Sunday, December 20, 2009


Sean Trende, posting at Real Clear Politics...
Health reform is shuffling toward its endgame, and even though the bill's popularity resembles George Bush's circa 2007, Democrats seem determined to push the bill through. Browse through certain liberal blogs, or listen to Democratic leadership speeches, and you'll read the same justification again and again: However bad passing this bill might be, politically speaking, not passing it would be much, much worse.

....
If Democrats need to appeal to Independents and moderates to hold their majorities, then passing this bill is a terrible idea.  The most recent polling shows that 81% of Republicans and 69% of Independents oppose the healthcare plan (with 74% of Republicans and 57% of Independents strongly opposing it).  With majorities of Independents strongly opposed to the bill, it's really hard to imagine any boost in Democratic turnout from passing the plan being enough to surpass the ensuing backlash from Republicans and Independents.
It isn't even clear that there will be a boost in Democratic turnout.  The latest version of the Senate bill holds little appeal for progressives. As I noted on the blog, without a public option, this bill becomes a wet, sloppy kiss to the insurance industry. It doesn't even represent a substantial triumph for liberalism by significantly expanding government through taxing the wealthy; there are large new subsidies, but for the most part the subsidies are paid for by gouging Medicare and taxing union health benefits. It really reads like a bill a moderate Republican would propose; it is a slightly stronger version of RomneyCare at this point. In other words, the only remaining group that might have even arguably been excited to vote for Democrats on this bill is now at best lukewarm on it.
Lukewarm and tasteless to all who consume.


As was the pablum climate consensus reached in Copenhagen (before Obama rushed back to DC to avoid the blizzard). Oh, you think I'm kidding about China and the US Treasuries?
Seems Obama might've annoyed our Red Creditors...From Shanghai Daily
In a discussion on the global role of the dollar, Zhu told an academic audience that it was inevitable that the dollar would continue to fall in value because Washington continued to issue more Treasuries to finance its deficit spending.

He then addressed where demand for that debt would come from.

"The United States cannot force foreign governments to increase their holdings of Treasuries," Zhu said, according to an audio recording of his remarks. "Double the holdings? It is definitely impossible."

"The US current account deficit is falling as residents' savings increase, so its trade turnover is falling, which means the US is supplying fewer dollars to the rest of the world," he added. "The world does not have so much money to buy more US Treasuries."
I guess Obama should've bowed, eh?.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment



 

FREE HOT BODYPAINTING | HOT GIRL GALERRY