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No wonder everyone is so upset at Wall Street

Started 7 months ago by JoB
Latest reply from kootchman

JoB
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“executives from Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, General Electric and other firms sat on the boards of regional Federal Reserve banks while their firms benefited from the central bank’s policies during the financial crisis.” In a particularly embarrassing example, the person who handled the bailout of Goldman Sachs had stock in none other than Goldman Sachs. No wonder everyone is so upset at Wall Street.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/bankers-decide-their-own-regulations.html#ixzz1bQwNdmxX

Posted 7 months ago #
DBP
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Seems like this would be a violation of some ethics rule. [Oh my! Did I really just use the word "ethics" in a discussion about Wall Street?]

Actually, this same kind of incest happens all over the corporate world, not just banking. Government officials make laws that benefit individual corporations, then they "retire" and go work for the same corporations they just helped out.

In some cases there's a mandatory "cooling off period" of six months or so before the ex-official can work for the company he just helped out.

Six months. Big deal.

Wall Street, you suck hard.

Posted 7 months ago #
Yardvark
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For a further peak into why our government is ineffective at regulating Wall Street and catching the crooks, it helps to look at which sectors are financing the Congressional campaigns of those on a few Congressional oversight committees.

Senate Finance Committee:
http://www.opensecrets.org/cmteprofiles/overview.php?cmteid=S12&cmte=SFIN&congno=112&chamber=S

House Financial Services Committee:
http://www.opensecrets.org/cmteprofiles/overview.php?cmteid=H05&cmte=HFIN&congno=112&chamber=H

Senate Banking, Housing, & Urban Affairs:
http://www.opensecrets.org/cmteprofiles/overview.php?cmteid=S06&cmte=SBAN&congno=112&chamber=S

Conflict of Interest is obviously rampant in Congress but members of Congress never admit this or recuse themselves from votes involving their owners. We need to bring it to an end in this election cycle.

Posted 7 months ago #
Jiggers
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Yep... The Market is almost at 12,000 pts. Looks to me like its doing real good.

Posted 7 months ago #
365Stairs
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The latest Wall Street movie "sequel" has those scenes with 10-15 old power cronies in their dimly lit richly decorated exclusive conference room - who apparently are the nations puppet masters for economic and political futures...

How far from the truth is that?

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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Vote for a flat tax. Nothing to lobby against or for... give up on "progressivity and contrived fairness" doctrines. When everything else fails... we could try transparency. Sober thought for you.. if you took all the "wealth" of the top 1%.... every sous, farthing, drachma, dollar, yen, yuan... all of it... you would have enough to run the federal government for 167 days.... want some more programs that the top 10% will foot the bill for? The government can't regulate itself... let alone Wall Street who has proven over and over again they are smarter, more resourceful and quicker to act....

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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Now who did Geitner work for before become the Sec of Treas.?

Posted 7 months ago #
JoB
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kootch...

and how exactly would a flat tax affect bankers setting the rules that regulate them?

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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All the exceptions to the regulatory environment are always hidden in the tax code. Assets in reserve? It will be in the tax code where a liability will be called an asset or an income stream will be called a "deferred reserve capital expense allocation"....

Posted 7 months ago #
JoB
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kootch...

the tax code isn't where they hid the regulatory exemption that sank our national ship.
and when it comes to banking regulation.. they aren't setting rules for the tax code at all.

they do that someplace else entirely...

as for the tea in china...

they must regulate that someplace too

Posted 7 months ago #
waynster
Member Profile

Kootch did you find that on the sims video game along with cains 9 9 9 flat tax program under banker rules and regs......

Don't worrie Job he has a banking progarm for chinas tea along with regs for the price of meat balls in saigon wait its ho chi minh city now.....lol

Posted 7 months ago #
DBP
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For those who haven't been keeping up, Candidate Herman Cain's "9-9-9 Plan" calls for a national flat income tax of 9% on all businesses and individuals and a 9% sales tax on goods and services. Income tax deductions will be allowed for things like capital investment and charitable donations.

Also, if you lived or worked in an "economic empowerment zone" (an area targeted for economic growth) you'd get a tax deduction for that. White Center might be an example of an "economic empowerment zone."

According to Cain's Web site, the 9-9-9 Plan will "expand GDP by $2 trillion, create 6 million new jobs, increase business investment by one third, and increase wages by 10%."

Cain claims the 9-9-9 plan does the following:

•Removes all payroll taxes and unites all tax payers
•Provides the least incentive to evade taxes and the fewest opportunities to do so
•Lifts a $430 billion dead-weight burden on the economy due to compliance, enforcement, collection, etc.
•Is fair, simple, efficient, neutral, and transparent
•Ends nearly all deductions and special interest favors
•Features zero tax on capital gains and repatriated profits
•Exports leave our shores without the Business Tax or the Sales Tax embedded in their cost, making them world class competitive. Imports are subject to the same taxation as domestically produced goods, leveling the playing field.
•Lowest marginal rates on production
•Kills the Death Tax
•Allows immediate expensing of business investments
•Eliminates double taxation of dividends
•Increases capital formation which aids capital availability for small businesses
•Increased capital per worker drives productivity and wage growth
•Features a platform to launch properly structured Empowerment Zones to renew our inner cities
•The pro-growth, pro-job, pro-export economic policies of the 9-9-9 PLAN equals a strong dollar policy

He also says the 9% sales tax will be in lieu of existing taxes and that it will actually lead to lowering of prices for goods and services.

http://www.hermancain.com/999plan

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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Job , I Disagree... and emphatically so. The tax code for instance, treats short term hedge funds, currency straddles, derivatives, as long term capital gains...not regular income. Now the little gem was a Chuck Shumer, Hilary Cinton, Barney Fwank, Joe Lierberman sponsored legislation...and signed into law by slick Willy... derived by bribe... or campaign contributions. It interjected extreme volatility in the markets, te opposite intent of long term gains..which was a value hold and grow intent... You can regulate piranhas too... but if the tax code says a piranha is a guppy... so ends the regulation. It is the business of K street to make pigs fly and call them jetliners. The housing blow-up had two essential actors... which you refuse to acknowledge... Wall Street and Congress. Congress gave the hall passes out to run amok.

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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AND they are doing it all over again... we passed a Trillion dollars in total Student Loan debt this week... Loans to unproven credit risks, loans not backed by assets, loans with no co-signers, loans with no verification of employment, a trillion dollars... unsecured loans to insecure credit risks to such an extent there is now more student loan debt than credit card debt. Colleges are like the National Association of Homebuilders, The National Realty Association, all chanting on the sidelines during the housing bubble...... because they will get theirs... and we will get ours... another great screwing from the federal government as we are on the hook for all the skeezer loans.. version 2.0.... I believe we are that stupid ... nary a peep of concern.. until it explodes in our face. Imagine a default so large as to eclipse all the consumer debt in total... now that is a depression... and our congressional delegation is proud of it. Baaaaa baaaa baaaaa.. off to the fleecing barn.

Posted 7 months ago #
JoB
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Kootch
When did I refuse to admit that Congress and wall street had anything to do with the economic implosion?

Posted 7 months ago #
redblack
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kootch: here we go again.

that's not my debt. it's wall street's debt. i'm not paying it back for them.

regarding those "skeezer loans:" it doesn't really matter who demanded they were made anymore, does it? you claim that free-loading liberals and advocates for the poor and freddie and fannie caused those loans to be made which poisoned the mortgage well. fine. it's about as far removed from reality as one could get - especially considering republicans controlled all elected government at the time - but whatever.

i, on the other hand, say it was wall street's demand for ownership of those mortgages and the interest that those loans garnered that destroyed the economy. the NINJA loans made by downstream mortgage brokers poisoned the bundled mortgages and made them junk.

doesn't matter. blame isn't the issue.

the issue is that, after TARP, wall street is enjoying a boom, sitting on trillions in cash, and not investing in the economy at large. and they have the nerve to bitch about taxes on income made from doing absolutely nothing but diddling on a computer all day, talking to tax attorneys, making a few trades, having a three-martini lunch, taking a power nap, and going back to the old mc-ranch out in the exurbs and bitching about the stink of humanity to their golf buddies in the insurance industry.

meanwhile the bottom 90% would love to have some income to pay taxes on.

i'd like to get the top hedge fund managers, tim geithner, the heads of b of a, chase, citigroup, harry reid, mitch mcconnell, boehner, pelosi, etc. all in one room while wielding a baseball bat (with a gutter nail driven through it) and yell, "listen, you a-holes. one of you had better do something. i don't care who it is. i don't care what it is. but do something. or the next time i come in here i'm bringing the 15 million unemployed and the 10 million uderemployed people with me."

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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No redblack, the origins of high risk loans originate in the Community Reinvestment Act. Successively carried foward and expanded. In fact, one young community activist made his bones forcing B of A to make redline loans, Ms. Janet Reno in point of fact initiated legal proceedings agains Fannie Mae to make more high risk loans available. This indeed worked to the benefit of all. It obscured the soaring loss of manufacturing jobs after Clinton signed both NAFTA and admitted China into the WTO and granted them most favored nation status. Home building went on a two decade tear. So vast was it,residential concrete consumption for 5 years, exceeded commercial use. Wall Street did not create these instruments out of thin air... they have to have someone to sell them to... and Clinton did just that... he authorized the credit default swaps and the derivatives market. Essentially the federal government was the underwriter. Now Wall Street is sitting on tons of cash, much of it in reserves as required by Dodd Frank... you DID read that Chase may yet have an additional 168 BILLION in settlements. You do have to set aside money for contingent liabilities my friend. That's the law. Don't ya wish you could just roll back the clock and tell Jimmy Carter... "the mortgage market is working just fine, the default rates are low, banks are making money, there is small business loans to make, and equity in homes is rising at an annualized rate of 41/2 per cent? " Don't interfere with a stable housing market"? !!! Or... tell Barney Frank, Maxine Walters, Chuck Shumer... to take up and pass the request of the Republicans to audit the status of FHA, Fannie and Freddie? Instead of killing the resolution in committee? The alarm bell was ringing loudly.. wanna see the videos? Let this burn deeply into your consciousness.... also note it was a Democratically controlled congress and President... ready? Financial Services Modernization Act via William Jefferson Clinton

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
Member Profile

Here ya go... read the facts as they are.. not as you want them to be.

"He employed the same "creating a twenty-first-century regulatory system" rationalization used by Clinton when he signed off on the sweeping deregulation legislation that unleashed the Wall Street greed that ended up being the biggest job-killer since the Great Depression. "Over the (past) seven years, we have tried to modernize the economy," Clinton enthused as he signed the Financial Services Modernization Act that repealed key New Deal legislation, adding, "And today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down those antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority." Modernizing was the propaganda constant, as in the Commodity Futures Modernization Act that Clinton signed, thus shielding financial derivatives from any government regulation."

Did ya get it redblack? And we are doing it again... who are you going to blame it on this time? I TRILLION and counting...

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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And did you note this was at the end of his term..when it was time to get Wall Street all ginned up to send his wife to the Senate... via Wall Street campaign dollars... and brother it worked! Sorta shoots the hell out of the theory it was a Republican engineered conspiracy... all participated... but Democrats were the hosts of the party. 9.9.9... starting to look better and better... beats shuffle from the bottom of the deck to every sucker and rube in the electorate.

Posted 7 months ago #
dawsonct
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DBP, I heard it also whitens your teeth, freshens your breath, and removes stubborn hard-water stains from your toilet bowl!

Posted 7 months ago #
dawsonct
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Herman Cain is barely qualified to run a lousy pizza chain Kootch. He would be an absolute disaster as a President.
Okay, I'm being a bit harsh. He is qualified to run a lousy pizza chain.
When WAS the last time anyone even SAW a Godfathers restaurant?

Posted 7 months ago #
TDe
Member Profile

Sorry to tell you this, but it's not a simple 9-9-9 anymore. Cain modified that because independent counsels analyzed the plan and realized it raised taxes on almost everyone except the wealthy, who would actually get a tax cut. So his modified plan is more 9-0-9 for the nation's poorest households and still 9-9-9 for the middle class. Still waiting to hear cheers about that from the conservative camp. :)

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20123893-503544/under-fire-herman-cain-tweaks-9-9-9-plan/

Posted 7 months ago #
JanS
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nein, nein, nein !

Posted 7 months ago #
DBP
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http://roominate.com/blogg/soundbytes/999.mp3

Posted 7 months ago #
sarelly
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Some fancy charts:

http://www.alternet.org/occupywallst/152811/the_shocking%2C_graphic_data_that_shows_exactly_what_motivates_the_occupy_movement_/

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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Yea..and the dude at 1600 PA Ave is sooo qualified? At least HC knows what it takes to meet a payroll, set aside enough cash to pay bills, how to hire and make productive the most unskilled amongst us, how to grow a business and make it profitable... but most importantly... he can see reality. He doesn't make the mistake of making wishes facts. Bet he also knows you can;t spend more than you make for over a century..and be a viable entity..

Posted 7 months ago #
dobro
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uhhh...if you exist for "over a century" then you are, by definition, a viable entity...I don't think many of us here will be that "viable"...

Posted 7 months ago #
JanS
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kman..hogwash. Herman CAin doesn't have a clue about running this country. He doesn't know whats in the constitution, he doesn't know how the constitution is changed. He was OK with choice on abortion 5 days before he said he would outlaw abortion and sign a constitutional amendment to say that if given to him. Presidents don't sign constitution amendments. At three am, when the red phone rings at the White House, do I really want his fingers on the button? No way ! So..I see you are all for the "big business" way of running the country. Joy !

Posted 7 months ago #
cadbury
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Kman, convenient that you left out the sentence before your quote from the Nation article you site.
"Barack Obama veered sharply down that same course, trumpeting his executive order "to remove outdated regulations that stifle job creation and make our economy less competitive.""
Um...isn't that exactly what the repubs (and yourself) have been sqwaking about wanting to do?
Here is Obama caving again to republicans demands and you still find a way to criticize him for that?

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
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He hasn't caved to anything. He is tacking, trimming sails, jibbing, to get re-elected. Uh huh... well if we are so viable dobro..what's the beef? I don't care about abortion, for or against... not really enough to get worked up about.. it's been a see saw issue for decades and the debate is old and tiring. I will take Cain over Obama... any day. If Obama HAD a clue about running this country..and the American people agreed... they would not have dumped his ass in prompt fashion during the mid-terms... Jan? He sucks at the job. The polls show it. 39 per cent approval rate? Feckless panderer.

Posted 7 months ago #
sarelly
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A police group that has decided to stand in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protestors:

http://www.occupypolice.org

And, a Marine veteran speaks out in New York:

http://youtu.be/WmEHcOc0Sys

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
Member Profile

Yep... good ole USA... free free free... don't ya love it?

Posted 7 months ago #
dobro
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"well if we are so viable dobro..what's the beef?"

"The beef" is that my statement challenged your lame and incorrect assertion- "Bet he also knows you can;t spend more than you make for over a century..and be a viable entity.."

which you promptly ignore and reply to with more BS assertions. That's why I don't bother to engage in your pi**ing matches much anymore and can't, for the life of me, understand why anyone does.

BTW, do you care to acknowledge that your statement (the one I replied to and addressed) was a fact-free ignorant opinion?

Posted 7 months ago #
JanS
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Kman..they are ALL..repubs and dems alike... "tacking, trimming sails, jibbing, to get re-elected"...it's called politics. And there's the problem...they all are just going through the motions of running things, while they just want to get re-elected, just want keep the "power"...and in the meantime this country is sinking on so many levels. Eric Cantor cares about you? Mitch McConnell cares about you? John Boehner cares about you? Same for Paul Ryan. Do not flatter yourself. They just want those running to win, at all costs, so they can say they are the party of power. But..they aren't doing a damned thing to help the economic problems of this country.

Posted 7 months ago #
JoB
Member Profile

Dobro
This is just a wild guess
but I think kootch is going to say no. ;-)

Posted 7 months ago #
JanS
Member Profile

stolen from a friend on FB...

http://www.alternet.org/occupywallst/152811/the_shocking,_graphic_data_that_shows_exactly_what_motivates_the_occupy_movement_/

Posted 7 months ago #
JanS
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but, then...there's this..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVwbYB2JfDU

Posted 7 months ago #
redblack
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kootch: don't change the subject.

i didn't say anything about a republican-engineered conspiracy. and, yes, i know that clinton was a republican-lite who weakened banking regulations. later, republicans came along and kicked them down all together.

(but i do enjoy the fact that you keep ignoring that congress was run by republicans from 1994 to 2006, and they're the ones who deregulated the banks and wall street.)

wall street responds positively to opportunity, correct? the dow was approaching 14,000 during the height of housing bubble, correct?

what was wall street buying so voraciously that was keeping an otherwise weak economy buoyed? why was their confidence so high? (because we know that they wet their pants and sell everything at the first sign of trouble.)

you can't pretend that the government forced wall street to buy bundled mortgages as financial instruments. they wanted to buy them. and they demanded that the government change the laws so that they could bundle them and buy them.

but you're trying to tell me that the government said, "here ya' go. take all of these worthless bums' mortgages. we know they aren't worth the paper they're printed on, but you have to buy them." wall street didn't give a shit whether mortgage-backed securities were toxic or not. they were paying 5 - 7% interest, guaranteed by a bank. they were ignoring the warnings that they were going to crash the economy, but still the champagne rained from the sky. they couldn't lose - and their bets were covered if they did.

what you're ignoring is that very few of the actual mortgages were toxic. the fact that they were bundled with perfectly good mortgages made them worthless as financial instruments.

but go right ahead and keep blaming the government for interfering with the free market's invisible hand, which is always wise and steady, and which should be dictating economic policy.

am i right?

Posted 7 months ago #
TDe
Member Profile

Sigh... I'd post the Community Reinvestment Act language AGAIN, like I did in a previous thread, so you could see that banks were not required to make risky loans via the CRA, but you would just poo pah it AGAIN and insist that politicians forced our hapless little financial institutions into making risky loans, even though they really didn't want to make all that money.

Posted 7 months ago #
Yardvark
Member Profile

Awesome to see a police group gaining steam in support of the Occupy movement:
http://www.occupypolice.org

It's been ridiculous to see some people trying to pit the police against demonstrators and vice versa. We're obviously all opposed to blatant corruption, shameless greed, and thoughtless ignorance in our economy and our government.

I'd love to see mutual, peaceful cooperation continue to grow not just between police and demonstrators but also among those of all political backgrounds and opinions.

Posted 7 months ago #
kootchman
Member Profile

TDe I could post the AGAIN the lawsuit filed by Janet Reno under the flag of the CRA..to make more risky loans available... but you would just poo pah it. But more to the point... here we go again...more bail outs for the banks... taking those rising student loan defaults off the hands of the banks and putting em' under the federal banner. I hope he gets the votes he is chumming for.. are you all ready for a few hundred billion more loan modifications and forgiveness programs? Maybe he just can't get past the abstraction of a trillion dollars, it is incomprehensible. Sigh.. TDe let's see how you mount a defense to this one? $50,000 debt loads to kids with no jobs, no credit history.... not to worry though.. right? We will get it out of the 1%. Or Fisker Motors? Maybe a magical top hat?

Posted 7 months ago #
cadbury
Member Profile

Let's play guess the president

"...That's why I've challenged the industry leaders all across the country to get after it for this goal, to stay focused, to make sure that we achieve a more secure America, by achieving the goal of 5.5 million new minority home owners. I call it America's home ownership challenge.

And let me talk about some of the progress which we have made to date, as an example for others to follow. First of all, government sponsored corporations that help create our mortgage system -- I introduced two of the leaders here today -- they call those people Fannie May and Freddie Mac, as well as the federal home loan banks, will increase their commitment to minority markets by more than $440 billion. (Applause.) I want to thank Leland and Franklin for that commitment. It's a commitment that conforms to their charters, as well, and also conforms to their hearts."

You're right. George W Bush 2002

Oh and don't forget, at the very height of the sub-prime mess (2004-2006) only 25% of all subprime loans were CRA-eliglble...

Posted 7 months ago #
TDe
Member Profile

Got no fight with you on Student Loan Debt. I used to work in the student loan industry and saw first hand what it could do to students. I once had to counsel a married law student at one of the nation's most prestigious law schools, who was graduating with way over $100K in student loan debt. He had 3 kids, another on the way and was on the verge of panic because he had no job offers above $35K a year. I had to tell him that under the very best of circumstances, which would require a bunch more paperwork, his student loan payments would be at least $1000 a month. He didn't know how he was going feed his family and told me he felt like he'd been duped because he bought into the notion that a great college education would guarantee you a great job.

I quit shortly thereafter.

I also worked for a bank that refused to make risky loans and they took a lot of ribbing and scorn from other banks that were making money hand over fist during those glory days of free lending, but they stuck to their guns. So don't tell me that our financial institutions were "forced" to make sub-prime loans. They weren't!

Posted 7 months ago #
DBP
Member Profile

I'd love to see mutual, peaceful cooperation continue to grow not just between police and demonstrators but also among those of all political backgrounds and opinions.

Well said, Yard. I see this "Occupy" movement as being mostly about Americans taking government back into their own hands.

Step 1 is to get corporations OUT of government and to curtail their political "rights."

Ordinary conservatives should be able to get behind that, right? If a so-called conservative said to me: "No, I think corporations should be equal with humans in the political arena," –I would have to say: "Well then, you're not a true conservative."

I don't know what you ARE exactly.

A corporate shill maybe. A toady.

But not a conservative.

Posted 7 months ago #
DBP
Member Profile

So don't tell me that our financial institutions were "forced" to make sub-prime loans. They weren't!

Correct, TDE, but neither was that law student you mentioned "forced" to take out $100,000 in loans. He was an adult when he borrowed that money, and he had a responsibility to research the job market and calculate his odds of being able to pay it back.

He took a gamble (rather naively) that he'd be making a lot of money right out of school, but he bet long and lost. Oh well. I feel somewhat sorry for the guy's kids, but not for him. You know, he probably shouldn't have even had the kids until he had some money saved and/or a more solid career under his belt. But that's people for ya. I've made my share of bonehead moves, too.

Anyway, I'm for corporate accountability AND personal accountability. How can we hold our corporations and politicians to a high standard when we don't hold ourselves to the same standard?

Posted 7 months ago #
Yardvark
Member Profile

Members of the US armed forces are now starting to actively organize and speak out in support of the Occupy movement as well:
http://occupymarines.org/

Posted 7 months ago #
TDe
Member Profile

You're right DP... or that other guy... :) Adults do have a responsibility to research the cost of debt before jumping in. Unfortunately, there are millions of college graduates who didn't do that. How many high school graduates this upcoming year will do that before jumping into college? Hopefully more, now that the recession has changed a lot of financial thinking.

This poor guy jumped right into college loans as a freshman, got married early during his undergraduate years, started having kids (as programmed by his religion), went right on through graduate school living on debt and part-time jobs while studying. He only got the awful wake-up call at graduation.

"How can we hold our corporations and politicians to a high standard when we don't hold ourselves to the same standard?" Good Question!

Posted 7 months ago #
Yardvark
Member Profile

Good call. It's usually your fault if you bite off more than you can chew. Presumably, this guy isn't a fraud, though. He isn't corrupt. He didn't accept bribes. He didn't deceive anyone but himself.

Our politicians, on the other hand, constantly accept large bribes (or campaign contributions) from wealthy individuals and businesses to deregulate their practices and maybe send some subsidies their way.

As a nice thank you, some of our most powerful corporations, in turn, have bent and broken the law to deceive both their investors and the general public. Their most recent deceptions have greatly contributed to (if not solely caused) a global economic collapse.

So the guy who wanted to get a good education and start a family comes out smelling just as evil as Enron or Goldman? He sounds like an otherwise ideal citizen who simply bit off more than he could chew. In fact, if we hold him to the same standards as our politicians and corporations, he actually comes off looking like absolutely purity and sunshine.

In reality, I think we currently hold ourselves and our neighbors to a much higher standard than corporations or politicians. That obviously needs to change. It's high time to raise the bar on the latter.

Posted 7 months ago #
redblack
Member Profile

TDe let's see how you mount a defense to this one? $50,000 debt loads to kids with no jobs, no credit history.... not to worry though.. right? We will get it out of the 1%.

what in god's name are you blathering about now?

if students had sufficient assets, they wouldn't need loans with exorbitant interest rates now, would they?

and pay it back they do. in spades. a lot of them have to take multiple deferments to pay that money back. and the juice keeps running. and the jobs keep leaving.

yeah, i do know what i'm talking about. my wife paid back two college loans at 9% interest while i supported our household.

and not one thin dime of those loans was paid back with taxpayer money.

man, wall street is laughing their asses off at us as we keep paying our bills while they jack up the cost of everything. and it's even better for them when we default or otherwise wreck our credit scores. pile on the interest!

this country is sick, and it was made sick by money.

it's time we got well again.

Posted 7 months ago #
Dunno
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Police union, Marines, whatever. Day late, dollar short. Whole movement has lost the media and its steam...next time.

Posted 7 months ago #

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