<p>Hey I think Clinton admitting to smoking pot is fine...the whole "not inhale"ing thing is pretty lame - after all, most people try it at least once</p>
<p>I mean, I bet Dubyou partied pretty hard in college....</p>
<p>Bush was at a party hosted by Hunter S. Thompson.</p>
<p>The one from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Think about it.</p>
<p>He has a DUI on record, as does Cheney.</p>
<p>
[quote]
nostalgic for clinton
[/quote]
</p>
<p>dont lose hope, if we can just get by two years, there is a light at the end of the tunnel</p>
<p>Hillary Clinton 2008</p>
<p>Didn;t both John Kerry and George W. recieve "gentlemens' C's" at Yale consistantly? That is what I heard but it could be false.</p>
<p>And yes clinton does kick ass.</p>
<p>And yes it is possible to not inhale... a lot of people "smoke" cigars to look cool but dont inhale... look uo the will smith quote from the song "miami" hehe.</p>
<p>Reagan... not my favorite, Clinton, yeah he cheated on his wife, but so do a lot of people. Not that it is right, but people make it out to be the worst thing anybody ever did. I would prefer a cheating Clinton to any kind of George W.</p>
<p>Sorry to be a basher. It's just how I feel.</p>
<p>Kerry and Bush Jr. both received mediocre grades at Yale. Kerry's GPA was actually slightly worse than that of Bush, but Bush gets the bad rap because his powerful father got him into Yale in the first place... Kerry's acceptance was more genuine. And it doesn't help that after going through Yale and Harvard, Bush is still extremely inarticulate.</p>
<p>The nostalgia for Reagan makes no sense now, and it will even less so as the years go on. You can't have nostalgia for a president when you weren't even around when he left office. This year's entering freshman entering freshman were born in 88/89.</p>
<p>Sadly, I'm nostalgic for either of them at this point.</p>
<p>you're not supposed to inhale a cigar. you just puff all the smoke out. i would feel if you were just puffing all that smoke out or a bowl or a bong people would immediately ****ed at you for wasting.</p>
<p>its just so incredibly not believable.</p>
<p>I was born in 1990, so didn't really pay attention to Clinton. Though from what I've seen, he just happened to rule while technology exploded, nothing that he did for the economy or whatever.</p>
<p>Reagan was a MUCH better president than Clinton.</p>
<p>Reagan
- tax cuts
- market deregulation
- monetary policies to contain inflation
- increased incentives to work
- decreased federal spending</p>
<p>Clinton
- wasted taxpayers money</p>
<p>Decreased federal spending? <a href="http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=879%5B/url%5D">http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=879</a></p>
<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaganomics%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaganomics</a>
Read the criticisms part. Notice that the deficit was created more due to spending than due to tax cuts. </p>
<p>Feeling good by using credit isn't anything great. Do yourself a favor, and know what you are talking about. Also note that anti inflationary measures were taken prior to Reagan (by the Fed's chief-Volker). </p>
<p>Clinton actually reversed that deficit into a surplus. That is quite a feat. Now the hope is to get a repeat performance by another president after this economic idiot.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Clinton actually reversed that deficit into a surplus.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, actually, Clinton was extremely LUCKY to be POTUS during three major bulls runs:</p>
<p>1) the single greatest US stock market bull in history
2) housing boom
3) incredibly strong US dollar</p>
<p>In sum: those three things together erased the deficit. Not Clinton. Period. Clinton was just a lucky dude to be in the right place at the right time to claim credit.</p>
<p>The 90's stock market bull was the single greatest contributor to the sudden increase in government revenue (via taxes, namely capital gains tax paid during the stock market bull run) than anything Clinton did. Further, this stock market "wealth effect" led people to spend way beyond their means -> housing boom -> further stuffing government coffers.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The stock market bubble added more than $8 trillion of paper wealth to the economy. This stimulated the economy in two ways. First, when families see the value of their stock portfolios rise, they spend more, since they feel less need to put money aside for retirement or their kids' education. Just as the textbooks would predict, consumption boomed and savings fell through the floor in the late '90s and 2000.</p>
<p>The stock bubble also stimulated the economy through its effect on investment. Contrary to myth, firms rarely finance new investment by issuing shares of stock. However, the '90s boom was an exception to this rule. With Internet start-ups able to raise billions of dollars by selling shares on the Nasdaq, companies were using stock to finance new investment in a big way. Soaring stock prices fed directly into an investment boom concentrated in telecommunications and other high-tech sectors. Investment in equipment and software rose by more than $300 billion between 1996 and 2000, an increase of more than 45 percent.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>So when the bubble "burst" (conveniently when Clinton was exiting and Bush was entering the White House):</p>
<p>
[quote]
The bursting of the bubble threw this process into reverse. This was seen most clearly with investment, which in both 2001 and 2002 was down by more than $140 billion from its peak in 2000. As we now know, much of the tech investment of the boom years was wasted on wild schemes that will never prove profitable. The tech sectors continue to have vast amounts of overcapacity, which will depress investment in semiconductors, telecommunications, and related sectors for years to come.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
The '90s stock bubble is also partially responsible for other recent problems. One is the switch from surpluses to deficits at both the federal and state levels. The federal government collected almost $120 billion in capital gains tax revenue at the peak of the stock bubble in 2000, most of which came from gains on stock sales. When stock prices plunged, capital gains revenue did also. It is now projected at $51 billion in 2003. Many states, especially California, were similarly affected by the stock crash.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The consequences of Clinton's "strong dollar" legacy:</p>
<p>
[quote]
To make matters worse, a third bubble from the '90s is also still with us -- the dollar bubble. The Clinton administration deliberately pursued a "strong dollar" policy. This had the desirable short-term effect of restraining inflation and raising domestic living standards by making imports cheaper for people in the United States. (An undesirable short-term effect was the devastation of U.S. manufacturing.) However, in the long-term, the strong dollar policy is unsustainable. As a result of its massive bill for imports, the United States is currently borrowing more than $550 billion a year from abroad (approximately 5.3 percent of GDP), since it is buying much more from abroad than it is selling. This borrowing is paid for by selling off U.S. assets. If the trade deficit remains at its current level, within a decade foreigners will own the entire stock market, much of the government debt and many of our homes.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>All excerpts taken from the following article:
<a href="http://www.alternet.org/story/15975/%5B/url%5D">http://www.alternet.org/story/15975/</a></p>
<p>As an aside: </p>
<p>I totally hate it when people praise Clinton for erasing the deficit. He basically was a lucky mofo who was in the right place at the right time and left the White House just as the stock market bull started to tank straight into bear territory.</p>
<p>Okay: </p>
<p>Better image: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Barrons_BubblesNewHome.png%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Barrons_BubblesNewHome.png</a></p>
<p>Where is the 90s housing boom again? I have a feeling you are mixing up the decades (or your sources are).</p>
<p>Yes the dollar was strong in the 90s. But you do realize that the reason why the dollar is now lower is mostly due to the deficit than anything else. The dollar bear market began in 2002. The current government actually ACTIVELY participates in a strong dollar policy. (<a href="http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=13429060&src=rss/politicsNews)%5B/url%5D">http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=13429060&src=rss/politicsNews)</a> The recent decline in value is actually considered to be rather conservative by most estimates as many people had/and continue to believe that the dollar as to slide further. Your can't simply say that the dollar was stronger and not give the fundamental case for why IT SHOULD have been stronger (which was indeed the case).</p>
<p>I love how that exerpt basically blames Clinton era economics for the current deficit problem which is far from the case.</p>
<p>mahras, i figure you have nothing to say about the stock market boom?</p>
<p>i mean that's the crux of what helped wipe out the deficit.</p>
<p>mahras, let's not confuse two things:</p>
<p>1) housing boom of the 90s due to the stock market "wealth effect"
2) the stock market bubble crash -> which led to massive interest rate cuts by the Fed -> which fueled housing re-financing / mortgage activity from '01--> currently </p>
<p>at any rate, you're not even addressing the main point (the stock market).</p>
<p>
[quote]
I love how that exerpt basically blames Clinton era economics for the current deficit problem which is far from the case.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, that part of the article is certainly debatable, but the massive wealth created (i.e. government revenue and huge capital gains surplus) due to the stock market boom is not debatable -> in other words, that Clinton really can not take any kind of credible credit for the deficit reduction.</p>
<p>And I see that you've updated your comment to reflect your thoughts on the dollar and housing but nothing about the stock market...</p>
<p>If you notice there wasn't any "housing boom" in the 90s even due to the stock market. Attributing the stock market performance to the deficit cut is not correct. The primary reason why the deficit cutting spree began (and why the stock market also began appreciating) is because of spending and tax reforms. Clinton cut the budget and increased taxes which lead to the start of reducing the deficit. The stock market just didn't appreciate due to no reason. It had to do with the economic conditions fostered by the Clinton era administration. For example, inflation had dropped to its lowest levels. The general cutting of deficit increased the value of the US Dollar which made imports attractive. The stock market doesn't move without any underlying economic stimulus. The Clinton administration was able to create a good economic condition for the stock market appreciation to actually occur. </p>
<p>Yes the initial interest rate cuts did have to do with the stock market crash. However, I will argue that the federal deficit has a lot to do with the federal spending than by the private sector. For example, view the following federal spending on defense chart: <a href="http://www.d-n-i.net/charts_data/evolution_of_the_fy_2004_supplemental.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.d-n-i.net/charts_data/evolution_of_the_fy_2004_supplemental.htm</a>.
When the governmet does little to control the deficit, it is useless to blame simply the housing sector for the entire blame for the matter. For example, in 2004 the administration conducted a tax cut even though the deficit sat at 477 billion. As I have noted, if the government doesn't create the economic condition then markets will simply not follow. As the government itself became a huge user of debt, the private sectors (particularly housing as you had pointed out) followed suit as well. </p>
<p>[I do have to conduct errands while writing these ;)]</p>
<p>
[quote]
It had to do with the economic conditions fostered by the Clinton era administration.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>With all due respect, that is just flat out wrong.</p>
<p>Economists all agree that the economy had already begun turning the corner by the time the '92 elections even took place (for those who can remember that far back, that's when Clinton was first elected).</p>
<p>Clinton was elected on the back of "the economy, stupid" and George H.W. took the brunt of that. BUT, the economy was already on its way back before Clinton even stepped into the White House. </p>
<p>The Bull Market had begun.</p>
<p>[i also have to run errands]</p>
<p>Not quite: </p>
<p>Remember, one of the reasons why big Bush lost the election was because of a poor economy (a recession was underway during that period). Also the federal spending cut and the tax cuts occured under Clinton when fear of a further increase in the deficit was spreading (here is the speech: <a href="http://www.clintonfoundation.org/legacy/021793-speech-by-president-address-to-joint-session-of-congress-as-delivered.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.clintonfoundation.org/legacy/021793-speech-by-president-address-to-joint-session-of-congress-as-delivered.htm</a>. Clinton was helped by the economy during the elections but because it was poor not because it was good (which does make sense does it?)</p>
<p>Excuse the disgression from the topic, my initial post was regarding the fact that Reagan didn't decrease federal spending (where we should be on the same page as they are verifiable numbers instead of arguing about the attributes of the entire economy).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Remember, one of the reasons why big Bush lost the election was because of a poor economy
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I remember it quite well. I never disputed that a recession was underway under the Bush admin (H.W.)</p>
<p>My contention was that the economy had officially stopped contracting by late '92 and was already on its way to expanding by 1Q'03 (before Clinton did a single thing).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Analysis</p>
<p>Several factors made the results possible. First, the campaign came in the midst of the recession of 1992. While in historical terms the recession was mild and actually ended before the election, the resulting job loss (especially among middle managers not yet accustomed to white collar downsizing) fueled strong discontent with Bush
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The economy's downturn was officially over before late 1992 and was on its way to expanding by early 1993 - before Clinton did a single thing and spent a single day in the White House.</p>
<p>At any rate, i agree and apologize for hi-jacking this thread a bit... that's all i really want to say on the subject...</p>