gun sales and government shutdown?

[Blitzkrieg]

The degree of contempt most of you hold for our federal government is nearly as sad as the degree of devotional respect you have for the private sector. Considering how many of these efficient private sector outfit go bankrupt every year, many of them after engaging in criminal behavior, this is amazing.

Just a short list here: ENRON, WorldCom, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, BP - Halliburton, TEPCO, Hooker Chemical (love Canal), America's Natural Gas Companies for fracking, Blackwater, Dow Chemical (Bhopal), Babcock & Wilcox - Metropolitan Edison for 3 mile island, over 3000 hedge funds that went bust from 2008 to the present, 200 banks that went bust 2008 to present, and the 50,000 business that went bust in 2010 alone usually ending by not taking any responsibility for paying their debts.

Contempt, you betcha, as would the Founders were they unfortunate enough to come to this time.

Here's a short list of agencies that need to be entirely or largely eliminated

BATF (in fact most of Treasury)

IRS

EPA (except for some extreme types of events for cleanup co-ordination )

FBI (cut by 80% and their mission toned way down)

Homeland Security

TSA

Health and human services (welfare, etc)

HUD

Department of Agriculture

Department of Commerce

Department of Education

Department of Health and Human Services

Department of Labor

And the Federal Reserve which pretends to be a government agency but which is in fact a private banking scam with massive political power

That's just a few, I have more. If we even did the above list the economy of this nation would eventually explode with full employment

 

[MA Duce]

Oh Fedzilla can make the rules and provide oversight, just let efficient organizations run the operations. Private sector parks management companies provide a better service at less cost. Why pay for all that bureaucratic overhead, over the top salaries, PERS?

Government screws up almost everything that we allow them to get their filthy claws into. They've run us into the ground and it's time to cut them to the bone.

Maybe PETA can take over ODFW, the Sierra Club can run the forests and parks....and BP can do pollution control.....

 

[MA Duce]

Contemt, you betcha, as would the Founders were they unfortunate enough to come to this time.

Here's a short list of agencies that need to be entirely or largely eliminated

BATF (in fact most of Treasury)

IRS

EPA (except for some extreme types of events for cleanup co-ordination )

FBI (cut by 80% and their mission toned way down)

Homeland Security

TSA

Health and human services (welfare, etc)

HUD

Department of Agriculture

Department of Commerce

Department of Education

Department of Health and Human Services

Department of Labor

And the Federal Reserve which pretends to be a government agency but which is in fact a private banking scam with massive political power

That's just a few, I have more. If we even did the above list the economy of this nation would eventually explode with full employment

If you do away with Homeland Security and TSA..who will run security for the ports, manage and maintain the navigation aids for shipping, conduct offshore fisheries patrols and perform search and rescue? Do you really think profit motivated security is the way to go in ports and airports? Do you want to pay an additional user fee every time you go through an airport? Pay to go crabbing on harbors and estuaries? What about our borders? Maybe we could farm out border control to the Mexican cartels.

 

[Dave Workman]

Justice just advised me via e-mail that NICS will stay up if government shuts down.

 

[Blitzkrieg]

If you do away with Homeland Security and TSA..who will run security for the ports, manage and maintain the navigation aids for shipping, conduct offshore fisheries patrols and perform search and rescue? Do you really think profit motivated security is the way to go in ports and airports? Do you want to pay an additional user fee every time you go through an airport? Pay to go crabbing on harbors and estuaries? What about our borders? Maybe we could farm out border control to the Mexican cartels.

I realize we need that to some degree but not under a totalitarian agency like that.. break it up like it used to be, with the smaller agencies co-ordinated to work together. And yes I would rather pay a user fee in some cases than have the government intruding on my life. You're paying for it anyway at gunpoint, it's called taxes

 

[salmonriverjohn]

Now we can see the end game and how easy it will be to cut us off in a "national emergency".. the wise are prepared long before such a time

In spades!

 

[billdeserthills]

At least we can still call it a crime when the private sector does something wrong, with Your hero Bugeye, The Federal Gov't we just call it business as usual. If you like the Federal Gov't so much why don't you Marry It?

 

[KenPDX]

Justice just advised me via e-mail that NICS will stay up if government shuts down.

Thank you. That's great. Are you able to post the email?

 

[MrNiceGuy]

If you do away with Homeland Security and TSA..who will run security for the ports, manage and maintain the navigation aids for shipping, conduct offshore fisheries patrols and perform search and rescue? Do you really think profit motivated security is the way to go in ports and airports? Do you want to pay an additional user fee every time you go through an airport? Pay to go crabbing on harbors and estuaries? What about our borders? Maybe we could farm out border control to the Mexican cartels.

Homeland security is more concerned with busting kids for tinkering with their xbox.

Student arrested for 'modding' Xbox consoles – SciTechBlog - CNN.com Blogs

If this is what they're focusing on, I wouldnt mind a HUGE cut in their funding.

The degree of contempt most of you hold for our federal government is nearly as sad as the degree of devotional respect you have for the private sector. Considering how many of these efficient private sector outfit go bankrupt every year, many of them after engaging in criminal behavior, this is amazing.

Just a short list here: ENRON, WorldCom, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, BP - Halliburton, TEPCO, Hooker Chemical (love Canal), America's Natural Gas Companies for fracking, Blackwater, Dow Chemical (Bhopal), Babcock & Wilcox - Metropolitan Edison for 3 mile island, over 3000 hedge funds that went bust from 2008 to the present, 200 banks that went bust 2008 to present, and the 50,000 business that went bust in 2010 alone usually ending by not taking any responsibility for paying their debts.

That's because private sector is held to standards. If the Federal Government were held to the same standards, rules, and regulations that private business are, they'd have been shut down decades ago and the people in charge would be in prison or on the lamb.

 

[BroncoFan]

Homeland security is more concerned with busting kids for tinkering with their xbox.

Student arrested for 'modding' Xbox consoles – SciTechBlog - CNN.com Blogs

If this is what they're focusing on, I wouldnt mind a HUGE cut in their funding.

I'm wondering what exactly this has to do with security of the Homeland??

I'm typically not "anti" fed but this is exactly what's wrong with the country. "Too big to fail" private indsutry and a government too big for effective accountability. In every instance that BugEye mentioned of private industry indiscretion there was a very large, very ineffective bureaucratic governmental agency that I guarantee you knew what was going on but was either too big and inept or itself complicit in mess.

 

[MrNiceGuy]

I'm wondering what exactly this has to do with security of the Homeland??

Homeland security is mainly focused on copyright protection nowadays.

Homeland Security Wanted To Seize Pirate Bay And MegaUpload Domains? | Techdirt


If you're a threat to the security of the homeland, that's a job for the FBI.
If you're burning copies of Avatar, modding your xbox, streaming a baseball game, or jailbreaking your iphone, THAT'S a job for Homeland Security.

 

[MA Duce]

Homeland security is mainly focused on copyright protection nowadays.

Homeland Security Wanted To Seize Pirate Bay And MegaUpload Domains? | Techdirt


If you're a threat to the security of the homeland, that's a job for the FBI.
If you're burning copies of Avatar, modding your xbox, streaming a baseball game, or jailbreaking your iphone, THAT'S a job for Homeland Security.

Or if you are in a sinking boat in a nasty storm.

 

[MrNiceGuy]

Or if you are in a sinking boat in a nasty storm.

The USCG was providing this service long before the Department of Homeland Security came into being, they're still doing it now, and they'll be doing it long after DHS is gone.
<broken link removed>

 

[glockguy]

looks liek they reached some kinda deal Budget deal reached, shutdown averted - Politics - Capitol Hill - msnbc.com

 

[MrNiceGuy]

looks liek they reached some kinda deal Budget deal reached, shutdown averted - Politics - Capitol Hill - msnbc.com

They have managed to push the deadline back another week.
They have reached a tentative agreement on the framework of a budget. "Tentative" meaning uncertain and "framework" meaning a loose goal.
The shutdown hasnt been averted yet, merely postponed.

 

[bugeye]

Contempt, you betcha, as would the Founders were they unfortunate enough to come to this time.

Here's a short list of agencies that need to be entirely or largely eliminated
...

That's just a few, I have more. If we even did the above list the economy of this nation would eventually explode with full employment

While I disagree with you I do accept your last point, I'm sure the 3 people left living would be fully employed.

 

[bugeye]

They have managed to push the deadline back another week.
They have reached a tentative agreement on the framework of a budget. "Tentative" meaning uncertain and "framework" meaning a loose goal.
The shutdown hasnt been averted yet, merely postponed.

Yes, maybe good to Thursday, sheesh.
The House is going to do nothing for the next year but argue out 4 day passes!

 

[bugeye]

When the private sector screws up they get sued, lose their market, go out of business or all of the above. This accountability keeps them in check.

When the Government screws up they give themselves a bigger budget, the problem gets bigger as designed since the Gov never solves the problems and things get out of control. It was the Gov that mandated the banks to make bad loans and the taxpayers would underwrite them. Pure geniuses, FUBAR all around, and they run things?

I've never been a true Libertarian but in the next Presidential election I'm voting for anybody with the last name Paul.

Sorry for the thread drift.

About the Private Sector, Goldman is doing just fine they paid the 500 million slap on the wrist for being a major player in the housing fiasco, and threw another 500 million at congress for campaign expenses (buy congress) just for good measure to make sure that whatever criminal activity it engages in will be legal. I guess that is an example of accountability? You know the golden rule, them with the gold makes the rules. Goldmans X CEO was Hank Paulson who left them to be W's treasury secretary, and because he was leaving the private sector to take a government service job he didn't have to pay any taxes at all on the 400 million dollars he was paid by Goldman, what a public servant! You may remember he is the cat that got to pass out the tarp money to his old friends in the criminal network.

It is common myth that the Gov caused the housing bubble. While the govs desire for people to get housing was a small factor the far larger factor was the ability to make massive housing backed bonds sell them to the world market that was seeking a safe investment. The impossible deals were done by parties that only held the paper for a few hours before it was sold to investment banks that were begging for more, so there was little risk for them. Since housing was on an inflation curve people wanted to play the make money on a house game, so the dealers had takers, the builders had buyers, and it was only the big investors who were taking the risk because they bought junk. They should have known better but the big investment banks got the rating agencies (like standard and poors) to overrate the bonds. Clever operators like Magnitar kept the bubble going by taking the worst levels of these securites (the ones not even bribed rating agencies would bless) and then buying Credit default swaps insuring the value of this junk for many times its face value. They bet for the system failing while making it far more likely to happen, and they won. Given regulation of the CDS market and the rating agencies by the gov the housing fiasco would never have happend at all. And this brings us back to our friends at Goldman, and our still unregulated CDS market, that has at present has bet about 1000 trillion dollars on the securites of the world (far more than the actual value of all the securites in the world), and that is about 18 times the value of all goods and services produced in the world in a year.

Go vote libertarian but do try to be an informed one, question everything you've been told is the truth.

The stuff I outlined above is really interesting to look at, the CDS market is an example of what happens in an asyum (the financial community) when the inmates (really greedy crazy people who want to make lots of money while producting nothing of value) are allowed to run it. I haven't heard the Pauls say much about this stuff, but if you want something that would really make our founders spin in their graves faster than a jet turbine, this is the stuff.

 

[RB87]

Oh for the love of... Bugeye who ended up "buying" most of those mortgages eh? Might that be fannie and freddie? The private banks went hog wild because they could. The gov would back up the mortgages and the gov via those GSEs were sponsoring cheap loans to people who couldn't really afford them. That helps drive up the price of housing, furthering the bubble.

The only people who come out clean after the housing bubble are the folks who didn't buy homes (or couldn't even with the easy terms, which were really bad ideas for most people anyway aka the ARM and subprime loans). Paulson, Geitner, various repubs in gov, wallstreet and various dems are all dirty as **** in this.

 

[Redcap]

The degree of contempt most of you hold for our federal government is nearly as sad as the degree of devotional respect you have for the private sector. Considering how many of these efficient private sector outfit go bankrupt every year, many of them after engaging in criminal behavior, this is amazing.

Just a short list here: ENRON, WorldCom, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, BP - Halliburton, TEPCO, Hooker Chemical (love Canal), America's Natural Gas Companies for fracking, Blackwater, Dow Chemical (Bhopal), Babcock & Wilcox - Metropolitan Edison for 3 mile island, over 3000 hedge funds that went bust from 2008 to the present, 200 banks that went bust 2008 to present, and the 50,000 business that went bust in 2010 alone usually ending by not taking any responsibility for paying their debts.

Tell me...what has big government done that is actually good?