Re: Cue John Mellencamp

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and yet who have unfailingly enacted laws to aid the small town's mortal enemies.

Is this gonna be another snobbish urban elite vs salt-of-the-earth rural folk thread?

Just kidding, mostly, but my head spins when I think about this stuff.

I presume you mean Wal-Mart, but was the Interstate Highway System good for small towns?

But, yeah, low tax rates, since most of the rich live in urban/suburban areas, was bad for small towns.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:50 PM
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The article's mostly about anti-farming policies pushed by the GOP.


Posted by: Becks | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:52 PM
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I guess I need help on who you believe "the small town's mortal enemies" are.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:53 PM
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I heard a great snippet from the Senate hearings on the way home today, as Brown reminded Paulson and Bernacke that Wall Street hadn't just turned a blind eye to suffering in the rust belt, but had reveled in it. Didn't Wall Street owe America an apology?

Paulson and Bernacke didn't seem to get it at all.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:56 PM
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I lived for my first thirty years in towns under 30k with no cities over 100k within 30 miles.

We had more factory than farm jobs. Small factories jobbing for Detroit, mostly.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:56 PM
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bob, can you try to address the article instead of Becks' presentation of it?


Posted by: parsimon | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:56 PM
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I don't know quite what to make of the Wall Street Journal publishing Thomas Frank.


Posted by: Josh | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 8:58 PM
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AH BUT AIN'T THAT AMERICA!!!!11!!!


Posted by: OPINATED JOHN MELLENCAMP | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:00 PM
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I presume you mean Wal-Mart, but was the Interstate Highway System good for small towns?

I guess I need help on who you believe "the small town's mortal enemies" are.

Bob, are you trying to question Thomas Frank directly? Because I don't think he's reading this thread.


Posted by: M/tch M/lls | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:03 PM
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Hasn't Frank been the token WSJ liberal for a couple of months now?


Posted by: mike d | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:05 PM
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NPR had an interesting piece on a DC federal employee who just died. The guy went to a gizzilon counties and focused not just on farmers but rural life.


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:10 PM
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Admittedly a digression. From a recent obit of a USDA demographer in the Washington Post:

Mr. Beale knew from firsthand experience that rural America is far more diverse, racially and economically, than most people realize. He also knew, despite common perceptions, that the vast majority of rural Americans have nothing to do with farming and are, in fact, more likely to work in manufacturing.

The obit describes a real character. The last paragraph:

In the words of his nephew, Richard Beale, "He's the only person I've ever known who, on his deathbed, said he should have spent more time at the office."


Posted by: md 20/400 | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:12 PM
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Pwned by will.


Posted by: md 20/400 | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:13 PM
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4: I saw that. I love Sherrod Brown.


Posted by: PGD | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:14 PM
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2

The article's mostly about anti-farming policies pushed by the GOP.

Actually purported anti-small farm policies. Since I think the romantic myth of the family farm is ridiculous and harmful I am not sympathetic.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:21 PM
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9:Sorry guess I didn't notice the blockquote. In any case, when someone is quoted with apparent approval, it may be fair to address the one making the quote.

What do I know about Kansas? But unless you are talking about towns under 5k, farming jobs haven't been important in this country for a century. What, 10% of employment in distressed areas in 1935? Something like that.

Kansas may indeed be different, lacking rivers and any metros nearby. But most towns are built on manufacturing. Worked for a year making alternator casings. 3000 sq feet, owner, 5 employees. Such places are always in the most off the main drag sections. .


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:25 PM
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opinated
i recalled i was reading opinionated like opionated for quite some time
listening to podcasts is really helpful for example i've learned the other day how to pronounce LOL, i was reading it lol like in lola, but it turns out should say el-ou-el or mojo i thought is moho in Spanish pronounciation, an it's not Spanish but woodoo


Posted by: read | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:29 PM
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SHEARER AND MCMANUS
SITTING IN A TREE,
K-I-S-S-I-N-G!


Posted by: OPINIONATED 3RD GRADER | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:31 PM
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I've never known where the word "mojo" came from. Makes sense that it would be from some African/voodoo belief system.

Opined is a word and Opinionated is a word, but is Opinated?


Posted by: CN | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:31 PM
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If the WSJ is going to have a token liberal on its op-ed pages, Frank is a surprisingly good pick.


Posted by: Barbar | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:38 PM
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18 is funny visually
i read wiki, it's from woodoo, i knew that it's some kind of charm, we have similar things and call it sakhius, a buddhist charm
i mean people wear it, not me
i have one but usually keep it in my purse, can't wear anything on my neck b/c it could induce headache


Posted by: read | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:42 PM
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Waxahachie Texas

Population 21k. 70% White 17% Black 20% Latino.

Employment opportunities in the city are highly oriented toward industry: Owens Corning Fiberglas, Georgia-Pacific, and neighboring Texas Industries and Holcim. Positions for these companies are mainly filled through the Texas Workforce Commission which has an office in the city...Wiki
...they really ain't so different from urban or suburban blue collars.

I'm not sure I like Frank that much. I bought him at one time, but now I think "Republicans is tricking all them rural folk" is patronizing and reductive.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 9:54 PM
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This shit is complicated. You gotta picture that Waxahachie native driving 20 miles cross town twice a day to get to work, ten miles to Walmart & Sam's. What is the carless future gonna do to Waxahachie?

Walking my dogs is one of my major pleasures. That involves piling then in the back of the car and driving 5-10 miles to one of about a dozen parks and open areas. I put 2000 miles a year on that car for the last ten years. I don't feel all that guilty about it. Am I gonna take those big dogs on a bus or electric train, even if my little suburb were to get some?

IOW, Yggles is an ally on many issues, but on some issues, and I imagine some of you with him, I consider my "mortal enemies".

Sorry, Sarah and the Harley vs helmeted Obama on the bike hit me in the gut.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 10:38 PM
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Am I gonna take those big dogs on a bus or electric train, even if my little suburb were to get some?

Two-wheel midget wagon; then you get the dogs to tow you. When you get there you rest for an hour and then have them tow you back.

max
['Lots of exercise.']


Posted by: max | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 10:50 PM
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24:I seem to have much better endurance than the dogs.

Maybe I'm overprotective, but down here in Dallas, we get a few stories about joggers & runners killing their dogs. Humans have better temperature control mechanisms.

I so want the high 80s to end.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 10:58 PM
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If you were really gonna do that, you'd want them to walk.

And of course, anytime I took the dachshund with me on a walk, he usually got my shirt to make him a superman-style cape.

max
['And about halfway along, I'd chuck him in the creek.']


Posted by: max | Link to this comment | 09-23-08 11:44 PM
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I think "Republicans is tricking all them rural folk" is patronizing and reductive.

I think this, also.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 4:57 AM
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I think dismissing Frank with "Republicans is tricking all them rural folk" is patronizing and reductive is patronizing and reductive.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:34 AM
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27 -- Au contraire. Exhibit A: Sarah Palin.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:44 AM
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But what really defines them in Mrs. Palin's telling is their enemies, the people who supposedly "look down" on them...Frank

A) A core part of the Republican base really does like Palin, almost everything about her. She ain't George W Bush, Ivy-League rancher. "Troopergate" is admirable, not a criminal or unethical mistake.

B) A core part of the Democratic base does "look down" at Palin, and at anybody who likes or admires her.

C) Both A & B understand this difference reflects core interests and will manifest itself in policy.

D) Maybe we can remember the story about Harry Truman and his piano-playing daughter. Or the JFK loyalists and their attitude toward LBJ, which persists to this day, e.g., "JFK would have withdrawn from Vietnam."

E) We have been through this ad infintum, and LB wouldn't even recognize that the "contempt" was mutual. That's a necessary part of the contempt. I didn't participate in that thread, and I should have stayed away from this one.

Too much blind prejudice.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 6:30 AM
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Humans have better temperature control mechanisms.
dogs' tongues, if they are hanging outside maybe their temperature control is working okay
just the noses should be always cold, the indicator of their wellbeing iirc


Posted by: read | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 6:43 AM
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What in the heck is the difference between look down on someone and {disagreeing with, despising, disliking, etc} someone? Is this just a game of conjugations with some resentiment thrown in?


Posted by: md 20/400 | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 6:53 AM
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Waxahatchie has a walkable downtown. Much of the surrounding area has rotted away, but there's nothing inevitable about it.

Pointless contempt is human nature. Philadelphians and New Yorkers are full of contempt for people who live in New Jersey. People in the Pacific Northwest are full of contempt for Californians. That doesn't stop them from voting the same way in elections.

I'm sure like most people you assume that you can't be manipulated on an irrational level, but you are. John McCain's campaign calculated that picking Sarah Palin would get people with your loyalties on his side. They knew that you would think the things you are thinking about her.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 6:55 AM
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30 (B) is a fairly accurate description of my view. She's a religious nut, lacks curiousity, is absolutely committed to her beliefs without having exercised any effort to justify them or subject them to examination, and quite plainly thinks she is morally superior to those who don't share her certainties. She is utterly unqualified for the job she seeks. People who support her despite these facts are at best profoundly ignorant.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 7:12 AM
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My sister loves Palin and I hate Palin, but I have very serious doubts about my sister, God bless her. The PUMA demographic is mostly Republicans or Republican-leaning independents who liked Hillary.

The Palin demographic is probably lost to the Democrats, but one shouldn't feel too bad about that. Authoritarian, quasi-rural, anti-environmentalist Armageddonist Christians with militia sympathies are a known quality in our politics. So are voters who prefer an ignorant, down-home candidate who shoots from the hip. My guess is that these two demographics are losing influence due the the way they've helped mess up the country. The hard core will never learn, but a lot of the sympathizers are fading away from that nonsense.

I doubt that the Democrats would have had any trouble finding a Democratic Palin-equivalent, but a gimmicky token move like that would have infuriated a major Democratic constitutency. Even a Sebelius nomination might have annoyed many of the Clinton people.

The latest word is that Palin solidified the Republican core but helped very little outside it. A non-event.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 7:14 AM
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I absolutely look down on Palin and her supporters. I have no doubt that feeling is reciprocal. Such is life in a divided country.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 7:17 AM
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On Frank, I think that the "Red State, Blue State" book set him straight. The culture war is between two groups of middle class Americans. Urban liberal arts types vs. practical anti-urban Christians. Coastal vs. West and South. Real cities and some suburbs vs. other suburbs, exurbs, small cities, and the country. And so on.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 7:18 AM
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36 is right on.


Posted by: Spike | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 8:04 AM
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Frank's an ass. I don't know why Democrats like him.


Posted by: SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 8:08 AM
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As I have said before, Kansas isn't Tom Frank's best work (addendum).


Posted by: Sir Kraab | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 8:17 AM
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Frank's an ass. I don't know why Democrats like him.

Eh, he may not always be right, but I think he helped the dialogue.

And, he was a nice person at UVa. (A friend of a good friend.)


Posted by: Will | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 8:22 AM
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I think he helped the dialogue.

I'm sure he's very nice, but we disagree about that.


Posted by: SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 8:27 AM
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40 - that's some insightful stuff there.

Market fetishism is profoundly wrong but profoundly useful to the people in power.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 9:34 AM
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I find the linked material from Frank unsatisfying, because he doesn't really make the case that Republicans are harder on small-town America, just that they are harder on family farmers (and even that case he doesn't really flesh out).


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 9:38 AM
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John McCain's campaign calculated that picking Sarah Palin would get people with your loyalties on his side. They knew that you would think the things you are thinking about her.

You talking to me, Walt? I would want "Never voted for a Republican" to be carved on my gavestone, if I weren't gonna be cremated.

I want better Democrats. I have been getting worse Democrats for forty years.

If Obama gives my healthcare to Wall Street this month, I know he will sell the SSTF to Wall Street, and I do not want to have say:"Well, I voted for him."


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 10:01 AM
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So are voters who prefer an ignorant, down-home candidate who shoots from the hip.

So my Democratic leader, the urban Ivy League professional millionaire is selling the working class out to his friends, other urban Ivy League professional millionaires...and I'm the ass for wanting Harry Truman.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 10:09 AM
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44: You were expecting an academic monograph from an Op-Ed column? Frank is specifically rebutting an attempt by Republicans to identify with farmers, and gives quite specific examples of why said identification is false. He could talk more about manufacturing, but then the story of American companies sending manufacturing jobs outside the country is familiar enough to be almost cliche by this point, so I don't see a reason to begrudge him his focus.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 10:17 AM
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Slightly OT: Dowd has a good line about Palin's meetings with Karzai, Kissinger, et al., yesterday: "Sarah speed-dated diplomacy yesterday."


Posted by: Sir Kraab | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 10:19 AM
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Calculated Risk

"I am betting on the Congress doing the right thing for the American public and passing this bill,'' Buffett said. On his investment in Goldman, Buffett said: "If I didn't think the government was going to act I wouldn't have done anything."

Your boss has spoken, Obama.

No other Democratic Congress in this century would pass anything resembling this bill. It's simply unbelievable.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 10:46 AM
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Frank is specifically rebutting an attempt by Republicans to identify with farmers, and gives quite specific examples of why said identification is false.

No, he's specifically rebutting an attempt by Republicans to identify with small-town America, which he conflates not with farmers, but with small-scale farmers. I'd like to see him say something about how Republican policies, specifically, hurt small-scale farmers, but I'm willing to take his word for it.

His critique of Republicans, otherwise, seems to be divided largely into things that Democrats also do, and things that are the result of structural changes in the American economy.

There's lots of rhetoric and some pure gibberish here. He proposes antitrust action against ... well, who?

He derides Freedom to Farm, whose net effect in reality was to add to subsidy money. Then he calls small-town folks suckers for not being sufficiently angry about it.

It's his usual schtick - the poor, dumb rural folks don't know when they're being played.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:00 AM
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45: You clearly have been moved by the pick, just not far enough to vote Republican. You identify with the class that someone else described as "ignorant and down-home". So do lots of other people. Steve Schmidt knows this. Palin is a blank slate on which you and lots of other people can project your anxieties about the US class structure and your place in it.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:17 AM
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You identify with the class that...

He says he identifies with the class that.... Recall that mcmanus was for Clinton over Obama and now is for McCain over Obama. I'm willing to believe he identifies with some group to which Palin appeals, but I don't know that the relevant marker is class, though it might track class a bit.


Posted by: SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:23 AM
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No other Democratic Congress in this century would pass anything resembling this bill.

How about we see what (if anything) actually does get passed before you light your torch?


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:27 AM
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52:Tim, people around the net know me better than that. I have been around since before 9/11.

I want a fucking Robespierre or Lenin or Mao.

Mark Thoma approvingly cites Bill Fucking Gross ...read the comments


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:29 AM
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53:All possible money should go to Main Street, not Wall Street.

If any money at all is sent to Bill Gross or Warren Buffett, it is not merely a tragedy, but a crime.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:31 AM
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Gross had a reputation as a straight-shooter. In retrospect it was probably unearned, since as a bond trader his self-interest involves talking doom-and-gloom, which automatically sounds serious. Now that the fact that he's talking up his book that reputation is rapidly evaporating. Maybe Thoma hasn't heard yet. Honestly, I think Thoma has been a little out of his depth these past couple of weeks.

Buffett's reputation is slightly more deserved (he did, in fact, say that his taxes were too low), but yeah, here he's too obviously self-interested to pay attention to.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:38 AM
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56: I think you're allowed to pay attention to them, you're just not allowed to forget that they've a dog in the fight and it's not your dog.


Posted by: SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:42 AM
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46: Bob, last time you unloaded this BS someone tried to clue you in to necessary v. sufficient. And Truman wasn't ignorant or inexperienced.

If you want to shove your head up your butt for Sarah Palin's sake, go ahead. But your performance art sucks. She's just a totally crappy, worthless candidate (and quite an unpleasant person, as many in Alaska and in her home town know), and nominating her was a breathtakingly cynical, shallow ploy.

I've been in Wobegon for 3 years now. This is as rural and white as you could wish, and there's a full range of political opinion (Bush Kerry 50.5/49.5). Some of the wingers are nice sweet people, but their picture of the world further than 40 miles away is delusional. And some of them are not sweet but extraordinarily angry, to the point of dementia and Armageddonism, without any understanding of why they're angry. I don't think that people can be blamed for not taking their politics at face value.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:44 AM
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58:William Jennings Bryan had a lot going for him, but on balance he would a pretty unattractive candidate for most here. But he represented more than just social conservatism.

Goo-Goo Robert LaFollette was much more attractive, and won the debate, but we still got the 20s,30s, 40s.

Emma Goldman was sent to jail and deported, by Democrats, IIRC.

Debs just went to jail.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:57 AM
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But your performance art sucks

Didn't Bphd decide I was sincere & serious, and didn't like me anymore? I thought that had become the consensus.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 11:59 AM
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No, he's specifically rebutting an attempt by Republicans to identify with small-town America, which he conflates not with farmers, but with small-scale farmers.

Well, he's rebutting this:

'Small town people, Mrs. Palin went on, are "the ones who do some of the hardest work in America, who grow our food and run our factories and fight our wars."'

Palin is pretty plainly attempting to evoke the image of the family farmer (or family factory-worker) here. Which is indeed a bit rich if her party is inimical to the family farm, as in fact it is.

He derides Freedom to Farm, whose net effect in reality was to add to subsidy money.

Did you read your own link? It argues that Freedom to Farm increased subsidies that benefit large-scale agribusiness and not family farmers.

As to what possible problems that could lead to, well, dismantling every possible aspect of the New Deal to benefit corporations has proved a foolish strategy in pretty much every sector where it's been adopted, and farming was no different. Given the condition in which rural America finds itself, I don't think it's incumbent on Frank to use an Op-Ed to sketch for you every little step of how the destruction of the family farm (or local factory) has been more-or-less inimical to rural life. The results speak for themselves.

The rural folks have indeed been played, saying so is a fact and not a "schtick."


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:00 PM
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Emma Goldman was sent to jail and deported, by Democrats, IIRC.

I always look to 1917 for help predicting what the 2008 Democratic Party will do.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:01 PM
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50

Makes sense to me.

And aren't there a lot of fights over things like the allocation of highway money in which Republicans generally favor rural interests and Democrats generally favor urban interests?


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:03 PM
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61

Did you read your own link? It argues that Freedom to Farm increased subsidies that benefit large-scale agribusiness and not family farmers.

Farm subsidies are generally sold as benefiting small family farmers while in reality most of the money goes to big operations. But this does not mean small farms would do better with no subsidies. Subsidies generally help marginal operations to hang on after pure market forces would have eliminated them.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:10 PM
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on after pure market forces would have eliminated them.

If there were any hope of pure market forces in agriculture, this might make more sense. Prices are artificially low, not artificially high, and the subsidy programs are mostly designed to merge small farms, not preserve them.


Posted by: soup biscuit | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:14 PM
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61: Oh, no disagreement there.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:14 PM
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Umm, 66 to 64. Naturally I agree with myself.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:15 PM
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good to see your consistency, DS.


Posted by: soup biscuit | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:16 PM
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Preach it, James !


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:16 PM
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68: I am as constant as the Northern Star.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:18 PM
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I always look to 1917 for help predicting what the 2008 Democratic Party will do.

A lot of black people think Barack Obama has their best interests at heart, so it'll be real interesting when they find out that his predecessor and role model Woodrow Wilson actually INCREASED segretation and racism in government. Ha!


Posted by: CN | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:21 PM
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sorry, that should be "egretation".

Now, of course, black people can join white people in shopping at Victoria's Egret and other integrated stores.


Posted by: CN | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:24 PM
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No Deal ...Yglesias

Here's a succinct comment:

kafka Says: September 24th, 2008 at 10:31 am

"If such a simple solution exists, why do we not hear about it? Easy: Wall Street would much prefer to be bailed out with taxpayers' money than to be forced to pay for its own
mistakes."

Exactly. New Deal Democrats would have seen through this in 2 seconds, lined up the public behind them, and crucified the GOP for trying to get away with this bullshit.

Now we have feeble hacks like Reid and Pelosi plus Wall Street whores like Dodd, Schumer, and Frank[and Obama]. They're out for themselves. Screw the voters.

Is there anything that Obama & the Democrats could do, anything at all, that could lose your vote? Do you think that's a strong negotiating position? Do you have any integrity left at all?i


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:28 PM
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Do you have any integrity left at all?

That's rich coming from a man who accused Obama of beating his wife because of the way that Obama touched Clinton's arm. Keep hope alive, mcmanus: McCain might still win.


Posted by: SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:32 PM
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anything at all, that could lose your vote?

In a different year, yes. This one? No. But seeing as they haven't actually done anything on this yet, you seem a little more hysterical than usual.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:34 PM
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I thought that the idea of giving the money to those in default was an interesting option. $700 billion would bring a lot of payments current.


Posted by: Tassled Loafered Leech | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:34 PM
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Anyhow, I'm still holding out hope that Bernie Sanders and Russ Feingold will manage to push through my Bionic Vagina Amendment. YES WE CAN!


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:36 PM
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74:Liar. I made no accusation, I simply asked the question.

And Obama is very obviously not who he pretends to be.

Keep hope alive, mcmanus: McCain might still win.

I think I'd rather McCain be Hoover than a Democrat. As long as Obama wasn't viable in 2012.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:40 PM
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The funny thing is that folks on our side actually have ethical debates as to whether to link to crap like this.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:44 PM
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I thought this was a good comment:

We have illiquidity and we have insolvency, and they're neither always in the same places, nor necessarily at the same time. We have illiquid paper -- CDOs, RMBS, etc. etc. -- that is being marked to a non-existent market, thus creating damaging prices. There are various ways of dealing with it, one of which is goosing the market into action by purchasing some of that paper from balance sheets where it currently languishes.

Turning to insolvency, we have institutions that do not have a strong enough balance sheet to fund operations. Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Bear, Lehman, etc. Pick your favorite FDIC list failed bank of the week. These institutions are insolvent. They are, in a parrot sense, no more. Now, illiquid paper can make banks insolvent -- via the wonderful feedback loops of credit rating agencies, default swaps, etc. -- but they are not the same thing.

So, could you have a bailout in which some toxic paper is bought from some (currently) healthy banks? Of course you could. Get over it already and let's be adults about this stuff. We're trying to deal with illiquidity and insolvency, and intelligent people should be able to tell the difference, and act accordingly. We are going to have to deal with both issues repeatedly, so let's get on with it.


Posted by: Tassled Loafered Leech | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:45 PM
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70: I am as constant as the Northern Star.

People who know him well say that DS is also amazingly regular.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:46 PM
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New Deal Democrats would have seen through this in 2 seconds, lined up the public behind them, and crucified the GOP for trying to get away with this bullshit.

New Deal Democrats would presumably have done any number of things that would have prevented things from coming to this pass, like standing up against open Republican vote fraud in two Presidential elections or being something other than supine, timid and servile while holding a slim majority in Congress. Kafka is right to call Reid and Pelosi hacks.

Now that things have come to this pass, they're on the horns of a dilemma. If the support the bailout plan, they're giving away money to the same idiots who caused the crisis, and will be implicated in its almost certain failure. If they oppose it, they're left holding the bag when the full extent of the economic disaster becomes apparent, and they've handed McCain a weapon that could swing the election for him even without the Diebold Advantage. Shitty cards... but Obama, if he sticks to his insistence that any bailout plan should either be discarded or come with four conditions that he has to know the Republicans would rather die than agree to, will have played them brilliantly. If he sticks to it. We'll have to wait and see.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:48 PM
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56

Buffett's reputation is slightly more deserved (he did, in fact, say that his taxes were too low), but yeah, here he's too obviously self-interested to pay attention to.

He also said repeatedly that derivatives were a menace. As in the Berkshire Hathaway 2002 annual report (pdf file, p13-15):

Charlie and I are of one mind in how we feel about derivatives and the trading activities that go with them: We view them as time bombs, both for the parties that deal in them and the economic system.

... In our view, however, derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction, carrying dangers that, while now latent, are potentially lethal.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:48 PM
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81: In fact, even after the bitter divorce and the public scandal, in fact, his ex-wife could not stop herself from expressing her admiration of his regularity.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:51 PM
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65

If there were any hope of pure market forces in agriculture, this might make more sense. Prices are artificially low, not artificially high, and the subsidy programs are mostly designed to merge small farms, not preserve them.

Why do you think prices are artificially low rather than high? There are numerous obvious things like the quota on imported sugar keeping prices up. What is keeping prices artificially low?


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:55 PM
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I once dreamed of staging a production of a Shakespeare play with faux-Elizabethan ads for modern products. "I am as constant as the Northern Star" would have been the tagline for a laxative called MetaMusal.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:58 PM
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Subsidies keep American prices low, though not costs to Americans.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:58 PM
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76

I thought that the idea of giving the money to those in default was an interesting option. ...

Only if by interesting you mean totally insane.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:58 PM
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Sorta OT: McCain has apparently just called for a postponement of Friday's debate on account of the financial crisis.


Posted by: Jesus McQueen | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 12:58 PM
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Why the Dodd Plan ain't so great. Tyler Cowen

Holding equity yields nothing if the banks never recover. If the banks will recover, you would think a loan from the Fed would suffice.

Buffet has bet that Congress will help Goldman be the last man standing. Goldman is using the Buffett and Japanese money to buy other banks, but still demands billions of taxpayer money.

Obama, by giving POS Paulson a vote of confidence, has done plenty already.


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:01 PM
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What! That would totally fuck up my Friday night plans!


Posted by: Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:01 PM
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with faux-Elizabethan ads for modern products in the programme, that is.

89: No surprises there. I suspect he'll have any number of reasons to postpone the debates.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:01 PM
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87

Subsidies keep American prices low, though not costs to Americans.

Ok, I thought of a couple of subsidies that keep prices down. Cheap irrigation water and cheap land leases. I don't think these counterbalance the things keeping prices up (like the ethanol boondoggle). What other subsidies?


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:02 PM
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What about tax breaks for companies using cheap foreign labor? Surely that's a form of subsidy keeping prices down.


Posted by: Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:05 PM
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Has constipation gone out of fashion? I don't see a lot of laxative ads any more.

I was joking about holistic health once and grumbled that pretty soon people would be offering classes teaching us how to shit properly. He immediately referred me to a book telling people how to shit. This was 10-15 years ago, and I was already probably 10 years behind the curve.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:06 PM
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85: Well, to be fair it was too broad a statement. Obviously there are different markets for different ag products, and the issues are different. But if you're looking at where the big money subsidies are, you have to look at crops like corn. It's become a little bit complicated on the demand side due to ethanol, but in corn you have for decades had a policy of maintaining prices below production costs by way of subsidies, but also a year to year drop in the amount of subsidy/bushel. So the only way for a farmer to maintain income year to year is up production via increases in mechanization (i.e. go into debt for machinery to the tune of 6-7 figures), yield, or land farmed (i.e. buy your neighbors acres and one of you keeps farming). This (since the 70s anyway) maintained an oversupply year to year which meant cheap inputs for feedlots etc (hence the growth of cheap CAFO outfits) and chemical (hence the growth of processed food). It may be in the last few years the corn farmers in the country have been able to sell field corn (we're not talking about marginal impact crops like sweet corn) above their costs, I haven't checked. It hasn't been the usual case for decades though.


Posted by: soup biscuit | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:07 PM
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What other subsidies? Some of them are direct, paid by the acre farmed or bushel produced or whatever the exact mechanics are. Which means you can produce near or even under your actual costs.


Posted by: soup biscuit | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:09 PM
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95: They've been largely supplanted by "cleanses," I think.


Posted by: DS | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:09 PM
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Basically subsidies reduce farmers' costs and make it possible for them to sell at a lower price. In the case of corn, the use of corn to make ethanol increases demand and raises the price for food corn that way -- I don't know what the net is between the subsidy and the ethanol use. But other commodities are subsidized too.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:11 PM
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86: Whaddya know. Joni Mitchell had help with that one.


Posted by: Wrongshore | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:14 PM
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Sorta OT: McCain has apparently just called for a postponement of Friday's debate on account of the financial crisis.

That's really astonishing. It sort of meshes with the basic Republican unitary-executive idea that whenever something important is happening, all normal procedures should be suspended, but it's completely ridiculous.

McCain is on record as not wanting to have to vote or take a position on the bailout bill -- that's what's called "leadership". And he bitterly resents cynical Democratic attempts to force him to take a position.

But Jesus, trying to postpone the debates is off-the-map goofy.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:21 PM
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99: I thought the way corn subsidies were set up was that the gov't reimbursed farmers (presumably meeting some standard, but I don't know what) for the difference between some set price, and the actual, lower, market price. So corn buyers get corn cheap, but sellers have the price raised by subsidy to the set gov't price, which gives them an incentive to overproduce, which lowers the market price still more.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 1:37 PM
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96 97

Ok, maybe subsidies keep prices paid by buyers below the market price but they also keep prices received by farmers above the market price. So they encourage small marginal operations to keep on.

Also subsidies increase the value of farm land which is a third or more of production costs (at least in Iowa). So eliminating subsidies would reduce production costs by reducing the value of farm land.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 2:31 PM
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103: Agree it's complicated but be careful a) `market price' is a bit misleading when it's set, not arrived at by any market process, and b) part of the effect historically of reducing the subsidies year-to-year has been to (intentionally) push out small operations and favor aggregating. "Get big or go home" has been the admin. motto for a long time now.


Posted by: soup biscuit | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 2:35 PM
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Paulson bill apparently DOA according to Bloomberg.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 4:03 PM
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Ag policy has no bias toward small producers, though that's the rationale.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 4:11 PM
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106

If US ag policy increases the prices received by farmers then it encourages high cost farmers to continue farming. If large operations have economies of scale (as I believe they do) then US ag policy is slowing the shift to large low cost operations.

Also some subsidy programs have dollar limits on how much a single farm can receive (although rumor has it they are easily avoided).


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 4:33 PM
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European agricultural policy leads to cheap wine. American agricultural policy leads to cheap high-fructose corn syrup. I think we're doing it wrong.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 4:38 PM
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Higher prices benefit everyone who sells, James, and the more you sell, the more you benefit. Your animus against the little guy is so blatant that it makes you stupid. (In the same way, for people just tuning in, James believes that the present financial crisis is all about fraudulent poor people and minorities buying homes.)

Small farmers have lots of problems, low prices being only one of them, and for better or worse they've been squeezed out continually for a century. The lobbying for the farm program comes from enormous enterprises like Cargill.


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:09 PM
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European agricultural policy leads to cheap wine. American agricultural policy leads to cheap high-fructose corn syrup

There are parts of European ag policy that benefit those who can promote tourism by looking picturesque, whereas modern farming methods are not as pretty. Chateaux are not exactly necessary to making wine, but look good on the label. Driving through Nebraska is like being in the middle of the ocean. If not for the odometer, you'd swear you haven't moved.


Posted by: Tassled Loafered Leech | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:26 PM
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The lobbying for the farm program comes from enormous enterprises like Cargill.

It's not as if anyone is influenced to buy ADM products from watching their commercials on "Meet the Press".


Posted by: Tassled Loafered Leech | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:28 PM
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109

Higher prices benefit everyone who sells, James, and the more you sell, the more you benefit. Your animus against the little guy is so blatant that it makes you stupid. (In the same way, for people just tuning in, James believes that the present financial crisis is all about fraudulent poor people and minorities buying homes.)

Actually your animus against me seems to make it impossible for you to follow what I am saying sometimes. I said in 64

Farm subsidies are generally sold as benefiting small family farmers while in reality most of the money goes to big operations. ...

so why are you implying I believe otherwise. Your version of what I believe about the financial crisis is similarly a ridiculous strawman.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 09-24-08 5:39 PM
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