Talk about Leadership-From-Behind

I find that the Right only says that both sides are equally at fault when they have criticized the Left and only then realize that they are far, far guiltier of the behavior they are criticizing than they initially realized and find it necessary to paint everyone else as equally guilty to save face. I think the psychological term is called transference.

 

I find the radical left NEVER admits any fault. I think the psychological term is called denial.

 

de-nial is a river in Egypt that most Right-wingers own houseboats on.

 

Ha! Ha!

 

I try to entertain.

 

*Spoiler Alert!*

I listened to a podcast the other day that gave a sneak peak into what the plan is going to be. These guys were saying that, the government is planning on sending money to companies to hire employees so that the companies can see how valuable the people are. People will work for the company and be paid by the government. The theory is that the companies will realize how valuable the employees are once they see how much they do for them, and want to keep them on once the the government money spigot turns off.

It's not worth it to waste time explaining the problems with this plan.

 

Oh, c'mom, this is a joke right? Not even BO and his dunces in DC are that stupid. Right?

 

Somebody seemed to have the inside scoop on this and they talked about it for an hour long podcast. I'm just the messenger. Don't be surprised if this really is the plan. There was talk of making sure everybody who wanted a job would have a job once the program was instituted. No speculation on how long it would last. I don't know how they could possibly come up with the money to do it. The other thing is, if these companies are fulfilling demand with the current staff they have now, what are the new hirees going to do 40 hrs a week?

It sounded like it will be proposed to congress. It will be soundly rejected and he will blame the republicans for the mess until Nov. 2012. That's the plan. Worst case scenario if he doesn't create any new jobs, he will be creating another new scapegoat for his re-election bid.

 

If this wasn't true before, it may be now. Apparently BO is putting us off until next month as he tries to come up with the recovery plan he promised. He's probably perusing many sources in an attempt to come up with something so maybe this is one of the sites he'll visit in his quest for ideas?

 

I think everyone agrees that we need to generate more jobs in this country. Obama can't seem to come up with any plan the cons will allow to pass either the House or the Senate. The cons have no plan at all, never proposed one and never will. Their only mantra is the same mantra that they have been chanting for decades, lower corporate taxes, no regulation, and elimination of worker’s rights.

Corporate taxes haven't been this low since the 1950's. The cons have blocked regulation even for the banking sector that brought us the current recession due to lack of regulations. Union membership has been declining for over 30 years. 50,000 manufacturing plants have closed over the last 10 years. Job have been shipped overseas while job loss in this country skyrockets. So more of the same is going to create jobs? Someone is going to have to show me how that is going to work.

 

I admit there was more to your post but you really need to know when to stop...once you went beyond what I quoted you started to sound like, well you know...

 

I will give you a good start - how about opening up oil drilling and exploration? Not only that, but it will help balance the budget if we import less oil.

 

In 10 years maybe. I seriously doubt a couple more jobs in one industry is going to rescue this country. We need a much broader recovery than focusing on one tiny little sector of the economy which no doubt benefits a few select businesses but wouldn't contribute much to the overall economy.
I'm all for using energy that we create right here but I don't think oil is the way to do it. Solar, wind, biofuels, and other renewable energies would also create jobs, reduce dependence on foreign sources, and help balance our budget while polluting less. Oil companies just have more political clout than green energy providers and you know this by the way congress has continued subsidies for oil companies but have ended them for alternative energy projects like biofuels.

 

SO you are able to ignore the fact that the cons have blocked any attempts that the administration has put out there to create jobs including denying that the stimulus they didn't vote for worked at all but then took the cash, actually did what it was supposed to do at least to some degree. I still see nothing coming from the cons on the job front. Any reason you give them a pass?

 

First off, it does not take 10 years or anything like it. In the mean time, there are almost 100,000 people laid off or going to other countries who could be drilingl/exploring NOW. They are shovel ready unlike other places I have heard about.

Secondly, " Solar, wind, biofuels, and other renewable energies" might begin serious jobs in 10 years, but that is doubtful. In the mean time, we are supposed to go without heat, gas and plastic until they come online?

 

The best analogy I can come up with is that the government has tried to drive a car with no oil for a long time. The engine is seized up now. They're doing everything to try to fix the car to get going again.... other than replacing the engine. They replace a little part here and a little part there and stomp on the gas. And it sits and goes nowhere. Then we have to spend a few billion on a committee to find out why it's not going anywhere.

If they were really serious about this, the entire Obama administration needs to be s#it canned. We're paying a fortune for a bunch of political hacks and kiss a$$es, all the way up to the top, that have no idea how businesses are run and know nothing about economics. They know nothing about the private sector. If Obama really wanted to get re-elected (and oh yeah, btw, cared about trying to get the country back on track) he would have ditched all his little buddies, cronies, and criminals, and actually brought in the best and the brightest two years ago. They may be people he isn't buddy buddy with. He may not know them and maybe they won't even like him. But you have to at least try to get something done using people who have a clue.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. It may take a radical change of course that nobody's comfortable with. But we dove into this world economy thinking it was going to help us and it has killed us. At this point, this country needs to do whatever it takes to survive. This may mean sending 0 (read ZERO) dollars to any foreign country but the ones we owe money to. The waste really needed to stop a long time ago.

We need to back up and get out of this global market if at all possible. If it can't be done 100%, it should be done to the fullest extent. Raise tarriffs on imports so it isn't so convenient for the world to ship everything here. Do something to encourage products to be manufactured here again. They have to realize, it is NOT POSSIBLE to have 100% of our population go to college, come out with a degree, and be supervisors making good money. Supervisors have to have something to supervise! The people that need to be supervised need to have somewhere to go. Most places have disappeared and we're lucky to have what we've got left.

Maybe they need to make it illegal to send money out of the country to foreign accounts? IMO we have far more draconian laws right now than this. Keep the money in this country. Don't let the rich and the illegals send everything they make out of here. What do 99.9% of the population care if they institute this? They require people by law to wear a seat belt in their own cars, at risk of a fine. So if that law is less intrusive than telling people they can't send money over seas anymore, let me know.

Then maybe we should cap earnings at say, oh, I don't know. $2 billion. If you have $2 billion in the bank, the rest has to go to taxes. If you spend a billion in the economy, then there is NO penalty. You get to try to earn another billion the next year. You stayed under the cap. Yes, that would be somewhat socialistic but we are somewhat right now already. Maybe something does have to be done to kick start things to get old money back out floating around again? Somebody sitting on 100 billion+ does absolutely nothing for America's population. If their kind heart donates $100 million to Africa to get a tax write off, it does absolutely nothing for America's population.

If somebody has 2 billion in the bank, nothing changes. You go over that, it can go to social programs. But, if you spend a billion, then you get the whole year to earn it all back and still nothing changes for you. You, or somebody else gets the benefit of the products you purchased with your own money, and you lose nothing!! You just don't get to horde 100 billion in the banks or over seas anymore. Start tomorrow without any notice. Go in and trim every bank account down to 2 billion. Warren Buffet will be happy as hell. Send the rest to work programs. It would affect almost nobody and could have an immediate impact on the economy. The rich stay filthy rich. They're just not as rich. It's a compromise.

I also believe a good 5% of the possible working population is unemployable, no matter how good things are. That number may be low. If there was less than 15 million dead beats in this country, I would really be shocked. Another 5% are employable but are likely only willing to do what they want to do and not willing to work a different job no matter what. That's 10% nobody can do anything for. So the rest can probably be helped if they really got serious.

But, the USA today says Obama has spent more than 3 times as much time on fundraisers than GW had at this stage. Quote: "When the president spends so much time fundraising, he's necessarily not doing other things that are important."

And he likes taking month long vacations. So we should take a break from this to. Next month, we can start the debate up again.

 

Who came up with the phase leadership from behind. Sounds a bit queer to me, as if we getting dic...

 

I believe the phrase was coined by BO's press secretary, Jay Carney to describe BO's management style.

 

I'd still like to know why the cons get a pass on job creation? It's easy to blame everything on the administration because that is all the cons ever do but what have the cons done to create jobs? Anyone want to address this issue? Obstructionism without one single idea is no way to lead either. I know the challenges the administration faces and they are mostly in the form of a political agenda that puts its Right-wing idealism over the needs of the country or at least the needs of 98% of the country.

I haven't heard one single idea from the cons and no one here has ever posted a solution put forth by the Right-wingers that can deal with the economic situation we face. The only thing that they seem to chant is "lower taxes for the wealthy". Well if that were a solution, you'd think that we'd be swimming in job creation but as we all know it has never worked and never will. You only need to look at the most profitable company in the world to see how supply-side has been a complete and utter failure. Let’s take the example of Exxon Mobil:

The usual drumbeat from any right-winger is that the only way to create jobs is through tax cuts. Any casual observer would agree that corporate tax rates have never been more favorable than during the Bush Administration. Of course in addition to those tax cuts, a company would also need to profit to create jobs. What is the most profitable company in the world today? Exxon Mobil. Don't take my word for it. Check out this link.

Top 10 corporate quaterly earnings of all time
1. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2008, 2Q $11.68 billion

2. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 4Q $11.66 billion

3. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2008, 1Q $10.89 billion

4. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2005, 4Q $10.71 billion

5. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 3Q $10.49 billion

6. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 2Q $10.36 billion

7. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 2Q $10.26 billion

8. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 4Q $10.25 billion

9. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2005, 3Q $9.92 billion

10. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 3Q $9.41 billion


Not bad at all. Exxon Mobil must be creating jobs at a record pace. That is what you'd have to believe if you were a right-winger... or brain dead.

I decide to research what Exxon Mobil recorded for regular employees since 1999. I was able to find this information through the SEC filings of Form 10-K for each year. Those can be viewed at this link here.

Form 10-K filings to the FEC for Exxon Mobil

I'll save you browsing through the documents and list the results below. Prepare to be shocked (or not).
1999 106,900
2000 99,600
2001 97,900
2002 92,500
2003 88,300
2004 85,900
2005 83,700
2006 82,100
2007 80,800

There is no information released for 2008 as yet. So despite the best possible corporate tax rates available and despite record profits compared to any company in existence, Exxon Mobil has cut regular jobs EVERY YEAR of the Bush administration. They've cut a total of 26,100 regular jobs during the entire two years Bush was president. almost 25,000 of those before the Democratic party took back control of the house and senate. So anytime some right wingnut says that tax cuts will create jobs, ask them how many jobs Exxon Mobil has created the last 8 years.
Source: DU.com

So essentially, driving up the national debt and lining the pockets of the wealthiest corporations is the only plan that has been put forth by the Right-wing. When exactly will these brain-dead notions that giving already wealthy people more money so that they will create jobs die the death it so richly deserves at least among the ranks of the conservatives that aren't in the upper 2%? My guess is probably not even on their death beds in spite of all the evidence we have that supply-side is pure folly.

 

Why don't your links work?