"As the year progressed, a series of life-threatening problems within many of the world’s great financial institutions was unveiled. This led to a dysfunctional credit market that in important respects soon turned non-functional. The watchword throughout the country became the creed I saw on restaurant walls when I was young: “In God we trust; all others pay cash.”

"By the fourth quarter, the credit crisis, coupled with tumbling home and stock prices, had produced a paralyzing fear that engulfed the country. A freefall in business activity ensued, accelerating at a pace that I have never before witnessed. The U.S. – and much of the world – became trapped in a vicious negative-feedback cycle. Fear led to business contraction, and that in turn led to even greater fear."

"This debilitating spiral has spurred our government to take massive action. In poker terms, the Treasury and the Fed have gone “all in.” Economic medicine that was previously meted out by the cupful has recently been dispensed by the barrel. These once-unthinkable dosages will almost certainly bring on unwelcome aftereffects. Their precise nature is anyone’s guess, though one likely consequence is an onslaught of inflation. Moreover, major industries have become dependent on Federal assistance, and they will be followed by cities and states bearing mind-boggling requests. Weaning these entities from the public teat will be a political challenge. They won’t leave willingly."

"Whatever the downsides may be, strong and immediate action by government was essential last year if the financial system was to avoid a total breakdown. Had one occurred, the consequences for every area of our economy would have been cataclysmic. Like it or not, the inhabitants of Wall Street, Main Street and the various Side Streets of America were all in the same boat."

- Warren Buffett, excerpt from letter to the shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., February 27, 2009

Ohh the oracle!! Well then all is forgiven!! It's not like he's ever been to Washington with his hand out. :rolleyes:

Gunna take some time to change the culture of greed and corruption that flourished on Wall Street during the Bush-Cheney (woo-hoo! regulation schmegulation) party years...

Who's fault are the bonuses?

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...d=aT_tMXRy2vDs

Obama says he's taking responsibility for it so I guess that qualifies as F up 70 something.

is that the change he's been talking about?
LMAO Michelle will go through her 'change' before the President does.

Seriously doubt BO can handle it himself, dellinger.

May need divine intervention to clean up this colossal economic mess from eight years (woo-hoo!) of Bush-Cheney...

chris dodd from CT , get a home mortgage lower than any of us can get, get oddles of cash from AIG , he is from CT , Aig FP is from ct .... he has 2 stories know about the retention bonuses - what gives folks?

the funny thing about this the deregualtion occured before bush came to wash , and a former sec of tresaury went to citibank and walked away with 100mm + , and now citibank is at 1.50 a share but all that seems to get forgotten

Boy I hate to recap but feeling good today so for you I offer this....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs

aig not the only one paying bonuses:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123739512036672809.html

Can't access u-tube here, dellinger.


What is it? ... some old lady who got burned in the stock market throwing her shoes at Bush? lol

yep

So - Palin can't count accurately (well, 69% is sorta like "just over half", except it's not), and she only wants money from us she doesn't have to account for.

Let's try and go slow so we only have to do this once. 69% of 930 million is 642 million. Now subtract the 128 million for Medicare and you get 514 million. Half of 930 is 465 so in reality the MILF from Alaska is off 50% by 49 million which, in effect is 55% or a little more than half of what the Fed is offering. So be happy she has kicked back almost $300 million and the knowledge she can count and be elected to the State's highest office with the votes of a male majority. Oh I forgot she's republican and tryng to be responsible to her State so she's an evil moron.

how shocking, who knew that Palin was a fiscal conservative and would not want the long tentacles from Washington dictating how the state is run.
how dare she run her state in a responsible way.
:zz:

and can count

Sarah: "I'm only accepting a little over 50% of the bailout!"

Aid: "Psst Gov - no, no, we WANT that 128 mil in Medicare, too".

Sarah: "I'm only accepting 69% of the bailout!"


Palin, the "responsible fiscal conservative"? - what has happened to the state budget in Alaska since she's been Gov?

"The former vice presidential candidate says she will accept only money without strings that will bind the state later."

Then I'll eagerly be waiting to see her veto the rest, after her legislature accepts it.

Yes - Palin wants the unexpected free federal money winfall, but just like AIG, she doesn't want to be held accountable to the Feds for what she does with it.

no money as yet has been distributed, correct? but the last two weeks the market has done better than in months.

i think they should rescind the vote, the money-we can't afford the cure for what ails us. in this case, the cure is worse than the disease. trillion dollar deficits for years-how exactly does that help us long term? or even short term for that matter????

how exactly did we recover from every other recession, as i don't recall votes or hysteria like this in the past?

Some of the companies eligible for bailout money have now said they don't need it; and several have said they will have it paid back quickly.

Trillion dollar deficit for years - our deficit doubled during the last eight years. Doubled.

Nobody knows for sure if the additional money will help or not. We just have to see. Yeah, that sucks.

This recession involves the banking failures. That is what makes it different than previous recessions, and the potential affect on the country, and world, much different.

thing is, what's happened already can't be changed. doesn't mean we have to continue down the same path that's gotten us where we are now. eight percent across the board budget increases (for example)won't get us out of this morass. stockpiling untold funds into a 'trust fund' for future health care isn't a priority right now either-at least it shouldn't be.

if you're concerned that it doubled in eight years to $400 billion aren't you the least bit concerned that this year it will quadruple to $1.8 trillion?
QUADRUPLE

?? How is the bailout like what got us here?

The stimulus package isn't "across the board" budget increases, so I don't know why you are using that as a "for example"?

Do you agree that spending is what ends recessionary times?

I think our healthcare system is an overpriced disaster run by insurance companies and having little to nothing to do with medicine, I think sometimes receiving medical care in the US can be dangerous to the patient, and I am not that thrilled with Obama's plan.

I remember when the Dow first got over 1000, then again when it got over 5000. When it hit 5000, all anyone could talk about was how unbelievably artificially inflated it was, and how desperately it needed to fall and correct to reality.

Of course I'm seriously, desperately concerned. But all Bush had to do was hold onto what Clinton started, and our deficit would have started to go down. Instead, he spent. And the deficit DOUBLED. Up into trillion-land.

When you look at recent times (the last 40-50 years), turns out the GOP have not been the financial conservatives when in the White House. I didn't know that.

The spending under Bush and under Obama - what they are spending it upon - are different, don't you agree?

What do you think should be done instead, regarding the current US financial situation?

it's not insofar as bailouts are concerned-i'm thinking of the entire increase in spending as the reason we are where we are. we can't keep operating under deficits, and from what i've read, our horrible debt is the biggest reason our economy is in a shambles. facing future record deficits doesn't help the situation one bit, if anything it only will prolong the pain, and cause further problems down the road.
the adding towards budgets, in a time of lower tax revenue, and running ahead of cost of living increases, imo is yet another recipe for disaster. now is a time for govt to tighten up, not unilaterally increase spending.

and anyone who thinks the market has just been going thru corrections imo should agree that a stimulus package is no way to 'fix' that. you can't fix what is essentially already broken.

no
obama is using the same approach bush used back when he wanted his war. ramp up hysteria, make everyone think the sky is falling, so that you can push your agenda thru with barely a whimper of protest. obama preached public works as a way to increase jobs, but only a small portion of his total budget will go towards that. the rest is just bigger govt. bigger govt only means a bigger expense in the end, and we can't afford that. govt is an expense only-and that expense grows every day.

I don't think the financial crisis is exaggerated or the extent and severity is being lied about by the Obama administration.

Obama's agenda (education, health care, etc) is why he was elected. I better see changes there, that's why I voted for him as President :)

What Obama wants to do with that (platform, campaign promises type of stuff) has been readily separatable from what the administration is doing with the financial crisis as far as I can see - I can separate them out, see which is which.

The administrations answer to the financial crisis is far more than healthcare, education, other platform promises.

But when you have thousands of unemployed people (California just went over 10%), and many are highly educated and successful in technology and business, putting them back to work, and the government putting money into, the grossly underfunded and understaffed area of education is terrific in my view.

The US is not the brightest bulb in the world box regarding education. We should die of embarassment over that, with our potential resources. That must change, asap. Getting all of our children a great education should be number one. We are not first on the "quality education" list when compared to other countries. It's embarassing, that 18-year-olds can't read n thy rite lyk this cuz thy txt Seriously - I remember when I tried to hire receptionists when I had my private practice, I was appalled at the void between some of their ears.

The health care industry is fairly financially sound, but you bet, I think there needs to be major shakeups (although I'm not convinced any national healthcare system can work in the US within the next 20 years), so I don't mind that getting serious attention, either.

Yes, but that portion will create jobs, no? And our crumbling infrastructure is getting to lethal threat (to the public) level.

Do you think public works (infrastructure improvement) should be a more major focus, receive major $$ of government anti-recessionary funding?

(If so, tell the govs who are refusing bailout money because the feds are telling them they must spend it on infrastructure in their states to stick it)

I agree with you, I prefer less government control, smaller government when the choice is there. I think the Peoples Republic of California is the perfect smaller example of what should be feared in that regard - across the board.

But I won't choose smaller or less "just because" - that depends what we are talking about.

I think we have to look at exactly what that "rest" entails if we want to start cherry picking what is good and beneficial given the economy, consideration for the future of the country, and what isn't.

the portion that goes to job creation is far outweighed by the costs of the total package. there's no way the govt can create enough jobs to bring in the tax revenue to offset the price.
the federal govt has become a bloated caricature of what it was intended to be. you can't continue to add to the fed, and expect it to also have less affect on daily lives-that's an impossibility.

Okay, see your concern clearly now.

i just find it ironic that the govt is telling everyone to tighten their belts, while they loosen theirs. a huge hubbub about the aig bonuses, but what about the bonuses going to freddie and fannie execs? ah, not quite as big a deal there... and then there's congress getting their raises as well.

do you seriously believe this? Maybe my memory is faulty but I don't remember Education being a critical issue in the last election and Health care was hardly mentioned though McCain's plan that was scoffed at by Obama is actually the one they are attempting to adopt.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123759906029901559.html

And the idea that Govs are turning down federal stimulus money related to infrastructure is unfounded. Most have said that they dont want the money that will change permanently state laws regarding unemployement ins and other state social programs. The Federal money will drastically expand these programs which the state will be on the hook for in 2 years when the money runs out. It is a bad longterm deal for states and will dramatically increase the size of their expenditures without a real revenue source which to fund them. Basically it is like the govt making a downpayment on your new Mercedes (which you cant afford) but then leaving you to make the payments (which you cant afford). This way the Congressional Democrats and Obama administration can claim credit for helping the needy yet put the individual states on the hook for failing to maintain them. Only in politics can you get money for nothing but the reality is that the Federal govt's money always comes with strings.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123759827524401409.html

Yeah. I believe alot of crap you don't.

Republicans were whining about where is this change...

Change this change that, he aint gonna change nothin.
Constantly ridiculing Obama...
I remember this very clearly during the campaign.

Surprise.

i remember it differently. Republicans weren't whining about where is the change. Republicans ridiculed people for not looking at the details, for getting caught up in a cult, for not looking at his marxist history, not looking at his total lack of experience. Republicans did this not because they thought he wouldn't change anything as president, but because they feared the changes he might make as president.

So far we've been 100% correct. These first two months have been nothing short of a disaster. A person hell bent on destroying the country would not have been worse.

I just have a hard time thinking that the reason Obama won wasn't almost entirely due to the mess in Iraq, McCain's age and running mate selection, Obama's public speaking skills and George Bush.

can you give and example of a Republican complaining about there being no change?

If you mean that he is another corrupt politician from Chicago
yes
there is no change

do you mean that the change he wants is socialism and some people still believe in America?

"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."



~~~~~ Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931

i don't think any but the selection of palin made more than marginal differences.

outside of missouri, i don't know what competitive state you could argue she may have helped him win. on balance she was clearly a negative where the election could have swung.

people's minds were made up about iraq and bush long before the election. those weren't issues that changed meaningful votes.

i think the election was over when the economy tipped over in september. palin was just a bonus.

awesome.

you finally found a spot where your quote makes sense. congrats.

and you guys keep at that socialism angle.

it's bound to work one of these days.

a plan for another trillion in spending to be unveiled tomorrow.

hey, a trillion here, a trillion there...no problem. anyone remember when a million was a lot? or when people gasped at a billion? chump change.