Interesting. Is this the same Bill Clinton who campaigned heavily for Blanche Lincoln? How stupid does he think we are. This is more political posturing in a fight between two arms of a corporate controlled government.

All the more reasons to enhance rather than blur these distinctions. Bipartisanship has served to smudge the sharp lines. If Democrats won't take the offensive, they need at a bare minimum to be much more forceful in their defense. Now, where can we find someone willing to lead us? Tapping fingers.....

Voters seem to have very short memories, and are more than a little impatient.

Only when Democrats are in power, because IOKIYAR. Witness the second term of Dubya.

So be it, indeed. Stupid people will get what they deserve.

Unfortunately impik the rest of us will get what the stupid people deserve right along with them.

It's not an immediate fix to the problem(s) that is in question, it is whether or not strong forward-moving actions are _being taken_ to at least _begin_ facing the problem. When Obama appointed Geithner many of us expressed great uneasiness, believing that a Wall Street insider was not the right person to push for economic repair (and, where necessary, retribution against malefactors), but we gave Obama the benefit of the doubt. Now we see that our concerns were well-founded and that Obama has a great fear of taking any strong, decisive action (particularly if such action might upset any Republicans; can't have that) and we don't think that another 180 months much less another 30 of the same will make any difference.

Cranky

"CLINTON CALLS FOR MORE TIME.... Sam Seder came upon an important realization yesterday: "Now we know -- it takes 8 years of GOP control to totally f**k up our economy and only 18 months to blame Dems for it."

Er..except that there were no "8 years of GOP control". Do you forget (or ignore) in 2001 Jim Jeffords became and independent caucasing with the Dems to give them control of the senate? How about the two years 07 and 08 (when the economy went to crap) that the Dems took over the congress and made Bush a lame duck? Then there was the fact that the GOP held only slim margins in the Senate were people like you have been telling us every day that you have to have 60 votes to get anything done. When did the GOP have 60 in the senate? Never. How about the Dems. 60 in the senate, own the house, have the hope and change man in the white house, and the country has the worst recession since the great depression. The only thing Obama "inherited" was a Democrat congress that took the country right into the financial mess he promptly helped worsen.

Hey...but at least there is the blog-o-sphere where you can preach to the left wing choir and revise history all you want.

Blog on Steve-o. Blog on.

When it comes to war, you supposedly can't get off midstream ... but asking someone to be laid off "a little longer" is a little tougher to do. The Dems have no way out of this one.

If only the GOP started electing people with the shortest "shelf life" possible, who can be easily defeated once the economy turns around? Oh wait, that's what they're doing....

Oh, Christ: you folks REALLY need to get out more.

A long time ago somebody gave me a marvelous bit of political wisdom: never trust somebody until you've seen 'em fighting a lost cause.

It's a vital sign. How somebody acts when the score is lopsided against 'em with almost no time left, the way they talk to (and about) their teammates (and politics IS a team sport), the way they get back up every time they're knocked down, and play to the last fucking second -- that's how you know if they're somebody you want next to you the next time...

... when there's a chance to win.

The landslide looming over us in November isn't coming because the election is coming unusually fast, yanno. When a guy on our team is bitching that we're gonna lose because we're only playing four quarters instead of five, I'd sorta want to remember what he was doing in the third quarter.

Don't blame it on the calendar.

More time does you no good if you don't really have a workable plan and approach to clean up the mess and to deal with a party that openly wants your failure/destruction. The Republicans can make a similar argument that all they need is more time and their tax cits for the rich solve all problems. Hey, given four more years, Neville Chamberlain's approach might also have been really effective...

The HAMP program is another excellent example: big chunk of money given to the Administration of help _citizens_ underwater on their mortgages. Net result? About 5% of the allocated money spent in 12 months, all of it going to additional bank bailouts, essentially none to individual mortgage holders. And of course no action on promoting restructurings and (where needed) cramdowns. Wonderful! 30 more months of that kind of inaction will really get the economy moving!

Cranky

A not insignificant historical footnote: Neville Chamberlain's plan WAS effective.

The revisionism on the 1938 Munich Pact is so deep, people never realize what Britain wanted, even though it was obvious: the Brits wanted Hitler to fight in the East, against Stalin.

They underestimated Hitler, of course. And they didn't check the map -- Poland literally stood between the Nazis and the Soviets.

Rather than launch an all out war against the Soviets in 1939, Hitler and Stalin divided Poland between them.

What folks don't realize is that, nevertheless, Hitler really did exactly what Chamberlain wanted him to do: he attacked EAST, rather than West, when he invaded Poland in September 1939.

But Hitler had also underestimated the Brits (and the French, and well, everybody). They decided to fight over Poland, as they had consistently chosen NOT to fight over Czechoslovakia, or Austria, a disarmed Rhineland, etc.

There were folks who argued -- crazy people, to be sure -- that if the Allies hadn't fought for Poland, Hitler would have gone ahead and attacked the Soviets anyway, possibly even earlier than June 1941. Only lunatics still believed in it after Molotov-Ribbentrop, but a war that was ONLY between Hitler's Germany and Stalin's USSR was not a crazy notion: in fact, it was the goal of British policy from 1933-1939.

manapp99 is awfully creative, but someone with his head so far up his ass really shouldn't be talking about others revising history.

Hell, he's practically trying to revise the present with his talk about the relative Senate majorities the two parties have held. Either that or the view from inside his own ass hasn't allowed him to notice the historic level of filibuster abuse that's been going on in this Congress. The Dems did not routinely filibuster every damn bill under Bush. That is literally the Republican policy now.

People who care about reality might also want to consider that Bush set a record for how few bills he vetoed--precisely one before the Dems took Congress, which rather suggests that he wasn't having a particularly hard time getting what he wanted. (Obama's had one so far, by the way.)

But all that is just post hoc ergo propter hoc anyway. It's absurd to try to assess blame for the economic situation based on such silly calculations without even looking at the freaking policies.

How about deregulation of the financial markets, and Bush's lack of interest in enforcing the regulations that did exist? How about the massive deficits caused by the Bush tax cuts and all his irresponsible spending? (Strange how deficits only hurt the economy when Democrats add marginally to gargantuan deficits that were first created by Republicans.) How about the utter failure to invest in our crumbling infrastructure or take any steps toward breaking our dependence on foreign oil?

How about the fact that the Republicans don't have a plan now except to cut taxes, deregulate, and then sit back and wait for the free market to work its magic?

But, whatever. It's not like facts and logic are going to penetrate a skull that's solid concrete.

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> A not insignificant historical footnote: Neville
> Chamberlain's plan WAS effective.
>
> The revisionism on the 1938 Munich Pact is so
> deep, people never realize what Britain wanted,
> even though it was obvious: the Brits wanted
> Hitler to fight in the East, against Stalin.
>
> They underestimated Hitler, of course. And they
> didn't check the map -- Poland literally stood
> between the Nazis and the Soviets.

I have read many versions of this argument since it first popped up about 5 years ago, but I find it unconvincing. Admittedly most writing on this topic accessible to Americans is heavily influenced/dominated by Churchill's post-war war to ensure history would vindicate him by writing it himself, but I find it a real stretch to conclude that Chamberlain was playing some sort of 11-dimensional chess game whereby he was directing Germany towards the Soviet Union (or "buying time for re-armament" in another version of this theory). His actions over a long period of time, including not only international relations but he fierce opposition to rearmament right up until the last few months, speak otherwise. As does Shirer's contemporaneousand also post-war reporting (backed by captured German documents) on the UK and France's treatment of Czechoslovakia and Poland, including their rejection of the Soviet's offers of a mutual defense pact for Czechoslovakia, and what the German's army's response to a strong stand on Czechoslovakia would have been. The "Chamberlain was just misunderstood" doesn't really stand up to the weight of the facts.

Cranky

Stephen, none of the insults in your rant corrects the incorrect statement attributed to Sam Seder in Steve Benen's original post. The assertion by Seder was that there were 8 years of GOP control and only 18 months of Democrat control. This statement is 100% absoulutely false.

Care to provide any facts that would make this lie true?

Then you go on about other falsehoods commonly parroted by left wingers like:

"Bush "deregulated" the financial markets." Exactly which regulation did Bush get rid of?

When was the infamous Glass/Steagall act repealed? In the 1990's when Clinton was president.

You say Bush had a lack of interest in enfocing regulation?

When did Enron, Global crossing and Arthur Anderson play loose with numbers causing the irrational exuberance that Greenspan warned us about? The 1990's when Clinton was president. When did they get prosecuted? The 2000's when Bush was president.
Your "facts" Stephen are really just left wing talking point lies that you have accepted without any basis in reality. Why you want to lie to yourself is a mystery but it does have the effect of keeping your head buried deeply in the sand.

I suspect that Steve Benen knows the truth but misleads in his blog in an attempt to create a name for himself or perhaps in hopes of getting on TV like Markos. Maybe even a show on MSNBC.

Why you would want to mislead is a mystery. Perhaps you just prefer imaginary truths as you seem unable to grasp the real ones.

Like I said. Solid concrete. I could respond, but I think I'll spend my time doing something more productive, like teaching trees to recite poetry.

CLINTON: “The Republicans say you have to throw all the Democrats out because of the economy, Clinton told a crowd of 1,600 at Wagner College. We knew we could not get out of the hole in 21 months.”

As I previously posted, Clinton knows how to frame economic issues so the typical American can understand them.

Why can’t Obama do this ?

manapp,

“Er..except that there were no "8 years of GOP control". Do you forget (or ignore) in 2001 Jim Jeffords became and independent caucasing with the Dems to give them control of the senate?”

And how many times did Uncle Dick ride in to cast the deciding vote ?

“How about the two years 07 and 08 (when the economy went to crap) that the Dems took over the congress and made Bush a lame duck?”

How about it ?

According to the private-sector NBER, which is THE official arbiter of when recessions begin and end, the national economy was already in recession in 2007, and it’s not like you flip a switch and you’re in recession, the national economy has to slow DRAMATICALLY first.

So the policies of Chimpy Bush and the Republican Congressional Majority were in full effect.

“The only thing Obama "inherited" was a Democrat congress that took the country right into the financial mess he promptly helped worsen.”

Wrong.

The stimulus reversed the almost 750,000 a month job loss that was occurring while Chimpy Bush was still in office, to an almost 200,000 a month job gain. That’s approaching a million jobs a month reversal.

And the GDP went from a negative 6.8% in the 4th QTR of ’08, to a negative 4.9% in the 1st QTR of ‘09, to flat with a negative 0.7% in the 2nd QTR of ’09, to a positive 1.6% in the 3rd QTR of ’09, and a positive 5% in the 4th QTR of ’09.

"Worse" my ass.

"As I previously posted, Clinton knows how to frame economic issues so the typical American can understand them.

Why can’t Obama do this ?"

She had the entire 1990's to work on telling lies while maintaining a straight face.

Joe, you are talking to someone here who can't tell the difference between an assertion and an argument, and who apparently believes this blog is all about spreading lies so Steve Benen can get on TV.

But you already knew that. Carry on.

> Like I said. Solid concrete. I could respond, but
> I think I'll spend my time doing something more
> productive, like teaching trees to recite poetry.

Glass-Steagal was unquestionably repealed during the Clinton Administration, with the full and unequivocal, and enthusiastic support of key Clinton Administration members (Rubin comes to mind immediately). That's not to say the owned-by-Wall Street Congress would not have done it anyway, but Clinton was fully on board. To say otherwise is indeed to retreat from the Reality-Based Community.

Cranky

"And how many times did Uncle Dick ride in to cast the deciding vote ?"

I don't know Joe. How many? What legislation?

Even with Cheney the GOP never had 60.

So...even if the economy WAS slipping in January of 07 when the Dems took over, you have to ask yourself why no Dems in congress even took notice much less introduced any kind of legislation to address it.

As far as the simulas doing anything productive you can find as many economists that say it did not as those who say it did. Even Krugman does not think it did much if any good. I know you will blame the GOP for the stimulas not being "big enough" however the blame game when you have congress and white house does not impress anyone except the left wingers.

We can never know the road not traveled. What if there had been no stimulas, no bank bailout and no auto bailout. We may would find ourselves shedding the bad parts of our economy and rebounding with a better more solid banking and auto business.

We can never know because the feds chose a path, took it and we are living the worse than expected results by any measure.

The promises of what the stimulas was SUPPOSED to do, such as hold unemployment to less than 8% did not happen. That in and of itself is failure of attaining the stated purpose.

I know...to you that is also the GOP's (or Bush's) fault.

Notice how that is not selling on main street though? Perhaps the overwhelming majority of the public not seeing it your way just might be right.

Increasingly we need to split into two countries: Dumbfuckistan and Realityville. The people in Realityville shouldn't have to accept what Dumbfuckistan wants or votes for. I think we'll be able to draw the borders pretty clearly after the November elections.

No matter how you spin it...this statement:

"Sam Seder came upon an important realization yesterday: "Now we know -- it takes 8 years of GOP control to totally f**k up our economy and only 18 months to blame Dems for it."

is, at best, incorrect and at worst a lie meant for those like Stephen that just want to be mislead.

Cranky, you're not thinking clearly.

For example, to suggest that Nazi Germany would have done something aggressive, if Britain had taken a strong stand on Czechoslovakia, doesn't speak to WHY Britain took a weak stand. The reason was just what I said: to point Hitler East, which is where he went.

Besides, Shirer reported at the time (and elaborated later) that Hitler was angry he had been deprived of the war he had wanted to precipitate over the Sudetenland, by Chamberlain's appeasement. (Yes, appeasement even pissed off Hitler.)

This isn't a revisionist interpretation that appeared in the last five years, yanno: it was a common understanding at the time, because it was British policy throughout the 30s, as I said.

Chamberlain intended to give Hitler everything he asked for at Munich, precisely because, having gotten what he wanted in "the West" (which is a bit of a stretch for the compass, Czechoslovakia having run east and west and been largely surrounded by Germany & post Anschluss Austria: the only direction it wasn't from Nazi Germany was West), he would turn East -- as he did.

Hitler's miscalculation (which Shirer understood at the time, but had largely forgotten after the war) was that, having wanted a war with Britain and France over Czechoslovakia and been denied, he didn't expect to get one over Poland, especially after he had agreed to divide it up with Stalin.

It's not nuts to conclude that, if Hitler hadn't gotten the war with France and Britain that he didn't expect in 1939 (but had wanted in 1938), he might have simply pushed on through Poland into the Soviet Union, as in fact he finally did do in 1941 after over-running France in 1940, once France had (finally!) declared war on Hitler the year before.

That Chamberlain really was committed to pushing Hitler East -- well, that's probably too strong a word, "pushing", because it denotes force. Chamberlain offered Hitler no resistance to the West, intending that, seeking a fight, Hitler would go East -- which he did. So it's simple truth to recognize that Hitler did what Chamberlain wanted and expected.

That Chamberlain planned on Hitler fighting Stalin, sooner rather than later, is strongly suggested by Chamberlain's disgraceful reaction to the invasion of Poland: first saying that the Allies would fight, then waffling as the French delayed: THAT, not Munich, is what ruined him among his peers.

But the guy had a plan, and it might well have succeeded in its purpose: but its goal was wrong and its results would have been even more evil than what actually happened, which was plenty bad enough.

W didn't create this recession all by himself.

The consequences of thirty years of Republican supply-side voodoo economic policies, thirty years of Reaganism, thirty years of policies that valorize the already-wealthy at the expense of everyone else, thirty years of tax cutting and starve-the-beast and freshwater economics and union bashing and so-called free trading, thirty years of contempt for Labor and for those who work for wages, have come home to roost. They won't be moving out soon. Much of the nation and most of the Village have absorbed Reagan's framing, and can't see anything else.

Yes, Clinton talks prettily, but as the President who signed NAFTA and Gramm-Leach-Bliley into law, he should STFU.

Cranky--I didn't mean to suggest that Bush had anything to do with repealing Glass-Steagall. Clinton, yes, along with Phil Gramm and the Republican Congress. I was just giving some examples of the right-wing economic policies that led up to the present mess, regardless of who's controlled Congress or been in the White House.

manapp,

“Bush ‘deregulated’ the financial markets.’ Exactly which regulation did Bush get rid of?”

I’ll start with this. Lemme know if you want more:

UNDER PRESSURE FROM BANKS, BUSH EASED LENDING RULES

(AP) - The Bush administration backed off proposed crackdowns on no-money-down and interest-only mortgages years before the economy collapsed, buckling to pressure from some of the same banks that have now failed. It ignored remarkably prescient warnings that foretold the financial meltdown, according to an Associated Press review of regulatory documents.

Bowing to aggressive lobbying - along with assurances from banks that the troubled mortgages were OK - REGULATORS DELAYED ACTION FOR NEARLY ONE YEAR. By the time new rules were released late in 2006, the toughest of the proposed provisions were gone and the meltdown was under way.

The administration's blind eye to the impending crisis is emblematic of a philosophy that trusted market forces and discounted the need for government intervention in the economy. Its belief ironically has ushered in the most massive government intervention since the 1930s.

Many of the banks that fought to undermine the proposals by some regulators are now either out of business or accepting billions in federal aid to recover from a mortgage crisis they insisted would never come. Many executives remain in high-paying jobs, even after their assurances were proved false.

Dec 1st, 2008

manapp,

“She had the entire 1990's...”

Where was Secretary Clinton mentioned in the article ???

manapp,

“I don't know Joe.”

No kidding.

So Mr. Bush had to, in his words, "use the mighty muscle of the federal government" to meet his goal.

He proposed affordable housing tax incentives. He insisted that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac meet ambitious new goals for low-income lending.

Concerned that down payments were a barrier, Mr. Bush persuaded Congress to spend up to $200 million a year to help first-time buyers with down payments and closing costs.

And he pushed to allow first-time buyers to qualify for federally insured mortgages with no money down

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/business/21admin.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

We had to bail out Wall Street. Without that, all the citizens in the country would be in bankruptcy court, defending their assets. And it is a part of our moral and religious duty to help poor people with medical problems. But the old way of helping them is costing the rest of us much more money than necessary, in our premiums and taxes. Nobody likes helping the undeserving rich or wasting money in helping the poor. But the way forward is NOT to deregulate Wall Street or deny universal health care. Let’s not give control of government back to the party that let these problems develop.

Bush On Jobs: The Worst Track Record On Record
President George W. Bush entered office in 2001 just as a recession was starting, and is preparing to leave in the middle of a long one.

That’s almost 22 months of recession during his 96 months in office.

His job-creation record won’t look much better. The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton’s administration and only slightly better than President George H.W. Bush did in his four years in office.

Here’s a look at job creation under each president since the Labor Department started keeping payroll records in 1939. The counts are based on total payrolls between the start of the month the president took office (using the final payroll count for the end of the prior December) and his final December in office.

Because the size of the economy and labor force varies, we also calculate in percentage terms how much the total payroll count expanded under each president. The current President Bush, once taking account how long he’s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records. -Sudeep Reddy

http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/01/09/bush-on-jobs-the-worst-track-record-on-record/

Oh what the hell. I decided to take a closer look at the statement from Sam Seder that manapp99 is so worked up about, and -- it's a tweet! I don't know what kind of moron expects academic rigor from a freaking tweet (oh wait, actually I guess I do), but there isn't even room there for the kinds of assertions that manapp99 is objecting to. Typing "8 years of GOP control" actually isn't tantamount to claiming that Jim Jeffords never switched parties. It's possible that Seder would have mentioned Jeffords if he had more than 140 characters to work with, but it should be obvious (it really should) that that wasn't the point.

for the first time in its history, the OCC was used as a tool against consumers.

In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative.

The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks.

The federal government's actions were so egregious and so unprecedented that all 50 state attorneys general, and all 50 state banking superintendents, actively fought the new rules.

But the unanimous opposition of the 50 states did not deter, or even slow, the Bush administration in its goal of protecting the banks.

An observation from north of 49

I can't believe how ineffectual the left is in US politics. And I do not mean the government, I mean the well-meaning progressive citizens. Faced with a choice between the current government that is heading more-or-less in the right direction, albeit slowly, and an an energized and wrong-headed opposition, the left are going to sit on there hands and let the right get back into power.

That is a great decision (NOT). 8 years from now you will be trillions more in debt, the President will be impeached, health care dismantled, the rich will be playing monopoly with your Social Security funds, and they will pay no taxes.

And you guys are going to sit there and let it happen because Obama didn't do everything he said he would. What a bunch of whoosies you are! If you managed to get out the vote for Obama 2 years ago, you could do it again if you just sucked it up and got off your asses. Sitting on your hands is like bending over and inviting the right to have their way with you.

The only thing you will get out of that besides a sore bung-hole is the comfort of being right about what would happen if the right wing takes over.

theAmericanist,
I have read the arguments in your 1:01 PM and don't discount them, but they require a level of 11-dimensional-chess playing that (1) IMHO the evidence does not support (2) if, however, given the depth of knowledge of foreign affairs and history available to the British Government in the 1930s, Chamberlain and his advisers thought they could execute such a scheme and were deliberately pursuing it, then to me that in itself shows that Chamberlain was self-delusional and incompetent since there was absolutely zero chance anything of that nature would work. And that was perfectly plain after the Anschluss if not the Spanish Civil War.

Also, any argument that requires as a condition that Willian Schier "forgot" a key factor leading to WWII is a bit dodgy to begin with. Not only was he there at the time and meeting with the senior Nazis regularly, after the war he had access to the German archives (including their captured French, Czech, etc, documents) and was able to read records that shortly thereafter were either sealed up for 50 years or simply destroyed. He was also able to talk to high-level Russians for the first year or so before total Cold War paranoia set in and obtain personal views that are probably entirely lost to history now. Not to say Schier is a demigod or even always right, but you have to provide a lot of evidence before you can say "he just forgot key factor x".

Cranky

The Americanist is citing the same sort of outstanding scholarship that proves that FDR encouraged Pearl Harbor attack so that he could help Churchill, Truman gave the bomb to stalin so as to stop Mao, JFK set up the Bay of Pigs disaster so that he could sucker Kruschev into putting missles in Cuba, and Reagan promoted Star Wars so as to bankrupt the USSR (simiar to the current secret plan of Bin Laden that is succeeding much more rapidly than anticipated).

Beware of metaphors intended to convince the one who uses them: there's nothing "11-dimensional" about hoping your adversary fights your enemy.

Why would you imagine it so?

I'll just note that the Times of London was quite clear throughout 1933-39 (and, in fact, even past Churchill finally getting the Prime Ministership after the disaster in Norway, because they favored Halifax) that the main enemy was the Soviet Union, not the Nazis. As late as 1936, they editorialized "there is more reason to fear for Germany, than to fear Germany."

The British elite's lack of concern about Hitler and preoccupation with the Communist threat defined the policy of appeasement from beginning to end, as well as the refusal to re-arm, which was at least as much an economic measure during the Depression, butter rather than guns to keep the working class quiet.

Plus there is the small fact, stated above, that not only was getting Hitler to turn east Chamberlain's goal at Munich, IT IS ALSO WHAT HITLER DID. That Britain and France would go to war over Poland was not Hitler's expectation, and given the way Chamberlain -- finally! -- ruined himself over it in the House of Commons, it's not like Hitler's assessment of the guy was wrong: after all, before he turned east (as Chamberlain wanted him to do) he signed a deal with Stalin (which, as a British imperialist, was simply unfathomable to Chamberlain).

Shirer was quite clear in his understanding of these facts before the war. After the war, there was no fascist threat to dilute anti-communism, so perhaps I was being a bit charitable in noting that he had simply forgotten what had been so obvious in 1938. You may not recall that Shirer was blacklisted in 1950, so there is a pretty clear motive for the, er, enlightened discussion of Munich when The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich was published ten years later.

gdb: you wouldn't know shit from sunshine if you were trying to get a tan.

> Beware of metaphors intended to convince the one
> who uses them: there's nothing "11-dimensional"
> about hoping your adversary fights your enemy.

Other than that 6000 years of recorded human history shows that every single time such a ploy has been attempted the aggressor has eventually turned around and attacked the entity it initially turned away from anyway, and that the 1st entity is inevitably in a weaker position at that time than it was initially. Again, if Chamberlain and Co. really thought they could carry off such a ploy, and that the Germans would not just attack them later, they were by definition delusional and incompetent.

Cranky

But that doesn't sound strong. Democrats need to warn directly of how dangerous Republicans are and of positive steps.

"...if Dems had more time, they might have more success addressing the disasters they inherited from Republicans --"

The Dems in general, and Obama in particular, has had all of the time they need to do exactly that. They didn't. They did not complain enough about the economic disaster from the Bush policies during the Bush years. Obama did not drive it home either during the primary campaign not the campaign. There has been plenty of time to make the case of the incredible economic hole the republican party has put this country into but they are just starting now. "If they had more time" is a poor excuse for waiting until it is apparently too late.

Given your monicker, I suppose nobody could expect that once you'd been schooled so publicly, you'd be gracious.

You said: "I find it a real stretch to conclude that Chamberlain was... [trying to push] Germany towards the Soviet Union ... His actions over a long period of time, including not only international relations but he fierce opposition to rearmament right up until the last few months, speak otherwise."

This demonstrates your profound misunderstanding of what motivated appeasement. It was characterized from beginning to end by a lack of concern about the threat of fascism, and an absolute certainty that the great threat to Western democracies was Communism, particularly from within.

So I just noted that in fact opposition to rearmament was one way the British elite responded to the Communist threat, particularly in choosing butter over guns to keep the workers happy, throughout the 30s.

You were wrong, Cranky.

I also noted that once Hitler took power in 1933, and commenced with the Rhineland, the Anschluss, and so on up through the Sudetenland, in EVERY SINGLE INSTANCE, appeasement offered no resistance, precisely because they knew the guy wanted to fight somebody, and they hoped it wouldn't be them.

You were wrong, Cranky.

What did you think Churchill's point was when he said: "An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last..." ?? Evidently, you never considered that Churchill just might have meant exactly what he said, instead of falling victim to his own cleverness -- which, to be fair, he often did.

And I pointed out, when you mis-represented Shirer on the point, that he understood it plainly (so did everybody else) before the war. It was only afterward, when he'd been fired from CBS in 1947 and then blacklisted in 1950, that Shirer's thinking on the anti-Communist goals of appeasement came to be 'enlightened', which is when The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" was published -- in 1960, by which time the blacklisted Shirer needed the money from what was, rightfully, a huge bestseller.

But it doesn't take a grasp of "11 dimensional chess" to understand why the fact that appeasement, the most unpopular foreign policy concept in the world, was a strategy against Communism might be just a bit volatile in the McCarthy era.

And as for your notion that getting enemies to fight each other has never worked: no less than Winston Churchill stated flatly that this was English policy toward the Continent for 400 years -- 'It has always been the policy of Great Britain to ally itself against any Power or group of powers that would tend to dominate the continent.'

Churchill wrote that in his Wilderness years about his ancestor John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough, who 1) led British troops to defeat the union of Spain and France; 2) negotiated on behalf of the British Crown AND William of Orange, such that the Holy Roman Empire spent several years fighting with France (this is one of a gazillion examples that refute you that getting your adversary to fight your enemy never works), and 3) finally turned on his patron James II to invite William of Orange to take the British Crown, which he did.

From a purely historical point of view, one of the brilliant facts about John Churchill's utter betrayal of his friend, patron and king, is that its religious character (ensuring that Britain would remain Protestant) is that it both built on his prior military and diplomatic achievements that kept Catholic Spain and Catholic France from uniting before he put William on Britain's thrown, whcih eventually (the guy led an eventful life) enabled him to do it again.

Just to underscore the point, Churchill did it by betraying the guy who had promoted him from a servant, and it led directly to the most important example of the balance of powers principle before the 20th century when there was a mess after the Spanish king died. Suddenly, the Holy Roman Emperor (whom, you'll recall, Marlborough had maneuvered into fighting France twenty years before) was on the British side: it was precisely this sort of pitting adversaries against enemies until events caused 'em to change sides that made Britain a world power.

There's a REASON it was a British Prime Minister (Palmerston) who said that Britain has no permanent friends, nor permanent enemies, only permanent interests.

americanist.your adhominem attack may well be true, but does not refute my point which stands.

LOL -- you don't HAVE a point, gdb. I'm fairly certain from the evidence that you don't even know what a point IS.

See, it works like this: somebody says something like (to provide a different context for illustration) 'Before he got hurt, Mickey Mantle was the greatest baseball player who ever lived, and if he'd had access to human growth hormone, he'd have broken every hitting record ever.'

Then they cite a ton of evidence (you've heard of that?) to back up their point: Mantle's record of early potential before injuries robbed him of 20-40 games a year, the records he did pile up, despite his injuries, the nature of his injuries (e.g., slowing him down, thus minimizing scratch singles and extra base hits), and finally, the nature of human growth hormone which enables athletes to recover more quickly from injuries.

See how it works? A statement of opinion based on evidence, followed by reasoning.

Your response -- which doesn't have a point -- would simply mis-characterize the Mantle point along these lines: "Saying Mickey Mantle would have been a better ballplayer if he never got hurt or was able to recover faster is like these guys who claim that Josh Gibson was better than Ruth, or that Randy Johnson would have thrown a dozen no-hitters if he'd played in the 1920s."

For one thing, the Mantle assertion makes neither of those claims. For another, the Mantle assertion is UNLIKE those claims, in three ways: first, asserting that Mantle was the best ever before he was hurt simply makes a statement about Mantle himself, and points to the evidence, second, when the evidence is added, it supports the statement, viz., how Mantle played when he WAS hurt, and finally, unlike your bizarre notions of comparison, it involves no extraneous information: human growth hormone really does enable athletes to recover more quickly from injury, which of course was precisely the great obstacle between Mantle's potential and his still impressive achievements.

You have had literally nothing to say about the actual history I cited regarding appeasement. You made the sort of assertion that establishes you're an idjit, instead -- and that you persisted in it, re-confirms what we all already knew.

BTW, the 'tan' really does improve your looks.

patrick II, Obama has indeed talked of how Bush was responsible for most of what went wrong. It's the media that gripe about blaming someone else etc. The media environment today is absolutely horrible, and all the complainers must take that into account. Don't make the job of the GOP and the indeed lame-stream-media and insane-scream-media even easier. (Not to mention, today's GOP *must not* be allowed to take power.)

Dems should aggressively and continuously refer to this economic mess at "The Republican Recession". Besides being true, it gives the MSM a hook to use when discussing it (much like "Ground Zero Mosque"). They like shorthand and it has the added bonus of being alliterative.

@neil b

Steve Benen implicitly asserts that if Democrats had more time they would have more success addressing the disasters they have inherited from the Republicans. Also implicit in that assertion is the premise that they have not been successfully addressing the disasters until now. It also seems he is calling for them to do something more than complain the media isn't on their side. Whatever that may be, Steve's call for change implies what they have done up until now has been inadequate.

You're right -- but it's too late to be effective now, in fact it would be counterproductive, since it looks backward.

Here's the real problem: when Obama took office, like any President he immediately realized that pretty much everything he wanted to do, had to happen in Congress.

Then he realized that the Democratic majority in Congress was the Blue Dogs, plus the 60 vote imperative in the Senate meant that for every Democratic vote he lost, he had to pick up a Republican vote.

Progressives immediately mis-construed the whole situation. They blamed Obama for the legislative arithmetic, and dissed their own majority (the Blue Dogs) for representing their districts: on issue after issue (energy, health, the stimulus).

When the Blue Dogs responded, naturally, by insisting they wouldn't vote for anything that didn't also get Republican votes (for cover), the President had no alternative to get anything done, except to negotiate with Republicans.

Don't miss the crucial fact buried in that: he was NOT negotiating directly with Blue Dogs, much of the time. The idea of getting a majority of the House from WITHIN the Democratic caucus was rarely an option, because progressives refused.

He was trying to pick off enough Republicans to give the Blue Dogs cover: not the same.

And remember that Obama was elected partly on a pledge to end 'politics as usual', to move beyond partisanship: he was pretty much abandoned by his own base (not quite the other way around) when he had to play the hand he was dealt -- it wasn't the base that elected him, after all (just nominated him), it was independents that put him in the White House.

And those are the folks, by staying home or voting for the other guys, who will be the measure of the longest fall in the shortest time in the history of American politics.

But it's not THEIR fault: it's ours.

> You were wrong, Cranky.

theAmericanist,
You have presented your theory in 3 or 4 different ways, all very impassioned, but you have failed to show in any way that the more conventional theory that I describe was "wrong". Sorry. Nice try though.

Cranky

@theAmericanist
So, are you saying that the only means of passing significant legislation is such so much compromise that you are doomed to lose the next election?

And your tagline -- it's not their fault its ours -- how exactly? What should we have done differently?
And by we I guess I mean progressives unless you meant someone else by saying "our" fault.

Cranky: Matthew 13:13.

Patrick II: I said it in the post -- it would have been better strategy (as some urged at the time) to get a majority of the House from within the Democratic majority IN the House.

The basic calculation goes something like this: from 260 Ds (for ease of arithmetic), you need 218.

With 180 Ds, you might get pledges from 20 Rs.

But when you get to 200 Ds, that gets cut to 10 Rs.

And when you get to 215 Ds, you have NO Rs.

But when you get to 220 Ds, you get ... THIRTY Rs, because they know whatever legislation it is, will pass: and they can vote for it cuz of constituent support, rather than voting against it for R caucus solidarity.

But instead, the Democratic strategy was to, er, appease the Blue Dogs by seeking R votes, to provide cover for the Blue Dog votes they needed -- even on procedural votes.

So the message was to tell the 54 (or so) Blue Dogs that they could vote against the Caucus on procedural votes, and still retain seniority. (Rs who vote against their Caucus on ANY vote lose seniority on committees.)

That's where the progressive political culture bears a heavy responsibility: instead of urging that the Democrats work out a deal with Blue Dogs, we complained that they were too conservative, that Obama (or Pelosi, or Reid) was giving too much away -- but never noticing that the problem wasn't too much effort to work it out with Blue Dogs, but the three corner shot of getting Rs to work against their Caucus in order to provide the Blue Dogs with cover.

The way to get bipartisan legislation is not to need R votes. But progressives rejected that, because it meant recognizing that Blue Dogs are on our side, leaving only the bogus outreach to the Rs.

All ist klar?

The Democrats who gave us the stimulus bill said, "trust us" if we get our trillion dollar bill, national unemployment WILL NOT go above 8 pct by the end of this summer. Of course, unemployment is now over 10 pct and climbing.

The question for me is why it's Bill Clinton out there making this argument, not Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid....you know Democratic leaders who are actually still in office?

The rhetorical silence from the Democratic in the face of GOP onslaughts is becoming deafening...

I find it bizarre that Clinton is taking credit for supposed budget surpluses. These so-called surpluses were merely budgetary projections based upon the maintenance of the status quo and had about as much to do with reality as cows jumping over the moon.

The fact is that the 1990s "growth" was simply a bubble economy based upon false valuations and illusory projections in the stock market. Anyone here remember the Netscape IPO? How about Web Van? Or Pets.com? Simply Net 1.0 hype and speculative balloon juice. Does the phrase "dot-com bubble" have any resonance to anyone?

Doesn't anyone remember 2000, when the bubble burst and NASDAQ took a huge dump, from a peak of on the order of 5000 down to the mid to lower 2000s in the space of a year?

And, all the while, downsizing after downsizing and offshoring after offshoring decimated (or worse) the workforce and wages, outside of the fortunate few dot-com professionals, remained stagnant or even were reduced in overall purchasing power.

Sorry, but the Clinton "prosperity" was just as big a hoax and Ponzi scheme as the runup of housing prices which helped to fuel the more recent economic bubble and eventual collapse.

Steve: I agree that Clinton began the cataclysm. The trade agreements and out-sourcing which devalued everything we were about accelerated past bingo fuel on his watch. But Bush went the step further and also outsourced our lives and future.

"Sorry, but the Clinton "prosperity" was just as big a hoax and Ponzi scheme as the runup of housing prices which helped to fuel the more recent economic bubble and eventual collapse."

The NASDAQ was around 600 when Clinton took office. So it was at 2000 at the worst of the recession after he left office. You consider this evidence in support of your claim?

The lowest point we've seen in the Dow since Clinton left office is still a lot higher than it was when Clinton took office. Bush can't say the same. You can take almost any significant metric of economic success and see the same difference in comparing the two presidencies. We were much better off after Clinton's presidency, much worse off after Bush's. In almost every way you can measure.

If despite this you find those two results equivalent, if you honestly believe that Clinton and Bush economic policies are identical in outcome, you've pretty much disqualified yourself from any reasonable discussion of the topic.

More words can't make your argument any better.

"If that means rewarding the party that created our current predicaments, and which fought tooth and nail for 21 months to prevent things from getting better, so be it."

That is a dialectic for the destruction of the United States.

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Kevin,

“The Democrats who gave us the stimulus bill said, "trust us" if we get our trillion dollar bill, national unemployment WILL NOT go above 8 pct by the end of this summer. Of course, unemployment is now over 10 pct and climbing.”

To be fair, that unemployment projection was based upon the CBO data released at the time, which was later HEAVILY revised downward, as nobody envision just how bad it really was. Not to mention that all the numbers were revised again earlier this year, and it turns out it was even worse than we had thought.

If the original numbers had held, then unemployment would be under 8%.

However, I still fault the White House for not reacting later when the first set of revisions were announced. They should have said, hold everything, it’s much worse than anybody thought, we need a much bigger stimulus.

mfw13,

“The question for me is why it's Bill Clinton out there making this argument, not Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid....you know Democratic leaders who are actually still in office?”

Because HE can.

Steve,

“I find it bizarre that Clinton is taking credit for supposed budget surpluses. These so-called surpluses were merely budgetary projections based upon the maintenance of the status quo and had about as much to do with reality as cows jumping over the moon.”

Utter nonsense.

From the 'Congressional Budget Office':

1998 - $069 billion SURPLUS
1999 - $126 billion SURPLUS
2000 - $236 billion SURPLUS
2001 - $128 billion SURPLUS

“The fact is that the 1990s "growth" was simply a bubble economy based upon false valuations and illusory projections in the stock market.”

More nonsense.

“Anyone here remember the Netscape IPO? How about Web Van? Or Pets.com? Simply Net 1.0 hype and speculative balloon juice. Does the phrase "dot-com bubble" have any resonance to anyone?”

Both the national economy and the stock market reversed and took off like a rocket years and years before any so-called “dot-com bubble”.

The first web browser (Mosaic) wasn’t even invented until 1993, and wide-spread commercial dial-up didn’t even exist until 1995.

Your chronology has no resemblance to reality.

“Doesn't anyone remember 2000, when the bubble burst and NASDAQ took a huge dump, from a peak of on the order of 5000 down to the mid to lower 2000s in the space of a year?”

Actually, the NASDAQ ended 2000 about where it was 16 months earlier in August of 1999, whereas that index plummeted from 2470 at the start of 2001 down to 1114 in October of 2002, all while Chimpy Bush was squatting in the White House.

“Sorry, but the Clinton "prosperity" was just as big a hoax and Ponzi scheme as the runup of housing prices which helped to fuel the more recent economic bubble and eventual collapse.”

Gibberish.

Your polemic screeds are an indicator that you are mired down in a bog of RightWing propaganda and have no comprehension of either history or reality.

* There were 22.2 million net new jobs created, the most jobs ever created under a single administration, and more jobs than Reagan/PoppyBush/Chimpy Bush created during their five terms COMBINED, with the majority created during the Clinton administration paying higher than the average wage in the national economy.

* The Unemployment Rate fell for eight years in a row, as the National Labor Participation Rate increased (what a concept !). African-American unemployment was cut in half to its lowest level ever recorded, and Hispanic unemployment fell to the lowest level ever recorded.

* The longest consecutive yearly increase of real wage growth since the 1960s. (Of course, real wages declined every year after 2000).

* The overall poverty rate continuously declined every single year, falling from 15.1% in 1993 to 11.3% in 2000, including the largest six-year drop in poverty in nearly three decades. The child poverty rate declined from 22.7% to 18.9%, the largest drop in three decades. (Of course, the overall poverty rate subsequently reversed and rose every single year after 2000).

For the record, I am not a right winger. I voted for Clinton twice, for Al Gore and (heaven help me) John Kerry, as well as Barack Obama. In fact, I've voted Democratic in every election since 1972.

However, I know a bubble economy when I see one and the economy in the 1990s was every bit as much a bubble economy as that of the 2000s. The reasons differ, I will grant you but that hardly matters to those affected by the crisis.

Most of the jobs "created" during the Clinton bubble were of a relatively temporary nature -- a lot of dot-com and dot-com associated jobs that evaporated (or went offshore to China or India) at the first sign of a NASDAQ downturn. As for my numbers, I admit to eyeballing a chart and not pulling exact numbers.

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2009-07-18-Nasdaq.png

In any event, things were already turning down in 2000.

Perhaps I overstated my case in calling the so-called prosperity a "hoax and Ponzi scheme" but for the average American struggling to put food on the table, save for children's college expenses, and perhaps sock away a little for retirement, the 1990s sucked as jobs became more and more tenuous due to outsourcing, real wages for many, if not most, remained stagnant, and 401-Ks were pumped up with illusory gains and then deflated in the inevitable crash.

Steve,

“For the record, I am not a right winger.”

Never claimed you were. If you check my post, I stated that:

“you are mired down in a bog of RightWing propaganda”

“However, I know a bubble economy when I see one and the economy in the 1990s was every bit as much a bubble economy as that of the 2000s.”

Gibberish.

“Most of the jobs "created" during the Clinton bubble were of a relatively temporary nature”

False.

“a lot of dot-com and dot-com associated jobs that evaporated (or went offshore to China or India) at the first sign of a NASDAQ downturn.”

You don’t seem to get just how minuscule the so-called “dot.com” industry was in regards to the overall national economy.

“As for my numbers, I admit to eyeballing a chart and not pulling exact numbers.”

No shit.

“Perhaps I overstated my case in calling the so-called prosperity a ‘hoax and Ponzi scheme’ ”

Ya think ?

“but for the average American struggling to put food on the table, save for children's college expenses, and perhaps sock away a little for retirement, the 1990s sucked as jobs became more and more tenuous due to outsourcing”

Are you daft ?

There were almost 23 MILLION net new jobs created. The MOST jobs ever created under a single administration in history.

“real wages for many, if not most, remained stagnant”

Nope.

The longest consecutive yearly increase of real wage growth since the 1960s.

“and 401-Ks were pumped up with illusory gains”

Wrong again.

The DJIA, in inflation-adjusted dollars, would need to be over 16,500 just to get back to where it was in 2000 when President Clinton was in office.

What planet were you living on between 1993 and 2000 ?