Random Thoughts

This is a continuation of my earlier posts on economic performance of democratic and republican administrations. My earlier posts include: Politics of the Federal Minimum Wage Democrats Have Kept Unemployment Low Democrats care about poor people Truth About Economic Performance of Political Parties I like to think I have shed light on some facts and debunked some conventional wisdom. In this post, I will attempt to examine the tax-and-spend liberal label put on democrats. Republicans often try to label democrats as tax-and-spend liberals who are soft on national security. While the latter point is based on anecdotal evidence, the earlier is amenable to empirical examination. So, I set out to prove or disprove the notion that democrats often tax and spend in a way that does not yield economic growth. The implication of tax-and-spend liberal is one that puts excessive tax burden on its population and finds inefficient (think socialistic) ways of spending that tax reven...

In my previous post, I tried to test my theory that democrats care about poor people than republicans by looking at the change in federal minimum wage under democratic and republican presidents. It is somewhat difficult to prove or disprove my theory graphically, so I prepared a little spreadsheet and calculated real numbers. While I was at it, I decided to factor in the role of Congress in determining the federal minimum wage. The results are as follows. It is important to get a general feel for the extent to which the two parties have controlled the executive (president) and legislative (Senate and House) branches of the government. As the pie chart below shows, Democrats have controlled Congress for a lot longer than the Republicans, while Republican presidents have ruled a little bit longer. SOURCE: http://uspolitics.about.com/od/usgovernment/l/bl_party_division_2.htm Next item to look at is government control by president, Senate and House majority. The Democrats have ruled t...

According to unemployment statistics from 1950-2005, democratic presidents have consistently managed to achieve low unemployment rates while republicans have increased unemployment. Granted there are circumstances that are out of a president's control like Wars, global conditions, natural disasters Congress might have been controlled by a party different from the president to push his agenda The factors above notwithstanding, it amazes me how republicans can claim good stewardship of the economy while they have generally failed to provide people with jobs. The democrats, on the other hand, have kept unemployment low during their administrations. The more I learn about the post-WWII economic history of the U.S., the more I realize how the republican party is the party of fraud and myths, at least when it comes to the economic record.

I think democrats care about the poor and middle class much more than republicans do. Lots of their policies this year are intended to provide relief to a struggling middle class families. I would like to compile tangible proof that democrats care about the struggling and down-and-out. The first case I wanted to look at was federal minimum wages during democratic and republican administrations. During the past seven years, a republican president and congress have blocked some 14 attempts to increase the federal minimum wage. Fortunately, they lost their control of congress in 2006 and were forced into passing law increasing minimum wage from the decade long $5.15/hr to $7.25/hr over the course of a few years. The battle for federal minimum wage increases got me thinking about previous battles of its kind. So, I looked into the all-knowing Wikipedia for stats and I found this : Since my interests were particularly partisan, I looked into how much minimum wage changed under democra...

... if you look at racial composition of the delegates at their convention. According to The New York Times , their delegates were overwhelmingly white and male. According to polls of delegates conducted by The New York Times and CBS News, 93 percent of the Republican delegates are white (compared with 85 percent in 2004 and 89 percent in 2000), while 5 percent are Hispanic and 2 percent are black. The Democratic delegate pool in Denver, according to the survey, was 65 percent white, 23 percent black and 11 percent Hispanic , roughly the same as at other recent Democratic conventions. The poll also found that men accounted for 68 percent of Republican delegates (compared with 57 percent in 2004) and about half the Democratic delegates. I suspected this just anecdotally from inspecting the crowds on TV. Democratic delegates represent the demographic of the country extremely well while republicans are overwhelmingly homogeneous. I decided to compare these numbers with the general...

I always wondered whether the stereotypes of democrats as tax-and-spend liberals and republicans as efficient, fiscally responsible, small government republicans had any truth. Now, I have found the real answer from a variety of sources. First, Jacques Distler a physicist from the University of Texas at Austin evaluates how fiscally conservative democratic and republican administrations have been and what kind of GDP growth they have been able to achieve. He gets into the nuances, but I prefer to present just the summary here. 1. Fiscal Budget Deficits Contrary to the notion that democrats are not fiscally responsible, it is the republicans who consistently put this country deeper and deeper into debt. How this stereotype holds in the presence of such overwhelming data astounds me. It is simply astonishing for such myths to persist. 2. GDP Growth Once again, democratic administrations consistently outperform periods of republican rule in terms of GDP growth by 1%+/year. That is ...

After McCain picked a relatively unqualified and inexperienced Sarah Palin, many people gasped at the possibility of Palin having to take over the presidency in case something happens to McCain. I think McCain dying in office is overstated considering he appears healthy and fit despite the recurrence of a malignant melanoma. Plus, he has been getting great healthcare due to his status and will continue to do so whether or not he wins the presidency. That said, it would be nice to get numbers on chances of McCain's survival as a function of his age. Thankfully, that information was provided by Alex Burns at Politico . The odds of a 72-year-old man living four more years, or one full White House term, are better. But for a man who has lived 72 years and 67 days (McCain’s age on Election Day this year), there is between a 14.2 and 15.1 percent chance of dying before Inauguration Day 2013 , according to the Social Security Administration’s 2004 actuarial tables and the authoritati...

Check out the Google Trends for the VP choices McCain was considering. MITT ROMNEY TIM PAWLENTY TOM RIDGE Then look at Palin's. SARAH PALIN Apparently, there has been little to no interest or knowledge of her until McCain named her his VP.

As the reasons for rejecting Palin's VP candidacy mount, I went looking for unusual pictures and this is what I found. She is indeed more of he same . Sorry, I couldn't resist. One interesting point is Sarah Palin being MIA from the public scene since her introduction to the national stage. I think she is so unqualified to hold her own in the national stage that she is hiding somewhere cramming McCain's policies and talking points into memory. It is shameful that McCain would select someone so unfit and unqualified for this stage. Another interesting development is McCain campain's attempt to turn the population against the media's coverage of Palin. Her many flaws and lack of qualification which apparently were not vetted by the McCain campaign are becoming public, thanks to the media. But McCain's campaign is crying liberal media bias, which is real, but totally justified in this case. Standing on the platform that Hillary Clinton built, the McCain campai...

As in, can she withdraw from the race for one reason or another, making way for McCain to choose someone else? I don't intend to read the rule books to figure that out, but it should be something McCain might have to consider for many reasons. If she does withdraw her VP candidacy, she probably will need to do it before accepting her party's nomination in their convention in a few days. That is unlikely, so this whole post is a futile exercise. Nevertheless, I would like to list the many reasons Palin is the wrong choice for McCain. Her apparent inexperience in anything non-Alaskan - She has demonstrated that she has no clue about international affairs. Over the last year, she has admitted that she pays little attention to national and international issues because she is too busy governing Alaska. Untested nationally - She has not been tested on the national stage like Romney and Huckabee. Making the transition from being a 20-month governor of a state with a population...