Before the governments of the world began pumping tax payer moneys into the failing backs and other industries, they should have had as a condition that the people with the most responsibility for poor investment strategies, etc, be fired. As it stands now, people in the lower ranks will be fired to make up for losses and to downsize, while those most responsible will stay in their positions. The government should, usually stay out of these issues, but once they are called in to salvage companies damaged by certain people’s mistakes, it can make sure that this bailout has some justice to it. New Upper Management can be chosen from within the organizations and from other organizations, so it is not as if the heads are simply being chopped off. Any whistleblowers and naysayers of past risky practices should be given priority.
Expecting and looking for are two different things. I was mulling, again, over that thread where they shut off someone heat because he did not pay his bills.
Those who think that mouse crossing their living room floor is justice
seem to manage to sleep through that herd of elephants when they come trumpeting through the same room.
If we are going to start with natural consequences, well, why not start with the powerful.
I agree with your agreements and with you addenda (addedni? plural in any case).
I just wanted to make it clear that something is not being done that would be more just. This employee, who is responsible for the problems, could be let go. Or these - what is it 10 or 15? on the same salary savings - could be let go because they are poorer and don’t matter so much to presidents, even liberal saviors like Obama who have not made any noise in that direction. I guess I had not heard anyone saying this. The layoffs of the lower employees are seen as inevitable but for the company CEOs staying on is seen as inevitable even though they are responsible. You would think the left and the right could come together on such an issue. The left with its criticism of power discrepencies between the classes and their criticism of the behavior of the Bank Prezes. The right for placing responsibility on those who, well, did the bad things, or were not as competetent at their jobs. Seems like a no brainer. And well, it is, but in the wrong way.
That would be the dipwads in government that forced them to provide “affordable housing” to people who couldn’t afford it, and then load all of those bad mortgages up into Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. Now, instead sending them to prison (like where Daschle ought to be going right now for tax evasion), we’re letting them turn hundreds of billions more dollars over to themselves to mismanage as well.
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“Government is not the solution to our problem, Government is the problem.”[/size]
No that would be the people in the finance sector who have been pressuring for these standards to be loosened for a long time. That would also be the Bank Presidents and boards of Ds who invested in the companies that were allowing poorly thought out loans. As if the Neo-Cons were against deregulating the loan business. I mean really. This whole liberal conservative we have two parties BS seems to have fogged up everyone’s brain and is showing no signs of clearing. The business community does not let enemies into the white house or even the house - oh, sure Bernie Sanders, what a revolution.
I certainly agree about the criticism of the upcoming mismanagement of taxpayer funds. But remember Bush was bailing out left and right on his way out. This is no liberal idea. The repubs are just playing a role as the fiscally conservative because their is a Dem president. They did not give a shit about all the Haliburton et al. no-bid contracts and the lack of oversight on all the incredible funds spent ‘rebuilding Iraq’.
Both parties, like there really are two parties, will happily spend your hard earned dollars on projects with no oversight and hysterical mismanagement. Conservatives only notice or invalidate the supposedly liberal versions. Liberals only notice what they don’t like. The business community and the extremely wealthy laugh all the way to the bank regardless of who is in office. It is good cop, bad cop psychology and you are falling for it. You will invest your energy being angry at liberals rather than noticing that you live in an oligarchy with one party. The oligarchy is laughing when the look in on you in the interrogation room and they will get you to confess.
What do you mean?
I have to say I don’t really buy the two party system. Many would call me a conspiracy theorist. But I suspect you mean something else.
the people responsible for the current economic situation are the politicians and beuracrats that have been putting ‘equal housing’ laws into place for years, violating the rights of banks by forcing them, at the point of a gun, to give loans to unqualified people-- this caused a housing bubble, which created an incentives market in subprime trading (mortgage backed securities (MBS))… further complicating the issue was the governments backing of the ENTIRE HOUSING SYSTEM via fannie and freddie; because there was literally NO RISK invlolved in making trades on these MBS and CDOs (collateralized debt obligations) since any losses were guaranteed to be bought by the government, this new incentives market literally exploded in size along with the housing bubble. true, no one complained about the easy money; everyone from homebuyers to builders to bankers to government officials went along for the ride. however, this does not absolve government from CAUSING this situation in the first place. government intervention into the housing and financial markets created the warped and false incentives that led to this situation.
now, banks are partly responsible, but not in the way you think. they did not LEAD to this situation-- their fault lies not in that they created the crisis, but that they BOUGHT INTO IT and played along, when they should have refused at the very first government attempt to FORCE THEM to GIVE AWAY their money to uncreditworthy people. as soon as the community reinvestment act and other such legislation was passed, bankers and loan institutions should have simply refused to comply, since the laws are a gross violation of property rights. the bankers could have brought the government to court, they could have stood on principle and made a case and stand for their rights to their own wealth and property, their RIGHT to dispose of WHAT IS THEIRS; instead, they gave up and gave in. the bankers have no balls, and THAT is their crime.
i would have loved to see one, just one, bank CEO get up from one of these senate witchhunts, stand up and say “you have no right to my life or my property”, and walk out, close up shop, sell off all his assets and just disappear. can you imagine what an effect it would have had, if, say, wells fargo had just vanished overnight, because the owners refused to let the government violate their rights? can you imagine a better wake up call to the american people as to the totalitarian nature of their government?? i cannot.
no one stood up against this injustice; no one stood up for their rights. and as such, they lost the right to their companies and their wealth. now, government is more than justified in firing all of them for any reason, or no reason at all-- they sold out to the government and now the government owns them, and it will do with them what it wishes.
in the end, while the blame lies with everyone who bought into this economic con game, the true FAULT lies with government, with the central planners of the american economy who thought they could get away with rigging the system… as it turns out, and as anyone with any common sense (which of course excludes anyone in government)could tell you, you cannot have your cake and eat it too…
Um, since you have blamed everyone, it’s difficult to argue.
I think there are some quibbles as to how the weight of the blame is distributed, however. Private citizens still had to apply for mortgages. During the winters of 2003-08, I lived in Southwest Florida, one of the hottest housing markets in the country during that time. I knew people who made 30 or 40 grand a year who had properties valued in the millions - all very highly leveraged, of course. Everyone knew the bubble would burst - everyone talked about it.
I knew real estate agents who knew almost nothing about real estate. Mortgage brokers who had no offices. Title agents who operated independently the day after they passed the licensing test. It was a zoo - and everybody knew it.
When a waiter in a restaurant can own six properties, all of which are worth over three hundred thousand dollars, the mortgages of which are not nearly covered by the rents charged, and which are brokered by another waiter, who got licensed last week, and when they both know that it’s all going to end, probably sooner than later, and particularly when people are getting their friends to “buy”, on paper, more houses for them, something very much like fraud is occurring.
Granted - the banks could have done something about due diligence. But ordinary people, who wouldn’t jaywalk, were defrauding banks in large numbers. The banks let them - most of those mortgages were no money down, and no income verification. But most of the people who got burned in Florida brought it all on themselves.
You know, most construction workers in Florida are mexicans, or some other recent immigrant, legal or otherwise. I have nothing against immigrants, and have championed the cause of illegal aliens many times, but some of the unemployement figures are a little skewed. They came here to work, and without work, many will leave.
yes, i see that i left out the individual loan borrowers from my estimation of blame-- you are correct that much, if not in the final estimation ALL, blame for this crisis lies with individuals for also buying into a con game that they themselves sensed, or should have known was wrong, but didnt care. anyone who thinks they can get a house for no money down, or a million dollar mansion for 3 percent down and payments of $2000 a month is living in a fantasyland. in the end, people DID make the CHOICE to invest and borrow these loans, and it was THEIR responsibility what happened when their house became so devalued.
but like i said… the blame spreads around; which is, of course, why no one did anything in the first place to stop any of this. when the blame is shared by everyone, then no one feels truly responsible (look at Enron)…