by Mike Kimel Stop Acting Surprised It seems a lot of Democrats seem surprised that Obama is willing to give up on what they view as core principles. On the Republican side, there seems to be an implicit understanding that pretending the economic mess and spending began under Obama’s watch, and thus the policies that […]
Readers here will know more about the US federal government income statement than I. However, given the near ubiquitous deficit hysteria, I wanted to illustrate the truth about the budget deficit. The truth is, that deficit hysteria has been set in motion by A surge in government spending on items like unemployment compensation, food stamps, […]
By Daniel Becker In the comments to my post “A reminder from Obama’s February 2009 speech”, there is the following: “I guess it relates to the fake Obama they had made up in their heads,…” This sums up the early comments to the post suggesting that those who trusted Obama have only themselves to blame. […]
Today a host of global purchasing managers indices (PMIs) reiterated that the global economy is slowing….quickly. Within 24 hours, China, the US, and the euro area all reported July PMIs falling toward the feared 50 (below which the manufacturing industry is contracting) – 50.7, 50.9, and 50.4, respectively. The UK PMI fell below 50 to […]
By: Daniel Becker In answer to the generic question regarding President Obama’s actions regarding the debt ceiling, I am re-posting this from 2/25/09. In comments of the original I stated that cutting the deficit by 1/2 seemed to “optimistic” for me. *************************** Ok, here are my basic issues with the substance of President Obama’s speech. […]
I won’t post it here—the full text would be so NSFW that Lee Papa might hesitate—but here’s the outline: UPDATE: I was correct about Mr. Papa’s likely reaction being more moderate, but he’s more lucid that Ezra (or Greg Sargent) has been so far today. Of course, “more lucid than people employed by the Washington […]
Mark Thoma, who supported (and probably voted for) the man during the primaries, is dumuch more gracious than I am: A vague promise from Democrats about the future is all but worthless right now, we’ve had too many promises broken already. Obama’s promises in particular mean nothing. The nicest thing I can do is describe […]
Hey remember me? Just a quick driveby to start some discussion. Classical, neo-classical, and neo-liberal economics all share a common mistaken psychological premise, one that is simple but deep, and in itself explains why they don’t understand the aims of Progressive Taxation. Label it how you like, the academic discipline that emerged from England in […]
After the US report on Q2… Angry Bear and credit market weakness in the eurozone, Rebecca takes a look at the retail side of the economy: Retail sales in Germany and Spain were reported last week for the month of June. On a working-day and not-seasonally adjusted basis, real retail sales fell 7.0% on the […]