Comments about ‘Half-trillion bailout in works’

Has anyone else noticed that anything George Bush touches turns into a disaster? It really is amazing, to those of us with any memory, that Bush inherited a huge budget surplus and a strong and steady economy. McCain is nothing but more of the same.

Meanwhile John McCain is so ignorant of economics--by his own admission--that he is clearly the wrong man for the job at this time. I beg and urge fellow Utahns to unite for change during this crisis for our economy.

Check out Mormons for Obama, we're on the web and on Facebook.

The Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 was established to prohibit a bank holding company from owning other financial companies and were repealed on November 12, 1999 by Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. Thank you Phil Gramm and your deregulation efforts. Now you are helping McCain bring about some added Socialism that Republicans rail about that has brought us this financial mess? Half-trillion? This is corporate welfare for big baks.

Proper Government regulation and oversight could have saved us from this mess.

When will we un-learn that, "Government isn't the solution, it is the problem".

The person who gave us this quote, was responsible due to his not believing in regulation for the Savings and Loan mess in the 1980s, which cost all of us, because of the required bail out by the United States government, hundreds of billions of dollars, a similar scandal.

Who is this person? President Ronald Reagan

Why am I as a taxpayer footing the bill for the gigantic mistakes of others?

What is the government going to do with these mortgages? Are they going to refinance all these loans with the home owners? Seems that Bush is trying to put anoher band aid on an heavily bleeding aneorism in the financial industry. This bail out will do more harm than help, this is a help your buddies program. The dollar value will plummet further and inflation will skyrocket some more and the american people are the ones who will suffer the most. Let the market crash, it was due anyway. You can't repair irresponsibility with rewards for failure and it's time our economy got back on reality using real money. As long as debt is created to bail out debt there will never be a recovery. The beginning was when government authorized individuals to put their incomes in the stock market as retirement investments. The market was floundering then and this was seen as a way to bail out Wall Street. And it did for a while but they failed to make needed changes to secure these retirement investments and how they were used. It was a windfall source of funding to carry on as usual without proper controls.

Help should not come to the mortgage lenders OR the borrowers without a steep cost. I agree that we need to stop the bleeding with some sort of aid, but the government needs to make it hurt both groups a bit, such as 40-year mortgages at higher interest rates. Perhaps we could put the gains into Social Security (sarcasm) so it could sustain itself.

I have a mortgage and since I could not sell my home before moving out of the U.S. . . . I still have a mortgage, which I am paying on my own!!!!

If you over-extended yourself, you lose your home. If you lend money to these people, you risk losing money. Sounds pretty simple to me.

If my memory serves, W has talked about Ownership Society as a way to give incentives to people.

Ownership clearly gets more protection from the Federal government than working. But isn't work the very thing that creates property? Apparently it doesn't matter, because you're only important if you qualify by owning financial instruments. But I do feel the pain of Enron employees, whose 401(k) accounts were wiped out because they had invested everything in Enron stock (a saying about eggs and baskets comes to mind).

@ 12:35 a.m. ? Are you serious? And I assume you think Obama is the second coming of Adam Smith. I won't get into all the accounting book-cooking that produced the so-called budget surplus under Clinton but I will admit that George Bush ruined the Republican brand name by growing Government like no other President ever has.
You are dead wrong about McCain - John McCain warned America five years ago that Fannie and Freddie were going to ruin the mortgage industry and possibly collapse our financial system and tried to pass legislation to reign these 2 GSE's in. Meanwhile, your man Obama was the recipient of the most money from Fannie and Freddie than any other US Senator.
I can make an argument that the Clinton admin created this whole mess by forcing banks to give mortgages to unworthy borrowers. And the banks didn't have to worry because Fannie and Freddie bought those garbage mortgages from them.

Why are the Democrats putting up the money for this bailout? Barney Frank and Chuck Schumer can't wait to give Bush the money for his plan. in fact, Schumer doesn't think we're spending enough.

Yes, we need change. We need to get rid of both sides.

The wheels were set in motion in 1977, that led to this mess today. There is plenty of blame to go around. Basically politicions don't know much of anything except how to get elected. The 2 running now are no excepsion.

How is this GWB's fault? The deregulation occured prior to his taking the presidency. The greed of the speculative investors was not his fault and the banks making stupid decisions is not his fault. Statements like those are why so many people can not take democrats serious. You probably are unaware of what a business cycle is right?

Anyone ever had a sibling who constantly lived their life in such a way dad always felt he had to step in and bail them out? My observation is that bailouts are not good for the sibling or dad... Easy cycle to get into, but tough to get out of.

Oh, and when did government start playing dad?

If McCain had his way, people's social security would've been invested in Wall Street. A man with that kind of poor judgment shouldn't be in the White House. We've already had 8 years of Bush, we don't need 4 more.

I really think this stinks!! I feel the only ones who need to pay for this mess are those who decided to buy in over their heads and then couldn't pay for their mortgages. Take it out their taxes! Don;t take it out of those who know and live within their budgets! This is not a good plan Bush and I hope Congress will kick it out!!! It wouldn't be fair nor right for hard working people to bail these banks out for their stupidity for not being more careful who they gave a home loan too!!

Make that 700 billion.

Our country's political system is a joke. Rampant crooks running amok, and a leader who makes disastrous decisions on a continual basis.
Get us OUT of Iraq and maybe the billions and billions being spent there every week can be funneled to clean up the financial markets.

The Oil bubble was speculation by Lehman and soon to be bankrupt investment banks trying to raise the losses by speculating on oil. Bush and Cheney knew that, but wanted to postpone it until after the elections. Then bang....egg on the face and they are holding the bag as the conservative legacy of 8 years of power! They go" all in" with social security, medicare and nationalize!

Please realize that a lot of the bad things which have happened under Bush have not been his fault.

9/11 was obviously not his fault, and anybody in their right mind would have gone to war after that, and war does tend to require deficit spending.

9/11 also was obviously very bad for the economy. Bush helped the economy to recover despite rising fuel costs! This new problem is mostly caused by people buying things which they could not afford. Did you want him to try to ban buying houses more expensive than $200,000 on credit?

McCain knows what he is doing with economics and has sound policy in that area. Just look at his economic policy actions on his senate website.

Isnt socialism wonderful?

It should be noted the Gramm-Leach act was passed by the Senate 90-8-1 and in the House: 362-57-15 and signed into law by President Clinton. The root of the problem was caused when you could by a house for 0% down and no proof of income. This change was hailed as a way more minorities could buy homes. If you check the foreclosure rate, the highest rates are in the minority neighborhoods. We need to get back to 20% down and have to provide proof of income.

I don't think Obama is the answer nor is McCain the answer, the answer is personal responsibility, understanding what your signing when you get a loan, and your house is a place to live not an investment.