9 Responses to THE CASE AGAINST JUSTIN’S NEW DEAL

  1. Martin says:
    December 10, 2008 at 12:18 am

    David. It’s just bollocks. What is it with all these bridges falling down?

    Is no maintenance being done at all on bridges then? Because if that’s the case people should be up in court.

    Installing broadband won’t employ millions, just a few thousand and there are private companies that already do it.

    Webb is just talking out of his arse as is Obama.

    Just like McBean. All these public projects will simply create jobs for the Guardian jobs section for equal opportunities co-ordinators to monitor how many of these construction companies employ 50% women, one legged lesbians and pikies.

    The Government (UK or US) have always been shit at big works projects. Can anyone think of anything they’ve ever done on budget or ontime?

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  2. frankos says:
    December 10, 2008 at 1:00 am

    actually the boulder dam was done under the budget and months early, but it did cost a lot of lives. But generally I agree goverments are crap at contract work, you only have to remember the scandal about contracts being awarded to Tarmac etc that were 2 or 3 times too expensive by goverment “contactors”. AKA shitbrains if you prefer)

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  3. Zevilyn says:
    December 10, 2008 at 2:28 am

    I wish Justin Webb would stop prattling on about Bush and Obama and investigate a real US scandal:

    “Hank Paulson was Goldman Sachs CEO and made 100’s of Millions off of them. Their biggest competition was Lehman Brothers.

    Their biggest client and debtholder was AIG.

    Lehman Brothers was allowed to sink to eliminate them as competition. AIG was bailed out because had they not been, Paulson’s company, Goldman Sachs would go down due to AIG’s debt.

    Let the competition bite the dust and bail out your biggest liability.”

    Investigating and exposing crooks like Paulson is what real journalists do, not waffling on about a man who is not yet in the White House; plenty of time to report on him later.

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  4. Cassandra says:
    December 10, 2008 at 5:54 am

    Life for a nu commissar is great when you have the media on your side isnt it?
    The BBC fawns and creeps to the Obamessiah, millions of nu jobs that will appear like magic, the Obamessiah sprinkles fairy some socialist fairy dust and waves his magic wand and millions of jobs just appear out of thin air? FFS!
    The Obamessiah isnt even in the job and the BBC is running an approval rating 24/7, the chosen one is going to do this, the chosen one is going to do that, grand five year plans/nu deals/nu jobs/nu climate fighting/nu taxes(but only for the rich, the definition of which changes with the states need for more cash), the media lap it up like mothers milk, the BBC have ‘their man’ in the top job so the great satan turns into the great friend like magic!

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  5. Jason says:
    December 10, 2008 at 6:45 am

    The morons should go and read the truth about FDR’s public works projects. As should have been predicted, the jobs were strung out for as long as possible so that workers could squeeze as much money out of the government as they could. Not only that, the work was (deliberately, some say) done to such a low standard that new crews had to be hired to follow the first ones and fix their handiwork. All to create more work, of course.

    Aside from that lesson in obviousness, I just don’t see how fully grown adults can be so blind to the basics of economics. Public works projects are just another way to distribute welfare payments. They’re either paid for with deficit spending, which of course will come back and slap them in the face in the future, or with an increase in taxes, which takes money away from the private sector where it would help the economy most.

    If it were just about throwing money at workers then they could just pay them to dig holes and fill them in again – that would save the expense of materials and fuel which should be in the private sector creating real wealth. Hell, forget about the holes, just give them the money. Why pretend to work just for the sake of it?

    So what are their expected “benefits to the economy”? The only thing I can think of is an “improvement in infrastructure.” The thinking among these idiots goes that wealth isn’t being created because the roads and bridges aren’t good enough to cope with production. Which is of course, pure poppycock. The roads and bridges in America are perfectly adequate for their purpose. The idea that its infrastructure is “crumbling” is preposterous. There is no country in the world which doesn’t have a proportion of its infrastructure which is outdated or “could do with improvements” at any one point. The left, as usual, feigns crisis in order to create a sense of urgency so that the public hands them a political blank cheque and says “Yes…do it! Do whatever it takes!”

    It makes me sick. The left is getting away with yet another smoke and mirrors trick. When the dust clears of course, we have a bigger government and more control over our lives. I live in America because I am of the opinion that it’s the greatest country in the world. The American Ideal, as embodied in its constitution, could be the greatest hope for civilization. This is a beautiful country and it’s being devoured from the inside out by a bunch of corrupt, petty, infantile, ignorant buffoons – what Ayn Rand would have called “psycho-epistemological savages.” They’re mainly of the left but sadly there are all too many conservatives aiding and abetting these idiots.

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  6. NotaSheep says:
    December 10, 2008 at 9:05 am

    The morons don’t care, they want money and power; we are just there to pay the bill.

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  7. el reapero says:
    December 10, 2008 at 10:10 am

    the worst thing about this crisis is that all these Beeb types have had loads of oppurtunities to mention that Keynesianism ended the great depression.another myth expounded enthusiastically by teachers at school when I was a kid.

    they haven’t got a clue.

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  8. NotaSheep says:
    December 10, 2008 at 10:29 am

    World War II ended the great depression and I think we may be heading for the “necessary” World War III to end this one.

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  9. Gordon says:
    December 10, 2008 at 11:58 am

    As I remember both Labour and Tory governments pursued “Keynesian” economic policies for some decades after WWII, using the analogy of the accelerator and the brake. When the economy overheated the brake was applied by raising interest rates to slow things down. For about thirty years this succeded although only the brake was used. When the economy flagged and the accelerator was applied it was like pushing on a piece of string, resulting in “stagflation”!
    There is no reason to suppose that Brown and Sarkozys’ “hair of the dog” treatment will produce results either.
    Angela Merkel thinks otherwise, but then the Germans have made great efforts to put their house in order over the last five years.

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