JimBob2232

I guess it makes sense...but I cant imagine having an ambulance on call for me 24 hours a day.

Yeah, I heard that too. I was yelling at the tv "you idiot, he threw it up for grabs into the field of play, thats NOT what he needs to do more of" Then McGuire proceeded to echo my comments. Funny stuff.

Ahh...start the evening with an aventinus, end it with a boddingtons ( <--Beer Snob)

He is....if he remembers to do it.

How can they not have this game in HD?

1) "that would be bad" is not a technical reason. I shell out 30% of my salary to make a mortgage payment. This isnt including my car loan or my student loans. Does this mean I have too much debt, and am having deep financial dificulties? Furthermore, should I not own a house, car or have an education? 2) Interest rates are (or were) at historic lows. This means we are replacing high interest debt with lower interest debt (in most cases) This is like refinancing your 12% home loan for 6%. Hardly seems like a bad situation.

I think alot of what i have posted here has been misinterperrete, so I'll take it in stride. I am not trying to make the point that bush is wonderful. He is not. I am trying to make the point that democrats have no clue what they are talking about, and trip over their own feet to make bush look worse than he actually is, especially when it comes to the economy. I only injected it into the conversation in relation to what I have heard some democrats say. My retort to you was not directed (necessarily) at you, but to anyone who says the deficit is too big. Give me proof, or else I cant take you seriously. Reserve board policy plays a role, no doubt. But stimulating economic growth is just one aspect of the reserve board. They have to carefully weigh what each move will do to inflationary pressures and unemployment. To rely on the reserve board to stimulate the economy is a poor decision, though they do have that effect. Case in point, rates are going up pretty fast right now. They are going up in an attempt to protect against inflationary pressures. While the economy is improving on its own, its not in a position where we need to stifle its growth. Oh, and as far as cutting rates further goes..the federal funds rate was sitting pretty at 1.0 pecent. Cant really go much lower! Not at all my point. Anyone well versed in stock market fundementals knows that there is a rate of growth that can be sustained. When companies start selling for 100 times earnings (or more!), or stocks go through the roof based on the anticipation of unsubstainable future earnings, there are problems. This is what happened in the 90s, and (nobody wants to hear this), but its what is happening with real estate now. This is an interesting question you are asking. I would think someone with as strong views and opinions on the economy and monetary policy would at least have an understanding of overall stock market valuation. That said, stock market valuation analysis is done by many investors. Each one takes the same data and comes to a conclusion. Conclusions vary by investor. One common indication is S&P500 PE Ratios, which averaged around 16 between 1950 and 2000. During the bubble it got up near 40, which indicates a drastically overvalued stock market, and should have been a warning sign to all. At present it is back in the 15-16 range. Of course, this is just one indication of a fairly valued stock market, but it is an important one. My personal opinion and analysis says the market is fairly valued right now, but as I said earlier, there are probably 1000 economists who disagree with me. It should be said that typically momentum will shift the market to an oversold condition prior to turning around. Not sure that is the case here...as downward momentum has slowed...but time will tell. The president does have some effect long term. But very little short term effect. I tend to agree with you on this. But remember between when he took office and Oct 2003, we had 911, Enron, Global Crossing, Worldcom, Tyco, etc. etc. Thats a big pill to swallow for an economy already in a recession.

They let him take the 5 second penalty and he finished 4th. Without the 5 second penalty, he would have won by 2-3 seconds. Basically, if he tried to push the sled, and did an average job (average compared to the linemen and backs in the competition), he would have won.

No. He did a half a$$ed job. Its like the guy who is driving drunk down the highway at 90mph without a seatbelt on. Now, he has started wearing a seatbelt, but he is still plastered and driving 90. Maybe he's a little better off than he was, but he's still an idioit, even though I think putting his seatbelt on was a good move. 1) Give me a technical reason why the federal deficit, at its current level, is bad. I cant make the case that it is good either, so dont ask me to, but show me its bad, or dont inject it into the conversation. 2) Federal Revenue has dramatically increased over the last several years, so im not sure how you can somehow say that the tax cut, which drove the revenue increase, is causing the deficit to soar. What goes up, must come down. The stock market was overvalued. It is now, by most accounts, fairly valued again and can resume its normal growth, dependant on the economy. My point was not how good bush's stock market is, because its not. But my point was that its not as bad as most people think. Most people on the street think the stock market took a drastic nose dive under bush. This is untrue.

Fastest man competition coming up after the commercial. GO MORM!

That was awsome! what was his time? With the 5 second penalty, I wouldnt be suprised if he would have won this thing!

For what its worth http://www.economagic.com/gif/g70016108701...73046489953.gif With the exception of 1997-2001, the unemployement rate is the lowest it has been since 1974.

Economists never know what they want. For every economist who says one thing, i am sure i can find 10,000 who will say the opposite. Not discrediting this particular economist, just making an observation in general. For what its worth, i think you are correct though. Outsourcing is greatly overstated. It makes for good political banter. But because its overstated does not mean its not a problem. Companies exist for one reason: To make money for their stakeholders. If you can agree with that premise, then there is only one reason to move outside the United States...to make more money. In many cases, companies are setting up shop outside the US to gain a competitive advantage there. (i.e. dont need to worry about shipping products from NY to China if you have a manufacturing plant in china). This is fine, and good for the us. The other reason to move, is that it is simply too expensive to do business in the united states, and therefore they pick up shop and go somewhere else. You see this in New York. Look at Kodak, Xerox, General Electric, B&L etc, etc. New York is killing corporations (and individuals) with taxation. As a result, they are moving to southern states, or offshore where it is cheaper.

I may be wrong, but I dont think you will see many june 1 cuts this year. With the CBA expiring, you can no longer spread dead cap money over multiple seasons. Someone correct me if i am wrong.

It doesnt...In fact i am not sure it IS even meaningful (because therea re alot of wraning signs in our economy)..but the point of my original post was to see how liberal kool-aid drinkers could justify a tax cut + bad enonomy = surplus.

It does if we are overtaxed as a society. Which we are. Cutting taxes on corporations (and those who own them....) allows them to invest more of their money back into their product. This results in higher income for the corporation, and a higher dollar amount of taxes paid. It also means, Mexico and other countries are not as attractive an option to avoid paying taxes. You have to understand one key thing. We tax income in this country, not wealth. The millionaire with 50k in income pays the same amount of taxes as the guy making 50k down the street. (all else being equal). The guy making 50k is probably not going to be saving alot of money. He is going to be spending most of his 50k. A 10% tax cut might give him an extra 500 bucks in disposable income a year, so he has that extra 500 bucks to spur the economy. But the guy with 1,000,000 in the bank looks at that 10% cut in income tax rate, and decides, maybe its time to open a small business, hire some employees, and ALL of that is new revenue to the government, including the multiplier effect. The same is true for massive corporations. The cut in taxes encourages them to invest in new ventures. I hear what you are saying however. We are not discouraging companies from moving offshore. There are 2 big reasons companies are outsourcing. 1) Taxes are killing them, and other countries offer much needed tax relief and profitibliity and 2) They want to be closer to growing markets and gain a competitive advantage. #1 is a problem, #2 is understandable and should be good. However, im not sure how you can say, with our current tax structure, tax cuts for "the rich" causes alot of money to go offshore, while tax cuts for the "middle class" causes the money to stay here, when we have already established the problem is too many companies are moving offshore. I hate this tax cut for the rich nonsense, beacause thats all it is. Nonsense. 10% of a million dollars is alot more than 10% of 50k, agreed, but its still 10%. Get over it. Its not fair that the "rich" pay a greater percentage to start off with, but thats another discussion. Define rich for me anyway...

Per ESPN

Yeh, if your house has lost value over the last 5 years...wow... But like all things that go up, they must come down. Housing is no different. The stock market crash of 2000 was bound to happen. Market fundementals dictated it. People thought "its a new economy, cant happen here" and got burned. Housing is the same way. It went up too fast for too long. Now, there will be some resistance to lowering prices, unlike the stock market, due to people not wanting to sell their personal residence for a loss, but investors, and people who foolishly took out ARMs they cant afford...its going to get ugly.

Yep. Completely agree here. Although, Its hard to say where that point is for the government. People alot smarter than me need to make that call. If I make 50k a year, and have a 225k mortgage and a 25k car loan, im 250k in debt, 5 times my anual income. if the government brings in 2.5T, is it reasonable to assume they can also support 5 times their annual income, or 12.5T in debt? If so, is 8T really a problem? And how much of a benefit are we derriving by carrying this debt? I cant make that call, its an interesting debate though.

First of all...its here, a reuters news story http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle....OCKS.xml&rpc=23 Second of all, why, if it appears on drudge, is it wrong? Would a bloomberg story make it more believeable to you? http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=100...id=aYuRPT2vssbU As for Bob Lamb, I have no idea where you were taugh economics, but I know where I got my MBA from, and its apparent you are not familiar with the term "economies of scale"...but I'll let that slide. I also know, that my job entails managing the finances of a 350 million dollar budget for the federal government. It is a VERY complicated thing to do, and its not even a measurable portion of the 2.5 trillion dollar federal budget. So yes, balancing the budget is extremely difficult, but that doesnt mean we shouldnt try to do it. Actually Bob, I have no idea what points you are even trying to make. Goverment can print all the money it wants (as if that solves the problem), Wall street earnings disppointing, sales tax increase affecting a ford plant...Where are you going with all this? So...let me see here. Corporations pay taxes quarterly..so January, April, July, October. So those must all be buget surplus months. People are still paying income taxes in February and March, so those must be surplus months too. So now we are up to 6 months out of the year being "expected" surplus months? Come on. In fact, i dont know the exact numbers, but I would suspect the government pays out more money than it recieves due to personal income tax filings each year. Regardless, the final budget number is completly independant of how much funds are recouped by taxpayers. It very well may. Bush has not been the best president for the economy. I applaud him on cutting taxes. We need to cut taxes WAY MORE. But we have to address the growing problems with outsourcing, trade deficits national debt servicing, and (what I think, is going to really kill us here soon), inflation. IF the economy is a house of cards as you predict, and it comes crashing down, its not because of what bush did, its what he didnt do, which he is equally responsible for. Again, I dont have a problem with people critizing bush. There are 1000 good reasons to do so. But when people jump on the wrong issues and show their ignorance, and make fools out of themselves, thats where I draw the line.

Assuming paying off the debt is actually a good thing..but I wont get into that philosophical debate right now.

We have been down this road before, and I dont think I need to rehash the discussion, except to say that you and I agree on alot of issues. For all Bush's flaws (and lord knows there is alot of them), the two that he has done a good job with, IMO, is the war on terror and cutting taxes. Unfortunatly the first was done with bad evidence, and without a proper plan for keeping the peace and the second was not done in conjunction with a sound fiscal policy. HOWEVER...Im sick of hearing how bad bush's economy is...and I take every chance I can get to dispute this fact. Bush is accused of lying all the time, but how is it democrats keep coming up with reasons bush is bad that are disputed left and right (no pun intended) 1) The federal deficit is too large 2) The large deficit is due to cutting taxes 3) The large deficit is due to the poor economy 4) The large deficit is due to increased federal spending 5) The poor economy is bush's fault 6) The stock market is horrible under bush etc. etc. ANYTHING to blame bush BUT 1) The economy is not bad 2) The stock market is where it was when clinton left office 3) Now, we are running a surplus And I still want a lib who believes this nonsense to explain to me how cutting taxes and increasing federal spending can lead to a budget surplus. I think this little exersise might go a long way toward causing you to realize how things really work and not how the democratic talking points want you to think.

Did Sherman interview?

Yep. Thats right. A SURPLUS. So...spending is up, taxes are down, the economy is in the tank, we are fighting too many wars which are costing us way too much money, and we run a buget surplus. Chew on that one for a while liberals... I cant wait to hear the rationale for this!

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle....OCKS.xml&rpc=23 Hmm... "The U.S. budget registered a surprisingly big surplus of $20.99 billion in January as strong receipts outweighed spending, a Treasury Department report showed. " interesting.........now what were you saying about large buget deficits...