TheAgitator.com
That’s Some Fine Oversightin’ There, Chairman
Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), chair of the House Banking Committee, on the bailout:
"I think we have to recognize the reality that we don’t have a choice now of debating whether this is a good or a bad thing."
Who cares if it might makes us worse off. Just do something, dammit!
Hat tip: Caleb Brown.
“I think we have to recognize the reality that we don’t have a choice now of debating whether this is a good or a bad thing.” — Reichstag member, 1933, on the Enabling Act.
I read somewhere recently that history doesn’t repeat itself, it rhymes.
Sam I am.
How PATRIOTic of our government, forgoing debate in the name of doing something.
Last time Congress was under the gun for quick legislative action it resulted in that masterpiece of government ineptitude called the Patriot Act. I have come to hate the word “bipartisan” because I know it means the resulting effort is bound to be far more destructive that when the two parties oppose each other.
Of one thing you can be sure, there isn’t a single soul working on this problem who has the good of the population at heart. They are simply no different than a swarm of parasitic vermin frantically competing to get a piece of the decaying remnants a once proud and respected icon of civilization.
Isn’t that how Democrats approach every issue? People don’t have health insurance, we have to do something about that. People are poor, we must do something. Disregard the costs of that something, and whether those costs outweight the benefits. So then they can parade around telling all their constituents that they did something while their opponent did nothing. And that’s all that matters. They did something. They care.
Ladies and gentlemen: your tax dollars at work!
I am so fucking sick of this shit. I just want to bury my head in the sand until this and the election blows over. The election will, but I am afraid the we’re the ones who will be blowing the bailout for many years to come. And there is no guarantee the ‘stimulus’ will help fix the problem. In fact, I am inclined to think it will not. Why the fuck should the recipients of corporate welfare try and do any better then they have? They have just been rewarded for bad business practices. No reason to think they won’t be again in the future.
How much more of this will America take? What exactly has to happen before people realize just how fucked we really are and how much more fucked we will continue to be without even the courtesy of a goddamned reach-around? I am losing hope very rapidly. I just don’t see it getting any better with how insanely stupid and seriously uninformed the majority of people are in this country.
And assholes like Frank are a big part of the reason this happened in the first place:
Underwriting standards, who needs them, when you have sociopolitical goals that you need to accomplish that interfere with them?
I hereby predict a turning point in the viability of a 3rd party platform and candidate in American presidential politics.
You’re right there, Bot.
I tore up my GOP card many years ago…I’m pretty sad that I voted for Bush last election…
I’m seriously looking at the Libertarian party…they have any room for right-of-center refugees?
Bot, I think you’re being too optimistic. Even if both parties were running on a promise of repeatedly slamming American voters in the nuts with a hammer, it would be a rare voter who considered a third party as a better alternative.
When you get right down to it, that’s kinda what they’re already doing.
When will these guys realize that sometimes doing nothing is the best course of action?
To quote from the hearing before the committee on financial services, September 25, 2003:
Barney Frank: I joined this committee in 1981 because I am interested in housing. And I guess I wouldn’t want to boast about my accomplishments, because the situation regarding housing, particularly people who are of moderate and low income, has gotten worse during my tenure. I won’t accept the blame, but I clearly haven’t done a great deal of good.
Surely, if you haven’t done any good you in better than twenty years, you’re doing it wrong.
Full text of this hearing can be found here: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=108_house_hearings&docid=f:92628.wais
Frank’s statements can be seen about 15 paragraphs down.
Good to see that checks and balances thing our founding fathers were so hard up on is working out like it should…
This is not fair to Frank since it’s taken out of context. The context is that ‘SINCE the administration has established a worldwide expectation that the rescue/bailout will happen, NOW we don’t really have a choice but to do something’.
Z:
Read my post two above yours. Frank’s been doing this crap for almost 30 years. He KNOWS pumping money into the system doesn’t help, but he’s still willing to do it.
Meanwhile…
(emphasis mine)
I knew I should’ve bought more house than I could afford and financed it with a 3/1 ARM. I guess I’m getting punished for having a 30-year fixed mortgage again. Sigh.
Andrew, I agree. It is truly stunning that they probably will pass a law which allows people to wipe out debt AND keep the collateral.
Ben, I certainly wasn’t suggesting that Frank has even a remedial understanding of economics, he’s clearly clueless.
“we don’t have a choice now of debating whether this is a good or a bad thing.” Not having a choice is the essence of democracy.
> It is disgusting what some people say about Bush’s power grabs….
Tell me again who’s the head of the Senate Banking Committee.
Do you even know? Without looking it up first?
- Anybody who thinks this is a partisan issue hasn’t the least clue in the world what is happening, and is probably going to overlook absolutely everything important while obsessing on the least relevant details.
Go to Karl Denninger’s Market Ticker site and click on the calender in the upper right, reading/viewing everything starting from the 14th.
Then you’ll know what’s going on.
I disagree, the American people will cling to this two-party system until it literally falls down around their ears.
We are witnessing the final throes of the insurgency known as the United States Federal Government.
You poor bastards have been voting for the lesser of two evils for so long that evil is all that’s left now.
Billy, there are days when you annoy the crap out of me. Today, however, I salute you!
That comment alone was worth today’s visit.
Dave Krueger:
And just like that monstrosity, you can bet that whatever “cure” emerges from Congress will have been pre-written long ago, just waiting for the opportunity to implement it.
On the topic of current Barney Frank quotes that are unsettling – he said recently in regard to this most recent bail out, “We’ll now own a lot of these mortgages” (see: Miami Herald, 9.22.2008).
It’s far more than being ‘worse off’ Radley. As Frank says, the gov’t is buying our houses now. They own us.
Lewis Black once said, “The only thing worse than democrats and republicans is when these fucks agree on something.”
honeyko, thanks for the link to Denninger’s blog. Very interesting reading. I was not surprised at all when I got to his last entry and he was comparing the present crisis to the German situation in 1933, as evidenced by post #1 above.
There is a coup d’etat in the works right now. If the Treasury Secretary gets this power, it is game over.
Cynical…anyone….answer me this question: Why would Goldman-Sachs pay out fifty billion dollars in bonuses unless the whole plan, all along, was to royally loot the snot out of the company in broad daylight, then dump the worthless debt on the taxpayers by selling it as an “asset” to the government while the company somehow gets a new lease? (Is this deal already “done” behind the scenes? Why the hell is Warren Buffet buying in?)
Paulson himself sucked $500 million out of Goldman, like an ant with his face buried in the ass of aphid.
The colossal *cheek* of these crooks simply beggars the imagination.
(Does Ron Paul intend to do anything else with the rest of his abject failure of a life, or is he content to just wind down as an utterly forgotten footnote? ….He ought to show up for session tomorrow wearing a tri-fork hat, and shoot that bald motherfucker right through his lying gob with a black-powder pistol on nationwide television.)
“Billy, there are days when you annoy the crap out of me.”
Just doin’ my job, man.
“I’m not happy ’til you’re not happy.” And I’m telling you the truth, all the time.
Onward.
The same schmucks that got us in to this mess are now trying to shove this Bailout down our throat. I mean Dodd,Barney Frank ,and Schumer!