another meaningful win for Dems last night

[Jim in CT]

There was a special House of Representatives election last night in western PA, in a district Trump won by 20 points. It's the second in a row (that I know of) where the democrats won a seat in a district that Trump easily carried.

The Democrats ran an interesting candidate, young guy early 30s, former marine, very conservative for a democrat. This was not someone from the Warren/Schumer wing of the party.

A very good chance they re-take the house in November.

[JohnR]

I'll vote for a Dem like him - someone center, not leftist / Progressive

[Nebe]

Originally Posted by JohnR

I'll vote for a Dem like him - someone center, not leftist / Progressive

Same here. No loons from the far left please.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[zimmy]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

The Democrats ran an interesting candidate, young guy early 30s, former marine, very conservative for a democrat. This was not someone from the Warren/Schumer wing of the party.
.

Pro union, pro obama care, pro environment and air/water quality regulations, supports abortion rights, opposed the GOP tax bill. Yes, a veteran and gun owner as are tons of democrats. He is a democrat.

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by zimmy

Pro union, pro obama care, pro environment and air/water quality regulations, supports abortion rights, opposed the GOP tax bill. Yes, a veteran and gun owner as are tons of democrats. He is a democrat.

That and people were prob. tired of the POS "Dems. hate the Country, God and the Constitution".

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by zimmy

Pro union, pro obama care, pro environment and air/water quality regulations, supports abortion rights, opposed the GOP tax bill. Yes, a veteran and gun owner as are tons of democrats. He is a democrat.

I didn't say he was Pat Buchanan. I said he's not Pelosi/Schumer. I wouldn't vote for him based on a couple of his positions you rattled off, but a lot of people who voted for Trump, chose this guy. There may be a lot of democrats who were in the Marines, but not a lot of liberal democrats.

There was also likely some blowback against the GOP because the seat was vacated by a Republican who was having an affair, who was a total sleaze.

[Got Stripers]

I'd suggest having Trump come campaign for you, just might not be the smartest thing these candidates should be asking for. I don't know if anyone saw most of his rally speech, man what a tool he is, if I were the candidate watching it I'd be thinking; OMG why did I bring him here.

[scottw]

do you guys remember anything???

Obama was the smartest...most popular....most bestest president ever....was fixing everything....and the media kissed his ass and licked his shoes on a daily basis

"Although the President's party usually loses congressional, statewide and local seats in midterm elections, the 2010 midterm election season featured some of the biggest losses since the Great Depression."

Trump is the dumbest, most vile and repulsive president ever....is destroying everything....and the media assaults him on a daily basis

it will be fun to see who loses more....

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by scottw

do you guys remember anything???

Obama was the smartest...most popular....most bestest president ever....was fixing everything....and the media kissed his ass and licked his shoes on a daily basis

"Although the President's party usually loses congressional, statewide and local seats in midterm elections, the 2010 midterm election season featured some of the biggest losses since the Great Depression."

Trump is the dumbest, most vile and repulsive president ever....is destroying everything....and the media assaults him on a daily basis

it will be fun to see who loses more....

I hear you, and I'm sure you have a point. But the GOP didn't make gains in solidly blue districts in 2010, they took back a lot of purple districts.

And I think the GOP will pick up seats in the Senate. The House will be interesting.

[spence]

Originally Posted by scottw

do you guys remember anything???

Are you forgetting a big reason the 2010 mid-terms turned out the way they did was because of the Tea Party rallying around record deficits and terrible unemployment that Obama inherited from Bush?

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Got Stripers

I'd suggest having Trump come campaign for you, just might not be the smartest thing these candidates should be asking for. I don't know if anyone saw most of his rally speech, man what a tool he is, if I were the candidate watching it I'd be thinking; OMG why did I bring him here.

If it's a district he won by 20 points, I'm not sure why he wouldn't be able to help. That's what's interesting to me about this. Interesting and very concerning from my perspective.

[Pete F.]

We shouldn’t bail out homeowners but the bankers that led them off into the bushes should get bailed out and not end up losing or in jail.
Don’t worry we’ll repeal Dodd Franks because it restricts banking.
History repeats I’ve seen a few real estate bubbles pop in my lifetime, it will be the stock market this time and we’ll be bailing out the ones that are too big to fail
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

We shouldn’t bail out homeowners but the bankers that led them off into the bushes should get bailed out and not end up losing or in jail.
Don’t worry we’ll repeal Dodd Franks because it restricts banking.
History repeats I’ve seen a few real estate bubbles pop in my lifetime, it will be the stock market this time and we’ll be bailing out the ones that are too big to fail
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

The tea party didn't advocate bailing out banks, either. Is a speck of honesty too much to ask?

I didn't say we should or should not bail out homeowners. I was pointing out, correctly, what triggered the birth of the tea party.

"it will be the stock market this time and we’ll be bailing out the ones that are too big to fail"

Many feel we are due for a stock market correction and a recession. The tax overhaul, and especially the reduction in corporate income taxes, may delay that a bit. But it's coming.

[Slipknot]

Artificially postponing recession(not depression) by bailing out your buddies instead of allowing ebbs and flows which seems more stable to me, is a mistake but I am not an economist, I just know right from wrong. The government is not supposed to be in the business of making money, that is not their purpose but you go ahead and ask me stupid conjecture about tanking. If you do things right to begin with instead of repeating the same mistakes, things would be fine.
So everything is just rosey in your world, but others not so much

[zimmy]

Originally Posted by Slipknot

Artificially postponing recession(not depression) by bailing out your buddies instead of allowing ebbs and flows which seems more stable to me, is a mistake but I am not an economist, I just know right from wrong. The government is not supposed to be in the business of making money, that is not their purpose but you go ahead and ask me stupid conjecture about tanking. If you do things right to begin with instead of repeating the same mistakes, things would be fine.
So everything is just rosey in your world, but others not so much

The government didn't make money off of HARP. I am not sure where you are getting that. If you are talking about bailing out buddies, I assume you are referring to TARP which was the work of Bush and Paulson. Neither TARP or HARP postponed the recession, the recession had already occurred. The increase in gdp ended the recession. Regulations were put in place were to prevent repeating the same mistakes. First thing the current administration did was reverse many of those regulations setting the table for a repeat. It wasn't a stupid conjecture about tanking, it was about the reality of the potential outcomes of action vs inaction.

[Pete F.]

Perhaps the road to serfdom is paved with good intentions?
How will the end of work play into that?

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

And decentralization can lead to localized corruption as well. See it all the time in communities.

Government, by definition, is a centralization of power.

Neither decentralization nor its opposite lead to corruption. That's why you "see it all the time in communities." We already have a progressively over-centralized federal system and that does not diminish corruption at local levels. Corruption is inherent in the human condition.

The individual is a central unit of self-government. Corruption and abuse of power at that level of government has the least impact on the entire nation. And the individual has, inherently, total control of his/her morality.

Families are centralized mini-governments. Corruption in a family unit does not affect the entire nation. And the family has near total control of its morality.

Local government is centralized, more or less depending on its structure of checks and balances. The corruption at that level does not affect the entire nation. And the local citizens have more influence in stopping or prosecuting corruption in their community than they have over corruption in the national government. And the numerous localities can show different ways to govern, regulate, and prevent malfeasance or allow growth and good citizenship which can be copied or rejected by other localities or by higher levels of government. And it is easier to change things in response to public demand at the local level. Power is more closely held by the people at the local level than at the national level.

The national government is centralized (it is also referred to as the Central Government), but it is limited in power by a constitutional structure, and its power is further disbursed by its system of checks and balances.

Any corruption or abuse of power at the federal level affects the entire nation. And the possibility of centralized conglomerates of commerce, including banks, having commercial power over the whole country is far more possible, easier, when they become quasi governmental in tandem with federal regulation which favors them. The people have very limited to no control over national power.

The type of centralization of power that is the most to be feared, by those who believe in limited government, is the steady centralization of all government into the hands of the national government--the incorporation of all the powers and rights, from the individual, the family, the local and state, into the power and right of the Central Government.

Corruption, abuse of power, fascism, have their greatest opportunities to thrive under that unitary consolidation of government. That unitary power has limited to no opportunity to observe and compare various policies in action since it is the sole actor. It usually will just repeat its errors with even more force and funding into a downward spiral of economic collapse. And the entire nation will be under its thumb.

Pretty much exactly the opposite. The bubble was mainly caused by a lack of regulatory control that allowed for cheap and reckless loans, further exacerbated by additional lack of regulation that encouraged corrupt banking practices to obfuscate the risk.

It was government regulation that encouraged and coerced the cheap and reckless loans.

[spence]

Originally Posted by detbuch

It was government regulation that encouraged and coerced the cheap and reckless loans.

That's complete nonsense, it was deregulation that allowed lending and securities to become one in the same.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

That's complete nonsense, it was deregulation that allowed lending and securities to become one in the same.

It was government regulation that led to people who could not afford to pay for a home loan to get one. That led to bad mortgage notes which were bundled in with good ones and then sold to unknowing suckers. Without the plethora of bad notes, that corrupt bundling would not have occurred or been far less destructive.

[spence]

Originally Posted by detbuch

It was government regulation that led to people who could not afford to pay for a home loan to get one. That led to bad mortgage notes which were bundled in with good ones and then sold to unknowing suckers. Without the plethora of bad notes, the corrupt bundling would not have occurred.

Your position isn't supported by the facts. CRA loans actually have had a much lower default rate historically. I think this was discussed years ago on this very site.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

Your position isn't supported by the facts. CRA loans actually have had a much lower default rate historically. I think this was discussed years ago on this very site.

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-c...s-guide-2009-6

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

Your position isn't supported by the facts. CRA loans actually have had a much lower default rate historically. I think this was discussed years ago on this very site.

"Historically" is not the point. In a moment of spare time, I delved into the archives to see if the President's new economic advisor had an opinion about the CRA's effect on the great recession. Larry Kudlow, (very respected, not fired from his job) said this little tidbit:

https://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/28/are-...-villains.html

[Pete F.]

While you say Traditional Banks, traditional banks no longer exist. The bank that i used to be able to call and say i need this, they would say, for what and put the money in my account, I would stop and sign the paper has been bought and sold 3 times in the past 20 years.
All we have now is corporations funding other corporations, there are no banks that care about the community or their clients.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

While you say Traditional Banks, traditional banks no longer exist. The bank that i used to be able to call and say i need this, they would say, for what and put the money in my account, I would stop and sign the paper has been bought and sold 3 times in the past 20 years.
All we have now is corporations funding other corporations, there are no banks that care about the community or their clients.

The smaller banks were not bailed out. Banking became, as did many other corporations, more centralized into fewer large ones. Many small "traditional" small, single owner businesses, like neighborhood corner drug stores, have become scarce or no longer exist. They have been replaced by franchises which are under the umbrella of large, centralized corporations. The regulatory state promotes corporatism over smaller business entities. The big business/big government complex grows.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

I see your reference is a financial gossip blogger who was fired from businessinsider shortly after the piece was authored.

Touche indeed

Oh, and I decided to check "the archives" to confirm your post about Carney being fired "shortly after the piece was authored." Turns out that it was not shortly after the piece was authored, but 9 months later and had nothing to do with "the piece."

His firing was a surprise move and was motivated not by his article on the effect of the CRA on the housing crises of 2008, but "The general consensus seems to be that Carney is out because he, Blodget, and publisher Julie Hansen could not agree on how to cover and present stories. Blodget pushed for clicks through sensational headlines and features, like galleries, while Carney preferred focusing on breaking stories and in-depth reporting." Sounds like Carney was the more reputable reporter on the magazine, and those firing him were the sleazy ones--http://www.adweek.com/digital/john-carney-fired-from-business-insider/

And Carney did well professionally after leaving BI. As of 2013, "John Carney is a senior editor at CNBC.com, covering Wall Street, hedge funds, financial regulation and other business news. Prior to joining CNBC.com, John was the editor of Clusterstock.com and DealBreaker.com." So he is not a gossip hack, but is a credible financial analyst.

So you tried to twist the story to make it sound like Carney was some incompetent gossip columnist who lost his job because he wrote a fallacious, fake news, story.

Seems like you're the faker. A rather sleazy trick to make the article by Carney that I posted to be stupid and not worth refuting. That you didn't have to refute anything he said--probably because you couldn't. I've read the leftist attempt by the Center For American Progress to acquit the CRA of any fault in the 2008 financial crisis, and Carney, in the article that you could not refute, rebutted that sort of whitewashing of the CRA, point by point.

[spence]

Originally Posted by detbuch

Oh, and I decided to check "the archives" to confirm your post about Carney being fired "shortly after the piece was authored." Turns out that it was not shortly after the piece was authored, but 9 months later and had nothing to do with "the piece."

In the span of a career 9 months is pretty short and fired is fired.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

In the span of a career 9 months is pretty short and fired is fired.

You structured you rhetoric to imply that Carney's firing was due to the article on the CRA. 9 months is a long time to fire someone over writing a fallacious article. And the reason for the firing was not even due to the article.

Actually, your post was fallacious, misleading, and a sleazy trick.