"I'M MAD AS HELL, AND...well, I'm not sure that there's much I can do about it."

[Gates9]

Welcome back to the thirties folks! Except this time the banksters and big industrialists were smart, they've convinced the people that regulation is bad, and "the govurment just wants to steal yer moneyz". Newscorp, Clearchannel, they've got half of America duped. They've led the assault on the working class by taking apart Glass-Steagall and all the other protective mechanisms designed to keep a leash on greed in corporate America. While we make the same money, or less, corporate executive compensation has gone through the roof over the last thirty years. We're going backwards people.

The BP oil spill and near collapse of our economy due to things like the under-regulated CDO market are the results of an unchecked, unrestrained capitalist system with little, and certainly ineffectual oversight. I fear that one day people will talk about the fall of America due to unrestrained greed in the financial and commodities markets, the same way I grew up hearing about the fall of the Soviet Union due to unrestrained authoritarianism.

[daggahead]

1. Welcome to DU! n/t

[dflprincess]

2. More like the 1920s

Beginning in 1933, we had FDR looking out for us. No one is doing that now.

[Gates9]

5. Same Diff.

I see your point. My main concern is that we are now dealing with the AFTERMATH of a major financial collapse. If Obama doesn't create some major legislation leading to something like the CCC and get banks lending again, he will have missed his "FDR" opportunity. There's a major spin campaign out there to demonize FDR's New Deal policies, asserting that, at least some of his financial market legislation, prolonged the Great Depression. They are laying out the argument against so-called "Keynesian Economics" as a failed experiment. I find it humorous that the economic framework, in place for at least fifty years (until Reagan "liberated" us from it, and did the real damage), would be referred to as "failed", or "an experiment". Bottom line; the New Deal worked, the economy got better. Tax cuts for the wealthy, "corporate personhood", policies like deregulation of the financial and large sectors of the industrial markets that were the hallmarks of Reaganomics, sent us back to the depression era. Which one is a "failed experiment" now?

[Art_from_Ark]

7. I hate the "New Deal prolonged the Depression" bullshit

The Depression had already been going on for about 3 1/2 years before FDR took over, reaching its lowest point in 1932, when Hoover was still President (and one reason why he lost every state except Maine and Vermont in the 1932 election).

I had a friend who worked in the CCC. He said that the pay, though low, was a "godsend". Conditions were quite austere, though-- most of a CCC worker's money was apparently sent directly to his family (probably so the worker wouldn't spend it on booze, gambling, etc.)

[sinkingfeeling]

3. Welcome to DU. I said greed would kill America about 35 years ago when this stuff started.

[Admiral Loinpresser]

4. Welcome, comrade! n/t

n/t

[clarence swinney]

6. 1980-2009 Middle Class Shafted

Brief Analysis

1945-1980 were Great Middle Class Years.
Affordable Education-Homes-Health Care-Jobs Jobs-Unions-Pensions

Reagan and NeoCons came on in 1981.
Ir was intentional ENRICH Wall Street reduce Middle Class.
1945-1% owned 30% Total Financial Wealth
1989-36% (Ron big tax cuts for 1%)
2008--Bush Finished the Job
1%=43%
10%=70%
20%=93%
80%=7%-=20,000,000 workers=SHAFTED

20 years 3 Conservative presidents
18 years Conservative Senate
12 years Conservative House
6 years TOTAL CONTROL
Bush 8 let Wall Street go into Big Time Gambling
Instead of using investors money to create new businesses and increase current ones and create Jobs,
They created 31,000 Net New Jobs per Month.A sham.
Prior were Carter 218,000--Reagan 175,000--Clinton record 237.000
31,000 was an insult to working America.
During Bush 8 Wall Street shipped 2,300,000 of our jobs to China,

The Conservative ideology of Market knows best gave us Great Depression and Great Recession. Even Ultra Conservative Alan Greenspan had to admit it.

WHAT DID THEY DO??

Since 1980
60% Tax Cut to Top 1%
47% Tax Cut to Gamblers on Wall Street in Unearned Income Tax
Huge Estate Tax Cut
Revenue Sharing costs to rich in income taxes transferred to Middle Class in property taxes.
Fed gave Bush 1% Interest and big increase in Total Money Supply
1920's Deja Vu. Banks rushed to borrow and lend lend lend to Developers
to build homes too large-too expensive for middle class declining disposable income
Increased Middle Class Payroll Tax
Taxes SS income
Five Cent Tax On Gas
Spending Spree on Defense which enriched Rich Investors in Defense
stocks,.
The Big Three took a 1000B of Debt from Carter and added on 8000B in 20 years of Spend + Borrow Our kids Can Pay Tomorrow.

Carter left Reagan a 600B Budget to which he added on 80%.
Carter left Reagan a less than 1000B of Debt and he added on 1700B
Clinton left Bush an 1800 B Biudget which Bush took to 3600B..
Clinton left Bush a Surplus as far as an eye could see and Bush added on
6000B Debt or more than we had after 220 years.Grover Nutquist had a party..

Folks! It was intentional. Grover Nutquist of ATR made 127 visits to White House in Bush first term. He was one who wanted to drown Government in a bathtub..How! Spend and Borrow to force us to eliminate Social Programs.
He has us, in 2010, exactly where he wanted us.
Facts hurt. Democrats are just dumb to not preach it over and over
8 more of Neocons snd American World Status will disappear to number two or three or worse.
Neocon ideology destroyed Rome-Spain-Holland-England and now America?
cswinney old ugly mean honest

prove me wrong please with facts and numbers

[upi402]

8. Great post, can't argue. +1

Clinton presided over a dot com bubble, however. I don't give him credit for that any more than Reagan's credit card growth or Bush's housing bubble. In fact, with NAFTA, GATT, the Telecommunications Act, Welfare Reform, etc - Clinton was one bad ass Republican in my view.

Yet the TV media propagandizes the people that Obama is a socialist. The Medici Family is reborn in the USA as a corporate crime family. And people still swallow the propaganda on the unchecked TV "news".

[bernynhel]

10. You're not wrong...

...Republicans have never sought office to govern. The wouldn't know where to begin. They seek office to manipulate the financial system and bleed what they can from social programs. How hard is it to pretend to care about family values and fight to keep the Ten Commandments displayed in your State Capital while working your real agenda? Why 1 trick Geo W only needed his one trick: "The War On Tear"(sic): his diversion. His exit? Toss $700+ Billion up in the air on the way out the way a magician leaves the stage in a puff of smoke! "Mission Accomplished", alright!

[bernynhel]

9. Except that you know what you know....

...a luxury Soviet citizens never had. And that very knowledge, and the ability to investigate further, is what sets us apart from most of the rest of the world. And since you know what you know, maybe you're just mad enough to actually do something about it, long's yer mad as hell n' all.