"Could everyone just stop talking about the current crises in America as being caused by Barack Obama's agenda? Seriously, the right-wing drama queens act as if they've been living under years of oppression and hunger in a Soviet-era dictatorship instead of 19 months under a politically moderate, legally-elected president. We did live under eight years of Bush, though. Speaking of Americans "yearning to be free" and to self-determine shit, the Pledge says, "Whenever the agenda of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to institute a new governing agenda and set a different course." Hey, you know what, Mike Pence and the rest? We did vote to institute a new governing agenda, Obama's. Senate Republicans have prevented its passage. Maybe you could complain if we were, you know, being governed by it. But, fuck it. Why bother to really try Obama's agenda when we can just go back to the one that ass-fucked us in the first place? Kudos, Tea Party."You can read the rest here.
Fun Fact: The Rude One's last comment is about the GOP cancelling George W. Bush's TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) even though House leaders John Boehner, Eric Cantor and Pete Sessions all voted for it. What he doesn't mention is that the majority of the TARP funds have been paid back:
Originally expected to cost the U.S. Government $356 billion, the most recent estimates of the cost, as of April 12, 2010, is down to $89 billion, which is 42% less than the taxpayers' cost of the Savings and loan crisis of the late 1980s...Of the $245 billion invested in U.S. banks, over $169 billion has been paid back, including $13.7 billion in dividends, interest and other income, along with $4 billion in warrant proceeds as of April 2010. AIG is considered "on track" to pay back $51 billion from divestitures of two units and another $32 billion in securities.Now, obviously $89 billion is a lot of dough, but what would have happened had we not bailed out the banks? I'll defer to an expert since I know shit about our crazy financial system:
There is no question that something substantial had to be done when the bottom fell out of the asset-backed securities (ABS) market. It had to be done because the crisis put the safety of deposits at risk. Why? Because Glass-Steagall had been overturned and banks had become traders. Who cares if investment banks, private equity firms, and hedge funds trade and fail? I don’t – caveat emptor – unless bank deposits are put at risk and they were.So protecting depository institutions required propping up AIG and a number of financial institutions because banks trading activities had made these institutions interdependent.What he said. Sometimes government has to govern.
