Ren, here. I have an idea for a new topic. There are a number of us, and a few trolls to boot, that believe the free market will cure anything. Here is a story from the International Herald Tribune that blows that out of the water. Re: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Mortgage crisis has Washington putting aside free-market ideology http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/07/business/07bailout.php
http://tinyurl.com/6ydd7p
This is the most asinine post I have read yet.
Ren,
No champion of the free market has ever made a claim that every business will prosper. Good business turn a profit, bad ones (like the government created Freddie/Fannie) will go bankrupt.
Instead, taxpayers (you and I) are paying to keep two shitty business running just to play politics.
Think a little deeper…if the mom & pop store down the road was run poorly, would Uncle Sam jump in to save the day & force taxpayers to keep it open? No fucking way. Follow the money trail.
how much longer can the dollar stand the strain.are we robbing peter to pay paul until the election is over.
Somebody should seriously challenge you to a duel for saying that!
MxRacer
So apparently your “free market” ideology embraces illegal behavior as well. Fraud is a crime. If you were a investment bank and you were sold loans rated as AAA that weren’t AAA and those loans all defaulted would you be sayin “Oh that’s just the way it goes”? Try being honest.
Gee thanks for lesson about capitalism in fairyland. The problem with the way you think about this issue is that you are willing to disregard underlying criminal activity and the fact law was written by big business that enabled this disaster.
Should we all pay for it? Not in some nonexistent “ideal” world. But we don’t live in that world. We live in a world where money enables lobbyists to literally write law. We live in a world where some politicians are willing to look the other way while criminal behavior is occurring. We live in a world where people vote these bastards into office because the bastards sucker them into their own demise by appealing to the peoples greed. We live in a world where the high risk activity of the uber-rich are always covered by us because that’s the way the set it up.
You want change? Or do you want small change?
MxRacer
Poor analogy. Think deeper still. Now if ma and pa’s supplier were fraudulently selling them knock-offs then your analogy would be a bit better.
Which trail?
Oh and don’t forget to add that ma and pa’s failure would put most everyone in town out of work and on the dole. Now you’ve got an analogy.
And don’t forget that it wasn’t just Ma and Pa Kettel that were sold the fraudulent goods. It was Ma and Pa Miller, Ma and Pa Johnson, and Ma and Pa Jones.
… and if only the elected sheriff had done his job.
So when the next budget deficit hits almost a Trillion dollars…will the weak minded simply blame the current president, or will they remember this “rec league” mentality of not allowing anyone to fail…?
And with this failure of the government to control Fannie-Mae or Fredi-Mac…
How can any intelligent individual still believe national health care would be different…?
What,
Fraudulent goods? How about more of the “woe is me, I’m a victim” mentality that is the American adult’s response to their own bad decisions?
That’s how capitalism works. Guess what happens when a major employer closes? People move to where there is demand, go back to school, learn a new trade, etc.
Have you ever been to the rust belt?
surprise, surprise, phreedm the god-wad is a republican
When Asia looses confidence in our ability to pay our debts we will see the dollar buy squat
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JA24Ak04.html
thanks bush white house for protecting us from the terrorists and a special thanks to both parties for allowing them to do so with reckless spending and no accountability
ga4ry
It’s twu! It’s twu! At a time when even republicans wont call themselves republicans.
McCain is running as a non-republican and maverick. Too funny! He’s been a republican congressman for 26 years but now that the republican brand has been destroyed by BushCo “my friend” McCain is trying to distance himself from McCain.
Ren,
I looked up Godwin’s Law and Formosa’s law. I understand the point. When phreedumb and Nukenads go parading their ignorance, it serves no purpose to go flaming on them. The mentally ill already have enough on their plates.
NeoWolfe
Mxracer,
When a fifty year old assembly line worker with twenty five years of experience in an automobile production plant is put on the street, you want him to move somewhere else, learn a new trade, all the while paying the bills for himself and his family. Then start a new trade with zero experience and earn the money he needs to make ends meet? I suppose sometimes its inevitable for people to get run over by the train of capitolism, but what’s not right, or necessary, is that Americans lose their jobs because the big corporation for whom they work has moved their job to a sweatshop in China. That’s not capitolism, it’s economic suicide, but not for the companies that exist all over the globe. They will watch America sink below the waves as long as the profits keep rolling in.
NeoWolfe
Neowolfe,
That is exactly what has happened in the rust belt. I know of 4 immediate family members and at least 4 others who were in their 40s or 50s and had to start new careers. And they did quite well, all blue collar guys. This has happened all across the North East, from Detroit to Boston, Buffalo to Charleston.
That’s part of being a responsible person, 6 months to 1 year salary/pay that’s relatively liquid for immediate use when in an emergency.
Since you brought up sweatshop goods, do you ONLY buy US made, or do you just bitch about this stuff? Shop at Wal-junk? Gap? Buy cheap ass Chinese shit for your car? Tools? Shoes?
What,
If I was an investment bank, I would have looked a little further than their loan rating before purchasing billions of securities. I remember hearing something about greedy pigs being slaughtered.
In case you didn’t realilze, credit ratings are fluid. AAA can go to junk if the market swings hard enough (like the housing bubble).
I don’t know why you have to have 100% guarantees on everything in life?
MX
So what you are saying is that if you were defrauded of millions or billions you would just say “oh well, shit happens”? Do you think anybody is going to believe that? Try again. Try being honest or at least answering the question this time around.
Huh? What do credit ratings have to do with this discussion. Maybe you don’t understand the basics of what is going on here?
Mike Oxley, the Ohio Republican and head of the House financial services committee until 2006 is blaming ideologues in the White House and Alan Greenspan for the Fannie and Freddie disaster. You can read about it in The Financial Times here: http://tinyurl.com/6hdueh
BushCo shot down the Federal Housing Finance Reform Act of 2005 which could have saved us all a lot of heartache and money. You can read the act at:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h109-1461&tab=summary
MxRacer,
I suspect that your last response was total bullshit. Lets see, they lost their jobs, with union benefits, and started a new career doing what? Restaurant district manager? Wait, they’ve never so much as worked as a waiter. Construction Superintendant? Oh, wait, they’ve never driven a nail outside their own property.
More like part time cashier at a seven eleven and suddenly the rainbow breaks on the horizon. I don’t think so. And move to another location when you’re unemployed? Well, there goes the savings in one quick pop. I suspect you are not only a bullshitter, but you are also extremely naive. Do your homework about whats happening in Detroit.
NeoWolfe
In our home, being close to the financial industry, we have seen this coming for a long, long time.
Many, many mortgages were given to people who simply could not afford the house of their dreams.
And what moron would refinance their home to take cash out so they could buy the latest crap from Best Buy??
Everyone has been so busy taking cash out of their house and we have been busily trying to pay down our mortgage. How unamerican!
There is also plenty of blame to go around including the financial lobbies who bought the Senate/Congress on the latest credit card and
BANKRUPTCY schemes.
The whole economy seems directed towards a crash-and-burn except for the very wealthy.
I STRONGLY recommend Lou Dobbs’ book “The War On The Middle Class.”
Neither candidate is a prize but one will do less damage.
I think it is the “newcomer”.
We have had some interesting discussions here (at home) about all of the T-bills that we are issuing and what will happen when China wants to cash some in………..
We are not optimistic in the short- or even middle-term.
Offshoring has led the decline of American industry and since NO manufacturing equiptment is American made any longer, in the next big war we will have to buy our Lathes, Milling Machines and other required equipment from the very country that we are fighting. Truly scarey the short-sightness of the American voter, businessmen and most of all Congress- but hey – What does Congress care- they each got theirs- f the voters.