Cash for Clunkers Success

[Danzig]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32513705...s-white_house/


The Obama administration expects the federal deficit over the next decade to be $2 trillion bigger than previously estimated...


The new projection, to be announced on Tuesday, is for a cumulative 2010-2019 deficit of $9 trillion instead of the $7 trillion previously estimated. The new figure reflects slumping revenues from a worse economic picture than was expected earlier this year. The officials spoke only on the condition of anonymity ahead of next week's announcement.

...could create anxiety with foreign buyers of U.S. debt.


In its earlier projections, the White House said the deficit would be manageable if it slides to 3 percent of gross domestic product. Earlier projections barely met that standard — even after relying on optimistic assumptions like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan costing $50 billion a year instead of the $130 billion budgeted for 2010.

Now, the deficits could easily exceed 4 percent of GDP, even after cost-cutting efforts or new revenues claimed in Obama's budget.

Such deficits have always prompted Congress and the White House to take politically painful steps to curb them, such as former President Bill Clinton's tax-heavy 1993 deficit reduction plan. A companion effort by Obama could force him to break his promise to not raise taxes on individuals making less than $200,000 a year.

[dellinger63]

Originally Posted by Riot

Too bad "American" companies don't make an efficient, well-made car people preferred. You said you bought "foreign", so you supported them yourself.

Those 3000 American Hyundai workers are probably laughing all the way back to the bank, off the unemployment lines, too.

I bought one because of its warranty and reliability MPH 24 etc but I did it on my own w/o $3 f'n billion dollars and expenses for the snail paced Gov. workers or the $4,500 in my pocket. Smart people would have come to this like decision anyway and why this move (cash for clunkers) was like pushing a pawn in front of a king after your Queen was begot. That’s why the GM bail was the start of a bad gambler chasing a bridge jump.

OB now wants to expand Medicaid as part of the new step-by-step program? What about the 2/3 of the $$$$ you (talking to Riot) spoke about? We still haven't heard the sad stories of the poor guy who bought a car using the $4500 as a down payment and bought a vehicle for 20K that was 16K pre clunker money @ 25% interest and they'll somehow blame the dealers. Give it 200 days. Can't fix a clunker with parts or stupid with insurance. To try will nickle and dime and billion and trillion yourself to death.

[hi_im_god]

Originally Posted by dellinger63

I bought one because of its warranty and reliability MPH 24 etc but I did it on my own w/o $3 f'n billion dollars and expenses for the snail paced Gov. workers or the $4,500 in my pocket. Smart people would have come to this like decision anyway and why this move (cash for clunkers) was like pushing a pawn in front of a king after your Queen was begot. That’s why the GM bail was the start of a bad gambler chasing a bridge jump.

OB now wants to expand Medicaid as part of the new step-by-step program? What about the 2/3 of the $$$$ you (talking to Riot) spoke about? We still haven't heard the sad stories of the poor guy who bought a car using the $4500 as a down payment and bought a vehicle for 20K that was 16K pre clunker money @ 25% interest and they'll somehow blame the dealers. Give it 200 days. Can't fix a clunker with parts or stupid with insurance. To try will nickle and dime and billion and trillion yourself to death.

what?

chess? medicaid?

help me out here. what did you just say? in a nutshell please.

[dellinger63]

Originally Posted by hi_im_god

what?

chess? medicaid?

help me out here. what did you just say? in a nutshell please.

sorry was kind of meant for Riot but in a nutshell for you. OB should be treated like a spoiled wife on a endless shopping binge, take his credit cards away and keep him away from the wallet now. Maybe he could do what a lot of other politicians have done and get himself a girlfriend. That seems to ease the urge of giving others money away a bit.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by Riot

That article confirms that Cash for Clunkers was a resounding success. It retroactively comments on the execution, mostly based upon government underestimation of the popularity and success.

a resounding success? really, you sound like a high school cheerleader for obama and co. i hope you read the article i put up about whan is expected down the road from this temporary 'success'. we americans are so into now now now-and we continue to rack up debt for down the road.

[Riot]

Your article also says this:

"Earlier this week, the White House revealed that it expects a budget deficit for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30 to be nearly $1.6 trillion. That figure was lower than initially projected because the White House scratched out $250 billion that it had initially added to the budget as a bank rescue contingency. The administration ultimately did not ask Congress for that money."

It should be noted that 1.2 trillion of this years deficit of 1.6 trillion was from George Bush, and would be there no matter who the President is now. That leaves 4 billion for this year from Bush, and that 4 billion also includes routine overseas military spending on two wars not asked for by Bush in the budget (that's not the way it's done), but is necessary and approved year-to-year by Congress.

So this year, the current administration has already kept the budget low.

Complaints about debt were ignored when Bush took Clintons' massive budget reductions, that would have left us with no deficit if followed, and ignored them, placing us in massive debt via bad management, tax cuts, two wars.

Then due to the recession, Bush had to initiate TARP funding last fall. Although I agreed with TARP, I didn't care for his rushing it through and giving money away to the banks with virtually zero accountability, but that's what he did. He literally didn't seem to care, as he was leaving office.

Ignoring that this occured, or saying, "it's in the past" is silly, as it comprises virtually all the debt we have now as a country, and is what this and every future administration, no matter the political affiliation, will have to deal with until it's gone.

Bush passed Medicare drug spending recently and never funded it by finding the money anywhere - just added this program to the deficit with no worry about how we would pay for it.

TARP, Medicare - Bush didn't care about "pay as you go" or "zero-based budgeting", where you find money to pay for things before you spend it.

This President at least wants any health care reform to clearly be deficit neutral. That's a huge improvement already.

It's funny, the GOP has a rep for financial conservativism while in office, but looking back at the last 40 years or so, that's a false assumption - the Dems are the ones that spend less money during their terms.

Obama was elected partially, I suspect, as McCain's only comment on the economy was massive tax cuts and that he doesn't "get" the economy, and Obama is far more fiscally conservative than Hillary Clinton when they were discussing what they wanted to accomplish.

It's been very popular to attack the current President so early in his administration about "what might be", rather than what is. And what might be 10 years up the road with the deficit is a notoriously moveable number with unreliable predictability in the past.

I want massive healthcare reform in this country, as we should have gotten that years ago (one of the reasons I voted for Obama) - and then we'll see. Every penny spent on healthcare reform, in my eyes, is worth it for this country.

[Riot]

Originally Posted by dellinger63

sorry was kind of meant for Riot but in a nutshell for you. OB should be treated like a spoiled wife on a endless shopping binge, take his credit cards away and keep him away from the wallet now. Maybe he could do what a lot of other politicians have done and get himself a girlfriend. That seems to ease the urge of giving others money away a bit.

I don't much justification for this. He spent 3 billion on Clunkers (actually, he spent 1 billion, and Congress added another 2 billion), a program which has been greeted as an overwhelming success by the car industry, from top to bottom.

[Riot]

I am seriously clueless as to what you guys (Cannon, Dell, Zig) want done fiscally by any administration in power now. How about this:

No healthcare reform at all, no new programs at all.

Ignore the recession/depression, zero government interference.

That leaves us with the massive debt we were saddled with by Bush. How shall we pay for it? Income tax increases?

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

I am seriously clueless as to what you guys (Cannon, Dell, Zig) want done fiscally by any administration in power now. How about this:

No healthcare reform at all, no new programs at all.

Ignore the recession/depression, zero government interference.

That leaves us with the massive debt we were saddled with by Bush. How shall we pay for it? Income tax increases?

I believe we have stated what we want but you obviously havent comprehended any of it.

What you simply dont get is that the information that you quote is generally spoonfed without regard for reality. Healthcare reform isnt going to do anything positive for the economy and will almost assuredly become a huge, unsustainable govt disaster. The ironic part about the deficit is that even though Bush did a poor job with it, Obama is putting us so far further in debt that Bush will look like a miser soon. Spending money that one doesnt have isnt the answer to our problems either individually or as a country. Massive debt, huge govt, rising inflation...How is this going to end well?

The fact is that special interest groups rule the roost as usual and all of the things that you see as progress are absolutely the opposite. Obama is a anti-business, pro govt leftist. He is basically a cleaned up version of Hugo Chavez.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by Riot

Your article also says this:

"Earlier this week, the White House revealed that it expects a budget deficit for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30 to be nearly $1.6 trillion. That figure was lower than initially projected because the White House scratched out $250 billion that it had initially added to the budget as a bank rescue contingency. The administration ultimately did not ask Congress for that money."

It should be noted that 1.2 trillion of this years deficit of 1.6 trillion was from George Bush, and would be there no matter who the President is now. That leaves 4 billion for this year from Bush, and that 4 billion also includes routine overseas military spending on two wars not asked for by Bush in the budget (that's not the way it's done), but is necessary and approved year-to-year by Congress.

So this year, the current administration has already kept the budget low.

Complaints about debt were ignored when Bush took Clintons' massive budget reductions, that would have left us with no deficit if followed, and ignored them, placing us in massive debt via bad management, tax cuts, two wars.

Then due to the recession, Bush had to initiate TARP funding last fall. Although I agreed with TARP, I didn't care for his rushing it through and giving money away to the banks with virtually zero accountability, but that's what he did. He literally didn't seem to care, as he was leaving office.

Ignoring that this occured, or saying, "it's in the past" is silly, as it comprises virtually all the debt we have now as a country, and is what this and every future administration, no matter the political affiliation, will have to deal with until it's gone.

Bush passed Medicare drug spending recently and never funded it by finding the money anywhere - just added this program to the deficit with no worry about how we would pay for it.

TARP, Medicare - Bush didn't care about "pay as you go" or "zero-based budgeting", where you find money to pay for things before you spend it.

This President at least wants any health care reform to clearly be deficit neutral. That's a huge improvement already.

It's funny, the GOP has a rep for financial conservativism while in office, but looking back at the last 40 years or so, that's a false assumption - the Dems are the ones that spend less money during their terms.

Obama was elected partially, I suspect, as McCain's only comment on the economy was massive tax cuts and that he doesn't "get" the economy, and Obama is far more fiscally conservative than Hillary Clinton when they were discussing what they wanted to accomplish.

It's been very popular to attack the current President so early in his administration about "what might be", rather than what is. And what might be 10 years up the road with the deficit is a notoriously moveable number with unreliable predictability in the past.

I want massive healthcare reform in this country, as we should have gotten that years ago (one of the reasons I voted for Obama) - and then we'll see. Every penny spent on healthcare reform, in my eyes, is worth it for this country.

the deficit is going to be readjusted two trillion higher than originally thought, you're happy they cut out 1/8th of that amount? still a lot more cutting to do.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

I don't much justification for this. He spent 3 billion on Clunkers (actually, he spent 1 billion, and Congress added another 2 billion), a program which has been greeted as an overwhelming success by the car industry, from top to bottom.

What else would the car industry say? The govt gave buyers $3 billion dollars to buy up unsold inventory. It is a success for buyers and sellers but doesnt do much more for the other 98% of the country that is financing this. As for the workers put back to work (union workers by the way), that will be nothing but a temporary reprieve since the autos that they are making are still no better or wanted than the old ones that they couldnt sell without a giveaway of massive proportions.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by Riot

I am seriously clueless as to what you guys (Cannon, Dell, Zig) want done fiscally by any administration in power now. How about this:

No healthcare reform at all, no new programs at all.

Ignore the recession/depression, zero government interference.

That leaves us with the massive debt we were saddled with by Bush. How shall we pay for it? Income tax increases?

the federal govt needs to be completely restructured, and much of what they currently fund needs to be cut out. you don't ignore a recession or depression, nor do you take steps that many think will only end up making a bad situation worse. the endless high dollar spending needs to stop-continuing to cook the books and shift debt to the future only continues what caused these massive problems.
and it wasn't just bush that saddled us with this, it was the entire federal govt, which includes our esteemed members of congress. this problem was created by more than just that idiot-it's been created by a few hundred over a period of time. but the changes we were promised only meant change from R to D. the spending remains.

i think the feds should adopt a new motto---first, do no harm!

[Riot]

I believe we have stated what we want but you obviously havent comprehended any of it.

Naw. Pretty much all you've stated is that you don't like anything Obama does. Your answer is just more of the same. Obama compared to Hugo Chavez

Please - go ahead and state how YOU think the administration (any administration) should deal with the economy now.

What you simply dont get is that the information that you quote is generally spoonfed without regard for reality. Healthcare reform isnt going to do anything positive for the economy and will almost assuredly become a huge, unsustainable govt disaster.

You are really good at disparaging anything you don't like (and the people that post it), yet you repeatedly fail to show anything that supports your argument.

So please, go ahead and support any of the contentions you've made above, using any argument other than something like, "If you can't see that you're stupid".

The most important concern regarding health care reform are fixing the massive consumer abuses present in the system now, and providing quality healthcare to all Americans in my book. Is cost the most important consideration to you?

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Danzig

the deficit is going to be readjusted two trillion higher than originally thought, you're happy they cut out 1/8th of that amount? still a lot more cutting to do.

And where should that come from?

[Riot]

What else would the car industry say?

The alternative to success would be: "It didn't work and I am starving and had to lay off my salesmen, and the car factory didn't have to gear up and produce more cars, and laid off people were not hired back."

But that's not what happened.

The govt gave buyers $3 billion dollars to buy up unsold inventory. It is a success for buyers and sellers but doesnt do much more for the other 98% of the country that is financing this.

Yes, nobody was buying cars, causing disaster for the car industry, and this made people start buying cars again, and they bought out the inventory causing the auto mfrs. to have to start building more to prevent a car shortage. Yes, that is a success for the targeted industry.

As for the workers put back to work (union workers by the way), that will be nothing but a temporary reprieve since the autos that they are making are still no better or wanted than the old ones that they couldnt sell without a giveaway of massive proportions.

You've not noticed what cars the public chose to buy? And you've not noticed what cars the auto industry is dropping (the ones turned in, the ones that didn't sell), and the new different cars they are introducing?

[Riot]

Okay, I'll try one more time:

"I am seriously clueless as to what you guys (Cannon, Dell, Zig) want done fiscally by any administration in power now. How about this:

No healthcare reform at all, no new programs at all.

Ignore the recession/depression, zero government interference.

That leaves us with the massive debt we were saddled with by Bush. How shall we pay for it? Income tax increases?"

Do you guys agree with no new programs at all? Yes or no?

Do you agree with zero government interference with the economy? Yes or no?

How do you want to pay for the massive debt we already have today, leftover from the past? Tax raises, or cutting current services? Which services should be cut?

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Danzig

the deficit is going to be readjusted two trillion higher than originally thought, you're happy they cut out 1/8th of that amount? still a lot more cutting to do.

Yeah, I'm happy they cut out 1/8 of that amount. Just like I'm happy 4500 Americans get off the public dole and go back to work, and the ripple effect from that spreading to other industries.

What do you want cut?

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by Riot

Yeah, I'm happy they cut out 1/8 of that amount. Just like I'm happy 4500 Americans get off the public dole and go back to work, and the ripple effect from that spreading to other industries.

What do you want cut?

everything possible. we can't keep making budgets year after year that are pie in the sky. i certainly don't see how we can add even more to the bottom line, considering the bottom line is already colored red.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

Naw. Pretty much all you've stated is that you don't like anything Obama does. Your answer is just more of the same. Obama compared to Hugo Chavez

Please - go ahead and state how YOU think the administration (any administration) should deal with the economy now.



You are really good at disparaging anything you don't like (and the people that post it), yet you repeatedly fail to show anything that supports your argument.

So please, go ahead and support any of the contentions you've made above, using any argument other than something like, "If you can't see that you're stupid".

The most important concern regarding health care reform are fixing the massive consumer abuses present in the system now, and providing quality healthcare to all Americans in my book. Is cost the most important consideration to you?

Perhaps you arent familiar with Chavez but Obama has many policies similar to what Venezuela has.

What is funny is that I always give reasons and post links that support my position. You simply repeat what politicians say.

According to you the most important concern regarding healthcare is massive consumer abuses. If this is so why wouldn't changes in the law deal with these issues? There have been plenty occasions where consumers were taken advantage of that didnt preclude a massive govt takeover.

Is cost most important? What costs? The costs that the country will suffer with govt healthcare? My costs?

You feel that this will reduce overall costs because Obama says it will. But Obama is a politician trying to construct a legacy. He will say ANYTHING to get this through. The fire behind that smoke that we are seeing but you are ignoring is tax increases to the non-rich along with further taxes on the usual targets. Social Security, medicare, medicade, the postal system, Amtrack, Fanny Mae, Freddy Mac, etc. all govt institutions that can not support themselves yet dont go away. Why wouldn't govt healthcare go down the same path?

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

The alternative to success would be: "It didn't work and I am starving and had to lay off my salesmen, and the car factory didn't have to gear up and produce more cars, and laid off people were not hired back."

But that's not what happened.



Yes, nobody was buying cars, causing disaster for the car industry, and this made people start buying cars again, and they bought out the inventory causing the auto mfrs. to have to start building more to prevent a car shortage. Yes, that is a success for the targeted industry.



You've not noticed what cars the public chose to buy? And you've not noticed what cars the auto industry is dropping (the ones turned in, the ones that didn't sell), and the new different cars they are introducing?

Since when do people not take free money? Since when does a handout not get taken advantage of? People will stop buying cars as soon as this program ends. This program did nothing but move backed up inventory. So what are we going to do now that people will stop buying cars since this program is over? Giving money away is easy, fixing problems isnt. Obama is great at giving money away. He doesnt appear to have any clue how to fix problems.

No one is saying that this program was a disaster or anything. But it is far from a novel or brilliant or really useful program. Maybe it gives a little shot in the arms to a battered (though deservedly so) industry but the fact is that going forward not much was really accomplished. Maybe with the amounts of money being tossed around these days, $3 billion isnt even something worth talking about?