Ron Paul Questions and Concerns Well

[aldante]

Markmax, here’s the difference between you and me. You’re an idealogue with a manichean thought process. You’re a believer, and any evidence in conflict with the belief, you reject, dismiss or ignore. And worse, you treat all criticism as the enemy of your truth, regardless of how benign.

My world is not so black and white. I have no emotional ties to my opinions. I don’t see absolutism, purity or consistency as virtues. I’m not bound by ideologies. I don’t believe or believe in anything. I research and evidence leads to conclusions, not beliefs. End of story. If you have evidence that is better than mine, I win. Because I end up smarter. Unfortunately, I doubt that’s going to happen in this conversation.[/

Sk,
So as your logic goes your argument can necessarily only be as good as your research. Yes or no?
If so are you telling us that you have done exhaustive research on each of your counterpoints? Or are you simply implying your research is far superior to the rest of us who would hold a different view? What happens if you don’t feel motivated to do the research? Does that mean the point is won?
No, sadly my opinion of your arguments on this blog is someone indeed that has a whole lot to protect and defend, against any reasonable counterpoint. And that is that you must be a egotist of the highest order. I think for you to ever believe that you could be wrong would never fit into your “logic”

[SK in CV]

For one aldante, my comment wasn’t directed at you, it was directed at markmax. I don’t think you’ve expressed the same kind of faulty logic that he has.

I don’t think my research is any better than his. I haven’t dismissed any evidence. I don’t throw evidence out because it doesn’t support my conclusion. To the contrary, I’d welcome evidence that makes me change my opinion. But I think the evidence that I’ve seen, including all that’s been presented here on the points we’re discussing, leads to a logical conclusion. And that opinion is that the GSE’s had no more than a minor role in the housing bubble and bust.

[blahblahblah]

I would have to agree that the GSEs played only a minor role in the housing bubble. As I recall (and I could be wrong), the biggest causes were the securitization of mortgages into MBSes combined with shady underwriting practices. Why bother caring if someone can pay back the loan when you’re just immediately going to sell it into a bundle of toxic waste that you can then sell to someone else.

Was the repeal of Glass-Steagall behind that change in mortgage financing? I’m not sure but the timing seems right since these silly MBS things appeared immediately after.

[markmax33]

[quote=SK in CV]For one aldante, my comment wasn’t directed at you, it was directed at markmax. I don’t think you’ve expressed the same kind of faulty logic that he has.

I don’t think my research is any better than his. I haven’t dismissed any evidence. I don’t throw evidence out because it doesn’t support my conclusion. To the contrary, I’d welcome evidence that makes me change my opinion. But I think the evidence that I’ve seen, including all that’s been presented here on the points we’re discussing, leads to a logical conclusion. And that opinion is that the GSE’s had no more than a minor role in the housing bubble and bust.[/quote]

Fine explain the simple theory that they set the tone for the market by buying risky assets that weren’t subprime and started a trend. They certainly perpetuated the idea that mortgages could be sold in bundles to them in a faulty manner and gave the market confidence in the MBS model. They ABSOLUTELY STARTED THE TREND whether they actually bought subprime or not. They ABSOLUTELY are to blame for not letting the whole bubble collapse and letting the market get back to a normal healthy point. The GOV is propping up the current housing bubble by purchasing 90% of the current mortgages in the system wouldn’t you agree? Isn’t that just or bad or worse than actually purchasing the first subprime loan? Your assertions that THE ONLY PERSON IN CONGRESS WHO WARNED ABOUT THE HOUSING BUBBLE, RON PAUL, was wrong is far fetched and a lie. You need to give me the man credit on another level if you don’t agree with the sub prime piece of the argument. WE CLEARLY HAD A HOUSING BUBBLE WITHOUT A SINGLE SUB PRIME LOAN.

[SK in CV]

[quote=markmax33]
Fine explain the simple theory that they set the tone for the market by buying risky assets that weren’t subprime and started a trend. They certainly perpetuated the idea that mortgages could be sold in bundles to them in a faulty manner and gave the market confidence in the MBS model. They ABSOLUTELY STARTED THE TREND whether they actually bought subprime or not. [/quote]

You know markmax, you’re very right on one part here. They certainly were the first to issue mortgage backed securities. From well before this most recent bubble/bust. And before the bubble/bust of the early 90’s. And before the bubble/bust of around 1980. And before the little bubble/bust of the mid-70’s. Ginnie Mae started issuing mortgage backed securities in 1968. Freddie Mac in 1971. They did it for more than 30 years before this most recent bubble/bust. But Wall Street? They just got involved after November of 1999. Took em a few years to get ramped up, but when they did, all hell broke loose.

[blahblahblah]

[quote=SK in CV]
You know markmax, you’re very right on one part here. They certainly were the first to issue mortgage backed securities. From well before this most recent bubble/bust. And before the bubble/bust of the early 90’s. And before the bubble/bust of around 1980. And before the little bubble/bust of the mid-70’s. Ginnie Mae started issuing mortgage backed securities in 1968. Freddie Mac in 1971. They did it for more than 30 years before this most recent bubble/bust. But Wall Street? They just got involved after November of 1999. Took em a few years to get ramped up, but when they did, all hell broke loose.[/quote]

This is where the hardcore libertarian arguments start falling apart. Government actually can do a lot of things really well, so can private industry. It’s when they start getting together, when people start rewriting legislation to suit certain big interests, when people are moving back and forth between government jobs and private jobs, when the prez has these same corporate goons in nearly every office, that things seem to go really haywire. With the bushies it is the oil and defense crowd and with clinton/obama it seems to be these financial clowns.

Again, I don’t know for sure but it definitely seems like repealing Glass-Steagall was the trigger for the whole deal. And again, that was government regulation that had prevented this sort of thing for a long time. Government regulation can sometimes be a good thing.

I will still vote for Paul in the primary even though I don’t agree with him on a lot of things. If he were somehow elected, he wouldn’t be able to turn the country into a libertarian wonderland overnight, there is still a congress and a judiciary he would have to deal with. At least he is getting people to think about the idea of liberty, that you can’t always expect someone to bail you out or take care of you.

[markmax33]

[quote=SK in CV]
You know markmax, you’re very right on one part here. They certainly were the first to issue mortgage backed securities. From well before this most recent bubble/bust. And before the bubble/bust of the early 90’s. And before the bubble/bust of around 1980. And before the little bubble/bust of the mid-70’s. Ginnie Mae started issuing mortgage backed securities in 1968. Freddie Mac in 1971. They did it for more than 30 years before this most recent bubble/bust. But Wall Street? They just got involved after November of 1999. Took em a few years to get ramped up, but when they did, all hell broke loose.
[/quote]

So in other words you are admitting Ron Paul was correct that the GOV GSEs were the ENABLERS and had a historic role in starting this whole mess. All Ron Paul predicted was that the GOV GSEs would have a role in a future housing bubble before ANYBODY else said it. To me it is clearly obvious that when he has predicted 90% of the things wrong in the country and there are videos, books, etc to prove it, he is the only man in Congress who can actually get a vote.

The equation is simple – When the GOV gets involved in an industry it diverts funds in an inefficient way, whether you agree with it’s intent or not, and it creates a more inefficient market for somebody, maybe not you. You should fight against these interventions because one day those interventions will affect you negatively in a minor of MAJOR way. If you don’t stop the trend the GOV will keep taking control. That is the history of GOVs.

I was a semi-professional poker player and couldn’t give two craps about politics before April 15, 2011. The GOV robbed me of my liberty to play online poker and I am irate. You will be irate too one day. I will fight for liberty for everyone else for the rest of my life. I don’t want it to happen to you, whether you believe me or not.

[SK in CV]

[quote=markmax33]So in other words you are admitting Ron Paul was correct that the GOV GSEs were the ENABLERS and had a historic role in starting this whole mess. All Ron Paul predicted was that the GOV GSEs would have a role in a future housing bubble before ANYBODY else said it. To me it is clearly obvious that when he has predicted 90% of the things wrong in the country and there are videos, books, etc to prove it, he is the only man in Congress who can actually get a vote.

[/quote]

Uh…no. I’m not sure how you reached that conclusion. Maybe show your work. The nexus between the GSE’s initiating the sale of MBS’s in 1968 and the bubble crash in 2003-2011?

I’m reasonably sure that Ron Paul was not the first to say it. The conspiracy theorists, the Fed, the Trilateral Commission, the CFR, the Bilderberg Group. The evil bankers. Many have made the same claims he has over the years. And others have made the same claims I have, that Gramm Leach Bliley, the bill that repeales Glass Steagall would lead to disaster.

Senator Byron Dorgan had this to say on the Senate floor, before the bill was passed. You’ll like the first part.

Of course the Fed has an inherent conflict of interest. I think, if the Congress were thinking very clearly about the Federal Reserve Board, they would decide immediately that the Federal Reserve Board is not the locus of supervision of banks. The Federal Reserve Board is in charge of monetary policy. It is fundamentally a conflict of interest to be listening to the Fed about what is good for banks when they are involved in running the monetary policy of this country. If the Federal Reserve Board were, in my judgment, doing what it ought to be doing, it would be leading the charge, saying we need to regulate risky hedge funds because banks are involved in substantial risk on these hedge funds. Apparently hedge funds have become too big to fail. Then there needs to be some regulation.

snip

I wrote an article in 1994 for the Washington Monthly magazine and derivatives at that point were $35 trillion. You know something, today in this country banks are trading derivatives on their own proprietary accounts. They could just as well put a roulette wheel in the lobby. They could just as well call it a casino. Banks ought not be trading derivatives on their proprietary accounts. I have an amendment to prohibit that. I don’t suppose it would get more than a handful of votes, but I intend to offer it.

snip

We have folks outside who have worked on this very hard and who very much want this to happen. We have a lot of folks in here who are very compliant to say: Absolutely, let me be the lead singer. And here we are. We have this bill, which I will bet, in 5, 10, 15 years from now, we will be back thinking of this bill like we thought of the bill passed in the late 1970s and early 1980s, in which this Congress unhitched the savings and loans so some sleepy little Texas institution could gather brokered deposits from all around America and, like a giant rocket, become a huge enterprise. And guess what. With all the speculation in the S&Ls and brokered deposits and all the things that went with it that this Congress allowed, what did it cost the American taxpayer to bail out that bunch of failures? What did it cost? Hundreds of billions of dollars. I will bet one day somebody is going to look back at this and they are going to say: How on Earth could we have thought it made sense to allow the banking industry to concentrate, through merger and acquisition, to become bigger and bigger and bigger; far more firms in the category of too big to fail? How did we think that was going to help this country? Then to decide we shall fuse it with inherently risky enterprises, how did we think that was going to avoid the lessons of the past?

He said those words in 1999.

And Ron Paul? He voted no. He didn’t like it for similar reasons as Dorgan, though he was a little more focused (obsessed?) with the Fed role in supporting the de-regulation. Kind of interesting. A libertarian voting to KEEP regulations, not to deregulate. Good for him.

[markmax33]

[quote=SK in CV][quote=markmax33]So in other words you are admitting Ron Paul was correct that the GOV GSEs were the ENABLERS and had a historic role in starting this whole mess. All Ron Paul predicted was that the GOV GSEs would have a role in a future housing bubble before ANYBODY else said it. To me it is clearly obvious that when he has predicted 90% of the things wrong in the country and there are videos, books, etc to prove it, he is the only man in Congress who can actually get a vote.

[/quote]

Uh…no. I’m not sure how you reached that conclusion. Maybe show your work. The nexus between the GSE’s initiating the sale of MBS’s in 1968 and the bubble crash in 2003-2011?

I’m reasonably sure that Ron Paul was not the first to say it. The conspiracy theorists, the Fed, the Trilateral Commission, the CFR, the Bilderberg Group. The evil bankers. Many have made the same claims he has over the years. And others have made the same claims I have, that Gramm Leach Bliley, the bill that repeales Glass Steagall would lead to disaster.

Senator Byron Dorgan had this to say on the Senate floor, before the bill was passed. You’ll like the first part.

Of course the Fed has an inherent conflict of interest. I think, if the Congress were thinking very clearly about the Federal Reserve Board, they would decide immediately that the Federal Reserve Board is not the locus of supervision of banks. The Federal Reserve Board is in charge of monetary policy. It is fundamentally a conflict of interest to be listening to the Fed about what is good for banks when they are involved in running the monetary policy of this country. If the Federal Reserve Board were, in my judgment, doing what it ought to be doing, it would be leading the charge, saying we need to regulate risky hedge funds because banks are involved in substantial risk on these hedge funds. Apparently hedge funds have become too big to fail. Then there needs to be some regulation.

snip

I wrote an article in 1994 for the Washington Monthly magazine and derivatives at that point were $35 trillion. You know something, today in this country banks are trading derivatives on their own proprietary accounts. They could just as well put a roulette wheel in the lobby. They could just as well call it a casino. Banks ought not be trading derivatives on their proprietary accounts. I have an amendment to prohibit that. I don’t suppose it would get more than a handful of votes, but I intend to offer it.

snip

We have folks outside who have worked on this very hard and who very much want this to happen. We have a lot of folks in here who are very compliant to say: Absolutely, let me be the lead singer. And here we are. We have this bill, which I will bet, in 5, 10, 15 years from now, we will be back thinking of this bill like we thought of the bill passed in the late 1970s and early 1980s, in which this Congress unhitched the savings and loans so some sleepy little Texas institution could gather brokered deposits from all around America and, like a giant rocket, become a huge enterprise. And guess what. With all the speculation in the S&Ls and brokered deposits and all the things that went with it that this Congress allowed, what did it cost the American taxpayer to bail out that bunch of failures? What did it cost? Hundreds of billions of dollars. I will bet one day somebody is going to look back at this and they are going to say: How on Earth could we have thought it made sense to allow the banking industry to concentrate, through merger and acquisition, to become bigger and bigger and bigger; far more firms in the category of too big to fail? How did we think that was going to help this country? Then to decide we shall fuse it with inherently risky enterprises, how did we think that was going to avoid the lessons of the past?

He said those words in 1999.

And Ron Paul? He voted no. He didn’t like it for similar reasons as Dorgan, though he was a little more focused (obsessed?) with the Fed role in supporting the de-regulation. Kind of interesting. A libertarian voting to KEEP regulations, not to deregulate. Good for him.[/quote]

Ron Paul was the first and only *current* candidate to say it. He is the only candidate that you can logically vote for. He was calling for the end of the FED longer than anyone in Congress, obviously because he’s been in there since the 1970s. You should stop attacking the man and give him credit and stop arguing semantics. I don’t mind fact checking, but discrediting over semantics is a waste of everyone’s time.

[SK in CV]

[quote=markmax33]
Ron Paul was the first and only *current* candidate to say it. He is the only candidate that you can logically vote for. He was calling for the end of the FED longer than anyone in Congress, obviously because he’s been in there since the 1970s. You should stop attacking the man and give him credit and stop arguing semantics. I don’t mind fact checking, but discrediting over semantics is a waste of everyone’s time.[/quote]

I don’t know what “it” is, so I won’t comment. But I won’t vote for him. I like some of his ideas. Others not so much. Overall, I think he’s a wack job. But since he’s for legalizing pot, I wouldn’t mind lighting up with him. That would cool.

And mind you, I haven’t been discrediting him so much as you. Use the right words and it won’t waste anyone’s time.

[markmax33]

[quote=SK in CV][quote=markmax33]
Ron Paul was the first and only *current* candidate to say it. He is the only candidate that you can logically vote for. He was calling for the end of the FED longer than anyone in Congress, obviously because he’s been in there since the 1970s. You should stop attacking the man and give him credit and stop arguing semantics. I don’t mind fact checking, but discrediting over semantics is a waste of everyone’s time.[/quote]

I don’t know what “it” is, so I won’t comment. But I won’t vote for him. I like some of his ideas. Others not so much. Overall, I think he’s a wack job. But since he’s for legalizing pot, I wouldn’t mind lighting up with him. That would cool.

And mind you, I haven’t been discrediting him so much as you. Use the right words and it won’t waste anyone’s time.[/quote]

LOLOLOLOLOL…Keep yourself amused SK. There’s only one wack job if you say those things about Ron Paul. There’s a reason nobody else here has supported your wacky ideas sir!

Ron Paul 2012! – Liberty for all, including pot heads!

[scaredyclassic]

I probably can’t vote for him in the primary cause I’m registered green or libertarian or maybe something else.

But count on me to get my absentee ballot in for Ron in the main election

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