Posted on 07/25/2009 8:04:19 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Is President Obama an economic illiterate? Harsh as that sounds, there's growing evidence he understands little about economics and even less about economic growth or job creation. Yet, as we saw at last week's presidential press conference, he's undeterred from holding forth, with seeming confidence, on economic issues.
Obama professes to believe in free market economics. But no one expects his policies to reflect the unfettered capitalism of a Milton Friedman. That's too much to ask. Demonstrating a passing acquaintance with free market ideas and how they might be used to fight the recession--that's not too much to ask.
But the president talks as if free market solutions are nonexistent, and in his mind they may be. Three weeks after taking office, he said only government "has the resources to jolt our economy back into life." He hasn't retreated, in words or policies, from that view.
At his press conference, Obama endorsed a surtax on families earning more than $1 million a year to pay for his health care initiative. This is no way to get the country out of a recession. Like them or not, millionaires are the folks whose investments create growth and jobs--which are, after all, exactly what the president is hoping for.
Another tax hike--especially on top of the increased taxes on individual income, capital gains, dividends, and inheritances that Obama intends to go into effect in 2011--is sure to impede investment. It's an anti-growth measure, as those with even a sketchy grasp of economics know. But Obama doesn't appear to.
The president also spoke favorably at the press conference of taxing "risky" ventures by Wall Street investors. It wasn't clear what risky investments he had in mind. Never mind. Reckless risk-taking is hardly a problem at the moment.
(Excerpt) Read more at weeklystandard.com ...
government makes the world go round
world go round
world go round
Dick ARMEY: I think with this president its even worse than that. He is more interested in income redistribution than he is in prosperity. … He’s got a whimsical notion of how things ought to turn out.
Economics is a very deep and complex discipline of understanding and I’m afraid we have a president right now who may be the greatest economic illiterate of any president of modern time. Not that he’s not capable of understanding. But I don’t believe he cares to understand.
Our economy has been hijacked by Marxists. Unfortunately, we will bear the brunt of the idiotic exercise. As Einstein said, doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is insane.
I’d like to see the Kenyan’s college transcripts, and bet he didn’t take a single Econ class.
0bama, and liberals in general, are “know nothings” in life and reality, not just economics. America’s biggest problem is that liberals think that they know EVERYTHING. At least Sgt. Schultz would admit that he knew nothing!
But he does know how to destroy.
Does the pope crap in the woods?
“Is President Obama an economic illiterate? “
Yes, economic illiterate, historical illiterate, consitutional and legal illiterate (even though he was supposed to be a LAW TEACHER) medical illiterate (tonsilgate)... and he was supposed to be some super genius because he (most of the time) pronounced words better than Bush.
You know, I told people back in the election that the stupid liberals mistook that uh, uh, stutter to be as if he were some freaky genius trying to orchestrate points to the lowly, not as smart masses. People WANTED to be so in love with him, they projected that desire on to him and he really was scrounging for an adequate vocabulary to satisfy them.
He’s a moron and the adoring masses are even dumber.
But I have never meet an attorney that did not claim to know everything about everything.
Obammam does claim to be an attorney you know.
Steve Forbes slamming cap and trade on Fox now. Says it’s a slap to capitalism.
ROFLOL, nice try, I think that is bear crap in the woods.
Calling Captain Obvious....Calling Captain Obvious
He doesn’t care. In Marxist eyes, economic collapse is the only solution to getting rid of capitalism once and for all.
Summers is a HG Wells visionary of all thing utopian. Utopian ideals trump economics.
Krugman is a Russian collectivist (it takes a village). Utopian ideals trump economics.
Goolsbee is a public economist known for some questionable papers that fits Obama’s agenda. Essentially, the rich can pay far more taxes and not suffer economic downturns.
“Taxes, High-Income Executives, and the Perils of Revenue Estimation in the New Economy,” American Economic Review (Papers and Proceedings), May 2000, vol. 90(2), 271-275.
“What Happens When You Tax the Rich? Evidence from Executive Compensation,” Journal of Political Economy, April 2000, vol. 108(2), 352-378.
Economics, science, health care, etc are not his strong points. Being a snake oil salesman is his strong point.
The American people like snake oil salesmen.
Barnes is a beltway elitist, open borders RINO!!
This is not quite accurate. Obama’s handlers(remember, he is just the face on a Central Committee) understand collective economics very well.
Solzhenitsyn explains it best: the collectivist has a very purposeful economic model. But it is limited in its understanding to just that, an economic model. Its failure is in applying other sciences to the equation, such as human psychology, ag science, logistics, demographics, engineering, mathematics, etc. The economy in the real world is fluid, but the collectivist demands rigid predictability. If there is failure, it is not in the model, but in the counter-revolutionary populace, and when that element is eliminated, there will be success.
In short, the socialist keeps shooting arrows straight up in the air, all the while chanting that there is no such thing as gravity.
The only thing he knows is Chicago ghetto politics. He knows nothing about this country period. If he did, he would do what the people want done. The only thing he is concerned about is “Changing” this country to something that “He” believes it should be, not what Americans want. Across the country, people are telling him that they don’t want Cap and Trade, they don’t want his health care but he’s not listening, or just doesn’t care.
I’m watching.
I still would vote for Forbes for President any day!
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