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More tomorrow, but...
Aug. 1st, 2011 12:16 amI'm still thinking about what I want to say overall, but have a few quick takeaways:
1. This deal is terrible. The only good thing in it at all is that it doesn't throw a hard shock into the financial system as we're heading into the second dip of a double-dip recession. Not a dime in new revenue, not a wetslap's worth of actual cuts; this addresses the actual problems in no way whatsoever. It's a stagger-along-a-couple-more-years nicotine patch to the ass. Good job, guys, by which I mean what the fuck is wrong with you people?
2. Keyesnians, kiss any ideas about further stimulus goodbye; the best you're going to get is the Federal Reserve's plan for QE III, and that's going to get sucked up by the financial system just like QE I and II. Have fun with that. Hayakians, in case you're buying the spin: these aren't cuts - I hear there's around us$40B in actual cuts in this, everything else is reductions-in-increases, and almost all of those other than the Iraq/Afghanistan war wind-downs is shuttled off to 2013, and thus utterly meaningless. And the mainline GOP is already protesting the military wind-down. As much as the Democrats are taking it in the teeth on this, so are you.
3. Supercongress? Seriously? Are you fucking kidding me? You're going to build this sideshow attraction? Oh, you are. Christ, what a completely purposeless pantload. The only good thing that could possibly come out of this is that it could generate enough distraction that Mr. Bush's incredibly unproductive upper-income-bracket tax cuts are allowed to expire - eventually.
4. But regardless of that, one thing you should all take away from this is that the US has called S&P and Moody's bluffs. This deal basically says, "Go ahead. Downgrade us - if you dare." To my mind, neither of these agencies have any credibility left whatsoever, but despite a decade and a half of spectacular failure, they're still paid attention by many. If they don't pull the downgrade trigger after this - after being so very specific about what needed to be done to keep AAA - I think they'll lose the Street. They deserve to.
More later. And oh, because I posted about it over the weekend and I want it to stay at the top of my LJ and Dreamwidth journals: I released a new pay-what-you-like song on the Cracksman Betty project - "Captain Kidd." More on that in the Sunday post, but basically, it's about the eponymous pirate. Enjoy!
1. This deal is terrible. The only good thing in it at all is that it doesn't throw a hard shock into the financial system as we're heading into the second dip of a double-dip recession. Not a dime in new revenue, not a wetslap's worth of actual cuts; this addresses the actual problems in no way whatsoever. It's a stagger-along-a-couple-more-years nicotine patch to the ass. Good job, guys, by which I mean what the fuck is wrong with you people?
2. Keyesnians, kiss any ideas about further stimulus goodbye; the best you're going to get is the Federal Reserve's plan for QE III, and that's going to get sucked up by the financial system just like QE I and II. Have fun with that. Hayakians, in case you're buying the spin: these aren't cuts - I hear there's around us$40B in actual cuts in this, everything else is reductions-in-increases, and almost all of those other than the Iraq/Afghanistan war wind-downs is shuttled off to 2013, and thus utterly meaningless. And the mainline GOP is already protesting the military wind-down. As much as the Democrats are taking it in the teeth on this, so are you.
3. Supercongress? Seriously? Are you fucking kidding me? You're going to build this sideshow attraction? Oh, you are. Christ, what a completely purposeless pantload. The only good thing that could possibly come out of this is that it could generate enough distraction that Mr. Bush's incredibly unproductive upper-income-bracket tax cuts are allowed to expire - eventually.
4. But regardless of that, one thing you should all take away from this is that the US has called S&P and Moody's bluffs. This deal basically says, "Go ahead. Downgrade us - if you dare." To my mind, neither of these agencies have any credibility left whatsoever, but despite a decade and a half of spectacular failure, they're still paid attention by many. If they don't pull the downgrade trigger after this - after being so very specific about what needed to be done to keep AAA - I think they'll lose the Street. They deserve to.
More later. And oh, because I posted about it over the weekend and I want it to stay at the top of my LJ and Dreamwidth journals: I released a new pay-what-you-like song on the Cracksman Betty project - "Captain Kidd." More on that in the Sunday post, but basically, it's about the eponymous pirate. Enjoy!
