Of course Reagan’s GDP gains must be weighed against the massive increase in national debt that he ran up. On balance his performance was not that great.

Accounting jobs going overseas? Names, places and companies please. I haven’t heard anything like that.”

Bel Aire,

I have worked for a Big Four accounting firm and much of the high volume/flat fee work (i.e. less complex income and sales tax forms) is being shifted to places such as India (much in the same manner as a lot of the pure coding and programming work of software and IT companies). The higher value consulting work regarding more complex accounting and tax advice is staying the U.S. as of now. Corporate clients are increasingly asking for a mix of offshore work in order to hold costs down. There’s no real right or wrong to this - the global marketplace is what it is and you can either work with it to take advantage of the opportunities out there or you ignore it at your peril. The key for any business in the U.S. is to be able to produce more of the high value work that others will pay a premium for. The days of people paying American wages for commoditized services and products that can be replicated elsewhere for a fraction of the price were over long ago (which the labor unions and the fear mongerers in both parties with respect to free trade either don’t understand or are ignoring introductory-level economics to pander to the increasing populist sentiment of Americans).

That’s not to say that we shouldn’t care for people that have lost their jobs. As someone earlier suggested, the approach that we ought to take is to have the equivalent of the GI Bill or some type of re-training program for older workers to adjust to the new economy. In fact, this was actually suggested by, all of people, Bill Clinton back in 1992 (who for all of his faults, deserves credit for being one of the handful of Democrats who were correct on NAFTA and globalization in general). The problem was that there was an allergic reaction to this suggestion by labor union leadership, who were much more interested in keeping their power than actually helping their members (since, of course, if their members actually received education and new skills, there was a pretty good chance that they wouldn’t be union members any longer). Imagine if these workers at GM, Ford, and similar companies had received skills training 16 years ago - people in places such as Michigan and Ohio would now have the chance to actually participate and benefit from the global economy, as opposed to trying to legislate back jobs that will never return.

The fact that there are constraints in this world will become all too clear in the coming years. I’m glad that we have new leadership with an adult-level understanding of the world to face those challenges.

Now that I would vote for.
Careful though Mr. M . . . distill this inspiring sentiment down any more and you’ll be accused of co-opting Obama-esque platitudes. Although considering how apparently successful feel-good sentiments are in this market (is my Internet broken or is he really within 10,000 of taking Missouri and 20,000 of taking NC?), something makes me think we’re going to hear alot of inspiring slogans in 24 months at the next go-round.

An era of limits? Democrats have tried that - Carter back in the 70’s. All it took was Volker and Reagan to remove the artificial constraints on the economy and we increased GDP by 400% over a quarter of a century. Never been done before at any time in the history of the industrialized world.

I think you are sincere when you say that but it presupposes the people stand still and don’t innovate, don’t create new opportunities - out of nothing I might add. This lack of faith in the genius of ordinary people is a pretty good base issue for Republicans to run against.

ed.

“mark30339 wrote: ‘and his share of the US national debt may exceed what he’ll make in a lifetime.’

Take heart, his actual share of the national debt will be closer to $10 TRILLION/300 million = $32,716 per person.”

Thanks Ron, I have probably exaggerated. But your numbers are incomplete. The public debt is 10 Trillion as you say, but the unfunded liability for Medicare is about 38 Trillion and about 12 Trillion for Social Security (if you use the accounting private pensions are required to use - see http://www.ncpa.org/pub/st/st263/st263c.html). So by my count, the estimated present value of the US Government’s debt obligations is 60 Trillion. Divide that by 136 Million taxpayers and you get $441,000 per taxpayer.

For some reason, you seem to think that if I favor Obama today, that means that I absolutely worship each and every idea, policy, and goal that either he, the Dem party (of which I am not a member) or the “Left” may subscribe to. Of the two choices (excluding the irrevelant also-rans), I personally do not favor Obama so much as reject McCain/Palin.

I’d also like to make this clear — I’d have voted for McCain in 2000 if he wasn’t robbed of the nomination (IMO). I had a hell of alot of respect for him, putting him in my top 3 trusted pols list along with Hagel (studied under his brother, and consistently admire his principles whenever he displayed them) and Specter (disagree on many issues, but strikes me as “fair”, whatever that means). 3 Repubs — no Dems. Don’t know why you’re all so terrified of the Donkeys — they’re so incompetent they could have all the seats and they still won’t get a damn thing done except dedicate some new flowerbeds and establish “hug a tree day”.
Again, I did not agree with McCain’s policies 100% of the time, but I felt I could trust him to be honest . . . or as honest as a politician is going to be. The last year, I can’t say that anymore: Straight-Talk John turned into Sniveling Lying Weasel #6,547 somewhere, and between the cariciture (sp) of a once great man he has become and looking at Palin waiting to be given the launch codes, Obama is the lesser of two evils. Disagree? Bless you your opinion. I’ve been wrong before, no doubt I’ll be wrong again. But this “sinner/saint” binary absolutist mindset espoused by many on the Right is, respectfully, nonsense.

People like me are the cause of the government’s crushing debt? I assume you pin the nation’s poor fiscal management on me becuase you think I’m a Dem-Leftist-hippie who wants to “go socialist” — based on nothing more than not liking the current makeup of the Repub Party. I’ll play along: What would you suggest? Give the Repubs the checkbook? After all, they’ve got such a good track record for fiscal responsibility. Engaging in two simultaneous wars while cutting taxes — that’s some M.B.A. thinking there.

Still, I suppose you’re right that its all the Left’s fault. After all, they’re the ones that added the prescription drug benefit to Medicare (and made sure to write the rules so the government couldn’t negotiate for a wholesale discount) potentially tossing another trillion plus on the debt (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9328-2005Feb8.html) . . . oops. Sorry.
Well, at least the Repubs intruduced those bills to abolish Social Security like you seem to want and lobbied hard for them, but the Evil Left just kept out manuevering them. Oh, they didn’t? Well, they did investigate steroid use in baseball. I guess you have to have priorities.

Listen — both parties are stocked to the brim with liars, cheats, self-serving dirtbags, and chowderheads. I don’t think EITHER is the “correct” party. Why do the extremists on either side blame every single problem with the other party? If “people like me” are solely to blame for the national debt, its people like you that took the “free exchange of ideas” and mutated it into “who can chant the loudest”.

Not that you care, but do you want to know why I’m voting Obama (not that my vote matters — I live in Cali now, and something tells me he doesn’t need my vote to carry the state)? I want these wars concluded We’d have signed the SoF deal with Iraq if the Admin didn’t insist on being legally able to use Iraqi-based troops to attack neighboring countries, then we can focus on Afganistan and finish what we started before somebody decided to pull the troops out to invade Iraq. I want Gitmo closed. Yesterday. It’s going down as one of the greatest National embarassments and humiliations of all time.
I think I have a better chance of seeing those two goals met with the Blue team this go-round instead of the Red team. Plus, as I said I have so little respect for the Blue’s ability to trip and hit the floor, let alone accomplish anything, that I’m less worried they’ll cause more damage than, say, U.S. Government 2000-2006. But I don’t think the Reds are demonic (except for Cheney). I don’t blame every failing of the government and society at their feet. To paraphrase Rick M — if the Blues win, we aren’t going to become socialist. The government and probably society will swing a bit to the left, then eventually it’ll swing a litle bit to the right. The world will keep spinning.

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