And They Said This Was Only Going To Be $700 Billion

Here's an interesting article I came across. The origin is noteworthy. Recently, I came across a Web site called The Daily Beast, I think because political satire extraordinaire Christopher Buckley writes there.

Anyway, they put together this section called The Cheat Sheet, which is a collection of the day's top news articles. I go there and to Buzzfeed for my news first when I sign online.

As for my two cents on the following article, it's like that episode of South Park. If you give the loch ness monster $3.50, he's going to keep coming back. Except instead of a giant cretaceous from the paleolithic era, we're talking about the government. Ain't life a bitch?

Here's a link to the story on latimes.com. Below I pasted the entire thing because I think the information is that important.

Economic rescue could cost $8.5 trillion
Heavy spending to battle the financial crisis is unlikely to abate soon. Analysts say next year's deficit could top $1 trillion.

By Jim Puzzanghera
November 30, 2008

Reporting from Washington -- With its decision last week to pump an additional $1 trillion into the financial crisis, the government eliminated any doubt that the nation is on a wartime footing in the battle to shore up the economy. The strategy now -- and in the coming Obama administration -- is essentially the win-at-any-cost approach previously adopted only to wage a major war.

And that means no hesitation in pledging to spend previously almost unimaginable sums of money and running up federal budget deficits on a scale not seen since World War II.

Indeed, analysts warn that the nation's next financial crisis could come from the staggering cost of battling the current one.

Just last week, new initiatives added $600 billion to lower mortgage rates, $200 billion to stimulate consumer loans and nearly $300 billion to steady Citigroup, the banking conglomerate. That pushed the potential long-term cost of the government's varied economic rescue initiatives, including direct loans and loan guarantees, to an estimated total of $8.5 trillion -- half of the entire economic output of the U.S. this year.

Nor has the cash register stopped ringing. President-elect Barack Obama and congressional Democrats are expected to enact a stimulus package of $500 billion to $700 billion soon after he takes office in January.

The spending already has had a dramatic effect on the federal budget deficit, which soared to a record $455 billion last year and began the 2009 fiscal year with an amazing $237-billion deficit for October alone. Analysts say next year's budget deficit could easily bust the $1-trillion barrier.

"I didn't think we'd see that for a long time," said Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "There's a huge risk of another economic crisis, a debt crisis, once we get on the other side of this one."

But the Bush administration and the economic team that Obama is rapidly assembling like a war Cabinet are vowing to spend whatever it takes to avoid a depression; they'll worry about the effect later.

"I don't think that there's any way of denying the fact that my first priority and my first job is to get us on the path of economic recovery, to create 2.5 million jobs, to provide relief to middle-class families," Obama told reporters last week.

"But as soon as the recovery is well underway, then we've got to set up a long-term plan to reduce the structural deficit and make sure that we're not leaving a mountain of debt for the next generation."

The mountain is already there, and rising faster than at any time since the 1940s, when the United States was fighting a global war.

Analysts say the current flood of red ink calls into question Obama's ability to launch programs such as middle-class tax cuts and a healthcare overhaul. In 1993, a deficit only a third the size of next year's projected $1 trillion prompted President Clinton to abandoned his campaign pledges of tax cuts.

Once the financial crisis eases, higher interest rates and soaring inflation will be risks. If they materialize, they could dramatically increase the government's borrowing costs to meet its annual debt payments. For consumers, borrowing could become more expensive even as the price of everyday items rise, holding back economic growth.

"We could have a super sub-prime crisis associated with the meltdown of the federal government," warned David Walker, president of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation and former head of the Government Accountability Office.

But even deficit hawks such as Walker acknowledge that the immediate crisis is priority No. 1. Just as with World War II, the government can worry about paying the bills once the enemy is defeated.

"You just throw everything you have at the problem to try to fix it as quickly as you can," said David Stowell, a finance professor at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. "We're mortgaging our future to a certain extent, but we're trying to do things that give us a future."

Washington could wind up spending substantially less than the sum of the commitments. Though the total estimated cost of the government's efforts adds up to $8.5 trillion, only about $3.2 trillion has been tapped, according to an analysis by Bloomberg.

And not all the money committed is direct spending. About $5.5 trillion in loan guarantees and other financial backing by the Federal Reserve is included in the total.

"The only way those commitments would become obligations would be if the economy completely collapsed, in which case it's a whole new ballgame anyway," said John Steele Gordon, a business and economic historian.

The government even stands to make money on some expenditures, such as the $330 billion it has used to buy equity in banks and other financial institutions through the Treasury Department's Troubled Asset Relief Program.

In the $1.2-billion bailout of Chrysler in 1980, the government ended up gaining $311 million when it sold stock options back to the company three years later.

But the federal efforts to forestall a depression are still historic in scope.

A $1-trillion deficit next year would represent about 7% of the nation's total economic output, or gross domestic product. That would top the 5.9% reached during the height of the Great Depression in 1934 but would fall well short of the deficits of World War II. In 1943, the high point, the deficit amounted to 30% of GDP.

The national debt is soaring too. In September, the National Debt Clock in New York City ran out of digits as the figure ticked over $10 trillion. The debt is now larger than the 45% of GDP it reached at the end of the Great Depression, but less than in 1946, when war spending had pushed the debt to 129% of GDP, said Gordon, author of "Hamilton's Blessing: The Extraordinary Life and Times of Our National Debt."

There's a potentially crucial difference, however, between the spending then and the commitments now:

Much of the Depression-World War II spending was on industrial production -- building new factories and converting existing plants to produce tanks, planes and ships. Huge sums also went into developing new technologies.

Those investments, combined with pent-up consumer demand and savings from the lean war years, quickly led to budget surpluses and sharp economic growth in the late 1940s as the baby boom began.

Analysts warn not to expect that to happen again. This time the government spending is largely ethereal, with the Federal Reserve printing more money to inject liquidity into the financial system and keep banks and other institutions afloat. And savings rates are low.

"Too many Americans have overextended themselves with regard to credit and debt, and too many have been following the bad example of the government," Walker said. "It is imperative that we recognize that this country has been living beyond its means and that we face large and growing structural deficits even after we turn the economy around."

Walker said he understands the need to attack the financial crisis. But the spending only adds to the looming problems of unfunded Social Security and Medicare commitments as baby boomers begin to retire.

He noted that the Moody's bond-rating firm fired a shot across the government's bow in January with a warning that spending on entitlement programs poses a long-term threat to the triple-A rating for government bonds. And that was before the financial crisis.

Interest rates remain low because of the crisis. But they will rise, particularly when the U.S. government starts borrowing more money to cover its growing debt, analysts predict. That could cause inflation to increase as well.

"We could easily enter into a highly inflationary situation because of all the stimulus we have and all the borrowing we have once it works its way through the economy," MacGuineas said. "The single most important priority right now is to stabilize the economy . . . but it really means that there is a huge risk on the other side."

Puzzanghera is a Times staff writer.

jim.puzzanghera@ latimes.com

If They Take My Cheap Beer Away, I'm Leaving

Have I had you sitting on pins and needles this past 10 days, waiting for that next post?

Don't fret, I have been allowing my professor to grade this as a project and waiting for the opportune topic to address.

So we have the reemergence of the Detroit Bailout (here's an interesting look about how the steel industry may provide as an example for automotive), the ongoing assemblage of President-elect Barack Obama's cabinet, the gay marriage issue and the Citigroup bailout all as possible discussion topics.

Luckily, all my readers are way to informed to care about listening to me go on a rant about how there is one simple solution to all of the three topics that are fixable (Obama's cabinet being a news story while the other issues being problems). The government should butt out of people's lifes!

Rather than focus on that junk, I'm going to go off the beaten pat with this post and address something that may be off your radar. Heck, this little nugget was off the epic New York Times Sunday edition.

England is considering a ban on happy hour! Forget the threat of bears, with all of this government intervention these days, is it not possible that the U.S. could follow the footsteps of those crazy Brits!

You want to spark a revolution Mr. Governement, take my happy hour and I will rain fire and brimstone all over your ass! It's right up there with football, apple pie, Internet porn and SUVs with America's past times.

Be sure to check out updates on this story because I sure as hell won't let those bastards get away of they try and pull this stunt in my U.S.A.

God Bless America!

Election Wrap-Up One Week Later

I am sorry blog, I neglected you too long.

But can you blame me? I haven't felt that burned out since I watched a 24-hour marathon of Dawson's Creek.

There are a few things I want to respond to and post in here, so this will be sort of a mix bag of blog goodies. Oh, and I may have to neglect this blog for another week or so because the official class project ends today and I think my professor needs to grade this as is.

Don't worry, though, I will post during winter break and up until someone pays me lots of money for my brilliant insights. That's right. I will sell out and never look back.

First things first, last time I posted was early morning after the election concluded. I ferociously tapped at the keyboard trying to get my election story into the Athens News so I could sleep. Here is a link to that story.

And now I will respond to my story

Things got a little weird after Barack Obama won the election. Everyone I encountered seemed happy, they just didn't know how to react.

The two reactions to transpire were tears of joy and run wild and scream like you have a banana in your pants and a monkey chasing you.

As I wrote in that last post, an Obama victory was one for the youth because so many felt a sense of duty for his victory.

My article states that even students who did not volunteer for the campaign still felt that Obama is the president elect because of their vote.

But the turnout numbers were not as overwhelming as I would have hoped. Even though the youth numbers went up for the third election in a row, 52 percent just doesn't cut it.

According to that Rock the Vote Blog, the 18-29 demographic accounted for 23 million votes. But, there are 44 million in that demographic.

What the fuck dudes?

Who didn't pull their weight? If the number doesn't continue to go at least expand from their in coming elections (and I don't just mean in 2012), then nothing is going to change.

It doesn't matter that the high voter turnout predictions for everyone didn't happen.

The point of this blog is and always will be to push a political agenda for the millennials. But that can't be done without votes.

I will now climb down my soap box and address two other things. But first, check out these cool maps of how the election would have turned out if only a certain demographic had voted. And check out this Racist Belt Theory.

Now onto Rob's insanely long, but totally appreciated comment

If you scroll down to the very bottom of this page, there's a list for followers. Rob would be my only one (this is when I nudge you on the arm and give you a little wink).

And as a loyal follower, Rob did two things. First, HE COMMENTED! Second, he completely disagreed with the man he was following.

Let me make one thing clear. I voted for John McCain knowing there were two flawed candidates. Because I lean right on economic policy (though the Republican party now leans not so right these days), I chose the most conservative candidate in hopes that he would choose the right people to solve the economic crisis.

Rob wrote that he is happy to have an intellectual in the White House, one of the reasons he voted for Obama. I don't know how much smarter Obama is than anyother politician because most seem to have that Ivy League pedigree, but Obama does sound smart and look smart.

I think Presdient George W. Bush has taken a lot of unwarranted criticism (though he did earn his fair share). But it would be difficult to argue that President Bush has come off as the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

So I will agree with Rob there. The other area where I agree with Rob is his fourth point where he states "I think the Republicans need their ass kicked."

McCain was maybe the worst candidate out of the primary pool. My explanation for the low voter turnouts, specificaly the low Republican turnout like in Ohio, is a result of a bad candidate.

Even though the numbers did not meet my expectiations, a lot of sources are writing about how the youth helped Obama get elected. So maybe with that ass kicking, the Republicans will have to get a youth friendly candidate who's not Sarah Palin.

Caution, this next link jumps into the Delorian to talk about 2012. Do not click here if you aren't ready. Although I haven't read enough on him yet, I think I like the idea of Gov. Bobby Jindal running with my only concern being a pro-life agenda (For the record, I am pro-choice because I think the issue is too religious for the government to be meddling with. If put in a position for a personal decision on abortion, I would never do it. And that's all I have to say about that).

Okay, and now to end the epic wrap-up post.

An email from Ohio University College Republican President Mellissa Short answering my pre-election question, what if Obama becomes president?

You pose an interesting question. Having worked personally on the McCain
campaign no doubt I will feel let down and a sense of disappointment after
working hard for a candidate that didn't win. Realistically the only option I'll
have is to express my views and concerns to my Congressman and hope they can
represent my views in Washington. Here on campus I'll undoubtedly have to deal
with a gloating population of Obama supporters, a handful of them being my
friends. But I think it will be interesting to see what happens when things
aren't magically fixed when Obama gets into office and his own supporters turn
on him, if that were to happen that is. Personally I don't see a Republican or
Democrat solution to the problems our country is facing today, I just see a
solution that will be even slower to present itself once all levels of the
Federal government are left leaning. I hope I answered your question, feel free
to edit and paraphrase any of my above comments. I'm looking forward to the
response of an Obama supporter will be.

I was glad that I didn't get a fearful response as some Republicans gave prior to last Tuesday. But the main point I want to drive home pulled from Mellisa's response is this.

Whether you voted for Obama or oppose him, we as citizens (and me as a journalist) need to hold politicians responsible for their actions. As voters, if an Obama administration screws things up, then don't vote for him when that time comes around. If he invokes the kind of change he promised, then give him another four years.

That applies to all elected officials. That will be the roll of this blogs in weeks and months to come, so stay tuned.

Obama Wins One For Youth Voters

I voted for John McCain, and I was not wrong in doing so.

Yes, earlier I posted that I wouldn't share my selection. But now it doesn't matter. The votes are in and I doubt you would have been influenced by me.

I voted McCain because I agree with a conservative ideology (though considering McCain a conservative may be a stretch) more than that of President-Elect Barack Obama and the Democrats. This article really influenced my decision.

But when I was uptown and in Baker Center tonight, watching the Obama supporters react to their candidate's victory, it legitimized him as a candidate for the young voters.

Now, I do not know if his policies are ideal for our generation. But he enfranchised us and that's why a President Obama is the best choice for our generation.

Obama made a significant amount of our generation care about voting. And because our voice was so essential in getting him elected, future elections will be forced to focus on us. That has always been the goal of this blog.

Here are some photos I took tonight and captions to explain each photo's significance. I'll post a link to my Athens News story in this post after it's published on Thursday.

Here is freshman Whitney Barksdale waiting in line to get free food. She told me that voting in her first election made her feel like her opinion was heard. It meant a lot to her to be apart of history in voting for the first African American for president. She said she believes in the change Obama can bring.

This is Skippers, the spot where the College Democrats and local Obama campaign volunteers congregated to watch the election coverage. Do you see the girl in the blue sweater with the arm on her shoulder? That's Liz Clark, the president for OU Students for Obama. I met her when researching for this article last year. She has worked for over a year in helping to get Obama elected.

Tuesday night, she glowed as tears of joy dripped down her cheek. I talked to her early in the night, before Obama captured the presidency. But when I came back to ask her about her final reaction, I couldn't interrupt the moment. During Obama's acceptance speech, he called his victory a victory for those who supported him and Liz has to be one of the people he was referring to.

Sure, these students were in line to get free food. But students are offered free food all the time and don't show up with these numbers. I talked to a few people in line and they all were interested in the election, the kind of enthusiasm that should carry over to future elections with our generation gaining political power.

Here is one of the Court Street mobs that took to screaming and running up and down the street. To be honest, this portion of the night got a little weird as Obama supporters took to skipping and yelling with one guy climbing a street light. I swear some people drove in circles just to honk their horns and yell "Obama" out their windows as much as possible.

The other mob started singing "We Are The Champions" outside of the Scripps Journalism building. When they were finished, they ran and skipped towards me like the herbivore dinosaurs in Jurassic Park.

Where To Get The Best Election Coverage

I'm guessing if you're reading this now, near the peak of election coverage, you are sitting at home, with your laptop on your lap, watching some coverage.

If you just settled in and went straight to this blog, then you are in luck my friend. Between myself and this random graduate student I met at the Donkey cafe, I think I know where you need to go to get the best information.

I think election coverage begins and ends with CNN at this point. My assignment for the Athens News is to cover the election on campus, which has led me to at least peak into four different locations where people are congregated and watching election coverage.

All are tuned into CNN.

Tonya Woodbridge, a graduate student at Ohio University studying education, is parked inside of Donkey armed with a laptop and continuing supply of coffee.

Although Tonya is an absolute Obama supporter, sporting her white t-shirt with the Obama campaign symbol, she is the kind of cynical thinker that I could talk to .

Tonya will not rest until they call the necessary 270 electoral votes and she is positive they are correct.

"I already was tricked once," she told me referring to the 2000 Presidential Campaign. "I went to bed then thinking one guy was going to be president and woke up to find out it was the other guy. I'm not going to let that happen again."

Tonya said she will wait until California's results come in, which probably won't happen for another three hours because the polls there will not close until 11 p.m.

Okay, I'll get back on topic now. From what I have been watching and hearing about the coverage, MSNBC seems to be the most trigger happy. They called Ohio (in favor of Obama) at least fifteen minutes before CNN.

So CNN is probably the best choice for watching TV, unless you are like me and would rather watch Indecision 2008 on Comedy Central. Check out comedian Patton Oswald's live blog from the Indecision 2008 Web site. It's complete bull shit that Comedy Central isn't streaming the coverage over the Web, giving us library patrons a chance to watch.

MSNBC has the best interactive map, in both mine and Tonya's opinions. Here's a look at it:



The wild card in all of this election coverage, in terms of Web production, would have to be Fox News. With an extreme Obama lead from the other two networks (CNN and MSNBC), Fox is taking the ultra conservative, gun shy approach when calling states.

Now their interactive map isn't working for me, but when it was, it may have been the most interesting of the three stations' interactive maps because it is the most different. As I type this, Fox News is calling Ohio for Obama, a mere 40 minutes behind CNN.

So this looks to be in the books, if everyone has reported results accurately. It interests me that the popular vote is so close, 51-48 Obama, but I'm sure that'll change by the end of the night if the stations have been accurately calling state victories. I'll post later tonight with a wrap up of the winner and some photos.

I voted this morning at 9 a.m, did not wait in any line and voted in about five minutes. Some of you may be wondering after all these posts and all the cynicism who I did I give my vote to?

I'm not going to share.

Although I cannot deny my admiration of the passion the Sen. Barack Obama supporters have displayed these past two weeks, I can't take them anymore. I don't care who you voted for, and you shouldn't care who I voted for.

If you want to debate me on something, challenge my cynicism towards both candidates. Tell me why I am wrong when I write that both candidates suck.

All I care about is that you go vote because a vote from a 18-25 year old, no matter who the vote is, should contribute to getting a more quality candidate in 2012. I'm going to make at least two posts tonight, so be ready for that.

Note: I'm well aware that face makes me look like I have a tickle in my anus. It's supposed to be kind of a dazed look I suppose, with elephants and donkeys humping through my head. The graphic is meant to show that I have been battling complete disdain for this election.

I Support Small Government, But McCain May Be Senile And I Ain't Down With That

Finding a Republican on the Ohio University campus is like finding someone who supports the HIV virus.

Okay, that may have been an exaggeration. I'm sure the Republican students are out there, but they aren't exactly coming out to support their candidate. And who can blame them.

Sen. John McCain is old, out-of-touch, computer illiterate, and has been a little erratic (Oh, God, I used the "e" word). Trinity Bracey, my favorite Sen. Barack Obama supporting freshman, told me that McCain makes her fall asleep.

While wearing that Obama/Biden pin or t-shirt has become as trendy as Northface fleeces and Ugg, a McCain/Palin sticker is more like wearing a beret.

Here's a photo from the former Burger King space on Court Street. As far as I can tell, this place is filled with Republican posters and nothing else. In the month or so it's been there, I have seen zero people enter. Is this why nothing has replaced Burger King here?


Okay, I'm not going to ramble onto a long-winded post here. My main concern with McCain is his age (72) and his inconsistency.

McCain has ran an awful campaign. check out this article for some campaign analysis. It was awful because he didn't run as himself, a bi-partisan moderate Republican. Instead, he tossed around the idea of being a Maverick, whatever the hell that means, but really just came off as a confused old man.

As a moderate Republican, he could have distanced himself from President George Bush and not lost the Republican vote because the GOP would see him as the better of two evils in comparison to the very left Sen. Barack Obama.

I know the statistic, that McCain voted with Bush 90 percent of the time, but this is Washington we're talking about. Just because you vote with someone, in the end, doesn't mean you didn't put up a fight. Here' s a quote from a Times Online article:

From then on he became the most reliably anti-Bush figure in the whole Republican Party. He clashed with the President over tax cuts, judicial appointments, the conduct of the war in Iraq, the treatment of detainees in the War on Terror and on campaign finance reform.

When he sought his party's nomination in the primary this year, he was attacked by almost all the other candidates for being insufficiently supportive of President Bush's policies and core conservative principles.

But with winning the nomination, McCain took on a responsibility to be as much like the rest of his party as possible. which led to a connection to Bush.

My second concern is really that McCain could die in office because he has lived such a full life. It would be awful to lose a president in office and even more awful without a strong contingency plan.

There is nothing presidential about Sarah Palin.

In my opinion, McCain would have had a real legit shot at winning tomorrow if he would have done one thing. Stood up against Bush and the rest of Congress when it came to this Wall Street bailout.

I have a big decision tomorrow and I don't know what I'm going to do. Either a) vote McCain because I don't think government should get any bigger and hopefully he would find a way to do so, b)vote for Obama because things are messed up right now and with a favorable Congress he can at least invoke change while McCain would have difficult; or c) vote for Libertarian candidate George Phillies or write in Ron Paul (my favorite candidate in the primaries) because they may see things more my way.

The idea is this. I'm skeptical about both candidates and do not see either as ideal. All I want out of this election is for the 18-25 voter demographic to go out there and put up a big turnout number so maybe that won't be the case in 2012.

I'll be posting tomorrow with my final decision first after I go vote at 9.