San Diego Housing Bubble News and Analysis

It's the same as "roman empire" falling articles I've read in the 90ies.

With unemployment climbing and baby boomers having their networth gutted just before retirement....I think we're looking at socialized health care at the very least and a global recession that will rival the 1930's.

But empires collapse at a slow and boring pace, at least historically speaking.

Frankly, I was a little surprised about how badly the local S.D. economy is doing these days. I would have thought that the economy is more diverse than say the Bay Area (which is concentrated in tech).

It might be diverse, but one thing I've noticing it's only diverse in the sense that S.D. hosts a lot of companies that aren't HQ'd here. So it seems like when the economy contracts, and companies need to cut heads, they start by closing remote locations. That said, how many major employers are either (1) hq'd here or (2) have an office that accounts for more than 30% of the entire company's workforce? Don't have an answer to that question.

Scared of Mexicans much?

Okay another dumb thread.
This one however, is actually in black helicopter land.
Which makes it funny.

The items of note are:
fear of gov't (pasty evil and white)
fear of mexicans (less white but tastier)
fear of everything else (some tasty, some pasty, some white, mostly scary)

Use of lots of utterly mad assertions with social studies vocab words and no backup.

Rule of law.
the will of the American people
democracy
... and lets just say Islamofacism

As a proponent of the NWO (mostly just the ministry song), I suggest we threadjack this one to something else.

Maybe the yeti???

Just an idea.

Flu,

You are right. SD is a sideshow to many major companies, not home. That being said, the major employers that are here are often Military. We are currently fighting multiple wars and military spending is through the roof right now, and alot of boats are being kept afloat due to our war spending.
A buddy of mine works for a military contractor, makes damn good money too. Able to keep his head above water only becasue of his "government job premium" and a boatload of overtime. If the war spending ever ends, the SD economy will do a whole lot worse IMO.

Seems like the number of nutjob posts has risen exponentially in the last 2 months.

I wonder if there are more nutjobs on the board now or if they are just more vocal ? Maybe we should have a poll.

Nutjob posts??? Let's see, you must be the below average American collecting unemployment and expecting our government to fix all the problems that lazy people like you create. As the post reads, I just thought it was interesting. I never said I believed everything in the article.

Go get a job and help our economy instead of whining. Smart people who understand basic economics actually see a lot of these issues causing a huge problem in our national economic situation. Complacency is one of the main reasons this democracy is failing. We have trained too many people to expect rather than to work.

Oh he must be.

He dared disagree with you.

Well I'm off to the dole line with my wife, baby, crackpipe, and eastern european slave girl.

let me know how the thread turns out.

YETI!!!!!!!!!!!

We need a flag abusive posts option on here.

If you're going to try and be funny at least make sense, and limit the insults.

Back on topic -

I wouldn't say it was planned as much as the result of politicians who are completely disconnected from reality.

They are living the high life, writing their own paychecks and pensions, set their own 3 day work week, and pocket the benefits while we work our asses off subsidizing their complacent stupidity.

The reality of our bipartisan politics now means nothing gets done. All they care about is who has bigger numbers.

So what do they do? They blow sunshine and hot air to get in office, then run things into the ground, because they have no concept of thinking beyond the next election.

The system is broke, and short of a revolution we need to eradicate the useless politicians - Democrat AND Republican - and get people in there who understand what it means to WORK, won't offer handouts to illegals at the expense of taxpayers, and actually do something for once that will get this country back on track.

I think the nutjobs have realized the power of the internet, only a decade late. First they took over radio, then they took over TV, now they're going after the internet. The internet by definition is the grassroots, and they are scared of it. They know from experience that they can shout down anything if they work hard enough and spew enough noise. It makes it harder to find the informative stuff if you have to sift through all the crap. They know that if they fling enough shit, some of it will stick. Hopefully the law of diminishing returns will save us.

Thanks for the encouragement.
But in my own defense your assumption or intuition of my work ethic or employment situation could not be more off base.

Could you please elucidate the logic that led you to your opinion ?

Coop, I agree with you. Our friend urbanrealtor must have a huge client base with his crack pipe jokes.

It really is sad to see so much corporate and political corruption. I wish I was in a government position to start taking these corrupt politicians out of office one by one. I am sure I wouldn't last very long in office. We need to clean things up a great deal and this is not a Democrat or Republican issue, it is just issue of GREED and POWER.

Unfortunately these positions lead to money, greed and power which changes so many people and very few are able to stay focused and do what is right for the citizens of this country. Now that all theses problems have come to the forefront, I think things will have to be changed or we will be in big trouble very soon!!

I think there are a lot FLU. Just off the top of my head:

QCOM, Intuit, Amylin, LPL Financial, Websense, SAIC, General Atomics, AMN Healthcare, PETCO, Callaway, TOPPS, Jack in the Box, Encore Capital, etc...

This was the most truthful part of the article...

I think that may be changing. More people watched Obama and Palin's speeches than watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics or than watch American Idol. When I read that I was shocked. I think people are starting to tune in.

Agree that Americans are far too apathetic and lack the abilty to logically spell-out the reasons for thier beliefs.

On that note, instead of hearing the usual name-calling (i.e.: "nutjob," "crack smoker," etc.), it would be very interesting to see the arguments -- logically laid out, with facts -- refuting the initial post.

I did not realize how offensive my jokes would be.

Though I am not really concerned about it.

You basically started this thread with a long rant about the New World Order and how the US was headed for collapse.

While I am not really in tremendous disagreement regarding certain things, I did not find this to be a thoughtful conversation. I just cant take seriously a long silly monologue that ties droughts, corruption, urban decay, and illegal aliens into some sort of insane tapestry.

My crackpipe comments were referencing the response you made to former sd's comment. I was implying that I was some sort of welfare stereotype.

Regarding the post: I don't know you well enough to comment on you personally, but the thread IS a nutjob post.

It just sounds angry and deranged. It does not sound critical or thoughtful.

That you responded to him (and then me) with the invectives about job status, professional productivity, whining and hurting America (while simultaneously distancing yourself from your zany thread start) does not go a long way toward arguing for the coherence of your point.

So, humor me. How does disagreeing with your confused points make you so angry?

@coop:
I don't know what you found so insulting about my post. I don't believe that I insulted anyone but myself. I further do not see that I my comments were particularly abusive or worthy of censorship.
Can you explain what you meant by that?

Nothing in this posts makes me angry at all. I just don't understand why someone would waste their time posting such pointless comments.

If the commentary is a fair rebuttal I am always up to hear it, but when the reply refers to crackpipes or nutjobs, I can only assume a level of intelligence.

Sorry I didn't respond sooner. I put in 14 hours yesterday as part of my personal crusade to improve this country, instead of sitting around whining about it.

Here is my problem.
The title placed on this thread was "Planned Collapse of America SCARY STUFF!"

The original post claims (among other things) ...

The powerful elite in this country are purposefully orchestrating a collapse of America for their own benefit and their primary tool of choice is illegal immigration.

My personal opinion is that the original article is using a conspiracy argument to whip up fear to push a particular agenda (immigration). Frankly, I don't understand why anyone would waste there time posting such a pointless article.

Sure there are some valid points, but they are wrapped in multiple layers of the smelly fish paper.

@socratt:
See previous comment.

You had a not very good thread starter that sounded, frankly, crazy.

When someone commented that it was crazy, you accused him of being a jobless whiner (rather explicitly) and did not seek to clarify your point.

When I made fun of you for this (which I think is totally fair game) you said a very similar thing about me.

I find the assumptions you make about intelligence ironic. Looking over the comments you have here, what assumptions do you think people make about you?

Rebuttal to your point is irrelevant if I can't figure out what you are saying (and its not as though I don't have reading skills).

Immigration is central to our demise. See the gumball video at Numbersusa.com . We have to shut it off and help ourselves first before we can help others and we need to help others where they live, not bring them here to make our conditions worse.

There is no way we can alleviate the destitution when 80 million more people are added in the third world every year. Resources are finite, so increasing our population will only make matters worse for everyone here in the US. CA is a good example of how the resources are dwindling at an accelerating pace due to immigration (legal and illegal) and there is no end in sight. If the infrastructure is burdened now, how about when the population doubles from immigration in the next 30 years?

As far as the politicians, they have been all bought and paid for, for millinia. Any country that is friendly, and many who are not, their leaders have also been bought. This is business as usual since the US dollar standard. So it will continue "as is" no matter who is voted in. If they cannot be bought, they will be eliminated...as is the standard practice.

The only way out is to vote in an independent who can shut down the Fed, IRS and most of the Federal govt institutions. This will only save the US, unless they can do it in concert with other nations, which is even more unlikely. Basically, the elite don't want to work, they want to leech off the rest of us and they have set up institutions to feed off of us. No fear needed, just reality.

Sincerely,
StevenO

The underlying trends that the OP calls out are there, but I do not agree with the implication that it is a planned conspiracy. Extrapolate US demographic trends about 30 years and the USA will look like Brazil. Vast underclasses of uneducated poor, a small middle class that manages things, and a ruling elite that stays in power through generations, with the occasional "union" candidate who "shakes things up" before being co-opted into the system. When politics is about many different groups competing for a bigger slice of the pie rather than governing the nation that is what will happen (clientelismo is what its called in Latin America). The only way to stop it is to discontinue the Federal Government's role as a redistributor of wealth - end transfer payments.

Truly the rich want to get richer, and do in cycles. At the end of these cycles more regulation is put in to detour the very greedy from taking everything. Unfortunately at the end of the regulation cycle, the regulation is removed (Glass Steagall), and the cycle starts over.

We are now at the start of the re-regulation cycle. If we fail to elect a president that will limit "robber baron capitalism", the Armageddon scenario may play out, but likely we will put limits on the new combo finance and banking houses, and go along in the next tick of the cycle. The new creative financial products that are heralded as the gift of "a free market place" are crap and need to be eliminated.

Bubba99 says:

more regulation is put in to detour the very greedy from taking everything

Perhaps true to some extent, however regulation better serves the purpose of maintaining the status quo, which benefits the incumbent wealthy while providing barriers to aspiring up and commers. This is certainly the way regulation is used in Brazil and other Latin American nations.

In my opinion, it is better to have a dynamic system, where those who are good stewards of the nations wealth get more to manage, and those who are lazy or irresponsible stewards of wealth are stripped of it by market force.

By the way, exactly what "new creative financial products" would you like to see expunged?

You know those new financial products like CMO's, and CDO's, and trillions in garbage loans to people who put nothing down, had inadequate income and lied about their assets. I would not really care if I were not one of the ones paying for their total lack of fiscal responsibility.

Up until 1999, we had regulations that separated the insured banks from the riskier Financial houses. Risk your shareholders money, not the FDIC's. That Glass Steagall act was not hardly a South American style "preserve the status quo", but a reasonable and prudent law to prevent the type of failure we see now.

Clearly the current financial meltdown was seen by many who chose to open their eyes to the "less than adequate" assets secured by the money they were lending and repackaging for sale to themselves and others. Those with their eyes closed were the "wealthy stewards" of the financial systems that made billions by selling crap to gain more. They are not stripped of their ill-gotten gains, you and I are paying for their lack of prudent planning and execution.

Take B. S. or Lehman Bros. for example, leveraged over 20 times, with little due diligence on the crap they bought held or sold swaps on. The stewards are granted their lofty positions more by the social order of the boards of directors than any real accomplishment. And given their poor performance, laws that prevent you and I from being on the hook for their bad judgments are a good thing.

If you want a free market place, the tax payer cannot be the one on the hook every time the "stewards" fail.

Preach it! What we have now is NOT free-market...it's Do anything you like and the gov't will bail your investment company out.

Interesting video but not very informed or informative. The weaknesses of your argument are:
-the assertion that immigration is charity (it isn't) and is not productive (it is)
-the assertion that we are being overwhelmed in unprecedented ways (we currently have a comparatively low percentage of foreign-born residents)
-we are in danger of having too many peasants or low-skilled workers dragging the economy down (China and India are the best counter examples of this)
This one is a problem with an argument in the video.
-we are hurting other countries by stealing their talent (If this is true, why are the countries that are contributing talent overtaking us so quickly?)

How can 8-11% (depending upon whose info is used) foreign born double our population?
Seriously, to double in 30 years, we would need more than 10 million per year to come over each year. I think we would really notice that. El Cajon would look like some weird scene out of "10 commandments". Or at the very least 3 million per year with more than 6 kids per mother. As someone from a large Irish/Mexican family, I agree the babies could happen (assuming this was 1950 and birth control still frowned upon by the church), but again it seems unlikely that immigration would double or triple with no initial reaction.

Considering that the US is rated one of the highest for being non-corrupt (planetwide), I am curious where you would find a more honest government (maybe Bulgaria or the Viking countries would be less corrupt). Am I wrong on this? (http://report.globalintegrity.org/United...)

How would it improve things to eliminate these institutions and what would you put in their place? Who is the elite in your model?

Well said, Bubba!

bubba?