Done With Bad News, Here Are Four Reasons To Be Optimistic

Barbara- You need to go on you tube and look up the video of Pres Bush and Sen John McCain Warning the democrats who HAD CONTROL ON THE HILL FOR THE LAST TWO YEARS!!, about the Fannie and Freddy mess and how the peril of lending to minorities and non minorities that did not have the means to pay for these loans would be "CATASTROPHIC". I think its funny that you and every other crazy liberal feel fine Blaming Bush for all your problems for the last eight years and then telling me not to blame Obama the hack when The stock market begun to make a major nose dive after Nov 08. To say that now its all about checks and balances in our government and that there is such a thing as personal responsibility now, as to why i should not put all the blame on obama is ludicrous. So i guess in the last eight years there was no checks and balances or personal responsibility. I love how you have your double standards. Please check your facts before you start spouting your liberal propaganda. Go post on the communist news network (CNN) with your liberal delusions. That is the station that worships their president the messiah!

Barbara --Our country has not been going down for 8 years it has been going down for 100 years. Our economic expansion has hinged on convincing mothers that they are enslaved in their home by a misogynistic society, but working for someone else is liberating and exploring your full potential. Couple that with Kaynesian economics, deficit spending and time-shared currency and you have temporary bolsters to the economy that cannot be replaced when they are stretched too far--THEY POP. --Women in the work force is not a bubble that can pop but created a quick infusion of productivity and consumption that cannot be repeated. Dumbari, Reagan and Bush overspent, No-one saw a need to live within a budget, investing on credit for growth is fine, (it is why we DON'T want to nationalize the banks), But, if you are adding expenditures without a plan to grow the revenue, you eventually run out of money. We are out of money!! When China cannot or will not lend and the government consumes the available credit domestically, their will be NO GROWTH IN THE US ECONOMY. The governement adding social obligations just furthers the descent of American Productivity. Produce less, sell less, take in less. People will reminisce about the days when the stock market was going down but milk and gas were still affordable, and when the rich got ridiculously rich but the standard of poverty by todays standards becomes an aspiration for tomorrows standards

Barbara --Our country has not been going down for 8 years it has been going down for 100 years. Our economic expansion has hinged on convincing mothers that they are enslaved in their home by a misogynistic society, but working for someone else is liberating and exploring your full potential. Couple that with Kaynesian economics, deficit spending and time-shared currency and you have temporary bolsters to the economy that cannot be replaced when they are stretched too far--THEY POP. --Women in the work force is not a bubble that can pop but created a quick infusion of productivity and consumption that cannot be repeated.

WOW! I'm impressed. Something positive on FOX. There is hope for the nation after all.

I know many people are out of work. Our family has faced that recently. My husband did not get a pay-check for months. He has a PhD., and took a job doing lawn work for $7 per hour. I have a college degree, and got a job cleaning houses. We are now both employed at better jobs, have sold our house, bought a new one, and are completely out of debt. It's still possible in this economy to live debt free. We rarely eat out, we drive old, but reliable vehicles, have four children that we are trying to instill personal responsibility in. No, we didn't vote for the current president, and certainly do not agree with his idea of the government taking on the responsibility of making sure everyone has a home(whether they can afford it or not), health care, abortion availability, food stamps, a college education. We are very thankful for some financial principles we learned early in our marriage - namely don't borrow money. We've never made more than $60,000 a year, but have been able to buy two homes with no mortgage. We saved until we could pay cash.

You're right! We should be positive! The economy positively sucks. It will positively get worse, I believe much worse. BO is positively adding to the problem. As the great American statesman, Will Rogers once said, "When you find yourself in a hole, STOP DIGGING." We just elected an excavator. Buying in now will get you in on the way to the basement. It is NOT a 6' deep pool. It's quicksand and no one has felt the bottom yet.

Marc 2679 nails it. If we were dealing uniquely with a market downturn, your comments would be applicable. However, the current administration's thinking and actions make past rules inoperative -- we don't know which industries their tinkering will destroy, we don't know which enterprise they will nationalize next -- and as for health care, who knows the impact universal health care will have on our Pfizers, Mercks and Johnson & Johnsons? I don't think that any industry is safe in the current climate. We must, must, turn Congress around in 2010. It's our only option.

Barbara, It seems that everyone is forgetting that the ALL TIME HIGH FOR THE DOW was in 2007, six years into the Bush administration. Inflation and unemployment were near all time lows, AND THE DOW REACHED IT'S ALL TIME HIGH....HMMMMM..... THEN.... the Democratic congress was elected. Look at the charts, it's astounding. I want to be hopeful, but the Obama plan just does more of what got us into trouble in the first place. I was in banking (before retirement) in the mid 90's, and we were mandated to make low income loans. THIS is where the seed was planted. This is what is coming back to haunt us today. The Bush administration tried to pull in the reins on Freddie and Fannie in '02 and '04, issueing warnings, but they went unheeded. It's time to stop the Bush bashing and look forward to serious ways to fundamentally fix the economy. I'm afraid that the current plans are fostering more government dependence.

Barbara, stay here and keep this debate interesting, I would hate to actually get back to work. But I agree with Matt84. Nobody knows that Senators Frank and Meeks threatened the race card on Bush's attempts to reel in FANNY/FREDDY. So it never happened and then collapsed under the man who caved to threats of racism. --Compassionate conservatism=Slower descent into socialism.

It is obvious that you lack wisdom and patience. There are those of us who have been through hell in our lives, and are still here, know and understand that when you are on your back the only way to look is up. You probably do not know this, but we live better than 99% of all the people in the world. We are in the top 1% of the wealthiest people of the world. Not of America, but of the World. Also I have faith in my God above my country. I Love my country and the freedom we have, but it is my faith that sustains me. I hope that you can look out and see that there are others who have it much worse than us.

I hate saying this, but there were and are many faithful people in Argentina before the Peron dictatorship and throughout many fallen empires that have collapsed by poor decision making. I think you will be hard pressed to find a theological scholar that thinks faith has much to do with the return of the stock market. You will likely find the opposite, espousing the virtues of poverty. Keep looking up, but it is our god given talents that have given America the financial and physical security that we enjoy today. If we choose policy that fails to support those god given gifts, then we are taking our faith out of gods hands and putting it into the governments. We have to produce things better and more efficiently than everyone else to get the stock market and the rest of the economy back. Keep looking up but remember, we the voters, spenders, investors, workers, employers, retirees etc. are responsible for today's lawmakers' decisions because we put them there and we are letting them change the underlying principles of this country. We are responsible for giving our children an America that is safe and free first and foremost. We are truly blessed to be in this country and you will be loved by god unconditionally. My children are also a blessing for which I must nourish the body mind and soul. I feel the same about our country.

I hate saying this, but there were and are many faithful people in Argentina before the Peron dictatorship and throughout many fallen empires that have collapsed by poor decision making. I think you will be hard pressed to find a theological scholar that thinks faith has much to do with the return of the stock market. You will likely find the opposite, espousing the virtues of poverty. Keep looking up, but it is our god given talents that have given America the financial and physical security that we enjoy today. If we choose policy that fails to support those god given gifts, then we are taking our faith out of gods hands and putting it into the governments. We have to produce things better and more efficiently than everyone else to get the stock market and the rest of the economy back. Keep looking up but remember, we the voters, spenders, investors, workers, employers, retirees etc. are responsible for today's lawmakers' decisions because we put them there and we are letting them change the underlying principles of this country. We are responsible for giving our children an America that is safe and free first and foremost. We are truly blessed to be in this country and you will be loved by god unconditionally. My children are also a blessing for which I must nourish the body mind and soul. I feel the same about our country.