• Welcome to OGBoards 10.0, keep in mind that we will be making LOTS of changes to smooth out the experience here and make it as close as possible functionally to the old software, but feel free to drop suggestions or requests in the Tech Support subforum!

Chat Thread 57: Smangin' It

Status
Not open for further replies.
S

SteelCityDeac

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 10, 2011
Messages
2,355
Reaction score
126
images


Need more Webb love.
 
oh shit, steelcity won! the stars are aligning. all is right with the world.
 
So pumped for this weekend!

Just finished my research poster. Now just a take-home final away from the weekend. Booyah.
 
Caturday said:
I'll ignore the irony in the fact that you called my argument "not a thoughtful assessment" though your response includes not only assumptions but blanket statements and straw man arguments as well. First of all there are posters here that are for massive government. Of course "massive," "huge" etc is relative but when I consider points including income redistribution, mandated purchases of goods or services, increased taxes and many more, that to me smacks of large government both in practice and philosophically. In each way, these modify the role of the government in our lives and in each way the government's role is enhanced.

This notion that Bush and his neocons solely created this mess shows a fundamental misunderstanding of history but it does make for an easy excuse, doesn't it? By saying that my argument is "bs right-wing rhetoric" you lump me in neocons that is neither consistent with my politics or beliefs. You speak of the huge debt brought on by neocons but this can't be considered in a vacuum. Large debt isn't, in and of itself, a bad thing. When the economy is humming, you'd want to borrow as much as possible so long as you can produce a profitable return. The size of the budget in the final W years is the result of a confluence of issues, not just some neocon conspiracy. I'm not saying this burgeoning debt was right or wrong, if Afghanistan and Iraq were justified, if tax cuts were needed, etc. However, at the time, the nation faced a crisis which destroyed more wealth than any event in history. This crisis didn't arise independently as I have explained ad nauseum. The triple crash crushed the economy and it was triggered before the term neocon was a twinkle in some pundit's eye. When the housing market collapsed it did so under the stress of leverage. Leverage used recklessly sent a tidal wave through the economy both home and abroad. The tidal wave had been brewing for a decade; loosened lending standards, subprime loans, NINJA loans collapsed under their own weight pulling down home values across the board. We had been living in a house of cards because the Clinton administration thought more Americans were entitled to mortgages. This government intervention was the shot across the bow. I won't waste my time explaining the domino effect of this. So to consider the size of these debts without context and history is naive and partisan. The size of the debt and the ability of the government to control it was directly undermined by the financial crisis. If you exclude the two wars, the Bush tax cuts and consider the financial crisis in and of itself, you'll see just how deleterious it was. Trust me, no one on my trading desk was saying "the DJIA's down 35%, Lehman's collapsing, fuck those neocons, if only we weren't in Iraq!!." But hey revisionist history never hurt anyone.

I believe the current debate transcends policy much as it did in Europe's elections. I believe these arguments are a proxy for who is more capable of running your money and life; yourself or the government? But we have an election approaching so pragmatism should trump all. If you believe the government multiplier>private sector multiplier by all means grow the government just know that's been resoundingly rejected.
Click to expand...

not one mention of how the neocons ACTUALLY drove up debt through big government. that's my point. you see "big government" through the rw framework of entitlements ignoring the war machine. i could not possibly care less about this debate because i dont discuss politics on message boards genuinely. that's a loser's game. my point is simply that you read their posts as wake grad, rich kid working in finance and think a crusty old cali dude is some super liberal. news flash: uber liberals dont go to wake. as such, they dont post on wake message boards. fiscally and socially wake forest kews right more than most universities. as such, so do the message boards.
 
I'm captain of Team Emo right now.
 
How do I get out of this???
 
buckets said:
Sometimes I think it would be fun to be homeless for like a week
Click to expand...

I wanted to be homeless for a project when I was studying abroad in London, but my prof wouldn't let me for liability reasons. I almost did it anyway, but chickened out after reading Orwell and meeting some particularly mean homeless people.
 
The easiest way to stop being emo is to remember that you're awesome and then act accordingly
 
I am not too fond of San Francisco but it is the only cheap place I can find to go this weekend and its not a million degrees there.
 
deacphan said:
not one mention of how the neocons ACTUALLY drove up debt through big government. that's my point. you see "big government" through the rw framework of entitlements ignoring the war machine. i could not possibly care less about this debate because i dont discuss politics on message boards genuinely. that's a loser's game. my point is simply that you read their posts as wake grad, rich kid working in finance and think a crusty old cali dude is some super liberal. news flash: uber liberals dont go to wake. as such, they dont post on wake message boards. fiscally and socially wake forest kews right more than most universities. as such, so do the message boards.
Click to expand...

i'm kinda sad you didn't address any of his points at all, phan, cause when you do express yourself in such matters, I find myself agreeing with you almost all the time. also, i am not a rich wake grad, i was uber liberal and went to wake and actually had a ton of my views endorsed, while many others were obviously challenged and changed.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top