Home     Contact Us    
Main Board Job Seeker's Board Job Wanted Board Resume Bank Company Board Word Help Medquist New MTs Classifieds Offshore Concerns VR/Speech Recognition Tech Help Coding/Medical Billing
Gab Board Politics Comedy Stop Health Issues
ADVERTISEMENT




Serving Over 20,000 US Medical Transcriptionists

And we bail out Wall St. who created this mess.....

Posted By: sm on 2009-02-19
In Reply to: Distressed Homeowners Get New Options - Backwards typist

Didja watch House of Cards? That spelled it out pretty succinctly. People were sucked into mortgages they couldn't afford, they were told they could refinance in 1-5 years and keep the mortgage payments they could afford - THEY WERE LIED TO. The bankers and Wall St. had to keep that Ponzi scheme going.......pizza delivery drivers were selling mortgages!! The more they sold, the more money they made - upwards $20,000 per month - they sucked people into refinancing to put cash in their pockets because housing values were skyrocketing.......and it all crashed down. So who did we bail out first? The banks and Wall St.............not the people who got screwed by con men. And these people were not POOR - they just got sucked into buying more house than they could afford. So, stick that in your pipe and smoke it.


Complete Discussion Below: marks the location of current message within thread

The messages you are viewing are archived/old.
To view latest messages and participate in discussions, select the boards given in left menu


Other related messages found in our database

what a mess bush has created
 Iraq's Fig Leaf Constitution
    By Robert Scheer
    The Los Angeles Times

    Tuesday 30 August 2005


    Who lost Iraq? Someday, as a fragmented Iraq spirals further into religious madness, terrorism and civil war, there will be a bipartisan inquiry into this blundering intrusion into another people's history.


    The crucial question will be why a preemptive American invasion - which has led to the deaths of nearly 2,000 Americans, roughly 10 times as many Iraqis, the expenditure of about $200 billion and incalculable damage to the United States' global reputation - has had exactly the opposite effect predicted by its neoconservative sponsors. No amount of crowing over a fig leaf Iraqi constitution by President Bush can hide the fact that the hand of the region's autocrats, theocrats and terrorists is stronger than ever.


    The U.S. now has to recognize that [it] overthrew Saddam Hussein to replace him with a pro-Iranian state, said regional expert Peter W. Galbraith, the former U.S. ambassador to Croatia and an advisor to the Iraqi Kurds. And, he could have added, a pro-Iranian state that will be repressive and unstable.


    Think this is an exaggeration? Consider that arguably the most powerful Shiite political party and militia in today's Iraq, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and its affiliated paramilitary force, the Badr Brigade, was not only based in Iran but was set up by Washington's old arch-foe, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It also fought on the side of Iran in the Iran-Iraq war and was recognized by Tehran as the government in exile of Iraq.


    Or that former exile Ahmad Chalabi is now one of Iraq's deputy prime ministers. The consummate political operator managed to maintain ties to Iran while gaining the devoted support of Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon, charming and manipulating Beltway policymakers and leading U.S. journalists into believing that Iraq was armed with weapons of mass destruction.


    Chalabi is thrilled with the draft constitution, which, if passed, will probably exponentially increase tension and violence between Sunnis and Shiites. It is an excellent document, said Chalabi, who has been accused by U.S. intelligence of being a spy for Iran, where he keeps a vacation home.


    What an absurd outcome for a war designed to create a compliant, unified and stable client state that would be pro-American, laissez-faire capitalist and unallied with the hated Iran. Of course, Bush tells us again, this is progress and an inspiration. Yet his relentless spinning of manure into silk has worn thin on the American public and sent his approval ratings tumbling.


    Even supporters of the war are starting to realize that rather than strengthening the United States' position in the world, the invasion and occupation have led to abject humiliation: from the Abu Ghraib scandal, to the guerrilla insurgency exposing the limits of military power, to an election in which our guy - Iyad Allawi - was defeated by radicals and religious extremists.


    In a new low, the U.S. president felt obliged to call and plead with the head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution, Abdelaziz Hakim, to make concessions to gain Sunni support. Even worse, he was summarily rebuffed. Nevertheless, Bush had no choice but to eat crow and like it.


    This is a document of which the Iraqis, and the rest of the world, can be proud, he said Sunday, through what must have been gritted teeth. After all, this document includes such democratic gems as Islam is the official religion of the state and is a basic source of legislation, and No law can be passed that contradicts the undisputed rules of Islam, as well as socialist-style pronouncements that work and a decent standard of living are a right guaranteed by the state. But the fact is, it could establish Khomeini's ghost as the patron saint of Iraq and Bush would have little choice but to endorse it.


    Even many in his own party are rebelling. I think our involvement there has destabilized the Middle East. And the longer we stay there, I think the further destabilization will occur, said Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel last week, one of a growing number of Republicans who get that we should start figuring out how we get out of there.


    Not that our what-me-worry? president is the least bit troubled by all this adverse blowback from the huge, unnecessary gamble he took in invading the heart of the Arab and Muslim worlds. What is important is that the Iraqis are now addressing these issues through debate and discussion, not at the barrel of a gun, Bush said.


    Wrong again, George. It was the barrel of your gun that midwifed the new Iraq, which threatens to combine the instability of Lebanon with the religious fanaticism of Iran.


Huh? You think Fox created the Federal
Heaven help us, I certainly hope and pray they wanted to make the government SMALL. I cannot believe you just said what you did and do not even understand the point you made, which is government is NOT SUPPOSED TO BE BIG. That is the problem!!!!!! I definitely want my government as small as possible, small enough we can drown it in the bathtub!!!!

Are you daft poster? Don't you see where BIG government has us now? They are DROWNING US!!!!!!! That's the entire point of small government, not regulating the h@ll out of me and my family.

I realize generations of people think that is what government is supposed to do....tell you how to think, what to read, how to raise our children (give them another pill if that's what the government says too),who to associate with, take away our civil rights one by one until we have nothing left of the country this was supposed to be.

Of course you want the government small. Did you think it was SUPPOSED to be big! That's what Obama wants.....MORE GOVERNMENT, BIGGER GOVERNMENT, more control of YOUR life. No thanks!!!!!!!! My life has been invaded enough by our out of control government.


This has created quite a conundrum.
It also may set up officially recognized causation for a war crime tribunal for members of the current administration.

As far as setting them free, in some of the instances so far where they have found a detainee to be innocent of claims that landed them in Gitmo in the first place they have not been able to send them home because the government of the country they were living in at the time will not take them back and no other country will accept them either. I read something regarding attempting to work out a deal with some European countries to take some the detainees who are to be released but only if we take a percentage of them also. (I can't remember where I read that and will have to do some searching.)


But...........he created homosexuals, too.
X
A pile of ca-ca created by Palin! (nm)
:)
Bush Created The Deficit
You should at least give the new president the opportunity to try to change things. He has to take a radical approach as the "business-as-usual" attitude in Washington would rather sit around and watch our economy and nation crumble than come up with any real, workable solutions.

Bush was handed a surplus when he took office and look how he managed to get us deep into debt. He left this legacy to the current administration to try to straighten out.

Republicans should put partisanship behind them and do what is right for this country - not themselves. When they were elected, they were supposed to represent all the people...
Claim: US Created al-Zarqawi Myth
Claim: US Created al-Zarqawi Myth
    By Jennifer Schultz
    UPI

    Thursday 10 November 2005


The myth of al-Zarqawi, Napoleoni believes, helped usher in al-Qaida's transformation from a small elitist vanguard to a mass movement.
















The myth of al-Zarqawi, Napoleoni believes, helped usher in al-Qaida's transformation from a small elitist vanguard to a mass movement.
(Photo: spacewar.com)
    The United States created the myth around Iraq insurgency leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and reality followed, terrorism expert Loretta Napoleoni said.


    Al-Zarqawi was born Ahmad Fadil al-Khalayleh in October 1966 in the crime and poverty-ridden Jordanian city of Zarqa. But his myth was born Feb. 5, 2003, when then-Secretary of State Colin Powell presented to the United Nations the case for war with Iraq.


    Napoleoni, the author of Insurgent Iraq, told reporters last week that Powell's argument falsely exploited Zarqawi to prove a link between then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida. She said that through fabrications of Zarqawi's status, influence and connections the myth became the reality - a self-fulfilling prophecy.


    He became what we wanted him to be. We put him there, not the jihadists, Napoleoni said.


    Iraq's most notorious insurgent, Napoleoni argues, accomplished what bin Laden could not: spread the message of jihad into Iraq.


    In an article of Napoleoni's in the current November/December issue of Foreign Policy, she said, In a sense, it is the very things that make Zarqawi seem most ordinary - his humble upbringing, misspent youth and early failures - that make him most frightening. Because, although he may have some gifts as a leader of men, it is also likely that there are many more 'al-Zarqawis' capable of filling his place.


    The myth of al-Zarqawi, Napoleoni believes, helped usher in al-Qaida's transformation from a small elitist vanguard to a mass movement.


    Al-Zarqawi became the icon of a new generation of anti-imperialist jihadists, she said.


    The grand claim that al-Zarqawi provided the vital link between Saddam and al-Qaida lost its significance after it became known that al-Zarqawi and bin Laden did not forge a partnership until after the war's start. The two are believed to have met sometime in 2000, but al-Zarqawi - similar to a group of dissenting al-Qaida members -rebuffed bin Laden's anti-American brand of jihad.


    He did not have a global vision like Osama, said Napoleoni, who interviewed primary and secondary sources close to al-Zarqawi and his network.


    A former member of al-Zarqawi's camp in Herat told her, I never heard him praise anyone apart from the Prophet [Muhammad]; this was Abu Musab's character. He never followed anyone.


    Al-Zarqawi's scope before the Iraq war, she continued, did not extend past corrupt Arab regimes, particularly Jordan's. Between 2000 and early 2002, he operated the training camp in Herat with Taliban funds; the fighters bound for Jordan. After the fall of the Taliban, he fled to Iraqi Kurdistan and set up shop.


    In 2001, Kurdish officials enlightened the United States about the uninvited Jordanian, said Napoleoni. Jordanian officials, who had still unsolved terrorist attacks, were eager to implicate al-Zarqawi, she claimed. The little-known militant instantly had fingerprints on most major terrorist attacks after Sept. 11, 2001. He was depicted in Powell's speech as a key player in the al-Qaida network.


    By perpetuating a terrifying myth of al-Zarqawi, the author said, The United States, Kurds, and Jordanians all won ... but jihad gained momentum, after in-group dissension and U.S. coalition operations had left the core of al-Qaida crippled.


    In her article, Napoleoni says, [Zarqawi] had finally managed to grasp bin Laden's definition of the faraway enemy, the United States. Adding that, Its presence in Iraq as an occupying power made it clear to him that the United States was as important a target as any of the Arab regimes he had grown to hate.


    ... The myth constructed around him is at the root of his transformation into a political leader. With bin Laden trapped somewhere in Afghanistan and Pakistan, al-Zarqawi fast became the new symbolic leader in the fight against America and a manager for whoever was looking to be part of that struggle, she wrote.


    The author points to letters between al-Zarqawi and bin Laden that have surfaced over the past two years, indicating the evolution in their relationship, most notably a shift in al-Zarqawi which led to his seeking additional legitimacy among Sunnis that bin Laden could help bestow.


    In late December 2004 - shortly after the fall of Fallujah - the pan-Arab network Al-Jazeera aired a video of what was bin Laden's first public embrace of Zarqawi and his fight in Iraq.


    ... We in al-Qaida welcome your union with us ... and so that it be known, the brother mujahid Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is the emir of the al Qaida organization [in Iraq], bin Laden declared.


    Napoleoni believes that al-Zarqawi, however, is still largely driven by the romantic vision of a restored Caliphate, and that his motives still are less political than some other factions participating in the Iraq resistance.


    She questions whether he has actually devised a plan for what he will do, if and when, he wins.


How The Democrats Created The Financial Crisis....sm

How the Democrats Created the Financial Crisis: Kevin Hassett

Commentary by Kevin Hassett



Sept. 22 (Bloomberg) -- The financial crisis of the past year has provided a number of surprising twists and turns, and from Bear Stearns Cos. to American International Group Inc., ambiguity has been a big part of the story.

Why did Bear Stearns fail, and how does that relate to AIG? It all seems so complex.

But really, it isn't. Enough cards on this table have been turned over that the story is now clear. The economic history books will describe this episode in simple and understandable terms: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac exploded, and many bystanders were injured in the blast, some fatally.

Fannie and Freddie did this by becoming a key enabler of the mortgage crisis. They fueled Wall Street's efforts to securitize subprime loans by becoming the primary customer of all AAA-rated subprime-mortgage pools. In addition, they held an enormous portfolio of mortgages themselves.

In the times that Fannie and Freddie couldn't make the market, they became the market. Over the years, it added up to an enormous obligation. As of last June, Fannie alone owned or guaranteed more than $388 billion in high-risk mortgage investments. Their large presence created an environment within which even mortgage-backed securities assembled by others could find a ready home.

The problem was that the trillions of dollars in play were only low-risk investments if real estate prices continued to rise. Once they began to fall, the entire house of cards came down with them.

Turning Point

Take away Fannie and Freddie, or regulate them more wisely, and it's hard to imagine how these highly liquid markets would ever have emerged. This whole mess would never have happened.

It is easy to identify the historical turning point that marked the beginning of the end.

Back in 2005, Fannie and Freddie were, after years of dominating Washington, on the ropes. They were enmeshed in accounting scandals that led to turnover at the top. At one telling moment in late 2004, captured in an article by my American Enterprise Institute colleague Peter Wallison, the Securities and Exchange Comiission's chief accountant told disgraced Fannie Mae chief Franklin Raines that Fannie's position on the relevant accounting issue was not even ``on the page'' of allowable interpretations.

Then legislative momentum emerged for an attempt to create a ``world-class regulator'' that would oversee the pair more like banks, imposing strict requirements on their ability to take excessive risks. Politicians who previously had associated themselves proudly with the two accounting miscreants were less eager to be associated with them. The time was ripe.

Greenspan's Warning

The clear gravity of the situation pushed the legislation forward. Some might say the current mess couldn't be foreseen, yet in 2005 Alan Greenspan told Congress how urgent it was for it to act in the clearest possible terms: If Fannie and Freddie ``continue to grow, continue to have the low capital that they have, continue to engage in the dynamic hedging of their portfolios, which they need to do for interest rate risk aversion, they potentially create ever-growing potential systemic risk down the road,'' he said. ``We are placing the total financial system of the future at a substantial risk.''

What happened next was extraordinary. For the first time in history, a serious Fannie and Freddie reform bill was passed by the Senate Banking Committee. The bill gave a regulator power to crack down, and would have required the companies to eliminate their investments in risky assets.

Different World

If that bill had become law, then the world today would be different. In 2005, 2006 and 2007, a blizzard of terrible mortgage paper fluttered out of the Fannie and Freddie clouds, burying many of our oldest and most venerable institutions. Without their checkbooks keeping the market liquid and buying up excess supply, the market would likely have not existed.

But the bill didn't become law, for a simple reason: Democrats opposed it on a party-line vote in the committee, signaling that this would be a partisan issue. Republicans, tied in knots by the tight Democratic opposition, couldn't even get the Senate to vote on the matter.

That such a reckless political stand could have been taken by the Democrats was obscene even then. Wallison wrote at the time: ``It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit. The Democrats and the few Republicans who oppose portfolio limitations could not possibly do so if their constituents understood what they were doing.''

Mounds of Materials

Now that the collapse has occurred, the roadblock built by Senate Democrats in 2005 is unforgivable. Many who opposed the bill doubtlessly did so for honorable reasons. Fannie and Freddie provided mounds of materials defending their practices. Perhaps some found their propaganda convincing.

But we now know that many of the senators who protected Fannie and Freddie, including Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Christopher Dodd, have received mind-boggling levels of financial support from them over the years.

Throughout his political career, Obama has gotten more than $125,000 in campaign contributions from employees and political action committees of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, second only to Dodd, the Senate Banking Committee chairman, who received more than $165,000.

Clinton, the 12th-ranked recipient of Fannie and Freddie PAC and employee contributions, has received more than $75,000 from the two enterprises and their employees. The private profit found its way back to the senators who killed the fix.

There has been a lot of talk about who is to blame for this crisis. A look back at the story of 2005 makes the answer pretty clear.

Oh, and there is one little footnote to the story that's worth keeping in mind while Democrats point fingers between now and Nov. 4: Senator John McCain was one of the three cosponsors of S.190, the bill that would have averted this mess.









http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_hassett&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0
It is an agency created by Congress, but is privately owned. sm
The stocks are owned by member banks, and they are private corporations. Every penny of income tax collected goes to private lenders for interest only on the national debt.

Quote from the Grace Commission report: "100% of what is collected is absorbed
solely by interest on the Federal Debt ...
all individual income tax revenues are gone
before one nickel is spent on the services
taxpayers expect from government."
He has never produced the original, just one that he created on a computer and is not the real COLB
It has been found out that the document he created and submitted is not the actual birth record. The original is a typewritten birth certificate. The ones we type on a typewriter to submit to the state office (and back in 1961 there were not computers like there are today to create documents like the one Obama's camp created and put on display). Even so, at the hospital it is still a requirement this COLB be typewritten. They did find the actual typewritten birth certificate and the Obama camp has had it sealed so that nobody can see it. Has to make you wonder. And that is what the law suit is about (there is more than one lawsuit trying to get this document released).

Question that is on a lot of people's mind is - If you are a legal American born citizen, then just show the blooming original birth certificate and get on with it. Why have you taken legal measures to hide it and then create a false one and posted it on your website. Then on top of that a group (Annenberg foundation) who is supporting and doing everything they can to get Obama elected are the ones Obama chose to come out and say its real. Give me a break! Anyone with sense can see this is a cover up. An independent judge needs to sign an order that the original birth certificate to released. If we the people are voting for him then we the people have the right to see what his original type written birth certificate says. I'll give you a hint - the birth place is not going to be Hawaii.
Nazi Germany was created during a long cold winter
when unemployment was high. People was literally starving and freezing. Leadership had failed to keep the citizens fed and sheltered. Rogue leadership, Hitler, arrives announcing he will bring an end to the suffering. War employs. When there are no jobs, war is the alternative for a country. And pillaging, which is what basically happened, and the attempt at extinctousing an undesirable (to Hitler) nationality. Desperation in a country is a ticket to the empowerment of leadership which could potentially change the course of history. Or maybe we know that as it has just happened to us.
Interesting to read the promises Roosevelt made when SS was created.
It's just like farm subsidies and so many other things that government gets into and then makes a mess out of.

The promises, incidentally, were basically "our older citizens will not have to live in poverty". Now, SS is nothing more than institutionalized poverty for anyone who has nothing else.

And, incidentally, some of the rhetoric around the time SS was created dealt with the objections some had to the withholding by saying "This way, you won't have to put money into risky stocks because this is guaranteed". In other words, the implication was that you didn't have to provide otherwise for your retirement. The message was very powerful for a generation that had seen the Crash of 29 and the market's performance throughout the Great Depression. Stocks risky! Social Security safe!

I've forgotten the exact age, but I think when SS was formed the average life expectancy was 60 or less. In other words, it counted on most recipients dying off before they collected much if anything!

Well...you can add it up for yourself. We have people living much longer than SS had ever anticipated. We have a climate where you can't reduce benefits and you can't increase withholdings. And we have not allowed people (other than federal employees!) to opt out of SS so they could invest the withholdings in things that might have performed much better. (Notice how right this minute YOU are probably thinking about our own crash, but the fact is that SS has not even done that well).

I agree that it sounds good to introduce means-testing so wealthy people aren't receiving benefits, but on other grounds I can't go along with what would just be another example of treating some people differently than others.
Well, it would not have been necessary to bail out...
FM/FM had the Democrats running it not stolen it blind, and the "reform" bill the Dems passed that nailed the coffin shut.

Obama dogged and hounded by the media? Are you JOKING? Any interview he did was on the softball channels where he never got a real question...were you even watching? He would not go on Fox where he knew he would have to answer the tough questions until this week. Hounded by the press my eye...only to fawn over him. Sheesh...lol
do you think they should just bail out
what kind of solution do you propose?
we bail out ceo's ......
It's okay to pump billions into the auto industry and wall street but not into our own people?
So what happens when we bail them out?

See!  We bail out the big guys and the money goes straight to the CEOs that ran the company into the ground, rewarding their incompetence!  Oh, lets hurry and bail out the automakers too!


WASHINGTON - American International Group is paying out millions of dollars in executive bonuses to meet a Sunday deadline. But the troubled insurance giant has agreed to administration demands to restrain future payments.


The Treasury Department determined that the government did not have the legal authority to block the current payments by the company that has already received more than $170 billion in U.S. support.


AIG declared earlier this month that it had suffered a loss of $61.7 billion for the fourth quarter of last year, the largest corporate loss in history.


Here's what happens when we bail them out: sm
AIG accepted our money after losing 60 billion, and guess what?  They are paying out 167 million in bonuses.  Why is this allowed to happen?  How can you lose that much money, accept money in bailouts, and then have the unmitigated gall to pay yourselves bonuses? This is UNACCEPTABLE!!  Out and out thievery!!
Do you think our government should bail out FM/FM

Just wondered what everyone thinks about this subject.  I haven't seen it discussed yet and if it has been sorry.  Do you think the government should bail out these two institutions and if so, or not so, why?


I heard someone on the TV today (didn't recognize the name but he's an idependent) he asked the question, so is it going to be the people who make $30K a year the ones who pay for this or the billionaires and trillionaires?  I thought that was a good point.


Also I heard that one of the guys in charge (forget his name right now) made over $90 million and he isn't paying anything.  I would think that if you make over $90M on this and you run it into the ground you should have to forfeit whatever you made and pay it back (but that's my own opinion).


 


the bail out really irks me
I think they should just let them fail and use the 700 billion or whatever it is to try and clean up the fallout from this mess. These greedy b@$st@rds need to deal with the consequences. I really don't get it. I thought you had to have mortgage insurance if you didn't have enough down. My sister has to pay for mortgage insurance, and it's highly unlikely that she is going to default on her mortgage (for one thing, she bought what she could afford). And as far a people losing their homes, well maybe they should move into homes they can afford anyway. There are nice 1-bedroom apartments in Harrisburg for $540, including utilities. Sounds good to me. grrrr....
The reason behind the bail out is

to put money back into the market.  If we do nothing at all, the result is likely to be horrific.  We have to do something to get money back into the market.  However, bailing out these big banks and making us foot the bill is unacceptable to me.  These banks and their big wigs should learn the consequences of their actions and not just walk away with a heck of a lot more money than I will ever see in my lifetime.  This initial bail out is just a band-aid really.  Our economy is collapsing and this bail out will slow down the collapse but there is no guarantee that it will stop it.


Right now they are debating about how to go about this bail out.  Some want the bail out left like it is with us taxpayers footing the bill.  Others are trying to come up with a plan to not make the burden on us and yet still get money into the market.  That is why no agreement has been made. 


My fear is that if we bail them out

what have they learned.  They obviously won't have any consequences to their actions.  We will be the ones to suffer for their greed and crimes.  However, what is to become of us if we don't bail them out?  I really don't know the answer to this.  I am just thoroughly ticked off that our government has allowed things to get like this.  Now they are sitting around crying and whining, pointing fingers, wanting special interests included in the bill, etc.  I'm just so disgusted. 


Is anyone actually in favor of the bail out?

I personally think that we should just let the banks fail and not save their greedy banker butts.  It seems like that's the way a lot of other people feel too.  I haven't heard one person say let's save their greedy banker butts.  However, I'm pretty sure that congress will bail them out.  If I could vote on this, I would definitely say no, no matter what consequence to myself (drop in stock, retirement and possibly the value of my home, no loan for college next semester). 


Are there any average Americans out there that are for this?


bail out the world?
So we have to borrow our own money so we can bail out the world? Call your Senator.
Auto bail out s/m

Read the following report.  8-10% of total cost doesn't seem like a huge percentage for labor costs.  Maybe they can't afford  the big salaries and bonuses for the top dogs?  About time the wealth started being redistributed.  Funny I haven't heard any outrage over the outrageous salaries the top dogs in these automobile business are paid.  Just whining about how much the UAW workers are paid.  It's about time the working class started standing up for the working class!!!!!


Let 'em all go bankrupt. I have no doubt the idjits in Washington are way more concerned about job losses in "developing countries" than those of American citizens.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081115/ap_on_bi_ge/auto_bailout_gettelfinger


Did you see where if we bail out the automakers - see msg
There are people that are laid off and have been laid off for years that are drawing $31 an hour to just sit in a room - they play checkers, they read, they watch TV, or they sleep and stare at the walls.  It is a guaranteed thing that cannot be stopped except through bankruptcy (and they may have to pay them off even then).  So in effect, if we bail out the automakers, we who are struggling to make our money in this world will be paying those people to keep sitting there!!!
How many think you should bail out illegal

what would that matter? you want to bail them out?
nm
I don't think we should bail out anyone's mortgage.
Anyone who took out a mortgage and signed a contract to repay the loan and needs to do so. I don't care if they are illegal aliens, legal aliens, space aliens, or United States citizens.
bail out.. Amen, sam. Disgusted with
the whole dang bunch of them, for sure. As far as this bail out goes, I think those at the top who made so many millions and apparently will just go on, should be treated the same way as Ken Lay and others of Enron fame. They should pay it back, confiscate their new homes and boats or whatever they have bought, do jail time and be forced out of their elite positions. Of course, by the time congress does an investigation they will no longer be around anyway. But I do not think they should continue to give away our jobs to nontax paying people and still fall back on the age old answer of taxing us. Even my math is better than that!
Fear is that they will still collapse even after the bail out.
Hedge funds are about to fold. Derivatives which I do not understand are a whole other ballgame - They are what made the hedge fund managers millionaires - it is like betting on stocks (as one would with football) and is somehow linked to the stock market.

This site explains it well:

http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2008/06/derivatives-market-is-unwinding.html
What is the bank bail-out if not socialism? s/m
Maybe you'd have better luck with your employees if you gave them a raise.  If you have a profit margin that allows you to give them a 25% bonus, surely a 10% raise wouldn't cause you to suffer too much.
And if we did bail out the auto industry......sm
how much is that going to cost us and where is the money going to come from?

I realize this country's economy is in the toilet at this point and people are hurting everywhere, but my question is, like I said above, where is the money going to come from (I don't believe tax increases on the wealthy are going to cover the tab) and what is going to happen when "they" call in the loans?
I think they shouldn't bail them out. They're
All those crooks in the banking, insurance/HMO industries, and most certainly Wall Street, need to be held accountable, have all of their assets seized to help pay for this, and then they should all be sent to Guantanamo Bay to rot.
445,000 per citizen is the bill for the bail outs.
And what then? The govt will own our homes and regulation will take on a whole new meaning.

This is called fascism.
Since when is a tax cut welfare? Corporate bail-outs, maybe...
corporations and plans to continue W's tax cuts for the rich in 2011. Is that welfare too? Sheesh.
While I have to admit that the Republicans started this whole bail out thing...
I really thought we were going to get change with Obama. I didn't vote for him, but this isn't just a continuation of the same old mess, this is adding on to it. You can't blame all of the dems for it, either - there are a couple of repubs signing on as well. I'm pretty sure that this isn't what those who voted for Obama signed on for.

All I can tell you is be sure to write your congressman about this - if you need email addresses or such, go to Congress.org - there's a place to put in your zip code and it gives you the names of all of the reps from your area. Doing that is a much better outlet than attacking each other on this board.
Excellent idea. I'm also charging up my cards, so I hope you bail me out! SM
But wait. If I bail you out and you bail me out and we bail out AIG and the government bails out mortgage-skippers and China bails out the US and...somebody tell me again, where does all this money come from? It's all so confusing.
First because of a hurricane. Now because of Wall St.
an earthquake in California. Or maybe because his favorite show is on TV that night.

I want somebody with some actual ballz in the white house, not an aged wimp.
McCain wants to put Soc Sec in Wall St just like
HE MUST BE STOPPED
Oh Wow. Don't think Wall Street
likes what was done today. It's down 383.73 points and it's not even 4:00 yet!
I have zero confidence in Wall St......nm
x
The writing is on the wall!!!
xx
I am, however, for building that wall...
Along the Mason-Dixon Line!! 
This is a really BIG mess....

instead of talk radio or Gore's electrice bill. I am referring to Libby's trial,


Well....he was convicted of perjury and if he in fact did lie under oath to the grand jury, he should go to jail.  That being said...why not pardon him?  Clinton was cited for exactly the same things...lying under oath (perjury) before a grand jury and obstruction of justice.  He is free as a bird, finished his term as President, making money hand over fist....yes, for that reason alone I think Libby should be pardoned to level the playing field again.  If liberals were happy that Clinton walked, they should not scream bloody murder if Bush does pardon Libby.  Because it is the very same thing and would expose the hypocrisy BIG time.  But, that has never stopped them before, has it? 


the firing of 8 judges,


I am having a hard time finding much usable information about this.  What I can find are various blogs that lean hard right or hard left and not much fact.  I saw where it was stated that they were fired for cause, citing one refused to file death penalty cases, one refused to file immigration cases, yada yada.  But I did not really find anything compelling and not in a blog that compelled me to fall either way on this.  I don't see any reason to think they were not fired for cause...don't see anything in writing to convince me either.


Pete Domineci,


If you are talking about the firing of David Iglesias, I am not much buying it that the administration fired him because of something he did or did not do back during the presidential election.  I can't find any evidence to prove that.  It is of concern to me that Iglesias held that information all this time, and now that he has been fired brings it forward.  He said himself, or at least was quoted as saying, he had no proof that his firing was related to that.  It sounds like sour grapes for being fired to me.  Typical, human reaction to being fired.  But because it is a political position, the sour grapes are made public.


the unnecessary and ever rising numbers of dead - everywhere, 40 towns in Vermont calling for impeachment (of course this won't go anywhere but the gesture is telling),


Nothing much to say about this.  Wars kill people.  Most of the Iraqi deaths are at the hands of other Arabs.  You can blame that on America if you wish.  I choose not to.  More Iraqis are coming forward and fingering the bad guys, and that is what it is going to take.  We have had a lot of successes.  Of course, you have to watch Fox to see them.  CNN studiously ignores such things as it does not fit their agenda.  As do the networks.  I hope you are not going to suggest that Fox has a soundstage where they fake the reports.


a pardon for Libby (and does he have to admit guilt to be pardoned which he has not done), the fact that Libby was the attorney to the much maligned Marc Rich who was pardoned by Clinton, which was also much maligned. Was Scooter as evil as Clinton for having defended him in his dealings with Iran and his tax evasion as Clinton was for pardoning him ??  If all this was just about infighting between the FBI and the administration and George Tenet, then why did Libby lie at all; wouldn't be important enough to lie about, IMHO. Throwing it out there.


This whole thing smacks of getting back, to me.  More interesting to me than Scooter and Marc, is Fitzgerald and Comey.  Fitzgerald and Comey were both prosecutors working on the Marc Rich case.  Obviously they were not happy when they were on the eve of an indictment when Rich ran (wonder who leaked to him that the indictment was imminent) and were even more UNhappy when Clinton pardoned him.  And who should be now prosecuting Scooter?  And who did most of the investigation?  Why, that would be Fitzgerald and Mr. Comey.  Which is why I think they went for Scooter's throat and did not indict the man who REALLY leaked the information, Richard Armitage.  Payback in politics is hael, my friend!!


No he isn't. He's trying to mess up
my debate party!
Yep...that's a mess....(sm)

I will have to admit though that I don't know that much about that aspect of it.  I do know there is some controversy surrounding the whole Hezbullah vs Hamas and Lebanon vs Gaza.  I obviously have some catching up to do on that one...LOL.


I do think, however, that Hamas kind of got a bad rap because they couldn't keep up with the demands for food, housing, etc, and particularly the distribution of aid....?  However, I also think that it's kind of hard to keep that flow of aid going when Israel is attacking incoming ships that carry that aid.  With that and the constant bombardment from Isreal in a military sense on the ground, I think it kind of put them on shaky ground to begin with.


I think in the end the success of whoever wins will be very dependent upon us being able to control Israel.


Foreign investors. China and Russia insisted on Fannie Mac bail out.
dd
Wall Street Journal for one

I know, I know a "liberal rag"!!!!   ha ha ha


 


90% of Wall Street is owned and run by....sm
liberal democrats.



The feds should use the bank & Wall St.
Then put a lien on, and sell, their fancy mansions in upstate NY, their yachts, their Mercedes, etc.  Let their kids to go public school instead of fancy private ones.   They're the greedy ones who got us into this mess, let THEM pay for it, not us.
McCain wants to privatize SS in Wall St just like
You have to really try to pay attention.  Wall St is now subsidized by us.  The big money is gone.  If GW had his way, everyone's SS would be gone.  McCain still wants to privatize SS.  Even a rabid republican would see this is a dumb idea.