My Tea Party Starts at 3:00pm

Or a new twist on Godwin's Law... ;-)

--
Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA

idea.

Ah but they do have house Representitives, just not Senator(s). .

over

;-D

doing

What a peculuar eligibility comment. I have known whites that were receiving welfare. Race does not seem to be a qualification, just poverty. .

Singular, not plural. That number is reasonable, given the population of the District versus the size of the mean Congressional apportionment from the 2000 Census.

However, it's a non-voting position.

--
Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA

If you redefine words. I feel free to do it too.

Deficit spending in a blueberry pie. Diluting the currency is toast and tea.

Back to the right definitions. Diluting the currency leads to inflation because you end up with an increased money supply. Right now the problem is that we have a sharply decreasing money supply.

d

We still have a choice between doing what we are doing about it or letting the economy go completely in the tank.

nonsense! The total of all the subprime borrowers is only 168 Billion dollars. If the sub primes was the real problem 168 Billion would have fixed it and we wouldn't have this mess.

You have bought into the story that puts the fault squarely where it isn't. Notice that far more money has gone missing than the total of all of the subprime loans. This should tell you something about the real case.

You're right, "sub-prime" has a more specific connotation than I intended. "Sub-par borrowers" would've been more accurate.

They're the ones who re-fi'd, squandered the money, and are getting off scot-free. The bankers and other poikilotherms just skimmed a few percent, while the borrowers got the principal.

I haven't bought into a story, I did the math. (Order-of-magnitude estimation, since actual honest numbers aren't available.) If I erred, t'was my own mistake.

Without necessarily accepting your number, even $168 billion x 25:1 leverage = $4.2T. About half that was bogus, bubble-making wealth, and subject to bubble-burst collapse, which is more than enough to knock over a few dominoes. In fact, the effects of a -$2.1T impulse would account for just about all the fallen dominoes, wouldn't it?

Cheers, James Arthur

"Life is like a sewer- what you get out of it depends on what you put into it." -- Tom Lehrer

I'd add, "And the scum always floats to the top."

Cheers! Rich

n

Do you have a number for how many dollars this is? I doubt that the total loss is anywhere near the 168 Billion total of all of the sub primes. Remember that many of the subprimes are still performing loans.

The leveraging means that the mortgages isn't most of the losses. Most of the losses is in the whole credit default swaps and tranches market. This is a market that really had little to do with the underlying security it was a classic bubble. It could have been tulip bulbs for all it mattered.

$2.1T is most likely way on the low side for all of the money that has disappeared out of the world's economy. The number I have heard for the total amount of "Bob borrowed $10 from Bill, Bill borrowed $10 from John, John borrowed $10 from Bob" paper wealth that leads in a circle is $1000 T. I expect that unwinding it all without losing

0.21% is not going to happen. The current decrease in money supply is because a lot of it is needed to do the unwinding.

Over about the last 40 years, the firewalls that prevented this sort of thing have been one by one removed. Some new ones will have to be put in place.

48% of subprimes are in foreclosure or default, last I heard reported (3/5/09).

I don't have a current figure for Alt-A assets.

Figures for these and Alt-A loans are scarce--no one wants to admit their exposure, and the Administration doesn't seem to want us to know--it appears to be actively suppressing the information.

Expect much more--you get free Obama bonusbux if you default and nada if you don't.

Subsidize defaults, and that's what you'll get.

Cheers, James Arthur

Really? I thought that they were all losing their houses? It seems to me that the people making the money are the mortgage vendors, who're getting paid out despite all the foreclosures.

--
    W
  . | ,. w ,   "Some people are alive only because
   \\|/  \\|/     it is illegal to kill them."    Perna condita delenda est
---^----^---------------------------------------------------------------

ld

Yes, the comparatively wealthy are the ones who are actually getting the bulk of the money. A few of the ones near the bottom got housing for a mortgage payment less than the rent they would otherwise have paid. Some people are claiming outrage that the poor gained anything at all out of the mess in hopes of distracting from the real cause of the problem.

The US is going through a series of bubble economies. From the 1930s to the 1980s, was a pause in the bubble and bust cycle. If you look back before the 1930s you see a string of bubble and bust economies. In the 1930s, a bunch of regulations were put in place that damped the effect. In the 1980s through today, the regulations were removed. There was also a clamping effect from the way that the tax code worked. When your income went up past what today would be about 3 million per year, you hit a sharp increase in taxes. This worked like having an amplifier in the system where the gain decreased suddenly at one point. This had the obvious effect on the unstable system.

I've read the real estate records for hundreds and hundreds of foreclosures.

The usual story is: the owners bought in. As prices rose, they re-fi'd every penny of bubble equity out on the way up--often several times. Then they split,leaving the bank holding the (empty) bag.

So yes, the borrowers got the money.

Even if the borrowers lose "their" house, a large portion have gotten to live in nice houses they couldn't afford for years, for less than they'd pay in rent. Then they bail, with no enforcement, and typically with some re-fi money in their pocket.

And the last, newest scenario is: the bank writes down their mortgage, and Obama makes the bank whole with your money.

Cheers, James Arthur

"JosephKK"

idea.

Didn't the SC overturn the gun controls just last year? .

Liberals only listen to the Supreme Court when it agrees with them.

A pause in the bubble-burst cycle? We've been having panics, bubbles, and recessions right along, just like we always have.

Panic of 1873 1873?1879

Long Depression 1873?1896

Panic of 1893 1893?1896

Panic of 1907 1907?1908

Post-World War I recession 1918?1921

Great Depression 1929?1939

Recession of 1953 1953?1954

Recession of 1957 1957?1958

Recession of 1960-1 1960?1961

1973 oil crisis 1973?1974 stock market crash 1973?1975

Early 1980s recession 1980?1982

Stock market crash of 1987

Friday the 13th Crash October 13, 1989

Early 1990s recession 1990?1991

Early 2000s recession Mar-Nov 2001

Cheers, James Arthur

Note the word "panic" for how serious and sudden like a bubble bursting.

Note the word "panic"

Note the word "panic"

Note that this was just a recession this time.

This started as a "panic"

Not "panic"

Not "panic"

Not "panic" nature here

I'll take your point on this one

This is the "oil crisis" again

Not a "panic" here

This was the "panic" sort again.

e

tax (t²ks) n. 1. A contribution for the support of a government required of persons, groups, or businesses within the domain of that government.

1. A fee or dues levied on the members of an organization to meet its expenses. 3. *A burdensome or excessive demand; a strain.*

At bottom, Mr. Obama's message was that he was giving us free money. He cited--as his proof--a "tax cut." In fact, he's borrowing and spending far more, in our name, which we'll have to repay.

He hasn't cut taxes, only borrowed and spent even more; he's put off paying them 'til later. More government-sponsored bubbles. It'll fool his fans, but it's not honest.

James Arthur

Welcome to Troy 2009:

Cheers! Rich

Nice.

Here's another (Warning: put down the food first):

Cheers, James Arthur