The Hillary Experience

[Morrigoon]

We've got an Obama thread, but I just found an interesting piece of news that is too Hillary-specific to fit there, and yet does not merit its own thread. And so, I present: the Hillary discussion, or, taking a page from her campaign, "Experience".

Let's start off with the bit I found, relating to her "plan" to deal with the housing crisis. As much as many parts of it scare me (the part involving the national coffers), there are aspects of it (retaining an equity share in the property) that actually come from existing programs (first-time buyer down payment assistance). So it's not all a fantasy, and there is some measurable track record for the idea.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23794001/

[innerSpaceman]

I can see why it's economically sound, but really fuctup, to bail out industry after industry in this country, while never bothering to bail out the individual Americans hardest hit by the foul-ups of those industries in need of bailing out.


I applaud this (likely too late) strain of the Hillary Experience.

[Ghoulish Delight]

"To those who object to our government helping middle-class and low-income families devastated by the housing crisis, I say this: We've given Bear Stearns a $30 billion lifeline, we've given their creditors, their lenders, their customers, and those associated with them the same lifeline," she said. "How can you tell a family about to lose their home that there's nothing we can do to help them?"

Umm, how is following one bad idea with another a good idea? I'm not happy about the Bear Stearns buyout, but that doesn't mean I'm okay with doing something equally stupid to "balance it out". I do think something needs to be done to rectify things, but I'm not really onboard with wholesale buyout proposals.

I can't find it right now, but a few days ago Hillary proposed some sort of committee to work out a plan to go forward. All well and good, though Obama proposed nearly the same thing one year ago. And, oh by the way, his proposal included leaders from the consumer side of the market, while Hillary proposed getting just the leaders within the mortgage industry together. Yeah, that bunch really did well thinking up the concept of sub-prime mortgages, I'm sure they'll continue to make excellent decisions together.

[Kevy Baby]

I didn't like the Bear Stearns bailout just as I was opposed to mortgage industry bailout. I say let the companies who made bad decisions suffer the wrath of their mistakes.

I also don't have a lot of sympathy for people who bought things they couldn't afford.

I am really fed up with having to pay for other people's mistakes!

[innerSpaceman]

So where's Obama's panel that he proposed a year ago?


Perhaps Hillary's will never materialize either, but we'll find out in 3 weeks. And then the truth will out more clearly than memories of sniper fire.

[Alex]

Bear Stearns was not bailed out. Bear Stearns' creditors (that would be, ultimately, us as the investors through pensions, 401k plans, and individual direct investments) were bailed out, and bailed out in about the least bailout way is possible.

Not one person at Bear Stearns woke up last week saying "hallelujah, the government sure saved our cookies: thank you taxpayers." If Bear Stearns had been allowed to go bankrupt I think we would very quickly have seen the man in the street lamenting how awful it was that such a thing had been allowed to happen.

I would have preferred that the JP Morgan had been brokered in such a way that the Fed didn't assume any risk but then on the other hand the only reason a deal could be brokered at all was that the market closes on the weekend. In other words, there wasn't really any time for trying to finesse the situation.

[innerSpaceman]

No, Bear Stearns was not bailed out. It was all the other investment banks that were bailed out, in a deal to sacrifice one of them in return for the government bailing out the rest.


It was not in the style of post-9/11 airline bailout (i.e., cash handouts), but applying government regulations (or lack thereof) to investment banks that were previously applied only to, for lack of a better term at my tongue tip, commercial banks. But there was a deal, and everyone in the industry and watching the economy recognizes it as a defacto bailout.

[Alex]

I was just responding to the Bear Stearns part. I've heard so many people over the last two weeks say something like "if the government saved Bear Stearns why won't it save people from losing their house?" Missing the fact that Bear Stearns wasn't saved, that millions of individuals were saved from their investments going into bankruptcy court, and the "government" didn't do it, the Fed did which has absolutely no ability to help an individual with their mortgage -- no matter how far it stretches its mandate.

While I wouldn't agree with using the word bailout for the industry credit part I wouldn't strongly object to it either. And the actual government has been doing various things to try and bailout individual mortgages, most recently easing restrictions on mortgages purchasable or guaranteeable by various quasi-governmental agencies.

[BarTopDancer]

Is the Hillary Experience like the Lost Experience?

[innerSpaceman]

Only if she wins.