Barfo is the biggest Greece and Obama cheerleader on this board. He acknowledges barely anything is wrong with his policies. He also supported the financial mess we are now in and wants even more money to bail out his friends. Well you don't know how bailouts work. If I gave you 50 billion dollars to fix your business you could easily do that. But you're stealing from other people that could use that money more efficiently. The point is we should not be stealing from taxpayers, and we should allow them to choose which businesses fail or succeed.
Denny's point is that if we're going to steal from taxpayers, we might as well then give the money away, mostly forever, to homeowners. My point is that if we're going to steal from taxpayers, we might as well give the money to people who are likely to give it back. Anyway, I think once the market tumbled when we did indeed let Lehman Brothers fall, it opened the Bush administration's eyes to the fact that they were extraordinary times, and letting the market run its course was simply not an option. When you think about it, the bailouts have been the most bipartisan (and least publicly popular) major policy initiative since....hmmm, maybe the invasion of Iraq? I mean both parties have railed against it to score points with voters, but when the shit really hit the fan and there was no time to posture, both the Bush and Obama administrations were basically on the same page, along with both the House and Senate.
You still have "too big to fail", in fact it is a lot worse now. And good luck trying to print a bunch of money again. Your timeline is messed up too. The Tea Party didn't exist during Bush's tenure and Bush was a Big government enthusiast.
What's the Tea Party got to do with anything I said? I agree that the "too big to fail" issue is bigger than ever. But I also am coming around to the idea that the time to fix it wasn't in 2008. At that point we were staring down a massive depression. What I'd like to see is some payback to those massive too-big-to-fail companies now. I'd like to see anti-trust regulation imposed to limit their size and break them apart. It's shit like this right here that needs to be reversed: I just think we need to do this in an orderly process over a couple of years. Not over a few weeks in 2008 when our economy was melting down.
Looks like ACORN is the driving force between Occupy Wall St. I knew this couldn't be an organic movement. ACORN connection
I see a lot of troubling contradictions in what you just said. Your timeline is erroneous. There was little ANTI-spending sentiment when Bush did his bailouts, and then the Socialist Obama got elected remember? Barry wasn't under heavy fire from the media either. Bush's M.O. is Spending. At that point Obama wanted to increase the Nation's Debt and cut nothing. You just realized "too big to fail" is worse now, yet you refuse to criticize TARP. This is why you need to stay out of people's lives. You make the problem much worse down the road. I'd like to see some anti-trust litigation imposed on the government, since they're the ones that gave them TARP and trillions of dollars.
Trillions? You kind of rambled all over the place, so I'm not going to even bother trying to understand your point. But what "trillions" are you talking about? If you follow the link I highlighted:
I love it that you don't know the facts of this story. The only reason it looks like rambling is because you're simply ignorant. The government gave them 6 trillion dollars actually, you simply are confused and unaware of reality. Google CRA, Fannie, and Freddie. Pure silliness on your part.
The interesting thing to me about TARP was just how much it actually didn't balloon out of control. I mean, more out of control than it was at the outset. I remember at the time a lot of libertarians knowingly nodding and saying, "Yeah, and that's just for starters! Those pigs will eat all that up, then come back for more, and Obama will just keep feeding them! Because that's all government does--always over budget, always out of control!" And yet this whole program seems like it's getting wound up way under budget. It all still stinks, but in the end it's not nearly as catastrophic as it seemed at the time. I'd still like to see more steps to make sure it doesn't happen again. Which is where the whole anti-trust stuff comes in. One of the main points of antitrust regulation is to prevent "too big to fail" situations from arising.
Buddy, the shit hit the fan and the government spent money like it always does. "I mean both parties have railed against it to score points with voters, but when the shit really hit the fan and there was no time to posture, both the Bush and Obama administrations were basically on the same page, along with both the House and Senate." They didn't make the right move, nor where they pressured to stop spending money. You made it sound like there was some bi-partisan sentiment against the bailouts but your timeline was fucked up.
Coming from an Obama disciple I'm pretty sure you don't have any room to talk. Wtf does anti-trust regulation have to do with the government's failed policies? You're one of these people that loves Government College Loans and Public education right? You're part of the problem.
The main reason housing prices declined is there is a glut of foreclosures and short sales on the market. By definition, those are being sold cheap. The effect on you, the good buyer/borrower is your home is losing value. At some point, you're likely to be underwater if the slide doesn't stop. So you'd advocate putting more of your neighbors on the street while putting the homes around yours up for sale at a huge discount from what you paid? All so the banks can be made whole! TARP has not been paid off by any stretch. The Fed has been buying up bad mortgages, the govt. nationalized Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and has been subsidizing huge and continuing losses for both. Again, the banks are made whole, but the bad shit on their books are on the taxpayers' balance sheet now. Why shouldn't the taxpayer be bailed out at the same time the banks were? As I pointed out, you'd have benefitted by having a smaller mortgage and fewer neighbors foreclosed on, and fewer property fire sales hurting your net worth further.
The slide has stopped, at least in my neighborhood. My home value is now almost exactly the same price it would've been if housing prices had risen by 3% since 2002 (the year I bought it). So actually, although I've been hurt on paper, it hasn't affected me in any meaningful way. My home was cheap, then ridiculously expensive by 2007, and now cheap again. The glut of foreclosures and short sales are actually great for me. I'm not underwater. I've managed my debts carefully. I've got an outstanding credit rating. Thanks to all the foreclosures I could buy twice the house I have right now and easily afford it. (Of course I'm too cheap to do that, but anyway.) For guys like me, it's a fantastic time to snatch up rental properties. Because while there's a glut of houses for sale, reasonably priced houses for rent in my neighborhood are getting snatched up extremely fast by renters (mostly, I assume, by people who were foreclosed on.) I see a lot of justice in that. On the other hand, you prefer the housing market NOT seek its level. You prefer the government to prop up housing prices artificially by subsidizing bad mortgages. You prefer that my tax dollars go toward making sure irresponsible people don't get kicked out of homes that are nicer than mine. You prefer that I subsidize their profligate lifestyle. You prefer that I, the responsible citizen, not capitalize on their stupidity by snatching up cheap rentals/a better home for myself. It's weird---I'm sounding like the libertarian here and you the commie Democrat.
I prefer the government not coerce banks to give out bad loans in the first place, and then most certainly I prefer the government not kicking those people out and owning their property. But if they're going to take from us and give to the banks, they may as well do it in a way that helps us at the same time.
Peter Schiff is the fucking man. Going to catch him when he speaks at UCLA in 2 weeks. [video]http://www.mrctv.org/videos/peter-schiff-takes-99[/video]
Interesting read. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ar...rty_1968_antiwar_movement_chicago_111826.html
Somebody hacked Bloomberg. These protesters are supposed to be portrayed as lazy, entitled recent graduate hipsters with worthless degrees looking for hand outs. (Did I miss any other stereotypes?) http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9QKTHS82.htm
