2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumDaily Beast: Bernie’s Socialist Dreamland Is BS
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The first part of this hard work is fiscal discipline. For decades, according to World Bank figures, Denmark has maintained a sound budget. Aside from the Clinton Administrations record from 1992 through 2000, the United States has been much weaker in this area. During those years of fiscal probity, balanced-budget advocacy group The Concord Coalition published an annual scorecard of the Deficit Hawks in Congress. Then-Congressman Bernie Sanders did not make the list. On the contrary, in both the House and Senate, Sanders has supported spending such as agribusiness subsidies, while opposing fiscal reforms such as earmark bans and balanced budget amendments. On the campaign trail, when challenged over his ideas for substantial new spending, Sanders claims the spending will be offset by economic growth and long-term cost reductions. That type of dynamic accounting was popular with Reagan and George W. Bush, and has consistently led to higher deficits.
A second key for Denmarks effective social services has been market-oriented government reform. Denmark introduced market forces to improve government performance in the 1980s, and Denmark undertook dramatic welfare reform in the 1990s. Bill Clinton campaigned and governed in a similar vein, with the Reinventing Government initiative focused on creating market forces within government, and Welfare Reform passing in 1996. Sanders has not advanced any such reforms in either chamber of Congress or on the campaign trail this year (he voted against the 1996 reform).
Perhaps the most important element of Denmarks success is creating wealth through a policy framework that includes business-friendly regulations and free trade. Immediately after the Democratic debate, the Danish Ambassador to the United States told Time Magazine that: Denmark has a lot to offer in terms of how we organize our society, he said. Danes have a very flexible labor market and we are open for business. On this, the Clintons have been consistently right, and Sanders has been a consistent foe. In the first debate of the primary, he equated capitalism primarily with greed, recklessness, and economic ruin. He has praised the communist Sandinistas in Nicaragua and the Castro regime in Cuba. He has repeatedly campaigned against free trade agreements, including Bill Clintons NAFTA agreement and Barack Obamas Trans-Pacific Partnership.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/18/bernie-s-socialist-dreamland-is-bs.html
I personally have no objection to an expanded social safety net, but let's not be naive about the complexity in implementing it.
AgingAmerican
(12,958 posts)You guys just do not get it.
Response to AgingAmerican (Reply #1)
Name removed Message auto-removed
99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)RiverLover
(7,830 posts)deutsey
(20,166 posts)stonecutter357
(12,697 posts)they get it. It just doesn't fit their current agenda.
rockfordfile
(8,702 posts)aidbo
(2,328 posts)The article linked in the OP also appears to be his only article on DB
madaboutharry
(40,211 posts)Americans can never and will never be Danes. They can't be Norwegians either. Americans are culturally and temperamentally different. Americans are too uptight, too competitive, and too socially isolated from one another to ever cope with the Nordic Model. American culture has never been based in equalitarianism. I don't see that changing. Ever.
That said, I don't think Bernie Sanders seeks to turn America into a giant Denmark. I think he sees taking the parts that work well in Scandinavian countries and Applying them in a way that makes sense for the United States. For example, convincing employers that family leave is actually good for business.
Chitown Kev
(2,197 posts)To be blunt about it, America is not white enough.
I firmly believe that if blacks and browns didn't benefit from the ACA, Southern whites would have had no problem supporting it...just as they had no problem supporting the New Deal.
Jamaal510
(10,893 posts)mentioned this. Not too long ago, 2 of my older siblings were discussing a correlation between how homogeneous some of the Scandinavian countries are and how they have a stronger safety net than the melting pot that is the U S of A. It's interesting to wonder if some of the racist mouth-breathers here in America would be quicker to support a stronger safety net if we weren't in the picture, and if RW politicians and billionaires would have a harder time demonizing government programs if that were the case.
mdbl
(4,973 posts)Just like when I asked a close friend of mine why the South went repuglican, his response was "they followed the racism". This from a conversation 10 years ago.
PatrickforO
(14,574 posts)You know what? The money that we owe in the national debt? We owe it to OURSELVES. That's right. You heard me.
The problem is that it is the Fed, not the US government that creates money. Basically they put some figures in a column, thus creating new dollars out of thin air, and then they charge us interest for it.
Why you ask? Because we've let them.
Nationalize the central bank, get rid of the Fed, and let the government print money as needed for projects. Just like the colonies of New York and Pennsylvania did before the Revolution. Just like Abraham Lincoln did during the Civil war.
Seriously. The enemy isn't the government. It is the capitalist bankers who hold us all in thrall.
You should read Ellen Brown's 'Web of Debt.'
snagglepuss
(12,704 posts)I will.
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)Non rich Americans until we take a meat axe to our insane military budget and close hundreds of us military bases all over the world.
And swear off the American Empire building. Our military was supposed to be a defensive force not an imperial force.
lovemydog
(11,833 posts)We should have peace, and a peace dividend.
It's an incredible drain on our resources. And much of our military spending isn't labor intensive. Jobs programs are a much more effective, labor intensive way of providing jobs, repairing our infrastructure and improving our economy.
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)Our infrastructure is crumbling. We could put hundreds of thousands or even more than that to work rebuilding it.
But oh we don't have the money! It's tied up in million dollar missiles, 3 billion dollar aircraft carriers and billion dollar bombers.
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)I think it was on ellen, is part of the problem is we are spending in areas where we shouldnt and not spending in areas where we should. i hope by "spending in areas where we shouldnt" he was talking about the ridiculous bloated military budget and all the "toys" for the neocons.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)She's FOR American Empire building. And a perpetually massive war budget.
And she's not even the only Dem who can win.
cascadiance
(19,537 posts)... since his recent proposed war tax on the wealthy almost mirrored what I suggested as a platform plank here earlier. I proposed a war surtax portion of the top marginal tax rate to be assessed if we were in a state of war measurable by some standards TBD. By doing so in a good way, we could not only raise more tax revenue, especially when we are at war when we need to have money to spend on it and have it in effect be paid for by those that benefit from it most, but by having such a tax, we actually put incentives for the very rich to reverse the notions of pushing a military industrial complex notion of us going to war to generate them revenue, when it will cost them more taxes to be paid.
Bernie LISTENS to us and does the right things! And doing something like that actually uses our state of corruption to work for us, if we could get such a law passed, so that the corruption would in effect help stop military spending then.
Salviati
(6,008 posts)Unless they're talking about large (+20%) cuts in the pentagons budget, then they're just using the budget debate to further their own policy goals.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)Mehlhorn started his career at McKinsey & Company, a consulting firm, and later became the Managing Director at Gerson Lehrman Group. He was also the Chief of Staff at O'Melveny & Myers, an international law firm.[8] Mehlhorn is the former chief operating officer and President of Bloomberg BNA Legal.[9][10] In 2013, he became a Senior Advisor to Eric Garcetti, the mayor of Los Angeles.[3] Since 2014, Mehlhorn has been a partner at Vidinovo, a venture capital network. He is a member of the boards for the technology companies, MedGenome, American Prison Data Systems and Aquicore. Mehlhorn has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones, GenomeWeb and Venture Beat.
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitri_Mehlhorn
Report1212
(661 posts)I mean, do we just outright have anti union right wingers being posted here now
https://twitter.com/DmitriMehlhorn?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
mmonk
(52,589 posts)after the great depression and the addition of Medicare and Medicaid in the past when we were more humane and people were above corporations in law.
sadoldgirl
(3,431 posts)correctly that we are the US. So, Bernie, try the comparison to
Canada, which is our close neighbor, and whose language we
share.
The greatest thing he could do is to ask the people whether
their grandparents or great grand parents voted for FDR and
if so why.At that time nobody would have called his plans
a democratic socialist plan, and yet they were and would be
in todays US policies. FDR was a democrat not only with a
capital D, but more importantly with a small d.
I have talked to people (some years ago) about FDR and their
clear answer was always:"He cared for the people." By now
the people should expect racial equality as well, and there is
no doubt that Bernie is a strong advocate for it as well.
Chitown Kev
(2,197 posts)is NOT a black veteran/household worker or a Japanese-American.
reformist2
(9,841 posts)They're for incremental change, small improvements, to be sure, which is better than what the Repubs want.
But they don't want to give up *too* much of their wealth to the masses. They're nicer elites than the Repubs, but they do enjoy lording it over the rest of us almost as much.
Bernie actually wants a releveling of the landscape, a real redistribution of their largely unearned, undeserved wealth - the result most often of rising real estate and/or stock prices. And that horrifies them. Third-way Dems would rather have Jeb! win than Bernie.
whatchamacallit
(15,558 posts)And people wonder why some think there's little difference between the parties...
Chitown Kev
(2,197 posts)is on an issue by issue basis...this author chooses more capitalist models of things but how about Denmark's health care system?
Fearless
(18,421 posts)ret5hd
(20,491 posts)stonecutter357
(12,697 posts)MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)that were already shitty to begin with, just like Clinton did?
Of course not.
That entire piece is full of similar BS innuendo, following the Clinton meme begun yesterday of "Denmark ain't so great, either."
Vinca
(50,271 posts)are happier, live longer, are better educated and healthier. Should we be screaming "We're number 13?" Or was it 18? This country could top them all if those at the top paid their fair share.
madfloridian
(88,117 posts)Response to madfloridian (Reply #35)
senz This message was self-deleted by its author.
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)Self-proclaimed one-percenters making passive-aggressive posts that are designed to tell us peasants we need to shut up and suck it up.