Reply #6: So, You Agree With This Economic Report's Prediction Of A "Tepid" Recovery

[Median Democrat]

I actually do. I think the report is a pretty frank discussion that does not cheerlead or diss on the President's proposals. Yes, there will be a recovery, but it will be tepid. Yes, the President's stimulus is needed to stop the slide in unemployment, but it is too small to reverse that slide entirely, and it will need to be paid later on with more taxes. In other words, no panaceas, and the report appears to generally support Obama's policy rationales.

I know that a lot of upper income types don't give a shit about what happens to the other 98% of the country, thus they are going to fight tooth and nail against modest increases in their marginal tax rate to the levels that were in place during the Clinton era.

The problem I see is that the corporate media CNBC/WSJ types are going to amazing lengths to distort the modest nature of Obama's proposals as socialism despite the fact that the top marginal tax rates under Obama are less than they were during the first six years under Reagan when top marginal tax rates were 50 percent.

What is missing are reports like the one I included that honestly discuss the costs and benefits of Obama's economic policies, as well as honestly identify the really hard issues like addressing the insolvency our Nation's banks.

Both liberal and conservative extremists distort the discussion by characterizing the decision as easy with some liberals pushing nationalization as a panacea and some right wingers pushing a let everyone go bankrupt because they deserve it as a populist talking point.

I know some folks like to demonize government officials, and during the Bush administration, there was a good reason to do so. However, my take on Tim Geithner is that the reason he hasn't solved the banking crisis in less than 60 days is because it is FUBAR.

Obama does not benefit from having uncertainty regarding the solvency of the nation's banks. The reason why he has not acted is because there is a lack of resources and the problems are extremely big, and maybe there really is not an easy answer.

Let me give you this example. Lets say you were a Madoff investor. The ponzi scheme is discovered. You now want your money back. What's the answer? The answer is that you are generally screwed, and depending on efforts to recover the assets, you may be a little less screwed, but you are still screwed at the end of the day.

I think the situation with our nation's banks is that we're screwed thanks to the Bush administration. The only question is how bad. There will be no magical policy that fixes things overnight, yet this will not stop liberals and conservatives from complaining that Obama has not magically erased the problems of the Bush administration.