I’m putting these vids up for those that actually can stomach the shit he is shoveling and for posterity so that I find them more easily later on (because you know I’m gonna need ’em). I know, I’m lazy. It’s also very early in the morning and I will puke if I listen to the entire dog and pony show.
Bambi wants to let you know that his Recovery Act circumvented the next Great Depression and that even though you have no job, no money, and it doesn’t really feel like a recovery – It.Really.Is!!! JUST BELIEVE!!! Oh frakkin’ happy day!!!!!
260 more days before we can politically neuter this fraud, liar, and state joke.
Meanwhile, here is the truth; most of the stimulus hasn’t even been spent yet. So would that be Obama taking credit for something that he didn’t do again?
Most Cash So Far Has Gone to Services, Government Jobs; Infrastructure Surge Unlikely to Put Big Dent in Unemployment
WASHINGTON—The Obama administration’s economic-stimulus program has delivered about a third of its total $787 billion budget during its first year, much of that to maintain social services and government jobs and to provide tax cuts for workers. Now, the pace and direction of stimulus spending are about to change.
Infrastructure spending is set to step up in the second year of the stimulus program, which should mean more money flowing to private-sector employers. Still, economists say that won’t likely have a big effect on the unemployment rate, which most say is likely to continue a slow decline as the broader economy recovers.
The shift could be significant politically, though, because Republicans have criticized the relative lack of private business hiring directly attributed to the stimulus.
The approach this week of the stimulus program’s one-year anniversary sparked a fresh round of dueling partisan statements, as Democrats sought to credit the effort with averting a deeper recession and Republicans said the program deserved a failing grade. But in terms of spending, the stimulus is largely incomplete.
The latest job numbers came out this morning and everybody is still holding their breath, but thinking about relaxing just a wee bit because the 10% unemployment rate didn’t change. Don’t. They are spinning these numbers, and of course, not giving the full picture (as usual). There seems to be some encouraging news from different industry sectors with the belief that the worst is behind us and that business may start hiring in a few months time. This would be the time to stop spending the stimulus on “shovel ready” projects that never happen and divert that cash towards tax breaks for small businesses.
Stuart Varney from Fox Business has a simple rundown that will help you understand the next part.
From The Wall Street Journal, and as usual, bold emphasis is mine.
Employers cut another 85,000 jobs last month, dashing hopes of a turnaround in employment, even as the U.S. economy grows.
With December’s losses, there were 7.2 million fewer jobs than in December 2007, when the recession began. Although the unemployment rate was unchanged at 10% from November, that’s only because many workers stopped looking for work and weren’t counted in the numbers. A broader measure of unemployment, including those who have quit job hunting as well as those working part time because they can’t find full-time work, remained about the same at 17.3% in December from 17.2% in November.
Here is the part that people haven’t taken into account, and aren’t telling you about.
Even once jobs come back, the unemployment rate may continue to rise. To keep up with a growing population, the economy needs to add about 100,000 jobs a month just to keep the unemployment rate stable.
Moreover, many people have stopped looking for work in response to the poor jobs environment. As a result, they don’t show up in the Labor Department’s tally of the unemployed.
In fact, a key reason why the unemployment rate didn’t increase in December was that work force declined by 661,000. As a result, as the labor market improves, and people re-enter the work force and begin looking for work, the unemployment rate could rise.
Can you imagine what the numbers would look like if those 661,000 were still looking for employment?
In the construction sector, hammered by the housing bust, the labor market worsened, with 53,000 jobs lost, compared with a November loss of 27,000. Nearly a third of the jobs lost were in the kinds of heavy-construction and engineering projects that much of the government’s economic-stimulus efforts are directed at creating, said Michael Carey, an economist with Calyon Securities in New York. “It seems like it should be working the other way,” he said.
Think back to when we absolutely, positively had to pass a $787 Billion Dollar Porkulus Bill to stimulate the economy. On December 10, 2009, the GAO sent a letter and 167 page report to congress detailing their assessment. The breakdown for the $787B is as follows. (Source: US Treasury via Recovery.gov 12.31.09)
Report to the Congress States’ and localities’ use of Recovery Act funds continues as the nation responds to the most serious economic crisis since the Great Depression. Congress and the administration crafted the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act)1 with the broad purpose of stimulating the economy. As of November 27, 2009, $69.1 billion, or about one quarter of the approximately $280 billion in Recovery Act funds for programs administered by states and localities, had been paid out. Estimates show that the largest share of the funds is expected to be spent in fiscal year 2010.
Anybody still confused as to why our economy is mired in mud? $257 Billion has been disbursed with the majority not set to be awarded or paid out until later this year. Also, the one section that was meant to create jobs, namely Contracts, Grants and Loans, has had the lowest disbursement rate. No one screams and beats the drum for almost a trillion dollars to “stimulate the economy”, and then does a pre-ghost Scrooge. No one is this stupid. Are you listening Barry? Why are you weakening our country through our economy?
America is a democratic capitalist country and the barometer for its strength is not the size of it’s military, it is the condition of it’s economy; like it or not. – Logistics Monster
…and we have been watching the fallout from lack of leadership from our elected officials and the raping and pillaging by financial pirates who chose to walk on the darkside because they could make a massive amount of money; quickly and quietly.
I know that I am not the only American that has known that the economy has gone from suffering the sniffles, then a slight cold, then a really bad head cold, to pneumonia. I have been watching the industry that I work in suffer for over two years now and have been living with the threat of layoff for about as long. A little over a year ago I was doing the groundwork for a business opportunity and just felt that it was not the right time to invest massive amounts of cash, time and energy into that project. I made the decision to not go forward and exactly two days later the whole Countrywide fiasco hit the MSM. As you might guess, I am very happy I did not travel that road but it does show that the wolf has been moving up the food chain gradually, quietly and relentlessly. Meanwhile, as the wolf has come down the mountain to feed upon average American’s paychecks, savings, retirement and college funds; our “leaders” have been doing absolutely nothing to hunt this demon down and dispatch it, with the exception of John McCain AND Hillary Clinton. I am once again left asking myself, why the devil is Barack Obama in this race at all? What was he doing two years ago; teaching economics or running a multi-million dollar company? If not, shut the hell up. I will not believe any rhetoric that comes out of his mouth because he has no chops to back it up.
We all know that the wolf was allowed to make it all the way inside our homes and eat our beloved Spot and the goldfish before somebody actually cried, “Market Collapse, Depression, Economic Crisis”, and decided that maybe they should actually put their heads together and try to fix what has become an intricately woven web of lies, deceit, and financial sleight of hand. I’m not holding my breath. Good Luck With That.
And now here we sit with 17.3% unemployment. I’m still waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Obviously Larry Summers has been smokin’ the same koolaid/crack pipe that most of congress has not taken a break from since the Fascist-In-Charge, (31 czars and counting), was installed in our White House.
Since when does anybody think that Google is the barometer of economic or any other success? Larry, how dumb do you think we are? Stop pretending to be stupid, we know you are not. Also, keep talking down to us and find out where that gets you…
Of all the statistics pouring into the White House every day, top economic adviser Larry Summers highlighted one Friday to make his case that the economic free-fall has ended.
The number of people searching for the term “economic depression” on Google is down to normal levels, Summers said.
Searches for the term were up four-fold when the recession deepened in the earlier part of the year, and the recent shift goes to show consumer confidence is higher, Summers told the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
Summers continued the administration’s push-back against critics of President Barack Obama’s handling of the recession, defending the economic stimulus package against Republicans who have tried to paint the program as a failure because it hasn’t stemmed the unemployment rate.
“We pledged at the time the Recovery Act became law that some of the spending and tax effects would begin almost immediately.,” Summers said in prepared remarks. “We also noted that the impact of the Recovery Act would build up over time, peaking during 2010 with about 70 percent of the total stimulus provided in the first 18 months. Now, five months after the passage, we are on track to meet that timeline. “
And for those of you that want a primer on Larry Summers, try these links out. For those of you just catching up, make sure to look at the education and organizations and you will start to see the pattern the rest of us are completely and totally aware of, and go all the way to the end of this post for another story. The corruption goes well beyond donkeys and elephants.
Gender: Male Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation:Economist Party Affiliation: Democratic
Nationality: United States Executive summary: US Treasury Secretary, 1999-2001
Father: Robert Summers (economics professor) Mother: Anita A. Summers (public policy professor) Wife: Victoria Summers (tax attorney, div.) Son: Henry Daughter: Pam (twin) Daughter: Ruth (twin) Wife: Elisa New (Harvard professor, m. 11-Dec-2005)
Why did Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley steer millions to a company Larry Summers directed while he administered “stress tests” on them?
Last month, a little-known company where Summers served on the board of directors received a $42 million investment from a group of investors, including three banks that Summers, Obama’s effective “economy czar,” has been doling out billions in bailout money to: Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley. The banks invested into the small startup company, Revolution Money, right at the time when Summers was administering the “stress test” to these same banks.
A month after they invested in Summers’ former company, all three banks came out of the stress test much better than anyone expected — thanks to the fact that the banks themselves were allowed to help decide how bad their problems were (Citigroup “negotiated” down its financial hole from $35 billion to $5.5 billion.)
The fact that the banks invested in the company just a few months after Summers resigned suggests the appearance of corruption, because it suggests to other firms that if you hire Larry Summers onto your board, large banks will want to invest as a favor to a politically-connected director.
Last month, it was revealed that Summers, whom President Obama appointed to essentially run the economy from his perch in the National Economic Council, earned nearly $8 million in 2008 from Wall Street banks, some of which, like Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, were now receiving tens of billions of taxpayer funds from the same Larry Summers. It turns out now that those two banks have continued paying into Summers-related businesses.
Are you sick of people who have no clue what they are doing when it comes to the economy? If you are one of the millions that cannot stand to look at, nor listen to The One, you can go here for the transcript of yet another empty speech. I am forced to read this garbage as I cannot even look or listen to this idiot-child.
According the The One, we need Government to fix what ails us. A few people are against the idea of going even farther into the RED than we are already now. As one of millions of Americans that follows a “staying in the black” fiscal policy for my household, I am thinking that another 1.2 TRILLION of “magic money” is really not going to help our dollar, our lives, our children’s lives, our grandchildren’s lives, etc. on into infinity.
President-elect Barack Obama today warned of double digit unemployment and a “generation” of lost earnings if his upcoming economic stimulus plan is not enacted quickly by Congress. In a speech today at George Mason University in Fairfax, Obama warned that failure to pass the plan — expected to cost as much as $800 billion — means that “a bad situation could become dramatically worse.”
“For every day we wait or point fingers or drag our feet, more Americans will lose their jobs. More families will lose their savings. More dreams will be deferred and denied,” Obama said. “And our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse.”
The speech today marks the start of the formal campaign to move through Congress a stimulus package that Obama today portrayed in broad strokes as an effort to “retrofit America” — rebuilding infrastructure while also investing in alternative energy, modernizing schools and extending broadband Internet service to rural areas.
What about “Drill Here, Drill Now”? Does anybody really think that OPEC is going to let the price of oil stay around $40 a barrel for very long?
In his speech, Obama blamed the current situation on “profound irresponsibility” — from money centers like Wall Street to power centers like Washington — and confronted the critics of his plan directly. He acknowledged both the staggering cost of his proposals and the enormous debt it will impose on future generations. To assuage those concerns, Obama pledges “an unprecedented effort to eliminate unwise and unnecessary spending.”
He conceded what skeptics have already said: that the government has already spent a lot of money to turn around the economy with little apparent result.
For those of you that haven’t been following exactly how much cash; $7 TRILLION, not $350 Billion. Don’t believe me? Do the research….starting with Bear Stearns, Lehman Bros., Goldman Sachs, Wachovia, WaMu…
“We haven’t yet seen that translate into more jobs or higher incomes or renewed confidence in our economy,” he said.
But, he added, “that’s why the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan won’t just throw money at our problems — we’ll invest in what works. The true test of policies we’ll pursue won’t be whether they’re Democratic or Republican ideas . . . but whether they create jobs, grow our economy, and put the American Dream within reach of the American people.”
What American Dream? Owning your own home? Oh, that’s gone bye-bye for at least the next 4 generations. Think we are $6, $7, $8 Trillion in debt? Try $14 Trillion with an additional $1 Trillion every 15 months; then add everything that Paulson, Bambi, and the Dems want to add to that.
Obama did not unveil the plan itself today. In comments this week, he said that his staff and members of Congress were continuing to work out the final size of the proposal and its details.
No details today…working out the “final size”. If that does not frighten you, then the next paragraph should.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters today that House committees will consider the bill the week of Jan. 19 and she plans to hold a House vote during the last week of January. She said that she has instructed the House leadership team to “think differently” because Democrats now have a larger majority in Congress and control the White House.
“Now we have arrived. We have a big, strong, 80-vote majority,” she said, explaining it’s more important than ever to get things right rather than just passing them quickly.
Nancy having a “big, strong, 80-vote majority” is personally scaring the BEJESUS out of me and making me rethink my position about expatriating.
Now, here is a simple video that explains what the heck is wrong and what to do in simple, plain, english with no double-speak or lack of details, and I do not want to hear any tinfoil hat comments about Ron Paul. Do not shoot the messenger!
Government needs to GET OUT OF THE WAY of the Private Sector, and not condemn us and our children to poverty and higher taxes for decades to come…
AKA Lawrence Henry Summers
