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tomk commented on the blog post ABC’s This Week Continues the Dumbing of America
A sad thing is that I’m not sure we’d be much smarter or better informed with 100% Krugman. He’s oblivious to the incoherence of mainstream economics and refuses to acknowledge the reality of pervasive fraud and criminality in the financial world. We can learn more from Bill Black and Joseph Stiglitz and Yves Smith.
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tomk commented on the blog post Colossally Low Residential Investment Due to Fraudulent Housing Market
Here on the coast of Maine self-employed people can get a mortgage loan from the local savings and loan, though they pay slightly higher rates because the loans stay in house. The bank has a small store front office, and employs about 6 people, the highest paid of whom is still in five figures. All their loans and deposits are local, and the board is a cross section of real working people in the community. They have never had to foreclose and they’re still making loans.
In reference to the bickering above. It’s pointless to turn this into a partisan issue. The blame is with both parties,and with all of those who enabled and benefited from what was so clearly fraudulent activities within the FIRE sector (finance, real estate, and insurance). Banking and insurance should be run as utilities.
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tomk commented on the diary post Unable to Get Simeone Fired, NPR Drops “World of Opera” by David Swanson.
Here in Maine we don’t have a lot of options. The local community station has Democracy Now, but if I’m driving I usually listen to NPR. They’ll occasionally have a show that features someone like Chris Hedges, and the BBC news isn’t nearly as objectionable as ATC or Morning Edition, which have become almost unlistenable. [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post The Warning Shot by Cynthia Kouril.
This was a headline post on FDL, not an email, not that Laura G’s name calling is any better than Cynthia Kouril’s. I commented earlier on the use of skank, which jumped out at me because it was symptomatic of an important issue confronting “left, progressive, green” politics, that it is identified with a moralizing [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post The Warning Shot by Cynthia Kouril.
I agree with your post but your use of the word skank to refer to a young woman was unnecessary. You could have called her a singer and call girl, or any number of things. What’s the point of being offensive about people you don’t know, who could very well be reading FDL. We’re trying [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post What Jonathan Chait Doesn’t Understand About Obama by Scarecrow.
It’s telling that you resort to name calling instead of responding to any of the details in Scarecrow’s post. I’d like to suggest a little thought experiment for you. If a republican had been elected and had pursued the exact same policies as Obama would you be fiercely defending them? Obama has clearly pursued extremely [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post What Jonathan Chait Doesn’t Understand About Obama by Scarecrow.
Fantastic response to destructive nonsense, thanks.
You may have wanted to say reeked of Obama’s bad faith, not wreaked, though
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tomk commented on the blog post Russ Feingold Won’t Run Next Year
I’ve decided to register as a Republican to help out Ron Paul. He is appalling, but his platform on civil liberties and the military budget make him the only significant candidate worth voting for.
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tomk commented on the blog post Beau Biden Raises Additional Issues with BofA Settlement
The issue isn’t so much that the investors didn’t read the fine print, in which case they wouldn’t have a case, but that the entities putting these packages together didn’t follow their own paperwork, or the state laws. It will be interesting to see how it plays out, because if Yves is right, a huge percentage of residential property is in some kind of legal limbo. The owners still owe the money, but the banks and trusts don’t have an actionable legal interest in the property, so they can’t foreclose.
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tomk commented on the diary post The Small Group of Thoughtful, Committed Citizens Has Been Drugged by David Swanson.
Millions of Americans have become addicted to opiates with the heavy promotion and distribution of oxcodone in various formulations. If they try to quit with a doctor’s help they become legal addicts with methadone or suboxone, or will have their addictions shifted to valium type drugs. This is not just recreational users but many “straight” [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post Deficit Hawk Drums Drown Out Cries of Jobless by dakine01.
I think it is a mistake to include he mortgage interest deduction in this group. While it does help many of the middle class (including me) over 90% of its benefits go to those who earn more than $250,000 a year. It is a worthy candidate for tax reform.
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tomk commented on the blog post Jared Bernstein: The Latest Casualty of Deficit Fever
My quick response, if I’m correct in assuming that you would argue against a stimulus, because our government is broke, and the private sector could do it better, would be to invoke the urgent need for infrastructure improvements in our country. Bridges, water supplies, energy conservation work, and so much more could and should be tackled with government spending, and the money could be available by cutting wasteful military spending and corporate entitlements (sugar, mining, ethanol, and on and on). And the massive financial fraud that by all rights should be sending thousands to jail could be investigated and prosecuted using stimulus money, but instead we get bizarre wasteful prosecution of athletes.
As for a forum to try to understand liberalism, I’ve found Naked Capitalism to offer excellent posts from a variety of perspectives, often liberal, with stimulating discussions that have on occasion changed my sometimes rigid mind.
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tomk commented on the diary post FDL Membership Program to Begin Live Virtual Conferences, Add More Benefits by Scarecrow.
My wife’s a teacher and most of what she gets from the union is credit card offers and insurance pitches. It’s disgusting. My point…I signed up as a member because I wanted to contribute, and I appreciate the news, which isn’t easy to get elsewhere. I have more than enough discount offers, enticements to buy [...]
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tomk commented on the diary post Saturday Art: Waste Land (2010) Everybody Has To Serve Somebody by Billy Glad.
Marvelous movie, saw it a couple of nights ago. Thanks for the thoughtful discussion. I didn’t miss scenes of grotesque wealth, it would have been difficult without being unsubtle and cliched, and we get enough of that in the MSM.
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tomk commented on the diary post Thanksgiving Day Gone Awry by wendydavis.
Holiday-James McMurtry
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tomk commented on the blog post Late Late Night FDL: Choctaw Bingo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THku9OcCAC8
This is another McMurtry song that should be better known.
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tomk commented on the diary post Even Chris Hedges Sides with Anarchism by veganrevolution.
I use to call myself an anarchist but after George Bush, and now Obama, the rule of law sounds pretty good.
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tomk commented on the blog post BofA Sets Up Huge Battle, Stares Down Pimco and NYFed on Mortgage Repurchases
Yves is not enthusiastic about this…
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tomk commented on the blog post Rand Paul Even Creepier Than Previously Thought
Taking people and forcing them to anything is weird, but is also the essence of compulsory education and the average workplace.
