GDP

[OakParkSpartan]

So you want more regulation Eno?

Seriously, you are just throwing crap out here.

A few banks had funny business going on with their mortgages.  Look at Countrywide/Bank of America, Wells Fargo...easy to research.

[berwynson]

The freedom to make a guaranteed profit at no risk. 

  What would have happened to these bond holders if GM had gone belly up and the government had not intervened?  Would they have been better off if GM had gone belly up?

Pray tell, Ted, how ANY holder of ANY security investment instrument, is guaranteed profit, much less at no risk?

Please explain how ANY investment may be claimed to carry "no risk"?

berwynson

[eno]

So you want more regulation Eno?

Seriously, you are just throwing crap out here.

A few banks had funny business going on with their mortgages.  Look at Countrywide/Bank of America, Wells Fargo...easy to research.

OPS:

What strikes me as "crap" is your blind assumption that people in government (doling out goodies paid for with other people's money) are somehow by virtue of the (D) after their name immune from the same temptations and misdeeds: greed, fraud, recklessness, criminality as people in the private sector.

Everybody had funny business going on with mortgages; none more than the elected and/or retired pigs feeding at the government trough while cloaking their greed and malfeasance behind exhortations of compassion and accusations of racism!   

[eno]

So you want more regulation Eno?

Seriously, you are just throwing crap out here.

A few banks had funny business going on with their mortgages.  Look at Countrywide/Bank of America, Wells Fargo...easy to research.

OPS:

Countrywide? Mozilo? As I recall, there were several elected pigs, from both sides of the aisle, lining their greedy pockets.

[Mr. Daniel Lumis]

Healthcare is broken.  We can fix it with the Affordable Care Act if we ignore the failed policies of the past. Lack of regulation screwed us big time in mortgage/real estate.  Lack of regulation, self-regulation, they don't work for financial institutions.  It's the same one note samba from the obstructionist Republicans.  It doesn't trickle down.
Now, Rmoney has a budget that even his former financial pundits call crap.  It creates a huge deficit but what does it manage to cut ?  Human Services ?  Entitlements ?
I'm tired of the Republican mantra.  Their failed policies don't work. They cower in fear of the boardroom and the broker, all the while protecting the top earners.  The Affordable Care Act will standardize insurance offerings across the country.  The ACA will help.  Gov't intervention is necessary.   

I agree with the highlighted statement to the degree that you might be referring to the U.S. government (which I'm sure you are not).

It was the rejection by Democrats of increased regulation of government sponsored entities: Fannie/Freddie (which were so heavily mis-leveraged in our housing market, and engaged in accounting fraud) which contributed to the insolvency of those programs and triggered both the bubble in housing prices, and the ensuing burst, which in turn triggered the recession...

The huge problems we are now experiencing are due in large part to too much government intervention in the housing market (and mortgage loans) and too little regulation of government! Obama and the Democrats haven't learned the lesson or stopped; they keep pushing homeowner bail-out programs (the cause of the initial crisis, and the reason why the housing recovery is still so weak) while pointing their crooked fingers at the banks.

It's brilliant populist politics, but horseshit economic policy.

Oeno,

Here's an idea: why don't you run for Congress? You seem to know everything about everything! I'm sure you'd agree. You could serve as our nation's first true, non-gasbag politician. I can see it now: "Oeno goes to Washington!" You could singlehandedly fix our healthcare system, the economy, the judicial system, the executive branch, everything! You know what's best for everyone. AND, here's the big bonus: since you wouldn't be caught dead suckling at the federal teat, we would save a crapload of money because you'd do it for free! I know you would because you're that kind of guy. You're the caring, compassionate type who recognizes the role of societal cooperation. I know that sounds kind of "liberal" and therefore "bad" but I think in your first speech to the nation you could put on that white straw hat I always picture you in and stand on the steps of the capitol and go on and on and on and on, all without a teleprompter! That would win points with the doubters and the haters. The point is this Oeno, your genius is wasted here in Berwyn. Save me from the liberal menace. Run for Congress...Come on! I'll be the first to sign your petition...

Very truly yours,

Mr. Daniel Lumis

[berwynson]

 
Oeno,

Here's an idea: why don't you run for Congress? You seem to know everything about everything! I'm sure you'd agree. You could serve as our nation's first true, non-gasbag politician. I can see it now: "Oeno goes to Washington!" You could singlehandedly fix our healthcare system, the economy, the judicial system, the executive branch, everything! You know what's best for everyone. AND, here's the big bonus: since you wouldn't be caught dead suckling at the federal teat, we would save a crapload of money because you'd do it for free! I know you would because you're that kind of guy. You're the caring, compassionate type who recognizes the role of societal cooperation. I know that sounds kind of "liberal" and therefore "bad" but I think in your first speech to the nation you could put on that white straw hat I always picture you in and stand on the steps of the capitol and go on and on and on and on, all without a teleprompter! That would win points with the doubters and the haters. The point is this Oeno, your genius is wasted here in Berwyn. Save me from the liberal menace. Run for Congress...Come on! I'll be the first to sign your petition...

Very truly yours,

Mr. Daniel Lumis

Mr. Danial Loomis:   Veiled hatred.

berwynson

[eno]

Mr. Lumis:

Believe me when I tell you, I'd look stupid in a straw hat making speeches; I'm too short and I'd look like a mushroom. Ask some of the people on the board who have met me.

I'm not running for anything. I don't know everything, nor even that much, just what I believe.

I do enjoy debating people with opposing beliefs (esp. on national politics and foreign policy).

You want "genius"? Vote for more "Hope and Change".

eno's not your man!

P.S. "Gasbag"? I say "passionate" bordering on "incoherent".

[Ted]

...  Ted's regarding bonds...   

  So, Eno, do you believe that bonds in a private company comes with absolultely no risk?

  Seriously?  What if GM had gone under?

P.S. The only "profit at no risk" which exists in this country is the money government takes with a club in its right hand from Peter, to give with its left hand to Paul; it is there that the effects of the sinister trade-off of freedom for perceived economic security are most obvious: decline, dependence, then dehumanization.

Yeah, coming from someone who paid only $137 in 1986 in property taxes on a mutl-unit while I paid over $1,000 on a single family 2 bedroom home in 1986, that makes sense.

  To Eno, the government is a bad bad thing except when it gives you an unbelievably low property tax while everyone around you is paying 10 times as much.

  I guess those extraordinarily low property taxes really de-humanized you, right Eno?

   

[Ted]

Pray tell, Ted, how ANY holder of ANY security investment instrument, is guaranteed profit, much less at no risk?

Please explain how ANY investment may be claimed to carry "no risk"?

berwynson

Dude, I was being facetious.

[markberwyn]

I still eagerly await eno's (or anyone's) explanation of how Americans' personal freedoms have been restricted by the president.

[eno]

I gave you one (property rights).

You don't believe that individual property rights are a personal freedom, so I await your definition of what "personal freedoms" are.

Can you name them, perhaps in a bulleted list?

eno

[markberwyn]

I gave you one (property rights).

You don't believe that individual property rights are a personal freedom, so I await your definition of what "personal freedoms" are.

Can you name them, perhaps in a bulleted list?

eno

You didn't tell me you believed that property rights were a personal freedom; you grumpily asked me if I thought they were.

In any event, how have the bondholders' property rights been violated, exactly?

[markberwyn]

That you respond to these requests so sluggishly, so angrily, suggests to me that you're not convinced yourself that President Obama has squelched anybody's personal freedoms. But perhaps you'll turn around and start posting more sensibly.

[eno]

I gave you one (property rights).

You don't believe that individual property rights are a personal freedom, so I await your definition of what "personal freedoms" are.

Can you name them, perhaps in a bulleted list?

eno

You didn't tell me you believed that property rights were a personal freedom; you grumpily asked me if I thought they were.

In any event, how have the bondholders' property rights been violated, exactly?

@ about 1:32 p.m. (yesterday) markberwyn asked: "How have your personal freedoms been restricted since the president took office? The question's for anybody"?

@ about 2:02 p.m. (yesterday) eno answered: "Let's just start here:Anybody and everybody who owned GM Bonds in 2009 had their personal freedoms restricted (though what Obama did to bond-holders' property rights was to abrogate them, not merely restrict them)."

How did Obama violate the property rights of bond-holders? Please Google it; also check 11 U.S.C. and 13 U.S.C.  which govern bankruptcy proceedings (in particular, the lawful treatment and order of preference of and among: secured and unsecured creditors, shareholders, etc.). Short answer is Obama screwed G.M. bond-holders to favor his union cronies, his campaign contributors, his political supporters. Obama has brought Banana Republic leadership (The Chicago Way, if you prefer) to the White House.

I'm channeling Ted here: "The Thugocracy still exists. It has never gone away and it will continue to exist so long as Obama is president and uses his authority and power unlawfully to steal from one group to give it to others who support him."

[markberwyn]

I gave you one (property rights).

You don't believe that individual property rights are a personal freedom, so I await your definition of what "personal freedoms" are.

Can you name them, perhaps in a bulleted list?

eno

You didn't tell me you believed that property rights were a personal freedom; you grumpily asked me if I thought they were.

In any event, how have the bondholders' property rights been violated, exactly?

@ about 1:32 p.m. (yesterday) markberwyn asked: "How have your personal freedoms been restricted since the president took office? The question's for anybody"?

@ about 2:02 p.m. (yesterday) eno answered: "Let's just start here:Anybody and everybody who owned GM Bonds in 2009 had their personal freedoms restricted (though what Obama did to bond-holders' property rights was to abrogate them, not merely restrict them)."

How did Obama violate the property rights of bond-holders? Please Google it; also check 11 U.S.C. and 13 U.S.C.  which govern bankruptcy proceedings (in particular, the lawful treatment and order of preference of and among: secured and unsecured creditors, shareholders, etc.). Short answer is Obama screwed G.M. bond-holders to favor his union cronies, his campaign contributors, his political supporters. Obama has brought Banana Republic leadership (The Chicago Way, if you prefer) to the White House.

I'm channeling Ted here: "The Thugocracy still exists. It has never gone away and it will continue to exist so long as Obama is president and uses his authority and power unlawfully to steal from one group to give it to others who support him."

What were the bondholders once free to do that they can no longer do?

[eno]

...possess the property which Obama stole from them and turned over to his cronies.

[markberwyn]

...possess the property which Obama stole from them and turned over to his cronies.

To the extent that these people are still allowed to own property, I don't see how this is a "personal freedoms" issue. Seems to me you're overstating things, taking your use of "cronies" and general knee-jerk contempt for the President into consideration.

I'd be more careful about claiming "personal freedoms" are being violated. That is a very, very serious charge.

[eno]

...possess the property which Obama stole from them and turned over to his cronies.

To the extent that these people are still allowed to own property, I don't see how this is a "personal freedoms" issue. Seems to me you're overstating things, taking your use of "cronies" and general knee-jerk contempt for the President into consideration.

I'd be more careful about claiming "personal freedoms" are being violated. That is a very, very serious charge.

I appreciate this rare expression of candor by you; I suspected that you do not believe that private property is a "personal freedom".

How careful should I be when answering specific questions you pose? More careful because Obama is president? Why should I be more careful? What will happen to me, other than being banished from this board?

You put the question of "personal freedoms" on the table; you obviously have a peculiar definition of the term, so why not tell us what it is instead of playing your usual games?

Merriam Webster defines "personal freedom" as follows: "freedom of the person in going and coming, equality before the courts, security of private property, freedom of opinion and its expression, and freedom of conscience subject to the rights of others and of the public"

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/personal%20freedom

Since you do not consider "security of private property" or "freedom of opinion and its expression"  personal freedoms,  what do you mean by "personal freedoms"?

I'm still waiting for your reply!

[markberwyn]

...possess the property which Obama stole from them and turned over to his cronies.

To the extent that these people are still allowed to own property, I don't see how this is a "personal freedoms" issue. Seems to me you're overstating things, taking your use of "cronies" and general knee-jerk contempt for the President into consideration.

I'd be more careful about claiming "personal freedoms" are being violated. That is a very, very serious charge.

I appreciate this rare expression of candor by you; I suspected that you do not believe that private property is a "personal freedom".

I didn't argue that. My point is that the situation you're keening about doesn't rise to the level of violation of personal freedom. There is nothing these people were once able to do that they cannot do now.

[markberwyn]

And besides: If the president has really and truly, as you say, unleashed a Great Terribleness upon the land in which Americans' "personal freedoms" are being violated willy-nilly, you should be able to unleash a long and persuasive list of these violations, instead of sadly clinging to a subset of corporate stockholders who are complaining that they got a bad deal when GM got restructured.