Daily Archives: September 8, 2008

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

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“Conservatives have a bad history with The New York Times,” she said, looking at my press ID, still smiling and still very friendly. “How can I be sure that you won’t take my words and twist them to suit some agenda that you already have?”

 

Part of the  Palin thing…A big part in my mind…is for us conservative-types being able to point at how she’s being treated and stereotyped. We can point and say:

“See? SEE?”

Yes, the Main Stream Media has a bias. And it’s influencing the broader culture’s tone. I’m personally tired of it. I have a right to put forth my opinion, too, once in a while. Even if I don’t agree with you, nameless-person-i’m-trying-to-talk-with.

But I try to do it with respect. I wish I got more back.

The election is all good…but there are 5 TRILLION dollars on the table

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So okay, now that i have given myself the responsible title of informed citizen, I have to stay diversified.

Palin is very fascinating, and so is the presidential race. But Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are about to be…um…hmm…changed.

Here’s the deal:

they have combined assets of 5 TRILLION dollars. That is a lot of money. That’s mortgages, basically. They pwn the mortgages in america.

So, of that 5 trillion dollars in debt that they are collecting on…They have 14 billion dollars that they are NOT going to collect on (the number of mortgage dollars in foreclosure).

The gummint stepped in and said they are taking over this establishment. That means firing the current men handling the job, and assigning new guys. And it cost:

200 BILLION dollars to do this takeover. And that is just the first step in the takeover.

I just don’t know exactly what to think of this.

But here is how I understand the numbers:

out of 5 trillion, 14 billion dollars lost is .28% of their assets gone.

That seems like a very risk-averse environment. Heck, we lose more money than that in the couch cushions.

But I guess I didn’t amass money in the trillions either. Maybe if we watched our ha’pennies we’d be a lot richer.

But then again, maybe it’s like the stepping on a butterfly when you go back in time scenario…The little things matter.

Talking it over with my co-workers, they thought that maybe the initial 14 billion in lost money was feared to be just the beginning. Could be that too.

Things are not entirely stable, either with the cause or the reaction.

(I would like to have a link showing the numbers I have above, but I got them from the weekend’s WSJ. And that paper takes money. The link would be broken if I put it there. And nobody else has it so succinctly  referrable. Sorry…)