Pacific ViewsYou've been had. You've been took. You've been hoodwinked, bamboozled, led astray, run amok. - Malcolm X Fear not. - GodObama's Father's Day Speech- June 16, 2008 Much of the press about Obama's Father's Day speech has focused on how he spoke to Black fathers on how they needed to be more involved in raising their children. But it seemed to me that he had a much broader message than that. His message was to all fathers and all parents on what we owe our children and those that come after them. It was a powerful message because it didn't just talk about African-American fathers, but what it means to be a father (and a parent) today when there are so...http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/003526.html Selective History- June 15, 2008 The Washington Post has the first of a three part series on the Housing Bubble. They place the beginning of the bubble in 1986 with the invention of the collateralized mortgage obligations. In 1970, when demand for mortgage money threatened to outstrip supply, the government hit on a new idea for getting more money to borrowers: Buy the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages from the thrifts, guarantee them against defaults, and pool thousands of the mortgages to be sold as a bond to investors, who.http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/003525.html Insulation- June 15, 2008 I read blogs -- lots of them. It is a bit early in the year for really dirty tricks, but I have noticed that people are already getting very worked up over second- and third-hand commentary. This is the kind of year when the Republicans can really do something toward "divide and rule". They can discuss how Hillary's partisans are being "ignored" by the Democratic party. They can discuss how Obama "dismisses" women and bruit that McCain is sympathetic ( ::rolls eyes:: ). They can discuss...http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/003524.html About Those Tax Rebates- June 14, 2008 Nouriel Robini doesn't think the tax rebates are up to the fight for saving the economy from a downward trend. Here's his analysis: The retail sales figures for May - better than expected - were driven by a temporary factor, the tax rebates, whose influence will fade out by early fall. Instead, more persistent factors will bear negatively on consumption over the summer and especially the fall: the fall in home prices and the collapse of home equity withdrawal (with their wealth effect on...http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/003523.html |