The Supreme Court Economy.

[kentuck]

Democrats blame George W Bush and his policies for most of our economic problems that we are enduring today. And he deserves much of the blame.

However, when we dig deeper, we can see the true culprits. Yes, the policies of Ronald Reagan were responsible to a large degree, also.

But the true cretins in all that we have experienced for the last 12 years is the US Supreme Court and Antonia Scalia, more specifically.

It was they that took the votes away from the people, because they did not trust the Democrats in Florida to count the votes accurately. They did not want to count the votes. Instead, they (Supremes) took it upon themselves to give the election to George W Bush. And this country has been going downhill ever since.

It is Antonia Scalia that has brow-beaten every conservative on the Court into doing his bidding. He is a bully which none of them dare to stand up to. He, more than anyone else, is responsible for putting George W Bush into office in 2001.

They inherited a balanced budget and a 4.1% unemployment rate and a projected surplus for as far as the eye could see. They even projected a balanced budget in the year 2012. Today. Now. But Bush and the Republicans said, "It's not the government's money, it's the people's money" and proceeded to give away the entire surplus plus everything that was projected to be a surplus in the future, to those at the very top. They called it "trickle-down". It has decimated our country to the point where we many never fully recover. At least, there will be few dollars for the social programs that might be needed in the future.

Add in 9/11, two unpaid wars, an expensive giveaway to the drug companies in Medicare "reform", $4 trillion in tax cuts, stock market crash, unemployment skyrocketing, and we get Barack Obama as President.

But it was not Ronald Reagan that put George W Bush into office. George W Bush was an ignorant chimp and he acted the part. But the real culprit for where we are today is the US Supreme Court and Antonia Scalia most specifically.

Just my historical opinion.

[Enthusiast]

1. Your historical opinion is right on the money.

And we now know that Bush ignored at least six specific warnings starting in May of 2001 leading up to 9/11. I believe this was done intentionally as one of PNAC's goals was a new Pearl Harbor type of attack.

These criminals did not steal the 2,000 election with good intentions. And as you point out, kentuck, the nation has been downhill ever since. It looks to me like they also engineered the entire bank/Wall Street/predatory mortgage fraud bailout giveaway fiasco. So the people responsible for this are traitors in every sense of the word, the worst traitors the nation has ever known. Another criminal act was the failure to investigate and bring these miscreants to justice. One does not "look forward" in the face of such a crime.

[No Elephants]

2. The Supreme Court is not responsible for the economy (or the budget), except as to FDR,

whose every effort (almost) to fix the economy the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional. After he threatened to "pack" the court, the SCOTUS has pretty much stayed its hand on the interstate commerce clause.

Blaming the Supreme Court for everything that Bush and Obama did after the 2000 election is not reality. Even blaming the Supreme Court for Bush's re-election is not reality.

Also, some Democrats seem to assume that Gore would have done only good things for the United States and the world. I respectfully suggest that none of us have the first notion what Gore would have done had he been in the Oval Office on 911.

I don't know what I would have done, let alone what Gore, whom I have never met, would have done. Maybe even Gore doesn't know.

Distinguishing between the national economy and the national budget is also very important.

I disagree that Democrats blame mostly Dummya for the national economy, unless we assume that Democrats wilfully refuse to recognize and tell the truth, to their own detrimant. As Biden said so emphatically during last night's debate, facts matter. They matter for the country, which is a lot more important than mattering for one Party or another.

What the SCOTUS did with Dummya may have raised a lot of constitutional issues, but Reagan, both Bushes and Clinton (and several Congresses), were solely responsible for both the national budget and the national economy. Their responsiblity does not end with their own respective terms in office. either.

Tax increases implemented by Reagan and Poppy Bush heleped Clinton balance the budget. On the other hand, deregulation by all three of them hurt the 99% and continue to do so to this day.

Yes, the trickle down policies of Reagan were harmful, but their effects did not end when Reagan left office. They continue to hurt us today. On the other hand, which Democratic President or Congress after 1990 reversed them?

Between them, Reagan and George H.W. Bush raised taxes several times, which went a very long way toward enabling Clinton to leave a budget surplus. So did Clinton's (and the "Contract with America" Congresses') ending "welfare as we know it," and making other budget cuts and I don't know how proud I am of those cuts.

Yes, Bush did spend a lot on wars. So has Obama.

As a general matter, though, war spending does a lot of damage to humans, and also to the budget--unless taxes are commensurate with war spending. However, war spending does not necessarily wreck the economy. War spending often props up the economy, much as other federal spending does. It does so in a very horrible way, but that is another issue.

Bush's wars were so hard on the budget because Bush cut taxes at the same time. And Obama made the very same tax cuts a couple of years ago.

However, the single factor most responsible for collapse of our economy and that of several other nations in 2008 was deregulation in general and, most especially, repeal of Glass Steagall, for which Clinton fought.

A few Democrats, like Harkin and Dorgan, fought both Clinton and the Republicans very hard on that, but they lost. And they told the truth about it at the time.

Harkin still tells the truth about it. Dorgan, being a lobbyist now, probably is more circumspect now about how responsible Clinton and many of Dorgan's fellow Democrats in Congress were for the collapse in 2008.

[Enthusiast]

3. No Elephants, no.

You say, "Blaming the Supreme Court for everything that Bush and Obama did after the 2000 election is not reality. Even blaming the Supreme Court for Bush's re-election is not reality."

Kentuck didn't blame the Supreme Court for everything that Bush and Obama did after the 2,000 election. He blamed the supreme court for throwing the election to Bush which allowed all the malfeasance and poor judgement to take place. Big difference. Handing the election to a non-winner was one of the most overt assaults on U.S. democracy in our history.

I don't think kentuck mentioned Bush's re-election. They simply stole that one by cheating in Ohio.

[No Elephants]

4. Enthusiast, this is a rare time that I disagree with you..

Yes, of course,, Kentuck's post mentions the so-called stolen election. So did my reply. However, his post says that the Supreme Court put Bush in office and therefore is to blame for everything that happened between Bush's first inauguration and today--and the focus of the post is the economy of today.


Indeed, the very title of the thread is "The Supreme Court Economy."

Kentuck's post brings in Reagan. Reagan had nothing whatever to do with stealing of the election of 2000 and therefore would be totally out of place in a post about that is only about a stolen election and an affront to democracy. Reagan, however, did have a heck of a lot to do with the current state of the U.S. economy, and is by no means out of place in a post that is primarily about our current economy.

Kentuck then goes on to say that, while Democrats blame Bush for today's economy, and while Reagan certainly contributed to today's economy, the ones who should get the lion's share of the blame for the past 12 years and today's economy, are the Justices who decided Bush v. Gore.


Here is Kentuck's post again, with my bolding and italics and some very minor snipping of a couple of sentences about Scalia.

The Supreme Court Economy.

Democrats blame George W Bush and his policies for most of our economic problems that we are enduring today. And he deserves much of the blame.

However, when we dig deeper, we can see the true culprits. Yes, the policies of Ronald Reagan were responsible to a large degree, also.

But the true cretins in all that we have experienced for the last 12 years is the US Supreme Court and Antonia Scalia, more specifically.

It was they that took the votes away from the people, because they did not trust the Democrats in Florida to count the votes accurately. They did not want to count the votes. Instead, they (Supremes) took it upon themselves to give the election to George W Bush. And this country has been going downhill ever since.

<snip>

They inherited a balanced budget and a 4.1% unemployment rate and a projected surplus for as far as the eye could see. They even projected a balanced budget in the year 2012. Today. Now. But Bush and the Republicans said, "It's not the government's money, it's the people's money" and proceeded to give away the entire surplus plus everything that was projected to be a surplus in the future, to those at the very top. They called it "trickle-down". It has decimated our country to the point where we many never fully recover. At least, there will be few dollars for the social programs that might be needed in the future.

Add in 9/11, two unpaid wars, an expensive giveaway to the drug companies in Medicare "reform", $4 trillion in tax cuts, stock market crash, unemployment skyrocketing, and we get Barack Obama as President.

But it was not Ronald Reagan that put George W Bush into office. George W Bush was an ignorant chimp and he acted the part. today is the US Supreme Court and Antonia Scalia most specifically.

Just my historical opinion.

My reply addressed what the OP said and only what the OP said.