USDA's Adelstein Promises To Cut Broadband Waste The man has quite a job in front of him... Former FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein has left the FCC and is now in charge of doling out $2.5 billion in broadband subsidies via the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service. According to Adelstein, the government "can't afford to waste a dime of taxpayer money" in distributing its $2.5 billion to fund delivery of broadband. While the USDA program has done a world of good for some rural communities without broadband, the program also has a long history of waste and favoritism, like when a million dollars earmarked for rural broadband instead went to fund broadband in an upscale housing development in Tom Delay's district.
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Cheyenne, WY | Who is this clown trying to kid. Oh come on this is total BS. This money is going to go where it will help get some Democrat incumbant re-elected. The intended target will see very little of this money. Yes they are not going to waste a dime....on anything that might help a Repulican district, or any place else that didn't vote for Obama.
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kudos:4 |  Re: Who is this clown trying to kid.
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| | | | | | | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. Journalistic integrity has become an oxymoron. And by definition, a forum is where people can post their opinion. And if you've paid attention, most of the people in here know, and voiced their opinions, about the nepotism we see from Washington.
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| | | | | Facts have a liberal bias. Academic truth also has a liberal bias.
Spending money to jump-start an economy out of a recession is the basic foundation of Keynesian economics. It's sad that you can claim bias and propaganda of things while knowing so little about the economic or academic world. | |
| | | |  pnh102Reptiles Are Cuddly And PrettyPremium
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Mount Airy, MD | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. said by sonicmerlin:Spending money to jump-start an economy out of a recession is the basic foundation of Keynesian economics. Keynesian economic policies have never worked anywhere they've been tried. If they had, the Great Depression would have been the greatest expansions of GDP ever. More to the point, government continues to spend more and more money each year than the last year, why hasn't our economy made any recovery? Heck, why are we even in a recession to begin with even with the government spending more and more money every year.
This goes beyond the current administration. Government spending has gone up every year since, well, forever, and we've had recessions, depressions as well as economic growth and recovery. Given this constant, it is logically impossible as well as incorrect to conclude that the Keynesian approach of "just throwing money at it" has ever worked to bring about an economic recovery.
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| | | | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. said by pnh102:Keynesian economic policies have never worked anywhere they've been tried. If they had, the Great Depression would have been the greatest expansions of GDP ever. More to the point, government continues to spend more and more money each year than the last year, why hasn't our economy made any recovery? Heck, why are we even in a recession to begin with even with the government spending more and more money every year. This goes beyond the current administration. Government spending has gone up every year since, well, forever, and we've had recessions, depressions as well as economic growth and recovery. Given this constant, it is logically impossible as well as incorrect to conclude that the Keynesian approach of "just throwing money at it" has ever worked to bring about an economic recovery. »www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYV6lUwrwDs
Don't you realize Keynesian was just invented to justify welfare for the capitalists/rich/corporate world? | |
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4 edits | Your logic is based on flawed assumptions. Your most annoying fallacy is assuming that the object of Keynesian policy is to somehow eliminate recessions. Booms and busts are the natural consequence of a capitalistic market. They are impossible to avoid, and are the consequence of a market in perpetual transition. Any economic policy the government pursues is meant to mitigate and smooth out those peaks and troughs, which decreases the length and severity of each recession.
At the time of the Great Depression, Keynesian economics was a relatively new and not fully understood concept by Western governments. FDR was not exactly the brightest of the bunch. I recall a story where FDR met John Keynes himself in his office to discuss Keynes' revolutionary new ideas, and after the meeting FDR commented how crazy Keynes sounded with all his "fancy math". In other words FDR didn't really understand Keynesian policy and didn't pursue it to its full extent.
To be fair, the New Deal actually did work for a while. The US began to recover from its massive recession, until a brand new recession wracked the market yet again in the mid '30s.
After WWII, however, Western governments *did* implement true classic, old-school Keynesian economics. This resulted in 2 decades of superlative growth. It wasn't until the late '60s and early '70s, in part due to the oil shock, that the old way of thinking was disbanded for "neo-Keynesian" economics.
As for your comments about the current recession, our economy has in fact stabilized. The recession has for the most part bottomed out. Although unemployment still lags behind, that has historically been the case in every recession.
Also, in your blind lamenting about increased "government spending", you completely disregard the annual increase in national GDP. More important than total money spent is % of GDP. Also key to government spending is *how* the money is spent. When the government throws away hundreds of billions on meaningless wars, and grants hundreds of billions in tax cuts to the already very rich, that is not going to help the country. | |
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2 edits | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. said by sonicmerlin:Your logic is based on flawed assumptions. What assumption is incorrect? It is a proven, irrefutable fact that nearly every year the US government spends more money than it did in the previous year. This is the root of Keynesian economics.
said by sonicmerlin: Your most annoying fallacy is assuming that the object of Keynesian policy is to somehow eliminate recessions. Really?
said by sonicmerlin:Spending money to jump-start an economy out of a recession is the basic foundation of Keynesian economics. In addition to your accurate description in your previous post, Wikipedia summarizes Keynesian economic polices as :
quote:
He [Keynes] advocated interventionist government policy, by which governments would use fiscal and monetary measures to mitigate the adverse effects of business cycles, economic recessions, and depressions.
said by sonicmerlin:Any economic policy the government pursues is meant to mitigate and smooth out those peaks and troughs, which decreases the length and severity of each recession. And again, the Great Depression is arguably the most blatant example of a spectacular failure of this ideology.
said by sonicmerlin:At the time of the Great Depression, Keynesian economics was a relatively new and not fully understood concept by Western governments. You're 100% correct. In fact, by the time of the Great Depression, the concept of laissez-faire economic policies had already been shown to be the quickest path for a society to create and build wealth.
said by sonicmerlin:In other words FDR didn't really understand Keynesian policy and didn't pursue it to its full extent. You would think the administrations that followed FDR would heed this advice.
said by sonicmerlin:To be fair, the New Deal actually did work for a while. The US began to recover from its massive recession, until a brand new recession wracked the market yet again in the mid '30s. That recession occurred when FDR raised taxes to attempt to reduce the debt he piled up to pay for his making the Depression Great.
said by sonicmerlin:After WWII, however, Western governments *did* implement true classic, old-school Keynesian economics. This resulted in 2 decades of superlative growth. Mainly because so much money was spent on reconstruction. If anything, you prove that Keynesian economics only works during or after a major war.
said by sonicmerlin: It wasn't until the late '60s and early '70s, in part due to the oil shock, that the old way of thinking was disbanded for "neo-Keynesian" economics. When JFK was president the top of his agenda was to lower taxes in the USA. This resulted in a strong economic growth.
said by sonicmerlin:As for your comments about the current recession, our economy has in fact stabilized. The recession has for the most part bottomed out. Meanwhile, job losses, foreclosures and economic shrinkage continues.
said by sonicmerlin:Also, in your blind lamenting about increased "government spending", you completely disregard the annual increase in national GDP. What annual increase? The GDP growth in 2008 was flat and so far in 2009 the GDP has sharply decreased.
said by sonicmerlin:When the government throws away hundreds of billions on meaningless wars, and grants hundreds of billions in tax cuts to the already very rich, that is not going to help the country. Yea. FDR was totally wrong to fight World War 2.
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| said by lesopp:This site has become too partisan and a huge waste of time for people seeking truth! People without a bit of journalistic integrity have earned the right to post articles, pimping their twisted point of view by linking to five (5) year old articles written by political hacks around election time. I'm a conservative O'Bama critic and I don't think DSLR is overtly partisan.
Since Inauguration,
I've seen many times more article references
that are critical of the O'Bama administration,
than of Republicans.
Bush bashers spent 8 years letting their hatred convert them into frothing insanity. That works for them because it's in general harmony with a mainstream liberal ideology. It won't work for mainstream conservatives and we'd best not travel down that road.
Conservatives exemplify themselves through superior reasoning and debate. What I'd offer is for you to find evidence of Democratic waste via the RUS and post it here to balance it out.
NV | |
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Mount Airy, MD | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. said by Noah Vail:I don't think DSLR is overtly partisan. Me neither. In fact, I've seen far more stories on this website that are critical of the current administration than in most other "news" sources.
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| | | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | said by Noah Vail:I'm a conservative O'Bama critic and I don't think DSLR is overtly partisan. ............................ Conservatives exemplify themselves through superior reasoning and debate. What I'd offer is for you to find evidence of Democratic waste via the RUS and post it here to balance it out. NV Conservatives don't exist anymore politically, only neo-cons do, with a faux image to lure legacy conservatives in. | |
| | | | | | | | | | Conservatives exemplify themselves through superior reasoning and debate. What I'd offer is for you to find evidence of Democratic waste via the RUS and post it here to balance it out.
Are. You. Kidding?
SERIOUSLY?!
So, "intelligent design", the banning of stem cell research, the incessant denials of global warming in the face of an academic consensus, wars in nations we have no business being in, hundreds of billions in tax cuts going to the rich (widening the gap between rich and poor), the ever-loving destruction of consumer rights, the slowest period of economic growth since forever, etc. etc. can be and *are* explained and argued reasonably by Conservatives???
I've seen white wannabe rappers appear on Fox News trying to act "hip". I've seen the most ridiculous and fallacious criticisms of nationalized healthcare the mind could even bear to watch. I've seen religious zealots try their best to prevent the concept of "evolution" from being taught in schools. Even on DSLR I've seen the most indefensible, illogical arguments made in defense of big business from the most conservative (apparently) of people.
And you want to argue conservatives have *superior* reasoning and debate skills? Are you freaking NUTS?
I could cite so many examples of the lunacy and narrow-mindedness of Republican zealots I couldn't even count them all.
I love, *absolutely love* a good debate. It's in my blood to argue and discuss, to point out logical flaws in others while shoring up my own arguments. But I CAN NOT tolerate discussing economics or politics with conservatives. Their entire mindset is set on one specific ideology, and nothing like real life or facts will change their minds.
I can't even tell you how many times I have facepalmed while listening to another conservative zealot scream about government socialism somehow resulting in a communist nation, as if the two are even remotely related. | |
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| | | Re: Who is this clown trying to kid. Let's try to keep the discussion on the topic of USDA waste, these "partisan ball" debates never really go anywhere... | |
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| | Good luck with that. Good luck with that. Yes, I know. My pessimism shines like a beacon. Granted the present track record, I think it is with good reason. | |
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King Of Prussia, PA | Old news? Is Tom Delay back in Congress?
Or are we dredging up old news? | |
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Mount Airy, MD | Epic Fail I just read a story about how PennDot spent a bunch of the pork money on road signs telling drivers that the pork bill was paying for road projects.
I wonder if USDA is going to do something similar.
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| | | | Re: Epic Fail We actually do need those signs. Rep Boner, the House minority leader, can't find any of the projects, including those in his own district. | |
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Santa Rosa, CA
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| said by pnh102:I just read a story about how PennDot spent a bunch of the pork money on road signs telling drivers that the pork bill was paying for road projects. I wonder if USDA is going to do something similar. What's wrong with the signs? They tell laypeople that the project is funded with stimulus dollars. All of my projects also have to have a sign. 4'x8' minimum.
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San Francisco, CA | Hmm... U.S. Dept. of Agriculture / Broadband Internet. Weird. | |
| | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | Re: Hmm... said by SLD:U.S. Dept. of Agriculture / Broadband Internet. Weird. USDA RUS is the successor to Rural Electrification Administration. And in a perfect, non corrupt, selfishless world, broadband would as available as electricity is in rural areas today. Too bad any efforts for the government to do any investments in social capital, without except, are always perverted into special interest pockets with no results.
AKA spend 100 million for a study for a 10 million construction project, then realize there is no money left in the appropriation to do the project. | |
| | | | | Re: Hmm... Right. I'd love a citation on that. I'd also like to point out the wealth of government spending that has been of great benefit to society, you know, without any citations. | |
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Noah VailSon made my AvatarPremium
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| Thanks for the confirmation. To patcat88; thanks for reinforcing my alluding to the link between negativity and leftism.
To sonicmerlin; I thank you for bringing some froth to the debate and illustrating how comfortable liberalism is with the shrillness that became Bush Hate.
To conservatives; this is what we have to rise above. Leave knee-jerk reactivity where we can see it belongs. If we are not better than Bush Haters, there isn't much point in hanging around.
NV
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I call it the Crapture. | |
| | | | Re: Thanks for the confirmation. To Noah Vall: Perpetually referring to a person's arguments as "froth" is a wonderful way to avoid the actual criticisms posited in said argument.
Throwing around ad-hominems is a great way to satisfy the limited sensibilities of the masses, but far from a reasonable way to handle a critical attack. If you actually disagree with my assertions, then by all means go ahead and provide an argument. | |
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| Re: Thanks for the confirmation. said by sonicmerlin:To Noah Vall: Perpetually referring to a person's arguments as "froth" is a wonderful way to avoid the actual criticisms posited in said argument.
Throwing around ad-hominems is a great way to satisfy the limited sensibilities of the masses, but far from a reasonable way to handle a critical attack. If you actually disagree with my assertions, then by all means go ahead and provide an argument. Traditionally, I do. This time I wanted fellow conservatives to step back and have a look at what we could become, if we allowed non-reasoning obsession to to rule our thinking.
You see, 8 years of observing folks who were beyond irrational with anxiety over Bush made me realize that my previous animosity toward Clinton was self-destructive.
I realize that Bush haters no longer have the ability to self-analyze, and are further crippled by the fact that unreasoning fury is a drug they can't put down.
I had an opportunity, in this thread, to highlight the first steps down that destructive road. I pointed out how losing objectivity can weaken our debate and was able to point out a bit of what we'd look like if we continued to let that happen.
We'll get into the minutiae of the painting, next time. This time I just wanted to step back and expound on the bigger picture.
Thanks!
NV
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| Helping Rural folks on DSL Most farmers (rural) are conservative (and thats an understatement). I dont see how they can help but put money either in rural areas or blatantly give it to a Liberal voter base (not rural, where it wasnt at all intended).
Also by the nature of Farmers, they live on the farm. Often WAY out in the boonies. Progressive farmers are very interested in high speed internet and most already have (satellite dsl or whatever else is available)
I would look for some crumbs given to the Satellite group, if they are serious about helping farmers (rural areas) out. | |
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1 edit | To pnh102 What annual increase? The GDP growth in 2008 was flat and so far in 2009 the GDP has sharply decreased.
You know very well I was responding to your lamentation of historically increased government spending year after year. Focusing on one or two exceptional years of spending is hardly a logical way to go about analyzing the causes and effects of government spending. No sane economist would do such a thing.
Mainly because so much money was spent on reconstruction. If anything, you prove that Keynesian economics only works during or after a major war.
That entire argument is so illogical I don't know where to begin. The war itself had little to no effect on America's infrastructure. The war took place *in Europe*. There was no "reconstruction" of America. Furthermore, government spending persisted for decades. The immediate effect of the war on the American economy would have faded away within 5 years. Why you would arbitrarily equate the prosperous decades with post-war spending is beyond me.
When JFK was president the top of his agenda was to lower taxes in the USA. This resulted in a strong economic growth.
And yet he followed Keynesian spending policies religiously. This is why he achieved the country's first non-war, non-recession deficit.
To put things in perspective, Kennedy's period of economic growth was extremely small. Furthermore, Lyndon B. Johnson passed the Revenue Act of 1964 which reduced individual income tax rates (the top rate fell from 91 percent to 70 percent) and, reduced the top corporate rate from 52 percent to 48 percent. Yet he was not able to replicate the outstanding GDP growth of the Kennedy years.
Meanwhile, job losses, foreclosures and economic shrinkage continues.
Sigh...rather than respond in kind, I prefer to just copy and paste.
From economy.com:
The global recession intensified in the first quarter of 2009, but the severity of the economic decline has abated in recent months. The aggressive and concerted monetary and fiscal stimulus has helped to shore up consumer and business confidence and has started to sow the seeds of recovery.
Back-to-back improvements in monthly business surveys and coincident indicators suggest a broad-based easing in the pace of contraction. A savage rundown in inventories in the final months of 2008 and the opening months of this year exacerbated the downturn as firms destocked at the expense of production. Although the global inventory drawdown is still in train, stockpiles are becoming lean in many countries; this has already helped restart some production lines and will eventually spur wider industrial demand. New manufacturing orders, a good proxy for demand, have rebounded slightly in recent months after falling at an alarming pace earlier in the year.
Your entire assessment of what caused the 2nd recession is completely wrong.
Let's review:
In 1937,
"Economists attribute economic growth so far to heavy government spending that is somewhat deficit. Roosevelt, however, fears an unbalanced budget and cuts spending for 1937. That summer, the nation plunges into another recession."
Also, do you realize that in 1934 Sweden was the first nation to recover fully from the Great Depression? It closely followed a policy of Keynesian deficit spending. | |
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