>> We are paying for the criminalization of the financial industry.
I'm pretty confident if crimes had been committed in the financial industry, Eric Holder would be very busy prosecuting them, no?
>> My point is that both parties are to blame.
Yes, but one party is more to blame than the other. If you look at our financial problems they stem from three things:
a) Social Security (Democrats)
b) Medicare (Democrats)
c) pseudo-Keynesianism (Democrats, for the most part)
d) General government bloat (like the Dept of Education, for example) (Democrats)
Now, one can argue that defense is a big part of it, and blame that on Republicans. But without the items enumerated above, the military cost wouldn't be a problem. You can't legitimately say that without military expenditures, any of the above wouldn't be a problem.
This is not to minimize the Republican's involvement, but the really big problems were created, not by Bush profligacy, but by Democrat's profligacy over a period of decades.
>> We need to increase taxes and cut spending, but not all at once, but slowly over the next 10 years.
We don't need to increase taxes. We need to restructure our spending so that it is sustainable with the lowest possible tax rates. Once Congress shows it can contain spending, fine, raise taxes.
>> Lastly, we need to prosecute the banksters relentlessly and reform the laws and regulations to break up the big banks and end TBTF.
What makes you think any laws were broken? You can't really prosecute people without evidence of wrongdoing. If you wanted to prosecute anyone it would have to be Clinton for ignoring the warning of Brooksley Born, or Dodd and Frank for blocking Bush's efforts to do something about FNMA & Freddie. |
