When all else fails go with the tried and true. So it is with President Obama who today called on Congress to pass a 13 billion dollar measure that would send 50 million senior citizens 250 dollars each. Considering that seniors have been among the most vocal opponents of Obama’s health care initiative, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that this money is meant as a nuanced Incentive !, for them to back off of their representatives long enough for Obamacare to become law. I guess they’re counting on seniors to, you know, vote in their economic interest !
But I have to wonder, with all of the accumulated wisdom of their time here on Earth, how many seniors will consider the one-time $250 payment to be fair recompense for all of the medical care they won’t be getting in the future considering the rationing of services as well as the complete life ideology that is inherently baked into the goods…
That said, there is a quote often attributed to Alexis de Tocqueville; “The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” But, that is actually a variant of Alexander Francis Tytler misattributed to de Tocqueville:
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy
[emphasis-ed.]
There are many folks in modern America that will testify to the lax fiscal policy of the last 20 years, and the unbounded fiscal policy of Obama. His redistributionist policies seem to reach for the scenario outlined in Tytler’s maxim, ensuring that a majority will permanently vote for the party promising the most largesse-in other words the Democrats. Still others will characterize his ideology as a tact to achieving the greater result of replacing our representative democracy with one of the other options Tytler mentions; and regardless of the benevolence, in the final analysis a tyrant is always just that-a tyrant…
That’s in exchange for the COLA (cost of living allowance), when a terrible inflationary spiral’s about to hit.
“Considering that seniors have been among the most vocal opponents of Obama’s health care initiative, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that this money is meant as a nuanced Incentive!” [emphasis added by Bob, the emphasis adder dude]
Who knew it only took gossipy speculation to power a rocket Bob into lunar orbit.
Yeah, they announce SS recipients won’t get a COL adjustment and Obama proposes a small stipend to make up for that, but – Duuuuuuuuh – it’s really about Tocqueville, err, no – Duuuuuuuh – Alexander Tytler, and populist bribery, err, no, specifically this is all about vote buying for health care legislation.
Let’s see if we can’t take Bobbo’s brain back past 20-years. Hey, Bobbo, who was Reagan bribing when he cut taxes and thereby created deficits that still plague our nation today?
A fuckin’ Marxist is what Reagan was, eh?
Social security has a well defined increase provision, and inflation was less than zero. Besides, they recieved an additional $250 above the stimulus check that everyone got from the treasury anyway…
That’s not speculation, it’s from the news story I linked; did you read it? And what’s with the “Duuuuuuuh” stuff? You can do better than that…
As far as the vote buying assumption? Well it;s easy to question the timing of this gimme since the Obamacare bill will be coming to a vote soon, and I’m sure the Capitol Hill phone lines will be burning up. It’s easy to see a motivation other than his benevolence and munificence…
And the quotations were meant to provide some context for Obama’s “chicken in every pot” giveaway; what he bills as a “Robin Hood” style program, but in reality is just more the “Hood” part…
As in gangster snark thor, not the Raaaacist! reference you’ll try to cast it as…
Reagan wasn’t bribing anyone when he put the nation on the better side of the Laffer curve and a “supply side” footing. As the Gipper said, a rising tide lifts all boats; what he did was for no one group but for the good of the nation…
I wondered where you’ve been; I hope you had a good time wherever you were and whatever you were doing. I’ve been saving an economic piece for you to disparage me for; stay tuned…
All the best
What Reagan did was fuck up our country. Seriously, Ronnie Reagan was not a good President on many levels, and yes, the Laffer Curve was dumb, meant for a dumb audience and that’s it’s why you don’t hear grown ups talk about it today.
COLA came out today and Obama’s was a proposal, nothing more, as I heard the news, you know, news without the propagandish dudder quacking. Lack of a COLA increase and a stipend for seniors are related while a chicken in every pot is parallel to Reagan’s ripping off the younger generation to buy votes from every taxpayer in the grandest tradition of populist pandering, or Robin “Marxist” Hood style if you prefer. At least try and get your contexts straight, Rocket Bob.
Where does the Duuuuuuh come from? It’s your clue that your daily anti-Obama dudder quacking is boring, worn out, tiresome, a yawner, disingenuous, etc…
And what is just as boring is your dumb Racist baiting followed by the same mocking slough off. Ever meet anyone, or read of anyone I suppose, who admitted they sat in the bleachers and bagged on Jackie Robinson? No, I doubt you have. But there they were at every game in every town early in his career, yelling, cackling and hounding the man. That’s you, Bob, one of the cacklers who, though it’s obvious to the rest of us, deny race has anything to do with the cackling. They didn’t like the way Jackie stole so many bases because, they’d insist, it was ruining the game! The way he swung his bat, did you see that! Nah, they weren’t being racists. They just didn’t like him! That one! The black one!
You’re too busy making an ass out of yourself to realize what you’re doing, I guess.
I’ll read your economics piece with an open mind but if it’s just the same old cliche-driven philosophies that have been so thoroughly disproved I might not even comment on it. This is getting old, Bob. I’ve already read many versions of the narrative you’ve been re-pimping.
Dan, I liked your story of mushrooms picking. You’re fun like that.
the Laffer Curve was dumb
Someone is dumb, all right, but it’s not Laffer.
Oh, dumb boy who poses as bright, Laffer is not considered among the serious economists of our day. He’s a flake and a political hack. He’s still around, laughed at mostly, and shows up on CNBC occasionally, but I guess you wouldn’t know that, being a broke-dick brain-dead rethuglidum and all.
Interracial couple denied marriage license in La.
By MARY FOSTER, Associated Press– 2 hrs 13 mins ago
NEW ORLEANS – A Louisiana justice of the peace said he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple out of concern for any children the couple might have. Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, says it is his experience that most interracial marriages do not last long.
“I’m not a racist. I just don’t believe in mixing the races that way,” Bardwell told the Associated Press on Thursday. “I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom. I treat them just like everyone else.”
Bardwell said he asks everyone who calls about marriage if they are a mixed race couple. If they are, he does not marry them, he said.
Bardwell said he has discussed the topic with blacks and whites, along with witnessing some interracial marriages. He came to the conclusion that most of black society does not readily accept offspring of such relationships, and neither does white society, he said.
“There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage,” Bardwell said. “I think those children suffer and I won’t help put them through it.”
If he did an interracial marriage for one couple, he must do the same for all, he said.
“I try to treat everyone equally,” he said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091015/ap_on_re_us/us_interracial_rebuff
Anyone want to bet against Bardwell voting Repub?
Compare that to Obama:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmfLTLU2vO0
Anyone want to bet against Bardwell voting Repub?
Considering that he was elected as a Democrat three times, and a Republican once, I’d take that bet.
Oh. It’s thor.
Buh-bye.
Run bitch, else I make a fool of you, again.
He switched parties after Obama, hahaha. A neo-Confederate, a Other McCainer! Haha.
You almost got me, almost.
But seeing how he votes Repub, pay your Master!
It’s the Chicago Democratic machine way as perfected by Mayor Daley.
1) Buy off the senor citizens (Blatant $2500 payoff).
2) Buy off the gay vote (Don’t ask don’t tell goes bye, bye).
3) Buy off black Reverends (already in Obama’s corner).
How did Reagan foul up our country? By winning the cold war? By re-establishing respect for our nation in the world? For rebuilding our military that had been gutted by Carter?
And what are you talking about, robbing the young for the same old populist pandering? Are you talking about defecit spending to re-build the military? Because that was paid in full by the higly touted “peace dividend” that Clinton collected on after the demise of the Soviet Union…
And cut it with the racist smear already. I’ve said until I’m blue in the face that it was not how it was written nor was it my intent; I will not let you hijack my intent with some higgledy-piggledy story about people rooting against Jackie Robinson. I’m not looking for excuses to criticize Obama-he delivers them gift wrapped! But I don’t criticize him daily, and in fact my last couple posts hven’t been critical of him…
And the Louisiana story about the guy that won’t conduct interracial marriages is just wrong; especially for a justice of the peace. He needs to lose his job if he’s going to discriminate like that.
And Aresay has the Daley checklist queued up ready for use by the wO!n !
Reagan was a border line idiot. No further proof than your words is necessary, Bob.
You sleep in a false reality and Ronald reagan is the teddy bear you cling to.
To have to listen to brain dead conservatives is Reagan’s legacy.
You are the reason America is in its current state of decline, Bob, you and Reagan.
When Congress cut taxes during the Reagan Administration it started an economic boom that lasted, with a couple of minor hiccups like the dot.com bubble right up until the real estate fun and games brought us here.
Funny how the receipts to the federal government skyrocketed with those lower taxes. If only Congress had kept social spending equal to the rate of inflation, plus population growth the Treasury would be rolling in money.
You standing there screeching, red-faced about how awful Reagan was doesn’t make it true. And, if we conservatives are so damned brain dead, what are you doing here?