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[sluissa]

That's the speech. The speech is meant to sound good. I'd like to know what the AJA is actually worded to do. I tend to like what he said, but damn it, I just don't trust any politician anymore, even Obama, who I used to love.

I get the feeling he just handed Republicans a big slice of their favorite pie... but covered in green peas.

Just from the speech, this sounds like an ultimatum. "Here, here's what you say you want congress, if you don't pass it, then you've proven yourself obstructionist." Except... it's not really what they wanted, at least not all of it.

Just from that, it feels like nothing except more political gaming. Hopefully it's not as bad as it sounds though.

However, from the whitehouse fact sheet:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/09/08/fact-sheet-american-jobs-act

I actually like nearly every idea there. I would prefer less tax cuts though, but hey, whatever, they all look to be temporary tax cuts, so I'll go with it.


AFAIK: This administration's definition of a "small business" has tended to be "Has 50 or less employees." i'm not sure if that's an actual government definition, or just the number that I keep seeing popping up places recently. That seems to match up with $5,000,000 payroll tax exemption as well, giving companies the ability to have 50 employees with an average salary of up to $100,000. That's significantly higher than the average wage, but I wouldn't consider it out of line for a company that does highly skilled work.

[Bauglir]

The only thing about that speech I don't endorse wholly is the "we have to outdo Asia" rhetoric, but I can excuse that as a cynical play to xenophobia in some of the people he's trying to sell it to, and being a government employee as he is it actually is in his job description to ensure ours is the best government. I hope it's an accurate depiction of what the bill entails, but I assume it is because if it isn't it's going to get absolutely torn to shreds; the only thing I'd worry about are things that he didn't discuss, and short of something utterly insane and unrelated tacked onto the end I can't think of anything that'd be a dealbreaker for something this badly needed.

I fully expect the bill to stall and die solely because it was endorsed by Obama. Time to write various congresspersons, I suppose.

[Vector]

Edit: Asking a screwdriver for Christmas? You mean you didn't even have a toolbox at home where you could borrow one for a while?

We apparently did (which is why my parents didn't give me one), but when you've got your own screwdriver you can, you know, use it, rather than the usual "Oh, honey, it's out in the garage, can't you wait a couple of days (real meaning: two or three weeks) (and then we can all have forgotten about it by then)."

[Christes]

I'm not a fan of Obama, but I generally approved of the content of his speech.  I'm highly skeptical of any politician's words, though.  To be honest, though, I thought he sounded a bit like one of those salesmen from the 1800's trying to get you to buy his magical health tonic - look at how many times he said "Pass this jobs bill, and (insert good thing) will happen to us".

Too bad we likely won't see whether Obama's promises are good or not.

[Vector]

Yeah.  I went "Wow, that really sounds great!" but the "pass the pass the pass the bill come on you fucks" thing makes him sound more than a bit desperate.

[Aqizzar]

Yeah.  I went "Wow, that really sounds great!" but the "pass the pass the pass the bill come on you fucks" thing makes him sound more than a bit desperate.

It was definitely not the level of sophistication the guy has a reputation for, but it's an interesting rhetorical move in itself.  It's almost a breaking-the-fourth-wall thing, if it can be said that speechmaking has a fourth wall; like it's so obvious what he's doing, that he's letting the listener in on how hollow he thinks the pageantry of making the speech is.  If we're going to talk about personal reactions, his "we can't afford both" closer sounded more like what I've come to expect from the guy, which is ironic because it's really not what I actually "expected" from him.

[Pistolero]

Preferential employment for veterans is an interesting one. I like it but I can see it concerning people. Not politicians or the media of course.

Never mind me sorry, I guess I'm fairly naive about the difficulties veterans face in returning to normal life. I didn't know the unemployment rate for them was above 20%. Now I really like it. It's kind of hard to argue against incentives to employ them.

[SalmonGod]

Discuss.

I would rather jobs become obsolete.  I'm not so fanatic about my ideals that I'll turn down some much needed relief, but it does feel like society is patching a coat that's already completely made of patches, when it really should be buying a new one.

[kaijyuu]

I highly doubt jobs will become "obsolete" until we find a renewable, cheap energy source. Then sure, once our robots can run indefinitely, we can all retire and gain wealth through production of non-necessities, like the article says.

Until then, no.

[SalmonGod]

Doesn't need to happen like the flick of a switch, but even if jobs don't go obsolete, specific jobs will continue to go obsolete and screw people over.  We need to find a better way to deal with it than constant warfare with employers over the creation of pointless drudgery work just so a small portion of young adults and obsoleted workers can have a chance at justifying their existence.  When progress becomes a bad thing, we're obviously doing something wrong....

[Vector]

*shrug*

I want a job.

Of course, I doubt a job as a tenured professor in "why the fuck do you study so much" counts under the article's metrics of what having a job really means.

[Heron TSG]

I'm amazed, that plan appears to do just about everything I wished the government would do. There are a few parts that I'm sure are in there just to get the Republicans on board, but they aren't really so bad. Good luck, Bill.

[Virex]

It's not through congress yet and by the looks of it, the plan has a pricetag, so I wish him luck with getting it implemented...

[ECrownofFire]

I highly doubt jobs will become "obsolete" until we find a renewable, cheap energy source. Then sure, once our robots can run indefinitely, we can all retire and gain wealth through production of non-necessities, like the article says.

Until then, no.

Then we discover how the human brain works and we can model it down to the last detail. From there, we know exactly what about art makes humans enjoy it, and we can create robots that create it.

Damn, that sounds depressing.

[KaelGotDwarves]

This is going quite a ways back to a separate discussion in this thread - but backing up what I said about progressivism in other cultures and nice, chill, relaxing songs to boot...

Thailand's Got Talent hilarity on mainstream tv.