Dick Armey: Obama ‘May Be The Greatest Economic Illiterate’ Of Any Modern President
Dick Armey: Obama ‘May Be The Greatest Economic Illiterate’ Of Any Modern President
In this month’s episode of Rep. Walter Jones’s (R-NC) TV show, Washington Watch, Jones hosted Dick Armey, former House Majority Leader and current chairman of the right-wing astroturf group FreedomWorks. About halfway through their conversation, Jones suggests that President Obama could have benefited from taking several months off in the beginning of his presidency to study public policy with “experts.” Armey disagrees, saying that Obama has no interest in “understanding of how the world really works” and warning that Obama “may be the greatest economic illiterate of any president of modern time”:
JONES: I was hoping that Mr. Obama…would say to the American people, “You know, these problems…are so complex that I’m going to take the first two or three months, I’m going to bring in certain people from different parts of the country who are experts with this and this and that. And then I’m going to try to come back to you the American people the first of April with some ideas and plans for this country.” … I wish he had just maybe taken a little bit of time and try to analyze some of these deep seeded problems. [...]
ARMEY: I think with this president its even worse than that. He is more interested in income redistribution than he is in prosperity. … He’s got a whimsical notion of how things ought to turn out. Without any understanding. Economics is a very deep and complex discipline of understanding and I’m afraid we have a president right now who may be the greatest economic illiterate of any president of modern time. Not that he’s not capable of understanding. But I don’t believe he cares to understand.
Watch it:
Armey’s own views on the economic crisis are often dictated by his lobbying interests. He has been a vocal critic of the Bush administration’s creation of the toxic asset relief program (TARP) in his capacity at FreedomWorks. But despite that, Armey’s lobbying firm DLA Piper has represented several of the greatest beneficiaries of TARP and other government interventions in the last year: AIG and Merrill Lynch. As Pat Garofalo writes, “it’s a safe bet that DLA Piper wasn’t enlisted to push for tougher regulations or more stringent capital requirements.”
As the Obama administration works to devise effective and nuanced regulations to prevent a financial crisis like that of last fall’s from recurring, Armey is advocating more of the same tired deregulation ideas that set the American economy up for failure in the first place. “We want to end burdensome government regulation and rely on the marketplace as an efficient regulator of business activity,” Armey’s FreedomWorks website states.
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Who cares what this Dick has to day? If he wants to talk about illiterate presidents, he’s off by one. Take a look at 43, Dick.
PEACE
July 1st, 2009 at 1:52 pmObama brought in experts to do all that stuff during – in fact, before – the transition period. Apparently Dick missed that part.
July 1st, 2009 at 1:53 pmDAVID SHUSTER: “…if you are planning simultaneous tea bagging all around the country, you’re going to need a Dick Armey.”
Priceless.
July 1st, 2009 at 1:57 pmOur first MBA president cut taxes and increased spending, compensating for some of it by taking the war spending off-budget. So he couldn’t add or subtract, but he was able to hide almost a trillion dollars of spending — and Obama is the economic illiterate? Wow.
July 1st, 2009 at 1:57 pmDick Armey: Obama ‘May Be The Greatest Economic Illiterate’ Of Any Modern President
– - Yeah? John McCain was certainly the greatest economic illiterate candidate for president.
July 1st, 2009 at 1:59 pmI’m surprise that they didn’t conduct this piece of garbage in white hoodies?
July 1st, 2009 at 2:00 pm.
Dick Armey on Palin…
… “She’s more qualified”
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=842271439
LOLOLOLOLOLolololololol…
… Whaere that dick now, Armey?
.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:00 pmBy Ryan Powers at 1:50 pm
FreeMarketLiberal Says: July 1st, 2009 at 1:51 pm
It’s interesting that rather than take the time to come up with some new material, this TROLL is spending all his time constantly refreshing his browser so he can post the same crap as the first comment on every thread.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:02 pmActually, the most economically ignorant president in recent memory would have to be “supply-side voo-doo” Reagan.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:05 pmTraitor.
This is an interesting comment. Obama, who achieved his success on his own talents is an economic illiterate. On the other hand we have George Bush who could not make it in the real world without his family’s influence. How silly of us not to recognize Bush’s talents.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:05 pmWow…so technically, taking those months between winning the election and the inauguration, where then President-Elect Obama did exactly what Dick Armey (insert Peter Griffin laughter here) is suggesting…but doing it in his own terms and OFF THE CLOCK is unacceptable?
July 1st, 2009 at 2:06 pmWhat he meant was President Obama hasn’t studied the Alternative Reality Economic Model.
But, how could he? He lives in the real world…DICK
July 1st, 2009 at 2:10 pmIf Obama had taken months after the inauguration studying economic policy with experts, he would have been picked on as inexperienced and incapable of “hitting the ground running.”
Dick Armey is a tool.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:10 pmThank you, TP, for getting rid of that ridiculous, off-topic and recycled comment by FleaMarketDrivel.
Much appreciated!
PEACE
July 1st, 2009 at 2:11 pmThank you Think Progress, I noticed that freemarketliberal was banned and his comments were removed.
This has renewed my confidence in flagging, for once it had a positive outcome.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:12 pmOMG! That a republican would deem ANYBODY “illiterate” is a joke by itself. But from TEXAS? hee hee hee
Case and point:
George W.Bush
July 1st, 2009 at 2:12 pmTom Delay
Pete Sessions
John Cornyn
Joe Barton
Rick Perry, and so on, and so on…….
!
And that would make Bush ___________________(fill in the blank).
!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Oh, yeah—he wasn’t the president.
Maybe they tell on themselves on top of telling on themselves, if you know what I mean. Underneath all that in-your-face gall, there’s yet more rot. The Bush administration and it’s residue will mark a new era in the understanding of sociopathy and ponerology.
Psychiatrists, psychologists, sociologists! Get busy!!!
If we learn, we just might be able to make a significant contribution to preventing the next regime of totalitarian ideologues from killing millions of our fellow human beings and smashing our collective planetary nest.
There’s a pithy aphorism about people without principles being able to leap over boundaries that people with principles have to move around slowly and arduously; but surely we’re much, much GREATER than people who think like—-
dickish-twatwaffles.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:12 pmAdd Dick Armey to the list of Republican Obama critics who apparently spent the prior eight years in a coma.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:14 pmwhat he says is true……but it’s not for idiot perpetrators like him to say it.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:15 pmNot at all.
Obama has just surrounded himself with economic illiterates.
Study reveals Torture is GOOD for You.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:15 pmNow we know why the call him “DICK”. This guy might was well take out his white rob and hood and wear it proudly. He doesn’t have the guts to admit he’s a Klansman, so he hides behind his former title. Come on “Dick” if you are going to speak like a Klansman, then be man enough to show your true colors.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:16 pmEh — Dick Armey would probably say the same thing about FDR. In fact, he would say that about anybody who didn’t march to the “tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts” cadence.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:20 pmIncome redistribution!?! Here we go again with another republican myth that too many ignorant republican voters believe in.
The fact is that the redistribution of wealth comes from the middle class to the upper class. For proof all you need to do is read the books ‘Free Lunch’ and ‘Perfectly Legal’ by David Cay Johnston.
The elite go to special, high paid tax lawyers to find the many tax loopholes to protect their millions of dollars from going Uncle Sam. They have offshore tax havens to hide their money. They set up non profit organizations, charities and dummy corporations to funnel their money through the system in one way or another and when it’s all said and done they end up paying less taxes then those in the lower middle class do.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:21 pmIt is absolutely amazing. In the past 6 months the Republicans have gone public about every nefarious, detrimental thing they did in the past 8 years (and more) and claim it is the Dems who did it.
They are laying out their entire playbook and pointing the finger. Like the little kid with chocolate frosting all over their face and fingers pointing at their little brother and yelling “He did it!”
July 1st, 2009 at 2:22 pmARMEY: Economics is a very deep and complex discipline of understanding. That’s why only rich Republicans should be allowed to have money.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:22 pmMr. Jensen’s Corporate Cosmology
July 1st, 2009 at 2:33 pmNetwork
Like Obama has said, he has been criticized by those on the right for taking on too much and moving too fast in trying to change the important policies and issues that were neglected for the past eight years.
He may not always do things that make me happy but damn it at least he is trying to get things done. He sees the importance in re-investing in our own country, our own children, into future, cleaner energy technology.
This country has been talking about cleaner energy and less dependence on foreign oil since the 1970’s and we still haven’t gotten anywhere. Wasn’t the rights big issue of “drill baby drill” to get us away from the dependence of foreign oil even though it was a short fix that we wouldn’t see for 13 years and yet now they are whining about Cap & Trade.
If we aren’t going to move forward and expand on clean energy solutions, renewables, wind and solar energy technology now, then when? The republicans need to STFU with all of their petty bickering and lies, jump on board at trying to solve the problems facing America or leave the country and live elsewhere where a country doesn’t care about the environment or the health or rights of their workers, say China or North Korea.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:35 pmDick Armey is the last person who should be talking about someone else being illiterate.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:39 pmDick Armey = Chief Teabagger
July 1st, 2009 at 2:41 pmAnother day, another Dick.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:47 pmYeah, just because he was top in his class in Law school, he’s an econ illiterate.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:50 pmRight. Dick.
Like the eight destructive years of BushRuin were some sort of model that ANY other president should emulate.
Duck you Fick.
July 1st, 2009 at 2:52 pmfinancial crisis like that of last fall’s from recurring
July 1st, 2009 at 2:55 pmYou forgot to mention Barney Frank and the Dems who made the Housing market financial crash possible by making ridiculous loans available to people who shouldn’t have them through Fanny and Freddy.:-)
I’d have more confidence if the guy in charge of the IRS wasn’t a 4-time tax cheat ;)
July 1st, 2009 at 3:00 pmReggie Says:
Thank you Think Progress, I noticed that freemarketliberal was banned and his comments were removed.
This has renewed my confidence in flagging, for once it had a positive outcome.
When flagging, I include quoted text from the troublemaker, and occasionally additional notes such as “this comment has been posted repeatedly on multiple threads.” It would just be nice is TP could figure out how to ban IP addresses, because otherwise the trolls just come back with a new registration.
July 1st, 2009 at 3:00 pmHe forgets that is previous President was the greatest illiterate on ANY topic!
July 1st, 2009 at 3:09 pmDick Armey and Phil Gramm are two people who may be in prison when we get to the bottom of the financial meltdown. They may have degrees in economics but economists have differing views. These two crooks believe in stealing the public coffers empty for the few at the top.
July 1st, 2009 at 3:12 pmenergylab Says:
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I’d have more confidence if the guy in charge of the IRS wasn’t a 4-time tax cheat ;)
July 1st, 2009 at 3:15 pm=============================================================
Paying back taxes and penalties is not considered a tax cheat. Republicans are the cheats for hiding income in Switzerland and the Bahamas. Cheats never pay. There is a difference no matter what the drug addled gas bag on the AM dial told you.
When did Dick Armey gain any credibility? Who knew?
Armey is a nasty piece of work and the country is so much better off that he no longer serves in the House. I wish to God Texas would secede from the Union and take W, Armey, Delay, Gramm, Perry, Sensebrenner and Gonzalez, among many others, along. Jebus — Texas should be barred from sending any more elected officials and their cronies to govern anything more complex than a lemonade stand.
July 1st, 2009 at 3:22 pmHere is a trail to the tax cheats at UBS.
http://crooksandliars.com/
July 1st, 2009 at 3:23 pmYou all gotta read this House GOP internal memo where they actually blame Bush but linked Obama for the collapse as well:
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/economy/internal-gop-memo-attacks-bush-handling-of-economy/
July 1st, 2009 at 3:29 pmFunny you should mention shady dealings and tax dodgers offshore. Chris Dodd helping his wife out in Bermuda based AIG company millions in bonuses…oh we can’t be talking about a Dem….he took over $281,000 dollars in “campaign contributions” from them….YAWN… i’m so tired of idiots that think one side is actually better than the other. They are crooks and your loose definition of a cheat shows your lack of morals…I didn’t cheat if i pay for that love child later;) but i did cheat if i never pay for it…
July 1st, 2009 at 3:36 pmArmey is delusional to the max. The POTUS has MORE financial experience than most Americans know about:
July 1st, 2009 at 3:38 pm
link didn’t work for me, but it is here:
July 1st, 2009 at 3:39 pmhttp:obama-zone.com/biography/
the psychologists should have a field day with this case of transferrence.
July 1st, 2009 at 3:45 pmRepublicans are the cheats for hiding income in Switzerland and the Bahamas.
who are you talking about?
July 1st, 2009 at 3:53 pmYes, this is exactly what gave us the likes of Ken Lay, Bernie Ebbers, Jack Cunningham, Jack Abramoff and Bernie Madoff. How many hundreds of billions were they responsible for?
July 1st, 2009 at 4:03 pmDick Armey and teabaggers…there is a great porno film there for the enterprising cineaste.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:07 pmEverywhere one looks these days, there are nothing but black
faces staring back from TV, websites, advertisements junkmail. You name it, there’s a black face on it. Even children’s cartoons in predominantly white areas are now featuring hastily constructed black characters. Seemingly overnight, the socialist liberal traitors have succeeded where blacks did not – they have marginalized and trivialized whitey.
How did this happen? The largest population group in the United States of America has lost it’s spine. Yes, white people in America no longer have a single spine between the entire lot of them. They have allowed the media and public schools to hammer them into submission with politically correct indoctrination of themselves and their children. Did they protest, fight or object? No, they caved in without even a whimper. Sticks and stones, Whitey. Had Whitey taken to the blogs with any shred of courage, CNN, CBS, MSNBC and ABC might well be going under instead of the venerable newspapers who are vanishing at the rate of one per week.
The millions who sacrificed their lives to build America are
spinning in their graves. What a disgrace. Being an American used to mean something, something special. It symbolized the strong, the brave, the indomitable force that nothing could withstand. They were revered the world over for their freedoms, their minimally corrupt government, and their
penchant for taking on the impossible with inevitable success. Everyone on the planet wanted to be an American.
Today, Americans are scorned, laughed at, thought of as fools. How did it come to this? The reasons are many, most unspoken for fear of peer criticism. Free speech, one of the most important rights of the American citizen, has been effectively neutered by the American media. It didn’t have to be that way, not in a capitalist society. If Americans cared, they could bend the media like a reed in the wind by expressing their discontent with media sponsors. A little sacrifice here and there, a little time, and not spending their money with those sponsors could put them both on their heels in less than a year. Americans simply don’t have the discipline to see something like that through. Most modern day Americans are weak and cowardly.They have more interest in fag or freak shows on television than their own person.
Free America is over. Corporate America, liberals, and a now
highly corrupt federal government have sold the entire country into slavery for 100 years. Americans stood by and watched it happen.
Shame on all of you
July 1st, 2009 at 4:08 pmFLAG THE YOUNG REPUBLICAN RACIST.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:12 pmYes, this is exactly what gave us the likes of Ken Lay, Bernie Ebbers, Jack Cunningham, Jack Abramoff and Bernie Madoff. How many hundreds of billions were they responsible for?
http://www.newsmeat.com/ceo_political_donations/Bernie_Ebbers.php
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/Madoff_fraud_Democrats/2008/12/22/164523.html
Madoff and Ebbers were major Dem bribers/contributors. They knew how to get what they wanted…or didn’t want
Take your blinders off!!!!!Not just GOP.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:18 pmI would agree, he’s being totally illiterate about the economy, you can’t get much dumber than advocating more power to the federal reserve.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:25 pmHe may not be a economist however unlike Bush who didn’t want to hear all the opinions Obama has been commended by his Republican Cabinet members for hearing everyone view, even calling them out if they are speaking. With that in mind one would think the man learns, and knows what’s going on.
Instead of the Republicant solution to cut taxes all the time, well if you do that then eventually you get to no taxes and by extension no government.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:27 pmenergylab Says:
——————————————————————————–
Republicans are the cheats for hiding income in Switzerland and the Bahamas.
who are you talking about?
============================================================
Of the 52,000 UBS has been hiding there will be one big republican, Phil Gramm, and probably many more. I doubt that there will not be democrat crooks as well. My point to you is the difference in a tax error that is paid at a later date with penalties and those that are hidden in a foriegn land. You called Geithner a tax crooks, basically. Once he paid the taxes and penalties, he did what millions of citizens do each year. When the taxes haven’t been declared or paid, that is a crime, whoever it is.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:34 pmHas Dick ever gotten any of his Econmic Predictions right?
Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX), CNN, 8/2/93:
Clearly this is a job killer in the short run. The revenues forecast for this budget will not materialize; the costs of this budget will be greater than what is forecast. The deficit will be worse, and it is not a good omen for the American economy.
Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX), CNN, 8/2/93:
The impact on job creation is going to be devastating, and the American young people in particular will suffer a fairly substantial deferment of their lives because there simply won’t be jobs for the next two to three years to go around to our young graduates across the country.
Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX), 8/5/93:
The economy will sputter along. Dreams will be put off and all this for the hollow promise of deficit reduction and magical theories of lower interest rates. Like so many of the President’s past promises, deficit reduction will be another cruel hoax.
Rep. Dick Armey, CNN, 2/18/93:
July 1st, 2009 at 4:40 pmI will tell you, this program will not give you deficit reduction. It will be a disaster for the performance of the economy.
You are speculating that Gramm is guilty at this point. That website might have to eat their insinuation. If the guy is guilty, I won’t make any excuses for him.
Senator Phil Gramm may have played in their illegal activity
ZeitGeithner only paid up when he knew it would be uncovered. He is a crook. He only paid when he was busted to get the Obama job. This guy is some kind of genious? Can’t use Turbo Tax?
Come on.
Standards get results.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:50 pmJesus.
July 1st, 2009 at 4:51 pmDick is just asking for another public beat down by Jaon Walsh.
yes, genius. i get excited.
July 1st, 2009 at 5:03 pmArmey liked it back in the 90’s when everything was blooming and it looked like the sky was the limit — who was the one with blinders on, the one who wrote a book on money, the one who thinks the NEA is ridiculous, who is friends with Newt Gingrich, who wants a flat tax, and supported deregulation.
July 1st, 2009 at 6:59 pmThis coming from the man who did more to destroy the Middle Class of America than anyone else? Piss off Dick.
July 1st, 2009 at 8:45 pmI have never seen anyone screw up anything as fast as Obama has done to the USA. Total idiot, needs to be removed from office before we are all dead or broke. This jerk really scares me.
July 1st, 2009 at 9:12 pmObama could not screw up what was already screwed up by Bush.
July 1st, 2009 at 9:22 pmDeuce Coupe Says:
——————————————————————————–
I have never seen anyone screw up anything as fast as Obama has done to the USA. Total idiot, needs to be removed from office before we are all dead or broke. This jerk really scares me.
===========================================================
Definitely not dealing with a full deck. Reported as stupid and abusive.
July 1st, 2009 at 9:48 pmThe toe-sucker speaks.
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:02 amHey Tombaker, that’s just begging for a template with drag and drop images—the cyber version of paper dolls for the GOP.
comes with slogans!
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:27 amhats!
threats of all kinds!
“We want to end burdensome government regulation and rely on the marketplace as an efficient regulator of business activity,” Armey’s FreedomWorks website states.
Oh, yeah….like that worked so well the LAST 8 years!
July 2nd, 2009 at 3:29 amMountains of debt. Thanks, Obama. Stimulus has never worked. http://bit.ly/OSgDQ
July 2nd, 2009 at 6:45 pm14.7 million: People unemployed in June 2009, the most ever in records dating to 1948. Nice 1st 6 months on the job, Obama. Plus you piled on historic debt with crazy stimulus. Welcome to the 2nd Carter administration and total disaster.
July 2nd, 2009 at 6:49 pmyeah, we can be like Japan in the 1990s and have a stimulus plan every quarter. How well did that work? Oh, it didn’t.
July 2nd, 2009 at 7:03 pmSure, all that unemployment suddenly appeared after Jan 20.
July 2nd, 2009 at 7:17 pm