Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Politico: "Obama Falls Flat"

You know things are going poorly for a Democratic president when the MSM turns on them. And the last month has seen a significant number of journalists doing just that. Some have been more obvious than others. The left-leaning Politico in particular has turned on their crush. Observe.

The morning after Obama gave his big speech at the convention, Politico ran a huge headline: “Obama Fell Flat.” This is quite the shocker, even if it is true. Even more interestingly, they pulled no punches in the associated article. They noted that a “long parade of Democrats and media commentators” didn’t think much of the speech and described it as “a fizzle – an oddly missed opportunity to frame his presidency.” They pointed out that even those who like the speech graded it as little more than “effective. . . in a tough-minded if prosaic style.” They said it paled in comparison to Michelle Obama’s and Bill Clinton’s. They said it “underscored the limits of Obama’s oratorical skills in the context of a grind-it-out campaign.” And they even pointed out that Obama’s campaign knew the speech had failed by evidence of senior staff sharing focus group results with reporters, something that would never have been reported on in the past.

Others has similar reactions, especially on the left:
● The Daily Beast: “Let’s be blunt. Barack Obama gave a dull and pedestrian speech tonight, with nary an interesting thematic device, policy detail, or even one turn of phrase.”

● James Carville: “Certainly not the best speech of this convention.”

● Mother Jones: “I didn’t feel any real passion in the delivery. It felt more like an actor soldiering through his lines. There was nothing memorable, nothing forward looking, and nothing that drew a contrast with Romney in sharp, gut-level strokes. Obama was, to be charitable, no more than the third best of the Democratic convention’s prime time speakers in 2012.”

● Nathan Daschle (former head of the Democratic Governors Association): “Disappointed. It was sort of a metaphor for his entire first term.”
These aren’t things Democrats or leftist television hacks normally say. Indeed, this is the silly season of politics where nothing you read isn’t pure spin anymore. So for them to criticize Obama now is truly amazing.

And it doesn’t stop there. Right after telling us how the speech flopped, Politico ran an article under the headline: “Jobs report challenges Obama’s economic message” in which they point out that last Friday’s jobs report completely undercut the entire Democratic message that things are getting better. The article even opened with this line: “President Barack Obama’s convention honeymoon lasted all of eight hours.”

And indeed, that jobs report was dismal as it showed dramatic slowing of the job market and hundreds of thousands of people dropping out of the search for employment altogether.

A few hours later, Politico pointed out under another blaring headline that the number of viewers for the convention was DOWN FROM 2008! (35.7 million compared to 38.4 million). That they didn’t downplay this drew a lot of angry comments.

And this follows a growing trend over the last several weeks where they did articles debunking Obama’s claims and pointing out that while both campaigns have been negative in terms of attacking the other’s policies, the personal attacks are coming overwhelming from Obama. They particularly noted the constant charges of criminality, racism, and the repeated comparisons to Nazis by Team Obama. I find this fascinating.

The MSM never takes shots at Democrats this close to the election, but here they are. I think there are three reasons for this:
Street Cred: If the media believes Obama is finished, and I’ve stated a pretty strong case for that, then now would be the time for them to regain their credibility with the public by attacking him and debunking his lies. They will need that credibility if they want to be able to criticize President Romney without being dismissed as partisan. And if Obama is going down, then there’s no reason not to pile on now.

The Left Is Angry: As much as some conservatives like to think of Obama as a leftist ideologue, he certainly hasn’t lived up to their expectations. His Wall Street reform bill was a sop to big banks. Taxes are still low compared to where they were even after Reagan’s first round of tax cuts. Obamacare sucks, but he didn’t socialize anything. . . it was basically a sop to insurance companies. There aren’t any new social programs. He didn’t grant an amnesty. He never pushed for equal pay amendments for women. He finally started talking in favor of the gay agenda, but hasn’t delivered. And his environmentalism is all crony-environmentalism. About the only thing he did was send taxpayer money to unions.

I suspect a big part of what we’re seeing here is that the left has decided Obama deceived them and that he will never come through for them. So I think they are willing to take him on.

Journalists Just Don’t Like Him: Finally, Politico has been running a fascinating series of articles detailing how many journalists simply don’t like Obama. They’ve described him as arrogant, detached, petty and uninspired. They don’t like the way they’ve been treated by the campaign. They don’t think much of his skills. It is very difficult to treat people fairly when you have personal animus toward them, and I suspect there is a large amount of this going on as well.
Whatever the reasons, it’s clear to me that the MSM is not Obama’s friend, not at the moment.

Thoughts?

73 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hope the MSM continues down this path, although I'm not going to hold my breath, not yet.

Whether the rest of the brain-dead morons will see this is unknown. They will still believe facts are nothing but lies.

DUQ said...

I think your three points at the end are excellent. I have to imagine that this is about personal dislike and getting back some credibility at this point.

Ed said...

Excellent article Andrew! I love the idea that the MSM is turning on him and I hope they keep doing it. I also agree with your reasons. I know that a lot of conservatives love to call him a socialist, but he really isn't. He's just a Chicago crony and that's left a lot of them very angry. As for the media, I'd heard rumblings about them not being happy with him.

AndrewPrice said...

Anon, I would like to see this continue as well. The longer the MSM continues to undercut him, the harder it will be for him to find his footing and find an effective theme to his campaign.

AndrewPrice said...

Thanks DUQ. There has been a lot of talk about the reporters disliking him and really disliking this entire 2012 campaign. I think that is significant. But I do think ultimately, the credibility issue is the big one -- if they think he can't win, then they have every reason to help take him down so they can always point back at that to deflect claims of how unfair they are to Republicans.

AndrewPrice said...

Thanks Ed. I agree. A lot of conservatives call him a socialist, but they really are just demonstrating their ignorance or irrationality. He's not a socialist, he's a crony. He's using the government to help his friends rather than impose an ideology.

ellenB said...

What a happy article for this fine Tuesday morning! :) I particularly like the bit about this being a metaphor for his presidency. So true. Does anyone know if the minor bounce he got has faded yet?

ellenB said...

Also, just a thought about 9/11. I'm glad that the country has finally come to terms with this and people can go about thier lives normally. That's how terrorists win, by making you change your life.

AndrewPrice said...

Ellen, I'm glad you approve. I always like to give a little good new. LOL! Seriously though, I think it's fascinating that the MSM is turning on him finally. This is the worst possible time for that too. I guess we'll see if it lasts?

I have not looked into the bounce because it really doesn't matter. The polls are highly inaccurate and short terms movements even moreso.

I agree with you about 9/11, terrorists win when society changes and I get the feeling that the country really is heading back to normal finally, at least with regard to the anniversary. Now we need to drop some of the fake security measures that were adopted.

Ed said...

Andrew, As much as I despise everything he's done, I have to agree that calling him a socialist is just knee-jerk stupidity. Everything he's done has been cronyism -- payouts to his contributors, not nationalization of industries, not confiscatory tax levels, not even creation of social programs. And while I hate to admit that, conservatives are wrong on this point if they think he is a socialist.

Ed said...

P.S. Totally agree with you and Ellen about 9/11. Although, I think too many people still buy into the "we need it to stop terrorism" argument to allow too many civil liberties to be taken away.

NightcrawlerER said...

I don't think we should forget 9/11 (and I know you're not saying that) but I agree we can't obsess about it. America is about the future, not the past.

AndrewPrice said...

Ed, There has been a lot of knee-jerk reaction out there and very little thought, sadly. It makes me a bit sad for conservatism because conservatives do best when they are thoughtful and explain their positions with great care. Conservatism is an intellectual ideology and must be taught -- as compared to liberalism which is based on emotion.

Unfortunately, it's very hard to teach conservatism when so many people are screaming things that are just ridiculous on their face. It makes us no better than the progressives, and will keep us from winning over the people we need.

Fortunately, Americans are conservative by nature, so we do have that advantage going for us. But that's doesn't change the fact we are often our own worst enemies.

AndrewPrice said...

Ed and Nightcrawler, I'm definitely not saying to forget, but I do agree with the sentiments above that it's a good thing when Americans begin to move on with their lives. America is a country that thrives on always building a better future, rather than wallowing in past glories or outrages, and so the sooner we get back to thinking about the future rather than dealing with the past, the better off America will be.

ScyFyterry said...

Andrew, I've noticed this change, believe it or not. Naturally, the MSM is attacking Romney at every turn. That's the be expected. But I'm not seeing them defending Obama so much anymore. Some are. But many more being quite skeptical of the things he says and pointing out all sorts of bad things they wouldn't have pointed out before. I think the winds of change are blowing here!

AndrewPrice said...

Terry, The change is there if you want to notice it. I see hints of it everywhere, plus the obvious ones like what Politico did with their series of negative articles. I thought the one about the reporters not being happy with Obama was particularly interesting because that's not the kind of thing we would have been told in the past.

Barack Obama said...

Why is everybody always pickin' on me?

ScyFyterry said...

Andrew, I have absolutely noticed it. I didn't see the Politico series, but I'm seeing a lot of MSM journalists acting very skeptically toward Obama.

AndrewPrice said...

Dear Mr. President, There are articles all over the web from both sides explaining why you're such a loser. Maybe you should read them?

AndrewPrice said...

Terry, It's there if people want to notice. We'll see if it lasts, but for now, it's there.

Unknown said...

Omigod! The idol really does have clay feet, and the emperor doesn't have any clothes after all. LOL I wonder what Axelrod has said to Politico?

AndrewPrice said...

It would be interesting if they threatened Politico, but I doubt they'd try it. Politico would win.

Interestingly, I haven't heard complaints YET from Obama about the MSM, but the election is still young.

rlaWTX said...

Andrew - you are missing the point! This is just further proof (because you conservatives never listened to ALL the past proof!) that journalists are, and always have been, unbiased! While you thought that the positive coverage for Obama was journalists fawning over him, it was actually just factual reporting. And since there is now these itty-bitty, almost insignificant negatives to report, OF COURSE we are reporting them. Whatever else would you expect from our honest, straight-forward profession?
\sarc off\

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

They turned on Obama, because Axelrod decided to go after Gallup for bad polls. Basically, it finally dawned on these MSM clowns that Obama will shut them down if they don't toe the Obama line. Time to get rid of the guy who would be GOD.

AndrewPrice said...

rlaWTX, How silly of me! You are correct that journalists are always unbiased, just as they assure us constantly. LOL!

Seriously, this is fascinating to me because I don't ever remember the MSM turning on a Democrat this close to an election. This is the point where every Democratic candidate can walk on water... according to the MSM.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, No, that doesn't work. For one thing, I doubt many people believe the Gallup story is more than just paranoid conservative spin. For another, this turn against started a long time (mid-2010) and has been manifesting itself in different ways for months. Politico, for example, has been getting increasingly negative. This was just a high point of that, which I discuss above.

Individualist said...

I am wondering if this is not long term strategizing by the DNC.

I think that unlike Bush in 2008 Obama actually has given the next President an economy that can't be corrected in four years.

Whoever is the next President is going to preside over an extremely tough period and if things really go south may doom whatever poltical party he belongs to.....

So let the GOP deal with it and save the spin for four years from now....

T-Rav said...

Well, they do say that every battered wife has her limits....

(I denounce myself.)

AndrewPrice said...

Indi, I doubt it very much. For one thing, they need to stay in power to make Obamacare happen, and socialized medicine has been their Holy Grail since the 1960s.

Also, in my discussions with liberals it's become clear that they don't believe that fiscal policy affects the economy. They think the economy does its own thing and it will just be a matter of time before things turn around, so it's unlikely they want to be out of power for four years.

Also, this really is evidence of the MSM turning on Obama and there's no evidence that this is a DNC strategy. Not to mention the level of coordination for that to happen would be beyond belief.

AndrewPrice said...

T-Rav, Putting that aside, I'm not sure how much of this the MSM simply getting angry at him for personal reasons or how much is ideological? I'm just not sure.

tryanmax said...

I can't say if it will last, but for the moment the MSM seems to be against both parties. However, I'm cynical enough to see some Democrat strategy in that, too. My biggest fear for the upcoming election is the number of people who stubbornly continue to believe there is no difference between the parties. Personally, I don't think the difference has ever been so stark in my life. But the idea that it doesn't matter who wins seems to help the Democrats more. And, unfortunately, right-wing media plays along by repeating that Romney isn't all that good but will do.

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, I concur.

First, it seems that right now the MSM is against both parties, which is probably about as fair as they will ever get. At least they've stopped cheerleading for Obama while slandering Romney, and that's something highly unusual. The last time I saw this was Carter-Mondale.

Secondly, I am amazed how many self-described conservatives are buying into this idea that the two parties are essentially the same. I am thinking, honestly, that these people are either idiots (highly possible) or not at all conservatives, but some form of reactionary instead. Like you, I have never seen the differences between the two parties more starkly drawn than during this election. They are indeed presenting fundamentally contradictory views of the country. What more do people want to see a difference?

ScyFyterry said...

tryanmax and Andrew, That has me really upset too. I've stopped listening to talk radio because they are just so relentlessly negative. Nothing any Republican does is ever enough for them. Who needs friends like that?

tryanmax said...

Andrew, ironically, the difference I think folks want to see would be no real difference at all when it comes to government. Lots of folks still wish Rick Santorum were the nominee, which tells me they just want big government in their own direction. I'll be generous and say they're idiots (reactionary seems worse to me) who are so obsessed with left-right politics, they can no longer even see the size of things.

AndrewPrice said...

Terry, I gave up on talk radio a long time ago. It stopped being informative and strategic and just became whining and self-serving.

BevfromNYC said...

The MSM are acting like scorned lovers. Obama assumes that the MSM is in his pockets, has refuses to allow direct unrehearsed questioning since April, and has just plain ignored them. And the MSM is revving to "boil some bunnies" to show hime that they "won't be ignored, Bam".

Also, I can tell you that for the first time in 12 years, Ground Zero was tolerable. Now that the events are in the Memorial Park, it leaves the rest of us to go about our business in relative peace. Well, except for the crazy jerk screaming his head off in front of City Hall Park "It's George Bush's fault". I showed him my great displeasure in a very unlady-like hand gesture for which I am not very proud...

tryanmax said...

Terry, on that topic, I took note today when Rush was criticizing the Romney/Ryan campaign for calling Obama "a nice guy." First of all, that's just politics, and Rush should know that. But then he went on to describe how "mean" Barack Obama is.

This caused two ideas to compete for prominence in my mind.

The first was that Rush would be absolutely lambasting the R/R campaign if they came out calling Obama "mean." He would call them wimps and worse. And wouldn't that be a heyday for the leftist media?

The second was that "mean" was the foremost criticism of Romney during the primary. Not really sure what to make of that, but it seems ironic that Rush should fault the guy he called "mean" for calling another meanie "nice."

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, I think it's a little of both actually. A lot of the "conservative" bloggers are really pure reactionaries. They don't understand conservatism and really don't care... they understand conspiracy theories and they are still fighting against the mythical New World Order and its black helicopter squadrons. These people latch onto any rumor and whine about how even absolute fringe candidates are suddenly "sell outs" and too mainstream for them.

The next group is just stupid and just repeats what they've heard on the radio.

The final group is reactionary "conservatives"... the Santorum crowd. They don't understand conservatism and they have no principles, they just know they hate liberals and so they want whoever promises to do the things which will most upset the liberals. And if that means huge government in the direction of things they like, well, they're fine with that and they'll just redefine conservatism to encompass that.

None of these groups are a good thing, and unfortunately they're all such mindless sheep who are easily led by people like Glenn Beck and Rick Santorum right into ideas that they should know are disaster. But there's nothing we can do about them except call them out when they do it and support the smarter people.

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, LOL! I would have loved to see this unladylike gesture! :)

On 9/11, I get a real feeling of normalcy this year. In the last couple years, honestly, the remembrances felt forced, like you were obligated to attend. But this year, suddenly the obligation is over and it all feels much more natural. I really think that's a good sign for the country.

On the MSM, you're right that they are acting like scorned lovers. I've seen several articles now about journalists making the most amazingly petty complaints. And the source of all of this was laid out well in an article this weekend (no link, sorry) where a liberal explained why he was giving up on Obama. His point was that Obama is arrogant and thinks he doesn't need to care about people or treat them well, but still expects that he will get the benefits as if he had treated them well. He made the point that this was why Obama couldn't get his agenda passed, why he can't raise funds, why he's lost the MSM and why he's losing the public.

I think that's very insightful.

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, That's interesting. Let me add a third observation. Rush is missing the point. The polls show that the public likes Obama personally, but doesn't trust him as a leader. So if you want to reinforce that message, you say, "he's a nice guy, but he doesn't belong in the job." Saying anything else is a mistake. Indeed, if you said, "he's an a-hole and needs to go," then the public tunes you out from the beginning because they disagree with you.

Not to mention, you don't need to make the public hate him personally to win this. You just need the public to be ready to dump him. And the best way to do that is to reaffirm their doubts rather than trying to add more. Trying to make the public dislike him is a distraction and is likely to result in a backlash.

Also, by saying he's a nice guy, they are taking the high road which lets them take a much more meaningful low road when they get the chance. If they come out whining about him, then everything they say later will be taken with a grain of salt. This way it means something when they later say he's running a truly nasty campaign.

EricP said...

While I'm glad you did indeed continue with the usual excellent wisdom, Andrew, you really could have just ended the "The Left Is Angry" section with those four words. No solutions, just anger, typically misguided at that. Heck, too many of them were even angry at their own party re. the "God" and "Jerusalem" business.

Would be interesting if the good vibes and renewed pride and promise of the Romney/Ryan ticket would counter that, maybe invite the disaffected, disappointed, disillusioned -- the "dissed" -- into the fold, be a part of the re-dawning.

AndrewPrice said...

Eric, Isn't that the truth... the left is angry. They lost their mind somewhere around 2000 and it's just been getting worse and worse for them, and Obama has been unable to placate them.

I think you make a great point. I am hoping that the relatively positive campaign Romney/Ryan are running and some early success in their administration might win over more of the disaffected in the center. I think those people can only be won over with a big positive vision of the future and hopefully we'll deliver that. If we could swing over even 5% of them, the Democrats would be finished nationwide.

Individualist said...

Andrew

I don't think it requires much coordination. Just a few mentions to the right editors that Obama is no longer untouchable.

I guess I am just musing .....

Whoever is the next President is probably not going to inherit a nightmare since the inflation seems to set to hit soon.

AndrewPrice said...

Indi, I suppose that's possible they could just put out the word that Obama is not untouchable, but I really don't see how that helps the Democrats. What will be interesting though, will be if they try to triangulate against him.

In terms of the economy, repealing Obamacare and massive deregulation would probably be enough to truly kickstart the economy again. But we'll have to see how it goes. I don't know what to make of inflation right now.

ScyFyterry said...

tryanmax, Excellent observations. I'm not sure what it means that Rush thinks they should be calling Obama "mean," but I agree that he would be livid if Romney/Ryan had actually done that. I think he's just trying to sound more angry than the next guy.


Andrew, Nice observations as well.

ellenB said...

Bev, Sometimes certain moments require an unladylike response. :D So be proud. Nice work!

Unknown said...

Andrew: The Axelrod/Gallup story at least points out the nastiness of the whole Obama gang. That alone would make it a worthwhile story, whether the writer (including myself) is paranoid or not. How much the story is worth as a campaign tool is another thing entirely. Probably not much. It's not a lot more than additional information about the thuggish tactics of the Obamists. Nothing new there. It's almost like piling on. But worth reporting.

That said, I don't think Axelrod or anyone else has enough power or "dirt" to intimidate Politico, and Axelrod's involvement with Gallup only seems to have stiffened Gallup's resolve not to be intimidated. Ultimately, the story may turn out to be simply a lesson in Chicago-style politics--politics which failed in these instances.

AndrewPrice said...

Lawhawk, Let me clarify. The fact that an administration would contact a polling company and try to intimidate them is very newsworthy and tells us a LOT about the nastiness and arrogance of that administration. It makes me think of Nixon, frankly.

What I don't buy is the idea that the government tried to intimidate Gallup by joining the suit. To me, that's where the paranoid spin is coming from. Is it possible? Sure. But there's nowhere near enough evidence to support the idea except wishful thinking on the right. In effect, people are missing the real story because they're trying to create something that just can't be supported.

And in my response to Joel above, my point is not that it can't be true (though I doubt it is), it's just that I doubt very many people, and certainly none in the center or on the left, believe it's true. Hence, it can't be the motivation which is getting journalists to turn against him.

As for Politico, what I've seen historically is that when an administration leans on journalists, the journalists take it personally and always fight back. They are willing to carry water for the Democrats, but they don't like to be pushed around in the process.

AndrewPrice said...

Thanks Terry, we aim to please! :)

Unknown said...

Andrew: I think that clears it up, and we're in substantial agreement. The test is always "does the story have legs?" The answer here is "no." With all the shenanigans the Obamists are pulling, this one is barely a well-placed footnote. It isn't a smoking gun, and it even seems to prove that Chicago isn't the tail that wags the American dog.

I just have so many enemies that I don't want to be called paranoid. LOL

AndrewPrice said...

I think it's interesting that Chicago thinks it does wag the dog. And I suspect that's been a large part of the tension between Obama and the Democrats and the MSM -- they are Washington Elite, he's Chicago.

Individualist said...

Andrew

My Finance professor (who was a liberal) last year explained it that the Fed ahs been printing money in terms of adding zeros to bank accounts for the banks since 2009. The reason according to him that this has not ending up in massive inflation is that the tightening of the loans has made it impossible for banks to lend money. Thus there is not an oversupply of money despite the printing that has occurred.

He stated that at some point in then future the banks were going to have to start lending despite the economic problems and fed tightening and that this would open a floodgate that would create Carter style inflation.

I am not sure of this as I am basing my assumptions on his expertise. I assume that dems are intelligent and that they plan there politics around the economic cycles. They may beleive they are just cycles that flow but they do predictm them as much as everyone else.

If they think that the next President is going to have inflation in excess of 10% or even 15% then they might calculate that it would be best that the POTUS (the guy blamed for these things is a Republican.

I assume that it is easy enough for these people to control the media (the MSM anyways) based on the fact that they had a Joun-O-List in the last electuion cycle. If media matters, editors of the NYT, the politico etc. are told to let Obama (who they know is propped up by them) shift in the wind.

Well..... I don't know.... I don't see this as a conspiracy just how they do business. In 2006 Barney Frank was told there was a mortgage crisus by OFHEO. They pushed it back and coincidently the collapse occured just before the election because SOROS was making strange money trades.... They have done this in the past.

Does it mean this is what is happening ... no it doesn't but I can't help but have the thoughts rattle around the rocks in my head so I speculate.

AndrewPrice said...

Indi, Soros did not cause the collapse. He, like many others, simply bet against the dollar and bet against the market before it happened. He doesn't have the power to drive the market. He was just smart enough to see the obvious.

In terms intentionally losing, that's the kind of thing a lot of talking heads think about, but parties don't. They want to win because too many perks, powers and privileges depend on winning. Losing is too disruptive. Also, there is so much more going on in politics than just the top line numbers and it's always worth it to win so they can control regulations, fund raising, patronage, etc.

I'm not sure I buy your professor's argument. The American consumer is too loaded with debt to go on a sudden binge. I think the reason we haven't seen massive, obvious inflation is because the entire world is currently devaluing their currencies, which makes the whole exercise pointless. When we stop keeping up with everyone else in that regard, that's when inflation will kick in.

Joel Farnham said...

One thing that was obvious to me is who ever had bet against the dollar would have been destroyed if Bush had just stayed his hand. In other words, let the market take care of itself and the US government not do anything. Who ever had been manipulating the money supply at that point could only do it for a week, and would have had to undo what was done to create the crisis if only to survive. Basically, someone panicked and talked a gullible president into doing something stupid.

The housing collapse had happened in 2006.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, That's the thing about taking those kinds of risks, you are betting against the intelligence of the people in charge. And in this case, Soros won because Bush and his team panicked.

And you're right about the housing collapse. That happened two years before the financial collapse. The financial collapse was triggered when insurance policies written on housing debts turned out to be worthless as the value of those houses continued to fall. That's when everything went into a cascade failure.

And the set up for those events dates back to the Clinton era -- though both parties are responsible.

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

I agree. However, if Bush didn't panic or just said something about let's wait a week, the market would have adjusted correctly and we might have had a rough week, but that would have been all. In this case, the cascade failure was initiated by who ever had locked up the money supply that week. George Soros comes to mind, but I doubt he was the only one. The advisers to Bush at the time are the real culprits. I just wish Bush had called for Thomas Sowell or Walter Williams to advise him. I am sure there would have been a better outcome.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, I don't tend to believe in conspiracy theories, but in this case, I find it hard to disagree with you. I've seen too much evidence in the past 4-5 years that companies like Goldman Sachs (who dominated Bush's and Obama's Treasuries) were involved in seriously conflicted trades, where they were betting against instruments they issued and were shorting investments that they were selling publicly... and it was Goldman employees temporarily working for the government who often were involved in regulating those investments.

They also lobbied to change rules (like the uptick rule) which gave them significant power to move the market, and microtrades which are pure insider graft. (Check out tomorrow's article - posting at 2:00 AM tonight for a little more on this.)

AndrewPrice said...

P.S. One of my real problems with Bush was that he was a moron who acted as a figurehead basically for his largest crony contributors. There is a lot of truth behind the charges the left made against several companies that dominated the Bush White House and they raped the taxpayers for incredible amounts.

And for the record, Obama has been the same, only for different players.

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

One other thing, most of the loaning giants knew of the inherent problems of loaning to people who couldn't buy their homes. Calling it sub-prime is only making it slightly respectable. Kind of like cleverly covering a naked woman with painted clothes. She looks respectable, but on closer examination, she is naked.

So, what they did was play hot potato with these risky loans and sold it to each other. If Bush had hesitated, a few of them would have gone down, but the structure would still be there. Basically too big to fail caused more problems then it was worth..... And allowed an incompetent radical into the Whitehouse to cause more problems.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, From what I've seen, the problems were:

1. The government encouraged people to buy homes they could not afford, causing homes to enter a price bubble.

2. The government allowed mortgage lenders to create the mortgage-backed securities, which were wrong on many levels -- they divorced the risk from reward, they allowed lenders to make intensely risky loans and then sell them off, and they created the illusion of safety by mixing good and bad loans.

3. They let insurers like AIG issue billions in insurance on these instruments which no one could price.

4. They let companies who were involved in this become so large that their collapse endangered the economy.

5. They let the line between savings banks and investment banks blur, which brought in the taxpayer backing to back investments.


All of that was done under Bush and Clinton and it resulted in us basically being placed on the hook to support these mega banks who where playing Russian Roulette with the housing bubble -- as long as they got out before it popped, they would get rich, but if they waited too long they would be broke or need us to bail them out. Lehman Brother's lost, the rest won.

This was entirely the result of letting the banks decide how the regulations should be set up. And now things are actually worse and too big to fail is even bigger.

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

I agree. The problem now is cleaning up the wreckage which won't happen as long as Mr Twinkle-Snot is the president.

T-Rav said...

That's telling him Bev!

I got caught up watching some of the programs, hence my absence. It's the same as last year and everything, but that doesn't matter. I can't tear myself away from it. 9/11 is always going to define the way I look at the world.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, I hate to be even more pessimistic, but I don't think the wreckage gets cleaned up. Both parties are dominated by the same people who caused these problems, and thus, the solutions the Democrats and the Republicans are offering are both "give more power and more taxpayer-backed protection to the banks and they will save us." That will only make it worse.

They really need to break these banks up, reimpose many of the rules that were removed over the past 10-15 years, ban the sale of mortgages as securities, and require more cash and less credit all around. But no one is even talking about those things.

AndrewPrice said...

T-Rav, I think 9/11 will always define the way most of us look at the world... BUT you need to make sure to look at the whole picture. Don't let it trick you into thinking the world is more dangerous than it really is and don't let it trick you into believing that we need to become less American just to protect ourselves. Remember that terrorists win when we surrender the things that make us who we are.

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

It will get cleaned up. It is what is driving certain "conservatives" to be less than stellar with helping Romney to win. They suspect but do not know what Romney will do after the election. They expect him to fix some things, but dread that he will fix the banking structure.

The reason why quite a few wanted Romney was the coat tails. The Senate is their goal. They feel that a Romney Candidate would never beat Obama, but would help enormously with the Senate. What they are seeing is Romney winning, and that bugs them, but since Romney isn't talking about Banking reform, they will be content with him not having a mandate.

Romney, to his credit, is mum about that, except for Ryan. Now, why did he pick Ryan? As you said, there were several to choose from. Romney could have picked any and still be sitting pretty. Why Ryan?

I think Ryan will be the most involved Vice-President in history.

T-Rav said...

Andrew, I comprehend what you're saying but I've never bought into that "When X happens, the terrorists have won" line. If these @#$%ers aim was to just make the world more scary, then sure, that would be valid. But the people who hijacked the planes aren't interested, except as a secondary goal, in making the country less American. I would imagine that the more perceptive ones hope it does stay just as American, at least in the short term, since that makes it easier for them to slip in and out.

No, what they're after is the propagation of radical Islam, at home and abroad. They want to drive the U.S. out of the Middle East, and/or inflict as much pain on the American population as possible. Scaring us is incidental to their longer goals.

Which is not to say we should be a police state or anything. But "proving" to the terrorists that we won't change our way of life isn't going to make them run away.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, Ryan gives me a lot of hope actually. He's the one "out of the box" guy I know in Washington who is both intelligent enough to know what he's talking about and savvy enough to pull it off. So hopefully, he will be very involved.

I am also hopeful of Romney, particularly with him being an outsider to Washington. I am hoping that he comes with a different mindset and different agenda and that he actually sets out to fix things rather than just coverup the problems created by those exploiting the system.

We will see. Like I said, I am hopeful on these points, but I also know the supreme challenge anyone who wants genuine change actually faces in Washington.

AndrewPrice said...

T-Rav, Those are two separate but related ideas. Having the will to do what we need to over there is a very different issue than what we do at home.

And when it comes to what we do at home, the danger is that we allow our fear of them to make life here so intolerable that we bankrupt ourselves economically, morally, or morale-ly. Think about the cost and hassle and damage to our way of life that our government now gets to strip search people getting on airplanes just because twenty a-holes got knives onboard planes? Think about all the other civil liberties that are vanishing in the name of stopping a threat that is pretty much non-existent. And ask yourself if it is worth the cost, the harm to our way of life, and the cost to our reputation and mindset (making us dependent on government in stupid ways) to stop something that can't be stopped. That's the real punchline to this... if a terrorist wants to blow something up, you can't stop them. All the security crap you see today is the government flexing its impotent muscles just to trick you into thinking you are safer.

And the danger is that we end up being less America and more of a police state, cringing behind a government that can't help us but promises the moon, until we finally get sick of it all and give up. That's the problem. That's when they win, when we give up or when we get stupid (as we are now) and hurt our own country because our policies are all for show without any real substance.

AndrewPrice said...

Also, let me point out one things. You are correct when you say: "proving" to the terrorists that we won't change our way of life isn't going to make them run away. But at the same time, proving to them that we will do stupid, counter-productive and self-destructive things because we are afraid of them not only won't make them go away either, it will give them the sense they are winning... which will encourage them.

AndrewPrice said...

T-Rav, By the way, tone doesn't come across easily in comments, so let me be clear that I'm not being hostile or attacking your point. You are correct that ignoring terrorism is not an answer. I'm just making the point that acting irrationally or overreacting is not an answer either and is even more counter productive.

We need to get smarter and stop doing things which hurt us while doing nothing to stop them. That's what causes terrorists to win.

Individualist said...

Andrew

The professor's argument was that the Fed has propped up the banks in the TARP bailouts buy essentially printing money. There are QE3 accounts where they essentially addd zeros to the bank account creating money.

The reason the oversupply did not cause immediate inflation is the Federal reserve placed restrictions on lending and the banks are not willing to lend. Since this money was not moving into the monetary system there is effectively no oversupply thus money is not going to inflate as the dollar becomes worth less.

His argument is that banks are actually sitting on a lot of cash but can't lend it. No I know as of last year these facts were true. The problem is when that money finally starts to go into the money supply because the banks can't simply sit on the money forever there will be a great deal of oversupply coming into the market and inflation.

I imaging that the recent rounds of quantititative easing that the FED has been making lately is meant to lessen the impact of it and spread it out over time.

His argument was that when banks eventually gegin to lend interest rates and inflation will spike in a correction. I guess the opposite arguement is that the FED will be able to control the interest rates and thus control the effect. Either way the dollar is going to fall.

There is really nothing the banks can do about it. It is the FED and monetary policy. I am undertain but I heard that something like half the TARP bailout were simple accounting entries by the Federal Reserve Bank creating money.

Either way the FED has been walking a tightrope with regard to this. Printing money to cover losses and bailouts and restricting lending policy to keep the money out of the market supply. I am not so sure that their philosophies are going to keep working in light of the increasing percentage of Debt to GDP. We will see ....

Individualist said...

Downgrade of US Bonds

FYI this is one of the points the Finance professor actually made last year in class. Downgrading debt will lead to increased interest rates along with higher inflation.

AndrewPrice said...

Indi, So far that hasn't been a problem, but it will be soon. And with the massive size of our debt, even a percentage point would be significant in real terms.

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