patrick.net

multiple bathrooms
God bless America!

BTW, did you visit Versaille? I have a mental image of you overlooking the gardens and announcing "Let them eat cake".

... excuse me, I meant to say "Let them eat sushi".

LOL! We skipped Versaille this time.

WOW!

By logical extension-

We need to build many more roads (more freedom), bomb more countries(more freedom), cancel Amtrak (more freedom), repeal the gas tax (more freedom), repeal the income tax and get on with it. I hope our bankers in China, Japan and the UK are cool with that!

btw - Versailles is awesome!!!!

Peter,

Don’t kid yourself. We have our own socialized system that is just as bad as Europe’s. The design is very different but it still exists. It is as destructive as Europe’s system. The system we have now is being held hostage by people leveraged 40-1 with the threats of a financial collapse.

You can see it all over the place. The gubermint lies about inflation, employment data, and how it spends the tax revenue. The system is corrupt because there are no true free market forces at work. If we had a free market, the FED would not have stepped in to stop Bear Stearns from going under and causing a massive snow ball of derivatives to do some real damage.

The people like Kudlow on Kudlow and company think free market capitalism is the best path to prosperity, yet when downside becomes apparent, they run and cry like little babies. It was just a few months ago He cried about the fed not fixing the credit squeeze by lowering interest rates. What he failed to see was the credit squeeze was a good thing and would have allowed market forces to fix the imbalance. It is simply easier to devalue our currency than pay the piper for our past sins. Do you think people would have bid up housing so much if cheap easy credit were not available? Do you think it would have gotten this far had 20% down been required by the banks? The only way to change bank’s behavior is to make them eat the losses.

I say kick the people out of the homes and give the banks their collateral. Make them rent or live in their cars. If the bank fails, many will, liquidate the assets and pay the depositors what ever you can.

If the market had been allowed to correct, the cash that I have in my home would be worth more. The monopoly money would simply have evaporated and FDIC would have only been able to make good on about 1% of its obligations. Oil consumption would have dropped and we would be flooded with cheap oil. Imagine gas at $1/gallon because Americans would have been *gasp* forced to live within their means.

The FED social engineers the system to bail out people that should have lost lots of money. This is nothing more than dispursed costs with concentrated benefits.

Yeah, Socialize risks and privatize profits - GO HARVARD / WALL STREET!

Don’t kid yourself. We have our own socialized system that is just as bad as Europe’s.

Well, I just hope that we can learn from the lesson and move away from the welfare state.

The market will eventually find its equilibrium (or a new stable disequilibrium) with or without intervention. Have faith in the invisible hand. It will do God's work.

I say let them eat asset backed paper. YUM!

Ironic, they started as a Christian, Protestant University, and now, no mention of that in the context of the CEO criminals that have graduated from that institution.

I should make millions of dollars worth of derivative contracts between my wife and me to use as collateral. I could then get cheap money from the central bank in exchange for worthless stuff. That is I can win in this game.

Too bad the central bank is not interested in you.

>> The market will eventually find its equilibrium

There is NO MARKET in US .... stop your bullshit.

United States is a socialist country for rich. Socialize risk and privatize profit. I will choose EU over US any day when it comes to welfare policies.

>> The market will eventually find its equilibrium

There is NO MARKET in US

The market exists whenever there are human beings. Market forces are the manifestation of collective human will.

and government interventions

this countries markets are VERY managed!

ie FARM BILL

ie Bear Sterns bailout

ie TEA 21

U n i t e d S t a t e s I s A S o c i a l i s t C o u n t r y F o r R i c h.

S o c i a l i z e
R i s k
A n d
P r i v a t i z e
P r o f i t.

Europe is better than US in taking care of its people

and so on and so on

and they tell two friends and they tell two friends...

People do not have health care in US

People work to death in US

watch Sicko

Vote republican to avoid housing bailout and illegal immigration

Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicare_Prescription_Drug,_Improvement,_and_Modernization_Act

1. RE: welfare state, US is still doing better than Europe
2. Important: we should look at Europe and see what we *should not* do

I disagree. Our welfare state only looks like it is doing better because we still are in control of the world's reserve currency.

Peter P

Yea - the truth is the US, for all f its many and painful flaws,is still better than most other nations.

Our inflation may well balkalnize the EU (or at least the EU Central Bank and currency).

Their form of social security is far worse and far more immediate of a problem than our problems (at least, Italym France and Germany).

Their immigration problems are worse than our problems.

Their labor competitiveness is worse than ours.

In the end, we need good government to keep us a step ahead, and I have lost a great deal of confidence in the people who are getting elected these days. Maybe a competency test is in order?

In any event, the Fed needs to curb inlfation NOW.

Bap

My comment on Merced was only this: homes are starting to clear there. That is the truth. People who are buying are planning to rent because they can do so - presumably to people getting aide. Also the truth. I am sure everything you are saying is also correct.

Our welfare state only looks like it is doing better because we still are in control of the world’s reserve currency.

But that is quite something, isn't it? ;)

I never said that I am a genius... and I always thought luck is a crucial element.

Most Americans live quite well compared to the rest of the world. We should work to keep it that way.

I should we have a tax on luck. LOL.

All nonsensical rantings aside, Peter P is right in that most Americans assume that European countries are better places to live than here and they attribute a lot of that to socialist policies. They are very wrong.

I believe in freedom and individual liberty. We are getting away from it at an alarming rate and that worries me.

Peter, the relief you feel might be short lived. We are fast on our way to becoming an unproductive, entitlement society.

London has good Indian food though. ;)

They even have good South Indian seafood dishes! Somehow Paapad tastes much better there.

Wether life is "better" in a western European country, Canada, Australia, New Zealand or the United States is really a matter of tastes and preferences. All these nations provide free public education and job/career/life opportunities for those who put forth the efforts to take advantage of them. The "luck", I suppose, (since very few in any nation are born upper class) comes from having parents who push for doing well in school and push other habits for success in a modern society. The opportunity for a comfortable material existence is available for all who work for it. Plus, given the dole programs available in all the above named countries, many who do not/cannot work fare rather well also.

It does not matter that "Americans are working harder," you can choose to work less. So what if the majority of your neighbors have both spouses working to pay for the huge house, cable, and SUV? You can choose to live in the smaller home, drive a midsize Chevy, and take vacations while working no overtime. The same concept applies to those who overconsume and run up credit card debt. You can enjoy parks (fishing, canoeing, baseball, basketball, hiking), cycling, over-the-air TV, home cooked meals from scratch, and other free activities while banking some of your salary. Just because others run up debts and pay interest does preclude you from putting away savings and earning interest.

"They even have good South Indian seafood dishes"

Peter, you haven't had the best sea food until you have tried fresh Chesapeake Bay she-crab soup.

Peter, you haven’t had the best sea food until you have tried fresh Chesapeake Bay she-crab soup.

I have heard about it. I can imagine the taste. Yum! :)

I love she-crabs. The coral is the best!