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Originally posted by nature's message
More and more jobs are being lost almost everyday. What a bone-chilling situation. I think this is only the beginning. Well...... so terrified.
I understand. Tonight I just found out that a deacon at my church lost his job after 28 years with the same company. I've never known someone who was laid off. I'm a recent graduate who's looking for teaching jobs for the fall. I know education is usually a safer industry, but sometimes I get worried when I think about budget cuts.
It feels like we're in a car, halfway over the edge of a cliff. Below we see a deep deep ravine, but if we make one false move we're over the cliff, and finished. That's how it feels to me.
I'll telll you one thing: If this stimulus plan works, and creates new jobs, and gets us on our feet. I will physically go to the local Democrat party office and register as a Democrat. There's a lot that I don't agree with them on. But they will have won me over enough.
The economy is going to crash, and crash hard. The question is when will it hit bottom and what will be left when it does. I think the government needs to scrap the entire stimulus package and try to stockpile a surplus of cash and material goods. That way when the U.S. economy finally falls flat on it's face, the government will be there to help pick us back up.
All a stimulus package will do is try to prop up the drunk that is the U.S. economy, and in the end all it will achieve is to have both fall down. If the government is weak, broke, and unable to help when (notice I didn't say if) the economy finally comes crashing down, there may very well not be a United States once all is said and done.
There is one thing I know that we can do, right now without fail, that will improve our economy... Go to war. Not this small time stuff we are doing now (yes, I know it's bad over there, I have friends and family who have come back from the sandbox), but a full blown war where we need guns, tanks, bombs, and bullets by the millions and billions and the only way to do that is to get them factories working full bore. But that will never happen... between the anti-war folks and the union folks, there is no way a wartime economy will thrive in this age.
Oh, and on an official I need to notify you note: I do not condone a war, I do not want a war, so please don't blast me for pointing out some simple facts as I see them.
The only way out of this mess is to somehow instill in the public the idea that Govt. is doing something on behalf of the average American. It does not matter what specifics are in the Stimulus package as much as that there IS a Stimulus package. The vast majority of us have the ability to consume, we just will not do it. I think fear of what the future holds is a primary problem. Perhaps there even is a certain amount of spending revolt going on as well. That is why a Stimulus package is so important. Our Govt needs to take actions that will help the public feel that there is hope. Thus far, the efforts have not been effective in doing that. The partisanship currently being displayed is not helping, if fact it is deepening the problem.
There is one thing I know that we can do, right now without fail, that will improve our economy... Go to war. Not this small time stuff we are doing now (yes, I know it's bad over there, I have friends and family who have come back from the sandbox), but a full blown war where we need guns, tanks, bombs, and bullets by the millions and billions and the only way to do that is to get them factories working full bore. But that will never happen... between the anti-war folks and the union folks, there is no way a wartime economy will thrive in this age.
So you're in favor of even more government stimulus? If spending billions and billions on building guns, tanks etc. which will be used up and destroyed will save us, why not spend billions and billions on things like, I don't know, high speed rail lines and a new power grid which will still be around after they are manufactured?
World War II lifted us finally out of depression because we hyped up the government spending until we were beyond full employment. But there's not the sense of urgency to do that now.
The economy is going to crash, and crash hard. The question is when will it hit bottom and what will be left when it does. I think the government needs to scrap the entire stimulus package and try to stockpile a surplus of cash and material goods. That way when the U.S. economy finally falls flat on it's face, the government will be there to help pick us back up.
All a stimulus package will do is try to prop up the drunk that is the U.S. economy, and in the end all it will achieve is to have both fall down. If the government is weak, broke, and unable to help when (notice I didn't say if) the economy finally comes crashing down, there may very well not be a United States once all is said and done.
There is one thing I know that we can do, right now without fail, that will improve our economy... Go to war. Not this small time stuff we are doing now (yes, I know it's bad over there, I have friends and family who have come back from the sandbox), but a full blown war where we need guns, tanks, bombs, and bullets by the millions and billions and the only way to do that is to get them factories working full bore. But that will never happen... between the anti-war folks and the union folks, there is no way a wartime economy will thrive in this age.
Oh, and on an official I need to notify you note: I do not condone a war, I do not want a war, so please don't blast me for pointing out some simple facts as I see them.
And on that note, have a better one.
It's funny how some people have alluded to war as the only solution that can stimulate the US economy out of its doldrums. Many other threads here argue that WW2 is what ended the Great Depression, implying, we should start WW3 to avert a repeat of the Great Depression.
Spending money on war is no different from spending money on buildings, bridges, roads, schools, hospitals, casinos, brothels, massage parlors, strip joints etc.....The common denominator here is that people are given jobs where they earn incomes that are then recirculated into the economy. A job is a job. Money is fungible.
The right wing has been calling the stimulus package pork. It's pork to them because the money has been ear marked for things other than their pet projects (i.e things you use for war-mongering). But if Obama were to designate the stimulus package 100% for defense spending, I'm pretty sure these right wingers will sign the package in a heart beat. Pork's bad unless it's good. And to the right wing, pork's good if it starts a war.
The only way out of this mess is to somehow instill in the public the idea that Govt. is doing something on behalf of the average American. It does not matter what specifics are in the Stimulus package as much as that there IS a Stimulus package. The vast majority of us have the ability to consume, we just will not do it. I think fear of what the future holds is a primary problem. Perhaps there even is a certain amount of spending revolt going on as well. That is why a Stimulus package is so important. Our Govt needs to take actions that will help the public feel that there is hope. Thus far, the efforts have not been effective in doing that. The partisanship currently being displayed is not helping, if fact it is deepening the problem.
I agree....scared people don't spend money....action is needed quickly and, as usual, the Repubs are dragging their feet and creating fear....so anti-American!!!
I think they need to eliminate the national debt. start with making the government responsible for the money... end the federal reserve. Slash our spending rate. make alternate energy the national priority and make the government a benefactor with the money they invest... same as the bailout. We should be owning these banks.... that is a good start to eliminating the fed reserve. Make sure we have a stake in the car companies as well. get us out of the social security business. or direct it towards investments in the banks we are owning. New weapon systems... NO. spend on butter not guns. Go take the profits form those that abused their position..... Bush family comes to mind...
I just do not see the government being able to help us out of a problem that they helped create. Where's the outrage? Where's the demands for reform or at least competency? Sure Bush is gone and I'd day he was asleep at the switch, but all the other suspects are still rattling around Washington. Pelosi. Reid. Franks. They are basically CEOS that have run a company into the dumper and then have pledged they will not rest until they get it up and running again. You have to be DENSE to think they can fix things. Obama? The poster child of using the system to his own advantege is now going to change things? Again, you have to be DENSE to think he'll take on the DC establishment. This goes for both parties but the democrats have to be the primary targets of our house cleaning efforts.
You want change? You want to fix things? Then start making your elected officials and representatives lives a LIVING HELL demanding they turn things around. Hound them, harrass them( non violently and legally of course), bombard them with emails, phone calls, worry the bejeebers out of them. Make sure the local media and press know that constant picking at them is what sells papers and gets ratings.
If they do good, then reward them with a little praise. If they don't, find somebody to run against them and kick in a few dollars for their election campaign. They care most about their jobs. If they know they're in trouble they'll soon be falling all over themselves trying to kiss your feet. Whether or not you reward them with a kick to the face is then up to you.
Give props for wasting money? I don't understand why people think there is an "out" for what is happening... people leveraged too much debt and are paying it off now... that is what is happening right now.... did you really think people can have 120% debt and get away with it? Who is going to loan them the next 5% so that they can continue to "survive" in their lifestyle? This is a debt economy and congratulations you have almost reached the ceiling... the only alternative is pay down your debt and then re-accumulate that debt (hence the tax cuts)...
I'm sick of this sort of biblical, god is punishing the sinners vision of the situation. It's crapola. A better analogy would be that you bought a brand new Lexus, and then some vandals came along and put sugar in the gas tank. This doesn't make a Lexus a crappy car, and it certainly doesn't turn Lexus owners into guilty people whom the gods must punish. There was nothing wrong with the mechanisms or functions of the economy until some vandals began poisoning the system by pouring more low-grade paper into the credit markets than they were designed to withstand. This was a willful act by a small group out to maximize their own personal profit at all costs, and that's the extent of it. Blame the vandals...blame the watchmen who were supposed to be guarding against vandals. After that, nobody and nothing else is complicit. Get used to it.
We have and will continue to have debt because debt is merely the other side of credit, and credit is what makes any modern economy go, because in a digital world, it is more efficient (i.e., cheaper) to run an economy on credit than it is to run it on anything else.
Do some people abuse credit? Sure, just like some abuse TV, Twinkies, cigarettes, the Free Exercise Clause, a driver's license, and stupid ideas that their high school football coaches planted in their heads. Some people will abuse almost anything, but that isn't grounds for banning American Idol, snack foods, tobacco, religion, the automobile, or interscholastic sports. So it's hardly any reason to condemn credit either. Credit abuse is and was a manageable issue and was NO FACTOR AT ALL in bringing about the current crisis. There is no way to rebuild and reinvigorate the economy except upon a basis of credit.
NAKED FEAR might prompt one at this point to cut back on credit and spending and to hunker down and try to save up, but there is no actual reason in the world not to continue or even expand your responsible use of credit, nor to remember that the old saying is that you save up FOR a rainy day, not ON one. Now, if you had legitimate reason to believe that your job or your company were on short time due to being directly in the path of the current economic steamroller, that would be legitimate reason for adopting a different strategy. But the substantial majority of people are NOT in such a situation. For them to behave as if they were is entirely counter-productive. Think about it...
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