I have changed my view.

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Originally Posted by Elliette

What I find funny (as in it makes me want to scream) is that the Obama policies are so very close to the Bush policies that the factional fighting means something close to nothing at this point.

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Thats because there are no real differences between the candidates, we the people will scratch each others eyes out for our prefered candidate, while the powers that be who own/control those candidates go about their business as usual. It wouldnt have mattered wether you voted McCain or Obama, you wouldve gotten the same thing, its just how policies are presented that make them left or right. Government of the corporation, by the corporation, for the corporation.

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Originally Posted by Wildtim

^^^^THats right folks we allow that to vote too!!!

WOW.

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What I like about forums like this is that people with widely varying viewpoints get to bounce their ideas around. Tim, are you really that surprised to find people who are displeased with Bush/Cheney policies of the past eight years? I am one, even though I voted for them in 2000.
Cheney can defend torture all he wants. That doesn't make it right, or good for our country.

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Originally Posted by VeeDubb65

I agreed with some of what you said, and ignored a lot of it, but I can't let this one go.

The problems with our economy started largely with the collapse of Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac. If you think Bush and/or Cheney were responsible for that, you've missed a few important pieces of history, like the fact that Republicans in congress tried for several years to push reforms to those organizations, because their imminent collapse was clear to see, and they were stopped by House Democrats at every turn.

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How's that? Republicans controlled congress, the senate and the white house for six years? What did the democrats filibuster or block?

I agee that there is plenty of blame to go around for this economic collapse in both parties (especially Bill Clinton for repealing glass steagall)

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Originally Posted by VeeDubb65

"Presidents are just like baseball pitchers. They get too much credit when things go right, and too much blame when things go wrong."

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Agreed on this one!

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Originally Posted by VeeDubb65

Also, regardless of which party is doing what, I'd rather see NOTHING done about the economy than see this idiotic bailout dump trillions of dollars into companies which will continue to waste it.

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It's easy to play monday morning quarterback, and just SAY that everything would've come up roses if we just let every major financial institution in the US fail....but, really, stop and think what would've happened..... pretty much every economist in this country agreed that it would almost certainly lead to a massive despression, possibly worse than the great depression....in short:

- Massive failure of banks would've caused a run on the credit markets and commerical paper, credit would completely freeze up, debts would be called in, leading to further isolation of credit.
- without access to money markets and commercial paper, businesses would collapse in numbers never seen before in this country.
- massive unemployment would lead to even less spending, resulting in even more layoffs, again less spending, more layoffs, etc...a downward spiral of unemployment like this country has never seen
- Due to frozen credit markets and massive unemployment, homeowners would find it nearly impossible to refinance or get loans to pay their mortgage and families would become homeless in record numbers.
- in a worst case scenario there would be a run on the dollar and other countries (ie. China) would call our foreign debt due.
- this would give the dollar even weaker buying power in international markets, excacerbating the problem at home and possibly leading to a "house of cards" style collapse of the entire economy

....especially at this point in our nation's history that would've been DISASTROUS and could possibly have lead to the literal downfall of this country (similar to the collapse/bankruptcy of the soviet union).....but we avoided a situation like this because the Obama administration (and congress, and the senate, and the fed, and just about every major economist) made the right choice...a tough choice, not a choice anybody wanted to have to make, but the right one

Even the Bush administration understood this and passed the first $787 billion bailout (which, unfortunately was terribly managed).

My point is that Obama inherited a bad problem, with no "good" solution....there was no easy fix....he chose the best solution, based on the best advice available by top economists....if he had let our major financial instutions collapse, we'd REALLY be screwed and of course he'd get blamed for all of it (ironically, probably by the same people who are attacking him now for NOT letting them collapse)......so c'mon, lay off the guy....he inherited a lose/lose situation and did what he had to do.

PS: If all goes to plan, we'll quickly pull out of this recession (notice NOT massive depression) and the banks and auto industry will recover and pay us back most of the money we LOANED them....this is probably wishful thinking, but even if they don't pay us back a penny, I think we're still better off.

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Originally Posted by nun2sharp

Thats because there are no real differences between the candidates, we the people will scratch each others eyes out for our prefered candidate, while the powers that be who own/control those candidates go about their business as usual. It wouldnt have mattered wether you voted McCain or Obama, you wouldve gotten the same thing, its just how policies are presented that make them left or right. Government of the corporation, by the corporation, for the corporation.

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Ironically that argument is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you don't fight AND VOTE for your prefered candidate, then your voice as a citizen becomes weaker....the voice of THE PEOPLE becomes weaker....which makes the voice of THE CORPORATIONS and their $$$ all that much stronger. If everybody thought this way and nobody voted, then the corporations would be the only game in town....

You can't say that things would be the same in 2009 if Al Gore were elected in 2000 instead of Bush....maybe they'd be better, maybe worse, but I gaurantee you they'd be different.... (among other things) we wouldn't be in this war with Iraq and thousands of American troops and Iraqi citizens would still be alive and healthy....c'mon, you can't say that's semantics. You've gotta vote! It's your duty as a citizen! Even if it's for the Green or Libertarian candidate or La Rouche or frikking Chuck Norris.....just vote and make your voice heard!!! Otherwise corporations get exactly what they want....if the public doesn't elect politicians, and hold them accountable to their interests, corporations will swoop in and do it.

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Originally Posted by Wildtim

^^^^THats right folks we allow that to vote too!!!

WOW.

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Dude you'd probably AGREE with the way I vote on most issues.....I'm pro gun rights, pro-immigration enforcement and border security, all for preserving American Language/Borders/Culture and don't really buy into most of the global warming BS that comes from the left......I'm a strict constitutionalist, freemarket capitalist (within reason) and for a smaller gov't than we currently have (again, within reason).

I find myself agreeing with REAL conservatives (ie. michael savage) and libertarians more than I do liberals on most issues.....that said, the policies of the Bush administration were far from conservative or libertarian and far from American.....they were self-serving, indulgent and wreckless.....no-bid contracts undermine free-market capitalism, and violating about half of the first ten amendments to The Constitution is NOT American.....torturing prisoners of war is NOT American.....fixing "facts" around flawed policy is downright wrong.

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Originally Posted by jdurango

It's easy to play monday morning quarterback, and just SAY that everything would've come up roses if we just let every major financial institution in the US fail....but, really, stop and think what would've happened..... pretty much every economist in this country agreed that it would almost certainly lead to a massive despression, possibly worse than the great depression....

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There's a few of problems with this.

First of all, I never said that "everything would've come up roses." What I'm saying, is that this bailout has had no appreciable benefit, what limited improvements we have seen are just as easily explained by non-bailout related changes, it's unlikely to have any appreciable benefit, and yet will cost the government (by which I mean you and me) a billion dollars or more that it does not have.

So, given the choice between major economic upheavals or the same major economic upheavals + $1,000,000,000.00 in additional national debt, I'll take the messed up economy without the extra national debt. It seems like a no brainer to me. It's like asking whether you want your finger broken, or your finger broken and a knife in you gut. If those are the only options, I'll take the broken finger without a lacerated small intestine.

Don't get me wrong, I'd have preferred that congress chose to do something with a reasonable chance of success, but that wasn't an option.

Second, at no point did pretty much every economist in this country agree about anything. There was never agreement (outside of CNN and the New York Times) that the bailout would fix anything. Nor was there ever agreement that the recession would turn into a depression.

Third, to go to the history books once again, after the great depression a wide variety of highly effective safeguards were put in place, making another great depression virtually impossible without a disaster of epic proportions, such as a pandemic (A real one, not swine flu), nuclear attack from another country, or some form of natural disaster so extreme that it wiped out our ability to produce food. Anything short of that, and another great depression is virtually impossible

Its due to the interest system as it is
(practically all interest is money that has never existed)
and due to the fact that there is no reserve for the money anymore
(like silver or gold you can trade for the paper)
and there have been far too many dollars released.

The interest system has no limit and sucks money like an endlessly powerful vacuum cleaner
moving it exponentially from the bottom to the very top.
Hence the economy needs to break down and and start from zero every now and then
cause the debts are just rising to an astronomous amount.

In germany its already out that we're facing a crisis of the same size as the breakdown in 1929

((just wish there would be an English translation for the stuff I've just read and listened to but until now I have none))

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Originally Posted by VeeDubb65

Third, to go to the history books once again, after the great depression a wide variety of highly effective safeguards were put in place, making another great depression virtually impossible without a disaster of epic proportions, such as a pandemic (A real one, not swine flu), nuclear attack from another country, or some form of natural disaster so extreme that it wiped out our ability to produce food. Anything short of that, and another great depression is virtually impossible

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Brother, I did go to the history books. Look up glass steagall on wiki, or the graham-leach-bliley act. Many of glass-steagall's provisions have been repealed over the years. The graham-leach-bliley act (phil graham) repealed a major portion of the glass-steagall which basically said that commercial banks, investment banks and insurance companies must owned and operated SEPERATELY from one another. The repeal of this provision arguably paved the way for this economic situation. BTW, graham, leach, bliley, all Republicans and it was passed mostly by Republican vote in the house and senate. Unfrotunately, Bill Clinton didn't have the foresight to veto it.

Anyway, you had a lot of politicians and talking heads speaking out against the bailouts, but very few real economists. I listen to and read news from both sides of the political divide, and the vast majority of actual economists I heard were in favor of the bailouts (albeit reluctantly, as I think we all were)

And you're assumption that we'd be better off without the bailouts....we'll have to agree to disagree. I just don't see how letting every major financial institution in the US fail would have a minimal impact on our country. I think we would've ended up with a broken finger and a huge gaping hole in our head....i just really believe the bailout option is the lesser of the evils.

BTW, here's an interesting video from Byron Dorgan in 1999....this is part 2 of 2, check out 1 for more:

YouTube - Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999-Part 2

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Originally Posted by 0livia

Its due to the interest system as it is
(practically all interest is money that has never existed)
and due to the fact that there is no reserve for the money anymore
(like silver or gold you can trade for the paper)
and there have been far too many dollars released.

The interest system has no limit and sucks money like an endlessly powerful vacuum cleaner
moving it exponentially from the bottom to the very top.
Hence the economy needs to break down and and start from zero every now and then
cause the debts are just rising to an astronomous amount.

In germany its already out that we're facing a crisis of the same size as the breakdown in 1929

((just wish there would be an English translation for the stuff I've just read and listened to but until now I have none))

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0livia, you're exactly right that in the long-term it's very good for bad companies to fail....it's simply free-market economics, survival of the fittest. But unfortunately, in reality, the LACK of regulation has caused some companies to get "too big to fail"...in that their failure would have disastrous results, sending the entire economy and country into a downward spiral......the glass-steagall act of the 1930's addressed exactly this with more gov't regulation, but it has since been effectively repealed.

We could've let the banks fail and we might be better off in the very long term (depending on what steps we make, or don't make to correct this problem), but in the short term it would've been horrible, and there's a possibility it would've led to the collapse of the entire country (ala the USSR) which is a big risk to take.

Again...I'm all about free market economics, but there has to be SOME common sense employed as well.

Jonny I'm afraid the bailout is just a small drop of water on a hot stone that leads increased debts on the other hand which make things worse. (Just like the German economy programs do)
Now our situation is a bit different since our economy lives from exports by 70% that dropped by 40% until now.
(Leading to layoffs and an impact on the consumption of the remaining 30% of course)
The US imports primarily and the consumption of goods and resources is much higher in average. Thats probably where the point for you is to change something.

Oh ok, haven't seen your last post when I answered.
A regulation is very desirable but the biggest company is the country economy itself. They have the biggest debts. And they need to recharge every now and then and start from zero. Much to the disadvantage of everyone who has money in a bank, stocks or else, cause that money will be worthless then and replaced by another currency.
Happened twice in Germany during the last century and people ARE horrified!
Not at least for their experiences with what it lead to after 1929 cause it has promoted the Nazis to come up.

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Originally Posted by jdurango

And you're assumption that we'd be better off without the bailouts....we'll have to agree to disagree. I just don't see how letting every major financial institution in the US fail would have a minimal impact on our country.

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The only conclusion I can come to from this statement, is that you didn't read most of my last post.

My whole point, one more time with feeling, is NOT that we would have been just fine if we let all the major financial institutions fail. My point is that the ones that would have failed without the bailout, are not going to be saved by the bailout, and therefore, we would have been better off without a billion dollars of extra national debt.

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Originally Posted by 0livia

Oh ok, haven't seen your last post when I answered.
A regulation is very desirable but the biggest company is the country economy itself. They have the biggest debts. And they need to recharge every now and then and start from zero. Much to the disadvantage of everyone who has money in a bank, stocks or else, cause that money will be worthless then and replaced by another currency.
Happened twice in Germany during the last century and people ARE horrified!
Not at least for their experiences with what it lead to after 1929 cause it has promoted the Nazis to come up.

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Well there was the economic situation and there was also the vacuum left by the Socialist Party (SDP) after the failed (Trotsky would say strangled) revolution of 1923, which left the theretofore rather well-organized working masses disillusioned and in effect leaderless. This situation was ripe for ultra-nationalistic exploitation, among other things.

There were a lot of factors going into the rise of Hitler - as is always the case with the rise of any government.

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Originally Posted by VeeDubb65

The only conclusion I can come to from this statement, is that you didn't read most of my last post.

My whole point, one more time with feeling, is NOT that we would have been just fine if we let all the major financial institutions fail. My point is that the ones that would have failed without the bailout, are not going to be saved by the bailout, and therefore, we would have been better off without a billion dollars of extra national debt.

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I did read your post....I just think the bailout did a lot more than you are giving it credit for. You can't say a bank that is on the brink of failure because it's $40 billion in the red and can't pay it's creditors, is STILL going to fail if it receives $50 or $60 billion in federal assistance and thus CAN pay it's creditors, and get back on it's feet.

Now maybe in the LONG RUN, they still make poor decisions or employ bad business strategies, which I why Obama is asking for increased oversight, new management in some (extreme) cases, and re-instating regulations so this cannot happen again.....of course he's being labelled a socialist for this.....maybe rightly so....but it needs to be done right now....this is a terrible mess that he has to clean up, and he's getting dirty in the process

BTW, we're talking a total price tag of several TRILLION dollars, not billions.....here's a breakdown of where all the bailout funds have gone (again, the Bush bailout was terribly managed and nobody is really sure where some of that money went or how it was used)

Follow the money: Bailout tracker - CNNMoney.com

you can also see which banks, sepcifically were helped....most of these institutions are still in business or were sold off (with federal support) to other banks....they would have collapsed without the bailouts (and probably bought down a lot of other institutions with them)

I've never had a problem with Dick Cheney. I heard him speak his piece. I agree with him. What was done saved lives.

Cheney's biggest problem? His former boss. Cheney was the one conservative in the entire previous administration. While the former president was a Republican, he was and still is FAR from conservative.....just like his father. One or two issues does not a conservative make.

Which brings me to the election of 2008. What choices were we given? Didn't matter, the same person ran. There were far too many similarities than there were differences between the two major parties.....the line between them wasn't blurred, it was non-existent. I liken the previous election to a train wreck.....and instead of sending help, we sent more trains. How so? We removed someone who leans far out in left field and we "solved" our current problems by putting in not just one person, but an entire government that leans even further to the left than the last administration. The result? We're fighting fire with fire. I'm tired of getting burnt.

Hope? Change? Our current president has managed to out-Bush Bush in his first 60 days! What I do see is more of the same, there is no change...... What I also see is a bunch of grand standing, political posturing and finger pointing and not ONE OUNCE of real leadership for thousands of miles. What I don't see are the Obama supporters expressing their dissatisfaction with their choice as I expressed about my unfortunate but......*gulp*....."necessary".....choice for the past 8 years. Giving this man a free pass to jeopardize everything that was fought and died for the past more than 230 years just because this is his first real job outside of being a rabble rouser is no excuse to not criticize him. I'm not here to defend McCain because I think the same could have been said TODAY had he been elected instead. Bad choices are bad choices. I keep hearing, "aw, just give him a chance". If our commander in chief told us we'd solve our problems by jumping off of a bridge, should we give that a chance, too(I'm sure the press would be willing to do that)? I understand the consequences of poor judgment and bad decisions all too well........and unfortunately for the entire world, the President of the United States does not have the luxury of making that kind of a mistake, and neither the world nor I can wait until 2017 to get a different person in the White House (what, you think America will really vote him out in 2012? I have lost faith that voting him out is a reality)

I used to think that conspiracy nuts were just that.....nuts. The more I pay attention to what is going on the more I start to believe them.

Is it really the government's job to:

force the banks to keep the money that was "loaned" to them?
tell me that I can't shoot heroin into my veins or snort cocaine?
tell me the size of my car or the size of the engine that makes it move?
discourage me from drinking soda by taxing the living hell out of it?
discourage me from smoking by taxing that, too?
discourage me from buying a land yacht by excessive gas tax?

The government needs to get out of my life and stay out and stop looking at the Constitution as a roadblock to controlling me and everything else. We now have more people employed by government than in the manufacturing sector. Government is one of the fastest growing sectors for employment. Can we really sustain this? Is all of this control really necessary?

Sorry, I was ranting and was waaaay :OT

That being said, I have no problem waterboarding the likes of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. I remember reading somewhere that we were saved more than once by these "enhanced interrogation techniques" that the former vice president refers to. What do I see in the news? Looks to me like our current political leaders are stumbling all over themselves to get in front of the press and say, "DUH!" after denouncing the very thing that saved us and kept us out of harm's way. It's quite funny and quite sad at the same time.

Just because we stop using "enhanced interrogation techniques" like waterboarding doesn't mean that those of us who want us dead are going to stop persuing that.

Do in the next election what I did the past election........leave the ballot blank.

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Originally Posted by CableDawg

.... just because this is his first real job outside of being a rabble rouser is no excuse to not criticize him.....

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HE SAID IT
NOT ME (at least not this time)
:rofl2: http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/m.../bitchslap.gif Obama


and no this is not another alias of me

:rofl2:

troublemaker

that is what we elected

a damn troublemaker

Obama won because God wanted him to win.
God is in charge of everything.
Therefore, those who supported McCain/Palin voted contrary to the intent of the Lord.
Nuff said...

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Originally Posted by CableDawg

Is it really the government's job to:

force the banks to keep the money that was "loaned" to them?
tell me that I can't shoot heroin into my veins or snort cocaine?
tell me the size of my car or the size of the engine that makes it move?
discourage me from drinking soda by taxing the living hell out of it?
discourage me from smoking by taxing that, too?
discourage me from buying a land yacht by excessive gas tax?

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Sounds like you've been hit by globalization! :roflmao

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Originally Posted by 0livia

Sounds like you've been hit by globalization! :roflmao

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And you find this funny?

There are not many choices left except finding it funny.
ETA: in Europe that would qualify you for the leadership of the leftest punk anarcho party
and you'd probably win any election.

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Originally Posted by CableDawg

Is it really the government's job to:

force the banks to keep the money that was "loaned" to them?
tell me that I can't shoot heroin into my veins or snort cocaine?
tell me the size of my car or the size of the engine that makes it move?
discourage me from drinking soda by taxing the living hell out of it?
discourage me from smoking by taxing that, too?
discourage me from buying a land yacht by excessive gas tax?

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You forgot the part about making me flush the toilet 3 times !!

because we all know that 1.6 x 3 = < 2.5 x 1
:rant:

Offtopic: don't you have toilets with 2 levers for flushing?
Over here, they are more or less the norm with new installations. That way you can 'FLUSH' if a 'flush' does not suffice.

that way you can save money while still having the option of a big flush.
Btw, there is no government legislation behind our flushing strategy. :)

I haven't read all the posts in this thread, but I'll say that GW and Cheney had 8 years to communicate with us as to why their policies were justified and they failed to do it. I think part of it was that they didn't want to spend the political capital required for true leadership. They also didn't trust our capacity to do the hard things that needed to be done. As a Republican, I see their administration as a failure.

Oh, and the election - that was over when the economy tanked. It wouldn't have mattered who McCain picked for VP. An economy like that is going to kill ya every time.

Jordan

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Originally Posted by Bruno

Offtopic: don't you have toilets with 2 levers for flushing?
Over here, they are more or less the norm with new installations. That way you can 'FLUSH' if a 'flush' does not suffice.

that way you can save money while still having the option of a big flush.
Btw, there is no government legislation behind our flushing strategy. :)

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Yes, ironically the free market in Europe has found many conservation techniques are actually cheaper for the producers! We're a little retarded here in North America thanks to the corporate lobby.

X

you had me at

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Originally Posted by xman

free market

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Originally Posted by gratewhitehuntr

You forgot the part about making me flush the toilet 3 times !!

because we all know that 1.6 x 3 = < 2.5 x 1
:rant:

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I thought about putting that in but decided to leave it out because the post you originally made about it is a classic!

:D

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Originally Posted by Hawkeye5

Cheney is off the leash and may express his views now that he is no longer part of an administration.

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Cheney is off the leash, I take it this implies that George W. Bush controlled Cheney? If Cheney was on a leash it was more like him dragging george down the street on the end of the leash.