Why did Obama fail to keep AAA US credit rating

S

sNYDER

New member
So when Putin delivers economic reforms that Western Economists call "impressive," which basically undo the catastrophe of the Yeltsin years, that obviously can't be considered good, right? You know, 150% real increases in salaries and 5-7% yearly economic growth is obviously bad.

And how does he do it? Well, by streamlining tax cuts and code simplifications. Businesses pay their choice of a 12% flat net profits tax or a 6% tax on gross profits. Individuals pay a flat 13% income tax rate. Despite being a drastic cut in taxes, revenues went up dramatically.

Honestly, I'd take a competent autocrat over a mob-ruled mess of a democracy any day of the week.

And I'd question whether comparing someone like Putin to Hitler is even fair. Hitler was a dictator who abolished elections. Sure, Putin has FAR more personal power to make policies and direct the country than an American president does, but he could get voted out at any time. He doesn't because he constantly delivers good policy that benefits everyone, even if some people lose in the short run.
 
And let's just ignore what happens if you disagree with what the autocrat wants to do.... economic growth isn't everything and most autocracies do not have high consistent growth rates nor are they particularly stable.
 
Because he is not Vladimir Putin.

Obama, unlike Putin, is an incompetent fuck who doesn't understand policymaking or leadership. He gives a good speech, and that's about it.

Honestly, he could have prevented it by strong-arming the S&P executives. America has an insanely complicated criminal code which basically makes everyone guilty of something at least some of the time. Obama could have simply made a phone call guaranteeing that something obscure could be used to throw the guys into a prison like Putin did to Khodorkhovsky, but he chose not to.

Weak president for a weak country lacking any backbone at all.
 
He didn't. He has no authority on spending. Whether or not he promotes failed economic policies is really irrelevant since this issue is Congress' problem.

In reality, Congress failed to keep our AAA credit rating through decades of kick the can and the republicans acting like children over the past few months.
 
I was going to go with "He's in over his head", but after thinking about it a bit, I went with "Simple, he's an idiot". Even someone who is in over their head can listen to others who know what the fuck is going on and make decisions. Not only is he too fucking stupid to listen to the advice of others who know what is going on, he doesn't even surround himself with experts, but rather just "pay back appointees".
 
Wait, so the Republicans cuts to entitlement spending, if approved, wouldn't have a strong positive impact on reducing the deficit?

I'm confused. I would think that cutting worthless spending is a great way of lowering debt.
 
As opposed to ignoring what happens when you get less than half the vote in a democratic election and neither party really has any idea of what to do, much less what neeRAB to be done. Or when the candidate you support as the lesser of the two evils doesn't really support a lot of things you want to see done.

If Putin really was screwing things up, there's nothing stopping the people from throwing him out of power. It's just that the stability and positive changes he brings make him quite popular. Right now it's just old people who are angry about their state pensions voting for the Communists, and a bunch of CIA fronts which just claim that Russia is undemocratic without offering any measurable difference to the policies Putin already implements...
 
the republicans inability to come to any kind of compromise to increase revenues wasn't exactly a strong point. Did they have to increase taxes, probably not. However, I don't recall the republicans at any point going "NO TAX INCREASES....here's out solution for increased revenues."

I could be wrong though.
 
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