Is there any way to make TESC go faster?

[skyfall123]

This is something I've really come to consider lately. I drank the republican kool-aid for a long time -- and I'm not suddenly a democrat, both parties are fundamentally broken and corrupted by special interests pushing their own narrow agenda at the expense of the rest of the economy. Hazlitt demolished this narrow economic focus decades ago but nobody listens. The democrats use class warfare to create a welfare state to perpetuate their voting base, and republicans as shills for the wealthy have convinced average middle-class Americans to vote against their own interests and instead vote to funnel wealth upwards instead of retaining it in their own pockets. We would also reduce (not eliminate) the credit bubble/recession cycles like the one we are going through now.

As someone who has voted for a mix of 4 Republicans and 4 Democrats (beginning with Reagan and ending with Obama), I feel that there is a third group of "so-called independents" that make up anywhere between 25-35% of the voters. They are not strictly beholden to either party. I don't think that either party (as a whole) is hell bent on destroying America although the extreme dialogue coming from both sides is unsettling and their bumbling (both sides) could. I do agree that because of big money they are becoming one in the same.

I saw Ratigan's rant and agree on most of his points. I am convinced that we can't count on politicians to come up with the answers. The numbers that we are talking about (trillions) require BIG solutions. A great many people don't think either sides "solutions" are capable of working.

I'm glad to see more business leaders speaking up including Buffett and the Starbucks CEO. Starbucks chief calls on CEOs to stop political donations, create jobs - chicagotribune.com If only contributions could/would stop.

I think that Mark Cuban makes some interesting points here An Idea for the Economy that will Freak Out a lot of People but could be Fun to Discuss. « blog maverick

Cuban:
The US Treasury is currently borrowing money at a Negative Real Yield. In any normal environment, if you can borrow money at a negative rate you should borrow as much as you can. The premise is that any idiot should be able to earn a return of greater than zero with the money. That’s a premise that should make the Democrats happy.

The problem for the Democrats is that the government hasn’t shown that they can earn a positive or even a break even return on their spending. (Stunningly, bailouts excluded).

As the Republicans and Tea-Party will tell you, we have a spending problem. The reality is that the problem isn’t how much we spend, it’s what we spend it on. Our government is not very good at funding projects/investments that generate much if any return. Our government is so overhead laden that just to get the money from the Treasury to a project automatically starts it in a hole. Plus our federal government loves to hire people. That isn’t a problem in and of itself. The problem is that they over pay and let them keep their jobs forever. A basic tenet of business is that it is rarely a good idea to borrow short term funds for long term projects or employees unless you are damn sure of the returns. Our government never is.

So what to do ?

First we pick a goal. I want the goal to be employment. I want to help companies hire employees. I think the first problem to solve is creating jobs.

The Republican/ Tea-Party approach to job creation is to cut taxes. The theory being that more money in the pocket of individuals will cause people to spend more money in the economy thereby creating more jobs. Nope. Not happening. Why ? Because individuals have too much debt. Any money they get goes to pay credit cards, student loans and for the smart and fortunate into savings.

[frankiebleyes]

Personally I could care less which party gets down to business on the hill, but they definitely need to work on our economy. First off without jobs people can't pay for anything, especially taxes. Second, whether or not you like it our country doesn't take care of us medically. I've always worked hard and so has my husband, but two major illnesses broke us. We never filed bankruptcy, but we had very little left when all was said and done for having worked over forty years each. Now, it appears that a special board will decide when I become medicare eligible that I cannot get treatment that is needed (that is right, die because you have diabetes and need insulin). You may think that is a joke, but right now my private insurance hasn't paid a dime this year for insulin or any other medical expense becuase my deductible is so high, yet I paid over $1,000.00 a month for my "so called" insurance. Best of luck folks, I don't see anything getting better sooner. We need taxes for everyone and we need jobs too.

[PonyGirl93]

Well, finally

Enrolled, registered, and evaluated. I asked them to reevaluate one course as an option for the multicultural course requirement and they did within a day, I was thrilled