OT: Sad Days for America and the World- Four More Years of Hell

I don't even have a mortgage for the house that I own or a loan for the car that I paid cash. I do have one small credit card (I hate those things), and like you, typically use a debit card.

Even with almost no real debt, it is still painful to pay the various utility bills -- because I only have about 80-90% of my paycheck left after all of my normal bills :-). Well, my homeowners association did an evil deed to me (well, all of us), so I have a temporary extra assessment that I have to pay for another month, but even then I have about 75% of my paycheck left after all bills.

Many/most of my co-workers (engineers) do live a low debt life, but alot of others seem to live a higher debt life. I truly hate debt, because in the past, with past debt, it seemed like I lost alot of freedom. So, it seems like there is probably a bimodal distribution of debt here in the US.

John

John Larkin wrote:

No- I cannot stand listening to that drawling brainless garbage for more than a millisecond.

Bush is a void- he believes nothing, he understands nothing, he knows nothing, he is nothing, just another ape with a title.

Okay - well here's the deal- your retard has "broken" his main substitute for a penis, otherwise known as the US Army. This fiction about a light, agile, high tech Army does not work when it comes to old fashioned occupation of a large land area inhabited by millions of heavily armed bitter enemies hell bent on destroying you at any cost. If you pay attention to little things like the statistic that support: combat ratio is running 4:1, then you would realize that the insurgent: US combat strength may be pushing 10:1. The situation is clearly becoming one where the full time job of the occupation forces is protecting themselves while providing very little security for the majority of the population. Nearly 500 high level Iraqi government officials have been assassinated in just the past four months, and untold thousands of apostates, collaborators, and/or what-have-you's have been executed. Now you were saying something about power? It doesn't look like the resistance fighters in Iraq are all that impressed with your idea of power. I've noticed that Iran is not folding especially fast in response to Bush's blowhard innuendo either. Bush's speech was an atrocious pile of evangelical crap. If he's so sold on democracy, then I challenge him to enforce it in Pakistan- not too convenient that one- would soon become a nuclear armed Islamic state with missiles pointed at the US- remember, the latest Pew poll conducted there showed that Bin Laden was #1 in their view, that the insurgency in Iraq was justified, and that the US invasion there was a blatant oil grab.

Nah=- you've got that wrong. What's going to happen is we herd all you Bush freaks into dumps like Wyoming and call it Jesusland- a new independent country of delusional idiots.

Not at all- the various analogies drawn by Bush have been trashed by history scholars every time. As an example, the retard keeps calling up the reconstruction of post WWII Europe as model for Iraq- this is not even close, the most similar historical analogy is Napolean's occupation of Spain and southern Italy the scholars say- actually the origin of the very word guerilla arose from that Spanish resistance- both occupations were failures.

We don't believe in throwing the whole world into chaos on the basis of a mindless faith with no grounding in reality- this loop is open, no feedback, and a failure. Bush is an un-American traitor to his country, the invasion of Iraq was an egregious personal vendetta against Saddam Hussein, and for this he will burn in hell for eternity. If you don't believe that then you are a dupe.

Not really- from the various critiques, that particular line is well-known evangelical speak.

I still cry daily over a mass murdering dicatator and criminal being removed from mistakes over WMD's. I can hardly sleep.

It's like saying "Isn't it a shame how that child-molesterer/rapist/axe murderer escaped from jail and gained his freedom and was shortly therafter struck and killed by a comet."

Ya know if the dollar keeps dropping along with interest rates being so low, why have not all banks gone belly up?

If you read these peoples posts four years ago, they say the same tired stuff.

Hope another democrat can save us. Just like Carter did. Or they can step in and take credit for Reagan's work that stimulate the best economy of modern times.

What will the dollar be worth? Dunno. Ask your liberal buddies here trying to raise the minimum wage and believing that raises the standard of living.

Really? I thought a mortgage was what you got after a divorce to again pay off the house you paid off when you were married.

I don't know the %, but I know a LOT of people with a net negative value. I know alot of peole with $100,000 mortgages and no savings.

Unfortunately, after my divorce and rebuying my house, cars and company, I am close to being one. But that is temporary. Others live and die and have nothing left.

I read in sci.electronics.design that John Larkin wrote (in ) about 'OT: Sad Days for America and the World- Four More Years of Hell', on Fri, 21 Jan 2005:

He's a Marxist????? (;-)

A $100,000 mortgage and no savings does NOT mean negative net worth unless the equity in whatever it the mortgage is a lien against (usually a house or condo) is less than the remaining mortgage value.

Eg. $100,000 mortgage, $5,000 in CC debt, $1,000 in savings, house worth $200,000 => net worth of + $96,000 (equity in home of $100K).

Yes, take heart. Statistically, men in your situation are much better off a few years down the road. You'll probably do better than average.

Or little, but they don't generally owe. If nothing else, the lending institutions see to that. They want to be able to dump illiquid stuff like real estate or a business quickly, pay all the fees, and still not lose money. And the gov't generally gets first dibs.

But you can have positive net worth and still go bankrupt- just because you have assets worth more than liabilities doesn't mean you have enough income to service the short term payments.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

This is for real... In the late '60's an engineer friend at Motorola Mesa went into the credit union and took out a "home improvement loan"

Went home, gave the money to his wife, and told her to get out ;-)

...Jim Thompson

Internationalization means that, if goods and services flow freely around the world, prices and wages will over time become more uniform. So the US and Europe can expect some reduction of living standards and the rest of the world can expect, by their standards, huge improvements, leading eventually to more education and more democracy. That doesn't sound bad to me, a little less stuff for us and a lot better life for billions of them. Most of us have too much stuff already.

Our historical "otherness" (ie, whiteness), our special position at the top of the heap, will diminish. I suspect that W and Condi understand this.

John

The latest scandal is Europe forcing the Thais to buy a bunch of the new big Airbus monsters, on penalty of increased duties on Thai fish.

John

That's silly. The world's most repressive regimes have been Nazi Germany, the USSR, China, Cambodia, and North Korea, places that kill you if they suspect that you're *thinking* wrong.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates are free and open societies compared to the above.

The ultimate measure of freedom is: are you allowed to leave?

Dang, why am I not surprised?

John

Oh yeah? You and what Army?

John

Hmm. A friend of mine builds racecar engines. Very nice and smart guy. Got 5 kids, wife stays home, barely makes ends meet - you know the type. Struggling, honest, working-class citizen, like so many Americans. Because of Bush's overseas tax incentives, he's lost two jobs in a row - and he STILL votes RepubliKan! It seems like so many white-collar workers are devout republican anymore. WHY?!?! Do they not understand that they are hurting themselves by voting for the anti-working class party? Where did Democrats get the bad wrap? Is it really "the biggest liar" or "best smack-talk wins?" What would drive a worker to be so blind?

I lost my job to Bush's tax incentives also - the company found it cheaper to move to Canada (not that there is anything wrong with Canadiens, eh, but they would be pissed if a bunch of their jobs suddenly packed up and moved to the US.) Ask me again what I think of Bush!

-- "Theoretically speaking... if a vehicle's mass were reduced to zero and its speed increased to twice the speed of light, would time outside the vehicle appear to run backwards at 1x speed?" MCJ 200405

Sounds like Church-Speak!

"Yes Father Dubya, 100 holy marys and the world will be perfect..."

In fact, it's the whole thing with religion in the middle east which is causing the problem. It has always caused problems - it's the cause of all problems over there. Ever since man first came there they have fought, and anyone who thinks they can make them stop in one lifetime is a fool. It is in their blood; ingrained in their past; part of who they are. It's a nation teeming with natural-born terrorists! Ever ask yourself why the innocent people of that area don't leave? Bombs and bullets and death every day - why stay unless you're completely accustomed to it?

I wish someone would find a few "dead sea scrolls" (or something) which proved once-and-for-all that Jesus was born on Native American soil and had NOTHING to do with the middle east whatsoever. Then we could disassociate ourselves with all the warring factions over there forever. Pull out the troops, thank the UK for tolerating us and this insane tirade, and leave the Iraqis to do what they are going to do anyways - kill each other under anarchial rule - but this time, not get caught up in it.

Yes, it might be a noble thing to help liberate a country from an oppressor. But only if the country wants liberated! If they don't want help, why force it on anyone?

Maybe America can't win this one. Maybe America can, at the expense of many more sons and daughters. Then again, maybe it's better not to try since we know the result is going to be the same. Remember Iraq didn't do 9/11 - Osama did. That's another contry altogether, called Afghanistan. Perhaps we've heard of it? Or does it just feel good to have some guns-a-blazin', no matter where they are?

Yep, you're one bad-ass holy-roller, Dubya. I gotta give you credit for being such a master manipulator though. Who would have thought you could be both good and evil at the same time?

-- "We cannot expect to stumble into happiness; it must come from within." MCJ 20050119

Boob, is that a technical term? :)

-- "Usenet Rule No. 2: Never claim, imply, insinuate, appeal, solicit, inquire, or pretend to know something that someone else may not. Typically the other party believes they have superior, exceptional, exclusive, noteworthy, paramount, or remarkable foreknowledge of said topic, and will surely fight to the death to prove you wrong..." MCJ

Yes, a differential equation. One that is difficult to model as weighting the parameters is difficult and most of all, it not repeatable in full. We already are in a recession, since several years. The proposed boom doesn't happen. At lest not here. Rather in the eastern european states, where the wages are low. We're going to devaluate by 20-30% too, I estimate, over whatever timeframe.

Rene