Let's See How The Republicans Will Spin This One ....
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Artist:
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Album:
Voting down of the '700 Billion Bailout Bill'.
Here is the official tallies:
In Favor:
Dems - 140
Repubs - 65
Against:
Dems - 95
Repubs - 133
Since when did the Republican Party become so fiscally responsible?
Here's how Fox (that bastian of free speech) reported the bills failure to pass.
Enjoy the 'Failures'.
Lyrics:
Don't speak of safe Messiahs,
A failure of the Modern Man,
To the centre of all life's desires,
As a whole not an also ran.
Love in a hollow field,
Break the image of your father's son,
Drawn to an inner feel,
He was thought of as the only one,
He no longer denies,
All the failures of the Modern Man.
He can't pick sides,
Sees the failures of the Modern Man.
Wise words and sympathy,
Tell the story of our history.
New strength gives a real touch,
Sense and reason make it all too much.
With a strange fatality,
Broke the spirits of a lesser man,
Some other race can see,
In his way he was the only one,
In his way he was the only one.
He no longer denies,
All the failures of the Modern Man.
No, no, no, he can't pick sides,
Sees the failures of the Modern Man.
Now that it's time to decide,
In his time he was a total man,
Taken from Caesar's side,
Kept in silence just to prove who's wrong.
He no longer denies,
All the failures of the Modern Man.
No, no, no, he can't pick sides,
Sees the failures of the Modern Man,
All the failures of the Modern Man.
Locating MOG account...
Comments (79)
Yeah, I was amused to see the McCain camp blame the Dems for putting politics ahead of the country, at the same time as the Republicans in the House claimed a "partisan speech" led to them voting down the bill.
Pot calling the kettle black?
That the feeling I got too D.
Weird times, Mr. Am, weird times.
Since when did the Repubs ever actually listen to Nancy Pelosi? Strange time to start.
Let's face it, whatever gets passed, we're the ones who are gonna get screwed.
the republicans are against the gov bailing out the people because then we'd be socialists. god forbid. why don't they look at the example set by sweden? they'll never learn...
ERIC D. HOVDE WASHINGTON LOOKING FOR SOMEONE to blame for the shambles in U.S. financial markets? As someone who owns both an investment bank and commercial banks, and also runs a hedge fund, I have sat front and center and watched as this mess unfolded. And in my view, there’s no need to look beyond Wall Street and the halls of power in Washington. The former has created the nightmare by chasing obscene profits, and the latter have allowed it to spread by not practicing the oversight that is the federal government’s responsibility. I find it hard to stomach that investment banks that caused this financial crisis immediately ran to the government asking for assistance. This is one of many eerie parallels that the current meltdown bears to the Great Depression, when Washington and the taxpayers had to step up and take unprecedented action to stabilize the financial markets and the economy. Unfortunately, the government today has already put enormous taxpayer resources at risk — bailing out investment firm Bear Stearns, mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and insurer AIG, and proposing to buy risky assets from the banking system — to stop the economy from plummeting into another depression. But these events only underscore the toxic relationship between Washington and Wall Street that has brought us to this point. To understand the role of that relationship in our current troubles, let’s go back to 1999. That was when the hype about the Internet reached its pinnacle. Technology spending by the government and corporations was booming as both sought to address economic and security fears surrounding the so-called Y2K problem, a potentially massive computer shutdown at the start of the year 2000. In the run-up to the millennium, the Federal Reserve, led by then-Chairman Alan Greenspan, began to pump money into the capital markets to deal with any financial problems that might arise from a Y2K meltdown. In the end, 2000 arrived to nothing but a wonderful celebration. But the monetary stimulus, coupled with the aforementioned hype, created an unfortunate bubble in Internet, technology and telecommunications stocks. At the center of this bubble were the large Wall Street investment banks, which understood the profit potential in promoting the technology boom to overeager clients looking for the investment of a lifetime. From mid-1999 to mid-2000, Wall Street firms took about 500 companies public, raising a total of nearly $77 billion for these companies through initial public offerings, or IPOs. For every IPO, the investment banks themselves earned an underwriting fee of 6 percent, returning them an enormous profit. But apparently that was not enough for Wall Street. As the middlemen between the insatiable investor demand for anything technology-related and young tech entrepreneurs needing to raise capital, the investment banks demanded the opportunity to invest in these companies before the public offerings, when the companies’ stocks were valued at a fraction of what they would bring post-IPO. It wasn’t uncommon for Wall Street firms to invest tens of millions of dollars in “anything.com” before taking it public, charge a multimillion-dollar fee for the public offering and then watch their investment multiply within a matter of months. Main Street investors, meanwhile, did not realize that the investment banks had essentially thrown away their underwriting guidelines, which had been in place since the Depression, to take companies public. Among these guidelines were rules requiring that a company be in business for more than five years, be profitable for two or three consecutive years and have certain levels of revenue and profitability. The business models of many of the companies that went public simply weren’t viable. Once the Internet bubble burst and the dust settled, America’s corporate landscape was littered with bankruptcies and mass layoffs, and investor losses have been estimated at more than $1 trillion. To offset the economic strain from these losses, the Fed once again rapidly increased the money supply and slashed short-term interest rates to 1 percent — a level that hadn’t been seen in more than 45 years. This enormous monetary stimulus (along with significant federal spending) energized the overall economy, but it also led to the greatest housing boom — and possible bust — this country has ever encountered. From 2002 to 2006, housing values appreciated at an astounding rate of 16 percent a year. It became impossible for the typical American family to buy an average-priced house using a conventional 30-year fixed-rate mortgage. Wall Street found another perfect opportunity to propel and take advantage of another forming bubble. The result was the explosion of toxic new mortgage products that enticed homebuyers into supporting escalating housing prices while eliminating the need for the traditional 20-percent down payment. Whether it was interest-only loans, low- or no-doc “liar loans,” or piggyback home-equity loans, the mortgage and banking industries found a way to place almost anyone with — or even without — a credit score into a home. Wall Street played its part by packaging those mortgages into complex financial products and selling them to other investors, many of whom had no idea of what they were buying or the associated risks. Once again, the investment banks raked in billions of dollars in fees, giving them incentive to keep lowering underwriting standards, allowing mortgage companies to originate and sell even the most unscrupulous home loans, which Wall Street then dumped onto the investment community. Wall Street never once questioned the ethics of these activities; it too was focused on the enormous rewards that allowed its firms to pay out an unfathomable $62 billion in bonuses in 2006 alone. Without Wall Street, the housing bubble would have ended shortly after the Fed started to raise interest rates in 2004, because no lenders would have originated these toxic mortgages if they had to keep the loans on their own balance sheets. The price of all this greed? Sadly, because of the actions of the investment banks, the mortgage industry and the rating agencies, the investment community has now incurred an estimated $1 trillion and more in losses. Even more troubling, housing prices have dropped 20 percent from their July 2006 highs, with the very real likelihood that housing could contract another 15 to 20 percent — essentially wiping out more than $4 trillion in housing values. This would be the biggest hit since the Depression to Americans’ most important asset. What is even more remarkable is that at the same time, firms such as Goldman Sachs and Lehman not only made billions of dollars packaging and selling these toxic loans, they also wagered with their own capital that the values of these investments would decline, further raising their profits. If any other industries engaged in such knowingly unscrupulous activities, there would be an immediate federal investigation. [Editor’s note: The FBI has begun a massive investigation of fraud on Wall Street.] Why is Washington so complicit in this intricate and lucrative affair? First, the Fed laid the groundwork for both these asset bubbles by lowering interest rates to historic lows. To protect his legacy after the Internet-bubble collapse, Greenspan provided unprecedented stimulus to re-inflate the economy and maintain his popularity with Wall Street. But in doing so, he spawned the largest debt and asset bubble in U.S. history. At the same time, federal regulatory agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission stood idly by as Wall Street took advantage of the investing public during both the Internet and the housing bubbles. The SEC took almost no action against Wall Street after the dot-com implosion. And in the midst of the housing bubble, in 2006, only the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency pushed for any level of regulation to address subprime lending. One has to wonder why Treasury secretaries under Presidents Clinton and Bush — Robert Rubin and Henry Paulson, especially — took no action to curb these abuses. It certainly was not because they did not understand Wall Street’s practices — both are former chief executives of Goldman Sachs. And why was Congress so silent until the disaster started to unfold? The Wall Street investment-banking firms, their executives, their families and their political-action committees contribute more to U.S. Senate and House campaigns than any other industry in America. By sprinkling some of its massive gains into the pockets of our elected officials, Wall Street bought itself protection from any tough government enforcement. This is no doubt the same reason why so many members of Congress were consistently blocking attempts to reform and downsize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are essentially giant, undercapitalized hedge funds. These two entities have been huge money machines for Democrats in both the House and the Senate, many of whom recently had the gall to ask why these companies hadn’t been reformed in the past. Nor should several Republican congressmen and senators who likewise contributed to watering down legislation aimed at reforming these institutions be let off the hook. Wall Street’s actions are now profoundly hurting American families, communities and the entire U.S. financial system. People are being thrown out of their homes. Once seemingly indestructible financial entities are succumbing to the crisis they have created and have jeopardized the stability of the global financial system. Isn’t it ironic that the same firms that preached free-market capitalism are now the ones begging for a taxpayer bailout? Many investment professionals operating in my world believe, as do I, that we are facing the greatest financial crisis since 1929. Fortunately, today we have safety nets, such as federal deposit insurance, that were nonexistent during the Great Depression. Yet there has not been a time since the 1920s when Wall Street has enjoyed as much influence over Washington as it has for the last 12 years. Let’s hope that this influence fades rapidly — and that this financial crisis doesn’t end the same way as the one of nearly 80 years ago. Eric D. Hovde is chief executive of Washington-based Hovde Capital and Hovde Acquisitions.
anna log: You want socialism so badly... I'll send ya my address and you can mail me a check directly. We can skip the whole "government" thing. Piss on this socialist bs.
Wow Jeff, I thought you were going to toast me. Interesting piece you put up there.
As far as I'm concerned this is what everyone is saying about the whole ordeal.
Today's vote shows that the Dems were on board but Repubs couldn't get it togther on the votes. What is up with that? Is it the provisions? What have you heard?
Nice try Eric.
Doomsayer,
I'm reminded of the time that Catherine - a little girl in our neighborhood told me that she wanted to be President one day. Both of her parents, liberal Democrats, were standing there with us - and I asked Catherine - 'If you were President, what would be the first thing you would do?' Catherine replied - 'I would give houses to all the homeless people.' 'Wow what a worthy goal you have there Catherine. ' I told her (while both parents beamed), 'but, you don't have to wait until you're President to help the homeless. You can come over to my house and clean up all the dog poop in the back yard and I will pay you $5. Then we can go over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $5 to use for a new house.' Catherine thought that over for a second, and then replied, 'Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and clean up the dog poop himself, and you can pay him the $5?' Welcome to the Republican Party, Catherine.
That's rich. Great anecdote.
Heh heh heh... It's amazing to me how liberals want to liberal with everyone else's money... except their own.
And Chris, I'm serious. Mail me the checks directly! WEEEEEE FREE MONEY!!!
WHAT exactly does a "community organizer" do? Barack Obama's rise has left many Americans asking themselves that question. Here's a big part of the answer: Community organizers intimidate banks into making high-risk loans to customers with poor credit. In the name of fairness to minorities, community organizers occupy private offices, chant inside bank lobbies, and confront executives at their homes - and thereby force financial institutions to direct hundreds of millions of dollars in mortgages to low-credit customers. In other words, community organizers help to undermine the US economy by pushing the banking system into a sinkhole of bad loans. And Obama has spent years training and funding the organizers who do it. THE seeds of today's financial meltdown lie in the Commu nity Reinvestment Act - a law passed in 1977 and made riskier by unwise amendments and regulatory rulings in later decades. CRA was meant to encourage banks to make loans to high-risk borrowers, often minorities living in unstable neighborhoods. That has provided an opening to radical groups like ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) to abuse the law by forcing banks to make hundreds of millions of dollars in "subprime" loans to often uncreditworthy poor and minority customers. Any bank that wants to expand or merge with another has to show it has complied with CRA - and approval can be held up by complaints filed by groups like ACORN. In fact, intimidation tactics, public charges of racism and threats to use CRA to block business expansion have enabled ACORN to extract hundreds of millions of dollars in loans and contributions from America's financial institutions. Banks already overexposed by these shaky loans were pushed still further in the wrong direction when government-sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac began buying up their bad loans and offering them for sale on world markets. Fannie and Freddie acted in response to Clinton administration pressure to boost homeownership rates among minorities and the poor. However compassionate the motive, the result of this systematic disregard for normal credit standards has been financial disaster. ONE key pioneer of ACORN's subprime-loan shakedown racket was Madeline Talbott - an activist with extensive ties to Barack Obama. She was also in on the ground floor of the disastrous turn in Fannie Mae's mortgage policies. Long the director of Chicago ACORN, Talbott is a specialist in "direct action" - organizers' term for their militant tactics of intimidation and disruption. Perhaps her most famous stunt was leading a group of ACORN protesters breaking into a meeting of the Chicago City Council to push for a "living wage" law, shouting in defiance as she was arrested for mob action and disorderly conduct. But her real legacy may be her drive to push banks into making risky mortgage loans.
In February 1990, Illinois regulators held what was believed to be the first-ever state hearing to consider blocking a thrift merger for lack of compliance with CRA. The challenge was filed by ACORN, led by Talbott. Officials of Bell Federal Savings and Loan Association, her target, complained that ACORN pressure was undermining its ability to meet strict financial requirements it was obligated to uphold and protested being boxed into an "affirmative-action lending policy." The following years saw Talbott featured in dozens of news stories about pressuring banks into higher-risk minority loans. IN April 1992, Talbott filed an other precedent-setting com plaint using the "community support requirements" of the 1989 savings-and-loan bailout, this time against Avondale Federal Bank for Savings. Within a month, Chicago ACORN had organized its first "bank fair" at Malcolm X College and found 16 Chicago-area financial institutions willing to participate. Two months later, aided by ACORN organizer Sandra Maxwell, Talbott announced plans to conduct demonstrations in the lobbies of area banks that refused to attend an ACORN-sponsored national bank "summit" in New York. She insisted that banks show a commitment to minority lending by lowering their standards on downpayments and underwriting - for example, by overlooking bad credit histories. By September 1992, The Chicago Tribune was describing Talbott's program as "affirma- tive-action lending" and ACORN was issuing fact sheets bragging about relaxations of credit standards that it had won on behalf of minorities. And Talbott continued her effort to, as she put it, drag banks "kicking and screaming" into high-risk loans. A September 1993 story in The Chicago Sun-Times presents her as the leader of an initiative in which five area financial institutions (including two of her former targets, now plainly cowed - Bell Federal Savings and Avondale Federal Savings) were "participating in a $55 million national pilot program with affordable-housing group ACORN to make mortgages for low- and moderate-income people with troubled credit histories." What made this program different from others, the paper added, was the participation of Fannie Mae - which had agreed to buy up the loans. "If this pilot program works," crowed Talbott, "it will send a message to the lending community that it's OK to make these kind of loans." Well, the pilot program "worked," and Fannie Mae's message that risky loans to minorities were "OK" was sent. The rest is financial-meltdown history. IT would be tough to find an "on the ground" community organizer more closely tied to the subprime-mortgage fiasco than Madeline Talbott. And no one has been more supportive of Madeline Talbott than Barack Obama. When Obama was just a budding community organizer in Chicago, Talbott was so impressed that she asked him to train her personal staff.
He returned to Chicago in the early '90s, just as Talbott was starting her pressure campaign on local banks. Chicago ACORN sought out Obama's legal services for a "motor voter" case and partnered with him on his 1992 "Project VOTE" registration drive. In those years, he also conducted leadership-training seminars for ACORN's up-and-coming organizers. That is, Obama was training the army of ACORN organizers who participated in Madeline Talbott's drive against Chicago's banks. More than that, Obama was funding them. As he rose to a leadership role at Chicago's Woods Fund, he became the most powerful voice on the foundation's board for supporting ACORN and other community organizers. In 1995, the Woods Fund substantially expanded its funding of community organizers - and Obama chaired the committee that urged and managed the shift. That committee's report on strategies for funding groups like ACORN features all the key names in Obama's organizer network. The report quotes Talbott more than any other figure; Sandra Maxwell, Talbott's ACORN ally in the bank battle, was also among the organizers consulted. MORE, the Obama-supervised Woods Fund report ac knowledges the problem of getting donors and foundations to contribute to radical groups like ACORN - whose confrontational tactics often scare off even liberal donors and foundations. Indeed, the report brags about pulling the wool over the public's eye. The Woods Fund's claim to be "nonideological," it says, has "enabled the Trustees to make grants to organizations that use confrontational tactics against the business and government 'establishments' without undue risk of being criticized for partisanship." Hmm. Radicalism disguised by a claim to be postideological. Sound familiar? The Woods Fund report makes it clear Obama was fully aware of the intimidation tactics used by ACORN's Madeline Talbott in her pioneering efforts to force banks to suspend their usual credit standards. Yet he supported Talbott in every conceivable way. He trained her personal staff and other aspiring ACORN leaders, he consulted with her extensively, and he arranged a major boost in foundation funding for her efforts. And, as the leader of another charity, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Obama channeled more funding Talbott's way - ostensibly for education projects but surely supportive of ACORN's overall efforts. In return, Talbott proudly announced her support of Obama's first campaign for state Senate, saying, "We accept and respect him as a kindred spirit, a fellow organizer." IN short, to understand the roots of the subprime-mort gage crisis, look to ACORN's Madeline Talbott. And to see how Talbott was able to work her mischief, look to Barack Obama. Then you'll truly know what community organizers do.
That's Barney Frank's story, and he's sticking to it. As the Massachusetts Democrat has explained it in recent days, the current financial crisis is the spawn of the free market run amok, with the political class guilty only of failing to rein the capitalists in. The Wall Street meltdown was caused by "bad decisions that were made by people in the private sector," Frank said; the country is in dire straits today "thanks to a conservative philosophy that says the market knows best." And that philosophy goes "back to Ronald Reagan, when at his inauguration he said, 'Government is not the answer to our problems; government is the problem.' " In fact, that isn't what Reagan said. His actual words were: "In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." Were he president today, he would be saying much the same thing. Because while the mortgage crisis convulsing Wall Street has its share of private-sector culprits -- many of whom have been learning lately just how pitiless the private sector’s discipline can be -- they weren't the ones who "got us into this mess." Barney Frank's talking points notwithstanding, mortgage lenders didn't wake up one fine day deciding to junk long-held standards of creditworthiness in order to make ill-advised loans to unqualified borrowers. It would be closer to the truth to say they woke up to find the government twisting their arms and demanding that they do so - or else. The roots of this crisis go back to the Carter administration. That was when government officials, egged on by left-wing activists, began accusing mortgage lenders of racism and "redlining" because urban blacks were being denied mortgages at a higher rate than suburban whites. The pressure to make more loans to minorities (read: to borrowers with weak credit histories) became relentless. Congress passed the Community Reinvestment Act, empowering regulators to punish banks that failed to "meet the credit needs" of "low-income, minority, and distressed neighborhoods." Lenders responded by loosening their underwriting standards and making increasingly shoddy loans. The two government-chartered mortgage finance firms, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, encouraged this "subprime" lending by authorizing ever more "flexible" criteria by which high-risk borrowers could be qualified for home loans, and then buying up the questionable mortgages that ensued. All this was justified as a means of increasing homeownership among minorities and the poor. Affirmative-action policies trumped sound business practices. A manual issued by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston advised mortgage lenders to disregard financial common sense. "Lack of credit history should not be seen as a negative factor," the Fed's guidelines instructed. Lenders were directed to accept welfare payments and unemployment benefits as "valid income sources" to qualify for a mortgage. Failure to comply could mean a lawsuit. As long as housing prices kept rising, the illusion that all this was good public policy could be sustained. But it didn't take a financial whiz to recognize that a day of reckoning would come. "What does it mean when Boston banks start making many more loans to minorities?" I asked in this space in 1995. "Most likely, that they are knowingly approving risky loans in order to get the feds and the activists off their backs . . . When the coming wave of foreclosures rolls through the inner city, which of today's self-congratulating bankers, politicians, and regulators plans to take the credit?" Frank doesn't. But his fingerprints are all over this fiasco. Time and time again, Frank insisted that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were in good shape. Five years ago, for example, when the Bush administration proposed much tighter regulation of the two companies, Frank was adamant that "these two entities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not facing any kind of financial crisis." When the White House warned of "systemic risk for our financial system" unless the mortgage giants were curbed, Frank complained that the administration was more concerned about financial safety than about housing. Now that the bubble has burst and the "systemic risk" is apparent to all, Frank blithely declares: "The private sector got us into this mess." Well, give the congressman points for gall. Wall Street and private lenders have plenty to answer for, but it was Washington and the political class that derailed this train. If Frank is looking for a culprit to blame, he can find one suspect in the nearest mirror. Jeff Jacoby can be reached at jacoby@globe.com.
I think we can blame the government in general for the mess we are in. Not just Dems or Republicans.
geez... I think a simple link would do. I agree with you Chris ... I am so tired of this blame game ... maybe if the rug really is pulled out from under us in a big way we'll start to see some humanity again ...
I have worked as a community organizer. What was just posted had nothing to do with what I did or what any of my superiors did.
That's good - blame the poor black people who were offered high interest rates without collateral to stimulate the economy. This country has consistently blamed the marginalized for its problems.
You think these people are begging for entitlements? You think they ask to be dependent on a state that villifies them? Many organizers do put themselves in a gatekeeper position, essentially securing their political place and not really empowering their constituents. But you are painting with an awfully broad paint brush. How much money did you inherit when your grandparents died? What do you stand to gain when your parents pass? In what ways were you criminalized in your educatinal system? I am sure you worked hard, but in what ways did you take for granted a starting point that to others would seem like a pretty nice plateau?
I think you make short work of the fact that blacks are 7-8 generations removed from not owning property but being property. Are they just supposed to stay in their place and not want a home? This CRA argument does not hold a breath of hot air. I expect a better debate in the future.
And yes, Capitalism in this country was built on cheap labor. And the common law is largely infatuated with maintaining vested property rights. Who has the property? Let's not blame the poor people. They are trying to play someone else's game by someone else's rules.
Humanity and a new life seem the only alternative. And no, I am not talking about socialism.
Oatmeal, you sure have internalized all the false premises of the left that's for sure.
Rule # 1) When you're caught doing something like Barney Frank, Chris Dodd & and even the good Senator have been....boldly assert that "now's not the time to play the blame game."
Chris asserts, correctly, that he thinks... we can blame the government in general for the mess we are in. Not just Dems or Republicans. Without recognizing the ideological underpinnings that lead to the current crisis.
"Chris asserts, correctly, that he thinks... we can blame the government in general for the mess we are in. Not just Dems or Republicans. Without recognizing the ideological underpinnings that lead to the current crisis."
I'm sorry DMDM ... but you never come across as even handed ... as one who can see both sides ... if that is what you are claiming you do. In fact I see some of your comments evoke some of the most partisan rancour of anyone here.
Especially when you make a statement such as "you sure have internalized all the false premises of the left that's for sure."
For all the fingers you point ... try pointing one back yourself for a change.
Ok ... sorry bout that ... Jeff. I really don't want to get personal ... but I know Amiel (oatmeal) personally ... and that statement above just felt too much like a personal attack to me... he was responding from his own perspective and you basically called what he acts upon, false...
I haven't even the energy to put in my two cents. I worry for this country. This is what lays ahead of us, and still most of the talk on the hill is partisan.
"The point is this is one of the most important irrevokable economic decisions we will ever make. Let's make it in a state of panic."
— Stephen Colbert
A little tip from Douglas Rushkoff on riding this whole thing out.
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/09/30/riding-out-the-credi.html
The only ideological underpinning that truly got us here was greed. We have to blame ourselves, we are the only true check on the power of government.
As far as me "internaliz[ing] all the false premises of the left," I have no idea about what that means. You seem to have internalized so much that you are not explaining something that you take as granted, and to which I have no way to respond because you don't specify.
Community organizers try to buld consensus and have a constant duty to empower and educate, but to not overstep their bounds. I totally get the stereotype of independently wealthy yankee carpet bagger liberals, but what you have to understand is that is not representative. I am not talking about any white man's burden. I AM PRETTY SURE THAT ONLY 16% OF THE CENSUS POPULATION IS BLACK, so then how many of these bad mortgages can you honestly pin on them and the left that obviously cater to this overhwelming political block (sarcasm). These bad mortgages went to poor people who could not afford them. Organizers build consensus to maximize political power for a common goal - an admirable trait in an executive.
As for all this Barney Frank stuff I did not even read those comments. I am not defending these guys, I don't even know what you accuse them of. So please con't construe my commenst in that way.
Capitalism means you need capital, in this day of age capital means credit. You borrow now at a short term rate to invest and pay it off. How do you get credit or assets for investment/collateral? Well you build it up over time.
For example Lehmann Bros histroy: (from wiki)
In the 1850s Southern United States, cotton was one of the most important crops. Capitalizing on cotton's high market value, the three brothers began to routinely accept raw cotton from customers as payment for merchandise, eventually beginning a second business trading in cotton. Within a few years this business grew to become the most significant part of their operation. Following Henry's death from yellow fever in 1855,[8][11] the remaining brothers continued to focus on their commodities-trading/brokerage operations.
WHO PICKED THAT COTTON!? WHO WAS IN THE POSITION TO PROFIT FROM IT!? If you can't understand this then you can't understand why affirmative action is a good thing, despite the flaws.
You can't wish away history becaiuse you want things to be color blind. Did you kow that bank's used to redline neighborhhods and refuse to loan for property in those areas. This was mortgage discrimination and the realization that money could be made in the rush to the suburbs and increase for demand there all roled into one, and it was legal due to notions of property rights and capitalism resulting in financial institution and governmentally sanctioned white flight and urban decay. Besides the inflated value of in demand property on the ever-expanding periphery of cities and the profits to lending institutions, there was the obvious manufacturing boom for all that plumbing, lumber, and household goods. The poeple with capital were making profit fueled by racist neding practices and racial fears. Cuts both ways DM!
I am not asking for you to adopt my views, but to at least realize that some of your own unspecified assumptions may also be a real problem. I myslef do not put capitalism on a pedastal.
Some grammatical errors in my comment, but the idea is that for people who want to participate in capitalism to have a chance they need to have either an educational or property based bit of equity to leverage into participation. Affirmative action did come under the commerce clause of the constitution after all! So once again I ask you, should people just stay in their place or should they try to play the game. Who bears the risk of the loan? A minority trying to get some capital that could perhaps lead to some home equity that he could borrow against - or a big ass bank. The banks fucked this one up, the top of the food chain fucked this one up. But we all play a part. I assume very little.
Please rebut.
I am in massive fucking despair that a post about the failure of the House Republicans to support the continued operation of a business venture ended up with some ugly racial overtones about community organizers, and what have you. Fucking hell people! WE are being used by nonsensical pundits and talk radio rabble rousers who are being used by the party elites to chop us up into governable pieces. And we buy into it.
Republican comments about Nancy Pelosi is cover for the fact that they didn't support it becuase they are tied into an ideological fantasy of fucking laissez-faire. That never happened, read some history. The US govt from its inception has supported businesses, let them get too greedy and unregulated, then stepped in to regulate and protect workers etc. Child labor laws, mandatory schooling laws, 5 day workweeks, all were the result of such things.
For those considering that Oatmeal (or me) have bought into the left wing fantasy, please check out this video from PBS called Traces of the Trade.
The reality is the Congress will get its shit together and pass some form of bailout. There's no way the single largest drop in Dow history will let them off the hook now. If only for the cynical reason they need to fund raise.
I'm off to listen to some of Dzend's more ambient musings to get my blood pressure down.....
Here here, the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior.
I commiserate with the plight of Repub's in the house. They are between a rock and a hard place, facing re-election but also forced to choose between a president that is unpopular or the anti-socialist propaganda that was overly simplified and has now put them in an untenable position. They are just gaining a little political cover with the Dems supporting it. Now they can say this is some more tax and spend Dems fodder stuff. Or claim that they were being fiscally conservative. Either way, everyone on that hill eats at the same bowl, and that bowl is filled by corporate donors. When the money is comiung in all is well.
Relaxation now...
relaxation now...
And I did not mean to make it so racial, but the argument that the policies of fair lending are to blame I find hard to swallow. Apologies to DM or anyone else who was offended. All policies have repercussions of course. If anyone has a better system, please stand up.
@ Contra-- that link is excellent. The key paragraphs to me are (sorry for the copy...)
"Sure, this has happened before. It’s just that, traditionally, when wealth disparity got too great and there wasn’t enough money in the right places, the wealthiest bankers temporarily suspended their greed to bail out the system. Or progressive tax policies opened corporate coffers, permitting a “New Deal” that employed people while rebuilding the infrastructure required to make real things and provide real services to citizens.
Today, however, such temporary restraints on greed are systematically untenable and philosophically unthinkable. Conservatives are still so angry about New Deal reforms of the 1930s that that they have infused politics and banking with an economic ideology that sees any regulation of worker exploitation or predatory investment as anti-capitalist, anti-American, and even anti-God.
So instead we are the beneficiaries of “wink” reform: stuff that’s supposed to make us feel good while reassuring the speculators that their interests will remain paramount. A few hundred dollars mailed to every American family creates the illusion that government is lending a helping hand, but this money is not redistributing anything. It’s being taken from the same people who are receiving it, in the hope that they’ll just pump it back into the system at Wal-Mart or the Exxon station."
oh, and because Joxley's post combined strong statistical analysis with appropriate graphics, this needs to be included.
hey, that new woody allen movie is a good one...
oh wait, here's the real key paragraph people:
" Whatever the case, the best thing you can do to protect yourself and your interests is to make friends. The more we are willing to do for each other on our own terms and for compensation that doesn’t necessarily involve the until-recently-almighty dollar, the less vulnerable we are to the movements of markets that, quite frankly, have nothing to do with us.
"If you’re sourcing your garlic from your neighbor over the hill instead of the Big Ag conglomerate over the ocean, then shifts in the exchange rate won’t matter much. If you’re using a local currency to pay your mechanic to adjust your brakes, or your chiropractor to adjust your back, then a global liquidity crisis won’t affect your ability to pay for either. If you move to a place because you’re looking for smart people instead of a smart real estate investment, you’re less likely to be suckered by high costs of a “hot” city or neighborhood, and more likely to find the kinds of people willing to serve as a social network, if for no other reason than they’re less busy servicing their mortgages.
"The more connected you are to the real world, and the more consciously you reject the lure of the speculative ladder, the less of a willing dupe you’ll be in the pyramid scheme that’s in the process of collapsing all around us at this moment.
"Think small. Buy local. Make friends. Print money. Grow food. Teach children. Learn nutrition. And if you do have money to invest, put it into whatever lets you and your friends do those things."
Oatmeal for Prez.
Seriously, though - I'm sure you've seen disparity in the form of greed, corruption, ignorance, etc. all shape and sizes down in NO. I appreciate your input, as a person whose been there. I can only offer conjecture from the saftey of my 9-5.
The more you know the more you realize you know nothing.
Dharmachris-
By coincidence, I have been reading up and taking part in the Urban Agricultural movement. I would love to see people abolish lawns for the sake of food (lawns are extremely wasteful of resources and offer almost no return on investment). If we planted Victory Gardens in the face of rising fuel and food costs we could make more of a difference then we think. If we returned to eating seasonally, and planting smart we might avoid this monoculture of the global food market.
I do it for the fun of it, but I like the connection to my food, learning and teaching my children about where the food they eat comes from.
There's something about the goodwill that is offered to neighbors through the giving of an overabundance of vegetables. It allows you to really connect to your neighbors, in a way you might have never before.
Oh now this is turning in a good direction ... Dharmachris you asked how life on the island was for me ... well my thoughts are constantly tending in this direction ... community and supporting each other .... I am still very much interested in farming and may make some major changes in the near future. I feel that there is a positive community that will come together in times of need, and that is comforting (if not actually tested fully). The recently passed farm bill actually contained some money, albeit small in comparison to the money for big ag-biz, for education of Community Supported Agriculture... some grants were written out here by Tilth members and there should be a training program in place... I am thinking about that program, yet that will take some major readjustments which I am still contemplating.
CBW .. it is amazing what people can grow in very limited space ... AND it can look beautiful too.
Speaking of ... we just harvested our corn recently ... first time growing it, must of known I'm from the midwest originally :)
Totally. I'm limited in land here in FLA, but I have more than enough space to grow lots of food. I also get to start my garden this weekend. I love the "Food Not Lawns" mentality. I suggest anyone read "The Urban Homestead"
http://www.homegrownevolution.com
Corn, huh? I'm thinking about it, but I'm not sure with space and every thing. I'm doing raised beds, so I'm a little more limited.
You would be surprised Tyler ... we did the three sisters guild .. you plant 3-4 seeds of corn real close together at four spots, then beans. The beans use the corn as a pole to climb and they fix the nitrogen in the soil for the corn... and then in between we planted pumpkins .. all in a raised bed appx 3-4 ft wide and maybe 10-12 ft long, of course our pathway is a bit overgrown from the pumpkins.... but we have some nice big ones gonna be ready for halloween.
I've read about this. It's kinda the basis for perma culture isn't it? Mog mail me any links you've got on it. I've got to investigate this further.
Hmmm, showing up on a politically-oriented post, throwing a few stink bombs, insulting/patronizing those who disagree, then disappearing. Why does this feel familiar?
three sisters,,, that sounds good. I'm determined to do raised beds nextg year. All that ties into the current economic crisis and energy problems, too, but i gotta cook some food.... though, alas, not grown here on the Woodlot Ranch.
All I can say is Wow! I'll have to read these comments and come back to my own post later. Dinner now Politics later.
I got to say Ivy I am trying to open communications but they don't seem to work. I think it is par for the course.
Chris, your intentions are honorable, and this post has shed a lot of light. I'm glad I showed up, as is inevitably the case when I check out one of your posts.
But the precondition for open communication has to be an honest desire to engage with other people. Which involves listening thoughtfully, maintaining an open mind, respecting other people's opinions and all that other wussy liberal crap.
As it always is on my page Bill. If you filter out the detritus you may stike gold.
It happens once in awhile.
Actually, it happens considerably more often than that....
In all fairness I think Jeff was at least civil if not totally tactful. I have to read his comments a bit more to get the drift.
Thanks for thew vote of confidence my friend.
"You sure have internalized all the false premises of the left that's for sure." The arrogance of that is breathtaking.
Okay I'll give you that. I guess he was looking for a fight, which he got in spades.
..... Stepping in, looking to see if it's safe to enter and talk about growing corn or at the very least, some music......
Did someone say corn? I'd love some cobs.
Chris my next post is way less cerebral and caustic.
Haha, sorry gang. Could not let that one slide. Corn is good, I just wish I was not worried about the lead content of may back yard... doh!
That bites man. Heavy metals aren't good for the brain.
Yeah, it is a common issue in parts of NOLA that flooded when the levies broke.
Step away from MOG for a day and a half and this is what I come back to. Damn.
What was that about Scarlett Johannsen?
Did someone say sexpot? I'd love some thank you.
Okay, what did we learn from this exercise?
1) hot pics of hot chicks are always appreciated
2) certain people need to seriously chill and actually listen
3) as the scarecrow says, "It's gonna get a lot darker before it starts to get lighter." Or something like that.
Chuck I think you just earned yourself some extra recess time.
WHATDYA MEAN HEAVY METAL'S NOT GUD FOR THE BRIAN?
It's true Eric, there is no daily recommended dose of lead in the current Federal Guidelines. So quit chewing on those sinkers and save them for fishing.
You know I was going to make a post tonight about an article a friend sent me. It was from the New York Times, way back in 1999 when Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac first started loaning out to people with less-than-desirable situations, you know, what got them in this miss int he first place. The article warned of what would happen if the market turned, and how a bailout would be necessary--basically it predicted this. It was interesting, but I decided against it after reading all this. Didn't want to risk starting something else!
Give it up Chuck, I'd like to see it.
Okay. Give me a few.
yeah give it up.....
and additional pics of ms johansen are always appreciated.
just venting with some facts - people need to either swear the whole thing off or get the history right and continue to try and fix things, capitalism is not apple pie, it is not infallible, just as people are not infallible
Do you think it is a good system? Capitalism I mean.
I ask cause I'm curious.
I wish a Brit would comment about what they think about socialism or some variation of it.
Oatmeal, you've clearly never listened to rush limbaugh or watched Bill OReilly. They are infallible.
Or so it would seem.
If America = baseball, hot dogs and apple pie, and Capitalism = America, the Capitalism = apple pie.
Oh, and if anyone is interested in definitions of economic systems..some of this reminds me of the old joke comparisons of economic systems...we might be in Hong Kong capitalism
CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.
HONG KONG CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax deduction for keeping five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via a Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority shareholder, who sells the rights to all seven cows' milk back to the listed company. The annual report says that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Meanwhile, you kill the two cows because the Feng Shui is bad.
I am not getting notifications for replies on your posts... (sigh)
That bites. Did you get notif on my last post?
Your missing out on a tear jerking good time.
I really don't care to make a value call, but I can't stand it when someone suggests it is perfect and will solve all problems. We're human, nothing is perfect and someone who tells you that something is perfect has something to gain from the idea. So I just want to encourage free and open dialogue with neighbors.
All of this will sort out, but not without effort and some airing out of delusions, and some real suffering I am afraid - you know?
That's cool and agreed.
Stand by for heavy seas.
Oat and the Chrises, you're parents, so you would get this analogy. You think your kids are great, but you also realize that without discipline and rules - not necessarily onerous, there-for-their-own-sake rules, but ones that keep them safe and teach them responsibility - are necessary. It is absolutely the same for markets. In the place of sensible regulation - which is the equivalent of discipline and rules for markets, to keep them safe and keep them responsible - we've adopted this mindset that to fetter them is to break faith with capitalism. Sort of the same way that some parents decide that to discipline their kids in any way is to stifle their creativity. As I mentioned in another MOG post, this is, in effect, asking people to choose between making a huge pot of money for themselves and serving the greater good. Most people, actually, would probably choose the greater good. But it only takes a handful of people, in this case, to royally bollix things up.
By the way, Chris G., your Hong Kong joke reminds me of another one I heard years ago, courtesy of a friend who was working there: What's the Hong Kong definition of a pervert? A man who prefers women to money.
Sorry, didn't quite close the circle on that last comment. The idea, which you probably got anyway, is that capitalism and regulation are not enemies - in fact, capitalism is improved as a system when it is subhject to reasonable discipline. Not that you would ever expect our free-markets-are-God ideological friends to ever accept this idea.....
Did someone mention corn - which can produce ethanol, which might help us avoid reliance on foreign oil, which might then shift power away from the oil-company toadies who have greedily plundered this country and the assets of its people and encouraged adventuring in Middle East to control oil fields in the guise of fighting terrorism? Mmmm...Corn. It's delicious this time of year. And I hear that Scarlett Jo likes to nibble on a cob now and again.
Notifications arrived sometime after I bailed last night. I will be attending some sites soon.
Wow Eric, you must have did something to piss off the Mog God.
Not enough Heavy Metal in my diet I think.
i must need some heavy metal too then, as some notifications are not getting to me either...
at the risk of throwing some fuel on a guttering fire, these articles on white privilege came my way for some interesting reading. This one, by Tim Wise, is a definitely a button-pusher. The other, unpacking the invisible knapsack, is a pretty common staple when facilitating conversation about race and class. That really changed the way I think about race. I thnk it gets to some of what Oatmeal was talking about too.
say, where's that corn....
Since when did the Republican Party become so fiscally responsible?
Since never - take a look back at who's run up the big deficitis for the last fifty or so years...
Deadmandeadman: And you accuse me of being unbalanced and biased on the issue of the Shrub and his illegal war?
May i recommend one thing? Mr Paragraph is your friend. Those huge blocks of undifferentiated text vomites on the page are virtually unreadabl - but that's okay because i can perceive the bias from the first few words of each one.
Mike the Knife says:
Except that it won't. For two reasons:Except that it won't. For two reasons:
and
Better to go to sugar cane (as Brazil does) or sugar beets as the feedstock for ethanol production - or to continue the promising research into general biomass ethanol - using microorganisms to crack cellulose and other plant components to simpler sugars that can be converted to ethanol cheaply and efficiently.
(Sugar cane would have the added advantage that it would provide an economic boost to economically-depressed parts of the South; and kudzu would be a good feedstock for biomass production - again beneifiting the South, and you could get multiple crops a year; you can actually see the damned stuff growing on a good day.)
Sorry, ff. Corn-mania. Got caught up in a craving for tender little niblits, tossed in a salad with arugula, sweet onion and a dash of balsamic vinegar. We elitists do love our gourmet grub. My mistake in imagining it as an a-maize-ing cure-all that would save the Republic.
Corn is good for drinking too. Many forget that.
Three or four years ago, on a visit to Texas, I saw a great bumpersticker: "Real conservatives don't do deficits."
fascinating thread. thank goodness there was an opportunity to rest my eyes on Scarlett Jo for a minute!
i especially love the story about the little girl, the dog poop and the homeless. fables for the new millenium.
it's my understanding (which is very limited in the area of politics) that the republicans voted in true Republican style of laissez-faire government. but saying that is like saying old-school Christians were hippies living in tune with the earth. what we call Republican today (and Christian) is not based on the same tenets the party was founded on.
i wasn't implying any connection between Republicans and Christians here. just that each has diverged far from its roots.