Should we really be trying to turn the economy around?

[cutman74]

I hate starting threads. I'm not very good at it and I usually don't know which forum to post them in. That being said, I think that this question most likely belongs here:
I live near the IL/Mo border and work in Mo. Most of the political ads I hear on the radio have a conservative bent to them. It seems that lately what I hear more than anything else is from politicians wanting to turn the country or economy around. Our economy has been growing, albeit poorly, for some time now. Am I to gather from this that these conservatives want our economy to be proportionately shrinking?

[John Mace]

We're not creating jobs fast enough to meet the demand. We typically need to create ~250k/month just to keep the unemployment rate from increasing. Typically, a recovery from recession is above average growth, but we're below average.

Whether or not the folks you're hearing in ads can actually change that is a different story. But no, they are not arguing for a return to recession. You knew that, right?

[cutman74]

Yes, of course I knew that, but the fact remains that if we were to turn the economy around at this point, we would be worse off than we are now. I am not particularly pleased with my position in life in relation to about 2007. (making about 50% less than then) but I have gainful employment, unlike 2008- 2010. I would hate for the economy to return to the level it was two years ago, therefore I think turning it around would be the wrong decision.

[Oakminster]

You're being way too literal. When you hear "turn the economy around", think "improve the economy", because that is what is meant.

[WillFarnaby]

Are you just getting a jab in on indelicate phrasing of the ad or do you think conservatives are really campaigning on returning to the economy of 2010 or 2009?

[Wesley Clark]

Political ads are theatre. It is no different than when Romney calls Obama an appeaser despite Libya being overthrown and Bin Laden dying on his watch.

[Flyer]

A lot of people are going to say--"I don't care that the recession ended three years ago. It still FEELS like a recession."

And you know what? They're right. This is such a slow, weak recovery that there's no meaningful difference between "recovery" and a shallow recession.

Here's a chart showing how this recession compares to previous ones.
http://www.cbpp.org/images/chartbook...e-loss-OPT.jpg

[Fear Itself]

Originally Posted by WillFarnaby

Are you just getting a jab in on indelicate phrasing of the ad or do you think conservatives are really campaigning on returning to the economy of 2010 or 2009?

They certainly want to return to the policies of 2007.

[Mosier]

Originally Posted by John Mace

We typically need to create ~250k/month just to keep the unemployment rate from increasing.

That can't be right, can it? 250k extra jobs a month is 3 million jobs a year. That's a bit more than 2% of the entire workforce. Are you telling me we have a 2% increase in the size of the workforce every year?

[Trinopus]

Originally Posted by Oakminster

You're being way too literal. When you hear "turn the economy around", think "improve the economy", because that is what is meant.

This. It's just jargon. It's like when someone -- nearly anyone! -- says, "Doggone those activist judges," all it really means is that a judge made a decision he disagrees with. When a judge makes a ruling he likes, he holds his peace, because he likes that variety of activist judging!

Or when they say, "Throw the rascals out," they really only mean, "Throw out the rascals belonging to the other party; our own rascals should be re-elected!"

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by Mosier

That can't be right, can it? 250k extra jobs a month is 3 million jobs a year. That's a bit more than 2% of the entire workforce. Are you telling me we have a 2% increase in the size of the workforce every year?

Maybe I was off. Seems like most estimates are more like 150k. But they range from 100k to 250k.

As for the "turn around" phrase, it also follows on the typical poll question about whether we are "headed in the right direction" or not. Right now, most people think we aren't. Whether that means they want Romney to be president is a different matter.

[Little Nemo]

The writers of those ads are working under constraints. They can't say what they literally mean, which is "we want the economy to improve more (or faster)" because then they'd be admitting the economy is already improving to some degree, albeit maybe not as well as it could be. And no political campaign wants to concede any ground to the opposition.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by John Mace

Whether or not the folks you're hearing in ads can actually change that is a different story. But no, they are not arguing for a return to recession. You knew that, right?

Originally Posted by Oakminster

You're being way too literal. When you hear "turn the economy around", think "improve the economy", because that is what is meant.

Originally Posted by WillFarnaby

Are you just getting a jab in on indelicate phrasing of the ad or do you think conservatives are really campaigning on returning to the economy of 2010 or 2009?

I can't speak for the OP but he's making a valid point. If a politician is promising to "turn the economy around" at a time when the economy is actually heading in the right direction, it's fair to ask if the politician is either unaware of the current economic condition or is trying to fool his audience about the current economic condition. Evidence that a candidate is either clueless or deceitful is worth looking at when you're considering who to vote for.

[Mosier]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

I can't speak for the OP but he's making a valid point. If a politician is promising to "turn the economy around" at a time when the economy is actually heading in the right direction, it's fair to ask if the politician is either unaware of the current economic condition or is trying to fool his audience about the current economic condition. Evidence that a candidate is either clueless or deceitful is worth looking at when you're considering who to vote for.

Is the economy heading in the right direction, though?

There's plenty to not vote for Romney for, but him promising to turn the economy around isn't one of them. You're reaching too far.

[gamerunknown]

Why bother when we can argue about horses?

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Mosier

Is the economy heading in the right direction, though?

There's plenty to not vote for Romney for, but him promising to turn the economy around isn't one of them. You're reaching too far.

This the whole point of this thread. The economy is growing, that is the right direction. If Romney is promising to turn the economy around, it means:

1. Romney is just mouthing empty slogans that have no meaning behind them.
2. Romney is unaware of what the economy is doing.
3. Romney is aware of what the economy is doing but is lying about it.
4. Romney is appealing to voters who don't know anything.
5. Romney thinks the economy should stop growing and start shrinking.

I don't see any of these as being a reason to vote for Romney.

[Hentor the Barbarian]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

I can't speak for the OP but he's making a valid point. If a politician is promising to "turn the economy around" at a time when the economy is actually heading in the right direction, it's fair to ask if the politician is either unaware of the current economic condition or is trying to fool his audience about the current economic condition. Evidence that a candidate is either clueless or deceitful is worth looking at when you're considering who to vote for.

This is the point. There are enough conservatives who think that the economy has been worsening, and enough occasions of sloppy or misleading descriptions by conservative political and media types that they ought to be called upon to get things right.

Make the argument based on fact, not fiction.

[TriPolar]

I think they do want to turn the economy around making it worse for the vast majority of Americans. The super-rich who are funding this current election cycle with billions of dollars were able to increase their share of the pie significantly during the economic downturn during the Bush administration. I don't see any reason these politicians wouldn't gladly return to that state at the behest of their masters. They don't have to be lying in their statements, simply deceptive in that they assume the electorate will believe they mean something else.

[BobLibDem]

It's just political-speak. If you're unhappy with the current situation, you want to turn it around, even if it's going slowly in the direction you want it to go. I'm not as offended by that as I am "take our country back" which really means "take our country backward".

[cutman74]

thank you for your replies. As many have said, they keep playing lip service to this idea of turning things around. If I were Obama, I would do my best to remind the people what turning around memeans, relative to our economic situation. Pposing on phone so forgive the mustards in sp and punctuation

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by cutman74

thank you for your replies. As many have said, they keep playing lip service to this idea of turning things around. If I were Obama, I would do my best to remind the people what turning around memeans, relative to our economic situation.

Good thing he doesn't have you as an advisor. He'd sound foolish playing semantic games like that.

[TriPolar]

Is no one going to address the idea that they mean what they say?

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by TriPolar

Is no one going to address the idea that they mean what they say?

We have no quotes of what they actually say, only a paraphrase in the OP, in which he says "to turn the country or economy around". A significant majority of Americans think the country is headed in the wrong direction. The ads probably address that, but without exact quotes, there is no way of saying for sure.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

It's just political-speak. If you're unhappy with the current situation, you want to turn it around, even if it's going slowly in the direction you want it to go. I'm not as offended by that as I am "take our country back" which really means "take our country backward".

I disagree. I think the real meaning of "take our country back" is an appeal to those people who divide the country into two groups; real Americans (ie people like me) and "those other people".

[BobLibDem]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

I disagree. I think the real meaning of "take our country back" is an appeal to those people who divide the country into two groups; real Americans (ie people like me) and "those other people".

True, that is the target. The implicit message I get is to take us backward to those days when women, blacks, and gays all knew their places.

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

True, that is the target. The implicit message I get is to take us backward to those days when women, blacks, and gays all knew their places.

You mean Like this?

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Mosier

Is the economy heading in the right direction, though?

There's plenty to not vote for Romney for, but him promising to turn the economy around isn't one of them. You're reaching too far.

But him promising to do so without a clue how is a good reason not to vote for him. We know he promises to cut taxes on the rich and pay for it by closing loopholes in things to be defined later.

Anyhow austerity would turn the country around in the sense the OP is implying, so Romney may be totally honest.

[rogerbox]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

It's just political-speak. If you're unhappy with the current situation, you want to turn it around, even if it's going slowly in the direction you want it to go. I'm not as offended by that as I am "take our country back" which really means "take our country backward".

No, "take our country back" means "put the WHITE back in the white house". The opposition to mr. Moderate Obama have made it perfectly clear why they hate him so.

[cutman74]

John, I was merely saying that this would give the president a chance to focus on the fact that, while not moving forward at the pace we would like, we are moving forward. Harping on this doesn't seem worse to me than constantly taking sentences spoken out of context and using them as a gotcha. The right uses semantics and flat out distortions of fact as a bludgeon regularly. I just think this point would get some of the fence riders to listen a little bit harder to the ideas the people who want to run this country are putting forth and sometimes the simpler the better. I just don't think it would hurt to remind the people what these people actually want to do with their power.

[foolsguinea]

Originally Posted by John Mace

Good thing he doesn't have you as an advisor. He'd sound foolish playing semantic games like that.

Consider the source of this statement.

Hey, anyone in the Obama White House reading this, you really should get a piece of the action on cutman74's point! Can't you hear Barack saying, "I don't want to turn the recovery around and start shrinking! I want to speed the recovery up! I want to catch up! So when I hear Romney say he wants to turn the economy around, I gotta wonder: Turn it around to where? Another crash?"?

[Mosier]

Originally Posted by Voyager

But him promising to do so without a clue how is a good reason not to vote for him. We know he promises to cut taxes on the rich and pay for it by closing loopholes in things to be defined later.

Anyhow austerity would turn the country around in the sense the OP is implying, so Romney may be totally honest.

Agreed. Romney is wrong for the economy.

I'm arguing against the idea that him saying "turn the economy around" is him admitting he wants to ruin the economy. That's just silly, but somehow people are running with it.

[TriPolar]

Originally Posted by Mosier

Agreed. Romney is wrong for the economy.

I'm arguing against the idea that him saying "turn the economy around" is him admitting he wants to ruin the economy. That's just silly, but somehow people are running with it.

Why is that silly? He, his financial backers, and others of that ilk will end up better off. Before Obama turned the economy around, Romney and his ilk were growing increasingly wealthier, and even devaluation of their assets from Bush's economic crash left the richest with a larger slices of the pie. He may be deceiving the fools who believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, but he might mean what he says.

[Chessic Sense]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

True, that is the target. The implicit message I get is to take us backward to those days when women, blacks, and gays all knew their places.

Originally Posted by rogerbox

No, "take our country back" means "put the WHITE back in the white house". The opposition to mr. Moderate Obama have made it perfectly clear why they hate him so.

Oh, you silly SDMB rascals. Always trying to say we hate blacks and women, always underestimating how much we hate liberals. Why don't you understand that we don't need any other reason to despise you?

Originally Posted by TriPolar

Before Obama turned the economy around

Heh. Tell me another.

Man, you guys will do or say anything to maintain your delusions, won't you? "turned the economy around"...I can think of 8.2% of the population that would vehemently disagree with that statement.

[TriPolar]

Originally Posted by Chessic Sense

Man, you guys will do or say anything to maintain your delusions, won't you? "turned the economy around"...I can think of 8.2% of the population that would vehemently disagree with that statement.

So 91.8 percent disagree with them then?

[rogerbox]

Originally Posted by Chessic Sense

Oh, you silly SDMB rascals. Always trying to say we hate blacks and women, always underestimating how much we hate liberals. Why don't you understand that we don't need any other reason to despise you?

Your side has made it quite clear, repeatedly with the use of imagery that you despise him because he is a black man in the white house. I don't need a cite for my claim because it's self evident to non-racists.

[Mosier]

Originally Posted by Chessic Sense

Man, you guys will do or say anything to maintain your delusions, won't you? "turned the economy around"...I can think of 8.2% of the population that would vehemently disagree with that statement.

Just out of curiosity, how high was that number in January 2009, when Obama took Office?

Okay, I admit I'm not asking out of curiosity. I'm asking because it directly contradicts the point you're trying to make, and I want you to admit it.