Hillary Clinton and the Senate Democrats pound Bush-McCain Economics
By John Amato Wednesday Sep 17, 2008 3:35pm
Hillary Clinton and many Senate Democrats pounded away at the economic policies of Bush and McCain.
Clinton: What we have seen over the course of the last eight years is an administration that refused to recognize the threats lurking in our economy. No matter what lurked just beneath the surface or what problems were facing middle-class families. Now, we know that many C.E.O.'s are paying lower tax rates than their receptionists. We know that President Bush and those who carry his mantle seek to lower those taxes even further. Middle-class families have seen their wages decline even as the cost of living has skyrocketed. This administration has the worst job creation record in 70 years.
Millions of families were locked into ballooning and unaffordable adjustable-rate loads as this administration stood by denying there was a crisis. Regulators and regulations designed to keep pace with the markets have been steadily chipped away by Washington Republicans even as companies experimented to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars in ever more complex and risky financial instruments.
More transcripts below the fold:
(from the C&L email inbox):
Senator Whitehouse goes there and fingers McCain's involvement in the S&L scandal. Points out how McCain and the Bush administration have always been on the side of the deregulation of "crooks and schemers" who have created this current economic mess:
No matter what one presidential candidate may think, the fundamentals of our economy are far from strong. Our economy is off the rails. For the past eight years, the Bush administration has preached over the financial markets a gospel of uncontrolled deregulation. Simply leave the banks and the financiers and the lenders to their own devices, they said, and all will be well. Well, all is not well.
Markets are places where people come to make money. They don't come for altruistic motives. And some are clever enough, when they come to those markets, to try to rig or gain the market in their favor, to gain monopoly power, to hide information, to cheat, to create special advantage. In short, to find a way to gull the suckers. Markets need to be defended against that age-old risk. Markets have to operate honestly, transparently and reliably. And that's where regulation comes in. That's how markets are defended against crooks and schemers. Special interests constantly seek special advantages and it's the regulators' job to push back.
In that constant struggle of the special interests against the regulators, the Bush administration always took the side of the special interests. They have systematically undercut the regulators in their efforts to keep markets safe, and now here we are.
And Senator McCain has been against the regulators even back to the savings and loan scandals of the 80's. The schemers, the manipulators, the Enrons, the subprime mortgage packagers, the oil market speculators, the credit default slop artists, they all found a friend in the Bush Administration, they all found an ally in Bush-McCain policies of deregulation, and now here we are.
Senator McCaskill just clowns the Bush-McCain Republicans new found love for market regulation:
Now here's the thing that is killing me. It's just killing me.
All of the folks that have been screaming deregulation - get the government off our back. Evil government off our back. Big, bad government off our back. Deregulate, deregulate, deregulate. In last 24 hours there has been ... remember the transformer toy that's went from animal to a massive machine, well, we have transformers around here.
These massive deregulation advocates all of a sudden, we've got to enforce rules on Wall Street. We've got to regulate. Come on. Do you think we're dumb?
You can't transform overnight from a big, bad deregulator to I'm now the cop on the beat. I'll take care of Wall Street. It's not honest. Be principled.
Either you're a deregulator and you want to live with these consequences and you want to say to the American people, hey, when we deregulate, this is the risk. This is the risk that we are taking with your money. They are going after the status quo.
Many of my friends on the other side of the aisle, they're fighting the status quo. And guess what? They created it. This was their plan. It didn't work out. It didn't grow our economy. It didn't create jobs.
American families for the first time in our history have gone down in terms of their average income. For the first time our history America is not growing. Our prosperity is not growing.
Senator Clinton gets snarky saying how no one could have predicted this current mess while mocking the claim of "fundamentals" of our economy for being strong:
What we have seen over the course of the last eight years is an administration that refused to recognize the threats lurking in our economy. No matter what lurked just beneath the surface or what problems were facing middle-class families. Now, we know that many C.E.O.'s are paying lower tax rates than their receptionists. We know that President Bush and those who carry his mantle seek to lower those taxes even further. Middle-class families have seen their wages decline even as the cost of living has skyrocketed. This administration has the worst job creation record in 70 years. Millions of families were locked into ballooning and unaffordable adjustable-rate loads as this administration stood by denying there was a crisis. Regulators and regulations designed to keep pace with the markets have been steadily chipped away by Washington Republicans even as companies experimented to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars in ever more complex and risky financial instruments.
Now, we were reassured that the risk was too diversified and investments too sophisticated to put our economy in jeopardy. Meanwhile, behind closed doors, the cracks were showing as the value of the mortgage-based securities slipped day by day by day. And the President and his supporters in Congress repeatedly changed and still chant the mantra today - that the fundamentals of our economy are strong.
I wish we had taken action long before this for the sake of all my constituents, but now we must have a concerted, focused effort. I don't believe we can wait until the next president. I am extremely hopeful and optimistic that we will have a president who will work with us to resolve our economic challenges, but I don't think we can wait.
Clinton calls for decisive action to confront the crisis saying no option should be off the table:
However, I do believe we can avoid a deepening crisis. We can take steps right now to address the root causes of what is taking place in our economy to stem the tide of foreclosures and mortgage defaults and the aggregating consequences in the credit markets on Wall Street and throughout the global economy.
But we must cast aside the haphazard, half hearted approach of this administration and bring every stakeholder to the table to seek out and implement the right solutions. We must be as vigilant on behalf of homeowners and middle-class families as we are on behalf of the Wall Street firms. We must chart a new course based on the facts at hand, not the ideology at work for eight long years. We've tried being reactive. It's time now to be decisive.
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Did they mention repealing the Gramm, et al Act that started, aided and abetted this mess?
No?
Then they're just blowing smoke up your asses, folks...
Vote Mccain in the membrane
I love to listen to Claire McCaskill. She doesn't let anyone get away with anything. She's one of the best friends Obama has out there speaking for him on the campaign trail and she's just as good on the Senate floor.
Glass Steagal will be put back into place. It just won't be called Glass-Steagal.
"A Palin / McCain administration?" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dysEy5O1dn4
Hillary....er, I mean Sara...sure is an ambitious woman isn't she? Good luck at getting that genie back in the bottle John, looks like somebody may have created a monster.
AP and CNN weigh in on McCain thinking Spain is in Latin America
John Aravosis
http://www.americablog.com/2008/09/ap-and-cnn-weigh-in-on-mccain-thinkin...
Forget the economy, Forget Carville’s Old Slogan, Here’s the Theme for 2008!
http://satiricalpolitical.com/?p=3263
Glad to be hearing this kind of talk. However, I can't help but wonder, for that part of the current mess that was legislation-enabled, how many people now screaming bloody murder voted in favor of of the enabling legislation.
pissed@3, Claire knocked down Nora ODonnel today about the tax cut issue. The Bullshit McCain is spreading about Obama's raising taxes on the middle class is crap. Nora and all the other MSM talking heads have to be told repeatedly that Obama won't raise taxes on the middle class. But then again, Nora is a rich righty, why should she pay her fair share?
Go get'em, Hill!
They are all fucking guilty.
NEWS ALERT!!!! Canadian reporter Heather Mallick refers to Piggy Palin as "white trash" with a "toned down hooker" look. FOX NEWS IS HAVING A KNIP FIT! HILARIOUS!!!
HERE'S THE LINK!!!
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/09/05/f-vp-mallick.html
Mallick is right. Sarah Palin is so completely white trash. It's hilarious. If you're outraged, then you have to face the fact that you're white trash too. Palin looks a bit like a cheap whore, anyone can see that. The CBC is right.
Way to go Canada!!! Piggy Palin supporters are pulling out their goatees and seething in their pick ups in anger.
Paul @ 8:
Mr. Clinton signed the Gramm, Leach, Bliley bill into law in 1999 which gutted the protections of the Glass, Steagall Act. All but one Democrat from South Carolina voted against it. All the Thuglies voted for it.
"Palin has a toned-down version of the porn actress look favoured by this decade's woman, the overtreated hair, puffy lips and permanently alarmed expression. Bristol has what is known in Britain as the look of the teen mum, the "pramface." Husband Todd looks like a roughneck; Track, heading off to Iraq, appears terrified. They claim to be family obsessed while being studiously terrible at parenting. What normal father would want Levi "I'm a fuckin' redneck" Johnson prodding his daughter?"
Read more here - http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/09/05/f-vp-mallick.html
Lou @ 12:
Oh, that is seriously funny. I sort of think of the Palins as the Alaskan Hillbillies. Especially Todd, he looks like Jethro on his first trip to the big city.
Jo @ 14:
woody, tokin librul @ 1:
True but the Bill the bill was sent to him with a whopping 90-8 veto proof majority. The Senate Dems caved after an initial party line stand of something like 45-55. Where was the leadership then? The DLC I suspect.
Now, we know that many C.E.O.’s are paying lower tax rates than their receptionists.
Good one, Hillary!
This is what Joe Biden meant when saying paying taxes was patriotic. time for the CEOs to do THEIR patriotic duty by paying their fair share. Of course Palin twisted it all up already.
Jones, where's the link to the vote you cite? would like to see it, thanks.
Far, Far Far ... too complicated for most US voters to grasp.
McCain and Betty Rubble will win.
dosido @ 18:
Palin is going to have more than that twisted by the time her debate with Biden is over. They will probably have to surgically remove her bloomers that night.
the republicans,the anti-government and Darwinian
capitalist got what they wanted....less regulated
free market. look what they did over leveraged
and too much borrowing. smart institutional banking
have a good risk management team....not in this case.
financial investors went hod wild buying derivatives
with more and more borrowed money.this happened
under the bush administration. this administraton and
the investment institutions got greedy.
take a look at oil future speculators totally greedy.
dosido @ 19:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s106-900#votes
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/09/05/f-vp-mallick.html
This is the funniest damned article I've EVER read. This Canadian reporter deserves the Pulitzer. Sean Hannity and the rest of the Faux News gestapo are going apeshit about this.
jones @ 23:
One Senator abstained???? One other notable said Aye???
pissed off patricia Says: dosido @ 18:
Palin is going to have more than that twisted by the time her debate with Biden is over. They will probably have to surgically remove her bloomers that night.
Are they frilly bloomies?
In a perfect (sane) world, Elliot Spitzer would be back on TV leading the charge for regulation and financial reform, the same way he tamed the out of control credit industry.
In a perfect (sane) world, John Edwards would be back on TV drilling home the effects this will have on the poor, and drive even more into welfare.
It's a damn shame that two of the most respected and proven voices on these issues are permanently sidelined.
Millions of families were locked into ballooning and unaffordable adjustable-rate loads as this administration stood by denying there was a crisis.
I would stay away from that if I were a Democratic spokeperson.
I am constantly hearing people say they do not want their tax dollars to bail out people who bought homes they couldn't afford. Many of the people facing foreclosure featured on TV news shows are feckless people who just refused to live within their reality.
I'd stick with portraying bankers as cynical people who pursued reckless financing, but I would not mention their homeowner victims.
So now that the shit has hit the fans.. the johnny come lately democrats are out in full force!
Why didn't the speak up before this happened? huh... weird.
dosido @ 19:
So would I.
Liberal AND Proud @ 26:
Hell no! They are moose huntin' camo all weather bloomers. They come with a matching bra too.
And the President and his supporters in Congress repeatedly changed and still chant the mantra today - that the fundamentals of our economy are strong.
***
remind anyone of a certain CEO that used to run Enron, a someone named Ken Lay?
dosido @ 32:
Crooks always cry, I'm innocent, whenever they get caught. Same thing here just different words.
The dems are missing an opportunity to redirect our entire thinking about what an economy is and its purpose. They should be reminding people that regulations were put in place for a reason. That reason being found in the actions of our grandparents that we joke about when we find balls of string made up of pieces to short to use but were saved.
They should be reminding people that an economy, especially one in a democracy is not about self serving money making. It is about our persuit of happiness. They should be talking about the lost fact that not one dollar is earn singularly but requries at least one other person.
They should be talking about the difference between a king taxing you and We the people taxing us. This would move people to understand that taxes are not bad and thus we could get the debt paid and health care. What is bad with taxes is exactly what is bad with today's economy...selfish people doing selfish things.
But, this can't happen at least not with Obama or Hillary because they are both from the conservative side of thinking about money (neoliberalism to the rest of the world). They both follow and are advised from the Chicago School of economics. Well, maybe it is time someone in the dem party stands up and points out that all the failure we are seeing today are the results of following the thinking of this one school and it just might be time to pick another school of thinking.
Now, that would be total change.
McCain's view of the "fundamentals of our economy" is basically like putting frosting on a turd....
the only thing it does is sweeten the taste of sh*t....
Donald Trump just stuck his foot in his mouth during a live interview with Wolf Blitzer.
John McCain is a liar.
Except, of course, that the Clinton's are also responsible in part for this economic meltdown.
Divorced one like Bush @ 34:
All Good points. As I noted above the DLC Dems are to blame just as much as the Reps. Here's the link to the vote on the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that repealed Glass-Steagle. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s106-900#votes It's my hope that if Obama is allowed to take office that he'll have no place to go but left because of the economic melt-down we're witnessing. Sure, he may have to reward those who do not deserve it with bailouts but if he makes good on promises about alt/energy and changing the direction of country/economy... The Reps are the obvious enemy but they are going to be marginalized in 2009. It's the DLC that is still very strong and who we need to be vigilant with so they don't sell us out too badly in the next term.
KEATING FIVE SCANDAL IS ON THE WAY!
NEW YORK TIMES: May 10, 2008, 6:54 pm
Obama Says McCain"s Keating Five Connection Is Not Off Limits
By Jeff Zeleny
BEND, Ore. " Senator Barack Obama said today that a scandal from Senator John McCain"s past " the Keating Five " was just as relevant to the presidential campaign as questions about who Mr. Obama has associated with over the years.
In a news conference here, Mr. Obama was asked whether his campaign intended to raise the banking scandal from the 1980s, which Mr. McCain has apologized for. Every piece of every candidate"s public record, Mr. Obama said, is "germane to the presidency."
. . .
"I was just asked previously about a whole host of issues and associations that are a lot more flimsy than John McCain"s relationship to Keating Five," Mr. Obama said. "What I said, I can"t quarrel with the American people wanting to know more about that and me having to answer questions about it."
Can we start saying "WE TOLD YOU SO!" yet??
For years we were mailigned, called names, told we just wanted and were hoping for failure, doom and gloom nay sayers...
Well to all the deregulating magically transformed Republicans: STFU!
Live with the consquences of your actions, WE SURE ARE!
We let them (Republicans) re-write and diminish history after FDR, we let people forget, we let high school history books get changed - NEVER AGAIN
Janice G Washington @ 40:
Whoo Hoo!
But be careful, remember the other four were Dems
And did you hear that McCain was a POW and didn't have a kitchen table?
But now he has 7 HOMES and A CESSNA CITATION JET! Life's a bitch when you're rich! Gold diggin' works real good.
Why didn't the SEC go after all those folks who were "naked short selling" and driving the markets to hell?....
Also who was responsible letting the "Uptick Rule" go by the wayside....
That's just like punching holes in a leaking boat....
Lonely voice from the back of the room asks: "Ummm...Mrs. Clinton...what about the Gramm etc. act that made all of this possible? Wasn't that passed during YOUR HUSBAND'S administration? What about NAFTA? Wasn't that passed during YOUR...hey! OW! Don't taze me dude! NO!!! DON'T TAZE ME>>>EEEEYYYAAAAAAGGHHH!!!!!!!!"
Hillary, it started out with your meddling in your husband's administration.
Hillary was so greedy that she was renting out the Lincoln bedrooms for her dem friends. Hillary did everything under the sun (Solomon's song of songs). The dems have sent all their funds to foreign banks.
Can you imagine, Savage who was constantly blaming Hillary, Clinton, Rubin for all the mess has changed positions and is now bashing the republicans. Who can trust the heart? Why Savage changed positions? The answer is that the media did not shine his shoes in the sun and attacked him instead.
Hey, dems, you have a new friend, Savage.
STOCKS UP 400, wow maybe McCain does know what he's doing! Go McCain! Cause it was his fault when they dropped right? Stupid King Obama idiots.
MONICA LEWINSKY = DEMOCRATS ARE WEAK
OBAMA = LAWYER = SCUM OF THE EARTH
AMEN 46, THE ROOT OF our trade issues was under Democrat watch. Tax the rich only! Wow are you that stupid people? 94 out of 94 votes to raise taxes, read the damn records before becoming Zombies. The real difference between these 2 guys is that one can and has crossed party lines. Obama is a flat out liar, nice comment Monday, pioneerd a economic bill? Umm no, you didn't and you didn't even show up to vote on it, even your baby CNN said so. People figure it out.
STOCKS SURGE 400 = MCCAIN ~! GO JOHN!
STOCKS FALL, Obama said it was failed McCain economics? So McCain economics are good now? I'm confused by your message now?
Is the Great Depression part 2 over in 1 day? I want a President who will cry wolf with a stock market drop, keep it up and you will continue to lose more of your King Obama socialist supports idiot.
FUNDAMENTALS of our economy, inflation, unemployment, interest, taxes, for the country wide part McCain is correct. Yes it has holes and he will fix them.
Obama just says it's the Great Depression and everyone panic! Oh on your way to the bread lines, stop in and vote for him.
Is this guy for real? People are not that stupid are they? That is rhetorical for the Obama supporters because they don't see this guy is a liar, 94 / 94 votes to increase taxes, I thought it was taxing the "rich" only? I'm confused?
McCain will fix the greed in Washington. Enough said he has my vote.
Obama continues to lie about his record (confirmed by CNN even), he calls himself black when he is half white - what's up with that? Can't he just say he's American like all of us? And voting 94/94 times to increase taxes, I thought he was only taxing the "rich", if people think he is telling the truth let me remind you he is a LAWYER.
NEW YORK has been hit the hardest by this, who is the SENATOR of New York by the way? HMM
HAVEN'T DEMS had control of congress for the last 2 years? Why haven't you done anything, maybe take 5 more weeks off and the market will come back up once you quit attacking Americans with fear and panic.
Stop making this a political issue cause no one is buying it.
VOTE REPUBLICAN
Paul @ 8:
Only Republicans. The vote was 54/44 with only one Dem voting for it. http://tinyurl.com/5lwv6z
Ed in Socal @ 54:
And, btw, Bush enabled the problem by announcing the gov't wouldn't enforce the Predatory Lending Act. As usual, he didn't go to Congress to change the law. He simply announced it wouldn't be observed.
Who let the chatbot troll in?
Admin!!!! Clean up in aisle 5!!!!!
Randy @ 53:
Yeah, right. The Republicans openly brag about how they've impeded and thwarted every attempt by the Dems to move the country forward, and you want to blame the Dems. Get real. Be a man and accept reponsibility for what has happened.
Then realize that it's stoopid to try and place blame elsewhere. It's time to work together to solve this. We can do it! Fight with me. Fight with me. :-)))
OK, does this means that the gloves are finally off?
Will Pelosi and Reid get out of the way?
Ed in Socal @ 57:
Don't feed the troll...
McCain will do ANYTHING to get elected and it's sad how few people actually see that. Folks, our economy is headed for another Great Depression. Are you seeing these banks fail? Do you see the stock market tanking? Do you see the job losses, foreclosures, repossessions
and rising numbers of homeless people in poverty? Eight years of Bush-Cheney took this country from prosperity to poverty and McCain wants to continue the same failed Bush economic philosophy. How much more painful evidence do you need to hear before you say you've had enough? Only a Democratic administration can save us now, just like FDR did after the Depression. Republicans can go ahead and cling to their guns and religion as they go to sleep under the highway overpass because those idiots are fiddling as Rome burns.
Oh yeah! Except, let's get honest about this. Who revoked Glass Steagal? Bill Clinton. True, under the Democrats, I hope, they would never have let it go as far as it did, it was Clinton who enabled these crooks by decriminalizing it under the guise of deregulation.
Lou @ 12:
In a similar vein, saw Mama Spears pimping her book on the 5pm "news" here. She's adopted the Palin look too...
Re: “Obama continues to lie about his record (confirmed by CNN even), he calls himself black when he is half white - what’s up with that? Can’t he just say he’s American like all of us?”
It would be nice for everyone to eliminate race as a factor in judging another human being. When that day comes, none of us will have to refer to ourselves as Black or Caucasian or Chinese or anything other than American. We have had several left-handed Presidents; I don’t know which was first. We no longer think anything of it. We think so little of the matter that we forget that centuries ago left-handed people we called “sinister” – which means “left” in Latin. It must have been something of a breakthrough to elect the first left-handed president, yet today we do not regard it as a breakthrough at all.
But race hasn’t yet evaporated as a subject that people think about, the way that left-handedness has ceased to be an issue.
And this is particularly true when we refer to persons of mixed race. There was a time when a person of mixed race, a mulatto or Eurasian, was looked at with even more suspicion than a Black or Asian. I do not know why this was the case, but I recall it well from the 1950s and early 1960s. William Faulkner’s great novel “Light in August” is about a man of mixed race, with the essence being that the man is being pulled back and forth by two conflicting trends in his blood. All this is stupid, but at one time many people believed it.
I think it is a great step forward for the old prejudice about mixed-race persons to have faded away. But it has in a sense just been oversimplified. In recent years we have simply regarded persons of mixed race as basically being members of the minority group. When Obama calls himself Black, he is obeying this convention. He should perhaps call himself of mixed race or avoid the issue entirely.
But the latter is impossible. He must deal with the fact that he is different in one visible way, and if he becomes president he will be the first person other than a pure Caucasian to hold that office. This would be historic, at least from the 21st century perspective. It may well be that in 200 or so years we will have forgotten who was the first Black president, the way that we have forgotten who was the first left-handed president.
But getting back to the reason why a person of mixed race refers to himself as Black and not white or mixed. The convention was not created by the Blacks but by the Whites.
For example, in the 1950s and before that, it was common to discuss very light skinned Black people who “passed for white.” That meant that while they seemed to be white, they were really Black. I believe that that kind of thinking has passed away for two reasons: First, because if someone seems to be white then what is the point of asking whether they are or are not; Second, because even if someone seems to be white, there is a new element of pride among minority groups, and they often want to emphasize their background.
There is a great pun on the subject of mixed-race people in the old musical comedy “Show Boat.” In the first act there is a scene where a couple aboard the showboat hear that the local police are about to raid the boat in search of a mixed race couple. It was at the time, and continued in many states until the Supreme Court struck down state miscegenation laws in the 1960s, illegal for a Black and White person to marry.
So, knowing that the police will raid the boat and drag them off to jail if they are Black and White and married, the husband (who is white) makes a small cut on the thumb of his wife (who is either Black or of mixed race, she is generally depicted as white skinned and dark haired, Ava Gardner played the role in one of the movie versions), and then he licks the blood. He does this in front of about five witnesses.
The police arrive and are about to drag them off to jail when the husband says: “You would not call someone White if they have Black blood in them, would you?” The reply is: “Oh no. If you have one drop of Negro blood in you, you are Black in the state of Mississippi.” (I’m not sure these are the exact words in the script.) So his reply is “Well, I have more than a drop of Black blood in me. And these witnesses will certify.” They all do, without mentioning that the drops of blood were ingested and not inborn, and so the police lets the couple go, because it is not illegal for two Blacks to marry.
And so that will give you some idea why Obama, and indeed most persons of Black-White background tend to call themselves Black and not White or of mixed race.
i loved hil! "... we've tried reactive, it's time to be decisive."
why is it that a comedy show is the only one really pointing out the facts of the bill that was passed, and the hypocracy of the repugs???
FUCK THE MSM
Randy @ 53:
do you truly believe that a congress that was unable to enact any significant piece of legislation due to repug maneuvering and the bush veto truly caused this economic collapase?
seriously?
or do you walk around all day only thinking in repug talking points
why cant you accept the fact that your party is controlled by criminals
its not hard to do...look at how many have been indicted or should be
i know you are a troll, and dont care what anyone here has to say...but look deep into your heart...think about what kind of country you are leaving to your hellspawn
thank you
Lou @ 12:
maher needs to book her on his show
as she writes outside of the states, she is comfortable putting on paper what most think, but will not say
do you want the beverly hillbillies in the white house?
woody, tokin librul @ 1:
why? do you think they are afraid because their names are on the final draft?
read it...there were safeguards still in place, put in by amendments from the dems
but the bushies were smart, and in the first 4 years, removed all those safeguard through other bills
should the mainstream dems have been smarter??? hell yes
should they be held accountable?? hell yes
doesnt take away from the fact that deregulation doesnt work...it doesnt
oh...and i still dont get it...where the fuck was this hillary during the campaign?
calm, cool and collected
i am starting to believe that she really didnt want to be prez...that she knew what the next prez would be facing and just decided to make a show of it
in any case, she will be the next senate majority leader...reid is a doof
They can pound their chests and scream at the top of their lungs, we aren't buying what Obama is selling. I want no part of a corrupt party any longer. I will not reward a man who has lied, cheated and stole his way into the nomination. Democrats aren't stupid people, we know a double talker when we see one, and Obama is a double talker. Do as I say, not as I do. What a thug. I will proudly join my fellow democrats and vote for John McCain in November. I will vote country before party, I will vote for a man I know to be a true patriot, a man with character and morals, something Obama is certainly lacking.
I cant vote for such a corrupt man, a corrupt DNC and a corrupt party. When and if my party of choice puts an end to this corruption and fraud, maybe then I will be back and I am sure millions will do the same.
Does no one in the government read Harper's Magazine? This is all shit that contributors to Harper's said in 2006-2007 and continuing. I'm sure this is no surprise to them.
Reading is their friend. As far as I know, this inevitability of the market crash was predicted not so eerily by many analysts/writers as far as 2005.
I believe some of you Obamabots need to go to college or back to college and leave the politics to those that understand them. The Clinton's are part of the reason for the economic meltdown, give me a break! You will continue to blame the Clinton's for everything wrong in the world wont you? Grow up! I doubt you were out of elementary school when Bill was President.
I think Hillary wants the Majority Leader post!
Lou@12
Unbelievable. Not the article, it is basically right on. What is scary and crazy are the commenters. Most of them are, apparently, white trash. She hit a chord and they came out in droves. Dennis would be in seventh heaven among them!
The root cause was called Reaganomics. It has been championed by every small minded moron with (R) after the name for twenty eight years more especially Phil Gramm, Dick Armey, Tom DeLay, Newt Gingrich, John McCain, et al. The finally caused the financial institutions to be able by passing this bill in 1999.
http://www.frbsf.org/publications/banking/gramm/index.html
The breadth of the bailout is only beginning. The laws passed by Phil(American whiners)Graham and John(noun, verb and pow) and the republican majorities in the senate and house to deregulate the financial markets led us in a journey through Enron and World Com to sub-prime and alt a debacles. The nature of what is being bailed out and who is being bailed is quite interesting. Was not saving Lehman have any anti-Semitic overtones. The next big deal is the 62 TRILLION dollars of "derivatives". No one will explain what they are, who owns them and to whom what is owed. This is a function of the opaque nature of these unregulated financial instrument. Once again 62,000,000,000,000 in an economy that is an annual 14,000,000,000 GDP. Now those are figures that will not change. Along with Norquist's drowning of the government , he and his ilk are drowning the future of every person and institution in the country, all I can say as job well done, assholes.
Not that I voted for Bush, but something must be said for telling the truth here. In 2003 Bush did submit a plan to do something about the impending problems of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. It was the congress that decided to sit on their hands and decided not to listen to him. Who can say if his plan would have worked, but something has got to be said for congress who decided to sit on their hands.
I supported Hillary in the primary, but I'm disappointed here that she chooses partisanship and blaming over admitting that the Democratic Congress just didn't do anything about the coming disaster. Neither does she comment on former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson, one of the men responsible for this mess, is an Obama advisor. A candidate who takes advice from this man doesn't sound like a promising change to me. If those in government are not willing to share the responsibility for this, the will not be willing to share the solution.
Clinton talks about special interests, but she doesn't talk about all the money going to Obama's campaign by the spouses and business partners of special interest lobbyists. Don't be fooled. McCain has a record of taking on fellow Republicans, and special interests. In these trying times, I don't think it's very wise to put your trust in a man who is taking his economic advice from the Fannie Mae guy.
Clinton doesn't tell you that many of the regulations she's complaining about are those that forced financial institutions to lower loan standards and accept high risk clients, which is the reason so man of those high risk mortgages are failing now. And she doesn't say that McCain wants to double the tax credits for dependents, which will be a giant relief for single parents, mostly women who could use a break.
She also doesn't say that the Obama economic plan will put such a heavy tax burden on small businesses it would contribute to the failure of many new and existing businesses. And since over half of all new businesses are started by women, this will hurt women.
She also doesn't say that our economy depends on small businesses, the very businesses that would be taxed to death of Obama and his Fannie Mae advisor have their way.
One of the reasons I supported Hillary in the primary was that she had a much better record of reaching across the aisle than Obama does. (Th