trump is serious!!!!!

[Econoline]

She's arguing that there are these "business owners" on the one hand, who have no cost and receive nothing but benefit, and "the rest of us " on the other, who are somehow gifting these robber barons with some sort of collective largess.

Uhhhh....*NOW* who's using and abusing that ol' strawman? Face it, you just plain dislike Sen. Warren and her ilk, and if you can't find anything in her words to disagree with, you'll just perceive something about her "tone" or make make up some words that YOU think she's "REALLY saying".

reasonably intelligent and reasonably well educated people (and I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that Meade, Long Run, Sue and your humble corespondent all fall into those categories)

I don't qualify!?!?!?!?

And what about me? Am I chopped liver, then? Huh?

[Econoline]

According to the GOP it is only class warfare if you are protecting the poor and weak. If you are enriching the wealthy and making the poor more miserable it is not.

That's an "understanding" of economics that doesn't even rise to the level of infantile...maybe "fetus" level

That statement had nothing to do with economics and everything to do with GOP political rhetoric.


Oh, wait...are you actually saying that Republican political rhetoric shows "an 'understanding' of economics that doesn't even rise to the level of infantile...maybe 'fetus' level"???

[Sue U]

That having been said, Warren's expressed "understanding" of economics is borderline infantile...

Yeah, because a "borderline infantile" "understanding" of economic policy is what really jumps out from her bio:

previously a Harvard Law School professor specializing in bankruptcy law. A prominent legal scholar, Warren was among the most cited in the field of commercial law while at Harvard University.[3] She is an active consumer protection advocate whose scholarship led to the conception and establishment of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Warren has written a number of academic and popular works, and is a frequent subject of media interviews regarding the American economy and personal finance.

***

Early in her career, Warren became a proponent of on-the-ground research based on studying how people actually respond to laws in the real world. Her work analyzing court records, and interviewing judges, lawyers, and debtors, established her as a rising star in the field of bankruptcy law.[32]

Warren joined the University of Pennsylvania Law School as a full professor in 1987 and obtained an endowed chair in 1990 (becoming William A Schnader Professor of Commercial Law). She taught for a year at Harvard Law School in 1992 as Robert Braucher Visiting Professor of Commercial Law. In 1995, Warren left Pennsylvania to become Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law at Harvard Law School.[31] As of 2011, she was the only tenured law professor at Harvard who was trained at an American public university.[32] At Harvard, Warren became one of the most highly cited law professors in the United States. Although she had published in many fields, her expertise was in bankruptcy. In the field of bankruptcy and commercial law, only Douglas Baird of Chicago, Alan Schwartz of Yale, and Bob Scott of Columbia have citation rates comparable to that of Warren.[33] Warren's scholarship and public advocacy were the impetus behind the establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.[34]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Warren

[oldr_n_wsr]

The "financial services" weasels who frankly defrauded the market and crashed the economy with bullshit CDO/CDS securities have not been brought to justice,

aka the "elite" I was talking about. Those same "elite" who contribute to the dems and repubs so they can defraud with impunity. And I doubt miss warren was talking about/to them as that is where she probably gets some of her money from. And if she was directing it at them it was with a wink and a nod.

As someone has pointed out before (LJ I think) she probably has no clue what it takes to run/start/or even be employed by an actual money making business, so her pontificating about how the business owner "owes" the social contract, is silly at best and demonizing at worst. the business owner is most likely holding up his end of the contract as he is still in business and not brought up on charges.

I congradulate you SueU for being a profitable small business owner and for keeping up your end of the social contract. I was not successful/skillfull/knowledgeable in being able to do that. But I can assure you that even in a failed endevor, I kept up my end of the social contract (and need no lectures from miss warren about it).
I still renew (aka pay for) my contractors license just in case I ever make a go at it again, although it will not be the roofing business. too physically demanding and I don't think I have that left in me If the son ever returns from Vegas, maybe finishing carpentry as he has that skill set (as do I) or small home handyman repairs. Maybe after I retire.

[Sue U]

The "financial services" weasels who frankly defrauded the market and crashed the economy with bullshit CDO/CDS securities have not been brought to justice,

aka the "elite" I was talking about. Those same "elite" who contribute to the dems and repubs so they can defraud with impunity. And I doubt miss warren was talking about/to them as that is where she probably gets some of her money from. And if she was directing it at them it was with a wink and a nod.

If you don't know (and it seems that you don't), Elizabeth Warren has been the strongest and most vocal advocate in the Senate for hunting down and prosecuting the Wall Street crooks who caused the crash, and making sure they are never in a position to do it again. See Why Elizabeth Warren Makes Wall Street Tremble. But she is only one voice and one vote.

[oldr_n_wsr]

Elizabeth Warren has been the strongest and most vocal advocate in the Senate for hunting down and prosecuting the Wall Street crooks who caused the crash, and making sure they are never in a position to do it again.

I stand corrected. Thank you for that info. But I still believe her tone was demonizing and condescending. If she was directing that purely at the Wall Street/banker fraudsters, she should have made that clear. But I doubt it was directed at them, just like Obama's, "you didn't build that..." rant.

I guess I will have to agree to disagree.

[Lord Jim]

Yeah, because a "borderline infantile" "understanding" of economic policy is what really jumps out from her bio:

Maybe I'm missing something, but I'm not seeing anything in there about her expertise in economics...

What I have seen, is Warren making the ignorant and fantastical claim that all increases in worker productivity are due to the efforts of the workers, and therefore every increase in worker productivity should be reflected in increased wages...

Now , there are two possible explanations for this...

Either she is so legitimately and sincerely ignorant about the laws of basic economics that she genuinely doesn't understand how this works...

Or, (and I find this explanation more likely given her educational background) she knows better, but she is engaging in demagogic pandering to less educated angry people much as Donald Trump does...


Moving along..

One of the things I find really entertaining, is when one of these leftist-populists (like Warren or Sanders) starts spouting off about how "somebody should have gone to jail" for the financial meltdown the country experienced in 2007...

Okay...

Who specifically should have "gone to jail", and what specific crime should they have been charged with?

Anderson Cooper to his credit once pressed Sanders on this point, and Sanders showed he didn't have a clue...

His response was something along the lines of, " well there were civil fines against companies...I don't know who specifically.. a homineh, homineh, homineh, (Ralph Kramden mode)...

If you want to say "people should have gone to jail" then you ought to be prepared to say which people and for what crimes...

If you're not prepared to do that, then you're just engaging in the same sort of dishonest, mindless anger creating, rabble rousing that Trump engages in...

[Big RR]

If you want to say "people should have gone to jail" then you ought to be prepared to say which people and for what crimes...

I have to disagree; private individuals do not have the resources to investigate crimes--that's why we have police and the DOJ/FBI to investigate violations of the law and prosecute them. If a person is robbed and beaten on the street it is not dishonest rabble rousing to say someone should go to jail for this, even if you do not know who that person is. Nor is it wrong to state that you believe the government is dragging its feet in pursuing the criminals and/or investigating the crimes if that's what you believe.

And the same is the case with the 2007 meltdown; I have read plenty that brought to light the questionable, and likely illegal, activities that were engaged in by, among others, the mortgage bank. The meltdown cost the country billions, yet many of the same people are still in place in their jobs and neither the republican or democratic presidents have pursued anyone. To me it is inconceivable that something of this magnitude can occur and that no one has been held responsible, yet that is exactly what occurred. And I fail to see it as dishonest rabble rousing to bring this up and say the government has shirked its responsibility in this regard. it's not my (or Bernie's for that matter) job to investigate and say who should be prosecuted, it is the job of the people who we have empowered to enforce our laws to appropriately investigate and enforce them.

[Lord Jim]

Well, maybe I'm just a little old-fashioned, but it seems to me that if you're a serious candidate running for President Of The United States going around yelling that "people should have gone to jail! " then perhaps you should have a few facts to back up your charges...

Unless of course you're operating in a Fact Free Zone, where truth is irrelevant, like Donald Trump....

[Big RR]

Jim--if he was asked "people should go to jail for what? and he could not point to any allegedly illegal activities he was concerned about, then I might agree with you. But he wasn't asked that, he was asked to identify specific people and charges that should be brought, and that is an unfair and silly question IMHO, whether you're running for president or Joe Schmoe deciding how to vote.

Now it is possible that there was a proper investigation done and it was found that n individuals acted criminally, but then have seen absolutely no proof of that.

[Sue U]

Well, maybe I'm just a little old-fashioned, but it seems to me that if you're a serious candidate running for President Of The United States going around yelling that "people should have gone to jail! " then perhaps you should have a few facts to back up your charges...

As I have been pointing out for years, both here and at the other place, the entire CDO/CDS market was probably the biggest fraud ever perpetrated by the finance industry; look up "synthetic CDO" sometime -- the entire concept was essentially to sell a product that didn't exist in a transaction that was designed to fail -- except for the tippy-top tranches that insiders took.

Oh, here's a wiki page about a documentary film that shows how they did it.

From 2007 to date, the SEC has charged exactly 89 senior corporate officers in connection with the financial crisis; 53 were "penalized" with suspensions or prohibitions from involvement in the financial services industry. Disposition of the other 36 cases was not listed on the SEC fact sheet, so I can only assume some portion of those cases are continuing and som portion has been dismissed. But I believe all of these are/were civil enforcement actions, not criminal prosecutions, and the 10-year statute of limitations on criminal fraud has already run or is about to run for the most serious offenses and offenders. So for whatever reason, we will likely never see the culprits actually prosecuted.

[MajGenl.Meade]

... and that is not a sufficient number of indictments

[Sue U]

Not even remotely.

[TPFKA@W]

Trump is saying Japan and South Korea aren't paying their fair share of their defense.

It is evident that AndrewD's soul is now controlling part of Trump's brain.

[Lord Jim]

It's funny that you mention Andrew...

I was also thinking that his, "let's sink the ships of any country that doesn't pay us tribute for patrolling the sea lanes" would be a policy that Mr. Drumpf would heartily embrace...

[Econoline]

For Jim (or anyone else who's interested) here's a pretty good article from February 2011, concerning who committed what crimes and why they never went went to prison. And yes, it names names (e.g., Art Samberg of the hedge fund Pequot Capital, John Mack of Morgan Stanley, Dick Fuld of Lehman Brothers, Joe Cassano of AIG, Fabrice Tourre of Goldman Sachs, Gary Crittenden & Arthur Tildesley of Citigroup); the crimes are generally insider trading and securities fraud cases that each involved hundreds of millions--or billions--of dollars worth of shareholders' money.

[RayThom]

... From 2007 to date, the SEC has charged exactly 89 senior corporate officers in connection with the financial crisis; 53 were "penalized" with suspensions or prohibitions from involvement in the financial services industry. Disposition of the other 36 cases was not listed on the SEC fact sheet, so I can only assume some portion of those cases are continuing and some portion has been dismissed. But I believe all of these are/were civil enforcement actions, not criminal prosecutions, and the 10-year statute of limitations on criminal fraud has already run or is about to run for the most serious offenses and offenders. So for whatever reason, we will likely never see the culprits actually prosecuted.

Has anyone mentioned the movie "The Big Short?" I think it is one of the best films in years. It encapsulates and crystallizes almost exactly how the collapse was orchestrated. To date, only one "small fish" has been fried.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kareem_Serageldin

[Jarlaxle]

I do not currently own a gun. I may take up drinking though.

Yeah...I may need to get loaded before voting this year.

[Jarlaxle]

Trump is saying Japan and South Korea aren't paying their fair share of their defense.

It is evident that AndrewD's soul is now controlling part of Trump's brain.

Hell, I've been saying that for most of 15 years! (Also, add Germany, France, and most of western Europe to that list.)

[wesw]

oh, I see. I leave and you are willing to have intelligent conversations again? I see how ya ll are....

since I don t particularly want to talk to most of you anymore anyway..., it s probably for the best,

i think that john cougar s songs explain the trumpian movement as well as i ever could, but i doubt that you ll listen.

you all are far too old to learn new things, it seems.....