Let me finish tonight with a simple political question.
Why on God's earth should we reward the people who got us into this mess? You can't sell a house because you can't get a decent price for it. You can't buy a house because people can't believe what you're offering for it.
Who created this political dung hill? Who created this financial horror show that has older people dying over their miniature 401(k)s, young people hopelessly out of work, certainly out of good work? It all started in a splurge of greed and deception and "grab what you can before the building falls down" that George W. Bush begat us late in the year 2007.
That's what we're living now. Okay, Obama hasn't been able to get us out of it yet - no doubt on that front - but that's what we're suffering from and there's no sense blaming one party or the other, but there's a helluva lot of sense in keeping your eye on the people who did it - who made millions on all kinds of off-the-wall investment "products" and then dumped them out there to people who didn't know what they were getting.
All I ask is why anyone, regardless of political philosophy, would want to be out there barking for better tax breaks for these people - why they could be so shameless as to tell us it's better to screw the old people out of their Medicare so we can keep the tax breaks Bush jammed through heading out the door, even if we have to deliver them in hot checks courtesy of the latest borrowing from abroad? Why? Ask somebody why reward the big shots who shot this economy dead with more millions in tax breaks - a running bonanza of generosity from you and the people who got screwed by the very people now with their hands out for more?
It's a no-brainer. For the average tax payer, it's simple. If there has to be pain to keep this country solvent - so we don't go the way of Greece - where do we come up with the deal? Do we sock it to the people who are old and sick or to the people making the big bucks who never really - come on! - really felt the hell they brought down on this country in the first place, the hell they left in town behind them.
Fair is fair.
Please repeat: fair is fair. This isn't just about ability to pay - it's about who - given how we got here - "oughta" pay.
Leave a Comment:
Chris, fer Gawd's sake, slow down!
You have great writers, you have good content. You are wasting it with a rocket ship delivery.
Trim a minute or two off everything else in your show and add it to your editorial. I am a preacher. I give editorials every week. You gotta slow down and DELIVER the speech. It ain't a race. You already won. Now just DELIVER the speech. Preach to us like you feel it and believe it. Tonight's editorial (above) and others, felt like you don't believe it.
Chris, you need to stop the gibberish. Really, it's Bush's fault??? Good lord, you want to see who to blame, read Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner's 'Reckless Endangerment'. A thoughtful, detailed analysis of why we are in the state we are in now, without resorting to "Blame Bush" oversimplification.
I watch you daily, and occasionally agree with you, but if you want to join the top tier, you need to do better. I agree Obama isn't to blame, but neither is Bush for the current economic mess. Other things, yes, but not the fiscal meltdown.
Rich, you are incorrect. Bush is directly responsible for :
1) the removal of any leverage limits for Wall Street in 2004, 2) TARP, 3) Telling the OCC/OTS to prevent all state regulators from regulating the lending insanity from 03 on.
When you remove lending regulation, of course house prices shoot the moon.. and now people are shocked when the moonshot has to be removed?
Note that the CRA has less than nothing to do with it.. the CRA had over 100 regulations, and loans under the CRA continue to outperform 100% of private label origination at the same time.
A review by the Federal Reserve on the effects of CRA shows that delinquency rates and cost of making CRA loans are higher than other loans. The results of the survey can be seen at The CRA pressured banks to increase loans to lower income borrowers that resulted in people getting loans for homes that they really should not have qualified for. Economy starts going poorly, get laid off, cannot make a loan payment that was a struggle in the first place, and the loan is foreclosed. These loans also increased the number of people in the market for homes which caused prices to go very high and the glut of resulting foreclosures caused the housing crash which is one of the major causes of the recession. I'm sure you want to blame Bush, but the facts are NOT there to do that.
I would like for you to explain to the republicans about shared sacafacrises. I remember in the fortys that I was asked to0 bring a nincklel to school to buy war stamps to help pay fot cost of the war . I was six years old.Chris,
Buddy.....the fact that I am the 3rd comment on this blog post should tell you something. But seeing as you are busy feeling that tingle run down your leg....let me translate ! What America wants less of is liberal, elitists, idealogues such as yourself and more of....dare I say it, Sarah Palin ! And Chris I can prove that to you by simply pointing out that your blatant sexism....would have got you fired at any other network ! Chris.....seen the Nielson ratings lately ??? I'm just asking ???
Chris this is one of the best commentaries ever. Thanks. Spreading around the blogosphere.
hardball...yes
" there’s a concerted effort being made in states from New Hampshire to North Carolina to Ohio to make sure fewer people vote in 2012.: In some crucial battleground states, more than 50 percent of ballots are cast as part of early voting, which makes voting an easier and more flexible process. In 2008, a third of voters nationwide cast their votes before Election Day. These voters tend to be working families and young people, and a whole lot of them voted for Barack Obama.
So Republican-controlled legislatures are cutting the amount of time people have to vote early, restricting when and how organizations like ours can register new voters, and making the voting process itself more difficult by requiring new types of identification, which lower-income voters are less likely to have.
Can your guest please discuss this Republican effort to disenfranchise voters?
Kathleen - Is it possible that the restrictions on time for early voting have something to do budget restrictions and the requirements for state government to balance their budgets every year. It wasn't very long ago that you voted on one day and one day only. Seems to me that turnouts have actually decreased even with early voting.
Not me.
Among all of the excellent "let me finish" segments, this may well have been the most precise and clear. No room to wiggle from the ethical clarity of what Chris presented.
Bingo one of the best. Comes in second to one where Chris demand again accountability for the "pack of lies" that resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths, injuries , millions displaced
Agree.
Well the profiteering corporation would continue on without paying taxes, the ultra rich would continue exploiting the tax loopholes custom made for them, we would continue spending trillions on wars & campaigns, military bases & such. Our 'allies' would continue extorting billions out of the tax payers every year thanks to their reps up on the Hill disguised as Americans.
So what ?
We have medicare, health care, Social Security, education, infrastructure, welfare programs to offer for defunding. We the middle class & down are prepared to bear the burden of more taxes, perhaps a war tax come, Iran invasion
We are obliging folks, always willing to make sacrifices. Let our country ,states & cities go bankrupt.
We are beyond caring.
If the Medicare and Social Security systems can be adjusted in a way that provides the same benefits at a lower cost, what is the problem with looking at it? Seems that the Democrats are more interested in using the old "Republicans want to kill/abuse the elderly" lie instead of looking for solutions to a future train wreck. There is a problem and we elected these Congressmen to look for ways to fix it, not just throw out talking points that do nothing to add to finding solutions. That is what Chris and Rush do.
Chris brings many people on to discuss solutions. Rush is his own world. One blowhard opinion...no guest...few to no facts.
I always imagine Rush as a blown up balloon the size of the world. Easy to pin prick. Reagan Dems (whatever that means) who listened to Rush and voted for Walker in Wisconsin and Kasich in Ohio are starting to get it. But easy to get when the Republicans stick broomsticks up union members collective asses Easy to get when those broomsticks are so painfully evident
Diametrically opposed