Comments on: Let a Republican explain it to you: Paul Ryan’s Fairy Tale Budget

By: Cleisthenes

Cleisthenes — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 22:06:00 +0000

In the NYT article Stockman is one of the few courageous politicians/commentators who makes the too big to exist argument about the banks. Unfortunately his argument is undeveloped simply because it is implied that he thinks that budget questions are more important than the banking question. At the website Positive Money (UK) one can find the development that Stockman lacks.

Much of the world economy is dependent on borrowing. Borrowing (rather than printing) is how much of the world creates money. The contrary is also true. If borrowing (and spending based on borrowing) is stopped or slowed and loans are paid off, money is destroyed. Put another way, if you’re rich or have accumulated savings, you are dependent on other fools who borrow. And, if those fools pay off their loans, you lose your money or become poorer. Such is the world of modern finance. We have credit/debt based economies. Most money is electronic. It’s not vaults. It’s blips on computers. Conceptually this is hard for people to grasp for persons of any political persuasion, socialist, liberal, conservatives or even communists, and yet, this is the basis of our economies today.

The path to reform is work on a positive basis. We can still have electronic money, but that money needs to be positive, hence the name of the website: “Positive Money” (UK). If lending and credit is reduced, it needs to be replaced by something else. If, at the stroke of a pen, we reduced all borrowing and government spending, the economy would crash for lack of economic activity. As an offset, then positive money (non-debt) serves as the financial replacement. It works out that budgets and economic equations are far easier if you do not use debt, or at least use very little of it. The number crunchers at the fed do their best to track money and manage it, but it’s extremely hard to do when the amount of money fluctuates so rapidly because of banking and borrowing. For the quants out there, the quantity of money is important. Borrowing is not.

By: Garcia_Blase

Garcia_Blase — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 19:34:00 +0000

Keep up the good work baja democrats! i’m a former GOPer and left the Republican Party FOR GOOD!

By: BajaDemocrats

BajaDemocrats — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 18:37:00 +0000

I would have used a different metaphor than the Vice-President – when Wall Street demanded a bailout or we would fall into another Great Depression, they didn’t have us in chains, they had us by the cojones.

By: fortbuckley

fortbuckley — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 18:13:00 +0000

“The already divisive presidential contest took on an even uglier tone
after Romney seized on the latest campaign-trail skirmish — a comment at
a Virginia rally by Vice President Biden that Romney’s plans to loosen
Wall Street regulations would “put y’all back in chains” — to go after
his opponents.”

Source: Washington Post, Philip Rucker and Amy Garner, August 14th.

FYI, at this same Virginia rally, Biden told the crowd that, with their support, the Democrats would win…North Carolina.

Not wanting to rest on his laurels, today the VP asked another Virgina crowd “Folks, Where’s it Written We Cannot Lead the World in the 20th Century in Making Automobiles?”

Oh, it’s written on every CALENDAR! (Credit to Instapundit)

By: fortbuckley

fortbuckley — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 17:04:00 +0000

Joe Biden told African-Americans that Republicans wanted to put them back in chains. Democratic operative Stephanie Cutter refused to refute those words when a reporter asked if she wanted to. A pro-Obama Super PAC was running an ad that claimed that a steelworker’s wife died of cancer because Bain Capital closed down the plant. Unfortunately (for the Democrats), Mitt Romney had left Bain Capital several years beforehand, and the woman had her own health insurance.

So, WHO is running a negative campaign? WHO are the empty suits?