After the Bailout: a $5 Trillion New New Deal?

FDR's Policies Prolonged Depression by 7 Years

Could Democrats really be that dumb?

Those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it:

FDR's Policies Prolonged Depression by 7 Years, UCLA Economists Calculate

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/FDR-s-Policies-Prolonged-Depression-5409.aspx?RelNum=5409

MacGhil of AZ @ Oct 07, 2008 10:43:32 AM

about right

5 trillion is what, half an Iraq war? except this time the nation we build is our own.

Aziz Poonawalla of WI @ Oct 06, 2008 23:55:03 PM

Look at Michigan

Anybody thinking that taxing companies (And spending 'wisely') works....look at Michigan. Terrible economy, and it is not getting better. No business growth, in fact it is quite the opposite. It has been nice for Indiana, though. Michigan didn't even attempt to woo Honda to build an assembly plant there (Honda doesn't use union workers) so Indiana reaps the benefit. And FWIW, Bush is NOT a conservative. No conservative is happy with W...in fact, most of us are going to be happy to see him go.

True Conservative of IN @ Oct 06, 2008 17:49:22 PM

house of representatives

It's the House that controls the purse. The Republicans (in name only) in the House who were spending like LBJ on acid from 2001-2006 completely destroyed the fiscally conservative concept.

Come to think of it, the Democrat-run House in Jan 2007 could have defunded the war, they did not. What have they done? Minimum wage that is still lower than most states? Way to go, Nancy.

Single party rule will be bad for the country (like it was from 2001-2006). I'll take Obama and a Gingrich-like House, please.

rob collins of NY @ Oct 06, 2008 17:43:42 PM

To Fatesrider

Friend,

You are correct in your statement that more republican presidents have led us into recession is correct, however misleading.

The portion that you are forgetting is that to correct this issue of recession, Democrats have eaten away at basic freedoms little by little in order to "save" the country from recession/depression or bring the country out of it.

Friend, I'd rather be poor and free than stable and bound. If you feel differently, perhaps your place isn't in this country at all.

Please move to another country so that the rest of us that do believe in capitalism can pick up the pieces that you and your party have left us.

American of KS @ Oct 06, 2008 17:21:05 PM

Let's get something straight about Republican presidents. Reagan helped decrease the top marginal income tax rate by over 40% with a promise from Congressional Democrats to curb spending. They went against their word and continued to increase spending.

Bush 41 raised taxes under a Democratic Congress. Bush 43 added massive new spending entitlements in the form of Medicare Part D.

So while Republican presidents have been asleep at the wheel, or in worst case, complicit in spending increases, we also have a Democratic Congress (who have dominated control of the legislative branch over the last 70 years) who cannot seem to stop voting in massive new entitlements while passing along the debt to some future generation of taxpayers. Add in their attempts to insert themselves into the free market and you suddenly have financial disasters like Freddie and Fannie.

Bottom line is, deficits are not caused by undertaxation, they are caused by overspending. You cannot increase taxes to pay for increasing federal budgets without severely affecting consumer spending and investing. The answer is to take a hatchet to the federal budget. McCain's idea to freeze federal spending while eliminating or reducing the captial gains tax will be much more effective than a Democratic plan to add even more entitlements and more government interference in the free market, which will only serve to discourage investment and take even more purchasing power away from taxpayers.

LibertarianAtHeart of CA @ Oct 06, 2008 17:18:56 PM

Please God protect us from people like Fatesrider

"Frankly, I don't mind paying more in taxes if I know the money is going to be spent wisely"

And when has the Federal government ever done that?

The best they can do is overspend on and mismanage important projects.

There is no doubt the current Republicans have acted like Democrats in their spendthrift ways and should be run out of Washington with their Democratic cronies.

Throw all the the bums out!

New York Conservative of NY @ Oct 06, 2008 16:35:30 PM

The means required to attain and maintain a reputation for liberality seem to lead to exhaustion and a reputation for stinginess and rapacity.

But more fundamentally, this prediction cited by James Pethokoukis reminds me of mankind's origin as hunters of big game. It seems not to have occurred to our ancestors that they would kill off what they hunted. When the prey were gone, it seems the hunters must have suffered a great dying-off of their own. Mankind breeds true, and the left seem not to think beyond bringing down and eating their next big meal. When they have devoured the substance of industrious men even in the liberal democracies, one foresees they must suffer and die along with the prey. That's small comfort, of course, for one who wishes to live, thrive, and live again.

Kralizec @ Oct 06, 2008 16:02:55 PM