Dow crosses 10,000; on the right, crickets chirp

_dji
Well, the Dow just closed above 10,000. Frankly, I’m surprised it has regained so much ground so quickly, and I’m still wary that it’ll stay at this level.

But for the moment at least, there it is.

I’m even more wary about claiming the Dow’s recovery as some sort of vindication for President Obama’s economic policies.  He and others, including President Bush, did help pull the economy back from the brink of collapse last fall and spring.  And Obama’s economic stimulus plan was necessary if not sufficient to ease the impact of the deepest recession in almost 80 years.

But that doesn’t account for such a strong rebound on Wall Street, and vindication of Obama’s approach, should it come, can’t be claimed for several years.

Nonetheless, as Steve Benen of Washington Monthly documents, the Wall Street Journal, Rush Limbaugh and a lot of other folks on the right did cite the Dow’s decline to 6500 last March — just two months into the Obama presidency — as evidence that Obama’s policies were dismal failures, proof positive that the wise men on Wall Street had no faith in him whatsoever.

298 comments Add your comment

Paul

October 14th, 2009
4:38 pm

Sorry WSJ, Rush and the rest. If an item going in one direction is evidence of failure, then going in the other direction is evidence of success.

But some people will try to spin the unspinnable.

#1 Foxy Lady

October 14th, 2009
4:40 pm

Another WIN for President Barack H. Obama. Punt 10,000 in the W column.

Suck it again conservative losers!

IC Atlanta

October 14th, 2009
4:42 pm

Great, but have you checked the dollar lately, the debt, the price of gold and unemployment.

What exactly has Obama done to pull the economy from the brink of collapse? Most of the stimulus money hasn’t even been spent. Putting Americans, our children and grandchildren into massive unbearable debt isn’t saving the economy.

Check back in 24 months and we can truly start weighing Obamanomics. However immediate unemployment speaks louder than anything. Having you seen the unemployment rate for black teenagers? 50+ % now that is some change.

jt

October 14th, 2009
4:44 pm

The Dow increases,

so does your tax liability(Obamacare, Cap-n-tax,etc…….).

Whatever the Fed lets you keep will be worthless.(inflation).

Yippeeee.

Matilda

October 14th, 2009
4:49 pm

Will someone please tell me when it’s okay to look at my 401K statements again? Last time was so horrific….

Brad Steel

October 14th, 2009
4:50 pm

The clapping must have been deafening at The Nation’s offices.

I Report (-: You Whine )-: O Stands For Zero

October 14th, 2009
4:56 pm

When the low interest rate Community Reinvestment Act housing bubble is fully reinflated and the Dow is back up to 14,000 where it was with Bush, wake me up.

Yawnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

Diving dollar worth, ballooning deficits, looming inflation, the same columnist that told us Wall Street was not a good indicator when the Dow was at 6,500, so typical.

josef nix

October 14th, 2009
4:59 pm

Who brought the Dow back up? I did. I invested when it was down and I’ve made money. Ima Gonna didn’t do it and Village Idiot didn’t do it. I did.

thomas

October 14th, 2009
5:00 pm

So if the dow could get back to 10,000 this quickly and not an overwhelming amount of the Stimulus money has been distributed or placed into the system.

If the Dow remains high would it be too much to ask if the remaining amount of the stimulus money that has not been released be stopped from going out? We are in debt and everyone knows that. Why add to the debt, especially since the claim for the latest edition was intended for economic recovery?

Or could this have been more about social programs than about economic recovery?

What level is an acceptable level for the DOW before the gov’t doesn’t feel the need to interject itself into free market enterprise? I am not talking about regulating free markets I am talking about altering the reality of those markets.

The inflation will be fun for all, rich and poor.

DoggoneGA

October 14th, 2009
5:08 pm

“If the Dow remains high would it be too much to ask if the remaining amount of the stimulus money that has not been released be stopped from going out?”

DoggoneGA

October 14th, 2009
5:11 pm

“If the Dow remains high would it be too much to ask if the remaining amount of the stimulus money that has not been released be stopped from going out?”

Yes, it would. In the real world, the DOW doesn’t mean squat. It’s a pretty number to point at…nothing else. In the real world unemployment is still at, or just below, 10%. If the “stimulus” money is used for it’s primary purpose – to PUT PEOPLE TO WORK – it still needs to go out.

There’s no true, real world, improvement as long as unemployment is high. THAT is reality.

Swami Dave

October 14th, 2009
5:15 pm

Reality dictates that you cannot tax and spend your way to long-term prosperity. Simple justice dictates that you cannot base economic policy on theft and redistribution to produce long-term positive economic growth.

The long-term consequences of the collectivist policies foisted upon America by the current administration and their cabal of redistributionists currently in charge in the House and Senate will be felt for generations. Both our children who will continue to have more and more stolen from that which they earn to finance the ever-growing entitlement classes unwilling to provide for themselves as well as those children who will be raised in a continuing cycle of dependence and confiscatory demand for unearned benefit.

America works when you do – the problems arise when we attempt to excuse entire classes of people from the obligation to provide for themsleves that which they want by confiscating and redistributing it from others.

Even the most marginally-aware fiscal observer sees a “bear-trap” when one stares you so closely in the face!

-SD

DebbieDoRight.

October 14th, 2009
5:22 pm

What exactly has Obama done to pull the economy from the brink of collapse?

He helped beat the Republicans and helped to drive them out of office, in droves, to finally have some people in place who want to roll up their sleeves and get some work done.

@@

October 14th, 2009
5:23 pm

While you all celebrate the DJIA, just know that it’s being reported that Israel is suspected of taking out a Hezbollah weapons depot in Southern Lebanon late yesterday.

One match is all it will take and KABOOM!!!

The DJIA? SWOOSH…

Pogo

October 14th, 2009
5:24 pm

For those few capitalists among us here I say, “Let the Bull Loose!”. I am making money hand over fist and loving it. Those of us smart enough to know what is happening realize that this is not going to be permanent and we need to make the money while we can and convert it into something more “stable”. Cash won’t be worth much in two years. So crow on, you simpletons that think the Big O (and Bush) have somehow been vindicated. As even Jay, the consumate socialist/progressive, points out, he doesn’t feel comfortable giving O too much credit for this. He knows, as most intelligent people know that this rally is really built upon nothing. Credit is still hard to come buy (and in this case that is probably healthy since most of this country doesn’t know how to handle the responsibility of credit). Companies are not hiring nor will they in the near future because of the uncertainty of Obama’s policies. The service/consumer economy of America is dead therefore the prospect for the overall economy is pretty much shot.

The bottom line is, there is no room for gloating on anyone’s (liberal or conservative) side about the Stock Market. We are in for some very, very hard times in the next 10 years. You can look after yourself or you can depend upon someone else to do it for you. If you depend upon someone else, then that is your choice but your freedom goes with it . If you look after yourself, beware of anyone who offers things that are “too good to be true” as the fools that are (and were) in Washington have promised. Also beware of those that wish to take advantage of the Party Loyalty Factor, whether it be Republican or Democrat. These are the most dangerous. What is happening in Washington today, under the Democrats and Obama, is nothing more than the legislating of the elimination of personal freedom. Freedom is precious and it appears that too many are willing to sell theirs for the promise of some kind of personal security which can never really be delivered by the politicians. George Orwell had it exactly right; give a person a little something and give it on a continuous basis and that person won’t aspire to have anything better and you will have total control of them. This is pretty much the premise the Democratic party of America is built upon. The Republicans have their own issues. They call themselves one thing but they act in ways that are totally contradictory to what they are supposed to be. Until people realize that ALL politicians are in it for THEMSELVES, there isn’t really much to be look forward to in this country.

thomas

October 14th, 2009
5:25 pm

So DOGGONE,

Are you saying that those praising this as a sign of Obama gaining the faith of investors is nothing more than chest pounding?

One more question, why don’t they hurry up with the release and distribution of the stimulus money since we were told the purpose of the stimulus was to avoid unemployment reaching 8% or 9%?

Me still thinks as Rham said and they did not let a crisis go to waste and much of the stimulus i about socila programs. Many of hich I do agree with. But honesty would be nice, I know it has never been a quality of politicians. But we were promised change. Change seems to be about as visable as I don’t know……. help wanted signs.

thomas

October 14th, 2009
5:27 pm

Debbie, What was that work that has been DONE?

I’ve seen some promises but not anything actually DONE.

He has DONE many of the same things as BUSH, but Bush is a republican so I know you won’t count that as something Obama has done.

But he has talked alot.

pat

October 14th, 2009
5:30 pm

Maybe it’s crap like this that keeps us unexcited:

Dollar loses reserve status to yen & euro
By PAUL THARP

Ben Bernanke’s dollar crisis went into a wider mode yesterday as the greenback was shockingly upstaged by the euro and yen, both of which can lay claim to the world title as the currency favored by central banks as their reserve currency.

Over the last three months, banks put 63 percent of their new cash into euros and yen — not the greenbacks — a nearly complete reversal of the dollar’s onetime dominance for reserves, according to Barclays Capital.

Currently, dollars account for about 62 percent of the currency reserve at central banks — the lowest on record, said the International Monetary Fund.

After printing up trillions of new dollars and new bonds to stimulate the US economy, the Federal Reserve chief is now boxed into a corner battling two separate monsters that could devour the economy — ravenous inflation on one hand, and a perilous recession on the other.

“He’s in a crisis worse than the meltdown ever was,” said Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital. “I fear that he could be the Fed chairman who brought down the whole thing.”

Investors and central banks are snubbing dollars because the greenback is kept too weak by zero interest rates and a flood of greenbacks in the global economy.

They grumble that they’ve loaned the US record amounts to cover its mounting debt, but are getting paid back by a currency that’s worth 10 percent less in the past three months alone. In a decade, it’s down nearly one-third.

Economists believe the market rebellion against the dollar will spread until Bernanke starts raising interest rates from around zero to the high single digits, and pulls back the flood of currency spewed from US printing presses.

Economists warn that a jump in rates will clobber stocks and cripple the already stalled housing market.

“Bernanke’s other choice is to keep rates at zero, print even more money and sell more debt, but we’ll see triple-digit inflation that could collapse the economy as we know it.

“The stimulus is what’s toxic — we’re poisoning ourselves and the global economy with it.”

(Full story at: http://www.nypost.com/…BW1YYLykSJwTTEL )

DebbieDoRight.

October 14th, 2009
5:30 pm

I guess the right isn’t as “fair and balanced” as they pretend……

pat

October 14th, 2009
5:31 pm

The DOW going up is good news, BTW. Is it sustainable as all the other indicators continue their southward trend is the other question.

DebbieDoRight.

October 14th, 2009
5:33 pm

thomas: the president as well as the rest of the country has to wait upon congress to enact laws and approve spending. until the bill hits his desk, he has to wait just like we do for the finished product. sorry.

IC Atlanta

October 14th, 2009
5:35 pm

Pat, but the dow is at 10,000 – the dollar what dollar – just print some more baby. We have a 2010 election to win – free health care for everyone! What about food, housing, water and money aren’t those rights too?

Obama’s America – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfGLB8LO1aM

Sunshine and Thunder

October 14th, 2009
5:36 pm

The blue line is the actual jobless rate. The red line is the jobless rate that we were told (by Obama’s economic salesmen) would occur without the stimulus and the green line is the rate they said we would have if we passed the stimulus.

This poor guess only cost us 787 billion.

I want my money back.

http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/ED-AK321A_1jobs_D_20091011165619.gif

Source: Wall Street Journal

Yadro

October 14th, 2009
5:37 pm

#1 Idiot Lady @ 4:40. DebbieDoWrong @ 5:22. Misguided middle class in denial about your new tax hikes. Enjoy………….

I Report (-: You Whine )-: O Stands For Zero

October 14th, 2009
5:37 pm

“Michelle Obama Stresses Small Changes to Diet, Exercise Routine to Improve Fitness, Health”–headline, Associated Press, Oct. 13

What would Idi Amin know about fitness?

Freaking Amazon.

penniless taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
5:42 pm

If the fundamentals of the economy were sound, then I would be happy to see the DOW surpass 10,000. But common sense and data tell me that things are wrong.

The Fed & the Government are basically re-inflating the bubbles that just burst, plus a few new ones, using massive deficits, Keynesian voodoo economics, and money printing. The bubble(s) are going to burst, and this time it will be worse. This is insanity.

Michael

October 14th, 2009
5:47 pm

I would say the Dow is like taking someone’s temperature. It can sense certain conditions, but it’s not a know-all barometer of all economic activity. I mean really, it’s just a fraction of the stock market.

One maybe-bad analogy is taking the temperature of someone with a tumor. It probably won’t show up in a temperature reading, which is why we have much more advanced devices to detect such things. Jobs are still a problem, but maybe the pyschological effect of the Down topping 10,000 will make more firms hire more people.

arulin

October 14th, 2009
5:48 pm

If Opec has their way , we will be going back to the gold standard…

In Magic the Gathering this would be an “You get your whole deck in your hand till end of turn and all lands tapped”, then the bubble pops as the reality of the fact there are no more cards to draw and you lose, that’s the US econ at the moment.

Anyone thinking EU right now?

Bruno

October 14th, 2009
6:04 pm

“Those of us smart enough to know what is happening realize that this is not going to be permanent and we need to make the money while we can and convert it into something more “stable”. Cash won’t be worth much in two years.”

Pogo, you’re singing my song. I’m trading as fast as I can, getting ready for the other shoe to drop. You can’t print that much new money without serious inflation down the road.

Bruno

October 14th, 2009
6:06 pm

“Jobs are still a problem, but maybe the pyschological effect of the Down topping 10,000 will make more firms hire more people.”

As I stated in an earlier blog, historically the stock market will improve 6-9 months before employment begins to rise again during an economic recovery. The stock market going up is a good thing, and not just for those with money in the market.

Redneck Convert (R--and proud of it)

October 14th, 2009
6:08 pm

Well, it must be on account of something My President done back a few years ago. They’ll figure out what it is in a couple years. It can’t be because of this Obama and the librul Democrats.

Anyhow, I ain’t concerned about no Dow. All my savings are in beer stock. People get drunk when they’re happy because they made a bunch of money and they get drunk when they’re sad to drown their sorrows. People will always buy beer.

Have a good night everybody. Next year, I halfway expect to get this Nobel Peace Prize. I figure if Obama can get it for doing nothing I can get it for working a little and then doing nothing. It’s nice to feel needed.

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

What makes all of you armchair economists out there think that anything that Bozo has done since Jan 20th has had ANYTHING to do with an economic upturn? Ever heard of cycles that happen on a regular basis and last about as long as this one has lasted? I can hear it now from all of the liberal posters on this blog….. look at what our savior has done to bring us back from the brink of disaster. Wow, are all of you walking around in a fog like his gang of thieves. Most of it would have happened anyway without spending trillions of dollars of borrowed money to give us a false sense of government security. Wrong decisions made at the wrong time by the wrong person.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

All we need now are jobs. Fortunately, those GOP tax cuts will expire just in time for those newly hired folks to start paying in to the system. Then, once again, all will be right in the universe and Republican policies will be buried away, never to rear their ugly heads again. Life is good.

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

The market generally reacts to what it thinks will happen sometime in the future, not so much what happens on any given day. As Jay’s chart shows, the downward trend began in November when his majesty was elected. The nose dive began when The One was inaugurated.

Why? The fear at the beginning of the year was that the magnificent one with his super majorities in congress would ram through his socialistic anti-business legislation without delay. With the exception of that awful pork-laden “stimulus” bill, our European wannabe leader has accomplished NOTHING.

On top of that, the wonderful and resilient American people have woken up to The One’s liberal agenda, and they don’t like it one bit. The market recognizes their resolve, so it doesn’t believe the Marxist Armageddon that O-man wants to implement will ultimately transpire. So trends are turning positive.

In sum, the market is going up in spite of the socialist democratic government in place. The great American people survived Carter, and they’ll survive this abomination.

But you knew that.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:21 pm

Matilda

October 14th, 2009
4:49 pm

You can take a peek. It’s recovered, but still has a way to go. As long as you kept investing at the bottom, you’ll probably be pleasantly surprised.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:25 pm

Russia’s answer to Hillary’s plea for Iran sanctions was the same one the public gave her in her campaign run–a big NYET!

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:25 pm

Well, the first paragraph speaks for me as well.

The stimulus has certainly helped, but the markets are up because companies have cut labor costs to the bone and are depleting inventory. They have to start rehiring soon, but will it be here or overseas? And no matter how many times the conservatives say otherwise, Obama believes that the private sector must lead the recovery and has said so many times.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:25 pm

Another no insurance story–whether insurance, or bad luck played into this outcome, I don’t konw but I do know the AJC wrote an incomplete story and printed an inaccuracy. A 10 year old child named Summer Rockerfeller died of H1N1 in Augusta Saturday. Augusta is the home of MCG’s teaching hospital, medical center, health clinics, and med school.

If you pick up the phone and call any of Fulton’s health clinics tomorrow, they will tell you they will only vaccinate ages 2-4. That wouldn’t include poor Summer, and she’s dead.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:27 pm

We don’t know from the AJC article whether the child got Tamiflu or Relenza in the first 48 hours of symptoms when it was effective, and of course symptoms vary. We do know that currently in large series, resistance has already developed as high as 60% for those drugs due to promiscuous and incorrect. use in well people over the summer.

We also know that the AJC’s 2 reporters persist in printing (not much editorial control or fact checking) that no one will be turned away, but people over age 4 will be turned away including now their caregivers.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:29 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

You’d better start composing your response for when it hits 15k and then 30k during The One’s time in office.

Come on, take off the blinders and give credit where credit is due.

Nothing Is Free

October 14th, 2009
6:30 pm

matilda (From downstairs)

**It means making ALL the decisions.**

By that definition, no one is in charge. The board of directors doesn’t decide what to call the new color that is a slightly off red. They don’t decide which robot to overhaul. But the key is that they have the ability to over ride those decisions. If the CEO tells the robot repair guy to start here, then he starts here. So it isn’t that the leader of a company actually makes all the decisions, its that he could over rule any decision made by any employer . . . just like the Federal government has that power to do, now that they have taken over GM.

**Are you this committed to freedom when it comes to individuals deciding whom to marry**

I couldn’t care less who anyone marries.

**or the privacy of personal medical decisions?**

As long as it is truly a private decision and doesn’t involve the intentional death of a different American citizen, I’m all for it. Are you for the freedom of every single American to pursue life liberty and happiness?

Family planning is often a very dishonest semantic concerning abortion clinics and often the use of this barbaric practice for the use of birth control.

Jeffery Dahmer would (if he was still alive) consider laws passed against cannibalism as an infringement of his own freedom and that might be true if it weren’t for the fact that another human would need to die in order to fulfill his wish of freedom.

Freedom is only freedom if it is freedom for everyone. I’m really big on that “Life liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Aren’t you?

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:30 pm

Taxpayer,

So a source of joy for you is the confiscation of earned money from others? Kinda sad if you ask me.

I’d hate to be your neighbor. If I brought home a new car I’d be afraid you’d want to key it.

Please get some counseling.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:31 pm

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

I wish, but I’m afraid we’re going to have to have a temporary 10% surtax on everyone to get the budget anywhere near balanced.

Nothing Is Free

October 14th, 2009
6:33 pm

Jay

Just 600 more to go before Obozo can be compared to the G W Bush Market. Not quite halfway back yet, but when $40 stocks have been selling for $1.35, people do tend to buy stocks.

You go, Boy!!!!! At this rate, the stock market should be recovered by the year 2015.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:34 pm

Obama should have let lobbyists for the banks receiving billion dollar bailouts long ago know that there was going to be a consumer agency with teeth and pushed for it–and told the banks to back their lobbyists off, pulling back bailout money if they didn’t comply.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:34 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:30 pm

I’m thinking Taxpayer is a builder, not a destroyer. He would be as sick as you would if your new car was keyed, as I would be.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
6:35 pm

The cost of sending one U.S. soldier in Afghanistan for one year is $1 million versus an estimated $12,000 for an Afghani soldier, according to Steve Daggett, a specialist with the Congressional Research Service.

The same ratio, or greater, holds for jobs in private industries. It’s just good business to farm out US jobs. Nothing personal.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:36 pm

Seems that the Repubozo Extremist means of arguing issues is to become an amateur psychiatrist conveniently skipping med school and residency rather than to argue the issue. That’s another permutation and variation of reaching deep into rectum and pulling out fecal material. Accept that a lot of people don’t agree with you and argue the merits of your issue rather than childishly suggest the commenter “needs therapy.” You have no training for what needs therapy, and no legal power to sign a 1021.

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:36 pm

TnGelding: “Obama believes that the private sector must lead the recovery and has said so many times.”

What he says and what he does are two different things. What he says is for the lemmings, what he does is for his beliefs.

His actions say to me he hates our system of wealth creation. He is doing everything he can to punish success.

Please prove me wrong.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
6:37 pm

F. Sinkwich,

Actually, I’m the proud owner of a keyed vehicle.

Matilda

October 14th, 2009
6:37 pm

NIF, I replied downstairs. Did you move your comment here or was it here before? Wierd. Anyway, have a good evening!

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:38 pm

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
6:14 pm

Without government intervention worldwide this economic crisis would have made the Great Depression look like a picnic. Death, war, famine and pestilence.

I Report (-: You Whine )-: O Stands For Zero

October 14th, 2009
6:39 pm

Then there are those like Reps. Barney Frank and Maxine Waters, who say they are willing to accept additional risk in FHA loans in order to prop up the housing market and keep lending to people who can’t otherwise afford to buy a home right now. Frank and Waters continue advocating giving these borrowers what Washington classifies as “affordable housing” mortgages. Both attitudes, Stevens as well as Frank’s and Waters’, are troubling when you consider the history of such government-backed lending and what FHA’s efforts say about the prospects for sensible reform and restraint.

Congress pushed FHA into the market after Fannie and Freddie, which had usurped much of FHA’s mortgage role starting in the early 1990s, went bust. To grease the wheels Washington raised the limits on a mortgage that FHA could approve to a whopping $729,750 per home in some markets. This is what qualifies as “affordable lending” in Washington. In addition, FHA heavily backed mortgages with a down payment amounting to as little as 3.5 percent of the value of the home, which lenders would never approve in the current market without government insurance.-RealClearMarkets

Nothing like another big ass democrat created bubble bursting like a bomb on the economy, suck up the liquidity while you can Dow Jones fat cats, and then sell, sell, sell, mmmm, mmm, mmmmm!

Nothing Is Free

October 14th, 2009
6:39 pm

DebbieDoRight

**He helped beat the Republicans and helped to drive them out of office, in droves, to finally have some people in place who want to roll up their sleeves and get some work done.**

Getting that work done is the problem. It will take a lot of work to convert our economy to one of socialism run by fascist. They are certainly working hard at getting that done.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:41 pm

We don’t know from the AJC article whether the child got Tamiflu or Relenza in the first 48 hours of symptoms when it was effective, and of course symptoms vary. We do know that currently in large series, resistance has already developed as high as 60% for those drugs due to promiscuous and incorrect. use in well people over the summer.

We also know that the AJC’s 2 reporters persist in printing (not much editorial control or fact checking) that no one will be turned away from public health clinics, but people over age 4 have been turned away including now their caregivers for one week.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:45 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:36 pm

Punish success? And exactly what has he proposed that would do that? We’ve always had a progressive tax system. You said above he had done nothing. Which is it?

It’s corporate America, the large investment banks in particular, that you should be enraged at, not Obama. And a Congress that has encouraged outsourcing could use a severe scolding.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:45 pm

It makes no sense to limit vaccination to children age 2-4 when a child age 10 have been dying this week; further few physicians listed on the state locator have received any form of vaccine (the mist for 2-49) and the shot for immunocompromised people, over 49s and those who are pregnant.

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
6:46 pm

Gov Option,

I believe that someone who tries to build themselves up by tearing someone else down needs help. Just trying to do my civic duty.

Not sure what a 1021 is, but I sure as hell know about 1040’s (that’s a tax form).

I Report (-: You Whine )-: O Stands For Zero

October 14th, 2009
6:47 pm

What we’re witnessing here is pretty simple: another bubble in financial assets. All that “liquidity” created by the Federal Reserve and other central banks has accomplished its task and prevented a global financial meltdown. But unless they move now to begin sopping up that liquidity, the central bankers run a serious risk of reinflating many of the same bubbles that got us into this mess in the first place.-Washington Post

hehehehehe, makin money while we still can, mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
6:47 pm

Gelding,

Sort of like global warming melting all of our glaciers. Repeat after me….. over reacting. Why must we do something that costs gazillions of dollars to correct something that is going to happen on it’s own. Again…. wrong decisions, made by the wrong people at the wrong time.

jconservative

October 14th, 2009
6:49 pm

If Rush, Sean Karl or anyone else took the time to criticize Obama’s policies because the DOW was down they were fools. Anyone with an IQ of 80 knows the DOW always goes up in the long run. If they criticized in March based on the DOW, then they look like utter fools today. The DOW always goes up.

Do not make the same mistake on unemployment. Reagan was inaugurated in Jan 1981 & the unemployment was a high but respectable 6% or so. By 1983 he had the unemployment up over 10%, the highest level since the great depression. We have not reached his high point yet. But, as it always does, unemployment came down as the nation recovered from a deep recession. Unemployment is always the last figure to change. And it will come down again, just not anytime soon.

Every one’s 401K’s should be back to about where they were in July 2008.
You guys with 401K’s need to decide if you will leave the money in stocks or transfer it to cash. Do you want to make money or preserve what you have?

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:49 pm

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
6:35 pm

I don’t know many workers that are costing their employers a cool million. I’d say the average was more like $60k.

Good business? How many of those foreign workers can afford to buy the products and services they produce? We’ve proven we can consume everything we can make and more, so why the emphasis on exports and outsourcing?

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:51 pm

If Mr. Obama has either campaigned on or indicated any way he punished success, it sure is funny that not only did he outnumber McLoser and Dimwitia in the number of small donations he procured, but he buried them in the number of donations he procured from “successful people” that someone alleges he is punishing. I know of no documentation that Obama is punishing successful people. On the contrary, he’s given a gift to large investment banks who got billions in bailout money and have really lowered the boom on consumers upping credit card interest rates and penalties.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:53 pm

jconservative

October 14th, 2009
6:49 pm

For once we agree. The markets don’t like uncertainty tho, and that contributed to the sell-off. But the economic crisis was the main culprit.

Bob

October 14th, 2009
6:54 pm

The republicans are not heard because of the deafening noise coming from the masses of unemployed that are so happy that the dow is back to where it was when they had jobs. To dems, the dow is a tool of the rich, now it’s up to 10k and they are all capitalists now.

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
6:56 pm

Gov Option,

Which would have happened anyway if regulation would have been in force by Frank and Dodd and his gang of thieves. Let the market correct itself…. it most always does. Then save those trillions of dollars that only win elections from uninformed people who thing that government is the only answer.

DoggoneGA

October 14th, 2009
6:57 pm

“Are you saying that those praising this as a sign of Obama gaining the faith of investors is nothing more than chest pounding?”

Not if you want it worded like that. “gaining the faith of investors” is EXACTLY what the DOW number indicates. It has nothing to do with the reality of the economy as it affects the lowly workers.

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:58 pm

Unemployment is slowing as to rate, but it’s not going to budge unfortunately until as early as late spring 2010, or even into early 2011. There is a huge lag effect that always happens with this degree of unemployment, and as usual, people conveniently forget that this was one of many messes dumped at the door of this President by the last one on 1/20/09.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
6:59 pm

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
6:47 pm

There’s not much we can do about melting glaciers at this point, but we’ll never know how bad it would have been. It would have had to have been worse, tho. Just think what the extra unemployment compensation meant to those that couldn’t find a job and to the economy as a whole. Some of the stimulus was silly, but it wasn’t wasted as long as it eventually gets spent in the good ole USA. Keep it circulating, folks!

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:00 pm

Doing nothing is much better than doing what The One wants to do.

If he really wanted to help this economy, he would have taken the $800 billion he spent on that awful spending bill and cut capitol gains taxes, corporate and small business taxes, perhaps payroll taxes.

He could have delayed the minimum wage increase.

Instead it’s spend, spend, spend.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:02 pm

Gov Option Done Deal!

October 14th, 2009
6:58 pm

You’re right about that! How soon they forget.

I look for some innovative job creation proposals coming out of the WH soon, tho:

“Obama says to explore all avenues on job creation”

“We are moving forward on a number of economic fronts and we are going to explore each and every avenue that I can think of that will lead to job creation and economic growth,” Obama said in Fairfax County, Virginia.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091014/pl_nm/us_usa_economy_obama_2

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:06 pm

Uh, how about the cutting taxes avenue?

Never mind. He hates people who actually hire employees.

Anybody ever get a meaningful, productive, and wealth creating job from Acorn?

Didn’t think so.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:07 pm

TnGelding, I said the ratio. Not absolute dollars. So, 1 million:12,000 is equivalent to 100,000:1200.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:08 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:00 pm

Only about a third of that money has been spent, for goodness sakes. It was designed to take some of the pain out of the recession, not cure it. Taxes being too low and the resulting borrowing by the fed is one reason the economy tanked. Even with low taxes AND fairy tale interest rates the real “unmentionable” got us in a ditch. Risky schemes and fuzzy math personified.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:09 pm

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:07 pm

I understood that, but the ratio is still off, but not by that much.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:14 pm

TnGelding, “good business” is typically viewed as maximizing returns or profits from year to year. There was a time when “good business” meant taking a longer view and it even incorporated the well being of the employees and the environment and the investors and the community but not any more. Good business today means pocketing as much as you can as fast as you can year after year until there’s nothing left to squeeze out then dumping your former money maker on an unsuspecting buyer for as much as possible. It happens all the time.

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:15 pm

TnGelding, yep, we need more turtle tunnels in Florida and airports to nowhere in blue states.

Why not just let people decide how best to spend their money? Are they too stupid? Or what?

Government knows all I guess, at least in liberal world.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:16 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:06 pm

I think all federal taxes should be removed from businesses so they can compete in the global marketplace. It just adds to their overhead and makes it too costly and aggravating to run one. And there are plenty of easy places to raise the needed revenues relatively painlessly elsewhere. But spending, especially at the Pentagon, has to be reduced. Let’s get those troops home and start protecting and defending our borders. Not to mention spending those hundreds of billions that are going to Japan, S. Korea, Germany and the rest of the world. Does anyone really think China or Russia is a threat to our security?

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:18 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:15 pm

Duh, they weren’t spending it, that’s why the government had to intervene. Small businesses couldn’t even borrow to meet payrolls. Who would have thought so many of them needed to? Is the small business engine-driver a myth?

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:19 pm

Taxpayer just hates anyone more successful than he is.

It’s like any dollar anyone else earns comes out of his pocket.

Kind of a sad life.

A liberal for life.

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
7:20 pm

Gelding,

You are beginning to sound like a Reagan Republican.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:20 pm

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:14 pm

I’m afraid you’re right, but why can’t we return to the good old days? Didn’t that work out better for everyone? Is that what Obama is trying to do?

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:21 pm

F. Sinkwich,

You are entertaining. Got any more one liners.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:24 pm

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
7:20 pm

No, I’d just rather have a job making $20 an hour than lose a $25 an hour one. But Reagan wasn’t any more true to what he said than Obama has been to this point. He had the last good chance to reform Social Security, but in his defense, we didn’t have the computer power then that we have now.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:29 pm

F. Sinkwich

October 14th, 2009
7:19 pm

We don’t hate or even envy those more successful. But to whom more is given, more is expected. Would you rather be making a million bucks and paying about $300k in taxes or $10k and paying nothing?

Nothing Is Free

October 14th, 2009
7:30 pm

Taxpayer

**There was a time when “good business” meant taking a longer view and it even incorporated the well being of the employees and the environment and the investors and the community but not any more.**

Total, complete BS. That might be true for the industry giants, the ones that Obama and Bush have given billions to, but America’s small businesses DO take care of their employees.

STOP QUOTING ALL ENCOMPASSING PROPAGANDA. it makes you look like a parrot for the left.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:32 pm

TnGelding at 7:20,

Greed has a mighty strong grip and it has tentacles that reach into areas that most people don’t even think about. We would probably have to bankrupt the US in order to get back to a better way on the fast track. We’ll eventually revert to a more sustainable mode but it’ll take time, in order to minimize the pain. We have to keep our eye on the ball and get people working in decent paying jobs and then we have to reduce our government spending and collect enough revenues to cover our bills and pay off our debt. That’s not easy. It’s like someone making $60,000 per year and using a portion of that to pay for a one million dollar home while feeding and clothing a family of four. You can probably do it in fifty plus years with the perfect mortgage but only if everything else falls into place, like no major illness, etc. There’s no room for errors.

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
7:34 pm

Gelding,

That’s the ploy that all liberals have to justify fleecing money from the “rich”. Let’s make it sound like we are giving the “rich” a bargain by only taxing them 300K. Then the ones making 10K will feel better, and that wins votes, doesn’t it.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:40 pm

Nothing is Free,

First you proclaim my words about big business to be BS, then you admit that it “might” be true for select big business. Is that your lesson of the day in contradiction. You may be funny but not in a humorous sort of way. :roll:

DannyX

October 14th, 2009
7:41 pm

“There was a time when “good business” meant taking a longer view and it even incorporated the well being of the employees and the environment and the investors and the community but not any more.”

Well said, taxpayer!

Obama, Bush, blah, blah, blah.

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:44 pm

Nothing Is Free

October 14th, 2009
7:30 pm

Most small “businesses” don’t even have any employees:

http://www.census.gov/econ/census07/

TnGelding

October 14th, 2009
7:50 pm

Kayaker 71

October 14th, 2009
7:34 pm

No, the ones making $10k will continue to wallow in their misery, drinking and smoking up what little resources they have as their children suffer with poor nutrition and neglect. You can’t get blood out of a turnip. Until spending can be drastically reduced, someone has to pay their fair share as well as mine. But I’d be prefectly willing to pay my share, if the politicians had the guts to change the tax code where everyone with income contributes something, even if just a dollar a week.

Bosch

October 14th, 2009
7:53 pm

Is this off base, because I’m not a financial expert nor do I play on TV, but wouldn’t the increase in the DOW be because of the bank bailouts which is separate from the stimulus money? The TARP funds was that money that McCain suspended his campaign over and all went to the banks/Wall Street institutions.

The stimulus money was totally separate and is being distributed among states, federal agencies, etc. A lot of which hasn’t been spent yet, so we can’t say whether it is a success/failure yet.

Discuss, ya’ know if ya’ want.

Bosch

October 14th, 2009
7:54 pm

Kayaker,

Just saying, but when you use the phrase “all liberals” your argument swirls down the drain.

Taxpayer

October 14th, 2009
7:58 pm

Why don’t some of you “conservatives” describe your Perfect, USA and then explain just how it is supposed to work and work so much better than anything we’ve ever had since whenever. Do some of you yearn for a Great Depression type environment to live in or what.

Nail Aluminum

October 14th, 2009
7:59 pm

Where’s the jobs?

Was employment held at 8%?

Did we got out of Gitmo?

I Report (-: You Whine )-: O Stands For Zero

October 14th, 2009
8:00 pm

This emerging health policy atrocity represents a fundamental breakdown of American democracy. The only broadcast news outlet reporting this story is Fox News. All the rest, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, NPR, carefully report the Democratic Party line and political propaganda as dutifully as the old Soviet controlled press. On Monday, the White House attacked Fox News as a Republican Party mouthpiece precisely because it is the only broadcast outlet not controlled by Obama and the Democrats. If you watch Fox, you will see it includes more overt Democrat party strategists than any other network.

Don’t forget the AJC, those little toads, mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!

stands for decibels

October 14th, 2009
8:06 pm

Rush Limbaugh and a lot of other folks on the right did cite the Dow’s decline to 6500 last March — just two months into the Obama presidency — as evidence that Obama’s policies were dismal failures,

Jay, I did a quick search and dug out this March 3, 2009 gem from the Excrement in Broadcasting…

“The Dow Jones Industrial Average down around 3,000 points. He doesn’t care! He just said we’re not looking at it. Day-to-day gyrations? How-about-month-to-month declines. There are no day-to-day gyrations to speak of here. There is just a steady decline. Besides he’s gotta worry about the long-term ability, the US and the world economy to regain its footing. The stock market happens to be where people who have skin in the game are located, and they’re getting out.”

mike

October 14th, 2009
8:07 pm

LOL. Jay whining that the crickets are chirping on the right?

I guess I must have missed the articles Jay wrote praising the Bush admin when the Dow was over 14,000.

It is the same with all pundits, when the numbers are bad they rush to say it isn’t “their side’s” fault. When the numbers are better they complain that “their side” isn’t getting enough credit. What silliness.

mike

October 14th, 2009
8:11 pm

Bosch –

“Just saying, but when you use the phrase “all liberals” your argument swirls down the drain.”

Yeah, if you want to support your argument legitimately you need to direct your comments at groups like “Tali-baptists”. That’s much better.

Add your comment