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Stewarthaas, man you don't even know. You notice the loud ones, the annoying ones, but honestly I don't even think you know which groups are the biggest beneficiaries of the welfare state, or how long they are on it. Perhaps you just don't understand how actually lucky you are, growing up in a place where we take care of people somewhat instead of throwing them to the wolves; by protecting the lowest we actually make us all richer at a shockingly low cost to ourselves. Hope you can find peace, you sound way too angry to be happy...
JV,
You're rewriting history. The financial crisis was absolutely years in the making that was allowed because of long standing policies, it lost the economy $12T in assets essentially overnight, and very little actually had to do with the housing crisis. All this came to a head really in 2007, a full two years before Obama took office. Lehman crashed in 2008, which was the biggest shock to the system. The problem was largely an asset bubble brought on by years of liquefying the economy and not taking enough out to infrastructure. Please, I respect you, don't fall into this hack talking point. PS it's not like the jobs that formed under Bush weren't net-positive jobs largely: it was largely retail, real estate, financial, and construction. And on top of that salad wages by and large fell as did PPP.
Nahh, I was just being an ass...but what I do think is it was a shared responsibility since the dems were in power since 2006. Now that they are in power of both, we are going to hell in a handbasket that's loaded with TNT.
I wrote this in November 2008, when everything started falling apart. This is my view of what happened to this country in the last 20 -25 years: Read it, cry over it, laugh over it, burn it, pass it around, discard it, or discredit it…but this is my view of how historians will write about the long decline of the United States of America and how it started in the 1980's...
MARCHING OFF A CLIFF…
ONE AMERICAN FAMILY AT TIME
As I watch the economic events of the last few months and weeks unfold……. I am amazed that most Americans still have no idea why our nation is in a long-term downward spiral. Wall Street, predatory lending, plummeting house values, Ben Bernacki, bailouts, foreclosures, financial meltdowns. We throw around these new financial verbs as if they can explain away what happened to the American dream. Each day we sit in front of our computer monitors and TV sets, and watch the folks in charge tell us how they can fix everything. Then we go about our daily routines… trying to ignore the slow death of our way of life. We rationalize the changing world we see - telling ourselves little economic and social fables that get us through the day…. and keep us from screaming too much at night.
The current economic decline of our nation is the final chapter in a story that could be titled “The death of the American middle class”. That great social class that flourished for nearly 60 years. The stable middle class family life from a generation or two ago….. is now quickly becoming the polar opposite of the true day-to-day world most American middle class families exists in. Historians will almost certainly look back at the dismantling of the American middle class….as a textbook example of how to quickly bring a nation to it’s social and economic knees.
What happened? How did a nation of seemingly stable, working and middle class families fall off a financial cliff. This can best be explained like the spokes of a wheel leading to a central point: Several enormous and significant economic changes have occurred in American over the last 15 or 20 years. Not only did these changes occur all at once, but in a truly savage way - they became cumulative. The result is that America is now trapped in the eye of a social and economic super-storm.
SPOKE 1…..Skilled manufacturing jobs went overseas. Blame who you want (the greedy capitalists not happy making millions, union demands, corruption…etc)…but the average man or woman from 1945 to 1985 could go to work for the GM, Ford, Kodak, or nameless others….and earn a decent pay to support a middle class life. By the late 1980’s and 1990’s …. American companies starting moving overseas in mass. The skilled manufacturing job was quickly vanishing across America forever.
When Reaganomics was implemented in the 1980’s…. it was deemed that what was good for the wealthy investor class…was good for all Americans. The main problem of course, was capitalists and investors - think like capitalists and investors….so that guy in Detroit making cars for $33 hour was replaced with a Indian or Chinese worker who would work for $3 an hour. The CEO’s made bigger bonuses, the company made more money, the shareholders were happy, and the company looked great on paper…..but the soul of America was sold out. Between 1980 and 2000 (according to Brookings) ……….15 million skilled manufacturing jobs in the United States vanished forever. The core of Reaganomics was that you could make money off money… instead of real physical products or durable goods. Of course, all the true financial gains went to the top. By 1988, when Reagan left office, the top 1 % of Americans (by income)…. controlled 20% of the nation’s wealth. Economically, the bottom and middle class saw little gain or started slipping by the early 1990’s.
The Middle Class Family starts to slip…..which leads to…..
SPOKE 2…..Family Debit/Credit Debit. As most middle and working class Americans were unable to sustain a life like their grandparents or parents before them…..they turned to credit. By the late 1980’s real wages (when adjusted to annual inflation) starting falling for the first time since the Great Depression. As skilled labor and automation moved to cheap overseas labor markets, the American capitalists could now raise the price of consumer products and goods…since no one bought anything in cash anymore anyway. It was great ( for awhile)….in a time of declining wages, massive movement of skilled jobs overseas….you could buy all you wanted ….and not have to pay until some distant point in time.
This of course led to SPOKE 3….
SPOKE 3…..Lending Deregulation. As Americas continued to consume on credit and real wages kept falling…..the financial and lending game became ever more rigged in the favor of big business, banks, and the capitalists. Middle and working class families starting choking. Banks and credit card companies started shaking down middle and working class Americans with ever-higher fees, penalties, and unfair terms. Financial and banking lobbyists in Washington continued to buy their way into our Government. Americans started drowning in debit. Of course, the capitalistic wolves smelled blood - and told millions of Americans, they only way they could survive it all….was more credit and debit.
THE LAST ACT...
Finally, millions of middle class American families put the only thing they ever owned in hock…..their homes. Worse, new home buyers - contending with falling wages, an ever increasing CPI, no down payment money, and home prices going through the roof because of all the “false equity” people had in homes…took on huge, high risk, and mostly unworkable mortgages that were sold to them by the ever more cunning… but morally bankrupt mortgage companies and banks.
Meanwhile….the capitalists and investors, flush with all this false money, could leverage those paper assets 60 to 1. They could play with trillions of dollars in mortgage-backed securities, stocks, 401-K’s, and retirements accounts of Americans…produce no physical product, make untold billions, risk free! Jobs, well who cares if don’t make anything here in America anymore…that’s the next generations problem.
The system lunged and staggered like an elephant shot thorough the heart with a cannon ball. It was only a matter of time before the whole system would fall - the only question was when and where.
Naahh, if I'm being genuine I really wanted to reply that the economy started to tank in 1912 when the most evil president we ever had got into office. Wilson. But most people would give me this look with that kind of reply.
That's where it all started IMO, and it's taken 100 years to get where we are.
Quote:
Originally Posted by wavehunter007
I wrote this in November 2008, when everything started falling apart. This is my view of what happened to this country in the last 20 -25 years: Read it, cry over it, laugh over it, burn it, pass it around, discard it, or discredit it…but this is my view of how historians will write about the long decline of the United States of America and how it started in the 1980's...
I'll read it when I have more time...promise. But I would disagree with your 80's timeline. We've been in the basket going to hell slowly over for a very, very very long time and it's not on accident, and it's been an undercurrent "nudging" us towards where we are now.
Naahh, if I'm being genuine I really wanted to reply that the economy started to tank in 1912 when the most evil president we ever had got into office. Wilson. But most people would give me this look with that kind of reply.
That's where it all started IMO, and it's taken 100 years to get where we are.
Oh man do I hate Wilson (crying during "Birth of a Nation"? Keep it classy, Wilson)... but I've been having this argument with someone else recently: the start of the Fed is hardly a bad thing. People that rail on it forget the extreme problems with currency (specie especially) that had bad effects on the economy both in terms of actual economic activity and also social cohesion. Incidentally, if I ever run for office believe you me that I'll run on a "Free Silver" platform. :P
As for this particular crisis: the problem is rooting much closer in my eyes. OTC derivatives didn't really come about until the Clinton years.
So wait..You're commenting on something that you've never experienced? Are you one of those Republicans that inherited ur conservativism?
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Originally Posted by stewarthaas
No I don't hang out with horrid people, I just experienced them....many from Birdgeport actually. Heres a simple and easy story you can try and prove me wrong....in high school all these kids would brag about beating the system and talk about when they can start getting food stamps, they receive a $00.40 lunch as they walk away with the food on shoes that could pay for there meals at full price for nearly the hole year...
I wish i would have responded to this earlier. Having grown up in a low income area, I would have to tell you that the kids that are truly on state would be wearing either fake sneakers or sneakers that their aunts and uncles bought them. I used to get $90 uptowns from my aunt twice a year. Was I not suppose to accept them because my mom couldn't afford them? What exactly are u saying here? Judgemental much????
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
...but let's get Dick in congress so maybe Obama will try and extend the unemployment period even longer. Don't believe theres jobs? Go into a fast food joint, go on craigslist, go into any auto shop, there are places out there dieing for workers. But then you get liberals like your self who kiss everyone's a$$ and make no incentive for people to even work, so your decent values are abused and help pay for those people.
Have you ever had a job in your life???????? Because most people who have had one know that a person has to work for a certain time before they can collect unemployment. They usually have to work a full time schedule for that time period also. So you're implication that Dick Blumenthal is interested in giving unemployment benefits to "lazy people" isn't going to cut it. Or if this is not what you're trying to say, speak clearer. Do you work for the Linda McMahon campaign?
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
As for the pharmacy story, I have a relative who works in one, she is not a conservative nor a liberal, she even voted for Obama.....she has changed her opinions on many things since working in a pharmacy drastically. It's disgusting what comes there to pickup there much needed pills with money from her paycheck.
Wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow... lol, this is amazing. Let me introduce myself. I intend on applying to a pharmacy school sometime after I graduate. I've been a license pharmacy tech since high school and I've worked in the profession on and off during college. There are numerous inaccuracies with your comments about pharmacies. First of all, there are 4 ways that an individual can get aid from the government in terms of prescriptions:
-Medicare Part D, which is a Prescription plan introduced by George Bush in 2006. Medicare Part D is a program that offers prescription drug assistance to low income seniors. These seniors pay a copay. Once the drug benefit pays for x number of copays, the seniors must pay $2500 out of pocket for their medications before the program will kick in again. This is called "the donut hole". President Obama has ended the donut hole beginning in 2012 with the new affordability act.
-Medicare Part B pays durable medical equipment and diabetes supplies and usually has no associated copay
-CT Medicaid pays for prescriptions all Connecticut residents under the age of 18. It pays for low income families for a period of 39 months with a continued need assessment called redetermination (conducted by DSS). It also pays for the mentally retarded and people who can't work anymore due to injury. It also pays for the copays of low income seniors who cannot afford to pay more than $15 a month in copays (usually combined with other need based programs for the elderly like CONNPACE or even Medicare Part D)
-Charter Oak Health Plan is a program for families who do not qualify for Medicaid but have met other income guidelines. They normally pay copays for their medications.
My point is the folks that walk into a pharmacy to pick up their prescriptions with prescription assistance actually need the assistance more probably 4x the number that actually don't. And makes sure she knows that she could be fired and sued if she says anything stupid to anybody who "she thinks" is ripping off the government. And she will look stupid if her assumption is wrong about that person.
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
If you put your self in any position to be caught by the police, your either a piece of garbage, or lack the maturity needed to be in public.
Comments like this is why i don't vote Republican
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
Kids in Bridgeport didn't have that option? See there you go again, saying how the kids who are proud to run around stealing cars and do drugs never had a chance. How about Platt Tech in Milford? They take in lots of Bridgeport kids if they want to take up a trade.
Yes. But like Kaynor in Waterbury (I'm more familiar with Kaynor Tech), they probably don't take ALL that want to go their. Kaynor denied people by the truckload when I was in eighth grade. Does that mean that all those people are destined have a poor life. But since we live in reality, we know that that's likely to happen because all the other city schools don't offer a trade where you can get a job right outta school.
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
Ever heard of the military? Theres nothing on a contract that says "you cannot be from the ghetto"
There's a catch to this, too. Most branches require you to not have asthma or diabetes (which many blacks have), you can't be obese, you have to pass a physical, you have to pass an ASVAB, and you can't be on probation or have any felonies. In my experience, more people want to join the military from the hood than you can imagine.
Quote:
Originally Posted by stewarthaas
By the way, where do you get your facts from, USA is #8 for crime per capita. And most countries below that have alot of unreported and misreported data because they are not as developed as us.
Yea, countries like...Waterbury. 5 years ago, if you dialed 911 in waterbury for the police you would normally get an a**hole miserable cop who would rant about how poor people are pathetic. Kinda like this story Three arrested after Waterbury shooting The Republican-American#
Almost a thousand people live there and nobody called 911. 2 shotgun blasts. LOL The "Republican"-American will never get it. Why? Nobody's afraid of anybody, its Waterbury. They just don't want to put up with the police's sh*t. Nothings changed in 5 years i'd bet.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JViello
Riiight, of course. How could we have missed that.
News flash, Bush was handed the worst attack on American soil since Pearl Harbor. It had an effect, and would have on any president.
Unemployment averaged 5.3% during the Bush Admin, it's over 9% for Obama. AND the reality is Bush had a 46 month period of continued and strong job growth...the second longest in the HISTORY of the United States. Wow, they didn't mention that on NPR.
Watch this video if you can handle it, it's 14 minutes.
Do you think we're all dumb? I don't understand why a pretty intellegent man keeps posting biased links/videos and expects for people not to view them as biased. Do you think we don't know who kevin hennessy is? Would you like for me to post something from Paul Krugman now? So we can start a debate on the economy and get no where by doing so?
I normally ignore these links but they're beginning to get insulting. By posting commentaries by conservative economists are you saying that these bushisms are superior to all other ideologies? Actually, by introducing biased commentaries in a thread like this, it should be considered propaganda and it should be banned. If I would respond in the wrong way it would be banned. I'll never understand how this website works.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JViello
After what administration won the election did the economy crash.
Watch that video. Seriously, all bias aside, you might find that Bush put a lot of the stop gap things in place that are now being credited to Obama. Frankly I don't agree with a lot of them, but it's just being honest and saying is "is".
Bush, even though I do respect him for his domestic policies more than many other liberals would, didn't create jobs. I could post something up here about the bubble that we were in by nobel-prize winning economists that prove that the Bush economic policies didn't necessarily create jobs and that we were in a bubble. But I'm not gonna because of course most of them are liberal and it would start an unnecessary argument between ideals. Plus you conservatives wouldn't read them.
Why don't you post conservative academics who no longer have a role in the Republican Party or a conservative think tank? (like david frum)
So Do you think we're all dumb? I don't understand why a pretty intellegent man keeps posting biased links/videos and expects for people not to view them as biased. Do you think we don't know who kevin hennessy is? Would you like for me to post something from Paul Krugman now? So we can start a debate on the economy and get no where by doing so?
I normally ignore these links but they're beginning to get insulting. By posting commentaries by conservative economists are you saying that these bushisms are superior to all other ideologies? Actually, by introducing biased commentaries in a thread like this, it should be considered propaganda and it should be banned. If I would respond in the wrong way it would be banned. I'll never understand how this website works.
So let me be sure I understand you
The Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under Obama being countered by the senior White House economic advisor to President George W. Bush is biased? Makes you stupid?
ROFL. I'm sorry the reality of the video pissed you off so much that you want to "ban people" (Ah the voice of tollerance comes out again.) but you've got to people in similar positions giving their viewpoints back to back.
Assuming of course you actually mean Keith Hennessey and not kevin hennessy as you wrote it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by brasscitybluenwhite
Bush, even though I do respect him for his domestic policies more than many other liberals would, didn't create jobs. I could post something up here about the bubble that we were in by nobel-prize winning economists that prove that the Bush economic policies didn't necessarily create jobs and that we were in a bubble.
Oh you mean like Clinton in the 90's during the tech bubble.
You can spin whatever you like, people were working and making a good living in the 90's and people were working and making a good living till 08.
Not anymore, and we are still going *down* not up.
The Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under Obama being countered by the senior White House economic advisor to President George W. Bush is biased? Makes you stupid?
ROFL. I'm sorry the reality of the video pissed you off so much that you want to "ban people" (Ah the voice of tollerance comes out again.) but you've got to people in similar positions giving their viewpoints back to back.
Assuming of course you actually mean Keith Hennessey and not kevin hennessy as you wrote it.
Oh you mean like Clinton in the 90's during the tech bubble.
You can spin whatever you like, people were working and making a good living in the 90's and people were working and making a good living till 08.
Not anymore, and we are still going *down* not up.
That's not what I mean and my bad for that because I know I wasn't all that clear.
What I'm saying is...
We all know you're conservative. You all know that I'm liberal. Just as you can find youtubes that support you're political ideology, I can easily find sources to support mine. And we would get no where by doing this. I feel like, and forgive me if I'm wrong, I feel like you are antagonizing.
I didn't say what I said to be offensive. And the only aspect of us going "down" is unemployment. We are far ahead of where we were during Bush's last three months in office in all other areas.
I'm not gonna try to argue with you. The sh*t hit the fan in 2008 and you wouldn't even believe that we were in/going toward a recession. Remember that?
Anyone else see Linda's 'empathetic' "don't forget about me" ad? It literally makes me nauseous every time I see it.
Oh please. People need to vote on policy, not stupid advertisements. It boggles my mind how gullible Americans are. Does a short TV ad really have any bearing on the policies of the candidate? No. None of this is relevant. Blumenthal's plan barely does anything to help small businesses and ease the tax burden on the American people. Linda's plan is more drastic. Unfortunately, based on the latest polls, it looks like we're gonna be stuck with yet another slimy, lying career politician who wants the world to be guided by government programs
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with that kind of reply.
