reflections on the elections...

[Conan71]

Conversely, we could let them all expire and see what happens.

Oh God don't do that, the earth will fall off it's axis and the sun might go dark!

[guido911]

+1

I swear these people make a commission on dumbing down America.

I really tried to listen to Rush and Hannity while driving during the day and then dilute the rhetoric with watching Olberman and Madow at night. I finally realized they were all lying.

Olbermann suspended indefinitely from MSNBC:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/11/05/olbermann-donated-to-three-dems-in-apparent-violation-of-nbc-policy/

[Conan71]

I thought that was a gag at first.  I really don't see the issue with this so much since Olbermann is obviously a liberal commentator, not a political journalist.  I was rather staggered by this statement though which would indicate he doesn't seem to understand his own bias or at least that of the network he works for:

In a subsequent show, Olbermann also pressed House Majority Whip James Clyburn if there was a "legislative "response" to a networks that "starts to shill for partisan causes.""

I think most people with a pulse realize MSNBC is Faux for libs.

So suspended indefinitely, does that mean he's fired? 

[nathanm]

MSNBC tends to be somewhat more fact-based than Fox, but it's still a hotbed of screaming liberals. And sometimes I've seen them not let facts get in the way of good spin. Morning Joe is probably the best show on the network. I agree with Scarborough on a lot of things.

Edited to add: Interestingly, Hannity apparently donated $5,000 to Michelle Bachmann's campaign. And apparently that's OK over at Fox.

[Conan71]

MSNBC tends to be somewhat more fact-based than Fox, but it's still a hotbed of screaming liberals. And sometimes I've seen them not let facts get in the way of good spin. Morning Joe is probably the best show on the network. I agree with Scarborough on a lot of things.

Edited to add: Interestingly, Hannity apparently donated $5,000 to Michelle Bachmann's campaign. And apparently that's OK over at Fox.

Of course it's okay.  Newscorp gave $1mm to the Republican Governor's Association (or convention or whatever the caucus is called) earlier this year.

On the actual news programs, I find both channels seem to report facts with little bias.  You might get selective editing of what stories make it on the air, but when you can compare the same story, the facts seem to come out the same.  I did feel the election coverage on CBS was decidedly biased based on comments Katie Couric was making about Sarah Palin on election night and people she had backed.

[nathanm]

Of course it's okay.  Newscorp gave $1mm to the Republican Governor's Association (or convention or whatever the caucus is called) earlier this year.

On the actual news programs, I find both channels seem to report facts with little bias.  You might get selective editing of what stories make it on the air, but when you can compare the same story, the facts seem to come out the same.  I did feel the election coverage on CBS was decidedly biased based on comments Katie Couric was making about Sarah Palin on election night and people she had backed.

If she was merely observing that Palin-backed candidates didn't do so well, that's not biased. It's the truth. (I wouldn't know, I didn't watch TV news Tuesday..I prefer my head not to explode)

I noticed a lot of selective reporting on the "news" shows on Fox during the BP gusher incident, and I've noticed that they fairly regularly run with stories other news organizations choose to pass on for lack of verification, but it is true they don't usually get directly shouty from a conservative point of view for the few hours a day they run news rather than opinion.

I'm not really sure what I think about MSNBC as a whole. I feel like they're not quite as blatantly biased as Fox (they do have Pat Buchanan, after all), but I haven't really watched enough to know. I see more stuff of theirs in the form of web clips than anything else, aside from the aforementioned Morning Joe habit I sometimes nurse.

I really ought to watch more CNN. From what I have seen, they still don't usually push a blatant political agenda most of the day as MSNBC and FNC do. In some ways that's worse, though. There's always some bias; at least with MSNBC and FNC you know ahead of time what that bias is going to be.

[HazMatCFO]

Russ Feingold getting his head handed to him by a Tea Party candidate who never ran for office before is the most shocking result of last Tuesday to me.

[we vs us]

Russ Feingold getting his head handed to him by a Tea Party candidate who never ran for office before is the most shocking result of last Tuesday to me.

A couple other high profile progressive D's got tossed, too, but the biggest casualties were the conservative Blue Dogs, who lost something like 50% of their caucus.  Despite Feingold going away (which I admit shocked me, too), the more liberal D's were re-elected by about 95% (I'm looking for a cite for these numbers; I know I read them somewhere out there in the last day or two but can't remember where off the top of my head).  

This seems to be mirroring one pattern of the D successes of 2006 and 2008:  the broad middle (conservative Ds and moderate Rs and sundry Independents) don't really know where to turn.  They keep swinging between the GOP and the Democrats looking for representation, while the extremes of each party are safely re-elected (most probably because of stable and/or gerrymandered districts).  

I keep hearing that we're ripe for a 3rd party (and Mike Bloomberg, mayor of NYC always gets mentioned first), but I'm still wary about a 3rd party's prospect of actually being victorious.  I'm not sure the broad middle actually exists as a bloc (in enough of a meaningful sense to give it to a 3rd party candidate). I have the sense that the middle is much more splintered, fickle, and one or two issue oriented, rather than a homogeneous group responsive to singular party or a singular brand identity.  

Obviously if someone could pull the center together into a unified political force then our politics would change fundamentally, but I suspect that it's an impossibility, mostly because it's never been done despite the better efforts of generations of politicians.

[we vs us]

Conan said;
I heard or read somewhere that individuals and corporations are sitting on about $9 trillion in cash right now.  If tax cuts are what business owners are claiming will help them hire, fine give them the tax cuts for a couple of years.  If nothing changes, take them away.  If business owners say Obamacare is a disincentive to hire, give them a better opportunity to opt out without it amounting to a penalty.

I've been trying to determine just how providing corporations with more $$ (through tax cuts) will encourage them to hire, and I can't understand how.  If $9T in aggregate isn't enough to make corporations invest, why would an extra $500 billion in tax cuts suddenly do the trick?  Or however much?  Money's cheap right now.  There's no reason to believe that shoveling more cheap money on the cheap money pile will incentivize different behavior.

Plus, I thought bailouts were badbadbad? 

[nathanm]

Russ Feingold getting his head handed to him by a Tea Party candidate who never ran for office before is the most shocking result of last Tuesday to me.

Yeah, that surprised me a lot, given how he's one of the people most willing to reach across the aisle and how voters by and large claimed to want exactly that in the exit polling data.

[heironymouspasparagus]

That's pretty much the whole point.  The richest have the privilege of paying only 15 to 16% taxes, while we pay 40+.  And they have gotten this special dispensation for 9 years.  And since 4th quarter 2007 until Jan 2010, we were losing jobs while they sit on the cash we put up for them to play with.

Interesting the Murdochian/Rove lie machine doesn't mention that the economy has added just over 1 million new private sector jobs this year (as well as the ongoing losses).  Just a very tiny little point of light in the darkness.  Now if we could just do that another 15 million times! 

Another tidbit;  unemployment for college educated is 4.4%, up 1 % since the start of the recession.  Blue collar jobs - like the ones we have shipped to China must then account for well over 10% just due to the averaging to get back down to 9.6% - probably 11 or 12% or more.  Need some numbers of how many college educated workers there are in the country and could do the algebra!  Just another case showing how much we have thrown away.

[nathanm]

Another tidbit;  unemployment for college educated is 4.4%, up 1 % since the start of the recession.  Blue collar jobs - like the ones we have shipped to China must then account for well over 10% just due to the averaging to get back down to 9.6% - probably 11 or 12% or more.  Need some numbers of how many college educated workers there are in the country and could do the algebra!  Just another case showing how much we have thrown away.

Non-degreed folks had an unemployment rate of 16 or 17% last I looked. Under 25s were at 25% or so. College educated people with established careers have not been hit nearly as hard by the recession and glacial growth as other segments of the population.

If you're just starting out, it doesn't really matter whether you have a degree or not. There are some bright spots, though. Professional firms have recently picked up in hiring of recent grads after hiring few to no candidates over the last couple of years. Not that that really helps the lawyers and accountants who graduated in the lost years, though.

[heironymouspasparagus]

We have hired thousands in the last year.  And still a few thousand short of the peak.  Just not fast enough - still behind in many areas.

At this point, I would just be thrilled to death if the rich got to pay even 20% average!!  That would take care of the deficit and the debt!  Like we were before the 3% Bush cuts....

[Cats Cats Cats]

We don't pay 40%.  They still have to pay state taxes too.  Though you are right, the richest pay around 17% effective tax rate (Federal).  Same as me.

[Conan71]

I've been trying to determine just how providing corporations with more $$ (through tax cuts) will encourage them to hire, and I can't understand how.  If $9T in aggregate isn't enough to make corporations invest, why would an extra $500 billion in tax cuts suddenly do the trick?  Or however much?  Money's cheap right now.  There's no reason to believe that shoveling more cheap money on the cheap money pile will incentivize different behavior.

Plus, I thought bailouts were badbadbad? 

Like I said, economic theory is moot when it comes to tax cuts.  Economic theory doesn't create jobs, people quite literally do.  Indulge human behavior, extend the cuts and see what happens.  If CEO's say that's what it takes, hold them to their word.