Obama Bombed

[Guest Guest]

The fifty test cases were legisation concerning earmarks, not examples of earmark legislation. Most likely the CFG counted all of the bills it judged would assist in getting earmarks under control. If you don't think so feel free to get off your underdeveloped cerebrum and do some research.

Of course, that completely evades the question and "proud American's" point (which you can't refute because it's true).

However, I do think I see your problem now. We're not sitting on our cerebrums.

[Bryan]

Meh. More liberal stupidity.

The Bush tax cuts did not keep the economy brisk.

Yes they did. Check the numbers, recall the words of the former Fed charman. Do some flippin' research instead of just speaking out of your rear end.

They redistributed wealth to the super-rich, in the process creating a massive federal deficit, which we're borrowing money from foreign investors to fund.

They cut taxes on the super-rich. Unless you start with the proposition that the super-rich don't own their own wealth your charge makes absolutely no sense.

The unjustified tax cut for the super-rich isn't the only problem. The balance of wealth in an economy is important. When too few have too large a share, it destabilizes the ecnnomy. The share of wealth held by the super-rich is at an historically dangerous level. We see that directly in the struggling American middle class. We see it indirectly in the ever-tighter stranglehold money has on our political system.

Nice platitude, but the economy has remained the strongest on the planet throughout. The recent problems were caused by the government strongly encouraging banks to extend loans to high-risk borrowers. Banks don't always win on a defaulted loan. You may have noticed that banks are sweating their bottom line because of the sub-prime problem? Oh, nevermind. You're a idiot Democrat so you won't have noticed.

Many years ago, there were real conservatives in the Republican party. They used to say "There's no such thing as a free lunch." Well guess what: There's no such thing as a tax-free society either, not in a developed country. Whatever minimal benefit the middle class obtained from its piddling tax cut was more than offset by the spiraling deficit, which we now have to fund.

So pretty much all you can do is repeat your (side's?) argument without acknowledging the counterargument. Is that it?

It's like buying a $250,000 antique car on a $40,000 income, paying interest on the purchase for forty years, then passing the real debt onto your kids. Passing the burden to pay off the debt onto our children is not responsible policy, especially when it went straight into the pockets of the super-rich. It isn't even moral. Junior got a good job, wanted to throw a party for his privileged friends, and promised us each a lollipop so we let him. I'd say Americans deserve what they get, except for the fact that some of us knew better.

Better fix it by putting Democrats in office so you can spend even more.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1205539363...=googlenews_wsj

Idiot.

It's not like buying a $250,000 car on a $40,000 income. Gross tax recepts annually dwarf the budget deficit, and the national debt is also manageable as things stand.

The real concern will come after Democrats have waited too long to fix their nightmare package of entitlement programs. That is what will break the country. Raising taxes alone isn't going to fix the problem. Benefits will go down, and it will be primarily the fault of Democrats starting with FDR.

The average voting Democrat has the very least type of clue regarding these issues. They hear "free healthcare," get that blank look in their eyes and sign on with ever more entitlement programs run by an inefficient government bureaucracy. And they're not even smart enough to really look at what has happened over the years in Europe.

Tax revenues are climbing twice as fast as the administration predicted in February, so fast that the budget deficit could actually decline this year.

The main reason is a big spike in corporate tax receipts, which have nearly tripled since 2003, as well as what appears to be a big increase in individual taxes on stock market profits and executive bonuses.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/09/washingt...agewanted=print

"Guest" is so divorced from reality that he should be forced to pay alimony.

[Guest Guest]

Nice platitude, but the economy has remained the strongest on the planet throughout.

That's not true. We have been losing ground steadily throughout Bush's disastrous tenure. We are borrowing from other countries and our currency is weak compared to theirs. Economists don't always agree, but there is a consensus now that we have major problems on our hands, stemming directly from the fact that Bush came into office caring about the rich and super-rich and virtually not at all about anyone or anything else. And as for the current mortgage disaster, it wouldn't be happening if the government had regulated the economy properly - which of course is contrary to the neocon agenda.

This happens every single time the representatives of entrenched wealth gain political power in this country. When are the American people going to learn?

[Bryan]

That's not true.

Sure it is.

We have been losing ground steadily throughout Bush's disastrous tenure.

That's not true, and even if it was true, the U.S. economy is so dominant that it can lose plenty of ground while still remaining #1.

The economy of the United States has been the world's largest national economy since the early 1870s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_United_States

http://www.economywatch.com/world_economy/usa/

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/capital-commer...ic-verdict.html

We are borrowing from other countries and our currency is weak compared to theirs. Economists don't always agree, but there is a consensus now that we have major problems on our hands, stemming directly from the fact that Bush came into office caring about the rich and super-rich and virtually not at all about anyone or anything else.

Really. Since there's consensus on that point you should easily be able to find that opinion expressed by a real economist (skip the political hack Paul Krugman, however).

And as for the current mortgage disaster, it wouldn't be happening if the government had regulated the economy properly - which of course is contrary to the neocon agenda.

As I've already pointed out, it was the Clinton pressure to relax lending guidelines that led to the subprime fiasco. Clinton wanted more people owning homes, so he applied pressure for banks to lend to high-risk borrowers.

Bush could have make it tougher to borrow--but of course he'd have been accused of racism or the like (race was used as a rationale in the original reduction of mortgage qualifications). And the beauty is that he could have made it tougher to borrow by simply reducing government interference with the economy.

That's the part of it that liberals don't seem to understand.

This happens every single time the representatives of entrenched wealth gain political power in this country. When are the American people going to learn?

American history shows that there is no such thing as entrenched wealth. But the Dems wearing shades of pink love their legend to contrary. The two richest men in America rose up from the true middle class (Buffet, Gates). But tell us again how the rich are persecuting you and keeping you poor. It's such a great story.

[Guest Irrational Republicans]

As I've already pointed out, it was the Clinton pressure to relax lending guidelines that led to the subprime fiasco. Clinton wanted more people owning homes, so he applied pressure for banks to lend to high-risk borrowers.

Bush could have make it tougher to borrow--but of course he'd have been accused of racism or the like (race was used as a rationale in the original reduction of mortgage qualifications). And the beauty is that he could have made it tougher to borrow by simply reducing government interference with the economy.

That's the part of it that liberals don't seem to understand.

American history shows that there is no such thing as entrenched wealth. But the Dems wearing shades of pink love their legend to contrary. The two richest men in America rose up from the true middle class (Buffet, Gates). But tell us again how the rich are persecuting you and keeping you poor. It's such a great story.

To say the cause of the current mess is the "Clinton lending guidelines" is an extreme partisan (Republican) rationalization. The mess occurred when sub-prime mortgages were re-packaged as triple AAA bonds, signed, stamped and delivered by investment banks and rating agencies. The trillion dollar wholly unregulated derivatives market is what took a problem with mortagage lending practices and the real estate bubble and turned it into one that threatens large swathes of the entire financial system. It's a fascinating story -- how ironic the so-called best and the brightest of Wall Street's Bear Stearns, Citigroup, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch got it so, so wrong. If only it were mortgage lending practices! It's old fashioned greed and short-sightedness. (I've copied a portion of the best analysis I've read to date on the financial crisis below.) As to entrenched wealth, that's right, it's been much less of a problem since our country instituted progressive income taxation in the 1920s. "Soaking the rich" (including the income tax and estate taxation) is what has restrained entrenched wealth in the last 80 years.

It is the private trading of complex instruments that lurk in the financial shadows that worries regulators and Wall Street and that have created stresses in the broader economy. Economic downturns and panics have occurred before, of course. Few, however, have posed such a serious threat to the entire financial system that regulators have responded as if they were confronting a potential epidemic.

As Congress and Republican and Democratic presidential administrations pushed for financial deregulation over the last decade, the biggest banks and brokerage firms created a dizzying array of innovative products that experts now acknowledge are hard to understand and even harder to value.

On Wall Street, of course, what you don’t see can hurt you. In the past decade, there has been an explosion in complex derivative instruments, such as collateralized debt obligations and credit default swaps, which were intended primarily to transfer risk.

These products are virtually hidden from investors, analysts and regulators, even though they have emerged as one of Wall Street’s most outsized profit engines. They don’t trade openly on public exchanges, and financial services firms disclose few details about them.

Used judiciously, derivatives can limit the damage from financial miscues and uncertainty, greasing the wheels of commerce. Used unwisely — when greed and the urge to gamble with borrowed money overtake sensible risk-taking — derivatives can become Wall Street’s version of nitroglycerin.

Bear Stearns’s vast portfolio of these instruments was among the main reasons for the bank’s collapse, but derivatives are buried in the accounts of just about every Wall Street firm, as well as major commercial banks like Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase. What’s more, these exotic investments have been exported all over the globe, causing losses in places as distant from Wall Street as a small Norwegian town north of the Arctic Circle.

With Bear Stearns forced into a sale and the entire financial system still under the threat of further losses, Wall Street executives, regulators and politicians are scrambling to figure out just what went wrong and how it can be fixed.

But because the forces that have collided in recent weeks were set in motion long before the subprime mortgage mess first made news last year, solutions won’t come easily or quickly, analysts say.

In fact, while home loans to risky borrowers were among the first to go bad, analysts say that the crisis didn’t stem from the housing market alone and that it certainly won’t end there.

“The problem has been spreading its wings and taking in markets very far afield from mortgages,” says Alan S. Blinder, former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve and now an economics professor at Princeton. “It’s a failure at a lot of levels. It’s hard to find a piece of the system that actually worked well in the lead-up to the bust.”

Stung by the new focus on their complex products, advocates of the derivatives trade say they are unfairly being made a scapegoat for the recent panic on Wall Street.

“Some people want to blame our industry because they have a vested interest in doing so, either by making a name for themselves or by hampering the adaptability and usefulness of our products for competitive purposes,” said Robert G. Pickel, chief executive of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association, a trade group. “We believe that there are good investment decisions and bad investment decisions. We don’t decry motor vehicles because some have been involved in accidents.”

Already, legislators in Washington are offering detailed plans for new regulations, including ones to treat Wall Street banks like their more heavily regulated commercial brethren. At the same time, normally wary corporate leaders like James Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, are beginning to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, new regulations are necessary.

“We have a terribly global world and, over all, financial regulation has not kept up with that,” Mr. Dimon said in an interview on Monday, the day after his bank agreed to take over Bear Stearns at a fire-sale price. “I can’t even describe the seriousness of that. I always talk about how bad things can happen that you can’t expect. I didn’t fathom this event.”

TWO months before he resigned as chief executive of Citigroup last year amid nearly $20 billion in write-downs, Charles O. Prince III sat down in Washington with Representative Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Among the topics they discussed were investment vehicles that allowed Citigroup and other banks to keep billions of dollars in potential liabilities off of their balance sheets — and away from the scrutiny of investors and analysts.

“Why aren’t they on your balance sheet?” asked Mr. Frank, Democrat of Massachusetts. The congressman recalled that Mr. Prince said doing so would have put Citigroup at a disadvantage with Wall Street investment banks that were more loosely regulated and were allowed to take far greater risks. (A spokeswoman for Mr. Prince confirmed the conversation.)

It was at that moment, Mr. Frank says, that he first realized just how much freedom Wall Street firms had, and how lightly regulated they were in comparison with commercial banks, which have to answer to an alphabet soup of government agencies like the Federal Reserve and the comptroller of the currency.

“Not only did Wall Street have so much freedom, but it gave commercial banks an incentive to try and evade their regulations,” Mr. Frank says. When it came to Wall Street, he says, “we thought we didn’t need regulation.”

In fact, Washington has long followed the financial industry’s lead in supporting deregulation, even as newly minted but little-understood products like derivatives proliferated.

During the late 1990s, Wall Street fought bitterly against any attempt to regulate the emerging derivatives market, recalls Michael Greenberger, a former senior regulator at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Although the Long-Term Capital debacle in 1998 alerted regulators and bankers alike to the dangers of big bets with borrowed money, a rescue effort engineered by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York prevented the damage from spreading.

[Bryan]

To say the cause of the current mess is the "Clinton lending guidelines" is an extreme partisan (Republican) rationalization. The mess occurred when sub-prime mortgages were re-packaged as triple AAA bonds, signed, stamped and delivered by investment banks and rating agencies.

Defaulted mortgages don't make very good investments, do they? Are you trying to dance around the why of it or what?

Read that great article again and take note of how it dances around the relaxation of lending standards. It all comes down to the fact that a defaulted loan is a bad investment.

[Guest Irrational Republicans]

Defaulted mortgages don't make very good investments, do they? Are you trying to dance around the why of it or what?

Read that great article again and take note of how it dances around the relaxation of lending standards. It all comes down to the fact that a defaulted loan is a bad investment.

Not at all. How much of the debt market in the US is mortgage loans? A small minority. How much of that mortgage loan market can be characterized as subprime mortgage debt (as opposed to traditional mortgages)? An even smaller minority of that minority. And how much of the submprime debt is in default? An even smaller minority of the minority of the minority.

In other words, subprime debt is not the cause of the current crisis in the financial debt markets; instead it's a consequence of the unregulated derivatives markets and it was the first sign that we have a serious problem that has no discernible end. All major banks have significant exposure to derivatives of all kinds, not just mortgages but other things like credit card debt, student debt, insurance contracts. It'sa trillion dollar plus UNREGULATED market. Except there's no market anymore because noone knows what they're worth anymore. Dancing? That's what the Republican Secretary of the Treasury, Paulson, and the Fed Chairman (also Republican) Bernanke have been doing the past two weekends. Both now acknowledge the need for regulation of the derivatives markets. And both negotiated the federal government's bailout of Bear Stearns for fear of a financial panic. The federal government (you and me) will be on the hook for $29 billion of Bearn Stearns's bad debt. Wow, isn't that an oxymoron, Republican Welfare/Bailouts?

[Guest Keith]

Not at all. How much of the debt market in the US is mortgage loans? A small minority. How much of that mortgage loan market can be characterized as subprime mortgage debt (as opposed to traditional mortgages)? An even smaller minority of that minority. And how much of the submprime debt is in default? An even smaller minority of the minority of the minority.

In other words, subprime debt is not the cause of the current crisis in the financial debt markets; instead it's a consequence of the unregulated derivatives markets and it was the first sign that we have a serious problem that has no discernible end. All major banks have significant exposure to derivatives of all kinds, not just mortgages but other things like credit card debt, student debt, insurance contracts. It'sa trillion dollar plus UNREGULATED market. Except there's no market anymore because noone knows what they're worth anymore. Dancing? That's what the Republican Secretary of the Treasury, Paulson, and the Fed Chairman (also Republican) Bernanke have been doing the past two weekends. Both now acknowledge the need for regulation of the derivatives markets. And both negotiated the federal government's bailout of Bear Stearns for fear of a financial panic. The federal government (you and me) will be on the hook for $29 billion of Bearn Stearns's bad debt. Wow, isn't that an oxymoron, Republican Welfare/Bailouts?

Don't you just love this facist country we live in where the corporations are capitalists when it comes to profits and socialists when it comes to losses? Greedy bastards and once again the taxpayer is left holding the bag.

[Bryan]

Not at all. How much of the debt market in the US is mortgage loans? A small minority. How much of that mortgage loan market can be characterized as subprime mortgage debt (as opposed to traditional mortgages)? An even smaller minority of that minority. And how much of the submprime debt is in default? An even smaller minority of the minority of the minority.

You'll have to explain the supposed relevance, given the structure of our financial system. Most "money" does not exist as such, so key shifts in assets trigger macro effects (such as when a minority of a bank's customers withdraw a small amount of a bank's liquid cash leaving the bank with too little to be able to meet similar requests from others: "a run on the bank").

In other words, subprime debt is not the cause of the current crisis in the financial debt markets;

Is that other words or simply a non sequitur?

instead it's a consequence of the unregulated derivatives markets and it was the first sign that we have a serious problem that has no discernible end. All major banks have significant exposure to derivatives of all kinds, not just mortgages but other things like credit card debt, student debt, insurance contracts. It'sa trillion dollar plus UNREGULATED market. Except there's no market anymore because noone knows what they're worth anymore.

How did it come about that nobody knows what the derivative investments are worth?

Dancing?

Yup. Dancing.

That's what the Republican Secretary of the Treasury, Paulson, and the Fed Chairman (also Republican) Bernanke have been doing the past two weekends.

That's it. Direct the attention away from your explanation.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/paul...272029A8710B%7D

http://www.merkfund.com/merk-perspective/i...2007-02-21.html

Both now acknowledge the need for regulation of the derivatives markets. And both negotiated the federal government's bailout of Bear Stearns for fear of a financial panic. The federal government (you and me) will be on the hook for $29 billion of Bearn Stearns's bad debt. Wow, isn't that an oxymoron, Republican Welfare/Bailouts?

Still looks like you're dancing. Explain why unregulated derivatives are a problem right now without defaulted subprime loans if you can.

[Bryan]

Don't you just love this facist country we live in where the corporations are capitalists when it comes to profits and socialists when it comes to losses? Greedy bastards and once again the taxpayer is left holding the bag.

It's almost as good as pinko Democrats who decry the predatory profits of lenders while ignoring the fact that the lenders are going out of business. Going out of business because the profits are too good, I guess.

[Guest Keith]

It's almost as good as pinko Democrats who decry the predatory profits of lenders while ignoring the fact that the lenders are going out of business. Going out of business because the profits are too good, I guess.

One example and I'm sure the first of more to come. Pinko Democrats? Are you channeling Archie Bunker now?

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080315/bear_stearns.html

[Bryan]

One example and I'm sure the first of more to come. Pinko Democrats? Are you channeling Archie Bunker now?

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080315/bear_stearns.html

OK, I suppose that there are no Democrats who favor socialist policies. I stand corrected.

I didn't see the part where the government is bailing out Bear Stearns because of its excessive profits.

And it is downright odd that you would use this example to prove that the government is giving away the people's money. Bear Stearns is receiving a loan from the federal reserve, which is one of the main things the federal reserve was set up to do (if you understood the money system you'd have an idea why). Using that logic, Keith, you should be completely outraged at well-to-do students who obtain the benefit of student loans. They're just soaking the proletariat, wouldn't you say?

[Guest Irrational Republicans]

Explain why unregulated derivatives are a problem right now without defaulted subprime loans if you can.

Pick up any Wall Street Journal or New York Times from this week. If you do, you'll read that Treasury Secretary Paulson is calling for regulation of derivatives markets. (Ironically, the conservative Journal has a very concerned column today on the financial crisis entitled "Ten Days that Changed Capitalism.")

I'll try one more stab at logic with you -- Bear Stearns alone has $30 billion of derivative instruments that can't be valued. (Under the proposed deal by the Bush administration and Bernanke, taxpayers will be responsible for $29 billion of the Bear Stearns debt instruments). But that's just the tip of the iceberg. Recently the Fed began lending directly to Wall Street investment banks for the first time EVER (historically, the Fed has only lent to commercial lending and savings banks.) Since the Fed opened the spigot, Wall Street investment banks have been borrowing from the Fed an average of $31 billion EACH day! In other words, Wall Street is borrowing from you and me, the taxpayer.

It's mathematically impossible that all that debt and all that borrowing is (or covers) bad sub-prime mortgage debt. Sub-prime loans were the warning signal of a huge mess. Unfortunately, the signal didn't come early enough. It's now a four alarm fire and the Treasury and Fed are trying to save Wall Street from Wall Street's mistakes. And you want to blame the little guy who took a subprime to buy his house?? It's the poor little guy who's losing his house to bank foreclosure, and this administration has taken only minimal measures to stop it.

[Bryan]

Pick up any Wall Street Journal or New York Times from this week. If you do, you'll read that Treasury Secretary Paulson is calling for regulation of derivatives markets. (Ironically, the conservative Journal has a very concerned column today on the financial crisis entitled "Ten Days that Changed Capitalism.")

In other words, you don't know so you'll keep right on dodging.

I'll try one more stab at logic with you -- Bear Stearns alone has $30 billion of derivative instruments that can't be valued. (Under the proposed deal by the Bush administration and Bernanke, taxpayers will be responsible for $29 billion of the Bear Stearns debt instruments).

In terms of logic and my question to you, that's a red herring. I'd prefer real logic, please.

But that's just the tip of the iceberg. Recently the Fed began lending directly to Wall Street investment banks for the first time EVER (historically, the Fed has only lent to commercial lending and savings banks.) Since the Fed opened the spigot, Wall Street investment banks have been borrowing from the Fed an average of $31 billion EACH day! In other words, Wall Street is borrowing from you and me, the taxpayer.

I guess you're trying to make the point that the businesses are preferring socialism. So they don't have to pay the loans back?

It's mathematically impossible that all that debt and all that borrowing is (or covers) bad sub-prime mortgage debt.

So you're saying that if the subprime market had remained completely stable that Bear Stearns would be in more or less the exact same trouble that it is in now?

Seriously?

Sub-prime loans were the warning signal of a huge mess. Unfortunately, the signal didn't come early enough. It's now a four alarm fire and the Treasury and Fed are trying to save Wall Street from Wall Street's mistakes. And you want to blame the little guy who took a subprime to buy his house??

Do I? Where did I say that, or do you just prefer to stick with red herrings and straw men while stabbing at logic? I said that government regulation that encouraged risky loans was the key cause of the problem. The banks who gave out risky loans are somewhat at fault--but the govermment (starting with Clinton) clearly encouraged that behavior. The problem would not be of its current magnitude without the derivatives market, but you've spent paragraph after paragraph dancing around the root cause.

It's the poor little guy who's losing his house to bank foreclosure, and this administration has taken only minimal measures to stop it.

That's appropriate. The government shouldn't be in the business of underwriting everybody's risk. If you can't afford an adjustable rate mortgage, don't get one. And try not to forget how the adjustable rate mortgage got its name.

[Guest a proud american]

So you want to attack them for bias instead of challenging the data? You know that's an ad hominem fallacy, right?

Club for Growth is a national network of thousands of Americans, from all walks of life, who believe that prosperity and opportunity come through economic freedom. We work to promote public policies that promote economic growth primarily through legislative involvement, issue advocacy, research, training and educational activity.

The primary tactic of the separate Club for Growth PAC is to provide financial support from Club members to viable pro-growth candidates to Congress, particularly in Republican primaries.

http://www.clubforgrowth.org/about.php

Nothing like changing the subject when your argument begins looking like the short end of the stick.

The more you spend on veterans the more fiscally responsible you are.

Democrats will win the contest over proposing higher spending every time, except when it comes to equipping our armies and funding them while at war. Veterans deserve to be properly assisted in thanks for their service, but that doesn't necessarily mean that more is always better, especially when the VA system is an inefficient monstrosity that serves as a harbinger of the nationalized medicine programs proposed by Obama and Clinton.

Nice work changing topics, by the way. You're a brave man as well as being a proud american.

I didn't change the topic, I simply wanted the people to understand who the Club for Growth really is and to let people see how their repesentatives vote on Veteran issues. But, I want to ask you this question. Is treatment at a VA Hospital a benefit or an entitlement? And since you mentioned the VA what catagory do you place tri-care in.

[Bryan]

I didn't change the topic, I simply wanted the people to understand who the Club for Growth really is and to let people see how their repesentatives vote on Veteran issues.

Because once they understand that they'll completely ignore the data regardless of its accuracy?

The rationalization subsequent to your protestation that you did not change the topic looks like an admission that you changed the topic. Where exactly did you deal with the Democrats' record on earmarks, may I ask?

But, I want to ask you this question. Is treatment at a VA Hospital a benefit or an entitlement?

It's both, but it's not an entitlement program in the mold of food stamps, welfare, or social security. Probably you had a fallacy of equivocation in mind.

And since you mentioned the VA what catagory do you place tri-care in.

VA hospitals sometimes have MRI scanners, too, so you should ask me to describe how an MRI works.

Since I mentioned the VA it would be on topic. Right?

Let me know where to mark my calendar for when you'll be willing to address the Democrats' history on earmarks.

[Guest a proud american]

Because once they understand that they'll completely ignore the data regardless of its accuracy?

The rationalization subsequent to your protestation that you did not change the topic looks like an admission that you changed the topic. Where exactly did you deal with the Democrats' record on earmarks, may I ask?

It's both, but it's not an entitlement program in the mold of food stamps, welfare, or social security. Probably you had a fallacy of equivocation in mind.

VA hospitals sometimes have MRI scanners, too, so you should ask me to describe how an MRI works.

Since I mentioned the VA it would be on topic. Right?

Let me know where to mark my calendar for when you'll be willing to address the Democrats' history on earmarks.

No because I wanted them to know that they are only seeing a one sided web site, that contrary to your popular belief is slanted. Every Congressman or Senator uses ear marks. For example, several years ago, our Senator earmarked $13,000,000 to build a new Building to house Psychiatric Patients. Another went to build a new Emergency Room and Clinics to treat the Veterans in our area. They've also used these so called ear marks to build CBOC's Community based out patient clinics. And, since I didn't see it on the Club for Growth list, where does the $150,000,000 Bridge to nowhere sponsored by Senator Stevens of Alaska fit. And also, since the Democrats are now in power, ear marks are separated from bills so that they can't be inserted at the last minute. Also, I noticed you left out the fact that for the six years the Republicans were in control these ear marks soared. Thats also under control now.

Now, the reason I even mentioned the VA site was to give you the opportunity to see how all of the elected representatives vote on Veteran issues, since we will be treating the veterans returning from Iraq and Aghanistan.

And your right, it is both a benefit and an entitlement. However, up until Reagan and 41 came along all veterans were treated for free. Edward Derwinski, 41's Secretary of the VA stated that the idea that all veterans were told that their care would be free was a myth. Well, there are an awful large amount of Korean and WW II vets who would disagree with that statement.

So my point was and is that if you choose to use web sites as your facts, atleast pick one that isn't bankrolled by wealthy Texas Republicans.

[Bryan]

No because I wanted them to know that they are only seeing a one sided web site, that contrary to your popular belief is slanted. Every Congressman or Senator uses ear marks. For example, several years ago, our Senator earmarked $13,000,000 to build a new Building to house Psychiatric Patients. Another went to build a new Emergency Room and Clinics to treat the Veterans in our area. They've also used these so called ear marks to build CBOC's Community based out patient clinics. And, since I didn't see it on the Club for Growth list, where does the $150,000,000 Bridge to nowhere sponsored by Senator Stevens of Alaska fit. And also, since the Democrats are now in power, ear marks are separated from bills so that they can't be inserted at the last minute. Also, I noticed you left out the fact that for the six years the Republicans were in control these ear marks soared. Thats also under control now.

Now, the reason I even mentioned the VA site was to give you the opportunity to see how all of the elected representatives vote on Veteran issues, since we will be treating the veterans returning from Iraq and Aghanistan.

And your right, it is both a benefit and an entitlement. However, up until Reagan and 41 came along all veterans were treated for free. Edward Derwinski, 41's Secretary of the VA stated that the idea that all veterans were told that their care would be free was a myth. Well, there are an awful large amount of Korean and WW II vets who would disagree with that statement.

So my point was and is that if you choose to use web sites as your facts, atleast pick one that isn't bankrolled by wealthy Texas Republicans.

Great. Now that you've got that off your chest deal with the Democrats' history regarding earmarks and go get your facts straight regarding their use (McCain is one of a number who have avoided the surreptitious earmark process that amounts to a legal mechanism for tit-for-tat dispensing of favors to a congressman's constituents).

[Guest a proud american]

Great. Now that you've got that off your chest deal with the Democrats' history regarding earmarks and go get your facts straight regarding their use (McCain is one of a number who have avoided the surreptitious earmark process that amounts to a legal mechanism for tit-for-tat dispensing of favors to a congressman's constituents).

First, you have to look at the growth of Ear Marks over the course of the last seven years. I use this time frame because the Republicans were in control for six of those year and were responsible for the large increase since they could have stopped them. But to be fair, both parties use them.

And, of course you have to look at what ear marks are and how they come about. And I do give Mc Cain credit for trying to reign them in. Sadly though, it didn't happen until this year. Some ear marks like the ones I mentioned went for appropriate reasons. And in large measures most of our elected officials use them to benefit their constituants.

Then there are those ear marks that are specifically requested through lobbyists. This is what got De Lay, Ney and Cunningham in trouble. These are the ear marks that should never be approved since they are a product of pure greed.

But let me ask you this, do you consider the Presidents request for $20,000,000 for the Laura Bush Librarian Program to be pork, an ear mark or a waste of tax payers money. Also, how do you feel about the Laura Bush Hospital being built in Iraq, one block from an Iraqi Hospital.

I think on this one we basically agree. But please don't disappoint me.

[Bryan]

First, you have to look at the growth of Ear Marks over the course of the last seven years. I use this time frame because the Republicans were in control for six of those year and were responsible for the large increase since they could have stopped them. But to be fair, both parties use them.

If all Republicans were opposed to earmarks then that would work. They tried that kind of reform back in the 1990s and it didn't fly. And there weren't enough Democrats helping out to make up for the Republicans who wouldn't get behind the reform). Meanwhile, Democrats bellied up to the table for their pork second to none despite their minority status.

And, of course you have to look at what ear marks are and how they come about. And I do give Mc Cain credit for trying to reign them in. Sadly though, it didn't happen until this year. Some ear marks like the ones I mentioned went for appropriate reasons. And in large measures most of our elected officials use them to benefit their constituants.

And happy constituents leads to re-election. It all makes good sense in a crazy sort of way.

Then there are those ear marks that are specifically requested through lobbyists. This is what got De Lay, Ney and Cunningham in trouble. These are the ear marks that should never be approved since they are a product of pure greed.

There's nothing wrong with proposing legislation requested through lobbyists, per se. The crime is in accepting undue influence (big money in Cunningham's case, tit-for-tat in Ney's case --I'm not sure why you included DeLay unless it's just a Democrat tradition to name him among crooked politicians). Bribery isn't allowed regardless of how the legislation gets passed. Earmarks stink because they make the mechanics of corruption so downright easy.

But let me ask you this, do you consider the Presidents request for $20,000,000 for the Laura Bush Librarian Program to be pork, an ear mark or a waste of tax payers money.

Neither of the first two, possibly the third depending on implementation. Primarily I don't think it's the proper purview of the federal government. Such programs should be instituted at either the state level or (even better) privately.

Also, how do you feel about the Laura Bush Hospital being built in Iraq, one block from an Iraqi Hospital.

A children's hospital adjacent to a general hospital? There shouldn't be any issue of competition. The location of children's hospitals relative to other hospitals (except other children's hospitals) seems irrelevant. It seems like a good investment in the future relationship between the West and Iraq, in the spirit of the Marshall Plan.

Inefficient or criminal business practices by contractors involved in the construction is a separate issue, in my view.

[Guest Irrational Republicans]

In other words, you don't know so you'll keep right on dodging.

In terms of logic and my question to you, that's a red herring. I'd prefer real logic, please.

I guess you're trying to make the point that the businesses are preferring socialism. So they don't have to pay the loans back?

So you're saying that if the subprime market had remained completely stable that Bear Stearns would be in more or less the exact same trouble that it is in now?

Seriously?

Do I? Where did I say that, or do you just prefer to stick with red herrings and straw men while stabbing at logic? I said that government regulation that encouraged risky loans was the key cause of the problem. The banks who gave out risky loans are somewhat at fault--but the govermment (starting with Clinton) clearly encouraged that behavior. The problem would not be of its current magnitude without the derivatives market, but you've spent paragraph after paragraph dancing around the root cause.

That's appropriate. The government shouldn't be in the business of underwriting everybody's risk. If you can't afford an adjustable rate mortgage, don't get one. And try not to forget how the adjustable rate mortgage got its name.

Well, time has told that it's not just about sub-prime loans but instead a much broader gamut of imprudent lending and the explosion of unregulated derivative instruments. It's Alice in Wonderland time for Republicans with a Secretary of the Treasury proposing a Socialist (your term) safety net from the tax payer and having government not only underwrite (again, your term) but actually absorbing alot of the risk and mistakes made by credit providers. Hey, Bryan, do you support the Paulson/Bush plan??

[Guest I know, I know]

Well, time has told that it's not just about sub-prime loans but instead a much broader gamut of imprudent lending and the explosion of unregulated derivative instruments. It's Alice in Wonderland time for Republicans with a Secretary of the Treasury proposing a Socialist (your term) safety net from the tax payer and having government not only underwrite (again, your term) but actually absorbing alot of the risk and mistakes made by credit providers. Hey, Bryan, do you support the Paulson/Bush plan??

Dear Irrational Republicans,

The silence you got suggests to me you should change your name from Irrational Republicans to Republicans in Serious Denial. Republicans who can't accept that their version of the unregulated free market has pushed our entire economy over a cliff. Republicans who can't accept that the public reaction to this administration's actions will result in solid Democratic margins in the Congress and the White House.