We Slept When Clinton/Summers Raped the Middle Class; We're Sleeping Again

[MannyGoldstein]

The two pillars of our current economic tsunami were both primarily products of Larry Summers, Robert Rubin, and Bill Clinton:

1. Wholesale financial deregulation
2. Job-obliterating Almost-Free Trade With China

When these things were happening, some of us said "Wait - this is a great idea for the Banker Class, but a catastrophe-in-waiting for the Middle Class." We were told to fuck off; after all "They're Democrats!", and these things are far too subtle to be understood by us little people.

Now here we are.

Today we're seeing a repeat - some of the same actors taking actions to, once again, brutally screw the Middle Class. Once again, it'll be great for the Banker Class; they will be given many trillions of our tax dollars under "heads you win, tails we lose" rules. Virtually every economist of any standing has called this for exactly what it is - another catastrophe-in-waiting. But, once again, those who see what's happening are being told to fuck off. "They call themselves Democrats, so we have to support them".

Look - if even most members of a site called "Democratic Underground" can't figure out what's happening, we are utterly doomed. I know my words are harsh, but this is an existential threat, not something to be coated with sugar.

Will we sleep through it? Or will we take action this time?

[Captain Hilts]

1. FYI: Income disparity went DOWN under Clinton. nt

[MannyGoldstein]

3. Link Please? n/t

[wyldwolf]

5. how about a link backing up your op?

[MannyGoldstein]

9. Which Part Do You Challenge? n/t

[wyldwolf]

13. all of it.

:)

So let's see them links

[MannyGoldstein]

18. Pick Any Single One. Any.

I'll not waste my time on finding links on whether the sun rose this morning, either.

[wyldwolf]

24. you'll not waste your time picking links because they don't exist.

You never could except a challenge to prove your points.

[MannyGoldstein]

28. Clearly, You Can't Find Even A Single Thing That's Incorrect.

Sad. I'm finished with this subthread.

[wyldwolf]

31. All of it is incorrect. Clearly you can't prove your case.

[leveymg]

55. Point made was that Globalization raped the middle-class. Process just took a while to complete.

Take a longer view of globalization and the process of restructuring. See my comments below about Summers and IMF austerity programs, and the current-accounts crisis that Krugman described in his seminal 1998 paper on the Asia Crisis.

[wyldwolf]

58. I know what the point was. There's still no proof given for it

:shrug:

[leveymg]

62. The proof is all around you. Painfully obvious since September. Your problem if you can't see it.

Just open your eyes.

[wyldwolf]

65. no hard evidence. Sorry.

[leveymg]

71. Read this. Then come back and comment.

You don't need a Ph.D, Econ. to understand the essential points being made, particularly "Pangloss value" (the role of gov't bailouts of bubble assets in current accounts crises). The current crisis goes back to the causes of the Asia Crisis of '97, follows that same pattern, the end result was the imposition of Summers-designed IMF austerity measures in those countries. Go ahead. Won't hurt you.

Paul Krugman, 1998, "What Happened to Asia?" mimeoWhat all of this suggests is that the Asian crisis is best seen not as a .... based not on the expected value of future rent but on the Pangloss value - in ...
http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/DISINTER.html - 37k - Cached - Similar pages

Globalisation and the Asia-Pacific:In effect, they argue that the pre-crisis asset values were more or less .... Suppose that in period 2 there is a collapse of the Pangloss regime, .... Krugman, P. (1998a) "Bubble, boom, crash: theoretical notes on Asia's crisis", mimeo ...
http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/FIRESALE.htm - 48k - Cached - Similar pages

[wyldwolf]

74. It's about Asia

fact remains, unemployment declined and wages grew after NAFTA was inacted in the US.

[leveymg]

81. And then the bubble burst, unemployment went up. Or, haven't you noticed?

I agree, but you're looking at the Clinton period in isolation rather than as part of a larger global economic process that's broadly termed Global Free Trade. Underregulated money sloshes around the world - assets in underregulated national markets get pumped up into bubbles - public and private debts rise to unsustainable levels, in large part because gov'ts fuel expections of bailouts -- the bubbles get burst by hedge-fund attacks -- currencies collapse -- global vulture capital equity firms move in and pick the bones clean -- the gov't itself has to be bailed out, but at the cost of privatizing or shutting down social services. The process gets repeated in the next country.

Do you really think that process is restricted to Asia?

[wyldwolf]

89. unemployment didn't go up significantly until the last 4 years

And there is no evidence linking that to NAFTA

[leveymg]

95. Underemployment - people working involuntarily as consultants or P/T went way up

starting with the NASDAQ crash of 2000. The phenomenon wasn't noticed by MSM until late last year. See my comment below.

[wyldwolf]

100. where are the stats showing people "working involuntarily?"

And what does NASDAQ have to do with NAFTA?

[leveymg]

108. That group of involuntarily P/T is included in the BLS U6 measure

See,

Table A-12. Alternative measures of labor underutilizationFor more information, see "BLS introduces new range of alternative unemployment measures," in the October 1995 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. ...
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm - 22k - Cached - Similar pages

Unemployment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaNote: "Marginally attached workers" are added to the total labor force for unemployment rate calculation for U4, U5, and U6. The BLS drastically revised the ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unemployment


I don't want to get into the NAFTA argument, specifically.

[wyldwolf]

109. where is the "involuntary" part?

[leveymg]

110. It's part of the definition of U6

"U6: U5 + Part time workers who want to work full time, but can not due to economic reasons."

IOW - involuntary P/T.

You couldn't read that yourself at the WIKI link provided? What's wrong with you?

[wyldwolf]

111. that is completely voluntary.

:shrug:

[leveymg]

112. There's something wrong with you. eom

[wyldwolf]

113. yeah, because I want factual posting here instead of fanciful interpretations.

[Jim Sagle]

257. Coming from you, that's funny. (Actually, it's pathetic.)

[wyldwolf]

262. you always did have a problem with facts.

[Jim Sagle]

263. No, only with factoids. Or in your case, facturds.

[wyldwolf]

276. you're a facturd! You nailed it!

[Jim Sagle]

286. I'm rubber and you're glue. Whatever you say about me sticks to you.

Nana nana na na.

[wyldwolf]

291. you're also a child

[Jim Sagle]

294. And you're a bot.

[wyldwolf]

299. so says the child bot...

[Moochy]

300. Oh Let's be Honest, you both fucking suck

God Bless This Subthread!

[wyldwolf]

306. he sux more

[Name removed]

308. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Moochy]

312. I just think its funny that two of my least favorite blowhard du'er douchebags are going at it.

[Jim Sagle]

313. Only one of us was trying to disrupt the whole damn thread singlehanded.

Can you get that through your skull?

[Moochy]

314. its through!

I agree, I've been in similar exchanges with wyldpuppy...you make a lot more sense than he does in this thread.
:hi:

[wyldwolf]

315. correcting the OP's dishonesty is what Sagle calls "disrupting" and what moocher calls...

.."making more sense."

[Jim Sagle]

321. You disrupted everyone who agreed with the op.

It was never correction. And we all know it.

[wyldwolf]

322. no I didn't. They didn't have to reply to me.

[Jim Sagle]

332. Everybody should shut up but you.

Got it.

[wyldwolf]

333. aww! You just want to say what you want without being disagreed with

[JVS]

334. Yeah. Ignored vs. Ignored is a hell of a show.

[Drunken Irishman]

137. Unemployment is still lower today than it was through most of the 70s and 80s.

For all this talk about the unemployment, the numbers even today are far better than what we were experiencing in the 1970s and 80s.

So yes, it's gone up, but it's still not even come to close to reaching levels seen in the 1980s and 70s, when it often reached 7-10% levels.

[Mr Rabble]

218. ITs calculated differently now. U3 v. U6.

If we were to use the methods used by the Carter administration, we would be near 20% unemployment.

There were numerous diaries on Kos (Jerome, Bondad, etc) which explained this and used BLS stats to show it.

[uponit7771]

250. No it's not, RayGun admin changed the way unemployement was calculated

[femrap]

155. Wages grew for who?

Middle and working class wages have been stagnate since the '70's. And if you need a link for that, you must be sitting at the Heritage Foundation getting paid as you type.

[wyldwolf]

162. 1990s - Fastest Real Wage Growth in More Than Two Decades for the middle class.

:shrug:

By 2000, the United States had five consecutive years of real wage growth -- the longest consecutive increase since the 1960s. From 1993 to 2000, real wages were up 6.5 percent, after declining 4.3 percent during the Reagan and Bush years. (National Economic Council, 6/00)

[femrap]

188. After accounting for loss of purchasing

power (inflation), the working and middle class wages have been stagnate.

Per a presentation from Prof. of Economics Fadkel Kaboub of Denison University on 4/2/09:

'Structural Inequality' started roughly 30 years ago. Between 1980 to 2004 worker productivity increased 68%; however the hourly wage went from $15.67 to $15.68 per hour.

Maybe you haven't been around long enough to remember Raygun and how his administration working hand in hand with multinationals stopped unions, deregulated Greed, and started the Inequal Tax Structure (VooDoo Economics).

The only thing keeping people going has been DEBT...!!! And now that game is over.

Clinton was the best Republican Prez we have ever had. He got in bed with the Multinationals and did what they said.

[wyldwolf]

189. I think it's you who "haven't been around long enough."

"Clinton was the best Republican Prez we have ever had" - one the dumbest lines "progressives" use.


Inflation DECLINED in the 90s.

http://www.philadelphiafed.org/research-and-data/publications/business-review/1998/july-august/brja98dc.pdf

[MannyGoldstein]

195. Inflation Declined Under Reagan

Which is just another of the amazing coincidences between the Reagan and Clinton administrations.

Actually, not so amazing - Clinton was essentially a Reagan Republican.

[wyldwolf]

198. and a declining inflation rate is a bad thing how?

[MannyGoldstein]

200. Did I Say It Wasn't?

In a vacuum, it's fine.

[wyldwolf]

201. actually, yeah. Or was the Reagan comparison just a casual observation? No.

[MannyGoldstein]

202. You Are A Very, Very Silly Person

The only thing that you can take away from that is that lower inflation proves zip, nada, bubkes.

Although Clinton being a Reagan Republican - that is clearly a very bad thing.

[wyldwolf]

210. you are a very deluded person

:rofl:

[femrap]

225. Go talk to some of your buddies

sitting with you at Heritage.

You're ignored.

[wyldwolf]

226. go talk to some of your buddies sitting at Green Party headquarters

:rofl:

[Jim Sagle]

255. Keep babbling to yourself. That's all you ever do anyway.

[wyldwolf]

256. then you must be me, because you keep answering. LOL!

[Jim Sagle]

258. If I were you I'd kill myself. But that's just me.

[wyldwolf]

261. considering how my personalities you have running around in your walnut sized brain...

... your statement doesn't surprise me.

[Jim Sagle]

265. Nothing ever does - surprise you, that is. Nothing ever penetrates, either.

[wyldwolf]

268. nothing surprises me from you. As for the penetrate part, take that up in your next counseling.

[Jim Sagle]

271. You're the one that made the sad sexual reference. Seek help.

[wyldwolf]

275. wow! That was your Nun personality coming up... Sister Sagle...

[Jim Sagle]

287. Wow...looks like yer IQ is climbing. Pretty soon you'll be able to tie yer own shoelaces.

[wyldwolf]

292. that's your adolescent personality

[Jim Sagle]

295. No, it's yer disability. Please try to adjust.

[wyldwolf]

298. ah, projection. I'll add that to your considerably long list of defects

[Moochy]

304. HAHAHAHAHAHA SO FUCKING FUNNY

[leveymg]

76. Here are some useful links on Summers and IMF austerity measures

Maurice Williams, Wall Street Demands Austerity, Buys Up Wealth Of ...On January 14 President Suharto formally agreed to the IMF's demands. U.S. deputy treasury secretary Lawrence Summers and State Department official Stanley ...
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/54b/059.html - 11k - Cached - Similar pages

Anthony Faiola, Brazil Details Austerity PlanThe austerity package, the details of which were released today by ... Shedding light on the forthcoming IMF aid package, Summers said it will have a ...
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/42/097.html - 11k - Cached - Similar pages

Kyiv Post. Independence. Community. Trust. » Homepage » World ...world news, Eastern Europe awaits austerity, summer of discontent. ... which have turned to the IMF and European Union for help, to others pumping billions ...
http://www.kyivpost.com/world/37843

[wyldwolf]

79. how does any of this lend any credence to the OP's fantasies?

[leveymg]

82. See my comment above.

Clinton and Summers were (are) part of a long-term problem of underregulated global capital and its repeated pattern of blowing up bubble markets followed by austerity measures.

[wyldwolf]

86. the 90s saw unprecidented growth for the middle class that wasn't halted ..

... until the recession of 2001. After we left that recession, no reasonable case can be made that the problems since then are on Clinton's plate. The facts and figures aren't there to support such a notion.

[leveymg]

94. The NASDAQ crashed during the spring, 2000.

Two bounce attempts that summer. At that point, equity capital for start-ups and small firms became almost impossible to get. What followed was a process of consolidation of industry where bank lending went almost exclusively to M&As by large multinational companies. Debt levels rose. Hiring, and middle-class earnings then flattened and plummeted due to outsourcing and offshoring. Investment went to Asia. Start of the housing bubble - people began using false equity in their homes to replace lost earnings to a middle-class lifestyle they were being priced out of.

This was going on before 9/11.

Yes, Clinton rode the crest of the wave. But, then, it broke. Bush made things ten, 100 times worse.

[eridani]

213. An uptick in major overall middle class income decline is better than nothing

Family incomes in 1998 had still come nowhere near inflation adjusted incomes of 1973, though.

[eridani]

279. It was incomplete movement toward, but nowhere near, our 1973 family income peak year

Cost of living for the things that matter, unlike electronic toys, increased at a far faster rate.

[Political Heretic]

171. I hate to get in the middle of these sort of things, but I've got plenty of evidence

That something has gone wrong.

Now before I point you in the right direction I need to make a disclaimer: this is one of those threads where I've been more interested in subsquent discussion that in the OP. So don't lump me in with OP just because you keep asking for some stats and I'm going to give you some...okay? Think of this more like an aside....

So, the best clearly house for economic statistics is here:
http://stateofworkingamerica.org

Specifically, you'll want to look at these tables:
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/tabfig_03.html|Chapter 3: Wages—Growth stalls while productivity and compensation diverge>

http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/tabfig_05.html|Chapter 5: Wealth—Unrelenting Disparities>

http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/tabfig_08.html|Chapter 8: International Comparisons—How Does the United States Stack Up?>

Also:
http://practical-vision.blogspot.com/2009/03/we-are-losing-america-right-before-our.html

Next we have a few other important things:



And:

?width=640&height=615

And then finally some other links of interest:

Unions Do Not Undermine Competitiveness:
http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/snapshots_20090225/

PUTTING U.S. CORPORATE TAXES IN PERSPECTIVE
By Chye-Ching Huang

The U.S. corporate tax burden is smaller than average for developed countries.<1> Corporations in 19 of the member states of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development paid 16.1 percent of their profits in taxes between 2000 and 2005, on average, while corporations in the United States paid 13.4 percent.

Nevertheless, some have argued that U.S. corporate tax rates unduly burden U.S. companies by pointing to the country’s top statutory tax rate, which is 35 percent. For example, a recent Wall Street Journal editorial calling for corporate tax cuts noted that this is the second highest top statutory tax rate among developed countries.<2> While true, this gives the false impression that the corporate tax burden is greater here than in other developed countries. Because the U.S. tax code offers so many deductions, credits, and other mechanisms by which corporations can reduce their taxes, the actual percentage of profits that U.S. corporations pay in taxes — or what analysts refer to as their effective tax rate — is not high, compared to other developed countries.

Because the average U.S. corporate tax burden is low, many economists believe a revenue-neutral corporate tax reform that reduces statutory corporate tax rates, while broadening the tax base by eliminating costly tax breaks, could improve economic efficiency and likely benefit the U.S. economy.

* Effective tax rate much lower than top statutory rate. Government and independent researchers have long pointed out that the top statutory corporate tax rate is an incomplete measure at best of the burden of corporate taxes. It does not take into account the generous depreciation rules, exemptions, deductions, and credits (some of which are sometimes termed “loopholes”) that corporations may be eligible for. Those special provisions lower corporations’ effective tax rate, or the share of their profits they actually pay in taxes, and do so in a way that creates different tax rates for different industries. These differential tax rates across industries are generally regarded as more harmful to economic efficiency than any burden due to the current top statutory rate.

*

The United States has plethora of generous corporate tax breaks. As the Treasury Department has noted, the United States’ low effective tax rate reflects its “narrow corporate tax base,” which is the result of “accelerated depreciation allowances special tax provisions for particular business sectors … as well as debt finance and tax planning.”<3>

These tax breaks lead to very low tax rates on certain types of investments — even negative rates in some cases. For example, a 2005 Congressional Budget Office study found that the effective marginal corporate rate — the rate paid on the last dollar of income earned and arguably the tax rate most relevant for investment decisions — on debt-financed investment in machinery was negative, estimated at -46 percent.<4> This means that the total value of the deductions that companies may claim for such investment is much larger than the tax they pay. (Put another way, it means that other taxpayers effectively subsidize the investment.) A recent Government Accountability Office study similarly found wide variation in effective tax rates across corporations.<5>

The Treasury Department estimates that various corporate tax breaks will cost the federal government more than $1.2 trillion over the next ten years (2008-2017), a period during which total corporate revenues are projected to equal $3.4 trillion.<7>

*

Many smaller corporations do not face the top statutory corporate tax rate. For small corporations, another reason that the top statutory corporate tax rate is an inaccurate measure of the U.S. corporate tax burden is that many of these companies do not face the top rate.<7> In contrast to many other developed countries, which apply the same tax rate to all taxable corporate income, the United States has a graduated corporate tax structure, in which corporations with smaller incomes are taxed at rates below 35 percent. While a very large share of taxable corporate income is earned by corporations large enough to face the top rate,<8> in terms of numbers, most U.S. corporations face a statutory rate lower than the 35 percent top rate.

*

Broaden the base, reduce the rate. Corporate tax reform that eliminates a portion of the existing tax breaks and uses the savings to offset the cost of reducing statutory corporate tax rates would likely improve economic efficiency without increasing deficits and debt.<9>

End Notes:

<1> U.S. Department of the Treasury, “Treasury Conference on Business Taxation and Global Competitiveness: Background Paper,” July 23, 2007, Table 5-3 (giving data on a sample of 19 of the 30 OECD states). For an international comparison of corporate-level taxes (taxes paid at the corporate level, including, for example, property taxes, labor taxes and contributions, and sales taxes), see: World Bank and PricewaterhouseCoopers, “Paying Taxes 2008: the Global Picture,” http://www.doingbusiness.org/documents/Paying_Taxes_2008.pdf. This study compared the corporate-level taxation that a hypothetical company with 60 employees would face in 178 countries. The study found that the corporate-level taxes the model company would pay, measured as a percentage of its profits, would be higher in 76 other countries (including 15 OECD countries) than in the United States.

<2> “America the Uncompetitive,” August 15. The ranking is based on data from the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development.

<3> Office of Tax Policy, U.S. Department of the Treasury, “Approaches to Improve the Competitiveness of the U.S. Business Tax System for the 21st Century,” December 20, 2007.

<4> Congressional Budget Office, “Corporate Income Tax Rates: International Comparisons,” November 2005, http://cbo.gov/ftpdocs/69xx/doc6902/11-28-CorporateTax.pdf. Effective tax rates were estimated by Michael P. Devereux, Rachel Griffith, and Alexander Klemm and are available on the website of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, at http://www.ifs.org.uk/publications.php?publication_id=3210. The methodology is described in Devereux, Giffith, and Klemm, “Corporate Income Tax Reforms and International Tax Competition,” Economic Policy, October 2002.

<5> U.S. Government Accountability Office, “U.S. Multinational Corporations: Effective Tax Rates are Correlated with Where Income is Reported”, http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d08950.pdf, August 2008. The paper also noted that for large corporations, “there was considerable variation in effective tax rates across taxpayers. At one extreme, 32.9 percent of the taxpayers accounting for 37.5 percent of income, had effective tax rates of 10 percent or less; at the other extreme, 25.6 percent of the taxpayers, accounting for 14.8 percent of the income, had effective tax rate over 50 percent.” One possible cause for this wide variation may be that the tax treatment of corporate investment varies significantly by asset type; for a discussion of this variation in the tax treatment of investments and the potential for beneficial corporate tax reform that reduces this variation, see: Aviva Aron-Dine, “Well-Designed, Fiscally Responsible Corporate Tax Reform Could Benefit the Economy,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, http://www.cbpp.org/6-4-08tax.pdf, June 4, 2008.

<6> U.S. Department of the Treasury, “Treasury Conference on Business Taxation and Global Competitiveness: Background Paper,” July 23, 2007, p 11.

<7> See United States Government Accountability Office, “Comparison of the Reported Tax Liabilities of Foreign and U.S.-Controlled Corporations, 1998-2005,” July 2008, which reported that in 2005, over 66 percent of U.S.-controlled corporations had no corporate income tax liability.

<8> All taxable income of any corporation with taxable income in excess of $18.3 million is subject to the 35 percent rate, although credits can substantially reduce the effective tax rate on taxable income.

<9> See: Aviva Aron-Dine, “Well-Designed, Fiscally Responsible Corporate Tax Reform Could Benefit the Economy,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, http://www.cbpp.org/6-4-08tax.pdf, June 4, 2008.

[wyldwolf]

183. no one is denying something has gone wrong, However, the evidence is lacking...

... that Clinton had anything to do with it.

1990s - Fastest Real Wage Growth in More Than Two Decades for the middle class. By 2000, the United States had five consecutive years of real wage growth -- the longest consecutive increase since the 1960s. From 1993 to 2000, real wages were up 6.5 percent, after declining 4.3 percent during the Reagan and Bush years. (National Economic Council, 6/00)

[mod mom]

136. Repeal of Glass Steagall, MF Nation status for China, NAFTA and even Telecom Act of '96

have done tremendous damage to the middle class. Sometimes it takes years for the effects of legislation to be felt, as you suggest. Some folks here would rather wear their blinders than admit there was damage done by Clinton policy.

I first started looking at Clinton policy after receiving a Mark Lombardi book for Christmas one year. He made connections by following the money. When you realize that Bill Clinton received much funding help from Jackson Stephens (think BCCI, Walmart, E Liverpool Toxic Waste Incinerator) it starts to make some sense. Had Bill Clinton exposed what had occurred w BCCI and Iran Contra, I don't believe we would find ourselves in our current predicament.

[wyldwolf]

139. what about them?

Repeal of Glass Steagall...

It was a congressional republican issue in which Clinton threatened to veto. the republicans made a deal with the congressional democrats to get the bill passed with a veto proof super majority. As is tradition, when a president is faced with a major passage with such support, there is no reason to veto.

MF Nation status for China...

It was Jimmy Carter who first pushed for it - In 1979 he sent Congress a trade agreement with China that included a MFN waiver which gave China MFN status on a year by year basis. He restored normalize relations in 1980. Also check former Carter's Op-Ed article in The New York Times on April 30 1991 calling for "reconcilation" and the renewal of most-favored-nation trade status for China.

NAFTA...

Jimmy Carter, again, was a tireless advocate of NAFTA and served as the co-chairman of it, actually worked out under the Bush I administration.

[mod mom]

142. Here's some reading material, but of course you mind is made:

Glass Steagall Repeal:

How the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act became law -
On Oct. 21, with the House-Senate conference committee deadlocked after marathon negotiations, the main sticking point is partisan bickering over the bill's effect on the Community Reinvestment Act, which sets rules for lending to poor communities. Sandy Weill calls President Clinton in the evening to try to break the deadlock after Senator Phil Gramm, chairman of the Banking Committee, warned Citigroup lobbyist Roger Levy that Weill has to get White House moving on the bill or he would shut down the House-Senate conference. Serious negotiations resume, and a deal is announced at 2:45 a.m. on Oct. 22. President Bill Clinton signed this bill into law on November 12, 1999.

Bill Clinton -
So we know that the topic of that late night phone call between Bill Clinton and Sandy Weill, the man whose career began in the subprime mortgage business, was the Community Reinvestment Act. We know that Phil Gramm, who was the one most strongly pushing for gutting CRA (Leach actually supported it) threatened to torpedo the legislation if the White House did not reach an agreement.

So why did Clinton go along? His writings are silent on the subject. He seemingly held the trump card with the threat to veto any legislation that did not meet his approval. And why is it Sandy Weill who makes the phone call to Clinton? At this point not enough evidence is available to finally connect the dots, but whatever it is, it cannot possibly benefit Bill Clinton. The reason for the silence may be that for the Clintons the repeal of Glass-Steagall may prove far more embarrassing in the long run than Monica Lewinsky.

-snip
http://www.theminorityreportblog.com/story/pilgrim/2008/09/19/the_players_in_paving_the_way_to_the_wall_st_meltdown


A chronology tracing the life of the Glass-Steagall Act, from its passage in 1933 to its death throes in the 1990s, and how Citigroup's Sandy Weill dealt the coup de grâce.


On April 6, 1998, Weill and Reed announce a $70 billion stock swap merging Travelers (which owned the investment house Salomon Smith Barney) and Citicorp (the parent of Citibank), to create Citigroup Inc., the world's largest financial services company, in what was the biggest corporate merger in history.

The transaction would have to work around regulations in the Glass-Steagall and Bank Holding Company acts governing the industry, which were implemented precisely to prevent this type of company: a combination of insurance underwriting, securities underwriting, and commecial banking. The merger effectively gives regulators and lawmakers three options: end these restrictions, scuttle the deal, or force the merged company to cut back on its consumer offerings by divesting any business that fails to comply with the law.

-snip

Citicorp and Travelers quietly lobby banking regulators and government officials for their support. In late March and early April, Weill makes three heads-up calls to Washington: to Fed Chairman Greenspan, Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, and President Clinton. On April 5, the day before the announcement, Weill and Reed make a ceremonial call on Clinton to brief him on the upcoming announcement.

-snip

Weill and Reed have to act quickly for both business and political reasons. Fears that the necessary regulatory changes would not happen in time had caused the share prices of both companies to fall. The House Republican leadership indicates that it wants to enact the measure in the current session of Congress. While the Clinton administration generally supported Glass-Steagall "modernization," but there are concerns that mid-term elections in the fall could bring in Democrats less sympathetic to changing the laws.

-snip

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/wallstreet/weill/demise.html

On MF Trade Status w China:

Clinton to renew Normal Trade Relations with China



June 2, 1999
Web posted at: 4:51 p.m. EDT (2051 GMT)


WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, June 2) -- President Bill Clinton will notify Congress Thursday that he is renewing China's most-favored-nation (MFN) trading status -- now known as Normal Trade Relations (NTR) -- for another year, CNN has confirmed.

MFN/NTR status offers low tariffs and treats countries as normal trading partners.

The formal notification, required by the Thursday deadline, is expected to trigger a major debate in the House and Senate due to allegations of Chinese espionage against the U.S. and other recent diplomatic tensions, including charges China tried to influence the 1996 presidential election with illegal campaign contributions.

One of the first speak out against Clinton decision, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-California), derided the president for making the decision near the 10th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.

-snip

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/06/02/china.mfn/



Clinton Proposes Renewing China's Most-Favored Trade Status

Congressional reaction mixed amidst larger China policy issues


WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, June 3) -- President Bill Clinton on Wednesday proposed renewing most-favored-nation (MFN) trade status for China, saying it was "clearly in our nation's interest" as he urged Congress to support the request.

-snip

House Speaker Newt Gingrich welcomed Clinton's recommendation for renewing MFN status for China, and vowed to work in a bipartisan manner to ensure that China receives it from Congress.

Gingrich, joined by Reps. Bill Archer (R-Texas) and Philip Crane (R-Ill.), made his comments in a letter to Clinton.

-snip

House Democratic leader Richard Gephardt issued a statement Wednesday opposing Clinton's plan to extend China's trading status for another year.

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/06/03/china.trade/

[mod mom]

143. More on Clinton's ties w China (and I suppose you didn't find this disturbing either):

White House Had Ended System of Checking Foreign Guests

By TIM WEINER
Published: February 3, 1997

Ten years ago the Reagan White House adopted a rule about foreign businessmen, lobbyists and consultants who wanted to get in to see the President without the blessing of their embassies: they shouldn't.

But President Clinton's aides did not follow that rule. In their eagerness to raise campaign money, they invited friends of the President's fund-raisers -- including China's biggest arms merchant, favor-seeking Indonesian businessmen, a reputed Russian mobster and other dubiously credentialed dealmakers -- to meet with Mr. Clinton. Nor did the White House check the suitability of Americans invited by the Democratic National Committee to meet the President, allowing, among others, a twice-convicted felon to sip coffee with Mr. Clinton.

-snip

And that is why nobody on the White House political team saw fit to ask the National Security Council staff a year ago about a man named Wang Jun, who showed up on a guest list for a White House coffee with the President. The question of exactly how Mr. Wang got into the White House has a simple answer: ''Nobody ever asked anybody,'' a National Security Council official said.

So, at the behest of a tireless political fund-raiser from Arkansas, Charlie Yah Lin Trie, Mr. Clinton wound up sipping coffee with Mr. Wang, who runs the Chinese Government's weapons manufacturing and procuring agency, which is involved in secret arms deals around the world. These coffees for fund-raisers and donors began as a way to raise morale among party loyalists after the Democrats' disastrous showing in the 1994 election. By 1995, they became a way to reward big donors and prospect for new ones, according to Democratic fund-raisers.

-snip

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E2DC103DF930A35751C0A961958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

Corporate Dems selling out to the highest bidder.

[wyldwolf]

144. I already know all this, but you choose to completely ignore the Carter connection

It's an inconvenience to the overall Clinton-is-evil theory, but it is nevertheless true.

You also ignore the futility of not signing something that is veto-proof.

[mod mom]

146. I wasn't aware that Jimmy Carter was overseeing the Clinton Administration.

[wyldwolf]

147. you obviously also weren't aware how much that fine "progressive" pushed for these things

;)

...and how much the prior Republican administration did to those ends. It's just Clinton Clinton Clinton.

[bread_and_roses]

216. No, it's just Corporatism Corporatism Corporatism...and the Scraps and Bones Party's

role in coming in to distribute those scraps and bones after the Corporate Raptor Republicans have had a run. Once the depredations on the poor and working class begin to affect the Wanna Be Lords and Masters Middle-Class and they start to get restless the Raptors have to send in the supposed Party of the People to put a few band-aids on and scatter a few more coins and left-overs to the rabble. Happens over and over, seems, and alas, we're seeing it happen again.

[mod mom]

145. Jackson Stephen's (Clinton Financier) WTI Toxic Waste Incinerator + the Clintons:

I ca't imagine anyone who reads this entire diary and isn't appalled by Clinton's action (REALLY READ THE ENTIRE THING!) :



Ask Hillary About This Tonight. I Dare You.
by Zwoof

Thu Jan 31, 2008 at 03:40:46 AM PST

Several days ago I posted a diary about the WTI and Von Roll Toxic Waste Incinerator. Because I posted it the same day as the South Carolina Primary, several Kossacks have asked me to repost.
Instead of duplicating the diary, I have added some new developments, and data.
While I was writing the original piece on the history of this foul project, a new ruling from the Ohio EPAallowed this incinerator, located 1,100 feet from an elementary school, to accept even more hazardous waste (anthrax, radioactive waste, infectious medical waste and mixed hazardous waste from Hurricane Katrina) than the original permit that was shrouded in corruption and approved by the Clinton Administration
Clinton and Al Gore promised the residents of East Liverpool, Ohio that they would not allow this incinerator originally approved by Bush '41 to operate. However, a Clinton EPA appointee, recommended by his classmate Hillary Clinton, approved the permit.
This is a tangled tale of corporatism, broken promises and an environmental disaster waiting to happen.
It's long, so hang with me below the fold.

-snip

Stephens "extended a $3.5 million line of credit to campaign through the Worthen Bank, which is partly owned by the Stephens family. The Clinton campaign deposited up to $55 million in federal election funds in this bank." (Source: The Nation)

-snip
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/31/21045/9822/688/446786

[Rosa Luxemburg]

150. Republicans had majority period

[Chef Eric]

97. You can start with today's WSJ.

<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123879462053487927.html#mod=testMod>

Tody in the WSJ, John D. McKinnon and T.W. Farnam report that Summers received $5.2 million over the past year in compensation from hedge fund D.E. Shaw, and also received hundreds of thousands of dollars in speaking fees from major financial institutions. How are we supposed trust Summers to put a stop to Wall Street's excess, when he is indebted to it?

[wyldwolf]

101. that does NADA to support the OP's contentions. You'll have to do better than that

[Deja Q]

63. I found some graphs a union person gave me once...

CEO pay as a multiple of average worker pay, between 1620 and 2000, went from 41x in 1960 to 79x in 1970, down to 42x by 1980, and since then it has gone up and up and up to 531x (in 2000). After offshoring, I suspect it's closer to 700~800x.

On the plus side, between 1975 and 1999, they kept going down between 1980 and 1997 (albeit with a couple token up points in the mid-80s), and went up a couple notches by 1999.

BusinessWeek had an article on executive pay; from April 16, 2001.

http://www.faireconomy.org

[MadHound]

133. Bullshit.

The income/wealth gap between the rich and the rest of us opened to record breaking proportions, eclipsing the previous record set in the Gilded Age, all under Clinton. Read Wealth and Democracy by Kevin Phillips for reference.

[Political Heretic]

161. Don't quote stats unless you know what you're doing:

Note that on Average, between 1989 and 2001, income inequality rose between the top fifth and the bottom four fifths.

Furthermore, wages stagnated.


We had the decoupling of productivity and wages for the first time in the 20th century back around the start of Reagan, and we've never gotten that back sense. You see the disconnect between the growth of productivity and wages here, but if you break this out into income categories, what you see is wages stagnant for the middle-class and wages in decline for the working poor.

[wyldwolf]

173. I have to agree

:)

[Political Heretic]

181. LOL shutup.

:rofl:

Chart 1:



Chart 2:

[wyldwolf]

185. the second graph makes the point. Real wage growth grew tremendously during the 90s

[Political Heretic]

187. No, no it didn't.

Wages were tracking with productivity - at the decoupling you see wages begin to sputter out in stagnation, whereas for most of the 20th century they would track right with productivity. What you call "tremendous growth" economist have near universally called "wage stagnation" - those some defend it and some oppose it.

And as I said, in addition to that stagnation, if you look specifically at certain segments, you see that the middle-class from median income down had wages that were even more flat, and for the working poor, their wages actually declined during this time period.

And actually, both graphs tell the story, not just one. Or really, the first graph tells my "story," as I was responding to a poster who said that income disparity went down in the 90s when it did not.


EDIT - for the record I'm not part of this whole clinton bashing argument. I have no interest in that. But let's not distort numbers to defend a president. Much of what was going on wasn't clinton's fault, and all of it is part of a LARGER PICTURE that we need to understand.

When we try to bash these numbers because we fear they might make a democratic president look back, that does a huge disservice to a broader conversation that we really need to have about the long term direction of the economy

[wyldwolf]

191. the graph shows both wages and productivity on an upward trajectory

[Political Heretic]

199. Right but let me try to explain....

And again, I hope you read my edit in the above post. I have no interest in bashing Clinton. It's not about him, for me.

Okay so, I'll also try to go round up some more information on this same time period that might help explain this.

I can't represent all of this with the graph, you'll have to read the state of working America report where the graph comes from to find credentialed people who back up what I'm about to say....

When economist talk about wage stagnation, they don't mean that the wage line has to be "absolutely" flat. Wages "grew" on the median. But not at a rate that kept up with inflation, and not at a rate that kept up with productivity. In fact, wages lost more ground and split further from productivity, and they have continued the same trend (of decoupling) every since. So simply because of things like inflation or overall economic growth over the years wages will grow - people aren't still making 5 bucks a week and thinking of themsevles as "comfortable." :)

But productivity has exploded, and where wages and productivity used to stay in sync, now productivity is ramps up exponentially and wages don't keep up. The other thing I mentioned is adjusting for inflation. Wages, adjusted for inflation, haven't risen for the average worker since the 1970s, INCLUDING during the period of the 1990s.*

(Some people, mostly conservatives, disagree. Here's a conservative economist arguing that we should look at wage numbers differently: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_425055.html

On the other hand, here's Paul Krugman back from when he was still "cool" in 2006 giving a history of wages from what I consider to be a more appropriate perspective: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/12699486/paul_krugman_on_the_great_wealth_transfer

He writes at the end:

The broader picture is equally dismal. According to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, the hourly wage of the average American non-supervisory worker is actually lower, adjusted for inflation, than it was in 1970. Meanwhile, CEO pay has soared — from less than thirty times the average wage to almost 300 times the typical worker's pay.

The bottom line is that wages for working class people (non-supervisory) have been either in stagnation or decline for nearly 30 years, and that trend has never very seriously been altered at any point.

****NOTE**** if you look at very micro snapshots you'll see alternations. Like this:



But the broader trend from 1970 to today, including through the 1990s is flat or decline.

[bread_and_roses]

215. Oh, s/he understands perfectly, but chooses to use a single, discrete measure over and over

as if repetition would make it any more valid. If Kevin Phillips can't convince him/her, no one else is likely to. Good luck, though - good stuff you have here; I'm bookmarking because I'm always finding and then losing some of this data, and then wasting time searching for it again.

[MannyGoldstein]

194. Exactly

Thank you. Thanks to 28 years of unrelenting attacks on the Middle Class, we have become such unequal partners with the predator Class that we can no longer hold our own. Productivity goes up, while wages go down.

[Optical.Catalyst]

254. Interesting Graph

You have, of course, heard that "correlation does not prove causation".

The productivity line on the graph looks just like one I have seen showing how the introduction of digital computers and assembly line automation increased productivity.

Could there be a little more going on in industrial manufacturing that just productivity verses wages?

[lamp_shade]

2. Manny manny manny.....

[Rosa Luxemburg]

4. You forgot to mention the Republican congress and Gramm?

why would you leave that out?

[wyldwolf]

6. He obviously loves the Republican congress and Gramm. Why else would he constantly attack Clinton?

[Rosa Luxemburg]

7. most of his posts seem to attack Democrats?

or am I imagining it?

[MannyGoldstein]

10. They Attack Democrats Who Aren't Democrats

The Democratic Party is about protecting the Middle Class, not sodomizing it.

[wyldwolf]

15. then you should be attacking yourself

[Romulox]

22. "Centrist" attempts to bully someone into silence. What a shock! nt

[wyldwolf]

26. "progressive" plays the victim card again. What a shock!

[Romulox]

30. Nope. No victim here--I'm not intimidated by the likes of you.

:hi:

[wyldwolf]

33. that's good.

:)

[Jim Sagle]

116. If he's like me, though, he's bored shitless.

:boring:

[wyldwolf]

123. but not bored enough not to reply.

:rofl:

[Jim Sagle]

125. I know it's like stepping on an ant but I just can't help it.

[wyldwolf]

126. leave your home life out of this, no one cares.

[Jim Sagle]

129. No, I was not over at your house. That was some other guy.

[wyldwolf]

131. Another senseless reply from you. Now you're just replying to reply.

[Jim Sagle]

156. Actually I'm just trying (in vain, it appears) to tie you down so that others can have a noise-free

discussion.

[wyldwolf]

163. I do know how you like noise-free (and fact free) discussions. sorry to spoil it for you

[Jim Sagle]

169. ASSertions are not facts.

[wyldwolf]

175. I'm glad you agree the OP is fact -free assertions.

[Jim Sagle]

230. This thread would've been fine had you not ruined it. But I guess that's what you're paid for.

[wyldwolf]

231. aww... is little jimmy upset I didn't let the bullshit stand? lol!

[Jim Sagle]

235. The only bullshit on this thread comes from you, and everybody goddamn well knows it.

Attention mods:

Wyldwolf is boasting that he derailed this thread.

[wyldwolf]

236. ooh... little jimmy is cussin' now!

[Jim Sagle]

259. I'll take that diversion as an admission that your only purpose is thread disruption.

[wyldwolf]

264. ooh, now little jimmy is acting all delusional

[Jim Sagle]

266. Wyldwolf is gurgling like an infant as usual.

[wyldwolf]

269. Is that your "mother" personality? You have so many!

[Jim Sagle]

272. All of them more constructive than yours.

[wyldwolf]

277. ah, an admission of you multiple personality disorder coupled with delusions of grandeur!

[Jim Sagle]

288. Actually, I'm just humoring you. In a season of gun violence, it's the best way.

[wyldwolf]

293. that's your inner paranoid OCD kicking in

[Jim Sagle]

296. Confucius say, armchair diagnostician equal real-life bozo.

[wyldwolf]

297. Confucius knew you well!

[Jim Sagle]

309. Ahh yesss....the old "mirror" gambit.

[truedelphi]

168. There in lies the problem

I grew up inside a Republican household. At a time when John F Kennedy was the President.

I remember the evening of the assassination, my Republican father entering our household in tears.

The kids that were my closest friends were Democrats. Their parents worshiped the Kennedys. They talked at their homes about Civil Rights for everyone, about the need for the poor to have expanded poverty programs. All of that. ANd since I was one of the family, at several of those households, and since I too worshiped John Kennedy, those credos became my own.

But now those kids that I played with - they have inherited their parent's businesses. The moment that times were rough, they put the companies into bankruptcy. Siphoned off the workers' pensions into their golden parachutes. "It's just sound business" is their defense.

ANd yet they REMAIN calling themselves Democrats.

So I think there is a big huge split between those of us "middle incomed" average person Democrats, and the ones who eat and sleep with the bankers They have no qualms at all about laying a worker off right before the Christmas holidays, then, remembering the lessons learned at their parents' knees, buy the laid off worker's family a turkey for the holidays.

Whereas those of us who understand what it means to be middle class hate that sort of thing.

[MADem]

11. It's like a virus that is going around this joint lately, I swear! nt

[Spazito]

12. Hmmm, I see the OPs from this poster the same as you....

so I don't think you and I are imagining it at all.

[wyldwolf]

14. it's true

[Raineyb]

92. Why attack Republicans for being Republican?

We expect Republicans to bend over backwards to accommodate the corporation and screw the middle class. We ought not put up with such behavior when someone claiming to be a Democrat does it. Hence, the attack against the so-called Democrat. Going after the Republican when the Democrat is equally guilty would be a superfluous exercise in futility would it not. Republicans don't listen to us. (Apparently neither do Democrats but they do pay lip service to doing so.)

You're being extremely disingenuous with this bit.

Regards

[wyldwolf]

114. The Democrat is NOT equally guilty.

You're being extremely disingenuous with this bit.

Regards

[depakid]

209. No, in many cases they're FAR worse

because not only do they know better- and betray thier own purported values- but they undercut honest efforts at responsible public policy.

At least with Republicans, you know what you're fighting- and who your enemies are. No so with the "stab you in the back" type Democrats- who advocate the same damn things from an ostensibly protected perch.

[Raineyb]

229. Exactly

I abhor people who ask me for money claiming to fight for my values then vote against them or undermine efforts to put things I want into place. I excoriate Democrats because they know better. I don't expect better from Republicans they behave exactly as I expect them to. I depend on Democrats to counteract that not cave in and help the Republicans.

Regards

[Rosa Luxemburg]

141. the Republicans were left out of the conversation

when they were to blame too in fact moreso

[Raineyb]

166. But we already know that the Republicans are to blame.

How exactly is pointing out that we can't sleep on our own unhelpful?

People are acting as though Democrats have never sold us out and that's not true. The outrage is generally more towards Democrats not because they're equally to blame (although there are times when they are) but because we expect better from the Democrat. We expect Republicans to screw us over. We ought not have to expect it from Democrats and too many people seem perfectly willing to accept bullshit from Democrats that we'd be screaming about if a Republican pulled it.

Regards

[MannyGoldstein]

8. Clinton Samelessly Pushed For Both

And vetoed neither, and handed the signing pen for the Glass-Steagall repeal to the CEO of Citi Group.

We expect this from Republicans. Not from Democrats.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

148. Republicans had veto proof majority so Clinton couldn't have

Republicans controlled congress in 1998/9. Republicans repealed the act by a veto proof majority. Democrats had no power to stop it.

"The bills were introduced in the Senate by Phil Gramm (R-TX) and in the House of Representatives by James Leach (R-IA). The bills were passed by a 54-44 vote along party lines with Republican support in the Senate<1> and by a 343-86 vote in the House of Representatives<2>. Nov 4, 1999: After passing both the Senate and House the bill was moved to a conference committee to work out the differences between the Senate and House versions. The final bill resolving the differences was passed in the Senate 90-8-1 and in the House: 362-57-15. This veto proof legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on November 12, 1999. "

[Raineyb]

167. He could have.

It may have been been overturned but he could have vetoed it. You cannot have the man willingly sign a bill and go so far as to hold a ceremony for the bill signing then say he had no choice.

Clinton chose not push harder to get Democrats not to sign off.
Clinton chose not to veto the bill.
Clinton chose to have a Rose Garden Ceremony.

We cannot pretend that he went in with a twisted arm when he did these things. He could have vetoed and see if it was overturned. He didn't have to have the very public ceremony for the signing.

It doesn't ring true to say there was no choice involved in Clinton signing this bill as though he didn't much care for it. If he didn't care for the bill he wouldn't have had the ceremony. That ceremony shows that not only did Clinton sign the bill but did so enthusiastically. To pretend that he wasn't willing as far as Gramm, Leach, Bliley (sp?) simply goes against the known facts.

Clinton obviously didn't have any problem whatsoever signing that rather toxic bit of legislation. And that bit of law plays a large part in why the economy is in the mess that it's in now.

Regards

[Rosa Luxemburg]

172. well

let's say twisted arm

[RedstDem]

221. So what if taking a stand and Using a veto would be overturned

You would be on record as being against something noxious, instead, they got Clinton's signature as a souvenir. think if he vetoed it like a someone who actually cared about the future of the middle class would have, there would be no back and forth argument about his stand on it today....

[Raineyb]

228. My point exactly.

I will not consider an argument about Clinton not wanting to something pass when his signature appears on the bill. It doesn't ring true. If you are president and you don't like a bill you don't pass it. If the veto is overturned it's overturned but you didn't endorse it. If you sign it then you wanted it to pass and you cannot argue that you didn't want the bill to pass.

Regards

[Enthusiast]

134. After eight years of persecuting

Clinton nearly anything could have happened. The 'TV news' was 24/7 attack Clinton all the time over every wild allegation except the one we should have been informed about. And this same media is now worse than ever.

[indimuse]

16. you got

JOKES, I see... :rofl:

[wyldwolf]

19. I think it's great the faux anger based on half truths and lies that...

... the modern "progressive" movement has been pushing the last dozen years or so is slowly unraveling. Soon avowed Democrat haters like Sirota, KOS, Huffington, and the OP of this thread will be laughing stocks.

[Name removed]

303. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[wyldwolf]

318. ooh... the moocher is getting desperate. He's probably punching his basement walls now

[Moochy]

323. just cuz you live in a Trunk in Al From's basement doesnt mean everyone lives in a basement

[wyldwolf]

326. but YOU do... Nader central in your mom's basement.

[Moochy]

328. F!@# Nader

Nader can go screw himself, as can all failed politicians. :think:

[wyldwolf]

331. So that's what you do with him! Eww.

[wyldwolf]

17. Clinton years - a smashing success for the middle and lower class

Clinton's 1993 decision to cut the budget deficit rather than propose substantial new spending helped lay the groundwork for an extraordinary economic boom. And, unlike the boom of the '80s, Clinton's genuinely benefited the poorest Americans. Under Ronald Reagan, 50,000 children escaped poverty; under Clinton, more than 4 million did. During Clinton's tenure, income rose faster for blacks and Latinos than for whites, and faster for single mothers than for two-parent families. By 2000, black and Latino poverty were at their lowest levels ever recorded.

And it wasn't only the economic boom. Clinton raised the minimum wage, he created schip, which offered health insurance to children of the working poor, and he dramatically expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit (eitc). These initiatives rewarded work, and none required large new government bureaucracies. But, on the ground, they changed lives. When Clinton left office, the poverty rate was 11 percent. But, as Ronald Brownstein has noted, when you factor in government policies, especially the larger eitc, it dropped to 9 percent. During Clinton's presidency, the percentage of Americans living in poverty fell by one-quarter. And, without particular policies based on a particular vision of government, that would not have happened. Morally and intellectually and economically, Clintonism was a success.

[MannyGoldstein]

23. It Was Borrowing Against A Giant Credit Card - Like Under Reagan

I believe you are one of the only people who believe that wholesale financial regulation and almost-free trade with China helped the Middle Class.

[wyldwolf]

29. still no links to back your revisionist history?

[MannyGoldstein]

38. Point Out Just One Thing That's Wrong

You obviously can't.

[wyldwolf]

51. for the 4th time, ALL of it.

[Jim Sagle]

118. Pathetic dodge from a dodgy fake centrist.

[wyldwolf]

120. irrelevant response from an irrelevant leftist wannabe

[Jim Sagle]

128. Half-baked meta mirror comment from a 5-buck an hour DLC hogwash slinger.

[wyldwolf]

132. clueless and irrelevant comment ... again.

[Jim Sagle]

157. Say hi to Al From for me, guy.

[wyldwolf]

160. sure thing. Say hi to Ralph Nader for me.

[Jim Sagle]

267. I did. He asked me if that DLC jagoff was sill stinking up DU.

[wyldwolf]

270. and you shook his hand for helping Bush steal the election in 2000.

[Jim Sagle]

289. Seriously, I hope he dies of brain cancer for that.

[Zynx]

45. Most of the early part of the boom (1993-1997) wasn't as consumer debt driven.

We also certainly didn't pass huge tax cuts for the rich while racking up the national debt.

[HamdenRice]

90. That is borderline insane. You realize Clinton ran budget surpluses right?

That's not borrowing against a giant credit card, that's paying down a giant credit card.

Clinton raised taxes on the rich, which enabled the government to begin paying down its debt, which made investment available for new industries in telecom, computers and the internet.

And don't say it was just a bubble. That's the most idiotic thing that anyone can write on DemocraticUnderground, an internet forum that could not have existed before the so-called bubble financed millions of miles of fiber optic networks, and millions of servers, software innovations and personal computers.

[wyldwolf]

102. Manny is saying anything at this point.

[denem]

93. A Giant Credit Card? You mean like a Federal Surplus?

Or perhaps Social Security heading towards sustainability for the first time in a generation?

[FailureToCommunicate]

Agree with your take on this. Folks can be mad that Clinton smiled as he signed the

bill. But Phill Gramm and the Republicans had a veto proof majority. How many of you who now wail about all the bad things Clinton supposedly did even VOTED in those
mid term elections that swept in Newt Gingrich and the Fat Cats? Let's see some hands up. No? Don't make me call on you...

[Romulox]

56. This is revisionism. Clinton pushed HARD for NAFTA / MFN China

[wyldwolf]

70. So did Jimmy Carter

[wyldwolf]

61. exactly, and the even funnier thing is how these keyboard warriors..

.. won't give Clinton credit for anything they think was good but rather credit congress. But when it comes to the "bad" things sent to him by Congress, it's all his fault.

[Moochy]

305. thats rich.. wyldolf calling someone "keyboard warriors"

:rofl:

From Al From's Cyber Piss-boy / Internet Tough Guy.

[wyldwolf]

316. that's rich. The moocher even having anything to say. Nader let you out of the basement today?

[Captain Hilts]

177. RIGHT!!! Dems didn't show up to vote. nt

[blm]

49. Dems in congress raised minimum wage, created SCHP, and expanding EITC was standard Dem

policy. Clinton happened to have lucked into the WH in the 90s when the internet expanded our economic fortunes.

Why do you give credit to Clinton as if he CREATED standard Dem positions? And...Hell, if it was up to Clinton in the 80s and 90s Reagan and Bush1 would never have been investigated for their illegal operations (especially since Clinton agreed with their IranContra/BCCI operations). Without fear of being exposed on IranContra or BCCI you think Bush1 would have been so easily defeated in 1992? Hell, Jackson Stephens would have had his boy Bill wait till 1996 to play cleanup for Bush. By then Poppy Bush would have been given the lion's share of credit for the internet economy.

[patrice]

57. Whether we agree about the particular steps or not, is it possible that the real problem

with President Clinton was that, when the time came to dial some of the de-regulation and things like NAFTA back a bit and maybe even create NEW more progressive groundwork, he/we had already lost too much power, because of the impeachment, to do any "fine tuning"?

Republicans saw Clinton Policies 2.0 coming and that geometrically increased their "moral" outrage over a blow-job and the definition of "is".

[KoKo]

138. With one hand he gave....with the other it was taken away....eom

[wyldwolf]

140. really? How? Examples?

[Romulox]

20. Thank you for all your efforts on these boards, Manny!

Please don't assume that the "Centrist" bullies that hang out here are anything other than a vocal minority.

[MannyGoldstein]

32. So Where Are The Actual Democrats?

It gets lonely here sometimes!

[Romulox]

40. Many of them have been banned, others have left in disgust.

There is a concerted effort to make GD : P the home away from home for blue dogs and DINOs, if you ask me.

If you post on GD, you will find more posters with traditional Democratic values.

:toast:

[NavyDavy]

73. man you guys are ridiculous! I believe in all things left...the more

social programs and employee rights the better.....but to sit here and attack each other because you are to center,left, right, it is just wrong....this is what the rightwingers want and some on here, not just you I just chose your post to reply on, like to add fuel for the rwers to put in there attack ads......just my opinion....I love all my Dem bros and sisters.....:-)

[bahrbearian]

80. So we should become more like the Rightwingers.. Goose step

We can do better and must.

[NavyDavy]

87. no i did not say that but perszonal attacks are ridiculous.....I may

disagree but I would never try to force you to change to my beliefs or views......never said we should be mindless drones, however, just a point of fact this is how the right wingers win alot of their elections....they may hate each other and fight with each other but when it comes down too beating a Dem they put all differences to the side and attack the common enemy, which we could do like we did to win back thw WH....then we can go back to our disagreements...IMHO!

[Romulox]

96. Er, irony alert!

"man you guys are ridiculous!...but to sit here and attack each other because you are to center,left, right, it is just wrong"

[bahrbearian]

78. We are here.

Fight the good fight. :hi:

[Kdillard]

21. Clinton can be accused of many things but raping the Middle Class is not one of them.

[Romulox]

27. Er, NAFTA and MFN for China are STILL devasting the Middle Class. nt

[wyldwolf]

34. links?

[Romulox]

36. www.google.com

[wyldwolf]

39. I see nothing at that link that makes yours and the OP's case

I do see that you're both to lazy to make your case and instead want to pass the burden of proof to someone else.

[Romulox]

42. I have no time to waste on a wolf in sheeps clothing like yourself. I won't apologize. nt

[Name removed]

47. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

119. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[wyldwolf]

124. quote one lie I've told on this thread

[Name removed]

127. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[wyldwolf]

130. you're living proof that ignorance is bliss. You can't quote one thing that isn't the truth.

[Runcible Spoon]

238. Project much?

You're an embarrassment to DU and Obama.

[wyldwolf]

243. nope, just point out the facts of the matter. You're an embarrassment to DU and Obama.

[Runcible Spoon]

249. You're not very creative. Stop ripping off my lines.

[wyldwolf]

251. you're not very factual.

[Moochy]

302. All of them, post links to prove that you are not lying! n/t

[wyldwolf]

317. moocher, I asked first. The OP is completely dishonest and can't prove his point

[wyldwolf]

135. thank god you keep posting, wouldn't want you to "waste your time" LOL!

[MannyGoldstein]

35. Actually, MFN is a Pony and NAFTA is a Unicorn.

Or so most at DU would have us believe.

[biopowertoday]

104. with the blessing of Obama

[Captain Hilts]

154. No trade with China is. nt

[JVS]

335. That depends on how one is defining middle class, which everyone claims to be in this country

If middle class means household income of $50-$80K usually received in the form of an hourly wage, the OP's right. If it means $80K-$150K usually received in the form of a monthly salary, then Clinton was quite good to them. Clinton's economy was generous to workers in proportion to the size of their stock portfolios.

[leveymg]

25. Problem with Summers is he designed the IMF-imposed austerity programs that will be applied here

if we continue down this insane current accounts crisis to its logical conclusion. Here's how the process progresses toward's Summers "restructuring" as described by Krugman: speculative excess - massive public and private debts - pump up assets and real estate bubble markets - implied/real gov't guarantees to investors, bubble inflates further - hedge fund raiders pop bubble - gov't attempts bailout, but unable to borrow further - currency collapse - middle-class tax base wiped out - social programs slashed - remaining assets bought up by global equity funds at fire sale prices - restructuring - global banks take possession of country.

Rinse. Repeat elsewhere.

GOOGLE: Krugman Asia Crisis

[wyldwolf]

37. Notice: The OP deflects requests to prove his talking points and instead...

... tries to pass off the burden of proof which belongs to him.

[MannyGoldstein]

41. Notice: You Have Refused To Point Out Even A Single thing That's Incorrect

Thinking people recognize your rhetorical claptrap for what it is.

[Romulox]

46. Wyldwolf is not worth your troubles. He/she/it is not amenable to facts or reason. nt

[wyldwolf]

50. I am when someone has facts or reason. But you don't qualify

[Romulox]

52. Just keeping kicking the thread with your inanities. :) nt

[wyldwolf]

59. sure, so everyone can see the aburdities of the OP's fabrications

[wyldwolf]

48. I've twice told you ALL of it is incorrect. Now prove your fabrications

[Moochy]

301. "I shat in your wheaties now you eat it!"

[wyldwolf]

319. no one's interested in your breakfast menu

[Kdillard]

43. Very true but not surprising.

[leveymg]

44. Push toward Globalization continued throughout the Reagan-Bush41-Clinton-Bush43 era.

Self-evident. Now, the middle-class reap the whirlwind.

Just take a broader view, and you'll see the point made in the OP.

[lamp_shade]

53. This is SOP for OP... nearly every post.

[LynnTheDem]

54. Ain't that the truth.

[Honeycombe8]

60. Don't forget NAFTA. That was the real big start of Americans losing jobs. nt

[wyldwolf]

64. The U.S. unemployment rate was 6.9% in 1993, the year NAFTA was agreed to

The U.S. unemployment rate was 6.9% in 1993, the year NAFTA was agreed to. It was 6.1% in 1994. The rate fell steadily until reaching 4.0% in the year 2000. Even in 2002, the year after we had a recession, the rate was 5.8%, lower than the year NAFTA went into effect.

But what about manufacturing jobs? We had just about 17 million in 1994. It actually rose to 17.56 million in 1998 and was at 17.26 in 2000 (still higher than in 1994 the year NAFTA went into effect). Then we had a recession in 2001 and since then the number of manufacturing jobs has fallen quite a bit, down to 14.3 million. So that is a loss of nearly 3 million since 2000, which might be due to the recession. If it were due to NAFTA, then why did it take so long for the loss to happen?

But what about wages? Real hourly wages have risen since 1994 for all workers. For all workers, hourly wages rose 38.4% while the Consumer Price Index (CPI) just rose 27.1%, hence the real gain. For manufacturing jobs, hourly wages also rose more than prices, with a 34.1% gain. But a pre-NAFTA comparison is in order. From 1984-1994, hourly wages for all workers rose 33.5%, while the CPI rose 42.2%, indicating a fall in real wages. The same happened for manufacturing jobs with hourly wages rising only 33%, well under the rise in prices. So it looks like workers did better in the years after NAFTA went into effect than before.

[MannyGoldstein]

66. I Got A New Credit Card Last Year

So I had a lot more money!

Now I have to pay it back, with interest.

[wyldwolf]

67. My wife and I both got raises last year. In fact, so did my best friend.

So I had a lot more money.

Unfortunately your point fails. Wages went up in the 90s.

[MannyGoldstein]

72. My Company Borrowed Last Year, And Gave Me A Big Raise!!!

But now they have to pay it back, so they I was laid off.

(Wait for it... Wyldwolf will claim there's no hard evidence of layoffs this year.)

[wyldwolf]

75. ha ha. In your joy of getting that credit card, you forgot your raise (snicker)

[polmaven]

117. Last year?

Bill Clinton was the president LAST YEAR???? Wow! Who knew? :shrug:

[wyldwolf]

77. that's how credit works. Did you not know you had to pay it back?

[TwilightZone]

84. Credit cards have been around a lot longer than Clinton

So, those are his fault, too?

Or are they Obama's?

Hard to keep things straight around here. Don't know which Democrat to blame - the one who hasn't been in office for more than eight years or the one who just took office a couple months ago.

Oh, yeah, I remember. Both.

[wyldwolf]

88. but Manny hasn't, obviously.

[TwilightZone]

68. Hey, no bringing facts into the conversation.

All you're allowed to talk about are rape and sodomy.

[wyldwolf]

69. it's a bad habit of mine

[HughMoran]

83. Fuckin' Democrats are to blame for everything and even DU is too stupid to do anything about it

We're stupid,



lemmings with



a bad attitude!

[leveymg]

85. No. Just those Democrats who are stupid enough to try to bribe Wall St. to behave itself.

All carrots, no sticks. Enough carrots, already. We're running out of f-ing carrots.

(Love your lemmings tag-line. What's the link?)

[mkultra]

91. Financial deragultion was not clinton

It was a congressional republican issue in which Clinton threatened to veto. the republicans made a deal with the congressional democrats to get the bill passed with a veto proof super majority. As is tradition, when a president is faced with a major passage with such support, there is no reason to veto.

[democracy1st]

98. Clinton was not a loyal opposition to the corp takeover,Nafta,1996 telecommunications act etc

matter of fact he helped

[TheKentuckian]

99. How is this a one way or the other thing?

Bubba certainly did sell us out to the Chinese while wages went up and the wealth disparity went down. He did push NAFTA pretty hard and over time it will probably prove fairly necessary as India and China get into full swing if we are going to even attempt to compete globally.

Trying to paint politicians, especially Democratic politicians who have more interests to answer to than a Republican 99 times out of a 100, purely in black and white terms can be a quick path to dishonesty.
I also think people lie to themselves for whatever reason about political climate. Clinton was about as liberal as the American people would tolerate at the time, maybe more so and got a pass with Perot splitting the opposition. Continue to deny the reality that the Reagan/Bush crime syndicate and their propaganda network did to the country but it won't change a thing.

Certainly, politicians are a big part of our problems but in the end they are just a symptom of our more generally screwed up electorate. The people ate up the greed is good, screw you I got mine, nothing is more important that right now mentality and it is woven into the national fabric. Even those inclined to resist the general rightward mentality have to exist in reality. Clinton was about as good as we could possibly get, without him the bar would be on George HW or Nixon for the last couple of generations. Same deal with Obama. Sure, he needs to be pushed as far left as the country will tolerate but realistically his platform that many feel is luke warm at best is far more liberal than most would project as palatable or electable even maybe a year ago.

Even half steps away from the cliff's edge are real steps in the right direction.

[kid a]

103. I'll be impressed when you actually do something that mattered

posting hyperbolic shit on a democratic website takes 60 seconds and you can watch your american idol while doing it.

while your motives may be genuine, your actions are lame

[polichick]

121. How do you know what actions the poster has taken??

I'd like to think that most posters here do more than sound off, but few post about the actions they take off the board.

[DevonRex]

105. Clinton wasn't perfect. Obama has inherited a huge mess.

And he isn't perfect, either. I believe Clinton's heart was in the right place but some of his policies had unintended consequences. I refuse to say he was evil because of that. I refuse to say Obama is evil when he's just trying to avoid having the world economy crash and burn.

[polichick]

106. Hopefully, we aren't all sleeping - those of us who care can email...

...whitehouse.gov as often as we like (as well as keep in constant touch with our Congresscritters and Senators, and take part in protests as they do in Europe).

By our actions we can give the president the political muscle he needs to do the hard things.

[Teaser]

107. addressing the substance of the original post...

[iamthebandfanman]

115. you're a witch!

burn him!


:)

[ShortnFiery]

122. Excellent commentary. I'm with you 100% Wide awake ;). nt.

[donheld]

149. You are TOTALLY full of shit

You do not belong on Democratic Underground.

[PBS Poll-435]

151. This is the saddest thing I have ever read

:cry::cry::cry:

[MannyGoldstein]

152. Reagan And Clinton Curves Look Similar

I suppose that Reagan borrowed against the future, and Clinton did not?

[PBS Poll-435]

159. Shit

You must have found the solution.

:crazy:

[PBS Poll-435]

158. .

hiccup.

[Hippo_Tron]

273. On this note...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5CLV500XAs

[femrap]

153. K and R

Rubin and Summers would sell their souls and the souls of their children to the devil for money and power. Let's hope Summers has to step down for conflict of interest (like he has a conscience...lol).

Clinton has some responsibility for our mess...but let's not forget:

1. Phil Gramm of Florida who got CDS (Credit Default Swaps) listed as Securities NOT Insurance so these 'financial instruments' did NOT require reserve money. Also Gramm's wife was a lobbyist at the time for the financial industry. This is why AIG is costing you and me a ton of money. This is directly Gramm's fault!!!!

2. Glass-Steagall Act went down under Clinton, BUT remember, the vote on getting rid of it was VETO PROOF...so Clinton signed it. (He shouldn't have.) I remember going nuts about this at the time.

3. Multinationals are running the world now...not our government. So I would suggest that you stop phoning your Congresswoman/Senator and instead start calling CEOs of multinationals...or at least their Investor Relations Departments and complain to them. Boycott them. Pester them. Go viral on this.

4. All of this MESS started with RAYGUN and his cooperation with Multinationals!!! He started the deregulation, the dissolution of unions, and the de-funding of Education (Says Raygun: 'Why should I educate people who disagree with me?). The death of decent healthcare started with Nixon.


Please....adopt a rich white CEO and call him everyday...twice!

[ElsewheresDaughter]

164. hardly...try Raygun, Greenspan, Newt, and the bush's...Clinton had a veto proof congress

[wyldwolf]

165. they're not MannyGoldstein's real enemy

[Name removed]

174. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

176. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[MannyGoldstein]

179. Clinton Smiled As He Signed The Glass-Steagall Repeal

And handed the pen to the CEO of Citi Group.

[wyldwolf]

180. so?

:shrug:

He smiled a lot.

[MannyGoldstein]

182. He Also Got Paid A Lot

By Citi Group.

[wyldwolf]

184. Citigroup has paid a lot to many people

:shrug:

Do you have a single shred of evidence... no, wait, wrong question for you.

[MannyGoldstein]

190. Prove You Exist

Good luck.

[wyldwolf]

192. finally, an admission that you can't prove a single thing you're spouting

[MannyGoldstein]

196. Wow.

Just wow.

[wyldwolf]

197. yeah, to put such little priority on facts as you do... just wow!

[MannyGoldstein]

208. The Final Response On A Thread Wins!!!

Congratulations!

[wyldwolf]

211. when will you make your next fictitious OP?

[leftofthedial]

170. I've stayed lubed up nonstop since raygun,

so the rape is less painful.

[high density]

178. I'm willing to give them a little time on financial regulation

I really can't give them a failing grade on that yet.

But I am not impressed by the Obama admin's posturing on the H-1B visa program... That needed to end yesterday. It's time for all this pro-corporate legislation to come off the books.

[bottomtheweaver]

186. Watching the former "Generous Motors" get taken apart by takeover vultures

is pretty horrifying. Who the hell is this Henderson character anyway?

[bottomtheweaver]

193. To believe that you'd have to believe Clinton was in the tank for WalMart.

On second thought. . . :blush:

[natrat]

203. obama clinton geitner summers are some seriously slick crooks, at least they work for crooks

In an explosive interview on PBS' Bill Moyers Journal, William K. Black, a professor of economics and law with the University of Missouri, alleged that American banks and credit agencies conspired to create a system in which so-called "liars loans" could receive AAA ratings and zero oversight, amounting to a massive "fraud" at the epicenter of US finance.

But worse still, said Black, Timothy Geithner, President Barack Obama's Secretary of the Treasury, is currently engaged in a cover-up to keep the truth of America's financial insolvency from its citizens.

The interview, which aired Friday night, is carried on the Bill Moyers Journal Web site.

Black's most recent published work, "The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One," released in 2005, was hailed by Nobel-winning economist George A. Akerlof as "extraordinary."

"There is no one else in the whole world who understands so well exactly how these lootings occurred in all their details and how the changes in government regulations and in statutes in the early 1980s caused this spate of looting," he wrote. "This book will be a classic."

But that book only covers the fallout from the 1980s Savings & Loan crisis; Black's later first-hand involvement in that scandal being the ensuing liquidation of bad banks.

"A single bank, IndyMac, lost more money than the entire Savings and Loan Crisis," reported PBS. "The difference between now and then, explains Black, is a drastic reduction in regulation and oversight, 'We now know what happens when you destroy regulation. You get the biggest financial calamity of anybody under the age of 80.'"

That financial calamity, he explained, was brought about not by mishap or accident, but only after a concerted effort to undermine and remove all regulations, allowing a creditor free-for-all that hinged on fraudulent risk ratings for bad loans.

"he way that you do it is to make really bad loans, because they pay better," he told Moyers. "Then you grow extremely rapidly, in other words, you're a Ponzi-like scheme. And the third thing you do is we call it leverage. That just means borrowing a lot of money, and the combination creates a situation where you have guaranteed record profits in the early years. That makes you rich, through the bonuses that modern executive compensation has produced. It also makes it inevitable that there's going to be a disaster down the road.

"...This stuff, the exotic stuff that you're talking about was created out of things like liars' loans, that were known to be extraordinarily bad," he continued. "And now it was getting triple-A ratings. Now a triple-A rating is supposed to mean there is zero credit risk. So you take something that not only has significant, it has crushing risk. That's why it's toxic. And you create this fiction that it has zero risk. That itself, of course, is a fraudulent exercise. And again, there was nobody looking, during the Bush years. So finally, only a year ago, we started to have a Congressional investigation of some of these rating agencies, and it's scandalous what came out. What we know now is that the rating agencies never looked at a single loan file. When they finally did look, after the markets had completely collapsed, they found, and I'm quoting Fitch, the smallest of the rating agencies, "the results were disconcerting, in that there was the appearance of fraud in nearly every file we examined."

He equated the entire US financial system to a giant "ponzi scheme" and charged Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, like Secretary Henry Paulson before him, of "covering up" the truth.

"Are you saying that Timothy Geithner, the Secretary of the Treasury, and others in the administration, with the banks, are engaged in a cover up to keep us from knowing what went wrong?" asked Moyers.

"Absolutely, because they are scared to death," he said. "All right? They're scared to death of a collapse. They're afraid that if they admit the truth, that many of the large banks are insolvent. They think Americans are a bunch of cowards, and that we'll run screaming to the exits. And we won't rely on deposit insurance. And, by the way, you can rely on deposit insurance. And it's foolishness. All right? Now, it may be worse than that. You can impute more cynical motives. But I think they are sincerely just panicked about, 'We just can't let the big banks fail.' That's wrong."

Ultimately, said Black, the financial downfall of the United States in the wake of the Bush years is due to "the most elite institutions in America engaging in or facilitating fraud."

"When will Americans wake up and hold the real criminals - Banksters - accountable for their actions, and pressure the government to enact systemic changes to prevent future abuses?" asked Huffington Post blogger Mike Garibaldi-Frick.

[Kablooie]

204. Yes we will sleep! Life will become harder, the rich will get richer, and we will do nothing.

You can take that to the bank!

(Sorry I'm so pessimistic but I have seen NOTHING in the past few decades to convince me otherwise.)

[merkins]

205. The last thing the elites do

in a country when they realize that the system cannot be saved is to loot the treasury.

[PBS Poll-435]

206. Man oh Man, I wish the OP was sentenced to life in PapaDominoHut Land

FUD is so 2008.

[pnwmom]

207. Why don't you post on Nader Underground? They won't be stopped

by your subject line.

[HughBeaumont]

212. K&R. Links? Holy shit. Visit Northeast Ohio. THERE's your link.

Watch The Big One. Michael Moore filmed this in the late 90s to prove life wasn't all peaches and cream for blue collar workers under neo-liberal trade policies.

And the whole wage stagnation argument can be proven by a simple read of either The Big Squeeze by Stephen Greenhouse, The Myths of Free Trade by Sherrod Brown (one of the biggest champions of the working classes) or Perfectly Legal by David Cay Johnston (a conservative economist) Wages haven't risen in real dollars since 1979.

Democrats have to START ACTING LIKE DEMOCRATS, not quisling Friedman, free-market embracing neo-libs. The middle/working/poor classes need to be revived, not be told "jobs aren't coming back" or "we need more h1-b visa holders to fill these jobs. After all, where oh where are we going to get the workers needed to fill them?"

HERE'S A NICE CLUE-BY-FOUR. THEY'RE HERE AND THEY'RE AMERICAN CITIZENS ALREADY!! SEVERAL THOUSANDS OF THEM!.

"Er, that's nice, but see, American workers demand this pesky thing called a 'living wage'. That would be . . . bad for bidness. You wouldn't want to be . . . bad for bidness, would you? What do you got against PROFIT? The way things WORK is that we're supposed to pay the worker one constant real dollar wage and they're simply supposed to make DO with that no matter how high the cost of living increases around them. It makes perfect sense to Big Bidness. It should make perfect sense to all of you. And that's that."

Also, watch this segment by Elizabeth Warren to hear the truth about how the average real-dollar wage not rising is slowly pricing the middle class out of the essentials such as housing, health care, education, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVL7QY0S8A

Greed has killed everything it touched. It's time to stop this plague and get us on the right track. That right track would not be to dredge up the same neo-lib policies that aid and abet Bad Republican Economics all over again.

[MannyGoldstein]

217. Great Post, Thank You!

You clearly have done your research; thanks for sharing the info.

[scarletwoman]

222. +1 -- Great post! (nt)

[LittleBlue]

233. Epic post

[antimatter98]

214. Americans remain in deep denial. The American Dream: you have to be sleeping to believe in it.

The US and the UK are the only major countries that have abandoned their
working population for the banking, investment house interests. Germany,
France, the Nordic countries haven't. China has of course, but that is
how China operates.

You have to ask the question: what is in store for the US population if
more and more jobs vanish, high quality jobs are outsourced (IBM), and
US corporations continue to invest overseas and not the US. The entire
country will become a rust belt, except for the exclusive boutique spots
like Miami, the Hamptons, etc.

Congress has been enabling the destruction of the country since Reagan
and is still at it. We all know enough now about who Geithner and Summers
are---their histories--to realize that President Obama has placed champions
of deregulation and banking at the helm.

We'll be standing 10,000 in line at WalMart to apply for greeter jobs in another 5/10 years
and will still be worshiping Limbaugh.

We're in deep denial about our country's future.

IMHO.

[MannyGoldstein]

219. The Astonishing Thing Is That Even At DU, Only A Few Recognize That Truth

Amazing. Just amazing.

[JFKfanforever]

227. Here's the truth - Geithner and Summers have a dark secret....

GEITHNER’S DIRTY LITTLE SECRET 



By F. William Engdahl, 30 March 2009 

http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net/Financial_Tsunami/Geithner_Secret/geithner_secret.html


US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has unveiled his
long-awaited plan to put the US banking system back in order.
In doing so, he has refused to tell the ‘dirty little secret’
of the present financial crisis. By refusing to do so, he is
trying to save de facto bankrupt US banks that threaten to
bring the entire global system down in a new more devastating
phase of wealth destruction. 

The Geithner Plan, his so-called Public-Private Partnership
Investment Program or PPPIP, as we have noted previously 
(In German: Obamas Rettungsplan für die Banken: keine Lösung,
sondern legaler Diebstahl), is designed not to restore a
healthy lending system which would funnel credit to business
and consumers. Rather it is yet another intricate scheme to
pour even more hundreds of billions directly to the leading
banks and Wall Street firms responsible for the current mess
in world credit markets without demanding they change their
business model. Yet, one might say, won’t this eventually
help the problem by getting the banks back to health? 

Not the way the Obama Administration is proceeding. In
defending his plan on US TV recently, Geithner, a protégé of
Henry Kissinger who previously was President of the New York
Federal Reserve Bank, argued that his intent was ‘not to
sustain weak banks at the expense of strong.’ Yet this is
precisely what the PPPIP does. The weak banks are the five
largest banks in the system. 

The ‘dirty little secret’ which Geithner is going to great
degrees to obscure from the public is very simple. There are
only at most perhaps five US banks which are the source of
the toxic poison that is causing such dislocation in the
world financial system. What Geithner is desperately trying
to protect is that reality. The heart of the present problem
and the reason ordinary loan losses as in prior bank crises
are not the problem, is a variety of exotic financial
derivatives, most especially so-called Credit Default Swaps. 

In 2000 the Clinton Administration then-Treasury Secretary
was a man named Larry Summers. Summers had just been promoted
from No. 2 under Wall Street Goldman Sachs banker Robert Rubin
to be No. 1 when Rubin left Washington to take up the post of
Vice Chairman of Citigroup. As I describe in detail in my new
book, Power of Money: The Rise and Fall of the American
Century, to be released this summer, Summers convinced
President Bill Clinton to sign several Republican bills into
law which opened the floodgates for banks to abuse their
powers. The fact that the Wall Street big banks spent some $5
billion in lobbying for these changes after 1998 was likely
not lost on Clinton. 

One significant law was the repeal of the 1933 Depression-era
Glass-Steagall Act that prohibited mergers of commercial
banks, insurance companies and brokerage firms like Merrill
Lynch or Goldman Sachs. A second law backed by Treasury
Secretary Summers in 2000 was an obscure but deadly important
Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. That law
prevented the responsible US Government regulatory agency,
Commodity Futures Trading Corporation (CFTC), from having any
oversight over the trading of financial derivatives. The new
CFMA law stipulated that so-called Over-the-Counter (OTC)
derivatives like Credit Default Swaps, such as those involved
in the AIG insurance disaster, (which investor Warren Buffett
once called ‘weapons of mass financial destruction’), be free
from Government regulation. 

At the time Summers was busy opening the floodgates of
financial abuse for the Wall Street Money Trust, his
assistant was none other than Tim Geithner, the man who today
is US Treasury Secretary. Today, Geithner’s old boss, Larry
Summers, is President Obama’s chief economic adviser, as head
of the White House Economic Council. To have Geithner and
Summers responsible for cleaning up the financial mess is
tantamount to putting the proverbial fox in to guard the
henhouse. 

The ‘Dirty Little Secret’ 

What Geithner does not want the public to understand, his
‘dirty little secret’ is that the repeal of Glass-Steagall
and the passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act in
2000 allowed the creation of a tiny handful of banks that
would virtually monopolize key parts of the global
‘off-balance sheet’ or Over-The-Counter derivatives issuance.


Today five US banks according to data in the just-released
Federal Office of Comptroller of the Currency’s Quarterly
Report on Bank Trading and Derivatives Activity, hold 96% of
all US bank derivatives positions in terms of nominal values,
and an eye-popping 81% of the total net credit risk exposure
in event of default. 

The five are, in declining order of importance: JPMorgan
Chase which holds a staggering $88 trillion in derivatives
(€66 trillion!). Morgan Chase is followed by Bank of America
with $38 trillion in derivatives, and Citibank with $32
trillion. Number four in the derivatives sweepstakes is
Goldman Sachs with a ‘mere’ $30 trillion in derivatives.
Number five, the merged Wells Fargo -Wachovia Bank, drops
dramatically in size to $5 trillion. Number six, Britain’s
HSBC Bank USA has $3.7 trillion. 

After that the size of US bank exposure to these explosive
off-balance-sheet unregulated derivative obligations falls
off dramatically. Just to underscore the magnitude, trillion
is written 1,000,000,000,000. Continuing to pour taxpayer
money into these five banks without changing their operating
system, is tantamount to treating an alcoholic with unlimited
free booze. 

The Government bailouts of AIG to over $180 billion to date
has primarily gone to pay off AIG’s Credit Default Swap
obligations to counterparty gamblers Goldman Sachs, Citibank,
JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, the banks who believe they
are ‘too big to fail.’ In effect, these five institutions
today believe they are so large that they can dictate the
policy of the Federal Government. Some have called it a
bankers’ coup d’etat. It definitely is not healthy. 

This is Geithner’s and Wall Street’s Dirty Little Secret that
they desperately try to hide because it would focus voter
attention on real solutions. The Federal Government has long
had laws in place to deal with insolvent banks. The FDIC
places the bank into receivership, its assets and liabilities
are sorted out by independent audit. The irresponsible
management is purged, stockholders lose and the purged bank
is eventually split into smaller units and when healthy, sold
to the public. The power of the five mega banks to blackmail
the entire nation would thereby be cut down to size. Ooohh.
Uh Huh? 

This is what Wall Street and Geithner are frantically trying
to prevent. The problem is concentrated in these five large
banks. The financial cancer must be isolated and contained by
Federal agency in order for the host, the real economy, to
return to healthy function. 

This is what must be put into bankruptcy receivership, or
nationalization. Every hour the Obama Administration delays
that, and refuses to demand full independent government audit
of the true solvency or insolvency of these five or so banks,
inevitably costs to the US and to the world economy will
snowball as derivatives losses explode. That is
pre-programmed as worsening economic recession mean corporate
bankruptcies are rising, home mortgage defaults are exploding,
unemployment is shooting up. This is a situation that is
deliberately being allowed to run out of (responsible
Government) control by Treasury Secretary Geithner, Summers
and ultimately the President, whether or not he has taken the
time to grasp what is at stake. 

Once the five problem banks have been put into isolation by
the FDIC and the Treasury, the Administration must introduce
legislation to immediately repeal the Larry Summers bank
deregulation including restore Glass-Steagall and repeal the
Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 that allowed the
present criminal abuse of the banking trust. Then serious
financial reform can begin to be discussed, starting with
steps to ‘federalize’ the Federal Reserve and take the power
of money out of the hands of private bankers such as JP
Morgan Chase, Citibank or Goldman Sachs. 

 

[change_notfinetuning]

220. During the campaign, President Obama, himself, said that President Clinton

had failed to halt a long term increase in income inequality. He intended to reverse this through bottom up economic growth instead of trickle down. Yet, his trickle down advisers have convinced him to follow a course of trillion dollar, trickle down bailouts rather than addressing the housing and employment issues from the bottom up. The bailouts of the gamblers, while allowing the banks to raise their already usurious interest rates on all of us, is a betrayal of his campaign promise. We do need to throw away our pompoms and wake up to what is happening today, regardless of whatever ingredients Clinton added to the cake we will all be eating.

[Hawkowl]

252. Obama needs to wake the fuck up

You are right on. The shift in Obama's philosophy has been so subtle that most everyone has missed it. Unfortunately, it will lead to the doom of Obama's presidency because this economic disaster can't be cured by an easing of credit, or restoration of credit, or unfreezing of credit or whatever other bullshit code word Summers and Geithner want to use as a synonym for Wall Street giveaway.

I am disappointed as only a life long cynic can be.

[Butch350]

223. What kind of action are you going to take?

[mkultra]

241. he just took it.

couch activism.

[dionysus]

246. .

:rofl:

[spanone]

224. utterly doomed, my ass

[LittleBlue]

232. Awesome thread, Manny

I can't add to it.

Kick

[mkultra]

234. actually, im only resting my eyes.

i stayed up late last night playing WoW

[debbierlus]

237. They aren't sleeping...More like covering there ears & going NA NA NA NA NA NA

I can't hear you.

It really isn't complicated. Policy over politician.

If Bush did the same thing, would they be okay with it? (This requires a level of self-honesty that is encumbered by needing to believe that a dem politician wouldn't do THAT...even though every factual and objective indicator proves they indeed would).

The concessions to insurance dictated mandatory health INSURANCE (not care my friends, INSURANCE) is a great example.

[donheld]

239. Idiocy

[stillcool]

240. The catastrophe in waiting..

has been building for a long time. I thought we should have had the collapse by now..and I'm kind of disappointed that we have to wait for it. I don't know what country people think we've been living in. People can't even call their representatives..but I'm sure they'll 'take the action' you advocate.

[dionysus]

242. weren't u an uber hillary supporter? why did you turn on the clintons?

:shrug:

[wyldwolf]

244. no, he wasn't. And if you read between the lines of his OP title, he's trashing Obama, too

[Name removed]

245. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[wyldwolf]

247. sorry dionysus' post got deleted. It needed to be said.

[dionysus]

253. only on DU would the post supporting the administration get deleted...

[stevenleser]

248. No links/evidence and trashing Democrats. Great OP

Do I need the sarc tag?

[high density]

260. We definitely need the color-coded rating system back

There are lots of threads these days I'd love to give that red "disruptive" rating on.

[Hippo_Tron]

274. Glass-Segall was traded for renewal of the Community Reinvestment Act

He couldn't veto the bill because he would've also been vetoing a renewal of the Community Reinvestment Act.

[polmaven]

281. Also, the bill passed

the Senate by a vote of 90-8. What good AT ALL would a veto have been?

[Hippo_Tron]

284. It was something like 55-44 before the CRA was put into it

Senate Democrats and Clinton collectively traded Glass-Stegall for renewal of the CRA. What it shows is not Democrats' eagerness to de-regulate the financial industry but that we were willing to cave so easily. If we did it the Republican way we would've won re-approval of the CRA by itself by calling every NAY voting Senator and Congressman a racist.

[BootinUp]

307. lol, how true. nt

[texastoast]

278. Outsourcing started in the 80s

Deregulation seriously started under Reagan and worsened under Clinton but became an art form with the neocons led by Phil Gramm sneaking dereg and offshoring amendments on unrelated legislation at the 11th hour of sessions. Shit-for-brains-bush signed off cutting the money for the staffs who were left at the SEC and any other place that didn't play the Rove game. Yes, there is plenty of blame to go around, but the free trade crap was staged up long before Clinton. Tack that on to a fucking unbelievable debt for war based on lies, and I'm having a hard time understanding the direction of your finger-pointing.

[Romulox]

282. President Obama is an outspoken advocate of "free trade"

and his SOS recently took human rights "off the table" in our discussions with China (we only talk $$$ now.)

And nobody (nobody) lobbied for NAFTA harder than Bill Clinton and Al Gore.

[texastoast]

285. I'm not sure I would use advocate

I know he spoke against Hillary in Iowa I believe it was, as Hills said NAFTA was a Bill success. He held that against her.

What O has said is that now that NAFTA has been in place for so long, to just dump it would cause a loss of American jobs. I don't know exactly how he figures that. I do think it is a thorny issue.

Bill went into office with NAFTA staged (by the pukes, natch) and ready to go. I believe his lobbying for it was to garner support from the righties for his other, more progressive policies. Al was in the deep throes of his poiticianism, from which we are all glad he is recovering.

Just goes to show you how it is IMPERATIVE to stand on principles and further shows you how difficult that is when you are in politics.

[quickesst]

280. Peddling horse-shit...

...and few buyers who are that fucking stupid. But smile, you will get a few. Thanks.
quickesst

[JCMach1]

283. Insulting Clinton and Obama in the same post- Don Pardo, can you show this poster

the prize

[BootinUp]

290. sex thread? nt

[jeanpalmer]

310. Anyone who shipped jobs overseas

ought to be hung. No matter who he is. He certainly shouldn't be serving on the CEA. These ciminals have wrecked our economy and have undermined the working people. ----can them. Get some new people in who truly look out for working people. Bye bye Summers and Geithner.

[vaberella]

311. Admittedly this is the craziest thread I've come across..

So far I see wyldwolf at 5 to nil. :D

[wyldwolf]

320. I can summarize it quickly

OP: Clinton and Obama suck, they did all these bad things
wyldwolf: That's inaccurate. Post some links, prove your point.
OP: fuck you.
OP defenders: Yeah, you neocon! We don't need proof! Fuck you!
wyldwolf: because you know the OP isn't true.
OP and OP defenders: DLCer! Neocon! Stupid!
wyldwolf: I think it's you that are stupid
OP and OP defenders: all you can do it attack! personal attack!
wyldwolf: :eyes:

[Moochy]

324. You forgot:

Wyldwolf feels a fleeting sense of accomplishment and a slight inflation of his perilously fragile ego.

[wyldwolf]

325. well, glad you agree with my summary in your own cute way

[vaberella]

327. ala Tweety...."Hah!"

wyldwolf 6 to nil... :D

[Moochy]

329. wyldwolf seeing agreement where there is none

and disagreement where there is agreement. mad dog!

[wyldwolf]

330. the moocher in denial