New memes; "Incompetent Wall St. traders," "Predatory Lenders."

[jazzjunkysue]

1. When will we hear the association of stock traders stand up and demand we stop referring to them as incompetent? Greedy? Cut-throat? Or, are they happy to be labelled the problem just as long as we hand over the $700B and forget about shoring up the levees (regulations)?

Are they so addicted to their greed that they take no offence at the indictment? Are they used to it? Are they beyond insult?

2. Are we all kidding ourselves when we try to blame the brokers and lenders? After all, who took those bad mortgages and stock profits? Someone handed over their own prescious money to the dealers.

I'm sick and tired of the false self-righteousness in america.

Every time we have a school schooting we wring our hands about what to do, and, "How could we have predicted it would happen??"

Meantime, we don't budge an inch on gun control.

We don't come out and protest the wars.

We don't write our legislators demanding Gonzalez and Cheney and B* resign.

We sit back and talk about our election like it's a football game.

We change the channel on PBS when someone like Bill Moyers tries to have a thorough, detailed, long, tedious explanation about media consolidation. It's boring. Yawn. Al Gore was boring. John Kerry talked too much. John didn't land the Rocky Balboa punches.

Every time we try to scapegoat our own greed and laziness and lack of attention, we make excuses for neglecting our role in representative government, and personal fiscal responsibility.

Many of us on here have state plainly that we turn down ridiculous credit offers daily. Many live without credit cards, or barely use them. Many of us are responsible and read and discuss and write to our representatives.

But too many don't. They just look for scapegoats as excuses to continue our own sloth.

[yurbud]

1. political sloth is tough to overcome--GOP has shocked some of us awake but once things

get tolerable again, most will go back to sleep, and the wealthy will slowly get a stranglehold on our democracy again because we will leave it unattended like putting your purse on top of your car in a parking lot and expecting it to be there when you get back from shopping.

[Beregond2]

2. It's a way of deflectng the blame from the real culprits, the deregulators.

[Fire Walk With Me]

3. BAD Wall Street traders! No money for you until you can learn to use it correctly.

Now go outside and play, it's a beautiful day..

[spin]

4. Yes, I learned to pay my credit cards off every month...

and I do my best to be financially responsible.

But I have seen predatory leading without regulation grow in this country. To a great extent I feel it is responsible for the decline of the middle class and has definitely slammed the poor into the dirt.

Was it irresponsible for people to by homes they really couldn't afford when most of the experts told them that their home was a excellent investment and that they could sell it for a profit when the teaser rates ended? My friends told me I was foolish to pay off my house and all my debts when I could use the equity in my home to finance a much more lavish lifestyle. They also had a hard time understanding my decision to purchase my new vehicle with cash. After all, I could have invested that money in the stock market.

And for many people it did work. My daughter and son in law built a house on a lake for $100,000. Eight years later they sold it for $300,000. The housing market collapsed and the house they sold was unoccupied 6 months later and was in foreclosure a year after. The real estate bubble burst. Bubbles have a tendency to do just that.

And while I'm upset that people were allowed to acquire loans they obviously couldn't afford, I'm furious about the unregulated credit card companies taking advantage of people. Some people make their card payments on time, but the card companies will use any excuse to jack up their rates so high that it can only be called usury. Some states do have usury laws, but the card companies bypass these laws by locating themselves in states that don't.

In the near future we will probably have to bail the credit card companies out from all the bad debt they have created. Our government will probably assume these debts and merely pay them back by appropriating the income tax returns of the delinquent card holders.