Live 2008 Presidential election thread - McCain v Obama

[Freo Big Fella]

Classy Repubs congratulating Obama on the win. Didn't see that in 2000 or '04 from the other side did we.

 

[KUNG FU]

you obviously dont understand how the health of the financial industry impacts on the health of the overall economy.

Hahahaha yes I do. I teach it at university. Now take your condescending tone and sour grapes and go play with the other boys.

 

[1jasonoz]

Fact, Clinton screwed up and it was only convenient the shit hit the fan when he was long gone. lending products featuring 'honeymoon' rates or payments of only interest in he 1st few years of the loan was the reason for this. the seeds were planted in his administration though his 'Home Ownership Strategy' policy.

Thankgod the plan to let 1st homebuyers tap into their IRA and 401k's to put a down payment wasnt approved, or else, people would have literally lost it all.

Don't try and pass of your opinions as fact ok?

http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2008/04/did-liberals-ca.html

One response to the housing crisis has been to blame a 1977 law that prevents lenders from red-lining or other practices that limit the availability of credit in low-income neighborhoods for the problems. However, the evidence is inconsistent with this idea:

Did Liberals Cause the Sub-Prime Crisis?, by Robert Gordon, TAP: The idea started on the outer precincts of the right. Thomas DiLorenzo, an economist who calls Ron Paul "the Jefferson of our time," wrote in September that the housing crisis is "the direct result of thirty years of government policy that has forced banks to make bad loans to un-creditworthy borrowers." The policy DiLorenzo decries is the 1977 Community Reinvestment Act, which requires banks to lend throughout the communities they serve.

The Blame-CRA theme bounced around the right-wing Freerepublic.com. In January it figured in a Washington Times column. In February, a Cato Institute affiliate named Stan Liebowitz picked up the critique in a New York Post op-ed headlined "The Real Scandal: How the Feds Invented the Mortgage Mess." On The National Review's blog, The Corner, John Derbyshire channeled Liebowitz: "The folk losing their homes? are victims not of 'predatory lenders,' but of government-sponsored -- in fact government-mandated -- political correctness."

Last week, a more careful expression of the idea hit The Washington Post, in an article on former Sen. Phil Gramm's influence over John McCain. ... [T]he Brookings Institution's Robert Litan ... suggested that the 1990s enhancement of CRA, which was achieved over Gramm's fierce opposition, may have contributed to the current crisis. "If the CRA had not been so aggressively pushed," Litan said, "it is conceivable things would not be quite as bad. People have to be honest about that." ...

The revisionists say the problem wasn't too little regulation; but too much, via CRA. The law was enacted in response to both intentional redlining and structural barriers to credit for low-income communities. CRA applies only to banks and thrifts that are federally insured; it's conceived as a quid pro quo for that privilege. This means the law doesn't apply to independent mortgage companies (or payday lenders, check-cashers, etc.)

The law imposes on the covered depositories an affirmative duty to lend throughout the areas from which they take deposits, including poor neighborhoods. The law has teeth... Studies ... have shown that CRA increased lending and homeownership in poor communities without undermining banks' profitability.

But CRA has always had critics... Rhetoric aside, the argument turns on a simple question: In the current mortgage meltdown, did lenders approve bad loans to comply with CRA, or to make money?

The evidence strongly suggests the latter. First, consider timing. CRA was enacted in 1977. The sub-prime lending at the heart of the current crisis exploded a full quarter century later. ... In late 2004, the Bush administration announced plans to sharply weaken CRA regulations... Yet sub-prime lending continued, and even intensified -- at the very time ... the law had weakened.

Second, it is hard to blame CRA for the mortgage meltdown when CRA doesn't even apply to most of the loans that are behind it. ... Perhaps one in four sub-prime loans were made by the institutions fully governed by CRA.

Most important, the lenders subject to CRA have engaged in less, not more, of the most dangerous lending. Janet Yellen, president of the San Francisco Federal Reserve, offers the killer statistic: Independent mortgage companies, which are not covered by CRA, made high-priced loans at more than twice the rate of the banks and thrifts. With this in mind, Yellen specifically rejects the "tendency to conflate the current problems in the sub-prime market with CRA-motivated lending." ...

Yellen is hardly alone... One of the only regulators who long ago saw the current crisis coming was the late Ned Gramlich... But Gramlich praised CRA...

It's telling that, amid all the recent recriminations, even lenders have not fingered CRA. That's because CRA didn't bring about the reckless lending at the heart of the crisis. Just as sub-prime lending was exploding, CRA was losing force... And the worst offenders, the independent mortgage companies, were never subject to CRA -- or any federal regulator. Law didn't make them lend. The profit motive did. ...

A little thing called greed was/is thr main factor behind the crisis, not the democrats!!

 

[Strike Swiftly]

Congrats Obama. Make a difference.

 

[camsmith]

Guys I am still worried he is going to have no life. He will have so much security that he wont have a life, these ****ing red necks etc will be gunning for him harder now.

Seriously, thats all you can think of? He is the first multi-race president and you're negative?

Bush wasn't exactly liked by many. The hatred for him would rival hatred for Obama by racists.

Go and get laid, for christs sake.

Great contribution to the thread.

 

[DaveW]

Colorado puts Obama over 300!

Obama 306
McCain 145

 

[1jasonoz]

Classy Repubs congratulating Obama on the win. Didn't see that in 2000 or '04 from the other side did we.

Can only hope he is a successful president that continues the tradition of America doing good in the world. I have my doubts but wish him well.

You truely are a conservative with NFI!

 

[sherb]

They give the impression that the person making the commont only believes in democracy when their side wins.

???

Bush was a disgraceful president in my view and for him to be re-elected reflected poorly on the US as a country.

It doesn`t mean for a minute that I believe any less in the democratic process itself.

I had little respect for the decision the US public made in 2004 - it had nothing to do with my respect for the democratic process.

They are two entirely separate issues.

 

[peternorth]

http://www.foxnews.com/video2/live.html?chanId=11

obamas name mentioned in mccains opening greeted with boos

 

[DaveW]

Obama miles ahead in Nevada.

When do we get a call?

 

[weagles_fan]

I think I'm right in asking how many weeks does he have left?

 

[morgoth]

McCain conceding.

 

[camsmith]

Don't try and pass of your opinions as fact ok?

A little thing called greed was/is thr main factor behind the crisis, not the democrats!!

hmm...

Since 2001, the Bush Administration issued 34 warnings to Congress about the need to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac before it caused substantial economic turmoil in the financial markets. However, they met continual opposition by Congressional Democrats who feared that tighter regulations on lenders would disqualify low-income applicants from affordable housing.

The detailed time-line of events below demonstrates that the collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was preventable if Congress were more receptive and responsive to the warnings of expert analysis.

In 1938, Fannie Mae was established by an act of Congress to provide liquidity to the mortgage market during an economic crisis known as the Great Depression.

In 1970, over three decades later, Freddie Mac was established by an act of Congress to counteract Fannie Mae's growing monopoly of the secondary mortgage market.

In 1977, the Carter Administration passed the Community Reinvestment Act that required banks to offer an even disbursement of credit throughout the financial market in an attempt to curb past lending practices that targeted more desirable markets. At the time, republican critics charged that such an act would impose unnecessary regulatory burdens on lending institutions and distort credit markets by forcing banks to offer loans to under-qualified applicants.

In 1995, the Clinton Administration pushed even harder to increase the supply of affordable housing to low-income families by offering performance-based incentives. According to economist Stan Liebowitz, these developments led to a loosening of lending standards that required no verification of income or assets, little consideration of the applicant's ability to make payments, and no down payment payments. The net effect was an inevitable collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac at the cost of its investors.

In April of 2001, the Bush Administration first red flagged Fannie and Freddie stating that "financial trouble of a large GSE could cause strong repercussions in financial markets, affecting Federally insured entities and economic activity."

http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2008/10/04/the-story-of-freddie-and-fannie/

 

[Strike Swiftly]

mccain is speaking very graciously and I applaud him.

 

[apollo_creed]

Go and get laid, for christs sake.

haha, funniest thing I've read on here for a long time.

 

[Clay Davis]

McCain's speech is brilliant so far.

Florida went to Obama.

 

[DaveW]

Florida in the Obama basket:

Obama 333
McCain 145

 

[WhyAlwaysMe]

haha look at the Rednecks at McCains speech.

 

[midorigreenwood]

hehehe, all that booing at the mccain concession speech......

secret muslim terrorist enabling activist judge appointer....

alot of bomb shelters going to be built me thinks

 

[SunKing]

Seriously, thats all you can think of? He is the first multi-race president and you're negative?

Not negative ,concerned for his well being like all of us.

The Mac is GONE

 

[DaveW]

Nice concession speech by McCain.

Seems to have genuinely swung the mood of the crowd too.

 

[peternorth]

mccain is speaking very graciously and I applaud him.

agreed.

 

[jimmyn13]

Seriously, thats all you can think of? He is the first multi-race president and you're negative?

Bush wasn't exactly liked by many. The hatred for him would rival hatred for Obama by racists.



Great contribution to the thread.

I love how fox news etc are all making sure to call him the first 'multi racial' president. Heaven forbid he's called the first black president.

 

[Dippers Donuts]

Oh yeah.

I'm speechless.

Just f***ing brilliant.

Well done America, I can now start to believe in you again.

McCain showing some of the dignity he discarded during the campaign in his concession speech. Classy.

 

[Alpha1]

Good speech by McCain, very classy Mr. McCain