Haha. Throw it over the fence. Maybe I'll throw some corn back :)

An email from my Senator...

Dear Mrs. Chopcinski:

Thank you for expressing your concerns with the problems in the financial sector and proposals to address them.

A lot of Ohioans, including me, are angry at the thought of bailing out people who made a lot of money making bad business decisions that created problems in neighborhoods across Ohio.

I agree that we need to avoid rewarding excessive risk taking. These institutions made unwise decisions, and taxpayers should not be expected to simply cover their losses.

On September 20th, Treasury Secretary Paulson sent a proposal to Congress that would have given him almost unfettered authority to spend $700 billion purchasing troubled assets from financial institutions. A few days later, my colleagues on the Banking Committee and I held a hearing at which Secretary Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke, and others testified.

They made a strong case for the need to act quickly to prevent further damage to our economy. The turmoil in the credit markets has the potential to do great damage to a lot of innocent bystanders. I am afraid that if we do not act, the economic instability could affect thousands of American jobs and the savings of countless middle class families.

But Secretary Paulson’s proposal is not the right answer. No Secretary should be given a $700 billion blank check. Taxpayers must be given an opportunity to recover their money, and assurances their tax dollars will not fund lavish pay and golden parachutes. We need strong rules to guard against abuse, and to ensure all types of institutions and regions are helped. And we need to ensure that the roots of the problem – struggling homeowners – get help.

In the days ahead, we need to focus on containing the damage to middle class families and local businesses as much as possible. In the months ahead, we need to take a hard look at how financial markets are regulated so we never find ourselves in this situation again.

Thank you again for contacting me. I will certainly keep your views in mind as the Senate decides how to restore strength to our economy.
Sincerely,
Sherrod Brown

Yay for democracy.

Population of US: 301,139,947
Bailout amount in US dollars: 700,000,000,000

Roughly $2,324.50

Now if each one of you guys had $2300 to spend, and you spent it on your mortages, loans, credit card debts, etc. Wouldn't that put money back into the banks, lending institutions and such?

Crazy thought, I know. I'll go hide in the corner now.

It would be even more if you gave it to just the adults. :)

However, it still won't be enough to stop the train wreck.

My parents have a lot of money in stocks, so I was relieved to hear they pulled out at the beginning of the year.

Was not so relieved to hear they neglected to do the same for all of *my* stocks [i.e. the Future Bail Kelli Out Of Debt Fund].

I say this with absolutely no economic back ground whatsoever - just trying to look at it with common sense. -and that may be lacking a few key elements but hear me out -

so what if;
The government got real numbers on defaulting mortgages - find out what that tab is. - Probably less than $7bill

Buy the loans from the banks. Reset the mortgage to that sweet percentage rate that people were able to afford in the first place and agreed to no realizing what a "reset" would *actually* mean to them.

Perhaps extend the loan out 10 years from the original date so some of the money can be re-couped. Or at least long enough for the housing market to rebound and stabilize and people can start earning equity and putting money back in the economy.

The banks are free of the mortgages and people can keep thier houses and the government wouldn't be handing out a blank check...and possibly would recover more money in the end.

I realize there is lots of math to do there, but it seems *doable*. I mean, eff the banks for taking a risk that didn't pay off. Let's not let the whole country suffer.

eh?

I have not read through this entire thread yet, but the way I see it is, if you are not worried:

1) All your money is either buried in your backyard, or stuffed under your mattress.

and/or

2) You are independently wealthy, and money is disposable without a care in the world.

I'm actually flat broke. Well, kinda. I have 25k in student loans and about $150 in the bank.

Why am I not scared? Well, my bank is a good bank. Secondly, it's a lie to believe that the economy will fail because the bill didn't pass. It's a lie to gain support from the general public.

You should still be worried if those are both your realities. Money is at risk of being worthless.

You should only not be worried if you've got a ranch in the middle of nowhere and you've been living unassisted for the last 10 years without a problem.

Of course, lots of guns and chainsaws will help for when the zombies arrive.

I don't carry much debt. My biggest debt is my mortgage, like most Americans.

I have no credit card debt. I have enough in savings that if I lost my job, I could cover bills for about 4-6 months.

What worries me the most is my retirement. I lost alot of it in my divorce a few years ago. At my age, and at this rate, I'll be working until I'm either in my 90's or dead.

Not how I planned to spend my retirement years.

If anything comes out of this that is good for me, would be a drop in mortage rates, and I don't see that in the immediate future because I now see it that I am paying for all the a-holes that took out mortgages that they realistically could not afford. Poor planning and poor judgement. I may be wrong, but I don't blame this all on the government, or lending institutions. There are alot of people out there that have no clue how to manage their money, and have no concept of living within their means.

Now the rest of us have to pay for it.

I couldn't agree more.

Try not to worry too much about your retirement. This will pass, just as other recessions have come and gone.

This entire mess started back during the Carter Administration.

Look up the Community Reinvestment Act.

Democrats pushed, and have been pushing for decades, to loosen lending practices in order to allow people who could not afford mortgages to get mortgages. Slowly but surely they kept lowering the requirements, under the radar, with the help of government sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Along the way, Democrats blocked any attempts to reign in what Fannie and Freddie were doing which was to back, with taxpayer money, loans and mortgages that were given to people who could just barely qualify (called subprime loans). Freddie Mac would take these mortgages and bundle them and create mortgage backed securities which were traded on Wall Street just like other securities. Then when things were starting to get out of hand, Republicans tried to reign in Fannie and Freddie and require them to have more cash on hand so that if or when these mortgages started to default, they could pay the banks back for the bad loans which were essentially forced to lend. Democrats, namely Barney Frank and Chris Dodd and Chuck Schumer among others, blocked these attempts for years.

When the price of oil went through the roof, all goods and services (since oil is the engine of all production) went up in price and the economy slowed down. This led to less cash on hand for people to buy food and pay their mortgages.

The mortgages and mortgage backed securities became junk and banks and investment banks were left with big fat holes on their books. They didn't have enough real assets or cash to conduct business and the dominoes started to fall.

Nancy Pelosi, in her speech, FRAUDULENTLY blamed the crisis on the Bush administration and the free market's "excesses" but the reality is that the big fat hole in the economy was a creation of the Democrats and liberals in this country and when she gave that speech, she pissed off people who were already against the massive expansion of government they were forced into because of the shady accounting and high risk financial vehicles the Democrats' love child (Freddie and Fannie) created.

Nancy Pelosi, Chris Dodd, and Barney Frank know EXACTLY why we're in this mess and Pelosi tried to place the blame on Bush and Republicans.

That's what happened. Unfortunately, the media is determined to cover up the real facts of how and why we got into this mess.

Honestly, are we not past the whole "the Democrats got us into this mess" or "the financial crisis is due to 8 years of a Republican White House"?

The "big fat hole" is not party created. It's there because we're a country that lives on credit. We wanted more more more and we didn't want to wait for it. People wanted mortgages for houses they couldn't afford, so they got them. It's the bank's fault for lending to them, yes, but it's also OUR fault for not saying "Wait a minute, I can't afford this. I'm not ready. I need to save more."

We have got to start f**king delaying gratification like a country of grown ups instead of a country of toddlers. There is no excuse for 10+ trillion dollars in national debt. No excuse. The truth is that we as a society got us into this mess. Not Democrats, not Republicans, just Americans.

Granted, I'm not American here, but I don't think this is a viable idea, bunny.

I agree the banks were unnecessarily (stupidly?) risky with respect to mortgages, but bailing out individual people who made stupid decisions and got in over their heads isn't much better than bailing out a corporation which did the same.

If people took mortgages without fully understanding the dynamics, why should the taxpayers (via the government) pay for their bad decisions? Furthermore, letting the government bail out individual people who couldn't grasp basic fiscal management or econmics really doesn't demonstrate how important those skills are... I'd be willing to bet many of those people would end up in a similar situation.


Or I could be completely wrong .

No, the big fat hole in the economy was created by Democrats.

Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats are relying on the American public being stupid and are LYING to gain political points.

The very people who caused this mess are pretending they can fix it. "We" were about to get past it before Nancy Pelosi opened her big fat mouth before the vote.

That's the point. Had she shut her botox laden piehole, the bill would have passed but she decided to score some points instead. The Republicans did not want this massive bailout.

Because the Democrats protected Fannie and Freddie there was no way to stop the inevitable collapse. Republicans tried to get the lending requirements under control.

Perhaps you would care to cite facts? Maybe show us how the party that was in the minority for years blocked the Angelic Republicans from looking out for everyman?

While you're at it, maybe you could show us how we're safer since we invaded Iraq and took out those WMDs and splintered their ties to Al Quaeda... I'm sure you can prove that too.

Better yet. Instead of giving the money to each and every American (this includes children as well I assume), take that money and pay off EVERY American's mortgage that owns one. Talk about putting money back into the economy. Think of all the things we would be able to purchase if no one had to pay their mortgage anymore?

There's nothing wrong with riding a horse at top speed. What *is* wrong is riding that horse at top speed until it dies of exhaustion, ignoring all it's signs of fatigue along the way.



There's nothing wrong with loosening lending practices. There's nothing wrong with saying, "let's make loans more accessible."

What *is* wrong is continuing with that policy until the economy tanks.