How do you think the American economy would look today if McCain and Palin had won?

Great Depression v.2.0.

The world economy might be in the tank, and we would have had a full fledged Depression, if they had clung to Supply Side orthodoxy, and had lowered spending and cut taxes.

But we’d have so much to laugh at!

To quote Bill Maher: “We would have a barter economy and be at war with Honduras.” On a serious note, I think the government’s finances would be in better shape, but the economy would be more stagnant.

Honestly, about the same. Only the deficit situation would probably be mildly worse because they would have simply cut taxes for the rich.

McCain would have stroked out by now, and Sarah Palin Tall would be sitting in the Roundish Office.

Like George Bush had won reelection and discovered the wonders of crack cocaine all in one fell swoop.

Things would certainly be much, much worse. The Republicans would have used the win as an excuse to spend, spend, spend wile cutting taxes below what is needed to run the country and, most likely, the economy would’ve completely tanked within the first six months. The geriatrically-challenged McCain would have tried to start WW3 by exercising his well-known and explosive temper and soon the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan would pale in comparison. Finally, can anyone seriously imagine allowing Caribou Barbie to preside over both the military and the Senate? I shudder at the very thought.

The biggest difference would be that there’d be no way of blaming the Democrats for the mess.

@Jeruba I wouldn’t bet on that. Much of what went wrong on Bush’s watch was all Clinton’s fault and what wasn’t attributed to him went back to Jimmy Carter. I’ve even hears Republicans blame FDR for the great depression. Quite a trick, since it started almost 4 years before he was elected.

They don’t call them the Party of No Personal Responsibility for nothing, you know. All they are responsible for is figuring who to blame for what they foul up.

@ETpro I hear that everything good that happened under Clinton was Bush-41’s “fault”, everything bad that happened under Bush-41 was Carter’s fault (despite 8 years of Reagan) and everything that was wrong as of 21 Jan 2009 was Obama’s fault even though he hadn’t been in office long enough to even adjust the chair in the Oval Office.

You do realize that the spiralling national debt has nothing to do with Iraq or giving no-bid contracts to the company that VP Cheney had a stake in, or Star Wars, right?

The spiraling national debt has mostly to do with Ronald Reagan’s massive tax cut for the richest Americans. He dropped the top tax rate from 70% to 28%. Before he did that, we had been slowly but steadily paying down the debt we ran up fixing the Great Depression then fighting WWII. From the moment he did it, the debt began to soar at astronomical rates. He tripled the national debt in his 8 years, a record no other US President has ever come remotely close to.

Clinton raised the top rate back up to 39.6%, gave us 8 years of prosperity, began again paying down the national debt, and left office with the largest budget surplus in US history.

George W. Bush ran on a promise to preserve that surplus. He lied. He blew through it in 1 year and doubled the national debt yet again with his foolish tax cuts for the rich. He gave us the first decade in modern times in which real income for the missle class declined. Only the very rich did fabulously well. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v255/nausved/National-Debt-by-President.gif

Despite thos cold, hard facts, Republicans will steadfastly insist that only further tax cuts for the rich will save the USA from Socio-Fasco-Communism.

McCain would’ve had a heart attack by now. oh, just noticed @filmfann said the same thing. lol)
The bald eagle would be replaced by the Alaskan Moose.
Health care would continue to be only for the very rich.
There would be more people hired to keep and eye on the border. Not the Mexican or Canadian border, but the Alaskan Border. (keep those ruskies out.)
But before things could get too far and assassination bill would all be voted for by all of congress and the senate.

Pretty much the same.

@ETpro The irony is that if 90+% of the people are poor, then we have what Communism inevitab;y turns into; a corrupt regime with a few “haves” and a lot of “have-nots”. In other words, their ideal is exactly the sort of thing that they fight against!

I agree with @dpworkin

what if palin tries next time???? eeeeeew

I think that we would have lost General Motors and some of the other monoliths. But who knows; Bush fired off the first bailout, McPalin might have followed suit. It might have been rockier, and we may have emerged with a leaner, meaner economy.

@Nullo Maybe, but I have yet to see the “Starve yourself to strength.” regimen actually work.

@ETpro But isn’t that the Conservative’s rallying cry? I mean, people who lose their jobs and/or are otherwise economically disadvantaged have to slim down and do everything right since healthcare, food, and housing are privileges and everything must be earned; survival of the fittest and all.
And now that corporations are people too, why should unfit corporations be more entitled to survive than someone who lost their job and has yet to find another one in this tough economy?

Not much different. Quite honestly, a year isn’t that much time to affect the economy.

@jerv Yes, knowing how wonderful Wal Mart is, I am fully convinced that things will be much better once there is only one corporation and it controls everything including the government.

@ETpro I thought Rupert Murdoch was almost there…

@jerv If he isn’t, it is not for lack of trying. :-)

He’d be dead, she’d be president, the world would be laughing their arses off at the silly lady in charge.

Short-term we would not see that much of a difference. There are no miracle solutions dealing with the most severe recession since 1929.

The downsides would be visible mid-term because the US would miss most of the opportunities becoming a major innovator and worldwide player in green technologies, even science and technology and education in general if Sarah Palin was given the chance to take her country back into the dark ages.

@mattbrowne Inquisitions and all.

@ucme – Either that, or they’d be rallying their troops to stop her from infecting the rest of the world.

Hello…anybody out there? Why do I need to keep coming back to this point? The Constitution of the US is obviously a dead letter to the American mind.

Where the hell in the Constitution does the Executive Branch of the Federal Government granted the power to wield control over the economy? This is the responsibility of the Legislative Branch, people.

You might make a (rather puny) argument that the Executive has defacto power over the economy through the appointments to head the Federal Reserve. Of course, even this office is bound by Congressional oversight and subject to Congressional approval. If this is your argument, than the answer to the original question here is that there is obviously NO difference between the Bush, Obama and (the hypothetical) McCain administrations. Perhaps you’ve noticed that the same rim-jobs who have headed the Fed have been “in power” since 1979—no matter which political party “owned” the Executive Branch? Consider Obama’s choice of economic advisor: Paul Volcker!

Congress has the power to spend, raise/lower taxes etc. The Executive has no power to spend a dime without Congressional approval…or when Congress unconstitutionally absconds from its duties by granting powers to the Executive Departments—like the Treasury, for example (Think Bailouts of 2008).

Even when it comes to war spending, Congress should have the real power. To end any war, they could simply de-fund it. Better still, DON’T declare war or give Presidents the power to make war without a constitutional declaration of war! The President may request fund for ongoing conflicts, but Congress does not have to comply.

Just one more proof that the Constitution is an irrelevant document.

I think we would have been better off.

Or at lest we would have been convinced of it.

I’d be standing in line downtown for some toilet paper, that is if my husband allowed me out of the house.

@davidk – “Where the hell in the Constitution does the Executive Branch of the Federal Government granted the power to wield control over the economy?”

It doesn’t. However, it DOES give Congress and the Senate the power to pass legislation (even at the President’s urging) which is in the nation’s and the citizen’s best interests and controlling a broken economy certainly falls within those parameters. To offer a slight correction, YOU are the only one claiming that the Constitution is irrelevant. I think it’s puny of you to even suggest it.

@ChazMaz – Whatever you have to tell yourself to get up in the morning, dude. Pretending that things are going to be all peaches and cream as long as a Republican is elected might sound rational to the Republicans, but it sure as hell hasn’t worked in anyone else’s world. As for me, there’s very little that McSenile or a group of rabid, obstructionist Republicans could do to convince me that any of them know what they’re doing.

@Rufus_T_Firefly
Of course I’m the only one claiming that the Constitution is irrelevant. That was the point! The others obviously did not even consider the mistaken premise of the question…because THEY TOO DON’T KNOW ANY BETTER>>>>>>>>>>
demonstrating that the Constitution is a dead letter to the respondents.

@davidk You’re twisting the response. @Rufus_T_Firefly Did not say or even hint that the Constitution is irrelevant. He told you why Congress has a perfect right, and even a Constitutional duty to concern itself with the economic health of the nation. The US constitution is not a list of the exact actions each COnstitutional Officer or body must take every day they function. There is nothing in the Constitution about the Federal Government regulating Air Traffic. Airplanes had not been invented in the days of the founders. There is nothing about regulating nuclear energy, or securing nuclear arms.

The founding fathers were intelligent enough to realize they had no idea what problems people 220 years in the future would face. They write a guidelines spelling out areas of responsibility, not detailed actions. Congress is specifically charged with the regulation of intrastate and interstate commerce. This means *the economy8. That is as Constitutional as you can get.

But if some right wingers think the Constitution prohibits a specific course of action, take it to court.

@jerv – Yes, a mild form probably. I heard there are already a few pharmacies that refuse to sell contraceptives.

@mattbrowne So long as they also refuse federal money like Medicare Part D reimbursement, they are within their rights. Of course, if they get any money from the government that won’t fly.
I wonder if pharmacists have anything comparable to the Hippocratic Oath though. I’m sure that few pharmacists would risk their license if they did. I mean, getting your certs yanked sucks!

@jerv – Law over here is different. The pharmacy would lose the license. The ethics of our politicians is the following: Contraceptives help reduce unwanted pregnancies and reduce the number of abortions.

@ETpro
You supposed “left wingers” are really a joke. You use the Constitution as a tool to push your political agenda just like the “right wingers” that you despise. The “left” abuses Constitutional powers to gain control of the economy while professing their undying love and commitment to preserving individual/social liberties, whereas the “right” uses abuses the Constitution to gain control of individual/social liberties while professing their undying love and commitment to preserve economic liberties.

Both are so steeped in shit that they can’t even smell it anymore.

Both have so thoroughly trashed the Constitution as a social contract that establishes limited government that this Constitution is meaningless.

Why the hell can’t you step back from your provincial and ill-defined political views for just one second to look at the larger picture?

The whole argument is so idiotically short-sighted. Those in the “left” make pretense to support the Constitution and they pick the damn thing apart to forward a “progressive” agenda, which weakens the limitations of the Federal Government and allows them to push their “Progressive Economic Agenda” through, expanding the role and powers of the Executive Branch in the process. Than these same idiots are puzzled when some monkey on the “right” gets elected and has at their disposal the same fucking tools that the “left” set up. Do you people ever consider that the right might get elected? I guess not. Better to be honest and fundamentally change the system than allow the right the opportunity to use the tools against us that we on the left created in the first place.

IF YOU HATE THE RIGHT-WINGERS SO MUCH…WHY DO YOU INSIST ON PROVIDING THEM WITH THE WEAPONS TO BEAT YOU DOWN? You have been instrumental in creating the right that you despise.

America needs a legitimate left wing, rather than pretenders.

@davidk – It’s called a democracy, which actually makes our Republic a Democratic Republic. We may not like or even support the traditional solutions provided by the extreme right, but for one side to take away the free speech rights of the other works against everybody. Are you proposing that we place all of our opponents in internment camps while we hammer out the details of the perfect plan? If so, who gets to choose whose opinions are invalid enough to include in the new constitution or to warrant internment? You? Dick Cheney? Joe Lieberman? Captain Kangaroo? It sounds more like you’re leaning towards a fascist dictatorship than a true democracy. But, since you appear to have ALL the answers, how exactly does a country go about throwing out their current Constitution and replace it with another without allowing input from all sides? Please, by all means, explain it to the rest of us. What you’re proposing is complete anarchy and the only short-sightedness that I can see in any argument presented here is, unfortunately, yours.

I vote for the Turtle Fence.

@davidk I do not hate the right. I think they are misguided in many of their ideas, and that if fully instituted, they would do great harm to our country. But I don’t hate them. I am not the person who has been doing all the name-calling and smearing of other’s integrity, you are. If politics makes you so angry, perhaps it is you who should do some self examining to see why.

Yes, both parties have been guilty or stretching the limits of the Constitution. But regulating commerce is not one of those abuses. That is as strict-interpretation-constitutional as you can get. Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 says that the United States Congress shall have power “To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes”.

@ETpro
Let me get this straight….
The party claiming that allowing insurance company policies to be portable violate the commerce clause, are the same ones saying national health care doesn’t violate the Constitution?
And
The party claiming that national health care violates Article I, 8(3) of the Constitution were/are proposing that health insurance “portability” could fix the problem.

Why shouldn’t this idiocy make someone angry?

[Mod Says:] Please stick to the topic.

Any personal or off-topic quips will be removed.

@davidk I am in no position to speak for any party. I can only tell you what I personally believe. I would favor portability and competition across state lines but (and this is a vitally important but) only if there is an Insurance Commission to ensure fair practices by insurance companies. Without controls, what would immediaately happen is that big insurers would target some low-population state needing lots of cash, and they would buy their way into control of the legislature, then make that state’s laws so weak they could essentially sell anything they wanted for any amount of money they wanted and renege on any contract they wanted whenever it was more profitable to do so than to live up to its terms. That has already happened in Credit Cards. In my state, the maximum interest allowable by law id 12%, But Credit Card companies all locate in states that allow interest rates we used to lock up Mafiosi for charging.