There is a two-way contractual system The bank agrees to loan, taking on all the risks associated with such load. The borrow does the same. ... You say the borrower should check his account, but that is barely his job: whereas it is the job of the banks.

I'm having a tough time conjoining these two bits here. We both agree that the loan is a two-way contract where the bank agrees to lend, and the borrower agrees to borrow - and that both parties agree to the risks involved. And yet there is this second bit here where you say that it is 'barely the job' of the borrower to check his balance and manage his end of the contract. If someone agrees to a contract that carries the risk of bankruptcy, homelessness, or financial ruin then to say it is 'barely' thier job to check the account comes off to me as insanely negligent.

I'd be interested to hear your explanation for all the banks that are doing just fine because they didn't buy into the mortgage scheme. I've heard radio interviews where they simply say that they didn't lend to anyone who couldn't be reasonably expected to pay for it. How did they escape your Catch-22?

Depends on the bank. Peeling back the onion that is the banking industry is complex, but back in the 90s the ones that were really pushing for the repeal of Glass-Steagall were not 'banks' in the sense that most people think about them. They were large, multi-national financial institutions and insurance companies - AIG being the principle player. These kinds of big money houses saw a way to make profit on the buying & selling of mortgages as financial packages WITHIN the financial industry itself. Effectively, the customer getting the loan was utterly irrelevant to these big players. They were interested in the financial packaging - not the loans themselves.

So when the law was changed, it allowed them to throughput mortgages within their own organizations. Historically, Glass-Steagall made it illegal for a financial house like AIG to buy & sell mortgages from banks that it owned or partnered with. But after the change, they could pool all the loans together and market them as a product. They started putting pressure on the smaller players to churn out more debt. There were banks that didn't play the game, but it was tough becuase all through the late 90s and early 00s, people were making money hand over fist the sl-easy way.

I have no doubt that there were politicians who pushed for easier mortgages to please their vocal minority constituents, but the people who stood most to gain were the wall street big money handlers. In your estimation, which of these groups tends to get their way in politics most readily? And therefor, which of these groups is more to blame?

Your question is this... Who is more to blame - the person MAKING A BRIBE or the person TAKING THE BRIBE? My answer is that the person TAKING THE BRIBE bears the greater guilt. All the bribes in the world are worthless if the other guy doesn't TAKE it. Businesses have no power to pass laws. That power rests in Congress. They are the stewards. They are the gatekeepers. They are the ones that are given public trust to only pass good laws, and to guard against this kind of crap.

Sadly - this is what happens when you allow a strong, central government to exist. I remember VERY clearly in the 90s that when AIG, Barney Frank, and a bunch of other guys were strong-arming the repeal of Glass-Stegall they were VERY insistent and persuasive that they were doing a really GOOD thing. It was going to lower the cost of housing. It was going to get more poor people into homes. It was going to make a lot of money for the middle-class, and ease the burden of the poor. In fact, the "repeal Glass-Stegall" guys were vociferious in accusing those OPPOSING their plan of being evil, selfish, cruel, and racist. And until October of 2008, who could really argue with them?

Government should have known better. Glass-Steagall was made a law SPECIFICALLY to prevent housing market collapses like this. It was implemented as a direct result of similar shenanigans which caused the Great Depression and the crash of the 20s. But because government people were wanting votes and conduct 'social engineering', they changed the laws. AIG didn't change the laws. Government did. They bear the ultimate responsibility.

In no way does this absolve folks like AIG. Quite frankly, the federal bailout is a massive crime aginst the people. It dumped money into financial houses to shield them from the consequences of their stupidity. The banks should have been allowed to fail. When this kind of thing happens, you let the chips fall and then the system rebuilds itself. And it does so rather quickly when government isn't there screwing things up like they did in the 30s.

>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:
The bank's job isn't to be your daddy, or to lecture you about whether you should or shouldn't get a loan. If a person walks into a bank, then as long as they qualify under the rules which are established by government then the bank doesn't have much choice. When people qualify, the bank issues the loan or they open themselves to discrimination lawsuits. It's a Catch-22.


I'd be interested to hear your explanation for all the banks that are doing just fine because they didn't buy into the mortgage scheme. I've heard radio interviews where they simply say that they didn't lend to anyone who couldn't be reasonably expected to pay for it. How did they escape your Catch-22?

I have no doubt that there were politicians who pushed for easier mortgages to please their vocal minority constituents, but the people who stood most to gain were the wall street big money handlers. In your estimation, which of these groups tends to get their way in politics most readily? And therefor, which of these groups is more to blame?

These borrowers knowingly made bad loans to people who didn't understand the contract

In the early 90s the banks were arguing AGAINST repealing Glass-Stegall. Politicians partnered with some big finaincal houses like AIG and started accusing mid-size & small banks of racism ala "red-lining" to grease the political skids for a repeal. In most instances there was no racism of any kind. Banks simply did not give loans to people that couldn't afford them. But poor, urban areas had higher percentages of minority populations - and so out whips the race card...

I lived in the 70s and 80s. I know how hard it was to get even a 30-year loan in those days. But literally overnight banks had to start giving out loans to people who traditionally would not qualify. Instead of making money on the interest of the LOAN, banks were expected to make profit by bundling & selling the mortgage. The government promise was that if things went sour on the borrower end, Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae would paper it over. It worked fine for about a decade. But you can't sustain a market when your only customers are poor people in homes they can't afford and property flippers taking out 2+ extra mortgages more than they can realistically pay for.

The bank's job isn't to be your daddy, or to lecture you about whether you should or shouldn't get a loan. If a person walks into a bank, then as long as they qualify under the rules which are established by government then the bank doesn't have much choice. When people qualify, the bank issues the loan or they open themselves to discrimination lawsuits. It's a Catch-22.

Your outrage should more properly be targeted at the government. Have them re-institute Glass-Stegall. Force them to tighten up the requirements on who can/can't get a loan. Make it so people who shouldn't get loans CAN'T get them and that banks aren't allowed to do it. Join the rest of us racist, evil, red-lining conservatives who think loans should only be given to those who can actually afford to pay them off. But prepare yourself for a tongue-lashing from every neo-liberal leftist group under the sun, because clearly your bean-counting logic is pure neo-con white hatred, right? Oh - and especially prepare yourself to get excoriated by guys like Barney Frank who was one of the principle engineers of this whole "UFFOWDABLE HOWSEING!" mess.

Good video, but does it have to evolve to where I lose the ability to be able to go where I want to? Also, I like bikes but Hate bicyclists and not to sound 2 much like an ass but 10 mins on a bus or train and I end up wanting to set fire to everyone around me.

I also do think that if you really want to see the change you need a lot a capital. You can put out all the info you have, all the clever media and video you want and you will not see the change your saying is needed. The company's will always use the excuse the stockholders do not want this. So become the stockholders. Start taking over the companies that don't want to change and as the stockholders force them to change. Being an ass and yelling at the dude in the Mercedes while riding a bike will change nothing. People do note like being told what they have to do. So take over Mercedes and make them change. But then the catch 22 kicks in. You start having the money and find its so much easier to just let things keep going as they have. Earth day started when the current generation in charge where young. They where going to change the world. Now they are in charge and nothing has changed.

^But the 'Indiana Jones' is what made me click through. A classic VS titling catch 22.

Kind of a catch 22 for me sarzy, as generally unless the trailer looks interesting, I won't touch a horror film. Way to much crap out there. Still, I'm better than most at forgetting trailer material once the movie comes round. Mostly this is a looker for me because for once its the GIRL going nuts and kidnapping the guy instead of the usual. Mmm can't wait.

Hi @NetRunner,

I like immigration in general. However, importing poverty doesn't seem wise. The more poverty we import, the larger a burden it is on the rest of society. Hence California's catch 22: either reduce social services, close state parks, etc, or go bankrupt. Even very high taxes are no longer enough to allow California to behave as if it is a well-off state.

@NetRunner: "My observation was that my peers in school went on to make vastly more money than me, despite their loafish and unintellectual mediocrity and ethically shallow outlook, while the people in my neighborhood went on to make vastly less money than me, despite their innate industriousness, untapped intellectual depth, and generally virtuous outlook on the world."

"Untapped intellectual depth:" That's really a big part of inequality... some folks tap their own depths, and other folks wait for others to tap their depths for them.

When we say people are unable to better their situations, we don't mean they're physically incapable of it... we mean they're ideologically incapable of it. They can't make the sacrifices I make because they're ideologically incapable of doing so. They must watch sports, make bad sexual and marriage decisions, and must generally waste their time in innumerable ways because their ideology is ineffective and they won't change.

I was recently dating a woman who has an ivy league doctorate, but who has the temperament of a short-term thinker. She's in the process of re-training to be a community college instructor in an only tangentially related field because it's more laid back, even though the pay is worse. I tried giving her some career management advice, but her options are limited because she doesn't have a good ideology.

It seems backwards to ask us to subsidize other people's predictably bad ideologies.

@NetRunner: "But then, you're making an easy enough mistake. A man who'd never lived anywhere but an isolated tropical island would deny snow exists, much less is something which people would need to stockpile salt and sand for..."

I've spent around 1/3 of my life living beneath the poverty line. I understand the value of a dollar.

context from a guy who was there:
young man gets stopped for jaywalking. Cop wants to arrest him and the girls get angry and start yelling. Cop grabs smaller girl and twists her arm behind her back to the point of pain. Bigger girl tries to separate them and gets punched in the face. Even if you just saw the video it looked to me like a man being rough with a much smaller person. The bigger woman tries to separate them and gets punched. take the word cop out of the situation and the man should be the one in trouble for assault. as far as the law stands the cop is just dumb as he will cost society millions if the girl gets a felony when there was no need for anything more than a simple verbal warning for safety's sake. I hope we will see more people resisting being arrested for nothing but resisting arrest. System needs to give people the right to resist a wrongful arrest so we can stop that bit of legal catch-22. Tons of people get arrested for resisting arrest without any other charges
-karl

I get what you're saying, but I still think what he's proposing necessarily forces people to make value judgments that are beyond science. While science can find evidence of empathy in the brain it can't tell us whether such empathy is necessarily good or bad. Say there is a society that is more "empathetic" than another society and that first society is more materially well off. You can't jump to the conclusion that empathy is good for survival, because there are hundreds of variables that affect the wealth of a nation and furthermore correlation does not necessarily mean causation. It could very well be the case that being materially well off creates a more empathetic society (or creates the conditions that allow such a society to arise). Or it could just be a total fluke.

That's what I found unclear in his speech--how exactly is science making value judgments? Science is providing facts about the world, but it still requires human consciousness to interpret those facts in a meaningful way. And people will interpret the facts differently and this will lead to conflict (global warming, the various string theories, etc.). How that conflict is resolved (whether with words or guns, for instance) will depend on a lot of things--including the values of those participating in the conflict. So it seems like a Catch-22 to me. You're using science to try to come up with value judgments about things, but in order to do that you have to make value judgments about the data you've collected. You're right back where you started.

Changing topics a bit here, I find his argument about the Muslim dress code frivolous. He is specifically cherry-picking by using Taliban-style extremely fundamentalist Islam as representative of all Islamic beliefs. It is true that certain Islamic governments have created laws to enforce a power divide between men and women but it is equally true that not all Muslims share this view and that Islamic countries vary widely in what is considered appropriate dress. The Koran itself admonishes both men and women to be modest in their dress and actions. Obviously certain Islamic scholars have ignored the "men" part and focused on the women in order to pursue their own agendas and strengthen their own power. Sam Harris blames religion for this but I blame human nature. It doesn't matter whether we are talking about religion, a political ideology, law, or any other organized system--there will be humans in the world who will attempt to twist and exploit it to their own advantage and to the disadvantage of those they don't care about. The crusade against religion that people like Dawkins and Harris are waging is, in my opinion, a waste of time. If you really want to change the world, find a way to change fundamental human nature.

Ironically, I believe this is the true purpose of religion--to encourage us to change our base desires or harness them for use towards a greater good. For me, whether a God or gods actually exist is irrelevant. If religion can help people to overcome their own innate self-destructive or selfish tendencies and work together for the good of humankind, then it is a useful tool. But all tools can equally be used as weapons. That doesn't mean you get rid of the tool, though. The problems of religion that both Harris and Dawkins talk about aren't problems with religion per se but with how certain people have interpreted religion in ways that are self-serving. I don't think religion needs to be destroyed. But I do agree with Sam Harris that we need to be vigilant against those who would use religion--or any other organized system for that matter--in order to pursue their own ends, and we need to be willing to call a spade a spade and not keep silent for fear of being considered ethnocentric. That's why I have no problem criticizing the Taliban's interpretation of the Koran and Islamic law. It seems to me to be a thinly veiled grab for power and dominance that uses religion as its cover. I could say the same thing about the drive to ban gay marriages in the U.S. or a host of other issues. My point is that these things are not representative of religions as a whole but instead are examples of discrete individuals (mis-)using religions to further their own agendas.

Sorry for writing so much. Took me a while to sort out all my thoughts on the matter. If you made it this far, thanks for reading.

>> ^mgittle:


I don't think it's about majority vs. minority happiness the way you make it sound. It's not 51% vs. 49%. If you accept his argument at the end regarding the father killing his gay child out of "love", then you must accept that there exists a type of love/empathy that is healthy for a vast majority of a population.
For example, in Turkish, there are two words for love. One is the type of love one feels for their parents, siblings, close friends/community. The other is more like passion/infatuation and would never be used for family/friends. We lack this basic word-based distinction in English, so the idea of love often gets strangely twisted between the multiple types and sometimes requires convoluted explanations of one's feelings. This distinction is important because I believe the former type requires empathy to feel, and the latter type is more instinctual and does not require empathy.
Therefore, if you can argue that empathy is a good survival trait because it creates a stronger nation/culture/etc, then there must be scientific evidence for empathy in the brain and evidence that certain individuals lack empathetic brains for whatever reason.
I don't think he's arguing that "good for the majority = good for everyone" is something that works 100% of the time. Clearly, personal freedom is important, but when personal freedom/morality encroaches on the freedoms of others (such as his argument that culture forces "voluntary" body covering, or the aforementioned father-killing-gay-son argument) it is no longer a good thing for anyone involved.

Then when they bite, you exploit them with all of the things written in the fine print in that contract they signed.

People keep acting like bank credit with interest is some 'secret'. Everyone knows that credit cards have high interest rates and fees. When a bank hits you with fees then you pay off the balance and cancel the account. Or (better) never run a balance and you'll never have a fee. Or (best) never borrow money from a bank. It isn't complicated.

Also, some are acting as if banks should behave like altruists. It's as if you are pretending the world is Bedford Falls, that banks are the Building & Loan, and bankers are George Bailey. No no no... Customers must walk into the bank with the mindset that they are dealing with Mr. Potter. Banks sell a useful, but dangerous product. If you are smart and careful you can come out well. If you are stupid and careless you will lose every time. Pretending that banks should act like friendly charities is foolish.

I don't know why the government hasn't made strict guidelines as to how a bank must conduct itself.

They did. The government was the entity that opened the 'free money' floodgates by repealing Glass-Steagal because they wanted more people buying homes & cars. Banks were cool with it because it allowed them to be one-stop-shops, repackage debt into paper commodities, and government promised Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae would cover it all. Government set the table & provided the food. Banks sold the tickets to the banquet. Customers gorged until they ruptured internally. Three parties were involved, and the blame is shared by all three equally.

I'm just saying the government needs to protect those less savvy about credit and debt and keep the banks from exploiting these poor fools.

I'm all for the concept, but how do you implement it? Force everyone to take a class or sit down with a lawyer before they can get a loan? I don't think that will help except maybe 1 case in a million. Almost no-one goed to banks with the delusion that they don't have to make payments or incur interest.

I volunteer time as a sort of career/money counseller to help people out of financial trouble. I've sat down and explained the whole 'never borrow money because of interest...' formula very patiently and clearly. It doesn't matter. People hear the speech, and turn right around and get in debt to the gills buying crap they didn't need. They don't want to sell the stuff and pay the bill either. They want someone to pay the bill or absolve the debt so they can keep their stuff. That's just the way human beings are. So forcing banks to sit people down and go through a "here is how debt & interest work" education is helpful, but will not make the problem go away.

The only sure fire way to 'protect these fools' (as you put it) is to have the banks use a means-testing system by which they deny credit to 'risky borrowers'. "Sorry - we're not lending you money for your own safety." That's a recipie just asking for a lather-rinse-repeat of the whole 'red lining' accusation in the 90s. Can't win for losing. Banks are 'evil' if they expect to be paid back.... Banks are 'evil' if they refuse to lend money to people who can't afford it... Nice catch 22.

To be honest he's right on dithering, but that's not entirely Obama's fault. Part of the problem has been McChrystal leaked report on Afghanistan which confronted him with being forced to make an immediate decision or appearing to waver. The fraudulent elections have also made committing more troops before the debacle is resolved unfeasible and would have appeared as if he was propping up a pro-US autocratic regime. Now that Karzai has agreed to a second round recount, and there exists the potential for a power sharing agreement eventuating with Abdullah, the symbolic gesture of committing more troops becomes more genuine, as well as politically plausible at home.

He's blatantly wrong on the missile shield though. The chance of Russia, particularly given how much of a hit its economy took from the global economic downturn, of making any big strides into Eastern Europe are slim. After all, it's actions into Georgia while disproportionate were arguably provoked. It's clear the main purpose of them from the start was to protect against the threat of a nuclear Iran. But then, the process of setting up this missile shield angered Russia, which then caused it become closer both economically in their willingness to help build nuclear reactors and in providing valuable VETO votes against further sanctions through the UN, which formed a catch 22. Especially considering the unproven nature of the missile shields, and the value of Russia as an ally versus slightly thornier relationships between the US and Eastern Europe, it seems that dismantling them was easily the best option considering the downsides of both choices.

Aren't they going to charge the WalMart employee for looking at child porn then too? That's also illegal. This whole situation is a catch 22 in the land of the "free". Welcome to Amerika.

It's not entirely clear that Obama is left-wing. In America he is left-wing. From a global and historical standpoint he is on the right. This is reflected here:
http://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2008

But anyway, I wanted to ask which policies are neolib kook? Trying to pass healthcare reform? Is there something else? What is he doing that unpopular with normal every day citizens?

In reply to this comment by Winstonfield_Pennypacker:
Obama is not NEARLY as liberal as we would like him to be.

Heh - I always get a good chuckle when I hear this. Seriously, Obama is the most liberal kook to ever hold the Presidency... And he isn't NEARLY 'liberal' enough for the kook neolib fringe.

Obama really is in a catch-22 when he listens to the kook neolib fringe. They are his core. The ACORN guys... The DailyKOS freaks... The AFL/CIO goons... The left-wing freak shows are his base. And to keep his base happy, he has to do stuff that is WAAAAAAAY out there to placate them. I mean WAAAAAAAAY out there. If he doesn't do these total whack-job, Dr. Insane-O, kook-fringe things then (as this vid demonstrates) his core of kook fringe flunkies start screaming bloody murder.

But Obama ran as a supposed 'centrist' who would govern from the center. He can't run his administration on a far-left kook fringe neolib ideologue platform. If he does, then he alienates every single independant voter, moderate, or blue-dog democrat who voted for him.

What Obama has actually DONE with his presidency so far is unequivocally left-wing.He has not governed as a moderate. He isn't even slightly conservative. He's a neolib kook and his policiies are all in that philosophy. Because he is such a left wing radical, he's alienating the bulk of his supporters. Moderates & Independants drank the Kool-aid in the election. They really thought he was a moderate. They're alarmed that he is such a slavish left-wing kook, and they hate what he's doing. His numbers reflect the fact that Obama's neolib platform is unwanted and unpopular with normal, everyday citizens.

But they aren't left wing ENOUGH for the neolib kooks - so he's losing support among even THEM. He's 10 points away from being George W. Bush. Almost feel a little sorry for him.

Obama is not NEARLY as liberal as we would like him to be.

Heh - I always get a good chuckle when I hear this. Seriously, Obama is the most liberal kook to ever hold the Presidency... And he isn't NEARLY 'liberal' enough for the kook neolib fringe.

Obama really is in a catch-22 when he listens to the kook neolib fringe. They are his core. The ACORN guys... The DailyKOS freaks... The AFL/CIO goons... The left-wing freak shows are his base. And to keep his base happy, he has to do stuff that is WAAAAAAAY out there to placate them. I mean WAAAAAAAAY out there. If he doesn't do these total whack-job, Dr. Insane-O, kook-fringe things then (as this vid demonstrates) his core of kook fringe flunkies start screaming bloody murder.

But Obama ran as a supposed 'centrist' who would govern from the center. He can't run his administration on a far-left kook fringe neolib ideologue platform. If he does, then he alienates every single independant voter, moderate, or blue-dog democrat who voted for him.

What Obama has actually DONE with his presidency so far is unequivocally left-wing.He has not governed as a moderate. He isn't even slightly conservative. He's a neolib kook and his policiies are all in that philosophy. Because he is such a left wing radical, he's alienating the bulk of his supporters. Moderates & Independants drank the Kool-aid in the election. They really thought he was a moderate. They're alarmed that he is such a slavish left-wing kook, and they hate what he's doing. His numbers reflect the fact that Obama's neolib platform is unwanted and unpopular with normal, everyday citizens.

But they aren't left wing ENOUGH for the neolib kooks - so he's losing support among even THEM. He's 10 points away from being George W. Bush. Almost feel a little sorry for him.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Joker, batman, batmobile, serious' to 'Joker, batman, batmobile, serious, catch 22' - edited by calvados