Friday, February 17, 2012
Miscellaneous 115
1) Most sane conservatives and liberals that I've known over the years don't have a problem with moderates. They see them either as a part-time ally or a group of persons who are at the very least "convincible". It's only these insulated preservers of the particular who seem to have a problem with them (and with free thought, in general, too, apparently). And, boy, do they ever have a problem with them.............2) I'd also like to recommend a couple of classic books that thoroughly explore this phenomenon of pathological ideological rigidity. One of them is "The True Believer" by Eric Hoffer and the other is "Escape From Freedom" by Eric Fromm. They're both great books and they really deconstruct this entire ditto-head mentality. Hell, I might even crack them open myself just for a refresher.............3) President Clinton, Robert Rubin, and Lawrence Summers played just as big a role in crafting the Commodities Futures Modernization Act as Senator Gramm did. But, for some strange reason, only Mr. Gramm gets eviscerated by the progressive schmoes. Hm, I really have to wonder why that is - NOT!............4) And I don't buy for one second this whole the Democrats were ambushed bullshit. First of all, nobody complained about it at the time. Nobody said, "Gee, whatever happened to that CFMA that we all of us voted on just a couple of months ago and which a compromise was hammered out in conference and between the Congress and the White House? They did what? They snuck it into an omnibus bill and then they didn't tell us about it? Holy shit, am I ever going to blow a gasket over that!". And, besides, even if not every single Democrat was privy to the action, isn't that the fault of the White House and the Democratic leadership?...I don't know, folks, the way that I see it is that the Democrats here are either culpable, stupid, or derelict. And the fact that they have apologists like David Corn (who, let's face it here, would never make excuses like this for a Republican - EVER) is abominable.............5) Another apologist has asserted that the 50 Republicans (as opposed to only 10 Democrats) who ended up voting no on this, only voted no because of the spending in the bill. Pure speculation. But even if it is true, at least the Republican can say that they actually...read the damn thing! This whole not reading the bill and then bitching about 10 years later stuff is crap, I think.............6) And like I said in the previous post, nobody even knew what a frigging credit swap was back in 2000, and so unless there was a big-time Kreskin or two on the Democratic side back then, I highly doubt that there would have been any major exodus, big time revolt, etc.....Obviously, though, I could be wrong.
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6 comments:
Will: Most sane conservatives and liberals... see [Moderates] either as a part-time ally or a group of persons who are at the very least "convincible".
I see Moderates as a part-time ally or at least convincible. There are only a few specific things about certain specific Moderates that rub me the wrong way. So I focus on those things and you've obviously reached the wrong conclusions about those "not sane" Liberals you refer to. I do NOT consider myself to be suffering from "pathological ideological rigidity".
Will: President Clinton, Robert Rubin, and Lawrence Summers played just as big a role in crafting the Commodities Futures Modernization Act as Senator Gramm did.
I agree concerning Rubin and Summers. I think Bill Clinton just took their advice and Gramm was just doing the bidding of the Financial Services industry.
Will: Nobody said, "Gee, whatever happened to that CFMA that we all of us voted on just a couple of months ago.
They assumed it was dead. I quoted that portion from the David Corn article.
Will: Republicans... who ended up voting no on this, only voted no because of the spending in the bill. Pure speculation. ...at least the Republican can say that they actually read the damn thing!
It was a spending bill from a Democratic president. I think it's a reasonable assumption. Also, I say it is HIGHLY more speculative that they voted NO because the didn't like the changes to the CFMA.
Also, how do you conclude that Republicans read the bill? According to the David Corn article, it wasn't possible that anyone read the revised bill. I'm sure some read large portions of previous versions, but I seriously doubt anyone read the whole thing. There simply wasn't enough time.
Will: And like I said in the previous post, nobody even knew what a frigging credit swap was back in 2000...
I don't remember you saying that. Also, there were Congressional hearings on the topic. If anyone didn't know what they were after the hearings, they could have had their staff look into it.
Why would you hold Congresspersons responsible for reading the full text of a recently revised thousands-of-pages bill that was to be voted on in a short period of time but NOT hold them responsible for knowing what a credit default swap is? I don't get it.
Pathological rigidity is defined by a) never deviating (you never deviate) and b) hero worship (you clearly worship ideologues such as Grayson, Frank, Kucinich, Sanders, Olbermann, etc.).............I've never heard you say a single good word about a single moderate or a single conservative. You lambaste both groups with impunity and regularity.............So, Bill Clinton was essentially a hands-off President. Interesting.............They assumed that it was dead but didn't voice an iota of a complaint for over a decade. Sorry, but CYA/20-20 just doesn't cut it.............I don't know why the 50 Republicans voted against it. I don't know why the 10 Democrats voted against it (not ENOUGH spending?). And I don't know why (and neither do you) the 292 Democrats AND Republicans voted for it.............You don't have to read every page of every bill but you DO have to know basically what's in it prior to voting for or against. I mean, come on, IT'S WHAT WE PAY THEN FOR!............And, I repeat, if any Congressperson didn't know what was in the bill, then that's the fault of the leadership (did those 50 Republicans NOT KNOW that it was in the bill, too?). They're the ones who failed.............Show me specifically in that testimony where the term, credit swap, is used. And, again, no, they don't have to read every word of every page of every bill. They just have to know WHAT they're voting for. Too much to ask?
And like I say in the previous post, the whole thing just might be a moot point. a) The CFMA didn't create the original risk (the actual toxic loans themselves) and b) it might have actually softened the collapse by distributing the risk over investors. It's complicated, isn't it?
A pox up all their poopshoots then (and I don't know why you're saying that, since you're not even sure if deregulation played a role). I never said I approved of anyone not knowing what was in the bill. But I do think David Corn's article was accurate... and it doesn't say Democrats didn't know but Republicans did.
I don't "worship" anyone. I didn't say Bill Clinton was a "hands off" president. I said he listened to advisors (and they gave him bad advice).
You seriously think someone would complain because they didn't know something was in the bill? They'd get attacked (your comment is proof of that).
A pox up all their poop-shoots, I'll take it (though I still blame Greenspan, Paulsen, Geithner and Bernanke the most).
What about George bush? Remember his "ownership society"? He's the one I blame the most.
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