Finger pointing

Barney Frank
Image by Getty Images
via DaylifeSo the bailout failed. Count me in the glad camp, maybe now a second try will come up with something more reasonable, something that really gets after the problem. Taking up toxic paper and leaving taxpayers holding the bag wasn't going to solve this mess.

But in among the finger pointing for the failure going on here (and there is a lot of it going on isn't there?), where is the finger pointed at Barney Frank? I think most agree this mess is due in large part is the vast number of bad loans given out during the housing bubble. Bad money drives out good, and when you had Fannie May and Freddy Mac competing against private lenders, but using loose underwriting standards, it only caused investors to clamor for other lenders to do the same...

Frank's irresponsible comments and actions to sabotage reining in the two GLCs are among the causes of that cause. His attempts to deflect inquiries into that by harping on CEO pay ought to be treated as what they are... BS. If you want to know the root cause, start by looking into which lobbyists gave which legislators how much, and when, and what the effect was on bills that would have required GLCs to follow the same standards as private companies.

You're no doubt tired of hearing it, but my party was against this well before it was fashionable.

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Is this the best we've got?

Joe Biden explains something
Image via Wikimedia CommonsRecently , when interviewed by Katie Couric, Joe Biden was quoted as saying:

"When the stock market crashed, Franklin Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the princes of greed,"

Look, I'm not really a big fan of either of the duopoly parties... or their candidates (my guy is Libertarian candidate Bob Barr and yes I know he's not going to win) but I just have to wonder... how well did Joe Biden actually pay attention in history class?

• The big crash was in 1929, before FDR was president
• In 1929 TV was just an experimental idea, not really something that presidents spoke on. (the first president to even be seen on television was Truman, in the 40s, and it wasn't until 1951 that a president spoke nationwide)

So maybe we have a VP problem regardless of who wins?