Think Progress

Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.

By Amanda Terkel on Sep 15th, 2007 at 1:00 pm

Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.

In his new memoir to be released Monday, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan “levels unusually harsh criticism at President Bush…in his new book, arguing that Bush abandoned the central conservative principle of fiscal restraint.” President Clinton, on the other hand, he calls a “risk taker” who had shown a “preference for dealing in facts.”

UPDATE: Greenspan also writes, “I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil.”

Comments
81

81 Responses to “Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.”

Jay Randal says:

Bush has abandoned sanity itself.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
rk says:

Why don’t these people ever speak up when it could really make a difference?
September 15th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
Jason Baddo says:

Greenspan is a sleazy liar, a political hack etc. When out of the spotlight he now writes this s@@t
September 15th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Briseadh na Faire says:

Fiscal constraint is for the working class, not the ruling elite:

New Fee for Those Getting Child Support

Millions of families that turned to federal and state governments for help in collecting child support payments will now have to pay more for the service.

Beginning Oct. 1, families in several states will have to pay $25 annually when their states have collected at least $500 on their behalf.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/09/07/national/w132330D37.DTL

In most states, this “fee” will be assessed on the custodial parent, thus unaffecting the deadbeat parent. Part of the purpose of this “fee” is to help reduce Bush’s deficit spending. In other words, our children are already starting to pay for Bush’s War.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
Briseadh na Faire says:

Jay,

you might want to check out http://tpzoo.wordpress.com/
September 15th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
Troll says:

Absolutely correct, which is why his poll numbers are in the tank. Even the conservatives are disgusted. Clinton, though practically forced to by the Republican sweep of 92, at least signed the balanced budgets sent to him.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
ï£¿âˆžÎ© says:

…the Republican sweep of 92,
Comment by Troll

I think you mean ‘94.

ï£¿
September 15th, 2007 at 1:23 pm
Troll says:

Thanks
September 15th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
Fan_of_Man says:

bush is the worst kind of liberal.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
bobwurst says:

“Clinton, though practically forced to by the Republican sweep of 92, at least signed the balanced budgets sent to him.

Comment by Troll”

Clinton wasn’t forced to do anything by the republicans in congress. That is just more neocon revisionist history. Clinton went about the business of running the country, protecting the country and catching the terrorists who attacked the country, while the republicans spent 80 million dollars defining “political witch hunt”.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
JMOHR says:

The Democrats have always been more balanced in terms of bringing the budget into balance. The one exception being Johnson who ran afoul of the Vietnam War while trying to expand social services. The Republicans also had emphasized balancing the budget as well. They had a different view of appropriate tax level and social services. However, this seems to have changed with Regan. The tilt is now to reward narrow special interests groups.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
bobwurst says:

“bush is the worst kind of liberal.
Comment by Fan_of_Man”

bush is a reflection of you. look in the mirror and weep.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
bobwurst says:

greenspan should be ashamed of himself for what he did to our country.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
tarazan says:

We need to control our spending as a government to strengthen our dollar,and to rely on ourselveslves rather than keep selling Treasury Bonds to contries who might not want to buy them anymore in the future and who might sell their current holdings in the Open Market and cause dollar to weaken even more than what the dollar value is now vs. other currencies.
September 15th, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Shirley Goodnessan Mercy says:

“A moment I’ve been dreading. George (Bush Sr.) brought his ne’re-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida. The one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I’ll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they’ll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work.”
– Ronald Reagan in his recently published diaries, written May 17, 1986
September 15th, 2007 at 1:54 pm
Pro Choice lib says:

Bush? Bush?

In “The Price of Loyalty” by Ron Suskind, Paul O’Nieill discussed the use of “triggers” to keep the administration fiscally restrained. Greenspan ignored him.

This must be the blame the idiot before the real crash comes.

Oh, and Brittain had a run on the Bank of England yesterday. http://business.guardian.co.uk/markets/story/0,,2169786,00.html

Thanks Mr. Greenspan.
September 15th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
GSD says:

Alan Greenpud, thanks for the recession.

-GSD
September 15th, 2007 at 2:21 pm
Jay Randal says:

Faire > thanks for the link and did not know that Zooey is doing her own blog now.
September 15th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Starve-A-Bush_Feed-A-Beaver says:

In a speech given by co-founder and Managing Director of the Carlyle Group, here’s what David Rubenstein said about George W. Bush’s three years spent on the Carlyle Group Board of Directors:

“…But when we were putting the board together, somebody [Fred Malek] came to me and said, look there is a guy who would like to be on the board. He’s kind of down on his luck a bit. Needs a job. Needs a board position. Needs some board positions. Could you put him on the board? Pay him a salary and he’ll be a good board member and be a loyal vote for the management and so forth.

I said well we’re not usually in that business. But okay, let me meet the guy. I met the guy. I said I don’t think he adds that much value. We’ll put him on the board because – you know – we’ll do a favor for this guy; he’s done a favor for us.

We put him on the board and [he] spent three years. Came to all the meetings. Told a lot of jokes. Not that many clean ones. And after a while I kind of said to him, after about three years – you know, I’m not sure this is really for you. Maybe you should do something else. Because I don’t think you’re adding that much value to the board. You don’t know that much about the company.

He said, well I think I’m getting out of this business anyway. And I don’t really like it that much. So I’m probably going to resign from the board.

And I said, thanks – didn’t think I’d ever see him again. His name is George W. Bush. He became President of the United States. So you know if you said to me, name 25 million people who would maybe be President of the United States, he wouldn’t have been in that category. So you never know. Anyway, I haven’t been invited to the White House for any things. …”
September 15th, 2007 at 2:41 pm
semidi says:

Bush didn’t abandon fiscal restraint because he never adopted it. He’s followed the game plan that his father and Reagan used: Massive tax-cuts for the wealthy, massive amounts of corporate welfare, unnecessary and costly wars, all used to “justify” harsh cuts in social spending that, brutal as they were, could never offset the amount of money being redistributed to people who already had more than they knew what to do with.
September 15th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
alex says:

Greenspan was ever the ‘loyal Bushie’ when it came to defending W’s deficits and his scheme to ‘fix’ social security. Now, as 2008 looms, we learn that Greenspan is a ‘libertarian republican. Wrong: he could have gone down in history as a collaborator in the unique 90’s economic recovery – but he chose to end his days as a partisan crook.

It was the Bush administration that coined the term “realist” as a synonym for “traitor”.

It remains a mystery to me how W. co-opted so many smart people – Greenspan, Colin Powell, Thomas Friedman — dozens of others. The whole establishment raced after him. Bought off? Blackmailed? Some blind, lemming-like will to destruction. Machiavelli working the strings behind the scenes.

I’m sorry, I really don’t understand it.

We’ll be paying the price for decades. Worst still, we will be subjected to a revisionsit ’stabbed in the back’ myth ad nauseum, jsut as the German right came to blame the catastrophic aftermath of their military adventurists in WWI on communists and jews.

Greenspan, a highly qualified academic economist, should have been the North Star of realism, irrespective of his private ideology. Could have been. Our “greed is good” society is rotting from the inside out.

Obama.
September 15th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
ace says:

In reading through the most recent piece by John Mauldin, the correlation of (mortgage backed) paper to real estate is apparent in one way.

The value of the paper is determined by the last price similar paper traded at. In the absence of an active market, all paper is subject to being priced by the most desperate fire sale price. All holders of paper are therefore holding their collective breaths, dependent on the worst case scenario fire sale wiping out much of the value of their formerly valuable paper. In essence, REAL estate was turned into fiat currency, in much the same way that the US Dollar (which used to be an actual receipt, redeemable for gold), was turned into paper, the value of which is always determined by the last price at which it traded in the market.

And so it goes with your house and every house in the neighborhood, in every neighborhood across the country. When the bankruptcies and foreclosures ripple through the system, and the bag-holders put those homes on the auction block, and there are few buyers, the value of your perfectly good home nearby will be determined by the worst case scenarios (now “comparables”) being fire-saled around you.

On the way up, all of the market participants and even Fed Chairman Greenspan were encouraging anyone with pulse to buy a home using any form of exotic (toxic) financing available. The entire system was encouraging the least credit worthy among us to lie about their income, and in turn, those liars were encouraging appraisers to lie about the value of the homes against which they were borrowing.

According to the chart above, the ACTUAL blowup in the value of all this paper occurred in February, and would have led to a total collapse at that time. Who prevented the immediate collapse, and how? Who injected so much liquidity into the system that the APPEARANCE of the problem being solved enabled the APPEARANCE of normalcy in the market for this paper? The Fed (the oligarchs who own the biggest banks), literally “papered-over” the hole in the dike until such time as they could offload the majority of this toxic waste onto the bagholders of last resort, in precisely the same way they encouraged the poorest among us to literally sign their lives away on an overpriced home they could not afford (but not before they paid their politicians to eliminate any/all protection that a declaration of bankruptcy used to provide).

The big boys not only ALL knew this decline was imminent, but repositioned their bets in time to make a killing on the short side, and then positioned themselves for the short squeeze which Bernanke engineered yesterday, which they knew was coming, because the banksters at the top of the game are the ones telling Bernanke what to say, AND when to say it.

The “Federal” Reserve is not “Federal” – merely the richest guys in the world gaming the system to their benefit, and your deteriment. They all lied about the inflation rate and the unemployment rate and consumer confidence, and they all lied about the “Goldilocks” world economy. They literally lied about everything. It was all done with smoke and mirrors, and only THEY were the ones allowed to know the ACTUAL condition of every market.

The arrogance is brought into sharpest focus in the following, by writer Ron Suskind:

“In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn’t like about Bush’s former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House’s displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn’t fully comprehend — but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.

The aide said that guys like me were ”in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who ”believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ”That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. ”We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

Get it?
September 15th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
ace says:

“We can have a democratic society or we can have the concentration of great wealth in the hands of the few. We cannot have both.” — Louis Brandeis, Supreme Court Justice from 1916-1939″

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them (around the banks), will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.” — Thomas Jefferson”

“It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe that there would be a revolution before morning. And that revolution would be based around the Federal Reserve.” –Henry Ford
September 15th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
ace says:

In the 1996-2000 period it was apparently necessary for the chairman to visit the White House about 12 times per year, or once per month. For no apparent reason, Mr. Greenspan’s visits to the White House tripled from just 12 in 2000 to 37 in 2001, when Bush took office. Starting in January 2001, the same month Mr. Greenspan began cutting rates and flip-flopped on the Bush tax cuts, he visited the White House at least three times per month, with the only slowdown in June and July of that year.

What were previously monthly meetings continued to skyrocket to over one per week in both 2002 (55 meetings) and 2003 (68 meetings).

These White House meetings since 2001 were with officials at the highest level, something Mr. Greenspan did not do in 2000 or apparently since 1996 based on his monthly meetings there. For example, in 2003 he met with the President once, Vice President Cheney seven times, Condoleezza Rice six times, and Chief of Staff Andy Card three times. In March 2003 he had 14 White House meetings, and in July 2003 he met with six members of the Cabinet, including Colin Powell.

Such increasingly frequent meetings at the most senior level, including the Oval Office, are appropriate for a politician but not a central banker, whose political independence is paramount. The noteworthy increase in these meetings since 2001 is puzzling and problematic.

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2004/05/fed_chiefs_cale.html

The chairman has met with Vice President Cheney at least 17 times since early January 2001; Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, 11 times; Rice, 12 times; Card, six times; Powell, once; Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz, twice; and Cheney’s chief of staff I. Lewis Libby, once, according to the Fed’s copies of Greenspan’s schedule.

Greenspan had at least four official appointments with Cheney and one with Rumsfeld before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, according to the Fed records.

It is not clear from the records whether Greenspan might have had more such meetings, since a number of appointments are described only as “White House meeting,” or “White House lunch,” without specifying the participants.

Greenspan has known Cheney and Rumsfeld for decades, having served with them in previous Republican administrations. Before Sept. 11, Greenspan was already calling more frequently on the White House and various cabinet secretaries, including then-Treasury Secretary Paul H. O’Neill, another long-time friend from the Ford administration and private business.

“Vice President Cheney has known Alan Greenspan for many years in a variety of roles, throughout their careers, and the vice president has high regard for him,” said Cheney’s spokesman Kevin Kellems. “In terms of the content of their meetings, I don’t know what they discuss. One would assume that a number of current issues of mutual interest would come up. But there’s nothing more I can do to accurately describe them.”

With Rumsfeld, “It’s a personal and professional acquaintance that they’ve maintained over the years,” Lawrence T. DiRita, the chief Pentagon spokesman, said Tuesday. “They see each other from time to time. That’s not unusual. It’s a meeting without an agenda. They enjoy each other’s company, they respect each other’s intellects, and it’s private — there’s no staff in there when they meet.”

Greenspan also has a personal connection with Wolfowitz, whose father was one of the chairman’s professors at Columbia University.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5074781/
September 15th, 2007 at 2:52 pm
ace says:

It’s strange that Alan Greenspan hasn’t been blamed for the housing bubble. After all, he set the “easy money” policies that put the whole thing in motion and he’s the one who should be held responsible when it goes up in smoke.

For example, when Greenspan lowered rates to 1% in 2002 he knew that money would surge into the economy and create the appearance that everything was hunky-dory. Predictably, the economy sputtered along from the economic activity generated by the housing boom and from the 30% increase in government spending.

But, what else did Greenspan’s lower rates achieve?

Well, they achieved the results for which they were designed; they kept the economy humming along while Bush dragged the country to war, they kept the American people asleep while $400 billion per year in Bush tax cuts were siphoned from the US Treasury, and they generated what the “The Economist” calls this “the biggest bubble in history”; the housing bubble.

All of these were purely political choices made at the Federal Reserve under the auspices of Fed-chairman Greenspan.

Greenspan, who prides himself on studying every abstruse fact and figure about the economy, was fully aware of the speculative bubble that was emerging before his eyes. He also knew about the “interest only loans”, “the no-down payments”, the shaky lending practices, and the exaggerated prices, but just like the 1990s, when he had every opportunity to raise marginal rates on stocks and stop the bleeding, he kept the game in motion.

Greenspan knows all about “irrational exuberance”; he’s its primary champion. The Fed seduces the public with cheap money, so that credit spending increases and, then, “presto”, millions of Americans slip inexorably into indentured servitude.

Isn’t this what’s happening right now?

The American public is presently mortgaged up to the hilt with most of their personal wealth invested in their homes and with the highest level of personal debt in any period since the Great Depression.

Not good.

Especially when we consider that the current bubble is “larger than the global stock market bubble in the late 1990s (an increase over five years of 80% of GDP) or America’s stock market bubble in the late 1920s (55% of GDP).”

Or, when we consider that “over the past four years, consumer spending and residential construction have together accounted for 90% of the total growth in GDP.” (The Economist”)

Or, when we consider that 2 out of every 5 jobs in America are now related to construction. One blip in the housing market and we’ll all be hawking pencils on the street corner.

Regrettably, this Greenspan-generated pyramid scheme is headed for the dumpster. The fundamentals for securing a loan have all been abandoned; putting traditionally unqualified applicants in a position to buy a home. 42% of all new home buyers cannot even come up with a few thousand dollars for a down payment. Equally disturbing is the fact that “nearly one third of all new mortgages this year call for interest-only payments (in California, it’s almost half)” (NY Times)”

The Fed’s “cheap money” policy has spawned a “creative financing” monster and the speculation in the housing market has grown accordingly. A full 36% of homes are bought either for investment or as second homes; “the very definition of a financial bubble.” (Economist)

“Speculation”? Not according to Colonel Greenspan. According to him, it’s just a bit of “froth” in the market.

“Froth”? The biggest bubble in history!?!

Of course, none of this even vaguely resembles the activities of a “free market”. The market is not free when a privately owned banking system like the Federal Reserve sets the prime rate according to its own political-economic agenda.

Most people have no idea to what extent Greenspan has abandoned his principles to carry out his task as the country’s foremost class-warrior. Earlier in his career, Greenspan proclaimed, “Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth”.

Hmmmmm?

The lesson of the housing bubble is simple: whenever monetary policy is put into the hands of privately owned institutions like the Federal Reserve, those policies will invariably reflect the narrow interests of the men who own them and the members of their class.

That’s why Thomas Jefferson warned, “Banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies.”

http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney08172005.html
http://www.communitycurrency.org/joycelynn.html
September 15th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
ace says:

It’s all just the same game the Banksters play with third world countries…loan them more money than they can ever repay, then control them.

Now who do you think is going to fight all these wars and fix all these roads and bridges?

Why the Nouveaux Homeless, of course.

Got indentured servitude?
September 15th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
thetruth says:

Video Israel Doesn’t Want You to See http://chimpplanet.journalspace.com/?entryid=9281
September 15th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Exley says:

TP,

The term is “fiscal RESTRAINT,” not “fiscal constraint.”
September 15th, 2007 at 2:58 pm
barfly says:

It wasn’t just Bush; the whole party embraced his economic Voodoo Redux, and looked for excuses to duck accountability. What Bush did was expose the fraud of conservatism, and that puts Greenlight in a bad light.

He was sooo fiscally conservative during the Clinton years, yet jumped on the Bush freespending bandwagon at the first opportunity.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
Badger says:

There was no “fiscal constraint”. There should have been “fiscal constraint”. But the Republicans ran the show for 6 years.

Half 50%.. of all the national debt has been run up with a Bush as president. Throw in President Reagan and the number is 70%. that’s since George Washington!
September 15th, 2007 at 3:08 pm
barfly says:

The term is â€œfiscal RESTRAINT,â€ not “fiscal constraint.”

Comment by Exley

Actually, it works both ways. Bush didn’t believe in restraining his own spending, nor in the constraints placed upon him by Congress.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:10 pm
barfly says:

“Throw in President Reagan and the number is 70%. thatâ€™s since George Washington!”

Comment by Badger

Though he tries mightily, he’ll never top Reagan’s worst. Reagan’s national debt was greater that all previous presidents combined.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:13 pm
bilbogaggins says:

Greenspan will spend his remaining years trying to convince people that he is not responsible for the current financial crisis in this country. Fortunately we will not forget that he was the one who thought all these sub-prime loans were hunky dory. Like Bush, Greenspan is trying to re-write history.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:13 pm
Ya Know says:

Well, I dont think it all falls on Greenspan, he certainly knew what was going on with the securitisation game. I remember Bush telling people to buy a home, buy something. Probably he knew as well what was looming.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Mac
September 15th, 2007 at 3:13 pm
smokey joe says:

Samantics, exley. Bush is a borrow and spend, tax the poor, feed the rich anti-American budget-busting zero of a president. is that clear enough? Fiscal restraint? he should be in restraints.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:23 pm
Mugsy says:

During the 2000 campaign, the GOP tried to give Greenspan the credit for the booming Clinton economy. But when the economy under Bush slid into recession (pre-9/11), Greenspan was the first person they blamed.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:31 pm
doro says:

Bush is a borrow and spend, tax the poor, feed the rich anti-American budget-busting zero of a president.

Hah! Apt description!
September 15th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
doro says:

on second thought, maybe add war-mongering after budget-busting.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
bilbogaggins says:

GD it Ace. Would you quit spamming this board with your cut and paste articles. You are as bad as the trolls. If you have something to say, say it and then link to the article you are cutting and pasting from.

I have gotten to the point where I ignore your posts, but it is still annoying having to scroll past your lengthly plagiarized cut and pastes.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:41 pm
Ya Know says:

Iâ€™m sorry, I really donâ€™t understand it. -Alex

I dont think the Republicans do either, they went from hate the government to love the government statists overnight. Quite an extraordinary flip-flop. What was a right wing ideology a decade ago would now be considered traitorous by them.
September 15th, 2007 at 3:57 pm
The Republic of Stupidity says:

It’s off-topic, but apparently Fred Thompson has already quit as a candidate. **Snicker… snicker**

Hoe long did “Big Fred” last? About a week?

Boy, is Frank J gonna be heart-broken.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:03 pm
Kevin says:

During the 2000 campaign, the GOP tried to give Greenspan the credit for the booming Clinton economy. But when the economy under Bush slid into recession (pre-9/11), Greenspan was the first person they blamed.

Comment by Mugsy

give me a break, just like todays realestate market, the stock market was wayyyy overpriced because of speculation. it made a coorection. I as a Republican like the tax breaks, yet dont like the huge spending that is going on. Tax breaks do work, in 06 the tax revenue hit 12 trillion, Clintons highest was 9 trillion. One of the problems that I foresee coming is if we have DEM in the whitehouse, and controlling congress, spending will go much higher than it is now, which will be paid for with higher taxes on the wealthy. if the taxes get tooo high, investment in everything will go down, which in turns causes unemployment which in turn causes tax revenues to go down which in turn means people will turn to the government for support. It not a good thing that 90% of the tax revenue our country takes in is paid by the top 10% of wage earners. If the wealthy aint makin money, we lose, our country loses.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:09 pm
Pete says:

Early in Bush’s presidency, the Premier of China said of Bush, “Logically unsound, confused, unprincipled, and unwise to the extreme!” Boy did he have Bush’s number!
September 15th, 2007 at 4:15 pm
Chris L says:

#

Itâ€™s off-topic, but apparently Fred Thompson has already quit as a candidate. **Snickerâ€¦ snicker**

Hoe long did â€œBig Fredâ€ last? About a week?

Boy, is Frank J gonna be heart-broken.

Comment by The Republic of Stupidity â€” September 15, 2007 @ 4:03 pm
#

This is too good to be true! Do you have a link??
September 15th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
doro says:

Comment by Kevin â€” September 15, 2007 @ 4:09 pm

Kevin, I take it, that like most of us you are not one of the “wealthy”. Do you realize that you admit being blackmailed into submission by the rich. They hold your testicles in their hands and you are afraid, that if you tax them, they are gonna squeeze?

I’m afraid you swallowed the neocon propaganda hook, line and sinker.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:20 pm
Badger says:

Kevin…the income tax falls disproportionately on the upper income earners….it is progressive. If, as you say, 06 tax revenues hit 12 trillion, it’s because upper income earners have done so well under Bush. by the way…I doubt your numbers… if the gobernment took in 12 trillion dollars in tax receipts…even Bush couldn’t spend it all. Maybe you mean taxes ON 12 trillion in income???
Social security and property taxes fall disproportionately on the working poor. Social security taxes are “capped”. Renters pay ALL of the property taxes on their residences. Hand to Mouth workers pay sales tax on most everything.
And I repeat….Republican fiscal restraint is a MYth…70% of the National debt was rung up under Reagan, Bush I , and Bush II.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:22 pm
TripMaster Monkey says:

Nobody likes me.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Anonymouse says:

Over time, I’ve come to believe that the real Bush Doctrine is the fiscal and political equivalent of Maoist revolution – to make the system so oppressive and unworkable that it breaks apart, and they (being the “permanent Republican majority”) will be the only ones around to rebuild.

This administration has been the personification of every fiscal and managerial “big, bloated and incompetent government” boogeyman portrayed by conservatives over the past four decades.

Forget “starving the beast” – these guys want a government so schlerotic and awful that it prompts major reforms.

I suppose it’s to be expected, that those who have no respect for the role of government (aside from national defense) would fulfill their own negative vision of an incompetent kleptocracy.

Nothing would make me feel more relieved at the ultimate power of American patriotism and common sense than to see Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and all their cronies breaking rocks for the next twenty years.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:31 pm
Kevin says:

Kevin, I take it, that like most of us you are not one of the â€œwealthyâ€. Do you realize that you admit being blackmailed into submission by the rich.

Comment by doro

Ok, let me tell you why I think the way I do, I work in the medical feild, most of our nurses are part time employees. Many of our female and older Radiologist dont want to work full time anymore. Me as well as 2 other mri techs that I work with are parttime. Most of us parttimers are because of the net pay from fulltime stressful work isnt worth it. I prefer to be in a lower tax bracket and work 1/2 of what fulltimers do and enjoy the benefits of more freetime at age 40. I am a fiscal conservative. For the past 5 yrs I have lived frugally and paid off a 90 k mortgage making anywhere from 44k to 66k gross. I know many people who see full time work as not worth the stress for the money. This is what I am satying about when you tax people toooo much, they will work less.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
AnacherForester says:

In this Wapo article it is easy to miss Greenspan’s subtle yet perhaps most telling slam of Lil’ George. It comes in the form of this compliment paid to Bill Clinton:

“We both read books and were curious and thoughtful about the world. . . .”

AF
September 15th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
doro says:

Kevin, you’re more privileged than I thought. I know many, who couldn’t afford the choice. They simply wouldn’t be able to live off part-time salary.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
doro says:

Ey TMM

I like you!
September 15th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
realshane says:

Hi Doro, that’s just the namejacking trolls who can’t get on here under their own names anymore. They sure are frustrated.
September 15th, 2007 at 4:45 pm
TripMaster Monkey says:

doro sez:

I like you!

That’s nice. If you really like me as you claim, you’ll side with me to break even more of TP’s rules.
^_^

Are you up for it?
September 15th, 2007 at 5:04 pm
michaelIsRetarded says:

Kevin, if real wages decline (don’t stay pace with inflation) or don’t raise at the same rate, then you lose with the GOP even if they decrease your taxes. That’s the part the wingnuts never understand.

I know many people who see full time work as not worth the stress for the money. This is what I am satying about when you tax people toooo much, they will work less.
Comment by Kevin â€” September 15, 2007 @ 4:35 pm

This is exactly what I was referring to, your complaint isn’t about taxes, it’s about your WAGES, yet you ignorantly can’t see the difference…
September 15th, 2007 at 5:10 pm
The Republic of Stupidity says:

This is what I am satying about when you tax people toooo much, they will work less.

Comment by Kevin â€” September 15, 2007 @ 4:35 pm

This is just BS.
September 15th, 2007 at 5:26 pm
Briseadh na Faire says:

thanks for the link and did not know that Zooey is doing her own blog now.

Comment by Jay Randal â€” September 15, 2007 @ 2:26 pm

Actually, it’s more a group effort.
September 15th, 2007 at 5:35 pm
big papa says:

Comment by ace #22

EVERYONE ON THIS THREAD SHOULD COPY ACE’S #22 and spread it around…

…Thank you ace…

…what an EXCELLENTLY concise synopsis of the latest economic HOUSE OF CARDS…

…the Savings and Loan Scandal part deux…

…If Gerald Gibson and the Ron Paulites are about…

…they may want to EDUCATE themselves in a quick EASY read…

…EXCELLENT POST ACE #22….

THANKS AGAIN!
September 15th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
big papa says:

Comment by bilbogaggins #39

What have you got against the truth bilbo?

…economics is hard to understand for most people…

…but ace’s #22 laid the latest “crises” and con out very well…

…cut him/her some slack on this one…
September 15th, 2007 at 6:11 pm
michaelIsRetarded says:

This is what I am satying about when you tax people toooo much, they will work less.
Comment by Kevin â€” September 15, 2007 @ 4:35 pm
This is just BS.
Comment by The Republic of Stupidity â€” September 15, 2007 @ 5:26 pm

Kevin has fraudulently confused “paying people too little” with “taxing them too much”, for why people work less!
September 15th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
katy says:

normally, just thinking about this topic, just NUMBERS,
will give me a headache…

i’ve reached my limit now, but learned so much in the meantime…
thanks to ace’s posts… and others for sure…

but what stood out the most?
a lame argument of semantics was ALL that
Exley could come up with @ 2:58 pm…

that shows progress!
.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:26 pm
BARTLEBEE says:

This is weird. Greenspan never criticizes anyone. He is normally softspoken and keeps to himself.

It is very, very unusual for him to criticize a sitting president like this.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:57 pm
BARTLEBEE says:

In other words, if Greenspans criticizing Bush, and the neocons in here and downtown today STILL don’t get it, then I imagine if the ressurected Jesus Christ himself appeared on Fox News to tell them Bush sucks, they still wouldn’t believe it.

Which means they suck too.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:59 pm
big papa says:

Why can’t the msm and America celebrate great Americans like…

…pro-golfer Tom Cousins…

…a man who has poured MILLIONS into Eastlake (an Atlanta neighborhood)…

…to revitalize it and give the under-privileged children hope…
September 15th, 2007 at 7:13 pm
sara says:

This is exactly what I was referring to, your complaint isnâ€™t about taxes, itâ€™s about your WAGES, yet you ignorantly canâ€™t see the differenceâ€¦

Comment by michaelIsRetarded

its all relative, by me paying off my house, i have no bills except electric, phone etc.. i have never paid a dime on any credit card. i live frugally. making more money for me isnt worth the hassle of full time work. also , yrs before the illegals got here, construction workers made good money, its the illegal immigrants who are depressing wages. get rid of them and your wages go back up- supply and demand
September 15th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
big papa says:

His name is George W. Bush. He became President of the United States. So you know if you said to me, name 25 million people who would maybe be President of the United States, he wouldnâ€™t have been in that category.

Comment by Starve-A-Bush_Feed-A-Beaver #20

…HELL! They didn’tneed to give that basta*d a board seat…

…to figure that out…

…GOOD OLE BOY privilege…

…ain’t life grand?
September 15th, 2007 at 11:21 pm
thetruth says:

Alan Greenspan claims Iraq war was really for oil : AMERICAâ€™s elder statesman of finance, Alan Greenspan, has shaken the White House by declaring that the prime motive for the war in Iraq was oil. http://timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article2461214.ece
September 15th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
thetruth says:

However, it is his view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy. â€œI am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil,â€ he says.Greenspan, 81, is understood to believe that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East. http://timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article2461214.ece
September 15th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
katy says:

here’s the thing sara… the “illegal immigrants” have got to eat too…
so they come looking for work… and your “construction worker” friend’s boss says to the immigrant, “sure i can put you to work, but i can only pay you $5 (or whatever)… and the immigrant says “sure thing mister. . . and i have a brother (cousin, whatever)… and the boss realizes that he can get 2 for less than he paid one, and there you have it…
the boss has got to eat too…
better than ever, better than many…
but it’s all relative, right?
.
September 15th, 2007 at 11:39 pm
The Republic of Stupidity says:

get rid of them and your wages go back up- supply and demand

Comment by sara â€” September 15, 2007 @ 10:02 pm

This gittin’ interestin’. kevin is now sara. Quick sex change?
September 15th, 2007 at 11:48 pm
The Oracle says:

Why would the culture of corruption Republicans be interested in “fiscal restraint”?

When certain members of the Republican Party decided to pillage our nation’s treasury and rape our public trust, all for obscene profits for their corporate pals and taxpayer handouts to their political cronies, any “fiscal restraint” would just have just gotten in the way of their scheme.

It’s not that our government is bad, it’s Republicans running our government for partisan profit, partisan greed and partisan power-grabbing that is bad, especially with all the thievery that has happened in the past six and a half years. Furthermore, the idea that any of the Republicans responsible, those elected and those doing the electing, are somehow Christian, after all the disasters that have happened, is laughable.

The damage these Republicans have done to our nation is incalculable, and it will be all of our nation’s children who will have to pay the tab for all this binging by a bunch of power-drunk and fiscally-insane Republicans.
September 16th, 2007 at 12:19 am
paul says:

While were talking about oil; remember all the complaining that democrats did about the price of gasoline prior to the last election. Record profits at Exxon. Bush’s ties to oil. Government wasn’t doing enough to relieve the working families from the high price of oil.

Now, that the Democrats control congress and the price of oil is hitting a record $80 a barrel with $3.00 a gallon gasoline – what is it exactly that the democratically controlled congress is doing?

Oh, and while you’re at it. It probably won’t make the price of oil go down when you surrender Iraq to Islamic jihadists.
September 16th, 2007 at 1:05 am
geronimo jones says:

Greenspan is going to be blamed for the the sub prime mortgage debacle. There goes his legacy as the grand master.

He’s just another one of the monkeys throwing poo.

How much money do you think he’s made on his oil and defense industry stocks?
September 16th, 2007 at 2:07 am
geronimo jones says:

They’ll never cover this on Fox.
September 16th, 2007 at 2:08 am
had enough says:

Greenspan: Bush â€˜abandonedâ€™ fiscal constraint
Perhaps you did too Greenspan… lowering the interest rates as you did maybe giving birth to the sub primes.. leading us into this mess we have now…. all this to make the economy look good while under the republican control. FU Greenspan.
September 16th, 2007 at 3:03 am
Jeffrey Stewart says:

Greenspan is a cover my ass, two faced POS! Does he mention that he endorsed president dinkledorf’s main tax cuts in 2001 when there was a budget surplus? If the “maestro” poured cold water all over the tax cut scheme, there probably wouldn’t have been the history of the world record budget deficits! What a dick!

Too little too late on the oil comment Alan. Your legacy is intact though.
September 16th, 2007 at 8:36 am
Derrick says:

Someone in digg commented that the original name for the Iraqi war was “Operation Iraqi Liberation”, which coincidentally can be abbreviated into OIL.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030324-4.html
September 16th, 2007 at 8:38 am
katy says:

glad to know you’ve tuned in, derrick…
(… better late than never, i s’pose)
be sure to spread the “news”… every little bit helps!
i mean that…
September 16th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
the Sweet Saviour on a Stick says:

>The term is â€œfiscal RESTRAINT,â€ not â€œfiscal constraint.â€

Exley, the term is “we do NOT know where the WMD is” not “we know where the WMD is”.

Don’t pretend your selective concern for detail is anything but self serving mental m@sturb3tion. If you really had such a deep concern for consistency you couldnt bring yourself to support this regime of pertually shifting rationales and constant mixed messages..
September 16th, 2007 at 2:30 pm
professorjoe says:

It has been diversionary politics all along. Any reason is acceptable, as long it creates instability in the area. It took the heat off of Bush’s connection to Enron and Arthur Anderson, his failed attempt to steal the Social Security tax receitpts, his locked-down documents from his administration in Texas, his absenteeism military career, and the fact that he is owned by corporate America. War creates profit. Death is merely a by-product of the manufactured wealth, which, by the way, is what was happening in the days of loose credit. Create the instability and then spin it backwards with mis-perception. They all have their own little nickel in the theater. the problem is that they are doing more damage than the country can ever recover from. It is too late for impeachment, but not for a firing squad.
September 16th, 2007 at 3:40 pm

Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.

Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.

81 Responses to “Greenspan: Bush ‘abandoned’ fiscal constraint.”

Blogroll