Curses: An election about the economy

Well, my worst nightmare for this election year has been realized. I had thought that this was a no-lose year for me. I liked McCain and I liked Obama, so what could happen to mess things up?

But if you'll recall, back in January I said that this was shaping up as a very good year, except for one thing -- the possibility that we'd be talking about the economy.

I freaking HATE talking about the economy. My entire career, a newspaper front page that leads with an economic story has always been, to me, a signal that nothing interesting is happening in the world.

It's not the economy per se. It's money. It bores me to moaning, retching tears. Talking about it, or being forced to hear other people talking about it, is torture, torture of a sort I'd hope even W. would disapprove of. (I suspect some of y'all feel the same way -- the post I reluctantly put up about it has drawn only seven comments so far -- even though I tried to dress it up in Looney Tunes language.)

And now, this mess on Wall Street, whatever it's all about, has BOTH candidates for president -- guys I used to like -- talking about it. So it looks like McCain HAS flip-flopped on torture...

How did this happen?

Comments

[bud]

It may be boring stuff but it's soooo important. If Americans cannot buy food or life-saving drugs what difference does it make if Iran is building nuclear weapons?

[Brad Warthen]

I feel like Vince Vaughan talking to Frank the Tank again: Yes, bud, we know you have an awesome time talking about the economy. The whole town knows you have an awesome time. I was asking Mitch if he has an awesome time...

Seriously, though, what you just said is a fundamentally flawed supposition. If I'm shooting rats at the county landfill to feed my family, Iran getting nukes is still a far more critical issue requiring the more immediate attention of the POTUS. No contest.

[Tim C]

Poor decisions by a Republican led Washington have created this debacle. Deregulation ended oversight. Boards of Directors rubber stamped the poor business decisions and get rich quick schemes and here we are. These company’s business practices were so inept that a Fifth Grader would know better. They spent billions of dollars buying boxes of loans sight unseen that were already labeled “Sub Prime.” What part of “Sub Prime” did these $100 million a year superstar executives not understand? Did it ever dawn on anyone that lending money to people without ever investigating their ability to repay might be a problem? These are the same folks that wanted social security privatized so they could pillage the retirements of hardworking Americans. McCain has consistently supported deregulation and privatization of social security. We should talk more about it and not less. It is incumbent that the voters are educated on these topics.

[bud]

Brad, I strongly disagree. Domestic issues are far more important than foreign. Domestic concerns claim more lives than any crackpot dictator. It's just a bunch of fear-mongering that makes Iran such a threat. They really aren't. Same with all this phony indignation about Russia invading Georgia. That is simply not something we should concern ourselves with. We ended up wasting 3 trillion dollars and 4,200 American lives by inflating the risk of Saddam Hussein. He simply was not a risk to our security. But that 3 trillion dollars has contributed much of our current economic plight. For you and me we may have to sacrifice that 42 inch plasma TV to buy the drugs we need to keep us alive but for millions without health insurance they don't have that option. They simply do without while high blood pressure or diabetes slowly snuffs their life out. This is the main reason our life expectancy falls short of other industrial nations.

[Jimmy]

Unfortunately, the only thing fundamentally flawed is Bud's understanding of what is the "economy". Bear Stearns, Lehman . . . not so much.

Economy is suffering from fits and starts right now based almost entirely on the housing crisis. (Nugget: The credit crunch is also a SYMPTOM of the housing crisis, not a function of the "economy").

Bush and McCain tried fixing a primary causative factor of the housing crisis years ago but were blocked. (See discussion below)

What's really sad is the Obama campaign now sees a great opening for the dying presidentail run and McCain's camp is not cohesive (and maybe smart enough) to shut this pathetic little argument down.

Obama may win this presidency just yet. Not because he deserves it but because his better equipped opposition can't get his crap together.

[Jimmy]

Oh and Tim, the more the votes are actually educated, the more Obama's poll numbers will slide. You better hope this argument stays at the 10,000 foot level.

Query: Which political party actually favors home ownership for all? And how do you think you open home ownership to those that don't have a $100 to put down or a paycheck to cover a traditional loan?

Sub-prime goes hand in hand with no money down, 5% down and no proof of income mortgages. The villain in the dark are the bond rating agencies. Where were they when these securities were being traded as investment grade and cash equivalents?

[slugger]


What has really happened in this economic nightmare is the people that ran the banks, mortagage houses, lending houses were looking out for themselves. This is where the board of trustees are just as responsible along with auditors that told the board all was well. Greedy people cannot be left unchecked.

There is enough blame to go around in all this mess. I just hate to see the ones that caused the problem (the CEO's not Democrats/vs/Republicans) walk away with millions of bonus money that the taxpayers will have to pay back in the long run. The politicians helped do this but the buck stops at the CEO and any audit firm that covered it up.

[bud]

So, McCain, of Keating 5 fame, was trying to head off this crisis but was blocked. That's a good one. The GOP controlled both houses of congress and the white house during the critical part of this situation. Yet they failed to head it off. Sorry Jimmy. Your guys failed, not the Democrats.

This has become a theme of the failed GOP reign. Blame the Democrats. Gasoline prices go up. Blame the Democrats. The housing market collapses. Blame the Democrats. The financial markets crumble. Blame the Democrats. Really, is this all you guys have? The GOP controlled everything for 6 years. Why were they unable to build a consensus for passing effective legislation? Sounds like a failure of leadership to me. If John McCain was such a reach-across the aisle maverick why was he unable to help craft legislation to head this thing off? And why on earth would we want to elect the party that has failed us so badly? Frankly it's laughable on it's face. The GOP has run the country into the ground with it's failed policies and now all they can do is blame the party who was out of power for so long. Their strategy is simple. Tell a lie long enough and loudly enough and pretty soon it becomes the truth. Not this time. The truth is the GOP has run things for far too long and now we're all paying for it.

[Lush Rimbaugh]

Yesterday, Rush Limbaugh blamed something Bill Clinton supposed did in 1999 for the current economic meltdown.

This is good to know as we can now hold George Bush responsible for every economic issue that occurs between now and 2016.

[Tim C]

It's way past time Boards Of Directors and CEOs are held accountable. They authorized spending billions of dollars on speculation without conducting an ounce of due diligence. An analogy would be my spending $200 billion to buy apartment complexes in Russia/Georgia/Bolivia etc. never verifying they were actually built or built correctly to code; on deeded land; had utilities; or had a rental history. Would you call me nuts when I wrote the check? That is what deregulation accomplished. It allowed people to act completely irresponsibly, and get rich, while their Boards, who also got rich, sat by and watched. A philosophy of deregulation coupled with greed and laziness threatens the very foundation of our economy. Now who can fix it and prevent it from happening again?

[Jimmy]

Bud, I am not blaming the democrats for everything. There was a cataclysmic failure on the part of so many parties you can not blame anyone. It is a fact, however, that McCain co-sponsored a bill that would have transferred Fannie and Freddie into the direct oversight of the government. It never made it out of committee.

You're arguments echo both parties tried and true political agendas. "Its their fault".

When it comes down to it, however, McCain has blamed Wall Street and Biden/Obama blame the GOP.

Its all for naught though. If Obama does not open a lead of at least 5 points in Penn and Michigan by vote week, it is over anyway. Even the CNN blowhards (and I consider the Fox news guys blowhards as well) admitted that if Obama loses one of those, it is over.

I am a diehard independent. But the premise of Obama's campaign (along with your argument) is total political BS. "4 more years of George Bush". If you are such a candidate of change and a breathe of fresh air in Washington, please come up with something better than that. Tell me what you are going to do, not what somebody else did wrong. In my opinion, this is exactly why Obama's polling numbers are fading and he can't even get a appreciable bump when the stars are aligning in his favor.

By the way, why do you think neocons and far righters hate John McCain? Because he falls in line with their policies. No, because he gives them the finger when they need him most.

I'm so tired of this election already.

[Tim]

It's the stupid, economy!

[tomfliesthebonnieblue]

Rush was talking about Clinton signing the act that repealed the Depression era law seperating investment and commercial banks. An act that both Biden and Harry Reid supported.
Brad is right about economics being boring, and from reading some of these blog comments, several of you never got beyond high school home economics class.
A simple request, if you are going to blame someone, have the courtesy to provide us with some facts to back it up.
A question: wasn't Sarbanes-Oxley supposed to stop all this malfeascance?

[bud]

You just gotta love stories like this. Our GOP run government is just about as incompetent as it gets.

300 National Guardsmen out of food and water in Houston

06:23 PM CDT on Sunday, September 14, 2008
Associated Press

HOUSTON – Hundreds of first responders at two staging areas in Texas for Hurricane Ike have run out of food and water.

Congressman John Culberson said Sunday that 300 National Guardsmen, state troopers and other emergency workers are going hungry at a high-school football stadium — and at another staging area on Houston’s west side.

Culberson blamed FEMA for the gaffe and says he tried to contact Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who is touring flood-stricken areas of Texas.

[bud]

Even Robert Reich has blamed the Clinton administration for some of the deregulation mis-steps. I don't exhonirate Clinton totally from the current crisis. Yet it seems undeniable that over the last 14 years the GOP has been in control of either Congress, the White House or both. And yet that doesn't stop the blame the Democrats first crowd from making the current economic mess the fault of the Democrats. What this really is is a problem with greed combined with very lax regulation. And John McCain's ties to the Keating 5 incident makes his claims of being a reformer highly suspect. Plus his recent association with Phil Gramm further taints his credibility.

I believe Obama will do a much better job of fixing the economy. His fiscal policy proposals are far more to my liking. He'll provide financial incentives to working class people rather than cutting taxes for the highest income folks. His plans for dealing with the greedy corporations sounds like the type of medicine we need. The current problems had their start in the Reagan years, ideas that are now discredited. We don't need some re-hashed version of trickle down economics. We need a fresh start.

[Jimmy]

From those raging conservatives at CNN.

This one is for you Bud. How can this be?

http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/17/news/economy/colvin_recession.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2008091713

[tomfliesthebonnieblue]

Bud-
McCain was exonerated from any wrong doing regarding the Keating 5. If your claim was true, O man and the media would have been harping on it for the last six months.
"The current problems had their start in the Reagan years, ideas that are now discredited." Please provide some back up.
"His plans for dealing with greedy corporations" Please substantiate.

I think the current situation is above your paygrade, your simplistic responses add little to this discussion.

Brad is right, if this election comes down to economic issues, it will be way over the comprehension level of most voters.

[Lee Muller]

Senator Joe Biden's nickname is 'Senator Credit Card', for the way he protects the banks and credit card companies from regulation.

Why isn't the media asking some tough questions of Biden, and Congressman John Spratt, a banker and chairman of the House Banking Committee.

[Tim C]

Food for thought: if the security and solvency of our financial institutions are so instrumental to the foundation of our economy that we are willing to bail out institution after institution, why is government regulation and corporate transparency not legislated? Did we just wake up this week and figure out they were vulnerable. And why would we ever allow foreign ownership of our financial institutions if they could be manipulated so easily? We must now make sound fundamental changes to the rules regulating this industry and hold those responsible accountable. It appears to me Wall Street wants to socialize the losses but keep all the profits.

[bud]

McCain was exonerated from any wrong doing regarding the Keating 5.
-tom

False. He was sanctioned by the Senate. He wasn't prosecuted because money apparently never changed hands. But he was hardly exonerated. Here's an excerpt from Wiki:

McCain and Keating had become personal friends following their initial contacts in 1981,[10] and McCain was the closest socially to Keating of the five senators.[21] Like DeConcini, McCain considered Keating a constituent as he lived in Arizona.[18] Between 1982 and 1987, McCain had received $112,000 in political contributions from Keating and his associates.[22] In addition, McCain's wife Cindy McCain and her father Jim Hensley had invested $359,100 in a Keating shopping center in April 1986, a year before McCain met with the regulators. McCain, his family, and their baby-sitter had made nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard Keating's jet. Three of the trips were made during vacations to Keating's opulent Bahamas retreat at Cat Cay. McCain did not pay Keating (in the amount of $13,433) for some of the trips until years after they were taken, when he learned that Keating was in trouble over Lincoln.[6][23]

[Brad Warthen]

Why not allow foreign ownership of our financial institutions? We allow foreign ownership of the government -- or at least, that would be the practical result (sorta, kinda, I think) if the Chinese ever try to cash in all the chits they own on our national debt.

Everything about high finance -- from Wall Street to financing the War on Terror -- is more than a little crazy.

[bud]

Jimmy, it doesn't matter whether we're officially in a recession or not. The fact is unemployment is at a 10 year high and rising. GDP growth is for elitists. Unemployment is where the rubber meets the road. If the rich are still making money what good does that do the poor guy who can't get a job.

[tomfliesthebonnieblue]

Bud-
From the American Heritage Dictionary:
Sanction: 1.Official permission, consent or approval. 2. Support or encouragement, as from public opinion. 3.A force or influence that determines action.

the unemployment rate is still below the level during the clinton years...
perhaps the man on the street should look into the 'jobs that americans won't do', but that is another discussion.

[bud]

Tom, that's one of Rush's phony spin talking points. The actual unemployment rate when Clinton left office was 4.2%. Today it's 6.1%. That's the relevant comparison yet Rush and other right-wing spinmiesters (liars really) use the 8 year average unemployment rate. Since Clinton inherited a very high unemployment rate from Bush Sr. he had a lot of work to do. Eventually he was able to bring it down to where it was in December 2000. But if you average all the years out the Clinton average probably was around 6%. Irrelevant statistic for sure, but since that's all the GOP koolaid drinkers have I guess they have to go with it. If my side had such bad numbers to work with I'd spin things too. Or, perhaps since as a liberal I actually have a brain I'd change sides.

[martin]

If the Editorial Board proudly knows nothing about the economy and is not interested, they should not make any political endorsements.