Comments on Bush's Jobs Deficit

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ExStud...

...hmmmm.

I'll have to give this some thought. I may have tied myself up here ;-(

D

posted by DamonLeigh on August 13, 2004 at 9:35 AM | link to this | reply

"The Republican ideal of small government is a good one that I subscribe

to fully?" Now my confusion is greater than ever! I accept that you reject labels; I can understand why you don't find them useful. But after blasting the free market for only making a lucky minority prosper, you also endorse small government? Which is it? The paradigm has long been small, laissez-faire government leading to corporate exploitation and wealth concentration versus strong, activist government to control the evils of laissez-faire. Where do your views fit in this paradigm, if at all? Do you mean to suggest it would be possible to have an alternative to market capitalism that did NOT involve the type of government that, say, Ralph Nader would create? That is, would it really be conceivable or practicable to control the harmful effects of the market without big government policies -- environmental controls, antitrust laws, health and safety regulations, living wage laws, universal state-run health insurance, and progressive taxes? If there would be some way to achieve these goals without big government, I would love to hear about it!

posted by Dylan24 on August 12, 2004 at 3:32 AM | link to this | reply

You could...

...give him one for me, too!

D

posted by DamonLeigh on August 9, 2004 at 5:45 AM | link to this | reply

If I ever see Alan Greenspan in the street

I would certainly give him a smack for his too little too late reactionary political motivated issues of FED decisions.

posted by SirReid on August 9, 2004 at 3:38 AM | link to this | reply

ExStud...

......sure I can explain!

A careful examination of my writings here, over the 20 or so months I've been around, will reveal one telling fact. I've NEVER attached a label to myself of any sort.

I've had lots of labels given to me by my readers in that time, of course, including Democrap (and other hilarious word-plays!), liberal, libertarian, leftist, Marxist, anarchist, tree-hugger, peacenik, coward, and on and on. But I don't subscribe to any of these - indeed, I don't really know what half of them actually mean!

I approach issues on their own merit.

Clearly, the free market, for example, has done much to improve the living standards of a lucky minority of the worlds population, including me. But clearly, it's reaching the end of its usefulness as its increasingly constrained by its now all-too-clear limitations.

Clearly, the war in Iraq was a bad idea from the off, based on bad intelligence, blatant lies and misleading references to al-Qaeda and 9/11. The result - a new and fertile recruitment and training ground for newly enraged and armed Muslim men into the ranks of the 'terrorists' is, to say the least, a very unfavourable outcome of a very rash piece of military adventurism.

Clearly, the Republican ideal of small government is a good one that I subscribe to fully. Equally clearly, the current White House rabble have completely lost sight of this, along with much of what's in the Constitution (most of which does actually make sense) and are persuing their own narrow goals and agendas based on their own personal wealth, security and futures.

For the record, I don't always agree with the Economist (of course) but they do provide some excellent analysis which on occasion, I feel would benefit folk here.

Your confusion with regard to the Economist comes directly from the fact you've followed the crowd here and attached labels to me, that you then believe to be accurate and which, from where I'm sitting, have no relevence whatsoever.

Thanks for reading! Hope that helps!

D

posted by DamonLeigh on August 9, 2004 at 1:58 AM | link to this | reply

Damon Leigh, I am amused by the frequency with which you use

articles from THE ECONOMIST in your blogs. This magazine is plainly free market, right-of-center by European standards, though quite centrist or even slightly left-of-center by American standards. But even that is a stretch, considering they endorsed BUSH in 2000 and as recently as this past spring wrote that said endorsement was still "probably the right choice" in light of Gore's endorsement of Howard Dean, who the magazine considered too dovish with his opposition to the Iraq war, which the magazine supported unequivocally. You are not the first leftist I have known to use THE ECONOMIST frequently. A self-proclaimed Marxist high school teacher and Chirac-supporting college professor of mine both really respected this right-wing magazine. And you seem to do the same. I don't quite understand it. Could you explain?

posted by Dylan24 on August 7, 2004 at 6:18 AM | link to this | reply

That's an interesting...

...take on things. However, I'm always very suspicious of the concept of planned shifts in economic factors. I know thousands of people work in some form of economic planning, so it's an important myth to keep going, but I see a national economy as way too complex and animal to be planned.

The concept of planning also raises an interesting point. The old USSR and the curent China are centrally planned economies. Ours are not, yet we still have central planners who claim to plan the future of the economy.

Hmmmmm....

Thanks for reading!

D

posted by DamonLeigh on August 7, 2004 at 4:07 AM | link to this | reply

This was planned.

Employers were getting worried, the shortage of workers in the boom economy, was starting to affect wages. American industry would prefer to have unemployment so that wages are kept down. The last boom proved that a high employment rate doesn't have to mean inflation, but the big boys were scared so when their man got in office he cooled down the economy. This only matters when there is an election, there is still one vote per person and no matter how much the corporations spend on the election, a poor economy is bad for the encumbent.

posted by Make2short on August 7, 2004 at 3:33 AM | link to this | reply