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Liberals in public office and elsewhere are willing and eager to punish BP for the oil spill. They are equally excited about bashing President Bush for everything they do not like. They always love to raise taxes especially for the wealthy but that doesn’t stop them from doing it to the rest of us. And certainly nothing would please them more than to cripple the recovery by making Wall Street villain of the year as their version of trickle down economics cripples Main Street as well.

So why do we never hear about liberals wanting to cap teachers salaries as they would do to all CEOs? Why don’t we hear about professors being held to the same standard of villain for getting in bed with special interest in a quid pro quo involving research? If TAs do most of the teaching why do professors command the salaries and perks they do? You can add the salaries of many others connected to education programs when asking that question.

Let’s not overlook school budgets, sports programs and coaching salaries either. Liberals cry foul that education is too expensive while athletic departments are like prostitutes for professional sports. Just like the sleazy relationships between professors and special interest funding for research the ADs as well as coaches, professional sports interests and athletic programs do little for the institutions they represent.

The current story about ‘realignment’ in college sports is a case in point. And go figure, Barry Switzer is central to making the point about college sports being sleazy.

Former Oklahoma coach Barry Switzer, a coaching rival of Osborne’s in the 1970s and ’80s and longtime friend, said hearing Nebraska and the Big Ten in the same sentence doesn’t sound right.

Switzer told The Associated Press he doesn’t envy Osborne having to play a major role in the possible destruction of the Big 12, which evolved from the old Big Eight and Southwest Conference.

“I’m sure it weighs heavily on Tom,” Switzer said. “I hate to think we would lose what we have and what we built for so long. Finances are a factor, and sometimes you have to give up tradition for finances.”

McClurg said the Big 12 has been a good fit for Nebraska but the Big Ten, if it extends an invitation, could be better. It would greatly expand the school’s reach and could mean far more money for the school’s athletic programs.

“We have to seriously evaluate any opportunity that comes our way,” McClurg said, “because everybody else is doing that.”

Isn’t that special. ‘Everybody else is doing that.’ Wisdom coming from a venue of higher learning. Switzer says, ’sometimes you have to give up tradition for finances.’

American taxpayers are constantly presented with soaring expenses for education programs. And American education continues to decline when compared to other nations. There is a theory that liberals, you know, the educated elite from Ivy League diploma mills, favor dumbing down the public to enable their socialist agenda.

So crack open that beer. Remain on the couch until that next collega game is on the TV. While you’re waiting consider this.

Your interest in watching may be driven by tradition. But that’s not what drives college sports any longer. Another piece of Americana is slipping away. Let’s stop that. Refuse to be dumbed down and take a stand. Or simply crack open another beer and ignore this minor rant.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

In an earlier post it was suggested a biblical reference about teaching a person to fish can feed them for a lifetime. It was part of commentary on entitlements and out of control spending. A final comment in the post warned the NEA would then ask for more funding but suggested the NEA would not ask to be held accountable for actually teaching. That brings us to the following story.

NY passes students who get wrong answers on tests

Despite promises that the exams — which determine whether students advance to the next grade — would not be dumbed down this year, students got “partial credit” for wrong answers after failing to correctly add, subtract, multiply and divide. Some got credit for no answer at all.

Examples in the fourth-grade scoring guide include:

* A kid who answers that a 2-foot-long skateboard is 48 inches long gets half-credit for adding 24 and 24 instead of the correct 12 plus 12.

That’s just one item in the guide. You can follow the link for the full story. But you do not need to read the rest to understand the sad state of affairs in US education. Is there any wonder why US education continues to cost more while student achievement continues to flat line and fall behind other students around the world?

You cannot teach a kid to fish if they don’t know what a fish is. But with this style of education you can all but guarantee most of these students will become entitlement recipients that promote the liberal agenda of the nanny state. Not to mention burden the taxpayer who will always be expected to pay for this failure.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Here’s a perfect example of why PORK, earmarks, ’stimulus’ or any other call for ‘government help’ is nothing more than politicians seeking political cover or nanny state advocates portraying taxpayer funds as manna from heaven.

Cash-strapped states press Congress for more Medicaid help

States are turning up the pressure on federal lawmakers to help them pay their Medicaid bills, cautioning that they’ll otherwise face a dire fiscal situation that could hurt their economic recovery.

The state-federal health program for the poor consumes more than 20 percent of state spending, according to the National Governors Association, and without extra federal funds advocates say states will have to raise taxes, slash social spending or cripple their Medicaid programs.

The first paragraph above might accidentally point to the real problem. POLS suggest their ‘economic recovery’ will be hurt if they don’t get federal TAXPAYER dollars to fund shortfalls for state Medicaid spending. That’s their emotional ploy to justify getting the money.

What they should be saying is that taxpayers cannot continue being asked to pay more for entitlements! Asking for federal taxpayer dollars merely let’s them seek political cover by not speaking the truth on out of control spending and avoiding personal political damage by increasing state taxes to cover the entitlement spending.

You can draw your own conclusion on why programs like Medicaid continue to require more spending. But it is hard to avoid the reality. As long as you offer ‘freebies’ for program participants that are paid for by someone else the demand for the program benefits and the associated costs will continue to rise. The costs will always exceed the taxpayer’s ability to pay for it.

That is the twisted burden shift caused by entitlements. Someone creates a program to provide benefit to someone lacking the funds to pay for it themselves. Over time the taxpayer lacks the funds to pay for the benefit of the recipient who lacks the funds.

There is a biblical reference that fits this scenario. Give someone a fish and you can feed them for a day. Teach them to fish and they can feed themselves for a lifetime.

OMG, with that reference the NEA will ask for more education funding. It doesn’t matter. They would ask for more funding without the reference. But they won’t ask to be held accountable to teach anyone to feed themselves for a lifetime.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Fresh concern about the health of the U.S. and European economies sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbling back below 10000 and drove the euro to new four-year lows against the dollar.

Friday got off to a struggling start as investors reacted to comments late Thursday from a Hungarian official who likened his nation’s debt woes to those of Greece. Then, before the New York open, the Labor Department released U.S. jobs data that was much weaker than expected.

Remember the markets tumbling dramatically some weeks ago initially blamed on a trading mistake and later liberals everywhere were outraged including President Obama? Ya, they used the event to push their so-called Wall Street reforms.

Funny, much about this decline in the markets is credited to ‘weaker than expected’ jobs data. The same jobs data where all but 41,000 or so jobs of the more than 400,000 are due to the liberal majority government hiring temporary census workers.

President Obama was still trying to spin this week’s news as positive and claim it demonstrates his agenda is working. Which is more than you can say for the record number of people not working because of it.

Yes, the agenda of President Obama and his liberals is working. That is if you believe the same socialist agenda is working in the EU. Places like Greece and the US state of California are finding out how well that agenda works.

Once those US census jobs dry up, the tax increases and restrictions of Obamacare cause more jobs to be lost Mr President will have some more explaining to do. That is if the oil spill in the Gulf ever gets off the front page.

Can you identify one item initiated by President Obama that provided a positive outcome for the United States?

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Another example of a misguided conclusion driven by politics features President Obama, space exploration and self-serving alliances. The report presenting this political nonsense is provided below.

Obama Space Plan ‘Vindicated’ by Private Rocket Launch, Builder Says
Clara Moskowitz
SPACE.com Senior Writer
Fri Jun 4, 7:15 pm ET

The successful liftoff of a new private rocket helps vindicate President Barack Obama’s plan to rely on commercial spaceships to carry cargo and possibly astronauts to orbit, the rocket’s millionaire owner said.

Commercial firm Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) blasted off its first Falcon 9 rocket Friday from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

“I think this bodes very well for the Obama plan,” SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said after the launch. “It really helps vindicate the approach he’s taking.”

Why is this report political nonsense? First of all, the report and Elon Musk suggest this rocket is ‘private’ not ‘public’ in terms of funding. Not exactly.

Established in 2002 by Elon Musk , the founder of PayPal and the Zip2 Corporation, SpaceX has already developed two brand new launch vehicles, established an impressive launch manifest, and been awarded COTS funding by NASA to demonstrate delivery and return of cargo to the International Space Station.

Then there is the suggestion that private space travel is Obama’s plan. Like he developed it. Not exactly.

Burt Rutan of Scaled Composites and Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Group joined forces to develop a fleet of commercial spaceships and launch aircraft. Rutan is responsible for the following:

White Knight launched SpaceShipOne 14 times, including the first privately funded human spaceflight. The final launch, on October 4, 2004, won the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE.

Let’s give credit where credit is due. Rutan, Branson and others were moving toward private space flight projects well before Musk’s NASA-funded project or President Obama’s endorsement of it. However, Obama should get credit for favoring privately funded space exploration if he in fact does.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

One sound bite or excerpt is probably as good as another regarding a recent backlash toward the ’social networking’ site Facebook. What appears to be a privacy policy may in fact be a default agreement to allow Facebook to exploit users’ personal information.

Facebook Privacy: How About Some Honesty?

You can say what you want about striving for granular this-that-or-the-other, but the truth is we all know what happens when you present people with a 5,830-word privacy policy and 80-gazillion intricate options: They say “screw it” and move on. Or adjust only a small handful of the now-defaulted-to-public-sharing options. And then, voila: Facebook gets to share their data with the world, opening new doors for advertising and profit.

As expressed on this blog before the author has no interest in things like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and the rest of the ‘wow’ fad sites trying to replace good old-fashioned communication between humans. That would be similar to the gripe on this blog suggesting wireless phones are anything but. Cameras, mobile internet access, bells and whistles, texting but sadly little in the way of reasonable performance for voice communications not to mention competitive pricing.

But then the public gets what the public wants from the market. Anything for any price as long as they think it’s cool. And the free market knows how to make you believe it is. Because most people make it easy for them.

How’s that for honesty?

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Earlier this year someone introduced me to the refreshing advice and commentary of Nicole Gelinas. Earlier this month at Roll Call Gelinas presented ‘A Simple GOP Plan for Wall Street.’ It is the subject of this post for two reasons.

First, it IS a simple plan and not just for the GOP although directing it toward them is helpful. Surely Democrats are not interested. And second, this blog has urged a return to a time before gutting Glass-Steagall, the attendant Gramm Leach Bliley and the sin of POLS at that time. The contract with America GOP and Bill Clinton set our course for troubles in the markets more than a decade ago.

According to Gelinas ‘Republicans should present to the public a clear goal — allowing free markets to govern Wall Street and a set of simple rules to get there.’

Republicans can say: Senators on both sides of the aisle want to end “too big to fail.” But the fatal flaw in Dodd’s bill is that it would try to decree an end to taxpayer bailouts, rather than create the conditions necessary to achieve that end.

Americans can understand that in a free-market economy, success in business doesn’t happen by decree. Instead, it is the result of a consistent, predictable set of rules that apply to everyone. Similarly, failure in finance can’t happen by government decree. It must be the result of consistent, predictable rules.

Follow the link to read the rest. You won’t be disappointed. Especially attractive are statements like this one. History shows that these rules work. That is what people usually mean when they use the words, ‘common sense’. Something sorely lacking these days.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Get a little thrill out of the stock market today did ya? Gee Barry, those nasty boys on Wall Street you keep talkin’ about probably didn’t cause this one. But it IS a safe bet you will try to influence opinion in that direction. Oops, the NYSE does not halt trading after 230pm ET if the market ‘free falls’ like it did today unless the dip is 20% or more.

Ooh, credit is given to ‘automated sell orders’ as reason for the market decline. Some say it is in response to the Greek debt problem going global. Whatever the reason, the liberals’ so-called ‘financial reform’ legislation will do nothing to eliminate wild swings as suggested by the President. But will today’s market activity cause the libs to add market halt requirements as well as limits on automated trading?

Maybe they should just stick to what they’re good at, talking nonsense and inciting the feeble among us, and leave the business of business to those who know something about it.

Here’s an excerpt of the WSJ’s take on today’s market action.

Traders described Thursday’s trading as driven largely by automated sell orders, which piled up after several technical barriers were breached, in particular the 1150 level on the S&P.

“A lot of people thought we had support around that level, so there was some disappointment that it didn’t hold,” said Phil Roth, chief technical analyst at Miller Tabak.

But he added: “The numbers themselves are a little less important than the manner in which the market gets there. The important thing is that we’ve had a very non-traditional bull market, without any major correction or several years of advances alternating with sideways periods. This could be the thing that sets off a real correction, but we’ll have to wait and see.”

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Shortly before publishing this post a news report gave credit for the market decline to a mistake that displayed P&G stock down 30% moving the market down 150 points which in turn led to the 988 point drop and 350 point closing decline.

The bottom line is GM was running an ad about paying back taxpayer bailout money five years ahead of schedule for a loan. The TARP loan was being paid back with other TARP or taxpayer money. The loan is a tiny portion of the boatloads of cash GM received courtesy of the US taxpayer. And Grassley called them on it.

After reading Grassley’s press release below from April 22, follow the link to the letter sent by Grassley. It’s definitely worth the trip.

Grassley asks about GM repaying TARP loans with other TARP funds

WASHINGTON — Senator Chuck Grassley is asking the Treasury Secretary to justify claims that General Motors has repaid its TARP loans when GM is using other TARP funds to repay the loans.

“It looks like the announcement is really just an elaborate TARP money shuffle,” Grassley said. “The repayment dollars haven’t come from GM selling cars but, instead, from a TARP escrow account at the Treasury Department.”

Grassley said his concern is based upon the most recently quarterly report from the Special Inspector General for TARP. Mr. Neil Barofsky testified before the Finance Committee this week and stated that the funds GM is using to repay its TARP debt are not coming from GM earnings.

Grassley said it’s a matter of the Treasury Department being straightforward with taxpayers about its management of the $700 billion taxpayer funded TARP program. Click here to read Grassley’s letter of inquiry to Secretary Timothy Geithner.

The Special Inspector General for TARP was created at the urging of Grassley and Senator Max Baucus of Montana, and when the Treasury Department changed the focus of the program less than a month after it began, Grassley worked with Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri to retool the Inspector General’s authority and empower the office to adequately scrutinize TARP spending and management.

Grassley has gone to bat for the Inspector General throughout the year, when the White House and Treasury Department put up barriers to the Inspector General asking questions and collecting information about where the money has gone. Grassley has been an outspoken critic about the lack of transparency with how TARP funds have been used. Last fall, he cosponsored legislation to end the program.

There are simply too many troubling stories in recent weeks. And this post simply selects a few that demonstrate the contrast of issues needing attention. From the never ending failure to enforce immigration law in the US to years of ignoring an issue of equal importance to national security, Iranian nukes, President Obama adds his ‘Katrina’ to the list of issues railed on by liberals during the Bush years but now silent with the Messiah in the White House. And let’s not forget about financial reform, too big to fail, bailouts and the announcement of a merger between United and Continental airlines.

An estimated 10 to 12 million people are thought to have entered the United States illegally, and most come from Latin America. Hispanics are the largest minority group in the American southwest, and immigration reform has become a potent political issue in the Hispanic community, where calls for crackdowns on illegal immigration have been viewed as anti-Hispanic.

There was a time when the number of illegals was estimated near 30 million. Over time it has been greatly reduced. The excerpt above points to the problem. ‘People thought’ to be here illegally. More important is stating ‘most come from Latin America.’ That the largest minority group in the southwest is ‘hispanic’ and the ‘hispanic community’ protests enforcement of immigration laws speaks to the larger problem. Being here illegally, making the most noise about amnesty, expressing no intention of becoming American while invoking the race card explains the fallacy. Illegal immigration is an entirely self-serving proposition. It denounces the very principles it claims to represent.

President Barack Obama says an expanding oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico is a massive and unprecedented environmental disaster that will require a relentless, coordinated effort to overcome.

That ‘relentless, coordinated effort’ is taking a long time to begin. Compare this to reaction over the response to Katrina during the Bush administration. NOAA has had an oil spill response program for 15 or 20 years. So why the long delays here? Now it is suggested the oil slick will travel around Florida and up the east coast of the US. Another example of how ineffective big government is.

And then there is the small matter of a merger in the airline industry.

The merger between United and Continental Airlines will be worth some $3 billion.

The combined company will have nearly 700 planes, 80,000 employees, and fly to 370 destinations in 59 countries.

Airline industry expert Joseph Schwieterman of DePaul University in Chicago says the announcement is a positive sign for an industry that has struggled since the 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

The airline industry struggled long before 2001. In many ways the troubles of the airlines is quite similar to that of automobile manufacturers. So two airlines merge as the answer to solve their problems. It does nothing to confront the underlying problems of the industry. But it does present a possible example of what the current push for financial reform in Congress, too big to fail and more bailouts in the future will bring. More problems for the American taxpayer, consumers in general and evidence politicians have no idea what they’re doing or are lying to you about their intentions.

This post concludes with a brief mention of Iranian nukes. This issue is the most troubling in this list. Continued failure to properly address and resolve it may result in a mushroom cloud. The only positive outcome thus far illuminates ineffective leadership around the planet, not just the United States. And that is little consolation.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad kicked off the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference with a lengthy diatribe against the United States and other Western powers who seek to sanction his country for its controversial nuclear program.

Mr. Ahmadinejad spoke for more than half an hour, giving what has become something of his trademark - a speech criticizing the United States, Israel and invoking God - and sending the U.S., British and French delegations walking out of the hall in protest.

There is nothing new about this issue. The UN is as impotent as ever. The Obama administration has done nothing. China, Russia and Iran have used this issue to their collective advantage and no one else presents an answer. As another terrorist demonstrates how vulnerable to attack everyone is weak minds obsess on how to be fair to those who do not understand the concept. When will we treat terror threats like terror threats? Stop coddling those who support and produce terrorism and other acts of war.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Real Immigration Reform Starts with Border Security and Stronger Enforcement
Published in the Ramona Sentinel

Now that health care legislation has been finalized, the Obama Administration and Congressional leaders have hinted at the possibility of moving forward with illegal immigration reform sometime this year. The prospect is still uncertain but one thing is clear. Any attempt at reform that does not make enforcement a priority will fall short in addressing the real problems with illegal immigration and should be opposed outright.

The more responsible approach is straightforward: secure our nation’s borders, starting with the U.S.-Mexico land border, and strengthen the enforcement of existing immigration laws.

It is no surprise that proponents of immigration reform have focused their energy on pushing an agenda that encompasses amnesty and open borders. What they seemingly fail to recognize is that the violence and destruction that is common along the Southern border is often the result of inadequate enforcement and policies that encourage illegal entry – including the prospect of amnesty.

More than 8,000 people were killed due to violence on the U.S.-Mexico border last year alone, far surpassing the number of deaths attributable to insurgent activity in Iraq and Afghanistan since the start of combat operations.

Click here to read the rest….

from Hunter’s bio….

Hunter is a strong conservative who is committed to strengthening national security, enforcing our borders, creating opportunities for American workers and protecting the interests of taxpayers. He is also a strong proponent of the Second Amendment, protecting traditional marriage and the rights of the unborn.

Click here to read the rest….

A stop at Google News to see what the MSM offers today starts out with US considers Goldman Sachs criminal charges. You have to ask yourself if that includes suspects like former employees of Fannie and Freddie as well as their co-conspirators in Congress, then and now? The push to place everyone in a home of their own whether they could afford it or not started the whole mess. It took years of quiet meddling by POLS and regulators as well as those who made a bundle in the market to lift regulations designed to avoid such problems. But the liberals need a villain to cover their tracks and apparently Goldman Sachs will suffice for their witch hunt and slight of hand redirection of blame.

And you have to wonder if BP is stepping up to pay for the spill in the Gulf of Mexico now that the slick is reaching shore and conspiracy theories abound? And it is reasonable that the Obama administration would postpone offshore drilling plans due to the incident. But that delay plays well into the liberal agenda in the first place. Another set of villains to be targeted by the left for political purposes rather than pursuit of justice.

Economic growth is slower than expected according to a report at WaPo. Again you have to wonder who really expected it to be above a 3.2% annual rate in the first quarter of 2010? The public opposition to continued fiscal irresponsibility likely includes business leaders and those who do the hiring and manage the risk of whether or not to expand. That is if they even have access to the resources (funding) to do so.

You would be hard pressed to find examples exhibiting effective leadership in government these days. When the taxpayer via government entities should be partnering with the private sector to improve the economy and resolve issues across the board little evidence exists that anyone is prepared to do just that.

That leads well into a sentiment expressed frequently on this blog. Come November, throw the bums out. Continue natural term limits through 2012. Repeat as necessary.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

crossposted at Maggies’s Notebook

Oh my, let’s get all indignant on the topic of Wall Street and the liberal pursuit of villains to take the blame for choices made by others. Maureen (Moron) Dowd does her level best to support the Democratic party’s attempt to shift blame. She pans ‘Las Vegas metaphors’ used by POLS in chastising Goldman Sachs while ignoring a basic rule designed to remind consumers of the pitfalls in the marketplace - caveat emptor, let the buyer beware.

According to Princeton’s Wordnet, caveat emptor is described as ‘a commercial principle that without a warranty the buyer takes upon himself the risk of quality.’ Does it get any simpler than that?

From Dowd’s op-ed….

As Americans lost homes and lined up for jobs, Goldman made $13 billion in 2009, and Blankfein got a bonus of, as he haltingly admitted to McCain, “um, um, nine million.”

“The idea that Wall Street came out of this thing just fine, thank you, is something that just grates on people,” Delaware Senator Ted Kaufman told Blankfein. “They think that you didn’t just come out fine because it was luck. They think that you guys just really gamed this thing real, real well.”

Sure, let’s talk about the greed of Wall Street and the bonuses received by Blankfein and others. Never mind the greed of those who were stung by real estate investments they would never have purchased had they performed the due diligence required.

This is no different than the wailing and gnashing of teeth coming from Enron employees who lost their jobs when that house of cards imploded as well as retirement accounts exclusively or largely built around Enron stock. Though one should never place all their investment eggs in one basket, the meteoric rise of Enron stock enticed the greedy to ignore another simple and common concept. If it seems to good to be true it probably is.

Conveniently, Dowd also ignores the role of many politicians steering Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, banking regulators and other government entities toward real estate disaster. A long history of accommodating the notion that everyone should own a home whether they can afford it or not led to ‘no docs’ loans and banking interests scurrying to unload bad mortgages they would not have produced on their own.

While POLS ‘grill’ Goldman Sachs in the US Senate and call for ‘Wall Street reforms’ take a look at Fannie and Freddie now and tell me anything has changed. As for those facing foreclosure since taking a mortgage they cannot afford or others lured by greed during the recent real estate ‘bubble’ POLS advocating more bailouts for bad decisions should be retired in November 2010.

It’s about time people begin taking responsibility for their own failures. Crying foul when you end up on the losing side of a transaction and expecting others to take the blame is childish. Some forget that transactions on Wall Street between buyers and sellers are a zero sum game. For each transaction there is a winner and a loser. Someone posts a gain and someone posts a loss. Get over it or get out.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com

Conservative talkers point to one of many subtle tactics used by liberals regarding their legislative reform proposals. That is beyond the point that they call their legislative agenda, ‘reform’. This week’s propaganda centers on what liberals refer to as ‘wall street reforms.’ They even have the media doing it.

This points to an old and trusted tactic by liberals to manufacture a villain right after creating a crisis. Rahm Emanuel has been quoted as saying, ‘never let a crisis go to waste’ or something similar. That would be especially true if you create the crisis. You might want to ask the Obama Chief of Staff where he acrrued most of his net worth. You can add the Senator from Countrywide, Chris Dodd, to that list. Follow the money, the committees and other congressional career paths to understand what caused the so-called financial crisis.

President Obama and other Democrats would like you to believe that Wall Street is the villain for economic turmoil around the planet over the last few years. Nothing is that simple. But it is a simple idea to create a crisis, invent the villain and pursue the rest of your liberal agenda by convincing the public you are gettin’ the bad guys.

Try this for a simple explanation. Changes were made after the Crash of ‘29′ to ensure what led to the Great Depression never happened again. You might want to study something called Glass-Steagall which was passed in 1932 and repealed in 1999 by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and President Clinton.

You might also consider the Community Reinvestment Act as well as other actions by Congress and the FDIC and Fannie and Freddie, etc. over time. The list can get quite long and like any whodunnit it takes some effort to sort out the mess. Nothing is as simple as Wall Street did it. But President Obama would like you to believe that. So would his cronies who share the blame for much of what happened. And the GOP is certainly not without fault in this. Neither is the general public.

“After a recession that stole eight million jobs, this is going to take some time,” he said. “And this will require that we continue to tackle the underlying problems that caused this turmoil in the first place. In short, it is essential that we learn the lessons of this crisis, or we risk repeating it.”

Barry from DC sounds pretty good in that quote. But then he fails.

Mr. Obama says it is necessary to end taxpayer bailouts of private companies and make financial deals more transparent. “That is how we will restore trust and confidence in our markets,” he said. “That is how we will help to put an end to the cycles of boom and bust that we have seen. And that is how, after two very difficult years, we will not only revive the economy, but help to rebuild it stronger than ever before.”

Look for the phrase ‘help to put an end’ when referring to ‘cycles of boom and bust.’ That’s right Mr President. You may help but it won’t eliminate up and down cycles. And some say your legislation will make things worse not better. One of these days POLS may get the message that when you muddy the waters with politics you have to slow down to prove what you’re saying.

While the GOP may be opposing Dems on general principle if only by accident they have been correct lately.

“It is time for Democrats to put away the political playbook and simply say publicly what they are suggesting privately: that this bill still needs some work, that both parties should come together to do that work on behalf of the American people,” she said.

A little too much political fluff in that statement but we get the point. And the larger point is legislators need to bring proof of concept to the table not just political or any other kind of rhetoric.

As a final note for this post, if Chris Dodd had anything to do with it, throw it out.

Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com