joedirt

Government spending as a percent of GDP is almost half, with no actual productive industry to show for it. Our short term debt is about 4 times as big as our reserves. Foreigners own almost half of our total debt. These things are gonna be a problem.

You must be a hoot at parties.

My Grandfather also died with shrapnel in him he picked up serving on a destroyer in Leyte Gulf. USS Abner Read.

I think she's too politically skewed, or else she's not that bright. First time I ever heard of her was in October when she said Bush's coup was taking place and we would never see an election.

And here I just thought he was some homo who spent half his life trying to turn shit into gold.

I haven't seen anyone else mention so... a trade deficit requires a DEBT to pay for it. There's just no way around it. If your debt gets bigger and bigger, eventually people don't want to lend to you. That could collapse your currency. So it's only a problem if you think we need a manufacturing base to have a surplus again.

Yeah, more money makes borrowing cheaper in theory. Just like a bigger supply of goods drives down the price of that good. Tha't actually how they lower the fed funds rate. They put more money out there. I for one can not tell you how this resemble's anything good.

As per your question... inflation is good for debters, that's about it. Most likely though, the assets they're trying to keep high will still fall, while other goods inflate. So while houses and equities deflate, commodities inflate. That's a worst case scenario that is starting to look more realistic.

I see he already chopped off the last sentence that said assault weapons belong in foreign countries, not here. Did you notice that?

*** The motive for the EC was stated by Hamilton (an elitist if there ever was one) in the federalist papers, and it was to prevent rule by "the mob". Nothing to do with making sure small states had an equal say in the matter. *** Did he come up with the idea of having 2 senators per state as well?

Well since he lowered overnight rates to 1% to prop up an economy that needed an overdue contraction, where exactly did his philosophy differ from the administrations? He's not exactly Volcker.

Oh...He's gonna have a legacy.

Do you just bitch about anyone making money outside of the government payroll or are you actually trying to make a point?

I don't have any source for you but I thought it was at least 40% owned by foreigners. Some countries hold it like gold, as reserves, because it's supposed to be stable. It is the world's reserve currency. It is our major export, and makes up for our trade deficit in one way or another. Hell, even our own federal reserve can "buy" our notes without putting them on the market. We're never gonna be able to pay it back at this point though, we just don't produce enough. If we were using the debt to produce hard assets and tangible, sellable goods we might stand a chance. Obviously we're going to keep buying liabilities with every new "fix" our great leaders come up with. They've made that pretty clear. Your gonna want to go ahead and get rich in the next couple of years in case the world decides they want a new reserve currency, one with a little promise.

That was the same year the Glass Steagal act was repealed. Really though, i'm sure Bush loved how the housing boom made for a very mild recession. These things just showed the money where the path of least resistance was.