SEC exempted 5 firms from capital/debt ratio. Geuss who?

[Science Abuse]

In 2004, SEC exempted five firms from required capital/debt ratio regulations. They are: Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs.

Coincidence?

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/09/regulatory-exem.html

[jeffmeden]

So what part of the Conservative Playbook does "setting up a financial disaster then funding the solution with other people's money" does this come from? It sure doesn't sound like a very conservative thing to do, if you ask me.

 

Maybe when Sarah Palin is running the show she can fix things with her brilliant "we need better regulation, so that the government can stop regulating" plan.

 

Let the political mayhem begin.

[OSUGT]

So what part of the Conservative Playbook does "setting up a financial disaster then funding the solution with other people's money" does this come from? It sure doesn't sound like a very conservative thing to do, if you ask me.

 

Maybe when Sarah Palin is running the show she can fix things with her brilliant "we need better regulation, so that the government can stop regulating" plan.

 

Let the political mayhem begin.

 

What part of the "conservative playbook" did Franklin Raines (Obama Economic Advisor) write when he was CEO of Fannie Mae in 2002?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Raines

 

How about Ms. Jamie Gorelick who was appointed by Clinton to be VP of the Federal National Mortgage Association? Was she writing the conservative playbook too, Jeffy?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Gorelick

[Science Abuse]

What part of the "conservative playbook" did Franklin Raines (Obama Economic Advisor) write when he was CEO of Fannie Mae in 2002?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Raines

 

How about Ms. Jamie Gorelick who was appointed by Clinton to be VP of the Federal National Mortgage Association? Was she writing the conservative playbook too, Jeffy?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Gorelick

So in summation, you're saying "HEY DON'T LOOK AT THAT OVER THERE, LOOK AT THIS IRRELEVANT THING OVER HERE! LOOK! LOOK!"

 

Stay on topic; regulation. Given who's on your side of the aisle, do you really want to get into the topic of financial scandals and fiscal failure? Do you? Do you realy?

 

He brought up something actually related to the topic: The fact that the "Conservatives" keep rolling back laws and regulations, many of which were put in place after the great depression to prevent it from happening again. It began with Reagan and has only gotten worse.

[jeffmeden]

What part of the "conservative playbook" did Franklin Raines (Obama Economic Advisor) write when he was CEO of Fannie Mae in 2002?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Raines

 

How about Ms. Jamie Gorelick who was appointed by Clinton to be VP of the Federal National Mortgage Association? Was she writing the conservative playbook too, Jeffy?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Gorelick

 

Way to miss the entire point of my post. Congrats. And the pet name is a nice touch, too. Here's a remark in plain enough English that hopefully you can understand it: Get a life. You are bad at this.

[OSUGT]

Way to miss the entire point of my post. Congrats. And the pet name is a nice touch, too. Here's a remark in plain enough English that hopefully you can understand it: Get a life. You are bad at this.

 

 

Truth hurts. It's not a conservative/liberal problem. It's a greed problem on both sides.

 

You're just a mudslinger, sir.

 

 

You calling me bad at the interweb makes me feel great. Because unlike you, it sounds like I have a life.

[OSUGT]

So in summation, you're saying "HEY DON'T LOOK AT THAT OVER THERE, LOOK AT THIS IRRELEVANT THING OVER HERE! LOOK! LOOK!"

 

Stay on topic; regulation. Given who's on your side of the aisle, do you really want to get into the topic of financial scandals and fiscal failure? Do you? Do you realy?

 

He brought up something actually related to the topic: The fact that the "Conservatives" keep rolling back laws and regulations, many of which were put in place after the great depression to prevent it from happening again. It began with Reagan and has only gotten worse.

 

Eric, calm down. I'm just as pissed as anyone. EVERYONE in Washington sux right now.

[LJ]

So what part of the Conservative Playbook does "setting up a financial disaster then funding the solution with other people's money" does this come from? It sure doesn't sound like a very conservative thing to do, if you ask me.

 

Maybe when Sarah Palin is running the show she can fix things with her brilliant "we need better regulation, so that the government can stop regulating" plan.

 

Let the political mayhem begin.

 

 

Let's not forget Clinton letting Glass Stegall expire THEN signing the Gramm Act....

[jeffmeden]

Truth hurts. It's not a conservative/liberal problem. It's a greed problem on both sides.

 

You're just a mudslinger, sir.

 

 

You calling me bad at the interweb makes me feel great. Because unlike you, it sounds like I have a life.

 

So you are the one who for some reason singles me out to waste their time personally attacking, and I am the one who is a "mudslinger" and doesn't have a life? Get real. Either address what I post directly, or save your breath.

[OSUGT]

So you are the one who for some reason singles me out to waste their time personally attacking, and I am the one who is a "mudslinger" and doesn't have a life? Get real. Either address what I post directly, or save your breath.

 

sorry. Did I hurt your feelings? I think you are just angry. Go get a puppy or something.

 

The economy is on a downturn, we are at war, the planet is burning up, gas prices are high, etc etc and McCain is hanging right with your puppet of a candidate:)

 

You just can't figure out why everyone isnt as angry as you and Eric.

 

Sorry for the hijack.

[jeffmeden]

Let's not forget Clinton letting Glass Stegall expire THEN signing the Gramm Act....

 

I don't seem to remember Gramm (or Leach, or Bliley) having a D next to their names. Not that I am defending what happened on either side of the aisle, but to blame Clinton for what was a complete Republican love-in of deregulation is a bit inaccurate.

[LJ]

I don't seem to remember Gramm (or Leach, or Bliley) having a D next to their names. Not that I am defending what happened on either side of the aisle, but to blame Clinton for what was a complete Republican love-in of deregulation is a bit inaccurate.

 

I never put the blame on Clinton... the blame ( what can be blamed on the gov't) is WASHINGTON, not this D vs R bullshit everyone is trying to play.

[jeffmeden]

I never put the blame on Clinton... the blame ( what can be blamed on the gov't) is WASHINGTON, not this D vs R bullshit everyone is trying to play.

 

There are certainly problems on both sides, but the biggest problem is that Washington isn't going away. While it would be nice for citizens to "scrap" the current system and build a Utopian government, that's a little bit beyond our reach. All we can do is keep our eyes open and do our best to stop history from repeating itself, one vote at a time. That means being critical of each and every elected official, on everything they do, from the local level on up to congress and the white house.

[Science Abuse]

D vs R bullshit

Akshully that is the root of many of our problems.

 

Imagine "spy v spy" where neither of the spies die when they're hit, but rather, America dies a bit instead.

[Science Abuse]

Hey look

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/22/america/22mccain.php

 

Nobody is clean.

Senator John McCain's campaign manager was paid more than $30,000 a month for five years as president of an advocacy group set up by the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to defend them against stricter regulations, current and former officials say.

[copperhead]

Nobody is clean indeed, but at least some people made an attempt back when it still could have helped.

 

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aSKSoiNbnQY0

 

Greenspan's Warning

 

The clear gravity of the situation pushed the legislation forward. Some might say the current mess couldn't be foreseen, yet in 2005 Alan Greenspan told Congress how urgent it was for it to act in the clearest possible terms: If Fannie and Freddie ``continue to grow, continue to have the low capital that they have, continue to engage in the dynamic hedging of their portfolios, which they need to do for interest rate risk aversion, they potentially create ever-growing potential systemic risk down the road,'' he said. ``We are placing the total financial system of the future at a substantial risk.''

 

What happened next was extraordinary. For the first time in history, a serious Fannie and Freddie reform bill was passed by the Senate Banking Committee. The bill gave a regulator power to crack down, and would have required the companies to eliminate their investments in risky assets.

 

Different World

 

If that bill had become law, then the world today would be different. In 2005, 2006 and 2007, a blizzard of terrible mortgage paper fluttered out of the Fannie and Freddie clouds, burying many of our oldest and most venerable institutions. Without their checkbooks keeping the market liquid and buying up excess supply, the market would likely have not existed.

 

But the bill didn't become law, for a simple reason: Democrats opposed it on a party-line vote in the committee, signaling that this would be a partisan issue. Republicans, tied in knots by the tight Democratic opposition, couldn't even get the Senate to vote on the matter.

 

That such a reckless political stand could have been taken by the Democrats was obscene even then. Wallison wrote at the time: ``It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit. The Democrats and the few Republicans who oppose portfolio limitations could not possibly do so if their constituents understood what they were doing.'

[Science Abuse]

party line vote? Riiiight. Post up the bill number and the vote results.

.

.

.

Having trouble? Oh snap bitches; IT WAS NEVER VOTED ON.

MIKE SITS ON A THRONE OF LIES!

 

Seriously, that second-to-last paragraph is full of BS wording meant to mislead. Everybody, on both sides of the aisle, voted to keep money available to prospective home owners. "OMG THE LIBERALZ VOTED..!" well so did your GOP goons. Teh reality of it was, after the lobbyists got through with it, the bill had no teeth whatsoever, and was essentially a waste pf paper. The miracle fix-all document that your pundit describes never existed.

 

Yes, your PUNDIT. The man who wrote that is a campaign adviser for John McCain and performed the same job for W Bush

 

Lastly, those two banks have been under the federal microscope since Clinton.

[copperhead]

Explain this throne of lies thing, eric. I simply quoted an article I found in todays news, in order to show an opposing opinion on the subject.

[Science Abuse]

Explain this throne of lies thing, eric.

I wanted something dramatic to say, so I pulled that out of my ass.

 

k?

[copperhead]

Did anything else drip out?

[copperhead]

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/1271/happyfeetrt7.gif

[cptn janks]

so the guy says democrats killed it in committee in 2005, however in 05, the committee had a republican majority... so whats the deal?

 

Members of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, 109th Congress:

 

9 Democrats: Paul Sarbanes (MD), Christopher Dodd (CT), Tim Johnson (SD), Jack Reed (RI), Chuck Schumer (NY), Evan Bayh (IN), Thomas Carper (DE), Debbie Stabenow (MI), Robert Menendez (NJ)

 

11 Republicans: Richard Shelby (AL), Robert Bennett (UT), Wayne Allard (CO), Mike Enzi (WY), Chuck Hagel (NE), Rick Santorum (PA), Jim Bunning (KY), Mike Crapo (ID), John Sununu (NH), Elizabeth Dole (NC), Mel Martinez (FL)

 

11 > 9

 

also, dont forget when this issue came up in 03 and 05 in congress, both times the administration threatened veto.

[Science Abuse]

so the guy says democrats killed it in committee in 2005, however in 05, the committee had a republican majority... so whats the deal?

 

Members of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, 109th Congress:

 

9 Democrats: Paul Sarbanes (MD), Christopher Dodd (CT), Tim Johnson (SD), Jack Reed (RI), Chuck Schumer (NY), Evan Bayh (IN), Thomas Carper (DE), Debbie Stabenow (MI), Robert Menendez (NJ)

 

11 Republicans: Richard Shelby (AL), Robert Bennett (UT), Wayne Allard (CO), Mike Enzi (WY), Chuck Hagel (NE), Rick Santorum (PA), Jim Bunning (KY), Mike Crapo (ID), John Sununu (NH), Elizabeth Dole (NC), Mel Martinez (FL)

 

11 > 9

 

also, dont forget when this issue came up in 03 and 05 in congress, both times the administration threatened veto.

Oh no! FACCTS!!!11!!!!ONE

[thorne]

(Kevin Hassett, director of economic-policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, is a Bloomberg News columnist. He is an adviser to Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona in the 2008 presidential election. The opinions expressed are his own.)