Free Republic

There is a major push underway -- engineered by Obama's Treasury officials, enabled by a mindless media, and amplified by the right-wing press -- to blame Chris Dodd for the AIG bonus payments.  That would be perfectly fine if it were true.  But it's completely false, and the scheme to heap the blame on him for the AIG bonus payments is based on demonstrable falsehoods.Jane Hamsher has written the definitive post narrating and indisputably documenting what actually took place.   The attempt to blame Dodd is based on a patently false claim that was first fed to The New York Times on...

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says don't blame George Bush for leaving President Obama with an economic catastrophe. It was everyone else, and the Democrats, who brought on disaster, said Cheney, who was one of Bush's most influential advisers over his eight years leading the country. "There's no question that what the economic circumstances that [Obama] inherited are difficult ones," Cheney said on CNN this morning. "I don't think you can blame the Bush administration for the creation of those circumstances." Instead, Cheney suggested the current problems stem for the worsening world economy and Democratic obstruction of Bush's attempts at...

As the days go by, America is seeing more and more the real Barack Obama. And the more one observes and hears, the more it is apparent that Obama is leading the country into the storm drain of history—economically, culturally, and in terms of its national security.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Don't blame the Bush administration for all the country's economic problems. That's the message from former Vice President Dick Cheney. President Barack Obama constantly talks about the enormous economic troubles that he inherited when he took office in January. Cheney agrees that Obama did indeed came into power amid very difficult economic circumstances......."

Washington Post is reporting that President Obama is trying out a new tactic in his economic policy - blame Bush. Note to WaPo: while you may have a point that Obama has repeatedly disavowed the politics of blame, his actions have never matched his rhetoric. Go check the video tape yourself, and use his address to Joint Congress as an example. How many times does he refer to the current economic situation as one that he "inherited"? No less than three times. He has reminded us of this fact from day one. Let's not pretend that this strategy is new....

It's getting crowded under that bus where President Obama throws the discards no longer useful to him. Fortunately, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright is there to offer the last rites, this time for Charles W. Freeman Jr., may peace be on him. Mr. Freeman is the well-paid shill for the Saudis and the Chinese who was stopped just before he was to assume the chairmanship of the National Intelligence Council, where he would have directed the preparation of intelligence briefings for the president and other high government officials - an official largely responsible for what the president should know and when...

Did Obama Cause the Stock Slide? Wall Street has soured on the new Administration's policy moves. Can this relationship be saved? Freerepublic only allows excerpts of articles - so I will provide the "red meat" of the article in excerpts. Since I believe that context is important, the entire article appears on my site here. At least on Wall Street, the honeymoon is over for President Barack Obama. Polls still show the President has strong popularity among the general U.S. population, and Obama continues to command power in Congress. But among investors, fairly or unfairly, there is griping that the...

GM workers just don't get it(video)GM is facing almost sure bankruptcy. UAW members fail to accept any responsibility. They feel they have given "concession after concession" over the last twenty years. This flies in the face of a current contract worth over $70 thousand a year per employee. They feel they have given up everything they can in spite of refusing to take a base wage pay cut during the recent negotiations. The truth is the UAW failed to give any serious concessions in the recent bailout negotiations. They actually blame their fellow Americans for not buying their overpriced, poorly...

Who will Obama blame for the economy now? The Dow has declined 25% this year. Why is that? The reason is investor and consumer sentiment are at record lows. Although Obama's poll numbers are still at a normal level for a new President, the country thinks we are still going in the wrong direction. The stimulus bill did nothing to change that perception. Most people realize there was very little in the stimulus bill about stimulating the economy. Most of the money went to social programs and Democratic special interest groups. The money allocated for infrastructure improvements won't be spent...

So the Republicans betrayed their own principles and allowed the Democrats in 2006 and 2008 to run against deficits in order that they could enlarge deficits, convinced that the natural opposition was long ago discredited. Trashing Bush for spending and not spending enough Note the irony. Liberals trashed George Bush for urging us to buy and consume after the shock of 9/11 in order to ward off a paralysis of fear and possible recession. Now in the present crisis they insist we buy and consume to ward off a paralysis of fear and further recession. It would have been better...

Pope blames idolatry of money for economic crisis Vatican City, Feb 27, 2009 / 07:03 pm (CNA).- Meeting with pastors and clergy of the Diocese of Rome on Thursday, Pope Benedict XVI discussed the economic crisis, the liturgy and evangelization. Naming the idolatry of money as a major shortcoming of the economic order, he warned that large-scale reform cannot be achieved without individual reform and conversion.Pope Benedict said that the Church has the duty to present a reasonable and well-argued criticism of the errors that have led to the current economic crisis. This duty is part of the Church’s mission...

A Frank discussionBy Brian P. Nanos Wed Feb 25, 2009, 03:45 PM EST U.S. Rep. Barney Frank talks about the mortgage crisis Feb. 19 in the Scituate High School auditorium. Speaking at Scituate High School Feb. 19, Democratic U.S. Rep Barney Frank was asked whether he would support a commission to assess blame in the run-up to the current financial crisis. Frank, who represents the state’s Fourth Congressional District, which does not include Scituate, had to stop himself before telling the crowd packed into the auditorium that such a commission would be too political. “I would be violating my own...

Given the sweep and severity of today's global economic crisis, it would seem there's plenty of blame to go around. But Bill Clinton doesn't think any of it should fall on his shoulders. On Monday morning's Today Show, Ann Curry's interview with the former president - recorded over the weekend outside a Clinton Global Initiative event in Texas - addressed Clinton's inclusion on TIME's list of the "25 People to Blame" for the global economic collapse. "Oh no," he responded, "My question to them is: Do any of them seriously believe if I had been president, and my economic team...

Given the sweep and severity of today's global economic crisis, it would seem there's plenty of blame to go around. But Bill Clinton doesn't think any of it should fall on his shoulders. On Monday morning's Today Show, Ann Curry's interview with the former president — recorded over the weekend outside a Clinton Global Initiative event in Texas — addressed Clinton's inclusion on TIME's list of the "25 People to Blame" for the global economic collapse. "Oh no," he responded, "My question to them is: Do any of them seriously believe if I had been president, and my economic...

Angelo Mozilo The son of a butcher, Mozilo co-founded Countrywide in 1969 and built it into the largest mortgage lender in the U.S. Countrywide wasn't the first to offer exotic mortgages to borrowers with a questionable ability to repay them. In its all-out embrace of such sales, however, it did legitimize the notion that practically any adult could handle a big fat mortgage. In the wake of the housing bust, which toppled Countrywide and IndyMac Bank (another company Mozilo started), the executive's lavish pay package was criticized by many, including Congress. Mozilo left Countrywide last summer after its rescue-sale to...

Next time when your liberal friend / relative* starts whining about how Bush economic policies caused the financial meltdown and how Obama will save America with his GigaPork stimulomarxist package, hit him back hard with this video. Read on

SPRINGDALE, Ark. -- Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said Saturday that the Republicans only had themselves to blame for losing control of Congress and the White House. "The country fired us from our congressional majority in 2006. Why? The country didn't stop being conservative. The Republican Party did," Jindal told a gathering of Arkansas Republicans. "We became what we came to Washington to change -- the party of earmarks and government spending. The party needs to stop worrying about what to do to fix itself. Let's worry more about fixing our country. Then the party will fix itself."

I'll list some names but it is by no means exclusive. It would be interesting if you could post a brief rationale by your post. The option of nobody also exists and the option of a class of people exists: Fed Chiefs: Alan Greenspan Ben Bernanke Paul Volcker Speakers of the House: Newt Gingrich Denny Hastert Nancy Pelosi Senate Banking Committee Chairmen: Al D'Amato Phil Gramm Paul Sarbanes Richard Shelby Chris Dodd House Financial Services Committee Chairmen: Jim Leach Mike Oxley Barney Frank Presidents: Jimmy Carter Ronald Reagan George H. W. Bush Bill Clinton George W. Bush Barack Obama Treasury...

It's believed that he earned upwards of £24,000 through his scam.Abdul Musa, a garage owner from Blackburn, Lancashire, today begins a 16 month stretch in jail after police discovered he was getting paid to take the blame for other people’s speeding offences. According to reports he charged customers £200 a time for his ‘services’, admitting to authorities that he had been driving a car when it got caught on camera. With his service proving particularly popular with local taxi drivers it is believed that he made upwards of £24,000. It is though that he falsely accepted responsibility for at least...

Before President Obama’s Treasury secretary nominee could use his confirmation hearings to lay out his plan to help steer the U.S. economy out of a recession, he first had to explain his own five-year tax problem — including his trouble operating tax preparation software. Senators got tough on Timothy Geithner Wednesday, including the committee’s top Republican, Charles Grassley of Iowa, who got the New York Federal Reserve president to concede he prepared his own taxes for two of the years in question with the help of TurboTax. Geithner said the program did not alert him to report income and pay...