Ahhh - but Bush did warn more than just Obama, he warned the leaders of Congress (Obama wasn't even there yet in 2004, if memory serves correctly). Multiple times.

I am certainly not trying to absolve him of the blame, but there were several warnings, they chose to put their heads back in the sand and continue pushing the agenda of allowing banks to make bad loans, with no checks, and then for Fannie and Freddie to cover them.

Kind of like if you had a kid with a gambling problem.  Everytime he goes to the casino, and loses money, you cover his debts.  He will not learn.

Obama has proposed budgets, you are right.  However, he does not seem to want to compromise, nor does he want to push the issue.  He could have said three years ago - "pass a budget.  I will not continue to sign temporary spending bills without one."

But if Bush warned congress in 04, and both houses in 04 were controlled by Republicans, how is that Obama's fault?

Read a little closer please - I NEVER said it was Obamas fault.

I said that you were holding both presidents to different standards of action, when in both cases their hands are tied.

Bush could have shouted from the tree tops in 2004 about impending doom.  He would have been branded a racist and an elitist - "denying good honest hard working minorities of their right to partake in the American Dream of home ownership" (even if they could not in a million years afford the payments). 

There was nothing he could LEGISLATIVELY.

Obama - as you correctly pointed out - as the President - cannot LEGISLATE a budget.

Same circumstances - differing levels of expectation - all depending on your political point of view.

I'll completely agree with you that both sides have a problem with the way they assign blame and their inability to accept blame.

minimalist - cannot accept that you are holding Bush and Obama to differing levels of expectations?

??? Here is crackhoes argument:

Obama didn't put forth a budget
Obama didn't do anything when Bush apparently warned everyone of Fannie and Freddie in 2004.

If Obama did put forth a budget and republicans controlled congress in 04, how is that holding them to different standards?

not concerned about his argument

If he says "Obama didn't do anything in 2004" he is wrong, because Obama was not elected until 2004.

Can you not admit that if you use consistent levels of expectations, both presidents are being held responsible for things beyond their actual abilities?

Posted by wrmiller13 on 5/23/2012 10:47:00 PM (view original):
not concerned about his argument

If he says "Obama didn't do anything in 2004" he is wrong, because Obama was not elected until 2004.

Can you not admit that if you use consistent levels of expectations, both presidents are being held responsible for things beyond their actual abilities?

Yes, I never disagreed with that point.

If you think for one minute that Bill Ayres, George Soros and Hussan obama had nothing to do with the housing collapse in 2004, you are all dillusional.  When Bush and his congress tried to fix the housing mess, he called for a committee to look into it.  Unfortunatly that commiittee was chaired by Barnet Frank, who was also a ranking member of Fannie and a clear conflict of interest.  But those things don't seem to matter to the left.  Frank and Dodd INSISTED that all was fine and indeed accused the right of racisim and trying to take the homes away from poor inner cith folks.  Obamas part was that he is an expert community organizer and put forth SEIU and Acorn to start this attack and begin his march to communist in chief.  All Soros did was fund it all and Ayres was the professer.  Grow up man and stop drinking the kool aid.

The seeds of the housing mess was planted during the Clinton Administration, when the regulations were relaxed and banks and mortgage companies were encouraged to make loans to potential home buyers that could go way beyond their means to payback.

Now you can blame the democrats for making that happen.  You can blame the republicans for allowing it to happen.  But a fair share, if not the majority of the blame, has to go to the American public for taking out loans that went well beyond their means to repay.

Posted by tecwrg on 5/24/2012 10:27:00 AM (view original):
The seeds of the housing mess was planted during the Clinton Administration, when the regulations were relaxed and banks and mortgage companies were encouraged to make loans to potential home buyers that could go way beyond their means to payback.

Now you can blame the democrats for making that happen.  You can blame the republicans for allowing it to happen.  But a fair share, if not the majority of the blame, has to go to the American public for taking out loans that went well beyond their means to repay.

Case in point:  my wife and I were shopping for our first house in 1996.  We both had full-time professional jobs at the time and were doing OK financially.  We determined how much we were reasonably willing to pay for a house, how much we would put down, and how much we would mortgage.  We determined that anything beyond those amounts would stretch us beyond our means.  It would be too high-risk for us, and would frankly be very financially irresponsible of us to buy beyond those numbers.

When we went to the mortgage company that we chose to use to start the process, they came back and told us that we were pre-approved for a loan amount that was around $250k beyond our own numbers.

Had we been stupid and said "woo-hoo" and bought a house beyond what we determined as financially reasonable for us, we would have eventually been foreclosed on, because despite what the banks were telling us, we could not afford it.

Unfortunately, for a lot of people, they took the loans, spent well beyond their means, and lost out in the end.

As far as I'm concerned, many of the folks who got screwed during the mortgage industry collapse had nobody to blame but themselves.

Posted by tecwrg on 5/24/2012 10:27:00 AM (view original):
The seeds of the housing mess was planted during the Clinton Administration, when the regulations were relaxed and banks and mortgage companies were encouraged to make loans to potential home buyers that could go way beyond their means to payback.

Now you can blame the democrats for making that happen.  You can blame the republicans for allowing it to happen.  But a fair share, if not the majority of the blame, has to go to the American public for taking out loans that went well beyond their means to repay.

Agreed, but remember, according to obama and his team, "a good crisis should never go to waste".  They twisted everything to make the right look like they hated the poor man and loved the rich which is the biggest lie in the history of politics. 

And as far as the budget goes, I guess you can say king hussan put a budget out there, even though both times he did he couldn't get ONE VOTE, NOT ONE!!!!!!!  Thats right 97-0 and 99-0....if that is good enough for you to say he tried, well, I guess it is good enough for you.  What flavor do you prefer?

Posted by tecwrg on 5/24/2012 10:27:00 AM (view original):
The seeds of the housing mess was planted during the Clinton Administration, when the regulations were relaxed and banks and mortgage companies were encouraged to make loans to potential home buyers that could go way beyond their means to payback.

Now you can blame the democrats for making that happen.  You can blame the republicans for allowing it to happen.  But a fair share, if not the majority of the blame, has to go to the American public for taking out loans that went well beyond their means to repay.

There is a very interesting book on this subject - "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis.  I think if you read it you may change your mind on this.  At least when it comes to blaming the general public instead of the investment banks.

Posted by jrd_x on 5/24/2012 11:18:00 AM (view original):

Posted by tecwrg on 5/24/2012 10:27:00 AM (view original):
The seeds of the housing mess was planted during the Clinton Administration, when the regulations were relaxed and banks and mortgage companies were encouraged to make loans to potential home buyers that could go way beyond their means to payback.

Now you can blame the democrats for making that happen.  You can blame the republicans for allowing it to happen.  But a fair share, if not the majority of the blame, has to go to the American public for taking out loans that went well beyond their means to repay.

There is a very interesting book on this subject - "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis.  I think if you read it you may change your mind on this.  At least when it comes to blaming the general public instead of the investment banks.

So people shouldn't take any personal responsibility for borrowing and spending beyond their means to repay?

No, they absolutely should.  But people are dumb and they are always going to try to get more than they should, especially when the credit is easy to get and seems cheap.  It's up to the banks who are underwriting the deal to use discretion.

btw, do you respond to every post with a question when you disagree?  Are you incapable of just saying that you think people should take personal responsibility?