The Bailout: For or Against

a.s. again we agree on something ....

i am adding bacon and avocado to my tomato sandwich today...

Okay anne, I see your point about those from a big state, maybe having more worldy experience. So tell me? What kind of national security did Clinton deal  in ARKANSAS? It seems to me that there are security issues that are more relevant in AK than AR, like the pipelines. No matter how much they want to joke about it, AK is a lot closer to Russia (and China for that matter)  than AR. And I am still trying to get ANYONE to specifically tell me what Obama has done as my senator. He was sworn in and immediately began his campaign for president. What has he done for the Illinois schools, the murder rate in Chicago, the severe budget deficits, the huge tax burdens, and every other problem in Ilinois since the democrats have taken over. People say they are scared of a woman for vice president who has made her state work more efficiently, gotten rid of corruption, and improved the economy yet they have no fear of a guy who has not done a thing but contribute to the problems in his own state. Obama will not solve the problem. HE IS THE PROBLEM.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9DjDlN6clIo

I interrupt this rant for another tasty morsel from my family recipe file:

Lemon Broccoli:

rinse broccoli, and while still damp, microwave it for five minutes. Rinse with cold water to stop cooking and drain well. Toss with olive oil (remember the good kind), lots of garlic (don't skimp!), some sea salt, and the juice of one whole lemon. Put in fridge  to marinate and serve cold. Yum!! And full of all those cancer fighting antioxidants!

mke--you are right--it would only come to $450.00

Sure glad the fellow who sent me this e-mail is not my accountant--hey, I bet he is doing some "creative accounting" for one of the Wall Street Firms, hoping to find more fools like me who pass these things on without checking out their accuracy!!  And invest on such bad information. . .

$450.00?  Indeed, chump change--won't even pay the month's parking around here, as AnneShirley says.

Lesson to self!  Read, proofread, double check numbers and don't pass on information so quickly. . .

And don't believe everything you read--question, question, question.

Apologies to all for my gaff.

LindaMemm:  Gotta love Jackie Mason!!  Remember his broadway show some year ago, when he said the only way to straighten out the mess in congress was to take them off salary and put them on commission?

Okay--how about this?  check my math, please, calculator is out of batteries--

 $700,000,000,000 of the bailout divided by 200,000,000--I think that would come to $3,500.00 per person!!

But without jobs or credit, and with our 401Ks tanking, health insurance being lost with loss of jobs--that would end up being chump change in the big picture too!!

No sunshine, but at least the market basically "held" today--I think people are confident that something is going to be done.

I still say put a federal tax on each and every market trade into the "bucket" to cover this bailout.  How many shares traded Monday if anyone remembers? Don't know if it should be per share (maybe too much) or per trade itself, but I am sure this would give us a whole lot to pay for the bailout. 

I don't know that people would be up at arms about this if it was made tax deductible.

AS-Please do not take this the wrong one, but I really have a problem when people think that  only people who go to Harvard or Oxford are well educated. I know that this an east coast preception and on the west coast it is Berkeley or Stanford, but for the rest of the country, it does not hold water. I can identify with Palin, because it is not about intelligence that we go to state schools. It is about $$$$. Like her, my family was not educated, but I was determined to go to college. In 200 years, none of my direct ancestors had ever done this and most had not even finished high school. They lived on and off of their farms or on their hands and knees in the trades. I had no support both emotionally and financially for college. Even though I had all the credentials to get into a top tier school, I never even had the luxury to consider it. Would I have jumped at the chance to realize my dream  and  go to Northwestern and study journalism? In the words of Sarah Palin, "You Betcha!".But  coming from a small Illinois town, there was no big city mentor helping me, like Obama had. Nor could I qualify for affirmative action, and the last strike against me was that females did not get much attention back in the day. So I chose the cheapest school in the state, became a teacher as women did back then,  and counted myself lucky to at least go to college. Do I feel my brains were not challenged? Yeah. College was a breeze for me compared to the tough hs, I attended. So please do not look down on those of us who are not Ivy League. There are brilliant people all over this country who could be great leaders if they had been able to have more opportunities, or luck, to meet someone willing to bankroll them as Obama and Clinton did. And by the way, look at the shady characters that had a hand in bankrolling Obama's education. Susie, do you remember that link?

And remember, our greatest president was a country boy from the Illinois prairie who taught himself to read. He was called a fool and and a country bumpkin throughout his time in the white house, but it was the good old common sense of a poor man from the heartland, who did away with the horrors of slavery, and kept this nation together. I am so proud that I come from the land of Lincoln and Reagan. Obama is not really from Illinois so we cannot be blamed for the fact he does not share the heartland values that are the glue that holds this country together.  

The truth is Palin, may not have come from privilege, but was just a mom who did not like how things were being done, so she jumped into action. She is a million other women in this country who volunteer endless hours and are never taken seriously because they are "just a mom". I can soooooo identify with her. If the mothers of this world were in charge, it would be a much better place. No one fights more viciously for her cubs than mamma bear. I like the fact that she took on the ole boy network. Why would anyone fear such a women? She should be admired for her tenacity and perseverence. If she was a man, no one would be thinking anything of it!! She did not have dreams of grandeur like Obama and Clinton. She is probably more shocked than anyone that she is now a candidate for VP. She did not jump into politics because of her personal pursuit of fame and glory. She saw problems and she thought maybe she could help to fix them. This is all the more reason why we should be behind her, and not ridiculing her. She may not know it all yet, but she has proven she is a quick study and she will be passionate to put this country ahead of her own ambition. Can anyone say that Obama is doing this? If so, tell what he has done to prove it?

Now I have to go make dinner:

Tonights recipe:

Leftovers- reheat and eat! And if you don't like it, here's the peanut butter!

Very interesting videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3p1Wc2NFa3w&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QBRIsCkGQ0&feature=iv&annotation_id=event_311253

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbkEAR2GgiA&feature=iv&annotation_id=event_352711

Here's a really good read from Wallison back in 1999.  He warned...I could have highlighted the entire article.  I am so darned angry!  I'm tired of hearing the REPUBLICANS DID IT!

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print   September 30, 1999

Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending

By STEVEN A. HOLMES

In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders.

The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring.

Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people and felt pressure from stock holders to maintain its phenomenal growth in profits.

In addition, banks, thrift institutions and mortgage companies have been pressing Fannie Mae to help them make more loans to so-called subprime borrowers. These borrowers whose incomes, credit ratings and savings are not good enough to qualify for conventional loans, can only get loans from finance companies that charge much higher interest rates -- anywhere from three to four percentage points higher than conventional loans.

''Fannie Mae has expanded home ownership for millions of families in the 1990's by reducing down payment requirements,'' said Franklin D. Raines, Fannie Mae's chairman and chief executive officer. ''Yet there remain too many borrowers whose credit is just a notch below what our underwriting has required who have been relegated to paying significantly higher mortgage rates in the so-called subprime market.''

Demographic information on these borrowers is sketchy. But at least one study indicates that 18 percent of the loans in the subprime market went to black borrowers, compared to 5 per cent of loans in the conventional loan market.

In moving, even tentatively, into this new area of lending, Fannie Mae is taking on significantly more risk, which may not pose any difficulties during flush economic times. But the government-subsidized corporation may run into trouble in an economic downturn, prompting a government rescue similar to that of the savings and loan industry in the 1980's.

''From the perspective of many people, including me, this is another thrift industry growing up around us,'' said Peter Wallison a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. ''If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out the way it stepped up and bailed out the thrift industry.''

Under Fannie Mae's pilot program, consumers who qualify can secure a mortgage with an interest rate one percentage point above that of a conventional, 30-year fixed rate mortgage of less than $240,000 -- a rate that currently averages about 7.76 per cent. If the borrower makes his or her monthly payments on time for two years, the one percentage point premium is dropped.

Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, does not lend money directly to consumers. Instead, it purchases loans that banks make on what is called the secondary market. By expanding the type of loans that it will buy, Fannie Mae is hoping to spur banks to make more loans to people with less-than-stellar credit ratings.

Fannie Mae officials stress that the new mortgages will be extended to all potential borrowers who can qualify for a mortgage. But they add that the move is intended in part to increase the number of minority and low income home owners who tend to have worse credit ratings than non-Hispanic whites.

Home ownership has, in fact, exploded among minorities during the economic boom of the 1990's. The number of mortgages extended to Hispanic applicants jumped by 87.2 per cent from 1993 to 1998, according to Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies. During that same period the number of African Americans who got mortgages to buy a home increased by 71.9 per cent and the number of Asian Americans by 46.3 per cent.

In contrast, the number of non-Hispanic whites who received loans for homes increased by 31.2 per cent.

Despite these gains, home ownership rates for minorities continue to lag behind non-Hispanic whites, in part because blacks and Hispanics in particular tend to have on average worse credit ratings.

In July, the Department of Housing and Urban Development proposed that by the year 2001, 50 percent of Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's portfolio be made up of loans to low and moderate-income borrowers. Last year, 44 percent of the loans Fannie Mae purchased were from these groups.

The change in policy also comes at the same time that HUD is investigating allegations of racial discrimination in the automated underwriting systems used by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to determine the credit-worthiness of credit applicants.

We're getting ready to vote on it now...there will be some amendments voted on first.  One amendment was just voted down by voice vote.

Oops...edited to read:  After Senator Reid talks about someone who is retiring.

Passed. 

Yeas:  74

Nays:  25

 Now we see what the House will do with it.

Anneshirley---I think she just blanked---understandable.  The more she's exposed to the press the less she will look like a dear in headlights.  She will be thrown out there after this debate and either she will sink or swim.

I'm glad McCain is sticking with her..........Either the confidence he has in her will be justified or she will go down in flames but he will have stuck by his convictions and I give him credit for that.

I wouldn't underestimate her.  

Anneshirley, I didn't realize I was implying that you were pushing Obama on anyone.  I never thought that.  I guess I was thinking out loud (typing).  I know you're not a supporter of Obama or McCain.  And, I don't need to listen to all the pundits talk after debates.  Like you, I can make up my own mind. 

When I heard MO say, this is the first time in my adult life that I am proud of my country, I didn't need a pundit to tell me what she said, how she meant it, etc.  When I heard that I thought, WTH?  And, the same thing about this country is mean.  I had my own opinions before the pundits opined.  I may not have a college education, but I do have a little common sense.  I thought McCain should have clobbered Obama on many things during the debate.

Again, I'm sorry but I wasn't implying you were pushing Obama on anyone....I should have left the "however" out of my sentence.