Knock Out Punches!

[Chris]

Veek!

Nice response, and I mean it(not being a jerk). You were right about alot of what you said. You did your homework and hopefully enjoyed yourself as you hammered out your rebuttal on your Commodore 64.

I did laugh a little when I read about the demise of Pets.com How does Clinton sleep at night?

 

[Bob Fechter]

Veek!

Nice response, and I mean it(not being a jerk). You were right about alot of what you said. You did your homework and hopefully enjoyed yourself as you hammered out your rebuttal on your Commodore 64.

I did laugh a little when I read about the demise of Pets.com How does Clinton sleep at night?

What Clinton needs to lose sleep over is the fact that under Hazel O'Leary, Los Alamos was opened up to the Communist Chinese who stole our multi warhead nuclear secrets.

Since the Chinese "couldn't hit the side of a barn with their missile guidance tech," Clinton allowed one of his biggest donors, The Loral Corp., to sell the ChiComs missile guidance technology.

Why? Let us not forget the Lippo Group, run by James Riady in league with Chinese Ventures, wholly owned by the Chinese Government, who laundered money to the Clinton administration. Remember the checks from the Buddhist nuns and Al Gore walking out of the Buddhist monastery with a bag of money?

 

[Doug S.]

Doug, Obama had 2 years with both Congress and Senate, he did nothing for the economy. Stimulus money went to places like Solindra, Ener1, Beacon Power, Abound Solar, Amonix Solar, Spectra Watt, and Eastern Energy. They all have two things in common, they are bankrupt, and they all contributed to Obama. Bain Capital had a 78% success rate with companies they took over. Obama has O% with our investments.

Tom, you're pretty good at pointing out Romney's successes (didn't I see a figure somewhere in the 70% range?) and Obama's failures, I just don't see how those figures can be compared, they are like apples to oranges.

As for the Solindra fiasco....the Repubs are pretty culpable, too, look at all the $$ they GAVE (didn't even try to enforce repayment) the Wall Street banking community, and even then a lot of banks went under. Those places where the stimulus $$ went that you referenced...solar energy companies, almost all of them, and despite Obama's best intentions to get our country into a condition of less dependence on foreign oil for our energy needs, solar energy is losing ground as a viable source of electrical generation at this time. Give the field a few technical breakthroughs and the picture may be quite different. Regardless, I'd like to see you post a review of the companies that SURVIVED with the stimulus moneys that Obama oversaw....much like you posted the companies that SURVIVED under Romney's administration at Bain Capital.

After working for 32 years in a field in which statistics are of paramount importance, I know statistics can be found that will "prove" whatever you want them to prove....it all depends on how the study is structured. In order for your stats to be persuasive, the sources would have to be vetted for veracity and their research validity and reliability established and the results would have to be independently verified by peer research. I sincerely doubt that has happened...try again, using a different approach.

Either way, we're not talking about the past here, we're talking about a very important future. Did you see the Romney interview of Face the Nation today? GEEZ....what a dufus! Cut taxes, raise military spending, and get us out of debt all at the same time???? Really? Who does he think is going to believe that is a good plan?

I swear....some people's children!!!!

Doug

 

[Bob Fechter]

Doug, don't you find it worrying that the only government program the President is willing to cut back on is our national defense?

 

[Doug S.]

Doug, don't you find it worrying that the only government program the President is willing to cut back on is our national defense?

Actually, I wish the POTUS would dedicate more $$ to OUR national defense, not other nations' defense....more $$ for patrols along our southern border to stem the tide of illegal immigrants, almost all of whom live 3 to a bedroom and not only avoid as many U.S. taxes as they can but also send almost all of their $$ back home to Mexico, more $$ to entice businesses to come back to the U.S. rather than outsource those jobs (although, I also believe that those incentives will NEVER be enough unless they are paired with fines for outsourcing those very same jobs), bring ALL our military combat forces home and use them to guard OUR nation's borders, yada, yada, yada, I could go on and on. The bottom line is that our money should go toward resolving OUR nation's issues...not somebody else's. If he would do that, we could cut military spending and still protect OUR country.

I would rather we curtail almost all foreign aid and dedicate THAT money to our country, not others. We ought to get our own ship in shape before we try to keep others afloat, IMHO!!

Romney's evasive answers today on the Face the Nation interview leads me to believe he will do just the opposite.

All y'all (not just you, LB, but "you conservatives") think a vote for Obama would be a vote FOR something we like...IMHO it's just a vote for the lesser of the two evils, not even a vote AGAINST something (although I do find Romney's position on abortions and same-sex marriages disgusting). It only takes one "Oh, $H1+" to wipe out a whole bunch of "Atta-boys", Romney keeps doing just that and his VP candidate is even worse. To me they are the greater of the two evils.....just MHO, though :quirk:

Doug

 

[Jim Craik]

Veek,

You are correct, President Clinton never had a surplus, the debt had been declining and there was a projected surplus down the road, but with tax cuts and two wars, it never came to pass.

Additionally, Clinton was President during the DotCom bubble and decline. Clinton left office 01/20/2001. As I recall the DotCom bubble burst around April 2000.

But Veek, I must take exception to your "Mr Clinton presided over the Enron Scandal" comment. As I said, Clinton left office in January 2001, the Enron Scandal finally broke into the news in October 2001.

At the time when Clinton left office, none of Enrons Texas Based Ponzi scheme had been revealed (Enron was #1 in BushII's donations). Additionally, during 2001 after Clinton left office, Mr Lay of Enron visited the Bush White House many, many times, including six meetings with Mr Cheney. Even as Enron Execs were selling their shares, Cheney said nothing.

Veek, I think you might want to check a little further before you lay Enron at Clintons doorstep.

One more thing, keep in mind, you can't have it both ways.

Its OK to claim that BushII inherited some problems from Clinton, but its not OK do do that and then try and blame Obama for things he inherited from BushII.

 

[Cliff Beer]

Jim is exactly right about the chronology of the Enron disaster. The only critique that can be levied against the Clinton administration with respect to Enron is the absence of greater corporate regulation (generally that means greater disclosure in SEC filings) during the years prior to the implosion when most of the off-balance-sheet financing was put in place by Fastow, and also the purchase of large amounts of company stock by the company's own pension plan (thus supporting the stock price), no doubt at the direction of Lay and Fastow. Greater regulation in the form of higher disclosure standards would have likely made these two conditions more visible to public scrutiny, or discouraged it altogether. Of course, when Clinton was in office there was no limit to how high the stock market may go so nobody worried about such things. Everyone had their blinders on.

On the topic of our taxing system, here in the US we have a progressive taxing scheme, the idea of which is that as personal income rises above certain levels then the need for wealth for personal consumption goes down on a proportional basis. That doesn't seem unreasonable. A human being doesn't need huge annual post-tax incomes to live well, so as incomes rise it's not unreasonable that the % of tax rises as well so that there's gov't funding for all the normal things....national defense, etc. The taxing scheme can't be so progressive that all incentive is lost to work hard/smart and make a high income....nobody benefits from that....such as is the case in say Sweden where the top rate is around 65%.

It's a fact that a very large percentage of the US population pays no tax at all. Some portion of these folks either don't file tax returns or don't earn wages where the tax is applied at the source. But the vast bulk just don't make enough money to be at the level where they start to pay much tax under our tax code. There's a good number of people in this bucket who actually get an annual tax subsidy (ie. negative tax rate), funded by other tax payers.

It's also a fact that the middle class tends to both a) pay the highest percentage of their incomes in tax, and b) fund the bulk of the tax revenues. Why? Because there's a lot of middle class folks compared to ultra wealthy, and b) the ultrawealthy tend to generate a higher percentage of their income from capital gains than the lower/middle class (and thus have the benefit of the lower capital gains rates). In other words, poor people don't own capital assets, rich people do....and when rich people sell capital assets (often that's stock in a business they started/run) then they end up subject to (lower) capital gains rates rather than ordinary income rates. However, in absolute dollars (not percentages) the ultrawealthy do pay a lot in tax, even if it is at lower effective rates. Said another way, Mitt Romney contributes more $$'s into government coffers, even if his effective tax rate is around 10%, than a whole village full of middle income folks with 25% effective rates. Perhaps Mitt SHOULD pay a higher effective rate of say 25% so as to be on par percentage wise with middle income folks. But in any case, he IS paying a large amount of tax at 10% or 25%.

 

[Keith]

Crikey! What I get from all of this is that never mind POTUS, this Obama feller should apply for Sainthood!

 

[Pat]

Veek,

But Veek, I must take exception to your "Mr Clinton presided over the Enron Scandal" comment. As I said, Clinton left office in January 2001, the Enron Scandal finally broke into the news in October 2001.

At the time when Clinton left office, none of Enrons Texas Based Ponzi scheme had been revealed (Enron was #1 in BushII's donations). Additionally, during 2001 after Clinton left office, Mr Lay of Enron visited the Bush White House many, many times, including six meetings with Mr Cheney. Even as Enron Execs were selling their shares, Cheney said nothing.

Veek, I think you might want to check a little further before you lay Enron at Clintons doorstep.

Well...
Just for the record, the dot-com bubble burst, numerically, on Friday, March 10, 2000, when the technology heavy NASDAQ Composite index, peaked at 5,048.62 (intra-day peak 5,132.52), more than double its value just a year before. I personally lost about 40% of my long term investments when that market crashed.

Here are some citations and quotes regarding Enron. I guess I could have gone into Global Crossing but the Commidore 64 was starting to overheat...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1994 - 1995 Clinton Administration "makes a sale" for Enron. Enron and the administration work together to win Enron the contract for a power plant in India.

Clinton uses resources from the CIA to assess risk and analyze the strategy of Enron's British competitor. The administration is instrumental in procuring $400 million in financing from the Export-Import Bank of the United States and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

The New York Times
February 19, 1995, Sunday, Late Edition - Final SECTION: Section 3; Page 1; Column 2; Business/Financial Desk

HEADLINE: How Washington Inc. Makes a Sale
BYLINE: By DAVID E. SANGER
DATELINE: WASHINGTON

(excerpt)

For 18 months, the Indian power-plant deal has floated near the top of the list of 100 or so big infrastructure projects around the world that the United States Government desperately wants American firms to win. It is the first of eight big power generation projects in India, and if the American consortium could close this one, it would create a precedent likely to give other American companies an advantage in billions of dollars of follow-on deals. In years past, American officials would have offered some modest help, but only as a sideshow to bigger foreign policy concerns, from containing Communist influence in South Asia to keeping India and Pakistan from accelerating their nuclear arms race. But that was another era in American foreign policy, before the Commerce Department built what Jeffrey E. Garten, the undersecretary of commerce for international trade, calls "our economic war room."

From that Washington war room, the negotiators for the Enron Corporation, the lead bidder in the American consortium, have been shadowed and assisted by a startling array of Government agencies. In a carefully-planned assault, the State and Energy Departments pressed the firms' case. The American ambassador to India, Frank G. Wisner, constantly cajoled Indian officials. The Secretary of Energy, Hazel O'Leary, brought in delegations of other executives -- including some last week -- to make the point that more American investment is in the wings if the conditions are right.

To sweeten the pot, the Export-Import Bank of the United States and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation put together $400 million in financing. And working just behind the scenes, as it often does these days, was the Central Intelligence Agency, assessing the risks of the project and scoping out the the competitive strategies of Britain and other countries that want a big chunk of the Indian market.

The big push by Washington Inc. paid off last month when the Indian government awarded the power plant project to the American consortium.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

October 1995. Bill Clinton recruits Ken Lay to act as a point man for Clinton in drumming up support for Fast Track legislation. Lay just happens to be an old friend of Mack McClarty.

Journal of Commerce
October 10, 1995, Tuesday SECTION: FOREIGN TRADE, Pg. 3A
HEADLINE: OUTSIDERS CALLED IN TO END LOGJAM ON TRADE AUTHORITY
BYLINE: JOHN MAGGS; Journal of Commerce Staff
DATELINE: WASHINGTON

(excerpt)

Two distinguished political doctors have been brought in to try to revive a nearly dead bill allowing President Clinton to secure new trade agreements with other nations.

Bill Frenzel, a former Republican member of the House Ways and Means Committee, and Ken Lay, chief executive of natural-gas giant Enron Corp., have been called in to break a year-long impasse that has blocked meaningful progress on trade pacts with Chile, the rest of Latin America, and the Pacific im.

Both men are well known to one player in that dispute - Ways and Means Chairman Bill Archer, R-Texas, whose district includes Enron's headquarters in Houston. The two also have connections to the Clinton administration. Mr. Frenzel served as a special adviser to Mr. Clinton to lobby his former colleagues on the North American Free Trade Agreement. Mr Lay has been a friend of Clinton adviser Thomas "Mac" McLarty since Mr. McLarty's time as head of Arkansas' largest natural-gas utility.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

August 1997 Clinton hosts Ken Lay at White House to discuss upcoming meeting in Kyoto, Japan concerning greenhouse gas.

The Houston Chronicle
August 6, 1997, Wednesday, 3 STAR Edition SECTION: BUSINESS; Business Digest; Pg. 1

HEADLINE: BRIEFCASE; White House warms to BP exec
BYLINE: Staff

(full text)

The Clinton administration, when calling business leaders to the White House to discuss what the United States' bargaining position on global warming should be at upcoming negotiations in Kyoto, Japan, chose John Browne of British Petroleum to represent the oil industry. But Browne is British, head of a London-based company. And Britain's new Labor government has blasted the United States for failing to go far enough to reduce greenhouse gases. So why was a Brit asked to participate? Browne has broken ranks with other oil executives to concede a buildup of carbon dioxide gases may be changing the Earth's climate. BP also happens to be the United States' largest crude oil producer with 13,000 employees in this country, company officials pointed out. Enron Corp.Chief Executive Ken Lay, who also was at the Monday meeting, said Clinton sounded Browne out on his opinions of the policies being pushed by the Europeans. Nobody seemed to worry the United States was tipping its hand. ""This is kind of early in the process,'' Lay said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
October 2000 Near end of Clinton's Presidency, but prior to the November election, a Clinton Assistant Treasury Secretary takes a position at Enron as vice president for federal government affairs. Observers call it a slap in the face to George Bush.

By 1993, Enron had set up a number of limited liability special purpose entities that allowed Enron to hide its liabilities while growing its stock price. Analysts were already criticizing Enron for "swimming in debt," but the company continued to grow developing a large network of natural gas pipelines, and eventually moving into the pulp and paper and water sectors. Enron was named "America's Most Innovative Company" by Fortune for six consecutive years between 1996 and 2001.

But Enron had been cooking the books from the early '90s, seemingly immune from regulatory oversight. That was on Mr. Clinton's watch. Misleading financial accounts
creative accounting allowed Enron to appear more powerful on paper than it really was. Special purpose entities – subsidiaries that have a single purpose and that did not need to be included in Enron's balance sheet – were used to hide risky investment activities and financial losses. Forensic accounting later determined that many of Enron's recorded assets and profits were inflated, and in some cases, completely fraudulent and nonexistent. Some of the company's debts and losses were recorded in offshore entities, remaining absent from Enron's financial statements.

During the late 1990s and into the early 2000s, more and more special purpose vehicles were created that allowed the company to keep debts off the books and inflate assets. These entities, along with other accounting loopholes and poor financial reporting, let Enron ultimately hide billions in debt from special deals and projects prompting the disaster.

I wonder if Pets.Com could have been saved by Bain Capital...Just sayin'...
I'll go back to my game of "pong" now...

 

[Jim Craik]

Veek,

You may not know this but most Politicions court seemingly successful companies, particularly ones that throw around lots of $. Courting seemingly successful companies is not a crime, in fact the recent Supreme Court ruling almost makes it mandatory. In the end it was the Republicans that received the most from Enron. Why?

Like I said, Clinton left office in January 2001. Enron, with the help of their accounting firm Authur Anderson hid Enrons House of cards from public knowledge until sometime near October 2001.

By that time BushII had been president for almost nine months. Like I said, Mr Lay of Enron visited the Bush White House many, many times, including six meetings with Mr Cheney. Even as Enron Execs were selling their shares, Cheney said nothing.

I have to think that if Enrons House Of Cards was known about that BushII and Cheney would not have welcomed them to the white house so many times, would they.

Your premis just does not hold water.

If Clinton knew of the problem, then BushII knew of the problem. If BushII and Cheney knew of Enroms problem, why would he envite Mr Lay to meet with them so many times?

So Veek if you are implying that Clinton and Bush both knew of the Enron problem and did nothing they both sould be held criminally responsibe. But you will need some proof.

But the fact that Enron was BushII biggest contributer and Lay visited the Bush White House right up until the end leads me to believe that just like everyone else Clinton and BushII were fooled by these criminals.

Either way it was BushII who presided over the Enron collapse.

 

[Keith]

Interesting stuff Veek. It is quite astonishing when you think of the witch hunts in Britain against those companies using "deal sweetener" tactics to win foreign Govt contracts (a historically traditional method) when in the USA you get the CIA involved behind the scenes!

No contest I suppose, + we (UK) got F all and Nothing from Iraq Infrastrucure contracts despite US commitments to the contrary at the beginning of Gulf 2, so, wos we scammed?

You bet!

 

[Chris]

I wonder if Pets.Com could have been saved by Bain Capital...Just sayin'...
I'll go back to my game of "pong" now...

Haha, thats great. Who knows? Maybe? Pets.com could have made a comeback with some rooftop dog crates endorsed by Romney and Clark Griswold. How did the pong go?

 

[Doug S.]

No contest I suppose, + we (UK) got F all and Nothing from Iraq Infrastrucure contracts despite US commitments to the contrary at the beginning of Gulf 2, so, wos we scammed?

No, Keith, you were just on the receiving end of just another one of Gee-Dub's unfulfilled promises!

He screwed the American public just as well, so you didn't really get any worse or better treatment than we did.

Cheers, and sorry for what Gee-Dub did to all y'all :thumbsdown:!!

Doug

 

[Jim Craik]

Yes Doug, everyone got screwed.

They lied us into the war and just kept on lying.

I remember Bush & Cheney telling us that we would be welcomed as liberators and the cost of the war would be repaid from Iraqi oil sales.

We were not welcomed as liberators, after they announced "mission accomplished", our "liberators" just went on dying.

Not only was the cost of the war not paid by the sale of Iraqi oil, but we are now paying to rebuilt what we destroyed.

Yes folks we were all screwed by BushII/Cheney and its the "scew" that keeps on giving.

On this eleventh anniversary of 9-11 we are still paying for their lies with the lives of our brave soldiers and billions and billions of our $.

But on the plus side, Halaburton has made billions.

 

[Keith]

Good God!

I agree with all that!

Does that make me a non Consevative? :drunk:

 

[Keith]

It's official.

In Banking, cheats do prosper.

BBC News - Tax cheat whistleblower Bradley Birkenfeld gets $104m

 

[Mark]

The beach hut beckons.

 

[Pete McCluskey.]

Good God!

I agree with all that!

Does that make me a non Consevative? :drunk:

I agree too, I guess that makes us both Liberals:shocked:

 

[Chris]

Here is a short video of Romney's birth shot by Papa George. The doctor seems very impressed with his agility after Mitt quickly removes the spoon from his mouth and replaces it with his own foot.

[ame]http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQwrB1vu74c&feature=related[/ame]

I also found the Paul Ryan's marathon video in its entirety. I know everyone is busy but don't worry it is less than 3 hrs long. Notice he is wearing pants for the entire race. Some suspect he has long been hiding the legs of a Kenyan under his Haggar slacks.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSg3f_T9FhA&feature=related]Paul Ryan's 6 Lies in his Convention Speech - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Jim Craik]

Thanks Chris,

It's good to finally hear in his own words, just where Mr Romney stands on the important issues.