While being nice to our children and grandchildren because they will likely choose our nursing homes is worth a snickering consideration, the ignorant choosing a national healthcare system is not funny yet perhaps inevitable. Mark Levin explained last night:
“If half the people don’t know that there’s three branches of government believe me, they’re not going to understand the problems with a socialist healthcare system. They’re going to think they are going to get something for nothing.” — Mark Levin
Take the quiz. If you score less than 50%, please move to Canada or stop voting. (For the record, I scored an 85%.)
Hannity looks nicer in person
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I took the quiz and got a few wrong. I was wrong on the Lincoln/Douglas debates and on two tax/econ questions.
Awesome resource indeed, but I’d argue with them on the two tax/econ questions. Government spending does not stimulate the economy. The government doesn’t have it’s own money. It has to take the money out of the economy before it can spend even a penny. Even by selling bonds and incurring debt to spend, it alters the markets (as capital shifts) and then increases the burden of government on the taxpayer, therefore changing how the taxpayer saves/invests/spends too.
You’d be arguing with yourself, CL, as the quiz’ creators were not furthering an economic opinion. Take another look at one of their actual questions. Their correct answer (please do not reveal it in a reply) did not judge the merit of that course of action:
The success or failure of that historical application needs further examination. I would argue the quiz maker’s correct answer, when applied, had results mixed by the degrees of the adjustments. Again, I won’t elaborate here so as to not spoil the quiz for those who have yet to take it.
Sgt. Tim,
You are right on this. I took that quiz (or a facsimile) a long time ago and got three wrong, took it again and I believe I got the same three wrong and I suspect that was because I really didn’t care enough about the material in those three questions to be concerned with the answers so I never bothered to commit them to memory. On the question you cited above, I knew the right answer and marked it accordingly, but I bet that most of us disagree.
Fact of the matter is that I understand where Steve Forbes is on Mark to Market accounting rules that he feels is tanking the economy and I suspect one could look at it that way but I disagree with him and I certainly am not as qualified as he is. Mark to Market is certainly the problem, just as a bad heart is when you are in congestive heart failure, but the fact that you ate 7 jelly donuts and 2 steaks each day for 45 years is why you have a bad heart, causing CHF in the first place and that is why I say the problem is government policies that caused hyperinflation in the RE market which artificially raised the price and also stimulated more product than could be consumed. When that happens, and people realize it, the value drops and if you lack the cash on hand to cover a run on liabilities, like bonds, then you are in trouble. Mark to Market didn’t cause this; it only reflects the government policy that caused it. Bottom line is that if I took a test created by Steve Forbes I would answer his questions based upon how he expected me to answer and not what I really felt.
My staff voted republican and there were a lot of them. The reason why is because many of them are in school getting all sorts of degrees and they often ask for input on their papers. When I look at how the professors cutely try to box them in so they buy into liberal dogma, conservatives, such as myself, quickly spot the foil. It takes time but, no matter how busy I am, I make sure these students understand, using real life examples, why it isn’t the way the professors say it is. When it comes to the finished paper, they get their A, because they give the answer they are expected to give despite their internal disagreements. Several of these academics were quite surprised to hear these students lay out sharply alternative opinions and conclusions after the course was over and the grade was safe.
Sgt. Tim, thanks for posting that individual question. I read it incorrectly as I’m sure others did. I read it as what would the best course of action be rather than what would a government most liely do. That certainly explains why my answer was incorrect.
Twins, I missed that question for the same reason as you.
MLF, the irony is I am always telling my son to read questions on a test carefully to be sure you are answering what was asked not what yot THINK was asked.
Sgt Tim,
You’re right! I had to read it a few more times before finally catching the letter ‘a’ I missed before the word government. That one letter changes the whole question.
Good job!
There is no such thing, in a good or bad economy, in a recession or in a boom, of decreased government spending. The concept and the reality are miles apart. Decreased government spending is an oxymoron. What is considered a cut is a decrease in the rate of government spending, never an absolute cut. In fact government spending out paces inflation, so you strive to bring it down, by voting for conservatives, to less than an inflationary increase. In reality it needs an absolute decrease. Less government spending translates to less government.
Historically, the reality has been a decrease in taxes as the only variable that governments do in severe economic times. If you look at the incoming administration they do not plan on decreasing taxes at all. In fact their plan is solely connected to massive government spending increases, via more bailouts and FDR public works projects, and an eventual actual increase in taxes by not renewing the Bush tax cuts. How else can you buy votes and/or attempt to purchase dependency.
Government spending and government dependency are one in the same. The closet thing I saw to an exception was Sarah Palin’s record and that spoke volumes. It would be nice to decrease taxes and spending regardless of the economy but the super person, or persons that can talk that talk and walk the walk are not on the horizon.
When you answer questions like this you sometimes have to think like the people who made the test and that means understanding the answer that they want. I’ve often given what I know is the wrong answer but is considered correct by the testers. No liberal would have a hard time with this question except, perhaps, on the tax end.