Re: Bush has screwed the economy for a long time was --->Re: Mortgage Meltdown

Jerry Okamura wrote:


"Islander" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:MfCdneHeJ-mgHpnbnZ2dnUVZ_h6vnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Jerry Okamura wrote:


"Islander" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:wJOdnUJJb_NJW57bnZ2dnUVZ_rOqnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

jimstevens wrote:

This is the tip of Bush's nasty little secret on what pushed up the
economy and created jobs since he came in office. I don't come here
as much as I used to because I spend a lot more time on investment
related issues. I have been reading a number of items on how they
just printed money like crazy since he came in. The dollar has fallen
to record lows and keep going down and down and down. Do the chart.
Then the Fed does not even put out the M3 report any more. This
economy is going to feed hyperinflation down the road. It is also
pushing up the standing of other currencies helping our enemies. Some
oil suppliers are pushing to only accept Euros for their product and
China is sitting on a massive pile of US paper.

We have only seen the tip of the iceberg on the damage Bush has done
to this nation.


I'm afraid that you are right on target. The only part that you left out was the consequence of the neoconservative energy strategy which led us down the path to the disaster in Iraq and which not only wasted our military but will have added $1T to the national debt by the time we are finished.

Incidentally, in case you haven't noticed, Japan is holding nearly twice the US treasury debt as China and also leads China in current account balance.

A professor who was teaching one of my economics course told us something that might interest you. What is the national debt? The national debt is simply a promissory note issued by the Federal Government so that they can borrow money. How can you reduce the debt? Well, the obvious way is not to borrow more money and instead start buying back the debt instruments you issued. But of course our government is not going to do that. "If" they did that, they would have to raise additional revenue, or decrease spending, either of which they will not do to the level that would be required. What is the other alternative? The other alternative is for the Federal Reserve Bank to simply start buying back all of the notes that they issued. They can do that, because they control the money supply. But that too has some serious problems, but they CAN do that....


As I said, one way to reduce the debt is to not wage unnecessary wars.


NO!!! That only works "if" you do not spend the money somewhere else....

The Iraq war will cost us more than the total treasury debt owed to both Japan and China or would pay off all debt to all other countries besides Japan and China. The Iraq war will cost us half the IOUs that the government owes Social Security. The Iraq war will cost us more than eleven times our entire gold reserve.


The basic problem I have with that line of argument is you are bascially saying we should not have gone to war in the first place, because going to war cost money and as Iraq illustrates, you can never predict what will happen once you do wage war. But like everything else in life, there is a reason for taking the action you take, and there is a reason for not taking the action you take. The only way not to spend the money on wars, is not to go to war period....ever.... Is that what you are suggesting we adopt as a national policy, never to go to war? A policy which the Japanese adopted after they were defeated? Becasue anything other than that, puts us back in the position we now find ourselves in. Perhaps those who are democrats should adopt that as a national platform. It actually has some advantages. No war, no need for so much spending on the military, which means you can spend more money of you pet proejcts that you want to spend the money one. How about that? Would you be in favor of drastically reducing our defense budget? We actually could do that with one simple move....do you know what that is? Or are you suggesting something different? If you are, what are you suggesting we do in the future?

It is very clear to me that the reason for going to war with Iraq had nothing to do with terrorism or any of the other reasons that the Bush administration put forward. It had to do with neoconservative ideas about US imperialism and Big Oil interests in assuring a continuation to an energy policy that would benefit them. The strategy was naive in the extreme and we were foolish to pursue it. The result was a $1T increase in our debt that is directly attributable to the war and an unknown increase in debt due to an increase in world-wide terrorism and reduced confidence in the US.

I tend to agree with Bacevich in his book recommending not specifically a reduction in our investment in military capability, but a serious reassessment in how, when, and why we use the military.
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