Not terribly shocking, but Iran is apparantly going to back out of yet another agreement. I'm not sure why anyone in the administration thought a direct negotiation with Iran would change anything. It sounded good in the campaign, but from a real-world perspective, it simply doesn't work.

Minister Says Iran Won’t Ship Uranium Abroad - NYTimes.com

Fixed that for you.

Rep. Buttars and I are pretty far apart politically, but I can see his point here:


From Andrew Sullivan.

Also he doesn't want them stuffing it in his kids face, which is fair.

That is pretty hilarious.

Also he doesn't want them stuffing it in his kids face, which is fair.

Could he have possibly said that without realizing what he was doing? lol

An early change in the House already. Dennis Moore (D) has announced that he is retiring after 12 years in office. He's survived in a heavily Republican district for the Democrats, but was facing an uphill climb for reelection due to his support for Obama's policies judging from recent polls and news. This district will likely go back to the red side in the 2010 election.

Republicans line up to vie for Moore’s congressional seat - KansasCity.com

Early compared to what? It's not earlier than the likelihood of IL-10 going to the Democrats after umpteen years of being on the GOP side of the ledger.


Unless the Palinites split the GOP vote, of course.

Doesn't seem early in comparison to NY-23 either.

I'll assume you're not fully aware of the situation. This isn't like the New York situation. It will go to the GOP. I'd bet my retirement savings that happens. Easy double-up there.

Just like the Mizzou-Nebraska game

O RLY? Cook lists KY-3 as R+3. For reference, NY-23 is currently R+1, but in the last two cycles the Republican won with over 60% of the vote. Obviously I don't have local information, but honestly KY-3 seems just ripe for another GOP split courtesy of the Palinistas if a moderate Republican gets the nomination.

So I'm curious as to why you post this and ignore things like NY-23 and IL-10. Further, you describe it as an "early change" and "due to support for Obama's policies" as if to suggest a trend.

If you are indeed suggesting a trend, then honestly it's pretty simplistic, since any casual observer of American electoral politics knows that the President's party usually suffers in the first mid-term elections after his inauguration.

However, this year we have a more interesting trend: the likelihood that, in a number of races, the GOP may split its votes between moderate & conservative and allow either:

A) An easy D win in what should have been a competitive race (see IL-Sen)

B) A D win in what should have been an easy R victory (see NY-23)


I still think the Democrats will lose seats in the House next November, but the damage may be much less than expected if Palin & her ideological allies (pretty much the entire conservative GOP pundit class) can keep up their effort for the next 12 months.

I would be very surprised to see any repeat of NY-23 on a widespread scale. It was easy for the Tea Party crowd to get involved in NY-23 because there weren't a ton of other races going on. I think you'll see some primary fights next year, but I wouldn't expect a lot of third party challenges.

Yeah, I don't expect it to be widespread either, and in fact it may not happen at all (12 months is a long time in politics). But it still remains more of a possibility than in previous cycles and in some particular cases (again, IL-Sen comes to mind), it could be quite critical.

Since this is a predictions thread, one thing I think might happen that would be truly interesting is a more-or-less equal disinterest in both parties come the election season.

Polls continue to show a large amount of the antipathy towards House Republicans holding over from the 2008 election. If House Democrats continue to bungle, they could be in a similar boat by polling time. Thus this could be one of the better cycles in recent history for well-funded independent candidates.

So my prediction is this: Since 1943, the greatest number of non-Republicans/non-Democrats in the House at any one time has been 2, and currently there are none - this next cycle will see more than 2 elected.

:D

1. I have no clue why you're listing Kentucky when we're talking about Kansas here.

2. I'm not suggesting any trend. It's 'early' because it's 2009 and the Republicans can count on grabbing that seat. The only question is which one wins it.

3. As far as the reasons, I'm once again assuming you're speaking from a total lack of understanding of the situation. Moore has been hammered for weeks now locally for his support of Obama's spending bills while claiming to be a 'blue dog Democrat'. He was in serious trouble and he knew it.

Panerd's 2010 predicitons:

While they will both be running as Republicans I hardly would consider either Peter Schiff (CT) or Rand Paul (KY) to be anything but Libertarians in sheep's clothing. It will be interesting if either of these guys can make it out of the primaries because if they do I think they both have a good shot at winning senate seats.

(I know, I am a big fan of Ron Paul and am slightly biased but I seem to be seeing more coverage of him lately which is a good thing for these other guys. Schiff is going to taken to the rail due to his father being in jail for tax evasion but I think his father's reasons might actually gain more voters for Peter than a Dodd smear campaign will cause him to lose)

I think Linda McMahon is the best choice for Republicans in CT. She kind of has a nice mix to lure different demographics. She has a strong business background while also having name recognition that would appeal to young voters. But the biggest thing she has going is that she can fund her own campaign and allow the GOP to use their money elsewhere. That's a huge plus and I think the GOP will really get behind her in the primaries.

I agree with all of the reasons you state but I sure hope it doesn't happen. McMahon would be a better alternative to Dodd but that is about it. I am pretty sure she would just do whatever the national Republican party tells her to do and that is 50% of the problem. Schiff on the other hand has stated he has no plans to be a career politician and justs wants to try to right the "Titantic" before it hits the iceberg. He is a "bit" (understatement of the year) of a bear but I would much rather have a guy that is skeptical on everything than someone who will agree to a Democratic plan as long as they put more money in the plan for Republican ideas as well.

I think you're right. The big fights are going to be in the primaries. Anybody that can win a primary is a fool to give up the name recognition and infrastructure a party would provide. Schiff, Paul, Rubio etc. all are looking to get the benefits of running as the Republican candidate.

So, Flasch and MBBF both have kids and suddenly I couldn't find the thread. Hell, we even had a Presidential address and this thread is down on page 3 ;)

Just sayin'

SI

I was thinking the same thing: "the Obama thread has really slowed down recently". :D

I was going to post something this morning about Bank of America paying back all their TARP funds plus interest but I then got pooped on.

These things tend to happen from what I understand

SI

You haven't lived until both your infant and your dog vomit on the carpet simultaneously... and you're the only adult in the house.

Let me tell you, that was an awesome morning.

Edit: My personal best is being peed on FOUR TIMES in one day. Luckily, however, I've never been pooped on. However, every time I pick up Sam to put him in the bath I think to myself "self, this could be the day, are you ready?"

/watches all the single guys squirm....

haha

my sister peed on my mom right after she was born

There's honestly not that much to talk about because there's not a whole lot being done right now by the administration. I've actually been on the board quite a bit. Can't go much of anywhere with a one week old kid other than the internet. :)

I found it pretty amusing at the 'job summit' today that Obama spoke about small business and how they are hurting the job market by finding ways to keep productivity up with less resourses to eek out a profit. Seriously? Small business owners are now supposed to give away profit just for the sake of hiring more people to make the unemployment figures look better?

Sometimes they just can't help themselves. A National Review writer questions whether teabagger is the new n-word.


"Get off my porch you teabagger!"

Nope, but thanks for playing

SI

I cant seem to find a direct quote where he said that? Link to quote or video?

Obama:

i think the actual quote that you cited and the way that you discussed it up in your initial post above is really informative.

i read that quote and it would be QUITE a leap for me to get to where you got to from it.

I agree DT. It would be quite a leap for you to interpret that statement that way. :)

The rest of the quote, including the end of the sentence where MBBF stopped:

sssh ronnie, you're ruining MBBF's spin!

key part that just shows the massive amount of spin you put on things MBBF:

That's why we made more credit available to small banks that provide loans to small businesses. That's why we provided tax relief, to help small businesses stay afloat, and proposed raising SBA loan limits, to help them expand.

Interestingly enough, there's absolutely nothing in the rest of that that changes the context of the quote I cited. Let's be honest here. There's a fundamental need for this administration to villianize any profit-taking, whether it's corporations or small business, to make themselves look more like they're for the common citizen and those under the poverty line. It's a good way to attempt to get reelected, but it's an extremely poor approach to solving the recession and debt issues facing this administration.

I'm calling BULLSHIT on your first sentence. If you can't see that it absolutely fundamentally changes the context of the quote that you cited then...I don't know...get your eyes checked.

No, it's just that the part you quoted is unarguably factually correct, and the claim that Obama is asking businesses to "give away profits" doesn't appear to be anywhere in there to me.

But DT's citation concerning loans to small businesses makes my point. He's offering the same opportunity to roll their companies further into debt just like he did with the government with no clear plan on how to address those issues. Just make jobs for the sake of making jobs. Obama is ignoring the simple truth that those small business would only use loans to survive this recession. They're not doing it to create more jobs because it makes no sense to do so in a recessional period.

I fail to see how that is equivalent to asking them to "to give away profit just for the sake of hiring more people to make the unemployment figures look better."

Or is making credit available the same? It's a moot point anyway, because that's what he's saying they've already done. In the speech you quoted he is asking those assembled to develop more ideas to accelerate hiring.

he's not offering them loans to make jobs. he's talking about offering them loans so that they can be the engine that leads the country out of the recession. It's a fact that small businesses drive the bulk of the economic activity in this country...you need to get those small businesses able to innovate and continue to develop their product offerings during the recessionary period so that they can begin to lead us out of it

They could start by rolling back minimum wage increases and abandoning threats to make them pay for healthcare that would scare anybody off from new hiring that could bite them soon...

There's no innovation involved. There's reduced profits all around. They can't lead us out of recession with more loans. They need a tax break. It's as simple as that. Offering them the opportunity to increase their debt is going to draw little more than laughter from business looking to survive this recession. They may take the loan to survive, but it's not going to be used for investment or job creation. Anyone who believes that is whistling through the graveyard.

Okay, now I'm coming in on the other side. First off, he did say tax breaks in addition to loans and some other bits.

Second, do you understand how business financing works? Most businesses work off a continual line-of-credit, where income goes to pay off loans, while more loans come in to pay off current expenses. One issue with the financial crisis last year was banks stopping those loans, which meant businesses with little cash (most small businesses) had no money to operate on. That needed/needs to be freed up for the business to have the capital to operate and grow. That's what I believe he's talking about here.

I'd like to see the substance of the exact tax breaks he's referring to. And as you noted above, the taxes associated with the health care bill loom large.

I certainly understand the line of credit situation. That needs to be resolved as you said to keep things going. But it doesn't do anything for the job situation. No intelligent small business owner is going to add jobs in the current climate just because the money is available. There has to be a tax cut that facilitates that shift. Until then, no jobs will be created and small business owners correctly should put away their money rather than invest it.

im trying to find a SFW image of "full of shit" but Im giving up suffice to say that this page, 140, again showed that MBBF is what we thought he is.

So if nobody creates jobs during a recession how does a recession ever end?

Gosh, I guess your right. It never ends. I guess we're stuck.

Where did I ever say jobs were solely responsible for bringing an economy out of a recession?

You're right. I'm a citizen concerned with the debacle that is this administration's economic policies. I've been outed again.

FWIW, I would find this board a whole lot less entertaining if MBBF became reasonable.

your post to start all of this was spun and disingenuous however.

I asked for a link and you clipped it or posted some footage from a past rally to make it look different than it really was. I guess it was a simple mistake and not intentional.

There are some days when I miss Bubba Wheels, but it soon passes.

Bubba Wheels was at least honest about his intentions.

+1

this page delivers

You said no jobs are created in a recession. If that's true, how do we ever get out of a recession?

I'd disagree with that. First, I'm all for paying less in taxes so I won't argue that at all. But you only get taxed on what you make. So if a company is hurting badly in a recession, tax isn't an issue.

And you're right, the loan will mostly be used to ride out the recession. That may mean not having to lay off workers that are valuable.

and if those workers keep their jobs they can keep spending!

Where did I say "no jobs are created in a recession"?

What? You like seeing the exact same 5 guys posting their spin over and over and over against 1 guy with his dubious spin?

Shhh, don't ruin the fantasy for them...

Isn't that the truth?

Fill in JPhillips, Flasch, DaddyTorgo, flere "I am conservative on a lot of issues" = I have made 500 posts in this thread, 498 of them are liberal.

MBBF "I voted Democrat a few years ago" = I have made 600 posts in this thread, 600 are conservative"

i'm pretty sure i don't just throw up a ton of links and spin them, but rather try to engage in actual conversations with people, particularly those on the other side, that are constructive. just sometimes you have to call a spade a spade when the spade is like a frigging klieg light panerd.

could throw your name in there too as far as being a caricature...everything is "government bad...libertarianness good"

But that is a constructive viewpoint, I admit to being partisan. Every one of your discussions tries to paint the other side as extreme while your idea isn't. I make no bones about it that my idea is extreme. And it is the only one that hasn't at least been tried. Your viewpoints aren't working! Why not try mine?

Except we have tried a gold standard, and no central bank, and no social safety net and the people decided changing those things was better.

How about doing something simple instead, like maybe balance the budget and not increase the deficit (and interest payments)?

Except that you are acting like what we have now is better... I know nothing about economics and will leave the gold standard debate to people more competent than me. I know a little about basic economics and know central banking and fixed prices and fixed interest rates are a scam. And I am fairly certain that welfare is a complete sham. My brother-in-law has 3 brothers and sisters that skirt welfare law for their own gains. (They would make less working at Wal-Mart than they do on welfare and sham disability) This has to be prevalent among all people living in poverty. What a joke! You really should have left that off there.

I'm with you on a balanced budget, but not before the recovery takes hold. Taking several hundred billion more out of the economy now will only extend the recession and the budget will never get balanced until more people go back to work. I would have preferred not to have to do the stimulus, but in that situation it made sense and it seems to have helped. (Although it would have been better to keep it to proven stimulus rather than non-stimulative tax cuts, and the reduction of direct aid to the states by the moderates was stupid as can be.)

The major reason I'm for letting all the Bush tax cuts expire is because the budget can't realistically be balanced with the current tax scheme. You can talk all you want about bloated government, but no way will Congress pass enough spending cuts given the current tax rates. I don't think Obama will go fully back to the Clinton rates and that's a mistake IMO.

One of the reasons I support health care reform is the clear reality that Medicare spending has to be controlled soon. This bill may not be perfect, but it will reduce Medicare spending and has a chance at reducing the cost curve in healthcare spending overall. Importantly, the Senate bill also reduces the deficit by 100bil+.

I've been pretty consistent in arguing the big problem is the structural deficit brought about by the last administration. I'll give Obama a pass on the stimulus as it had to be done to spur the economy, and the lack of revenue due to lack of employment isn't his fault. Healthcare reform is critical to long-term deficit reduction, and while I'm sure you disagree, I see him trying to bring healthcare costs more under control. Now after employment turns around I'd like to see a plan to get to a balanced budget both through increased taxes and spending reductions. I don't support Bayh's chickenshit commission that just provides cover for cowardly politicians.

edit: I agree a lot with former Reagan staffer Bruce Bartlett's take on spending and taxes, but now that he sees the reality of needing increased taxation to get to a balanced budget he's no longer claimed by the GOP.

The overwhelming majority of PhD economists would disagree with you about the central ban and interest rates.

The social safety net is much bigger than welfare, which I'm sure is abused, but not in ways approaching corporate handouts. For m the social safety net includes child labor laws, worker safety, unemployment insurance, Social Security, Medicare, WIC, traditional welfare, etc. People want those things and initially wanted them because they didn't have them and wanted something better.

But sentence one you lose everyone. It is basic economics. If my brother-in-law said "I know your sister and me owe $150,000 but we are going to take out a loan for $1,000,000 and now we don't owe that $150,000 anymore." We would say they are fucking lunatics. How is this different?

Hasn't the government ever looked wrong in 20/20 hindsight? "No, Copernicus the Sun does not revolve around the Earth."

Years later, "Perhaps we were wrong. Go ahead try something that might actually work!"

"Fixing interest rates and costs may actually create bubbles that eventually burst causing much worse repercussions."

Depends on the future prospects for your brother-in-law. By taking out that loan can he reasonably assume he'll keep his job and over the next few years greatly increase his earnings? What if he rationally believed that loan was the only way to keep his house and somehow his neighbor's houses as well? Macroeconomics isn't the same thing as microeconomics.

Stimulus spending works well if it's short term and targeted to the right things. The CBO just released a report showing how parts of the current stimulus boosted GDP by 1.5 to 2 dollars per dollar spent. Now some of it performed much more poorly, most notably the tax cuts, but overall it seems to have done what economists would expect. In a crisis of demand stimulus spending can alleviate a recession to some degree. It's not always the proper prescription, but given the circumstances of last Winter it was what the doctor ordered.

And I almost forgot to add... "I know your sister and me owe $150,000 but we are going to take out a loan for $1,000,000 and now we don't owe that $150,000 anymore." + "Plus while we are trying to recover we will buy a boat (health care package) and continue our membership at the country club (war in Afganistan)"

I don't think that's quite a fair analogy. I'll take a stab:

I'm going to take out a $50K home improvement loan (when I already have a mortgage) so that I can improve my future earnings when I sell but there's no guarantee on it. Not only that, but I'm going to weatherproof my house (health care)- sure it's going to cost something up front but it's going to bring down costs in the long run. Oh, and we're idiots so we're going to continue our membership at Khandahar Lakes under some guise that living next to the golf course and being well known will prevent any crime that could happen to us.

It's not the way I'd want to live my life but I can see the logic. (Also, it does beat "My life budget isn't balanced so rather than just working some overtime and cutting that deluxe cable package and country club membership, I've got a better plan. I'm going to start working less hours, turn off the electricity, water, stop doing any maintenance, leave my home unlocked and door wide open, maybe even take a chainsaw to half the house to decrease the area I have to take care of and then expect my home value to go up." But I think at this point, the analogy is breaking down a bit)

SI

While we don't see eye to eye on health care I will take it out of my previous analogy. I think it is an unecceasary government intrusion that will make us less free and more broke in the long run but the current system is also very screwed up. I stick with the war part which you seem to also agree with but lets add this final part...

"I know your sister and me owe $150,000 but we are going to take out a loan for $1,000,000 and now we don't owe that $150,000 anymore." + And I almost forgot our million dollar loan will be paid by everyone who did keep an eye on their finances the past couple of years. You didn't overbuy for your house and you ignored a loan agent who said you could afford putting 50%+ of your income into a house? Too bad, I couldn't live in an apartment so I need $50 of your money towards my $1 million loan. You exercise, eat healthy, and don't visit the doctor for stress tests and MRI's when you have indigestion or sprain your ankle. Too bad give me $25 of your money towards my loan so that I can keep eating McDonalds and have my blood pressure medicine and diabetes treatment paid for by the government. You think that in 20 years there is going to be some unintended consequence of the Afghan war? (Maybe Pakistan will be our "good friends" then and we will have created a powerful enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan) Well even though blowback is the root of all of our problems in the middle East right now we still want your money to fight this war, to hell with history!!! You actually read to your kids and care about their education? Well we think that is solely the teachers' and government's job so please give us another $10 of your money towards a federal program so you can be a parent to our kids also. You decided that you couldn't afford to live your lifestyle if you had more than 2 kids. Well we wanted 5 kids so please give us $25 of your money to raise ours. And on and on and on................."

But you're right my Libertarian views are wacky! I shouldn't be responsible and expect my tax money not to go to those who aren't. Maybe I will go out and take advantage of this cash for appliances thing that is coming down the road. What, every economist on the planet can explain how these programs are bad ideas? But what about populism!!!???!!! Why can't I have my piece of the pie also!!! Fuck personal responsibility!!!!! Yeah one party system!!!!!! Long live Rome!!!!

What happened to the Roman Empire? Well, that's ancient history, it never repeats itself!

...and this is the problem, or one of them as I see it. Very few people are debating individual topics even when theyre the one at hand. Instead people are talking about the topic at hand but are really hiding their feelings 'on the whole' behind the topic at hand label. So instead of talking about the pros and cons of reforming health care were talking about that as a guise for our fear of bigger government, or socialism intruding. We cant talk about the pros and cons of individual bills or ideas because it'ssimply the tallest nail of what is the entirety of our ideology. To argue otherwise is bunk IMO.

When have I stated that? Link?

I'll say it before and I'll say it again. Anybody who wants to box me into a conservative mold is making a generalization that simply doesn't hold water. Regarding economics, I'm as conservative as they come. Regarding social issues, I'd be an immediate outcast of the GOP due to my heavy leanings towards the liberal end of the issues.

Listen I like you a lot, you are one of my favorite posters to read. Your posts often jibe with mine in this thread and I love your Mizzou posts, espeically when the rest of the board gets super pissed off. But you are a Republican talking points machine (some of which are very true and some of which just keep the one-party system going) and the fact that you can't see this doesn't make it untrue.

Your description of yourself sounds very Libertarian. Why argue the Republican talking points all the time?

As far as the link goes I really don't want to dig through this thread but I am sure someone will. If you really don't see this about yourself I will do some digging later.

I do. Maybe that's why I like reality TV so much.

"This is the true story of 6 strangers forced to post on a chat board....

That is why I stay out of the health care reform thread. This thread is about the Obama presidency and I feel like my Libertarian viewpoints at least resonate with some people. I think a few pages back I had a couple of people say that my message actually made them rethink their phiolosophy.

I don't care if you guys want to argue talking points all day, I just wish you would step back and realize this is what the one party system wants you to do. Keep arguing talking points while the two sides (one party) retain control of not only the government but more speicifically you.

I would second the suggestion made a few pages back to read the book "Are you... Liberal? Conservative? or Confused?" by Richard Maybury. Real simple read but a real eye opener.

It mostly has to do with the nature of this thread discussion. The discussion has to do with economics, whether it's debt, taxes, or even health care so I'm almost exclusively falling on the conservative side in this thread. We rarely discuss abortion, stem cell research, legalizing drugs, etc. If we talked about those things in this thread instead of money issues, my nickname would likely be 'Captain Liberal'.

I don't have a problem with people noting that I'm very conservative when it comes to economic issues. I do have a problem with being lumped into the GOP just because of those stances. I'm not registered with either party for a reason. Both of them only fit half of my stances.

No. For you, all of the issues fall into the Economics debate while for some of us the economics of something are simply one facet of the discussion. For example, I view Health Care reform as having moral implications as well as economical and when I say economical I mean it'll save us money and lower our debt load in the long run. When I was for the war in Iraq it was for Moral reasons (being Jewish it is something that differs from many other people but Im highly interventionist when it comes to Genocide) not for the economics of it. etc. etc. etc. You steer issues where you want to steer them so that it makes sense for your stance. When the CBO said the first Health care bills (ish) it would raise the deficit you and the GOP touted that, when the CBO came out and stated that the new bill (ish) would lower it, the GOP and yourself argued that the CBO estimates are wrong/watered down/untrue etc. And then of course you simply move on to the topic/talking point du jour instead of admitting what may have been on a previous page.

took a break after i got a lil heated at panerd so didn't see this last night.

FWIW I'm for a balanced budget amendment to the constitution

Another editorial

I agree with a lot of that, but I'm not sure their interpretation of "go our own way" is correct. I'd bet some percentage of those respondents think we should be more engaged internationally, but in a more unilateral manner.

snip

Without going to hunt this particular Pew poll, I almost have to assume that this alleged pro-isolationist trend is based on a lot more than the "go our own way" citation. Looks like just a shitty choice of items to highlight if that's the point the writer was trying to make since I'm pretty established in the "fuck what they think" category but that would not be an indication that I'm an isolationist in any way.

I think unilateralism works only if it furthers America's interests. Sometimes maintaining the status-quo is best, sometimes going along with others is best for us and sometimes going against the many that are jealous, envious, hating of us is best.

By the way, the editorial is from our local libertarian-centric editorial philosophy, owned by Freedom Communications.

I gotta third this (after JPhillips and JIMGA)- I think they just misread the survey. I read that solution more as people saying "eff the international community" rather than isolationism.

SI

Interesting poll results from Rasmussen. A theoretical Tea Party fairs better than the GOP in a generic ballot. From Talking Points Memo:

That seems to me more like a "devil you know" sort of question. Yeah, a lot of Conservatives aren't happy with the GOP. Turns out when you start putting candidate names to that face, tho, I bet the picture is a lot different. You know who the majority of GOP (and Dem) figures are in your area and we're a lot better about being dissatisfied with our politicians than being satisfied. But when you actually fill those shoes with, say, Doug Hoffman- you end up with a carpetbagger (sic) who doesn't know the district and hands the district over to the Democrats.

SI

I think you're confusing me with someone else. I'm pretty sure I've never said "I'm conservative on a lot of issues".

I like to think I've been pretty clear about where I stand on issues and have prefaced a number of posts by reminding people that I am biased a particular way (which way should be obvious). I'm almost positive I have never claimed to be nonpartisan or something like that.

Having said that, it's true i'll criticize Democrats on occasion and I do have a tendency to agree with the older version of the GOP on a number of economic points (though not all). However, if the national mood were to move 15 percentage points to the left tomorrow you wouldn't see me bemoaning the loss of bipartisanship. :D


I'm trying to quit, but honestly it's a bit like crack.... :D

I think you're right, but if there's enough money behind it, now does seem like a good time to start a third party. I wonder if what would happen if a money man got Palin to lead the charge?

On another note, I think it also gives some evidence to the notion that some part of the rise in independents are actually to the right of the GOP as opposed to all in the middle.

Good discussion about the reasons why the foreclosure program has failed. It appears the Obama administration oversight is the main reason for the failure. Thousands were incorrectly rejected by the program.

Anatomy Of A Failed Foreclosure Program

Health care reform bill faces opposition in Reid's home state of Nevada, putting his re-election bid in question......

OPINION POLL: Fewer back health reform - News - ReviewJournal.com

I wouldve expected your first comment about the oversight would have been positive in that the rules were so tight that they were careful not give out or subsidize people too loosely. Instead you left that out. It is true that the plan isnt working out like I had hoped and still hope but you simply left out...for your fiscal vein that you admit is so conservative, that the administration's oversight is too careful, too conservative. strange you didnt opine on that.


Again, if you trust the CBO when the analysis was in your favor, and then dont trust the CBO whent he analysis isnt in your favor, im not sure how you debate it. Its like the Pres. campaign. There is nothing to debate if you take one side's rhetoric as the truth when they say it and the other side's rhetoric as lies when they say it. There is no even platform to debate.

i'll be the first to admit that the program has been a huge dissapointment and I wish it could have accomplished a ton more, but your reading comprehension is really poor man.

Straight out of the article:

Out of every 100 homeowners who came to JPMorgan Chase for help under the program, just 15 have or will likely receive a permanent payment reduction.

What happened to the other 85? For every 100 trial plans initiated from April through September 2009 under the Home Affordable Modification Program:

• 29 borrowers did not make all required payments under their trial plan;
• 20 borrowers did not submit all documents required for underwriting;
• 31 borrowers submitted all required documents but the documents did not meet HAMP underwriting standards, due to such things as missing signatures or nonstandard formats;
• 4 borrowers were or are likely to be rejected for undisclosed reasons;
• 1 borrower will not or is not likely to get their payment lowered.

So in 49/85 cases it wasn't the government's fault. Being generous, in 36/85 cases it was (to some degree we're unsure of - depending on what was wrong in those 31 cases...missing signatures is clearly not the govt. fault, but i'm sure there were some cases in there that could have been the fault of the HAMP program).

Reading further down in the article, sure it seems that the government's "formula" that they were giving to people was "wrong" according to JP Morgan Chase - and that's a massive fucking blunder. They should have gotten the lenders participating in the program to agree ahead of time on whatever-the-fuck the formula was going to be...line up all their ducks in a row before going out with the program. I'll be the first to admit that.

But clearly if 49/85 cases as I showed above, are failing due to homeowner's being idiots or being unable to make their payments, you can't lay THAT on the government's doorstep. Personal motherfucking responsibility.

I merely cited the situations the government could control, which was the formula as you mentioned. I said nothing about the other situations, but feel free to lump it all in if it makes your argument. It certainly had nothing to do with mine. I was pointing out the screw-up in the formula, which you agreed with. I'm not sure why you're disagreeing with me when you agree with my original statement concerning the blunder.