Coming to grips with an altered reality
Maybe you’ve come to grips with it.
Not me. Not yet.
Months into this crisis, I still don’t fully comprehend how things could have changed so profoundly in such a short time, and how much more change has yet to come. The economy has changed, the culture has changed, the future has changed for all of us.
You knew that already. I know it too. But every time I think I get it, something surprises me; something reminds me that I still don’t fully grasp it.
Sometimes it’s a little thing. Last week it was news that thousands of tickets were still available to the ACC basketball tournament in Atlanta, the first time in 46 years the tourney hadn’t sold out beforehand. A weekend earlier, the NASCAR race in Atlanta also had thousands of empty seats. Even the sports industry, long a symbol of societal excess, is undergoing a painful “right-sizing,” to use the term.
But that was nothing compared to the sight of mothers with small children begging for handouts on a downtown Atlanta street, a new sight and something I had never seen outside the Third World.
Of course, some Americans have faced change a lot more directly. People who have lost homes, jobs, careers or retirement savings confront it on a daily basis. Every morning they wake up to an altered reality, and I doubt that even now most of them know what to make of it, or where it will end. All they know is that the world they knew has ended, and with it their place in that world.
Even the TV commercials are jarringly different. Financial institutions that a few months ago extolled the merits of greed and wealth now laud the virtues of security and the simple things in life; car companies brag about gas mileage, not horsepower. The conspicuous consumption that our culture treated as a sign of success seems as outdated as a Nehru collar from the ’60s or leisure suits from the ’70s.
Nationally, most of our leadership acknowledge the severity of the crisis. But you get the sense that many still believe that once we work through this, things can return to normal again.
Normal is gone. A new normal will eventually assert itself, but it’s a long way off. Between here and there lies a lot of chaos, fear and anger.
And naturally, that fear and anger are looking for targets to vent themselves upon. Bernie Madoff, the $65 billion man who pleaded guilty last week, may be the most despised man in the country, displacing even Osama bin Laden. And last week Jon Stewart used CNBC’s investing guru Jim Cramer as the victim in a ritual sacrifice, drawing and quartering Cramer on national TV to the cheers of millions who had been suckered by Wall Street.
Cramer deserved some of that; Madoff deserved all of it and more. But some of the Wall Street types feel they’ve been a bit ill-used.
“When I hear the constant vilification of corporate America, I personally don’t understand it,” says Jamie Dimon, chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase & Co. “I would ask a lot of our folks in government to stop doing it because I think it’s hurting our country.”
On one hand, Dimon has a point. The abuse at Wall Street may indeed be more than they deserve. Then again, they didn’t deserve $100 million bonuses either. But they took them, saying the money was deserved because they were the ones who were responsible. Nobody said life was fair.
So if they’re now taking more abuse than they deserve, well, they were the ones responsible, and life isn’t fair.
We also haven’t come to grips with how this has changed our position in the world. Chinese Premier Wen Jinbao, for example, has publicly questioned his country’s $1 trillion investment in U.S. bonds. “Of course we are concerned about the safety of our assets,” Wen said. “To be honest, I am a little bit worried.”
If Wen’s unhappiness leads him to stop investing here, our economic mess worsens considerably. We have so indebted ourselves to China and others that they now have influence over our national policies.
Again, that’s a hard thing to wrap your head around.
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134 comments Add your comment
Joe Matarotz
March 16th, 2009
6:36 am
Stop vilifying our corporations, you meanies. In the meantime, AIG sees fit to dole out another $165 MILLION in bonuses.
Hye, newsboy, your favorite liberal rag, the NYT, ran an article on the potential bailout backlash. Why not copy of few paragraphs and run them here? You could even add a sentence and pretend it’s an original thought.
Did you ever wonder what would happen if the AJC folded?
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
6:37 am
Yeah, socialism sucks, don’t it?
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
6:57 am
Jay,
I just hope that new norm consists of more statesmen and a lot less politicians. We the people hired these people to do a job and I think that far too many of them have lost track of that.
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
7:06 am
Here’s a little article that may help some folks come to grip with part of our new reality.
Colin
March 16th, 2009
7:09 am
Cramer has been manipulating stock prices for years……..
http://www.deepcapture.com/the-story-of-deep-capture-by-mark-mitchell/
Eric
March 16th, 2009
7:26 am
Good reflection, jay. This is very much where we are in “mindset” right now. Among other things, gas prices are ticking back up to $2/gal., which is also a painful, daily reminder of an altered reality still to come.
A funny thing- while many people are being laid-off from their jobs, those who are still working are experiencing longer hours and greater pressure to perform during these hard times. It seems corporate greed is rampant in all aspects of living – on main street as well as Wall St.
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
7:32 am
Colin March 16th, 2009 7:09 am Cramer has been manipulating stock prices for years……..
Yep, and you libs said nothing about it until he had the audacity to criticize the glorious Oblahmi.
Name one democrat that isn’t a crook, the only distinguishing characteristic left to tell them apart from one another; who has been indicted and which one hasn’t.
ew
DB, Gwinnettian
March 16th, 2009
7:43 am
Normal is gone. A new normal will eventually assert itself, but it’s a long way off. Between here and there lies a lot of chaos, fear and anger.
I can only hope you’re not right about that.
Andy the welcher
March 16th, 2009
7:57 am
Name one republican that isn’t a crook, the only distinguishing characteristic left to tell them apart from one another; who has been indicted and which one hasn’t. And they all welch, like Andy.
ew
G
March 16th, 2009
7:57 am
Jay, you are spot-on.
All of it brought to us compliments of the Rushpublicant party.
Bud Wiser
March 16th, 2009
8:01 am
So what’s so different about “…the sight of mothers with small children begging for handouts on a downtown Atlanta street…? I and my brothers, in town on a visit last week, were accosted by one on a busy street corner.
When she shoved her little one out in front of her, asking for some ’spare change’, I asked her if she intended to use it to buy some more cigarettes similar to the one she was smoking at the time. After cursing at me, she and the little one made their way further down the block to inquire elsewhere, I suppose. Maybe she figured I wasn’t going to be her entitlement daddy for the day.
$160 billion for AIG, @ 6.7 of that going to European banks, and another @ $160 million in bonuses that were ‘contractually required’, more Obama waste. If the Prez had any cajones, he’d simply say that any money going as bonuses and the like, contractually required or not, to companies that accept taxpayer money, would trigger an immediate default of any cash on hand to repay, and no future bailout money – sorry Charlie, you’re on your own now…
And Bernie Madoff, court reports family net worth in the neighborhood of $820 million…that’s a nice neighborhood. Of course all of that money should be seized immediately by the court, and a redistribution (Democrats love that word) to those he defrauded. But it won’t happen, not today, not tomorrow, not ever. Crooks win again.
And what does Obama do? At least he has found a new appointee for the head of the FDA, a person who apparently paid their taxes, at least as far as we know for now. Must not be a democrat.
Ah the change, the smell of change; it sort of reminds you of some of the good old days of the aromas in the air around Pittsburgh or Los Angeles in the 1970’s.
Obama, PLOTUS (President Liar of the United States – …”we will ban ALL earmarks…”) cheats you can believe in, and people we NEED!
Redneck Convert
March 16th, 2009
8:02 am
Well, I don’t see no altered reality. The people that are out of work are just a bunch of shiftless bums. There’s plenty of jobs out there. McDonalds has ads all over the place. When you’re out of work you can’t start out again at the top, like being a beer truck driver. You got to work your way back up. Anyway, that’s the Republican view and that’s the Conservative view and that’s good enough for me. If we just had more tax cuts for the rich there would be Trickle Down and even more jobs would open up. And if you got rid of paying people that are out of work people would look for work faster. This Socialism got to go. We need to get rid of guvmint and let people fend for theirselfs.
Have a good day everybody.
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
8:04 am
The Republican party’s laissez faire philosophy in conjunction with greed have been proven over and over to be a disastrous combination. I think we’ll finally be seeing an end to Ayn Rand’s picture of the perfect society and good riddance. However, things like greed will always be around and as long as it is kept in check, it can be used to capitalism’s advantage. If we let things get too far out of control and let the greedy and arrogant and power-hungry amongst us have too much influence, then we will most certainly be setting this country up to become another Venezuela or worse. By the way, the so-called “libs” have been saying a lot for years about the lack of oversight and regulations dumped on us by folks like Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan. At least Alan Greenspan has now admitted that all things Ayn Rand doesn’t work. Of course, it only took him 20-20 hindsight to finally face up to that little fact.
RW-(the original)
March 16th, 2009
8:04 am
But that was nothing compared to the sight of mothers with small children begging for handouts on a downtown Atlanta street, a new sight and something I had never seen outside the Third World.
Didn’t we read this exact same story from this very writer a few days ago? I guess some things never change.
I’ll just take a w.a.g. on the ACC tourney, but I’m guessing it hasn’t been played at the Georgia Dome for these 46 years it’s been sold out. The Dome is an awful place to watch basketball and it got blown down by a tornado last year during the SEC tournament, Georgia Tech’s basketball team was pretty bad, tamping down local interest and the ticket prices were probably at a record high. High definition television and the convenience of your living room is sending as much of a message as the economy to these outrageously priced sporting events.
All that being said, the bumbler in the White House sure isn’t helping when his teleprompter can’t figure out from one day to the next whether we’re in a crises of epic proportions or if, as he said the other day, that the fundamentals of our economy are strong and things just aren’t so bad. Maybe he alternates between that speechwriter that gropes cardboard Hillarys and the one McCain used in the general election.
Brad Steal
March 16th, 2009
8:05 am
Whiner bloviates “Yeah, socialism sucks, don’t it?”
The irony of your ignorance is delicious.
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:12 am
The angry and delusional whiners are up early again.
As for the topic at hand, Jay’s right, things have changed and more change is going to come. The building anger will lead to a backlash that will likely make things worse at least for a little while. History doesn’t repeat, but it does rhyme.
Let me give you an example. Say we don’t fund AIG’s responsibilities to those foreign banks and those banks go under. Many of those banks are even more heavily leveraged than our investment banks were and are in countries where the government could not print money (since it’s in Euros) to pay off the depositors who are “insured” by the government. Imagine an already heavily endebted European country — Italy, for example — defaulting on their debt to save their citizens’ deposits and what that does as a shock to the entire system (both the EU and the world financial markets). Where the Dow is now will seem like a long way up from where it could end up in this scenario.
A very real scenario, by the way. Italy really is in trouble, as are Greece, Spain, and Ireland and maybe even the UK. We are not at bottom yet.
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
8:16 am
ByteMe,
One thing to be even more concerned about is that what you describe is precisely what some of this country’s right-wing fringe want. The perverts.
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
8:19 am
If lower taxes are such a roadblock to prosperity, then why do the goons in the OneTerm administration keep bragging on them?
Modest as they are, these taxes will generate enough revenue to pay for half of what’s needed for universal healthcare and still reduce the deficit by about $750 billion over 10 years — to 3.1 percent of the GDP by the end of the decade.-Robert Third Reich.
Modest, eh?
Yeah, the very threat of this “modesty” has people stuffing money in their mattresses and scaling back their earnings to under 250 K, gee, isn’t this a recipe for growing the GDP, duh?
But isn’t universal healthcare itself a pretty radical step? Not according to this view. The other half of what’s needed to pay for universal healthcare will come from health-care savings that are also necessary to keep the current big healthcare entitlement programs — Medicare and Medicaid — affordable. It’s just common sense: Allow government to use its bargaining leverage under Medicare and Medicaid to lower drug prices, strengthen Medicare pay-for-performance incentives, and ——–>institute better disease management<———–, prevention, and health information technologies.
Just like any good Nazi, listen to these fascists as they go around putting a price on what they think you are worth.
And, trust me, they are bargain shopping too.
You’ll be going up the chimney if you don’t pass the good “doctor’s” criteria.
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:21 am
Tax: I won’t ascribe that outcome as something they really want, but I think they really just don’t grasp the magnitude of the crisis and the interconnectedness of our financial markets. It’s easier thinking in bumper-sticker language than to truly understand where this crisis came from, where it’s going and why.
Hanging tough on your ideology won’t get the job in times of crisis.
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
8:24 am
That’s three mindless personal attacks in a row, I guess the new found era of respect for our fellow bloggers was a short lived one.
Just kidding, I know for a fact that if I respond in kind, “law and order” will be reinstituted, pronto.
DB, Gwinnettian
March 16th, 2009
8:26 am
Didn’t we read this exact same story from this very writer a few days ago? I guess some things never change.
Well, Jay gave us his immediate, visceral impressions of that encounter some days ago, yes. This is a fleshed-out column-length thing. You do know the difference, yes?
I really wonder sometimes if this is the only blog some people ever read, from the way some folks gripe about how Jay doesn’t turn out a brand-new column-length piece three times a day (”you just copy/pasted an article and gave us one paragraph of your own! wahhh!!!”).
Anyway, I’m going to write off your post as being somewhat tongue in cheek, although it seems a rather grisly topic about which one might choose to get light hearted, and move on a bit–I saw your advice about the Peachtree 10k.
Of course I’ll submit my race app at the very earliest opportunity, but I don’t think I adequately conveyed my real concern. In years past, running a qualifier + registering within a day or two of the Sunday paper’s publication virtually ensured a race number. (a “qualifier” being another 10K within a year of the Peachtree, to get you in a seeded group.) I took the trouble to do just that a little over a week ago, and now I find that I very well might not get in.
Furthering complicating things (and this isn’t the Atlanta Track Club’s, nor the AJC’s, nor Active.com’s problem, of course) is that I had planned to run with a visually-disabled guy; we don’t have to run together, but we do need to rendezvous at a particular spot. If his app is accepted and mine’s not… well, that’ll suck, won’t it?
Gotta fly. Later, all.
DB, Gwinnettian
March 16th, 2009
8:28 am
But first: Jay, why do you allow filth like this on your blog?
Just like any good Nazi, listen to these fascists as they go around putting a price on what they think you are worth.
And, trust me, they are bargain shopping too.
You’ll be going up the chimney if you don’t pass the good “doctor’s” criteria.
You really ok with Whiner calling proponents of healthcare reform “nazis?” Really?
And you’re ok with Whiner referring to the Jewish former labor secretary as “Robert Third Reich?”
RW-(the original)
March 16th, 2009
8:32 am
I see a voice of sanity in Hollywood has died. RIP Ron.
No surprise that it’s far down the list of important stories on the home page at the AJC. Numero uno is a story about a teenage mother’s “ex” speaking out. I’m not sure if that story placement says more about the people that run this “news”paper or if it’s driven by reader hits. Either way it’s pathetic.
I’m off to the forest early today, See y’all upstairs at happy hour.
RW-(the original)
March 16th, 2009
8:36 am
DB,
Why are you, of all people, so hell bent on censorship? It’s not like you haven’t been known to turn a colorful phrase and frankly when I read about liberals wanting to use “better disease management” curing me isn’t the first thing I think pops into their minds.
Later!
BDAtlanta
March 16th, 2009
8:40 am
They got the fat bonuses. Now, they can take the fat criticism.
DB, it’s a cat fight. The wealthy in this country see the end is near for their continuous partying at the expense of the middle class.
Let em claw and scratch and scream and whelp. That sheeeot is over.
Copyleft
March 16th, 2009
8:40 am
These problems have been a long time coming, but the symptoms were covered up. There’s a VERY large chunk of Washington officials and their media pets who are thoroughly invested in the laissez-faire fantasy of “Hands off the market (except to do special favors for corporations).”
That approach, which really got its full head of steam back under Reagan’s administration, has always been a bad idea from the standpoint of sound economics… but it had a LOT of ideological support from supply-siders, corporate cheerleaders, lobbyists, stock traders, and others with billions to accumulate and influence to peddle. The absurd notion “Let the market decide” took hold, especially in the Republican Party. And the long, slow crash of the middle class, with a widening wealth gap, began and continued over the next several decades.
Hopefully we’ve learned our lesson. Deregulation is a bad idea. Corporations will not “police themselves” when it runs against their short-term financial interests. Economic oversight and accountability are crucial. Governmental involvement in the marketplace is necessary for it to function properly. And finally, capitalism exists to serve the PEOPLE, not vice-versa.
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
8:40 am
ByteMe,
I’d like to believe also that these fringe right-wingers do not want to plunge our country into chaos but some of their actions, philosophies, and comments tell a different story. After all, many of them were and still are of the mind-set that we should not have intervened in the markets at all. What do you think would have happened if the Fed, for example, had not intervened last September and stopped that electronic run on the bank. And, what if our government had not stepped in and upped the coverage on FDIC insured savings or added the coverage on money market savings. And, that’s just for starters. I think we would have had some new definitions for “depression”.
On a side note,
Does anyone know what …Whine is talking about with his 8:24 post? Jay, do you understand …Whine?
Bosch
March 16th, 2009
8:44 am
ByteMe,
“Hanging tough on your ideology won’t get the job in times of crisis”
I like that – that would make a good bumper sticker
Nice column Jay -
The Corporal
March 16th, 2009
8:45 am
….. or the fact that the AJC really shrank my Sunday paper and today’s was “onion skin”. I wonder if my bill will be less?
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:46 am
Tax: As I said, ideology over reality is not what we need right now and the Randists need to just accept that they’re in over their head following a philosophy that no longer matches the way the world works. They won’t, but they do need to accept it in order to understand what’s going on and why.
Ireland, by the way, had to go to 100% coverage of all deposits in order to prevent a run on their banks. Had the bank failed, the country would have had to declare bankruptcy, because 100% of deposits was like 10x their GDP, so no way they could have actually followed up on their promise.
As for Whiner, no idea what his problem is. Don’t know, don’t really wanna know.
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:47 am
Corporal: the “up” side is that there are also fewer ads to ignore!
The Corporal
March 16th, 2009
8:47 am
P.S.
Does anyone remember who actually started all this? The democrats with their inane policy that forced banks to make house loans to people who could never pay them back!
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:48 am
Bosch: That would take up, like, the whole car bumper on my Audi!
ByteMe
March 16th, 2009
8:52 am
Corporal: there you go spouting inane stuff again. “Poor people started this!!” We’ve already debunked that crap six ways to Sunday (including numerous citations showing the level of CRA loans relative to where the problems are), but you still try to blame poor people for screwing up the economy.
Go to RealtyTrac.com and look at the THOUSANDS of houses and condos being foreclosed or bank-owned along the beaches of southwest Florida and try to get your mind around the fact that poor people don’t live there.
DB, Gwinnettian
March 16th, 2009
8:54 am
“Why are you, of all people, so hell bent on censorship?”
1) your use of “censorship” is a bit ridiculous in this context
2) yes, I enjoy the colorful turn of a phrase. And had my infamous “down a flight of stairs” comment (to which I’m sure you’d consider the nadir of my colorful turns) been snipped by Jay I’d never gripe about it–his blog, his rules
3) Calling an American Jew a member of the third Reich is simply beyond the pale, and this isn’t the first time IR/YW’s done it. Much as I dislike Charles Krauthammer, and consider some of his leanings to be hard-right, I’d draw the line well before ever calling him something like that.
and now I really gots to run.
gttim
March 16th, 2009
8:55 am
Yesterday I watched the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car.” I have to say, it was very amusing to watch a GM purposely kill a car that may have saved their company. It was sad for the country, not only for the lost jobs but also because it was a hell of a car with a lot of positive benefits. However, the fact that if they were still making it, they could have been beating the Honda and Toyota in sales right now, was hilarious. Then when you are told that Honda and Toyota started pursuing hybrid vehicles, vehicles which are helping their companies beat GM, because they were scared GM was getting ahead of them with the EV1, you almost want to roll on the floor!
How did we get into this mess so quickly? It wasn’t quickly. Corporations have been driving us down this road for a long time.
@@
March 16th, 2009
8:56 am
Define normal, jay. There’s always those 1.2 million job openings your paper lauded the other day — CENSUS WORKERS, temporary and no benefits.
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
9:02 am
Taxpayer- In an effort to lend Bookman a hand in his quest to “restore civility” to the blog, I will no longer respond to your ponderous blubbering. Pout if you must, but this is my last reply to you.
I suspect you libs will be unable to reign in your knee jerk diaper filling, thus we shall see once and for all where the real problem lies.
caz1158
March 16th, 2009
9:09 am
Jay-I could see a trend reversing itself if the liberals and “far left way thinking media” could actually bring themselves to tell the truth. Capitalism as a whole is good!!! Not all billion dollar corps are corrupt!!! Not all the wealthy are greedy/non taxpayers. If the above would stop trying to scare the crap out of us & provide some positive solutions,maybe just maybe the attitude of the american people can change also. I know it ain’t rosey right now, but Negativity breeds Negativity!!! Is that really what we need? Lets try something differently-Positive politicians and reporting!! Sounds crazy I know but the “Sheep” facet of the american public truly need it.
Red
March 16th, 2009
9:10 am
An Economics professor postulated to class when I was at university; that in the long run, markets DO work perfectly. But in the long run, you’re dead. We can do nothing and in 20 generations (give or take) have a perfectly balanced economy. Or we can speed along the market forces with interventions. I like the latter thanks.
I Report/ You Whine
March 16th, 2009
9:10 am
The American People are not going to sit idly by as TeamOneTerm sets about burning Paris-
The Mason resident was one of thousands who showed up Sunday at Fountain Square for the Cincinnati Tea Party, an effort designed to show disapproval for “wasteful government spending.” The group wants Congress to repeal the $787 billion stimulus package that President Barack Obama has championed as a way to create jobs and give the economy a boost.
Cincinnati police said unofficially that about 4,000 protesters showed up Sunday.-Cincy.com
Wait till they hear about the mortgage bailouts, hahahahahahaha.
You’ll get your “revival.”
AmVet
March 16th, 2009
9:12 am
So the good little Dick Cheney wannabes all parrot the Republiconned BS.
“Nobody saw this coming.”
“Economic crisis? What economic crisis?”
“The ACC’s not sold out because…this that and the other….or who knows…global cooling?”
“Desperate people on the streets by the boatload because that’s the way they want it.” (I gave them 15 cents!)
These immoral incompetents will never acknowledge what rational Amricans already know – their elected heroes helped rape this country.
And the faithful are content to let them and their corporate monied masters walk/laugh all the way to the bank — with their money!
The corporate destruction of capitalism.
Rascal
March 16th, 2009
9:13 am
If any of you think an Ayn Rand society has been tried and failed, you are amazingly blind. The Federal Government has been screwing things up so bad in this country for 70+ years. Push control back to the states and in this day and time of open communication, no control of our media by bought and paid for newspapermen, we will see a great day again. Keep heading headlong into the abyss of socialism to protect us from or own human nature, an impossible wish, and we will see the end of the great experiment. Once again, I ask any of you to name a single federal government program that has ever achieved its stated goals and been completed within its budget.
The Corporal
March 16th, 2009
9:16 am
To ByteMe:
I said “started” this (not totally to blame) and the loans were not all to so called “poor people” but people of some means who borrowed way over their heads ………
The bottom line, this whole unfortunate situation is being used as a “socialist power grab” by the liberals (most democrats and some republicans) in this country and be assured down the road we “will” take it back.
Swami Dave
March 16th, 2009
9:18 am
ByteMe:
There -you- go again creating the imaginary straw man of an alleged statement (your quoted “Poor people started this!!”…..that Corporal never said!) that you immediately discount.
Likewise for all of your supposed “debunking” of CRA involvement in the eventual meltdown, the common sense reality simply opposes your hard-pressed attempts to defend a failed political theology.
There were mandates by government for lenders to relax historical underwriting standards to meet social and political ends ignoring basic financial realities. In response, the mortgage markets along with Freddie & Fannie created the entire derivative industry to allow “insuring” and diversification of that newly-created higher risk loans. Since lenders would not have underwritten the loans with these mechanisms to spread the risk, government authorities (seeking the ends – more loans to those who historically could not get them – with little attention paid to the means) abdicated their oversight responsibility.
As the profits from these instruments grew (and while the markets trended upward), those constucts were spread to other mortgages that were equally or even more risky. These would include many of those “THOUSANDS of houses and condos being foreclosed or bank-owned along the beaches of southwest Florida” that you mentioned in your response.
For all of your “debunking”, the fact remains. Rules like CRA were at the core of how we got into this mess specifically because they were the impetus for financial markets to separate themselves from what were historical underwriting standards.
-Swami Dave
BDAtlanta
March 16th, 2009
9:18 am
Don’t forget, the GOP is made up of two kinds of people – the wealthy and the dumb.
The Republican party ONLY passes legislation to benefit the wealthy. Since there aren’t enough wealthy people in this country to win any elections on their own, they have to lie to the middle class and the poor to help them vote. Hannity, Boortz, Limbaugh are all tools to lie to people to get them to think that the wealthy are looking out for the middle class’ best interests:
1. We’re the conservative party…but only when it suits us wealthy folks. Case in point, the Bush administrations spending spree while cutting taxes for the wealthy.
2. We put christianity first. Yeah right. All the religious-oriented legislation is to get the middle class and lower class to vote their way. They could give a rat’s backside if the 10 commanments are on the wall of the courthouse.
3. We put America first. If the wealthy can’t find an angle to make a dime on something they will just talk it up but never try to pass any legislation on it. Look at the issues with illegals. What happened to that discussion? The wealthy rely on that cheap labor to increase their profits. They use them in their homes, in their workplaces, and the pick them up on corners when they need a cheap handyman. That’s why they told Hannity to shut up about it.
They lie to the not-so-intelligent folks in the middle and lower classes by telling them the wealthy class back the agendas of the working class when in fact they are lying to get the middle and poor classes to back the agenda of the wealthy.
If you are middle class or lower class and you vote Republican…well, you don’t fall into the wealthy category so you must fall into the dumb category.
If you aren’t wealthy, you’ve been had. Hard to swallow aint it?
Taxpayer
March 16th, 2009
9:19 am
Awwww. I feel a “pout” coming on.
Wait just a gosh darned minute! THAT was NOT a POUT! Try again.
All right, you. That’s enough of that. Now, give me a pout, NOW! I mean it.
I just give up. Those danged emoticons just have a mind of their own.
Red
March 16th, 2009
9:20 am
Regarding bonuses at AIG: I know some ‘folks’ that can be found who live in the hills just north of Chattanooga that will, for a case of Jack Daniels and $500, give those bankers a taste of what they deserve.
BDAtlanta
March 16th, 2009
9:22 am
This didn’t start with the poor. How much money do you think a poor person can borrow? Do you think they have that much borrowing clout?
The Corporal
March 16th, 2009
9:27 am
TO SwamiDave:
Thank you.
To BDAtlanta:
Good grief. “Poor” is relevant. If you can get a bank loan for a house you are not “poor” because you also probably have three cars and 2 wide screen t.v.’s. The point is you had no way (or more likely INTENT) to pay it back ! And when you add GOVERNMENT MANDATED loans by the hundreds of thousands of borrowers ….. you have a problem.
Can you not see that?