Privatized profits and socialised losses...
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Are there any true conservatives left? Or is it just smoke and mirrors. Seems Corporate socialism is OK. Redistribute the wealth to the top by taking taxpayer's money and handing over 700 billion, while Americans are still losing their homes, their taxes will go to keep those at the top in good pay. There's nothing "free" about this market. This is not unexpected. This was forewarned by economists. So they take risky ventures and now want to be saved. Lessee... if my business doesn't succeed because of a risky move on my part can I get a bail out? Nope. But I'll have to pay for this one. I still support the free market concept. We shouldn't bail any of it out. Let it fall. Else it is a total lie. A total lie. No more can people declare with any moral high ground that the free market won't get out of hand if deregulated. Evidence is 700 billion on top of the 85 billion to AIG and the 200 billion to Frannie and Freddie. 995 billion dollars. A TRILLION DOLLARS! Unbelievable. But don't mention health care. Our dollars are reserved for those who create them. Now I dare any conservative to argue that this is not nationalizing the finance system and isn't corporate socialism and is a sound functioning piece of the free market system as argued by conservatives. What a joke.
I've heard more said about less.
If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives. They had nothing whatsoever to do with it. The entire thing was caused by the government forcing lenders to make loans to people who they otherwise would not have lent to. Did conservatives elect Bush? Yes, we did. Did Bush lead as a conservative? No, he did not. But the only people trying to institute any sort of regulation over fannie and freddy were George Bush and John McCain in the last couple of years, and they were defeated every time by democrat led opposition. The lack of any real regulation has been the work of liberal democrats. They are the culprits here, and them alone. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0[^] What is the proof that republicans are not directly to blame for any of this? A democrat controlled congress is not demanding hearings. They know that the only people who could possibly be found culpable are their own. None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder, they have not the courage or the will to fight this, but they sure as hell did not cause it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Ed Gadziemski wrote:
Where is the other $875 billion going?
Here's what I learned today (Just like in the Lounge except for the anger ;) ) The government’s $700 billion rescue plan for our failing financial markets has grown to include foreign banks operating in the United States too. Over the weekend, foreign banks emphasized their importance and influence in the U.S. banking system to make sure they get a piece of the pie, and our government, brandishing the negotiating skills of a three-year-old, capitulated to their every demand. :wtf: As the government prepares to bail out Wall Street, many of the same executives who caused the mess are still going to collect their bonuses. About 10,000 executives at the New York office of bankrupt Lehman Brothers will share in a $2.5 billion bonus pool. House Democrats are demanding that the bailout call for “appropriate standards for executive compensation.” But Secretary of the Treasury and Wall St insider, Paulson argues that that would make it harder for persuade companies to sell their troubled assets to the government, and he wants to avoid punitive steps. :omg:
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
The truly frightening aspect of all this is that we are paying for this bailout with dollars we don't have. this $T is all borrowed funds, which will just expand the national debt. In the long run, this just hatens the day when interest on the debt (the only bill the Treasury really seems to have to pay) will exceed GDP (of course the revolution will have come before that, since the taxed class cannot afford to pay even at 1/2 GDP). The only apprpriate standard for "executive compensation" of those whose companies take any of this handout should be reduction in pay to the same as the least paid employee. $2.5B "bonus" pool my ass. Bonus for what, I ask.
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If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives. They had nothing whatsoever to do with it. The entire thing was caused by the government forcing lenders to make loans to people who they otherwise would not have lent to. Did conservatives elect Bush? Yes, we did. Did Bush lead as a conservative? No, he did not. But the only people trying to institute any sort of regulation over fannie and freddy were George Bush and John McCain in the last couple of years, and they were defeated every time by democrat led opposition. The lack of any real regulation has been the work of liberal democrats. They are the culprits here, and them alone. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0[^] What is the proof that republicans are not directly to blame for any of this? A democrat controlled congress is not demanding hearings. They know that the only people who could possibly be found culpable are their own. None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder, they have not the courage or the will to fight this, but they sure as hell did not cause it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives.
Okay, you and the two other true conservatives are absolved. Teo Absofuckingsolvo. Now stop trying to convince anyone that the Republican Party has been conservative in any sense of the word. You might as well claim that pigs are the same thing as pigeons. A Republican President, a Republican Secretary of the Treasury and a Republican head of the Federal Reserve are picking your pocket and mine in order to practice naked state socialism. Wake up and smell the thievery.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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BoneSoft wrote:
just can't help be see this as a shining example of why we shouldn't socialize health care, or anything else for that matter.
Sorry, there's no relationship. This is (as Chris points out below) a crisis caused by greedy financial companies run amuck. It is a failure of regulation,. The bailout is corporate welfare, not socialism, and is happening only because the alternative is so short-term painful, the government fears it could fall because of it (and well it might if everyone's 401k suddenly became nearly worthless, along with everything else). We will pay even more in the long term, because the bailout is with borrowed dollars, compounding the sin.
Rob Graham wrote:
Sorry, there's no relationship. This is (as Chris points out below) a crisis caused by greedy financial companies run amuck. It is a failure of regulation,.
It's the disasterous results of government meddling where it doesn't belong.
Visit BoneSoft.com for code generation tools (XML & XSD -> C#, VB, etc...) and some free developer tools as well.
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If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives. They had nothing whatsoever to do with it. The entire thing was caused by the government forcing lenders to make loans to people who they otherwise would not have lent to. Did conservatives elect Bush? Yes, we did. Did Bush lead as a conservative? No, he did not. But the only people trying to institute any sort of regulation over fannie and freddy were George Bush and John McCain in the last couple of years, and they were defeated every time by democrat led opposition. The lack of any real regulation has been the work of liberal democrats. They are the culprits here, and them alone. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0[^] What is the proof that republicans are not directly to blame for any of this? A democrat controlled congress is not demanding hearings. They know that the only people who could possibly be found culpable are their own. None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder, they have not the courage or the will to fight this, but they sure as hell did not cause it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder,
They're sure fighting harder to give away more borrowed money to the banks and insurers that ran amuck without regulation. Now Paulson is insisting we buy the poison assets of Foreign banking firms just because they do business here. The price tag went up from $700B to $1T+ yesterday when he discovered more friends "in need of relief". The Republicans in the house are mostly backing this, it's the Dems that seem to be the only voices of opposition. And you thought Iraq was going to be Bush's "Legacy". He'll be remembered as the destroyer of the mighty US Economy, and of the republican party, for neither will likely ever recover. Another $T to the national debt in one weeks time. Unbelievable.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives.
Okay, you and the two other true conservatives are absolved. Teo Absofuckingsolvo. Now stop trying to convince anyone that the Republican Party has been conservative in any sense of the word. You might as well claim that pigs are the same thing as pigeons. A Republican President, a Republican Secretary of the Treasury and a Republican head of the Federal Reserve are picking your pocket and mine in order to practice naked state socialism. Wake up and smell the thievery.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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Don't get me wrong, I don't suggest that we lay all of the blame at the feet of the Democratic party. And you may be right about deregulation. But from what I understand it's Clinton's "sub-prime mortgage" that killed us. The heads of lending firms were just all too happy to profit from it (and fund Obama's campaign).
Oakman wrote:
Which includes George Bush the way I parse socialism.
Are you referring to the bail-out? Because from what I gather it doesn't sound like there's much of a choice. Though I all for faulting him for not seeing this comming and try to head it off at the pass, if that had even been possible.
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BoneSoft wrote:
But from what I understand it's Clinton's "sub-prime mortgage" that killed us.
Until Reagan reformed the tax code, Mortgages were safe, secure, and boring. By eliminating the tax exemption for all other kids of debt, he made them attractive far beyond their intrinsic worth. Ask all the credit card companies. Clinton's people certainly pushed sub-prime mortages, but remember that Clinton's Whitehouse had to get Newt Gingrich's Congress to go along on everything that was done.
BoneSoft wrote:
Because from what I gather it doesn't sound like there's much of a choice
There's always a choice. In this case we are being assured by the people, like Paulson, who caused the problem and the people who were supposed to oversee the system so no-one could create a problem, like Dodd, that, if we hand them a blank check for a trillion dollars (yes, it's supposed to be less, and if you believe it will be, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you) then they (and they alone) will be able to fix this problem they either caused or allowed to be caused. All we have to do is trust them. :wtf: I don't want to play Charlie Brown to their Lucy. They will yank the football away - no question about it. And they will all get richer while they do it.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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Rob Graham wrote:
Sorry, there's no relationship. This is (as Chris points out below) a crisis caused by greedy financial companies run amuck. It is a failure of regulation,.
It's the disasterous results of government meddling where it doesn't belong.
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BoneSoft wrote:
disasterous results of government meddling
Nope. Had the regulations governing mortgage investment and investment banking not been "liberalized" by multiple "conservative" administrations, this could not have happened. And this National Socialist rescue of the guilty companies is being foisted on us by the Republican Administration, no one else. Someone explain why it's the Investment Banks that need bailing out, rather than the account holders? Why not just garauntee all $401K and similar statutory retirement accounts including pension plans (most of whom likely have little sxposure to this crap) and let the hedge funds and the like take the pain. Let these dealers in worthless paper fail.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder,
They're sure fighting harder to give away more borrowed money to the banks and insurers that ran amuck without regulation. Now Paulson is insisting we buy the poison assets of Foreign banking firms just because they do business here. The price tag went up from $700B to $1T+ yesterday when he discovered more friends "in need of relief". The Republicans in the house are mostly backing this, it's the Dems that seem to be the only voices of opposition. And you thought Iraq was going to be Bush's "Legacy". He'll be remembered as the destroyer of the mighty US Economy, and of the republican party, for neither will likely ever recover. Another $T to the national debt in one weeks time. Unbelievable.
Rob Graham wrote:
They're sure fighting harder to give away more borrowed money to the banks and insurers that ran amuck without regulation.
And what choice do they have? If they don't do it they risk a meltdown of the entire international economy. All of this was inevitable from the very first moment Fannie Mae was created.
Rob Graham wrote:
He'll be rembembered as the destroyer of the mighty US Econmomy, and of the republican party, for neither will likely ever recover. Another $T to the national debt in one weeks time. Unbelievable.
All of which will enable the real culprits to cause even more havoc which will end up blamed on some future president.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder,
They're sure fighting harder to give away more borrowed money to the banks and insurers that ran amuck without regulation. Now Paulson is insisting we buy the poison assets of Foreign banking firms just because they do business here. The price tag went up from $700B to $1T+ yesterday when he discovered more friends "in need of relief". The Republicans in the house are mostly backing this, it's the Dems that seem to be the only voices of opposition. And you thought Iraq was going to be Bush's "Legacy". He'll be remembered as the destroyer of the mighty US Economy, and of the republican party, for neither will likely ever recover. Another $T to the national debt in one weeks time. Unbelievable.
Have you read the actual plan[^]? It says only $700B at any time. So they can happily stack on more once some clears. And in the meantime, it also says "the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency." I really do wonder what is motivating people to back this.
Visit BoneSoft.com for code generation tools (XML & XSD -> C#, VB, etc...) and some free developer tools as well.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives.
Okay, you and the two other true conservatives are absolved. Teo Absofuckingsolvo. Now stop trying to convince anyone that the Republican Party has been conservative in any sense of the word. You might as well claim that pigs are the same thing as pigeons. A Republican President, a Republican Secretary of the Treasury and a Republican head of the Federal Reserve are picking your pocket and mine in order to practice naked state socialism. Wake up and smell the thievery.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
Oakman wrote:
practice naked state socialism
Socialism made inevitable by... well... socialism.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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BoneSoft wrote:
disasterous results of government meddling
Nope. Had the regulations governing mortgage investment and investment banking not been "liberalized" by multiple "conservative" administrations, this could not have happened. And this National Socialist rescue of the guilty companies is being foisted on us by the Republican Administration, no one else. Someone explain why it's the Investment Banks that need bailing out, rather than the account holders? Why not just garauntee all $401K and similar statutory retirement accounts including pension plans (most of whom likely have little sxposure to this crap) and let the hedge funds and the like take the pain. Let these dealers in worthless paper fail.
Rob Graham wrote:
Nope. Had the regulations governing mortgage investment and investment banking not been "liberalized" by multiple "conservative" administrations, this could not have happened.
Government meddling.
Rob Graham wrote:
And this National Socialist rescue of the guilty companies is being foisted on us by the Republican Administration, no one else.
Yes, it happened on their watch. I would assume the problem has been growing for more than 8 years though. The rest I agree with. I want them to explain the consequences of not bailing them out, and they also need to scrap their plan and write something that includes some oversight. And then let US decide whether or not to foot the bill. But they should first squeeze everybody who profitted for all they're worth before dropping it in our laps.
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Actually, this insinuates that Bush might be Caesar[^]. Question is, is there anybody on Capital Hill clean enough to play Brutus?
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BoneSoft wrote:
Question is, is there anybody on Capital Hill clean enough to play Brutus?
"Et Tu, Johannes?" But it's importantant to remember that it was Caesar's nephew who became the first Emperor of Rome. Big Julie, Marc Anthony, Brutus, Crassius, Cleopatra -- all dead.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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Rob Graham wrote:
They're sure fighting harder to give away more borrowed money to the banks and insurers that ran amuck without regulation.
And what choice do they have? If they don't do it they risk a meltdown of the entire international economy. All of this was inevitable from the very first moment Fannie Mae was created.
Rob Graham wrote:
He'll be rembembered as the destroyer of the mighty US Econmomy, and of the republican party, for neither will likely ever recover. Another $T to the national debt in one weeks time. Unbelievable.
All of which will enable the real culprits to cause even more havoc which will end up blamed on some future president.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
All of which will enable the real culprits to cause even more havoc which will end up blamed on some future president.
It was Bush's watch. He's not innocent, just stupid and venal. The "real culprits" are everyone that has been part of this mess and who had any power to stop it from happening. No exceptions.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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BoneSoft wrote:
But from what I understand it's Clinton's "sub-prime mortgage" that killed us.
Until Reagan reformed the tax code, Mortgages were safe, secure, and boring. By eliminating the tax exemption for all other kids of debt, he made them attractive far beyond their intrinsic worth. Ask all the credit card companies. Clinton's people certainly pushed sub-prime mortages, but remember that Clinton's Whitehouse had to get Newt Gingrich's Congress to go along on everything that was done.
BoneSoft wrote:
Because from what I gather it doesn't sound like there's much of a choice
There's always a choice. In this case we are being assured by the people, like Paulson, who caused the problem and the people who were supposed to oversee the system so no-one could create a problem, like Dodd, that, if we hand them a blank check for a trillion dollars (yes, it's supposed to be less, and if you believe it will be, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you) then they (and they alone) will be able to fix this problem they either caused or allowed to be caused. All we have to do is trust them. :wtf: I don't want to play Charlie Brown to their Lucy. They will yank the football away - no question about it. And they will all get richer while they do it.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
Oakman wrote:
Clinton's people certainly pushed sub-prime mortages, but remember that Clinton's Whitehouse had to get Newt Gingrich's Congress to go along on everything that was done.
Fair enough.
Oakman wrote:
There's always a choice.
God I hope so, I'm not in the least bit interested in wasting my tax money on this. But nobody is tell us what the alternative is. But I guess they woudln't if they have a trillion dollar agenda.
Oakman wrote:
a blank check for a trillion dollars (yes, it's supposed to be less, and if you believe it will be, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you)
The plan says no more than $700B at any time, meaning certainly more. I'm starting to think that maybe the Mayans might have been onto something, except that I'm not so sure we can last until 2012.
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Oakman wrote:
Which includes George Bush the way I parse socialism.
I'm not sure one can describe the Bush political philosophy as socialism some much as corporate welfarism. there really is no name I can think of for this scale of plundering the treasury (read middle class) to line the pockets of the rich. Paulson and cronies should be (I can't say it, FBI would be on me in a minute...). I can only hope that the Democrats force the inclusion of some limits on the degree to which the executives involved can benefit from this. I have given up on the Republicans. They have truly betrayed every conservative principle. I begin to think this was deliberate, to insure that the next Administration would have no money left for social programs, or for that matter, anything else...
Rob Graham wrote:
I'm not sure one can describe the Bush political philosophy as socialism some much as corporate welfarism.
I think Bush's political philosphy was best summed up as "I'm all right, Jack - blow you all!"
Rob Graham wrote:
I begin to think this was deliberate, to insure that the next Administration would have no money left for social programs, or for that matter, anything else...
Remember 2000, when everyone was arguing over how to spend the surplus?
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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Stan Shannon wrote:
All of which will enable the real culprits to cause even more havoc which will end up blamed on some future president.
It was Bush's watch. He's not innocent, just stupid and venal. The "real culprits" are everyone that has been part of this mess and who had any power to stop it from happening. No exceptions.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
Oakman wrote:
The "real culprits" are everyone that has been part of this mess and who had any power to stop it from happening. No exceptions.
There are specific culprits - and unless we identify them we cannot hope to fix the problem that caused all this. Should Bush and the republicans have done far more to avert all this? Absolutely. But there was constant opposition from the left to any kind of real fix (just as there is for the coming social security meltdown) and there was no courage from any politician to risk what would have been extremely unpopular legislation before the real crisis was upon us. I would be more than happy to support throwing all of these assholes out by whatever means possible. But I am not going to help sugar coat what is a clear cut case of the failure of leftist centralized planning. We conservatives were correct. We have always been correct. The only possible change that will fix all of this is an immediate abandonment of every political principles integrated into our government since the 1930's. The New Deal and the Great Society and all related legislation should be ripped out by the roots. If you are not for that than stop complaining about Bush and what the republicans did or did not do, because you are most certainly as much a part of the problem as they are.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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BoneSoft wrote:
Question is, is there anybody on Capital Hill clean enough to play Brutus?
"Et Tu, Johannes?" But it's importantant to remember that it was Caesar's nephew who became the first Emperor of Rome. Big Julie, Marc Anthony, Brutus, Crassius, Cleopatra -- all dead.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
True, but Caesar didn't have the Secret Service. ;)
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shiftedbitmonkey wrote:
We should not be bailing them out.
I agree with you. But Zepplin paints an awfully bleak picture of a world where we don't bail-out.
shiftedbitmonkey wrote:
And why would conservatives support this socialist move?
Personally, I don't support it. But it's sounding like there's not much of an option at this point. Personally, I say we seize the assets of everybody who profited from this and sell them into slavery to fund a recovery.
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BoneSoft wrote:
sell them into slavery to fund a recovery
A bit harsh, perhaps if we called it 30,000 hours community service, and require those to be served in .. oh .. Helmand, say :D
Bar fomos edo pariyart gedeem, agreo eo dranem abal edyero eyrem kalm kareore
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If there is one group of people who do not deserve the slightest bit of blame in this entire fiasco, it is conservatives. They had nothing whatsoever to do with it. The entire thing was caused by the government forcing lenders to make loans to people who they otherwise would not have lent to. Did conservatives elect Bush? Yes, we did. Did Bush lead as a conservative? No, he did not. But the only people trying to institute any sort of regulation over fannie and freddy were George Bush and John McCain in the last couple of years, and they were defeated every time by democrat led opposition. The lack of any real regulation has been the work of liberal democrats. They are the culprits here, and them alone. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0[^] What is the proof that republicans are not directly to blame for any of this? A democrat controlled congress is not demanding hearings. They know that the only people who could possibly be found culpable are their own. None of that is to absolve the republicans for not fighting harder, they have not the courage or the will to fight this, but they sure as hell did not cause it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
March 24, 2004. The Bush Administration's Zero Down Payment Initiative is specifically designed to help first-time homebuyers purchase a home. The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) will insure 100 percent of the cost to acquire the home for first-time homebuyers, allowing them to finance the full purchase price as well as all of the closing costs. In December 2003, President Bush signed into law the American Dream Down Payment Act that authorizes $200 million in formula grants to help homebuyers with down payment and closing costs. FHA's proposed Zero Down Payment Program will complement this program. The President's goal is to expand national homeownership and add 5.5 million new minority homeowners by the end of the decade. In summary, the Administration and the Department are firmly committed to helping more American families achieve the dream of homeownership.[^]