First it was the Jews...

[_harmony]

And we need to let the banks eat their stupidity for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

It's not their fault. It's my understanding that the government forced the banks to make home loans to minorities, regardless of whether they were poor and unable to actually pay the mortgage.

Don't say that too loud. GoodK will call you disgusting.

Let their bankers pay for those loans out of their "bonuses".

Their "bonuses" were their salary. Their pay had been regulated into oblivion, so to remain competitive and prevent "brain drain" the banks had to pay qualified executives via bonuses.

So the bonuses weren't literally "bonuses" dreamt up last week; they were contractual obligations written far in advance.

Obviously the banks could have used a little more "brain drain". $165 million in salary to people who managed to so sink the company that they needed a government handout? They should have fired them instead.

[_John Larsen]

That's the idea.

Nobody cares about manufacturing. Those low to middle paying jobs are unimportant. Only jobs like the guys working the line for $50 an hour making cars matter... and then boy! do they matter! They matter to the tune of billions of dollars.

Most of my children have college degrees. One is a chemical engineer who makes paper stuff... napkins, toilet paper, tissue... stuff everybody uses He works in a medium sized manufacturing plant. The plant is the backbone of the economy in their community and you probably have used their products at one time or another. The average pay is aout $15 an hour. This is a good thing in their community.

Another of my children is a computer engineer. He makes the relays on the telephone poles. He works in a small manufacturing plant where another of my children and his wife work on the plant floor itself, putting together the relays. The two that work in the plant itself make $10 an hour each. That's $20 an hour, $40,000 a year between the two of them. For most people in the US, this is not enough. They won't work for that. So the plant is constantly hiring new people. They have plenty of work available, and could put on another manufacturing line, but they struggle to fill the positions they now have.

What we need in this country is multifaceted:

1. we need the government to quit giving our tax money to people who squander it.

2. we need to reward the people who do their jobs, not the ones who drive their businesses into government-bailout bankruptcy. I've yet to see a line worker in a manufacturing plant get a $50 million dollar bonus. They usually don't even get $50 bonuses. Yet they do all the work.

3. we need the average worker to be desperate enough to take a job that puts food on the table and a roof over the head, not put their hand out for a taxpayer financed bailout.

4. we need to foreclose on the loans that have been defaulted on, not use taxpayer money to bailout people who made agreements they couldn't support. And we need to let the banks eat their stupidity for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Let their bankers pay for those loans out of their "bonuses".

5. we need to put people to work at living wages, not inflated wages. So what if it takes 2 people to make $40,000 a year? So what if you lose your house because several someones in management positions were so greedy they gutted company and you're out of a job? Why does that make you unique? Move. Get another job; lots of jobs in my newspaper every Sunday. Lots of jobs out there, like the ones my kids work at, for $40,000 a year between the 2 of them. You used to make $150,000 a year, but you got laid off? Did you save anything? Do you have enormous credit card debt? Do you drive a big car with an equally big payment? Can you not see that you are a big part of the problem, just like the greedy bankers and managers who have driven this country to the edge? It's not all the government's fault that we're where we are. The pride and greed of the American consumer is just as much to blame.

And where's that trillion dollars?

I take it you are not much of a capitalist. Viva la Revolución!

[_truth dancer]

It's not their fault. It's my understanding that the government forced the banks to make home loans to minorities, regardless of whether they were poor and unable to actually pay the mortgage.

I'm not an expert and do not know all the laws but I do know a bank owner whose bank is doing remarkably well, better than ever actually. With much deliberation, his bank decided not to give out any sub-prime loans so I do not think the government forced the banks to make the loans. I have the impression it was more of an option of which many banks took advantage.

~td~

[_Dr. Shades]

Obviously the banks could have used a little more "brain drain". $165 million in salary to people who managed to so sink the company that they needed a government handout?

That's just it--they DIDN'T sink the company. The government's policies sunk the company. Think of Atlas Shrugged.

They should have fired them instead.

Why, when it was the government's fault and not theirs?

[_Jason Bourne]

Well, it is important of course but the cost of allowing it all to play out is not acceptable for most Americans.

The cost of any rescission is not acceptable to most Americans, and it is especially not for political leaders because they always lose elections if the economy stinks. However, mush of that unwillingness to bear pain and build an economy on 71% consumption financed with too much debt and inflated home values is why we are where we are today.

Again, what would happen to tens of millions of people homeless, on the streets, starving, and with no government resources?

Some, maybe a lot. I do not know.

And yes, this is what would happen.

Come now. Nobody really knows this for sure. But we are told this is what will happen so we will swallow these astronomical costly plans to perhaps fix things.

And yes this would happen for regular, law abiding, did-everything-right folk who didn't take advantage of anyone.

Maybe, maybe not. No doubt there will be pain. The question is whether what is being done will fix it or if it does fix it will it create more long term problems of even more dire consequences.

Going back to supply and demand, we have WAY too much supply and have got to re-balance ourselves but to just let it play out would take decades and untold suffering without some intervention.

Supply of what? What does this mean? Over excessive supply means cheap prices for the goods. How does the stimulus impact this?

And... we BETTER get the AIG $ back or else!

I totally agree.

[_Jason Bourne]

Nobody cares about manufacturing. Those low to middle paying jobs are unimportant. Only jobs like the guys working the line for $50 an hour making cars matter... and then boy! do they matter! They matter to the tune of billions of dollars.

nah I think we care about manufacturing. The problem is how does a company compete against other companies that manufacture goods is places where people work for $15 a day rather than per hour and are quite happy about it.

Is the American consumer willing to pay more of clothes made in the USA if it keeps decent jobs here?

1. we need the government to quit giving our tax money to people who squander it.

I am not sure what you are referring too.

2. we need to reward the people who do their jobs, not the ones who drive their businesses into government-bailout bankruptcy. I've yet to see a line worker in a manufacturing plant get a $50 million dollar bonus. They usually don't even get $50 bonuses. Yet they do all the work.

I am all for paying top executives low base pay and only rewarding them based on success, profits and keeping good jobs going in their company. In my company the base pay of the top person is no more than about five times the lowest. The rest is based on profits after a significant amount of those profits are paid to employees. And even with profits the top person does not make more than maybe 7 times the lowest.

3. we need the average worker to be desperate enough to take a job that puts food on the table and a roof over the head, not put their hand out for a taxpayer financed bailout.

My wife works in a family owned farm. They cannot find US persons willing to work on a farm for $12-$13 per hour plus benefits, milk and meat. Of course they have illegals working there so they can get the work done. Sure their pay is not high. But it is not horrible either. Someone working 50 hours a week can make about $33k per year. This is an issue.

4. we need to foreclose on the loans that have been defaulted on, not use taxpayer money to bailout people who made agreements they couldn't support. And we need to let the banks eat their stupidity for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Let their bankers pay for those loans out of their "bonuses".

Agreed.

5. we need to put people to work at living wages, not inflated wages. So what if it takes 2 people to make $40,000 a year? So what if you lose your house because several someones in management positions were so greedy they gutted company and you're out of a job? Why does that make you unique? Move. Get another job; lots of jobs in my newspaper every Sunday. Lots of jobs out there, like the ones my kids work at, for $40,000 a year between the 2 of them. You used to make $150,000 a year, but you got laid off? Did you save anything? Do you have enormous credit card debt? Do you drive a big car with an equally big payment? Can you not see that you are a big part of the problem, just like the greedy bankers and managers who have driven this country to the edge? It's not all the government's fault that we're where we are. The pride and greed of the American consumer is just as much to blame.

Here, here!! Harmony for economic czar!!

[_truth dancer]

My wife works in a family owned farm. They cannot find US persons willing to work on a farm for $12-$13 per hour plus benefits, milk and meat. Of course they have illegals working there so they can get the work done. Sure their pay is not high. But it is not horrible either. Someone working 50 hours a week can make about $33k per year. This is an issue.

Ummm Jason, isn't it like, illegal to hire illegal immigrants?


~td~

[_Jason Bourne]

The US Is Facing a Weimar Moment
By Robert Freeman

March 16, 2009 "Commondreams" --- -- In early 1919, Germany put in place a new government to begin rebuilding the country after its crushing defeat in World War I. But the right-wing forces that had led the country into the War and lost the War conspired even before it was over to destroy the new government, the "Weimar Republic." They succeeded.

The U.S. faces a similar "Weimar Moment." The devastating collapse of the economy after eight years of Republican rule has left the leadership, policies, and ideology of the right utterly discredited. But, as was the case with Germany in 1919, Republicans do not intend to allow the new government to succeed. They will do everything they can to undermine it. If they are successful, the U.S. may yet go the way of Weimar Germany.

Well I started to read this till I see utterly bereft of any intellectual creditability statement above and I quickly stopped. I see this is as much as a left wing ideological rant as the OP was a right wing one.


Let's get this straight. Anyone who believes that the economic problem we face are only due to "eight years of Republican rule has left the leadership, policies, and ideology of the right" is frankly naïve and rather stupid. The mess we are in is the fault of both sides. It is the fault of leadership that lacks the moral back bone to lead. It is the fault of self aggrandizing leader that are more concerned about being re-elected and padding their own pockets than leading the way the should. And it is the fault of the American people for over consuming, not saving and borrowing too much myself inclded.

Let's not forget that Republicans got us into this mess.

Wrong again. Not just the republicans.

Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and others are stoking resentment daily. They are having some success. Many Americans are resentful, and forget who got us into this mess to begin with.

I would exclude O'Reilly and Beck to a certain extent. Hannity I have little use for. Limbaugh I am tired of.


Let's hope we don't repeat history! We should indeed all read our history books!

t.

Meanwhile, debt has risen to astronomical levels. Reagan and Bush I quadrupled the national debt in only twelve years. Bush II doubled it again in only eight. It is now ten times higher than it was in 1980 when Reagan was elected. Total public and private debt exceeds 300% of GDP, half again higher than it was in 1929.

Yes and Obama out did them all in just two months! And yes I do hope Obama succeeds. I did vote for him.

Second, prevent the new government from succeeding in any meaningful endeavor. The Republicans have set all their efforts to doing everything they can to make sure the Obama administration fails. Rush Limbaugh's infamous, "I hope he fails" pronouncement is only the beginning of the fomenting of hatred from the right. As Limbaugh said, "Let's be honest. Every Republican in America is hoping for Obama's failure."

Sounds like what the left wing did to Bush.

The same malignant hope oozes unadulterated from all the other Dogpatch Demagogues that rent themselves out to the Republican party to foment resentment against anything liberal: Joe the "Plumber," Rick Santelli, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Ann Coulter, and virtually every other wing-nut operative whose intellectual stock in trade has been vaporized by the collision of right-wing policies with objective reality.

ANd you should listen to Reid and Polosie if you want to hear nuts. I predict they will be more of a problem for Obama than any republican ever will be. Just watch.

[_Jason Bourne]

I respectfully disagree with the idea the Rush knows his stuff even from a conservative stand point. I know several conservatives who think he is totally off his rocker (trying to be nice here).

That is ok. You have been wrong before.

I do know he appeals to a particular group, but I don't think it is the educated, knowledgeable, or informed, conservatives that buy into his bloviating tirades.

I don't listen much anymore. How much have you listened to him?

[_Jason Bourne]

Ummm Jason, isn't it like, illegal to hire illegal immigrants?

Yep

I don't hire them. I do not own the business. In fact my wife and I have had vigourous "discussions" about this issue. She does not own the business either. She tells me they all have "documentation" and that the owners are not required to check to see if the documentation is forged. They do payroll for these folks, pay payroll taxes on them, and so on.