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    • 4 Money Problems That Obama Can't Fix [view article]
      Tim, re "reduce healthcare costs through more competition," competition among whom? insurers? providers? patients? Aug 28 04:20 PM
    • The People's Republic of America? [view article]
      Couldn't the government buy the big 3 automakers for less than $50 billion? Maybe they could be fixed and then IPOed for a profit. If not, well, we'd have lost the $50 billion on the loan anyway.

      I just think handing over a huge pile of money to the overpaid executives who haven't done much of anything right for decades is foolish. Maybe I'm a creative destructionist.

      (Probably an easier way to prop up Detroit until it has the chance to electrify would be to initiate single-payer health insurance promptly. Worldwide no other carmaker has to shoulder the Big 3's bennie burden.)       Aug 28 10:48 AM
    • 4 Money Problems That Obama Can't Fix [view article]
      Obama is supposedly a fan of behavioral economics, so expect lots of tweaks in incentives. I predict a fairly quick move into wind and solar power and electric cars, pulled along by government rebates and tax code changes. That should help with "high gas prices." (If only Reagan hadn't torn down the White House solar panels, we could have made the change into renewables by now!)

      I am hoping he goes with a "Medicare for all" plan, which would help "exorbitant health care" immediately and also help the "empty wallets" problem in that some businesses could hire more workers because they're paying each less in total due to lower bennie costs. Moreover, there'd be a boom in new business starts and self-employment, as entrepreneurial types are no longer blocked by fear of lack of health insurance for themselves and their family members. This should also stop all those medical bankruptcies.

      As for "falling home values," I think we'll just have to wait for them to level out. Around my area, average sales time is now 60 days, down from "the day the sign goes in the yard."       Aug 28 08:55 AM
    • A Quick Review of I.O.U.S.A. [view article]
      I've been on this theme since Ross Perot first ran for president. At the end of Clinton's second term, amid all the impeachment stuff, we had surpluses, and I had hope. Then there was Bush.

      I'm pretty sure it won't be straightened out in my lifetime.       Aug 24 11:35 AM
    • A Closer Look at Income Tax and the Rich [view article]
      I'm citing a big hole in your argument that the rich are productive, not arguing for socialism, which, for success, requires a better quality of people than is possible, given original sin.

      Be grateful I haven't mentioned lottery winners and celebrities.       Aug 15 11:10 AM
    • The Great Consumer Crash of 2009 [view article]
      One reason people didn't save money is Alan Greenspan's interest rates. There was no sense in tying up your cash in a 2% CD. I took mine out of the bank and put it into stocks with high dividends, but I think a lot of others just spent it.

      There has to be a reward to saving beyond patting yourself on the back for being virtuous.       Aug 14 09:40 PM
    • A Closer Look at Income Tax and the Rich [view article]
      So you agree with me, Pretzel Logic. The rich are not the productive members of society. Way back a couple of generations ago, an ancestor acquired a pile of money, and now they are conspicuously unproductive.

      I'm with Andrew Carnegie, who acquired a mountain of money: Put aside a little to make sure his wife and daughter wouldn't become streetpeople and spend the rest on church organs, peace studies, public libraries, and generally making the world a better place for his having been there.

      PS: Conrad Hilton Jr., the first heir, made quite a public name for himself, too, and not as a hotelier.       Aug 14 08:45 PM
    • A Closer Look at Income Tax and the Rich [view article]
      The rich are the productive members of society? Like Paris Hilton and all the other winners of the genetic lottery? Aug 13 07:49 AM
    • A Closer Look at Income Tax and the Rich [view article]
      Nobody's mentioned the tax brackets of the 1950s. Aug 13 12:47 AM
    • Obama vs. McCain: Which Candidate is Better for Ethanol and Equipment Companies? [view article]
      You have a link for "Obama's talk is that of a socialist"? McCain's apparent desire to bomb, bomb Iran (see YouTube) will make $4 gasoline the good old days. Aug 10 11:56 AM
    • Five Great Businesses Currently on Sale [view article]
      Exactly, Jake2. One has to have an unwisely sunny view of the economy to buy credit card company and consumer delivery stocks, and one has to be unaware that government hiring was the bright spot of the unemployment report to falsely label Obama as "socialistic.&quo... Aug 08 12:00 AM
    • Are Hedge Fund Programs Driving the Market? [view article]
      Buy cheapened stocks with good fundamentals and high dividends. Aug 07 06:06 PM
    • WSJ Chooses Spin Over Precision [view article]
      I dunno, Brian. The Simpsons show has been pretty good over the years.

      But Jim, I'm not about to try to emulate Murdoch on anything other than cartoons. I want to keep going to church Sundays without crawling under the pew in shame.       Aug 07 05:20 PM
    • Fitch Increasingly Downgrades Non-Subprime [Housing Tracker] [view article]
      I didn't know AmEx and Costco had a relationship. Aug 07 05:12 PM
    • The New York Times Attack on Freddie Mac's Richard Syron [view article]
      Ivy undergraduate degree in history, Ivy MBA---just like George W. Bush, who apparently learned little history or statistics. Aug 06 08:22 AM
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