I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

So sorry, everyone -- sometimes my links work, sometimes they don't, and I don't know why!

The simplest thing to do is go to the website

www.talkingpointsmemo.com

and scroll down the front "page" until you come to the story.  IMO, this proves that all doubters about the validity of invading Iraq were justified.  My Prime Minister at the time was a big doubter -- that's why Canada would not join the so-called "coalition of the willing".

Want to see how lovely Alaska looks, once you get outside of Anchorage? 

Interested in what the "teat-sucking" citizens of that state might be doing with all those checks they get from their State government?  (Why should it be okay for the Federal government to tax rich people and corporations and then give the money to poor people, but it's not okay for states to do the same thing?)  Okay, the State of Alaska also gets more federal money on a per-capita basis than other states... but here's another way to look at those numbers that makes them sound much more reasonable:  http://a4theroad.blogspot.com/2010/11/politics-states-like-alaska-with-lots.html

Or, you could watch "Flying Wild Alaska", on the Discovery Channel:  http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/flying-wild-alaska/about-show.html

The show is about a family-run airline business that operates out of Unalakleet AK (population 752; with 85% Native Americans).  The airline serves 97 villages and towns in Alaska, the vast majority of which have no road access and can only be reached by bush plane.  Here's a route map:  http://www.flyera.com/passengerservice/route

Flying Wild Alaska just started on the Discovery Channel in January 2011.  My household is hooked on it.  My dh is a private pilot, and the show fascinates him. It is totally different from all the other Alaska reality shows. (Good thing, eh?)   If you like flying even a little bit, or if you're interested in the Alaskan scenery, or if you're curious about life in those native Alaskan villages perched out at the edge of the tundra, or if you're wondering what "stink flipper" might be, ... give the program a try.  Any misgivings I had about the wisdom of the state of Alaska (or the Federal government) giving money to "teat-sucking" Alaskans has pretty much been cured by that program.

There have been a whole bunch of reality shows filmed in Alaska lately (duh).  The Anchorage Daily News surveyed Alaskans recently to find out what they thought about each of those shows.  The respondents gave Flying Wild Alaska 4 out of 5 stars, the highest ranking of all the Alaska reality shows (it was tied with "Deadliest Catch").  They hated that show about she-who-will-not-be-named-in-February.  Results of the survey were published on line yesterday:  http://www.adn.com/2011/02/14/1699528/alaska-based-shows-what-do-the.html

I've been to Alaska twice -- once to Anchorage, with side-trips to Homer and the Kenai Peninsula as well as Denali N.P.; and once to Juneau.  During the Juneau visit, I spent a couple of mornings riding the city buses to get around (e.g., a shopping trip to KMart).  I was surprised by the poverty, which isn't apparent if you stay aboard your cruise ship or stick to the tourist districts. It's an amazing state, unlike anything you'll find in the lower 48.

Okay, that's it for your Travel Channel briefing for this morning.  I need to go work on my taut arms and athletic physique.

otter

[P.S.:  Please forgive any dropped "m's".  My keyboard is misbehaving and I'm not catching them all.]

Found an interesting table on the OMB's website which I copied below. The first column is the year, then the gross receipts, the gross outlay (spending) and the surplus+/deficit-. Interesting that Bush's last 2 years of office ran a deficit of 160B and 458B. President Obama's budget goes out seven years and even at 7 years out he has us running at a deficit of 648B!

The numbers speak for themselves. Check out the spending column. In 2009, Congress spent a TRILLION and a half more than in 2008!!  I hope this table posts properly. If not I will link to the OMB's website.

Sorry cannot get the gobbledgook to delete but here is the link. Table 1.1 was what I was trying to post. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals/

2013 estimate	3,003,345	3,770,876	-767,531
2014 estimate	3,332,588	3,977,141	-644,553
2015 estimate	3,583,043	4,189,773	-606,730
2016 estimate	3,819,103	4,467,806	-648,703

I am not against the government helping people. I just wish people who get govt assistance in any of its many and varied forms would quit telling the rest of us we can't have any.

3monst - LMBO about your DH. They are such GUYS is right!!

Wabbit, I would be very interested to know if that is correct. I will see what I can dredge up and will let you know if I find it.

wabbit, I found it. This is from the Heritage Foundation but they are using a WaPo graphic.

"Many Obama defenders in the comments are claiming that the numbers above do not include spending on Iraq and Afghanistan during the Bush years. They most certainly do. While Bush did fund the wars through emergency supplementals (not the regular budget process), that spending did not simply vanish. It is included in the numbers above. Also, some Obama defenders are claiming the graphic above represents biased Heritage Foundation numbers. While we stand behind the numbers we put out 100%, the numbers, and the graphic itself, above are from the Washington Post. We originally left out the link to WaPo. It has now been added."

http://blog.heritage.org/2010/02/05/past-deficits-vs-obamas-deficits-in-pictures/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2009/03/21/GR2009032100104.html

oh I see the humor alright.  And as far as I'm concerned, nothing wrong with laughing at him--I did!  When I got into the car, I called him "Nine fingered _____" and suggested one way of stopping the bleeding was to lop off the rest of the finger and cauterize the remainder.

The topic of "is it too dangerous" to send your kids to the park is a VERY common thread on parenting lists.  The hullabaloo about the NYC mom who lets her kid ride the subway alone was mind boggling.  I was floored when I discovered some people don't let their kid outside in their yard by themselves.  Like many of you, I left in the morning, did what I wanted and came back when my mom blew a whistle or when the five o'clock cannon went off [we lived near a military base].

There seem to be two camps and no more than two--yes and no.  I fall in the camp of it is no more dangerous in life than before, we just hear about it and think about it more thanks to too much news.  This is what I alluded to earlier when I said I avoid the negative in my life. If you read the statistics, most kidnappings in the US happen between fighting parents [or by other "helpful" relatives.  And most sexual abuse is by also by family members or people known to the family.  We delude ourselves when we think we can protect our children from all evil or bad.  When I was about 7-8-9 or so, a guy exposed himself to me.  I was in a medical facility, getting my arm checked post allergy shots.  There were other people around--a woman in a wheel chair with her back to the guy, a nurse out of sight in a room--and yet he did it anyway.  I told my mother, we went back and reported it.  I later id'd the guy in a line up.  I think the reason I coped with the situation as well as I did was that by sending me in by myself to get my arm checked for reaction or to go to the store for milk, my mother had instilled a level of confidence in me.  She had also talked to me about right/wrong behaviors but not in a scary way.

I am a strong advocate of creating independence and confidence in my kids.  If I don't teach them what to do on their own now, how will they ever be able to grow up and live on their own?  In my opinion, it is worse to send them off to college without the life skills because there are so many worse things that can happen at that age.

So they ride their bikes around the neighborhood without us.  They play outside on the street and they do go to the park together without an adult.  They have been going to the park alone since oldest was 11 [now 13].  Oldest has been going to the store by himself to get bread since he was nearly 12.  He mostly rides his bike.  He knows to watch for cars and wears his helmet and a reflective vest.  He has also flown by himself to visit a friend [when he was 11, not since the change in TSA] Of course, I worry when he is gone and sometimes my brain kicks into frantic mode and I imagine the worst things happening.  But going to the store by himself gives him confidence that he can handle situations.  And to me, that is vital.

Wabbitt - both you and Barbara are correct. Bush kept the wars off the books, but the deficit is still higher. However, that does not, IMO, exonerate the GOP of total hypocrisy on its sudden obsession with fiscal responsibility whenever there is a democrat in office, contrasted with its laissez faire attitude under Big Deficit Spenders Reagan and Bush 2.

Help me out please, who was the last President who presented a balanced budget to Congress?

(If you include off the books defense spending in the total-and if you don't but please tell me which method you are using)

Clinton.

For the record, the federal budget is really the "Unified" budget. One part is non entitlement programs and the other is the Soc. Sec. and Medicare trust funds. Clinton presented the first part balanced. Conservatives like Paul Ryan and libertarians like the Cato institute have argued that the entitlements fund is not really balanced because they are just paper, or debt.

Technically, they are correct, as the government has borrowed heavily from those funds, so we are in debt to ourselves, you could say. The paper is stored in a vault in West Virginia, I believe, and Stupid Bush 2 had the audacity to refer to it in derogatory terms as he was making his push to partially privatize Social Security. I say stupid because I don't think a president should question the legitimacy of US debt commitment within hearing shot of anyone, including China (which probably understood his remarks for the political posturing they were). However, if the US doesn't pay it's own debts back, the world's economy will crash, so I think one can still put Full Faith and Credit in the United Sates!

Athena

Surplus?

Perhaps my question was phased wrong. Which president presented a budget with a surplus? Dang, my brain did much better at this stuff pre-chemo and pre-Femara. Edited because I never could and still can't type
Diagnosis: 2/25/2007, IDC, Stage I, 0/2 nodes, ER+/PR+, HER2+

That's what I thought. Democrats need better PR.

Rhetorical question-Why oh why is the cap lock next to the shift key?

I looked at the chart and the articles.  There is no doubt that the deficit numbers increased mucho for 2009.  A part of it is that revenue went down due to the bad economy.  That still leaves alot ... the bailout expenditures?  Obama made some of those decisions but much of what shows up in 2009 would have been started by Bush and the budget he submitted for 2009.  Much as many of us look at the bank bailouts and such with a  there did seem to be bipartisan agreement that it needed to be done.  Or else the 'big boys' have such power over the politicians that they got it done anyway.

There are disagreements about whether the stimulus spending accomplished anything.  I'm no expert but when I look at personal experiences I have to think it did something.  3 new high efficiency furnaces were bought in my immediate family ... we would not have done so right then if not for the tax credit.  So our small local company and their employees got the sales and work from that.  I have family that works construction who are working on road and bridge projects that were funded by the stimulus.  They would very likely be laid off if not for that work.  So ... my gut tells me that each company with a sale and each person with a job and therefore money to spend creates a ripple of sales for other places and on and on. 

  

I think the second stimulus should have gone to restoring roads, bridges, and highways.  Employing people who then pay taxes is a long term cure for the deficit.  Of course ending the two wars we are in would help also.

The big problem with the original stimulus is it didn't restrict the bonuses of the executives and top employees of Wall Street, the very ones who caused the problem.  Both parties should be blamed for the lack of control and oversight of both stimulus packages.