If McCain and that part of the GOP who saw this coming don’t get out in front of this credit mess and start hammering away at the blame game the Dems and their media myrmidons are pushing, we could conceivably end up with the lunatics in charge of the asylum.
Or, to put it another way, clear the sidewalk: we need space for bread lines, baby!:
It was a room full of people who rarely hold their tongues. But as the Fed chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, laid out the potentially devastating ramifications of the financial crisis before congressional leaders on Thursday night, there was a stunned silence at first.
Mr. Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. had made an urgent and unusual evening visit to Capitol Hill, and they were gathered around a conference table in the offices of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“When you listened to him describe it you gulped,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York.
As Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and chairman of the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, put it Friday morning on the ABC program “Good Morning America,†the congressional leaders were told “that we’re literally maybe days away from a complete meltdown of our financial system, with all the implications here at home and globally.â€Â
Mr. Schumer added, “History was sort of hanging over it, like this was a moment.â€Â
When Mr. Schumer described the meeting as “somber,†Mr. Dodd cut in. “Somber doesn’t begin to justify the words,†he said. “We have never heard language like this.â€Â
“What you heard last evening,†he added, “is one of those rare moments, certainly rare in my experience here, is Democrats and Republicans deciding we need to work together quickly.â€Â
Although Mr. Schumer, Mr. Dodd and other participants declined to repeat precisely what they were told by Mr. Bernanke and Mr. Paulson, they said the two men described the financial system as effectively bound in a knot that was being pulled tighter and tighter by the day.
“You have the credit lines in America, which are the lifeblood of the economy, frozen.†Mr. Schumer said. “That hasn’t happened before. It’s a brave new world. You are in uncharted territory, but the one thing you do know is you can’t leave them frozen or the economy will just head south at a rapid rate.â€Â
As he spoke, Mr. Schumer swooped his hand, to make the gesture of a plummeting bird. “You know we’d be lucky …†he said as his voice trailed off. “Well, I’ll leave it at that.â€Â
Wait — you mean corruption, graft, and political protectionism for said corruption and graft can have consequences? Yikes. Who knew?
Good thing Chuck and Chris have already feathered their nests.
But don’t worry. When the time comes, they’ll be sure to note how they feel your pain — even as they go about covering up their previous errors by compounding those errors on the way to Edward Bellamy’s Utopia.
— Which, someone should remind them, only worked because the author reinvented humanity and controlled the story’s outcome. In real life, it looks a lot like Chavez’ Venezuela.
Though in fairness, to the progressive fascist, that’s a feature, not a bug.
****
related: much backstory on Obama and subprime lending — much of it from Karl the racist, formerly of this address.
Also, from Darleen: Look, something shiny!
****
More: “Shock Forced Paulson’s Hand: A Black Wednesday on Credit Markets; ‘Heaven Help Us All'”:
When government officials surveyed the flailing American financial system this week, they didn’t see only a collapsed investment bank or the surrender of a giant insurance firm. They saw the circulatory system of the U.S. economy — credit markets — starting to fail.
View Interactive
Huddled in his office Wednesday with top advisers, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson watched his financial-data terminal with alarm as one market after another began go haywire. Investors were fleeing money-market mutual funds, long considered ultra-safe. The market froze for the short-term loans that banks rely on to fund their day-to-day business. Without such mechanisms, the economy would grind to a halt. Companies would be unable to fund their daily operations. Soon, consumers would panic.
For at least a month, Mr. Paulson and Treasury officials had discussed the option of jump-starting markets by having the government absorb the rotten assets — mainly financial instruments tied to subprime mortgages — at the heart of the crisis. The concept, dubbed Balance Sheet Relief, was seen at Treasury as a blunt instrument, something to be used in only the direst of circumstances.
One day later, Mr. Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke sped to Congress to seek approval for the biggest government intervention in financial markets since the 1930s. Some Fed officials saw this as the moment to spur action from Congressional leaders distracted by an election campaign. But in a private meeting, some lawmakers started asking for extra provisions, such as help for individual homeowners, according to a person present. One asked what would happen if the bill failed.
“If it doesn’t pass, then heaven help us all,” responded Mr. Paulson, according to several people familiar with the matter.
Read the whole thing.
Then this: “U.S. Drafts Sweeping Plan to Fight Crisis: Treasury Announces Plan To Buy Troubled Mortgage Assets”>:
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson announced plans Friday to quickly set up a “bold” government program to take over troubled mortgage assets from financial institutions, along with other efforts to step up the purchase of mortgage-backed securities. “The federal government must implement a program to remove these illiquid assets that are weighing down our financial institutions and threatening our economy,” Mr. Paulson said in prepared remarks for a press conference. (Read the full remarks)
President George W. Bush warned that a “significant” amount of taxpayer funds will be put at risk with the government’s plan to bolster shaky markets, but said intervention is necessary to keep the financial system from grinding to a halt. “This a pivotal moment for America’s economy,” Mr. Bush said Friday. “In our nation’s history, there have been moments that require us to come together across party lines to address major challenges. This is such a moment.”
Yeah, well, good luck with that, W.
There’s an election in the offing — and as with Iraq and redeployment — I suspect some on the left will be content to let things play out until they have power.
But then, maybe having watched them operate my entire life has made me cynical.
(h/t Terry H)
****
update 2: Just watch.
Didn’t Chuck U. Schumer put a run on a bank recently?
Baracky used to help write a financial newsletter so he will know what to do. This is why the Annenbergs gave him all that money to manage. NPR says he is teh smartest one.
I am going to buy food storage and lots of ammo right now!
Ah, to the gesture of a plummeting bird, finally we can all join in with our new great friends in Iran (the kool kids on the block) and learn to chant “Death to America”. I so tired of rooting for the bad guys (us) all these years, so out of step.
“but the one thing you do know is you can’t leave them frozen or the economy will just head south at a rapid rate.—
That’s “Card Check” for you “greasey union workers”.
Just so, dre. I got your back on this.
http://tinyurl.com/428jzu
article helps explain some
the problem for McCain is that the repubs arre on record as historically anti-regulation, and the repubs have had stewardship of the country for the last eight years pretty much.
they will be percieved as culpable, even though both parties are at fault.
ownership.
and Bush did say that, “go Shopping”.
frivolous and dumb.
“What you heard last evening,†he added, “is one of those rare moments, certainly rare in my experience here, is Democrats and Republicans deciding we need to work together quickly.â€Â
Uh-oh.
We’re fucked.
Comment by thor on 9/19 @ 7:44 pm #
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 9/19 @ 7:46 pm #
Please ingore the talking telephone poles.
Thank you.
“even though both parties are at fault.”
Demorat idea: Give money to stupid people let our Demorat Overlords make money.
thats good thor.
heres Manzi.
have to wonder what a half trillion debt dollars is going to translate to in interest rate pain.
Interesting comment here:
agree, disagree, or “present”?
feets, O is pretty obviously teh smarter one.
He dosent believe in creationism, like Bush and Palin.
nor does Obama need a booster chair for prime time like Palin did in that Hannity interview. ;)
lol!
/snicker
The Fed chairman has to address the oversight committees biannually. I’ve watched these hearings off and on for years now and would swear the issue of the size of the portfolios of MBS’s on Fanny and Freddie’s books came up in virtually every Q&A session after the formal testimony was done.
I’ve been trying to find transcripts for these Q&A’s on the web but have come up dry so far. Anyone with better skills at this sort of search than I will have a treasure trove of blah-blah-blah predictions of the meltdown we’ve seen over the last few weeks to hand. Warnings from the Fed and brush-offs from the Senators as I remember them (save the occasional barking from Sen. Bunning and doom resigned musings from Bennett of Utah.)
agree, like with the Manzi article.
something had to be done.
remember Resolution Trust Corporation?
it is just going to take a lot of taxpayer $ and cause mega pain.
its going to be apartment america, rental america for a while.
the feds will be slum lords.
Everyone is acting like this is such a big deal, but for real it’s all just a catastrophe at the margins I think. I can tell cause NPR today is still pimping the “ohnoes teh money market mutual funds are failing” story, so they definitely think matters aren’t so bad. Not so bad that they shouldn’t try and help tank a market that’s really not at all related to mortgage-backed securities. It’s very important that Baracky become pezzydent because of the smartness he has in his head.
feets, O is pretty obviously teh smarter one.
He dosent believe in creationism, like Bush and Palin.
His plan is to balance the budget by selling off those 7 surplus states we really don’t need.
oh. nishi is right at #8, but she overstates it I think. Americans I think are smarter than to give power to peoples that won’t drill our own oil in the middle of a financial crisis, and it doesn’t help that Democrats will start yammering about the earth having a fever in the middle of a seemingly rational discussion. Harry and Nancy and Baracky just aren’t who you turn to when there’s a crisis. Maybe you might call them if your kid’s teacher calls in sick, but there’s really no consensus on that even.
Another Dem caught, Charlie Rangel blames his defaulting on Republicans
a better plan, Moes, than funding the Manifest Destiny of Judeoxian Demcracy for 10 billion an month and tellin ppl to avert recession by goin shopping.
feets, we could drill every drop and still be short.
we have 3% of the worlds reserves and 15% of the consumption.
independence thru drillbabydrill is a cudlip fantasy.
we should convert to propane to start with.
i dont care if we drill, btw, but its not a solution.
Democrats are already scheming how to lard any congressional action with benefits and highway monies and god knows what else. Opportunistic in a time of crisis, that’s our Democratic Party. You can count on them.
Yeah because stability in the middle-east is so over-rated with regards to the global economy.
Which mythology is more detrimental to economic recovery, nishi, creationism or global warming?
Gotta admire the chutzpah in telling us that the solution lies with the fellow who raked in millions of filthy lucre from the system rather than the fellow who was warning about the system years ago.
Our reserves aren’t a percentage of the world’s reserves, goofy. They’re 100% ours. Do the math.
Ignore the fascist talking telephone pole, folks. It ain’t interested in any real discussion, remember?
Alex I’ll take “Global Boring”
I hid my yo-yo
In the garden.
I can’t hide you
From the government.
Nishi —
Lose the cudlip / l33t affectation. It is old (like McCain lulz!!1!) and it’s starting to really irritate me. Now’s the time to write like an adult if you want to participate in the discussion.
That goes for you, too, thor. If you have something to add, do so. But make it substantive. Otherwise, hold onto it like your own private little jewel, and take pleasure knowing we never got to share in its brilliance.
If AIG’s International Leasing Co. gets bought by Munich Re, as predicted, I’d like to think there would persons smart enough to ask that there be regulations against Munich Re helping bolster Airbus sales versus Boeing.
But what do I know!
Just a random thought I had this morning, but does it seem to anyone else that effectively, what we’ve had here is an attempt at social engineering by stealth?
Consider:
1. The received wisdom is that people who have homes and mortgages are more stable, more productive. (Broadly speaking, this is because (a) they stay employed in order to make an attempt at paying their mortgages and (b) pride in ownership sets in, and that means they feel they have a stake in the community.)
2. The subprime mortgage initiative got lots of people who wouldn’t normally have done so buying homes.
3. Even though the mortgages were bound to tank, there was only one entity – the federal government, financed by the U.S. taxpayer – that could reasonably be expected to pick up the pieces after the whole house of cards fell down.
4. And now, taxpayers will be paying this off for some time into the future.
So in effect, what we have is a slight transfer of wealth from the taxpayers who could afford a mortgage over to the ones who couldn’t until FNMA came along.
Result? A few more homeowners/solid citizens/taxpayers in the future.
Okay, after having this thought, I filed it in the same place as the Illuminati and the Trilateral Comission, but still, as a conspiracy theory, I think it’s swell.
However, in order for it to work, there would have had to have been someone in Congress who was smart enough to think this through. (Snork.)
ok……i’ll say yeomanfarmers and elites.
is that better?
look, McCain cant escape this.
It happened on republican watch, and lassiez-faire market is a republican brand.
McCain is onrecord as anti-regulation, and help passed deregulation law.
If I lose my house and Obama becomes prez, I’ll be setting up a big refrigerator box on the lawn of the White House.
Me and Barack can spend some of our off time discussing literature. Like a salon — only, when it’s held at my place, we’ll be using folding chairs, and the appetizers will be Ritz and cheez-whiz.
Didn’t Chuck U. Schumer put a run on a bank recently?
Uh yeah, that’s why
Is particularly appalling. What a schmuck.
Which wasn’t the reason for the failure. You know, for someone who is always on about perception being reality, you don’t seem to want to do much to keep perception tracking close to reality.
Meaning, you’re part of the problem rather than part of the solution. And the reason is, you’re a fucking elitist who doesn’t believe Americans can be taught to understand what is actually happening here, so you sit back and sneer at the very condition you help to create.
And this makes you proud? And smart?
Odd calculus.
I’m going to go pound the heavy bag. Before it’s repo-ed.
I like my chances in Thunderdome.
Hmm. Good big picture thinking there, Marco. All I know is lots of people are pretty excited about buying a house next spring here in California that never could have at what prices were.
Howard Veit, who needs a hug, points to this article as being super-duper insightful. It seems like it’s just one guy talking and they don’t really fill in the blanks to make their case, but they want you to focus on this part as the genesis of teh crisis and I thought it was interesting…
NPR just tried to point to this same thing – how SEC measured broker-dealer capital, as being the heart of the problem too, but they forgotted to mention the part about how we were emulating Europe. To me if I were a journalist I would think that was interesting and I would tell you guys about it but it would break my mom’s heart if I became a journalist after all she and dad did for me I think.
lol Jeff i cant even explain tribalism and the biological basis for behavior to them.
How can i possibly explain Voodoo Economics?
“It happened on republican watch”
Nancy & Harry aren’t available for comment since 2006? Oh yea “BUSH WAR CRIMES” are SO important to you nut jobs.
lol
i think the warcrimesimpeachboosh ppl are idiots, and ive been jacked up at dkos for saying so.
the republican party is the party of laissezfaire markets.
and this disaster happened on republican watch.
fair or not, i think it will be sticky.
“If McCain and that part of the GOP who saw this coming don’t get out in front of this credit mess ”
ACORN!ACORN!ACORN!- Community Organizer™
This is good.
“and this disaster happened on republican watch.”
Bill Clinton is BLACK & REPUBLICAN
She means the fallout happened on Repub watch. And “it will be sticky” means that, rather than correct the false impression for who is to blame, she will watch with detachment as the “cudlips” misunderstand economics and elect Obama to solve the problem people like him created.
Part of the problem, as I say.
i kinda think the law dissolving the shield wall between banks and mortgagers that McCain helped pass in 1999 (err before Obama was in congress?) is a lot mre the origination of the Troubles.
no Jeff…..i will watch with detachment as the yeomanfarmers misunderstand economics and elect Obama to solve the problem people like him created.
Grrrr! Stop your lulzing!
This is better.
Understand the instruments of doom and rely less on personal political animosity.
people like Obama AND McCain created.
/sigh
“she will watch with detachment as the “cudlips†misunderstand economics and elect Obama”
Or Barry is the “Fall Guy” in this:
“When you were young and your heart was an open book
You used to say life and let life
(you know you did, you know you did you know you did)
But in this ever changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry
Say live and let die
Live and let die
Live and let die
Live and let die
What does it matter to ya
When you got a job to do
You gotta do it well
You gotta give the other fellow hell
When you were young and your heart was an open book
You used to say life and let life
(you know you did, you know you did you know you did)
But in this ever changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry”
Yes! What we need at this time of trial is boomer anthems I think.
“Yes! What we need at this time of trial is boomer anthems I think.”
The “Open Book” says “White man’s greed runs a world in need”
Somehow this is like “The Sting”
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070735/
It’s confusing. The media is handing McCain a powerful rationale for fiscal discipline if he wins while trying to hand Baracky a blank check if he wins. That’s what the we can’t help wall street if we don’t help main street formulation does I think. I don’t think they took the time to think this one all the way through.
Disagree in part.
While the diagnosis is sound, the prescription misses the fundamental built-in flaw that made this mess (along with the S&L and Enron failures) possible. I tried to expound on this specific weakness and how it works in the Historical revisionism revisionism thread (starting @ 200).
As long as our system allows the level of risk for any and all investments to be represented by the ratings of a hand full of companies that operate in the shadows of our economy, these failures will continue to happen. That is to say these events will happen only as long as we can expense them, and then it’s over for real.
I’m not convinced we can even do what our Government has just committed us into doing. I could talk about this more if anyone is interested, but for the sake of expediency I’ll just say that the price that the investments banks will need to sell this “bad paper” at in order to function and regain the confidence of the public (e.g. costumers), might be more than the government can finance.
For the banks to remain solvent and functional they’ll have to do more than just unload this debt at any price, and nobody knows what those numbers are or when they will finally be properly accounted.
In Short, there is no long-term solution offered here, and the short-term play is a shot in the dark. They are rolling the dice, looking for a hard eight.
The up-side; if they hit their number not only will they save the economy, but they (U.S. Government) could stand to make a nice profit.
That is good. Why, even a cudlip could understand it. Or nishi.
“might be more than the government can finance.”
Bad news for the Chicoms and the Arabs.
heres an anthem from my demographic.
3oh!3
thats our area code,huh Jeff?
a local band
the republican party is a raddled old whore.
If McCain was smart, he would take my argument and run with it all the way to the white house.
It’s a free market reform approach that demonstrates a real command of the issue.
“the republican party is a raddled old whore.”
Yea more cow bell and socialism NOW
Vic, how does the unwinding of these complex instruments work in the practical sense? How do the good components in a bundle of mortgages get distinguished from the bad? And, of course, then what? How is price discovered? How does the gov. begin to put price to any given illiquid asset?
Hey O! is raising “The Greatful Fred”!!!!
I like how they bounce up and down together, nishi. That’s always fun I think.
Don’t trust a O!
Never trust a O!
Won’t trust a O!
cuz a O! won’t trust me
I’m not convinced that there would be a necessity to break-up any of these bundles, at least not the vast majority.
These are real tangible assets we are talking about here, U.S. Real Estate, and betting against a long term recovery would be foolhardy in the face of history.
In extreme cases you could handle the poorest performing loans in a number of ways. Some examples would be selling outright on the open market or through HUD. Others could be turned over to a bankruptcy court where a judge restructures the loan- possible even extending it out to 100 years at a note the owner can afford.
Yes, Marco, that’s exactly right, except that there wasn’t any “stealth” about it. The road to Hell needs a firm and unyielding pavement.
There was even a precedent. Once upon a time there were “Savings and Loan” institutions. They weren’t allowed to do retail banking, only to accept long-term deposits and make home (and some business) loans using those as reserves. They were remarkably successful. Probably ninety percent of the post-WWII housing boom was financed that way. You might read up on why they went away, but the principle was clear: reasonably easy finance is an enormous “force multiplier” for an economy.
The problems we’re having now are the result of Ric’s Rule Number Three: The ants find the sugar. In this case, it’s more like leaving a three-bean salad on the counter in a house with roaches. Now the light’s on the roaches are running, and each of them has gotten fat on what was carelessly left around, but compared to what they’ve spoiled what they’ve stolen is nothing.
And Ric’s Rules aren’t the end. Russell’s Law, after Eric Frank Russell, who wrote a story called “A Study in Still Life”: Any system can be corrupted by turning the handle the way it goes, only farther.
Nishi, I’ve never read the book, so tell me: Quellcrist Falconer had a name for unmodified humans. “Cudlips”. You use it a lot. Did he also have a name for brilliant fools, the people who could analyze any problem and solve any puzzle, but always chose the wrong puzzle to solve? Any economy is a massive lie we tell one another. That’s as true of thor’s “reserves” and Barrett’s “hard money” as it is the system we’ve got — why the Hell should gold (for instance) have any value? Exposing the lie destroys the system. Exposing lies is very virtuous, and when they’re complicated it takes a lot of intelligence to ferret out the truth. It’ll destroy me — I have essentially no reserves — but it’ll come down around your ears, too, and you’ll be too fucking egotistical to name yourself correctly: Fool.
Regards,
Ric
I guess now’s not the best time to hold a fundraiser.
Too bad. Because I need like, $40K to get solvent. And Pajamas TV hasn’t come a-calling yet.
What I think Mav, and we all to a lesser extent, must do when confronted by the finger pointers on the left is to remind them:
1) Of how the CRA started this whole ball rolling in the 90’s
2) Of how corrupt groups like ACORN, the folks that bring you voter fraud, not only benefitted monetarily but in terms of political power as well, through their role in “policing” their locales adherence to CRA
3) How the predominantly Democrat Fannie and Freddie board members literally made millions of dollars while mismanaging those concerns; all while Obama expresses his Shock! and Outrage! at eeeeeevil CEO salaries in the private sector.
4) While whining about lobbyists and special interest influence, perhaps Obama should hand wring a little about being number 2, second to friend-of-Angelo Dodd only, on Fannie and Freddie’s all time political donations list; even though he has not completed a full term in the senate yet.
5) Continue to point out the Mav called for regulation in 2006, and even evil Booooooosh called for new oversight in 2003; but the Democrats blocked both of these initiatives…
Uh, maybe Mav shouldn’t mention that part about Boooosh; but the rest of us can…
I’m not sayin that the bankers didn’t act like crack-heads at a rock show, after the got the notion in their heads that they could make a ton of money by making loans to sketchy folks that ultimatly increased to incredible interest rates. But it is equally as true that some folks, in their zeal to be flippers or to move on up, lied about their incomes or simply signed contracts that they never even considered the ramifications of…
This is a tough nut to crack. I believe that the RTC redux is the safest way to go about it without ruining the credibility and viability of treasury and fed securities…
I just hope the Democrats stick to their word and send it through as a stand alone bill; and dont fatten it up with pork or grease it up with stealth energy measures…
The sweet part of it is, it would be so easy. All McCain has to do is point out that when faced with the crisis, Reid and Pelosi shit themselves and kicked the responsibility for figuring things out to the Bush Administration and the Secretary of the Treasury.
The Dems’ Wonderboy is preaching change (with his 36-year tenured Senator running mate), and his own komrades are showing they aren’t up to snuff.
THIS is why Congress’ ratings make Bush look like a rock star–they’ve been completely spineless on leadership from the get-go because they became so comfortable with blaming everything on Bush the last eight years that they can’t take any responsibility when the opportunity arises. Obama’s tried with his “six-point plan”, but his past shows he’s a black hole for money, so why trust him?
There’s a saying that there are those who are born great, those who achieve greatness, and those who have greatness thrust upon them. Can anyone honestly say at this point that any of the Democrats emobody any of these, without lying or being delusional?
Ric: Have you ever written down (and explained, for idiots like me) those Rules of yours?
I really think I’d like the opportunity to read some of your collected wisdom…. (And I think maybe a lot of us SHOULD read it….)
It’s in the pub, Challeron – click on his name at the left. Okay I’ll get it. brb
here you go
McCain ad.
Here’s ACORN
Here’s ACORN on DEMORAT DRUGS
Perfectly logical for the gov’t to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
After Kelo, I mean. Why the Hell not go all the way?
Munchos garcias, hf.
(Do I gotta denounce myself for that?…)
Everyone sounds so bitter but it’s just money. We just need somebody really good with excel I think.
Happyfeet,
The reason NPR is harping on the Money Market Fund is because they know that’s the real action.
That Market holds about $72 Trillion cash just looking for a safe place to land. It props up central banks all over the world, fuels economic expansion for every nation that has moved beyond the battery powered flashlight, and when that fund begins to shrink the forecast is certain doom.
It’s more powerful than Karl Rove.
thor has been pointing to the credit rating agencies part in the failures we are seeing today. He has much right there. Read this.
The banks have been moving to a “world economy” model based on European risk assessment since 1988. The Basel I and Basel II Accords were established to supposedly more properly quantify and risk assess holdings of banks. These holdings were tier based and were to assign levels of liquidity required based on these tiers. These changes were first applied and adopted by the five largest banks in the US and are to be implemented by the next largest banks by 2010, I believe. The Basel I Accords have been implemented for most regional banks in the US since the mid 1990s.
The problem with the Basel Accords, is that much of the risk assessment is done INTERNALLY ie self quantified and that internal assessment and tier/risk assignment is what governs the amount of reserves the bank must maintain. These internal assessments are also what is used to define the assignment of credit worthiness by other institutions/investors. The internal risk assessment/credit assignation conflict is for all intents and purposes, the fox guarding the hen house. Federal oversight and International oversight do not examine the internal risk assessments for accuracy in any meaningful way other than to rely on the banks own risk assessors.
Basel II uses a “three pillars” concept – (1) minimum capital requirements (addressing risk), (2) supervisory review and (3) market discipline – to promote greater stability in the financial system.
The first pillar
The first pillar deals with maintenance of regulatory capital calculated for three major components of risk that a bank faces: credit risk, operational risk and market risk. Other risks are not considered fully quantifiable at this stage.
The credit risk component can be calculated in three different ways of varying degree of sophistication, namely standardized approach, Foundation IRB and Advanced IRB. IRB stands for “Internal Rating-Based Approach”.
For operational risk, there are three different approaches – basic indicator approach or BIA, standardized approach or TSA, and advanced measurement approach or AMA.
For market risk the preferred approach is VaR (value at risk).
[edit] The second pillar
The second pillar deals with the regulatory response to the first pillar, giving regulators much improved ‘tools’ over those available to them under Basel I. It also provides a framework for dealing with all the other risks a bank may face, such as systemic risk, pension risk, concentration risk, strategic risk, reputation risk, liquidity risk and legal risk, which the accord combines under the title of residual risk.It gives bank a power to review their risk management system.
[edit] The third pillar
The third pillar greatly increases the disclosures that the bank must make. This is designed to allow the market to have a better picture of the overall risk position of the bank and to allow the counterparties of the bank to price and deal appropriately.
The Basel I accord dealt with only parts of each of these pillars. For example: with respect to the first Basel II pillar, only one risk, credit risk, was dealt with in a simple manner while market risk was an afterthought; operational risk was not dealt with at all.
(wiki source)
Conclusion, the entire concept of regulatory oversight has been mooted as the banks are in the position of judge and jury in their risk assessment.
No wonder the entire house of cards is collapsing…
Well, anything NPR can do to help panic the money market is appreciated I think.
How are you with excel, Victor?
That’s the death to america part.
Interesting article, Sdferr. But there’s just no way around it: having a good credit rating really helps one’s self esteem.
And that’s what’s most important. I know, because I used to watch Oprah.
Quellcrist Falconer,
Damn dude, how much did you pay off the bulls to a) get transferred to minimum security and b) obtain regular computer privileges? No more “drop the soap” for you, huh? Good times, convict, good times.
I’m too cheap to find out my score. That’s probably a sign it’s not too bad, no?
I thought Oprah was one of those “show me” people from Missouri so’s it’d figure she knows how to rate ’em.
On the other hand, what was the deal with the Hubble mirror? Failure to convert properly from the english to the metric system or something like that? Years before the thing goes up?
“#
Comment by happyfeet on 9/19 @ 9:59 pm #
I’m too cheap to find out my score. That’s probably a sign it’s not too bad, no?”
$5.95 Equifax
BTW I used the synopsis in Wiki as I didn’t think anyone else would want to wade through the actual accords as they are as mind-numbingly nonsensical as a speech by The One. I have read and analyzed these accords to write code to report this shit for a bank that is moving to this standard, and let me assure you, they are the most inane pieces of crap any regulatory agency ever adopted.
$5.95 is two slices of red velvet cake. Credit score. Red velvet cake. Credit score. Red velvet cake. I think you know how this ends.
Ass. Holes.
That is all. Return to your homes.
Wasn’t the CRA (Community Reinvestment Act) a financial affirmative-action program, at its core? I can’t remember where I read it (recently, too), that the practice of lending money to the under- and unqualified was to correct discrimination against pigmenty people.
And that discrimination appeared in a report, whose numbers pretty clearly illustrated that there was racial discrimination going on, until someone discovered a mathematical error, and when it was corrected, the racial discrimination disappeared.
But that didn’t matter to the folks who were high on Doing Good (and payoffs). They kept giving loans to people who couldn’t possibly pay them off because it was More Fair that way.
But, like sending underqualified students to the Ivies, you’re not really doing anyone any good by putting them in a situation they’re not prepared to handle. It would, of course, make more sense to help people learn how to handle college, mortgages, etc., but it also requires much more effort and cogitation to help people help themselves.
The bad loans were Yet Another Quick Fix That Gives Warm Fuzzies But Does More Harm Than Good.
QED.
But unlike stymied students in the Ivies who just drop out or whatever, this might take the whole ship down with it.
Well done, Dodd, et al. I’ll bet in your wildest dreams you couldn’t have thought of a better way to compel the government to take over such a large swath of the economy.
It’s almost as if all these snoodlers think that money is like water flowing on an MC Escher drawing. They are the felchers and the felchee.
Search Fannie Mae Foundation and you find all leftists “community organization” groups and affrimitive action inniatives
http://www.fanniemaefoundation.org/grants/grants_awarded.html
Obama affiliated ACORN and Center for Community Change
and other Obama affiliated
Chicago Urban League
Woodlawn Preservation and Investment Corp
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0804/S00064.htm
Barack Obama – Operation Board Games For Slumlords
Monday, 7 April 2008, 12:03 pm
Column: Evelyn Pringle
Fannie Mae Foundation grants were all paid for by taxpayer dollars – with out our INPUT or KNOWLDGE!
Now I call that really, REALLY VERY fucking patriot on our part!
So SUCK IT Biden!
Victor (#77) has spotted the crux of the matter, as (by happyfeet’s testimony) NPR has.
The lynchpin of the modern financial system is one man’s debt is another’s asset. When the bank loans you money, you have cash and the bank has an asset — your note. They are (theoretically) of equal value, so nothing at all has occurred. For those of you of a bent toward physics, think of the vacuum energy — particles and antiparticles come into being all the time, then annihilate before anybody notices; if you could keep them apart you could run your car, or a spaceship, or a country’s worth of computers, for free.
Most of the “cash” Victor is talking about it like that. It’s assets that have been monetized — that is, the holder of the asset found somebody who would pay for it, took it, and deposited it in a “bank” (though we don’t call them that any more, mostly.)
The problem is that we live in an industrial economy. What that means is that, for us, the sources of wealth — the “means of production” — must themselves be produced. The only real difference between an iPod and a factory to make iPods is the scale; the factory is many, many times more expensive. A wafer fab, a factory to make integrated circuit chips, costs five billion dollars. (Therefore there aren’t many of them.) With Governments everywhere hungry for money, and socialists everywhere explaining that anybody who’s got five billion dollars is a villain by that very fact, the ability to collect five billion dollars to build a wafer fab is highly treasured, which is why bankers and financiers get rich. They provide a valuable service.
The main way they do that is to deny that the collectors of money are “banks”. Nosiree bob, ain’t nobody here but us debtors. The Government can grab a bank account. When it comes calling at the mutual fund, the manager shrugs. Ain’t no money here, boss, you can look around and see. Hiyut‘s done all bin invested. So that’s where most of the money is that can be used to build factories — and if it can’t move around because the assets upon which it’s based are other people’s debts, and it’s doubtful whether those debts will be repaid and therefore the “assets” ain’t worth much, well, factories don’t get built and people don’t have work and it all falls down.
Captain Capitalism wants to shoot him some bankers. I’ll be glad to hold his coat, but the solution would only be temporary. A good chunk of this came about because for all their bleating about rationality and reason and “risk assessment”, in fact financial and “bidness” people from Captains of Industry down to fuzz-faced Ensigns of HR are as faddish as their teen-age daughters. When something cool comes along, they’re like groupies at a rock concert except that (being older and better educated) they can rationalize it (see the document Bmeuppls quoted).
Regards,
Ric
The problem is, and I’m not joking here, there is quite likely but a handful of people in the press capable of doing the kind of investigative reporting it would take to uncover all this dirt and connect up all the dots. And those so inclined likely work for outlets that have a partisan bent.
Somebody like the NYT or The WaPo could go a long way toward rehabilitating their reputations by finding capable, objective investigative reporters to dig into this over the next two months.
But good luck to all that. J-schools are turning out advocates, not journalists — and even their own self-interest in advancement can be rationalized away as advocacy when in truth, many of them simply don’t have the skills to do that kind of reporting job.
I’d say somebody should put Matt Welch on it.
Captain Capitalism is wigging out. Also he can’t spell Escalade. We all just stay calm and ain’t no one what needs to die. Anyway Congress is on the case.
Here is a deliverable of a Fannie Mae Foundation grant to
Neighborhood Funders Group that a Fannie Mae Executive Director Peter Beard was a memeber
Community Organizing Toolbook
(in case you don’t want to go to the pdf link)
Throughout the Toolbox, books, articles, reports, films, and other materials have been cited that can be useful for funders interested in exploring various aspects of the CO field and in designing and implementing a CO grantmaking program. In addition, Web site addresses and other information about key organizations involved with CO  both funders and CO groups  accompany many of the case studies and other examples that are used to illustrate major points in the text. In this brief section, we list and describe the contents of several publications that various NFG members have found particularly helpful to them in implementing a CO grantmaking program. For additional references, please contact NFG’s staff.
WEB SITES
Organizing Networkst
the Applied Research Center is a public policy, educational and research institute which emphasizes issues of race and social change. http://www.acorn.org-
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) Web site includes a Living Wage Resource Center, publications, and other campaign updates. http://www.ctwo.org- The Center for Third World Organizing site has information on trainings and other resources to promote and sustain political analysis, policy development, and collective action in communities of color across the U.S. http://www.gamaliel.org –
The Gamaliel Foundation is a network of professional community organizers and key institutional leaders working to rebuild urban areas, with a predominant focus on faith-based community organizations.
Other Web site resources
americanprospec- American Prospect is a monthly news magazine which frequently covers organizing campaigns.
http://www.commchange.XXX {another ACORN}
http://www.socialpolicy.XXX {leftist Chomsky}
BOOKS
Saul D. Alinsky, Reveille for Radicals, New York, Random House, 1969.
The classic clarion call to organize the people to claim their rights and powers of citizenship in a free society. Many regard Alinsky as the “father†of modern CO. His views and methods continue to influence CO today, but the book is particularly useful for establishing a baseline and helping readers to understand how CO has evolved, and is evolving still, since Alinsky’s time. The book is written in hard-hitting, passionate and colorful language.
Gary Delgado,Organizing the Movement: The Roots and Growth of ACORN, Philadelphia, Temple University Press, 1986
—-
And so the fuck on.
Taxpayer PAID!
So instead of selling them the rope, we finance it for them. Peaches!
Agreed, ‘feets. Waste of perfectly good pistol rounds, and the Captain will no doubt come around to that realization pretty soon.
Congress? LMFAO. When the going gets tough, Congress goes home.
And Jeff, what you say is true, but I’m gonna quibble anyway :-) The big, overwhelming problem we have right now is not enough shoulders to the wheel — Captain Capitalism is right about one thing: this definitely exposes one Hell of a lot of incompetent bankers and financiers! Anybody who was even capable of credibly pretending to know what he was doing would be snapped up, handed a six-figure salary, and stuffed in a cubicle somewhere to help try to keep Juggernaut between the ditches. The whole reason they’re in “journalism” in the first place is that they’re too ignorant to pound sand.
They even have an excuse — “conflict of interest”. Anybody who actually knows the subject can make more money exercising that knowledge than they can writing about it, but “journalism” has declared that anybody who’s ever made money off the knowledge can’t be trusted to explain it. Thus ignorance becomes a virtue.
Regards,
Ric
Maybe they will call it Flip This Blog!
“How to turn a “pure shit” blog into a new and improved blog that talks about shit. Hosted by Jeff G.”
Ric —
Oh, you’re right. But go smaller and assume I was referring only to the Obama/Fannie/Fred/Acorn/Alinsky/CBcaucus/etc., connection.
There’s a big big big story here, and so far, Topsecretk9 has done more in the comments on a Friday night to ferret it out than just about any journalist I can think of.
“How to turn a “pure shit†blog into a new and improved blog that talks about shit. Hosted by Jeff G.â€Â
Right, because the heavily protected echo chamber at firedoglake is a font of “ideas” the likes of “first!!11!!! and “Fitz!!11!”
Jeff don’t you think that they would just counter with Bush 2002 speaking to lenders about “dismantling” the racist barriers to the American Dream? He targeted down payments and the fine print of mortgage contracts.
My advice would be to “hold and pivot”.
McCain should just cross his fingers and embrace this latest deal, then turn the argument towards reforming the stranglehold that the Credit Agencies enjoy by opening the market to competition and new voices.
iirc, republicans have a history of being on the right side of that issue, with dems fighting them every step. This approach comes without “the Bush” and keeps maverickism alive.
Victor
not necessarily as slam on you, but I really tire of any notion PW is a shit blog.
Or did you give yourself away…
Topsecretk9,
I guess it wasn’t as cute as I had imagined.
Sorry- I didn’t mean for it to be taken that way.
The idea was taking an example of a success (i.e. Jeff) and having him put hardwood floors and new landscaping on someone else’s shit…
But yeah, I’ll leave the comedy to you guys.
-sorry again.
Fannie Mae Foundation
http://www.slate.com/id/2193445/
http://www.minnpost.com/stories/2008/06/03/2078/obama_turns_to_trusted_political_insider_jim_johnson_for_key_campaign_role
Grantee:
http://www.communitychange.org/
it’s okay Victor, we all fall on our faces occasionally. *
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $50,000 approved in 2005
Support of the Housing Trust Fund Project, an initiative dedicated to creating stable and sustainable streams of funding for affordable housing production and preservation across the country
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $50,000 approved in 2004
Support of the Housing Trust Fund Project, an initiative dedicated to creating stable and sustainable streams of funding for affordable housing production and preservation across the country
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $175,000 approved in 2003
Support of the Housing Trust Fund Project, an initiative dedicated to creating stable and sustainable streams of funding for affordable housing production and preservation across the country
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $0 approved in 2002
Support of ‘Rising Subprime Foreclosures: Estimating the Costs to Communities,’ a community resource guide for estimating the range of financial costs resulting from concentrated foreclosure activity associated with subprime and predatory lending
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $250,000 approved in 2001
Support of the Housing Trust Fund Project, which provides access to financial resources, expertise, technical assistance, and support systems for new housing trust funds nationally.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $125,000 approved in 2000
Support of capacity building in the Upper Northwest for low-income community-based housing development organizations and a program of technical assistance nationally.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $1,000 approved in 1999
Support of the 30th Anniversary Benefit Dinner to support the organization’s operations.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $125,000 approved in 1999
General operating support of an organization that strengthens low-income community-based organizations and creates permanent sources of housing revenue for their communities across America.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $125,000 approved in 1998
Support of the Neighborhood Revitalization Project and support of technical assistance for housing development in low-income areas across the United States.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $20,000 approved in 1998
Support of the first annual Celebration of Change.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $125,000 approved in 1997
Support of the Neighborhood Revitalization Project and support of technical assistance on housing development in low-income areas.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $100,000 approved in 1996
Support of a report on housing trust funds in each state, and support of technical assistance to develop Native American housing in urban areas.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $100,000 approved in 1995
Support of technical assistance to low-income community groups and support of the Neighborhood Revitalization Project.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $100,000 approved in 1994
Support of national technical assistance activities and the Neighborhood Revitalization Project.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $100,000 approved in 1993
General operating support and special project support of the Neighborhood Revitalization Project, an initiative to increase access to credit for community-based organizations.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $100,000 approved in 1992
Support of the Center’s Neighborhood Revitalization Project.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $50,000 approved in 1991
Support of the Neighborhood Revitalization Project, a program that provides assistance and training to low-income and minority community-based organizations on how to assess local credit needs.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $25,000 approved in 1991
Support of a national organization that assists community-based organizations in both urban and rural areas.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $25,000 approved in 1990
General operating support of a national organization that seeks to build and develop low-income, community-based organizations in both urban and rural areas by providing technical and other assistance.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $5,000 approved in 1989
General operating support of a national organization that seeks to build and develop low-income, community-based organizations in both urban and rural areas by providing technical and other assistance.
Center for Community Change
Washington, DC $2,500 approved in 1988
General operating support for a national organization that seeks to build and develop low-income, community-based organizations in both urban and rural areas by providing technical and other assistance.
MORE of our money Obama crony spent our behalf – patriotically of course
ACORN Housing Corporation – Dallas
Dallas, TX $20,000 approved in 1993
Support of a housing counseling program.
ACORN Housing Corporation – Little Rock
Little Rock, AR $1,000 approved in 1997
Ninth Maxwell Awards of Excellence honorable mention grant for a 9-unit affordable homeownership project using sweat equity.
ACORN Housing Corporation – Washington, DC
Washington, DC $3,386 approved in 1994
Support of computer equipment necessary to operate the Desktop Home Counselor.
ACORN Housing Corporation of Illinois
Chicago, IL $3,386 approved in 1994
Support of the purchase of computer equipment required to operate the Desktop Home Counselor.
ACORN Housing Corporation of Illinois
Chicago, IL $35,000 approved in 1994
Support of the placement of Americorps members with homeownership counseling programs.
ACORN Housing Corporation-National
Chicago, IL $100,000 approved in 2004
General operating support of an organization that helps families of limited means to secure and protect decent housing by providing housing counseling services, building homes, and educating policy makers in Chicago, IL; Phoenix, AZ; and Brooklyn, NY
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $75,000 approved in 1999
General operating support of a national organization that works to provide information about affordable housing and financial services to low- and moderate-income families and minority people.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $80,000 approved in 1997
Support of home-buyer fairs in 43 cities across the country.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $12,000 approved in 1996
Support of the Philadelphia ACORN and Friends Bank Fair 1996, a home-buyer fair that includes workshops on homeowner insurance programs, buying a house, refinancing mortgages, and credit issues.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $100,000 approved in 1996
Support of the National Loan Counseling Training and Support Center and support of mortgage loan counseling programs in Phoenix, Denver, Oakland, and Los Angeles.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $68,000 approved in 1996
Support of home-buyer fairs in 26 cities, which include workshops on homeowner insurance programs, buying a house, refinancing mortgages, and credit issues.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $100,000 approved in 1995
Support of the Loan Counseling Program, which provides training, technical assistance, and financial assistance to local loan counseling programs.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $100,000 approved in 1993
Support of the homeownership counseling component of the national program and local ACORN programs in Philadelphia, Bridgeport, Baltimore and Atlanta.
ACORN Housing Corporation-Philadelphia
Philadelphia, PA $100,000 approved in 1992
Support of the National Homeownership Counseling Program.
Obama adviser, James Johnson, bless his heart, is our own UNKNOWN patriotic BETTER!
precious.
“It’s not surprising that politicans are for sale, it’s just amazing how cheap they are.”*
* Anyone know the source for this? The Google Goggles, they do nothing.
“the problem for McCain is that the repubs arre on record as historically anti-regulation, and the repubs have had stewardship of the country for the last eight years pretty much.”
Problem with morons who advocate more government regulations is that COngressional and Clinton-administration Democrat politicians encouraged the finacial industry to do what it does best, ie make profit, using the Democrats government-backed money to lend that money to Americans who were unqualified to pay the money back, all the while these Democrat politioans were in on the profit-taking by doing the looting under the regulatory radar.
Dodd, Schumer, Obama, Clinton, Franks, Raines, Johnson, Gorelick, Reid, Pelosi………made millions by scamming people into believing they cared when all they were doing was pillaging and looting everything.
So what good are government regulations when Democrats in government are intent upon scamming the people with their good intentions.
Bush tried to stop the Democrat looting in 2003 but Barney Frank and his gang of Democrat thieves told him to keep oput of their money-making government business.
McCain also tried to stop the government rip-off artists in 2005.
I only vaguely understand high financial matters (thor’s expertise sends a thrill up my leg), but thor’s linked article mentions subprime loans, and connecting that with the video at Vodkapundit:
May 2004 — Subprime Mortgage Lending: Benefits, Costs, and Challenges — Federal Reserve Board. “Subprime mortgage loan originations rose by the whopping rate of 25 percent per year over the 1994-2003 period, nearly a ten-fold increase in just nine years…More than half of these new homeowning households are minorities.”
April, 2005 — Minorities depend on subprime loans — USA Today
April 2007 — Minorities are the emerging face of the subprime crisis — San Francisco Chronicle
Etc.
So what conclusions am I supposed to draw?
David Horowitz’s Discover the Networks is helpful here. And more visually here. (Takes a while to load)
Salt Lick, you’re getting a bit too close to the truth. Tread lightly, or I’m gonna have to call you a racist.
And, I saw Chris Dodd on CNN yesterday (at the gym -arg) and he was saying similar to what Jeff quoted. I wanted to bash his fucking face in.
My old hood saw a lot of new homeowners over the last five years. Now, I’ve got a lot of empty houses.
The thing that really is messed up – Detroit tax structure makes renting homes REALLY expensive. You have to charge a mint in rent just to cover the taxes.
Government hates poor people, I’m thinking.
Dude, landlords are evil.
Well, I can’t SELL my house … and no one can afford to pay the rent we’d need to charge. $400 bucks is needed for taxes alone. To break even, we’d need to charge over $1200.
For a three-bedroom bungalo in Detroit.
#114
I said it once when I had to pay off a Chicago building inspector, $100 bucks. But that was years ago. I’m sure it’s all different now.
Just so I’ve got this right; B.Obama wants to put the guys who ran federal mortgage guarantee budiness, in the white house? Yeah. That’s a good idea.
“Just so I’ve got this right; B.Obama wants to put the guys who ran federal mortgage guarantee budiness, in the white house?”
Now that is what McCain can hammer. Political campaigns have to use KISS in their themes so they fit the 30 sec. sound bites.
Topsecretk9, excellent work you’re doing.
The big money Dems are lining up to support this bailout. They are out in force telling anyone who will listen why this is important for the future of the country. And they are right, no bailout means economic disaster. What they are not mentioning though is their real fear; that economic disaster leads to large mobs bearing pitchforks, tar, and feathers, mobs that will follow the money trail from CEO to politician and back again, and then crucify the whole lot.
Nothing else could explain the Schumers, Bidens, Dodds, et.al. of the world rising up so quickly in unison to sing the praises of financial markets, telling us that they must be saved in order to secure the nations future.
In one sense they have done us a favor. They’ve taken away the anti-capitalism argument. Now this is nothing more than a bitter pill of a bailout and an underlying corruption scandal. That is the tack McCain needs to take, pick up on his RNC acceptance speech line about ‘you will know their names, and I will make them famous’ and repeat their names over and over again, along with the corresponding dollar figures. Are there some of the guilty with Rs after there names? Sure, let them fry like the rest, it would only reinforce the change mantra his campaign has picked up.
Yes, there are market imbalances that need to be corrected. But that discussion is just not going to be productive in the next two months, and only plays in to the Dems arguments about who’s better at government regulation. The American people will recognize the corruption and big money merry go round for what it is, that’s what needs to be hammered home.
Jeff it doesnt matter.
A lot of dereg was instantiated during Clinton by dems or dems or even before.
Bush did nothing about it and even made it worse, exacerbated it.
The top 400 families in America have seen a welth increase of 700billion dollars, the middle class has seen a decline in income.
You can rake muck 24/7 but u cant change the fact the repubs branded themselves as the deregulation party and did nothing about this for 8 years.
I personally think….Bush believed a democratic presidency was inevitable and did everything he could to push this out.
tant pis
A trillion chickens coming home to roost.
instead of trying to do anything to fix it.
that might be the muck u uncover if you dont watch out.
the zigzag express
Doesnt that scare you guys just a little?
McCain has totally flipped on agents of intolerance, and selected a demagogue for a vp, the most feared and loathed danger of the Founders, who had a beautiful understanding of human nature.
The guy will do absolutly anything to win.
What is McCain’s core belief? That he should be president.
w/e the cost to the country.
ohnoes. The media, it does not like McCain. Developing…
This is the most basic problem with conservatism, the doctrine that “it will last our time”.
No vision, no plan.
Bush told America to “go shopping” post 911 to avert a recession.
But that didnt solve the problem, it just pushed it down the road, growing in malevolence and energy.Bush thought the bubble would hold for his term in office, and, shoot!, the dems would get the whitehouse next anyways.
A nice housewarming gift for them.
Well, the gift arrived early.
Am fear nach seall roimhe
Seallaidh e as a dheigh.
[He who will not look before him
Will look behind him.]
Shhhh… Be vewy vewy qwiet…
It wasn’t freedom of action, aka deregulation, that did in the financial firms. It was political pressure to take actions and reward actions that no lender would have done otherwise.
Democrats like Dodd, Schumer and Frank used their power to place carrots on a path that led to this mess and used their sticks to make sure the dumb-asses followed the carrots right over the cliff.
That they themselves didn’t see the cliff because they were sucking blood out of the dumb-asses during the whole trip just makes them worse.
Democrat politicians, either too evil and corrupt to be in power or too stupid to be in power. They will, as usual, take the “I’m stupid” defense. To use a Nishi-ism, they are the “cudlip” Party.
If you consider it….the bubble pop came at that very worst time possible for mccain.
time enough in the runup to the election for the gloss to wear off Palin and reveal her as the depthless short demagogue she is, and time enough for the electorate to understand the extend of the pain they are gonna have to take on, and who exactly is to blame here.
Culture of blame.
lol, maybe Bush might get fired/impeached after all….for violation of his fiduciary responsibilities to the Corporation of the United States of America.
Before 9/11 I didn’t own a toaster. Now I have a very shiny one. I’m taking it up to the office today cause New Girl and bossperson want to start making sammiches in our little kitchen so they don’t have to pay the girl at the little cafe thinger for them cause she raised prices. What they forget is both of them, they get grumpy when they eat at their desks. Me I don’t see how if you can make a sammich in our little kitchen you can’t just make one at home, but I might could be overthinking it. But if they want to give it a try they can use my shiny toaster that I bought after 9/11.
geoffb, who do you think the electorate will blame for this?
the hand at the tiller lol.
good luck educatin them on why dereg wasnt the proximate cause.
McCain/Palin have already comeout guns ablazing at evil Wall Street and the feckless deregulators.
sure, mojo, that is wat the yeomanfarmers believe…that anyone can bootstrap themselves out of poverty with those splendid oldtimey judeoxian values.
but guess wat?
EVERYONE is going to feel this pain.
And Bush an 8 years of repub admin are gonna get the blame.
Be honest Jeff…..do u think honestly Bush didnt have an inkling that this was coming over the last year?
Or at least that it might happen?
He has some bright economic advisers.
I think he believed the bubble last until he left offfice.
I think you are overrating the painfulness. What you should do is let the sun shine in and face it with a grin I think. Smilers never lose and frowners never win cause that’s just how it works. Me I will be smiling.
Housing. Mortgages. Subsidies. Rezko.
ROTFLMAO @ feets nevah trust a O!
hahaha
do u like hiphop feets?
i think science and hiphop will save the workd.
;)
Read the links. That way, you won’t ask questions that have already been answered.
Hiphop in doses and it helps if it’s clever. I didn’t like it for awhile when it sounded like music what used to come out of your Atari. I put your 3Oh!3 on my list though to get laters when my new computer is here and I have speakers again.
lol Pablow, whatchu gonna do, give the yeomanfarmers a crash course in economics?
the repub branding as deregualtors and 8 years of bush admin is gonna be what sticks in their forebrain.
McCain is flailing aound like a kokanee on the dock.
Deregulation is his natural habitat.
I think he is having truble breathing.
lol, Pablow, b-b-b-but Bushco did nothing!
hahaha.
From McCain’s speech on the Fannie/Freddie mess.
“The financial crisis we’re living through today started with the corruption and manipulation of our home mortgage system. At the center of the problem were the lobbyists, politicians, and bureaucrats who succeeded in persuading Congress and the administration to ignore the festering problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
These quasi-public corporations lead our housing system down a path where quick profit was placed before sound finance. They institutionalized a system that rewarded forcing mortgages on people who couldn’t afford them, while turning around and selling those bad mortgages to the banks that are now going bankrupt. Using money and influence, they prevented reforms that would have curbed their power and limited their ability to damage our economy.”
He then goes on to name names.
“This CEO, Mr. Johnson, walked off with tens of millions of dollars in salary and bonuses for services rendered to Fannie Mae, even after authorities discovered accounting improprieties that padded his compensation. Another CEO for Fannie Mae, Mr. Raines, has been advising Senator Obama on housing policy. This even after Fannie Mae was found to have committed quote “extensive financial fraud” under his leadership. Like Mr. Johnson, Mr. Raines walked away with tens of millions of dollars.
Senator Obama may be taking their advice and he may be taking their money, but in a McCain-Palin administration, there will be no seat for these people at the policy-making table. They won’t even get past the front gate at the White House. “
Found: Congressional Committee Hearing Transcripts and in them, a trove of discussions of GSE’s, the Banking system and regulation, systemic risk and reform, and more…
Search for Monetary Policy Reports (there are two per year). Here, for instance is the second report for 2006.
See Bush in 2003 and McCain in 2005.
The idea for McCain to name names is a good one: he’s pick up 15% alone just for his willingness to shine a light and catch the roaches scurrying.
Both parties, too. The “worst demagogue” who frightens the pantaloons off the founders, Palin, did the same thing in Alaska, and dismantled an entrenched group of corrupt politicians.
The founders would have hated her for that — as well as for vetoing her own party’s bill denying same sex partnership privileges.
She is the devil.
To put it another way, the only way McCain can lose now is to remain silent. But even then he’ll have to try hard, because the GOP and government waste groups are going to start with some damaging ads once we know how all this will shake out.
But Geoffb..in March McCain tole Wall Street he was against regulation.
Monday McCain said the economy is “fundamentally sound”.
How are u gonna walk back those soundbites?
hehe, anyways that Raines stuff has been debunked.
went down the memory lawls.
McCain is lookin stupid and clueless.
mebbe HockeyMom can give us a solution based on her ……umm….well no.
no Jeff, Palin isnt the devil.
but she is the perfect exemplar of the thing most feared by the Founders, the achilles heel of democracy, the thing the electoral college was designed to prevent.
A demagogue.
A candidate with no qualls, credentials or experience that has only personal popularity to advance to office.
Good lord, a ni-nazi appears to attempt to school people on capitalism. BWHWHAHAHA.
dy/dx
The Founding Fathers feared little but a rise of a new aristocracy. They tried to make sure to give exclusive power of the purse to The People’s House, while limiting it to 2 year terms and using a Constitution to further constrain the Federal government. Elected officials were to be FROM the people, not some elite class that come from the right breeding, schools, and connections.
Palin is the essense of the FF’s citizen-politician.
Chairman Bernanke, July 19, 2006:
“[…] Now having said that, I think it is worth, for the purposes of trying to come to some kind of agreement on GSE’s legislation, we could perhaps discuss or consider the possibility that the director might provide some emergency ability to GSE’s to make extra purchases during times in which the director judged the housing market to be in distress for some reason, but then to get rid of that extra portfolio, get rid of the extra MBS, over a period of time when the emergency
was eliminated. […]”
Not one minute later……….
Sen Tom Carper (D-De):
“[…] As Chairman of the Federal Reserve, you regulate some of
our biggest entities and holding companies in the country. I
want to just come back and ask you for some advice as we try to
find–we have really differences in two principal areas. One of
those is with respect to an affordable housing fund and how to
structure that. The House has passed legislation, by a pretty
wide margin, where they establish one.I think they ask for setting aside I want to say 5 percent of net income from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to go into an affordable housing fund, that monies would be apportioned from there into affordable housing in our different States. […]”
Obama’s Democrats go Soprano
Bullshit, nishi. Until and unless you and your allies discard your poisonous mythology and actually listen to what we have to say, this sort of thing is going to happen again and again and again and again…
This is how Government works.
This is what Government does.
This is what Government IS.
If you put together a great big pile of money, you’re going to get a host of volunteers to “guard” and “manage” it. All your stupid class-warfare, envy, and jealousy (“It’s not fair! They’ve got too much money!”) does is hand ’em a shovel. They can simply recite the cant, and you and others rush to hand over the responsibility, and the cant is easy because all that’s changed since the European nobility and Church used it to rip off the Jews is a few nouns. Memorize a few catchphrases, and the important thing is sincerity — once you learn to fake that, you’ve got it made.
Science, bah. The fundamental basis of science is honest reporting — see what’s there, describe it as accurately as possible, and publish the results so that other people know what’s up. You push the same buttons, in the same sequence, every time, and the same shit pops up and bites your ass (and ours) every time, and you make the same complaints every time: It’s not fair! It’s not supposed to work that way! Science, hah. You don’t know what science is, as evidenced by the fact by the fact that stuff bites your butt every time and you never learn.
Then you cuss us out for “magical thinking”, and somebody pops up to tell you soothingly that this time it’ll work out, that the problem is that the first guys didn’t push the buttons gently enough (or forcefully enough, depending on context) and you can trust them to do it right, and you hand it over to them and smile, and go back to wanking off. And the same thing happens, again and again and again and again.
And we tell you, Don’t build the big pile of money and power and prestige in the first place. That sets you off: You just haaaaaate the poooooor and don’t wanna see them have any money! Bullshit. We know what’s going to happen, namely, the same thing that happened the last thousand or million times it was tried. And how do we know that?
One of the things that you’re gonna expostulate about is it’s all the fault of the dirty capitalists! it’s your allies who do the damage! Well, d’oh. Who better to know what they’re like and what they’re likely to get up to than their regular associates? We know those people. They do almost as much damage to us as they do to you, if they’re allowed to operate freely. They are parasites. If you let them multiply without limit they kill their host, then stroll away fat and happy with plenty of resources to survive until the next plump victim shows up. Out here in “the business world” we have mechanisms for limiting the damage they do. Not eliminating it, mind you — that’s as impossible as exterminating cockroaches. But we can keep their depredations to the fringes, so the system doesn’t fall down completely from their soaking up some of the resources and spoiling the rest, and all we can do is grit our teeth (or sneer, or deliver insults, depending on personality) when our warnings aren’t heeded.
It’s like watching a bad horror movie. Don’t go in there! we shout to the ingenue. It’s dark, and you’ll be eaten by a grue! But she always sniffs. You’re just keeping things from me, she sniffs. I’m gonna go get the prize! And we never get past the first reel, never arrive at the point where the Plucky Hero knows how to deal with the situation; he watches helplessly as chomping sounds come from down the dark corridor, and the audience averts its eyes, or watches avidly, as the little blood trail flows under the door…
That’s why we don’t like welfare, or national health insurance, or a host of other wonderfully progressive programs. What you see is poor people who need help, and sick people needing doctors; what we see is a great big pile of money, power, and prestige exerting a pull that would make a black hole blush for its inadequacy, attracting a host of parasites adept at adopting the protective coloration of your own rhetoric. The ants find the sugar. Every time. And you never notice. Science.
Regards,
Ric
By way of contrast, a June, 2003 address by Peter Wallison at the AEI on the topic “Are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Meeting Their Obligations?”.
40%ers for O!
designed to prevent.
A demagogue.
A candidate with no qualls, credentials or experience that has only personal popularity to advance to office.
That’s really a hoot, nishi. You know, before you know it, Time magazine is gonna have her on their cover with a halo around her head. And the media talking heads are gonna say they feel a tingle up their leg when she talks.
Are you stupid? Vote Obama!
“regulation”, this word does not mean what you think it means.
I was a lifelong Republican, a nuclear physicist and a long term supporter of John McCain. But then I had my skull crushed by a steel girder in a construction accident that cost me 60% of my brain. On December 4th, I’m voting O!
And you didn’t even call nishibot a “cudlip”.
That’s restraint!
Sigh. My @163 was for @156.
Someone please denounce me.
Where is the Pencil Czar?
Lol Carin, Palin is the perfect exemplar of a demagogue.
Did u see how she needed a booster seat in her Hannity interview?
lol!lololollloll!
Mark (#163): nishi isn’t a cudlip. She’s a fool. Measurement along an orthagonal axis.
Regards,
Ric
lol Ric Locke
juss what i said.
the yeoman farmers believe those splendid judeoxian ethics can bootstrap any one.
in the runup to teh Singularity the consevatives better make a truce with Science.
Or they will be left out of the future.
I really like how she talks about hope and change w/o ever getting very specific.
But what REALLY gives me confidence, is all that money she took from Fannie Mae and how she hired those really savy business folks to run her campaign.
oh look, ni-nazi is jealous! Add her to the list of ugly-to-the-bone females who are similarily disabled: Michelle Obama, Sandra Bernhard, Margaret Cho, St. Mandy, Jeannine Garofellato, et al.
Really, I don’t know why nishi concerns herself with politics. Once she become transhuman she can fly away to utopia and leave us mere mortals to our coil.
no Darleen, Palin is a noble yeomanfarmer.
That is Thom Jefferson’s term.
He was a polymath and an elite.
The electoral college was specifically designed to keep Palin and her ilk out of office.
demagogue: a person, esp. an orator or political leader, who gains power and popularity by arousing the emotions, passions, and prejudices of the people.
Perfect exemplar.
Carin, srsly.
Can we have a president that needs a booster seat to sit at the table with heads of state?
And if we can, if that doesnt matter, then why doesnt Team McCain just let ppl see her height?
lol, Pablow, the problem there is O is an elite, like Jefferson.
and Palin is a yeomanfarmer.
Jefferson, also an elite, praised the yeomanfarmers, but designed the electoral college to keep them out of office.
;)
Nishi: champion of the little people.
nishi, srsly.
Ya think Palin has a Napoleon complex? This is bad.
Lincoln too, I suppose. That rube had virtually no schooling whatsoever.
Picked up off another blog, while the MSM is desperate to destroy the non-aristocrat from AK by obsessing over her vagina and emails, here’s a little list of things they REFUSE to cover:
1. Occidental college records-NOT released
2. Columbia college records- NOT released
3. Columbia thesis paper- “NOT availableâ€Â
4. Harvard College records- †NOT availableâ€Â
5. Selective service registration- NOT released
6. Medical records- NOT released
7. Illinois state senate schedule- NOT available
8. Law practice client list- “NOT availableâ€Â
9. Certified copy of original birth certificate-Not released
10. Embossed, signed paper of certification of live birth NOT released
11. Harvard Law Review articles published…NONE
12. University of Chicago scholarly articles NONE
13. Record of Baptism…NOT released or NOT available
14. Illnois state senate records..â€ÂNOT available.â€Â
an we have a president that needs a booster seat to sit at the table with heads of state?
ni-nazi, Dr. Mengele protege, would have disqualified FDR from running because he couldn’t stand to greet heads of state. Indeed, she would have had him euthanized after he got polio, for the good of The State.
You know where you can find a ton of “yeomanfarmers” but not a lot of elites? Successful businesses.
Carin
King Obama would have you not worry about those successful businesses..when he raises taxes, they’ll be a thing of the past. We will all be safe and warm working as civil servants for the glorious Fatherland.
Oh, Christ. Here comes Barrett, Darleen. You see, Harvard LAw articles are not attributed to authors, therefore O! probably wrote something that was published, though no one seems to know what. Therefore, that list is a great big fat stupid Rethuglican lie, and your pants are fully aflame for reposting it. As are Dan’s. You need to issue a retraction immediately.
Wait, maybe we won’t need Barrett, as I’ve already covered the argument for him.
Darleen, FDR wasnt on tv.
I think we should vote the best qualified candidate actually.
But many ppl vote on appearance.
And i dont kno the answer to my question.
Obviously Team McCain thinks her height will hurt her if it becomes apparent.
They are obscuring it.
I will be interested to see what happens.
Biologically homosapiens views tall=good, short=bad.
#156….Ric, that was terrifyingly good. I am going to copy that and keep that handy.
Almost like watching someone drop the USS Iowa on a lab rat…
Well, I understand they need to “pay their fair share.” Merely employing citizens and providing a service just ain’t gonna cut it in Barack Obama’s America.
Nishi, you prattle on about ‘yeomanfarmers’ and elites, while writing in a style that is substandard to that of peasants. The Amish I know are better spoken.
You would probably do well attached to a plow via harness and hitch, if they would have you.
i think yeomanfarmers can be good businessmen.
but Thom Jefferson didnt think they would be good presidents.
Nishi, I really wish you’d put down the sci-fi paperbacks and read the Constitution or even a decent middle school civics book.
1) the dy/dx of the national polls is almost completely meaningless in terms of the presidential race– the outcome sits not with the people, but with the electoral college. The useless overvote in California
2) looking at the current state by state poll averages, we have Obama 202 electoral college votes, McCain 216 electoral college votes, with 120 toss up votes. McCain has a slightly better base to build from than Obama, but needs to do a little more work to get the edge — if we accept those margins inside the margin of error as being true and accurate, Obama has a mere 8 electoral college vote lead.
Not to mention, Pablo, that Barrett knows that Barack was considered a bright mind by conservatives at U of C law school.
He’s working on those names for us, right? Or did he post them in my absence? I’d hate to think I missed them.
Or, is this one of those “I can’t answer EVERY question directed at me?” kinda things from Barratt?
Nish is brain-dead. Why engage her?
nishi keeps hopng that there’s a pony in there somewhere for her guy. The friends of her guy started this mess. You keep on hopin’ kid. The stink is all the Os.
I “srsly” doubt you and Mr. Jefferson would be in agreement as to who is, and isn’t, fit to be in office.
And, I really “SRSLY” doubt he would pull the lever for Obama if he were given the chance.
he emailed them. ;D
Ben Franklin didn’t have much education either. This guy didn’t have any formal education at all. Clearly, Jefferson meant to keep people like him out of the Presidency and wrote the Constitution to do just that. Right nishi?
What a fool.
That was before television, Pablo.
Carin
I love the Obamabot/Dem arguments about “brightness” or intelligence, because they turn it into a quick ciruclar reasoning.
Recent Dem “statments” about “intelligence” (paraphrased)
Michelle, consort to The One: “they [Rethugs] aren’t use to someone intelligent.”
Slo Joe Biden: “[Rethugs] see someone smart and they think, ‘he’s not from our neighborhood’ ”
Rangel: “Palin is disabled”
Dems figure “intelligence” is the utmost qualification to higher office and then define it as only stupid people are Republican – therefore, Republicans are not qualified to hold office.
Pablow, Franklin, Washington, all the Founders and Framers were elites.
Adams was a yeoman farmer that raised himself to elite with passionate study.
And yes, Jefferson would have voted for Obama.
all the Founders and Framers were elites
Someone skipped American History.
Probably off somewhere reading Mein Kampf
No, he wouldn’t.
At the center of Jefferson’s vision of the United States stood the educated, yeoman farmer. An enlightened citizen, trained in many fields, was the only force that Jefferson felt could maintain our democracy and the land upon which it was based. This natural educated man was the basis of stability in government, the basis of true morality, and the basis of the country’s freedom.
http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/2005_summer_fall/agronomist.htm
Skipped Logic too, it seems.
/shrug
Carin do you think Palins height will matter?
I dont think it can be obscured forever.
Jefferson would have owned Obama.
lol, yessss, Pablow, Jefferson valued the yeoman farmer……just not as President.
;)
Palin is a good 3 inches taller than Ahmadinejad. Do you think he’ll notice? Do you have any new easily debunked memes?
Cite, please.
Thom Jefferson:
May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. That form which we have substituted, restores the free right to the unbounded exercise of reason and freedom of opinion. All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.
Pablow, just my question then.
Can we elect a VP that needs a booster seat?
How about something relevant, nishi?
Let’s please not give short shrift to George Washington, who really set much of the precedents of the Presidency — 2 terms, addressed as “Mr. President” rather than “Your Majesty” , etc.
Good luck with that request Pablo,
I am still waiting for nishi to enlighten me about theis “Surge” she finds to be a dangerous failure. Sounds interesting.
Ric,
On another thread you showed how the “purpose of taxes” divided conservative from progressive. The “purpose of regulation” divides in the same fashion.
From the conservative side regulation is to provide clear rules and a reasonably level playing field for private commerce to play out. In addition it is to make sure the adverse information reaches the market so it can respond appropriately.
To the progressive regulation is to reward friends, punish enemies and enrich yourself off the wealth of others. Regulation that is corruption hidden by a different name.
Deregulation by conservatives is to undo the progressive’s type of regulation. They in turn push to do the opposite.
Thomas Jefferson was once upbraided for allowing bills to pass that he, himself, didn’t agree with. His response (in paraphrase, because I don’t have the book at hand) was that the Congress was directly elected by, and therefore knew the wishes of, the People, whereas the President was selected by electors and farther from that, and unless he saw a specific disastrous result as being inevitable he should approve legislation by default. Compare G. W. Bush being criticized for not enough vetoes… if you can take that attitude, and argue from it that Jefferson was in favor of Government by Philosopher-Kings, you’re a bigger fool than I thought — which takes some doing.
Regards,
Ric
Palin is of average height and probably a bit taller than Hillary. Got any new easily debunked memes?
btw ‘Nejad is 5’5″.
Mccain is bio’d as 5’6 1/2″, but has likely lost an inch or so due to scoliosis and vertebral compression.
Palin is viably shorter than McCain even with 3 inch heels and a bun.
im very interested as to why Palin’s height is obscured, its been wiped in the interwebs, if Team McCain thinks it wont make a difference.
show me Palins height Pablow.
Maj John, thank you for your service, sir.
I am not saying the Surge is a failure….i am agreeing with Gen.Petraeus and Dr. Kilcullen who say the Surge success is fragile.
It was a top-down solution, a brute force solution, imposed from outside.
Anbar, OTOH, is a grassroots solution and i think very successful, very strong.
When opponents are reduced to chittering about a candidates height, I think things look pretty good for that person…
its been wiped in the interwebs
cuz of the Vast RW CONSPIRACY!!!!1!1!!!Eleventy!!1!!!
(pay no attention to Palin having played on a state championship basketball team)
ni-nazi now wants a height requirement for Presidency.
Also, paraplegics are also disqualified.
im not chittering…..im interested scientifically in the question as to whether we can elect someone, even if she is female, in the television age and in an American Idol election.
i should do the chi-square just on the TV presidents.
darleen, i would be grateful for link to Palin’s height.
I have looked pretty hard i cant find anything.
mebbe my search-fu is off.
ni-nazi would rather have a corrupt Marxist in the White House as long as he is good-looking and tall.
not me darleen…..the elctorate.
218 – you are welcome, but I think you have it wrong about the top-down solution. It was a two-fold solution – 1st, secure Baghdad to give the Iraqis some breathing room and time to develop their own answers – not ones dictated by us, 2nd, it was a change in our methods – instead of hiding on FOB GIGANTOR, we went out and lived amongst the Iraqis, stayed with them, fough along side them,, and they responded. They stuck up for themselves knowing that we had their backs. They gave us the intel tips about where “Ali Baba” was hiding, becasue they knew the ISF or us would go in and clear them out and keep them away. You cannot EVER imposes a solution “Top-down” in an insurgency and hope to win (cf Soviets in Afghanistan). Don’t mistake Anbar for a unique thing – I saw the same thing in Al Basrah, Maysaan, and Baghdad. And I had to go out and live amongst the Iraqis, stay with them and it pained to leave them, even well after the battle was won. I still keep in touch with a Jundi Awal (PFC) and an Areef (SGT) from the 14th Division. They are my ukwhane now, and I am theirs’. Not exactly “top-down”…
jalapeno peanut brittle. nishi’s got me doing Christmas shopping when I’m opposed to be working.
that is awesome Major sir.
and…that is the Anbar model totally.
very much increased robustness.
but….i thot the Surge model was increased troop presence?
plz correct me if im wrong. ;)
You are presenting the armed solcial work solution, which worked in Anbar.
Darleen, Pablow, im still waitin for that link.
what’s the control height? Hillary?
Post a link. No control, no science.
#183 Pablo:
Harvard Law Review articles may not be attributed to the author, but the student who wrote the article knows darn well what he or she wrote, and is likely very proud about that article. And I doubt that if the students on the review at the time Sen. Obama was there couldn’t quickly point to their articles and claim them.
That is hard work in addition to the regular studies, and being an attorney I know we take pride in what we have written. I know I do – I wrote a Michigan Court of Appeals brief that saved my client agency about a $150,000 that it didn’t have. (And once I did a ‘moot-court’ before oral argument at that court, with the ‘judges’ being the state’s solicitor general, an attorney who had extensively worked on the same subject, and two other attorneys who can only be described as brilliant, and I came out of it feeling like I went into the wringer and told that I did well.) If anyone wanted to make the effort they could contact those attorneys that were on Harvard Law Review then and ask them who wrote what. You would get the answers. Pride Is.
In what I write I may be right, I may be wrong; but I do take pride in my work, and I do know lawyers that have something like that in their background do.
What I find interesting in this sordid business is the Soros connection. Soros upped his holdings to 9.5 milliion shares in Lehman Brothers (June 2008). Soros is a known global market manipulator and his primary vehicle is short selling. One of the largest debtors to Lehman among the other debtors seeking repayment under Chapter 11 bankruptcy rules is BNP Paribas, a large French bank whose largest single private shareholder is Nadhmi Auchi’s General Mediterranean Holdings (GMH). BNP Paribas is owed $250 million by Lehman. Now who is Nadhmi Auchi? Obama’s sponsor to get into Harvard…
Markets start to go south… what does the fed do?
Leave Lehman twisting in the wind, the only one to get NO BAILOUT… and eliminate short selling, which is Soros’ prime investment choice. Cuts off Soros at the head and leaves Auchi on the hook as well. Interestingly, Rezko is a big debtor to Lehman Brothers. London, Tokyo and other markets moved in concert with the Fed to instigate the same bans on short selling and the markets rise in response. Short sellers are taking a bath and are sent a message.
Seems to me a Soros coup was in the offing (google Soros Argentina) and the feds and other markets acted in concert to shut it down, backing up their shutdown of the coup with the assets of Fannie/Freddie.
NSA wiretaps and foreign intelligence services may have some interesting tapes that were played to the congressional meetings on Friday. The congress is told “this is what you are going to do.” And that is why Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd looked like they had just seen their own deaths and were as meek as sheep….
Soros is ruined, Obama is decloaked and a crisis is averted. Enough of this will be leaked out over the next 6 weeks to cause the election to go to McCain and the house cleaning can begin.
My conspiracy theory FWIW… your mileage may vary.
Victor, i’d just like to know how tall Palin is.
can you give me linkage?
Ric, why the electoral college then?
why not, one man, one vote.
ni-nazi
You’re the one obsessed with Governor Palin’s height. When did you obsess about “I got my job because of my husband, but I’m the True Feminist” Hillary’s height? Please give us a link.
Ahamadinejad is 5’2″. http://www.pdc.co.il/ahmadinejad.htm
Palin is approximately 5’5″.Oh, and they’re totally hiding that by sneakily having the former Alaska state champion point guard walk around in crowds, on camera. Got any new easily debunked memes, memebot?
Not armed social work at all. When you are out at a JSS or a COP you are there to fight the bad guys and protect the innocent.
The only place that the “Surge” added troops was around Baghdad. They were there to help clear the town out of bad guys, and let the ISF fill in and protect. No heavy hand – just a help for a number of months. A “top down” solution would have excluded the ISF. Instead, we also gave them time to grow. The size and proficiency of the Iraqi Army, National Police and some of the local cops has improved over the same time frame. We withdrew the surged forces, and the ISF has held.
The surge model is more about a change in thinking – go out to the people, they are the “center of gravity” in an insurgency. They are the “key terrain”. When they know you are there to protect them from maniacs who kill the innocent, rape, steal and torture, they will help you – “you” being the ISF or the Coalition. More and more it is the ISF. In Basra, it was the 1st IA QRF, 26th BDE, 50th BDE, and 51st BDE of the Army, and some really good National Police. The Iraiqs did the heavy lifting – people like me were there only to advise. We won that battle, and I think, this war – WE, the Iraqis and the Coalition.
Now off for the night – a nice, short 14 hour work day today!
show me the link Pablow
D’oh, to prevent any one state having undue influence in the election due to population. Back then, the states nominated the senators to represent states rights, it was not voted on by the people. This was done to prevent the more populous states having too much say in the way government was run. NY and CA vs Wyoming and Rhode Island….
Geez typical stuff covered in 5th grade civics… you sir are NOT smarter than a fifth grader…
How tall was Golda Meir? Margaret Thatcher?
However physically short Sarah Palin is, Nishi, her stature is superior to that of either Obonga or Biden.
Or yours, for that matter.
im perfectly willing to cioncede Palin is 5’5″ if you can show me a link.
#214 Ric Locke:
Agreed. If Jefferson was in favor of ‘philosopher kings’* he wouldn’t have writeen “We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal…”
*Those who argue in favor of philosopher kings always seem to find themselves on that side of the line, and not the other. Fancy that, eh?
actually serr8D im 5′ 8 1/2″, and ……..im not running for VP.
Nishi, How tall are you?
If you can’t post a picture of you standing next to something of a known height, then I’ll just have to assume that you are both physically and mental deficient.
Mikey same question, why the electoral college?
This must be midget basketball. Or, nishi is a fool.
I report, you decide. (Hint: Go with the latter.)
why not one man, one vote if this is a democracy?
just give me the link plz Pablow.
– nishit – aren’t you dead yet?
QF, queef or whatever.
See #239 for the answer..
Thank you for playing.
Yo, nishitler, I’m 6′ 6″. I am clearly superior to Palin.
And Baracky, and especially you.
Margaret Thatcher was plenty tall enough. Baracky is tall but he opposed to be. Duh. It would be weird if he wasn’t.
Mccains height is public knowledge.
im estimating by relative height.
Hannity is 6′.
Thus the tromphe l’oeil camera angle and the booster chair.
#233 matoko:
You are the l33t; find out on your own.
perhaps we could also ask what color her underwear is.
i do think her hair looks much better….lol a 21st century do ‘stead of a 18th century one.
;)
actually serr8D im 5′ 8 1/2″, and ……..im not running for VP.
Got a link?
Who cares what office you are or are not running for, it’s about the electorate, right?. The electorate at protein wisdom is going to use your method and judge you on your height- without a link you look crippled, and that’s bad because of the technology.
i dont care what color her underwear, id just like to know how tall she is.
linkage plz.
QF cause this ain’t a fucking democracy… it’s a representative republic… The framers specifically did not want a democracy cause that is what is commonly referred to as majority rule.
Again thanks for playing “Who’s Smarter Than a Fifth Grader.” You lose…
nishi, the mechanics of the surge, as described by Maj. John, are precisely as outlined in Bush’s announcement of it, and have been publicized widely. It’s not our fault that you get all your information from leftbots and self-styled “elites”.
As for Palin’s height, does it ever disturb you in the least that all you’ve got is bigoted ad hominems?
Regards,
Ric
Mikey, i cant find it.
i suspect its been redacted cuz Team McCain thinks it will hurt her.
Will it?
“I had a great upbringing under Title IX,” Palin told Alaska Business Monthly shortly after becoming governor in late 2006.
Affirmative action disciple and beneficiary, earmark mayor, welfare governor, mom of preggo high school dropout, unemployed spouse, currently under investigation – Sister Palin is a typical Republican, that’s for sure.
Jefferson would have voted for Obama.
LANGUAGE ALERT
Nishitler, you are a f*cking idiot.
This height thing is sorta not going anywhere. What would be more fun is if we all bounced up and down together.
Sorry, sometimes there’s just no substitute.
ni-nazi obsesses about Governor Palin’s hair and height. Excitable Andy obsesses about her vagina.
I think that should disqualify both of them from getting within 100 feet of a voting booth.
Bush’s announcement publically delineated an increase in troop strength so the Iraqis could get thier act together.
It has nothing in it about social network strategy or armed social work.
– Why does anyone respond to ni-shit. Shes brain damaged.
– Just a matter of time before she craps out, so of course she hates everything and everyone. Total waste of time.
And it’s funny because I didn’t know this lady was from the 18th century.
Ok, now it makes sense. Nishi is crippled and is pushing Obama for her own crippled self interest.
Science.
darleen, just show me the link.
im not saying im voting on appearance…..but i think ppl do.
hard to poll, cuz ppl wont admit to it.
#246 matoko:
I suggest you go and order a copy of ‘Magruders American Government’ from Amazon and read it carefully. The explanation is in there, and I am not going to give you a basic civics lesson you should have paid attention to in high school.
Beyond that, read the Federalist Papers.
why is it so hard to find out how tall Palin is?
I’ve got RTO working on something… ;D
It has nothing in it about social network strategy or armed social work.
because, of course, all details of every operation is fully revealed in news conferences and by the MSM.
If you don’t read it in the NYSlimes, it doesn’t exist.
meshugga schmuck.
Cowraper, you’re a fuckin’ c*nt.
OH fuckity fuck fuck fuck… it ain’t her size you should be worried about…
It’s the freakin laser beams attached to her freakin head…
What a stupid ass argument about nonsense… been to the Dr. Seuss school of debate much, QF And Nishi???
Y’all are Mr. Knox…
– Shut the fuck up thor.
Napoleon Bonaparte wasn’t very tall, but he commanded respect where he went.
Amazing how a thread on finance went to this. matoko = fool
Suck yourself, gullaboy.
The indecent troll has slithered forth. Please do not feed it.
Napoleon Bonaparte wasn’t on tv.
darleen link plz
#262 matoko:
Others seem to have found it. Perhaps you aren’t so l33t after all?
Or perhaps the information you want is relevant to no other person?
Make your choice. The Old Guard made theirs.
Thanks for your valued input, Little Thor Person.
I would deserve that if I’d said something as stupid as that Jefferson would have voted for Obama.
do you thin Pablow is going to come to come back an say he cant find it either?
i wonder why that would be.
;)
Mikey NTH
The anti-capitalist ni-nazi doesn’t/can’t talk finances. Hurts her “science must be free of ethics and grubby stuff like earning or asking for money” excuse for a brain.
others found it?
then show me.
#265 haps:
Little kids have the most fun because they can go on moonwalks and bigger heavier persons can’t.
Click the link in #247 and STFU, memebot. While you’re doing that, you can google up some midget beauty pageant finalists. When you find them, bring them back, because that will be interesting.
Those of us who can see are not really interested in your babbling against the obvious.
– Apparently your brain is breaking down faster than you expected ni-shit.
OMFucking fuckiness… if it’s not on TV it didn’t matter? Like the troops couldn’t see his height up close and personal….
HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA oh shit…
now I have to go buy a homecoming dress for a school function where it seems my kids are better educated than either Nishi or Queef….
Off to put some $$ into the evil industrial complex known as Federated Department stores….
– Shut up thor.
When your schtick is such thin gruel that you find yourself defending a Nazi, normal humans would give up the game.
But not our Little Thor Person.
…and I think Nishi is just lonely today.
Wiki Answers…
Sarah Palin
We should be judged by character, not by physical attributes but here are the numbers
At 44 years old she is a fit woman in good health
Height speculated to be 5’5
measurements have been speculated to be
-34¼ – 30½ – 40¾.
or
-36 -26- 36
Amazing how tv has become the deciding factor to the self-described inteligentsia, just as network tv is crashing.
If you row faster you can get on the Titanic. I hear a lot of passengers are vacating their staterooms.
Bmeuppls
did the troops vote for Napoleon?
IJS
moonwalks! A friend of mine just rented one of those for his little girl’s birthday next month. He was gonna just get the colored ball one but his wife said they were unsanitary. I’m glad I don’t live in her world.
Marching orders of the day… these are not the zombies we have been waiting for….
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/19/19192/9208
#288 Darleen:
I know, but I like going by the cages sometimes and poking Jeff’s pet specimens with a stick. It’s so funny how they jump and whirl about.
Then I go and get a snack.
Thor’s brilliant observations and the Nazi’s profound queries aside…
Here in the Heartland, this morning I had a rummage sale and lots of people in huge, gas-guzzling, polar bear-drowning SUVs came and bought many worthless things from me.
Panic hasn’t set in here yet.
Oooh! So tiny! I’ll bet she’s wearing 6″ heels.
Palin’s height is 5’6″ and 3/4 in her stocking feet.
I don’t have the link anymore but it was stat’s garnered from her pageant competitions, I’m sure they could be rediscovered by a motivated person. That would make her just very slightly shorter than myself. Although with heels and hair, she probably could stare me down.
She was a former basketball player, and her height is nearly 3 inches above average.
speculated
i speculate Palin is 5’1″ based on height comparisons to known heights
im quite curious as to why this ifo has been scrubbed.
does Team McCain think it will hurt her?
I like to shake my plastic bag full of PW triggers.
Makes me hungry for more pie.
Queef… seems they followed him into battle during the revolution… and it seems to me that if I remember my history correctly,
THE FUCKING FRENCH PEASANTS DIDN’T VOTE ON HIM. HE ATTAINED POWER THROUGH A COUP D’ETAT… BUT HIS SOLDIERS DID FIGHT FOR HIS COUP.
Like I said.. you ain’t smarter than a 5th grader…
BTW, I gave Nishi that link ages ago. So she’s just a dishonest person or easily gulled by silly speculations.
SarahW
McCains height is on record, Hannity’s height is on record.
Palin is obviously shorter than McCain even with 3 in heels and a bun and needed a booster seat for Hannity.
I dont believe you.
#302 Nishi is a KOStile?
Are they allowed in Jeff’s house?
Nishi parrots the Kos blog, and demands we answer to her bigotry.
Nishi, you ignorant crippled slut.
probably somebody hit the reset button before clicking “save”
Nishi, You’re just making that up. She comes up to people about where I would.
there was no link sara
you just said she was 5’6″
McCain is 5’6 1/2″ according to bio.
use ur eyes.
Nishi, I gave you a reliable link ages ago. Go find it.
alternatively give me the link.
That’s also a lie. McCain is 5′ 10
That diarist, Quell, is Nishi. Read her memechants there.
#300 matoko:
Look up the Hundred Days about how fast they voted for him with their feet, a real vote with real consequences for those troops.
Of course, asking you to look up and read about the Napoleonic Wars would be tasking you too hard.
No, Nishi, you are a liar. I gave you the link. You could find it if you tried.
liar
there wasnt a link.
i can look up your comment u kno
not like i havent done that b4, eh Carin?
Little Thor Person:
You are really not nearly as provocative as you believe yourself to be.
Mostly, you’re just tiring.
Who else is short is that Jennifer Aniston. And yet she muddles through. Also, Madonna. You call Madonna short she will beat you up with her Madonna skillz cause she’s in better shape than you are.
and ive tried lol.
if you found it once, find it again SarahW.
you are the liar.
why?
speculate Palin is 5′1″ based on height comparisons to known heights
WHAT “known heights”??
and Palin doesn’t always wear high heels
Unless you think every girl on her basketball team was 5’2″ and under and were playing another team of the same height, then you’ve confirmed your basic amoral indecency yet again.
“Soros is ruined, Obama is decloaked and a crisis is averted. Enough of this will be leaked out over the next 6 weeks to cause the election to go to McCain and the house cleaning can begin.”
Your mouth to God’s ear, as they say.
movie stars can be short feets.
they can stand on boxes like tom cruise.
i dont think that works for presidents.
nice threadjacking btw… can we get back to the issue at hand? I’d like some response to the conspiracy theory I posted earlier…
What I find interesting in this sordid business is the Soros connection. Soros upped his holdings to 9.5 milliion shares in Lehman Brothers (June 2008). Soros is a known global market manipulator and his primary vehicle is short selling. One of the largest debtors to Lehman among the other debtors seeking repayment under Chapter 11 bankruptcy rules is BNP Paribas, a large French bank whose largest single private shareholder is Nadhmi Auchi’s General Mediterranean Holdings (GMH). BNP Paribas is owed $250 million by Lehman. Now who is Nadhmi Auchi? Obama’s sponsor to get into Harvard…
Markets start to go south… what does the fed do?
Leave Lehman twisting in the wind, the only one to get NO BAILOUT… and eliminate short selling, which is Soros’ prime investment choice. Cuts off Soros at the head and leaves Auchi on the hook as well. Interestingly, Rezko is a big debtor to Lehman Brothers. London, Tokyo and other markets moved in concert with the Fed to instigate the same bans on short selling and the markets rise in response. Short sellers are taking a bath and are sent a message.
Seems to me a Soros coup was in the offing (google Soros Argentina) and the feds and other markets acted in concert to shut it down, backing up their shutdown of the coup with the assets of Fannie/Freddie.
NSA wiretaps and foreign intelligence services may have some interesting tapes that were played to the congressional meetings on Friday. The congress is told “this is what you are going to do.†And that is why Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd looked like they had just seen their own deaths and were as meek as sheep….
Soros is ruined, Obama is decloaked and a crisis is averted. Enough of this will be leaked out over the next 6 weeks to cause the election to go to McCain and the house cleaning can begin.
My conspiracy theory FWIW… your mileage may vary.
TTFN…
ni-nazi
where’s your link that you are 5’8″? You are lying because you’re jealous of Governor Palin.
darleen just show me a link.
or else STFU.
arent u curious as to why its so hard to find?
i feel pity for Palin.
shes been used bfore she was ready.
Thanks Docob… didn’t think anyone else was gonna address this. I find it fits in with the Wizard of Oz theory pretty well..
McCain threw her away cuz he wanted to be president.
“A candidate with no qualls, credentials or experience that has only personal popularity to advance to office.”
And I thought nishi was pro-Obama!
– I give up. You guys just can’t help yourselves. thor-ass and ni-shit just keep sucking you into thread jacks and you just keeping taking the bait. If they’re asocial misfits, and you keep answering their call, what does that make all of you?
What I find interesting in this sordid business is the Soros connection.
Certainly the first name that came to my mind when the shit started to unravel was Soros.
You so funny.
Know what Sarah Palin calls cripples and sluts – family!
You’re right, Nazi. It’s terribly difficult to find Pain’s height.
30 seconds–Wikipedia–5′ 5″.
Guess what else I found out?
Obama has dark skin.
“[…] The legislation, a copy of which has been obtained by FOX News, grants Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson broad powers to fund or buy mortgage assets from any U.S.-based financial institution. The legislation limits the secretary’s buying power to $700 billion.
It also would raise the statutory limit on the national debt from $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion  making room for the massive rescue.
[…] Democrats are insisting the rescue include mortgage help to let struggling homeowners avoid foreclosures. They also are also considering attaching additional middle-class assistance to the legislation despite a request from Bush to avoid adding controversial items that could delay action. An expansion of jobless benefits was one possibility. […]”
Meanwhile…
Putin is a munchkin and he invaded a whole entire country and killed many gentle and harmless peoples. Also he scares the France and the Germany muchly just by looking at them. Governor Palin is a much much better person than he is I think, and probably taller even. And also she is a good leader without killing people that aren’t hurting anybody. So that settles that I think.
You do realize that it was the French (ties in the French to shutting down the BNP Paribas- Auchi angle) that tried and convicted that Soros on these same type of charges before? Seems to me to be a worldwide effort to thwart his activities and bleed him dry.
I think what’s going to happen is that people will say they’ll vote for McCain/Palin, but when they get in the booth, they’ll say to themselves, “You know that average height Palin? Her average height kind of gives me the creeps. I’m not going to vote for her.”
It’s the Palin effect.
GOOGLE IT!!!!
cowboy link plz
Has anyone noticed the vast sums of capital fleeing the Russian markets with no signs of stopping? I’ll bet Putin and his flunky have.
Oh, we should be tickled that Obama, World Citizen and Man of International Intrigue, wants international
interferenceinput on “solutions” to US finance.SarahW, do have that link?
darleen?
pablow?
anyone?
How about this response: you’re dumber than a pile of Palins.
Sorry about my lack of link fu:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_Sarah_Palin's_height_and_weight
…and it’s the same information already given you.
include mortgage help to let struggling homeowners avoid foreclosures
WHY???? My husband and I can service our mortgage, why should my taxes be raised to pay for the idiot down the street who bought 3 houses as to do speculative flipping?
Oh, wait, did you mean a link to proof that Obama has darker skin?
I’ll have to work on that one, brb.
Must be 9″ heels here because her hair is down.
Hannity is 6′ you say, memebot? Are you blind, stupid or a lying memebot?
Oh, I gave that one away, didn’t I?
Palin could have been a contender in 4 years.
People would have had time to used to her, and to height and social values and her record.
I might have voted for her after two terms in the senate, if she modulated her position on creationism and abortion-rights.
No one has to stay a yeoman farmer……Adams didnt.
McCain sacrificed her for this.
I’d just like to know if it’s too late for me to get a mortgage I can’t service to buy a house I can’t afford and keep it.
ni-nazi
here’s the deal, you find the answers to #179, and we’ll give you Gov. Palin’s height.
She’s just lonely, Pablo.
Understandably.
Historically, Nazis have a hard time making and keeping friends.
It’s the whole, “If you’re genetically inferior, I’ll have to kill you” thing.
Talk about a boner kill.
Baracky and Harry and Nancy will attach the oil drilling ban to any legislation for mortgage stuff. You just watch, and lots of other things besides. This is a huge opportunity for them is how they think.
Yes. By not running away.
I’ve not put much study into the Napoleonic period of warfare, but even I know that an essential factor in that period was an officer’s ability to rally and sustain his troops’ morale. That was a time when an officer’s ability to command was limited by the sound of his voice and the strength of his reputation — I have no idea what kind of voice Napoleon had, but do know he had a strong reputation among his troops. They undoubtedly knew he was short, but unlike the resident fascist troll, didn’t give a rat’s ass because they placed more value on other aspects.
The odd thing is the idiot is (or rather, in the past has) argued that it’s the average joe will be dissuaded to vote for Palin based on her height. So, you see, she’s not the shallow one, it’s all those lesser people. That she’s merely trying to blame her own shallow impulses on others never occurs to her.
And note that the ignorant fascist troll, since being told by Jeff to knock off the “cudlip” line, has merely found a new word to use in its place. She’s mis-using the word, of course, but her attitude is still present: she is one of the elect (one of the anointed if you will), everyone else is a herd animal unfit to decide the course of their own lives.
– nishit….aren’t you dead yet?
that is speculation cowboy, not stats.
show me the linkage.
McCain sacrificed her for this.
to consolidate his base.
that was enuff for Bush in 2004.
i dont think it will be this year.
How tall is Governor Sarah Palin? She’s tall enough to look down on the hide of that grizzly bear she shot, and know she can take down Corruptocrats and display their hides, too. She’s tall enough to look at her fifth child and see a fountain of God’s love and blessing, not a “burden” as some would call him. In the eyes of the citizens of Alaska, she’s 80% approval tall. To the Secret Service, she’s “Denali” tall, the tallest mountain in America. To the Obama/Biden campaign, she’s insurmountably tall, especially when Obama and Biden keep cutting themselves off at the knees. Yet, I’m sure she’s been greeted by the bar-bouncer movie, “Road House”, line: “I thought you’d be bigger.”. Obama/Biden will soon feel like another line from “Road House”: “A polar bear fell on me.”.
Bmeuppls, I wondered about that Soros stuff as well. Do you have a li..
(never will I ask that again. Nishi the KOStile has ruined the question.)
Comment by Bmeuppls
I agree. Soros was the first person I thought about when the Feds shut-down shorting. Soros is smart though, he countered by scrubbing the intertubes of any reference to his physical height so that the electorate won’t hate his shortness.
Dar, at 352. Why indeed? Why aren’t the holders of CDO’s, MBS’s, ABS’s, and structured finance instruments of every sort left to their own responsiblities to take the losses or make the gains they signed on the bottom line for? Why must we have a false order rather than an actualized chaos. Gales of destruction! Winds of liberty!
hannity height
see how easy that was?
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0360458/bio
Don’t you get it? The people (like us) who try to live by the rules and fulfill the commitments they’ve made are suckers.
OK, Nazi, you win.
The depths of your loneliness and the tenacity with which you hold onto a thread you jacked have overcome what little patience I have for evil, ignorant people such as you.
Sorry for feeding the troll, folks.
I’ve got football to watch.
the camera angle is tromphe l’oeil and palin is walkin on a raised track i think.
note the booster seat in the seated segment.
Baracky is tall enough to be a schoolteacher in elementary school even. All the little kids look up at him when they get into reading circle and he helps them sound out words and stuff.
kk darleen, just admit defeat.
u cant find, its been redacted.
i guess we will find out eventually lol.
back and to the left… back and to the left…
Mr. bama I need to go baffroom can I have a pass pease?
mebbe friday at the debate.
;)
Palin standing next to him, walking with him. A couple of inches shorter, and probably on 2-3 inches of heels, leaving her around 5’6″ or so. See how easy that was? And how did you hallucinate a booster seat into the one of two identical chairs they were sitting in? Peyote? Mushrooms? Have you been licking frogs, memebot?
Victor… snort…
I’ve got to go to the store for the aforementioned dress before I am hounded out of the house on a rail by a pissed off 15 yo… but I will put some links up (trolls be damned) and put more of a picture together.
BTW… Soros the Short… the new name of the Wizard of Oz… h/t Victor
Now that we have successfully woven both arguments into one. I bid you TTFN….
Very interesting post & comments, minus the usual troll spam. I actually wondered about a link to Soros, though I rather doubt it.
thers a booster seat, u are hallucinating.
hmm then how is palin shorter than mccain in heels if shes 5’6??
mccains bio has him at 5’6 1/2″
doesnt make sense.
just show me the link pablow unless……team mccain is hiding something?
LOL! You’re deranged, I think. Also, you can see the floor behind her as they make their way down the hall. No track. SCIENCE!!
Rob, Sdferr
The thing is this whole flogging of the foreclosure thing… the vast majority of both prime and subprime mortgages ARE BEING SERVICED. Indeed, all the times one sees the MSM citing states on foreclosure rates, they always lump them in with DELIQUENCIES. NOD’s are NOT foreclosures.
This is so like the so-called “healthcare crisis” … use the government to skew the market, create cronyism (as in Ric’s brilliant ants to sugar), when the bubble bursts blame the crippled free-market aspects of the plan, NOT the government fiddling.
Whe lenders are FORCED to make loans to people who are high risk, why is anyone surprised that those people will merely walk away from their homes? Especially since mortgages, by and large, are nonrecourse debts?
lol shes standin on a box and walkin on a raised track pablow.
lol.
Don’t worry, matoko.
Sen. McCain hasn’t yet pulled Rev. Wright out of storage, he’s only hitting on things from 2005. When he gets to the 2008 footage, then you can worry.
Failure has failed.
Would Bush have done anything differently had this not been an election year? Even still, marginalizing Soros was very interesting.
Yep. And most people are paying their credit cards, buying gas and groceries, and generally going about their lives.
But that doesn’t make a good headline, lead story, or campaign sound bite. So every week without rain becomes a new Dust Bowl, every ditch becomes a Grand Canyon.
Joey Hairplugs has ass hair on his head though, nishi. I think probably Governor Palin will just look like she smells better even if she’s not as tall.
Would it cost 700B$ to pay off the principle of every goddamn subprime loan in trouble on the books today? I rather doubt it.
Obviously the track’s made of transparent glass. Or maybe cleverly painted to look exactly like the rest of the hallway! Did you ever see Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade? The leap of faith?! GOOGLE IT!@!!
Ni-nazi
Is Gov. Palin on a booster chair here? Or is First Dude only 5’3″?
Here’s the link. See 0:13. The truth is out there.
So is Rezko. We’ll be seeing him soon enough.
Anyone else amused by Miss SCIENCE!!! desperately clinging to a non-falsifiable belief and resorting to the same sort of nonsense as moon-landing conspiracy nuts in order to protect it?
First person I thought about was Warren Buffet. He stands to make a lot of money continuing to short the U.S. dollar, but of course he gets inside information from Hank Paulson.
blockquote>
And oh, by the way, CEO of Merrill Lynch, who you and I used to work at Goldman Sachs together, I know you put money into the deal, but you have a parachute here of 50 million bucks if this — if you get sold.
That on top of — and I don`t know if anybody`s picking this up, but two weeks ago, Warren Buffett after the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac deal went down on a Monday, mentioned that he got a call from Hank Paulson on Sunday, asking if his — if this structure passes the smell test.
Well, guess what: Warren Buffett runs a publicly traded company. He shouldn`t have access to inside information.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0809/19/gb.01.html
Paulson might be doing some time after all is said and done.
Warren Buffett owns See’s Candies which are over-priced and not very good quality really at all but what’s worse is they refuse to make white chocolate so I think Warren Buffett can blow me and I will just get good chocolate from people who take these things more seriously and offer more better variety. Also he’s not very tall and I think he likes young boys.
The delinquencies are significant because they point to people exhausting their home equity lines of credit.
In this bail-out you have to cover both (mortgage and home equity loans) at some price that the banks can remain functional.
The bad debt amount, just principle is 700 Billion at 125%. From here, add the unpaid interest over the term of the loan to date.
I’m not sure 1 trillion is enough.
Nishi, here’s some data for you.
If height were of any import, then some KosKidde would have..nevermind.
hf
See’s Candies which are over-priced and not very good quality
BLASPHEMY!!! Best chocolate EVAH!
you’re confusing See’s with the overrated Godiva.
– Yeh hf. I don’t know which candy company you’re thinking of, but See’s has a whole range of white chocolate goodies.
oh yeah well maybe it’s okay chocolate if you’re at the mall but for real find me a picture of Warren Buffett in bed with naked boys looking like he’s NOT having a good time. LOLS you can’t cause it’s been scrubbed from teh internets!!
i watched hannity 1.
look at palin obviously in heels and shorter than mccain (5’6″) in first part.
is mccain wearing lifters lol?
her chair seat cushion is thicker, and the camera uses perspective tromphe l’oeil for the angle from her to sean.
she stands on a box and walks on a raised track.
im just interested in why Palin’s heoght is obscured on the web.
curioser and curioser.
lol serr8D
do the same thing with mccain who is 5’6 1/2″
discontinuity lol
shes standin on a box.
The funny thing thor is that I think Buffet’s position (according to what you posted) is also going to be left hanging.
The last refuge for these scoundrels is the US dollar. None of their thieving will pay off if they let that slip into the shitter. So it’s a must prop at all cost sort of issue for them.
I tend to agree with those who are suspicious about Paulson motivations/corruption.
To me the case seems obvious, but hey, he just told Soros to go find another whore so there is always hope.
ni-nazi
#391
– You’re supposed to be dead ni-shit. Why aren’t you dead yet?
http://www.newsweek.com/id/159421
Ot-oh!
SuckRead this, BBH. Fight the tears!arent u even the tiniest bit curious as to why its scrubbed from the web?
ssarahW never had a link.
shez a liar.
everyone is reduced to comparin palin to known height men in the pictures.
why not just publish her height and end speculation?
– Shut up thor…
Newsweek.
Hahahaha!
You kill me, thor.
Do you think anyone beside you and the rest of your little koolaid cult believes those guys any more?
Hint: they don’t.
Why don’t they publish a picture of M’chelle for real shopping at Target? Cause she lies is why.
No, no it’s not. You don’t “short sale” currencies, you buy or sell with a forex dealer.
Nishi and thor have to threadjack. Anything to divert attention from uncomfortable facts.
Sucks to be them, I guess.
Nishi and thor have to threadjack. Anything to divert attention from uncomfortable facts.
Also it gives them the negative attention that they used to get from their abusive fathers.
Public humiliation makes nishi wet and makes thor hard.
I’d lay long odds on thor having a gimp mask in his closet.
Newsweek is a lot fail cause Slate is already what Newsweek aspires to be some day. I imagine the Washington Post will be looking to sell it before they have to fold it.
– nishit is due for a brain tumor or something. I guess that’s why she spends her time worrying about Palin’s height.
SBP
here
BBH
ni-nazi is jealous. Nothing like a jealous nihilist to spew the invective.
Is the position salaried or hourly? I’m asking because I’m worried about the apparent need for overtime in this position.
Newsweek is a lot fail
Indeed it is.
I think there’s an attitude along the lines of “We’re all doomed anyway; might as well squander our last remaining shreds of credibility in one go”.
This is the last election where those guys matter at all, and they know it.
The best they can hope for is to wind up like Dan Rather — covering entertainment news on that deep cable channel that’s between the one with the city zoning commission hearings and the one with Reverend Abner Yokum and the Trailerpark Tabernacle.
Believe it or not thor there is more confidence in American Commercial banks than there is abroad- right now.
None of these guys are willing to trade the devil they know for the devil they might get, so they want to stay American for 9 more months and propping up the dollar is the way they will do that.
Buffet’s position is a loser here.
Really?
Stupid Beeb.
i pretty much said it all startin at #41 Sbp.
i think this is gonna cost mccain the election pure and simple.
and cost the taxpayers a cool trillion by the time all is said and done.
a trillion baddebt dollars coming home to roost.
lol.
pardon my metaphor.
Jeff knows im right too.
and…i think GW had more than inkling that this was going to happen.
likely he planned it would be a housewarming gift for the dems come january.
look for the woodward tellall muckrake about how Bush knew this was gonna happen lol!
im more curious than anything else about the height thing.
its a webmystery.
im not votin for the Septugenarian Guy/HockeyMom ticket, for a lota reasons.
none of which have anything to do with palin’s height.
Actually, Darleen, I’d already seen that, it’s just that hammerboi isn’t even worth the trouble to refute any more. :-)
Definitely worth a read, though. Thanks!
i pretty much said it all startin at #41 Sbp.
Sorry, I’m not reading your stuff any more. One sentence is my limit.
nishi,
Sarah Palin is 2′ 10-1/4″ tall, wears size six EEEEEE shoes, and has hair between her toes. When the MSM gets done selecting camera angles, everybody who ever thought about voting for McCain will run shrieking to O!
Now, fuck off and OBSESS ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE, DAMMIT. Even the “Christianist cudlips” crap is less fucking annoying.
Regards,
Ric
Obama sees a “crisis”, Obama votes PRESENT!
He’s aspires to be the Gov. Blanco of the United States.
also i never saw SarahW tell a lie here before.
i thot she was on the side of angels.
amazing.
There’s no way that the mortgage thing will cost a trillion dollars. It will be a small fraction of that. It’s very simple. The houses aren’t going anywhere.
thass cool sbp.
u dont thave to read me.
i might say sumpin u dont like, lol.
;)
says you, happyfeet.
I would think that even teh nishidiot would be self-aware enough to think twice before accusing someone else of being a liar.
But that’s because it’s not self-aware at all. It’s clearly an IS experiment in artificial stupidity.
thor,
You don’t “buy or sell.” You buy and sell. It can’t be done any other way.
Which results in taking a long position on one currency and a short position on the other.
I don’t have any information that says that Buffet routinely sells (shorts) dollars, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
Nishi, I posted the source, and you can find it if you look. I’m not going to spend my valuable time disabusing you of your follies. I’m tired and sick and impatient with you.
SarahW
Still sick? :-( Sorry to hear that. I would’ve hoped you were in recovery mode by now.
okay so there will be a small fee for putting ankle bracelets on all the houses I guess. Does Paulson know about this?
,em.i can look up your comment u kno
not like i havent done that b4, eh Carin?
True that. Nishi is really good at looking up old comments, taking them completely out of context and to prove her misguided point. She’s got, like, wicked skillz.
andjust like O! I’m starting to see a pattern here.
“Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 9/20 @ 1:21 pm #
Nishi and thor have to threadjack. Anything to divert attention from uncomfortable facts.
Also it gives them the negative attention that they used to get from their abusive fathers.
Public humiliation makes nishi wet and makes thor hard.”
Just a guess, but right about now, thor is playing “yankee-my-wankee”
The pathectic, dumb fuck.
I relapsed. Ear infection at the moment. I don’t think I’ve had one of those since I was 12.
About that link – it was stats on a Celebrity news/gossip site, and they provided stats from her pageant bios.
I suppose she could have shrunk since then, but I doubt very much she shrank six inches.
And for support of this idea, Nishi ought to consider the obvious:
Beauty queens from the 80’s who won usually were not below average height.
Girls on the basketball teams are usually of average height or greater.
Also, If she were remarkably short, or petite it would have been remarked on in press accounts.
So I don’t want be mean, but it’s just to silly to spend any effort. I figure at some point Nishi will bother herself to find out.
Whatever-up, douchebag. Best stick to humping packs and lecturing grunts.
I’ve a forex account, like everyone else who is making money off the worthlessness of the U.S. dollar.
Amusing that nishidot is up in arms over the internet-scrubbing of Palin’s hight, yet doesn’t seem to care about all the info we are missing on O-man.
Best chocolate? Ethel-M. Yum.
Thor shorts dollars.
sarahW there was no link.
i remember u sayin Palin was 5’6″.
but McCain is 5’6 1/2″ and theres beaucoup footage where shes wearin heels and is visably shorter.
if there was a link, it shud be reproduceable.
as for the basketball team…sheesh…its Alaska.
theres no black ppl.
SarahW i remember there was no link.
i am not lying.
Nishi is just short.
and there is zip nada zero zilch.
cant find anything official on Palin’s height.
i suspect its been redacted.
but why?
beauty queens wear heels.
Nishi
SarahW there was no link.
I would have clicked, i would have bookmarked.
I remember wantin a link at the time.
I am sorry about your infection SarahW but you are not telling the truth.
Thor shorts dollars.
Thor takes off his shorts for dollars, more likely.
Nishizono Taracoon wears flats.
QED
“Comment by quellcrist falconer on 9/20 @ 2:22 pm #
and there is zip nada zero zilch.
cant find anything official on Palin’s height.
i suspect its been redacted.
but why?”
Becasue you’re an idiot, nishi.
Comment by thor on 9/20 @ 2:25 pm #
Mad HTML skilz you got there, fucknozzle.
There’s the non-falsifiable belief.
See, nishi, there’s a difference between falsifiable and non-falsifiable statements. Saying Palin is 5′ tall is falsifiable — and has quite adequately been falsified. Yes, most of the arguments have been based on indirect evidence — being a basketball player, a beauty pageant winner, her height relative to people standing beside her — but they’ve damned well established that she’s not 5′ tall. Hell, the picture of her sitting in a normal-sized chair next to her husband is enough — she in no way resembles an actual 5′ tall person sitting in a normal-sized chair.
The non-falsifiable belief is your assertion that her actual height is being covered up. No one can prove it’s not, and you cite the absence of absolute proof of Palin’s height as proof of some dark conspiracy to hide it.
It gets particularly funny when you start asserting claims of invisible booster chairs and walkways. Again, those claims are non-falsifiable — you see them, no one else does, and no one can prove their absence.
The parallel isn’t just to the moon-landing conspiracy nuts, but also, hilariously, to your personal bugaboo of creationism. The evidence of prehistoric evolution is primarily indirect — fossils, morphology, genetic traces — as opposed to directly observed. You heap nothing but scorn on people who do not accept this indirect evidence as (heh) gospel, and, I dare say, would have no problem deriding their attempts to create non-falsifiable assertions to bolster their position (irreducible complexity, for example).
You have, essentially, created for yourself a religious belief that Palin is unsuited for high office.
As I said, quite amusing.
You keep shrinking McCAin, too, Nishi. And I gave you a link. And kept on nattering.
Or rather, you kept on nattering. But then, it’s not like you have a history of ignoring facts, links, or logic. That is so out of character.
But you could find it if you wanted to.
Here’s the Treasury Dept.’s proposal to Congress, untitled as yet. @ WSJ.
Here’s the Treasury Dept.’s proposal to Congress, untitled as yet. @ WSJ.
Thanks for that, Sdferr.
So a two year “cooling off” period, then?
It’s surprising that the Wall Street Journal commenters are more looney tunes than some of our ones. They sound like basket cases.
It is disheartening to me to see constant ad hominem every where I turn, hf. But whatever, I must mistake the world, for what else would the peoples be bitching about, turtles?
Bmeuppls,
Thank you for the information and theory you have posted.
I look forward to your links.
Turtles have gotten off pretty light on this whole deal. So far.
I wonder what Nishi’s next obsession will be?
* “wud u elect a vprsident who nds glasses?”
* “cn we srvive a vp whos lactating?”
* “wot if she gets icky menopause durin a crisis???”
Place your bets!
I’ll put this in here, too.
Seems appropriate.
First they came for the alligators. But I didn’t speak up, for I was no alligator (waving, hi mom!).
Then they came for the leopard frogs, but again, I said nothing as I was no leopard frog (hi dad!).
Then they came for the turtles……ohnoes, doomed we’re all doomed, momma, help us momma.
Oh. Our coffee maker thinger here has a light for descale but there are no buttons for it and we can’t figure it out. Nothing appears to be scaley though so we haven’t gotten too excited about it. Mostly we sit around and worry ourselves sick over how tall Governor Palin is.
hf, try white vinager.
Typical.
Tom Mcguire is trying to work through the practical aspects of the Treasury action, should we do it, will it be worth it, are we taxpayers all gonna be screwed, are the bad actors who took the bad paper gonna make out like bandits, etc. etc.? He’s trying. Which is more than I can do.
Oh, and just an aside. I think if B. Obama gets elected (which I can’t conceive), Bob Hormats gets the Dep. Sec. State plum. Its Goldman all the way down, baby.
Well, also you have to factor in all the extraneous unrelated crap that Harry and Nancy will want as long as they feel they can hold the economy hostage for it. Times like this is what they live for.
I so long to break my knuckles on their faces the two of them. Viler politicians I can hardly think of…..oh, wait……I mena I don’t want to think of.
hf, try white vinager.
Racist.
Anyone have any numbers of the success/failure rate of this program,
I know some people who got their homes through this program.and they really do appreciate it.
Tony
South Haven,MI
I think the light lights up to tell you you need to descale the coffee maker.
Sorry, haven’t slogged through the whole thread yet, but it occurs to me, hasn’t Congress already pretty much granted Treasury the authority to step in and backstop institutions as it sees fit? As I recall that authority was pretty broad and nebulous. So why are they bothering with Congress at all here? I cannot believe that Congress will be able to hammer out some sensible and comprehensive economic overhaul over the weekend. Hank to Cranky Wanks: I’m the Bank, Thanks!
“This” program?
“Well, also you have to factor in all the extraneous unrelated crap that Harry and Nancy will want as long as they feel they can hold the economy hostage for it.”
Any of that should be called out as front-page news and names named. List all the sludge and the slugs crawling in it.
This election brings to mind a line from the end of “I Claudius”
“Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out”.
I’ve been saying that this country’s going to be in a world of $%@# when Bush was elected, and it certainly seems to me that my predictions have been correct. This is one case when I’m sorry to be right!
Yea, sure Julie.
I bet you wish the surge hadn’t worked.
I read through the plan linked at the WSJ…
For the first time in my life, I think that passing along my honest assessment in a public forum would be irresponsible.
If you ever wanted to test out the whole “pray to god” thing, now would be a good time.
Carin: Come on, she’s got to grasp at any straw she can reach and blame it all on Bush.
No. Really. The debate is about Sara Palin’s height? You have got to be fucking kidding. You resident snotgobblers have way too much time on your hands.
Thanks for the link, Victor. $700 billion cap. Just wow.
RTO Trainer,
The program of getting low income families,into home ownership, with high-risk loans and mortgages.
Im curious about the effectiveness
of the program.
We do have chairs that are height adjustable, so there is no need for booster seats.
google it
Tony
South Haven,MI
SarahW there absolutely was no link.
Why are you lying?
oh. Thanks, geoffb. That maybe makes more sense. I will keep a watchful eye. Except then I will have to figure out what exactly it wants me to do. Or not. I’m not really that guy. I mean, I guess I could step up. It’ll just depend on my mood that day I think. If the descale light came on today I would be really a lot indifferent I think.
I bet Julie would know what to do cause she’s teh smartest one.
Wow, I just learned that the Giant Squid has a toroidal brain shape with its esophagus passing straight through the middle. They don’t worry about scales either, they just eat their way tight through them.
http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-09/colossal-squid-revealed
snagged from insty
r
SBP-
Thor takes off his shorts for dollars, more likely.
Look out the window! It’s thor and Bambi. NSFW!
http://jimtreacher.com/archives/001608.html
tee-hee.
The singular “program” is what caught me off.
The variety of programs and the misregulations that allowed for them have resulted in about 12% of mortgages being “subprime.” Of the foreclosures 52% are subprime.
Working those numbers shows that about 6% of all mortgages are both subprime and in foreclosure. If 6% is 52% of foreclosures total, then of the 88% of prime mortgages, roughly 82% are healthy. Hopefully those mortgages are all with healthy financial institutions.
Oh yeah, like that‘s gonna happen.
Nishi, why are you so lazy?
Look sarahW
no fuckin link
#
Comment by SarahW on 9/5 @ 6:10 pm #
I found a couple of sites that say Sarah Palin is 5′ 6.5″. That makes more sense for a basketball player (and beauty contestant, for that matter). I’ve got a half inch on her, so yay, wonder bread.
Liar , Liar pants on fire.
And you’re just trying to be irritating about the height thing, you know better.
https://proteinwisdom.com/?p=13217#comment-531990
well…..you lied.
you never gave any links.
yeah, that’s the first time I brought if up. I mentioned it several times after that. IF you missed it, too bad for you. It exists on the web.
And you can find it.
bcuz there arent any
that is the only time you mentioned
your a liar sarahW
haha
prove ur not a liar sarahW
all you have to do is give one single link
It was easy to find then. Now, it might be harder. But It’s not the kind of site that would get wiped or disappear.
Uh, no, Nishi, I prefer being called a liar by you to wasting time on you.
why do u care enuff to lie about about SarahW?
Palin cant be 5’6″………mccain is 5’6″
why the lying?
you cant produce a link………and you’re a liar.
Nishi, quit being an ass. You know better, I know you know better.
Nishi, I posted the source, and you can find it if you look. I’m not going to spend my valuable time disabusing you of your follies. I’m tired and sick and impatient with you.
liar.
yopu never posted a source.
no i dont.
i thought you were one of the honest posters here.
i thought you told the truth.
you lied repeatedly.
Well I’m just crushed you think so.
why would u do that?
Prove you’re not insane, nishi. And point out the booster seat and the rolling walkway. And link to anything that shows your theory to have any validity whatsoever.
you never linked a source…….an you repeated lied and said you did.
why?
That Magnificent bastard, rove, managed to get all those shots of Palin next to midgets. Especially the beauty pageant ones. Oh, that was brill.
and it was a dumb lie.
mccain is 5’6 1/2″
there is plenty of video of her standin next to him in heels and shes visably shorter.
Odd, isn’t it, how Miss Science is the one ’round here most prone to acting the fanatic?
Well, you can OCD yourself to death about it Nishi, cause I’m not finding it for you.
just admit you lied when you said you had linked it to me.
and ill quit.
SarahW:
The Idiot:
Well, that’s certainly the truth.
or find it on the thread i linked
i looked…..there is nothing there.
liar.
nishi. For the love of
GodAllah … please go take your medicine.McCain is 5’9″ according to IMDb, and that’s now, not in his youth.
happyfeet,
Scale is the deposits left behind when the water boils away. Lime mostly, like the formations in caves. Hard water, more scale. It plugs up the pipes.
Run a pot full of white vinegar through then a couple pots of water to clear out the vinegar. Dishwashers are the same and have to be descaled every once in a while. Easy compared to making guacamole.
And height has nothing to do with it at all just like the presidency so that’s a bonus.
lol! PW commentariat are liars AND homophobes AND racists!
hahaha
I’m with geoffb. You can do the descaling. It will make the coffee taste better, and that’s what it’s all about, right?
Is anyone else imagining nishi shuffling around her house with tissue boxes on her feet for shoes?
RTO Trainer,
82%,It coulda been worse.
I wonder how many are first time homeowners vs quick profit property owners(those that buy 3-4 homes,then sell them off)are trying to get in the housing bubble?
New family homeowners do have a positive effect in a community.Could payoff down the line.
I doubt we will get any money back from bailout.
Half empty/Half full
You don’t have to like it.
You just have to do it.
stole that from some book,
Tony
South Haven,MI
Pray for the pipeline.
https://proteinwisdom.com/pub/wp-trackback.php?p=1672
My coffee maker needs a good de-scaling. It’s burbling and taking too long. But I have the fear.
This one time, at clinical toxicology lab camp, I cleaned the coffee make with mislabed acetic acid. It was a very strong solution and it descaled my lungs
mislabeled.
Sheesh
Damn ,i need a tiny little magic editor, on my shoulder,to fix my crap.
Tony
South Haven,MI
nishidiot-
Since the taller candidate always wins, I’m sure that Presidents Gore and Kerry both enjoyed their time as CinC.
When you add Jimmy the Dhimmi vs Ford and Nixon vs McGovern, that makes four of the last nine elections during the TV age where the shorter candidate prevailed, you fucking ignorant twat!
White vinegar. Got it. I will be ready. oh. I wish I were one of those people that was all ahh that’s a good cup of coffee but mostly I just want the caffeine molecule bits. Which, science!
Beware science, Happy. Look what it’s done to nishi.
Tissue boxes. On her feet.
Really? Based on her historical track record, I expect she’d be wearing TP rolls on her feet.
In women, Babe Factor trumps height.
Oh. It’s superstition, this taller thing. Like squiggle bulbs controlling teh weather. Superstitions … I can’t think of any what I have just right off. Oh. When I smoke I always tear off the end of the burny part and put the filter part in my pocket. I do this cause once I read on a website that filters kill sand fleas and that I should check back and they would have documentation for this later. I don’t really know what ecological importance sand fleas have but I won’t have their deaths on my conscience, no sir. That’s a lot like a superstition I think.
“Comment by quellcrist falconer on 9/20 @ 6:31 pm #
lol! PW commentariat are liars AND homophobes AND racists!
hahaha”
And you’re fucking insane and a fascist.
Oh.
A liar, don’t forget that you’re a liar.
Oh. Gay peoples and also peoples of the different races what I want you to know is … I love you. Peace, y’all.
It’s superstition, this taller thing.
When it comes to electoral superstitions, I prefer this one in conjunction with this data.
It keeps me going, it does.
Spoken like a man who’s never been attacked by swarms of viscious sand fleas. The little beasts are .125 inches and have teeth 4 inches long.
Oh. Who knew? Jeez. Nature. Freaking nuisance is what it is.
That’s what I say when the hoppy-bugs come in the laundry room.
Nazi:
I left at 12:30. Took my wife to work, watched football, took a nap.
Not very productive, I know, bit then again I didn’t spend almost seven hours ranting about Sarah Palin’s height and calling Sarah a liar.
Really, it’s a testament to Jeff’s writing and inight and the contributions of the intelligible commentariat that people keep coming back here after you and your little friend, Thor, have been shitting all over the floor.
SBP
When it comes to electoral superstitions
GWB broke the Redskins superstition in 2004. (That just proves Bush stole the election… -ed.)
To be safe, I’ll be rooting against my beloved Steelers on Nov. 3…
Somebody linked to a study the other day to a trend that the more negative, gloom and doom campaign always loses to the more optimistic one, which would favor McCain.
I don’t have the link handy so I am probably lying.
Also a google search indicates the McCain is most likely about 5′-8″ +/- 1″ Only estimate of Palin I found was about 5′-5″.
A couple weeks ago, I ran across one sort of not very reputable celebrity site had her height at 5’8″, but I discounted it. Five-five seems much more plausible
She seems very slightly above average height from most of her pictures. But that’s dont’ with tricks of scale, I’m sure nishi could not be wrong.
Must have been glacial acetic acid Sarah W. I used to use it to make the “stop bath” when I did darkroom work as a kid. Nasty stuff.
I also wonder if happyfeet brought this up as a kind of metaphor.
Coffee maker is the financial system. Scale is the defaulted sub-prime mortgages. Vinegar is the 700 billion Treasury buyout. Water is the resale of the properties cleansing the system of the cure. As long as we apply the proper strength acid so as not to burn out the pipes we will have some good coffee in a couple of years. If the acid is too weak then everything remains clogged and the coffee will stink.
Anyway the best part of coffee is waking to that heavenly smell of it brewing.
done, not dont’ which I don’t know what that is but shakespeare for donut. I am all in, and going to bed now.
Invisible trackway, I’m telling you.
*snort*
Well that didn’t take long.
Sen. Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are apparently all over their “somber” “gulp” moment and, from a link that Dan has at The Pub are now talking about what they can get for going along with the proposal to save the nation’s financial system.
Bloodsucking leeches all of them.
speculated
i speculate Palin is 5′1″ based on height comparisons to known heights
im quite curious as to why this ifo has been scrubbed.
She’s not that short. I met her at the Bush Rally at Eilsen Air Force Base in Fairbanks last month while I was in Alaska for National Guard Annual Training.
She was very nice, not at all like other politicians I’ve met, and she is not 5’1″. I’m 6’2″ and she was probably 5’7″ in her sensible heels.
Her height was unremarkable. She’s not short, quellqueef.
“She’s not short…” Gray, that’s just what They want you to think.
What I find interesting in this sordid business is the Soros connection. Soros upped his holdings to 9.5 milliion shares in Lehman Brothers (June 2008). http://tiny.cc/1GWNr
Soros is a known global market manipulator, and his primary vehicle is short selling. Heis pne of the largest debtors to Lehman and among the other debtors seeking repayment under Chapter 11 bankruptcy rules is BNP Paribas http://tiny.cc/E16TJ , a large French bank whose largest single private shareholder is Nadhmi Auchi’s General Mediterranean Holdings (GMH). BNP Paribas is owed $250 556 million by Lehman . Auchi’s GMH is the largest stakeholder in BNP Paribas. Now who is Nadhmi Auchi? http://tiny.cc/qTURC Obama’s sponsor to get into Harvard… and middle man in the Oil for Food Scandal. He was sentenced to two years for his involvement in the ELF scandal which was the largest fraud inquiry in the EU http://tiny.cc/9dWav . This same Auchi loaned Tony Rezko 3.5 million http://tiny.cc/BdkBu about one month before the Obama home purchase that resulted in Rezko’s wife buying the “lot” next door and later selling part of it to Obama http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/Story?id=4315880&page=1 .
Another unnamed but big name circling the Lehman debacle is none other than Al Gore – whose climate credit scheme (GIM) was underwritten by Lehman http://tiny.cc/UrmsT .
Who is the biggest purchaser of pampas in South America causing land prices there to skyrocket? George Soros… http://tiny.cc/OUux9 Why is he buying pampas? To grow and develop biofuels.
Markets start to go south… what does the fed do?
Leave Lehman twisting in the wind, the only one to get NO BAILOUT… and eliminate short selling, which is Soros’ prime investment choice. Cuts off Soros at the head and leaves Auchi and his Rezko prblems on the hook as well. London, Tokyo and other markets moved in concert with the Fed to instigate the same bans on short selling and the markets rise in response. The rapid response of all of the global markets to this was unprecedented. Short sellers are taking a bath and are sent a message.
Seems to me a Soros coup was in the offing (too many to list the urls – google Soros Argentina or Georgia, or Poland) and the feds and other markets acted in concert to shut it down, backing up their shutdown of the coup with the assets of Fannie/Freddie.
NSA wiretaps and foreign intelligence services may have some interesting tapes that were played to the congressional meetings on Friday. The congress is told “this is what you are going to do.†And that is why Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd looked like they had just seen their own deaths and were as meek as sheep….
Soros is ruined, Obama is decloaked and a crisis is averted. Enough of this will be leaked out over the next 6 weeks to cause the election to go to McCain and the house cleaning can begin.
With links added for interested parties…
If the Soros’ well is dry, the money flowing to Obama should dry up, too. He has leveraged himself so deeply in real estate in SA, which is not a liquid asset, and if his liquidity, has evaporated, he is caught in the same credit freeze as the rest the rest of the hedgefund/banking/investment groups and has no pressure valve to draw more funds.
link
John McCain, nominee of the United States Republican Party in the United States presidential election, 2008, is 5 ft 6 in (1.70 meters).[3] Were McCain elected to the presidency, he would be the shortest president in 120 years and tied for the second-shortest president of all time.
How pathetic is must be to care so much about something as immaterial as someone’s height.
What I find interesting is that with the trainloads of scrutiny that Palin, her kids, her family, her history and her vagina have been subjected to in the last 3 weeks, no one has “noticed” her alleged diminutive stature except our psychobot.
Nah, Pablo, it’s apparently a minor issue of concern with the Kossacks. Where do you think nishi got the idea? Certainly not from her own mind.
OK, our psychobot and other psychobots. But no one saner than, oh, Andrew Sullivan has made any mention at all of her being a midget.
She must have drywall stilts hidden under her pants and stuffed into a pair of shoes here.
Bmeuppls on 9/20 @ 11:39 pm:
Interesting set of “six degrees” you have there.
I’m entirely amenable to believing that Obama is a Soros puppet. And it’s clear there’s something about those relationships that Obama wants to remain hidden.
But how is Soros a loser if he’s shorting Lehman?
I did find Paulson’s “best of America” statement a bit odd and the Dems statements more docile than I would have expected given supposed context. But NSA tapes? Don’t you think that would have leaked given the roomful of people present? And that the meeting wouldn’t have been publicly announced if such sensitive information were to be disclosed?
Sounds a bit Lyndon Larouche-ish for me to buy.
Oh, and how does the MBS angle fit in?
Wiki. Oh. brother.
Shrimpgate had been making lefty rounds, for some inexplicable reason. It’s bollocks according to pre-nom sources.
If you can’t trust Wiki, I don’t know what’s real anymore. lamentation noise here
Shoes on their heads. Song about a “little potato”. HAHAahahaha.
#465 and #467.
The turtles have gotten off easy because of the vigilence of the Turtle Troopers of the Anna Maria Turtle Watch!
‘Turtles nest safe on the beach at night because there are rough people ready to visit harm on those who would harm them.’
I had forgotten about about that, Mikey. They do their work in the dark mostly, at night. They are indeed vigilant.
Jesus Christ, will you people PLEASE quit feeding the fucking idiot trolls.
I mean, for fuck’s sake…arguing to the tune of a couple of hundred comments about Palin’s height? What the FUCK is that about?
It’s about caring what the nishtoon says — which, I don’t understand that either.
…other than its sheer amusement value, of course.
ding!ding!ding!
quiet Saturday at home. well, not soooo quiet for all the giggling, but whatevs, you get the idea.
takeshi-san….sadly u have not read far enough.
the Quellists prevail in Woken Furies with the help of a bio-engineered gecko sleeve, antique surfer culture and bricolaged Marstech.
and eventually the Quellists will succeed here as well.
In the Technological Singularity.
whose karakuri are u anyways?
Sad, lonely little girl.
Psssst, Kate: You do know none of that is real, don’t you?
No, she doesn’t McGehee. Reality is not in her arsenal.
Hey, c’mon guys! Give Kate some credit here. What could possibly be more important to the world marketplace than Sarah Palin’s height? It’s one of those crucial data points that the truly deep thinkers among us focus on.. Or not, I wouldn’t know. But genius is a rare thing, so we should be careful not to stifle it when it raises its puny head.
…
Okay, you could tell I was being sarcastic there, couldn’t you?
Kate??
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