What has Obama accomplished that leads you to believe he can run this country?

[Rose T]

Much like Bush supporters can only blame Clinton for this administrations problems.

[Jen Davies Farts All Day!]

What's he going to do? Invade more countries? Spend more money to accomplish nothing?

[Hehehe Its Clitsy!]

Part 1
In just one year. Remember the election in 2006?
Thought you might like to read the following:
A little over one year ago:

1) Consumer confidence stood at a 2 1/2 year high;
2) Regular gasoline sold for $2.19 a gallon;
3) The unemployment rate was 4.5%.

Since voting in a Democratic Congress in 2006 we have seen:

1) Consumer confidence plummet;
2) The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.50 a gallon;
3) Unemployment is up to 5% (a 10% increase);
4) American households have seen $2.3 trillion in equity value evaporate (stock and mutual fund losses);
5) Americans have seen their home equity drop by $1.2 trillion dollars;
6) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.

America voted for change in 2006, and we got it!

Remember it's Congress that makes law not the President. He has to work with what's handed to him.

Part 2:
Taxes...Whether Democrat or a Republican you will find these statistics enlightening and amazing.
www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/151.html
Taxes under Clinton 1999 Taxes under Bush 2008
Single making 30K - tax $8,400 Single making 30K - tax $4,500
Single making 50K - tax $14,000 Single making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $23,250 Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K - tax $16,800 Married making 60K- tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $21,000 Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $38,750 Married making 125K - tax $31,250

Obama will return to the higher tax rates. It is amazing how many people that fall into the categories above think Bush is screwing them and Bill Clinton was the greatest President ever. If Obama or Hillary are elected, they both say they will repeal the Bush tax cuts and a good portion of the people that fall into the categories above can't wait for it to happen. This is like the movie The Sting with Paul Newman; you scam somebody out of some money and they don't even know what happened.

[chris_6212]

Ahhh... let's go through this little list, shall we?

1) Consumer confidence plummet;
----- subprime crisis
2) The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.50 a gallon;
----- Iraq war, oil speculation (aided by the Enron loophole), and foreign growth
3) Unemployment is up to 5% (a 10% increase);
----- subprime crisis
4) American households have seen $2.3 trillion in equity value evaporate (stock and mutual fund losses);
----- subprime crisis
5) Americans have seen their home equity drop by $1.2 trillion dollars;
----- subprime crisis
6) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.
----- subprime crisis


So, the problems with this country have to do with the subprime crisis, the Enron loophole, the Iraq war, and foreign growth.

Exactly which of those is the Democratic Congress resposible for?

Wanna know what IS interesting....? McCain's chief economic advisor is one of the architects of the legislation that allowed the subprime crisis and the Enron loophole, when he rushed through a bunch of bank deregulation as a senator in 1999; otherwise there would have been a far smaller economic breakdown (and maybe no Enron scandal and less oil speculation, too).







http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/27/221225/738/890/523892McCain, Lobbyist Phil Gramm, and the Subprime Mortgage Mess

One of the failures that had caused the crash of 1929 concerned the structural design of the banking system. Banks were simultaneously involved in both commercial and investment banking. They would take the money that individuals deposited into their bank accounts, and invest that money in the stock market. When the stock market crashed, most of that deposited money was lost. This triggered an uncontrollable run on the banking system, as individuals hoped to pull their money out before it was too late. Since no bank ever keeps enough cash to pay all of their depositors at once, the result was a systemic collapse of the banking system.
....It was this depression-era event which caused the enactment of the Glass-Steagall Act. The Glass-Steagall Act erected a regulatory wall between commercial and investment banking. Congress realized that the inherent risk associated with investment banking (investing in the stock and bond markets) did not mix well with the risk-adverse world of commercial banking. Thus, the Glass-Steagall Act would theoretically confine a systemic collapse like the one of 1929 to the investment banking world. But then along came the "free market" conservatives who were never fans of things like facts or logic.


Phil Gramm's bill, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, revoked the Glass-Steagall Act and thus removed the wall between investment banking and commercial banking. This was done, according to Phil Gram, in the name of "freedom".


So why did this help to cause the mortgage collapse? Up until the early 1990s, if you wanted to take out a mortgage, a bank would lend you the money. The bank would then keep the mortgage on their books. Thus, they wanted to ensure that you did not default on the mortgage, because the bank would have to eat the loss. To prevent this, banks would be extremely careful when lending money, and would only lend money that they thought they could get back. These banks were commercial banks.
After Phil Gramm's law passed, there were no longer any barriers between investment banks and commercial banks. Now, commercial banks would lend you the money, and then sell the mortgage to an investment bank. The investment bank would combine thousands of mortgages into a single unit, .... With this system, any losses would be absorbed by investors, rather than by the original lender. Once the mortgage was off the books of the lender, they no longer bore any risk. But they could sell these mortgages for so much money that they were very profitable. Thus, they had every incentive to lend money to people who couldn't afford it.
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/12/21/Business/Four_subprime_lessons.shtml
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0308/9246.html

And at the very least, we'll have to pay for this WONDROUS deregulation with unemployment, foreclosures, and inflation. Thanks.



@FUNKbrs's "facts" backfiring.

[XxAmberxX]

[arabs?]

except that it was Trillion, not billion...but good try, I can see why you voted for Bush.