A Joe-the-Plumber
Free Zone! Not a word about him in today’s show!
UPDATED POST: See last entry below for an article I just received from THE NATION magazine about Voter Fraud. I know that The Nation is a left-leaning magazine but the points made in the piece are germane to discussions about ACORN and other voter fraud conversations that have been going on here on the LRC Blog.
Whole lotta linkin' (not Abe!) goin' on, see below to connect to sites Matt mentions. Arianna’s
on the road today; it’s an all-male revue. The final debate’s over.
Can McCain make a comeback? Tony sees
a glimmer of hope in the polls. Bob defends the underdog, but calls
some of his followers scary. Tony takes extreme exception to this
characterization and says McCain’s “been running far too clean a
campaign” compared to Obama, whom he says “has ruthlessly been playing
the race card.” Matt says he’s heard that Colin Powell will announce
for Obama this weekend. Enough politics: how ‘bout that economy? Tony
says it's easy to buy equities if you've got 80 billion dollars (like
Buffett, see below). Bob tells us why he bought Google, and “did the
right thing” while making a 50% profit. Bob also stresses the need to
help the homeowner not the bandit bankers; Matt says we need both
mortgage relief and an economic stimulus, and is writing a piece about
his conversion away from fiscal conservatism, “Why I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Trillion Dollar Debt…” I’ll share it once it’s
published.
PS: I am
planning a tiny little contest -- the person who most closely picks both the final vote percentage and the
number of electoral votes for each candidate -- deadline Nov. 3 -- could win --
hang on now -- one of TWO Left, Right & Center sun visors! Yep, it's a
collector's item, only about 100 were made, and I just found the last two that I was hoarding in my
closet! I'll work out the details and tell you how to enter, stay tuned to this
space.
One final note: LRC is live ONSTAGE in Santa Monica, ON
AIR in SoCal and ONLINE worldwide @ KCRW.com (video and audio webcasts) on Sunday, Nov. 9th starting at 5:45
pm Pacific Time (for the behind-the-scenes stuff), 6 pm live
broadcast/webcast. We'll make the show available as a special podcast or you can watch it on demand later.
NY Times Sunday Magazine preview
For a guy who just four years ago was running his
first statewide campaign, Barack Obama has made startlingly
few missteps as a presidential candidate. But the moment Obama would most like
to take back now, if he could, was the one last April when, speaking to a small
gathering of Bay Area contributors, he said that small-town voters in
Pennsylvania and other states had grown “bitter” over lost jobs, which caused
them to “cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like
them.” That comment, subsequently posted by a blogger for the Huffington Post, undercut
one of the central premises of Obama’s campaign, an argument he first floated
in his famous 2004 convention address — that he could somehow erode the tired
distinctions between red states and blue ones and appeal to disaffected white
men who had written off national Democrats as hopelessly elitist. Instead, in
the weeks that followed, white working-class primary voters, not only in
industrial states like Pennsylvania but also in rural states like Kentucky and
West Virginia, rejected his candidacy by wide margins, and he staggered,
wounded, toward the nomination.
“That was
my biggest boneheaded move,” Obama told me recently. (more at the link above)
THE financial world is a mess, both in the United States and abroad. Its
problems, moreover, have been leaking into the general economy, and the leaks
are now turning into a gusher. In the near term, unemployment will rise,
business activity will falter and headlines will continue to be scary.
So ... I’ve been buying American stocks. (more at the link above)
The Bing Blog
http://stanleybing.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/
Thursday, October 16, 2008 at
12:18 pm
I walked home last night from the office. All along the route, I passed the
places I used to stop in for a drink. It’s been a month now since I had a nice,
frosty martini, so cold that the ice chips float to the top and the sides of
the glass bead up with condensation… or a brawny glass of Johnny Walker
Black, sinuous and golden in a big bottomed glass… or even a
festive balloon or two of rich, big-shouldered, blood-red Zin, oaky and
spicy and redolent of cinnamon and chocolate…
I walked by these places but did not go in. I figure the time to start
drinking again is when I don’t feel the inexorable pull to the cozy dimness
that lies beyond their inviting portals. In other words, when I don’t need
a drink is precisely the moment when I’ll feel okay having one.
THE BIG PICTURE economic blog
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/
Remarks by Governor Ben S. Bernanke
Before the National Economists Club, Washington, D.C.
November 21, 2002
Deflation: Making Sure "It" Doesn't Happen Here
Since World War II, inflation--the apparently inexorable rise in the
prices of goods and services--has been the bane of central bankers.
Economists of various stripes have argued that inflation is the
inevitable result of (pick your favorite) the abandonment of metallic
monetary standards, a lack of fiscal discipline, shocks to the price of
oil and other commodities, struggles over the distribution of income,
excessive money creation, self-confirming inflation expectations, an
"inflation bias" in the policies of central banks, and still others.
Despite widespread "inflation pessimism," however, during the 1980s and
1990s most industrial-country central banks were able to cage, if not
entirely tame, the inflation dragon. Although a number of factors
converged to make this happy outcome possible, an essential element was
the heightened understanding by central bankers and, equally as
important, by political leaders and the public at large of the very
high costs of allowing the economy to stray too far from price
stability.
With inflation rates now quite low in the United States,
however, some have expressed concern that we may soon face a new
problem--the danger of deflation, or falling prices. That this concern
is not purely hypothetical is brought home to us whenever we read
newspaper reports about Japan, where what seems to be a relatively
moderate deflation--a
decline in consumer prices of about 1 percent per year--has been
associated with years of painfully slow growth, rising joblessness, and
apparently intractable financial problems in the banking and corporate
sectors. While it is difficult to sort out cause from effect, the
consensus view is that deflation has been an important negative factor
in the Japanese slump.
So, is deflation a threat to the economic health of the United States?
Not to leave you in suspense, I believe that the chance of significant
deflation in the United
States in the foreseeable future is
extremely small, for two principal reasons. (read complete speech at link above)
UPDATE ADDED ON 10.21:
The Nation's DC Editor takes on ACORN, GOP voter suppression and the post
office.
First, voter fraud doesn’t exist. Second, if ACORN were
trying to do it, they sure are going about it all wrong. No, this is just a
routine Republican scam.
How I
Committed Voter Fraud
by Christopher Hayes
Last week, I committed voter fraud. Or, I should say: ‘voter
fraud’ -- inside the same sarcastic scare quotes that John McCain deployed when
he recently invoked that old tricky word ‘health’, as in "health of the
mother.”
I didn't even need to take my cues from ACORN. I'm kind of a
voter-fraud cell of one, you might say. Here's how it went down.
Having moved to DC last year, I suddenly realized a week ago
that I needed to register to vote at my new (disenfranchised) address by October
5. So I dutifully printed out the form, filled it out and prepared to mail it. I
happen to live in one of those pre-war apartment buildings that has a mail
chute. As I went to the mail chute to deposit my registration I encounter a
problem: The chute hole was too small for the large registration form. So,
foolishly, I folded it in half and stuffed it in. Immediately, I realized I'd
made a terrible mistake. The form got about a foot down before getting stuck. I
went and got a coat hanger, attempting to fish it out, but, of course, as always
happens in these situations, only succeeded in pushing it further down. I
resigned in despair and gaped: There was my precious franchise, tantalizingly
close, and yet so far. What to do?
Since it was only a few days before the registration deadline
I had no choice. The next day I printed out another form and mailed it
from a mailbox on Capitol Hill. But here's where the serious, class A fraud
comes in. That very same day, my excellent and competent building super had
managed to get the mail chute unstuck, meaning there were now -- gasp! -- two
identical registration forms speeding their way towards DC Board of Elections
Headquarters. That's right, a fraudulent registration with my name on
it.
Ok, so obviously this is absurd. I had no intent to defraud
the DC Board of Elections, and certainly no intent nor means of voting twice,
which is the actual theoretical danger being invoked here. The faux-outrage that
Republicans have marshaled over alleged voter fraud is so transparently faked,
so expertly cynical its almost surreal.
When John McCain accused ACORN of being on the "verge of maybe
perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history" Obama just broke down
laughing. I was too. It was the only reasonable reaction.
But sure enough, they've managed to embed the notion deeply
among the right-wing base and its now bled into popular discussion. I even heard
someone on ESPN make an ACORN vote-fraud joke the other night, and I knew this
had gotten out of hand).
As nearly everyone on the left has pointed out, this is now a
Republican routine. Every two years, they gin up baseless accusations of "voter
fraud," often directed at ACORN. The strategic imperative is simple: Create a
pretense that will allow them to more credibly hassle and hopefully suppress
poor and minority voters.
Just to get this out of the way: In the real world, there is
no such thing as voter fraud. There will be roughly as many fraudulent votes
cast in this election as there were stockpiles of biological weapons in Iraq.
That is to say, none.
“But what about all those duplicate and obviously fake voter
registration cards submitted by ACORN?” you ask. They were required by law to
submit them. In order to prevent tampering, state law in many places requires
groups like ACORN to submit all the forms they collect, whether obviously
erroneous or not.
Keep in mind that ACORN registered somewhere around 1.3
million people this cycle. Not surprisingly, there are errors. Think of all the
times you've eaten at a restaurant in your life. On the rare occasions when the
restaurant totaled the bill wrong, were they trying to defraud you? Did you
inform the cops of an attempted robbery? Are you suspicious of restaurants
generally and view them as an enterprise committed to widespread fraud? No, of
course not. You would have to be a paranoid doofus to believe that.
But let's do it anyway. Imagine ACORN wanted to pull off a
massive campaign of voter fraud. What would that look like? Well, first they'd
probably want to target swing states. And if they were going to undertake the
task, they'd have to set up a goal of delivering a certain amount of votes in
each of these states, say, just to be conservative, 500. Now, if they were
planning on stealing or buying that many votes in each swing state, it's pretty
unlikely they would be sending out press releases every day publicizing their
work, boasting about their voter registration numbers and inviting reporters
like myself to come shadow their workers. Indeed, it's unclear why they would
bother registering so many people to begin with. Just how would 1.3 million
extra registrations aid them in pulling off their fraud? How do all those extra
registrations help any one person vote twice?
In fact, the easiest, most direct way to commit fraud would be
to find 500 people and simply pay them to register and then vote the way you
want. But doing that wouldn't be aided by a widespread voter registration drive
with lots of faulty registrations. Indeed, that would only draw unwarranted
attention! And if some organization were to attempt some plot to pay lots
of people who ordinarily don't vote to register and then vote the way they say,
what are the odds that would stay secret? Approximately zero.
In other words, the ACORN-Truthers persist in believing
something that on its face is manifestly and obviously absurd. But this isn't
some fringe movement. This is being cynically fomented by everyone in the entire
right-wing noise machine, from talk radio, to Fox News, all the way up to the
actual members of the ticket, Sarah Palin and John McCain. My suspicion is that
the people who are fomenting this garbage, the RNC, Sarah Palin, Fox News and
others know that it's crap.
But for frank political reasons they are heavily invested in
reducing the number of poor people and black people who vote. Black people are
going to vote for Barack Obama in overwhelming, historic numbers. Poor people
vote for Democrats by massive margins as well. Ergo, the Republicans want to
keep them home. Simple as that. Increasing the likelihood that these voters are
struck from voter roles, or intimidated into staying home redounds to their
benefit.
Then there's the rank and file, the members of the GOP's base
who've been told by their leaders that there actually is a massive conspiracy
afoot and whose belief to that effect have now so hardened that no bit of logic,
reason or evidence will puncture it. This is dangerous stuff.
If Obama wins, we are going to be living with this for a
while. Not only is this a deeply cynical attempt to subvert the democratic
process itself, to roll back the clock to the days of yore when the franchise
was a bit more, ahem, heavily restricted. It is also an attempt to deny Barack
Obama, the Democratic party, and the center-left a legitimate claim at state
power.
In the meantime, it is, as it so often is, up to the media to
call this was it is: deranged and paranoid. Anyone who implies or accuses ACORN
of pulling off a fraud of historic proportions should be treated by the media
with about as much deference as those nutjobs who say 9/11 was an inside
job.
Christopher Hayes is the Washington editor for The
Nation magazine.
Copyright © 2008 The Nation – distributed by Agence
Global
Comments
PS - not assigning blame to McCain for the hate we have seen at his rally's, when he and his pit bull, ask their supporters to question the "mysterious motives" of this very "mysterious and dangerous" man is what sparked the fuel. Shame on them. All the best and love the show, Jeff
--Sarah (producer, not Palin!)
Agreed.
Not only is Pailin an embarassment (after 8 years of embarassment by a wanna-be cowboy--hey, I'm a native Texan, not like W.) but she is danegerous. Not because of her troubling lack of experience or intellect but because she is a demagogue in the tradition of Hitler and Farakhan.
McCain's torrid temper and awful judgement (not just Palin but it says it all, remeber the Keating scandal?) and propensity for risky and behavior unbecoming someone of his station (gambling issues, womanizing issues).
Read this expose from Rolling Stone on his sense of entitlement and ambition that lead him to risk it all for personal gain and daddy's approval (aren't we suffering the effects of that syndrome enough?)
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain
The election has for all intents and purposes been over for weeks.
What's going on now is just a back and forth psychic wounding.
Re: Tony Blankley's assertion that the Secret Service has repudiated and closed the investigation into the incident(s) at the McCain/Pailn rallies where supporters ("fringe" or no) called for violence against Barack Obama is just plain wrong. The USSS spokeman (Eric Zahren) said that they had reviewed the tapes from the FL rally and "heard 'tell him' or 'tell them,' but agents never heard 'kill him,'". In the same statement, he urged anyone who heard threatening remarks to report them to local law enforcement or the USSS.
Ultimately, the virulent remarks (caught on camera and tape) at the McCain/Palin rallies are real and the candidates initial refusal to discredit them is unjustifiable. The fact that they are back-pedaling now and attempting to
Re: Tony Blankley's assertion that the Secret Service has repudiated and closed the investigation into the incident(s) at the McCain/Pailn rallies where supporters ("fringe" or no) called for violence against Barack Obama is just plain wrong. The USSS spokeman (Eric Zahren) said that they had reviewed the tapes from the FL rally and "heard 'tell him' or 'tell them,' but agents never heard 'kill him,'". In the same statement, he urged anyone who heard threatening remarks to report them to local law enforcement or the USSS.
Ultimately, the virulent remarks (caught on camera and tape) at the McCain/Palin rallies are real and the candidates initial refusal to discredit them is unjustifiable. The fact that they are back-pedaling now and attempting to equate Sens. Obama and Biden's criticisms to hate speech are laughable.
Tony Blankley also sought to characterize Rep. John Lewis as an agent of Sen. Obama and/or his campaign and to try to loop in his comments this week as an example of Sen. Obama taking part in race-baiting. Mr. Blankley where is your proof? The time for portraying fiction as fact is rapidly coming to an end.
Here is a alternate "bailout" plan.
If this happens and a bank holds a "distressed" security, the mortgage payoffs would bring in money from lots of mortgage payoffs then the bank will have a good idea that whatever portion of that security that is not paid off has a high potential to be the bad dept. They still might loose money on the security but at least they would have a better idea of how much the losses would be. Right now, there is so much uncertainty about what these things are worth because nobody understands them.
What I don't understand is, here we have two candidates with nearly equal political experience and yet one has been branded as an embarrassment and the other a historic figure? The only major difference I can see is one has drawn the vehement rigor of the liberal press and the other has enjoyed a blind eye by the same.
Tony - you're normally the king of civilized debate. . .don't let your colleagues on the center, left, and Marxist (cough, Bob, cough) drag you down into to the screaming matches. You're more effective when you're calmly swatting aside Bob's rants with cool British aplomb and conservative logic.
LR&C used to be the best political talk show available. It had a nearly perfect balance. I could not wait to download the podcast each week as soon as it was posted.
The saddest thing to me in this season is how much credibility I feel it has lost as a result of Tony Blankley's bald intellectual dishonesty. Previously I could usually count on Tony to provide a conservative viewpoint that was partisan and representative of the Right, but which was largely fair and still adhered to basic facts, and was free of serious hypocrisy or revisionism.
For the past 6 weeks I have experienced great disappointment in listening to Tony completely contradict his own previously stated views in many areas, including most importantly The Bailout and Republican Smear campaigns. To wit:
- Tony's completely biased, revisionist explanation of why it is still a free market even though it needs an injection of huge sums of public money every generation or so. Coincidentally these generational epochs have been periods when Republicans have been in power and regulation had been suppressed or effectively circumvented. Shockingly, Tony sees no correlation between these, and apparently sees no contradiction inherent in believing in a free market and feeling that taxing citizens to support failing companies is fair.
- Normally Tony is explicit in his evaluation of poltical, ideological, and even moral dimensions to most issues. It is this quality that could endear him to many listeners from other political persuasions and gives him intellectual credibility. However, he no longer seems to be able to distinguish between the any of these in discussing such issues as McCain's campaign tactics, the choice of Sarah Palin, or even the Iraq war. Unfortunately the discussion on LR&C rarely continues long enough to pry apart a facetious rhetorical argument, so he is often allowed to make fairly baseless comparisons and claims about McCain's vs. Obama's campaigns tactics. To choose a single example, it is patently ridiculous to fixate on William Ayers as a serious issue, and the fact that Blankley has not repudiated this as a campaign issue proves that ultimately he serves the party machine as much as any Republican politician.
Disappointing to say the least. I truly expected better.
It's disingenuous to say that Obama and Palin are similar when it comes to their experience.
Compare that to Palin who is a first term Governor (almost 2 years now after beating the sitting governor in the primary then a former governor in the general election). Prior to that she was chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission where she eventually resigned her seat in protest of corruption by members of her own party. Prior to that she had a failed bid for Lt. Governor. Prior to that she was a small town city councilor and eventually Mayor. Hardly a thick resume either.
I think it's disingenuous to say that Palin's experience is not similar to Obama's.
I fear that we are poised to refight the last "war" and that a widespread sharing of Bob's views of efficacy of government FDR's will bring similar results. Many European countries recovered from the depression substanitally earlier and to a much greater extent than the U.S. under FDR. While I am all for reviewing the actions of FDR and others both in the U.S. and elsewhere for hints of what will work and what worsens the situation, that review should not be undertaken from the position of a hagiographer.
I apologize for running on about had been a minor reason for posting. Please do have Ms Shlaes on some future shows.
Even if you accept that Obama's and Palin's experience are equal (or even if Palin's is better), that is not the important question.
Experienced people have been running down this country and economy for 8 years.
The most damning criticism I've heard about Obama has actually come from the Left, via Robert Sheer. Who right wonders why Obama is taking so much advice from some of the same "experienced people" who have helped cause this problem.
That said, though, the relevant comparison is experience, character and judgement.
In this regard, comparing Obama to Palin is like comparing Tina Fey to Sarah Palin. One is a very intelligent, well-read, reasonable person who has the ability to both think for themselves and make big decisions based on input by experienced experts.
Palin has shown her intellectual weakness by her unwillingness to do more media interviews. Strong, intelligent leaders would never back down from this challenge. McCain hasn't. Obama hasn't. Biden hasn't.
Palin has made some of the most outlandish claims with no hint that she herself understood how ridiculous they were (Alaska, Putin, etc.). At least when McCain says nonsense you can read his body language that he himself might realise how ridiculous it might seem to others.
Palin is on tape being ministered to by an African priest who takes it upon himself to annoint which women in the village are witches and witch ones are governors. And this is not the first time on tape she has made the claim that she is God's candidate.
Obama by contrast is a very intelligent man, a very well-spoken man, a family man and an accomplished man. Frankly speaking, his only weakness is that he isn't a woman. But no one can credibly claim he doesn't care about women and womens' issues, and family issues for that matter.
As Mr. X argues above, Palin is the secondary candidate and has qualifications that exceed those of the democratic primary candidate, yet she garners the venom of the media. There are miscogynistic elements at play because she doesn't look like, sound like, or act like the woman that we expect to be vice president. Women are especially hard on their own in this circumstance.
Enough said about Palin, I only brought it up this time after reading the first few posts of this week's blog.
Obama Is Fronting for Islamic Jihadists. Writing in The Washington Times this week, former Reagan Pentagon official Frank Gaffney, charges that Obama’s campaign has received “between $30 million and $100 million” from the Mideast, Africa and other places [where] Islamists are active.” He asserts it “seems likely” that “these funds come not only from Wahhabis, Muslim Brotherhood types and jihadists of other stripes but from non-U.S. citizens.”
Quit reading and believing the left-wing attack blogs on Palin and try to make some sort of educated analysis of the candidate.
In this week's program, Bob Scheer said that Palin has no experience in foreign policy, she hasn't delt with these issues, doesn't understand the complexities of this world, and speaks in silly sound bites. Well, you could very well argue that Scheer's argument works very well in describing Obama's experience and judgment. He was pitiful during the Georgian crisis. He's still trying to separate himself from his gaff about sitting down with despots without preconditions. His foreign experience consists of a campaign tour through Europoe last summer.
So, my point is...if you hold Palin up to your standard, you must hold Obama up to the same. Either condemn both or exonerate both.
Facts about Palin:
1. While running for mayor, she turned her church against a Republican opponent by spreading a rumor he was a jew. Why? Because his last name sounded Jewish.
2. After winning the election for mayor, as the "real Christian", she used her position for personal gain.
3. She left her town with a deficit. She couldn't balance the budget of a small town even after receiving millions in federal pork.
4. An African Christian Priest ran a woman out of town for being a witch, then came to Alaska and chose Palin to be the next governor. Palin has never repudiated him.
5. As governor, used her husband to try to settle a family dispute.
6. She wants to criminalize women in trouble and the doctors who help them without even exceptions for rape or incest.
7. Her state leads the nation in rapes, but she decided to make victims pay for their own rape kits.
8. She is afraid of the press. She is afraid to sit down with a reporter and go one on one. This level of cowardess has never been seen in a candidate for national office in our nation's history.
9. Claims her state's nearness to Russia as foreign policy experience, yet she has never visited the island where you can see Russia and she has never even spoken to the mayor on that island about it.
10. She recieved she recieved thousands of tax payer dollars travel expenses to her own home and also claimed expenses for working at home. Also filed claims for her daughter and husband, claiming they were doing state business. All this is bad enough, but she didn't even report it on her taxes.
McCAIN has SHOWN not only BAD JUDGEMENT in selecting Palin, but in 2008 he cares more about getting elected than he does about our country.
"Presidential campaigns are full of hypocrisy, of course," wrote the New Republic's Jonathan Cohn. "But I can't remember the last time a candidate was this brazen about it. It makes you wonder what McCain thinks about the public's power of perception."
This is the best quote so far on McCain's character.
The recent attack by the Obama media was best illustrated by Mark Steyn's column today..."The editors called the Wasilla Holiday Inn and told their legion of reporters to return to the lower 48 and investigate this Joe the Plumber guy. My God, he owes back taxes, he is a single dad, he doesn't make $240 thousand a year, and he's not a licensed plumber."
The standard the media holds Obama is so much lower than that of the McCain-Palin campaign is ridiculous.
Tony, do you really believe Palin has the intellectual curiosity and heft to be president? Bob, repeal of Glass Stiegel did not cause the current economic melt down and it is debatable whether it contributed at all.
Similarly, Freddie and Fannie are not significant causes as they were extremely late to the subprime loan party. Best comment recently was by Matt when he suggested that striking the balance between free market and regulation may be the most important political issue of the next decade.
I’d like to see you all discuss and site sources regarding the results of the competing tax policies “trickle down” and it’s opposite. While not the first proponent, Reagan was perhaps the most effective spokesperson for trickle down, saying that tax cuts that favor the wealthy stimulated the economy, created jobs and caused all boats to rise. Others argue that such tax policies do not cause all boats to rise or result in economic growth and that even if they raise economic growth by a significant amount (relative to existing estimates of the growth effects), most households will end up worse off after the tax cuts, the growth effect, and the financing are considered than they would have been if the tax cuts had not taken place. Moreover, it has been suggested that tax cuts that favor the wealthy have been responsible for a widening gap between the top 1% of US holders of wealth and income and the rest of the US.
Another topic I’d like to see discussed is whether the gap between top executives and average workers has widened over time and whether any gap is the result of the “invisible hand” or the distribution of shareholder power over so many that there is no shareholder check on executive compensation.
Please target your discussions to our brains and not our emotions.
Many thanks
http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/daily-brief/2008/10/17/hedge-fund-manager-goodbye-and-f-you
This show was good on its discussion of economics and seemingly less on trivia about Ayers, Palin etc. Obviously the election is decided by turnout and not by polls.
Miller is probably correct that Obama’s strategy of just appearing sober, intelligent and calm in all the debates, is more important than scoring points or zingers on some issue or other, particularly given the amount of anxiety his ancestry can generate.
I doubt that Obama has been ruthlessly playing the race card, as Blankley says. In fact he now avoids mentioning race like the plague, no mention of what happened 40+ years ago at Ole Miss, for example. He just said he was glad to be at Ole Miss, like he belonged there. The race card, the Moslem card, and other efforts to generate anxiety are coming from the right.
Similarly all of these complaints about the media being soft on Obama and hard on Palin, particularly the so called liberal media as opposed to the conservatives who are the dominant pundits. I am concerned that if Obama actually wins, the conservatives will become as intransigent in opposition as they were under Clinton, creating these narratives on how McCain and Palin were done in by the media.
It would be interesting the extent to which Blankley must agree that conservative free market ideology is not a religious principle and that the discussion should be about how much regulation is needed to defend against runaway greed, and when it becomes petty, poorly thought out or corrupt.
Good to see that Joe the Plumber was not mentioned. It turned out that the real Joe was not like what the candidates made him out to be, which may be typical of the relation between reality and what the campaigns talk about. I do feel bad for the guy who just questioned a candidate and then ended up with all his warts exposed to the public, in part because McCain wanted to turn him into a talking point.
Prix is correct that it was really World War II and not the New Deal that ended the great Depression, although the New Deal made its effects worse. We have never really had a peacetime economy since and we can not prove that one is possible. At the same time the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are bankrupting the country. And who wants to be killed in a war just to keep the economy moving.
Mr. X has an intriguing bailout plan. Obviously the weakness is being able to value all of these assets, as well as get a fair result so the homeowners, many of whom have been bilked out of real equity or into real debt, a way to keep their homes, preserve their family life and pay the mortgages off. Mr. X suggests having people get low fixed rate mortgages devoid of predatory features like adjustable rates, balloon payments etc. Another good way to solve the mess (a plan devised by James Carr of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition and probably others as well) is for the government to buy all the mortgages at deep discounts and refinance them into decent mortgages. Under Mr. X’s plan people will do the work themselves and no one really has to worry about how much the old mortgages were really worth, or fix them individually. As long as the value is reduced drastically the government can do this, even though ultimately banks end up with less. It’s good that McCain has campaigned on the need to fix mortgages in the debate, as has Obama. This issue was mostly ignored when the bailout bill was in the Congress. Now will the Congress go along? The banks wouldn’t even let Congress allow bankruptcy courts to compel loan modifications.
McCain losing Colin Powell is surprising, as he was a military Republican like McCain. One wonders if he feels betrayed by Bush sending him to the UN with information about Saddam Hussein’s Iraq that turned out to be untrue. It may be a sign that McCain is losing the decent intelligent wing of the Republican party. Or more likely that Bush lost it for him. Since Powell also shares Obama’s African immigrant background (by way of Jamaica in Powell’s case) it may be that whoever he chose to endorse may not carry that much weight.
Whether or not Obama is “running out the clock” Miller certainly ran out the clock in the 30 second space on the show just before the rant. No one got to say anything. How good of moderating is that?
How many times must we hear Obama say, "He's not the man I once knew," before people begin to believe that he knew all of these men very well.
Joe the plumber wanted to pursue the American dream, he wanted to buy his own plumbing business, he just wanted to get ahead. He asked Obama a simple question, "I'm planning to buy a plumbing business that may make $200, 250, or 260 thousand per year. You want to tax me, don't you?" Obama's answer was essentially, "yes."
Obama's plan to take Joe's money and give it to poor people who don't pay taxes but who will receive a tax credit, is essentially welfare. Handing a person a check doesn't get that person out of their situation, in fact it is more likely to keep them down. Don't believe me, just ask...Obama. Remember in the Saddleback debate he said that his greatest mistake was that he at first opposed the repeal of welfare benefits during Bill Clinton's presidency and later saw that repealing the welfare benefits eventually got the people out of the welfare trap.
Furthermore, Joe's less likely to keep working 12 hours a day saving for that business after he finds out Obama will confiscate 50% of his profits once he gets there. Good-bye to the four of five employees Joe was going to employ. I guess they'll be okay because they will then qualify for Obama's welfare, but wouldn't they have been better to have been working for Joe?
It's well known that the last two tax cuts resulted in higher revenue for the government. Don't rely on me, ask...Obama. During his debate with Hillary, Gibson (of Palin fame) informed Obama of the fact that more tax revenue came in after the two tax cuts. Obama essentially said, "What-do-you-know." And then he goes on to essentially say, "He'll still raise taxes on the "rich" because it's "fair."
You know what? All of Obama's rhetoric fits like a glove and says a lot about his true purpose, he's about class warfare and redistribution of wealth. He's a socialist or worse.
McCain's erratic reaction to the economic crisis aside, I'd like to go back to my centrist instinct for a moment and defend Sarah Palin.
She now, in my book, is more qualified to be the next president than John McCain is. Here's what she said today, even as McCain was doing the talk show circuit whining about Ayers and defending hate-inspiring Robocalls:
Thinkers like George Lakoff would say, "don't let your opponent define your framing." What she should have done was ignore the criticisms, and play to her strengths instead. She could claim to be untainted by the Washington, and to be a "Mrs. Smith goes to Washington" candidate, even more than Obama could. Whether that's true is another matter, but she could claim that with more credibility than she can speak to policy specifics. She should have talked about how her values would shape her policies, instead of capitulating to the demand for concrete policy.
It's clear from history that many voters would prefer to hear about values instead of policy details. When you talk about details, you invite endless chatter and quibbling about those details. When you talk about values, it's better politics -- who can argue with nuggets like "place working Americans first?"
Palin failed an opportunity to use that to her advantage, instead of falling into the trap of exposing her ignorance on specific issues. Either the McCain campaign (e.g. "message nazi" Steve Schmidt) unwisely forced her to be somebody she isn't, or else her own hubris made her think she could do something she couldn't.
This would be funny if I thought it was intended as a joke.
I think that you're misreading Stan's remark. I took him to mean that it may not carry that much weight with voters because of the shared background NOT that it shouldn't be given that much weight because Powell was influenced by the shared background.
HAHAHAHAHAHA
I prefer to say half a dozen, not six, but you're making a distinction without a difference. I wouldn't say you're half empty, I'd say your half full of it.
But all joking aside, Powell's heritage had no relevence when he was fighting in Viet Nam. It had no relevance when he was Chairman of the Joinst Chief of Staff. It had no relevance when he was Secretary of State. It had no relevance when he was the darling of the Republican Party.
And it has no relevance in his choice of Obama over McCain. I think it's a mistake for "our side" to give any relevance to that kind of thinking. I'm not accusing of StanH of being a racist or anything like that.
If i have a racist thought, i'm not racist, if i have a sexist thought, i'm not sexist, if i say something stupid, i'm not stupid...but it's up to friends to call other friends on things they say that aren't right...that's all i'm doing.
Palin and Obama are smooth talkers in their own way, but Obama has a greater gift of talking around direct questions. Presented with the Gibson or Couric questions, Obama probably would not have had any more accurate answers, but he would have made their ears bleed, their eyes glaze and their mind daze before he was finished.
I doubt Obama "would have ears bleed, their eyes glaze and their mind daze before he was finished."
Aren't you exaggerating to make a point, here?
Obama is one of the most gifted orators of our time. As much as you can't stand him, millions of people actually enjoy his eloquence and his intellect.
Obama has found a way to be intelligent and thoughtful without being intellectual.
To intellectualize is to take the "personal" out of a political argument. Such as Robert Scheer arguing that high gas prices are a good thing because they make us aware of a larger issue. Or Palin's dismissal of women in trouble who are victims of rape or incest.
Palin, on the other hand, has embraced the "intelligent" is "other" rhetoric. So called "common sense" and "school of hardknocks" is superior to book learnin'.
I pray to God it doesn't work this time.
I don't think that StanH was weighing in on the validity of Powell's remark,
but on the impact that it will have.
Capiche?
PS: I wouldn't say that you're half full of it either- you're totally full of it.
That's the same thing. Valid remarks have more impact than invalid ones in my world, but maybe not in rightwing world. If that's your point, then I take your point. And I though we were discussing an "endorsement", not a "remark." But I'm sure you have a smart-a** rationalization for that one, too.
The CW is that endorsements in general do little more than get a little media attention for a hot-second and reenforce what a voter already believes or doesn't believe. But on occasion, an endorsement can gain the attention of a voter who hasn't made up her mind yet.
And I think Powell's endorsement goes a long way in this regard. Powell was once a darling of the Republican Party. He lost a lot of face with anti-Bush people of all stripes when he got pulled into the neocon web for a bit. So, now he has redeemed himself. Nobody can argue that Powell doesn't know what he's talking about - and he gave a full endorsement to Obama.
Nobody ever said Lieberman's endorsement of McCain doesn't count because they're both old white neocons.
To compare Palin's and Obama's "vitae" is ridiculous and intellectually dishonest. Obama is a lawyer who graduated from one of our nation's finest institutions with distinction, serving as Harvard Law Review's editor; Palin attended five universities before earning her journalism degree. Obama wrote two well-received books and sponsored more than 800 pieces of legislation during his time as a legislator at the state and national levels. Palin has presided over a state that is flush with oil income, so much so that it doesn't have state income or property tax.
If you honestly believe that Palin and Obama are on the same intellectual playing field, then I suppose I have given you too much credit over these many months.
Then watch Obama's interviews with Bill O'Reilly, on Meet the Press, with Chris Wallace. Look at his answers during the debates and compare them with Palin's during her debate with Biden. Who answered the questions with more depth? Who seemed to have a better grasp of the issues?
She has accomplished some things as governor and has proved she has charisma. But I do believe there's a depth of understanding of today's issues that Obama possesses that Palin doesn't.
Yes, I think that's true. Criticizing Palin on her values would be perceived as an attack on the millions of Americans who hold the similar values. That would not be a winnable political strategy, it would lead to the Democrats appearing like they disapprove of about 30% of the country (according to Palin's favorable number). That's exactly why the Republican campaign should have steered toward that framing, but they failed. They blundered into the framing that was imposed upon them by the media.
Meanwhile, critics of Sarah Palin have been labeled sexist anyway, sometimes in nonsensical ways. For example, Carly Fiorina criticized the Sarah Palin/Hillary Clinton sketch on Saturday Night Live, claiming: "yes, I would say, sexist in the sense that just because Sarah Palin has different views than Hillary Clinton does not mean that she lacks substance." Excuse me? The criticism of Sarah Palin on her views and her substance -- compared to another woman candidate -- is somehow sexist? Talk about double-speak!
Overall, from the standpoint of political rhetoric, the McCain/Palin campaign has been executed incompetently.
I think McCain's fatal flaw was to not have faith in the American people's ability to choose the candidate that is right on the issues that affect their lives and the American peoples' lives as a whole. Instead he has focused almost entirely on demonizing Barack Obama and making ridiculous accusations about Obama's intentions. The fact is that both candidates are sacrificing an unbelievable amount for their country, and have all their lives. But what this campaign has turned into is constant messaging appealing to the American people's animalistic competitiveness, instead of appealing to their better judgement and good nature. Political campaigns are notorious for being the worm in the fruit of public service and humanitarianism, and gives a bad name to politics in general. John McCain is making it worse, and is totally unapologetic about it. I pray that Obama wins, not only because I am a democrat, but so that McCain and the republican base will maybe come to terms with the fact that Americans are smarter than they give them credit for.
Sarah Palin name does equal 666. Now to many that is real serious. To me it means nothing. People are interesting. How people react to Sarah Palin’s name equaling 666 is interesting. I think this takes on more significance if you are a serious religious rightee...
Barack Hussein means Blessed is this child. If Hussein scares you it probably should. If 666 frightens you. Wonderful!
I'm not sure what world you live in, but I suspect that it has a population of exactly one. In the real world the validity of a remark doesn't determine its impact. If it did then 'liberal intellectual' would not be a common term of derision, Olbermann would still be doing sports, and David Brooks would have more impact than Rush Limbaugh.
As far as 'rightwing world' goes, if there were an ideological mirror that could be turned toward the most vehement and intellectually shallow drivel produced by the residents of that world, then the image that it would reflect would show rhetoric just like yours.
StanH and you were discussing both. (Powell endorsed Obama, but he also explained what observations led him to his judgement.) I was defending Stan's realistic assessment (as I interpreted his comment) that the impact of Powell's public statements will be blunted because of race.
True- but many have said that it counts less because of his relationship to Israel. A lot of people believe that the more bellicose members of the Knesset don't trust that an Obama administration would provide the support that they would need to bomb Iran (and will move to act between the election and the inaughuration).
If you want to argue about whether it is fair for Lieberman and Powell to have their impact on the election lessened by race and religion, then that is a different discussion.
The USSS spokeman (Eric Zahren) said that they had reviewed the tapes from the FL rally and "heard 'tell him' or 'tell them,' but agents never heard 'kill him,'"
Where can we go to hear/see the tape for ourselves?
My point was this.
If Powell endorses McCain, you can write him off as a military Republican endorsing a military Republican.
If Powell endorses Obama you can write him off as sharing Obama's African immigrant heritage.
As it turns out I think Powell's endorsement of Obama may be effective with suburban educated people, mostly business oriented, because he has articulated what they think, and may validate those feelings, about Palin, negative campaigning and the general incompetence of the Bush Administration.
I'm sorry StanH, but I don't see how you can say "write him off" because he's Black. We don't write off white people who endorse other white people. Or old people who endorse other old people. Or bald people who write off other bald people. There are certain aspects of our humanity we were born into and can not write off.
I suggest you stop be encouraged by the rightwing lunacy of Ockraz, and just admit you mispoke.
By the way, I love McCain's new Richard Nixon campaign strategy:
"I'm not a crook!"..."I'm not George Bush!"
StanH, I'm obviously the wrong messenger for tolerance, so here is a link that explains my point far better than I could.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-ridley/the-myth-of-colin-powells_b_136311.html
The author details how Blacks in fact do not support Black candidates in any knee-jerk kind of way.
He gives specific and recent examples.
Actually the Lieberman endorsement analogy is fairly similar. How much do we care about endorsements? If the endorser has an ulterior motive, we may care a whole lot less. And if we disagree with the endorsement, we are more likely to find an ulterior motive.
If Lieberman endorses Obama, he is still technically a Democrat, so he's endorsing the Democrat. If he endorses McCain, it's probably because he agrees with his neocon views, and maybe from having served with him in the Senate for so long (which equals old I guess. And most of the Senate but Obama is white, (there are also two Asians and three Hispanics according to http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/minority_senators.htm) so that part may be less of a big deal). So for people who haven't been in the Senate for years, unless you really think that the President should be a neocon, you may not care much who Lieberman endorses. Maybe some people looking for someone who can reach across the aisle will be impressed. Admittedly Lieberman's side of the aisle has been somewhat ambiguous since he lost the Democratic primary and won as an independent, although he votes with the Ds on internal matters.
Powell's endorsement of Obama is most noteworthy for the way he articulated both his view of Obama's positive qualities and his disagreements with the Republican party which he served and to which he gave his credibility. I don't remember a similar articulation from Lieberman altough maybe someone can point to one.
Critics of Powell have often felt he was a careerist, and Mr. X seems to agree that he was jumping on the bandwagon when it appears that Obama is ahead. Certainly Powell has invited Obama to give him a prime foreign policy or national security reach-across-the-aisle role. However since many conservatives believe that the race is essentially even, and many blame the media for trying to con the people into thinking that Obama is ahead, that Palin is unpopular, that McCain is erratic and so forth. If these conservatives are correct, then Powell has taken a more significant step than Mr. X gives him credit for.
Now, when Obama defeated Hillary Clinton and has a recent advantage over McCain, I hope Tony will remember his words, bite his lip and will feel humble for a second.
I am not an Obama fanatic, he is not even an inspirational figure for me as he is for many others. I just believe when he speaks. And I do not believe a word that comes out of McCain's mouth. But this is quite important point - Obama is an inspirational figure for many. How many people can say that about McCain. That's why I have a hope that he will win!
:: Russo ::
I also noticed that as closer we get to Election day - the more Tony looses his cool. OK, I can understand that - it is not easy to see that your candidate is not doing well, especially when you are not excited about him in the first place.
But at last show I think Tony fail the biggest test that most Conservatives have now, thanks to McCain's campaign "whatever it takes" approach. The test that some of very respectable conservatives passed with reluctance but nevertheless they did. The Test Of Sarah Palin. This is the time when you can easy recognize Republicans that do not see their party as a cult and feel that it is beneath them to support Sarah Palin, and Republicans that will repeat anything that their party wants them to. It is sad, as after this test there will be quite a few Republicans that would not be considered as capable to have their own opinion and therefore not be taken seriously.
I always thought that Tony had his own point of view despite of "Republican political correctness." But now Tony joined the Republican crowd of those who failed the test.
Sad.
:: Russo ::
:: Russo ::
So, brevity carries the day in your world? If you think that sound bites are the height of political discourse, then I guess that explains the way that you write. You're just proving my point about shallow simplistic drivel. There is a difference between people who actually write manifestos and people who write bumper stickers other than the number of words they use.
Appealing to the LCD seems more your speed, though.
To help you along I've taken to emphasizing the highlights for you now :)
I would have been more convinced if you would have made your message a bit longer and convoluted, like your earlier posts.
color me disappointed :(
p.s. i agree with Russo and StanH above. But Mr. X's comment about waiting so long i think is a bit of a reach. I'd take General Powell's integrity over his any day.
but I deleted it on the theory that you lose interest in anything that can't be written on a Post-It note.
Freddie and Fannie are significant in the housing bubble but to lay all the blame on them wouldn't be fair but let me try to lay out their involvement. Where they got it started was in the decision years ago to start underwriting standards for mortgage loans to the point that virtually no down payment was required(the worst part) and then to also put few restrictions on the size monthly payments could be relative to income, require little or no examination of credit scores and little examination of income or employment history. This was the big innovation in mortgage lending that helped drive up demand for housing and thus drive up home prices. The reason this was done was to increase home ownership among the poor and minorities.
When prices started going up because of all the new demand and up this brought in the speculators who were not rich people but rather moderately incomed people who found that they could go for an ARM mortgage with no money down and as long as the housing prices continued to go up, they could turn a tidy profit without even using their own money. When the bubble burst these people start to get out and since their investment wasn't made using their own money, they just accept foreclosures since it wasn't their money to begin with. This is why foreclosures rates are so high for ARM loans but not for fixed-rate loans.
So how did this affect Fannie and Freddie and why did they go under? They were buying up all the sub prime loans from places like Countrywide who found that with the relaxed underwriting standards, they could simply make the sub prime loan then turn around and sell it to Fannie/Freddie and make a profit. Fannie and Freddie started packaging and selling these loans as securities. Since they are Government sponsored entities, the securities they were selling were implicitly(wink wink) backed by the fed who ultimately came to their rescue when the bubble burst.
I don't think we can assign all the blame to Fannie and Freddie but it is fair to give them credit for getting the ball rolling. Other factors include the Speculators who are the ones that really started to default the most. Banks and investment houses securitizing sub prime and ARM loans in ways nobody understands (Bear Stearns and Liemen Bros. are either gone now or essentially gone because of this). Low interest rates by the fed encouraged more mortgage lending "Mark to market" accounting rules forced investment houses and banks to suddenly sharply lower the value of their Mortgage backed Securities when the bubble burst (even though they were going to hold them for years, imagine what would happen if you had to keep your steak in your house at 20% and pay the bank to keep your equity steak up if your home value suddenly dropped even thought you are not selling for years) which led to them being over leveraged on paper and forced them into a "fire sell" urgency to unload assets in order to meet federal capitol requirements.
I could go on but this post is too long as it is but I think there is plenty of blame to go around but there is no denying that Freddie and Fannie are involved allong with the fed. This is not a "deregulation" caused crisis like Mr. Sheer likes to portray it.
So which works? Well, I think the history is on the side of the Supply siders since most times we have had a cut in marginal tax rates we have seen increased economic activity, growth in the economy and higher tax revenues while when marginal rates have been high, the incentive for business to expand and incur higher marginal rates decreases the economic activity and tax revenues fall off.
There is a limit to how much you can cut taxes and still see increased revenue and ultimatly, the cycle of expansion and recession usually is intact.
How to Lie like a Rightwinger
Prosecutors asked Palin-pal and supporter Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska about a gift he received that he omitted them from the financial disclosure forms. The rightwing Republican said he considered it "a loan."
Prosecutor: "And the chair is still at your house?"
Stevens:"Yes.”
Prosecutor: "How is that not a gift?"
Stevens: "He bought that chair as a gift, but I refused it as a gift. He put it there and said it was my chair. I told him I would not accept it as a gift. We have lots of things in our house that don't belong to us."
Prosecutor:"So, if you say it's not a gift, it's not a gift?"
Stevens: "I refused it as a gift. I let him put it in our basement at his request."
VECO founder Bill Allen testified that his workers spent hours transforming Stevens' small A-frame cabin into a large, modern home with a sauna, wine cellar and wraparound porches.
Stevens:"He did work for VECO, yes, but when working at my house, he's working for me. VECO was not involved in renovating my house."
Larry King.
Can you believe Palin won't even go toe to toe with Larry King?
King of the softballs!
If Palin doesn't have the guts to be interviewed by Larry King, how is she going to negotiate with Putin when he raises his head?
If this were a movie script, it would be rejected as too ridiculous.
And yet somehow I can't help but feel that the rightwing is going to steal this election.
The real understanding of economics has to start with an understanding of the biophysical world we live in. Classical economics assumes that the human economy is a closed system cycling between production and consumption. It takes natural resources for granted. It also assumes growth (measured now in period to period GDP) is an ultimate good.
In fact, the constraints of the biophysical world are at the base of causes for the current economic and financial situation. For example, world total energy production from oil has reached a plateau starting in 2005. Energy is the ultimate currency of the economy and is not reflected (but only very weakly) in the price structures and their fluctuations. As net energy production declines, in part due to increased amounts of energy needed just to find and produce new oil, the total energy available to do economic work diminishes leading to both a contracting economy and, eventually higher dollar prices.
We, in the west, have been financing toys, SUVs, NASCAR-style entertainment, strictly consumptive products and services, and many luxuries with money based on work (creation of wealth) to be done in the future. We have been borrowing against a presumed future rather than prudently from past savings. But energy declines will surely prevent that future from coming. The credit markets and debt base is collapsing because the truth of this fundamental fact is starting to emerge. I strongly urge people to become a little more knowledgeable about energy matters as these are the fundamental issues that will shape the future.
G. Mobus
University of Washington Tacoma, Institute of Technology
Question Everything
http://questioneverything.typepad.com/
I just don't see a strong connection between the current credit crisis and energy prices. Oil prices have been in free fall lately which hasn't abated with OPEC plans to cut production.
--Sarah, producer/moderator
From the article:
Why do we think that reducing borrower requirements (I'm not sure that Fannie and Freddie had anything to do several of the things mentioned, which were instead done by the secondary market seeking loans to sell to investors. But they did eliminate the need for large down payments) contributed to the inflation of home prices? Particularly in the inner city midwest where there was no substantial increase in home prices. Rather that inflation was caused by population increase, changing taste in large homes and particularly on the coasts, lack of land to build new large homes further from urban problems. Particularly when prices kept increasing (thought to be a political necessity in America) and rates fell, people started financing consumer spending with refinances. And then the lending industry (not Fannie and Freddie as most of this happened by private label securitizations) discovered how to abuse various "products" such as adjustable rates and balloon payments, that had been protected from state regulation by Congress during the inflationary 1970s and were not regulated federally, to keep the loans coming.
Once the money came rolling in, everyone felt they had to get in to the act.
I'm glad you posted George. THis is a serious question.
Do you consider Sarah Palin to be the most knowledgeable person on energy issues in the nation, if not the world, as John McCain claims?
If so, we don't need to become more knowledgeable, because Sarah will take care of it, won't she?
ACORN is ostensibly a partisan group recruiting registrants for Democrats. If they flood the registration rolls with bogus registrations, it's easier to push fraudulant votes through. As Mr. X stated, look at what is going on in Ohio. There are thousands of faulty registrations, same day registration/voting prevents verification, the attorney general resists verification of registrations.
As I previously posted, the stigma of voter fraud will produce election chaos and uncertainty stimulating litigation for months afterward regardless of who wins. The losers will resent the winner and support for the winning president lessens.
ACORN preys on vulnerable populations in an attempt to sway their vote for a purpose. It is not a "arms-length" organization. I, for one, feel that America would be better off if we did not have recruiting in the election process. If it does not result in outright manipulation and fraud, it produces the appearance of both.
As far as weather Fannie and Freddie had something to do with everything mentioned, I stated in my first sentence that they don't deserve all the blame but there is no denying that they blew up spectacularly.
Some markets didn't bubble (Dallas, Houston, Raleigh) while others bubbled pretty bad. In the San Fransisco area, for example, there are strict regulations on home building. Some areas passed "smart growth" or other land use restrictions which restricted the supply of new housing which would have moderated the bubble. Paul Krugman explained this in 2005.
The rates staying low is the Feds fault as I said. As far as people financing consumer spending with refinances, I don't know if that was a major issue or not since so many homes carried second mortgages from the very beginning (known as an 80-10-10 or piggy back loan in the industry). The idea that some banks were being predatory is over blown rhetoric because they were encuraged by the feds to do what they did. When Countrywide and others were largest sub prime lenders, they were receiving accolades from minority groups and banking regulators for their work and great HMDA(Home Mortgage Disclosure Act) scores. CountryWide was singled out by Fannie Mae for their work in using "non-traditional credit" for people with no credit history. ContryWide (and others) were simply following Fannie and Freddies loose standards to originate the loans which were bought by Fannie adn Freddie after ContryWide took a cut.
Sarah Palin announced today that the VP is in charge of the U.S. Senate, once again building upon Dick Cheney's attempt to erode the separation of powers as established in the U.S. Constitution.
I believe that as soon as Palin takes office, she will set up her own, independent branch of government. She will use her implied powers as someone close to the president or who soon could become president to bully people lower than in her into supporting her agenda.
She will probably also begin a whisper campaign against McCain himself, questioning his mental and physical fitness. Her intention will be to declare McCain unfit to govern and that she should take over as president.
My biggest complaint about Palin is not her lack of knowledge or her Bush-like lack of interest in learning (this is the 3rd time she has been asked what a VP does). My biggest complaint is actually a genuine fear.
She has a history in Alaska of using unethical methods in pusuit of power. Why is she getting a pass from the media? Why do they never ask her about her ethics violations? Or her relationship with Ted Stevens? Or her relationship with a priest who drives witches out of town? Or tax evasion?
I heard no answer on how elimination of down payments caused home places to inflate. Admittedly it left lenders undersecured if property values fell or if the values were bogus because loan originators got appraisers who wanted work to inflate the appraisals. And Fannie and Freddie got overleveraged and collapsed much like the banks in Iceland, which certainly didn't cause the inflation of American Housing prices.
The lending industry was only "encouraged by the feds to do what they did" by not having any regulation against unconscionable and deceptive practices. It's a little like saying the cops encouraged bank robbers to rob the bank by not standing in front of it. The government is supposed to protect the public against the crooks but the crooks are the ones who decided to be crooks. Countrywide is now well known for its sweetheart deals for high profile public officials of both parties. But as the New York Times notes at http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/11/business/11angelo.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&adxnnlx=1224647789-yGVTjJEZ06k2yOKduV4jhQ) Countrywide dived into adjustable rates, subprime and other exotics in order to become the leading lender in terms of market share, not because the feds made them.
" While [conservative lending] strategy benefited Countrywide throughout much of its history, when mortgage lending was a more plain-vanilla affair, it turned perilous during the past three years. By then, competition among mortgage bankers was so fierce that the only way to gain share was to loosen underwriting standards.
“To the extent that more than 5 percent of the market was originating a particular product, any new alternative mortgage product, then Countrywide would originate it,” said a former financial executive at Countrywide who was granted anonymity because he was concerned about legal action from the company. “Apply that principle to anyone’s business and it would get you in so deep — it’s the proverbial race to the bottom.”
Among the fashionable new products were so-called affordability loans, like adjustable-rate mortgages (or A.R.M.’s), interest-only loans and reduced documentation mortgages. In addition to helping Countrywide win market share, those loans generated enormous profits, both in the commissions that borrowers paid and the premiums investors paid when they bought them as pools placed in securitization trusts.
Investors were willing to pay significantly more than a loan’s face value for A.R.M.’s that carried prepayment penalties, for instance, because the products locked borrowers into high-interest-rate loans with apparently predictable income streams.
For years, Countrywide specialized in straightforward fixed-rate loans. From 1999 to 2003, for example, fixed-rate loans accounted for 82 percent to 95 percent of loans originated by the company, according to corporate filings. But in 2004, its loan mix changed significantly. While A.R.M.’s accounted for 18 percent of the company’s business in 2003, by the next year, they made up 49 percent of the lending pie.
Subprime loans, as a percent of total originations at Countrywide, also jumped in 2004, rising to 11 percent from 4.6 percent in 2003. These loans, including those requiring no down payments and very little documentation of borrowers’ incomes or employment, were also highly lucrative to Countrywide and all those who sold them. "
Whatever Countrywide's CEO says about Fannie Mae standards making him do it, this was a race to make the most money writing whatever he could get away with. The main blame for bad loans lies with the industry that made them, and secondarily with the regulators who let them.
And McCain is getting a free pass as well. Why no questions about his links to the gambling industry?
This is a man who spends hours at casinos that he HAS OVERSIGHT over. How is this different from a supervisor dating his employee?
It's an incredible conflict of interest, that should worry pepole more than ACORN or Ayers. And why does a man who has 7 houses, 13 cars and millions of dollars feel the need to gamble? Most gamblers say they do it for the thrill. Do we want a gambler with his finger on the button? Do we want a gambler who looks Putin in his snake eyes and sees "K-G-B"...I mean how many eyes does he think Putin has anyway?
There is evidence of McCain betting at a casino he oversaw as a member of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, and he was doing it with a lobbyist , Scott Reed, representing that casino.
The Mashantucket Pequot tribe has contributed heavily to Mr. McCain’s campaigns and built Foxwoods into the world’s second-largest casino. Joining them was RICK DAVIS, McCain’s campaign manager.
As a two-time chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee, McCain has helped transform the Indian gambling business into a $26-billion-a-year business with 423 casinos across the country.
McCain had more than 40 fund-raisers with gambling interests and online poker people.
And he takes sides with the tribes who give him the most money, specifically the Pequot.
McCain of course is a prolific CYA politician, in the vein of Ted Stevens. So, yes, on occasion, he has crossed the gambling industry on issues like regulating slot machines. But overall, he has carried their water and spent their money and gambled on their tables.
And why hasn't any of this been reflected on McCain's tax returns? Does he deny he is a gambler? Are reporters so afraid to be tossed off the campaign jet that they won't ask these critical questions?
The root of the crisis is with the members of congress who promoted NINJA homes to provide homes to low income people. Our friends like Barney Frank and Chris Dodd were being lobbied by ACORN, F&F themselves, and from companies such as Countrywide.
The fruit of these NINJA loans came from the brokers who bundled them with good loans and resold them to others. The deregulation of the banks to merge or developed investment arms destabilized the top end.
In 'Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship' (US Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2007, on internet), the US. Catholic Bishops write:
89. As Catholics, we are led to raise questions for
political life other than “Are you better off than
you were two or four years ago?” Our focus is not
on party affiliation, ideology, economics, or even
competence and capacity to perform duties, as
important as such issues are. Rather, we focus on
what protects or threatens human life and dignity.
The Catholic Bishops make it clear that in good conscience a catholic cannot vote for a candidate who supports: abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, cloning, or same sex marriage, unless the other candidate is worse on these issues (not the case), or supports some cause equally as horrific (not education or health care, etc., which are very important but come after the right to life, but world war or racism or nazism, etc. - also not the case). Obama supports four of the five, and we can throw in infanticide also. And Sarah Palin is pro-life, very pro-life, and Obama is very pro-death, so Sarah Palin looks good to Catholics. I don't see how a Catholic can vote for Obama.
22. There are some things we must never do, as individuals or as a society, because
they are always incompatible with love of God and neighbor. Such actions are so
deeply flawed that they are always opposed to the authentic good of persons. These
are called “intrinsically evil” actions. They must always be rejected and opposed
and must never be supported or condoned. A prime example is the intentional
taking of innocent human life, as in abortion and euthanasia. ...
23. Similarly, direct threats to the sanctity and dignity of human life, such as
human cloning and destructive research on human embryos, are also intrinsically
evil. These must always be opposed. Other direct assaults on innocent human
life and violations of human dignity, such as genocide, torture, racism, and the
targeting of noncombatants in acts of terror or war, can never be justified.
Priests for Life is having a national conference call on Monday October 27th: see
www.priestsforlife.org/conferencecall
Ed.
As far as unscrupulous appraisers, I just haven't heard much about that being a major cause of the bubble so I can't comment other than to say that they have to show "comps" in the area (Public record)so if a market is hot they will show the bank those comparable houses which is what the bank that buys the loan will see also.
You get preferential treatment from the GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises (Fannie and Freddie)) if you do what they want you to do. They buy off your loans and you get a nice fee for your trouble.
I would say it's more like the government raising the speed limit to 100MPH. Just because it's legal doesn't make it safe but many people will start driving faster.
As I said before, Contrywide was doing what Fannie and the Fed wanted and it was getting praise for all the loans they were originating for minorities.
I don't really want to spend too much time defending Countrywide, they were just doing what the government wanted. As long as Fannie and Freddie were willing to buy their loans, they kept making those loans and selling them to the pair of GSEs.
The problem is that Fannie and Freddie are that industry. If Fannie and Freddie had not been buying all these loans with hardly no underwriting standards, they would not have exploded and damaged everyone around them.
I don't think that Fannie and Freddie deserve all the blame but they are far from blameless. I have listed other factors that came together to cause this crisis. There is plenty of blame to go around.
Hello Edward
It seems that the primary focus here is a position against “abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, cloning, and same sex marriage:” There will be no support for the candidate that it has been determined, supports these things. It matters not that such a person may have deep, personal, moral reasons to feel as he or she does. The church has decided that these things are wrong. No discussion allowed.
There is a secondary layer; “violations of human dignity, such as genocide, torture, racism, and the targeting of noncombatants in acts of terror or war” However there is no refusal to support the candidate who supports these things.
Further, there is no mention of the tragedy of the numbers of children dying in the agony of starvation – one child’s death every 5 seconds. There are no pronouncements about the number of children born into families of drug and alcohol addiction; children that are abused both sexually and physically all over this country and throughout the world; children that are forced into child labor at an early age and thus an early death due physical disability. There is nothing said about the abject poverty of children in this country.
Christ spoke out against poverty and greed. He did not speak out against such things as gay marriage and abortion. Now, when the greed of our country is so evident, why does the church not write letters and emails and posts decrying this greed and its destructiveness? Why does it not demand that that the government and this rich country solve the world problems of starvation and poverty?
Why can the church not say “we will not support the candidate that supports war?”
If the church were to make demands such as these, it would have the entire world behind it. And maybe then the term ‘Priests for Life’ would have some meaning.
But I fear that the church has lost its way. It has fallen pray to its own greed and ignorance. By spending all its energy and power attacking the legal practice of pregnancy termination and (to some) the abstract issue if stem cell research, there is nothing left to deal with the troubles of the living and the very real and messy world that we live in.
Dear Charly,
Thanks for your detailed and heartfelt reply, no doubt there are people of good will on all sides. Along the lines of your email, the bishops say that we can't be one-issue voters in that it's not enough to be pro-life and not have concern for these many other issues: if we vote for a pro-life candidate, we then have to try to convince that candidate to have concern for these other critical issues as well.
The way it should be, and the way I sure would like it but have never had it, is that everyone should agree on the life issues, and then we could argue sensibly about prudential ways to address these many serious issues. But the bishops are saying: the life issues are fundamental, and are prior to concern about any other issues. I applaud your heartfelt concern about these other issues: I can't hide behind being pro-life, I must be concerned about them also.
The difference about the life issues is that human life is being directly and purposely destroyed, which is grave evil and grave sin. In the war in Iraq, for example, which John Paul II counseled against unsuccessfully, it's not the intention to kill innocent civilians, but it does happen. The starvation of children is something we need to devise prudent means to address, and Pope Benedict has spoken out about the greed of the West as the cause of the suffering in the Third World.
The bishops are very strong, as I read it, in saying that we must be concerned and be activel in trying to mitigate all of these things, to be eucharistic people, to be thoroughly pro-life, but still there are some policies which in no place at no time are ever prudent, since they are intrinsically evil (the destruction of human life), and to use evil means to a seemingly good end is evil, and we must not cooperate with evil, but resist it.
On this score, Senator Obama is scary in his opposition to life.
John Paul II wrote a lot about life issues, and he said that these issues exist prior to the political community. If the political community denies them, all it does it negate its legitimacy, and guarantee that it will collapse. (Human Life Review.) In my experience I notice that whenever the U.S. votes against life, disasters happen. Watch what happens if Senator Obama is elected.
The U.S. has a history of suppressing or denying voting rights to people of color. The 15th Amendment, the 24th Amendment, and the Voting Rights Act are examples of trying to protect everyone's right to vote, but efforts continue to the current day to prevent these underrepresented groups from voting.
It is a dangerous premise for a single group to manipulate people, even if ostensibly it is for their good, for there is a greater chance the benefit is for the manipulator and not those they manipulate. The clear abuse at this time is the voter registration apparatus, there is no evidence of voter suppression.
For all Americans, of all ethnic groups, of all religions, and of all creeds, we must keep the voting process pristine.
No allegations against ACORN have been substantiated in 20 years of investigations. It's time to end this fallacy. It's the pot calling the kettle black.
Meanwhile, ACORNs abuses are confirmed and "former" employees have been convicted multiple states of turning in false registrations (better not start a direct mail campaign to those false registrations, you might run afoul of the law).
This voter fraud business is not a winning strategy for McCain. So, it begs the question why you keep harping on it.
The obvious answer is that you expect Obama to win and you are a part of the rightwing campaign to undercut and disenfranchise an Obama presidency.
We've all seen this all before with Clinton.
Problem is that just as these tactics aren't working in campaigns anymore, neither will they work when the Republicans are the minority opposition party again.
This is a different age...lies are no longer quite as effective. Why don't you guys turn your minds to building an effective, inclusive agenda again? It's time for you guys to dissassemble your 3-legged stool--social conservatives, liberatians and neocons. The social conservatives would be better served building a coalition with other religious dominations, both moderate and conservative. The libertarians would be better served teaming with the actual Liberatian party and Constitutionalists. And the neocons are not relevant anymore.
While I agree with most of what you said on the abortion issue, I don't understand why most Pro-Choice Democrats are opposed to Parental Notification.
To me this is akin to the NRA supporting the right to own AK47's or bullets that can penetrate a bullet proof vest.
Once they NRA decided to go in a more moderate direction a few years ago, they gained wider acceptance among the American people and even won an historic Supreme Court Case.
Until Pro-Choice extremists learn to moderate their views, they will continue to divide this country.
I urge everyone in California to vote in favor of Prop4. There is no such thing as a "slippery slope." This is just a rhetorical gimmick.
Prop. 4 would amend the California state Constitution to require doctors - with limited exceptions - to alert a pregnant minor's parent or legal guardian at least 48 hours before performing an abortion on the girl. The measure would allow a designated adult relative to be notified if the minor says she is from an abusive home.
A doctor who performs an abortion without first notifying a qualified adult could be sued by the family.
Jesus was way ahead of us on the "nature versus nurture" debate some dinosaurs still have about if people are born gay or choose to be gay (the answer is both):
King James Bible, Matthew 19:12
This is not to say, however, that mainstream Christian churches must or should change their orthodoxy about homosexuality. And it certainly doesn't mean "Christians" must or should accept the "gay lifestyle," whatever that means.
It does seem to suggest, though, the Gays should be encouraged to join into monogomous relationships and even marriage.
There are thousands of ACORN registrations under investigation by the FBI in 14 states.
Is the FBI currently investigating anyone for voter registration suppression at this time?
The part that reinforces my view is the bit about him or his workers allegedly telling people they had to register as a republican in order to sign some petition and the part about him getting paid based on how many republicans he signed up. The current system creates a bad atmosphere around an important step in the voting process.
An interesting thing about the article, the thing he is charged with is:
I am not sure why a "signature gatherer" has to be eligible to vote in California in order to gather signatures there but assume that means he must lives out of state but the article never says where he really lives other than to say his company works in others states too and has been investigated elsewhere for similar tactics.
As far as I know, the cited case consists of an individual who is a professional vote registrator over many states, who uses his mother's address for his own registration, and the current allegation is whether it is his true permanent address. I did not hear that there were improprieties regarding the people he registers.
http://www.slate.com/id/2167284/pagenum/all/
Remember that the Monica Goodling testimony was done in relation to the US Attorney firing scandal. This brings to light the fact that the White House and several other operatives refuse to appear in front of the House Judiciary Committee. They are even ignoring subpeonas and clinging to executive privilege as an excuse. Once these people are forced to testify there will be a lot more information about the illegal Republican voter caging. Ahh but that will come after Obama wins the election.
Dear Barry,
When the bishops use the phrase 'We shouldn't be one-issue voters' in their 2007 document 'Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship', I think they are urging Catholics to be not only pro-life, but to be concerned about all the other issues also. It's not enough for a Catholic to be pro-life, they legitimately must be concerned about health care, poverty, starvation, etc.
I don't think that everyone agrees on the life issues in the sense that the bishops are speaking: they are so serious that they must be resisted and legislated against. These issues are abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, human cloning, and same sex marriage. As to who deicdes, the bishops, knowing that we face a forest or moral issues, are putting them in order for us, helping us to decide the critically important from the very important. And they would say that these moral guidelines hold for all people, but they are writing to Catholics in order to give them guidance.
We'll just have to disagree on your views of the papacy and Vatican City.
Jesus didn't speak directly about homosexuality, but his view is contained in the law of the Jews, and in his teaching about marriage and purity. For Catholics, homosexuality is a serious aberration. We have compassion on homosexuals, and try to help them, but we can't promote their lifestyle by making it legal, for their sake or others; sake.
About homosexuality, the Catholic reading of this passage from St. Paul (in this Pauline year) is that he's discussing the question: Should a man marry (marry a woman), or remain single? Those are the options. We are told to read the Bible as a whole, in light of all other verses, of course, and in the first chapter (I think) of his letter to the Romans, St. Paul makes clear his view of homosexuality.
So, you disagree with the Catholic view of things on a few points.
This is a very kind response Edward. We should all be so gentle when expressing our personal views. Thank you.
I would like to say that I feel very strongly that the church should not be advising their parishioners how to vote. Once the church starts telling people that they must choose a certain candidate the boundaries have been over stepped. There must be separation of church and state.
Further, if I can’t decide what government is best for me and my family, based on economic indicators, my democratic right is being removed.
Lastly, I feel that those churches making the decision to become political to the extent that they work to control the outcome of an election based on the churches’ criteria, should lose their tax exception.
Example: the League of Women Voters. The LWV's policy is to neither support nor oppose candidates or political parties, but they do state positions on issues and propositions.
An organization simply stating its positions seems acceptable. Not only is it acceptable but in some way it is the responsible thing to do. In this instance they are simply stating what they stand for. It's OK by me. As leader I say they can keep their tax exemption
However, I think there is strong coercion by certain churches towards their parishioners to vote for a specific candidate and to appose others. Edward mentioned in his first post that the church says they cannot vote for candidates that support certain positions. Here the line has been clearly crossed. By all means tell me how you feel regarding issues that you feel strongly about, but don't tell me how to vote. This is my decision and mine alone.
Yes, I see how this could become a grey area. Who decides when the line has been crossed? But this is a democracy. It’s hard work and it’s never going to be easy. There will always be the ongoing discussion as to what is and is not acceptable within our society. But, certainly, no one group makes these decisions for us all. Not the Catholic Church. Not the Republican Party and Not the League of Women Voters (bless them).
There you go again, Edward. Yes, of course, my views are different from Catholic orthodoxy. I'd find it very difficult to find any church in which I agreed with the pastor on EVERYTHING. If you must agree on everything, that is not a church but a CULT.
As an individual, I should be permitted to choose what I believe and vote on what I believe, not be forbidden by a beauracracy to vote one way or another. I'm nust just picking on Catholics, here, but any church that tells their members how to vote. Now, I understand that these churches aren't walking in the booths with their members and holding a gun to their heads, but they are suggesting to their members they will be punished by God if they don't vote a certain way.
I have many friends who are Catholic and i have found very few who follow the church's teachings %100, so I certainly don't want to overstate my alarm.
But your answer to me was just a reshuffling of words. I suggest one more time: a One-Issue Voter is a voter who decides about a candidate based on one-issue first. Then, if the candidate passes that test, the one-issue voter considers other issues.
You can't have it both ways. If you're going to promote One-Issue voting and pretend to be holier than thou, at least admit what your preaching. Don't hide behind doubletalk. Leave that for Bill Clinton and Ted Stephens.
You are 100% correct. If a nonprofit simply exresses its position or preference, that is totally legit. However, if begins campaigning for a specific candidate--even indirectly by issue--it should lose its tax exemption.
Why should I pay for your church to work against Jesus's candidate?
It's my opinion, that if Jesus were alive today he would look at both candidate, he would look at the totality of their positions and vision for the country, and he might look at their character and history a bit. And then he would vote for Barrack Obama.
Now, someone else my disagree. Someone else may assert Jesus would vote for McCain.
That's the problem with churches getting involved with politics. What church can tell me with 100% clarity which candidate is best in Jesus's eyes? If a church thinks it know that answer, you should find a new church. Because nobody knows that answer.
Not to pick on Catholics, but they have a long history of being on the wrong side of certain issues and human rights. They also have a long history of doing good works and helping millions of poor people. But one doesn't cancel out the other.
Even popes have been wrong in the past. So, the bishops should feel free to express their opinions, and even the church's, but to campaign for its members to vote one way or the other is a sin.
Personally, I wouldn't think it spiritually healthy to belong to a church that tried to coerce the votes of their members like that.
I'd be okay with a church or any organization declaring their official endorsements. Endorsing partisan candidates is a little dodgy, but I'd be willing to let that go. But their endorsements must be presented very sensitively, without any perception of a mandate for their members to conform.
The most prudent solution is for churches to stay away from making political endorsements.
If you're saying people shouldn't belong to the Catholic Church, I can't agree with that. My kids actually go to a Catholic school, not because we are Catholic but because the Church has a great outreach program in developing countries like where I live. They provide a low-cost education option and do not require their members to attend church or even convert.
It's a completely different experience than the one you find in America, where the Catholic Church is very open in some ways and very closed in others. In America, the church tends to be very rigid about doctrine and inserts itself quite a bit into person lives, even declaring which members are fit to take communion and who is not, etc. Even joining the church is quite a complex ordeal.
I don't if this difference is due to a different set of bishops and leaders in different parts of the world; or if this is a deliberate strategy from the Vatican.
So, overall, I think the Catholic Church is a force for good. It's just that their current politics about specific issues have not evolved yet.
Ironically, though, members of Catholic Churches in non-American countries tend to follow the directions of the Vatican in their belief systems; whereas in America, Catholics tend to mostly ignore the political directions of their leaders.
So, it's a weird dichotomy. Maybe it's just human nature that people don't want to be told what to do. And when they're not told what to do, they tend to agree witth their authority figures.
What Edward and many conservative churches haven't learned is that by promoting intolerant politics they are eroding the credibility of their religious teachings. Edward and I could argue all day about my interpetations of the Bible and his Bishops' interpretations (not his, he doesn't have his own), but BOTTOM LINE is that Jesus taught and preached TOLERANCE. That is indisputible.
Dear Edward,
Why do you suppose the U.S. Catholic Bishops are endorsing a known and unrepentent gambler as president of the U.S.?
Did you know that individuals, families and communities all suffer from problem gambling?
The average gambling-related debt in 2007 among problem gamblers in treatment was was over $26,100. Studies of Gamblers Anonymous members report that approximately half of the participants had stolen to gamble and over one-third had been arrested.
The National Research Council (1999) reported on studies indicating that 25 to 50 percent of spouses of pathological gamblers have been abused
Case studies of 10 casino communities revealed that the majority of those communities witnessed increases in domestic violence related to the opening of casinos (National Opinion Research Center, 1999)
Children of compulsive gamblers are often prone to suffer abuse, as well as neglect, as a result of parental problem or pathological gambling. (National Opinion Research Center, 1999)
Research consistently shows higher rates of pathological gambling in teens whose parents gamble excessively (Gupta & Derevensky, 1997; Jacobs, 2000; Wallisch & Liu, 1996)
Children of problem gamblers have higher levels smoking, drinking, drug use, and overeating than their peers (Gupta & Derevensky, 1997)
What's more, more than 21 percent of problem gamblers in Oregon treatment in 2007 had suicidal thoughts, and more than 7 percent had attempted suicide.
A major depressive disorder is likely to occur in 76 percent of pathological gamblers (Unwin, Davis, & Leeuw, 2000)
A Nova Scotia study listed problem gambling as a factor in 6.3 percent of suicides (2004).
Given unanswered questions about McCain physical and mental health, is it responsible for a church to endorse him?
Dear Charly,
I think I over-stepped what I said because of space and enthusiasm. The bishops in their document make it clear that to vote for someone who supports any of these five items is a grave thing to do and can only be done if the other candidate is worse or 'for a grave moral reason', which has to be, as I read it, extraordinary.
But they didn't endorse a candidate, they just set out the moral principles to help us make sense of the many issues that are under discussion. I drew the conclusion of saying 'I don't see how someone can vote for Obama', Ed.
I found the quote, the bishops write:
In this statement, we bishops do not intend
to tell Catholics for whom or against whom to
vote. Our purpose is to help Catholics form
their consciences in accordance with God’s
truth. We recognize that the responsibility
to make choices in political life rests with
each individual in light of a properly formed
conscience, and that participation goes well
beyond casting a vote in a particular election.
The Republican Brand: a Response
Mr. Feehery's proactive plan is heavy on process, but light on real transformation.
I'm late as I listened on podcast and then procrastinated, but I definitely wanted to answer the question posed to listeners.
Do we live in a nihilistic world, in the sense that nobody really knows anything?
I could go way stoner philosophical on this one, but that deeper analysis is why pot is really illegal isn't it? So I'll just stick to the more superficial, political, level.
Most of us do live in a nihilistic world. Due to corruption, though, not that the universe is lacking in knowledge, just that we have no source of it. For example, Bush changes the wording of scientists and coporations pay for research studies, so we cannot trust anything we hear from science.
We cannot trust economic analysis because they change the way these numbers are formulated in order to put lipstick on any pigs of data out there. Unemployment level? Do you mean as measured in the 70's or currently? Inflation? Including gas and food and things you buy or the way it is measured currently. Prices are not the indicators of information they are meant to be, they are shaped by subsidies hidden in opaque legalese novel bills.
We cannot know whose opinion is right on national security matters, as we cannot be told anything. For if we were to know, the enemy would know. And they would know we know, and we can't let them know anything, so we can't let you know anything, but vote for McCain because he knows and you can trust he also knows the right thing to do. Why? We can't tell you that, but he's been a part of everything else we couldn't tell you details about. Believe you are on the good guys side, why not, that's the definition of patriotic.
We cannot know if our opinions are right on the issues of the day being discussed. Is Lou Dobbs right on immigration? I don't know, I keep getting told we can't afford to deport 12 -20 million illegal immigrants. But I've never been told how much that would cost. Yet without important details like that, we all hold our opinions very sacred.
But all of the opinions on both sides appears to be based on uncredible knowledge with no true foundation.
That doesn't mean that there isn't any, only that we are living in a time where there is no necessary transparency. If anybody knows true factual information, I pray, with all the impotent power of prayer that you breakthrough all of the corruption of our current world and force facts to be unobscured.
I do believe that democracy would work if its citizens were allowed to use their inherent rationality with real facts. That they cannot is why Bush recieved 54 million votes. Except theirs Diebold, so did he really. I don't really know.