Enigma869 wrote:While I'm not a proponent of Socialism, don't we essentially have a form of it now, with all of these government takeovers? I mean you go to IndyMac's website now, and it says "IndyMac FEDERAL Bank"! I fail to see how that is going to be any different, regardless of which candidate gets elected. The damage has already been done, on a Republican's watch!
We've had a hybrid form of socialism that essentially began with the New Deal. Most Conservatives I know that do not tow the Republican party line did not support the bail out. Even I was on the fence about it until Congress stuffed it full of fucking pork. That was deal breaker for me.
You are dead on correct, it did happen on the Republicans watch. They had the ability to stop this run away train many times and they simply failed to do so. Granted, there were a few half assed attempts by some Republicans (including McCain), they simply didn't push hard enough. Although some lefties like Voyager would like you to believe George Bush is solely responsible for every single calamity of the 20th century (Aids, 1906 San Fran earthquake, Pearl Harbor, 9/11, Kennedy's tumor, Mother Teresa's death {just to name a few}), their blind hatred of Bush alters their perception of reality. He is responsible to some extent but it doesn't begin and end with him.
Ground zero of the financial meltdown is Fannie & Freddie and the reason they got into the mess they did is directly tied to the Community Reinvestment Act, something the Democrats have been huge proponents of. As far back as 2001, a few Republicans were expressing concern about Fannie and Freddie. During the ENTIRE time right up to the flash point, the Democrats had their heads stuck in the sand. They simply didn't want to hear it.
I'm speculating here but I can only imagine that by July 2008, MANY in Congress had to have been made aware of Freddy & Fannie's financials. I refuse to believe F&F went under in a matter of weeks. Despite that, Barney Frank had this to say in July:
Barney Frank wrote:I think this is a case where Fannie and Freddie are fundamentally sound, that they are not in danger of going under. They're not the best investments these days from the long-term standpoint going back. I think they are in good shape going forward.
The defense of Democrats in this particular matter doesn't even come close to passing the straight face test. What I believe is the ultimate piece of evidence that both parties are at fault is this.
Nobody is going to jail nor are there any investigations into F&F.
It is absolutely well documented and well established the Democrats had their greedy hands in the cookie jar too. Consider this. When was the last time you heard a democrat talking about the cost of the Iraq war? Probably 30 seconds (or less) ago. In case you don't know, the cost is creeping up close to the 600 billion mark.
The cost for the bailout, as indicated by MANY geeky accountant types, will be AT LEAST 2 trillion and that begs the question: where's the outrage by democrats towards members of their own party who are partly to blame in this?
2 TRILLION. Chew on that number for a while.
