Adam Holland wrote on April 19, 2008 01:14 PM: The idea that "modern scholarship" on the subject of the Great Depression starts with Murray Rothbard is a sick joke. Rothbard was a crackpot ideologue. If you agree with him, that's your story. Just don't try to portray him as an objective source of scholarship. I've read some of what he's written on the subject and his case is a vale of lies and distortions. He basically attributes all actions by any government agency of any jurisdiction to a comprehensive plan by Hoover to mitigate the crashing economy. Ever wonder why virtually no other scholars agree with him? You should. Hoover's Sec. of the Treasury wanted to "purge" the U.S. economy -- they thought the depression would do us some good.

More to the point: the American public is not "whining" when we ask for sound economic policies, including equitable and sustainable distribution of the tax burden, and basic competence and good faith in the exercise of policies. That apparently has been far too much to ask of Bush and his administration. Maybe the Las Vegas Review-Journal should join us in making these demands.

timinator wrote on March 31, 2008 10:03 PM: "If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them (around the banks), will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."

- Thomas Jefferson

The federal reserve has plundered this nation long enough. The debt-based money system is about to crash, but this is by design, so that we will accept the North American Union. The republicrats are complicit with the bankers.

Hopefully, enough of us will hold onto virtue and liberty long enough to see us through this mess.

Fasten your seat belts, we're in for a bumpy ride...

doa wrote on March 31, 2008 03:27 PM: Or hopefully one of the Dumb-o-crats or Republi-thieves will enact a new "program" to fix whatever ails us right now.

doa wrote on March 31, 2008 03:25 PM: Hopefully there will be a nice virulent pandemic soon to thin the herd a bit. Maybe some REAL tough times to smack the intellectually lazy American around a bit, just enough so we demand our country back from these political mongoloids.

Herb wrote on March 31, 2008 01:12 PM: The fact that Bush does not want to bailout homedebtors makes me so proud that I voted for him twice. I wish I could vote for him a third time.

It is unfair for those of us who have paid our bills and played by the rules through the years to see these deadbeats get a free house. Most of these subprime "homeowners" put no money down. The house is not theirs, it's the banks.

Many of these subprime brrowers getting kicked out of their house are downright rotten. They punch holes in the walls, pour motor oil on the carpet, and worst of all leave their poor pets inside to starve to death. This riff raff that trashes the banks homes truly deserve to become homeless for awhile.

For those who want a bailout to keep home prices high. You are selfish. The market needs to correct itself, home prices are still too high, they have a long way to drop. Do not reward bad people to keep your home price artificially high.

Rodman wrote on March 31, 2008 10:59 AM: If Bush stands by his word and doesn't allow the bailout in the housing market it will be the first correct thing he has done in 7 plus years. As a homeowner who read the fine print when both buying and later refinancing I don't feel as a taxpayer I should be bailing our banks and the people they loaned the money to. Perhaps if loans are to be renegotiated and let people keep their house then new terms should not reduce their obligations but in stead extend them at a fixed rate. Lets say a person has an arm loan for 30 years at an escalating interest rate. If the government wants to help they should do so by seeing that the homeowner is allowed to refinance at a fixed rate and extend the loan from 30 to 40 or even 50 years, at an affordable rate, thus giving people their chance to own a piece of the American Dream, if that's what they really want, while aiding but not bailing out banks and lenders. As a taxpayer I don't feel I should be the one to bailout the greediest who caused the problem. Let the real estate companies whose salespeople reaped huge commissions, the builders who flooded the market with over priced homes, and the banks who created these problems be the ones who rectify them. As a taxpayer I don't have the right to write off billions of dollars as all the banks and financial institutions are now doing while still crying bail us out. The best way to start this process is to start by firing all the CEO's of these financial institutions who allowed these problems to occur while they were taking 10-25 million dollars worth of pay and bonuses.

Don Evans wrote on March 31, 2008 10:11 AM: By all means, let's allow debtor's prison again as well. Especially when it was the Fed and the various banks that loaned the money that created the current credit crisis to begin with. Repeat after me; people that have no (or low) income can't pay back loans.

To recap:

Banks loan money to people that can't pay it back, during the days when they were getting the money virtually free from the Fed, and then they whine when people default.

As one poster so aptly described, the resulting loss of property values, due to homes being dumped on the market by both builders and defaults, lowers ALL home values.

The Fed, fearing an economic meltdown, lowers interest rates again (as a means of saving the banks and markets) and then arranges for an unprecedented Fed purchase of private equity (Bear Sterns) using taxpayer money. The decreasing interest rates, in turn, cause INCREASING RATES OF INFLATION..for the rest of us, of course.

Now they're considering changes to financial oversight(?!) that would ostensibly DE-REGULATE the financial markets. Prepare yourselves; Enron and Worldcom were just the beginning.

No one put a gun to the banks' heads and forced them to make poor investment decisions; and yet the rest of us have to pay for their foolishness with unstable/lower property values, uncontrollable inflation, and even more taxpayer money lost. It stinks of the Savings and Loan scandal of the 1980's, as I've said before.

In sum, free markets and Adam Smith forever..until all but the high and mightiest of us are poor, and cheated blind. After all, government apparently exists for the protection of those few who can afford the lobbying, to the detriment of the rest of us..As always.

Russ wrote on March 31, 2008 07:31 AM: Daniel, "Hey Demoncrats:Hillary parachuted into Iraq today with Chelsea to campaign." We can live with a lie like that one. Too bad we can't say the same about the 7 years worth of lies your beloved KING BUSH and his cronies have spread around the world. You just keep living in your Republican Make Believe Everything is fine world. I just hope you never wake up and see what has happened. Have you ever seen planet of the apes?

Daniel wrote on March 31, 2008 07:13 AM: Wells Fargo wanted to refinance our home last year and had made a very good pitch as to why. I wanted a fixed and they wanted another. It turns out if i went with W.F. I would be paying $2,145 today than my $745.00 fixed rate today. Plus i would have to pay my own taxes which are included in my fixed rate. I did read the contract and my loan officers tried to tell me what was in it. I did not sign and man was i right. Many could not comprehend these contacts and took the word of the loan officer. A house is a big step in your life and should be handled with a lawyer. Yet the banks should be tried for fraud if these loan makers did not tell these borrowers what could happen.
Hey Demoncrats:Hillary parachuted into Iraq today with Chelsea to campaign.

Lee wrote on March 31, 2008 06:58 AM: Watching the empire and its welfare state die is sweet. Glad I rent and sold my overpriced house two years ago. Ha Ha

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