During World War II, the American Military came up with a creative plan to deal with soldiers who had mental problems in combat. They moved them behind enemy lines out of earshot. of gunfire; gave them clean clothes, good food, a chance to talk about things, and a "ration of rum;" then they sent them […]
The era of greed and irresponsibility on Wall Street and in Washington has created a financial crisis as profound as any we have faced since the Great Depression. Congress and the President are debating a bailout of our financial institutions with a price tag of $700 billion or more in taxpayer dollars. We cannot underestimate […]
Bush Mouthpiece Admits: They’ve Been Sitting on this Plan Hidden in an article reporting that Cheney’s going to go hunt up some support for the $700,000,000,000 bailout is this admission that the Bush Administration has been sitting on it for some time: Fratto insisted that the plan was not slapped together and had been drawn […]
In 1960, The Conscience of a Conservative was published by Barry Goldwater, then Senator from Arizona. Interestingly, though the book catapulted him to the Republican Candidacy for President in 1964, he didn’t write it: The book was ghostwritten by L. Brent Bozell Jr., brother-in-law of William F. Buckley. Bozell had been Goldwater’s speechwriter in the […]
John McCain and the Lying Game by Joe Klein Politics has always been lousy with blather and chicanery. But there are rules and traditions too. In the early weeks of the general-election campaign, a consensus has grown in the political community — a consensus that ranges from practitioners like Karl Rove to commentators like, well, […]
I woke up this morning in something of a "state." Part of the stimulus were these two statements by our outgoing, soon to be former, President: "There will be ample opportunity to debate the origins of this problem," Mr. Bush said in the Rose Garden on Friday. "Now is the time to solve it." "We […]
Bush Backs Unlimited Compensation For Disgraced CEOs: Now Is Not The Time For ‘Punitive Measures’ Today, the White House released a statement criticizing Congress’s potential plan to limit CEO compensation at the companies the federal government is bailing out, firmly standing against any “punitive measures”: We certainly understand and are sympathetic to the sentiment regarding […]
The causes of The Great Depression that gripped the world in the 1930’s were multiple, still being debated among economists, but one major factor was how debt and credit had been managed in the 1920’s. Here’s one version [from Wikipedia]: … in the 1920s, American consumers and businesses relied on cheap credit, the former to […]
A couple of weeks ago it seemed okay for me to say "I don’t know much about the economy," or so I thought. As things are playing out, it was anything but okay. Up until a few weeks ago, I knew that lending institutions had allowed people to buy property who had no money to […]
Barack in Charlotte, NC: "The stakes are too high" Because while I certainly don’t fault Senator McCain for all of the problems we’re facing right now, I do fault the economic philosophy he’s followed during his 26 years in Washington. It’s a philosophy that says it’s ok to turn a blind eye to practices that […]