Friday, January 30, 2009

A Shitload of Shorters

I let the crap pile up again, time to start shoveling.

Euroskepticism is back in fashion:

The best part of the global economic meltdown is that I have a way to trash economic policies I don't like. Sure, the meltdown is the responsibility of my ideological comrades and a culture based around enabling greed and selfishness, but I'll never own up to it.

Mortgage cramdowns are a bad option:

If I keep framing the issue as homeowners versus unfortunately essential financial institutions maybe we can keep this whole issue of taking back bonuses from gaining ground. FFS, next someone will suggest that there's a whole bunch of people who got very rich off the problems underlying this meltdown who maybe shouldn't get to keep all those riches.
If we pretend the bank accounts of a corrupt executive class equal the banks themselves, maybe we can still save them.
The bank accounts, that is.

One more step towards gender-norming:

Now women have what I can only describe as a female version of Penthouse Letters.
If Megan were a good writer, we'd know whether that is a negative or positive assessment, but...

What's the matter with mortgage cramdowns?:
Why not make the cheeky bastards who run banks pay for their mistakes?
Axiom: There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. If you make the bankers pay, they will make you pay.
That axiom is a double negative, Megan. You're such an awesome writer.
Also, blackmail isn't a good argument, in the traditional sense.

How OJ Simpson may help keep Dick Fuld from stiffing his shareholders:

If I feign indignation over well publicized but comparatively minor shenanigans maybe it will give me cover for papering over far more serious misdeeds the rest of the time.

Good. Fast. Expensive. Pick Two.:

Here we see Megan grasping at straws. She's been wrong about everything, ever (the war, the economy, George Bush twice, 2x4s, jail the Jena 6, where's that recession, etc) but she's civil a total ass-kiss, so there.
The basic idea is that if everyone is afraid to spend money because they might be laid off, and sits at home in the dark, all the people who made money selling the things they used to buy will get laid off--and so will they, because they're part of "everyone". The government basically shocks us into a higher level of output by spending the money we're afraid to.
Though you wouldn't think it from the really quite shocking incivility emanating from the pro-stimulus side, the empirical evidence that this works in a large industrial economy like ours is basically nonexistant.
Unlike evidence that charter schools accomplish anything besides increased economic segregation.
Also, the New Deal didn't accomplish anything, dammit. Don't believe your lying eyes.
Finally, pro-stimulus people are mean, what with not being open to ideas from the very people who caused the crises we currently suffer from.

More on mortgage cramdowns:

Clearly, the fact that people disagree with me so vehemently shows that they have problems.

Back with more shorters after this commercial break.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

We could solve Megan's difficulties with writing if only she'd lay off the economics and government stuff to focus on the areas of "Cool Stuff I have in My Apartment" and "Why I don't like the motor vehicles department." It's axiomatic that to write well you write about what you know. Yet we never see a post about "Why my head is So Far Up My Ass I Can See My Duodenum."