Call to arms. The Creeprepublicans are already in force trying to strategize for the next election with lies - of course what else is new? The party that just finished bringing down the country haven't even bothered to let people breathe or let them see the results of the lawsuits and justice for all of those people that they allowed to destroy us. Nope, forget about putting the country together - actually working for the people - instead they prefer to start whining and manipulating their minority base now in the hopes that while those poor suckers are cold and hungry and unemployed as a result of 8 years of Bush blundering...they'll be able to make them believe it's Obama's fault. So from now on, let's all keep referring to this economic freefall as the Bush Recession..all it takes is labelling like this, constantly hearing it called Bush Recession and eventually the link takes hold and pretty soon everyone in a difficult position now will immediately think Bush Recession link Republican link Never Again..sammieswife.
by Steve Rosenbaum..
When Barack Obama took office, it was clearly with a vision of a bi-partisan (or in his mind - 'post partisan') administration. This was clearly naive. Perhaps voters want it, and perhaps there are some enlightened politicians who can see the forest for the trees, but for the large majority - the Democratic win in 2008 is little more than a call for the Republicans to regroup and prepare for a full frontal assault in 2012.
If this wasn't clear before the vote on the Stimulus package, it should be clear now.
Already Republican operatives are drafting commercials for the midterm elections. They'll play like this: "Since Barack Obama took office, XX Americans have lost their jobs, XX Americans have lost their homes, and XX Americans have filed for bankruptcy. In light of the failed programs of the Obama administration, it's time to re-elect Republicans on a platform of tax reform, smaller government, and less handouts to the poor and underprivileged."
These commercials will work, because we all know that however successful the stimulus package is, there will be months, or years of economic pain before we start to see the positive effects of these investments.
So, what to do about this?
The answer is, we must name our pain. We must begin to refer to the current recession asthe "Bush Recession." We must talk about the difficult, complex, long-term efforts we'll need to all engage in order to reverse the toxic economic environment created by the "Bush Recession."
The Bush Recession didn't happen overnight -- it took 8 years of careful, purposeful, willful actions to create this cycle of economic devastation.
I understand why Obama isn't focused on blaming the Bush administration. He's right to look forward, rather than back. There's way too much to do to spend any cycles placing blame. At the same time, if we don't name our pain, then we're likely to find ourselves fighting off right wing pundits in 2 years, and 4, who try to re-write history and hold the Obama administration responsible for the very things they're trying to fix.
So, with that in mind, let's catalog the drivers that have created the Bush Recession, and make sure we agree that these collective actions happened long before the Obama administration was in the White House.
First, the sub-prime mortgage meltdown. During the 8 years the Bush administration was in charge, we saw a dramatic expansion in available credit to borrowers who where not able to quality for conventional mortgages. This boom in new buyers drove up housing prices, creating a bubble of newfound wealth in the equity of homes, and creating a cycle of borrowing against newly inflated home equity. This bubble was evident to economists and consumers alike, yet in the absence of any legislation or government controls - the trend continued to balloon.
Second, Iraq. The cost of our dramatic increase in military spending provided a huge drain on the Federal Budget, as services that were heretofore part of the military budget became privatized and outsourced. Companies like Blackwater and Halliburton received huge military contracts to provide services - often without bids or oversight. Now, seven years later, we're uncovering fraud, waste, and violations of human rights that reflect both the size of the contracts and the Government's basic lack of ability to oversee or administer these programs. The elixir of privatization and deregulation created an environment that was ripe for fraud and misuse. In hindsight, is this any surprise?
Third, abandonment of a US economic vision. For 8 years the Bush administration focused on security and fear, while any vision of our economic future got put on hold. Gasoline taxes, emission standards or innovation in our core sectors were all either ignored or frowned upon.
Fourth, the environment. As George Bush dragged his heals on any environmental science, things like Kyoto were left unsigned. As former Vice President Al Gore raised the nation's awareness of Global Warming, the Bush Administration sought to minimize and obfuscate the science around climate change. As a result, government funding for new energy was back-burnered, and industries that count on the Government to legislate change and create a level playing field continued to build and produce gas guzzling trucks and automobiles. While world governments have used gas taxes to drive both conservation and innovation, the Bush administration essentially subsidized fossil fuel burning automobiles. The result, our energy industries are desperately behind, and our automotive industry is almost a decade behind in thinking about alternative energy.
Fifth, Wall Street and Banking. For 8 years there has been a dramatic expansion in the services and fast consolidation of what had been separate and in some cases regulated industries. As banking, brokerage, insurance, and financial services companies acquired and merged - the speed of these transactions far exceeded the regulatory ability or resources (not by accident) resulting in such things as credit default swaps that now even seasoned wall-streeters say were hard to understand.