DebateGate
General Category => 3DHS => Topic started by: fatman on July 11, 2008, 01:36:02 PM
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"A nation of whiners"
Posted by: The Economist | WASHINGTON
IN case you haven't read, Phil Gramm, the former senator from Texas and one of the men who is supposedly tutoring John McCain on economics, said some controversial things about the economy this week. America, he said, is in a “mental recession” and that the country is “a nation of whiners”. Surely, insulting voters is a good way to help your candidate lose an election. And his implication that things aren’t so bad in America right now doesn’t jibe with what either candidate is saying or with what Americans are feeling.
Barack Obama pounced this afternoon:
"Today one of (McCain's) top economic advisors, former Sen. Phil Gramm said that we're merely in a 'mental recession,'" Obama told a crowd of 2,800 at a town hall meeting in Fairfax, Virginia Thursday.
"He didn't say this, but I guess what he meant was that it's a figment of your imagination, these high gas prices. Senator Gramm then deemed the United States – and I quote, 'a nation of whiners.' Ho! A nation of whiners. This comes after Sen. McCain recently admitted that his energy proposals for the gas tax holiday and the drilling will have mainly quote 'psychological benefits.' I want all of you to know that America already has one Dr. Phil. We don't need another one when it comes to the economy. We need somebody to actually solve the economy. It's not just a figment of your imagination, it's not all in your head," Obama told the crowd.
Mr McCain piled on:
"I don't agree with Sen. Gramm," McCain said, "I believe that the person here in Michigan that just lost his job isn't suffering from a 'mental recession.' I believe that the mother here in Michigan or around America who is trying to get enough money here to educate her children isn't whining. America is in great difficulty and we are experiencing enormous economic challenges as well as others," adding, "Phil Gramm does not speak for me, I speak for me. So I strongly disagree."
To his credit, Mr Gramm stood firm:
"I'm not going to retract any of it. Every word I said was true," said Gramm.
"Look, the economy is bad. It is far below what we Americans have a right to expect, but we are not in a recession," he said. "We may or may not have one in the future, but based on the data we are not in a recession. But that does not mean all this talk does not have a psychological impact."
Indeed, Mr Gramm has the luxury of being right about a lot here. The candidates are selling an overblown narrative of Americans’ current suffering. Certainly, those who have lost jobs or homes this year have reason to be upset, and commodities prices are rising, forcing families to rethink their budgets. But even as the country teeters on the brink of recession, Americans enjoy a standard of living their parents could only dream of. Far from getting worse, life in America has gotten substantially better in the last decade by any number of indicators, and the economy is hardly a shambles. And yet, consumer confidence is plumbing surprisingly low depths.
So what can Mr Gramm expect to get for his honesty?
Asked whether Gramm could secure a cabinet position in a McCain administration, McCain said sarcastically, "I think Sen. Gramm would be in serious consideration for ambassador of Belarus, although I'm not sure the citizens of Minsk would welcome that."
Phil Gramm Comment (http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2008/07/a_nation_of_whiners.cfm)
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Don't call me a whiner!
One should say this in the timbre and lilt of an ambulance siren for best effect.
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No one who has lost his job due to an economic downturn is a whiner. For him the recession could not be more real.
Phil Gramm is a fool. He is also a bloodsucking lobbyist, and should be ignored by everyone from today and ever after.
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No one who has lost his job due to an economic downturn is a whiner. For him the recession could not be more real.
Phil Gramm is a fool. He is also a bloodsucking lobbyist, and should be ignored by everyone from today and ever after.
Lets make a deal.
Everyone that has a good job should vote straight Republican .
Everyone that is out of work or feels that they are underemployed should vote Democrat.
There might still be three or four Blue states.
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There is no reason for anyone with a functioning cerebellum to elect a goddamn Republican. They have been incompetent stubborn liars of stupendous proportions.
Republicans and Democrats do not hire or fire anyone officially, but gasoline is $420 a gallon because Juniorbush mongered a war on credit and buggered the money. Dolts like Phil Gramm are directly responsible for making it possible for the home loan crisis to occur.
When a Republican can't be reelected in Texas, and then becomes a stinking lobbyist, that is a pretty good indicator of his character.
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When a Republican can't be reelected in Texas, and then becomes a stinking lobbyist, that is a pretty good indicator of his character.
Phil Gramm didn't run for re-election. Matter of fact, his successor was a fellow Republican. Gramm even vacated his seat early so his successor would have a term advantage over other incoming Senators.
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When a Republican can't be reelected in Texas, and then becomes a stinking lobbyist, that is a pretty good indicator of his character.
Phil Gramm didn't run for re-election. Matter of fact, his successor was a fellow Republican. Gramm even vacated his seat early so his successor would have a term advantage over other incoming Senators.
As a side note (just to tie this thread back around), his successor Senator Cornyn once got into a shouting match with GOP presidential candidate John McCain in the Senate over some illegal immigration item.
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Phil Gramm didn't run for re-election. Matter of fact, his successor was a fellow Republican.
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Was this because he realized he could not win, or was the strong scent of lobbyist money to great to resist?
Gramm is a fool, as evidenced by his idiotic statement about "whiners".
This is as stupid a move as idiot drivers in Miami punishing people in traffic by honking their horn at them.
What did he expect? Whiners to immediately see the errancy of their ways and apologize for whining?
Ever true whiners will never admit to whining.
Saying he stood by his statement is like continuing to honk after the car ahead of you has already driven away. He is a fool.
An ugly fool, as well.
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As a side note (just to tie this thread back around), his successor Senator Cornyn once got into a shouting match with GOP presidential candidate John McCain in the Senate over some illegal immigration item.
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There are many Republicans dumber than McCain.
Gramm is one, Cornyn is clearly another.
I favor Kikey Freedman, myself.
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"....but gasoline is $420 a gallon because Juniorbush mongered a war on credit and buggered the money..."
What is the connection?
Do you mean that if Saddam was still in his Palaces India and China would not be buying twice as much oil as they did ten years ago and there would be plenty of oil?
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Was this because he realized he could not win, or was the strong scent of lobbyist money to great to resist?
You go "to" the country for vacation, lobbyist money would presumably be "too" great to resist.
I guess he figured 18 years in the Senate was enough. His district was obviously not ready to vote non-GOP.
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I guess he figured 18 years in the Senate was enough. His district was obviously not ready to vote non-GOP.
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Phil Gramm was a Senator from Texas. Senators do not have districts, they have entire states.
He was the guy who was instrumental in changing the rules so Enron could pillage and loot without supervision.
His wife Wendy was in the government, and helped remove regulations as well, and then, in a completely unrelated manner, she was appointed to the Board of Enron.
Then the sh*t hit the fan in 2002, and Phil decided to resign.
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=983 (http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=983)
Gramm's picture should be in the dictionary under "corporate corruption"
But lovers of corruption need take heart, as he seems to still be a good pal of McCain.
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XP: "....but gasoline is $420 a gallon because Juniorbush mongered a war on credit and buggered the money..."
plane: <<What is the connection?
<<Do you mean that if Saddam was still in his Palaces India and China would not be buying twice as much oil as they did ten years ago and there would be plenty of oil?>>
I think he means that by running up a $3 trill tab without raising taxes or revenues to cover it, Bush irrevocably damaged confidence in the U.S. dollar, effectively raising the cost of all imports, most notably oil, as the oil producers rush to turn their dollars into euros and yen and the currency speculators figure they've got better things to bet on from now on than the U.S. dollar.
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I think he means that by running up a $3 trill tab without raising taxes or revenues to cover it, Bush irrevocably damaged confidence in the U.S. dollar,
If we can borrow 3 trillion (a Lancet figure if i have ever seen one) we are worth 3 trillion dollars.
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I think he means that by running up a $3 trill tab without raising taxes or revenues to cover it, Bush irrevocably damaged confidence in the U.S. dollar,
If we can borrow 3 trillion (a Lancet figure if i have ever seen one) we are worth 3 trillion dollars.
Is a Lancet figure likely to enter our language like Bork and Swiftboat?
I think it should mean a clearly large exaggeration , especially one delivered by someone wearing a labcoat.
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Phil Gramm Is Right
By Amity Shlaes
Saturday, July 12, 2008; A13
"In serious consideration for ambassador to Belarus." That's the role John McCain joked that former senator Phil Gramm might have in a McCain administration. Gramm is McCain's most senior economic adviser, the one best qualified to lead the finance team of a McCain presidency. Now, however, Gramm faces political exile because he made the mistake of telling the truth.
What prompted the abrupt demotion? The short answer is what might be called Campaign Econ. Campaign Econ says the American economy is a certain way because Americans think it is. Campaign Econ competes with real economics and often wins -- with damage that extends way beyond, say, the political career of either Phil Gramm or John McCain.
Consider what happened this week. While speaking with the Washington Times, Gramm said that the country was not in a true recession but a "mental recession." He also said, "We have sort of become a nation of whiners" and "You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline."
Gramm was right about the recession and stood by his recession comments on Thursday. A recession is two consecutive quarters in which the economy shrinks, and last quarter it grew. But no matter. Voters feel they are in a recession, and so they are, at least according to Campaign Econ.
Gramm's second sin was political. Calling voters whiners is to shame them. He later rephrased this comment, saying it was not voters he meant but politicians. That's because shaming voters is something American politicians simply don't do. Campaign Econ is unabashedly populist, and to seek to elicit shame is regarded as unpardonably elitist. Earlier this year, the McCain team was already terrified of seeming elitist. His advisers convinced themselves that the closeness of the primary contest was due to a lack of generosity. In January, when the McCain folks were desperate to win the Michigan primary, they ground their teeth down as Mitt Romney pandered to the auto industry. Romney's promise of unlimited support for carmakers won him that primary -- but not the nomination. Still, since then, McCain's advisers have sought to prove that he understands Campaign Econ; consider their proposal of a summer gas tax holiday.
That Campaign Econ is also calibrating Barack Obama's economic team goes without saying. The view among the nation's political advisers, from far left to far right, is that the economy is in a Katrina. Anyone who disagrees has no role in the 2008 presidential contest.
Campaign Econ is certainly understandable. Gas prices are ruining vacation plans and killing businesses. Many Americans have lost or are about to lose their homes to foreclosure or in distress sales. The federal government may not be talking about it much yet, but inflation plagues the country. The weak dollar is altering our everyday calculations. For many, this is not a happy summer.
Still, to liken the current moment to the Great Depression, or even the early 1980s, as Campaign Economists have, is to whine, just as Gramm said. During the Depression, people lost their homes even though they had borrowed only 10 percent of the purchase price. People losing their homes today frequently have borrowed 90 percent or more. The country approached double-digit unemployment in the early 1980s. This week, even as McCain was trying to talk his campaign past Gramm's comments, joblessness stood at a historically modest 5.5 percent.
And Campaign Econ has costs. The first is that talk of a downturn -- or "mental recession," as Gramm put -- can itself generate a downturn. Keynesian economists say this is so because consumer spending slows when people are afraid. But there's also a non-Keynesian dynamic. Grumbling leads to costly government rescues that scare markets and slow growth.
Second, as evidenced by the plummeting prices of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shares, serious trouble may be closer than we think. The plunging stock of the government-sponsored mortgage companies reminds us that those entities urgently require restructuring. Wall Street figures and the Senate Finance Committee that Gramm used to chair are already talking about how to structure a bailout. But this task is about stopping recession, not luxuriating in it.
Social Security and Medicare also need rewriting -- and Gramm put forth one of the better proposals on Social Security in the 1990s.
In short, to fix it all, we need a frank conversation about the economy. McCain, in fact, inaugurated one back in 2006 when he gave a speech that was downright Gramm-like at the Economic Club of New York.
In that speech, McCain said that on entitlements, hard choices were necessary. He concluded: "Any politician who tells you otherwise, Democrat or Republican, is lying."
This was McCain at his best. Many voters knew it, too.
The way to strengthen the economy right now is to elect leaders who dare to talk about problems in precise and even technical terms -- and then act on them. McCain has that capacity, but only if he can transcend Campaign Econ.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102543_pf.html (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102543_pf.html)
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There is no logical reason for anyone to complain about the public "whining" about a recession. A person who has just lost his source of income and is faced with foreclosure is in his own personal recession, and all his complaints are legitimate, and not whining, and the last thing he needs is a filthy rich fatcat lobbyist like Gramm, who has millions of dollars and gained most of them by peddling influence and generally being a corrupt piece of sh*t telling him that he is whining.
The Republicans have been trying to destroy Social Security since 1932. They are far more ikely to get away with this if McCain is elected.
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Does Grahm actually say that the public is whining?
The whine is from the people who are trying to divide the public, with a false assessment of the state of the economy.
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According to the definition of recession, two or more quarters of negative growth, we are not in a recession.
So if we aren't, why are the pols and the press saying we are.
Even when times are good people face adversity.
And it doesn't matter how much money Gramm has in his wallet. What matters is if he spoke the truth.
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<<And it doesn't matter how much money Gramm has in his wallet. What matters is if he spoke the truth.>>
Yeah, well DID he speak the truth? Did he say that a millions of Americans are really pissed off that gas is at $4 a gallon, that they can see the price of food rising as gas costs rise, that they are losing their jobs and their homes? Did he mention that the trends in gas prices, in home foreclosures, in job losses, are NOT the direction most Americans want to see their country going?
I mean, "whining" after all is a pretty subjective assessment. What might seem like whining to a filthy-rich influence peddler who moves in some pretty wealthy and powerful circles might seem like well-justified, vocal resentment to a lot of honest, hard-working guys not so fortunately placed as Gramm. What real home "truths" did Gramm actually proclaim to America anyway?
I don't really think the point is whether or not America technically qualifies for use of the term "recession," which is a technical issue of interest only to economists and nit-pickers. What matters is whether a whole bunch of people are feeling economic pain that they wouldn't be feeling today if gas hadn't shot up to four bucks a gallon and if tighter industry regulation had prevented unscrupulous lenders from making home-purchase loans to people who hadn't a hope in hell of paying them back.
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Yeah, well DID he speak the truth?
Yes he did. We are not in an economic recession.
What matters is whether a whole bunch of people are feeling economic pain that they wouldn't be feeling today if gas hadn't shot up to four bucks a gallon and if tighter industry regulation had prevented unscrupulous lenders from making home-purchase loans to people who hadn't a hope in hell of paying them back.
No one forced anyone to buy a gas guzzler and no one forced anyone to take out a mortgage they couldn't afford. and those who made bad decisions and seek to blame others for those decisions certainly could be called whiners.
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<<Yes he did [speak the truth]. We are not in an economic recession.>>
Do you really think that all this public concern we see every day is focused on the issue of whether the U.S. meets the technical requirements for a recession? Or do you think that people are much more concerned about issues like "Gas is $4 a gallon" and "4 homes on this block are under power of sale?"
People are voicing a lot of pain over unwelcome economic developments. Gramm and his defenders are dishonest in portraying all of this pain being voiced as complaints that the U.S. is in a "recession" and then destroys the strawman he just created (complaints of "recession") by proving on purely technical grounds that there is no recession.
I consider that to be extremely dishonest. The essence of the complaints is specific increases in the price of gas at the pump, loss of jobs and now loss of homes to foreclosure or power of sale. To characterize the complaints as complaints of "recession" and then to prove (on the narrowest and most technical of grounds) that there is no recession is just pulling a typically Republican snow job, using smoke and mirrors to convince people who are really upset about real misfortunes that all's well. He's a bullshitter and people (most people) see right through him. THAT'S why even John Insane disowned his remarks.
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How many people do you know who lost their jobs this year?
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<<How many people do you know who lost their jobs this year?>>
Personally, none. So what? It's not as if I'm personally acquainted with even one-tenth of one percent of the population. I believe the hard-luck cases being interviewed or written up by the MSM are real people telling real stories. They can't all be fakes.
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Personally, none. So what? It's not as if I'm personally acquainted with even one-tenth of one percent of the population. I believe the hard-luck cases being interviewed or written up by the MSM are real people telling real stories. They can't all be fakes.
Never claimed they were fakes. Perhaps the media looks for hard luck stories, because it sells better than life is normal stories.
I know of one guy in town who was laid off, he does metal work but he found work within a week.
The only other people i know with job troubles always have job troubles. So the portrait we see on tv doesn't match the view from my window, nor does it match your view.
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During the best times the USA has ever had there were some unemployed , some bad luck and some bad decisions.
That there is low unemployment is a fact .
There is the beginning of a difference in the Immigration picture as we are supporting fewer illegal Alians by a small amount.
If the dollar continues to fall and Mexico stats making better money on its oil sales our illegal immigration problem might get solved , but we are still attracting a good number of these guys .
I would like to ask about Canadian economic conditions , our economy's are related , so is Canada feeling much difference yet?
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<<The only other people i know with job troubles always have job troubles. So the portrait we see on tv doesn't match the view from my window, nor does it match your view.>>
Yes but in addition to interviews there are also statistics. Gas really IS $4 at the pump and I don't think too many workers got pay raises to compensate for that either. You're trying to make out a "business as usual" case but I think a lot of people (in addition to the usual Sad Sacks) have genuine complaints about the situation.
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$4.00 a gallon gasoline is not any sort of a problem for a fatcat ratbastard like Phil Gramm. Phil Gramm calling poorer Americans "whiners" is like Dustin Hoffman or Charleze Theron making fun of junior high school kids in a school play for their poor acting and makeup skills techniques.
Hoffman and Theron would never do this, of course, because they are not fatcat ratbastards.
Gramm should go back to his Scrooge MacDuck money pool and enjoy swimming around in his ill-gotten gains. No one needs his stupid nonconstructive criticism.
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Gas really IS $4 at the pump and I don't think too many workers got pay raises to compensate for that either. You're trying to make out a "business as usual" case but I think a lot of people (in addition to the usual Sad Sacks) have genuine complaints about the situation.
And perhaps you can show me where Gramm said $4 a galllon is not something worth whining about. He was talking about recession. Gas price increases could be categorized as inflationary which would go along with your theory of the declining dollar.
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$4.00 a gallon gasoline is not any sort of a problem for a fatcat ratbastard like Phil Gramm. Phil Gramm calling poorer Americans "whiners" is like Dustin Hoffman or Charleze Theron making fun of junior high school kids in a school play for their poor acting and makeup skills techniques.
One i don't think he said anything about gas prices.
Two, how do you know Gramm doesn't make most of his purchases at flea markets, garage sales and off of Yugster like certain fat cat professors in South Florida with well performing fund portfolios?
Being thrifty and frugal is not always synonymous with need.
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Two, how do you know Gramm doesn't make most of his purchases at flea markets, garage sales and off of Yugster like certain fat cat professors in South Florida with well performing fund portfolios?
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I don't really think this is relevant.
I am not proclaiming that my financially strapped fellow Americans are "whiners".
It was not the baker's daughter, but the Queen that annoyed people by allegedly saying, "let them eat cake".
It will no doubt cheer you up to learn that there are very, very few well performing mutual funds at present.
Compared to Gramm, I am a pauper.
My sweet little Sylvester cat was bit on the cheek by a ruffian feline several weeks ago, and then went into hiding. When she finally appeared, her cheek was infected and swollen to the size of a golf ball and she was down to six and a half pounds. The vet gave her a shot and some antibiotics and drained her cheek, and I fed her massive amounts of canned catfood, so she is up to eight pounds. But she is not yet as fat as Phil Gramm.
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I don't think his net worth is relevant either.
but back to the issue:
Indeed, Mr Gramm has the luxury of being right about a lot here. The candidates are selling an overblown narrative of Americans’ current suffering. Certainly, those who have lost jobs or homes this year have reason to be upset, and commodities prices are rising, forcing families to rethink their budgets. But even as the country teeters on the brink of recession, Americans enjoy a standard of living their parents could only dream of. Far from getting worse, life in America has gotten substantially better in the last decade by any number of indicators, and the economy is hardly a shambles. And yet, consumer confidence is plumbing surprisingly low depths.
From the article.
We are not in a recession. Americans are better off than they were a decade ago. And the problem with the economy is psychologically driven and self fulfilling.
And again, where did Gramm say inflatinary gas prices was not real?
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<<And again, where did Gramm say inflatinary gas prices was not real?>>
That's the whole point - - he DOESN'T address the major areas of discontent. He sets up strawmen and knocks them down. Whether America is in a repression or not. Whether Americans' parents (of some indeterminate generation, depending on which generation of "Americans" he has in mind, some Americans' parents, for example, retaining vivid memories of the Great Depression) ever dreamed of the present generation's standard of living or not. Whether "life" has gotten better or not.
Thus by purporting to address the current barrage of complaints over the economy but in fact NOT addressing any of the leading specific complaints, Gramm knocks the "complainers" by demolishing strawmen that they are not complaining about. And fails to address any of the leading causes of complaint, such as $4 gas, foreclosures, unregulated loan sharks, etc.
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Once more, Gramm is the clown who made it possible for Enron to rip off its shareholders and employees and customers for bazillions. It is not just that Gramm profited from this, but that he used his government position to do it and later joined the enemy as a lobbyist. He is a thieving ratbastard, which makes it particularly annoying for him to accuse his fellow more honest citizens of complaining.
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And yet they are complaining. So how is his accusation false?
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Wall Street's Great Deflation The Nation
Mon Jul 14, 12:38 PM ET
The Nation -- Phil Gramm, the senator-banker who until recently advised John McCain's campaign, did get it right about a "nation of whiners," but he misidentified the faint-hearted. It's not the people or even the politicians. It is Wall Street--the financial titans and big-money bankers, the most important investors and worldwide creditors who are scared witless by events. These folks are in full-flight panic and screaming for mercy from Washington, Their cries were answered by the massive federal bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, the endangered mortgage companies.
When the monied interests whined, they made themselves heard by dumping the stocks of these two quasi-public private corporations, threatening to collapse the two financial firms like the investor "run" that wiped out Bear Stearns in March. The real distress of the banks and brokerages and major investors is that they cannot unload the rotten mortgage securities packaged by Fannie Mae and banks sold worldwide. Wall Street's preferred solution: dump the bad paper on the rest of us, the unwitting American taxpayers.
The Bush crowd, always so reluctant to support federal aid for mere people, stepped up to the challenge and did as it was told. Treasury Secretary Paulson (ex-Goldman Sachs) and his sidekick, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, announced their bailout plan on Sunday to prevent another disastrous sell-off on Monday when markets opened. Like the first-stage rescue of Wall Street's largest investment firms in March, this bold stroke was said to benefit all of us. The whole kingdom of American high finance would tumble down if government failed to act or made the financial guys pay for their own reckless delusions. Instead, dump the losses on the people.
Democrats who imagine they may find some partisan advantage in these events are deeply mistaken. The Democratic party was co-author of the disaster we are experiencing and its leaders fell in line swiftly. House banking chair, Rep. Barney Frank, announced he could have the bailout bill on President Bush's desk next week. No need to confuse citizens by dwelling on the details. Save Wall Street first. Maybe lowbrow citizens won't notice it's their money.
We are witnessing a momentous event--the great deflation of Wall Street--and it is far from over. The crash of IndyMac is just the beginning. More banks will fail, so will many more debtors. The crisis has the potential to transform American politics because, first it destroys a generation of ideological bromides about free markets, and, second, because it makes visible the ugly power realities of our deformed democracy. Democrats and Republicans are bipartisan in this crisis because they have colluded all along over thirty years in creating the unregulated financial system and mammoth mega-banks that produced the phony valuations and deceitful assurances. The federal government protects the most powerful interests from the consequences of their plundering. It prescribes "market justice" for everyone else.
Of course, the federal government has to step up to the crisis, but the crucial question is how government can respond in the broad public interest. Bernanke knows the history of the last great deflation in the 1930s--better known as the Great Depression--and so he is determined to intervene swiftly, as the Federal Reserve failed to do in that earlier crisis. By pumping generous loans and liquidity into the system, the Fed chairman hopes to calm the market fears and reverse the panic. So far, he has failed. I think he will continue to fail because he has not gone far enough.
If Washington wants real results, it has to abandon the wishful posture that is simply helping the private firms get over their fright. The government must instead act decisively to take charge in more convincing ways. That means acknowledging to the general public the depth of the national crisis and the need for more dramatic interventions.
Instead of propping up Fannie Mae or others, the threatened firm should be formally nationalized as a nonprofit federal agency performing valuable services for the housing market. That is the real consequence anyway if the taxpayers have to buy up $300 billion in stock.
The private shareholders "are walking dead men, muerto," Institutional Risk Analytics, a private banking monitor, observed. Make them eat their losses, the sooner the better. The real national concern should be focused on the major creditors who lend to Fannie Mae and other US agencies as well as private financial firms. They include China, Japan and other foreign central banks. Foreign investors hold about 21 percent of the long-term debt paper issued by US government agencies--$376 billion in China, $229 billion in Japan.
It is not in our national interest to burn these nations with heavy losses. On the contrary, we need to sustain their good regard because they can help us recover by bailing out the US economy with more lending. If these foreign creditors turn away and stop their lending now, the US economy is toast and won't soon recover.
Americans should forget about whining; it's too late for that. People need to get angry--really, really angry--and take it out on both parties. What the country needs right now is a few more politicians in Washington with the guts to stand up and tell us the hard truth about out situation. It will be painful to hear. They will be denounced as "whiners." But truth might be our only way out.
The Great Deflation (http://news.yahoo.com/s/thenation/20080714/cm_thenation/15336722;_ylt=AsQXD4uSq4Zdq5CE5e3F.7L9wxIF)
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Democrats and Republicans are bipartisan in this crisis because they have colluded all along over thirty years in creating the unregulated financial system and mammoth mega-banks that produced the phony valuations and deceitful assurances.
Sheesh. what fun is shared guilt?
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And yet they are complaining. So how is his accusation false?
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His accusation was that they were "whining". As a rule, whining means "unwarranted complaining".
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As a rule, whining means "unwarranted complaining".
Whining is "loud complaining" not "unwarranted complaining".
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Sheesh. what fun is shared guilt?
I think the point is that it's not supposed to be fun, and that all parties are at fault. I posted the article because I liked and in general agree with it, though I'm not wild about the idea of nationalizing Freddie and Fannie. But then again, perhaps if it had been nationalized, we wouldn't be in the mess that we're in now. I see no reason why my tax money should go to prop up investors, lenders, and borrowers who made extremely bad decisions. That some of the people are undoubtedly innocent doesn't negate the fact that when I bought my home, I researched the financing, saved the money (delayed gratification is a rather obsolete term these days), and didn't buy into the housing the bubble.
The plus side is that my mortage is less than most people's rent, even with the taxes added on it comes out to just under $600 a month.
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Whining is "loud complaining" not "unwarranted complaining".
No, it isn't.
Whining is not any louder than any other complaining.
Whining is like bitching or fussing: unwarranted, or unproductive complaining.
Gramm was not alluding to the volume of the whiners, but the lack of justification for whining.
He said nothing about decibels, did he?
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Whining is not any louder than any other complaining.
Whining is like bitching or fussing: unwarranted, or unproductive complaining.
From the dictionary:
whine
v., whined, whin?ing, whines.
v.intr.
1. To utter a plaintive, high-pitched, protracted sound, as in pain, fear, supplication, or complaint.
2. To complain or protest in a childish fashion.
3. To produce a sustained noise of relatively high pitch: jet engines whining.
v.tr.
To utter with a whine.
n.
1. The act of whining.
2. A whining sound.
3. A complaint uttered in a plaintive tone.
Nope, nothing in there about "unwarranted".
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2. To complain or protest in a childish fashion.
Is to complain in an unwarranted manner.
Do you seriously believe that Gramm was annoyed by the pitch or volume of the complaints?
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Do you seriously believe that Gramm was annoyed by the pitch or volume of the complaints?
No. He was annoyed by certain people talking down the economy for political advantage.
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2. To complain or protest in a childish fashion.
Is to complain in an unwarranted manner.
"Childish" is not "unwarranted" either.
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No. He was annoyed by certain people talking down the economy for political advantage.
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In that case, "whining" is not the proper word.
What the poo difference does it make to him, anyway?
In what country are people going to mend their wicked ways when accused of whining?
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In what country are people going to mend their wicked ways when accused of whining?
Not this country.
Observe the whining about being called whiners.
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Not this country.
Observe the whining about being called whiners.
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Precisely.
Now Gramm is allegedly an experienced politician, ostensibly well versed in the temperment of the American people, and yet he calls the voters "whiners". There are two reasons that this is a stupid move: (a) the people who have increased their productivity greatly in the past four years and yet have received no raises, and now are faced with paying $4.25 for a gallon of gas and 10% more for food are not whiners, but justifiably complaining, as is anyone who has lost his/her job and now has zero income because of the unwisdom of fighting a useless war on credit, and (b) even if the whining is unjustified and excessively shrill, loud or childish, the whiners will not mend their ways, nor will the justifiably complaining conplainers cease complaining just because this dorky ex-senator turned fatcat zilionaire lobbyist calls them whiners.
The conclusion? Gramm is incompetent as a politician, and has proven his wortthless self to be as useless as tits on a bull, balls on a priest and dentures on a hen, and had he been manufactured rather than born, a giant light on his forehead would flash, blinking "TILT" in neon letters, followed by him wilting into a pile of plastic, like some badguy robot henchman in a bad Sci-fi film.
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Gramm isn't a politician, he is an economic adviser to a candidate.
If his truthful remarks about the recession cause you to reconsider voting for that candidate, so be it.
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Gramm isn't a politician, he is an economic adviser to a candidate.
If his truthful remarks about the recession cause you to reconsider voting for that candidate, so be it.
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Gramm was in the government for over a decade. His lobbyist job is a direct result of his political experience. He is most certainly a politician, though he does not seem to be a very bright one. Calling people "whiners" is NOT a truthful remark, nor is it an untruthful one. It is an opinion. It is a value judgment, not a fact. It may be based on a fact.
If I say your nose resembles a hubbard squash and it does, that is a fact. If I say you are ugly beyond the call of duty, that is just an opinion.
A truthful remark would be: "we are technically not in a recession, and those that say we are seem to be mistaken, if we use the usual definition of a recession".
I think he could handle the job of chauffeur to the US Ambassador to Belarus would suit his level of expertise fine.