Letters to the Editor
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Valkyrie607
Valkyrie607: I agree, the quotes I posted by James Cone, Rev. Wright's mentor, are very racist. If you'd like to verify them, all but one of them are directly from his book entitled "Black Theology and Black Power."
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Fester
Dear Uncle Fester,
Though I don't always agree with what you say, I have to congratulate you on your thoughtful and civil posts. I confess, I haven't read every word of every one of your posts, but you are usually a voice of reason and moderation. I appreciate that and I think it raises the level of these threads.
Cheers,
EP
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@EP Thank you
for the kind words. Don't always agree with myself either, which brings to mind Oscar Wilde's “Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative”. I do take a dim view of those claiming to speak for a majority. Rather than channeling the voice of the multitudes, it's more likely to be the mouth of Sauron. It's good to know that my self-restraint is appreciated, though I have been known to get snarky on occasion.
Lately a bit more effort has been required, though paradoxically the increased absurdity has made it easier just to laugh. I'm sorry if that offends anyone posting with serious intent. I am a strong proponent of the middle way; any issue worth it's salt has many sides to it. I'm here to listen to other people voice those sides.
Cheers
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This Should Help Our Economy!
From Obama's interview on CNBC today:
BARTIROMO: "How do you plan to change the tax code when it comes to capital gains? How high will that 15 percent rate go?"
Sen. OBAMA: "Well, you know, I haven't given a firm number. Here's my belief, that we can't go back to some of the, you know, confiscatory rates that existed in the past that distorted sound economics. And I certainly would not go above what existed under Bill Clinton, which was the 28 percent. I would--and my guess would be it would be significantly lower than that. I think that we can have a capital gains rate that is higher than 15 percent. If it--and if it, you know--when I talk to people like Warren Buffet or others and I ask them, you know, what's--how much of a difference is it going to be if it's 20 or 25 percent, they say, look, if it's within that range then it's not going to distort, I think, economic decision making.
Later:
The broader principle that I'm interested in is just making sure that we've got a tax code that is fair for all Americans. And I think it is not unreasonable to say--you know, I know that we'll get some arguments from some folks on this, but it's not unreasonable to say that those of us in the upper brackets have benefited disproportionately from a globalized economy; that those benefits have been compounded by the Bush tax cuts and that for us to roll back some of those tax cuts and to put this economy on a more stable fiscal footing and to make investments in the American people so that they can afford a decent life...
I mean, I wasn't aware that the purpose of the tax code was to punish overly successful people.
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Bush's Pursuits
Bush has persued a weak dollar policy and that hasn't really helped either.
Of course it hasn't helped. Our manufacturing base has been decimated after a 25 year assault from Washington and from poor Wall Street management. You can thank the Clintons for some of both - this was a bipartisan, public / private sector screw-up. We import virtually everything manufactured save some food and export almost nothing in return. A quick trip thru a shopping mall checking the "Made In" tags will demonstrate the truth of that. Or just watch all of the empty container ships floating away from the Port of Los Angeles.
All weakening the dollar does now - in the short term, anyhow - is drive up the cost of imported goods, imported food and imported energy. It's like feeding a hungry man after he's already dead from starvation.
It also doesn't help that China's currency is still largely pegged to the dollar, which means our exports aren't much more competitive there than they were a couple of years ago, and their exports still remain comparatively cheap.
It'll take years now for currency devaluation to bring the situation back into some kind of balance - even longer if our banking system continues its deregulation-fueled implosion and can no longer offer our manufacturing sector the capital it needs to expand and take advantage of our devalued currency.
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Disingenuous Much?
I'd have a lot more respect for you Uncle Fester if you didn't slice 'n dice other people's posts in order to twist their meaning, and then reply to your own distortion.
For example, in my original post, I said the following:
If you're running the show, you're responsible for whatever happens on your watch. That's what leadership means. The Clinton Administration not only failed to use the tools at their disposal to prevent the mess we've found ourselves in today, they aided and abetted the crooks who caused it.
You decided to slice 'n dice out the second half of that paragraph in order to score some sort of sophomoric debating point, but it's crucial to the meaning of that statement.
If you're going to play stupid debating games like that, there's no point trying to hold an adult conversation with you.
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Sunspot
I certainly don't want any fake respect that isn't earned. And I'm sorry if I didn't copy your post verbatim or elided the most tasty bits. I highlighted what was confusing to me. I understand that you think the Clinton admin aided and abetted crooks. That was the easy part.
I don't think you addressed the what I consider a fundamental question: If you are not running the economy show, how much credit/blame/responsibility should you have? That has nothing to do with scoring points. Your point simply doesn't make sense to me. Maybe some additional clarification would be more helpful to Fester than outrage that you were quoted out of context. I don't need to count coup over you.
And your posts makes it sound like people in government can predict the future or fully understand the consequences of their actions, and all screw ups or bad outcomes are acts of deliberate malfeasance. It's possible to act in good faith and still screw things up. Yes these people are powerful and have lots of influence, some of them are corrupt. But that doesn't mean that they are wise, or that they can control the outcomes. History tends to show that over the long run they can't. I have a lot of faith in the stupidity of elected officials. So I don't think that all the bad stuff that happened in the Clinton admin was the result of scams or rip-offs.