The Goat Pen

bluetick wrote:Assorted quotes from the 2012 election season:

Rush Limbaugh "The country's economy is going to collapse if Obama is re-elected, people."
Mitt Romney "Under Obama chronic unemployment will continue for four more years or longer."
Newt Gingrich "Obama should be your candidate if you want $10-a-gallon gasoline."
Michele Bachmann "Obama is the final leap to socialism."
Mitch McConnell (2010 remark often recast) "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."

Where jobs are concerned, Texas has consistently outperformed the national economy in terms of job creation and rate of unemployment in every month since the advent of the Great Recession and the discovery of the Eagle Ford Shale play, both of which took place in October of 2008. Indeed, during the 24 month period from July 2009 through June of 2011, Texas created 49% of all new jobs created in the United States, and the vast majority of those jobs were either directly or indirectly the result of the state’s oil and natural gas boom, centered in plays like the Eagle Ford in South Texas, the Permian Basin of West Texas, and the Granite Wash play in the Texas Panhandle.

We ALL know how much stimulus went to Texas....and/or the oil bidness....but the shameless dems and their gobblers here will unabashedly take credit...


...IBD points out that more than 100 new plants and factories in a variety of such industries are planned to come online by 2017, and “When all are up and running, another $300 billion will be pumped into GDP and 1 million more jobs created.”


http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidblackm ... -security/

bluetick wrote:

Toemeesleather wrote:
....and certainly the PAH deciding her royal self which e-mails should be turned over to the gubment is obstructionist in the highest degree.

How many billions are we out because of Hillary's email 'scandal'? Ten..twenty.. NONE? Nary a dime?

Remember the debt-ceiling shitstorm (and the resulting credit rating downgrade)? Cost us 20 billion. The government shutdown? A direct cost of 24 billion..and also reduced 4th-quarter GDP growth from 3% to 2.4%

lol Faux News feeds you the "goods" on Hillary and you can't wait to spread the news. Good boy..

If not faux news, then where do you get your shitty statistics from?

http://www.factcheck.org/2013/10/democr ... own-costs/

Which states are the most and least dependent on federal funds?

http://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-le ... ment/2700/

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/arc ... rs/361668/

These are the ten states that are the most dependent

1. New Mexico
2. Mississippi
3. Kentucky
4. Alabama
5. Montana
6. West Virginia
7. Arizona
8. Louisiana
9. South Dakota
10. Maine

Talk to the average conservative voter in these states and can pretty much guarantee that he's utterly convinced that his state is keeping New York, Illinois, California, etc. afloat and not the other way around.

This graph shows the % of each state's population that's on food stamps. Look at which states are in the Top 10. Most of them are govt-hating, bastions of conservatism

Most conservatives that I know here would have no problem greatly reducing welfare and food stamps in those states.

If you live in one of the following states, your state is paying more to the federal govt than it's getting back in return:

Delaware, Minnesota, Illinois, Nebraska, Ohio, Kansas, New York, Colorado, Utah, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Massachusetts, California

These 14 states are basically subsidizing the other 36.

For every $1 South Carolinians send to Washington, they receive over $7 in return, leading the way in states that love the federal trough. Notice that many of the states that are takers rather than givers also tend to have low tax rates and can attract businesses easier. They can afford to. The federal govt is taking care of them.

AlabamAlum wrote:Most conservatives that I know here would have no problem greatly reducing welfare and food stamps in those states.

No doubt true. I would contend that one of the primary reasons they feel that way is that many believe that these programs aren't helping their state or their local communities. They think food stamp recipients all live in Democrat-run ghettos in Chicago or California.

No. You didn't read what I wrote. They know there are food stamps and welfare in their home states.

Dr. Strangelove wrote:

This graph shows the % of each state's population that's on food stamps. Look at which states are in the Top 10. Most of them are govt-hating, bastions of conservatism

The bottom is also "conservative"...what's your point?

AlabamAlum wrote:No. You didn't read what I wrote. They know there are food stamps and welfare in their home states.

I realize that as well. But I would guess that many conservatives who oppose these programs believe them to primarily benefit places like New York City or Chicago

Do you think most conservatives in southern states like Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Kentucky are aware that their states have a higher % of folks on food stamps than Illinois, NY, California, or Michigan? I doubt it.

The mantra that appeals to many anti-govt folks is that food stamps and other welfare programs are a wealth transferal from the 'productive' areas of the country (namely, the red states) to the lazy, assistance-addicted ones (blue states). The truth is actually the reverse. The states paying more than their fair share are overwhelmingly the blue ones. And i don't believe most who oppose govt programs are aware that this is the reality.

I've never heard that here; that is, that welfare goes to Chicago (or wherever). Most realize that there a ton of lazy, poor people in the state who need to be cut off.

Dr. Strangelove wrote:Which states are the most and least dependent on federal funds?

http://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-le ... ment/2700/

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/arc ... rs/361668/

These are the ten states that are the most dependent

1. New Mexico
2. Mississippi
3. Kentucky
4. Alabama
5. Montana
6. West Virginia
7. Arizona
8. Louisiana
9. South Dakota
10. Maine

Talk to the average conservative voter in these states and can pretty much guarantee that he's utterly convinced that his state is keeping New York, Illinois, California, etc. afloat and not the other way around.

DSL, can you find out if this study includes military base spending. If it does, don't you think that kind of skews things a bit?

Also see if includes medicare disbursements.

Hard to think military spending would be included with North Carolina so low on the list of net recipients (looks like we are getting a buck and a quarter for every dollar we contribute)...

It doesn't include military, but it does include social security and medicare, which of course, skews to the warmer client states because if you retire and get to choose where to live, why would you choose to live in Ohio?

http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-an ... the-states

sardis wrote:

Dr. Strangelove wrote:Which states are the most and least dependent on federal funds?

http://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-le ... ment/2700/

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/arc ... rs/361668/

These are the ten states that are the most dependent

1. New Mexico
2. Mississippi
3. Kentucky
4. Alabama
5. Montana
6. West Virginia
7. Arizona
8. Louisiana
9. South Dakota
10. Maine

Talk to the average conservative voter in these states and can pretty much guarantee that he's utterly convinced that his state is keeping New York, Illinois, California, etc. afloat and not the other way around.

DSL, can you find out if this study includes military base spending. If it does, don't you think that kind of skews things a bit?

I'll try to see if it does...

But let's be honest about that too...why are military bases located where they are? Some of them are for strategic reasons. Others were created for political, pork-barrel reasons. Some of them are basically federal jobs programs. There's a ton of military bases across the South and Sun Belt as compared with the Northeast and Midwest. Why? A lot of that is (maybe ironically) due to FDR. FDR needed southern and western conservative Democrats to stay as part of his coalition in order to get New Deal legislation passed. The price he was willing to pay was the creation of new bases almost always located in the Sun Belt that effectively served as jobs programs for states hit very hard by the Depression.

Places like Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri or Fort Campbell, Kentucky weren't chosen just because they were intrinsically strategic locations. Politics played a major role.

Spending on the military is often heavily political and has nothing to do with military necessity. It's highly unlikely the United States will ever again fight a war in which Abrams tanks will mean the difference between victory and defeat. But we keep ordering more. Why? Because Congressmen in Ohio represent the district where the Abrams tank is made and none of them want to see those jobs lost. So the program continues.

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2014 ... 630&rank=8

sardis wrote:It doesn't include military, but it does include social security and medicare, which of course, skews to the warmer client states because if you retire and get to choose where to live, why would you choose to live in Ohio?

http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-an ... the-states

Yep, I think it makes sense that "retirement" states receive more than they contribute...but that doesn't change the fact that they ARE receiving more than they contribute. How's that an excuse? "Well we have a lot of old people..." That's entirely the point. Those states rely more on federal income to keep their economies going. Because the people in Florida and South Carolina and Mississippi are collecting payments from the federal govt more so than people in Illinois or New York, those states have the luxury of lowering their own taxes. Those states allow New Yorkers and Californians to do the heavy lifting while they sit back, sipping Old-Fashioneds and Mint Juleps.

Far from the stereotype perpetuated by southern conservatives, it's the north and west coast folks that are contributing more and working harder.

I guess we should make old people stay where they're at?

Maybe global warming will make it more fair, eventually.

I am amused that Illinois is listed as one of the hard-working states that is subsidizing the Southern slackers. Illinois is a fiscal basket case that runs up billions in deficits and pays for it by looting their teachers pension fund. They raised taxes so much they are causing an economic boom to neighboring states as businesses flee. They are a new Detroit in the making, not the sugar daddy of Dixie.

Listen, DSL, it's an interesting tack, but the conservatives here are anti-social program funding and they fully acknowledge that there are tons of money going out to lazy poors in their own state. You've made yourself a nice strawmen and are wailing away on it. Also, I don't think social security should be included in the discussion

As far as the north and the west "working harder" - no, it's just that there are more of them of means. The federal dollars contributed from someone who earns $200k is the same in all areas of the country. But, yes, there Is a higher % of poor people in the south.

I'm a little shocked that you are picking on the Poors. You're coming across as kinda elitist. You gonna lash out at blacks and Hispanics next? What underprivileged group will you lampoon and denigrate as your finale?