"President Downgrade" Known forever as The Guy that made Everything Worse

[JG55]

[h=1]“President Downgradeâ€[/h]By Joy McCann

– August 7, 2011Posted in: Homepage Slider

Really need to watch the video as she goes off. Here's a link to the post and the video

go here to watch video “President Downgrade”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkOExn3A62Q&feature=player_embedded

She’s right, you know: he’ll be known forever as The Guy Who Made Everything Worse. Amilya Antonetti, the Chair and CEO at AMA Productions, gives Obama the talking-to he deserves:

Meanwhile, Phil Klein insists that there’s no way the President will be able to escape blame for the downgrade:

Standard and Poor’s explanation for why it downgraded U.S. debt is written in such a way that it can be seized upon by all ideological stripes. The statement cites the unwillingness of Republicans to raise taxes and of Democrats to agree to entitlement cuts. And the rating agency’s discourse about the political dysfunction will provide column fodder for Washington pundits who long for the days when both parties would work together to reach compromises. But make no mistake, when all the dust settles, it will be difficult for President Obama to escape blame for this.

Defenders of Obama will attempt to pin the blame on his predecessor, President Bush, and on intransigent Tea Party radicals in the current Congress. But that would leave out the part in between. For his first two years in office, Obama’s party controlled both chambers of Congress – for part of that period, he had a filibuster proof majority in the Senate. During that time period, he and his fellow Democrats could have passed his supposedly ideal, long-term, deficit-reduction package — one that represented a “balanced approach†between spending cuts and tax increases. It also could have delayed the deficit reduction for several years, so it wouldn’t have affected the current weak economy or the “investments†he considers crucial. Forget about actually accomplishing serious deficit reduction — he didn’t even attempt it.

When Obama came into office, he argued that we needed deficit spending to boost the economy, so he passed a $800 billion stimulus package. Then, in one of his first supposed pivots to the deficit, he convened a ‘fiscal responsibility summit’ in February 2009. But that actually turned out to be part of a different pivot altogether. It was during that summit that then White House Budget Director Peter Orszag declared, “health care reform is entitlement reform.â€

And so, for the next 13 months, Obama spent all of his energies trying to get health care legislation across the finish line. The end product was a plan that, according to both the Congressional Budget Office and actuary for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, did not bend the health care cost curve down. Let’s even set aside the argument over the accounting gimmicks that were employed to obtain a CBO score that showed modest deficit reduction. The reality is this: the law used money raised through tax hikes and Medicare cuts that otherwise would have been available for deficit reduction, to instead expand Medicaid by 18 million beneficiaries and create a massive new health care entitlement.

Of course, there’s more. After health care passed last March, Obama punted on the debt for the rest of the year as he awaited a report from his fiscal commission. He then ignored its recommendations and released a budget so ludicrous that within two months, it failed 0 to 97 in the Senate and he himself rejected it. He instead delivered a speech about his deficit reduction vision, which didn’t have enough details for the CBO to score. And then he spent the last few months arguing that he was prepared to offer Republicans a “grand bargain,†but to this day he hasn’t released details of this supposedly awesome deal that Republicans refused, beyond calculated leaks to favored reporters.

But there’s another reason why Obama won’t escape blame for this. Obama was elected president at a time when Americans felt the nation was in decline, and his central job was restore their faith that our best days were ahead of us . . .

Unfortunately, he thought his central job was to play golf; there was, of course, an unfortunate misunderstanding.

[h=4]BY Joy McCann[/h] Joy McCann is a refugee from the modern version of left-liberalism who has been blogging since the spring of 2003, primarily at Little Miss Attila. She's an accomplished editor of cookbooks, Harley-Davidson guides, gun catalogs, and interior design magazines. Her online publications include everything from corporate blogs to an article on St. Paul's views of women.

[NRA]

I REALLY like that woman

[Guest drv2fst]

+1

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Thank God for people like her. She is a do-er.

[Guest HvyMtl]

Nice propaganda piece. Using the present situation to get her AMA Productions out there and bought. Smart move. (no, seriously.)

What is that? Oh, just the stock market since O has been in office.... Yup, he so messed up the economy, the stock market has increased over 4000 points since he got in office...

Beating up on politicians sells.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

And you think he had anything to do with that? You can't defend stupid economic

policy like that and get away with it. There are a few more trees in the forest.

[Guest HvyMtl]

No, there are a few more trees in the forest. Point was he must not be so terrible as investors in the stock market continued to do their thing...

Point was, people see the closest tree (600+ point drop) instead of the forest of investment increase (and stock value increase.)

And again, I think she just did a huge marketing move which will boost her pocket book. Smart. But, I see propaganda as propaganda, and called a lot of people out on it with W, I will do it with O, and will do it post-O. Because propaganda is twisting truths and lies to control the political will of the people... And if calling propaganda out makes one voter THINK for themselves, I have achieved something crucial to the bettering of this nation. Whether or not I approve or disapprove the message.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

That's so typical. Someone is on a show being

asked questions and all one can think of is

calling it propaganda and self promoting.

Whatever. Scotty, beam me out of here!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[sigrug17]

Great vid ... very much agreed.

[Tnscooter63]

She said alot of truth about what a commander and chief is and I would give her a big thank you should I ever meet her. But, if anyone thinks this is ONLY a 2 day slide I certainly pray it is, yet dont believe it for a second and I for one did a bit of stimulous this weekend and bought some extra ammo and topped off my food pantry. I would much rather Obummer be known for something else than this tho, Hang on folks I believe it is going to be a bumpy ride.

Edited August 9, 2011 by Tnscooter63

[Oh Shoot]

...if anyone thinks this is ONLY a 2 day slide...

Well, it's a two day slide that wiped out average gains for the last 7 months or more. Same as a gradual 7 month slide to same point. I don't know which should be seen as more ominous.

- OS

[mav]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think she is hot?

[analog_kidd]

A buddy of mine was telling at work today about a news segment over the weekend where Obama was trying to put the blame on everyone he could. He was saying how he inherited a bad economy from Bush. The talking head then said, well OK, but you also inherited a Triple-A rating from him.

If you're going to dish it out you have to take it too.

[eapking]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think she is hot?

Sho-nuff!!!

Btw....don't be in a hurry to buy bargains yet. This rollercoaster ain't going back up for a while.

[JG55]

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Nice propaganda piece. Using the present situation to get her AMA Productions out there and bought. Smart move. (no, seriously.)

What is that? Oh, just the stock market since O has been in office.... Yup, he so messed up the economy, the stock market has increased over 4000 points since he got in office...

Beating up on politicians sells.

Linearize that chart against the price of gold or other commodities, and it would get pretty flat.

When you dump trillions of new money into the economy, even a dead cat will bounce. All that money had to go somewhere. It is called devaluation. The stocks are not especially more valuable than 2008. The dollars are just worth less so the price is higher to buy the same value.

The above is phrased declarative and it isn't that cut-and-dried. But it is pretty obvious that $11,000 of stock portfolio when it got there around year 2000, would have bought a whole heck of a lot more than $11,000 of stock portfolio today. In fact, according to BLS inflation figures, the Dow Jones would have to be $14,418 today to match value with $11,000 in Y2K. Many suspect that the BLS inflation figures are low-ball so maybe the Dow Jones would need to be much higher than $14.5K to match 2000 levels of value.

Dow Jones Industrial Average (2000 - Present Daily) - Charting Tools - StockCharts.com

The brief local peak in Oct 2007 right before the crash, of $13,930, was only 5 percent higher (adjusted for inflation) than $11,000 in Y2K.

In other words, if you bought at the bubble peak in Y2K and sold at the bubble peak in 2007, then you may have earned 5 percent in real wealth over 7 years. If you had sold any other time from Y2K to mid 2007 then you would have lost inflation-adjusted dollars. If you had sold any time from 2008 to the present, you would have lost inflation-adjusted money for the entire period.

Unless you are FABULOUSLY LUCKY timing the market, you have been basically treading water for at least 11 years. If you just routinely buy and hold regardless of the current price, I don't see how an average joe would get ahead as long as the market looks like this.

But I've always been reluctant to gamble and am very ignorant of the fine points of stock gambling.

[clarky07]

Speaking of propaganda piece, nice chart. At Obama's election the DJIA was at 9500. You conveniently cut that part out and post the start of your chart 2 months after he took office, after the stimulus bill passed, and after the DJIA dropped 3k from his election to under 6500.

Nice propaganda piece. Using the present situation to get her AMA Productions out there and bought. Smart move. (no, seriously.)

What is that? Oh, just the stock market since O has been in office.... Yup, he so messed up the economy, the stock market has increased over 4000 points since he got in office...

Beating up on politicians sells.

Edited August 9, 2011 by clarky07

[Guest 6.8 AR]

I guess everytime someone says something bad about Obama(which happened to be true),

a new chart will spring up to defend the saviour of our free republic(almost) from impending doom.

but, I digress. It's still Bush's fault. No, it's the Tea Party's fault says David Axelrod and John Kerry.

Heavy, I still don't understand why you said what you did about that woman. Do you have some

inside track on how she got on the show? Did she buy time so she could shamelessly promote

her company? Did she sleep with the producer? Is there something on TMZ I didn't hear about?

I am truly trying to understand.

Defending a communist is one thing, stupid and telling, but defiling a guest who spoke what any

business man or woman would say is a bit boring. If she promoted her company I applaud her.

I would do the same.

I guess truth isn't chic at the moment.

[Guest HvyMtl]

Clarky07 got it. (and kudos to Lester, too, though he looked at dollar value vs stock value) I thru a piece of Dem propaganda at a piece of Conservative propaganda...

6.8AR, one of the best ways to market your biz is to do exactly what she just did. Same reason Trump went after O the way he did, it was good for business... Same reason Roseanne will profit from her declaration to run...

[JG55]

[E4 No More]

Ironic that trading was fairly even until after he got on TV and ran his mouth of blame and his "They made a mistake defense" then the market tanked.

I don't pretend to know anything about the market, but I don't think that was coincidence.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Ironic that trading was fairly even until after he got on TV and ran his mouth of blame and his "They made a mistake defense" then the market tanked.

I don't pretend to know anything about the market, but I don't think that was coincidence.

Didn't something similar happen after the first bailout in the Bush waning years? May be remembering it wrong, but IIRC the market was wobbling and holding its own thru a couple weeks debate with Paulson and others saying the sky will fall unless we bail it out. But then after they finally passed the bailout, the bottom dropped out right afterwards. IIRC there was a Bush speech about that time where the market was ticking down for the whole time he was talking.

Not blaming Bush. Just sayin maybe the politicians mistake the factors that politicians think will worry investors.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Clarky07 got it. (and kudos to Lester, too, though he looked at dollar value vs stock value) I thru a piece of Dem propaganda at a piece of Conservative propaganda...

6.8AR, one of the best ways to market your biz is to do exactly what she just did. Same reason Trump went after O the way he did, it was good for business... Same reason Roseanne will profit from her declaration to run...

There was a TV show once called "People say the darndest things". You still haven't answered any of my questions.

Where is the dirt you have on her to say she is just a shameless promoter? C'mon, did she buy her way on Cavuto's

show? That's a bit too cynical. He has a broad spectrum of the business community on his show, to place him

in the category of Beck. Always an angle, nonsense.

[JG55]

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Didn't something similar happen after the first bailout in the Bush waning years? May be remembering it wrong, but IIRC the market was wobbling and holding its own thru a couple weeks debate with Paulson and others saying the sky will fall unless we bail it out. But then after they finally passed the bailout, the bottom dropped out right afterwards. IIRC there was a Bush speech about that time where the market was ticking down for the whole time he was talking.

Not blaming Bush. Just sayin maybe the politicians mistake the factors that politicians think will worry investors.

Lester, if you are referring to 08, that is what happened, then.