Posted on 02/01/2009 3:03:39 PM PST by quesney
Apparently, former presidential candidate, Senator, maverick and jokester, John McCain, is fond of saying, "It is always darkest just before it goes totally black." In that same jocular spirit, I give my predictions for the Obama Administration, short term and long. Let the hilarity ensue.
1. Obama and the Democrats will pass a massive stimulus bill. It will come with a cost of about $849 billion. That is, it will cost just a smidgeon less than the $850 billion bailout proposed, pushed and passed by President Bush and supported by Senator McCain. Thus the Democrats will be able to deflect any accusations of irresponsible spending with "our bill cost less than the Wall Street bailout bill supported by the Republicans." Be prepared to hear that Main Street deserves just as much of a bailout as Wall Street got.
2. The $849 billion stimulus will be a bit short on construction spending but chock full of funding for the left. ACORN will make out big time. So will lawyers and education bureaucrats. We'll have to see if Bill Ayers gets some juicy new government grant. Barney Franks' friends will do OK. The devil will be in the details, of course, but $849 billion to the ACORNs and Sierra Clubs of the world is effectively easy street into perpetuity. By 2010, any person or organization pushing freedom or a free market will be met with a swarm of massive PR, media coverage, protests and law suits. You'll wonder where the freedom-killers get all their money to do such things. It will no longer have to be from George Soros. They'll be funded by your government.
3. The current recession will end later this year, although its end might not be declared until some time in 2010. President Obama will be seen as the man who fixed the problem started by President Bush. Democrats will say, and people will believe, that his stimulus package and wise governance ended the crisis. (The real story, of course, is that it was only a mild downturn to begin with, until the trillion dollar bailouts turned it into a real recession. The uncertainties associated with the bailouts and a new Obama administration spooked the markets. Once the parameters of all that become known and uncertainty reduced, the markets will start recovering. Not to a Dow of 14,000 though - don't be ridiculous.)
4. Obama will keep his promise about pulling US troops out of Iraq. His promise was to pull nearly all troops out 16 months after becoming President. That would be by June 2010 by my reckoning. The public will consider his promise met and, once again, Obama will have gotten us out of another mess President Bush got us into, despite the real victory earned in Bush's time. Those who were killed or injured there will not be considered brave soldiers who kept America safer, overthrew a tyrant and freed 25 million people; they will be considered victims of an irresponsible cowboy Republican.
5. Benjamin Netanyahu will be elected Prime Minister of Israel. When the Mideast situation degrades to constant warfare and higher casualty levels than even now, it will not be blamed on Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah or Iran, nor will it be blamed on the new US policy. It will be blamed on Israel's right wing, intransigent Prime Minister.
6. Iran will get the bomb. Some voices will say "but we can't be sure they really have it." Other voices will say, "we need to be nice to them now; they have the bomb you know." In any case, no one will take action against them. And some will say we have no right to deny another country weapons of its own making. Sanctions will either be lifted or ignored, and Iran will have oil money, WMD and terrorist connections. Ahmadinejad will be personally welcomed to the nuclear club, either by President Obama himself, or by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
7. Osama bin Laden will be killed or captured, with credit going to US troops. President Obama will be hailed as doing what President Bush could not get done in eight years. The War on Terror will be considered over, with Iraq relegated to one huge mistake for all history. Pakistan and other Muslim countries won't be too happy about Osama's demise or US actions in Pakistan, but Obama will make them an offer they can live with: let me get credit for getting Osama, and the US will not intervene in the Mideast - develop your WMD and harass or attack Israel as desired. We'll release some former Gitmo detainees for good measure.
8. A host of leftist legislation will become law, but most of it will be made to look like moderate steps. Instead of the government outright owning the means of production, banking and communication, it will regulate them with rules incomprehensible to the layman.
* Instead of the Fairness Doctrine, we'll get broadcasting ownership restrictions that will have the same effect. You might have to get Sirius to listen to Rush, Sean or Mr. Savage - if Sirius is still in business then. * Instead of the Employee Free Choice Act (eliminating secret ballots in union votes), we'll get other unionization laws that will effectively make unionization easier. The proportion of the workforce that is unionized will increase significantly. Union bosses will be well compensated; workers, not so much. * We will get universal health care, but it won't be single-payer, at least on its face. Regulations and mandates will effectively mean that health care in the US will be run by the federal government, but mostly paid for by employers, individuals and states. (Not all that different from now; just more expensive.) * Banks and banking will be effectively nationalized. (Bank execs will still be well compensated. But they will, almost magically, contribute generously to Democrats. Think Franklin Raines.) * Gay marriage will not be passed at the federal level, but the Defense of Marriage Act will be overturned. Once the federal government recognizes gay marriage in one state (e.g., Massachusetts), it will be defacto law everywhere. Congress will also overturn the rule prohibiting open homosexuals from serving in the military. * Abortion will be totally unrestricted, and all civilian and military hospitals, secular and religious, will be forced to provide them. Abortion will be funded by the government both in the US and as part of foreign aid. Of course, embryonic stem cell research and embryonic cloning will be funded with federal dollars.
For guidance on what else will be enacted, see the Communist Manifesto or go here http://www.cpusa.org/article/archive/3/ and click on "Election 2008."
9. In a development that will surprise many, President Obama will not spend like a drunken sailor (or a compassionately conservative Republican), at least in 2011 and 2012. We will have uncomfortably large deficits, but they will be blamed on the lingering effects of the mess the Republicans left and the smoldering crisis (always a crisis). Obama will actually be painted as fiscally moderate and responsible. Of course, defense spending will be cut to 3% of GDP or less (from the current 4%). He won't "raise" Social Security taxes; he'll just apply them to all income levels. And much of a leftist agenda can be accomplished with rules and regulations (see above) rather than spending, at least in Obama's first term.
10. Barack Obama will be re-elected in 2012 with approximately 60% of the popular vote. He will be hailed as the man who got Osama bin Laden and ended the War on Terror, the man who extracted us from the Republican messes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the man who pulled us out of a Republican recession that almost became Great Depression II. Yet his fiscal policies will seem almost moderate: deficits of 3% of GDP after the Republicans left us with deficits of 7% or more. Republicans will lose more seats in the House and Senate in 2010 and 2012. Efforts to remove the 22nd Amendment will gather steam.
Those are my predictions for the short term, through Obama's first term. My long term predictions are worse. The US will be bankrupt by 2020, 2030 at the latest. We'll be such a basket case that few will care whether we are governed by communists or the caliphate (even fewer than now). Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Switzerland will have to enact stricter laws to limit American immigration.
The new unilateral superpower will be China. China will adopt the models of Singapore and Hong Kong: economically free, politically unfree. China will have the largest GDP in the world, nukes, access to oil deposits and natural resources and over a billion people who are good at math and work hard. You will be very screwed.
That is the rosy scenario. The less rosy ones involve mushroom clouds.
This article assumes that the freedom loving Americans (46% of us right now, probably higher once the idiot moderates wake up) roll over, grab the ankles, and take it up the @$$. I for one, will not stand idly by while any of this happens.
We were in worse condition in 1976, and we bounced back. We can and will do it again - it just takes hard work.
This, of course, assumes that all other factors will remain static, and there will be no surprises, such as 9-11.
Damn.
I was sitting here in a reasonably good mood, getting ready to watch the Super Bowl, then I read this shit.
It reads like a nightmare. Hell, it will probably go down almost exactly as written here..... /cry
The less rosy one more likely involves soup lines for years to come.
Indeed.. Moderates will not be whistling past the mushrooms.. They are in complete denial..
The midwestern ice storm that just shut everything down for a few days.. will be a fond memory, THEN..
I don't plan to roll over and play dead, either.
But this isn't 1976.
The Dems now have a massive vote-fraud machine, a massive campaign-finance-fraud machine (which will become taxpayer-funded), plus Secretaries of State in key battlegrounds, a de facto fillibuster-proof Senate majority (counting the RINO's as Dems), and they own and operate the fifth-column major media.
Even without throwing in the possibility of a Fairness Doctrine and Gun Confiscation, and ignoring the continuing indoctrination of students by the National Endoctrination Association (teachers are so dumb they can't even spell Indoctrination correctly); how are you going to overcome that with "hard work"?
We're going to need a better plan than that. Let's start out by supporting Michael Steele. We need to communicate with him and let him know what is important to us. No more John McCain's as Republican Presidential Candidates. No more being run by the Rockefeller Wing of the Republican Party. Otherwise the above article is overly optimistic.
You and me both brother. I was about to leave for church services. I will have to pray EXTRA HARD tonight for God to give America another chance. I think He is probably tired of giving us second chances. He might be ready to pull the plug.
And that would be right. An Effin commie enemy.,p> We will defeat them one way ofr the other.
Acorn will make it hard.
And the Obama Secret Service also.
They are already here on FR.
In 1976 there WAS a fairness doctrine. There was no conservative media. There was no talk radio. The three networks dominated all media coverage. The Democrats had 61 senators and a stronger majority in the House than they do now. ACORN was also around in 1976 as well.
ACORN will become less effective the more light is shown on their activities, and they are front and center on the RNC’s radar right now.
Ooh, I am going to have to stay off FR also, this whole thing is upsetting me too much. I am 54, I told my daughter starting college if there is anyway she can planon living in another country she should probably give it very serious thought.
Isn’t Barry giving ACORN 2+ Billion from the porkulus package. They’ll have some great attorneys with all the money.
So much so that many ping groups conduct discussions via reply mail instead of in open forum.
Who wants to deal with Agitators from the Obama camp every time we have a conservative thread discussion.
And believe me, they do want to know where you live.
I had one tell me that I need to watch what I say and how I say it. I told him to eff off.
One of the problems is determining which countries will survive the current tidal wave of socialism and worse that is sweeping the world. It is difficult to determine a long-term, freedom loving, safe harbor without running the risk that a new country might be even worse than the future USSA.
Well I am with you except mines Scottish. I ‘ll guard your back any day!
I agree with a good bit. I don’t agree Iraq troops to be pulled out completely. Issues in Afganistan will continue; largely due to poppy wars.
I disagree with O being re-elected. I think you have doubted grass roots and the 46%...hard to see the roses, but they are there.
You left out Supreme Ct justices stepping down and being replaced with libs.
Why is there no outcry in the MSM, saying "Heck of a job, Brownie" to Obama's absent FEMA? Why is Kanye West not proclaiming that Obama doesn't care about white people?
I think that Rahm Emanual personally steered that ice storm to the midwest. This is hugh and series.
“This, of course, assumes that all other factors will remain static, and there will be no surprises, such as 9-11.”
He does say this is his most optimistic scenario and that the others include mushroom clouds.
Randall might be on target, but he’s forgotten the human element here. The Soviets had an even larger state apparatus to control and contain their population, but in the end, they were just an empty shell. Everything outlined in this article would increase public cynicism about the government and officially-sponsored government activities, especially from the left. A culture with a disconnected elite and a sullen, disaffected mass might have the appearance of power, but when people are really needed, they won’t show up, or won’t care.
The end result of this scenario would be out-of-touch bureaucrats imposing meaningless regulation which would be ignored and subverted by most people - some of which already takes places in government-run insitutions like the public schools, where those of us who are conservative and patriotic silent put up with inane leftist workshops, return to the classroom, and teach what we wanted to in the first place. The scenario outlined in this article would grow the ranks of those who will be increasingly empowered to fight back in the old style of the slave, with incomplete work, half-assed efforts, sly subversion, and undermining the slaveowner. This also implies the occasional slave revolt.
In the words of the old Soviet joke, “We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.”
Eventually it will disappear like the nothingness it is based upon.
The big assumption underpinning this scenario is that the economy recovers and Obama gets credit for it.
Frankly, I think the government will continue to have its own financial crises (what’s happening in California is a sneak peek of what will happen in the Federal government), continued deficit spending will crowd out private investment, thus stalling any economic recovery. We will be economically stagnating for years, and Obama will get booted out in 2012.
It all comes down to deficit spending and the uncertainty and pessimism becoming ever more prevalent among investors. Investments, not consumer spending, will lead us out of the recession. Investors have to be confident in future economic performance, AS WELL AS EXPECT PRIVATE INVESTMENTS TO OUTPERFORM GOVERNMENT BONDS, to begin investing, which will itself spur recovery.
Investors tend to see things as improving or on the verge of improving before consumers themselves do. All this talk of consumer spending and how it drives the economy ignores the critical business spending (i.e. investment) side of the equation.
The thing that is the most amusing about the victorious, gloating Socialists is the way they're whistling past the mosque...
Actually, Islam's breeding machine will wash over the Socialists like a tsunami.
It WILL be hilarious - the feminists becoming pieces of meat for the men to own, the homosexuals dealt with according to Islamic law, the impotent subjugated Greenies watching in horror as the Muslims turn their beautiful nature preserves into rotting ghettoes dedicated to the glory of The Prophet, and Allah.
Oh, yes - and the return of outright slavery. Leftists make retarded morons look like rocket scientists.
You got that right.
Hope no terrorists are watching and "thinking" about what just happened.. The whole area just shut down.. lock stock and barrel.. No water, gas, elec, gasoline, heat, grocerys or refrigeration.. Just shut down the elec grid.. and any area is in a world of hurt..
Would not take a couple of genius's to do it either..
Even a primitive sand monkey could do it..
A dirt bike and load of explosives.. boom no elect...
Doesn't seem too rosy to me...
Gulp is right!
I think so. Not just because most in america think the gravy train is endless but also the baby boomers are retiring.
We're going to need a better plan than that. Let's start out by supporting Michael Steele.
Start with yanking conservative kids from the government indoctrination camps ( misnamed "schools") tomorrow!
Bismarck: "God has a special providence for fools, drunks, and the United States of America."
Quoted in Walter Russell Mead, Special Providence: American Foreign Policy and How it Changed the World (2002). pg vii
Thanks to GOPJ who pinged me this one : Says the US will be bankrupt by 2020, 2030 at the latest.
One wild a$$ guess among 300 million, and worth no more than any others.
Bismark had a bunch of great quotes, that’s a new one to me, thanks!
I’m sorry, I dont share your optimism. We no longer have the manufacturing jobs to pull us out of this one without creating a tax state.
Some would argue that the USA is bankrupt today...
We don’t need manufacturing jobs.
We need to cut taxes across the board, eliminate taxes on capital and divends, and then have the government go on an austerity program.
We dont need manufacturing jobs? That’s the most rediculous thing I have ever heard! Manufacturing pulled us out of the Great Depression. www.mises.org.
So what? The economy is different than it was in the 1930s.
Economies progress from an agrarian economy, to a manufacturing economy, to a services/financial/information economy.
Labor costs are too high (relatively speaking) to support a robust manufacturing industry in this country. As long as manufacturing can be done in other countries for 10% the cost, it will never be done here (unless you want American consumers to pay significantly higher prices for everything).
Doesn't seem too rosy to me... ping
Later
You're right. We have the "financial industry" and government jobs to take up the slack!... Oh, wait a minute. Never mind.
There will never be manufacturing jobs in this country when things can be manufactured in foreign countries for 1/10 the cost. How do you propose we manufacture goods in this country competitively??
If you throw up tariffs, you will make any recession exponentially worse.
Your thesis is flawed. Economics were no different then than they are now. A country cannot have the same degree of prosperity with service jobs. Consumption is now financed with OPM. What we are seeing now is a huge correction that will not be completely reversed. Basic economics.
“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”
~The late Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931 - 2005
“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation.” ~ Dr. Adrian Rogers
I don’t know if you have fond feelings left for GWB but I believe he made expectations from the government worse. Right now as our we are being sold to the Chinese as slaves (national and public debt, buying all our businesses) the public has been trained to think, “debt and deficits don’t matter”, that they can have everything. Sure, the public expected handouts in 2000, but it is worse now because they figure no one has to pay for it, certainly not them.
GWB also naturally gets the blame for the economy, like it or not. So that just adds to the fire of socialism. His economic vision was short sighted, he thought he had a real economic boom (Hannity still says so.) But no one cares about it now. They think republicans=depression and greed and stupidity. bad PR.
“...So that just adds to the fire of socialism...”
We are too far down the deficit path to pay for socialism. If taken together, the bailouts to present, the $820B porkulus bill, and all the other spending needed to complete the shoring up of the financial system, we will be near 80% of GDP in debt. That is the general threashold when creditworthyness will be in serious doubt and hyperinflation would most likely kick in. Trying to convert to socialism now would be like the fall of the USSR, only it would happen in the blink of an eye.
Democrats would be wise to take some time to reflect on why they find themselves where they are at this moment in time. It isn’t because we bought their ideas. It’s because people were angry about the economic problems and expect them to fix it, not make it worse. This includes accepting the notion that we no longer have the economic resources to blow on handouts, nationalization of the financial institutions, or to spend on buying votes. We’re sapped, and unless that changes and changes fast they will go down with the rest of us.
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