Tag: Politics

Politics

That new car smell

petewareLeave a comment

I’m closely keeping track of that cash-for-clunkers program. It sounds like the Senate is close to approving a plan that provides a $3,500 subsidy for trading in an old gas guzzler for a more efficient car!

The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a plan and the Senate is likely to do the same this week. It looks like the plan would provide a $3500 subsidy to anyone trading in a car getting less than 18 miles per gallon as long as there is at least a 4-mpg improvement. (I think I got yardage on my old car, not mileage.) A 10-mpg improvement would get you another $1000.

News · NYC · Politics · Technology

Closer to a new car?

petewareLeave a comment

It’s one step closer to happening! Getting a new car based on a trade in might actually happen. It hasn’t passed the House yet (much less the Senate) but the leadership of both parties agree on doing it.
From House Reaches a Deal on ‘Cash for Clunkers’ Program:

Under the House plan, a car trade-in that improves fuel efficiency by at least 10 miles per gallon would qualify for a $4,500 voucher, as would the trade-in of a small truck that improves efficiency by 5 miles per gallon. The new vehicle must have a minimum fuel efficiency rating of 22 miles per gallon for cars and 18 miles per gallon for small trucks.

Politics

The Banality of Bush White House Evil

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Frank Rich in the NY Times does a great job reminding us tat the Bush Whitehouse desire to invade Iraq drove so many things:

Five years after the Abu Ghraib revelations, we must acknowledge that our government methodically authorized torture and lied about it. But we also must contemplate the possibility that it did so not just out of a sincere, if criminally misguided, desire to “protect” us but also to promote an unnecessary and catastrophic war. Instead of saving us from “another 9/11,” torture was a tool in the campaign to falsify and exploit 9/11 so that fearful Americans would be bamboozled into a mission that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda. The lying about Iraq remains the original sin from which flows much of the Bush White House’s illegality.

Politics

Going Galt? Give me a break

peteware

I have a friend who seems to believe in Ayn Rand Objectivist philosophy and talks about Tea Parties and Going Galt.
I’m guilty of not having read Atlas Shrugged though I did like this 1000 word summary of Atlas Shrugged . I certainly enjoyed this discussion from Ezra Klein
Here’s a great review from Whittaker Chambers reviewing in 1957 Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged on National Review Online:

Its story is preposterous. It reports the final stages of a final conflict (locale: chiefly the United States, some indefinite years hence) between the harried ranks of free enterprise and the “looters.” These are proponents of proscriptive taxes, government ownership, labor, etc., etc. The mischief here is that the author, dodging into fiction, nevertheless counts on your reading it as political reality. This,” she is saying in effect, “is how things really are. These are the real issues, the real sides. Only your blindness keeps you from seeing it, which, happily, I have come to rescue you from.”
Since a great many of us dislike much that Miss Rand dislikes, quite as heartily as she does, many incline to take her at her word. It is the more persuasive, in some quarters, because the author deals wholly in the blackest blacks and the whitest whites. In this fiction everything, everybody, is either all good or all bad, without any of those intermediate shades which, in life, complicate reality and perplex the eye that seeks to probe it truly.

News · Politics

Stimulus and the Economy

petewareLeave a comment

This chart from the Fed shows how far below capacity the economy currently expressed as a percentage of total capacity.
Utilization
It’s the counter argument to the proposition that the stimulus is just going to crowd out private investment. Businesses have cut back on production because of reduced demand which further reduces demand.

Politics

The White House fights back

petewareLeave a comment

Barack Obama has an op-ed in the Washington Post
starts to fight back at the short sighted, self-serving views that the Republicans have been using the past two weeks.
The Action Americans Need:

In recent days, there have been misguided criticisms of this plan that echo the failed theories that helped lead us into this crisis — the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems; that we can meet our enormous tests with half-steps and piecemeal measures; that we can ignore fundamental challenges such as energy independence and the high cost of health care and still expect our economy and our country to thrive.
I reject these theories, and so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change. They know that we have tried it those ways for too long. And because we have, our health-care costs still rise faster than inflation. Our dependence on foreign oil still threatens our economy and our security. Our children still study in schools that put them at a disadvantage. We’ve seen the tragic consequences when our bridges crumble and our levees fail.

I particularly liked the modest identification at the end of the article:

The writer is president of the United States.

Politics

Roubini: more bad news

petewareLeave a comment
  • Global, synchronized, recession.
  • Recession continues through 2009 with weak, 1%, growth in 2010.
  • Unemployment at 9% in 2010. Job losses easily at 500k/month through 2009 and may be worse. Stimulus may lower that to 200k/month.
  • $1.8 trillion loss for banks; need another $1.4 trillion for banks to recover.

  • Top 3 banks in US are technically insolvent. Nationalization only reasonable approach. Re-privatize them in 2-3 years. Otherwise, end up with zombie banks like Japan: a decade of stagnation.

  • Deficits this year: 2 trillion; next year 1.5 trillion.

News · Politics

Warren Buffett and Obama

petewareLeave a comment

Here is Warren Buffett interview by Tom Brokaw on Dateline NBC. Buffett is very positive on Obama’s leadership. (7 min):

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