jerryzflies

Good point. Real Americans, you know the ones who support the Constitution, would never condone depriving someone of life, liberty, or property without due process. I guess Texans don't fit that description. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

What's odd is the people who bitched about the Bush years and elected Obama on the promise of change are using "But the last guy did it" as a defense. But, but, but, the change is coming. If Bush had spent $Trillion building bridges and schools and other infrastructure, investing in US R&D, and supporting energy independence I'd have little objection. Wasting it on an unnecessary invasion of a country that presented no threat to us whatsoever was a sheer waste of money. BIG difference. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

It's not hard to understand. You just won't accept the answer. The housing bubble is the primary cause of the current overall economic situation, and the housing bubble was caused by ludicrous decisions in Washington at the hands of Clinton, Dodd, Frank, and their buddies. This is all well established. You just keep looking for an answer you like. Irony score 10/10. Plenty of data has been presented (as opposed to opinion pieces which you present) and you refuse to accept. You have not presented a single item that proves that CRA, Dodds or Frank, fannie, or Freddie CAUSED the banks to behave in the irresponsible way that lead to the crisis. If any congressional action encouraged bad behavior by banks, look to Gramm (R), Leach(R) and Bliley(R). If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

(emphasis added) Sorry, but that's not evidence that companies were forced to lower their lending standards. The lawsuit alleged racial preference in lending ("redlining") not that lending standards were too high. Also, even if I grant you that that lawsuit was an attempt to lower lending standards for certain people (and I'm only granting that for the sake of the present argument), your evidence says nothing about the long term impact of those lowered standards on the housing market, or the economy in general. http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2009/02/feds_reimpose_loan_standards_t.html An opinion piece from a right winger does not constitute proof either. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

A founding principle here (which doesn't mean it's still fully true) is that the people has to tell the government what it can and can't do. The opposite that you describe, seems more apt for a continent that was ruled by Kings for 500 years. Very funny. Tell the government to allow you to smoke crack and see how far you get. US Code of Federal Regulations Title 1: General Provisions Title 2: Grants and Agreements Title 3: The President Title 4: Accounts Title 5: Administrative Personnel Title 6: Homeland Security Title 7: Agriculture Title 8: Aliens and Nationality Title 9: Animals and Animal Products Title 10: Energy Title 11: Federal Elections Title 12: Banks and Banking Title 13: Business Credit and Assistance Title 14: Aeronautics and Space (aka the Federal Aviation Regulations, administered by the Federal Aviation Administration) Title 15: Commerce and Foreign Trade Title 16: Commercial Practices Title 17: Commodity and Securities Exchanges Title 18: Conservation of Power and Water Resources Title 19: Customs Duties Title 20: Employees' Benefits Title 21: Food and Drugs (administered by the US Food and Drug Administration and the US Drug Enforcement Administration) Title 22: Foreign Relations Title 23: Highways Title 24: Housing and Urban Development Title 25: Indians Title 26: Internal Revenue Title 27: Alcohol, Tobacco Products and Firearms Title 28: Judicial Administration Title 29: Labor Title 30: Mineral Resources Title 31: Money and Finance: Treasury Title 32: National Defense Title 33: Navigation and Navigable Waters Title 34: Education Title 35: Reserved (formerly Panama Canal) Title 36: Parks, Forests, and Public Property Title 37: Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights Title 38: Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief Title 39: Postal Service Title 40: Protection of Environment (administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency) Title 41: Public Contracts and Property Management Title 42: Public health Title 43: Public Lands: Interior Title 44: Emergency Management and Assistance Title 45: Public Welfare Title 46: Shipping Title 47: Telecommunication Title 48: Federal Acquisition Regulations System Title 49: Transportation Title 50: Wildlife and Fisheries If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

The CRA was Carters deal. I'm referring to laws made in the 80/90's brought to us by Chris Dodd (who got a special "friends only" deal on his own mortgage from who else...Countrywide), Barney Frank, and their underlings in congress. These laws dictated dramatically reduced home lending standards, including such lunacy as no proof of income required, no down payment (can you say default risk?), and financing for more than 100% of the homes' value. It was an orchestrated housing bubble. In the name of "affordable housing", standards were lowered to moronic levels, lenders were "encouraged" to make the loans, and were strong-armed by ACORN and others if they tried to pass on loans they could clearly see were destined for failure. Then the government backed Fannie and Freddie with mine and some other Americans tax money to encourage lenders to continue the practice. Now Frank and Dodd blame predatory lenders for issuing the loans. Aren't they a laugh a minute? You have a remarkable talent for sticking to your theories in the face of overwhelming evidence that they are incorrect. Not one lender was FORCED to lower lending standards. They did that all by themselves, in the hope of making a big profit. Not one investor was FORCED to buy over leveraged crap. They chose to do that all by themselves in the hope of making a big profit. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

SOME businesses made very bad choices. Others have been brought down by the chaos produced by the first group. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Hmmmm, a survey of Speakers Corner participants exploring correlations between polite behavior and gun ownership. Number & frequency of warnings or bannings might serve as a stand-in metric for "politeness." Any speculations on what that correlation would look like? One might be hard-pressed to argue that posters in Speakers Corner are indicative of the wider population, tho' ... If one compares 3 nation-states: Netherlands, Norway, & USA (see Table 2): Households w/firearms: 1.9%, 32.0%, & 41.0% Gun homicides per 1M: 2.7, 3.6, & 62.4. There is a huge disparity btw Netherlands and Norway w/r/t gun possession but the homicides rate are close (if not w/in statistical variance by year; data not given), which strongly suggests presence or absence of guns is not the sole variable w/r/t homicide rate. Oslo population 544073. Hardly comparable with Dallas/Ft. Worth, Chicago or NYC in any respect. What fraction of Norway's guns are handguns? In the USA the fraction of homicides committed with long guns is fairly small. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

It's too bad the justice system in the U.S. can't seem to do that. Cops are overworked and the courts don't bury the bad guys like they should. The result is that if a person in the U.S. wants to stay safe, they must take it upon themselves. And for that, we have the second amendment (which some want to take away). Ehm... a couple of unfounded assumptions here. You assume that harsher sentences would in some way cut down crime. The incarceration rate in the US is approximately five times that of the average European country (source). At the same time your gun laws are a lot looser. However, your homicide rate is still nearly seven times higher than in Denmark as the_sarge posted. I consequently see no evidence for neither of your assumptions. I will give you this, though. The strict gun laws make sense here because it has always been so. There just aren't that many guns around. In the US, on the other hand, you have had hand-guns floating around forever. There you are right that it shouldn't pose too much of a problem for a criminal to get hold of a firearm. I guess what I am saying is that loose gun laws make sense in the US because there are so many bloody guns everywhere. On the other hand I am perfectly content with the Danish rules... in Denmark. For the interested reader Buying a gun is not that difficult. It will be stored in your gun club. To store it in your home you need to have been a member of a gun club for two years and the board of your club need to co-sign your application for a permit Storage is in a safe Carry permits practically don't exist. A firearm must always be disassembled when being transported (oh, and as a civilian you are not allowed anywhere near calibers beyond .357 magnum) For the record, I like shooting hand-guns myself. Preferably revolvers. It has been well documented that harsher sentencing deters criminals. Even though there are more people locked up in the U.S. than other countries, you must consider things like population, and why they are in jail. With 300 million people, it stands to reason that there would be more people in jail in the U.S. than in a country 1/10 the size. And the vast majority of people in U.S. prisons are there for drug crimes, not murder by gun. . You seem to be having a little problem there with the concept of "rate". I guess you're saying that Americans are just plain nastier people than Europeans. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

The deadbeats who got us into this mess are the Wall Street Wizards who figured out how to leverage debt to the Nth degree, so that eventually the house of cards they built came tumbling down. You make a very valid point however, the house of cards built by leveraging credit would not have collapsed if people had not purchased homes and used credit in manner they had no business doing. How much are you willing to bet that a good number of the people whose homes are being foreclosed have the ability to pay their mortgages if only they would be willing to make some sacrifices when it comes to their standard of living? You must be thinking of the 2+ million people who have lost their jobs and their health insurance since November. Yup, I bet they'd rather lose their homes than their TV sets. Must be nice to be a government employee like you. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Hey, haven't you been paying attention? The banks need money. Who better to pay for the banks' bad investments than the people who lost their jobs because of it. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

So..... I got laid off last Tuesday. I'm 45 years old, a veteran (but that was 20 years ago), and this is the first full week I've been unemployed since I was 14 years old except for the first year and a half of my daughter's life. That sucks! But you did join the "subvert American moral values team". If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Mike - you do understand that a big part of Heinlein's use of that was a metaphor for opposition to tolitarian societies (like Soviet Union), yes? /Marg I think you'll find the idea predated Heinlein. Nevil Shute's "In the Wet" (1953) allows additional votes: everyone gets a basic vote. Other votes can be earned for education (including a commission in the armed forces), earning one's living overseas for two years, raising two children to the age of 14 without divorcing, being an official of a church, or having a high earned income. The reason was as an antidote to socialism. Multiple votes have been known in actuality. Until 1950, the graduates of Oxford University and Cambridge University sent representatives to Parliament, effectively allowing them a double vote. (The humorist and purported author of Eskimo Nell, A.P. Herbert, was the MP for Oxford University until 1950). The graduates of the National University of Ireland and of Trinity College are still represented in the upper house of Ireland's parliament. Part of the UK's Reform Act 1885, as originally proposed, would have granted some Britons a second vote. That part of the Act was never enacted. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

You know the answer to that perfectly well. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

According to the IRS, 21% of people in the $500k - $1M income range underpay their taxes. Guess that makes it OK Nice bit of selective snipping there. No-one said it was OK. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

I don't believe any congressionperson forced any bank to lend to unqualified individuals. The banks managed to do that all by themselves. AND before you start again on the CRA, CRA loans had nothing to do with this mess. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

I wonder how much you have to pay to get a job working the scanner. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Great metaphor, but I think they deserve several months in it. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Two comments, not original from me, that I saw yesterday and I agree with 100%: 1. The national conversation on the economy is frozen, and has been for a while. Republicans say tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts. Democrats say spend, new programs, more money. You can't spend enough for the Democratic base, or cut taxes enough for the Republican. But in a time when all the grown-ups of America know spending is going to bankrupt us and tax cuts without spending cuts is more of the medicine that's killing us, the same old arguments, which sound less like arguments than public tics, only add to the public sense that no one is in charge. 2. If it were really a stimulus plan, it would include turning 50% of US law schools and business schools into engineering colleges. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

You mean your mantra of "It's all the Republican's fault", right? Where did he say that? All he said was that the myth that CRA loans precipitated the crisis has been debunked by the Federal Reserve Bank. Your leap to assume this blames the Republicans suggests that you have subconsciously blamed them yourself. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

the CRA did NOT cause the housing crisis. Another myth from the right wing blogosphere that has been debunked completely (by the Federal Reserve Bank, no less) but it still comes back over and over again. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

It's really SIMPLE. When TAXPAYERS see executives of corporations that TAXPAYERS have had to bailout buying bizjets, and TAXPAYERS are used to seeing bizjets prominent on the ramps at ski resorts, ocean resorts, gambling resorts, island resorts, etc., etc., then it's not unexpected that TAXPAYERS get pissed off. Do you understand yet? If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

No it isn't. That is a really silly statement. No, you are wrong and in saying what you say here you help prove my point. You may choose to have your own definition of religion, but the generally accepted definition involves belief in a supernatural power. wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=religion If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

No it isn't. That is a really silly statement. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.

Incorrect. Another myth about evolution put about by people with no knowledge of science. If you can't fix it with a hammer, the problem's electrical.