Image of the day

Captured by
Douglas Rollain

M20 Trifid Nebula in LRGBHa

About Astromart

My Account

New to Astromart?

Register an account...

Need Help?

Posts Made By: Richard Wright

September 21, 2008 05:34 AM Forum: Polls

The fundamentals of our economy are ---

Posted By Richard Wright
Each weekend comes with another back room deal to make the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. With this weekend's additional $700 billion rescue, now I am really wondering how they will top that, next week. I suppose I should steel myself for the announcement we are selling Alaska back to the Russians. wink

September 18, 2008 06:10 AM Forum: Polls

The fundamentals of our economy are ---

Posted By Richard Wright
Hey, let's admit it, the politics are funny. Kinda bizarro, but definitely amusing.

And that's a lot more entertaining than the economists telling us we're on the verge of the second great depression. I'd rather not get to the point where I wash out and re-use ziploc baggies like the folks I knew growing up who did the first great depression. Come to think of it, that's kind of a funny mental image, too.

Herb York said:

grin

September 19, 2008 04:00 AM Forum: Polls

The fundamentals of our economy are ---

Posted By Richard Wright
Hugh Peck said:

[QUOTE]Richard Wright said:

I'd rather not get to the point where I wash out and re-use ziploc baggies like the folks I knew growing up who did the first great depression.QUOTE]

WOW! Time-travel, too! Ziploc baggies weren't even test marketed until 1968.

Heh- no. I was referring to Great Depression survivors, who, 50 years later, were so marked by the experience they were reusing anything they could. Including items most of us think of as single use.

September 24, 2008 05:13 AM Forum: Polls

We (the TAX payers) should......

Posted By Richard Wright
What common good? That sum is so large, it makes this election irrelevant if we do it. The new president gets to watch over a massive infusion of new debt in exchange for nothing. No campaign promises happen. We might as well flip a coin over who'll be failing to live up to their promises while slavishly paying on massive debt as we cut our military back to nothing, end upkeep on all infrastructure, give up on education, and pay whatever anyone names for oil because we'll have no initiatives of our own. Who will care if the banking problem was serious? Choosing to drink strychnine instead of arsenic is hardly a cure.

Paul Kammueller said:

Complete a bailout for the common good, but

golden parachutes for none,

iron handcuffs for some.

September 25, 2008 04:54 AM Forum: Polls

We (the TAX payers) should......

Posted By Richard Wright
What is interesting is I haven't found a person of any political persuasion who is behind this bailout. See, Americans really do agree on things. Here, if folks want to let market forces govern when times are good, well then they should get to enjoy that same freedom when things go down.

September 26, 2008 04:40 AM Forum: Polls

My current US Senator and Representative will ...

Posted By Richard Wright
Man, what an election to vote on.

If I decide to try to fire McCain, so what? He's got other plans.

But I must say, my curiosity is killing me about whether tomorrow will be Black Friday on the stock market due to the continuing bizarre economic problem. I mean, it has people in a panic who only seemed to only take a passing interest in two wars the country is trying to fight. Instead of fearing this like the Earth falling into the Sun, I just feel, well, curious. The last time stuff like this happened, it was before WWII. And I've heard my whole life about how that sort of thing wasn't possible anymore.

So here we are, after a string of bank failures, Washington Mutual has gone down. And on the same day, the conference for showing iron resolve in the face of an unpopular bailout broke down in an apparent three-way mutiny. We should keep notes about our thoughts and perceptions. People will want to know, someday.

Mike Clemens said:

LOL... TED STEVENS AND DON YOUNG... Governor Palin sure wont get my vote next time either.


September 30, 2008 04:16 AM Forum: Polls

Bail out fails

Posted By Richard Wright
Well, there's the stick it to 'em, but I think most people were really reacting more with, "They need WHAT to save them?" And then when you look at what was proposed, it doesn't sound like anything so much as a bizarre money grab. So, though the Republicans asked for it, there is also enough of the party of Reagan left in them to shoot it down.

I tend to suspect if it passed, this bill would have had the exact same effect as the economic stimulus payments did earlier this year. That is, the underlying problem with the dying mortgages means they'd be back with their hands out for another $700 billion 6 months later.

Mike Hosea said:

Yeah, I think this "stick it to 'em" sentiment will dissipate right along with economic growth, jobs, and savings. Life's not fair. Checked your retirement accounts lately?

October 1, 2008 02:58 AM Forum: Polls

Bail out fails

Posted By Richard Wright
Hey Leonard,

Lighten up. The redistribution of wealth is happening right now. So don't be afraid of the person who states what is clearly true. Fear the one who claims a lie is real, and he will do what he clearly cannot.

-Rich

Leonard Marek said:

Quote:"We are being scared into socialism and we don't even see it!!! Wake up!"

Democratic Party = Social Programs

Social Programs = Democratic Socialism

Let's face it, anytime you have social programs where we continually give handouts to any groups, they have this mindset of entitlements.

Don't get me wrong, I don't see anything wrong with some social programs such as social security, etc. The problem I have with any of these programs is that they go too far in granting too many people or the wrong people with what the program was originally intended for.

Well, sometimes I wish people would wake up. But what all of us Americans need is a good douse of loss such as this to realize that you can't go on forever buying things on credit all the time. Sooner or later this was going to catch up to us. Greed makes one blind. How many times have we been told by our parents or grandparents who have lived through the Great Depression that you need to save. So many of us said they didn't know what the heck they were talking about or that oh it'll never happen again.

I have been preaching to my friends at work at the steel company I used to work for that the whole IRA or 401K concept is going to fall flat on its face someday. My notion of this was based on the increasing numbers of "baby boomers" retiring rising rapidly in the early 2000's as they become of age and the flow of outgoing cash would be faster than it going in. And coupled with say a bear market, will drive us into another depression.

What really frightens me is how one candidate claims he is going to "redistribute wealth" in this nation. I would be VERY leary on anyone who says this. 8O This sounds like some kind of socialist concept. This same candidate cannot even begin describing his plan. People just keep cheering him on though.... Sounds like something out of the history books during the mid 1930's Germany when one certain individual started preaching for political power.

Len

October 3, 2008 04:37 PM Forum: Polls

Bail out fails

Posted By Richard Wright
The Fannie and Fredfoe story is a minor sideline in all of this. The bigger issue is Credit Default Swaps, which were used to insure these mortgages and the securities they spawned. The Republican congress specifically prohibited regulation of these in a middle of the night passage at the end of 2000. The reason all of these insane levels of buy outs are being orchestrated is the government can't allow a bankruptcy hearing where the value of credit default swaps would have to be publically determined. So, for example, AIG had heavily gone into the credit default swap business, and when securities became worthless because the mortgages they were underwriting were in default, AIG was suddenly on tap to pay back everything these investors were losing. But there was no way they could cover that, so the swaps really weren't worth that much. That's because there are some $70 trillion (not a typo) worth of these in existence, more than the value of every asset in the US combined. If someone goes into bankruptcy court hearings and says swaps previously evaluated at $0.85 on the dollar are worth $0.07 on the dollar, the US economy effectively ceased to exist. Unfortunately, more foreclosures mean more of these get called in...

So, this is why Washington is suddenly panicked.

Herb York said:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QBRIsCkGQ0

October 2, 2008 05:04 PM Forum: Polls

Bail out fails

Posted By Richard Wright
But wait a minute, this $830 billion dollar bailout is all borrowed, too. How can you go to wall street with a request to borrow $830 billion to buy bad debts from wall street, when the problem is they don't have any money to lend to anyone? Am I the only person in America who sees what's wrong with that? It can't possibly work any more than going to someone who is being foreclosed on because they can't make payments and asking them to lend you 5 months worth of payments so you can subsidize their house payment. Of course that won't work. If the world finance system has the cash for us to borrow $830 billion, then they don't need a bailout. If they don't, our taxes skyrocket next year or the government just prints do many dollars they become worthless. Which is it? This bailout is bad, bad, bad.

Morgan Spangle said:

No I mean really good.

Stick it to em??? Its us that'll get it stuck to if this doesn't work...when you can't get a car loan, or a mortgage, or a line of credit for your business cause your local bank can't lend cause its assets have been marked to market, i.e., zero, you think that's going to affect rich people? Its going to affect us, man..

Yesterday, I had a very interesting discussion with a person who was one of the top bond traders for Bear Stearns in the 1970s-90s - he ran their NYC bond trading operation (retired, his foundation lost millions when the stock collapsed this year). He knows the credit markets. He believes that the government can make money buying these "toxic" assets, holding the underlying houses until the market heals somewhat, and selling them prudently over time - perhaps 5 years. He also believes that without intervention, 300-400 local banks will fail this year, resulting in untold job loss and greater expense for the government by far than any losses possible from the rescue plan. He had many things to say about the people and the firms that got us into this mess (Alan Greenspan seemed to top his chart of all-time bad guys), but mostly what stuck with me was that he thinks that without intervention, our economy will be affected negatively for at least a decade.

And yes, this guy is very rich indeed. But he deplores what happened to his market even more, if possible, than you or I do; he believes that many of the players should go to jail, and that eventually they will....

Funding Member

Sponsors


View all sponsors

Search