Mid Term Madness

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Those are two different types of spending that are not really connected:

The wealthy are going to spend money on whatever they want, and it doesn't matter much to a whole lot of people. The wealthy makeup less than 1 percent of the population so who really cares, except for those who are directly affected by them?

Corporations provide goods and sevices for their customers, and it is the level of business that determines the hiring and capital investment on new building and equipment. It doesn't matter if it is a large or a small business you still have to provide an acceptable level of service if you want to stay in business. Unless you have a business that relies on government contracts, what the government "says" hardly matters - it's what your customers say, and demand, that matters.

All this stupid talk by the pundits about corporate "uncertainty" and "Obama" is BS for those who know nothing about running a business (and I don't mean to say that about you or anyone here in particular, but the general public).

What has happened is one of two things: Corporations are cutting costs and still doing the same level of business and that could be any number of factors - to working smarter, to cutting corners by outsourcing (how do like that Dell support from India?) - or they are cutting pay, hours and benefits of their employees and settling for flat topline sales. There is no "uncertainty" in hiring, as there is in capital investment. But this is just an extension of the same business stratigies we have seen over the last 10 years anyway. That is why consumer spending is driving the economy and not business spending.

Businesses no longer "create" jobs like they did in the old days, since it is the consumers who create the jobs, and business tries to dovetail its investment and hiring to match consumer sales. If they miss it in one direction they piss off their customers and lose market share; if they miss it in the other direction they lose it right off the bottomline. Generally, it's been the former that they have been falling into. It works pretty much the same in BtB, since someone in the food chain needs to supply a customer base somewhere at the end of the day.

Jim Cramer was talking directly to this recently: "When you see an earnings report that's postive, is it based on cutting costs, or is it an increase in topline sales? If it's mostly based on increased sales and marketshare, it's probably a good investment; if it's a company cutting costs (or even worse, cutting corners), it's a much greater risk." Note that I'm paraphrasing, since I heard him on TV. The point is, Obama has little to do with it, unless he's buying a new car, or putting new carpeting in his office.

 

Which talking heads are those? I have heard such allegations, and I somewhat doubt them. If you actually examine Obama's actions, I don't think you'd find something that hostile to business. Certain businesses and corporations have been targeted (usually those who were the villains of the day anyway), and there is the possibility - for now only that - to raise taxes. Gosh, with the US running near-record deficits and tax cuts ready to expire, who wouldn't see that? Unless you based your business decitions on Fox new opinion shows or bloggers, I doubt you'd consider the current political climate so unstable - and if you do, is Obama the one to blame?

When push came to shove, the Obama administration bailed out big businesses. It didn't come forcefully against big finance. It promised millions of new customers to big health insurers - maybe it would have wished otherwise, but it was content to leave it at that. It let BP clean its rig up and even worked with it to some degree - I wouldn't be surprised if there was a political reason for that optimistic report on how 75% of the oil just disappeared. Where is that GD Marxist who was supposed to be in the White House?

BTW, what new regulations have entered in force since the start of the Obama administration?

 

Shaman:
Healthcare included new regulations. The new wallstreet regulations (or were those just tougher regulations?) and now there's talk of new banking and lending regulations.

Chandos:
The wealthy that are that wealthy typically invest their wealth depending on how they feel the market is going, and they own enough wealth that it's a pretty big chunk. I have heard that consumer spending has been driving the economy for many years, though, and that most of the recession has actually been in the consumer spending area, not the business spending area.

 

Now you are saying something different. But investment in what? The stock market? Now we certainly are talking something different. What you are saying is true of any investor, or even an institutional investment fund manager. The wealthy are only a piece of that market. There is no doubt that there is "uncertainty" in the stock market but it has little to do with Obama, except in the larger sense of the economy, but even then it is difficult to gage what the market will do. For instance, even though the unemployment rate is still a very high 9.5 percent, the market is still hovering at about 10,000. The market recovered before the rest of the economy. That's because almost every investor (regardless of type) knew there was value in the market at 7500.

OMG, you should hear the talking heads on FOX! EVERYTHING is Obama's fault according to those morons. While it is true that corporations are switching their support away from Dems and towards Republicans, the "Rs" have kissed their corporate arses nonstop for the last two years, trying to win them back. But I suspect that it is really because the tide is against the Dems in this next election and the corporate fatcats want to be on the winning side. What is lost in the media debate is that the public is just as angry at the corporate guys as they are at the government. Here's the thing:

The public is angry at the government for bailing out big business, but if they vote Republican they are voting for the party of big business. Isn't that just like American politics? According to the Tea Party leaders, TARP was the big push that got them started, but which president signed off on TARP?

BEFORE Obama was elected. Politics in America.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubled_Asset_Relief_Program

 

Wonder why unemployment is so high, despite rising profits? Here's at least part of the reason:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38935053/ns/business-us_business/

 

Yeah, those guys should be in prison.

 

Just saw the headline on the BBC website, about how the Tea Party won some big primary victories. When the economy is still verging on a breakdown and the IMF and other such bodies are recommending large fiscal spending, why are people voting in a candidates from a group which support tax cuts and and reduced spending? Is it that they are just sick of the general Washington crowd? Ill-informed? Or disbelieving?

 

Well, the Tea Party is, for the most part, an off-shoot of the Republican Party - that's why they run as Republican in the primaries. There is a brand of the Republican party that preaches fiscal conservatism and small government. (Note: I haven't actually seen this brand of conservatism practiced in America in my life time, but it exists at least in theory.) The Tea Party takes those viewpoints to the extreme.

I think the reason they have gained popularity is because many Republicans are willing to give just about anything a chance. We have basically been in a recession since at least the summer of 2008, and after two years with little improvement, people are sick of it.

I will point out that I have no idea how well Tea Party candidates will fare in the general election. My gut feeling is that they will perform better in primaries than the general elections, because in the primaries, they only have to win the votes of registered Republican voters. In the general election, when they are up against a Dem, they may have difficulty getting many moderates to vote for them.

I'm also starting to change my viewpoint on the mid-term elections in terms of Congressional composition. In the last month or so, polling has got even worse for Democrats. While I think a Republican takeover of the Senate is still remote (there's simply not enough contests in play that they can reasonably expect to win), I think I would give them better than even odds of taking the House. While I don't think this outcome is certain, I think it is more likely than not.

 

Yes, this has been working to the Dem's advantage. Before the Tea Party got in, many had written off Harry Reid in NV, but now he has a good shot; same thing in Delaware, where some Sarah Palin wannabe just won the primary.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/201...ctual-remarks-and-republican-cannibalism.html

Didn't someone make the comment that "the Dems eat their own?" I think there is a difference between taking your party to task for making bad choices, but it is something different to ruin the party leadership and put its chances (which looked pretty good), at risk. But if were a Democrat I would still be nervous, even though their chances have improved a bit.

 

Hardly surprising. Not only has the economy not gone upward, but they've lost the battle of the spins on too many fronts. Heck, they trail even on healthcare reform, which they hoped would be a strong point for the elections. Here are the results from a Rasmussen poll back in the end of August about which party is better trusted to take care of various issues:

Education

Democrats 40 percent

Republicans 41 percent

Health Care

Democrats 40 percent

Republicans 48 percent

Iraq

Democrats 40 percent

Republicans 43 percent

Economy

Democrats 39 percent

Republicans 47 percent

Social Security

Democrats 38 percent

Republicans 44 percent

Government Ethics

Democrats 38 percent

Republicans 40 percent

Personally, to me some of those are almost stunning (no, seriously, healthcare? What concrete measures did the GOP propose during the debate?). My opinion aside, the above means the Democrats have been singularily unable to get their message across, even after the disastrous defeat 2008 was for the GOP and what this meant for the trust in that party. If they are so unable to frame the way issues are discussed, they are in for a serious problem, even if they pull through the elections more or less intact.

 

Chandos,

As I mentioned and you alluded to, I think the Dems chance of keeping the Senate are good. I'm not so sure about the House. This definitely appears to be a "throw the bums out" election, and so the party with more seats is the party that will lose more seats.

Snook,

The other stunning one is SS. The GOP has been trying to get rid of it for years. Unless they were asking which party you trusted more to end SS, I cannot understand that one at all.

 

That poll is among likely voters in the mid-terms. That does not reflect the US population in general. That "likey voter" think skews the results a bit. This is from Gallup:

I'd be interested to see where Independents are on that. We mostly get ignored until election day.

Here's something interesting regarding health care:

http://www.gallup.com/home.aspx

 

How up-to-date is that, Chandos? I know the numbers have been shifting Republican (or, actually, just away from Dems and toward Independents I think) this last year, so if that's from 2008 or something, it may be inaccurate now. Anyway, I don't know how they define 'likely voters', but it's the ones who actually vote who will make the decisions. If Rasmussen's definition is accurate, then that's the useful number, not registered voters.

 

September. And I was responding to The Shaman's post, not making a statement about which party would actually win in November. If those who are Democrats were likely to vote in November, the Dems would have little to worry about. Democrats are apathetic at the moment, because Obama has been a bit of a disappointment. I don't think he has been terrible, but not good enough to fire the base about mid-term elections. But in November, 2012, it will be a real dogfight.

 

Actually a threat to the budget of some state colleges, or so I here, is that not only do they face increased pressure because of what the economy has done to state budgets that give then a chunk of change, but they also face increasing competition from state run healthcare budgets because of the fact that more people are on them as wages are down and employers are offering less coverage.

Unfortunately I think you are correct about democrats being more apathetic. The job situation has seemed to turn around just yet-stablized but not turned around.

Though some would argue that this is because we didn't know just how bad a fall the economy was going to have-hence when republicans talk about the 8% employment figure that Obama failed to keep us below they aren't acknowledging that we were already headed for worse and neither Obama nor they knew that at the time the statement was made.

If democrats can get people out they may hold back and make good counter arguments perhaps some of the republican tide will be held back.

I hope both in the federal House of Representatives and in my state which just had its primary.

EDIT: As a matter of fact, now that the primary is over I'm going to watch a bit to see how quickly the republicans change their tune as democrats may be able to hold their more questionable comments up as a example of why they shouldn't be elected.

 

Of mice and men ...

The pre-midterm season sure is a colourful spectacle to behold:

Scientists were "cross-breeding humans and animals and coming up with mice with fully functioning human brains." said Republican tea-party candidate Christine O'Donnell of Vermont a couple years back ... just were did she get that idea I wonder ...

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She has in the past also said interesting stuff that is haunting her, like that masturbation is kinda like adultery - and very recently, that questions about her personal and public finances insult voters. Touché! She's really cute IMO, but what an airhead. Best of luck to her, since I have a weakness for cute women. If I may add: It may be in her best self-interest to speak little.

And if Sarah Palin has her way, Christine O'Donnell ought to speak through FOX News (i.e. a sympathetic filter). I guess Sarah knows a thing or two about the benefits of that.

Another Republican candidate from Vermont is currently making headlines for the statement that separation of Church and State was invented by ... you guessed right, Hitler.

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Maybe there's something in the water up in Vermont?

I imagine grown-ups like Karl Rove (who I detest but who is still a grown-up) must wince in agony over candidates like that.

 

It's pretty scary when we start thinking of the Bushmen as the "grown-ups."

 

Comparably.

 

Heh-heh. I get your point:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39246797/ns/politics-decision_2010/