Well, the problem is that Bush has been saying how awesome and brilliant our economy has been and how we should be thankful for that. When the economy is doing well so should salaries.

This revelation proves that people aren't stupid when they say, as they have for a long time, that even though the powers that be say the economy is doing great they aren't seeing it. Nobody ever said this was a depression, or even a recession. Just all income gains are going to the people on top. This proves it.

I'd love to see the median, I imagine it tells an even bleaker tale.

Posted at August 21, 2007 12:30 PM in response to WH Incomprehensible on Inequality

We can keep looking for "common cause" but I'm not sure its there.

Lugar and Warner can talk however much they want, at the end of the day, they side with Bush and Cheney every single time it matters. And over the past six years, that's the best we've gotten.

But make no mistake, there has been bipartisanship in Washington. There was the Military Commissions Act. This new FISA act. The confirmations of Alito and Roberts. The Patriot Act. The authorization for the war in Iraq. The Bankruptcy bill.

So yea, we have had some bipartisanship in Congress. It just sort of makes your stomach turn, though.

Posted at August 8, 2007 10:20 AM in response to "To set the ship on a better course, you have to be ready to sink it."

I also want to say that the Bush Administration talked a lot, and took a lot of credit for, increased minority-homeowner rates. You don't see them talking about it much now, though. Like so many things with this Administration, it was all smoke and mirrors, a good show with a rotting core.

Posted at August 6, 2007 10:19 AM in response to Housing Market Meltdown: Who Is To Blame?

I do think its a meltdown, and we haven't even see the worst of it. Reset rates are going to kick in for huge numbers of people later this year and for the next few years. It's gonna get a lot worse before it gets better. But so far, its taken out some mortgage companies (a new one today), Bear Stearns hedge funds got wiped out, and tons of money got lost in others.

The securitization of mortgages has meant that this will, and already has, spread itself far deeper and stronger than a regular "housing bust". It's not just a matter of people not being able to sell their homes, it's also a matter of people across the country invested in that home as well, with all that entails.

Posted at August 6, 2007 10:17 AM in response to Housing Market Meltdown: Who Is To Blame?

I agree on principle, but if you go back through Bush's life you could see he wasn't a uniter, didn't base his decisions on sound science, didn't surround himself with qualified people, wasn't a very nice guy, wasn't a very savvy businessman, etc.

So all that stuff about uniter and so forth was just BS. Not enough people believed it, nor did the press. Rosenberg is essentially applying the lessons to Romney.

It's a decent enough stance to take but Romney has been such a lunatic in the debates it makes me uncomfortable.

Posted at July 12, 2007 1:13 PM in response to If Not a Dem, Mitt Romney Is the Least Bad Republican in '08

McCain was finished the instant Bush announced his surge. McCain had been saying for months if not years that if *he* were the President he would send an additional 20,000+ troops. It was a good tactic then, because Bush wasn't gonna do it. It allowed McCain to support the war *and* criticize its handling. Maverick and all.

But once Bush embraced his strategy it was all over. The surge hasn't worked and McCain has no answers but to emptily support Bush's policies. Unfortunately for him, there are other guys doing that job better. Gitmo Mitt, 9/11 Profiteer Rudy, Rule of Pretend Law Fred, etc. McCain is yesterday's news.

Posted at July 10, 2007 1:56 PM in response to McCain the Inevitable

Stop being so naive. Every candidate spends $400 on their haircut. For Mitt Romney I would peg that as a floor, not a cap.

George Bush wears handmade suits that cost thousands of dollars. Yet for some reason nobody made an issue out of that during his campaign while he tried to portray himself as a down home guy you drink a beer with at the pub. Thompson drove around a red pickup truck during his campaign but it was as much a prop as that machete Bush uses to clear brush. Romney's pop was governor of Michigan and the head of one of the country's biggest car companies.

Edwards is unique for a few reasons: one, he actually grew up blue-collar (unlike Bush or Romney), two, he actually does care about poor people (being formerly blue collar), and three, he doesn't try to hide his wealth. So the $400 haircut is just a distraction. It means he wants to look good on TV and to the world and every President should. I don't want my representative looking like garbage on the world stage.

Posted at June 26, 2007 6:13 AM in response to Edwards Steps Up On Middle Class

1. it's not necessarilly because of shopping at the mall - by credit card was mostly larded up with tuition bills. In my observations people run up credit cards not out doing shopping sprees, but paying for crap they need to pay for. Car repair, medical bills, and things along those lines. Sometimes other ways to pay aren't possible or feasible. That's just reality.

2. What about the credit card companies saying no? Why is it okay that they extend credit to people they KNOW cannot pay it back? I know I turned down about 99.99% of offers I got... but the one I did accept still screwed me.

3. I am not anti-credit card or anti-making money. I worked hard to pay off my debt. The companies don't play fair, however. They use their power and leverage to take advantage of people's situations and exploit them. That's the problem. And the government has been sadly complicit in this, which is what Edwards wants to change.

Posted at June 22, 2007 10:46 AM in response to Edwards Steps Up On Middle Class

This is going to be a common talking point Edwards is going to have to fight. It's total BS, just like all of them, but he's still gonna have to fight it.

When I was in college I got a credit card with, lets say, a $2000 limit. Not that much but I was in college so my income was extremely limited. Nevermind that. By the time I graduated, my debt limit was $10000. I had no job. I had no income. I had heavy student loan debt. But they kept giving me that credit.

So I had a meager temp job and was paying down my loan as much as possible even though I was getting socked with a 25% interest rate (I made some late payments in school - my income was strained, etc. etc.). So a fourth or more of my payments were going to interest. But no matter, it was "my responsibility".

After a few months I noticed they *raised* my interest rate to 30%! This was after five or six months of solid, continuous payments and a good year after my last late payment. I called them up, "we did it, there's nothing you can do to lower it, we'll lower it when we feel like it, TS".

Fortunately, I was getting 3 or 4 credit card offers in the mail *every day* so I was able to find one that gave me a lower interest rate so I balance transferred. If I didn't do that I would have paid tons more money to them for... well no real reason at all.

Nevertheless, it's funny that companies will send 3 or 4 offers a day to a kid with no job and lots of debt and histories of late payments on their sole credit card.

I'm not alone, either. Credit card companies are not interested in giving you the amount of debt you can reasonably handle. They don't make money from that. No, they spend a lot of time and effort getting people more debt than they can afford and then shackling them into servitude when they make *one* mistake. I don't care who you are, that is messed up. There's no reason why making one payment a few days late should be punished with hundreds or thousands of dollars in future interest payments. There is no reason why a company should change the terms of someone who pays their entire balance each month (read: who doesn't make the company money) so that one slip-up will send them to financial hell. This is abuse, plain and simple.

Posted at June 22, 2007 6:41 AM in response to Edwards Steps Up On Middle Class

As a New Jerseyan (albeit one that was too young to vote for her) I must say that Whitman is a disgrace. All these sick people, dying people, sick and dying because she was too gutless to do the right thing! By now we shouldn't be surprised that the Administration chose politics above all else but it's sad Whitman played along.

And meanwhile the Administration ignores these people while they lay sick and dying... of course not before they got a really good "flag raising" shot they could put next to Iwo Jima. I guess we can't be surprised by Walter Reed, body armor, etc... we all saw this coming. They tried to warn us.

Posted at June 26, 2007 10:35 AM in response to TPMtv Transcript: Thursday, June 21, 2007