Bush: History Will See Him As An Effective President!

[Balloon guy 158]

So are we agreeing that Bush's tax cuts helped the poor, resulted in the richest paying more and the government getting more?Then we can move on to the next topic.

[Balloon guy 158]

I hope you are right for our sake (and Israel's).

Me too

[dapokerbum 0]

But Bush did use his veto. He veto'd the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act. Unfortunately, this was one of the worse vetos in memory.

Yeah ... but that's like your opinion man.**Note: I don't really lean one way or the other on stem cell research as I have not researched it enough, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who were on the side of bush on this one**

[Balloon guy 158]

that's better.

I'm not smart enough about the issue of the reasons for the housing crisis to argue Bush caused it, but I suspect that caused it is incorrect.

[Balloon guy 158]

**Note: I don't really lean one way or the other on stem cell research as I have not researched it enough, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who were on the side of bush on this one**

Just the scientist of today

[mk 11]

I mean, all of what you posted is just so wrong and shows that your head is SO SO SO deep in the sand that you can't even see when people on your own side point out MASSIVE flaws in your politicians. You are SO eager to drink the kool-aid that you fail to see clear mistakes for what they are.It wasn't a zero sum game at all. Tax revenue absolutely DID NOT meet spending increases, just like it didn't under Reagan in the 80s. Voodoo (supply-side) economics was very, very, very clearly shown then (in the 80s) as well as in the 2000s to do nothing except:A) Increase the budget deficit dramaticallyB) Widen the gap between the rich and the poor dramaticallyEven without defense spending increases, Bush presided over massive deficit inflation. These numbers are available everywhere.Iraq and Saddam Hussein had absolutely LESS THAN NOTHING to do with 9-11. Attempting to justify the Iraq invasion by invoking 9-11 is at best intellectually dishonest and at worst PURELY FUCKING EVIL. The administration, of course, was guilty of both, pushing through a massive marketing campaign which attempted to convince the American public that the two were, in fact, somehow connected in order to garner support for an invasion that the neoconservatives surrounding Bush in the Pentagon and DOD had been fomenting for over a decade, a marketing campaign which, sadly, worked.Who gives a flying fuck about veto threats if they're clearly all empty?

[CaneBrain 95]

I'm not smart enough about the issue of the reasons for the housing crisis to argue Bush caused it, but I suspect that caused it is incorrect.

Obviously it is way more complicated than any one man or administration....but I think it is pretty obvious that the things we were doing generally that led to the boom of 2002-2007 also were very much behind the eventual collapse in 2008. How much credit a President should get for what happens to the economy is an interesting question.....it's probably a lot like how QBs and Head Coaches get proportionally more credit or blame for NFL teams.....it's just in Fox News world Bush "caused" the boom, had no hand in the collapse, but Obama is definitely responsible for everything that happened since January 2009.....and that kind of uneven, biased reasoning makes me want to punch Sean Hannity in his stupid, smug face.

[Balloon guy 158]

Might as well get into the Stem Cell research veto.The argument for the veto was that the future likely to present itself was that an industry in the harvesting of embryos was the likely outcome. The country is split about abortions being legal, but enacting an entire industry to make more abortions is not something the country is split on.Do we really want women lined up for abortions to make money?I know for a fact we can kill retarded children to harvest their organs for healthy kids, but should we? Of course not.The argument for stem cell was that it might be good. Not that 100% it would be.A Nov 2007 article in Cell and Science reported that it was possible to create stem cells that functioned identically to those taken from human embryos without destroying human embryos, and could be obtained from adult stem cells.How much better for our national soul to use cells from people without harming them than to create a cottage industry centered on increasing the number of abortions.

[CaneBrain 95]

don't stem cells just sit there, though? If they are going to just sit there, shouldn't we make them useful?The idea that allowing more stem cell research will lead to incentives for abortions is the silliest thing I have heard yet about this issue.Also, if you want less abortions, give kids condoms instead of telling them condoms don't work. Because the idea that abstinence will take hold in high schools used to be the silliest thing I have heard about these issues.

[Balloon guy 158]

Obviously it is way more complicated than any one man or administration....but I think it is pretty obvious that the things we were doing generally that led to the boom of 2002-2007 also were very much behind the eventual collapse in 2008. How much credit a President should get for what happens to the economy is an interesting question.....it's probably a lot like how QBs and Head Coaches get proportionally more credit or blame for NFL teams.....it's just in Fox News world Bush "caused" the boom, had no hand in the collapse, but Obama is definitely responsible for everything that happened since January 2009.....and that kind of uneven, biased reasoning makes me want to punch Sean Hannity in his stupid, smug face.

I agree that we give blame when it is not due, and credit when it is not deserved.Clinton got all the credit for the internet boom, which government had little to do with ( other than creating the internet for the DoD.The housing market though was not a result of pure government decisions, or was it?

[CaneBrain 95]

I agree that we give blame when it is not due, and credit when it is not deserved.Clinton got all the credit for the internet boom, which government had little to do with ( other than creating the internet for the DoD.The housing market though was not a result of pure government decisions, or was it?

It was part government decisions and part lack of government oversight.....but that only accounts for some of it. There is also the massive greed of the American banking/mortgage industry and the gullibility/stupidity of the general populace.

[Balloon guy 158]

don't stem cells just sit there, though? If they are going to just sit there, shouldn't we make them useful?The idea that allowing more stem cell research will lead to incentives for abortions is the silliest thing I have heard yet about this issue.

Well you have the reality than when you make something valuable, you make people want to sell it.When you add in the potential for stem cell rejection from the host, you create the possibility for a need to create 'personalized' embryos, or harvesting embryos from the person who needed them and then destroying the embryo to harvest the stem cell.I get that since there are lots of aborted children lying around all willy nilly, we should start cutting them up an experimenting on them...I just think it would be bad for our souls.

[Balloon guy 158]

It was part government decisions and part lack of government oversight.....but that only accounts for some of it. There is also the massive greed of the American banking/mortgage industry and the gullibility/stupidity of the general populace.

I was first angered and thought we need to have the government look into these things while they are happening to stop excesses, then I realized that this is the government we are talking about.Much better to let the markets force sound loaning, buying and selling principles than the centralized government.

[CaneBrain 95]

I was first angered and thought we need to have the government look into these things while they are happening to stop excesses, then I realized that this is the government we are talking about.Much better to let the markets force sound loaning, buying and selling principles than the centralized government.

eh, that is the inherent problem with free markets....they are prone to abuse by insiders if no one is watching......I mean if the markets were so self-correcting then how did the collapse happen. Seriously, people were just inventing money out of thin air by using risky mortgages as collateral. Seriously, you have to watch this:http://www.mymoneyblog.com/subprime-loan-c...ck-figures.htmlIt coves the whole thing quite nicely. Slides 28 and 29 are so true and slay me every time.

[akoff 0]

eh, that is the inherent problem with free markets....they are prone to abuse by insiders if no one is watching......I mean if the markets were so self-correcting then how did the collapse happen. Seriously, people were just inventing money out of thin air by using risky mortgages as collateral. Seriously, you have to watch this:http://www.mymoneyblog.com/subprime-loan-c...ck-figures.htmlIt coves the whole thing quite nicely. Slides 28 and 29 are so true and slay me every time.

Have seen this before, the problem is there is nobody responsible, none on the lender, none on the guy taking out the mortage, none by the guy selling the securities and none by the guys buying the securities...nobody did their homework. That is why i didn't like the bailouts. If you don't do your job you should be held accountable. Government intervention regaurdless if it was TARP (repbulican) or stimulus (democrat) is bad.At the end of the day i blame the purchaser of both orginal mortgage that was unaffordable and the buyer of the junk bundles for not realizing what they were buying the most.That and Democrats writing laws that require Frannie and Freddie to fuel this mess. That is the biggest problem, in my opinion.

[Balloon guy 158]

eh, that is the inherent problem with free markets....they are prone to abuse by insiders if no one is watching......I mean if the markets were so self-correcting then how did the collapse happen. Seriously, people were just inventing money out of thin air by using risky mortgages as collateral. Seriously, you have to watch this:http://www.mymoneyblog.com/subprime-loan-c...ck-figures.htmlIt coves the whole thing quite nicely. Slides 28 and 29 are so true and slay me every time.

I saw this slide thing a while back, yea, it is funny.But it doesn't really address how we can expect to trust the government to stop people from doing dumb things with their money ( like trusting the experts in this case)

[JoeyJoJo 18]

At the end of the day i blame the purchaser of both orginal mortgage that was unaffordable...

I don't understand how people were getting mortgages that they couldn't afford. Wouldn't that be an issue, like, right away?

[Balloon guy 158]

I mean, all of what you posted is just so wrong and shows that your head is SO SO SO deep in the sand that you can't even see when people on your own side point out MASSIVE flaws in your politicians. You are SO eager to drink the kool-aid that you fail to see clear mistakes for what they are.It wasn't a zero sum game at all. Tax revenue absolutely DID NOT meet spending increases, just like it didn't under Reagan in the 80s. Voodoo (supply-side) economics was very, very, very clearly shown then (in the 80s) as well as in the 2000s to do nothing except:A) Increase the budget deficit dramaticallyB) Widen the gap between the rich and the poor dramatically

Pure BS propaganda only believed by the gullible.

Even without defense spending increases, Bush presided over massive deficit inflation. These numbers are available everywhere.Iraq and Saddam Hussein had absolutely LESS THAN NOTHING to do with 9-11. Attempting to justify the Iraq invasion by invoking 9-11 is at best intellectually dishonest and at worst PURELY FING EVIL. The administration, of course, was guilty of both, pushing through a massive marketing campaign which attempted to convince the American public that the two were, in fact, somehow connected in order to garner support for an invasion that the neoconservatives surrounding Bush in the Pentagon and DOD had been fomenting for over a decade, a marketing campaign which, sadly, worked.Who gives a flying f about veto threats if they're clearly all empty?

Yea, the military has been lobbying for increased spending for every single day since July 5th 1776, except for one day in June of 1912 when the Army Navy game had a lot of side action.But you're right, Bush just gave in to marketing pressures to buy more tanks.And the war on terror had such clear delineations between the players that Bush was obviously trying to deal with his father complex when he invaded Iraq after the failure of the UN.I bet you ignore that more Iraqis died as a result of Clinton's policies than Bush's entire war don't you?

[Balloon guy 158]

I don't understand how people were getting mortgages that they couldn't afford. Wouldn't that be an issue, like, right away?

More government oversight is needed at the mortgage offices!

[CaneBrain 95]

I don't understand how people were getting mortgages that they couldn't afford. Wouldn't that be an issue, like, right away?

No, because housing prices always go up!Yes, yes it is an issue right away.Also, that Fannie and Freddie fueled this mess. Every bank and mortgage provider was TRIPPING over themselves to get poor people into homes they could not afford. At the time, everyone was getting rich and no one was thinking long term. I would say 10% or less of the loans I see are Fannie or Freddie related.Also, I should interject here that out and out fraud by appraisers and mortgage brokers (and regular people who bought these mortgages) was a huge problem and any gov oversight at the state of Federal level would have been helpful.

[CaneBrain 95]

SOME government oversight is needed at the mortgage offices!

we are getting there.

[strategy 4]

That is why i didn't like the bailouts. If you don't do your job you should be held accountable. Government intervention regaurdless if it was TARP (repbulican) or stimulus (democrat) is bad.

does your business rely on a line of credit? any significant interaction with the financial system? do any of your business partners rely on the financial system? customers?I think you see where I'm going with this.

I don't understand how people were getting mortgages that they couldn't afford. Wouldn't that be an issue, like, right away?

I saw some charts in a financial markets course that showed mortgage default rates increasing very rapidly between 05 and 08. maybe not "right away," but it happened WAY faster than it does normally.

[Balloon guy 158]

No, because housing prices always go up!Yes, yes it is an issue right away.Also, that Fannie and Freddie fueled this mess. Every bank and mortgage provider was TRIPPING over themselves to get poor people into homes they could not afford. At the time, everyone was getting rich and no one was thinking long term. I would say 10% or less of the loans I see are Fannie or Freddie related.Also, I should interject here that out and out fraud by appraisers and mortgage brokers (and regular people who bought these mortgages) was a huge problem and any gov oversight at the state of Federal level would have been helpful.

Don't forget that the real culprit was Clinton. During his reign, there was massive amounts of money made in the stock market, and when the bubble burst, people pulled their profits out and had to spend them somewhere so they started buying bigger houses and vacation homes. That was the catalyst for the surge in prices.

[Balloon guy 158]

does your business rely on a line of credit? any significant interaction with the financial system? do any of your business partners rely on the financial system? customers?I think you see where I'm going with this.I saw some charts in a financial markets course that showed mortgage default rates increasing very rapidly between 05 and 08. maybe not "right away," but it happened WAY faster than it does normally.

See above reason.People bought bigger homes with profits from internet stock bubble profits.Then they couldn't afford them what with the Clinton recession and all.

[nutzbuster 7]

Yeah its Fox...but please watch because it includes factual data and actual video of people being stupid about the pending crisis

no one wanted to be the "mean evil bad guy that stopped folks from getting a house"and off the cliff we went...