Republicans are starting to use the “s” word a lot – socialism, in reaction to President Obama’s policies. But an interesting article in Newsweek posits that we are already a socialist country…and we are on the way to becoming rather French-like.
Here are a few excerpts from the Newsweek article:
As the Obama administration presses the largest fiscal bill in American history, caps the salaries of executives at institutions receiving federal aid at $500,000 and introduces a new plan to rescue the banking industry, the unemployment rate is at its highest in 16 years. The Dow has slumped to 1998 levels, and last year mortgage foreclosures rose 81 percent.
All of this is unfolding in an economy that can no longer be understood, even in passing, as the Great Society vs. the Gipper. Whether we like it or not—or even whether many people have thought much about it or not—the numbers clearly suggest that we are headed in a more European direction. A decade ago U.S. government spending was 34.3 percent of GDP, compared with 48.2 percent in the euro zone—a roughly 14-point gap, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In 2010 U.S. spending is expected to be 39.9 percent of GDP, compared with 47.1 percent in the euro zone—a gap of less than 8 points. As entitlement spending rises over the next decade, we will become even more French.
This is not to say that berets will be all the rage this spring, or that Obama has promised a croissant in every toaster oven. But the simple fact of the matter is that the political conversation, which shifts from time to time, has shifted anew, and for the foreseeable future Americans will be more engaged with questions about how to manage a mixed economy than about whether we should have one.
The architect of this new era of big government? History has a sense of humor, for the man who laid the foundations for the world Obama now rules is George W. Bush, who moved to bail out the financial sector last autumn with $700 billion.
Bush brought the Age of Reagan to a close; now Obama has gone further, reversing Bill Clinton’s end of big government. The story, as always, is complicated. Polls show that Americans don’t trust government and still don’t want big government. They do, however, want what government delivers, like health care and national defense and, now, protections from banking and housing failure. During the roughly three decades since Reagan made big government the enemy and “liberal” an epithet, government did not shrink. It grew. But the economy grew just as fast, so government as a percentage of GDP remained about the same. Much of that economic growth was real, but for the past five years or so, it has borne a suspicious resemblance to Bernie Madoff’s stock fund. Americans have been living high on borrowed money (the savings rate dropped from 7.6 percent in 1992 to less than zero in 2005) while financiers built castles in the air.
Now comes the reckoning. The answer may indeed be more government. In the short run, since neither consumers nor business is likely to do it, the government will have to stimulate the economy. And in the long run, an aging population and global warming and higher energy costs will demand more government taxing and spending. The catch is that more government intrusion in the economy will almost surely limit growth (as it has in Europe, where a big welfare state has caused chronic high unemployment). Growth has always been America’s birthright and saving grace.
Click here to read the rest of this article.
This is what Yogi Berra told the New York Yankee players a FEW years ago.
“When you come to the fork in the road take it”
That’s where we are today. While the road has been rocky I prefer the right fork and president Obama is taking us DOWN, NOT UP, the left fork.
Not to repeat myself but we have spent time with a family who lived under a socialist program. Be careful what you ask for. There is no free lunch.
Larry,
One thing for sure…this is not what we expected when we voted for Bush, not once but twice.
Obama is simply carrying on with programs that Bush started.
What a mess…
$500,000 is still too much to pay the idiots that ruined their institutions. I myself charge much less for throwing money off the top of the Empire State Bldg.
If GM had developed high mileage, reduced emissions vehicles then the standards would be so high that foreign companies would have to buy GM engines to compete and our factories would be humming – but no, they prefer the high price monopoly profits approach. Look at the electronics industry for instance.
Hey Larry, why don’t you enlighten us as to your “right fork” plan (and PLEASE be specific}, I can hardly wait to hear ALL about it.
Larry, we were on the “right fork” for 8 years. It has brought more government spending, more big government. We can simply not afford any more on your “right fork”. The last 8 years have clearly shown that it is the wrong fork.
The new President is getting us on the real right fork, but it of course can’t happen overnight.
Joe. It was the RIGHT fork with the WRONG bus driver. And I admit voting for him
anonster.
Why didn’t you call earlier? Lunch is over and the fork is in the dishwasher.
If you didn’t oppose the Bush stim-pack and bail-outs then you sound silly opposing Obama’s. The differences between Bush and obama are purely cosmetic. The Newseek article is right, but its so hard to know what to do about it.
Larry,you and the other right-wingers on this blog indulge in all kinds of whining and disinformation,yet NEVER seem to have any real answers to the HUGE economic problems this country is facing. What would you have the poor and newly poor do? Starve in stoic silence or take a gun and shoot themselves and their families so they’re not a burden on society? One third of the stimulus plan goes to the states for food stamps and to extend unemployment benefits, you and Art may call this “socialism” but I call it living in a civilized country.
This is a little long, but, “The whole justification for permitting the corporate executive to be selected by the stockholders is that the executive is an agent serving the interests of his principal. This justification disappears when the corporate executive imposes taxes and spends the proceeds for “social” purposes. He becomes in effect a public employee, a civil servant, even though he remains in name an employee of a private enterprise. …
This is the basic reason why the doctrine of “social responsibility” involves the acceptance of the socialist view that political mechanisms, not market mechanisms, are the appropriate way to determine the allocation of scarce resources to alternative uses.” – Milton Friedman, The New York Times Magazine, September 13, 1970.
So you see, any thought of social responsibility is anathema to Repub neo-liberals, also known as libertAryans, and any hint of social responsibility will be dismissed as socialism. The Right has missed a few decades of history due to Reaganoid- Schwarzeneggerian delusions. Luckily, the OC is an island of ignorance in a sea of people power. The youngsters already see the Repubs as racist, anti-Obama geezers. Things will change in the OC, even as Mickey weeps.
anonster
“Larry,you and the other right-wingers on this blog indulge in all kinds of whining and disinformation”
When you are not happy with what we write you call in whining and disinformation? Perhaps you can share an example of my posting disinformation
You are clueless as to my story. Let me simply say that I once worked three simultaneous jobs in order to provide for my family and purchase our first home. While we did not resort to accepting food stamps we surely did not eat caviar.
Larry, how about Nancy Pelosi is uneducated and ignorant because she misspoke saying 500 million instead of 500 thousand, while not exactly disinformation (I’m too lazy to go back further than a couple of pages) it’s certainly a mischaracterization.
Anecdotal stories DON’T make good policy. Bully for you and your family, but what if you had lived in some small midwestern town where most people work for one or two factories and when they shut down there are no other jobs to be had? What do you do? You can’t find a job and you can’t sell your house because no one else can find work either.
Ten percent of the country is already receiving food stamp assistance (of about $3 a day per person, hardly a caviar budget) should we just let things get worse?
Interesting post on The DailyKos tonight; U.S. 3 hours away from economic and political collapse in September 08.
I don’t know if Bush and Paulson were just trying to roll congress, but if it’s true and we are still on the knife’s edge, well, it’s pretty scary stuff.
anonster.
“There you go again.” I did not say that Nancy Pelosi was “uneducated and ignorant.” All I did was watch the posted video clip and heard her make an error in job losses. Did you view the clip?
Globalization is a double edged sword. Think back to Ross Perot when he stated hearing a “giant sucking sound” as American jobs moved to Mexico.
By the way, I voted for Ross in his first bid for president.
Here’s what was written prior to 9-11
“Globalization is entering a fateful new stage, in which the competitive perils intensify for the low-wage developing countries much like the continuing pressures on high-wage manufacturing workers in the United States and other advanced economies. In the “race to the bottom,” China is defining the new bottom.”
So while we enjoy the bargains at WalMart and Costco there is a price to pay internally called American jobs.
What good is it if you can find an Asian made 52 inch TV when you don’t have a job to pay for it?
That said I still do not agree with president Obama’s proposal to solve our ugly recesssion.
Didn’t you characterize Obama as “naive and inexperienced ” for the protectionist proposals in the stimulus bill? I guess there is no pleasing some people.
Yeah, Nancy Pelosi misspoke, YOU implied that she did not know the actual figures (go back and read YOUR post).
anonster. Yes, president Obama is inexperienced.
shall we engage in that debate today when he has already told us that HE WON!!!!!!!!!!
CBS reports that “It has been a rough two weeks of on-the-job training for the former one-term Illinois senator.”
That’s progressive CBS speaking not conservative Larry Gilbert. Did they call it “ON THE JOB TRAINING??” I rest my case.
Throwing money at the problem without being able to answer congressional questions presented to Treasury Sec Geithner needs to be closely scrutinized. And yes, we should have set the same accountability standard for the Bush team on the first stimulus.
What about the free market, larry? Can’t we buy the cheapest crap the Repug/ Chinee market offers?
Rintrah.
We live in a “free market” and a free country with “free will.” My goodness, everything is free including a lunch.
Has the government told you what to purchase be it by product or point of manufacture?
Let me share a story about protectionism and discrimination when I really had a job in electronics. Some of the best components were produced by Motorola with bat wings as a logo. One customer in an Arab nation told us that they would not accept any system that contained Motorola semiconductors. So there were people on the production floor removing the bat wing M logo off transistors to avoid detection while retaining the tight spec compliance.
Point being I have lived through both open and closed markets, supported “Buy American” and now recognize that we must compete globally in order to survive. Kindly help me out. Was your TV or VCR manufactured in the 48 states? How about your telephone? Just curious!
Only in Larry World is CBS “progressive”.
How do American car makers compete with China when their import tariff is 25% and ours is 2.5% ? This isn’t “free trade”, it’s a recipe for destroying American manufacturing.