Take Mr Obama's stimulus package for example, which ended up at $787bn (or just over three-quarters of a trillion if you prefer). You have probably heard by now the calculation that that is the equivalent of spending $1m a day every day starting from the birth of Christ and going on through the present day.

How much perspective does this snooty ass-clown think we need? Seriously, f*ck you, pal.

submitter: Enjoy your 11T national debt

I lay the blame square on the shoulders of fiscal conservancy or at least what was sold to us as fiscal conservancy.

Sarah Palin with her vast Executive Experience would have solved all our economic problems by now while John McCain was out hunting Osama bin Laden.

I'm not sure which group represents a more vapid and meritless segment of society: the morons who believe that writing articles like this create some interesting or worthwhile set of knowledge to add to our society's collective store; or the empty-headed lemmings who find such meaningless comparisons helpful in achieving an understanding of complex concepts.

I don't need a list of comparisons stretching from here to the sun to know this: it's way too much. My understanding is fine.

Pocket Ninja: I'm not sure which group represents a more vapid and meritless segment of society: the morons who believe that writing articles like this create some interesting or worthwhile set of knowledge to add to our society's collective store; or the empty-headed lemmings who find such meaningless comparisons helpful in achieving an understanding of complex concepts.

Or the empty headed lemmings who keep following this asshat because he is an awesome black guy who is going to send our great grandchildren into debt. Spending money is awesome! The more we spend the more jobs we make! Did you notice he is black? What a country! w00t!

$11 trillion isn't going to seem like that much money after the government inflates its way out of debt.

Ask an Argentinian for some of that perspective.

muck4doo:

Or the empty headed lemmings who keep following this asshat because he is an awesome black guy who is going to send our great grandchildren into debt. Spending money is awesome! The more we spend the more jobs we make! Did you notice he is black? What a country! w00t!

Did you support Bush's massive tax cut in the early 2000s? Did you support the $300 cheques he sent out so everyone could buy a new Playstation? Did you support the artificially-low interest rates during the '00s which encouraged the housing bubble and the subsequent banking mess? Did you support the Iraq war?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you have no right to complain. It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

Take Mr Obama's stimulus package for example, which ended up at $787bn (or just over three-quarters of a trillion if you prefer). You have probably heard by now the calculation that that is the equivalent of spending $1m a day every day starting from the birth of Christ and going on through the present day.

That's un-farking-believable.

I really, really, really pray and hope that the stimulus package works. If it doesn't work, we (the US and the rest of the world) are totally farked, no two ways about it. We're looking at even worse global recession and likely World War III.

No pressure or anything.

Brokenseas: $11 trillion isn't going to seem like that much money after the government inflates its way out of debt.

Who's the bigger idiot here? The government who printed 11 trillion IOUs on an entirely fiat currency they could print a trillion of any day? Or, the people who took those IOUs?

Brokenseas: It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

True. But "the black guy" does have a responsibility to make things better, not worse. I think that the stimulus will make things significantly worse. I really, really hope and pray that I am wrong, because I don't want to see what happens if I am right.

Brokenseas: If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you have no right to complain. It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

We can debate how far Bush may have gotten us it a hole, but there is no sign that Obama is going to stop digging deeper.

Brokenseas: $11 trillion isn't going to seem like that much money after the government inflates its way out of debt.

Ask an Argentinian for some of that perspective.

Yea, allot of government stupid went into that mess.

At least Saddam is no longer in power.

/that's all the matters

KaponoFor3: Brokenseas: It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

True. But "the black guy" does have a responsibility to make things better, not worse. I think that the stimulus will make things significantly worse. I really, really hope and pray that I am wrong, because I don't want to see what happens if I am right.

Back in the late '20s, Hoover responded to the great crash and depression by doing nothing. That didn't work out so well, so now Obama is trying something different. If the government tried to tighten its belt and balace the budget in this economy, it could be disasterous.



Link (new window) is a very scary read on the causes of the depression:

The self-centered attitudes of the 1920s seemed to fit nicely with the needs of the economy. Modern industry had the capacity to produce vast quantities of consumer goods, but this created a fundamental problem: Prosperity could continue only if demand was made to grow as rapidly as supply. Accordingly, people had to be persuaded to abandon such traditional values as saving, postponing pleasures and purchases, and buying only what they needed. "The key to economic prosperity," a General Motors executive declared in 1929, "is the organized creation of dissatisfaction." Advertising methods that had been developed to build support for World War I were used to persuade people to buy such relatively new products as automobiles and such completely new ones as radios and household appliances. The resulting mass consumption kept the economy going through most of the 1920s.

But there was an underlying economic problem. Income was distributed very unevenly, and the portion going to the wealthiest Americans grew larger as the decade proceeded. This was due largely to two factors: While businesses showed remarkable gains in productivity during the 1920s, workers got a relatively small share of the wealth this produced. At the same time, huge cuts were made in the top income-tax rates. Between 1923 and 1929, manufacturing output per person-hour increased by 32 percent, but workers' wages grew by only 8 percent. Corporate profits shot up by 65 percent in the same period, and the government let the wealthy keep more of those profits. The Revenue Act of 1926 cut the taxes of those making $1 million or more by more than two-thirds.

As a result of these trends, in 1929 the top 0.1 percent of American families had a total income equal to that of the bottom 42 percent. This meant that many people who were willing to listen to the advertisers and purchase new products did not have enough money to do so. To get around this difficulty, the 1920s produced another innovation-"credit," an attractive name for consumer debt. People were allowed to "buy now, pay later." But this only put off the day when consumers accumulated so much debt that they could not keep buying up all the products coming off assembly lines. That day came in 1929.


History repeats itself, doesn't it?

KaponoFor3: That's un-farking-believable.

I really, really, really pray and hope that the stimulus package works. If it doesn't work, we (the US and the rest of the world) are totally farked, no two ways about it. We're looking at even worse global recession and likely World War III.

No pressure or anything.

And last night, Limbaugh gave the keynote speech for CPAC and urged the Republicans to hope/pray that Obama fails. The opposition party in this country believes that massive civil unrest and economic collapse is it's best hope for political survival.

I'm still stunned by the implications of that speech.

Brokenseas: Back in the late '20s, Hoover responded to the great crash and depression by doing nothing. That didn't work out so well, so now Obama is trying something different.

Doing something that will make things worse is not better than doing nothing. If Obama's plan doesn't work, we are totally screwed. We've added a new mountain load of debt to pass onto to our children and grandchildren. We're condemning them to failure if it doesn't work.

Like I said, I hope that it does. I really do. I don't want to be right in this situation.

Brokenseas: History repeats itself, doesn't it?

If it does, then it looks like we are heading towards another World War, doesn't it?

Weaver95: And last night, Limbaugh gave the keynote speech for CPAC and urged the Republicans to hope/pray that Obama fails. The opposition party in this country believes that massive civil unrest and economic collapse is it's best hope for political survival.

I'm not surprised, it's Rush freaking Limbaugh for God sakes.

The GOP is farked for many years to come.

Crosshair: We can debate how far Bush may have gotten us it a hole, but there is no sign that Obama is going to stop digging deeper.

Well, Bush dug a giant farking hole so steep we can't climb out of it. So we're having to dig a tunnel to get back out and hope the tunnel won't collapse on us. That's a better perspective on what Obama is doing, I think.

Weaver95: I'm still stunned by the implications of that speech.

I'm not. The only thing I'm surprised about from that speech is that they're willing to admit it so blatantly. I figured out a while back they would refuse to work with Obama or any other Democrat just because, and the only endpoint for that process is insurrection.

GAT_00: Weaver95: I'm still stunned by the implications of that speech.

I'm not. The only thing I'm surprised about from that speech is that they're willing to admit it so blatantly. I figured out a while back they would refuse to work with Obama or any other Democrat just because, and the only endpoint for that process is insurrection.

I expected the Republicans to have difficulties with the next 4 years. I did NOT expect them to hope for widespread economic collapse and suffering of the people/citizens in the very country they claim to love so much. That kind of thinking is close to rabid insanity.

Rush: 'hey, if the country implodes in an orgy of violence, we can pin the blame on Obama and maybe pick up a few seats in Congress!'

Me: 'um..yeah, but isn't that kind of....well, evil?'

Rush: 'I prefer the term morally challenged.'

KaponoFor3: Doing something that will make things worse is not better than doing nothing. If Obama's plan doesn't work, we are totally screwed. We've added a new mountain load of debt to pass onto to our children and grandchildren. We're condemning them to failure if it doesn't work.

Like I said, I hope that it does. I really do. I don't want to be right in this situation.

Actually, I don't think you have to worry about the debt that this is going to cause. Either we can fix this, get out of the hole and pay it off, as Obama is already working towards getting the budget positive as quick as possible to reduce the deficit, or we collapse and the spending won't mean bupkis. I don't think it is possible to get out of this mess without spending like hell, so I have no problems with the stimulus package, and we can pay it off if we can recover. Since there won't be a Republican in office after the 2016 elections, it is likely the next Democrat will continue reducing the deficit. I seriously believe that if we make it through the next 8 months or so we will be fine. If we are going to collapse, we would have done so by then.

KaponoFor3:

Brokenseas: History repeats itself, doesn't it?

If it does, then it looks like we are heading towards another World War, doesn't it?



Maybe. World War II involved massive government expenditure, greater than Obama's spending. If we can spend the money this time on civilian life rather than the military, that would be better for everyone.

If not, hopefully the upcoming wars are just a bunch of smaller regional ones rather than The Big One with nukes and such.

Doing something that will make things worse is not better than doing nothing. If Obama's plan doesn't work, we are totally screwed. We've added a new mountain load of debt to pass onto to our children and grandchildren. We're condemning them to failure if it doesn't work.

America's national debt was higher in the early 1950s than it is now, relative to the size of the economy. It's hyperbole to say that we are totally screwed. There are some major lifestyle changes for all of us ahead though.

Weaver95: I expected the Republicans to have difficulties with the next 4 years. I did NOT expect them to hope for widespread economic collapse and suffering of the people/citizens in the very country they claim to love so much. That kind of thinking is close to rabid insanity.

Heh, I've been treating the entire Republican party as brain dead batshiat insane idiots for the last couple of months. It is why my new favorite curse to call someone is to call them a Republican: a stiff-necked, uncompromising, thoughtless moron. Now when you make sweeping generalizations like that, they are generally wrong. But as time goes on, I keep seeing my stereotype reinforced. Which actually is kinda scary, even if it does keep making me laugh.

Brokenseas: muck4doo:

Or the empty headed lemmings who keep following this asshat because he is an awesome black guy who is going to send our great grandchildren into debt. Spending money is awesome! The more we spend the more jobs we make! Did you notice he is black? What a country! w00t!

Did you support Bush's massive tax cut in the early 2000s? Did you support the $300 cheques he sent out so everyone could buy a new Playstation? Did you support the artificially-low interest rates during the '00s which encouraged the housing bubble and the subsequent banking mess? Did you support the Iraq war?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you have no right to complain. It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

No. No. No. No. STFU.

And the housing crisis has been a problem growing long before Bush took office. Again, STFU.

Brokenseas: Back in the late '20s, Hoover responded to the great crash and depression by doing nothing.

Hoover responded by increasing taxation and government spending. FDR accused Hoover as being a Socialist during the 1932 campaign. Once FDR won he more or less did the same things Hoover did, just slapped a catchy name onto it and increased spending/taxation further.

Doing nothing is often better than doing something, it depends on the situation.

Brokenseas: Maybe. World War II involved massive government expenditure, greater than Obama's spending. If we can spend the money this time on civilian life rather than the military, that would be better for everyone.

AAAAAAAAAnd, where does that money come from? Didn't think that one through I see.

I love how we have recently started to measure our spending in terms of "this is how many times X can go into Y". Such fun.

No worries, soon all those Little Sam Adamses and their huge tea parties will overthrow the imperial overlord and His Obamabots in Congress, return the GOP to power and re-apply the kind of fiscal responsibility that that worked so well for us over the past 30 years.

Lawnchair: Brokenseas: $11 trillion isn't going to seem like that much money after the government inflates its way out of debt.

Who's the bigger idiot here? The government who printed 11 trillion IOUs on an entirely fiat currency they could print a trillion of any day? Or, the people who took those IOUs?



//we're running out of people to snooker into taking the ious

Weaver95: I expected the Republicans to have difficulties with the next 4 years. I did NOT expect them to hope for widespread economic collapse and suffering of the people/citizens in the very country they claim to love so much. That kind of thinking is close to rabid insanity.

Rush: 'hey, if the country implodes in an orgy of violence, we can pin the blame on Obama and maybe pick up a few seats in Congress!'

All I can say is, if the Revolution DOES come; I'm coming after Limbaugh first!

How much money was the Bush tax cut again?

If each dollar was one light-year long, and you lined them up from end to end, the national debt would be more than one-thousand universes long. Think about that, kids. Think about that.

The solution is near at hand...

So you're telling me that if we apply a totally arbitrary and unrelated measurement it makes things look bad? Oh noes.

/My car gets eighteen rods to the hogshead.

Please put this into terms I can understand - like how many times a trillion dollars will physically circle the world.

And the housing crisis has been a problem growing long before Bush took office. Again, STFU.

And so it grew throughout his entire administration, causing the housing market to collapse when he was almost out. In other words, he had 7 years to deal with the problem and didn't. That's totally ok.

Lionel Mandrake: No worries, soon all those Little Sam Adamses and their huge tea parties will overthrow the imperial overlord and His Obamabots in Congress, return the GOP to power and re-apply the kind of fiscal responsibility that that worked so well for us over the past 30 years.

GOP fiscal responsibility? Where were you from Jan 2001 to Jan 2009?

If you stacked a trillion dollars in one dollar bills on top of each other...the stack would be pretty tall.

Amazing fun fact.

It's funny how people think we are dealing with real money and expect that this will ever be paid back with tax dollars. We will need quite a surplus every year just to pay the interest.

gwanur: Lionel Mandrake: No worries, soon all those Little Sam Adamses and their huge tea parties will overthrow the imperial overlord and His Obamabots in Congress, return the GOP to power and re-apply the kind of fiscal responsibility that that worked so well for us over the past 30 years.

GOP fiscal responsibility? Where were you from Jan 2001 to Jan 2009?

Well, to be fair, they also had to make time for compassionate conservatism.

Lionel Mandrake: No worries, soon all those Little Sam Adamses and their huge tea parties will overthrow the imperial overlord and His Obamabots in Congress, return the GOP to power and re-apply the kind of fiscal responsibility that that worked so well for us over the past 30 years.

The best government we had in a long while was with a Democratic President and a Republican Congress. That appears to be the only way to get a government surplus.

Brokenseas: Did you support Bush's massive tax cut in the early 2000s? Did you support the $300 cheques he sent out so everyone could buy a new Playstation? Did you support the artificially-low interest rates during the '00s which encouraged the housing bubble and the subsequent banking mess? Did you support the Iraq war?

Yes, no, no, yes.

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you have no right to complain. It ain't the black guy's fault the wheels are falling off the economy, and it ain't the black guy's fault the government is in massive debt.

Maybe it isn't his fault we're in this mess (as a member of the Senate, I'd argue he shares some culpability), but it'll sure be his fault if he and his party make it worse.

You know, for the last several years while everybody else has been biatching about this...where were the people that are currently biatching a shiatstorm?

And, those of us that aren't biatching 24/7 don't like this anymore than you do. But, we are at least thinking of some way to help the country.

The country has been on a downward slide for several years and it seems half of you have finally caught up with the rest of us.

Perspective:

If you turned our debt into some irrelevant tangible thing, you could have a whole lot of this tangible thing.

If you turned our debt into some irrelevant intangible thing, you could have a whole lot of nothing.

If a single dollar could buy a single gold atom, how much gold would our national debt buy?
3.2706 x 10^-22 x 1.1 x 10¹³ = 3.59766 × 10^-9

That's not even a single gram! That's some debt...

thamike: How much perspective does this snooty ass-clown think we need?

David: Oh sorry...well this is thoroughly depressing.

Nigel: It really puts perspective on things, though, doesn't it?

David: Too much, there's too much farking perspective now.

jjorsett: Maybe it isn't his fault we're in this mess (as a member of the Senate, I'd argue he shares some culpability), but it'll sure be his fault if he and his party make it worse.

Well, seeing as how we can't possibly answer this question right now...what the bloody f*ck is all the outrage about right now?

Where were these guys for Bush's 1.4 TRILLION stimulus when he got in office?

Breaking news: numbers that are bigger than other numbers are actually bigger than other numbers!

$700 billion for the Iraq war

$700 billion for the banks

$700 billion for America

The stimulus is in line with expectations.

Well If the U.S. borrows some more and then let some financially stable banking industries that are in a temporary rut borrow it, It is my understanding that the tax payers can actually turn a profit with such a strategy. Why didn't someone think of this earlier? Turning the U.S. into a huge hedge fund.

Well that solves that problem.

Owangotang: Breaking news: numbers that are bigger than other numbers are actually bigger than other numbers!

Interesting fact: If you printed the bigger numbers in a larger font than the big numbers, they'd be bigger than the big numbers in at least two ways!

Makes you think, doesn't it?

Why couldn't we have had a "Job-Creating Plan" instead of Pelosi's "My Wish List Plan"?

Why didn't we just not invade Iraq.

Why are we bailing out anyone?

Let the chips fall. We've still got a strong Republic, but we need to hang on to the free-market, albeit with far more oversight now.

The problem is that G.W. Bush took his shoes off, was able to get to 20, and then figured that $10 Trillion was something like a Brazillion, which he knows to have a tan and lots of cocaine. So a Trillion is a good thing.
That's how we ended up adding another digit to the National Debt Counter.