The Goat Pen

Red Bird wrote:

There are Republicans and Libertarians out there with a lot of ideas that go beyond mere tax-cuts.

Post some; I'd love to see them.

Ron Paul, Paul Ryan and Chris Christie, for starters. Regardless of whether or not you or I would ever consider voting for them, they clearly have ideas that go beyond simply cutting taxes.

And the Bush tax cuts DID result in economic growth. That much is indisputable.

It's not indisputable, because I'm disputing it now. Bush's tax cuts took effect in 2004, by 2006 the country was falling into a deep recession. So what happened to the economic growth?

Simple answer: he spent it.

...and then some, unfortunately.

We've already got Tick and a couple others to defend liberalism around here. We used to have more, but they've been scarce of late.

They ran out of excuses.

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Red Bird wrote:Yea, let's blame the little guys!

If I remember correctly, it was working class home-owner wannabes demanding easy credit and insisting on an unsupervised market for exotic derivatives that finished Lehman Brothers and brought our great nation to its knees.

What exactly is "working class people?" I work for a living, am I working class? I have easy access to credit. I am able to make all my mortgage payments (on time AND in full) so because I am responsible, does that remove me from the "working class" pool?

Leeman Brothers would still be in business if "the people" acted responsibly. "The people" welched on their home loans. Leeman's sin in all of this, is that they risked too much of the companies assets in the most credit-unworthy. That ended them. I am not crying for Leeman. Fuck 'em, they got what they deserved for being so risky. But it was your proverbial "...little guy..." walking away from his house for whatever reason, that started the snowball rolling down the hill to everyone's ruin.

Red Bird wrote:Those working class losers organized into cells like commies and campaigned for no-down-payment mortgages that they didn't deserve and could never hope repay, only to default and end up either homeless or living in their parents' basement.

What an incredibly clever plan to ruin themselves. Can anyone imagine a more diabolically perfect means of self destruction?

The sin here is not just the welching homeowner, but partially the lending institutions. Basically, the lenders should have assumed that IF the only way someone was going to get a mortgage, it meant no money down, then automatically they don't get a mortgage. Unfortunately, our government WANTED those people to GET those mortgages. Let's turn back the clock to about 2005 when Congressman Barney Frank said everything was fine with Freddie and Fannie. Frank did not wanty anyone to mess up a good thing he had going. Why did he do that? Because those institutions were contributing heavily to his re-election campaign, all the while, helping to ENABLE your "working class" person with a "no-money-down" loan.

Barney Frank STILL will not craft any bill that would insist lenders to require any money down. He can't. The most irresponsible among us are his voters.

Red Bird wrote:What amazes me, what keeps me awake at night is trying to figure out how these irresponsible dead-beats got control of the home loan process in the first place. I'll bet they greased a few palms with their grimy, sweat-soaked $10s and $20s. We all know Alan Greenspan is on the take. How could that greedy Jew resist the milk money offered to him by those near-idle free-loaders?

Thank God we're on guard now, and these . . so called "working" poor can't hope to pull another fast one.

Of course it could happen again, and it will happen again Red Bird. It is human nature for the least responsible to walk away from responsibility. Nothing at the Federal level has happened to change that because too many people at the Federal level owe their jobs in Congress TO the least responsible among us...

Re: The Republicans have no ideas cant.

Here's a list of the One's ideas:

1. Hope and change

2. America is bad and we need to apologize for it

3. It's Bush's fault.

4. Create positions in gubment (Czars) that don't have to be vetted.

5. Spend/create mo money/debt.

Let's take a stroll down Memory Lane and recall how Obama got elected...

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I would like to invite these people over to this board for a debate with you all. The words field day come to mind.

Now let's take a look at your typical Republican voters circa 2008

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That's from Ohio. You expect the denizens of that state to be morons.

Unfortunately, our government WANTED those people to GET those mortgages. Let's turn back the clock to about 2005 when Congressman Barney Frank said everything was fine with Freddie and Fannie. Frank did not wanty anyone to mess up a good thing he had going. Why did he do that? Because those institutions were contributing heavily to his re-election campaign, all the while, helping to ENABLE your "working class" person with a "no-money-down" loan.

I agree, including Frank's and Dodd's role in it. But when you say "the government" did it, who ran the whole "government" for 8 years preceding the housing/financial collapse? It was the Republicans W, McConnell and (for 6 years) Boehner. If the ruling Republicans had cared about the lending insanity that was happening on THEIR watch, they could have stopped it. But they let Dodd and Frank - leaders in the MINORITY party - perpetuate a system that led to disaster.

There's also an aspect you didn't mention: the packaging of millions of worthless loans and letting them be traded all over the financial system. This metastasized the cancer and made it MUCH more damaging to the overall economy than if the problem had been limited to Freddie and Fannie. Dodd and Frank had nothing to do with this component of the calamity. We are supposed to have the SEC and other federal regulators to prevent this kind of thing, but they did not do their job. Those federal regulators didn't work for Dodd or Frank. They worked for the executive branch, i.e. the W, for 8 years.

AlabamAlum wrote:That's from Ohio. You expect the denizens of that state to be morons.

Ouch. I hope there are some exceptions.

Professor Tiger wrote:

Unfortunately, our government WANTED those people to GET those mortgages. Let's turn back the clock to about 2005 when Congressman Barney Frank said everything was fine with Freddie and Fannie. Frank did not wanty anyone to mess up a good thing he had going. Why did he do that? Because those institutions were contributing heavily to his re-election campaign, all the while, helping to ENABLE your "working class" person with a "no-money-down" loan.

I agree, including Frank's and Dodd's role in it. But when you say "the government" did it, who ran the whole "government" for 8 years preceding the housing/financial collapse?

I would respond to your intelligent response, but unfortunately, I no longer have any respect for you.

You know what you need to do Professor. Swallow your pride.

I would respond to your intelligent response, but unfortunately, I no longer have any respect for you.

I am cut to the quick, IB. Bordering on devastated. You don't like me? I can live with that.

You know what you need to do Professor. Swallow your pride.

Okay, okay. You win. I'll do what I need to do. I, Professor Tiger, hereby promise to accept your apology for being a dumbass if you ever tender it.

Professor Tiger wrote:

I would respond to your intelligent response, but unfortunately, I no longer have any respect for you.

I am cut to the quick, IB. Bordering on devastated. You don't like me? I can live with that.

Live with this professor, you don't have the education enough to admit when you are wrong.

Swallow your pride.

heh. Get a life, dumbass.

We've already got Tick and a couple of others to defend liberalism around here

Moi? Liberal? You gotta be shittin' me.

Prof, I own 27 guns. I am a firm believer in capital punishment, and I am all about cracking down on illegal immigration. I voted for Reagan and G. W. H. Bush. There's not a lib organization within a thousand miles of here that'd have me (or vice versa).

I argue from the middle and always have. Now, all things being relative, occupying the middle ground at PNNistan generally means you are associated with limp-wristers and bed-wetters and the like. But I see that as a small price to pay for trying to bring these Cro Magnans into the 21st century. It's not healthy to be right of right of right. The center is where the light comes from...kinda like our solar system, you see.

Red Bird wrote:Obama served three terms representing the 13th district in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004. He also served in the United States Senate from 2004 to 2010. Palin was a small town city councilwomen, a small town mayor and Governor of Alaska for a few months before she ran for Vice President.

Neither had a particularly strong or glowing resume, but I'd rate Obama's 6 years in the US senate as more impressive than Palin's short stint as governor.

Now, how do you support your claim that Obama "has been such a disaster that it's impossible to imagine any way that Palin (or almost anyone else) could have been worse."?

What has Obama done that makes him worse than say George W. Bush? What horrors has Obama brought?

Wow I didn't know that Oprama served 2 yrs in the senate AND as president at the SAME TIME!

Oprama served TWO years in the senate before running for president the next two years.

Now I do have to say this is the first time I've seen anyone mention state senate experience as qualifications for president. If that counts surely mayoral experience is even better as it is an EXECUTIVE position and of course Gov of a state trumps them all.

bluetick wrote:If Obama hands his successor 2 wars, a crippling recession, and huge numbers of unemployed and uninsured

then he'll be dubya deux

Oh Christ did tick just now add the uninsured as a W invention?

So was W handed a stock market crash by Clinton?

Prof, I own 27 guns.

Dang. You got me beat. I only got four (just gave two to relatives).

I argue from the middle and always have. Now, all things being relative, occupying the middle ground at PNNistan generally means you are associated with limp-wristers and bed-wetters and the like. But I see that as a small price to pay for trying to bring these Cro Magnans into the 21st century. It's not healthy to be right of right of right.

Here and I thought I was the only moderate around here.

The Bush tax cuts were not fully in place until 2003. We had nearly 48 straight months of job growth when they passed.

The deficit trended down each year after that down to 160 billion in 2007. Then the stimulus plan A jumped it to about 400 billion in 2008.

Then Oprama came in and blew the lid off of it with more than 1.3 trillion+ a year each year in office.

And btw the W tax cuts made the tax cote MORE progressive. Not less. Again libs should be sucking W's cock.