Bliss? A scored ‘Fix’ for an Addicted Dysfunctional Society to pass on an $11 Trillion Debt to the Future Generations.
Blunder? Deregulation in the first place was the Blunder.
Free Markets are like Machines… unGoverned they runaway and selfdestruct.

It should not pass until it is accompanied by arrest warrants for all those Democrats who refused to admit that Fannie and Freddie were committing serious fraud for the past several years.  They (Barney Frank, Maxine Waters, Chris Dodd, and many more) testified in Congressional hearings, seen on CSPAN and available on You-Tube, that there was no trouble with them and no need for new regulation.

Unfortunately individuals with the opinion of Fred Miles (September 28 at 10:15 pm) simply don’t have a grasp on the facts or truth of the matter.  Viewing too much mainstream media and too many Obama campaign ads without the intellectual ability to differentiate between truth and lies causes this.

I agree with Wysiwyg 100%  Paulson should lead perp parade.  Add Franklin Raines and Jamie Gorelick to the list.

This will obstruct individualism and install collectivism.  Absolutely the opposite of what has made our country so great and wonderful.

Sorry Wally, Not having MSM connections (T.V. or Subscriptions) I go from travel observations and communication with people from around the Globe.
Since Richard Nixon took the U.S. off the Gold Standard to Clintons repeal of the Glass-Stegal Act, Everything that made the U.S. a Strong/Stable Nation has been systemetically destroyed.

The first thing congress should have considered—at some length—is what would be the worst-case scenario if the federal government simply did nothing.

Wouldn’t that force the banks, etc. holding bad debts to sell off those debts at their current (i.e., realistic) value?

They talk about all the homes in foreclosure, or nearly so. Did anyone hold a gun to the buyers’ heads and force them to pay more for a house than its genuine value, and enter into a mortgage agreement that is either open-ended in terms of interest rates, or puts them so far in debt that the first unexpected event upsets their ability to pay? I think not.

There’s a couple down the street from me who paid $100K more for their house than any had fetched in the past. $275 in a neighborhood of $150K sales. If they go belly-up, why should it be my responsibility—as one who has been there 35 years and owns his property outright—to help them?

Another myth is that “businesses need easily available credit for inventory and operating expenses.” If you are running a business and need to borrow money for operating expenses and salaries, you are operating in the red, and need either to fix that problem or go out of business. If you are borrowing money from a bank to buy inventory, something is wrong. There is virtually no product-based business in which retail sellers do not get a line of credit from their suppliers. If those suppliers are operating on credit rather than cash, that’s a failure in THEIR business plans. The only reason a business ought to need borrowed money is for start-up expenses, expansion or rebuilding after a catastrophe.

The automobile companies have been selling vehicles with below-market-rate financing for years now. They are borrowing the money from banks and lending it at a loss, in order to prop up the price of their vehicles. Only in recent months have we seen vehicles offered at considerably less than “MSRP,” which is an invented number. GM has recently advertised trucks for about 30% less than MSRP. They should either be building them less expensively or taking a smaller markup in the first place.

And here again, as a person who drives a 10-year-old truck and a 12-year-old minivan (both purchased for spot cash), what responsibility do I bear to prop up the auto business? Especially when they charge outrageous prices for repair parts…like $425 for a turn signal (excuse me, “multifunction”) switch, or $300 for the door-jamb switch that turns on the interior lights?

The government has encouraged more than a generation of people to spend, and spend on credit rather than save, and now the pigeons are coming home to roost. If I had family members who were caught in this fix, I might have responsibility to help them, but even that would not be without limitations or consequences.

A “bail-out” or “buy-in” is only perpetuating the problem, and can only be paid-for by printing more worthless paper money.

A complete, thorough and serious investigation should be made of every member of these companies and ever member of Congress to convict every one of them who played any part in allowing this travesty in the first place to happen.

I still think that if there was a third choice when we go to vote, the problem would go away almost immediately.  1) Democrat, 2) Republican, and 3) None of the Above.  So many would vote the third choice to clean out the good ol’ boys, that we might not have a representative for a two year period, but we wouldn’t have them there to spend our money, while they take money they scammed from people that support things bad for the taxpayers, and hey, we wouldn’t have to pay their salaries for that two year period.  Just a thought. lol

The bill is failing in the House, 207-226 with the time run down to zero.  I hear they’re keeping the vote open to attempt to get the 10 more votes to pass it.

It needs to fail.

I have to SAY PLEASE THINK! ! ! Our Govt. should NEVER bail out ANY private owned business that knowingly made bad businnes moves time and again with no care to if they failed—because they were backed by govt money (taxpayers)AND NOW THE SAME CRIMINALS WHO MADE IT POSSIBLE TO HAPPEN—-Is Washington all on crack??? They are letting the same ones write the fix on this—Who is REALLY the dumbasses—us the taxpayer because it seems OK to watch the same group of criminals put their hands all over this too. Or the criminals who think we are just a little upset and this election will side tack our simple minds and then they will be able to get this thur. Why are all of these people standing in front of T.V. crews all afternoon long and I never saw one set of handcuff on any of these people—instead they are telling TAXPAYERS what we need to let them get done—no matter what- OTHERWISE-the only thing that can happen is a DEPRESSION that will be worse than the 1929 one—we tried to warn you. OH but not till we had milked dry every single way to ward it off sooner. Imagin that.

Absolutely right, Marsha!  There has to be some serious repair done but those who created the mess – starting with Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Barack Obama, and others who contributed to the coverup of the fraud and praised Raines and Johnson’s management of Fannie and Freddie, should be out of Congress. 

It is a real travesty that Barney Frank is setting himself up as a spokesman after he has been shown on camera lying about those institutions being in great shape.  Nancy Pelosi must have a lot of stock in the banks they want to bail out too. 

No wonder the Democrat Congress has the lowest ratings ever.  They are a total embarrassment to this country and they need to be thrown out of office.

First things first: IF popular outrage cannot stop this juggernaut, then people need to start thinking in terms of how to disable it once the legislation is passed. I doubt seriously these dolts in congress have left any kind of escape clause, if their solution happens to fail miserably. So it will be up to some taxpayers to start litigation almost immediately after the bill is signed. (And face it, you KNOW some form of it will pass and be signed into law.)

As for identifying and prosecuting the culprits, I am all for this, at every level up and down the line. They should not only be prosecuted, but their punishment should include restitution rather than jail time. (No point in spending more money to feed and house them.)

But the prosecution can be done at leisure. What voters need to know right now is the span of the statute of limitations on this kind of crime (fraud, malfeasance, etcetera).

The trouble is in letting the criminals write the bill to cover up their deeds.

Also, the bill does nothing toward addressing the cause of the bank failures – the Congressional mandates to the banks (thanks to Bill Clinton) to make loans to people without the means to repay them.  As long as the “mark to market” laws are there they can continue to make these loans under pressure by Obama’s ACORN groups.

Banks have to be allowed to go back to making mortgage loans to people who can prove their ability to repay, with a decent downpayment and work history.

“Banks have to be allowed to go back to making mortgage loans to people who can prove their ability to repay, with a decent downpayment and work history.”
Wysiwyg, Pecisely the point I grew up with in a small town where the Bank still operates on that Principle & Principal. So it is not a matter of being allowed to operate that way… it is a matter of being allowed to operate outside of that Basic Principle. I.E. Deregulation as it has occurred since the Nixon days, by Both Parties. Seems you have not understood the metaphores I use… an thats O.K. Basic Values is what’s important and Neither the Bush Gang nor the Pelosi Mob have any.
Did you not love it when Ron Paul asked where in The Constitution the ‘Bail Out’ clause was?
A Ron Paul write-in.

Here’s an explaination of today,spoken 12 years ago.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6439567275949909333

Ron Paul is absolutely right about this and so very much more.

Still I see people talking that it is the Democrats fault.

Funny this President was able to use his considerable pulpit power and minions to get us into a war where no reason existed.

He has used his considerable power to protect illegal aliens and make sure they get cared for – even to buying houses.

Why couldn’t he have used those powers to let the people know the problems.

How many of you did not know this was happening years ago?  How many didn’t see this coming?

I agree with WYSIWYG.  These Dems KNEW about this fiasco and now they want US to bail them out.  NO WAY.  This Democrat can see that Obama is a Socialist, along with his buddies in Congress.  I have a major email list that I frequently send out.  99% of them are against the bailout.  I have to agree.  I like our free enterprise and don’t want to see socialism.  Our Constitution never wanted the government to own banks and businesses.  Once they do own them, kiss whatever you have GOODBYE!  You won’t be allowed to keep it eventually.

Ron Paul had dozens of great ideas, but he fell flat on others.  An isolationist will never be able to lead this country.

President Bush used his bully pulpit when he was pressured to by both parties – Remember that Bill Clinton authored the national policy to remove Saddam in 1998, and many leading Democrats were on record supporting his removal from power before Bush was even elected.  He had majority support in both houses.

I agree that his biggest mistake was in allowing illegal immigration, and that is a black mark on John McCain’s record as well.  The trouble here is that Barack Obama will be far worse on both counts.

Neither Bush nor McCain come out as shouting to the people like FDR used to when there is a serious problem.  They speak softly and with respect to their colleagues on both sides, hoping to get the same kind of treatment.  That got Bush nowhere, and it looks like McCain is going to be treated the same way. 

The press is all on the Democrats’ side (90% of the media is Democrat), so “Mr. Nice Guy” gets no press.  Only negative episodes are revealed, and if McCain gets the stones to stand up to Congress he will be portrayed as losing his temper, being senile and out of control.

Ron Paul is not an isolationist – that is fear talk.  That is media, and run of the mill politicians being afraid the people of this country will actually stop and take a look at what is happening in this country.

Isolationist is a buzzword – let’s stop allowing the media to put words into our heads and think for ourselves.

He simply said let’s put this country first in defense and trade.  That’s no isolationist – that’s common sense – that survival. That’s what each and every politician should do and what every citizens should want done.

You know the fact is, those who follow the media lead in finding fault with Ron Paul’s ideas, need to look at what they have been following politically all these years and where it has gotten us.

We cannot continue to support these same corrupt politicians – because it’s ‘my party’ – and expect to get different results.

This President knew there was a problem – heck 99% of the people in this country saw there was a problem.

  Why did he need to be ‘pressured’ to do what was right?

Just because Pres. Clinton also used Saddam as a bogeyman to misdirect our attention doesn’t mean that he was right.

Funny Clinton couldn’t do anything right according to the supporters of this PResident, yet they constantly bring him out as validation for this war????

No McCain won’t be any better on illegal immigration.  Remember he wrote the last amnesty bill.

Let’s get a grip and stop thinking in terms of party – for goodness sakes and realize they are all destroying this country.

Most of the discussion of any subject is based on ‘the democrats did so and so’ or ‘the republicans did so and so’. Very little discussion about the problem and what should be done.  That’s kinda frightening that we can only see the problems in the country through the lens of party politics.  The only solutions offered are usually ‘vote democrat’ or ‘vote republican’.

Don’t we have minds of our own?

Ron Paul is a Non-interventionist, quite different from an Isolationist. The Saddam removal issue came from Project New American Century cir. 1997 in a letter to Clinton.

We need a “WORK OUT “NOT A BAIL OUT” SEND THESE KEY WORDS TO ALL YOUR CONGRESS MEN AND WOMEN

“Real men and Real Women love Sarah”

magmaman: Every last homeowner who has lost a house in foreclosure had the opportunity to go to the bank and renegotiate terms of the mortgage.

There is no law compelling a bank to accept a work-out, but considering the fact that a lender NEVER profits from a foreclosure, they are well motivated to do so.

One problem is that most homeowners who get behind on the mortgage are deep in denial that there’s a problem: to a person, they think “something” will save them, but they don’t see themselves responsible for creating that “something.”

I have had tenants (more than once) who did the same thing. Among all of them, only one woman had the courage to propose a deal when she was short on cash, and she always made good on her promises. She managed to pull herself up from being a single mother on welfare to getting a college degree and a teaching certification.

The last property I owned was an office building, which was losing over $1,000 a month because of vacancy and bad-tenant losses. Most people would have let it go to foreclosure. Instead, I approached the bank and worked out a reduced payment deal for six months, during which time I found a buyer for the place. As a result, I sold the property at no loss, other than the operating losses over the two years prior to sale.

There are times when you have to take your lumps, financially. Asking the government (i.e., all your neighbors, includng the ones who don’t like you) is as cowardly as going to Mommy and Daddy for help, when you are forty years old.

Are we allowed to post links to videos?

I think that anyone who looks toward any of the two major Party’s to get us out of the various messes we are in is suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome.

Like it or not, the only chance we have is the rise of a Third Party that is run by Constitutionalists such as Ron Paul and Chuck Baldwin.

pizcaj – I hope you are not expecting any disagreement from this group on that point.

There is a lot of talk about how a vote for Baldwin or Bob Barr is effectively a vote for Obama. I think that people need to quit voting for bad choices, and unless there is either a sizable under-vote for President, or a few million popular votes cast for Baldwin or Barr (or even McKinney or Nader), things will continue along the current course.

Either way we are going to have a bad time.

Maybe if enough of us vote third party – next time around we can show others it just might be the right answer.

Here is a link, I hope will lay to rest the idea that the Democrats are totally responsible for the mortgage problems.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLUbb2DUYGk

Just watch and listen to this President’s speeches.

Blogger1947
You’re my hero! We need people like you to go Washington and join forces with men like Ron Paul, Gingrich and Huckabee.

” I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up money aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power(of money) should be taken from the banks, and restored to Congress and to the people, to whom it belongs.”

                  -Thomas Jefferson

Unfortuntely, the news media dropped a few names on Ron Paul, and repeated constantly the idea that he couldn’t win, and the people bought it.

The media worked equally as hard to silence Ron Paul as they have to put Obama in the WH.

If Ron Paul had been given an honest chance, the debates in this election wouldn’t be whether Gov. Palin wears too much makeup, has too many children, or goes bear hunting with a switch.

We would have been talking issues – like the looming bail out which may result in a complete collapse of this country’s economy.  We may have seen it coming, had his message been heard.

Peter, I am flattered.

But I suspect my plain-spokenness would never fly in politics, especially in the Democrat-dominated state of Maryland where I live.

In my home county and state, the incumbent politicians have simply stopped answering my emails, or sending form-letter responses.

In any event, it’s a job for a younger man than I, and one with some academic credentials. The media would immediately squelch someone like me, a mostly self-educated person who has been self-employed and not gotten filthy rich, but learned a lot of important lessons along the way.

However, I I promise you this: I will keep squawking from every possible platform until they come and shut me up, forcibly.

We should try ALL other possibilities before we take a huge risk like this.
here are just a few ideas floating around the web from various economists:
Among the steps that the government could undertake are:
* Suspend so-called mark-to-market accounting rules, which during the past year have required financial firms to write down more than $500 billion in losses.
* Give banks the chance to exchange loan notes for notes from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. As a government agency, the FDIC’s notes would be more valuable than the banks’ notes, allowing the banks more flexibility to make loans.
* Extend limits on short sales of financial sector stocks.
* Cut the fed funds rate – the Federal Reserve’s target for short-term lending – perhaps all the way to zero, or in coordination with rate cuts by other central banks around the globe.

There ARE other options.
Democrats- remember- the EVIL G.W. supports this!
Republicans- remember the democrats supporting this bill got us into this mess!!
Just follow you talking points- they are all guilty.  Tell them you have HAD IT!!!

Ladytexan, Funny how in the 70’s & 80’s a Veteran couldn’t find a lending institution or be directed by the V.A. as to where a loan could be obtained. Then all of a sudden 100% home loans were everwhere…… to anyone who wanted one, under the guise of what I call ‘Creative’ financing… sorry I’ll pass on that. So save & save until a regular conventional loan was obtainable and even them they demanded a ‘Letter of Intent’ that my wife would find ‘employment’ before it would be approved. So quite frankly I could care less about those who bought into this Scam regardless of race/ethnic nonsense. I just refuse to allow it to be yet another burden of Economic Endenturment that will be passed on to Future Generations to carry.
Check out these videos ( one is a repeat listing)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6439567275949909333
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3948313477993412658
This Nation was founded on the Principle of a Constitutional Republic regardless of what the ‘New Speak’ of today is.

Blogger1947,

“pizcaj – I hope you are not expecting any disagreement from this group on that point. wink”

Actually, I wonder how many on this forum supported Paul during the primaries last spring, compared to how many on this forum had supported the mainstream Republican candidates.

Fred,

I do remember.

We have owned several homes, and never used anything but conventional loans. 

It wasn’t easy to save the money, and we bought our first home in 1968/69 and they wouldn’t consider my income as I was ‘only a secretary and not a professional’.

Of course, we have never bought expensive homes.
We bought homes and made them more valuable.

Our daughter and SIL are looking at houses in the NE. My heart skips a beat when I see the prices on these houses.

They wisely decided to put off getting into a house until they see how things are going to settle.

Thanks for the links, I will watch them later and comment.

ladytexan,

And it just wasn’t the MSM that marginalized Ron Paul, it was also the so-called ‘right-wing talk show hosts’ such as Hannity, Bob Grant, and even Michael Savage who would bring up the word ‘Kook’ when Paul was brought up in discussion.
I don’t know what Limbaugh had to say about him.

As far as the ‘piling on’ of Governor Palin by the media and shows like SNL, that can be summed up in one word…ABORTION.

pizcaj – To a certain degree Limbaugh, Hannity and Michael Savage have become co-opted into the MSM. Limbaugh can be counted upon to parrot the Republican talking points, come what may.

I think you need to get away from these highly syndicated talkers to the lesser known ones such as Ron Smith (WBAL, Baltimore), Chip Franklin (San Diego) and Brian Wilson (NOT the Beach Boys singer) before you get consistently libertarian views.

Fox, of course, put the last nail in Dr. Paul’s coffin when they excluded him from the debates.

I believe that even candidates who don’t stand a snowball’s chance in Hell of getting elected must be heard in the primaries. Once in a while, these people have good, if not great ideas that the “electable” candidates ought to hear. I don’t think Obama (for example) has done much other than preach to the people who were already predisposed to support him.

To address your #32, I supported Ron Paul unabashedly from the moment I heard him propose disbanding the BATFE and reducing the powers of other extra-constitutional government agencies.

He is the only candidate in some time to have talked specifics about reducing the size and power of governments.

pizcaj,

I think you are right about abortion being the most important point. I know it is with the feminist who attacked her so viciously.

It’s been a while since I listened to any talk shows, and I don’t know Bob Grant, but I consider them part of the media – at least those and Limbaugh as well.

I was a big fan of Limbaugh when the Clintons were in office because I thought at last someone was saying things that needed saying.  My brother kept telling me not to get to carried away as he was just a Republican mouthpiece.

I also have supported Ron Paul from the get go.
Getting his message out was the most important thing to me.

Everyone talked as if he was spouting something foreign (perhaps to them he was).  To me, he was talking the way Republicans used to talk when I was young.

It looked to me as if everyone worked to keep Ron Paul from being heard.  That lets me know he was saying something really important.  The media, all of them, did their job well.

Blogger1947,

Oh, believe me, I’ve been onto the Hannity and Limbaugh type of Republican-appeasing talk show hosts for years now.
Ever since they jumped on board the NAFTA bandwagon during the early 90’s with Clinton, my eyes were opened and I haven’t taken them seriously since.
Could you imagine their condemnation and outrage if a President Gore or a President Kerry got us into Iraq and then mishandled it identically as Bush did?…in fact, used political correctness the way Bush had in conducting the ‘war on terror’?

I only bring up ‘right wing talk radio’ to show that it’s not only the MSM that marginalized Ron Paul, but also these group of hypocrites who wrap themselves in the American flag and claim their admiration for the Constitution.

Michael Savage, though, is a curious one. Unlike the other hosts, he has consistently and justifiably hammered Bush and the Republicans for years, to the point where even Fox News pretends he doesn’t exist, even though he’s something like #3 in the national ratings. And yet, he has little regard for Paul.

I’m glad to hear that you and ladytexan supported Ron Paul during the primaries.

Limbaugh and some of his ilk like to think they are the “alternative media,” but all you need do is take notice of the fact that so many of them share the same sponsors, e.g. eHarmony, Sleep Number Beds, Roger whatzisname (the mortgage expert), various debt-reduction schemes, various work-from-home schemes. These talkers are a little cartel—perhaps without realizing it—who think they alone shape opinion that is other than the left/liberal orthodoxy.

Libertarianism (with a lower-case “L”) is too complex a concept for most of these birds, and Michael Medved (I believe) calls them “loser-tarians.”

The conservatives and neocons are just as mired in their admiration for government authority as the Democrat party, differing only in the issues they latch onto. For example, Medved and Brent Bozell would like the government to censor sexually salacious entertainment. But they do not understand that to give government that power also gives it the power to censor religious expression. I spent over a year hammering at Bozell on this point, and never got a response from him.

Genuine libertarians are usually considered dangerous by both left and right. As we ought to be.

Blogger1947 - 

[“For example, Medved and Brent Bozell would like the government to censor sexually salacious entertainment. But they do not understand that to give government that power also gives it the power to censor religious expression.”]

I would probably agree with Medved and Bozell on this matter. The government already has the power to prevent people in public from stripping naked in public places and acting in a sexually salacious manner, so I don’t think there would be any danger of same being banned from the public airwaves such as TV; even cable TV and the Internet.
My fear is the further coarsening of society and of our youth becoming jaded from such exposure. I thought that the more restricted level of exposure of what was being shown on TV 30, 40, 50 years ago was just fine. Any desired salacious entertainment could be obtained by renting or buying it.

I believe in freedom, but with certain limitations, so as not to get to close to a scenario of anarchy.

40 or 50 years ago, when these ‘old fashioned’ rules were in place, I don’t think government was on the brink of censoring religion back then.
As far as today, if our government was decent enough to bring back these rules for the sake of society, then it wouldn’t make any logical sense for them to go after our religions.

piz – you can’t have it both ways, where government censorship is concerned.

I too am gravely offended by the coarsening of our society. But I believe the appropriate action is to confront foul language and the like directly and immediately when it occurs.

The high school kids in my neighborhood know that they will hear from me or my wife if they can be heard behaving lewdly from our front porch or garden. Most of them have taken the message, even if resentfully, that they had better clam up when they are within earshot.  The others will still be reminded, every time. On balance, we speak to all of them cordially and politely. Now, the police in my neighborhood think I am somehow putting myself at risk by doing this, as do some of the local merchants.

I stopped a young kid in the midst of a foul tirade directed at the clerk in a nearby convenience store. He blustered a bit at me, especially at the notion of being corrected, but backed off and left. Next time I was there, the manager had heard about the incident and pleaded with me not to do it again. “What if he had a gun?” was her question. I asked her whether it would be worth living a long life, if the price of longevity were being pushed around by teenaged brats every day. She had no answer.

When I was a kid in the fifties, you did not worry about the government (e.g. police) coming down on you for being foul-mouthed. You worried about being tossed out of and banned from the place you behaved that way, being embarrassed in front of your friends, and having your parents learn what had happened. It’s only when the government got itself into the business of acting in loco parentis that things began to get as bad as they’ve become.

Stand up for yourself!

Blogger1947,

I’m well aware of the importance of standing up for one’s self.

In fact, last year I had to confront some teenagers who started hanging out at the side of our 8-unit condo building and were tampering with the condenser units, hitting the side of our building with baseball bats, and generally acting rowdy. After refusing my demand that they hangout elsewhere, I went back into my unit and called the police. They left when they saw the squad car approaching, and then I spent about 20 minutes in the back seat of the police car to give the officer a description.
A few weeks later, same scenario…teens acting rowdy/destructive, me calling cops, them leaving, etc.
Finally, a neighbor downstairs happened to see the teens hanging out late one night and told me how they left when he threatened to call the police. After I told him my story, he suggested we go to speak to the police sergeant downtown. We did, the sergeant was very receptive, and told us he’d take care of the situation, and we’ve never had any problems since.
That neighbor and myself were the only two unit owners, out of the eight in our building, who did anything about this problem.

It’s good that people like you and me, Blogger, take action when harassed, however, it always doesn’t work. We were both lucky in our particular situations.

Also, I feel that we shouldn’t have to live in a type of deteriorating society where decent people have to take on a “I’ll die if I have to” philosophy (similar to your convenience store scenario), when it shouldn’t be necessary to have to think like that in the first place.

My parents and older relatives would tell me stories of the ‘cop on the beat’ in New York City during the 40’s and 50’s who would not hesitate in using their night sticks on any punks who hung out late and caused trouble. The streets in those days were very safe to walk around and people kept their doors unlocked at night.

So, I’m very much in favor of bringing back that kind of government intervention, along with non-salacious content broadcasting over the public airwaves and the Internet.

I can’t argue that things seemed easier when the police were around rattling doorknobs, and knew everyone who belonged in a neighborhood, and rousted those who didn’t.

Our neighborhood cops can’t even control speeding on the residential streets (50 to 70 mph on my 25 foot wide street is not uncommon). The ones who know that we confront the kids tell us we should call them, that it’s dangerous for us to do that.

But a couple of years ago, they were zero help when a guy flashed a gun at me in front of the house. (He was taking a whiz in the middle of the street, BTW.)

I was an un-athletic, bookish kid who was always harrassed but never allowed myself to be intimidated. Damn if I am changing my ways now that I’m a senior citizen.

Blogger1947,

Boy oh boy!

Sounds like you would have made a great ‘cop on the beat’ back in the day. (wink)

I probably would have, since I seem be more aware of what’s around me than many people.

In hindsight, I’d have made a good soldier too. But my army service (1969-71) was quite undistinguished (though I have an Honorable Discharge). It was only in middle age that I learned where my strengths lie.

Advocate – I can parse nothing sensible out of the words you have posted, and honestly this post looks like comment spam, in view of the two links you have provided.

FWIW, both presidential candidates voted for the recent bailout bill, as did Sen. Biden. And among the three of them, none had the decency or honesty to reveal the 700 billion that congress had previously pumped into Wall Street.

From where I sit, it looks like all the big-money guys will come out OK, and the “hurt” will be spread between the foolish who borrowed what they couldn’t afford, and those of us who have lived a financially prudent life.

Funny, how the evening newscasts talk about a “credit crunch,” yet my snail mail box receives five or six loan offers per week, of one form or another. I have lost track of the dozens that come daily by email, because they are filtered and discarded unread.

Blogger,

I don’t think there is a ‘credit crunch’.  The same lenders are still doing advertising on the net, billboards, etc.

Ladytexan—

#45 was in response to a post that was deleted because it was “comment spam.” (It was almost incomprehensible, but contained two links to some money-lending site.)

I agree: if there is a shortage of credit availability, I have not seen evidence of it.

On the other hand, if the commercial banks want to quit lending money to GM so that it can operate at a loss, that’s just good business. And that is apparently why GM recently appealed to congress for a TEN BILLION dollar loan.

Blogger1947 –

Thanks for the explanation.

We don’t have TV, but have been on the road a lot lately and I am seeing billboards advertising by these same lenders who were so irresponsible as well as pop ups on the ‘puter.

From what I read – every corporation in the country – and some foreign ones are in Washington lobbying for some of our great granchildren’s future earnings.

I’m sure the congresscritters knew that was coming and probably had everything in place to be ready to ‘listen’ to whatever they had to offer.