From the Star Ledger:
NJ housing crisis: 8 key takeaways from live chat with experts
1) “New Jersey has quite a bit of affordable housing, but number one, not enough, and not necessarily in the right places.”
The overwhelming majority of affordable housing that’s available is in urban areas — far from the suburban places where there are jobs available.
2) “There are far more people who are eligible for affordable housing than there are units. As a result, most [eligible] people, the great majority of those people..spend more than 30 percent, often more than 50 percent, of their income for rent.”
3) “Let’s say you have a family income of…22,000, which means maybe you have somebody who’s working full time as a nurse’s aid or in a Wal-Mart or something, and trying to support 2 or 3 kids, and you’re paying $900 dollars a month for housing, which…is a pretty low rent compared to the average in New Jersey. After you’re done, you’ve got about $1,000 per month for everything else. … As long as everything goes well, you can somehow survive, but if anything goes wrong you’re over the edge.”
4) “The housing market has tiers. … If you don’t have first-time buyers, whether it be affordable or just above the affordable, then the whole housing market stalls. So you might be pretty well off. Your house might be worth $800,000. Well, it’s not going to stay at $800,000 or go up, if there isn’t this constant influx of new buyers into the market.
…
1) There’s currently a mismatch between what home buyers are looking for (smaller, higher density homes, closer to public transit and walkable downtowns) and what’s available (larger, single-family homes in suburban communities). The mismatch is due largely to local zoning laws, which were generally established in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, and which haven’t kept pace with demand.2) Demand for rental properties is on the rise, in part because of the difficulties that people — especially young adults with short credit histories and large student debts — face in getting a mortgage than in past years. Outdated zoning laws, onerous approval processes and financing difficulties also makes it hard for developers to build enough rental properties to meet rising demand. With more people competing for a limited number of rental units, rental costs are on the rise.
3) Cities like Trenton and Newark are full of boarded up and abandoned homes that can be purchased inexpensively. But these homes don’t help solve the problem of supply. Crime and poor city services deter buyers from wanting to move into these areas. Plus, many of these homes require “gut rehab,” which would be prohibitively expensive for many buyers.
4) “Most of New Jersey, by its nature, particularly because of its proximity to New York, particularly because of the nature of its work/job base, is going to be a more expensive state than most in this country.”
Frist, Bill?
Housing is dead money for 50-100 years.
That is all.
There isn’t any affordable housing in LBI.
288,000 new jobs 6.1 UE
They are correct, the housing market has tears.
You just can’t buy a median home in NJ…
all of the above is painfully correct. Was this the sum and substance of the so-called experts discussion? Anyone could learn that lurking here for a day.
I wasn’t invited, tells you all you need to know about the quality of the panel.
Or perhaps I’m just not relevant anymore?
6
grim,
I agree with that statement 90-95%… but aren’t there areas like Parsippany, Denville, Caldwell, West Caldwell (other towns as well?) where you could find a ‘median’ house?
Those towns aren’t that far from NYC/Hobo/JC…
Another cop assaults man in wheelchair
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2014/07/02/video-officer-shoves-man-in-wheelchair/12014303/
Nope, this is a different incident involving a cop shoving a man in a wheelchair to the ground. Don’t worry, none of the other five men on scene did anything close to rebuking their colleague. Tell me why again this fat @ss pig wasn’t charged with battery?
#6 ‘You just can’t buy a median home in NJ…’
It’s possible but you have to be constantly on the lookout, networking, lucky, and prepared to move fast. Took me two years to find the deal I’ll be closing on shortly.
As has been discussed here repeatedly: Most inventory out there (in the median range) is ‘underwater’ overpriced garbage.
9 – No, not really. Median home price in NJ is around $280-290k. You’ll find nothing for that price in any of the towns you listed. If you do, it’s at best a decrepit lake shack that needs a bulldozer.
“The housing market has tiers. … If you don’t have first-time buyers, whether it be affordable or just above the affordable, then the whole housing market stalls. So you might be pretty well off. Your house might be worth $800,000. Well, it’s not going to stay at $800,000 or go up, if there isn’t this constant influx of new buyers into the market.
While this is absolutely true, absent of mention in the article:
1. Out of control property taxes.
2. Non-existent wage growth.
3. Smaller populations of would-be (won’t-be?) buyers in all the move-up tiers behind the affluent baby boomers.
4. College loan debt at unprecedented levels.
5. Buy now/make minimum payments later attitude toward credit card debt such that it is never paid down.
I don’t know about dollars, but if you pick a better yardstick, that $800K house will be worth far less very soon measured in gallons of gas or heating oil, minimum wage labor hours, or pounds of ground beef or chicken.
14 – Are we talking local or national?
1. Out of control property taxes.
This is happening everywhere, across the country. Towns everywhere are realizing that property taxes and other ancillary/related taxes are the cash cow. As these towns grow, they will be forced to add services that were not previously necessary, sewerage, water, trash, expanded building departments, expanded police departments, fire, building, zoning, courts, public health, schools, etc. Call someplace a tax paradise, kiss it good bye.
2. Non-existent wage growth.
This is a global phenomenon, any local US region that is showing an increase is largely anomaly based (a single large employer skewing small population statistics). I would argue that this phenomenon will destroy the geographic middle america before it causes an any real pain on the coasts.
3. Smaller populations of would-be (won’t-be?) buyers in all the move-up tiers behind the affluent baby boomers.
The millennials are now the largest US cohort in history, the “baby boomers” will now need to look for a new name, because the existing one is misleading. They may not want to own, but if there is a roof over their head, someone else is going to own it.
4. College loan debt at unprecedented levels.
Does this not correlate with having an unprecedented level of educated residents? For years we talked about having to step up the level of education across America. Now that we’ve got it, we’re going to complain that it cost money?
5. Buy now/make minimum payments later attitude toward credit card debt such that it is never paid down.
This isn’t new, by any stretch, more interesting is the fact that this phenomenon is sure to sweep across the emerging market middle class, who (to use the word again) represent an unprecedented amount of spending power globally.
Amazing comeback in LBI. Hardly a shack left to fix up. I am not sure of the rental situation but there did seem to be plenty of vacancies this week in Beach Haven.
Yes only a cool million for an expanded cape in LBI with 8k taxes…..
http://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/39657776_zpid/39.585227,-74.213194,39.576644,-74.229201_rect/15_zm/1_fr/
Well, if you’re going to be picky
grim says:
July 3, 2014 at 9:55 am
it’s at best a decrepit lake shack that needs a bulldozer.
No it is not Love Ladies but we still want 2. 4 million for this lovely LBI home that last sold May 1994 for $148,000
http://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/39657907_zpid/39.588269,-74.212035,39.579687,-74.228042_rect/15_zm/1_fr/
grim,
I remember you making this comment a while back. The same increased levels of “education” can be reached for far less money. I don’t believe you’re hearing complaints about people spending money for college… just that they’re spending too much by an order of magnitude (or two).
4. College loan debt at unprecedented levels.
Does this not correlate with having an unprecedented level of educated residents? For years we talked about having to step up the level of education across America. Now that we’ve got it, we’re going to complain that it cost money?
Same story as yesterday……what is the better offer?…….FHA loan at $465,000 or $55K down, conventional mortgage at $452,000?
I never got a chance to comment yesterday.
Really no such thing as an “underwritten” mortgage that doesn’t have a property attached, or even a contract. Maybe this is a more advanced kind of preapproval, or perhaps they were under contract on another similarly priced property that fell out of contract.
$465 vs $452 – are these two different buyers? $465k with $55k down is a solid FHA offer (recognizing I know nothing of the borrower’s finances). If it’s the same buyer, the two numbers make no sense. If they can put $55k down with the FHA, they have enough to do a 10% down conventional with plenty of room for closing costs. If these are two different buyers, the different in price can be attributed to noise alone. Difference of +-$10k would be expected between different buyers.
I agree with all your points, esp these two. They support my theories of staying in the northeast and that middle America is dead.
Just look what happened in nj, to support point no 1, at one point you could head out to west jersey to first escape the property taxes, now that development has caught up to town needs, every affluent area in nj now pays high property taxes. Montville used to be cheap taxes, now they are on par with wayne taxes. You can go on and on. Same thing will happen to coastal areas on both coasts. It has now become a reality that if you want to live in affluent areas in the u.s., you will be high taxes and pay a high per sq ft price on your property.
1. Out of control property taxes.
This is happening everywhere, across the country. Towns everywhere are realizing that property taxes and other ancillary/related taxes are the cash cow. As these towns grow, they will be forced to add services that were not previously necessary, sewerage, water, trash, expanded building departments, expanded police departments, fire, building, zoning, courts, public health, schools, etc. Call someplace a tax paradise, kiss it good bye.
2. Non-existent wage growth.
This is a global phenomenon, any local US region that is showing an increase is largely anomaly based (a single large employer skewing small population statistics). I would argue that this phenomenon will destroy the geographic middle america before it causes an any real pain on the coasts.
Record Number of Americans Not in Labor Force in June
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/ali-meyer/record-number-americans-not-labor-force-june
Plenty of houses in nice PA towns with $10k property taxes these days, hitting $7.5k isn’t a stretch out there anymore. Those numbers usually don’t include trash, and water/sewerage charges are higher as well (phillly is in the top 10 most expensive).
Property taxes: like when the other counties in NJ realized that they could raise their rates up to Essex County levels! I am looking at you Passaic!
I remember GEMs in the mid 80’s! Negative Amortization!!!!
Morris takes the cake now.
[15] grim – newsflash – there may be more 23-year-olds in the US than any other age, but they aren’t buying RE and they’re only interested in suburban housing if the rent and utilities are free with complimentary wash and fold laundry services. Good luck with that move-up market.
Re [27];
Morris takes the cake now.
*pained nodding*
What’s really surpsing to me is how many people live in the higher end towns, pay their property taxes, and still send their kids to Delbarton or Seton Hall Prep anyway. I could build a compund in a crap school district with half the taxes if I was planning to pay private school tuition.
My cousin chose low taxes and parochial schools. Their logic was that the tuition will go away, the taxes won’t. Also, they only have one kid.
#29…made similar calculation since I knew we were sending our kids to catholic schools, didn’t want to bad a town, just average but with “lower” taxes.
David Burge @iowahawkblog 1h
Breaking: President Keeps Adding Jobs In States That Didn’t Vote For Him
#15,
College debt- I think the value add for the majority of college “educated” has dropped significantly in last 20 years while cost has gone parabolic. For-profit colleges, back–door adult programs, online only degrees..this is not indicative of quality education but rather gorging on young and naive or old and desperate. Uncle Sam won’t do a thing it keeps people employed and makes connected, ultra-rich like Jack Welch, even wealthier.
By [32];
Here’s how I see it — the job market sux so Starbucks and WalMart can have their pick of batchelors’-educated baristas and greeters. In that sense, if you don’t have some sort of degree, you are at a serious disadvantage in getting hired by someone else. So from that viewpoint, college is ‘worth it’, if only because the average person would be even worse off without the degree.
I agree with you that by and large the education is a worthless.
BTW, why Jack Welch? Isn’t his successor, Jeff Immelt (Obama’s favoritest CEO) comparably rich and equally as well-connected?
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/29/realestate/affordable-new-york-apartments-with-a-catch.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0
You needed to be income poor but savings rich
but they aren’t buying RE and they’re only interested in suburban housing if the rent and utilities are free with complimentary wash and fold laundry services.
So just like this trend drove increased cost of education, it will also increase the cost of urban rentals. So in 10 years we’ll all be bitching and moaning about the “$4000 studio”.
Nothing says “moron” more that a co-ed with Seton Hall sweatshorts with the letters on the bottom, a stretched earlobe, and forearm tats, drinking a mocha-doppio-half-skim-frapa-latte-cake pop…….
Bystander says:
July 3, 2014 at 11:51 am
#15, College debt- I think the value add for the majority of college “educated” has dropped significantly in last 20 years while cost has gone parabolic. For-profit colleges, back–door adult programs, online only degrees..this is not indicative of quality education but rather gorging on young and naive or old and desperate. Uncle Sam won’t do a thing it keeps people employed and makes connected, ultra-rich like Jack Welch, even wealthier.
Moose,
I would argue if your options are $150K debt, and poor job prospects vs learning a trade and becoming an apprentice… that latter MIGHT be better over the long term.
Why Jack (vs Immelt)… because Jack founded an online college. Did Immelt?
Christ, left right left right left righ left right… pathetic
Anon E. Moose says:
July 3, 2014 at 12:03 pm
By [32];
Here’s how I see it — the job market sux so Starbucks and WalMart can have their pick of batchelors’-educated baristas and greeters. In that sense, if you don’t have some sort of degree, you are at a serious disadvantage in getting hired by someone else. So from that viewpoint, college is ‘worth it’, if only because the average person would be even worse off without the degree.
I agree with you that by and large the education is a worthless.
BTW, why Jack Welch? Isn’t his successor, Jeff Immelt (Obama’s favoritest CEO) comparably rich and equally as well-connected?
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/capitolreport/2014/07/03/more-than-half-of-2014s-new-jobs-pay-higher-than-average-wage/
The U.S. is not just adding jobs at the fastest pace since the end of the Great Recession. Hiring is also more spread out and the new jobs pay better than in years past.
As the chart above shows, more than half the jobs the economy has added so far this year are in positions that pay higher than the hourly U.S. wage. Some 58% of the new jobs created in 2014 pay above the average hourly wage of $24.45.
By contrast, about 48% of the new jobs created in 2013 paid above the national average, according to a MarketWatch review of the data.
What’s going on? Businesses in 2014 are hiring more white-collar employees, construction is on the mend, health care is going strong and even the long-downtrodden financial industry is finally getting into the act.
About 42% of the new jobs, meanwhile, fall into categories that pay less than the average wage, but even that overstates the case.
Consider the generally lower-paying retail business, a sector that’s one of the biggest job creators. Retailers have generated nearly 100,000 jobs in the first six months of the year, but almost one-third are at auto dealerships. While the average retail job pays just $17 an hour, employees at stores that sell autos and auto parts make about $22 to $25 an hour.
No surprise there. Auto sales are at the highest level since 2006 with no letup in sight. Dealerships need to pay more to attract good salespeople.
Yet what’s puzzling is the general lack of upward wage pressure – workers demanding more money as the labor market improves and the pool of potential employees shrinks. Wages have risen just 2% over the past year and weekly wages have actually fallen in the past two months.
Some analysts contend that meager wage increases reflect a still-high number of part-time workers in the economy. Others suggest that wage gains are generally accruing to a small pool of well educated employees, many in higher-level positions.
Whatever the case, the pickup in hiring is unlikely to translate into much faster U.S. growth unless wages also start to rise, especially with higher inflation eating away at worker paychecks.
– Jeffry Bartash
[35] grim – I can’t predict in dollars, but yeah a studio in NY city may go for the equivalent of 2000 Monster Energy drinks per month in 10 years, meanwhile 8’x8′ rooms at your house will go for just a dozen cases of Mountain Dew, but with shared kitchen privileges it that won’t be such a bad deal. By then Wayne will be known as West Paterson (since the name is available again);-)
So just like this trend drove increased cost of education, it will also increase the cost of urban rentals. So in 10 years we’ll all be bitching and moaning about the “$4000 studio”.
grim (15)-
First of all, the diplomas don’t equate to educated individuals. The standards have been dumbed down to the point where a kolledge degree is actually not an asset for many of those who hold one.
Second, the complaint isn’t about the raw price of higher edumacation. It’s that the asset isn’t worth very much, and the price of that asset is a function of financialization rather than the scarcity or even the future value of a degree. The asset dwindles, and the debt remains.
“For years we talked about having to step up the level of education across America. Now that we’ve got it, we’re going to complain that it cost money?”
Gunsmithing and ability to create improvised armaments and IEDs. All else are useless skillz.
There’s a right way and a wrong way to make a Molotov c@cktail.
Don’t make a Molotov with a plastic bottle of Popov.
It bounces, and the rag will fall out, don’t ask me how I know.
RIP Zamperini..
There goes on of my willow tree branches. Wind hasn’t even picked up yet.
When we were kids we used to put an M-80 in a glass gallon apple juice jug on the 4th of July. The explosion usually rained glass and made lots of noise as it hit the aluminium siding on all of the neighbors homes. Then the Roman candle and bottle rocket wars would start. Good times when 50 plus kids all had fireworks and no parental supervision to speak of. I am surprised we all came out with of childhood with all of our digits still attached and nobody had an eye patch.
Can I play blackjack at Xanadu yet?
Most likely the Meadowlands race track if nullification gets by the courts.
48 – That would be filthier than Dover Downs.
Perhaps a casino in Hoboken.
Post a comment about blackjack and overnight I get spam attacked from all over the world with crappy online casino links.
Re: Education discussion
My College education was worthless. I already had two years of college coming out of a prep high school. I hated college as I realized those courses and electives were nothing more than a money-making scheme. Now? Omg, what a heist!
It wasn’t until I went to a sh1t business school for 15 months for computer programming did my career take off. Since then, I have never failed to garner interviews and job offers. Today? I’m working with Phd level folks in-house conducting technical AND modeling analysis for clients in the Insurance industry. If I had to offer advice to a kid today I’d tell them to learn a trade skill that’s in demand.
This one is horrible. I was in this one months ago and the amount of lipstick used to mask the deformities is tremendous. And the drama behind the reason this one is being sold is ripe for a reality show.
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1418810&dayssince=&countysearch=false
I’m itching to see what the deal is with this one. No backyard? I presume this has it’s level of weirdness; thus, still listed. It’s probably ripe for a lowball but why settle? That’s always been my contention. Show my the good stuff!
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1419489&dayssince=&countysearch=false
I feel like I should do the sign of the cross and bless myself with h0ly water if I walk into this one:
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1410550&dayssince=&countysearch=false
$25,000/yr. in taxes and $700/month for fees. And the place is sterile, dry and dead:
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1334305&dayssince=&countysearch=false
The dreaded open, cavernous foyers and vaulted/trey ceilings. This is the reason why so many @sshat muppets are financial m0rons:
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1400606&dayssince=&countysearch=false
Almost 21K in taxes to live like Tony Soprano. Jesus.
woops moderated is Cl@ward-Piv#n a filter trigger?
Not only a Soprano wannabee but poorly decorated. Why the f.uck even attempt to move anymore? For what? The sh1t-appeal meter is at full tilt! I’d be better off moving out to Wellsboro, PA. What a sewer North Jersey has become.
Yo, who’s got the muzz-a-dell! Hey Paulie, did you take care a dat ding?
http://www.njmls.com/listings/index.cfm?action=dsp.info&mlsnum=1423067&dayssince=&countysearch=false
#59 Wellsboro, PA. Quaint, quiet town but if you decide to move there make sure you bring a job with you ’cause there are none (that pay) out there.
Tried to talk my wife into moving there back in the 90s (was going to start a business). She wouldn’t budge. Would have a made a killing!
gary (60)-
That’s more Tony Montana than Tony Soprano.
The listing agent looks like a Russian mobster.
Is this the Franz Ferdinand moment for the festering Eurozone banking system?
“Ever since 2012, when we first revealed that the biggest problem plaguing Europe’s financial sector is the $2 trillion+ in bad debt on the books of European banks (not our numbers, the IMF’s), it became clear that the only way Europe can avoid a complete financial meltdown coupled with currency disintegration, is if it can constantly keep rolling over said bad debt (obviously the only way to do that would be to create an epic debt bubble leading managers of other people’s money to do idiotic things like buy Spanish debt at 2.75%). This is why not only the BOJ launched its mega QE in 2013, but why Draghi also kicked in with NIRP a month ago: the logic – do anything and everything to reflate the biggest credit bubble possible as otherwise European banks will have no choice but to face up to their trillions in bad loans.
Unfortunately for some banks, especially those which operate in Europe’s supposedly highest-rated country, Austria, sometimes just being able to kick the can is not enough as on occasion a law will change, having the unintended consequence of forcing the bank to admit just how ugly its balance sheet truly is. That’s what happened overnight when Erste Group, Austria’s largest bank by assets, and the third biggest bank in Eastern Europe after UniCredit and Raiffeisen, announced that, oops, its earlier forecast about the amount of bad loans on its books is wrong, and will have to rise by a massive 40%, leading to what will be a record $2.2 billion loss, and triggering writedowns.
Shareholders, not used to being told the truth and instead preferring sweet, little lies, promptly took the stock to the woodshed.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-07-04/stock-largest-austrian-bank-crashes-after-revealing-40-surge-bad-debt-provisions-rec
DECLARATIONS
The Daydream and the Nightmare
Obama isn’t doing his job. He’s waiting for history to recognize his greatness.
By PEGGY NOONAN CONNECT
July 3, 2014 4:59 p.m. ET
I don’t know if we sufficiently understand how weird and strange, how historically unparalleled, this presidency has become. We’ve got a sitting president who was just judged in a major poll to be the worst since World War II. The worst president in 70 years! Quinnipiac University’s respondents also said, by 54% to 44%, that the Obama administration is not competent to run the government. A Zogby Analytics survey asked if respondents are proud or ashamed of the president. Those under 50 were proud, while those over 50, who have of course the longest experienced sense of American history, were ashamed.
We all know the reasons behind the numbers. The scandals that suggest poor stewardship and, in the case of the IRS, destructive political mischief. The president’s signature legislation, which popularly bears his name and contains within it the heart of his political meaning, continues to wreak havoc in marketplaces and to be unpopular with the public. He is incapable of working with Congress, the worst at this crucial aspect of the job since Jimmy Carter, though Mr. Carter at least could work with the Mideast and produced the Camp David Accords. Mr. Obama has no regard for Republicans and doesn’t like to be with Democrats. Internationally, small states that have traditionally been the locus of trouble (the Mideast) are producing more of it, while large states that have been more stable in their actions (Russia, China) are newly, starkly aggressive.
That’s a long way of saying nothing’s working.
Which I’m sure you’ve noticed.
But I’m not sure people are noticing the sheer strangeness of how the president is responding to the lack of success around him. He once seemed a serious man. He wrote books, lectured on the Constitution. Now he seems unserious, frivolous, shallow. He hangs with celebrities, plays golf. His references to Congress are merely sarcastic: “So sue me.” “They don’t do anything except block me. And call me names. It can’t be that much fun.”
In a truly stunning piece in early June, Politico’s Carrie Budoff Brown and Jennifer Epstein interviewed many around the president and reported a general feeling that events have left him—well, changed. He is “taking fuller advantage of the perquisites of office,” such as hosting “star-studded dinners that sometimes go on well past midnight.” He travels, leaving the White House more in the first half of 2014 than any other time of his presidency except his re-election year. He enjoys talking to athletes and celebrities, not grubby politicians, even members of his own party. He is above it all. On his state trip to Italy in the spring, he asked to spend time with “interesting Italians.” They were wealthy, famous. The dinner went for four hours. The next morning his staff were briefing him for a “60 Minutes” interview about Ukraine and health care. “One aide paraphrased Obama’s response: ‘Just last night I was talking about life and art, big interesting things, and now we’re back to the minuscule things on politics.”’
Minuscule? Politics is his job.
When the crisis in Ukraine escalated in March, White House aides wondered if Mr. Obama should cancel a planned weekend golf getaway in Florida. He went. At the “lush Ocean Reef Club,” he reportedly told his dinner companions: “I needed this. I needed the golf. I needed to laugh. I needed to spend time with friends.”
You get the impression his needs are pretty important in his hierarchy of concerns.
***
This is a president with 2½ years to go who shows every sign of running out the clock. Normally in a game you run out the clock when you’re winning. He’s running it out when he’s losing.
All this is weird, unprecedented. The president shows no sign—none—of being overwhelmingly concerned and anxious at his predicaments or challenges. Every president before him would have been. They’d be questioning what they’re doing wrong, changing tack. They’d be ordering frantic aides to meet and come up with what to change, how to change it, how to find common ground not only with Congress but with the electorate.
Instead he seems disinterested, disengaged almost to the point of disembodied. He is fatalistic, passive, minimalist. He talks about hitting “singles” and “doubles” in foreign policy.
“The world seems to disappoint him,” says The New Yorker’s liberal and sympathetic editor, David Remnick.
What kind of illusions do you have to have about the world to be disappointed when it, and its players, act aggressively or foolishly? Presidents aren’t supposed to have those illusions, and they’re not supposed to check out psychologically when their illusions are shattered.
***
Barack Obama doesn’t seem to care about his unpopularity, or the decisions he’s made that have not turned out well. He doesn’t seem concerned. A guess at the reason: He thinks he is right about his essential policies. He is steering the world toward not relying on America. He is steering America toward greater dependence on and allegiance to government. He is creating a more federally controlled, Washington-centric nation that is run and organized by progressives. He thinks he’s done his work, set America on a leftward course, and though his poll numbers are down now, history will look back on him and see him as heroic, realistic, using his phone and pen each day in spite of unprecedented resistance. He is Lincoln, scorned in his time but loved by history.
He thinks he is in line with the arc of history, that America, for all its stops and starts, for all the recent Supreme Court rulings, has embarked in the long term on governmental and cultural progressivism. Thus in time history will have the wisdom to look back and see him for what he really was: the great one who took every sling and arrow, who endured rising unpopularity, the first black president and the only one made to suffer like this.
That’s what he’s doing by running out the clock: He’s waiting for history to get its act together and see his true size.
He’s like someone who’s constantly running the movie “Lincoln” in his head. It made a great impression on him, that movie. He told Time magazine, and Mr. Remnick, how much it struck him. President Lincoln of course had been badly abused in his time. Now his greatness is universally acknowledged. But if Mr. Obama read more of Lincoln, he might notice Lincoln’s modesty, his plain ways, his willingness every day to work and negotiate with all who opposed him, from radical abolitionists who thought him too slow to supporters of a negotiated peace who thought him too martial. Lincoln showed respect for others. Those who loved him and worked for him thought he showed too much. He was witty and comical but not frivolous and never shallow. He didn’t say, “So sue me.” He never gave up trying to reach agreement and resolution.
It is weird to have a president who has given up. So many young journalists diligently covering this White House, especially those for whom it is their first, think what they’re seeing is normal.
It is not. It is unprecedented and deeply strange. And, because the world is watching and calculating, unbelievably dangerous.
Bojangles has been wildly successful in his main pursuit: the evisceration of the middle class and the imposition of the largest welfare state in history.
Just watch Wall-e to see how this all ends.
Circa 1980 some of my college buddies and I bought a bl@ckj@ck system mail-order
for $50 called “Aus the Boss”. We actually made our money back really easy even though it wasn’t rocket science (single point count system with some additional strategy). We would often head out on weekend trips to parties at other colleges and stop off at AC as the casin0s opened early Saturday mornings to finance our gas and liquor purchases at the $2 tables. The additional strategy that I added back then still works today: If the deck is very “cold” (not 10-rich) and it’s late in the shoe ask the dealer to mark(save) your spot and then wander across the casino and watch from afar until you see the dealer re-shuffling and then start fresh on the new shoe instead of losing a lot of minimum bets waiting for the reshuffle.
Post a comment about bl@ckj@ck and overnight I get spam attacked from all over the world with crappy online casin0 links.
Does Safari tell you if you’re in mod? I posted a comment that I tried to spam-reduce by using words like bl@ckj@ck and cas1n0, but it didn’t post.
^^never mind;-) Happy 4th everyone!
This is a president with 2½ years to go who shows every sign of running out the clock. Normally in a game you run out the clock when you’re winning. He’s running it out when he’s losing.
Sums it up perfectly.
Too bad that the real losers are you and me. The fcuktard Bojangles has another half century left to collect speakers’ fees and infect millions more with his special brand of stupid.
That min wage push couldn’t come at a better time
http://www.adpcomplianceinsights.com/unemployment-insurance-tax-increases-expected-through-2014/?obmain
Saw a kid wearing a t-shirt in Denver, nearly spit out my beer.
“I was anti-Obama before it was cool”