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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: combjelly who wrote (536029)	12/12/2009 12:46:56 PM
From: i-node	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1577825

it still doesn't change the fact that the system was set up for a major collapse even if small things go wrong. It is very amusing how you frantically do your best to ignore this point. I don't ignore this point. But I also don't arbitrarily place blame on people whose actions had nothing to do with it. Bush pushed hard for controls on FNMA and FMAC -- but was unable to get Congress to act on it. Now, I guess you can blame Bush for that, but it seems to me Congress is more at fault than GWB is. Even extremist liberal Time Magazine, in its coverage, has admitted that most of the real problems were in place long before Bush was elected. GWB didn't "set the system up" for a major collapse. But he also didn't whine about it when the music stopped on his watch. What GWB did wrong was to not recognize the disastrous policy of the Clinton administration of requiring lenders to provide funds to persons who could not afford the loans. This is a policy that should have been stopped. But like 9/11, it is really hard to place blame. Bush could have stopped both, but who is REALLY to blame for the core of the problem? Even liberal BBC understands this issue fairly well -- "They failed to police the market in mortgage-backed securities which has now collapsed with such devastating consequences." [referring to GWB] ... "Many see the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act as a major, direct cause of the current financial crisis. But it was signed by a Democratic President, Bill Clinton, and supported by many other Democratic politicians, among them the scourge of Bush deregulation Nancy Pelosi. What is more, President Bush actually increased the burden of regulation on US companies, enacting in 2002 what he called "the most far-reaching reform of American business practices since the time of Franklin D Roosevelt", the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. " ... "So the image of Mr Bush as the arch deregulator and the Democratic Party as the champion of stricter rules for business does not quite tally with the evidence. " "Affordable home ownership, especially for African-American and Hispanic borrowers, who had traditionally found it difficult and expensive to get a mortgage, was a key policy goal of the Clinton administration and one enthusiastically carried forward by President Bush. " A lot of rational people understand that this problem was created by the laudable objective of trying to provide home ownership to families who just weren't good credit risks. The fact that the collapse happened months before GWB left office versus months after he left is mere happenstance and had little to do with his policy. Republicans actually LEFT his administration in disapproval of his pursuit of more regulation in this area. One could argue, "GWB should have tried harder", but where does that leave Democrats who pushed hard the other direction? Your argument is specious and/or naive.