Obama’s and Bush’s effects on the deficit in one graph

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Danzig

and you completely missed my point. if the stimulus kept things from getting worse, couldn't the same be said about the tax decrease?? i guess not. yet if it did nothing, it was continued-why was it continued if it was a mistake?

I think not stopping the tax cuts, at least for the rich, was a huge mistake by Obama, that has harmed this country irrepairably.

your remark about the gop being the reason for our issues is laughable, they didn't accomplish this on their own. yet i'm the one who needs to be objective??

Well, that was directed to the general "you", not the specific "you".

But yes, unlike you, I think there is a vast difference between the goals and methods of the two major political parties in the country. They have never been further polarized and apart.

But where the worse the far right can do is bring down the country irrepairably (IMO) with dangerous, proven-unworkable fiscal policy and direct attacks on the poor, old, and have-nots; the worse the far left could do to me would be give me universal health care.

Yes, I agree many politicians from both sides are simply corporate lobbyist-owned whores. But there are good politicians in Washington, trying to do the right thing.

and as for your lengthy post just above this one, yes, our infrastructure needs help. what that has to do with tax payer dollars going to provide low income homes with high speed internet i don't know.

The internet is considered "essential infrastructure" in other first world countries. Like telephone? Roads? Electricity in the 1940's? I can talk to people around where I live in Kentucky, and the old ones remember when the federal government made a point of paying to get electricity to every individual rural farm out in the country and middle of nowhere. It was life-changing for the country. Called a spending fiasco by some. That is the internet, now, for first world countries.

It's about the only way to find a job nowadays. We are a world community and economy, no longer separate countries who can keep their borders closed and their states separate from all other interaction. And that connection is essential. That type of connection is what just enabled the Arab Spring.

Face it - America has fallen far behind other first world countries in most objective measurements of those things that build a quality life, and happiness. The rest of the world looks at us and thinks we are crazy. They wonder why we have destroyed our greatness.

And the GOP has become so far right and polarized, compared to where they have been throughout my lifetime, that they now are just a shell company shilling for the wealthy. They have lost all humanity and social consciousness (health care and good social programs have been Republican goals for much of my lifetime) My politics haven't changed - the GOP is now irrelevant and blatently counterproductive to any progress and growth of this country at all, and I'm left with trying to work with what's left. Part of the Democratic party has moved so far right to embrace many of my political views. BTW, even our Democratic party views is considered "far right" or "very conservative" in many other first world countries.

In the late 1940's and 1950's, our federal policies created a great, upwardly mobile middle class. That - enabled consumerism - is what grows a country and creates jobs. And it did. We boomed.

We have spent the past 40 years, however, destroying those policies that created and enable the middle class, thus our middle class is now practically gone - our incomes haven't moved upwards in decades. The top 1% hold all the money. There is nobody left to be a consumer and grow the economy. Thus we are imploding. It's as simple as that.

In the Monopoly game, when one person has all the wealth, the game is over. That's where we are in America.

Should the holder of the wealth give money away to others, to keep the game in play? No, of course not.

But the game should be set up to allow everyone to play. And, if you read the real rules of Monopoly, something we all do not do, when you land on a property and can't afford to buy it, is that the property is supposed to be auctioned to the highest bidder among the other players. We don't do that, when we play Monopoly.

That's like America - the rules have been changed to favor one person owning everything, rather than interactive, thriving growth among all.

The GOP has spent forty years changing the rules to favor that, and the left has passively allowed them to do it. Now we are there. The vast wealth of this country, trillions, are in the hands of the few. The GOP attacks the left for wanting them to give away their money. No, that's false (but it's a good straw man) - the left just wants the rules to be fair.

The amazing thing, in that You Tube clip I posted about wealth, is that out of the top 400 wealthiest Americans, 200 of them are "progressive" or "liberal", and want different policy. How come they can't force that? Think about it.