Michigan becomes 24th right-to-work state

[HenryReardon]

Well unfortunately I worked in an accounting office throughout the entire debacle and I saw the ENDLESS e-mails and faxes of requests coming in from CountryWide and other agencies asking us to simply verify that we prepared a tax return for x person-- no income verification--- so that they could close their homeloan.

Over 90% of these people were middle or upper middle class white people buying investment properties with dollar signs in their eyes knowing full well they couldn't afford the mortgage long term and weren't planning to, they were planning on dumping it back off in 6 months when the house had gone up $200,000 in value.

Don't give me this absolute bullcrap that the housing crisis was poor first-time black homeowners getting unreal loans for $70,000 houses in economically depressed areas.

And they wouldn't have been able to invest in spec housing if the government hadn't created the climate for it.

[Rolyo85]

It always amazes me when liberals call someone a conservative Republican just because said person dares to disagree with their warped view of society and reality, or just because said person opposes what a left-wing president does. As the saying goes, "One should never assume, because it makes an ass out of you and me."

When you try to repeat somebody else's post structure, please read the words correctly. Also, I call people conservative republicans, when they repeat talking points instead of showing critical thinking. Opposition requires a personal opinion, repeating what you read on Breitbarf isn't opposition. It's being a lemming.

[xbuzzerx]

And they wouldn't have been able to invest in spec housing if the government hadn't created the climate for it.

It is AMAZING to me how fast the "personal accountability" rhetoric goes way out the window the moment that free market opportunism has created a crisis that hurt everyone. It's then the government's fault.

[HenryReardon]

It is AMAZING to me how fast the "personal accountability" rhetoric goes way out the window the moment that free market opportunism has created a crisis that hurt everyone. It's then the government's fault.

It's always the government's fault - at least 99.44% of the time.

[Rolyo85]

It's always the government's fault - at least 99.44% of the time.

How can you stand to live in a country where you hate your own government so much? That is completely unfathomable to me...

[xbuzzerx]

It's always the government's fault - at least 99.44% of the time.

Let's be clear though. Having stipulations for low income first time homebuyers to get credit and then saying an entire loan and banking industry colluding to give out knowingly bad loans and hide them shredded up into fraudulently triple-A rated investment packages around the world is like saying it's the government's fault that matches are legal and x amount of people commit arson insurance fraud every year.

The Fannie Mae thing is a total red herring, the issue was not enough regulation and oversight of the subprime industry and particularly the INVESTMENTS as the collusion between those two industries enabled both of them to profit and shift the liability off on the taxpayer (ultimately.) If either step along the way had been properly regulated the entire fiasco wouldn't have been possible. The fact that the people seeking the rating on their investments are also the one paying the companies that give the ratings was also a pretty big LOL.

But yes, let's blame it all on first time inner city homeowner lending policies... clearly that was what made this all happen and forced fraud and greed up on the poor poor innocent shareholders and executives of CountryWide and Wall Street who simply had to engage in massive fraud when they knew they could profit off of it.

[HenryReardon]

The Fannie Mae thing is a total red herring, the issue was not enough regulation and oversight of the subprime industry and particularly the .

t.

Without the backing of Freddie Mac/Fannie Mae the bad mortgages could not have been issued.

Are you totally unaware of the fact that banks were being threatened by the gov to make loans in areas that had previously been redlined?

[xbuzzerx]

Without the backing of Freddie Mac/Fannie Mae the bad mortgages could not have been issued.

Are you totally unaware of the fact that banks were being threatened by the gov to make loans in areas that had previously been redlined?

Are you totally unaware of the fact that inner city low income people buying their first home weren't the ones speculatively over-mortgaging by a factor of 4x what they could afford? Boom speculators were, and most often not with their primary home.

[Jack Springer]

^^^

Prove it.

[xbuzzerx]

^^^

Prove it.

I'm not going to scour the net for links to things for people have absolutely proven they completely disregard facts or figures. It's a waste of time.

If there was the thinnest shred of intellectual integrity to your request for data I'd go to the bother.

[HenryReardon]

Are you totally unaware of the fact that inner city low income people buying their first home weren't the ones speculatively over-mortgaging by a factor of 4x what they could afford? Boom speculators were, and most often not with their primary home.

There is this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortgage_discrimination

and this

http://dailycaller.com/2012/09/03/wi...can-americans/

and this

http://www.capitalnewyork.com/articl...risis-not-bank

just for openers.

[Jack Springer]

I'm not going to scour the net for links to things for people have absolutely proven they completely disregard facts or figures. It's a waste of time.

If there was the thinnest shred of intellectual integrity to your request for data I'd go to the bother.

So you statement was false.

[HenryReardon]

So you statement was false.

And we shouldn't forget one very important factor. When the standards were lowered for poor people, it opened the floodgates for the rampant speculation in houses that has been mentioned.

All because liberals in government decided to buy the votes of people at the lower end of the socieo-economic scale.

[rareboy]

Neutral people are generally not disparaging, especially not when its only to one side. That's why you aren't very convincing.

You've noticed this too?

It is like the faux fence sitters who try to pretend their minds aren't made up, thinking that as others see their 'journey' through an issue they will be won over by the oleaginous logic and talking points to the posters own a priori conclusion.

The 'I'm not racist, but....'

The 'I don't hate Obama, but...'

The 'My mind is not made up, but.....'

[palemale]

It always amazes me when liberals call someone a conservative Republican just because said person dares to disagree with their warped view of society and reality, or just because said person opposes what a left-wing president does. As the saying goes, "One should never assume, because it makes an ass out of you and me."

I referred to you as a conservative Republican not because you disagreed with my view of society and reality, but because you were parroting conservative Republican talking points. You didn't criticize President Obama from the perspective of a libertarian, marxist, moderate Republican or Democrat or based on any other discernible view point. If it walks like a duck, quacks likes a duck and swims like a duck, one can fairly assume it is a duck.

[palemale]

Let's not overlook the fact that Federal bureaucrats were pushing banks to lend money in certain areas - pushing hard, complete with threats.

There's so much blame to go around, and the roots of the crisis go back at least to Jimmy Carter.

In any case, it was Bush's economy only in the sense that he was POTUS at the time.

You overlook the real cause of the economic crisis. The use of derivatives and credit default swaps skyrocketed during the Bush years, with barely a peep from federal regulators. These exotic instruments resulted in bad loans being split up and sold as securities to investors who were lulled into a false sense of security by corrupt rating agencies who rated them as safe investments. Banks like Goldman Sacs knew they were selling securities that were worthless piles of shit. These instruments gave banks and the mortgage industry had an incentive to give mortgages to people who could never pay them back because they earned fees, but broke up the mortgages and sold them to unsuspecting investors because those making the loans ended up with no exposure when the borrowers defaulted on the mortgages.

Naked greed, aided and abetted by an "anti-regulation" do-nothing administration, wrecked the economy. The myth of Barney Frank and Fannie and Freddie destroying the economy is no more true than creationsim. Republicans continue to live in a fact free zone. That is why they will likely go the way of the Whigs.

[HenryReardon]

. The myth of Barney Frank and Fannie and Freddie destroying the economy is no more true than creationsim. .

Continue to live in lotus-land if you like, but some of us know better than to succumb.

[xbuzzerx]

So you statement was false.

No, I just am not going to spend 40 minutes preparing links for someone who has demonstrated time and again that when presented with hard facts he's either going to ignore them or leave and not respond. It is what I said-- a waste of time.

You overlook the real cause of the economic crisis. The use of derivatives and credit default swaps skyrocketed during the Bush years, with barely a peep from federal regulators. These exotic instruments resulted in bad loans being split up and sold as securities to investors who were lulled into a false sense of security by corrupt rating agencies who rated them as safe investments. Banks like Goldman Sacs knew they were selling securities that were worthless piles of shit. These instruments gave banks and the mortgage industry had an incentive to give mortgages to people who could never pay them back because they earned fees, but broke up the mortgages and sold them to unsuspecting investors because those making the loans ended up with no exposure when the borrowers defaulted on the mortgages.

Naked greed, aided and abetted by an "anti-regulation" do-nothing administration, wrecked the economy. The myth of Barney Frank and Fannie and Freddie destroying the economy is no more true than creationsim. Republicans continue to live in a fact free zone. That is why they will likely go the way of the Whigs.

This. What I said remains valid, saying that policies meant to enable low income first-time homebuyers to get credit in former redline district somehow forced the hand of the entire apparatus of Wall Street and the subprime industry to engage in a massive tsunami of housing speculation and uncollectible loans to people buying 2nd or 3rd investment properties in high housing value areas is the same as saying "matches are legal, it's therefore the government's fault that people burn down their houses to defraud insurance companies."

Only in this case the insurance company was the taxpayer, and Wall Street and the real estate financing industry in general made enormous profit off willful defrauding of the securities sector.

Henry, your position is basically unworthy of credibility to me when on any other issue regulations or government action of any kind would be the "problem", but when the lack of regulation allowed massive fraud by private industries for private profit, it's still the government's fault. Basically at this point I have no reason to believe your position wouldn't be "it's the government's fault" on any issue regardless of the circumstances, you more or less already said so a few posts ago, so like the Israel discussion--- what is the point of discussing these topics with you? Your position is going to pop out like a prewritten fortune cookie message any of us could predict so I fail to see the point.

[Rolyo85]

Continue to live in lotus-land if you like, but some of us know better than to succumb.

Some of you know very little about anything actually. Which is why all your posts are copy-pasted from other people's opinions. Cause you got none of your own.

[HenryReardon]

Some of you know very little about anything actually. Which is why all your posts are copy-pasted from other people's opinions. Cause you got none of your own.

Oh dear. Did I strike a nerve when I tossed a few actual cold hard facts into the equation? quel dommage.

[rareboy]

Some of you know very little about anything actually. Which is why all your posts are copy-pasted from other people's opinions. Cause you got none of your own.

Life is so much easier when FOX, Rush and BreitBarf just keep telling you what to say in a C&P forum.

[xbuzzerx]

Oh dear. Did I strike a nerve when I tossed a few actual cold hard facts into the equation? quel dommage.

More like an in-denial scapegoat argument to maintain the integrity of a capitalism-doesn't-have-bad-points-or-accountability, blame-gub'mint worldview. Facts, not so much.

[Rolyo85]

Oh dear. Did I strike a nerve when I tossed a few actual cold hard facts into the equation? quel dommage.

You tossed what where now? I am sorry, I must have missed them among all the nonsense. Would you care to point me at them specifically? I would be ever so grateful

[cocksucker4use]

From personal experience, my first job out of school was with the University of Illinois Hospitals. I was an RN working on a medical floor. Talk about workin your ass off. We had a nurse's union. Nurses got annual increases based on the contract. Coworkers who were non-union professionals (like occupational therapists) hadn't had a raise in three years. When their annual reviews were coming due, they were notified that the review date was pushed back six months -- six different times! No review, no pay. Anybody who thinks that corporations give a flying fuck about their employees is delusional. Who does the work and produces the widgets to sate a piggy marketplace in order to further engorge the stockholders? As long as management can find cheap labor and treat them anyway they want, they don't have to become innovative, they don't have to devise ways to increase productivity and profitablility. Just hire and fire muppets to compensate for greed and incompetence. So, conserative JUBBERS, champions of freedom, consider this. Industry hires low skilled workers at a big discount, and doesn't have to give them insurance or retirement benefits. Little or no time off. Poor or no healthcare for them and their issue. They spend a lifetime working for peanuts, barely feeding their families who are going on to be a permanant underclass. They get sick, disabled, old....what do have?? A bunch of lazy assholes looking for entitlements!? Well, anyway, that settles the immigrant labor problem. Who needs them, when we have unorganized laborers willing to work for whatever. Only better these are documented slugs who have social security numbers, so we can tax what little we give them....while the ten figure execs pay nothing into the system. Cuz, well, they create the jobs, right? And they pay a disproportinate amount of sales tax. Jeez.

[xbuzzerx]

^ YUP.

The reality of the non-union workplace is get the money you need when you are hired, don't count on raises. If you get them they're rare, way overdue, and if they surpass inflation you got lucky. This is a huge part of why people my age are switching jobs much more often. They're never going to squeeze raises out of their employers generally speaking.

[Jack Springer]

From personal experience, my first job out of school was with the University of Illinois Hospitals. I was an RN working on a medical floor. Talk about workin your ass off. We had a nurse's union. Nurses got annual increases based on the contract. Coworkers who were non-union professionals (like occupational therapists) hadn't had a raise in three years. When their annual reviews were coming due, they were notified that the review date was pushed back six months -- six different times! No review, no pay. Anybody who thinks that corporations give a flying fuck about their employees is delusional. Who does the work and produces the widgets to sate a piggy marketplace in order to further engorge the stockholders? As long as management can find cheap labor and treat them anyway they want, they don't have to become innovative, they don't have to devise ways to increase productivity and profitablility. Just hire and fire muppets to compensate for greed and incompetence. So, conserative JUBBERS, champions of freedom, consider this. Industry hires low skilled workers at a big discount, and doesn't have to give them insurance or retirement benefits. Little or no time off. Poor or no healthcare for them and their issue. They spend a lifetime working for peanuts, barely feeding their families who are going on to be a permanant underclass. They get sick, disabled, old....what do have?? A bunch of lazy assholes looking for entitlements!? Well, anyway, that settles the immigrant labor problem. Who needs them, when we have unorganized laborers willing to work for whatever. Only better these are documented slugs who have social security numbers, so we can tax what little we give them....while the ten figure execs pay nothing into the system. Cuz, well, they create the jobs, right? And they pay a disproportinate amount of sales tax. Jeez.

So what you're saying is that union people are the 1% of the working class.

[Jack Springer]

No, I just am not going to spend 40 minutes preparing links for someone who has demonstrated time and again that when presented with hard facts he's either going to ignore them or leave and not respond. It is what I said-- a waste of time.

If you can't place the links to back up what you say is true documentation about who abused the mortgage system then sorry I and others will look at your post as a comment ... not as fact.

[xbuzzerx]

If you can't place the links to back up what you say is true documentation about who abused the mortgage system then sorry I and others will look at your post as a comment ... not as fact.

Until you offer some proof that government regulations to fix low-income first time homebuying in redlined districts somehow compelled lenders to give 600,000 loans to investment buyers who couldn't afford the mortgage and forced Wall Street to give those loans triple A ratings nad spread them around the world in investments, the position you're defending is more than a comment. It's ideological myth.

I was allowed to buy matches. I had to commit arson insurance fraud. The government made me do it.

P.S. Positive assertion wars go both ways. Validate what you say before you demand everyone else do so.

[chance1]

pretty sure no one is talking about michigan

or the "right to work" concept

and haven't for some time

[palemale]

Continue to live in lotus-land if you like, but some of us know better than to succumb.

It's long past the time that we expect conservative Republicans to succumb to the truth. Was there anything I posted about the Bush administration's role in our economic meltdown that you think is inaccurate?

- - - Updated - - -

pretty sure no one is talking about michigan

or the "right to work" concept

and haven't for some time

What more is there to say? It's just one more example of the Republican Party doing the bidding of their corporate masters.

[HenryReardon]

It's long past the time that we expect conservative Republicans to succumb to the truth. Was there anything I posted about the Bush administration's role in our economic meltdown that you think is inaccurate?

.

Not anything worth mentioning. But I don't expect accuracy from bedwetting liberals.

[palemale]

Not anything worth mentioning. But I don't expect accuracy from bedwetting liberals.

So you found no inaccuracies worth mentioning? I guess that means you agree with my conclusions. Good to know.

[cocksucker4use]

ADD is the thingy

Right to work ...... In Michigan

Half the states in the country

Now Michigan

It's a trend

Much like gay marriage support

"Bush wrecked the economy"

Bush attacked the Benghazi consulate

Bush killed Kennedy

Bush drove his car off the Chappaquidick bridge and left a girl to die

Bush told Rosa parks to get her ass up on THE BUS

Gonna start a new thread

"What bush did"

TGIF

Dubya cut taxes to help the economy, and cost the treasury about a $trillion so far. He started a $3 trillion dollar war. Tax cuts are the Republican mantra for stimulating the economy and the government infusing warbucks into the econcomy should give it a boost. How do you fuck that up? George?

[HenryReardon]

Dubya cut taxes to help the economy, and cost the treasury about a $trillion so far. ?

Got some absolute proof of that? AFter the Bush tax cuts, treasury revenue increased by a considerable amount, just as it did after previous tax cuts.

http://news.investors.com/ibd-editor...yth.htm?p=full

[frankfrank]

Anybody? Does this law allow an Emergency Financial Manager to be appointed to a Michigan entity which is not at all in trouble such as the University of Michigan, and that Financial Manager could, in turn, sell all the assets of the UofM to the Koch Brothers? Could the entire city of Flint be turned over to be managed by a Chinese company? This shit scares me.

[thewiz]

1. Revenues decreased after George Bush's tax cuts. Expenses also soared due to changes in health care prescription drug coverage (which prohibited negotiating rates paid), two wars, and huge increases in Homeland Security following 9-11. At the same time state revenues collapsed due to economic conditions and local revenues plummeted because of the collapse of the housing market (and property taxes along with sales).

2. The Emergency Manager Law was voted down by the voters. However, the legislature and governor have just passed a new law that in some ways mirrors the old except it retains some function of elected local government. In the meantime, the old financial manager law is being used to operate a number of cities; Detroit in line to likely have a financial manager soon.

3. Under the existing, proposed, and voted down law, certain economic conditions had to be present in order to have a financial manager. In addition, meetings and appointments must be open to the public, the state having lost that battle in court as it tried to keep deliberations secret. I think something between the old (now used) law and the one voted down by the voters is necessary. Cities that declare bankruptcy usually pay far more in attorney fees than for programs that benefit local communities. It is also possible that a judge could order assets sold to satisfy debts. How much is totally open to the judge. Also, most municipal bankruptcies have been caused by stupid or ill-advised specific project decisions such as building incinerators or huge sewer projects. However, there are a number of cities now filing that are trying to limit or eliminate legacy costs such as health care for retirees or pension obligations that have become too large to pay without gutting other services. Sacramento, Stockton, and at least two other cities are in or looking to enter bankruptcy to free the corporation (city) from past obligations that are draining the tax resources today.

[ruivinho]

^ Yeah because we all know that if someone caught this nonsense on video, then it means the unions should be crushed.

I for one, have never been able to understand the idea that firemen or police or teachers or any other public service non blue collar workers were ever allowed to collectively bargain. I agree, each one should have to individually negotiate their own salary and benefits. It is ridiculous that women workers should have to be paid equally as men as a general rule. Get rid of unions and let women get paid whatever they are willing to work for too.

When my mother was a nurse, there was no union and she didn't get any benefits or protection for working night after night and extra shifts. Or even a pension plan. Served her right for getting the sack for trying to get better pay and benefits for all the nurses in her hospital instead of just herself.

That is all very pretty in the perfect market land.
However women with the same skills/ability ARE negatively discriminated
(via having children, for instance - which is essentially for the survival of our society)

I am not saying i agree with compulsory unions though,
but Meritocracy is a beautiful philosophy, but one that is also out of touch with the reality.

[HenryReardon]

1. Revenues decreased after George Bush's tax cuts.

Dead wrong. Revenues have increased after every tax cut from Kennedy to Bush:

http://news.investors.com/ibd-editor...yth.htm?p=full

[thewiz]

Total revenues increased -- largely because of increases in rates in FICA and the numbers of population contributing. The other issue was that this trend has long continued -- until the Bush depression.

http://www.econdataus.com/taxcuts.html