WH rep: I'm under strict instructions...

Originally Posted By Mr X

...not to discuss the dollar.

"I'm not getting fired today to satisfy your question", nice.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-Cvg9deslg" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=C-Cvg9deslg</a>

 

Originally Posted By SuperDry

I think she was trying to be a bit humorous, and building rapport with the press corps is part of her job. Also, by revealing her restrictions, that pretty much shuts down the reporters repeated questions, as it's then obvious that she simply won't answer the question. But it is very interesting to see how such a position works, and reveals that the administration views that the weak dollar is a political problem that they'd rather not discuss.

BTW, did you see that the dollar dipped below 97 yen?

 

Originally Posted By Mr X

Yup.

It actually hit 95 in early trading today! Yikes!

Oh, Monday looks like another grim day on Wall Street too.

Bet the white house would rather not discuss that, too!

 

Originally Posted By SuperDry

No, they wouldn't!

 

Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan

President Bush called this "an interesting time" the ther day. Isn't there something about that in a Chinese curse?

>>If George W. Bush had read The Pet Goat to his Economic Club of New York audience on Friday, his speech would have been no less infantile. If the first 9/11 was caused by a massive failure of intelligence about terrorism, the second 9/11 -- the slow-motion collapse of the American, and maybe the global, economy -- has been caused by a catastrophic failure of intelligence about Wall Street rapacity. If the now five-year-old Iraq war was the inevitable, tragic consequence of the neoconservatives' Project for the New American Century, then the subprime mortgage quagmire, the Bear Stearns bailout, and the foreclosure fiasco are the foreordained outcome of the Republican ideology which holds that regulation of corporate financial behavior is the domestic equivalent of Islamofascism.

The economic meltdown is the new 9/11, and it's George W. Bush's fault -- his, and the fundamentalist free-marketeers who have been living high on the hog, feeding at the public trough, intimidating Democrats, and getting away with capitalist murder ever since Ronald Reagan made "government" a dirty word.<<

<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marty-kaplan/my-goat-ate-the-economy_b_91759.html" target="_blank">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
marty-kaplan/my-goat-ate-the-economy_b_91759.html</a>

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

Meanwhile, the Democrats are busy promoting all the things that will make our economy worse - more protectionism, more taxes. Those things didn't work for Herbert Hoover, and they won't work now.

 

Originally Posted By jonvn

Herbet Hoover, the Republican?

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

Yes. When Republicans embrace liberal solutions, things get worse. When Democrats embrace conservative solutions, things get better.

 

Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan

No new taxes, no new taxes. Spend and spend, but no new taxes. That's the GOP mantra these days.

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

<Spend and spend, but no new taxes. That's the GOP mantra these days.>

Hopefully President McCain will do a better job at reigning in spending than President Bush did.

 

Originally Posted By jonvn

Actually, hoover was condemned by the populace for doing NOTHING to solve the problems of the nation.

It took Roosevelt who created programs to actually solve the problems we were having to get something done.

What you seem to ignore is that Republicans spend more than Democrats do. Under the current idiot and the god-like Reagan, spending went UP, and the deficit skyrocketed.

You can't spend money you don't have. It eventually catches up with you. And you either have to live in an impoverished state trying to pay it back, or move to bankruptcy.

If you want to say "Tax and spend" for the democrats, then you have to say "Borrow and spend" for the republicans, because that is exactly what they are doing. And they are busily selling our futures out in the process.

 

Originally Posted By jonvn

"Hopefully President McCain will do a better job at reigning in spending than President Bush did."

He can't do worse. But I imagine he could do as bad.

They have to stop spending money in washington. There just is no more cash to wring from the economy. But no one dares cut a single program, ever. The republicans simply pay lip service to this idea and do nothing about it, year after year after year. Even when they control both houses, and the administration.

They don't do it. Instead, they opt to just spend as much or more than the democrats. They are no different. Maybe worse, in that they say they want to do one thing, and end up doing the exact opposite.

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

<It took Roosevelt who created programs to actually solve the problems we were having to get something done.>

Except they really didn't solve the problem. That's why it took so long for the nation to climb out of the Depression.

<What you seem to ignore is that Republicans spend more than Democrats do.>

I ignore it because it's not true.

<Under the current idiot and the god-like Reagan, spending went UP, and the deficit skyrocketed.>

Spending went up because the Democrats who controlled Congress kept voting for it to go up.

<If you want to say "Tax and spend" for the democrats, then you have to say "Borrow and spend" for the republicans, because that is exactly what they are doing.>

I don't have to say "Borrow and spend" because that is not what the Republicans have to do. They can vote to stop spending. Of course, I doubt the Democrats would agree to that.

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

<He can't do worse.>

A President Clinton or a President Obama could.

 

Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan

>>If you want to say "Tax and spend" for the democrats, then you have to say "Borrow and spend" for the republicans, because that is exactly what they are doing. And they are busily selling our futures out in the process.<<

That's right. They spend and spend and kick the can until someone else has to be the bad guy and raise the taxes to pay for their nonsense.

I don't understand why they pretend that we can do things without tax increases, or drastic, drastic cuts. If the GOP is so sure that they're doing the right thing, own up to it. Quit hiding the costs.

 

Originally Posted By jonvn

"That's why it took so long for the nation to climb out of the Depression."

By 1935 we were already climbing out. It was such a financial disaster that there was a huge hole to dig out from.

"Spending went up because the Democrats who controlled Congress kept voting for it to go up."

I'm sorry, but the republicans controlled the congress from the mid 90s to this last election.

Somehow, when they run everything it's the democrats fault still? And when they don't, it's still their fault?

Who do you think you're kidding? The republicans passed whatever they basically wanted to for the last several years. Bush vetoed a total of one bill the entire time the republicans controlled congress. They are entirely and completely to blame for the current fiscal mess we are in.

 

Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan

Spending went up because the Democrats who controlled Congress kept voting for it to go up.<<

What's your excuse for most of the past 7 years, when the White House, House and Senate were all under GOP control? I'm sure a Democrat is to blame, somehow....

 

Originally Posted By jonvn

"A President Clinton or a President Obama could."

I don't see how. We are already so far in debt, we'll never be able to pay it off.

I am of the opinion that the dollar is purposefully being made worthless so that paying off the debt will be feasible, because otherwise it is not.

 

Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan

>>Bush vetoed a total of one bill the entire time the republicans controlled congress.<<

And that was about stem cells, not cutting spending in a major way.

It's all talk from these guys, every one of them. Pure hot air.

If we could harness it, we wouldn't need oil.

 

Originally Posted By DouglasDubh

<I'm sorry, but the republicans controlled the congress from the mid 90s to this last election.>

So they can't be responsible for spending in the 80's can they? Republicans did lower spending in the late 90's, over the objections of the Democrats.

<Who do you think you're kidding?>

I'm not kidding anyone. I'm speaking the truth.