Clueless about the economy

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-17-2006
Clueless about the economy
175
Tue, 09-16-2008 - 7:37am
Does John McCain really believe that our economy is fundamentally sound? Is this guy out of his freakin’ mind? He is either too old or too stupid to be president. Umployment is down. Wages are down. The price of everything is up. The deficit is up. The national debt is up. Yeah, sounds like the economy is in great shape, John. Perhaps it is time for another tax break for those who make over $250,000 a year. We could use some of that Reagan trickledown voodoo economics about now.
Perhaps when McCain is elected, his new treasury secretary Phil Gramm will straighten all of us whiners out?
The guys seem to be clueless about the economy.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 07-03-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 9:36am
That is such hogwash. And like Republicans don't want ultimate power.
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-09-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:03am
That is such hogwash. And like Republicans don't want ultimate power.



iVillage Member
Registered: 01-12-2004
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:04am

"I believe it was Larry Kudlow, saying that policies were put in place to force institutions to make these loans to unqualified people that they didn't want to make"


Not true.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-12-2004
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:06am
He also strongly supported the deregulation of the banking industry, which has made all of this possible.
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-12-2004
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:10am

We're willing to share the economic power......but you have to earn it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-03-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:10am
Thank you Jane, you are more knowlegable than most on this board!
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-09-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:16am

Wow, I guess you only have to earn the economic power if you work for wages.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-31-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:27am

"Can you actually google "Obama's lies and distortions?" Hey, you can!"


as you can google McCain's lies......


McCain Lie Counter:


http://www.mccainpedia.org/index.php/Count_the_Lies

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-12-2004
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 10:49am
Umm... Actually, in exchange for the loan, the gov't took control of 79% of AIG's stock.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Wed, 09-17-2008 - 11:39am

Actually, the government does force banks to make these loans. It actually started under Jimmy Carter and was expanded (a lot) under Bill Clinton. Read this from Investors Business Daily:

"Obama in a statement yesterday blamed the shocking new round of subprime-related bankruptcies on the free-market system, and specifically the "trickle-down" economics of the Bush administration, which he tried to gig opponent John McCain for wanting to extend.

But it was the Clinton administration, obsessed with multiculturalism, that dictated where mortgage lenders could lend, and originally helped create the market for the high-risk subprime loans now infecting like a retrovirus the balance sheets of many of Wall Street's most revered institutions.

Tough new regulations forced lenders into high-risk areas where they had no choice but to lower lending standards to make the loans that sound business practices had previously guarded against making. It was either that or face stiff government penalties.

The untold story in this whole national crisis is that President Clinton put on steroids the Community Redevelopment Act, a well-intended Carter-era law designed to encourage minority homeownership. And in so doing, he helped create the market for the risky subprime loans that he and Democrats now decry as not only greedy but "predatory."

Yes, the market was fueled by greed and overleveraging in the secondary market for subprimes, vis-a-vis mortgaged-backed securities traded on Wall Street. But the seed was planted in the '90s by Clinton and his social engineers. They were the political catalyst behind this slow-motion financial train wreck.

And it was the Clinton administration that mismanaged the quasi-governmental agencies that over the decades have come to manage the real estate market in America.

As soon as Clinton crony Franklin Delano Raines took the helm in 1999 at Fannie Mae, for example, he used it as his personal piggy bank, looting it for a total of almost $100 million in compensation by the time he left in early 2005 under an ethical cloud.

Other Clinton cronies, including Janet Reno aide Jamie Gorelick, padded their pockets to the tune of another $75 million.

Raines was accused of overstating earnings and shifting losses so he and other senior executives could earn big bonuses.

In the end, Fannie had to pay a record $400 million civil fine for SEC and other violations, while also agreeing as part of a settlement to make changes in its accounting procedures and ways of managing risk.

But it was too little, too late. Raines had reportedly steered Fannie Mae business to subprime giant Countrywide Financial, which was saved from bankruptcy by Bank of America.

At the same time, the Clinton administration was pushing Fannie and her brother Freddie Mac to buy more mortgages from low-income households.

The Clinton-era corruption, combined with unprecedented catering to affordable-housing lobbyists, resulted in today's nationalization of both Fannie and Freddie, a move that is expected to cost taxpayers tens of billions of dollars.

And the worst is far from over. By the time it is, we'll all be paying for Clinton's social experiment, one that Obama hopes to trump with a whole new round of meddling in the housing and jobs markets. In fact, the social experiment Obama has planned could dwarf both the Great Society and New Deal in size and scope.

There's a political root cause to this mess that we ignore at our peril. If we blame the wrong culprits, we'll learn the wrong lessons. And taxpayers will be on the hook for even larger bailouts down the road.

But the government-can-do-no-wrong crowd just doesn't get it. They won't acknowledge the law of unintended consequences from well-meaning, if misguided, acts.

Obama and Democrats on the Hill think even more regulation and more interference in the market will solve the problem their policies helped cause. For now, unarmed by the historic record, conventional wisdom is buying into their blame-business-first rhetoric and bigger-government solutions.

While government arguably has a role in helping low-income folks buy a home, Clinton went overboard by strong-arming lenders with tougher and tougher regulations, which only led to lenders taking on hundreds of billions in subprime bilge.

Market failure? Hardly. Once again, this crisis has government's fingerprints all over it."

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=306370789279709

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