standard reply of it’s Bush’s fault will soon be ringing forth.
Funny how that works.
according to this graph, it looks like unemployment is rising at a decreasing rate, a trend which would probably be even more apparent if you extended the chart past jan 2009. assuming that trend continues, and unemployment starts to decrease in the next few months, will you revise your conclusion that the stimulus has been a waste of taxpayer money? since i think i know the answer to that question, let me ask another: what evidence, if any, would you need to see to convince you that the stimulus has worked?
Obama’s true unemployment number is 16.8%. That’s using the government’s own numbers. Peter Schiff explains: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vU_yxAYvVA
In brief: The government’s headline number excludes discouraged workers (people who have given up looking for a job) and unwilling part-time workers (people who have accepted meager part-time work while continuing to look actively for a ‘real job’). But it still counts them, and adding them back we get overall unemployment of 16.8%.
So-called “stimulus” (which means: deficit-spending and money-printing) always “work” (i.e., have some positive effect) in the short run. If there is anyone on this blog who denies it, I’m not aware of it.
Nonetheless, the fact remains that the money *is* being wasted. Or to put it another way, so-called “stimulus” has damaging medium- and long-term effects. It is like a drug addict taking another hit of her drug. Short-term bliss, long-term damage and agony. Our economy will never fundamentally improve until we kick the “stimulus” habit.
(continued) …and let free-market forces liquidate the vast malinvestments that have happened now under decades, even generations, of “stimulus” policies. Painful, but kicking a drug addiction always is.
Bad economic news = Bush’s fault.
Criticism of Obama policy = racism.
Here’s an indoctrination video that I find just a bit ominous.
Hey, Chad… if the economy is recovering and prosperity is right around the corner as you claim, then can’t we cancel the unspent part of the Spendulus and reduce the deficit by $700 Billion?
I mean, obviously, if we’re poised for a massive recovery, we don’t need to spend the rest, right?
Ah, but V, the economy isn’t real, it’s MAGIC! The recovery happens if you BELIEVE! And to make people BELIEVE, we must burden our children with trillions of debt, for the benefit of Democrat special interest groups 😉
Translation: we’re screwed.
Last I heard, that stimulus money was still but a trickle… How does that equate to helping the recovery?
I’m not ready to lay blame for the recession solely on Obama – he had a lot of help from his fellow congressmen and GWB. The US economy was in trouble before Obama took office and is just too big to turn around quickly. I’m no economist and I remember conversations with fellow pessimists four or five years ago wondering when the bubble was going to pop.
It took a couple of years for the economy to recover after Reagan took office (and he knew what he was doing).
Obama’s culpability is support of policies that gave us this mess; he was no fiscal conservative in the Senate (although he wasn’t there long enough to make a lot of difference).
Where the blame starts sticking to the Messiah is what he and his cronies in Congress have been doing since his Immaculation. If someone were to come up with a list of things to do in order to strangle a capitalist economy, it would look a lot like what the Dems have been doing since January 20.
The sad thing is that Obama, et al, know exactly what they’re doing. Our problem is that normal people can’t figure out why they’re doing it.
Liberals just “think” differently. For example, it’s been obvious for 30+ years that Great Society thinking has had nearly genocidal effect on certain segments of the population yet libs continue to push these ideas regardless of the misery inflicted on so many.
Oh, don’t forget Greenspan and Bernanke. The largest cause of the financial crisis (of many causes) was that the Fed has been encouraging mal-investment and over-expansion of credit for decades. In the name of allegedly preventing recessions, no less.
That’s part of it – but only a small part. Obama’s culpability, Robert, is that he has voluntarily *doubled down* on the failed policies of the past. Or even quadrupled-down.
Think about it. Bush runs $100-400B deficits. Obama runs $1.6 trillion deficits. Say you want to argue that he inherited $1T to $1.2T of that $1.6T. Fine. Why didn’t Obama immediately look for ways to cut spending, like he promised when he was running, to make it $700-800B? He voluntarily boosted it to $1.6T or more.
Or let’s say, Greenspan and his chief lieutenant Bernanke ran 1-5% interest rates, which is too low and caused not one but two mal-investment bubbles in a row. Bush re-appointed Greenspan, so Bush owns that. What does Obama do? Encourage Bernanke to run 0% interest rates. And Obama recently re-appointed Bernanke, taking full ownership of Bernanke’s policies.
Or let’s say, Bush is slowly increasing business regulation, undermining innovation. (Which Bush did, contrary to left-wing myth-making that Bush somehow favored deregulation and free markets.) What has Obama done? Propose massive increases in regulation.
So let’s be clear: Obama own the mess. Not because he personally created it all. Others started it.. But then Obama not only fails to reverse their bad policies, he doubles and triples and quadruples their badness.
That is because, SoCalRobert, that libs do not give a flying flip about anyone but their own pleasures and power.
Now my question is this, and I am not referring to anyone here, but the fools. How come gays love Hillary, another student of Alinsky, so much? The hillbuzz boys love her, even as they are coming around to the idea that lib ideology really kind of stinks. She is part of that stink – it’s like a fog surrounding her – and they think it’s Obama farts, not hers.
Look what she is part of now. Cutting off humanitarian aid to Honduras.
Sorry for going off topic, but how does one justify Hillary Clinton’s part in now cutting off humanitarian aid to Honduras?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090903/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_us_honduras_3
The Secretary of State has made the decision, consistent with U.S. legislation, recognizing the need for strong measures in light of the continued resistance to the adoption of the San Jose Accord by the de facto regime and continuing failure to restore democratic, constitutional rule to Honduras,” Kelly said in a statement.
The San Jose accord, brokered by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, aims to return Zelaya to power with limited authority until elections now set for November.
What the heck does the San Jose accords have to do with Honduras’ Constitution?
“Accord” means an agreement among parties in a disupte. Did Honduras ever agree to the San Jose “Accord”? Somehow I doubt it.
So what the hell was the Stimulus Package for anyway, besides wasting taxpayer money?
Payback for the UAW and other unions.
Say Boob, is that the same al-Qaeda Times who denied Chairman Obama would increase taxes, during the campaign, and today demands it?
Let’s see. Unemployment is the highest it has been since 26 years ago. And it is Obama’s fault. Right?? Now let’s see. Who was president 26 years ago?
That would be 1983. That would be President Ronald Reagan. So that was his fault. OH….NO, NO, NO! That was Jimmy Carter’s fault. Hmmm. Reagan had been president for over 2 years but it was his predecessor’s fault. But Obama has been president for less than 1 year, but it is his fault. Makes sense to me, right???
Look where it’s gone: Unions, environmentalists, and ACORN. It was for paying off campaign contributors.
Makes sense to me, right???
Chairman Obama has done what, exactly to inspire faith in American businesses? I don’t recall Reagan running around the country and the world proclaiming how much America sucks balls. Nor do I recall Reagan rent-a-mobs harassing businesses or threatening punitive taxes on them. Did he ever hire an unelected, unaccountable “czar” to dictate how much money people could make?
Just what the hell has Chairman Obama done to make people think they can hire folks again?
Boob,
You and the treasonous NYT are both lying. They say:
Which is a blatant lie according to the CBO which UNTIL DEMOCRATS TOOK OVER CONGRESS was projecting Republican budgets would ELIMINATE the deficit and begin paying off debt by 2010.
The lying propagandist hacks at the NYT also attribute blame for the recession which began 12 MONTHS AFTER DEMOCRATS TOOK OFFICE on Bush instead of on the Democrats who had been in charge of the purse strings for a full year.
Remember, when Republicans lost control to the Democrats, the economy was growing at over 3% and continued to grow, until 12 months of Democrat policies, and the growing liklihood of a Democrat president became too much.
The financial crisis also did not happen until Democrats had been writing the laws and the budgets for TWO YEARS. Not to mention filibustering all of Bush’s and Republicans attempts to reform Fannie and Freddie for the past 6 years.
Moreover, the filthy liars at the NYT try to give Bill Clinton credit for the surplusses that came as a result balanced budgets that Republicans had to FORCE Clinton to sign.
For f*cks sake, is it physiologically impossible for liberals to tell the truth about ANYTHING???
Actually, Obama’s “Recovery.gov” logo is really a pie chart, showing just exactly where the stimulus has gone. 50% to big government projects (aka unions), 25% additional directly to unions, 25% to envirowhackos and NADA to economic stimulus.
#22: “The economic growth under George W. Bush did not generate nearly enough tax revenue to pay for his agenda, which included tax cuts, the Iraq War and Medicare prescription drug benefit.”
Thank you, AE, for reminding bob that he’s an ignorant, partisan fool that is incapable of thinking for himself, as only you can.
I also just wanted to make an observation about the quote above from the NYT’s handy-dandy little flowchart that I find both repugnant and a clear indication of the type of leftist stenographers we’re dealing with. Note their conclusion that tax revenues were insufficient to cover Bush’s tax cuts–it reminds me of the Washington elites screaming about how we “can’t afford a tax cut” and their insistence that a 300 dollar rebate per taxpayer was simply “too risky” to even consider. It’s so gross the way they refer to the “Bush tax cuts” as if they were part of some CRAZY, MISGUIDED, DOOMED-FROM-THE-START government program that Bush was inexplicably obsessed with (like Obama with cap and trade or cash for clunkers). They couldn’t wrap their minds around the concept of the government giving money back, directly to the people who earned it in the first place. All they remember is that it was some insane Bush “agenda item” that helped put the federal government in this terrible financial fix. I also think it’s very telling that the Iraq War is identified as part of “his agenda.” Maybe it’s just semantics, but saying it was part of his “agenda” makes it sound like it was a campaign promise he had made or something. (Of course, I’m sure the idiots working at the NYT believe that Iraq was part of George Jr.’s “agenda” since it was programmed into his subconscious in some Skull & Bones hazing ritual at Yale).
And as for your question: “For f*cks sake, is it physiologically impossible for liberals to tell the truth about ANYTHING??”
Ummmm…yes.
Further, Cecil, could you explain how funneling $800 BILLION away from the private sector is supposed to be “stimulative”?
The economy is fine. The stimulus has been a miracle. People are cutting back on working and spending more time packing belongings from houses they are turning over to the banks. There is a general calm which has spread throughout the people who know that the Obamessiah holds them in his hand.
Just the other day Acting Obamessiah Biden declared “Mission Accomplished” from the hidden bunker.
Sure some people are “unemployed” for a short time. But they will find relief in the new Cutacheck program where they get paid by the government for carrying out the Obamessiah mission. Sort of a human Cash for Clunkers program.
Meanwhile, hyperinflation will work miracles on the national debt. Everything is coming up roses, unless you are stuck in the tired old policies of the past: personal responsibility, paying your way, working hard, playing by the rules, etc.
Stick with the MSM, they will lull you with a deep sense of security. After all, it was all Bush’s fault and moving forward the only course we can take is the counter intuitive one. We have had enough of what works. This is the age of Aquarius where the unicorn rules and mystical forces will win the day. Yes We Can!!!
Though not Cecil, I can give it a shot. The government finances its deficits by printing money. It puts on a show of borrowing it from the private sector, but the Fed in turn has lately been buying hundreds of billions in private sector assets with newly printed money. It’s the same net effect as if the Fed were buying the government debt directly with newly printed money. In effect, the government robs people’s cash balances (and corporations’) of their purchasing power. By its spending and printing money, the government says, “We’re going to steal people’s stored purchasing power and put it into motion NOW, on what we want.” The people/corporations who save money (as cash, as opposed to say gold) are effectively robbed of their purchasing power by the government diluting the dollar.
Which brings us to another way the Obama-Bernanke “stimulus” policies work. By eliminating the real return on your cash savings – or in fact, destroying your savings’ purchasing power over time – the government disincents you from saving and all-but-forces you to spend now. Spend it on stocks (rising stock market, anybody?), spend it on vacations and new cars and houses, go deeply into debt if you have to, but whatever you do, keep spending against your own better judgment, so the government numbers will come out better. That’s the regime we’ve been living under, first kinda bad with Bush-Greenspan, and now four times as bad with Obama-Bernanke.
So, that’s why “stimulus” works a little, in the very short run… and why it destroys the economy in the long run. In America’s case, we’ve been practicing “stimulus” for decades, even generations, and “the long run” has arrived… the future reckoning has come.
#19 – Cecil – I made the point about the ’83 recession in post #14. Your mission is to tell us how liberal policies are helping to bring the recession to an end. I’ve tried to figure out how adding trillions more in unfunded liabilities, cap ‘n’ trade, amnesty, and explosive growth in the bureaucracy will improve the situation and I’m just not smart enough to do it.
ILC – thanks for pointing out the responsibility the Fed has in all this… I omitted the biggest player in the whole game.
Just to toss in my two cents: There never was a balanced budget under President Clinton.
Republicans may try to claim it happened due to Republican fiscal sanity, but, the sad reality is this: The so-called “balanced budget” and “budget surpluses” were due to Social Security overpayments. In other words, Social Security collected more than it paid out.
Monies collected by government, whether for Medicaid, income tax, Social Security, etc., all go into the general fund, before they are disbursed to the various entitlement programs.
The balanced budget and budget surplus was nothing more than bookkeeping dishonesty.
I’m just sorry that the blog’s lefty friend Tano isn’t here to tell me I’m an insane fool who knows nothing, LOL 🙂
Blake,
I hate to break it to you, but that’s what budgeting IS — taking your income into account and making sure that you spend less. Regardless of whether you approve of the way SS is handled, it is the first time in decades that the Government spent less than it took in.
I’ve a feeling that Chairman Obama will be like FDR: making the economic disaster last about 20 years. Except that I don’t think he’ll have a war which would put people to work.
AE – don’t worry. All that “extra” money paid into Social Security is tucked away safely in the Lock Box. Al Gore said so.
#33: Lock Box? Lock Box? Oh, SoCalRobert, you mean LAAAHWCK-BOX. Remember the year that the entire Oscars telecast was devoted to making the Man/Bear/Pig feel better about himself for being such an embarrassing, petulant ninny in the election against Bush? All those celebutards kept saying, “Pleeeeze, Al?! Puhleeeeeze!” from the podium, trying to get him to run again? I remember thinking, all he has to say to get them off his case forever is “LAAAHWCK-BOX.” Leo DiCaprio would have been like, “Oh yeah. That sucked. Nevermind.”
AE,
Ah, but, the problem is this: Social Security is a trust fund. As such, all money collected for SS should not be counted toward balancing the budget.
That trust fund money is already spoken for by future commitments.
For instance, until I make my car payment, it looks like I have several hundred extra dollars in my checking account. So, at that point, I’ve spent less than I’ve taken in, and, have a surplus. But, if I spend that car payment money on something other than making the car payment, that money longer exists for that payment obligation.
Money that is spoken for in the form of a future obligation cannot be counted on the balance sheet as an asset. It’s considered an expense and is on the books as such.
Yes, and if you go look at the debt graff through the 90s it continued to grow upwards. That meant they were borrowing even if they didn’t spend it all…
And Blake, recently the USSC declared that the US was not obligated to any set benefit under SS. Therefore, if they gave you a dollar, they would meet their obligation. This is one of my reasons for being against the Democrat’s health care proposals I view it as another money pit much like SS. And the fact is that no congress is obligated to the promises of another congress. In 2011, the new congress can change the rules completely without regard to what was previously promised. I prefer a constitutional amendment that establishes a guideline that cannot be erased by any congress unless later repealed under the same amendment process. But, I want it spelled out that the funds cannot be used for any other purpose.
Dan, when you talk about monthly increases in unemployment since Congress passed a stimulus package you should keep in mind that unemployment increased monthly for over a year after Congress passed President Reagan’s tax cut.
I see some Obamaphile toadies have raised their heads just long enough to bow down to the dear leader and of course spout the administration line. Think for yourselves dear libeals or you will be bowing down like the Mao and Stalin trolls.
However #39, they have been unusually quiet for the most part haven’t they? Very interesting.
#19
Liberals rely on an uneducated people so they can propagate myths and lies. Reagan in the 80’s had many more challenges after 4 years of a bumbling Democrat Carter administration. He not only was faced with horrific unemployment…..he had to deal with the American malayse encouraged by the Democrat President. Who actually went on American tv and told the nation our best days were behind us, we shouldn’t strive to be great, to get use to being just an average nation. He wore a sweater on tv in a darken White House encouraging Americans to save energy by darkening their lives. Reagan challenged the nation to be great again, that government was part of the problem not the solution. Reagan had a horrible MYSERY INDEX from Democrat Carter that included 14% inflation (not 2% that Obama had handed to him), 10% unemployment (not the 5% that Obama had handed to him), Reagan had 21% interest rates to deal with, (not 6% handed to Obama). So WHAA WHAAA liberal Democrats can whine all they want. Obama wanted the job. He lied and told us he knew what to do. He lied when he said passing the pork bill on friday was critical, it couldn’t wait til Monday, because it had to start working immediately. Now that his bumbling corrupt tainted administration has lost the confidence of the American people in record time, he’s got no one to blame but himself. Quit crying. Get to work or quit.