tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post1539082010474933939..comments2023-12-05T07:50:19.855-05:00Comments on No Oil for Pacifists: Leftist Media Bias of the Day@nooil4pacifistshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16688417615117569825noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-14071367360860802732009-06-02T17:49:06.067-04:002009-06-02T17:49:06.067-04:00bobn:
CDOs and fraud are birds of a different fea...bobn:<br /><br />CDOs and fraud are birds of a different feather. Except for you, there seems to be widespread agreement that--properly accounted for on bank balance sheets--CDOs are good for risk spreading and efficiency. Don't lump them together with illegal activities.@nooil4pacifistshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16688417615117569825noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-3789045892802028842009-05-30T17:03:51.926-04:002009-05-30T17:03:51.926-04:00Why are you so eager to curtail individual choices...<I>Why are you so eager to curtail individual choices and freely entered-into contracts?</I>Oh, maybe because the transaction was fraudulent (both sides knew or should have known there was no way this could work) and that millions of the many variations of these, put together, are destroying the world? That sounds like a good reason to me.<br /><br /><I>One word: "Liberal"</I>.<br /><br />Flattery will get you nowhere.<br /><br />Who was the last Liberal you know who was rabidly against gun-control, in favor of killing terrorists and pirates wherever it can be done, and against any PC accomodation of creeping Islamofascism?<br /><br />But hey, if all that, combined with the idea that reasonable regulation of corporations is needed to prevent excessive concentration and abuse of power by large corporation - if that makes me a Liberal, then so be it. <br /><br />But I think it's silly name calling - and I really couldn't care less. I've already spent too much time responding to it.bobnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07715238134585125684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-46309858797513051812009-05-30T16:51:57.537-04:002009-05-30T16:51:57.537-04:00We went from the end of the First Great Depression...<I>We went from the end of the First Great Depression until almost 2000 with no huge crackups</I>.<br /><br />I forgot the S&L crisis. But deregulation and nonregulation seem to have been involved there, too.<br /><br />It's scary - the S&L crisis looked so big then, and looks so tiny now.....bobnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07715238134585125684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-76174656985823473252009-05-30T16:47:30.229-04:002009-05-30T16:47:30.229-04:00OBH:
GSEs were under regulation of OFHEO, which w...OBH:<br /><br />GSEs were under regulation of OFHEO, which was part of HUD, which was part of the EXECUTIVE branch. The fact that stupid congress-critters (but I repeat myself) said stupid stuff to the head of OFHEO in no way removed his legal requirement to regulate the GSEs sensibly. (I'll admit the regulation of GSEs under Clinton was no better - but the explosion of garbage didn't happen under CLinton, it happened under Bush, who was every bit as far into the "ownership society" crap as the Dems, maybe even moreso.)<br /><br />And since GSEs were subject to regulation by the executive branch, I won't be discussing this again. <br /><br /><br />Carl:<br /><br />Systemically imporatant entities (TBTF) should not be allowed to participate in activities (YSP; CDOs; Securities fraud) that bypass all sensible restraints. I repeat: borrowers who were trying to get in over their heads used to be told "NO". And I still maintain that it's no coincidence that the end of NO followed the <A HREF="http://liberative.blogspot.com/2009/01/fallacy-of-fallacy-post-hoc-ergo.html" REL="nofollow">massive changes made to a previously working system</A>. We went from the end of the First Great Depression until almost 2000 with no huge crackups. (I'mm not sure how to classify the tech bubble.) That says something for the regulatory regime that was in place, but was dismantled (bi-partisan legislation at the end of the '90s) or ignored (BushCo "regulation").bobnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07715238134585125684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-46823195223292974742009-05-30T02:01:59.964-04:002009-05-30T02:01:59.964-04:00> Why are you so eager to curtail individual ch...> Why are you so eager to curtail individual choices and freely entered-into contracts?<br /><br />One word: "Liberal".OBloodyHellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09992539380115488567noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-50343508848046095042009-05-28T23:25:43.175-04:002009-05-28T23:25:43.175-04:00bobn:
I agree that some aspects of banking oversi...bobn:<br /><br />I agree that <A HREF="http://nooilforpacifists.blogspot.com/2009/04/banking-opacity-and-financial.html" REL="nofollow">some aspects of banking oversight need re-working</A>. But regulation is less appropriate where <A HREF="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/magazine/17foreclosure-t.html?ref=magazine" REL="nofollow">the incentives are appropriate</A>:<br /><br /><br />""Who am I to tell you that you shouldn’t do what you want to do? I am here to sell money and to help you do what you want to do. At the end of the day, it’s your signature on the mortgage -- not mine."<br /><br />You had to admire this muscular logic. My lenders weren’t assuming that I was an angel. They were betting that a default would be more painful to me than to them. If I wanted to take a risk, for whatever reason, they were not going to second-guess me. . ."<br /><br /><br /><br />Why are you so eager to curtail individual choices and freely entered-into contracts?@nooil4pacifistshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16688417615117569825noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-35555460003149226482009-05-28T13:01:26.458-04:002009-05-28T13:01:26.458-04:00> I was referring to the genralization that bor...> I was referring to the genralization that borrowers caused this. We've always had senseless borrowers - but until we had mortgage-brokers being fed YSP, and securitisers with 40:1 leverage and an SEC that didn't give a damn about anything - the senseless borrowers were told "no".<br /><br />Ah, so, then, bob, when Franklin Raines, of Fannie Mae fame, argued before the Democrats in the Senate Oversight Committee regarding OFHEO's allegations of chicanery and shifty accounting practices (<I>even for a defacto agency of the government!!</I>), and claimed that "2% reserve was too much", that was A-OK, right?<br /><br />And when same Dems on same committee excoriated not Raines but <B>the representative of OFHEO who brought this to the public's attention</B>, and made claims like "There's nothing wrong with Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac" and "I want to roll the dice a bit longer", that was all the Bush SEC's fault?<br /><br />This crap at least could have been headed off in 2004 and 2005 by prompt and intelligent attention from the Senate Oversight committee whose job it is to pay attention to such things.<br /><br />We might have had a downturn but I'd lay huge odds we'd have had a lot less of one than we got with two more years of defective business practices and "unregulated" government oversight that still manages to constitute millions of pages of paperwork each year. <br /><br />Even if we allow for volume, how many pages of government "oversight" occurred per transaction in the 1800s? <br /><br />Yet a modern industrial empire was created, literally from scratch, with such boundless opportunities for abuse intact... <br /><br /><B>So, what, exactly, are you claiming this government oversight is supposed to be providing?</B>?<br /><br />.OBloodyHellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09992539380115488567noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-15116345722790401572009-05-28T12:46:01.142-04:002009-05-28T12:46:01.142-04:00> If there was anybody who should have avoided ...> If there was anybody who should have avoided the mortgage catastrophe, it was I. As an economics reporter for The New York Times, I have been the paper’s chief eyes and ears on the Federal Reserve for the past six years.<br /><br />And yet this man has the BALLS to actually claim the right to speak on economic issues.<br /><br />Excuse me while I go write a piece for the NYT about how a woman <I>should</I> feel after she's been raped.... No facts or reasoning behind it... but it should succeed just on BALLS, right?OBloodyHellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09992539380115488567noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-62364842124085275972009-05-27T14:00:10.668-04:002009-05-27T14:00:10.668-04:00As I said: "Andrews was an idiot, and was probably...As I said: "Andrews was an idiot, and was probably doomed even if his wife had some sense."<br /><br />I was referring to the genralization that borrowers caused this. We've always had senseless borrowers - but until we had mortgage-brokers being fed YSP, and securitisers with 40:1 leverage and an SEC that didn't give a damn about anything - the senseless borrowers were told "no".bobnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07715238134585125684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-45721985674672844722009-05-27T13:40:31.887-04:002009-05-27T13:40:31.887-04:00Oh, please. This guy is a total doofus. He's the o...Oh, please. This guy is a total doofus. He's the one who bought the house. The original mortgage payment ate up all his take home, leaving him only a few hundred a month to live on. His "plan" was for his new wife (who hadn't worked in a very long time, and who was bringing in major debts of her own) to pay for everything else. It was never viable. His story is interesting only because it shows just how bad the lending was.<br /><br />Nothing about the system caused this guy's problems. A divorce, child support, alimony and stupidity are the causes.MaxedOutMamahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08011469804162511617noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6427940.post-32968109291067661982009-05-27T13:15:58.843-04:002009-05-27T13:15:58.843-04:00But mostly, the mistakes were made by millions of ...<I>But mostly, the mistakes were made by millions of individuals such as Andrews chasing a dream and--unfortunately--reaching a bit too far.</I>Andrews was an idiot, and was probably doomed even if his wife had some sense.<br /><br />But the tendency of humans to reach too far has always been with us - gee, I wonder <A HREF="http://liberative.blogspot.com/2009/01/fallacy-of-fallacy-post-hoc-ergo.html" REL="nofollow">what changed</A>?bobnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07715238134585125684noreply@blogger.com