Where Have All the Lefties Gone?

[DC Tom]

Interesting...

 

Why? I've been saying the same thing for a while. Most people mistook that as support for the Bush administration...but that doesn't make my statement interesting, it makes their assumption asinine.

[John Adams]

NPR is far, far better than most. Which might not be saying much...

 

I've told this story before but it's worth retelling. In 2004, a friend of ours worked for the Kerry campaign. On election night, she was travelling and listening to NPR's election coverage. She called us up proud that it looked like Kerry was going to win...my wife laughed at her and told her that every network had already called the election for Bush.

 

NPR is absurdly liberal. I like the station because they dive deep on stories but it's still liberal. And Terry Gross is the 2nd best interviewer alive (behind Howard Stern).

[GG]

Of course. The economy pretty much does whatever the hell it wants. The President has little, if any, control over it.

 

This is where I disagree. In normal circumstances, POTUS doesn't have as much impact on hiring and the economy chugs along. But when you have a once in a lifetime POTUS who has inserted his administration into private business like few have and there is a huge uncertainty over future regulations and taxes, you bet that this is causing many to hold off.

 

Part of it is push and pull. You haven't had the natural rebound in spending and purchases as people are concerned about jobs, while jobs aren't coming because companies are still squeezing out maximum productivity out of their workers. Soon, you'll run out of productivity gains and will have to resume hiring. But the fear is that the hiring pickup will be modest because of all the uncertainty and you won't really dent the 10% unemployment figure.

 

On the other hand, if you remove the uncertainty, but that finality says that your costs of doing business will be high, then you will compensate by hiring less people. The net result is a European model of perpetually low growth high unemployment state.

 

So yeah, in this case it's the President.

[IDBillzFan]

So yeah, in this case it's the President.

Interesting local story here. Orange County is loaded with small business owners, and while it's a small snapshot, I do believe it's a good example of what small businesses are sensing.

 

Jorgenson said, “I want to believe him but at the same time he talks about creating jobs, he’s pushing health care that will kill business. When the first bill came out I calculated its impact on my business and it would cost me $60,000 to $80,000 more a year…Such proposals make any business owner afraid.”

 

“Reducing capital gains taxes and extending write-offs of capital spending are needed steps,” said Raymond Keating, chief economist for the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council. “Unfortunately, the President’s ideas here are targeted, temporary and conflicted. The economy needs substantive, permanent tax relief that boosts incentives for entrepreneurship and investment. For example, permanently reducing individual and corporate capital gains tax rates to 10% and indexing gains for inflation, and offering all businesses the write-off option would make sense.”

[KD in CA]

Not with our business. We deal with clinical trials sites and private practice clinics. 'Shackled by excuses' was slightly tongue-in-cheek. I understand that there are small businesses that are struggling. Nobody said it's supposed to be easy though. We are thriving through hard work, good timing and good ideas. The American Dream if you will.

 

I thought union membership and free healthcare was the American dream?

[Wacka]

erynthered, Wacka and others I may have purposely blocked out of my mind have just not been living up to the hype lately.

 

I have read most of the stuff here, but it's been boring recently. Connor hasn't posted enough.

 

I have been spending most of my time on the internets attacking creationists on a conservative site I frequent. I am a conservative scientist and these creationists are like the conservative version of Conner. Total whack jobs. One guy spams the board with articles equating evolution with Nazis, Communuists, and worst of all Liberals. He admitted to not taking a single science course in college, but argues with PhDs that he is right. Others believe the sun goes around the earth and that appendicitis can be prevented with prayer. Much more entertaining.

[John Adams]

I have read most of the stuff here, but it's been boring recently. Connor hasn't posted enough.

 

I have been spending most of my time on the internets attacking creationists on a conservative site I frequent. I am a conservative scientist and these creationists are like the conservative version of Conner. Total whack jobs. One guy spams the board with articles equating evolution with Nazis, Communuists, and worst of all Liberals. He admitted to not taking a single science course in college, but argues with PhDs that he is right. Others believe the sun goes around the earth and that appendicitis can be prevented with prayer. Much more entertaining.

 

You're our version of them.

[Chef Jim]

You're our version of them.

 

Every group should have one.

[IDBillzFan]

He admitted to not taking a single science course in college, but argues with PhDs that he is right.

Does he reference Bill Nye a lot?

[Wacka]

No, just the bible. There's another kook who says the reasons the dinosaurs were so big was that the earth had lower gravity due to Saturn sitting over the north pole . I am not kidding.

[Magox]

No, just the bible. There's another kook who says the reasons the dinosaurs were so big was that the earth had lower gravity due to Saturn sitting over the north pole . I am not kidding.

[DC Tom]

No, just the bible. There's another kook who says the reasons the dinosaurs were so big was that the earth had lower gravity due to Saturn sitting over the north pole . I am not kidding.

 

"Screw Newtonian mechanics...it's not in Genesis. So Saturn can do whatever the !@#$ it wants."

 

What. The. !@#$ing. Hell. I don't suppose this kook also thinks triceratops were truculent sand-eaters, or statistical distributions are caused by error?

[blzrul]

If you don't understand how Obama has absolutely paralysed the desire of small businesses to hire, there is little I can do to help you. While some companies are still on pretty solid ground, they REFUSE to expand their staffs until they know how much they're going to have to shell out next year for health care costs and, possibly, cap-n-trade. Obama is desperate to jump start the hiring, but he refuses to listen to the very people who actually do the hiring. He thinks offering small businesses pennies as an incentive to hire is the answer, and the small business world is laughing at him.

 

Our unemployment rate will very likely sit still at 10% for quite a while, and his threats of excessive spending are one of the biggest contributors to this. If he keeps doing what he's doing, you will see his failure front and center in less than a year. It's going to be very, very scary for a lot of people.

 

But hey...I'm sure your cubicle is safe, so everything looks rosy to you.

Uh I think it was the financial meltdown, frozen credit AND the Bush recession that made almost EVERY business afraid to hire. That predated Obama and in fact many of the HUGE job losses all took place before Obama took office. Certainly job losses continued.

 

I too wish he - or anyone for that matter - had a magic wand to fix things immediately. Alas it's not to be. Fortunately he's got a big bucket, a shovel, a broom and all the will in the world to clean up the mess left by those fiscally-responsible compassionate conservatives who brought us war and near-financial disaster.

[DC Tom]

Uh I think it was the financial meltdown, frozen credit AND the Bush recession

 

Those are pretty much the same thing, actually.

 

And LA has a very valid point. My company's growing, revenue-wise, but hiring isn't keeping pace because of current conditions, not past ones.

[erynthered]

As opposed to how the economy, jobs, war, gitmo, etc......... are all his fault. If only those lefties had some perspective.

 

 

Not all his fault. But him and his administration are not helping the cause either. Wouldnt you say?

[erynthered]

I've told this story before but it's worth retelling. In 2004, a friend of ours worked for the Kerry campaign. On election night, she was travelling and listening to NPR's election coverage. She called us up proud that it looked like Kerry was going to win...my wife laughed at her and told her that every network had already called the election for Bush.

 

NPR is absurdly liberal. I like the station because they dive deep on stories but it's still liberal. And Terry Gross is the 2nd best interviewer alive (behind Howard Stern).

 

 

Thank you.

[/dev/null]

"Screw Newtonian mechanics...it's not in Genesis. So Saturn can do whatever the !@#$ it wants."

 

Of course Saturn can do whatever the !@#$ it wants.

 

He was the father of Jupiter who pretty much did whatever he wanted, but Jupiter still had to eat his vegetables and go to bed when Saturn told him

[Chef Jim]

Uh I think it was the financial meltdown, frozen credit AND the Bush recession that made almost EVERY business afraid to hire. That predated Obama and in fact many of the HUGE job losses all took place before Obama took office. Certainly job losses continued.

 

I too wish he - or anyone for that matter - had a magic wand to fix things immediately. Alas it's not to be. Fortunately he's got a big bucket, a shovel, a broom and all the will in the world to clean up the mess left by those fiscally-responsible compassionate conservatives who brought us war and near-financial disaster.

 

Hmmm, let's see. If the conservatives left the recession for Obama to clean up, who left the one for Bush to clean up?

[erynthered]

Hmmm, let's see. If the conservatives left the recession for Obama to clean up, who left the one for Bush to clean up?

 

 

It wasnt from true conservatives. Wannabe lying through there !@#$ing teeth spend money they dont have like the democrats do conservatives, yes.

[IDBillzFan]

Those are pretty much the same thing, actually.

 

And LA has a very valid point. My company's growing, revenue-wise, but hiring isn't keeping pace because of current conditions, not past ones.

My point exactly. I think liberals believe that every time Obama blames Bush, a delta smelt gets its wings, but while small business owners may recognize what got us here, they're more interested in what is going to get us out as soon as possible. If Obama was going to spend his first year blaming Bush for leaving him a schitstorm, why the hell did he run for president? Because it comes with a nice house?

 

Obama (and his staff's) embarrassingly laughable lack of corporate experience is so freaking obvious to any decent business person, and yet a liberal will yell over and over "But Bush brought us here," and that's the problem. Every succeesful business person I have ever met believed, at the very least, in one simple problem-solving truth: "Never mind the storms at sea. Let's get the ship in."

 

But not Obama. And not his staff. Oh, no. Screw the ship. It's probably gonna sink, anyway. Let's complain about the storm in case someone survives to tell the story.

 

Ginormous pusssssssy of the nth degree.

 

If you've read this far, I'll add one more bit of speculation: remember when TV writers went on strike? Remember what happened? In the face of adversity, TV re-invented its content, and to this day absolutely NOTHING draws an audience and ad dollars like a reality show featuring a bunch of low-dollar chuckleheads from Blzrul, Nebraska. While Obama fumbles around with his ridiculous job plans, companies (like yours) are going to realize that maybe there's some value to maintaining size and revenue if it shows more consistency. So even if the temptation is there to grow, many companies probably won't. And the minute any current version of the health care reforms gets passed, you can bet your ass it won't change any time soon.

 

But hey, look. Another delta smelt just got its wings!!! Hurrah!!!