dayman

Haha, I should have kept a list of the Tebow people. Where are they now?

Hmm..I agree probably don't see it as being AS bad as you do but plain and simple I do agree. It's a little tough to really tell b/c it's been so long since a non-Clinton democrat was in there and well..lets face it Clinton had it coming. And even going back before Clinton the media was totally different. But I agree generally. That said, that's the media. Mitt can't just complain about it. He should have some sort of media initiative brainstorm in his campaign b/c really the majority favoring Obama (both slightly and those that are totally in love) talk a lot about how Obama is good and Mitt sucks. I watch ... not a lot of Fox but some ... and they don't really talk a whole lot about Romney at least maybe I just don't see it. (O'Reilly anyway doesn't seem to be in love w/ Romney not too many Mitt stories at all it's almost strange) I mean, at some point if it's going to be a close election...Romney should try and win someone over, get something going on his own, get someone talking him up. Politically that just makes sense and I'm sure they know that and really have yet to roll out whatever they have planned for post-Tampa. It's a tough one but they have to at least do something so I'll be interested to see what happens there.

A lot of it is, some is totally against him, and some try and be fairly neutral. On balance it's in the tank for him but that's not really any different than it has been in the past and Republicans have won anyway. Romney should find a way (I don't know what it is) to be more open to them in a good way if possible. Maybe it isn't, maybe politically he should keep his shell strategy going...but ultimately if it is close I'm not sure playing everything so close to the vest will pay off.

Oh well sorry didn't catch that thread. In any event I really don't use this thread (personally) for discussion of the validity of anything. Just saying this will probably be a messaging deal they sell and then of course jobs numbers Friday. Next wave of new crap to fill the political analysis on daily cable shows and talk radio.

What's really interesting is how the Bills use their running backs as receivers. At times, Fred Jackson or C.J. Spiller will be the No. 2 receiver. hmmmm

I don't hate Thig...but he's done nothing to separate himself from VY after being the offense and me having seen him play a little (only a little)...there is no way he wins the job. If Fitz goes down it'll be roll the dice on whatever the offense can do with VY whatever that may be and regardless of how different it looks from what we ordinarily try to do.

Well recent analysis of Romney's tax scheme will be the next wave http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2012/08/study-how-mitt-romneys-tax-plan-could-save-the-millionaires-87000-and-raise-taxes-on-the-middle-clas.html Romney campaign obviously takes issue with the findings. One spokesman said it doesn't take into account that cooperate cuts will obviously translate directly into higher earnings for employees. That's kind of a funny thing to say for me...and they say it doesn't factor in budget cuts but we don't know what those cuts are so that would be tough. In any event...this will probably be the next weeks topic + jobs report.

Well hey I think very highly of you and your worldly experiences too 3rd. So that's at least 2 of us. One day I will go beyond these walls of my crib. Then my soul will be crushed and I'll hate ideas. Then I'll be a big boy like you.

Well like I said I brought up job creation in the discussion as a by-product point. Solar and wind would be the norm now if it were a fix all and ready to take the reigns, I don't deny that nobody does. What I'm saying is the innovation curve is on the rise w/ world demand, and world demand is on the rise not for no reason at all...b/c this stuff is as of today great energy in some areas and looks increasingly promising in others. Here in America it could work great...we have a lot of wind and a lot of sun (obviously not all over the nation but in various places). It's not being "forced in" it's about looking to the future. I get the market mindset. I really do I'm not trying to say it's stupid or trivialize it. I'm actually a fan in many (actually almost all) circumstances. But investment and planning and positioning for the future makes business sense. Investment is apart of market forces. In some things it happens perfectly fine naturally...in others the competition and uncertainty in time frame and most of all status quo is something that causes the market to not jump on something until later. As a nation, collectively, we can and should position ourselves to excel in ALL areas of new energy....gas, wind, solar, anything else under the sun (pun intended). It's a philosophical divide and I respect that...but there are IMO some things that through incentives and programs should be encouraged publicly. This is one such area. Every tactical procedure we use to position ourselves? What programs? What incentives? That's where the debate is ripe. Is CO2 bad? Is solar and win a crock of ****? That's not a debate I see as credible.

Osama's plan carried out from beyond the grave (or beyond the ocean).

“Whoever brings the mujahidin information about the whereabouts of infidel Obama and the lady of Bill Clinton, the woman named Hillary Clinton, I will give a reward,” the man said. So can I collect if I tell them about the White House? http://www.runtanews.com/2012/08/01/somali-islamists-offer-10-camels-as-bounty-for-obama-2/

CO2 is the topic and that is THE factor I'm really concerned with in this thread but it goes along with all sorts of other considerations b/c we live in the real world. Someone started talking about coal and whatnot and then "other factors" came into the discussion that's why those stats came out. And the less energy...it's not true. It's energy with lower annual costs. And solar and wind are things other countries are going at aggressively and we are well equipped as a nation to do the same. Like I said earlier we consistently come out on top in studies about countries whose natural layouts are conducive to wind and solar. So it's not about making jobs the idea. Or CO2 the idea. Or annual costs the idea. Or energy independence the idea. It's about all of that, rolled into 1. And lest I leave it out of any post I make...it's also not about only solar and wind as far as my position it's just about solar and wind being good ideas for us that we should not be made to hate or trivialize.

Supposedly on the jobs end, yes the coal jobs go away. But on average every billion spend on new coal fire plans nets 870 jobs. The same amount in solar closer 1900 and for wind a whopping 3,300 on condition the turbine are actually built in the US (which is a significant condition). Retrofiting houses/buildings on the other hand produce 7-8 million jobs per billion spent. Despite certain example I know you love to point out and they are fair enough, a study from the Brookings institution found that from '03-'10 new clean energy jobs grew by 8.3%, way faster than in other fields, and on average they pay 20% more. And while nothing has performed the way we want, they've continued to grow through the recession. Now this stuff comes from the brooking institution and http://www.google.org/energyinnovation/The_Impact_of_Clean_Energy_Innovation.pdf ... so I know being the skeptic of all things left many coal supporters will nay say it all and call it BS and that's fair enough. All I'm saying is if you consider the coal folk, consider the other folk as well. The biggest challenge v. coal is that coal plants are easier to finance...solar and wind have very low annual costs but high upfront costs (despite solid rates in increasing technology which are lowering this cost). Anyway, I agree with you. It is a good discussion to have. I do support solar and wind I think we have a great layout in this nation to take advantage of it and a lot of other nations are doing so for good reason. But at the same time I'm just adding this to the discussion...I don't need coal plants gone tomorrow. But it's pretty clear to me our focus moving forward isn't there.

Haha first and foremost I use PPP to develop skills that will further my career. That's why I'm here. It's not about the market recovering prior to correction it's about policies that in some people's opinion can help spur that along while in your opinion only delay the correction. And I read btw too...so if there are some articles that talk about the views you all have that disqualify some of the solutions I've posted I'm all for clicking links and scanning them later tonight over dinner and thinking about it. I'm not sitting around and making stuff up I mean I don't pretend the position I have is some grand original thought I have b/c I'm a genius and know how to fix everything...this isn't remotely my field anyway. These are the views of various people writing articles I've read and doing interviews I heard...it's not "hiding behind experts." I'm not an expert. What am I to do ignore everything written? This is what people do, they read about stuff. The whole "circumventing the natural laws of the world" ... look I get it. And like I said I'm not some top down central planning guy. You insist I have some staunch controlling ideological agenda propelling me, it's not the case. I'm not an ideologue at all and as I said in normal circumstances I do agree, don't !@#$ with it. But in this circumstance it seems we should. My point is not hide behind experts, it's to point out that experts are the people framing the discussion and they differ. To just say "all experts who say anything will help at all are wrong" ... that's some pretty staunch ideology as I see it. But anyway like I said over and over, I'm not here to sway you or anybody else. I'm not going ton convince you. I'm not even trying to argue with you. It's discussion.

We'll never agree but I enjoy the conversation. To me it just isn't going to happen on it's own. I'm not under the impression btw that there's a magic fix, but I look at some actions various experts think can help and say I think we're better off going with them than doing nothing. You all say no, do nothing b/c it isn't going to happen in any acceptable way with that action. Whatever. This is why we have elections. One thing seems clear to me though, doing nothing means no strong recovery for years and years. Is that acceptable? To people who say yes b/c that's economics...that's your disposition, and I respect that. It's fair enough and I agree in normal circumstances btw I just don't agree today. But don't go around screaming your head off about the economy not partying like it's 1999...and how Mitt will walk in and lay out a huge line of blow on day 1 and we'll all get it on again. You don't want to consider any solutions b/c they can't work, so we'll all just wait around on it to fix itself. Nothing can be done to aid market crisis or spur growth in time of recession apparently...everything in any past scenarios is the past fair enough...I don't agree though.

Look we're fixating too much on the eminent domain idea. If you go back through the thread you'll see I just saw some guy going on about that as a creative idea last night while I was in the thread. It's not something I even heard about until yesterday. And besides, the government would take the mortgage, write down the principle, then sell it out again. The entire thing isn't to set the floor in individual properties it's just a work around to write down the principle on these houses that are underwater and dragging us all down with them. It's not about setting the market at artificial levels. It's about providing some relief to the homeowners so they can participate in the economy normally again, in doing so foreclosures happen far less often which helps the housing market stabilize naturally, etc... This isn't some big government central planning solution like you make it out to be, at least not as I see it. And like I said the eminent domain idea isn't my baby I'm just talking here...I never even heard about that until last night. But keep in mind they would take the debt from the bank, not the house.

First off I'm not advocating for that I'm just explaining it as one potential creative solution if DeMarco refuses to budge. It would be much easier if F&F would just write down some of this **** themselves and share in the profit if/when the house bounces back. And while to me it makes sense do this for a hell of a lot of houses, it's not right for every house. There are other ways some people have put forward to address those problems which I've talked about. The idea that there is no market value at which any of these houses can be purchased (or revalued) at b/c they are "falling to market value" is nonsense. It just makes no sense to me, no I'm not really in the finance business I admit but I'm just having a discussion here. There is a value these houses have, people buy and sell houses even today at prices that take variables into account. Houses have no value right now? That's nonsense every house has a market value today. The government doesn't "set" the value ... that value is there.

As to the first paragraph that's just nonsense. The market value is something a "central planner" can never have? These houses have identifiable market value. How do you think people realize they're underwater in the first place? These loan holders think that over time (given a recovery which once again won't happen until the housing market stabilizes) the value will go back up but the fair market value today takes that into account. People trade these all the time we can determine exactly what the fair value is. And it's not a central planner deciding btw...it IS the market. In that guys idea the local municipality acquires the mortgage for fair value (yes, as determined by the market today), works with the home owner to restructure it and then it's sold into the FHA programs (so the money comes from the very people who buy mortgages today) as a superior property where the payments are far more likely to be made and where there is a person in the house and where the market is the better for it. The opposition is simply from people holding lottery tickets waiting on the recovery, but those very people benefit more than anything else from the recovery of the market itself and their lotto ticket sure as hell isn't going come up a winner without it. Principle write down is needed plain and simple. We're over-leveraged plain and simple and the entire economy won't recover until the housing market stabilizes and people can start again. You guys are ideologues. It isn't true that government intervention is responsible for where we are, and it isn't true that the government can't play a role to help get us out of our spiral. And that's why addressing the problem would help some w/ the mortgage, others would get a lease/option or have some sort of equity interest created (various creative solutions for those who really can't have the house), and finally those w/ no solution should be foreclosed on QUICKLY. The the general idea that we simply shouldn't write down some of this is bogus. Yes in normal times this should be our policy but it isn't right for today. The collapse hurts the entire economy many people who would benefit from these policies actually were reasonable to think they would never default when they signed the mortgage papers before the collapse. And in any event as we all know every foreclosure drives down the prices of all the other homes around it, and what we see w/ them happening in massive amounts is the depletion of the single greatest source of wealth for American families. A quarter of all mortgages are worth more that their homes... And in any event the idea described above is just one get around dick head DeMarco who is simply looking to preserve F&F's assets. If F&F wrote the damn mortgages down themselves and the value does go back up the terms can be such that they homeowner should share the profits with the lenders anyway. The overall point is this, it's time to put aside your ideology for the moment. This isn't your standard economic event, this isn't your standard downturn, we're !@#$ing stuck and we aren't coming out on our own that's just the bottom line. We aren't. There are a lot of different ideas about things we can do that many very smart people think will help us spur a recovery....when we finally recover then we can go back to being governed by "normal" principles. Doing nothing is not the answer. It's obvious.

OK allow me to clarify, you can't complain while we sit here not doing that (which you say we should do) and letting your idea go. B/c the housing market IS still freezing the recovery and our housing market policy as of now is basically your policy. So we're waiting. So you should tell people to wait patiently.

What would could we accomplish with these demon interventionist policies if done in a rapid coordinated comprehensive way? Bank balance sheets cleaned up freeing up lending money, massive reduction of economic stress on millions of people allowing them to participate as normal members of the economy once again, turn the rotting foreclosed death omens sitting in neighborhoods and condo units into properly maintained rental properties so they are no longer toxic to the surrounding home values, and yes even some (I'm not saying a huge fix to unemployment here just saying "some") direct jobs in preparing these foreclosed properties and as a general result of some house cleaning in the housing market. The guys holding these mortgages don't want to them down b/c they basically have lottery tickets waiting for the recovery. But as long as they hold their ticket, it isn't coming. The bottom is nowhere and the recovery is dependent on something happening here. We need to write down and/or refinance the people who can pay, those who can't there are a lot of idea we can convert the deed to leases w/ options to purchase at the end, I read some idea instead of the lease/option to convert a portion of the bank mortgage to an equity investment (not entirely sure of all the details on that idea), etc...and yes even after all this some will need to be foreclosed on anyway and we need to expedite those foreclosures. The idea that this is going to just find it's bottom isn't insane...but that isn't going to be acceptable to most people when they understand what that means in terms of time. I know government intervention is a sin to you and there are others who feel that way so I'm not saying you are crazy. But this ongoing mortgage-recovery cycle is crippling us and both sides complain about the job numbers and slow recovery...the implication is we need to fix it. If that's true this is how. Now if the implication you would have people draw from your ideology is that we don't need to fix it but simply eat it and let it go...that's fine...but what you are saying is deal with it. You can't say deal with it and then complain about the recovery...that's all I'm saying.

The policies DeMarco ignores and can't be compelled to accept?

People disagree and I get that. If we don't start some principle write-downs, IMO we're not going to recover any time soon and that seems fairly obvious to me. So all I"m saying is don't complain about recovery. Complain away about Obama I would never take that from you, but even assuming I'm wrong and you are right...your policy on the mortgage issue admits the recover simply won't get going until the market finds it's natural bottom which is something the President has nothing to do with b/c he should be hands off.

I don't agree that this is the way to go here. But I do accept the basic logic that in your opinion we have to let the cyclical feeding of this disaster just continue. However, I had better not see you complaining about jobs numbers in some other thread in the near future And btw just for the record guy on Eliot Spitzer talking about local government taking the debt by eminent domain. Paying fair value for the public purpose of plugging the drain and writing it down to keep people in their houses. I'm simply reporting here I don't know about this one just hearing it as I type.

No b/c LABillsFan is a proud non-thinker. You don't tell anti-intellectuals to think. It's offensive to their doctrine.

Honestly both campaigns have been !@#$ing around none of this matters. Obama and Romney will roll out what will become the true campaign movement in the next month and after the conventions it will be on. No matter what happens or has happened until then it's all just nonsense summer campaigning. The only reason it matters at all is b/c they all need so much money.