But Link, we want this thing to weigh on us for many months. The closer we get to next November the more pressure the Senators and Congressmen up for election will feel and the more you’ll see support drop off. This bastard just barely passed the House in the first place and the Senate is shaping up for a knock down drag out just to get a vote on it.

Obama, Reid, and Pelosi will scream from the mountain tops that we need to move quickly on this, b/c they know that time is against them, but I refer back to my original quote.

“tis a tale, told by an idiot…” or in this case, 3 of them.

I hope you’re right. But I wouldn’t count on it. Obama-Pelosi are driven to get Healthcare done.

We have the 60-vote requirement because the Democrats reduced it from a higher requirement back in the 1970s — when they had 62 votes. It’s a roadblock but hardly insurmountable. We may still see the public option.

Even if Healthcare isn’t adopted, it will weigh on us for many months.

When Western economists finally gained access to research materials after the fall of the Soviet Union, they found something interesting: alongside the non-functioning official economy was a gigantic black market which allowed the country to hobble along for decades. I’m pretty certain this is where we’re headed – with the IRS replacing much of the function of the KGB.

if you don’tknow what to do contact the political rivals of these guys and tell them you’ll sign the petition.

No way the Senate can ram this monstrosity through as a “budget bill” meaning they’ll need the full 60 votes to pass it, not 50.

After months of wrangling, if they pass anything, it will not have the public option which means it will not pass the House in reconciliation.

We’ve already been through this dance.

Larry Summers might (I don’t know for sure) subscribe to the view that people will work harder to keep their disposable income high when taxes are increased. The only problem is that empirical evidence shows otherwise and a plethora of new entitlements will make it theoretically unnecessary. Beyond shelter, food, clothing and at least the promise of health care, why bother busting your butt? If you have a right to all that stuff without working a day in your life, why work even harder than you do now?

If this passes, our only hope is to vote out the Democrats and vote them out in big numbers. It’s possible to repeal this thing before it takes effect.

The only country that has ever tried this plan on a scale anywhere close to the United States is the USSR – on 150 million people. As a victim of that system for several years, I can assure you that you will not enjoy it.

We’re running huge deficits — what could be more simulative than $1.8 trillion in deficit spending? — but we are only seeing modest economic growth, with increasing unemployment. Something is very wrong with this picture. It’s unsustainable. Our leaders live in a big bubble, and persist in ignoring this.

In past years deficits went up because government spending went up. Today, we also have government revenue going down. Our current huge deficit is attributable in significant part to much reduced incomes among the “rich” and corporations. We’ve become very dependent on these segments to raise our taxes. I don’t see these segments recovering to recent levels to deliver these taxes. Obama & Co are doing everything they can to ensure this.

So how does this play out. I expect continued high unemployment — a figure everyone can understand. But if the recovery stalls, I expect that in about two years or so we’ll also see huge shortfalls in projected government revenues at all levels. Our already huge projected deficits will balloon. What then?

Like Dr T, I’ve long suspected that Obama-Axelrod want this to happen. Or they’re just really stupid. Doesn’t Larry Summers see this, or is he just another idiot savant?

Link, over

Assuming standard office paper, about 7.936 btu’s.

Which leaves me puzzled.

Given the huge quantity of hot air that went into its making, wouldn’t this constitute a violation of the principle of conservation of energy? I understand that, in most examples, the missing energy would have produced work, but here we simply move more towards entropy.

Dr. T,
You went on for a bit in “But’s Its My Hard Work Paying Your Unemployment” about people getting cash and not playing taxes on it. You now write “You are assuming that the bad economic consequences are unintended.”

This is the whole point of socialist systems. Government make the environment so hostile that people and business have no choice but to “work” off books with kick backs to the politicians.

You hate it. I hate it. Warren hates it. But I realize this is the hand our government has dealt the people. I’m not going to harm myself for the betterment of the federal government.

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Fred from Canuckistan said: “If this passes your Senate, America is going to be the world’s biggest Laboratory for the Law of Unintended Economic Consequences.”

You are assuming that the bad economic consequences are unintended. I believe that they are intended. They are part of Obama’s plan to “save” the US economy by destroying it. The only way he can turn our current mixed economy (capitalism, some corporatism, and a bit of fascism) into a sociofascist economy is to bring our economy to its knees. At that point, most people will welcome a new Mussolini.