Obama+#44= so what

Quote:

Originally posted by ntvtxn

All I can say is I didn't serve my country in the US Navy so this guy could be elected.

The beauty of OUR democracy is that you did serve in the Navy so this guy could get elected. And thank you for that.

However, you did not serve in the Navy to guarantee that the extreme wing of either party will stay in power permanently--again the beauty of democracy.

Quote:

Originally posted by BDWW

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Rogue, the chickens coming home to roost now, are hatchling from the Clinton admin. If you've studied economics you'd know that. It was Clinton that changed FNMA lending guidelines that began the debt fueled spending spree that this country ran with for the majority of the Bush administration. I am not saying Bush didn't do his own part to make things worse or add to it. I am saying the beginning of this mess rests squarely in Clinton's lap.

Blaming Clinton for the mess we are in is like blaming the cops for child porn.

Under Clinton, housing and lending rules were relaxed. I'll give you that. But that wasn't the cause of the big fall of the US economy. It was graft, greed, and fraud. CDO's, backed by nothing more than someone saying it was OK, caused a HUGE economic rift between reality and hosing prices. Since the CDO's were "supposed" to be AAA and A rated, even though they were backed by B rated comodities at best, is what caused the problem. Not to mention that CDO's were issued based on OTHER CDO's that were crap aided the fall of the US economy. When the comodities failed, there was nothing to back them, and people started loosing money. That caused a panic that led to a lot of people wanting their money back before it was time, and illiquidity in the market not seen since the 1930's.

Economincs is all about attitude. There really isn't more or less money, just more or less willingness to spend it. There needs to be a flow of money in and out. The more that money flows the more the economy grows. The less it flows, the worse it does. It is about perception, and that's why it's had to perdict what it will do.

The biggest stimulus for the economy is the one that will make people feel good about spending money again. A direct cash payment (like the Bush stimulus) will only work if people aren't that afraid to spend. Otherwise they will save it. More jobs, a stonger "safety net" for workers and (to a VERY small degree) tax cuts are the best way to move the economy forward. Yes, it sound socialist, I know. I'm not a big fan of big goverment. But sometimes you need to swallow a bitter pill to make the illness go away.

In a kind of tirtiary way, we can blame rising oil prices for the collapse. Those that were "on the brink", i.e. those that were able to make all thier bills, but just barely, we suddenly in over thier heads. That spurred the forclosures to higher levels than "expected", which caused softness in real estate, and began the downward spiral.

More oversight and regulatory authority might have prevented a lot of the "bad" loans from being issued in the first place, but hindsight being what it is, how could anyone know?

Quote:

Originally posted by fiach

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Blaming Clinton for the mess we are in is like blaming the cops for child porn.

Under Clinton, housing and lending rules were relaxed. I'll give you that. But that wasn't the cause of the big fall of the US economy. It was graft, greed, and fraud. CDO's, backed by nothing more than someone saying it was OK, caused a HUGE economic rift between reality and hosing prices. Since the CDO's were "supposed" to be AAA and A rated, even though they were backed by B rated comodities at best, is what caused the problem. Not to mention that CDO's were issued based on OTHER CDO's that were crap aided the fall of the US economy. When the comodities failed, there was nothing to back them, and people started loosing money. That caused a panic that led to a lot of people wanting their money back before it was time, and illiquidity in the market not seen since the 1930's.

Economincs is all about attitude. There really isn't more or less money, just more or less willingness to spend it. There needs to be a flow of money in and out. The more that money flows the more the economy grows. The less it flows, the worse it does. It is about perception, and that's why it's had to perdict what it will do.

The biggest stimulus for the economy is the one that will make people feel good about spending money again. A direct cash payment (like the Bush stimulus) will only work if people aren't that afraid to spend. Otherwise they will save it. More jobs, a stonger "safety net" for workers and (to a VERY small degree) tax cuts are the best way to move the economy forward. Yes, it sound socialist, I know. I'm not a big fan of big goverment. But sometimes you need to swallow a bitter pill to make the illness go away.

In a kind of tirtiary way, we can blame rising oil prices for the collapse. Those that were "on the brink", i.e. those that were able to make all thier bills, but just barely, we suddenly in over thier heads. That spurred the forclosures to higher levels than "expected", which caused softness in real estate, and began the downward spiral.

More oversight and regulatory authority might have prevented a lot of the "bad" loans from being issued in the first place, but hindsight being what it is, how could anyone know?

I think you would agree that it was a domino effect of issues that brought us to where we are. My perspective comes from being in mortgage lending and having my customers call me back every six months to pull moneyh out of their homes as values rose. I made reference to debt fueled spending. People were treating their homes like they were ATMs. When that collapsed, I never heard one person take personal responsibility. They ALL blamed the people they borrowed the money from. When I blame Clinton for his share of this, I am stating that he created a very liberal (excuse the term) lending enviroment such that, if you had collateral and could fog a mirror you could borrow money. As such he was the first and to my mind the largest domino. It was all these refis that people used to buy the majority of goods that fueled the economy for that time period. You want a new car, refi. You want a big screen, refi. It was a house of cards. This is what I observed.

Your statement about the economy being about attitude is on point IMO. You are correct that the CCI has a MAJOR part of how the economy functions. We are seeing a trend torwards increased savings which is ultimately good. The downside is the lack of spending that fuels jobs in the retail sector. People are holding onto their cars longer. That hurts our auto industry. They're staying put in their homes, that hurts...yada yada yada....

Oil speculation last year caused the prices we see. Selective reduction in refinement is the current cause of gas rising while oil has plummeted. Oil companies liked their profits too much. I don't read about R&d expenses anymore. I read about major profit windfalls. I'd like to bitchslap a number of people in that industry. I'd especially like to choke the specualtors that drove prices up....

There is a bitter pill stuck in ALL of us now. WE have to swallow it and hope we begin to feel better....

Quote:

Originally posted by RogueLeader

Obama is the best thing that has happened to this country since Lincoln... Deal with it, n00b!

What has he done, other than get elected? Yea, that was awesome for the forwarding of racial barriers and whatnot, but aside from that the man has been in office for less than a month. In fact, the only thing he -has- done is pass yet another 'stimulus' bill that is going to drive us further into the hole you were bitching about. You can't fix a wasteful spending problem by spending even more and you most certainly CAN NOT print all the money you want and expect things to be ok. The shit is going to hit the fan...and I expect it to happen sooner rather than later.

I really miss WBW before this sub-forum existed. I'll always refer to the pre-panel WBW as the golden years. I feel like this site is in a recession because of this damn thing.

Anyway, I'm no huge Obama fan but what was the alternative? An old guy who's ideals and votes are directly linked to Bush AND showed terrible judgement by picking the biggest idiot in the country as his VP.

Not to take away anything from Obama but the democratic candidate could have said nothing the entire time and Palin would've ensured victory for the democrats anyway. She made Bush look like Einstein. VP's generally don't matter that much but when they're that blatantly stupid they make a huge difference. It didn't help either that the McCain camp had no original strategies and attempted to steal every one Obama came up with. Half way through they tried to steal the "change" motto which just made them look desperate and pathetic.

I'm an independent and will die an independent because I believe the 2 major parties are exactly what is wrong with this country and why nothing can get done. It's always "my team" vs "your team" but never "what's best for the country." If you're a Republican and you're mad you have no one to blame but the idiots in your own party who nominated the fossil and his cheerleader in the first place. You had no chance from day 1 with those two. Romney would have at the very least put up a fight. The election was a landslide because your candidates couldn't have been worse if you picked them blindfolded.

Quote:

Originally posted by RogueLeader

Obama is the best thing that has happened to this country since Lincoln... Deal with it, n00b!

Seriously, though... As I mentioned in my Great Depression 2.0 thread (http://whatboyswant.com/forum_read/4533191/1/10) he is much better than what we had... He has passed a stimulus package and a housing package that I hope that will help the economy. Let's face it, the past 8 years of incompetence have put us in a hole that it will take us a long time to dig out way out of. Goodness hopes that we will see a day that we will be out of this mess before it's too late.

Now that gets on my nerves! Sorry but Im sick and tired of Obama being put on a level with Abraham Lincoln! The only thing I see is they can and could speak well. Its way too soon to make comparisons of such magnitude. Who can say that in 2 years we dont use Obama and Nixon in the same sentence as a comparison. Its just way too early!

Quote:

Originally posted by BDWW

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When I blame Clinton for his share of this, I am stating that he created a very liberal (excuse the term) lending enviroment such that, if you had collateral and could fog a mirror you could borrow money. As such he was the first and to my mind the largest domino.

I agree with 95% of what you've said. People blaming mortgage companies cause they couldn't pay back loans they were taking out is ridiculous. Folks did use their homes as piggy banks, enjoyed the money and then started pointing fingers when it was time to pay up.

But blaming Clinton is.....cherry picking history. Clinton's role in this goes back to his signing the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act which enabled much of the deregulation we are now so pissed at. Clinton signed it. His fault. McCain voted in favor of it as well at the time. And Phil Gramm, who co-wrote the thing and has his name on it, was McCain's chief economic advisor during the last campaign. So honestly, it was a bi-partisan mess that was created and if anyine thinks having a President McCain inaugurated last month would have helped.....look who he was getting his advice from.

The whole congress sucks. They are fucking up in either direction. Anyone pointing fingers to either side right now is a dumb asshole.

I voted for Obama but I agree with Assman that its far too early for comparisons. We ought to let the man work for a year or so at least. He has been in office a month so far...... (and I entirely agree with Swiss. that post was dead on the money)

Quote:

Originally posted by assman3

... Now that gets on my nerves! Sorry but Im sick and tired of Obama being put on a level with Abraham Lincoln! The only thing I see is they can and could speak well. Its way too soon to make comparisons of such magnitude. Who can say that in 2 years we dont use Obama and Nixon in the same sentence as a comparison. Its just way too early!

amen.....

i was really against this 2nd stimulus package because of the way the package was structured...half of the money can't be injected untill a few years down the road...you can't fix everything by just throwing more money at it...BTW didn't he say he was going to fix it ?...then why is he putting a task force together to come up with a plan...i thought he had one ? He has no clue how to fix it either...hence the task force.

The problem with those who are comparing Obama to Lincoln is that they don't realize that Lincoln:

1) Provoked an unpopular war that caused draft riots in most major cities (due to the policy of letting the rich buy their way out of the draft)
2) Issued a piece of military propaganda that ignored slaves in Maryland, leaving them in bondage
3) Didn't care if the slaves got freed or not, as long as he could end the war and preserve the Union
4) Lead an assault on rights that Bush did not even think of. He imprisoned opponents, shut down newspapers, suspended habeas corpus nationwide, and instituted martial law in all areas considered friendly to the South.

He was a great President for preserving the Union at any price. Not so good for most anything else.

Quote:

Originally posted by Swiss407

I really miss WBW before this sub-forum existed. I'll always refer to the pre-panel WBW as the golden years. I feel like this site is in a recession because of this damn thing.

You don't have to read the stuff, if you don't want.

Quote:

Originally posted by Gouda407

Half way through they tried to steal the "change" motto which just made them look desperate and pathetic.

Yeah, that was pretty ridiculous. It was also ridiculous for the Obama campaign to use it and then bring in Clinton, Biden, Emmanuel, Daschle, Larry Summers (Treasury Sec. under Clinton), Volcker, etc. It's one of the least change oriented presidential transitions I've ever seen. (Which, obviously, isn't that many. )

Quote:

Originally posted by Cheddar407

I'm an independent and will die an independent because I believe the 2 major parties are exactly what is wrong with this country and why nothing can get done. It's always "my team" vs "your team" but never "what's best for the country." If you're a Republican and you're mad you have no one to blame but the idiots in your own party who nominated the fossil and his cheerleader in the first place. You had no chance from day 1 with those two. Romney would have at the very least put up a fight. The election was a landslide because your candidates couldn't have been worse if you picked them blindfolded.

The only bad thing about being an independent is that you can't really vote for anyone in the primaries, which sucks, because the majority of primary voters are the hard-core committed members of a party which leads to the ideologues and zealots getting nominated.

But you're right, there is almost no difference between the parties and they're both as corrupt as the other.

Quote:

Originally posted by RogueLeader

Obama is the best thing that has happened to this country since Lincoln... Deal with it, n00b!

Seriously, though... As I mentioned in my Great Depression 2.0 thread (http://whatboyswant.com/forum_read/4533191/1/10) he is much better than what we had... He has passed a stimulus package and a housing package that I hope that will help the economy. Let's face it, the past 8 years of incompetence have put us in a hole that it will take us a long time to dig out way out of. Goodness hopes that we will see a day that we will be out of this mess before it's too late.

I respectfully disagree with you. That "stimulus package" is $787 Billion that we don't have so it has to be borrowed, printed or both. It is impossible to borrow yourself into prosperity, it can't be done and there is history to show this. If the money is printed it will cause inflation. Try to look at it from a micro economic point of view, use your personal finances as an example. If you're $250,000 in debt and your pay gets cut from $50,000 a year to $30,000 and you are now unable to make your payments what do you do? Do you go out and borrow more money to make your payments, putting yourself further in debt. No you don't, for one there isn't a bank out there that would give you the money but even if they would all that would do is put you further in debt, not pave the road to prosperity. When the government borrows that kind of money it sucks money from the private sector, that could be used for real growth, to spread the cash around on make work projects that end in a few years. There are way to many reasons this is bad for me to address here, educate yourself and you will realize this is a bad road to go down.

Start here
http://mises.org/

after studiously reading all the previous posts I come to a couple of conclusions, well maybe several.
1.Obama inherited a mess, deal with this however you like. There were several salient points as to past history etc. But the fact is that until January 20th, he was not President. Tomorrow he will have been the President for 1 month, It took 10 years for this mess to happen, it will not be fixed in a month.


I am really here for the pRon, now please lets enjoy the babes.

Quote:

Originally posted by Rob3

...I am really here for the pRon, now please lets enjoy the babes.

I'm with you Rob

Socialism will not work in the US or even Socialism's nastier sister Communism.
The US has always been a Market Economy based on Capitalism. This will not change without a revolution and/or a Civil War II.

Obama got the seat by pure luck....... He is much less qualified to be the POTUS than Jimmy Carter was in the late 1970's.

Housing will come back, jobs will come back but GM/Chrysler are most likely doomed due to their insane legacy costs.
CEO misconduct, wall street a-holes, madoff type clowns must all be dealt with criminally and with forfeiture when possible. CEO pay must be roped in and based on profitability instead of stock price.

Congress must address the ambulance chasers(lawyers) pain and suffering b.s in medical malpractice lawsuits. Then, maybe we can get a decent National Health care system for those uninsured or under insured.

Quote:

Originally posted by rikko

Socialism will not work in the US or even Socialism's nastier sister Communism.
The US has always been a Market Economy based on Capitalism. This will not change without a revolution and/or a Civil War II.

Obama got the seat by pure luck....... He is much less qualified to be the POTUS than Jimmy Carter was in the late 1970's.

Housing will come back, jobs will come back but GM/Chrysler are most likely doomed due to their insane legacy costs.
CEO misconduct, wall street a-holes, madoff type clowns must all be dealt with criminally and with forfeiture when possible. CEO pay must be roped in and based on profitability instead of stock price.

Congress must address the ambulance chasers(lawyers) pain and suffering b.s in medical malpractice lawsuits. Then, maybe we can get a decent National Health care system for those uninsured or under insured.

Obama got elected because the American people saw him as the best choice to recover from years of neocon treachery and malfeasance. Correct on some constraints on executives, but a sweeping philosophical change will be required. The Reagonesque notion that ANYTHING GOES as long as the stockholders make money has proved to be our downfall. There is nothing wrong with capitalism, entrepreneurship, risk taking, etc., as long as there is some semblance of concern for the public welfare in the mix. This has not been the case. Under the rule of Rove and Cheney, we have been transformed into a plutocracy, with a few thousand elites having almost all of the money and virtually all of the power, a sort of neofeudalism. Unfortunately, the vast majority of us are now the serfs and peasants, and a once burgeoning middle class has been supplanted. How sad for our great democracy. Our only hope is for some really smart and decent people, Obama at the head, can reverse this trend.

show me the jobs. and how the debt our kids grandkids won't be able to pay off!!

I don't disagree with most of what Rikko said, but how Obama got his seat by pure luck is beyond me. He ran an organized, committed campaign that was purposeful and systematic. The other side was disorganized, gimicky (Joe the Plumber and Bible Spice) and I still don't think ever actually presented for public consideration anything beyond "Obama has evil friends".

Obama sold the notion of hope and -- I hate to say it cause I love John McCain and think he is a truly great American -- the Republicans sold the notion of fear. Worked in 2004. Did not work this time. The end result was an election which by historical standards over the last 25 years was not at all close.

Luck had nothing to do with it.

Quote:

Originally posted by russej

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Obama got elected because the American people saw him as the best choice to recover from years of neocon treachery and malfeasance. Correct on some constraints on executives, but a sweeping philosophical change will be required. The Reagonesque notion that ANYTHING GOES as long as the stockholders make money has proved to be our downfall. There is nothing wrong with capitalism, entrepreneurship, risk taking, etc., as long as there is some semblance of concern for the public welfare in the mix. This has not been the case. Under the rule of Rove and Cheney, we have been transformed into a plutocracy, with a few thousand elites having almost all of the money and virtually all of the power, a sort of neofeudalism. Unfortunately, the vast majority of us are now the serfs and peasants, and a once burgeoning middle class has been supplanted. How sad for our great democracy. Our only hope is for some really smart and decent people, Obama at the head, can reverse this trend.

Amen

Quote:

Originally posted by EricLindros

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You don't have to read the stuff, if you don't want.

Without trying to take this thing totally off topic. I do have to read these things because by nature I'm an argumentative person and certain topics make my blood boil. Basically any kind of topic which would be posted in this sub-forum. So it's like crack to a crackhead. If you put him somewhere with no crack and no way to get it then sobriety isn't that hard but if you put him in a crack house then he's not gonna stay away for long. Crackheads don't necessarily like crack they just can't stay away. I don't like these topics but when they pop up in front of me in the recent posts all the time I just can't help but my throw in my 2 cents and get pissed off and annoyed at the same time.

You have my support to get rid of Obama bin laden and of course the worlds biggest racist Oprah the biggot winfrey.But when it comes to the teachers, They have my full support. They just keep cutting the budgets by the billions, but still expect better results. I have been buying cases of paper reems and ink for printers and copy machines for my wife for the last 3 years. This is so she can maintain a great job in her classroom teaching kids that aren't even ours. However she keeps telling me thats what she signed up for and enjoys her job. Keep in mind 4 years of college and one year of working for free (student teaching) to make a starting salary of $29,100.00. If your looking for support lets start with prison guards who make double the money and didn't have to pay for the education. Even firefighters who make double their money on overtime. Im ok with the over time but lets pay them half pay when they are sitting in the station doing nothing. See how that works the people babysitting our criminals are more important than the people educating our kids!