The economy crisis is not only on TV, recently I heard of some layoff stories from my friends. Can Obama save the world?
not till January (inauguration).. at this point, Bush is still president, and in charge of whatever should be done. But at the rate things are going down.. kind of scary to be in this "twilight zone" between presidents. Hope Obama has a miracle up his sleeve by inauguration day...
I don't know... it is really scary the way things are going. My husband and I were talking about the layoffs around the country this weekend. I saw last night that shelters are saying they are having quite an increase of people coming to shelters for food.
Let's face it.. It is going to be a hard task to stop the nosedive we seem to be in.
But, Obama seems to be assembling a very smart group around him.
By DAVID BROOKS
Jan. 20, 2009, will be a historic day. Barack Obama (Columbia, Harvard Law) will take the oath of office as his wife, Michelle (Princeton, Harvard Law), looks on proudly. Nearby, his foreign policy advisers will stand beaming, including perhaps Hillary Clinton (Wellesley, Yale Law), Jim Steinberg (Harvard, Yale Law) and Susan Rice (Stanford, Oxford D. Phil.).
The domestic policy team will be there, too, including Jason Furman (Harvard, Harvard Ph.D.), Austan Goolsbee (Yale, M.I.T. Ph.D.), Blair Levin (Yale, Yale Law), Peter Orszag (Princeton, London School of Economics Ph.D.) and, of course, the White House Counsel Greg Craig (Harvard, Yale Law).
This truly will be an administration that looks like America, or at least that slice of America that got double 800s on their SATs. Even more than past administrations, this will be a valedictocracy — rule by those who graduate first in their high school classes. If a foreign enemy attacks the United States during the Harvard-Yale game any time over the next four years, we’re screwed.
Already the culture of the Obama administration is coming into focus. Its members are twice as smart as the poor reporters who have to cover them, three times if you include the columnists. They typically served in the Clinton administration and then, like Cincinnatus, retreated to the comforts of private life — that is, if Cincinnatus had worked at Goldman Sachs, Williams & Connolly or the Brookings Institution. So many of them send their kids to Georgetown Day School, the posh leftish private school in D.C., that they’ll be able to hold White House staff meetings in the carpool line.
And yet as much as I want to resent these overeducated Achievatrons (not to mention the incursion of a French-style government dominated by highly trained Enarchs), I find myself tremendously impressed by the Obama transition.
The fact that they can already leak one big appointee per day is testimony to an awful lot of expert staff work. Unlike past Democratic administrations, they are not just handing out jobs to the hacks approved by the favored interest groups. They’re thinking holistically — there’s a nice balance of policy wonks, governors and legislators. They’re also thinking strategically. As Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute notes, it was smart to name Tom Daschle both the head of Health and Human Services and the health czar. Splitting those duties up, as Bill Clinton did, leads to all sorts of conflicts.
Most of all, they are picking Washington insiders. Or to be more precise, they are picking the best of the Washington insiders.
Obama seems to have dispensed with the romantic and failed notion that you need inexperienced “fresh faces” to change things. After all, it was L.B.J. who passed the Civil Rights Act. Moreover, because he is so young, Obama is not bringing along an insular coterie of lifelong aides who depend upon him for their well-being.
As a result, the team he has announced so far is more impressive than any other in recent memory. One may not agree with them on everything or even most things, but a few things are indisputably true.
First, these are open-minded individuals who are persuadable by evidence. Orszag, who will probably be budget director, is trusted by Republicans and Democrats for his honest presentation of the facts.
Second, they are admired professionals. Conservative legal experts have a high regard for the probable attorney general, Eric Holder, despite the business over the Marc Rich pardon.
Third, they are not excessively partisan. Obama signaled that he means to live up to his postpartisan rhetoric by letting Joe Lieberman keep his committee chairmanship.
Fourth, they are not ideological. The economic advisers, Furman and Goolsbee, are moderate and thoughtful Democrats. Hillary Clinton at State is problematic, mostly because nobody has a role for her husband. But, as she has demonstrated in the Senate, her foreign-policy views are hardheaded and pragmatic. (It would be great to see her set of interests complemented by Samantha Power’s set of interests at the U.N.)
Finally, there are many people on this team with practical creativity. Any think tanker can come up with broad doctrines, but it is rare to find people who can give the president a list of concrete steps he can do day by day to advance American interests. Dennis Ross, who advised Obama during the campaign, is the best I’ve ever seen at this, but Rahm Emanuel also has this capacity, as does Craig and legislative liaison Phil Schiliro.
Believe me, I’m trying not to join in the vast, heaving O-phoria now sweeping the coastal haute bourgeoisie. But the personnel decisions have been superb. The events of the past two weeks should be reassuring to anybody who feared that Obama would veer to the left or would suffer self-inflicted wounds because of his inexperience. He’s off to a start that nearly justifies the hype.
so, I pray Obama can pull a rabbit out the hat.
What worries me is can the budget ever be balanced again after all the bailouts... I think only if the bailouts actually turn the economy around.. and that doesn't seem to be happening.
I think that to ask one American president to "save the economy" is an impossible feat.
This is an international crisis and although some things may be able to be done on the US front many nations will have to step up to the plate with some creative problem solving.
I think there is a great opportunity to "re-tool" the worlds national financial system and a lot of people with skill and vision are needed
Its really obvious to most of the world that the rampant materialism and our current concept of progress, which is always more consumption and more construction is not a pathway to a sustainable planet that include life forms as we currently are accustom to, especially that of humans.
I think we are headed to a type of death and decay of a paradigm for society, culture and survival. Out of death comes the opportunity for rebirth.
Just what will be born we cannot say yet but we must remain vigilent that what ever comes is ethical, sustainable and promotes the overall freedom of humanity through a democratic system.
I do think that capitalism as we have known it is going to decline and other systems of economy will move to the forefront.
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�God is the basis of life, life is the basis of energy, energy is the basis of matter.�... Carey Reams
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I think Obama could be the turning point. If he can make people gaining back some confidence, many people would be more willing to spend money, and consumption will stimulate the economy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Arrowwind09
I do think that capitalism as we have known it is going to decline and other systems of economy will move to the forefront.
Probably the economy will be more healthy. Stock investors shouldn't be the richest people in the world.
The economy crisis is not only on TV, recently I heard of some layoff stories from my friends. Can Obama save the world?
No! But if McCain was elected neither could he. The president has every little control of the economy he can stand up and make eloquent speeches but that is about it. This down-turn was predicted over a year ago by people in the know, those who took the time to actually look at what was really going on, of course at that time they were considered kooks. Current predictions say it is going to get worse before getting better.
The current problem was in the works for a long time and started when banks were allowed/forced to make high risk personal loans. This was done under the guise of supposedly helping the �little people�, naturally with help like this one does not need enemies. The next shoe to fall in this soap opera is if commercial loans start to fail. Take the auto industry for example if that happens we are talking some really big dollars. How much and for how long can government money be poured into them if no one is buying their cars?
The bankers and people that really control the world have built this house of cards and now they are knocking it down. The result of this is that they will have the average citizen running around screaming �do something, anything, just save us� and I would suspect that these fine folks already have a plan ready to go. Naturally this plan will require some small sacrifices to be made such as the individual giving up some of their basic rights and freedoms thus concentrating more and more power in the hands of fewer and fewer people. The eventual goal being that there should only be two classes of people the elite and the workers with the only job for the workers being to keep the elite fat and happy.
On the other hand if this power grab becomes so blatantly obvious that even the most diehard skeptics can no longer deny its existence then maybe the people will rise up and demand a real change. Hopefully by then it will not be too late.
Obama is surrounding himself with the same people that caused all the problems in the first place. The same people who advised Clinton and Bush, and even some of the wall street "losers".
I think people are in for a big disappointment.
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Let Food Be Your Medicine And Medicine Be Your Food.(Hippocrates)
He is putting action people around him that will do what they are told to do.
Really, some quite brilliant people within their fields.
You need to put some folks in there that know what has happened and why it happened to help figure the way out. So far none of CNN's most wanted for the financial collapse though.
The period of deregulation is about to end.
And really, a number of new faces are coming in as advisors. You have to understand that people placed in the head of departments are there to do the presidents bidding not their own. Obama is a lot smarter than Bush, and he will not be letting them run the show. The errors of the Clinton administration will be rectified.
But still, it may not be enough to save us from a depression. A whole new economic system must be designed and then interfaced or accepted by the world at large. Either way, I think we, as an economic force will go down for a time.
So, I store food, and prepare for the worst. When the inner cities deteriorate the people will start roaming with guns and brutality, just to survive. If it gets really bad we will have our own military turned on us to hold social order
So, I store food, and prepare for the worst. When the inner cities deteriorate the people will start roaming with guns and brutality, just to survive. If it gets really bad we will have our own military turned on us to hold social order
It's really hard to believe it could be so bad. Have you been in similar situation before?
It's really hard to believe it could be so bad. Have you been in similar situation before?
Well, its not that bad yet, but many are thinking that it might get that way. How to predict? Better to be prepared.
And when you think of the inner city and how bad it is already for folks there who work minimum wage jobs and have no education etc etc. who can say what will happen. In the US, unlike some foreign countries, minimum wage will not even hardly pay the rent, never mind eat, have a car, health insurance, etc.
Right now a lot is hinging on the big 3 auto companies, if they will make it or not. If they go down about 3 million jobs will be lost and whole towns devastated and these are not poor or even lowly educated folks. they are middle class. Most middle class here can barely get by over 3 months without a job. Its pretty scary.
President Elect Obama has been having news conferences almost daily this week and from what he says it is likely to get very bad even if we can curtail somehow the worst. Words used to describe the worst are "horrible" "terrible" like the great depression, perhaps worse. It could be worse due to our increased population and more people's general disconnect from the land. How do you plant a garden if you live in Brooklyn or South Chicago in the projects? or in any apartment complex, really?
Now, the Great Depression here in the US was particularly bad due to extreme weather conditions called the Dust Bowel with made everything worse due to agricultural collapse. Now we are not seeing that coming but what if all the farmers can't get loans as they usually do in the spring to get production underway? I suppose they will just print some more money for them too. who knows?
Harry your idea is a very good one regarding the charities. I think I will talk about it over thanks giving with the family.
Last edited by Arrowwind09; 11-25-2008 at 07:39 PM.
Some 691,000 children went hungry in America sometime in 2007, while close to one in eight Americans struggled to feed themselves adequately even before this year’s sharp economic downturn, the Agriculture Department reported Monday.
I always have a hard time coming up with gift ideas (for myself). So, this year, instead of trying to come up with things that I don't really need, I asked my "Secret Santa" partner to simply make a charitable donation on my behalf.
I decided on a charity that appears to be reputable and efficient. If anyone likes this idea and would like to adopt it ... please do so. I wish I had been doing this for many years. But, sadly, this is my first.
Economy Getting Worse?
Hybrid Mode
