The hope of many a moderate, fueled by some of Obama’s early appointments, was that the new president would govern a lot like Bill, but with more class and less collateral trashiness. But that hope can no longer be kept alive, as Steve Chapman explains.
I don't miss Clinton nearly as much as the circumstances of the early and mid 90s that pushed Clinton in a more centrist direction. Clinton's first two years indicated that he would have been a radical enough President if he thought he could get away with it. He was however a real free trader and he took on his party's base over the issue. So things from the early Clinton years that I wish we had:
1. 43 Republican Senators. There were a bunch of GOP squishes in the Senate even then, but it was alot easier to maintain a filibuster, when the Democrats has to pick off more than one or two.
2. A Democratic party that was more deeply divided among itself than presently. Clinton had to fight to get 218 House votes and 50 Senate votes for a budget (and tax increase) that was much less radical than the one that Obama is proposing. Clinton had to give up his proposed VAT just to get the bill on the floor.
3. A Republican minority that was confident that it had a bunch of popular policies (of varying quality but all polled well and the public had been exposed to all of them over a several year period).
4. An electorate that associated the most recent tax cutting President with prosperity and associated the most recent tax raising President with recession.
Geithner's choice for deputy pulls out that's all I have to say. This situation is getting ugly quick...
"Don't let the U.S. government get dragged down into the quicksand. It's too deep.
"Don't bail out the banks, the bond insurers, and the thousands of other gamblers in the derivatives casino. They're too big.
"Don't get entangled in the giant web of bets and debts they've created over the years. It's too complex."
Now they're agreeing with my deep concern for the future ... but only for one reason — to justify taking all the steps and making all the mistakes I warned against.
Market Oracle
SO MUCH FOR TRANSPERANCY as the fed refuses to publish its findings. “If the American taxpayer’s money is at stake, and it is, big time, I believe the American taxpayers, the people, and this committee, we need to know who benefited, where this money went,” said Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama, the committee’s top Republican. “There is no transparency here. We are going to find out.” This is getting real bad!
Oh and a war with Iran is about to start: J post article so that aught to jump start the economy, except for the fact that the government is invested in 3 other wars and into a war with the economy (all it cannot win) as well as a environmental crisis. Did someone say something about 2012?!