As people keep watching this economic crises unfold we keep hearing that Bush is going to declare martial law. But Bush has no control over the Democratic Congress and it’s the Democrats who control this “bail out” not the Republicans. The Democrats also control the war in Iraq. So this Congressman says the Republicans have been shut out of the bail out legislation and nobody has any idea as to what is in the bail out bill. There are hints that much of it has little to do with bailing out anything but is a money grab. And what is all this about Pelosi declaring martial law?
Support the Blog — Buy This Book!
For Kindle and with free ePub version. Only $9.49 Great reading.
Here is what Gary Shapiro CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) said: Dvorak's writing sings with insight and clarity. Whether or not you agree with John's views, he will get you thinking and is never boring. These essays are worth the read!
Put this ad on your blog!
Syndicate
Subscribe to Main Blog feed here:
Subscribe to Comments too (below):
Junk Email Filter
Yeah, Freddie and fannie are all Republicans faults….. http://tinyurl.com/3jdn9e
Oopsie, the NYT in 1999 speaks of Fannie Mae: “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.”
Why, do you ask? Well, from the same article: “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”
But yeah, Bush is to blame for the mortgage crisis.
Calm down… “Martial Law” in this context refers to a parliamentary procedure in the House of Representatives. Rule XIII(6)(a) provides that a resolution (called a rule) reported by the Rules Committee cannot be considered by the House on the same legislative day that the rule is reported (except by a two-thirds vote of the House). This is supposed to ensure that Members of the House and the public have at least one day to examine and analyze what is in legislation before they have to debate and vote on it.
This extraordinary procedure is known as a “martial law” rule because it suspends the normal procedures and safeguards and allows the House Leadership to operate in a more authoritarian fashion.
I suspect that the gentleman from Texas was seeking to evoke exactly this sort of reaction.
#31, just another inconvenient truth that the libtards have chosen to ignore.
#16 I understand you are a wise person but have you considered the Democrat led congress has almost literally had a gun held to its head. They have made several attempts to end, or at least limit the war, while the Republican “minority” along with Pres. Bush have done everything they can to continue the Iraq war. The President, with his veto proof “minority” wields more power than the Democrats. The only alternative would be to not vote for any funds, effectively putting a screeching halt to the conflict and creating who knows what in the world political situation. Admittedly, both sides have done their share of political posturing, but the Republican side has been the perpetrator continuing the war.
As far as the economy is concerned, the conservative supply side economic thought is you can borrow your way out of poverty. This effectively works to create a polarized class structure. You encourage people to buy more and more things they don’t really need to live a happy and healthy life. Instead of paying cash for the goods, credit is extended. More and more of the debt is backed up only by the interest paid on the debt while the balance sheets of the manufacturers show more and more product going out the door. More product, more profits! There’s more money for the owners, CEOs, and Wall Street skimmers. The problem is, the money the Top is stripping off is not backed up by anything tangible. It is only the interest and small amount of principle being paid on the debt. Sure there is all this “stuff” floating around out there, but it goes without saying, once the box is opened, it is no longer worth anything near what was paid for it. What has happened now is the Top has reached a point where there is little left to skim off because the value of the assets has dropped so far below the value of the money borrowed against them, nobody is willing to stop eating to continue to pay for them.
What’s the solution for the Top? Borrow more money from someone with deeper pockets. Who is that? You guessed it, the Feds, AKA the taxpayers. The average person still does not have more money to spend but their debt is instantly increased without much control on their part. Steal a penny from every bank account in America and you soon will have millions in your pocket. The only solution for the average person is the only use the amount of credit you can pay off without going deeper into a hole. Pay off debt before you have to. Pay as little in interest as you possibly can. Don’t replace things you own until they can no longer be used. Have fewer kids, make sure they get a good education and understand what you do about economics and the world. Enjoy life and don’t waste all your money trying to extend your earthly presence beyond what it was meant to last.
This could go on forever, as the problem is way more complex than a few paragraphs can explain. The war economy is a whole other, yet related, story.
#31 – Calin
From the article you cited:
”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.”
What Fannie and Freddie (and the CRA) were encouraging were selling cheap houses to lower-income (but credit-worthy) people who were “a notch below” premium credit scores.
Not selling $600,000 McMansions to people making $65,000/yr (many of whom ended up defaulting on their mortgages), or homes in the Hamptons to ghetto dwellers.
If it were just poor people from the ghetto who were defaulting, nobody would give a f&ck. They’d be kicked out of their houses, denied welfare and a bed at the homeless shelter, and that would be that.
The upwardly-mobile dimwits who bought way beyond their means (as well as the paper-shufflers and money-changers who profit off their mortgages and their endless re-fis) that are the reason this thing has caused a global meltdown.
Trying to blame this on poor people, the CRA, or Fannie and Fredie is delusionalism at its worst.
#34 Scamp said, “They have made several attempts to end, or at least limit the war, while the Republican “minority” along with Pres. Bush have done everything they can to continue the Iraq war. The President, with his veto proof “minority” wields more power than the Democrats.”
All Pelosi & dems had to do was NOT vote FOR war spending. That’s it. No bill sent to the Pres to sign = no more war.
Do you understand this SIMPLE concept?
#36 – Paddy-O
>>All Pelosi & dems had to do was NOT vote FOR
>>war spending. That’s it. No bill sent to the
>>Pres to sign = no more war.
Are you talking about the initial authorization, or subsequent spending bills?
The first time around, most of those who voted “for the war” were naive, and apparently didn’t realize Dumbya’s uncontrollable urge to go to war, no matter what the facts. They thought that he would actually honor the language in the bill (stupid, stupid, stupid).
As to the subsequent authorizations, well. Even an anti-war nut like myself recognizes that they can’t very well (or at least couldn’t back then) just pack up and leave in one fell swoop. “We” got ourselves into this mess, and now “we” have to find a way out of it.
Unfortunately, Dumbya and his cronies have no interest in getting out of it, they still semm to be in denial in thinking that somehow Iraq is going to become the next Greenwich CT, with prosperity, democracy, and happiness abounding. The whole campaign has been a rat’s nest of deceit, lies, cover-ups, and incompetence.
An NO politician is ever going to go back home saying “yep, I voted against supplying armor for the Humvees and body armor or medical care for the troops”.
#36, do you understand the simple concept that even the Dems understood the chaos that would ensue if such a move was made? Bush couldn’t find his veto pen until the Democrats got their majority and tried to limit his powers.
#38 You didn’t answer the question. Do you know that the Dems could have ENDED the wars without the Repubs being able to stop them?
Yes or no.
Waiting…
I THINK…
martial law in this context means that any
important bill sent to the floor needs to allow the house (or whichever) 24hrs to be able to read the bill before voting on it..
when they institute martial law on the house floor, its basically a tactic to ram thru a bill thru the house without anyone being given time to read and digest it. -it suspends the normal rules of the house..
i may be off, but i think that is the basic “gist” of it…
NOW…for real martial law…NSPD-51 bush wrote
in may of last year, allows him to institute martial law *without* approval from anyone in congress during time of any crisis foreign or domestic, natural or man made, that threatens the stability etc of USA. -it also gives him the power to suspend elections indefinitely until such time that he deems the crisis is over..etc..
it creates a new executive branch that need only “work” with congress, not seek or get approval from them… it allows this new branch to take control of ALL “critical” infrastructures/industries, communications, medical, military etc… also..there is a secret annex that not even congress is allowed to see attached to it…
and note: strangely this PD is not listed with all the other presidential directives bush has wrote during his time in office…only place you find it is in a white house press release.
mostly because when you read it..it basicaly
gives him dictatorship powers, i gather..
its a quick read..
read it here:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/05/print/20070509-12.html
-s
#37 Mr. Mustard, “An NO politician is ever going to go back home saying “yep, I voted against supplying armor for the Humvees and body armor or medical care for the troops”.”
You & I voted 2 years ago to overthrow the Repubs in Congress by working to get Dems in to end the war as per Pelosi’s campaign. (I’m making assumptions I know)
Now, would you have been happy about your rep for refusing to continue the war?
Neither would I have been.
Like the saying goes, “fool me once …”
They lost my vote by not doing what they promised and the promise is why I voted for them…
ps
mind you the language of nspd51 is extremely vague(like all most all the major bills/acts that have rammed thru(patriot act etc)
under its language…this economic crisis definitely would allow him to activate nspd-51 if he chose to do so..
-s
#42 “mind you the language of nspd51 is extremely vague(like all most all the major bills/acts that have rammed thru(patriot act etc)”
This isn’t a law and does not have the power of law.
#39 Of course the answer is yes. I could also help solve the over population problem by putting a gun to my head. The real question is how do you end a war where both sides win? Or do we accept that both sides have to lose?
#44 “The real question is how do you end a war where both sides win? Or do we accept that both sides have to lose?”
I don’t care as long as we get the hell out of there. In Vietnam we could have stayed forever and not have won.
The Iraqi’s want to kill each other. It’s not a real country. There’s nothing we can do to change that FACT.
#20.
So the Republicans would like to see a more generous payout to Wall Street, but later they will spin it to the electorate that they were against the bailout?
It would be funny if an appropriate number of Democrats absented themselves from the votes (is that allowed?) so that the measure fails in both houses. Or simply vote against the motion. But not enough to defeat it, if all the Republicans vote yes. A roll call vote, if such a thing is allowed, could become dramatic.
A famous Aries said:
“The most effectual means of preventing the perversion of power into tyranny are to illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large, and more especially to give them knowledge of those facts which history exhibits, that possessed thereby of the experience of other ages and countries, they may be enabled to know ambition under all its shapes, and prompt to exert their natural powers to defeat its purposes.”
– Thomas Jefferson
#45 Paddy-O
my friend, -its another name for executive order.. ie:
“Presidential directives are a form of executive order issued by the President of the United States with the advice and consent of the National Security Council. As a form of executive order, a Presidential Directive has the “full force and effect of law.”
-s
#48 Nice wiki quote. Now quote the actual LAW that says they have the force of law.
You do know than an original law would be required for that, right?
Geez, John, for such an obviously intelligent guy, you sure post some idiotic political arguments. It’s all been explained to you above, so I’m not gonna bother, but man. Get a grip.
To have martial law, you have to have some sort of crisis show up that allows it to happen. While complaining about Bush and the Right doing this, it is actually the Left that plans on this sort of thing.
In The Nation in 1966
By crisis, we mean a publicly visible disruption in some institutional sphere. Crisis can occur spontaneously (e.g., riots) or as the intended result of tactics of demonstration and protest which either generate institutional disruption or bring unrecognized disruption to public attention.
http://tinyurl.com/4dzmmq
Well, let’s see, the pieces are falling into place:
Bush wants to be a DICTATOR,
Now has US Army Units in America training for “Domestic Operations”,
Has established and paid for with our tax money, a PRIVATE ARMY OF MERCENARIES – BLACKWATER,
And now has the “Wall Street Finacial Crisis” to use like 9/11 !!!
Watch out if Bush starts growing a Schickelgruber-like mustache !!!
#52 JimD “Well, let’s see, the pieces are falling into place: Bush wants to be a DICTATOR,”
Don’t worry, the libs have ensured that the citizenry of this country is well armed to enable them to resist tyrants like this…
#53 – Paddy-O
>>Don’t worry, the libs have ensured that the
>>citizenry of this country is well armed to
>>enable them to resist tyrants like this…
Yeah. I know that when the Special Forces and Sherman tanks and soldiers armed with RPGs show up in MY front yard, I’m going to take out every last one of the bastards with my .38 special six-shooter.
Yee-haw!!
#54 “I’m going to take out every last one of the bastards with my .38 special six-shooter.”
Yep, because that pea shooter is all the libs have let you own…
#49 Padd-O
-ugh..i’ll dig up the offical “stuff”
my main PC mainboard died 2weeks ago..it has
all the docs and links i saved to support
the above.
i assembled a makeshift pc from parts lying around the house..300mhz celeron with a failing 20gb drive and 128mb ram, so its *very* slow surfing atm..
main pc is all Sata II connects. none if its hardware works in the makeshift pc..
give me some time…i’ll get what you requested.
-s
#56 Cool.
If you know the and or name of the bill I can search online.
#55 – Paddy-O
>>Yep, because that pea shooter is all the
>>libs have let you own…
Ah, Paddy-O. Perpetrating the NRA myth that personal weaponry will protect you from the gummint.
Left-wingnut liberal whack0 that I may be, I’ve owned a lot of guns in my time, including some serious firepower. (.454 Casull, .44 Magnum revolver, .45 1911-AI semi-automatic, Thompson/ Center Contender (30-06 cartridge), 10 gauge shotgun, even a .40 caliber Glock 27 Sub-Compact, nasty little f&cker that it was).
I was also a card-carrying member of the NRA.
And even at the height of my arms stockpiling, never for a split second was I under the delusion that if the gummint wanted to get me, I would not be gotten. The best I could have hoped for was a Ruby Ridge or Waco situation. And I’d still lose.
#58
Serious firepower is a Browning M2.
Give it up. You don’t want citizens to really be able to protect themselves from the gov’t, do you?
#59 – O’Furniture
>>Serious firepower is a Browning M2.
>>Give it up. You don’t want citizens to really
>>be able to protect themselves from the gov’t,
>>do you?
Well, Paddy O’Furniture, if you like the .50 caliber arms, I also had a .50 caliber Desert Eagle. I got rid of it, though, as it hurt my hand to shoot it and the ammo was too expensive.
You’re right though, I never had a machine gun. Those damned libs made it too hard to get one legally.
No matter. If the gummint comes for me, there’s just no way they’re not going to get me, no matter HOW MUCH weaponry I have in my home/ survival shelter. That’s a myth perpetrated by the NRA, gun manufacturers, and right-wing kooks.
Maybe OK for scaring away a burgler, or more likely having your kid shoot one of his friends or himself. Worthless when it comes to driving away the marauding forces of the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, FBI, ATF, and local law enforcement though.