When a Simple Majority Equals Socialism

Ken, although I do not agree with your blanket description of Tea Partiers as extremists – I’m with you on the rest.

At the end of this month, the Fed stops buying Mortgage Backed Securities. At the end of next month, the tax credits expire. Timed, no doubt, to coincide with the summer selling season so cyclical summer sales figures can blind everyone to the serious effects both of these events will have on the housing market. Oh, and lest we forget, the FHA seller contribution is cut in half, and the PMI goes up. The bottom line is these changes – all of which make it harder or less rewarding to buy a home – will have a negative effect on the housing market – and all are within the control of the current administration.

I believe the tax credit should expire, and the Fed should stop buying the securities, but without the genesis of some other forms of incentives to free up lending we may be facing a very dire last three quarters of 2010.

Navy Chief, Navy Pride

There’s so much un-directed rage and frustration with the economy and the housing market:

“The government needs to create jobs”
“The government need to shrink and get out of the way”
“The government needs to cut taxes, cut the deficit and cut spending – and still create jobs all at the same time.”

As a society, we’ll be paying for two wars and the near-implosion of our economy for years to come — maybe a generation. I honestly can’t see anything that the government can do to eliminate the short-term pain. Our structural deficit *must* be addressed, but that’s not going do anything for the ‘here and now’.

As for the housing market, I’m with Fred. We have to let RE continue its correction. The Fed has done an extraordinary job with monetary policy to make financing as affordable as possible, and I expect they will continue to do so going forward. Home prices have come down. Banks are lending to qualified buyers – that’s what I’m seeing. I’m even seeing 95% conventional financing from credit unions. Let the homebuyer credits expire. Let the market take care of itself.

Ken

I am sorry but I need to be direct.
In my humble opinion, you are wrong on just about every point.

First off, even Realtors should base their political decisions on what’s best for OUR NATION not what’s best for the RE business.

Let me ask you a question:
Have you previously ever written about the Senate fillibuster rules?
Did you compain about those rules when the Democrats were a minority in the Senate?
I doubt it!
If you didn’t protest Senate rules when the Dems were the minority than I suggest your position NOW may be touched with a tad of hyprocrisy.

Did you speak of your outrage when the Dems in Mass tried to change the rules for replacing Ted Kennedy in the Senate?
I doubt it!
To refresh your memory, Mass law was that when a Senate seat was vacant, the Governor would appoint the Senator to complete the term. You might remember when Kerry ran for President and there was a Republican Governor, Dems in control of the state legislature passed a law mandating a special election. Do you remember that? Fast forward to last year, Ted Kennedy dies. Dem governor. Dems, guess what, tried to change the law again back to governor appointment.
Do you remember that?
This effort failed.

Since I mention Kerry, do you remember John Edwards?
Let’s see, the pretty boy $400 haircut weasal cheats on his wife who has cancer – lies about it – fathers a child with a mistress and not only lies about it but has his staff member claim the kid as his.

Is that the kind of moral leadership a Democratic majority will provide?

Let’s see what else those wonderful Dems have been up to lately.
Dem Gov of Illinios tries to sell Obama’s seat.
Dem Gov of NY former attrorney general Sptizer cheats on his wife.
Appointed Dem Gov of NY Patterson has State Police harass a woman who has filed a sexual complaint against one of his staff members.
Rangel forgets to pay taxes on some investment property and guess what blames his staff.
How about the $40,000 cash in the Lousiana politician’s refrigerator?

Is that the kind of good government the Democrats will bring?

Or do you believe a person’s personal conduct has no impact on their public conduct?

Is that what you mean by good government offered by Dems and liberals?
I mean really?

America is in trouble. We need leaders we can believe in, leaders we can trust.

Our political system is broken and corrupt.
Unlike you, I realize both Dems and Republicans are at fault.
Both Democrats and Republicans are running this country into the ground.
Most if not all of our elected representatives are more concerned with being re-elected as opposed to doing what is best for the Country.
Yes they take money from corporations but let’s not forget public employee unions that spend just as much money.

Politicians from BOTH parties use their office for personal financial gain.
Or do you believe only Republicans do this?

How can government spending ever be held in check when public employees retire after 25 years service at 90% of the income? Mathemactically it doesn’t work. Every time a public employee retires the personal cost of the government goes up. They pay the new employee 100% and the retiring employee 90% so they pay 190% for a 100% job.

Of course, labor unions send money to big government Dems and liberals so they can keep milking the public purse.

Do you support labor’s push for card check, which violates a fundamental principal of our democracy which entitles everyone to a SECRET BALLOT?

Congress now in control of the Dems is spending money we don’t have on programs that don’t work so they can act like they actually care about the common man and woman. They treat a BILLION like a cup of coffee.

The words good and government do not belong in the same sentence.
Can you give me any examples of good government?
You mean the Post Office?
Do you mean the Department of Motor Vehicles?
Or do you mean the Pentagon that spends a $1000 for a toilet?
Do you mean Social Security which is a Ponzi scheme that would make Madoff proud?
Medicare?
Do you mean a government that only spends money they have?
Or do you mean the government that is mortgaging our kids and grandkids’s future?

Do you mean our government that can not enforce existing immigration laws?
All of my grandparents on both sides of my family immigrated to the US.
My grandparents followed all the rules, why shouldn’t new immigrants follow the rules?
Of course, the liberal moveon.org Dems of which you appear to be a member will say it is not PC to aks those questions – that somehow even asking those questions is a problem.

Our federal deficit is what in the Trillions and Dems are hell bent to spend more money.
The State of California has a $20 Billion dollar deficit.
The US post office has a deficit.

Is this all George Bush’s fault?

The other important point in your post is that liberals and Dems typically believe anyone who does not agree with them is either 1) stupid or 2) morally corrupt.

Obama and Dems say the reason the US public does not support Obama Care is that they do not understand it – ie. they are too stupid to know what is good for them. I say nonsense. Obama and the Dems promise to cover more people, provide better care, AND reduce costs. Even a 5 year old knows this is nonsense.

Let’s take global warming.
I have always been a skeptic. Those that did not buy Al Gore’s vision of disaster were called “deniers”. That we denied the truth – that we must have been bought by the oil companies (morally corrupt) or stupid.
If the “science” was undeniable, why did various organziations feel the need to fudge data, report as science non factual studies, and supress dissent?
Why does the UN offical now say in truth temperatures have not increased from the mid 1990s?
And when we get some cold weather, global warming becomes climate change – that way no matter what happens, the Dems can push for increased government regulation and taxation that costs people their jobs.
Is that what you mean by good government?

I live in the San Francisco Bay area – one of the most liberal areas in your country.
My opinions are certainly in the minority.

So Ken – do you really believe the problems in our government and our nation are solely due to Republicans? That the liberals and the Dems have played no part?

My comments are not a defense of Republicans.
In my opinion, they are just as bad as Democrats.

How much more insanity do we need to see?
How much longer are we going to buy empty promises?
How much longer is each special interest group in America going to push their own agenda to the deteriment of the entire country? The polticians give in and spend our money in return for campaing contributions in return.
Do you believe only Repbulicans do this?

Dems point the finger at big corporations and the wealthy.
Republicans point the finger at labor unions, trial lawayers, and welfare cheats.
They pit Americans against each other for their personal and political gain.

When are we Americans going to wake up to the corruption in our political system?

As long as the politicians keep Americans riled up at the OTHER PARTY, their selfish malfeasance will continue.

The Wash DC politicians believe they are above the law – they have better retirement, better health care – than the rest of us. They lie cheat and steal believing we are too stupid to see. Day after day, we see our political leaders exhibit behavior we would not approve of in ourselves or our kids. The list is endless. They act like royalty.

I thought we ended royalty running America in 1776.

Ken – I don’t know you and I bet you are a good guy.
So my comments are nothing personal.

I just ask you to stop, look at things from a different perspective.

Anericans need to read from a variety of sources so they can form their own opinions and not just buy hook line and sinker what MSNBC or Fox News sells?

We each are entitled to our opnion.
And despite all the critics of our country and political system, we still live in the freest nation on Earth that offers its citizens the best opportunity for personal growth and success – nowhere is better.

What’s the old saying – be careful what you wish for.

The mood of the country has certainly changed in the past year.
Lots of people hated George Bush and believed he was the problem.
Obama won and the Democrats gained additional power in Congress.
Anericans have seen Obama and the Democrats in action.
Today, Americans are not as sure Obama and the Dems have all the answers as they were a year ago.
Don’t know about you but I haven’t seen CHANGE.
What’s different?
I see more of the SOS.

*stunned*

Did you just equate Tea Partiers — Americans exercising their Constitutional right to peacefully assemble and engage in politics — with Islamic Jihadis?

And we’re the extremists?

/*stunned*

Regarding the specific Senate rule you’re ranting about… here’s an interesting video:

You let me know where you stand on your “simple majority” idea, mmkay?

-rsh

“You know, because we’re so detached from really having to deal with all the things that our conservative, laissez fair, and most beneficent overlords in the financial sector have brought upon us.”

You mean like the former Chairman of Goldman Sachs and recent Director of CitiGroup, Robert Rubin? You remember Bob, don’t you Ken? Clinton’s democratic Secretary of the Treasury?

Funny think about good ole Bob Rubin is that even his friends hold him responsible for his part in the financial disaster. Since you seem to be more into op-ed pieces than journalistic truth (usually because of the tendency to either forget history or still waiting for Michael Moore to release it on BlueRay or DVD), I will try to shed some light on to the role that Clinton’s “conservative, laissez fair” financial right hand man played in this mess:

In 1998, Sandy Weill and John Reed founded Citigroup. At the time there was this law, The Glass-Steagall Act, that was enacted to prevent an entity like Citigroup from combining both commercial and investment banking. Citigroup did it anyway, which was kinda sorta technically illegal. That small problem was dealt with though by the Clinton Administration. At the direction of then Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, they dismantled the law and Citigroup lived on, Rubin resigned in 1999 and was hired in the same year by Citigroup, where he held an influential position on their Board of Director and was chair of Citigroup’s executive committee. The rest, as they say, is history.

If you would like a history lesson on Lloyd Bentsen, also Treasury Secretary under Clinton, I can help there as well.

At one point in time, he was called a Tory Democrat by the Texas liberal Democrats, and “Loophole Lloyd”. But what you may not know is that he and Bush 42 were close friends whose politics were almost identical, except for one thing. Whereas Bush called Reagonomics “Voodoo economics”, Bentsen got Clinton to embrace much of what Reagan espoused and Clinton’s 2nd term, and the economy, benefited. When Bush came in, he turned away from the clintonized version of Reagonomics.

We also cant forget the “Friends of Angelo”, which included many Democrats, including Sen. Dodd and Sen. Conrad, former Fannie Mae CEOs James Johnson and Franklin Raines, former HUD director Henry Cisneros, and CNN commentator Paul Begala.

What you apparently fail to grasp is that the financial collapse was a wholly bipartisan effort that started in the 70s. It was guided by greed, arrogance and stupidity, not partisan politics.

Another thing Clinton understood (while foolhardy, IMO our smartest President) that I don’t believe you do, is that you cant govern a center right nation from the left. Clinton learned that in ’92 and bolted to just left of center, saving his first term and ensuring a second. Our current President does not hold Clinton in high regard because of that. He is a statist and idealist. He can continue to be a statist, but if his idealism keeps him from moving to the center, he will lose in 2012.

My Christian right of center apologies if you feel this response is too mean.