I said huge profits. I got no problem with profits

Define that. When is a company making 'huge profits' versus just plain 'profits'?

What I think you (and other prog-libs) are doing is not complaining about profits per se. You are complaining about HOW the profits were earned. Nothing the banking industry did in the bubble qualifies as illegal so we can't say they are illegal profits. So we enter a subjective arena where profits can be earned legally, but questionably. Apple, Microsoft, Banks, Oil, Tobacco, Green, Food - blah blah blah... Everyone that earns profit is attacked as achieving those profits unethically from some perspective.

The prog-libs claim the banks behaved questionably and so their profits are 'bad'. Brass tacks - prog/libs say the banks should have told people "No" when they applied for loans that they LEGALLY QUALIFIED for. I remember a story in the housing bust of a guy who earned only $45K a year. He bought a million dollar home and was paying for it by flipping 3 other properties. The bubble bursts. Now the dumb sap has 4 properties and he couldn't pay for any of them. He lost his house, all his credit, and had to go live in an apartment. A Prince trying to live on Pauper's income. Who's fault?

In 1995, the banks would have told this guy to jump in a lake. The interest rate was over 9% and the only loan he could possibly have qualified for was one with a payment of no greater than 25% of his gross monthly income. Check the tables to see what he would have qualified for in 1995. Hint: it ISN'T a million bucks...

It changed with Frank's "Uffodubble How-sing" act. The FED jacked around the rates. The FED changed Glass-Steagall. The FED told banks they would back up ARMs and other risky loans. 5 years later in the year 2000 when a doofus walks into the bank there is a smorgasboard of million dollar risky loans he legally qualifies for. When someone qualifies for a loan, and bank refuses, bank gets sued.

Some banks acted conservatively in the bubble and many others chose to do the risky (but still legal) loans. Just like how there were CONSUMERS who behaved conservatively during the bubble, and others who took the risky (but legal) ARMs. The problem was that the number of conservative players was a lot smaller than the risk-takers. The banks were stupid to take so many risks. People were stupid to take out so many loans. Government was stupid for engineering the whole mess. But make no mistake - the primary offender in this picture is the Federal Government. If they had not interfered in the market, then the whole mess would never have happened.

Now for some facts. I am a fan of facts. I just got this email from my extremely conservative Mormon brother, as part of an email exchange about the topic of scaling back the rhetoric:

I have a friend at Church who is pursuing his PhD in Political Science at UC Davis. I asked the question about the level of rhetoric because of your observations.

Poly Sci guys find ways to collect metrics and quantify everything. He stated that their metrics suggest this is the most divisive dialogue since the civil War.

I honestly didn't expect that answer. I thought it had always been bad and I was just not sensitive to the issue.







>> ^SuperHotbUNZ:

I couldnt agree more with the comment below
Look, we need to get some things straight:
1. There is no proven link between the shooter and any group. ANY group.
2. One can denounce the "gun targeting" fund raiser from an a priori standpoint.
3. The shooter met the Representative in 2007 long before Palin was on the national scene.
4. The shooter was from an economic class under siege, esp. in Arizona after the housing bust. He was booted from school for disruptive behavior, his economic future was bust.
5. If Palin et al. had such a potent effect, we should see daily if not multiple shootings per day, bombings, etc. given the 100s of millions of people she reaches via the media. These things happen for very personal reasons; politics, if it is involved, is just a fig leaf.
Bottom line: trying to score points off of a tragedy like this is the very mindset that puts us where we are as a nation. We need to unplug from the 24 hour news cycle and focus on our own here and now, and the people who are hurting and going unhelped.

I couldnt agree more with the comment below
****************************************************************
Look, we need to get some things straight:

1. There is no proven link between the shooter and any group. ANY group.

2. One can denounce the "gun targeting" fund raiser from an a priori standpoint.

3. The shooter met the Representative in 2007 long before Palin was on the national scene.

4. The shooter was from an economic class under siege, esp. in Arizona after the housing bust. He was booted from school for disruptive behavior, his economic future was bust.

5. If Palin et al. had such a potent effect, we should see daily if not multiple shootings per day, bombings, etc. given the 100s of millions of people she reaches via the media. These things happen for very personal reasons; politics, if it is involved, is just a fig leaf.

Bottom line: trying to score points off of a tragedy like this is the very mindset that puts us where we are as a nation. We need to unplug from the 24 hour news cycle and focus on our own here and now, and the people who are hurting and going unhelped.

This is NOT about taking sides. This is about the absurdity of using this kind of political rhetoric in campaigns. Any kind of calls to violence of this sort should be frowned upon. People need to be responsible for their words, and in this case, Palin's words just happened to be related to a random act of violence. This is not directly Palin's fault because both sides are at fault, but this is an example of what this kind of rhetoric can lead to and how dangerous it actually is.

>> ^TangledThorns:

The Left trying to pin this on Palin will only blow back in their face. Besides, the left have used this kind of imagery and rhetoric many times, see below, so stop the hypocrisy!
http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/112823/


>> ^COriolanus:

Look, we need to get some things straight:
1. There is no proven link between the shooter and any group. ANY group.
2. One can denounce the "gun targeting" fund raiser from an a priori standpoint.
3. The shooter met the Representative in 2007 long before Palin was on the national scene.
4. The shooter was from an economic class under siege, esp. in Arizona after the housing bust. He was booted from school for disruptive behavior, his economic future was bust.
5. If Palin et al. had such a potent effect, we should see daily if not multiple shootings per day, bombings, etc. given the 100s of millions of people she reaches via the media. These things happen for very personal reasons; politics, if it is involved, is just a fig leaf.
Bottom line: trying to score points off of a tragedy like this is the very mindset that puts us where we are as a nation. We need to unplug from the 24 hour news cycle and focus on our own here and now, and the people who are hurting and going unhelped.

Look, we need to get some things straight:

1. There is no proven link between the shooter and any group. ANY group.

2. One can denounce the "gun targeting" fund raiser from an a priori standpoint.

3. The shooter met the Representative in 2007 long before Palin was on the national scene.

4. The shooter was from an economic class under siege, esp. in Arizona after the housing bust. He was booted from school for disruptive behavior, his economic future was bust.

5. If Palin et al. had such a potent effect, we should see daily if not multiple shootings per day, bombings, etc. given the 100s of millions of people she reaches via the media. These things happen for very personal reasons; politics, if it is involved, is just a fig leaf.

Bottom line: trying to score points off of a tragedy like this is the very mindset that puts us where we are as a nation. We need to unplug from the 24 hour news cycle and focus on our own here and now, and the people who are hurting and going unhelped.

Two wars (three?), housing bust, record deficits, high unemployment, oil disaster, endless broken campaign promises, and a congressional advantage that the cowardly Democratic Party has largely wasted... and he LEADS Ron Paul in a RASMUSSEN phone poll? On FOX? LOL!

My message to her: Good luck with that. Have fun having your credit score go into the toilet, and then you can cry and whine some more on YouTube when your wages do get garnished, and you're spending the majority of your free time riding the bus to work. That is of course if you can still afford a PC and an internet connection to do your complaining.

Why my attitude? Because I learned my own lesson 7 years ago, when I paid off $19,500 dollars of debt, $3000 of which was at 22% (cash advances) while the remainder was at 17.5% My minimum monthly payment was $330. I got myself into the mess, and I took responsibility and got myself out of it. Since then, I've been at 0 debt three times, heading to my fourth time this December. I raised my credit score to 830 out of 850, and I learned to be smart and frugal with my purchases. My only credit card has a $3500 limit at 7.25%, and I refuse to let them raise my limit. Sure, what the credit card companies do is bullshit, but when do you take responsibility for digging your own hole? You agreed to their terms, as stupid as they are, and borrowed the money. So instead, this fool is going to sit there like a child, forgoing any personal accountability, and hold her breath until she gets her way.

Sorry, but I hold nothing but contempt for people like this, as well as all those that were too greedy, and got fucked in the housing bust, and are now crying for their bailout. If I, of all people, was able to do it, then there's no excuse.

A nationwide housing bust? Dream on Krugman. I'm certain Bush will foresee any kind of avoidable economic dip/global meltdown.