marinara's Comments (318)

“Friedman reminds me of Bill Kristol in how he can ignore the elephant in the room and instead focus on nonsense to prove his argument. Thank you Ms. Narwani!”

“With all respect to Mr. Sirota, but this blog needs to address some of the math. For instance, the Health Bill assumes that costs increase conservatively, and the budget assumes that taxes are collected for 5 years before the bill comes into effect. If the bill was enacted today, the Republican numbers start looking correct.”

“From MS. Choate's blog:"Will President Obama invite these three Members to his Jobs Conference? The answer will be a neat little test of the President's seriousness about the jobs issue."

Obama is:
1. Pro-Wall St.
2. Anti- Deficit.

Therefore, not a chance he will do anything but provide vague lip service.”

“Nice Blog, Mr. Black!”

“crazy!”

“From Mr. Ellis' Blog: "Sure, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase made huge profits. Thank goodness they were taking the risks and making the markets that earned those profits. Without their work, the market panic would have cut deeper into our economy and lasted longer - and we'd all be worse off today - much worse off."

Exactly how can you say this to be true? It seems so obvious to you that the banks have restored normalcy. The problem is that it's only back to normal FOR WALL ST. NOT MAIN ST. For Main St. the credit market is still frozen. I mean small biz can't get loans, institutions can't issue bonds.

I allege that the counter-cyclical federal policy is the only thing keeping the financial industry profitable. Those same policies aren't doing anything for the average worker, as they have to shoulder the gambling debts incurred by AIG and Freddie and Fannie.

The truth is, Wall St. would make a profit if America was sinking into ruins, just as it made a profit during the last century. The connection Mr. Ellis insists on, between Wall St. and our GDP, is only on paper.”

“From Mr. Carr's Blog: "We should implement policies that encourage the creation of reliable and sustainable jobs"

This is never going to happen. Read how 90% of the stimulus actually goes overseas.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leo-w-gerard/hell-if-dc-didnt-offshore_b_363647.html

Our Congress and Administration doesn't care how the money is spent. Just as long as they don't appear controversial and get forced out like Van Jones was trash heaped.”

“Obama says the unemployment problem is just a lagging indicator. In the Wall St. sphere, what he said is more or less correct.

As an unemployed American, I would like to have Obama say that to my face.”

“common sense is not the answer when hundreds of trillions are floating around in unregulated markets. But, I love the blog Mr. Davis!”

“Mr. Leopold also mentions that Congress and the Cabinet fall over themselves to give gifts to this privileged class of billionaires. This is obvious to everyone.

It follows that the billionaires don't deserve the admiration and special attentions of our government.
Do the billionaires deserve their giant awards? That case is somewhat separate and more difficult to make. Let's start digging their grave now :)”

“Yes. And more clearly if we consider the wealthy different from those who just have income. The wealthy will protect their wealth, even if it costs income for the economically vulnerable.”

“Remember the war was financed off balance sheet, as a budget supplemental. That's like the proverbial blank check.”

“Gerald Celente says there will be more terror attacks very soon. He backs up his prediction with razor sharp analysis of current trends. I predict he's right about the terror attacks. So Obama will get plenty of support by a terrorized American nation.”

“No, it's voters telling our government that we don't care about unpaid overtime for asian child labor. But then worker's rights have fallen off the democratic platform, i suppose.”

“If I may, an addition to the "cons" list.

a. Wall st. made their profits by misrepresenting paper, selling junk bonds as quality paper.
b. banks are guilty of helping clients evade taxes, evade regulation
c. rather than the market stabilizing prices, the market is prone to bubbles that fleece ordinary investors
d. wall st. allows predatory takeovers, in the sense they execute a hostile takeover on a company, load that company with debt, and sell it off in pieces.
e. much like item d, but wall st. puts the company in bankruptcy as a pretext to breaking the union.
f. the wall st. wealth is not actually real wealth. Rather it just appears so on paper.
g. predatory lending has real effects, especially with the poor.
h. wars have been started over assets being liquidated. Seriously.”

“very true, and very sad that you have such an accurate answer. :)”

“Les, why are you trying to fit a rational solution to what is a moral problem?

Allowing fees to be skimmed from a retiree, is a moral dilemma. A woman who can't afford to pay for her pain meds, that's a moral problem. Growing the market cap for your corporation, now that's just pure numbers.

100 years ago, corporate charters had to show they provided a clear good for the public interest. Seems like an age ago.
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC41/Rowe.htm
^documents how corporations used to be linked to the public interest.”

“I wanted prosecution for those in our government who used torture to gain false confessions. I applaud Ms. Huffington for reaching the same conclusion.”

“Ok, you say, robbing peter to pay paul,is very bad, that's what more taxes are. I say, what good does having 30M men out of work do? Half the children on food stamps? Let's choose the lesser of two evils.”

“yeah but they are politicians, which means they can turn on a dime, when the voters make their determination clear.”

“progressives are spread out over what is a large number of issues. That's not news. Electing a black democrat and then finding out hes as far right as Bush, that's a surprise.”

“The problem is that the people in charge aren't responsible for the people affected. If they had the possibility of losing their own lunch, things would be completely different.”

“"Why would you worry about that? The future is far away and we all have to make money now!"

So sad, it's funny. Why would anyone be responsible for his own behavior?

On a related note: I think I know what went wrong with our system of capitalism.”

“Would like to see more about the real effects that the muni bonds crash, I mean the inability for counties, cities and pubic utility boards, for them to issue new bonds or renew the bonds.

I guess you can't predict the future. Why did you set my expectations so high? Mr. Johnson. Just kiddin.”

“Awesome Blog! Mr. Epstein”