President Trump- The Implications

[erfalf]

Really??   Where were you during those years??   You have said you are old enough to remember them, so why don't you??


And yeah, Congress was knee deep in the hoopla, too.   Remember who controlled Congress during that time?   And most of the time since then....

And as for everyone voting to go to war...well, that was due to lies told to them to rationalize and justify it.  Even some of the Repubs have recanted since.

That's an interesting tactic to absolve Dems of any blame for voting to fund the Iraq war. I'll have to try that one out on my friends, see how it plays.

[erfalf]

An example of keeping debt "off the books" is what we saw during Quantitative Easing. Debt that is not owned by the public, kind of misleadingly shows how much is "outstanding".

[swake]

And we could argue till we are blue in the face about which things were more difficult and expensive to deal with, there will be no winner (except in your diluted mind).

Diluted? Heir, you been drinking?

Erf, I really hope you aren't trying to argue the Dotcom Bubble was anything like the Great Recession. Because that would be a profoundly dumb argument.

[Red Arrow]

Speaking of useless deaths:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year

[Red Arrow]

Erf, I really hope you aren't trying to argue the Dotcom Bubble was anything like the Great Recession. Because that would be a profoundly dumb argument.

No way to equate the two.  However, the dotcom bubble helped Clinton.  It happened during his watch so he gets the credit, deserved or not.

[Red Arrow]

That's an interesting tactic to absolve Dems of any blame for voting to fund the Iraq war. I'll have to try that one out on my friends, see how it plays.

Good luck with that one.

[patric]

This is America's modern "free speech" rally in the era of President Donald Trump. Trollish far-right leaders... plan a battle royale disguised as a celebration of the First Amendment. People come decked out with weapons and armor to fight anti-fascists, and one of two things happens: The two sides beat the living snot out of one another en masse, or police break it up.

Police did a good job on Saturday preventing what could have been the most violent far-right rally since last year's deadly "Unite the Right" gathering in Charlottesville, Virginia — all they had to do was protect the proto-fascists who came to town, and use riot control weapons, flash-bang grenades and chemical irritants against anti-fascist counter-protesters.


Violent Proto-Fascists Came To Portland. The Police Went After The Anti-Fascists.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/portland-patriot-prayer-proud-boys-police-antifascists_us_5b668b7de4b0de86f4a22faf

[heironymouspasparagus]

That's an interesting tactic to absolve Dems of any blame for voting to fund the Iraq war. I'll have to try that one out on my friends, see how it plays.

Yeah...I am absolutely sure your friends won't believe reality either.  But the rest of the world understands that lies that Baby Bush propagated to get us to all jump in both feet into the wrong war.  When a guy like Colin Powell says he is ashamed of what he was mislead into during that time, then it was bad.  Regardless of your revisionist fantasies.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Speaking of useless deaths:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year

Always has been.  And yet, we refuse to get serious about drunk driving (about half of traffic deaths).  And it took from about 1935 (when seat belts were invented) until 1968 until they became mandatory in US autos (1964 for front outboard seating only). - even though it was known for decades that death rates decreased 50 - 60% just by using them!   

[heironymouspasparagus]

Diluted? Heir, you been drinking?

Erf, I really hope you aren't trying to argue the Dotcom Bubble was anything like the Great Recession. Because that would be a profoundly dumb argument.

Lots of water!!   Wish I could slow down enough to have a couple of whiskey sours...hold most the sour...!

[heironymouspasparagus]

Emergency Appropriations do not equal does not get counted in spending. It was only "off the books" of the pentagon's budget. I was young, so I understand I may have missed things. But this by no means that the spending somehow didn't count. It was just a budgeting gimmick, to essentially spread the cost of the war over other departments, thus misleading the true cost of the war. I promise you though, it's all still there in some budget somewhere.

It was "off budget".  That's one of the reasons talking about 'budget' is often missing a large part of the point.   The Federal debt history page cuts through all that BS and shows exactly what happened, year to year, without the smoke and mirrors.

[heironymouspasparagus]

You misleadingly used the worst year of Bush to make comparison's to Obama. And we could argue till we are blue in the face about which things were more difficult and expensive to deal with, there will be no winner (except in your diluted mind).

No, I didn't.  What I was showing was the reality that Bush's debt numbers were extremely high and rising overall throughout his term.  And Obama's cut Bush's last by $300 billion his first year, while fighting a massive recession (biggest ever) and still giving all the rest of us some temporary tax relief,  and were going down overall throughout his term.  

[rebound]

Emergency Appropriations do not equal does not get counted in spending. It was only "off the books" of the pentagon's budget. I was young, so I understand I may have missed things. But this by no means that the spending somehow didn't count. It was just a budgeting gimmick, to essentially spread the cost of the war over other departments, thus misleading the true cost of the war. I promise you though, it's all still there in some budget somewhere.

I'm not weighing in on this whole running topic, as "context" is important on both sides.   I do think that generally the GOP has talked a good game as far as budget and deficit, but never really lived up to it.  The Dems on the other hand, just generally seem not to care.  Not sure which is worse...

But, this particular piece about Bush and the Iraq war and deficit really did, and still does, irk me.  It doesn't matter how or whether these were "emergency appropriations", or what.  Spent money is spent money.   Bush went for years not showing the Iraq war "on the books".  If he had included Iraq expenditures, the public perception of the war would have turned much earlier, and it might have created an in-generally more attentive attitude toward the economy, that might have (and this part might be wishful thinking) allowed the US to make some moves that would have softened the housing crisis.   

As it was, Bush hid Trillions in expenditures so that it looked better on the books, and could not afford politically to address the home loan crisis because it would have started the dominoes falling.  It was a double-dip bad move, and has taken us well over a decade to stabilize from (and then we still have the long-term debt to pay off).

[patric]

Armed Trump Supporters March on Portland, Beating Up Opponents and Calling for Hillary Clinton's Arrest

https://www.thedailybeast.com/armed-trump-supporters-march-on-portland-beating-up-opponents-and-calling-for-hillary-clintons-arrest

[cannon_fodder]

Trump's Son Met With Russian Lawyer After Being Promised Damaging Information on Clinton

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/09/us/politics/trump-russia-kushner-manafort.html

Here's Donald Trump Jr.'s full statement on his meeting with a Russian lawyer

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/09/donald-trump-jr-full-statement-on-meeting-with-a-russian-lawyer.html

Trump Jr.: I don't know if Trump had role in statement about Trump Tower meeting

http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/387927-trump-jr-not-sure-if-trump-had-role-in-drafting-statement-about

Trump 'Weighed In' on Son's Misleading Statement About Russia Meeting

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-weighed-son-s-misleading-statement-about-russia-meeting-n788616

Trump's lawyer repeatedly denied Trump was involved in Trump Jr.'s Russia statement. But he was.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/07/31/trumps-lawyer-repeatedly-denied-trump-was-involved-in-trump-jr-s-statement-but-he-was/?utm_term=.fb57b5c2de51

Trump dictated son's misleading statement on meeting with Russian lawyer

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-dictated-sons-misleading-statement-on-meeting-with-russian-lawyer/2017/07/31/04c94f96-73ae-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304_story.html?utm_term=.b73310329531

Lawyers say Trump 'dictated' statement on Donald Jr.'s Russia meeting

https://nypost.com/2018/06/03/lawyers-say-trump-dictated-statement-on-donald-jr-s-russia-meeting/

Cohen claims Trump knew in advance of 2016 Trump Tower meeting

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/26/politics/michael-cohen-donald-trump-june-2016-meeting-knowledge/index.html

Trump takes up Giuliani's line of attack: Collusion is not a crime

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/31/trump-collusion-not-a-crime-751332

Fake News reporting, a complete fabrication, that I am concerned about the meeting my wonderful son, Donald, had in Trump Tower. This was a meeting to get information on an opponent, totally legal and done all the time in politics - and it went nowhere. I did not know about it!

https://www.npr.org/2018/08/06/635860399/trump-admits-his-son-met-with-russian-lawyer-to-get-dirt-on-clinton

Define Collusion: secret or illegal cooperation or conspiracy, especially in order to cheat or deceive others.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/collusion?src=search-dict-hed