Murdoch and the WSJ slam McCain on economy

[Ivor Karabatkovic]

I guess when John McCain himself said he doesn't know much about the economy, he really wasn't joking.

The Editorial Board article states that John McCain's comments regarding how he would handle the financial crisis is “false and deeply unfair…un-Presidential.â€

[Stephen Eisel]

http://www.thrfeed.com/2008/09/murdoch-obamas.html

Murdoch: Obama's economic policies are 'naive'

News Corp. chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch said he doesn't regret the New York Post endorsing John McCain, even as some say the Republican ticket is the weaker choice for voters concerned about the economy.

"I am very worried," Murdoch said during an interview Friday with Fox Business Network. "I like Sen. Obama very much. I have met him. He is a very intelligent man. But his policy of anti-globalization, protectionism, is going to be -- and card checks -- are going to do two or three things. It's going to give us a lot of inflation. They're going to ruin our relationships with the rest of the world. And they are going to slow down the rest of the world, too. And they're going to make people frightened to add to employment. You are going to find companies leaving this country if it's -- if you put a protectionist wall around it. You're going to get -- his policy is really very, very naive, old-fashioned, 1960s."

[ryan costa]

http://www.thrfeed.com/2008/09/murdoch-obamas.html

Murdoch: Obama's economic policies are 'naive'

News Corp. chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch said he doesn't regret the New York Post endorsing John McCain, even as some say the Republican ticket is the weaker choice for voters concerned about the economy.

"I am very worried," Murdoch said during an interview Friday with Fox Business Network. "I like Sen. Obama very much. I have met him. He is a very intelligent man. But his policy of anti-globalization, protectionism, is going to be -- and card checks -- are going to do two or three things. It's going to give us a lot of inflation. They're going to ruin our relationships with the rest of the world. And they are going to slow down the rest of the world, too. And they're going to make people frightened to add to employment. You are going to find companies leaving this country if it's -- if you put a protectionist wall around it. You're going to get -- his policy is really very, very naive, old-fashioned, 1960s."

Mr.Murdoch is not honest. for one, most working class adults were better off in the 1960s. fewer wives had to work outside the home. college was more affordable for kids bright enough to attend. there was plenty of work for hardworking high school graduates. healthcare was cheaper. pension checks arrived on time.

for two, foreign companies that open in america generally are here to produce things to sell to america. whether as a token act of good will, or to cut down on transportation costs. Honda of America doesn't export much back to Japan. With modest tariffs, more foreign companies that got rich exporting to america will be eager to invest in America. America is about the richest country in the world: maybe if wall street invested in production rather than mortgage backed securities, Bush wouldn't be pushing a 700 billion dollar bailout.

There has never been a protectionist wall around America. There have only been protectionist speed bumps and toll booths. this was the cornerstone of American development and prosperity.

[Will Brown]

The US unemployment rate in 1961 was higher than today, and in much of the sixties was higher than in 2007 and 2008 (the 6.1 % that has everyone atwitter is from one month, August; for January and February it was below 5%). One suspects that the rate, which declined after 1961, was artificially low because of the huge number of potential workers who were being removed from the marketplace by the draft, and there was plenty of work for the remainder as LBJ spent heavily in support of his war effort.

As to protectionism, you don't seem to recall the Smoot-Hawley act, a trade barrier of such consequence that many think it led to a world-wide depression, which set the stage for the Nazis to take power in Germany and beyond.

While Bush seems to be saying that immediate action is necessary, from what I have read the bailout is a plan concocted by three men, I think the secretary of the treasury, and chair of the federal reserve board, and the head of the federal reserve bank of New York. I may have a name wrong, but the articles I have read seemed encouraged that the plan was created by three non-elected officials, rather than the usual gang of politicians. Of course, given time, the politicians will find ways to change the plan to be more consistent with the special interests who control them.

[Bill Call]

I guess when John McCain himself said he doesn't know much about the economy, he really wasn't joking.

Actually he was joking. His sense of humor sometimes gets him into trouble.

Ivor, did you actually read this article? If you did it must have occurred to you that the point they were making is that the current fiscal crisis was made in Washington not Wall Street and that bashing Wall Street might sound good it is not sound policy.

[Ivor Karabatkovic]

I guess when John McCain himself said he doesn't know much about the economy, he really wasn't joking.

Actually he was joking. His sense of humor sometimes gets him into trouble.

Ivor, did you actually read this article? If you did it must have occurred to you that the point they were making is that the current fiscal crisis was made in Washington not Wall Street and that bashing Wall Street might sound good it is not sound policy.

Bill,

I did read the article. What I got from it is that John McCain wouldn't do anything that would help us normal hard working Americans out. That's not my opinion, that's the WSJ's opinion. The op-ed piece was written based on the remarks John McCain has made on what he would do if he were President this week and he had the power.

I'll quote it again just so you can read it again.

In a crisis, voters want steady, calm leadership, not easy, misleading answers that will do nothing to help. Mr. McCain is sounding like a candidate searching for a political foil rather than a genuine solution.

Do you want political foil or do you want a short term and long term solution to the wealth this country has lost?

[ryan costa]

The US unemployment rate in 1961 was higher than today, and in much of the sixties was higher than in 2007 and 2008 (the 6.1 % that has everyone atwitter is from one month, August; for January and February it was below 5%). One suspects that the rate, which declined after 1961, was artificially low because of the huge number of potential workers who were being removed from the marketplace by the draft, and there was plenty of work for the remainder as LBJ spent heavily in support of his war effort.

As to protectionism, you don't seem to recall the Smoot-Hawley act, a trade barrier of such consequence that many think it led to a world-wide depression, which set the stage for the Nazis to take power in Germany and beyond.

While Bush seems to be saying that immediate action is necessary, from what I have read the bailout is a plan concocted by three men, I think the secretary of the treasury, and chair of the federal reserve board, and the head of the federal reserve bank of New York. I may have a name wrong, but the articles I have read seemed encouraged that the plan was created by three non-elected officials, rather than the usual gang of politicians. Of course, given time, the politicians will find ways to change the plan to be more consistent with the special interests who control them.

The Smoot-Hawley tariff did not cause or extend the U.S. Great Depression or any Global Depression. Trade was a much smaller portion of the U.S. economy during and before the Great Depression. The Roaring Twenties caused the Great Depression. If anything prevented recovery from the Great Depression it was the feds continuing a constrictive monetary policy even after most of the 1920s speculators finished going broke.

Unemployment statistics are misleading between now and then, because they are based on the number of people who report being unemployed. Was there a foreclosure crisis during the early 1960s? Did we import a smaller or larger portion of our energy? Were median household savings positive or negative? Were the Feds bailing out mortgage backed securities speculators to the tune of 700 billion dollars?

I had read an article that it costs over 60 grand a year to keep the average U.S. soldier in Iraq equipped and provision. that means....if they weren't in Iraq the government would be better off buying them a house in Cleveland.

[Bill Call]

I did read the article. What I got from it is that John McCain wouldn't do anything that would help us normal hard working Americans out. That's not my opinion, that's the WSJ's opinion.

Do you want political foil or do you want a short term and long term solution to the wealth this country has lost?

Would you care to debate the relative merits of each candidates positions?

Maybe under the heading: The Karabatkovic Call Debates

Each post would be limited to 246 words because any post longer than the Gettysburg Address is repeatedly redundant

[Stephen Calhoun]

Mr. Call.

If you did it must have occurred to you that the point they were making is that the current fiscal crisis was made in Washington not Wall Street and that bashing Wall Street might sound good it is not sound policy.

I have read over the past two weeks several arch interpretations of historical events that reduce the crisis in ideological terms to: liberal Washington do-gooders forcing the financial industry to service the aspirations of po' folk too stupid to read the fine print.

If true, then the usual culprits can be rounded up: liberals and po' folk.

This 'analysis' does not ring true. It is a mythic, not rational analysis, propped on a pedestal of unscientific claims. I assume it's hope is to deflect accountability and personal responsibility from the actual culprits to the always ripe scapegoats provided by lefty latte sippers and persons of color.

If the analysis were correct we would expect to find in the critical literature many warnings about how the 'liberals' were leading Wall Street over a cliff. Where are those warnings?

And, what were the instrumental features that "forced" Wall Street to throw good money after bad? The whole case of the claim rests on concrete features. What were they?

(Washington does get a share of the blame, especially since it has become clear that Bush and years of a Republican Congress have "enronized" the economy.)

***

Blaming liberals and po' folk is a refuge for those lacking which virtues?

It's myth making and an attempt to deflect the blame from the greedy Daddy Warbucks who figured out with their co-dependent conservative washington allies a way to remake Wall Street's foundation into a house of cards.

Now the conservatives will try to push through a clean bailout with no punishments, this allowing the tax payers to go on the hook for the sanitizing of the financial titans' balance sheets. Personal responsibility? That's for suckers and for the little people.

Finally, it seems, Grover Norquist will get to see government programs drowned in a bathtub emptied for the sake of supercharged corporate welfare socialism.