April 07, 2013

Sunday Morning Book Thread 04-07-2013: Crisis? What Crisis? [OregonMuse]
— Open Blogger

crisis.jpg
Victim of Sequestration


Good morning morons and moronettes and welcome to the once robust, but now increasingly shakey and on the verge of collapse Sunday Morning Book Thread here at the award-winning AoSHQ.


The Irremediable Corruption At The Top Of The Pyramid

OK, so we all know we're on a downward economic spiral and I suspect it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Here are three books attempting to detail the history and the causes of the 2008 financial collapse.

All the Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis. You know what's disgusting about this book is that the paperback edition costs $6.80, but you have to shell out $13.99 if you want get it for your Kindle. Heck, even the hardback version sells for as little as $5 (new, not used!). Also, most of the 1-star reviews are complaints about the Kindle pricing, and say nothing about the book itself. I dislike the price, too, but there is something consumers can do: if you think something costs too much, DON'T BUY IT! I used to get into big discussions about this with Mrs. Muse early on in our marriage: there was a certain style or manufacturer of kitchenware (plates, cups and saucers) that she liked, but not the price, about which she complained bitterly every time she bought more items. I would tell her, "yeah, but you paid it" and try explain to her that despite the fact that she thinks the dishes are priced way too high, her agreeing to buy them is a signal to the manufacturer that the price is OK. What she thinks about the price is irrelevant, what counts are her actions. This is the basic mechanism of a free market. Mrs. Muse is no socialist, but it took her a while to understand this.

So Kindle prices will be high as long as we're willing to pay them.

Anyway, about the book:

As soon as the financial crisis erupted, the finger-pointing began. Should the blame fall on Wall Street, Main Street, or Pennsylvania Avenue? On greedy traders, misguided regulators, sleazy subprime companies, cowardly legislators, or clueless home buyers?

According to Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera, two of America's most acclaimed business journalists, the real answer is all of the above-and more. Many devils helped bring hell to the economy. And the full story, in all of its complexity and detail, is like the legend of the blind men and the elephant. Almost everyone has missed the big picture. Almost no one has put all the pieces together.

The only caveat here is that it was rated very high by the execrable Huffington Post, which tends to make me suspicious. Might be worth checking out, anyway, though.

Reckless Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led to Economic Armageddon is priced more reasonably at $7.99 (although Vic is probably shouting "that's still too damn high!"). What this book has got going for it is that most of the 1-star reviews appear to be written by left-wing parrots who want to blame everything on "deregulation". Which is surprising since the book was written Gretchen Morgenson, a business reporter and columnist at The New York Times. So you'd think her liberal credentials should be pretty solid.


crisis_2.jpg
"Serious you guys!"


And here's one I discovered while looking at the other ones: Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street by Neil Barofsky, the man who oversaw the $700 billion TARP program as the Special United States Treasury Department Inspector General. The best way for me to talk about this book is to include a rather depressing quote by the author from the Afterward:

I now realize that the American people should lose faith in their government. They should deplore the captured politicians and regulators who took their taxpayer dollars and distributed them to the banks without insisting that hey be accountable for how the bailout money was spent. They should be revolted by the financial system that rewards failure and protects the fortunes of those who drove the system to the point of collapse and will undoubtedly do so again. They should be enraged by broken promises to Main Street and the unending protection of Wall Street.

With all of this in mind, I would think the solution is obvious: we must drastically reduce the size, scope and power of the federal government. But this is simply not going to happen, at least voluntarily. I think most of the low-information types who've been voting themselves free shit for the past four decades aren't going to wake up until the day when they discover the banks won't be opening and the ATM machine eats their card.


Books By Morons For Morons

Moron author Ray Fiore has written a sequel to his sci-fi novel Riley's Rogues, which is now available in paperback and on Kindle.

Riley's Rogues: Darkstorm reunites former Imperial Marine Corps officer Logan Riley with his former teammates, the Rogues, as he sets out to find an Imperium Security Agency operative who has disappeared while investigating an assassination attempt on the emperor.

This is cool:

Note: a portion of the proceeds from Riley's Rogues: Darkstorm will be donated to the Wounded Warrior Project.

Mr. Fiore is also the author of the WWII novel, Wings Over The Pacific

___________

David Vining tells me he has been skulking about the AoSHQ since 2009, not commenting much, but just kind of hanging around in the background in that creepy "peeping tom" kind of way. He also mentioned something about a restraining order, but I don't know anything about that. Anyway, his parole officer said it would be good if he occupied himself in a useful activity, so he wrote a book. It's a fantasy adventure novel called A Quest through Winter Sleep, and is available for 99 cents on Amazon. 99 cents! How can you go wrong?

The main character in Mr. Vining's novel is a teenaged girl, but he assures us, "no cutesy shit, though." Which is good. He goes on:

She wakes up to find her dad dead outside and her mother missing. She goes out looking for her mother and we see the fictional country of Corstae through her eyes. It's a country that exists near the end of a medieval/renaissance period that is still recovering from a brutal civil war ten years earlier that erupted on religious lines. Along the way, she discovers more and more of her parents' hidden past and what happened on the night that led her on her journey.

Hmmm... murder, war, religious conflict, missing relatives, and hidden family secrets? Hell, that sounds like the annual family Christmas dinners with the in-laws some of you morons have to endure every year.

David says to buy his book, or he'll cry. That's his marketing strategy. What a genius.

Oh, and he passed along an endorsement, too:

James Joyce (a guy down the street, not that one) called it the greatest novel he'd read since the last one he'd read.

High praise, indeed.

___________


So that's all for this week. As always, book thread tips, suggestions, rumors, and insults may be sent to OregonMuse, Proprietor, AoSHQ Book Thread, at aoshqbookthread@gmail.com.

So what have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as we all know, life is too short to read lousy books.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 06:55 AM | Comments (195)
Post contains 1250 words, total size 8 kb.

1 the president is a scoamf

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 06:57 AM (GVxQo)

2 This would never have happened if we stopped funding Karl Rove!

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 06:58 AM (p0uh1)

3 First? Reading Sax Roehmer's Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu. He'd never be allowed to publish today, more's the pity.

Posted by: Darles Chickens at April 07, 2013 06:59 AM (mtdwZ)

4 Good morning morons and moronettes and welcome to the once robust, but now increasingly shakey and on the verge of collapse Sunday Morning Book Thread here at the award-winning AoSHQ.



Please tell me you are not going to kill the book thread.  This is my favorite thread.



Anyway I am still into reading the Lord of The Rings on the Kindle.  It is a damn long book and it could be slimmed down some.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:00 AM (53z96)

5 You know what's disgusting about this book is that the paperback edition costs $6.80, but you have to shell out $13.99 if you want get it for your Kindle.



If you go through Amazon you will see almost all of the books are like that.  Its called gouging and people swallow it whole.  I refuse to buy a book on the Kindle if the price is higher.  If everyone would do this they would quit that shit.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:02 AM (53z96)

6

With regard to Kindle pricing: For me, it's a better product worth the higher price.

 

For example, when I want to look up something I've read previously in a book, I'd rather punch keywords into a search box than flip through a couple hundred pages looking for it.

 

Also, when I want to quote text from a book, I can sync the Kindle edition to the Kindle file on my computer. Then all my bookmarks and notes will transfer as well, and I can copypasta the text.

 

It's a better product. Costs more money. Can't argue with that.

Posted by: Michael Rittenhouse at April 07, 2013 07:03 AM (qDFhC)

7 The financial collapse root cause if the CRA law and its associated regulations that caused banks to be forced to loan money to people who could not afford it.  All the other things are factors that made it worse, but CRA is the real culprit.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:06 AM (53z96)

8 vic i tried to read LOTR but frankly i found myself skipping pages filled with "elven" songs/poems i put it down and never picked it up again....i so much more prefer the movies.....all the hot guys doing manly things.......oh boy.....

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 07:09 AM (GVxQo)

9 I am brainstorming ghost writing a book for Nicholas Sparks. I am in the early stages but I am developing three characters right now. Male lead: Independently, wealthy, Divorced/widowed, and handsome. Female Lead: Independently wealthy, Divorced/Widowed, and beautiful. SMOD: A loner asteroid/comet who kills the male lead tragically, after he has found his one true love and willed his fortune to her. I just need to put a few thousand sentences between them and Volia best seller.

Posted by: Picric at April 07, 2013 07:09 AM (XMAfO)

10 FYI: Hilary is prepping for 2016, and unless something gets done, the same people who voted for Obama because it was "cool" will vote for her, regardless of empirically measurable misery, foreign bumbling, and economic devastation.

Somehow, we gotta take the "cool" factor out. I have no idea how to do that.

Having unemployed family members didn't do it for them last November. Having their healthcare run like the DMV won't do it in 2016. They are sheeple of the first order.

Sorry for being OT.

Posted by: Random.Thought at April 07, 2013 07:10 AM (Q8Wa9)

11 Just finished "Detroit", by Charlie LeDuff, an great newspaperman's account of Detroit, his family, and how incredibly corrupt Detroit city government is. However, LeDuff (who wrote for the New York Times and the Washington Post), wrote this howler - talking about working-class whites in the Detroit suburbs, he says: "This was the same group of people who delivered the 1972 Michigan Republican primary to Gov. George Wallace, the snarling segregationist from Alabama." Wallace, of course, won the 1972 Michigan DEMOCRATIC primary. Hey, if someone is racist, they must be a Republican, right?

Posted by: Obama The Masterful at April 07, 2013 07:11 AM (Hu/Da)

12 picric make sure you include the working hard all day or for days....clothes are dirty rumpled and wrinkled...no make up....hair a mess feeling like crap and then.....wham!

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 07:11 AM (GVxQo)

13 Correction: LeDuff wrote for the New York Times and the Detroit News.

Posted by: Obama The Masterful at April 07, 2013 07:12 AM (Hu/Da)

14 7 The financial collapse root cause if the CRA law and its associated regulations that caused banks to be forced to loan money to people who could not afford it. All the other things are factors that made it worse, but CRA is the real culprit. Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 11:06 AM (53z96) Yes, this

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:15 AM (p0uh1)

15 make sure you include the working hard all day or for days....clothes are dirty rumpled and wrinkled...no make up....hair a mess feeling like crap and then.....wham! Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 11:11 AM (GVxQo) I was thinking it will be more of a Huge WHAM, but I will add these in, I am sure they can be no worse that than Nick could do himself.

Posted by: Picric at April 07, 2013 07:16 AM (XMAfO)

16 Picric: you need to have a scene with a space elevator. Some alien kid gets on and pushes all the buttons.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:16 AM (p0uh1)

17 Finished "A Flowershop in Baghdad". Entertaining; most every paragraph made me chuckle. Informative; I knew we were doing good stuff over there, but kinda had to go on faith because not much made it into the media. Recommended. Could use a good proofreading, though.

Posted by: Assault Citizen Anachronda at April 07, 2013 07:17 AM (U82Km)

18 Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 11:09 AM (GVxQo)


THIS


I skip all those poems and song as well. Utter trash.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:18 AM (53z96)

19 Reading The Twelve, Cronin's sequel to The Passage....hard to see what the hell is going on so   far.

Posted by: USS Diversity at April 07, 2013 07:20 AM (5wHPS)

20 Oh hell no. They are not EVEN going to wake up when the ATM's eat their cards. You cannot awaken the brain dead with little  splashes of reality, you gotta give them the entire pie-in-the-face treatment if you want them to do more than just mumble 4-more-years.

Posted by: and irresolute at April 07, 2013 07:20 AM (DBH1h)

21 Truman: I am penciling that in right now, baby. I do think he needs to accidentally push the buzzer button as well.

Posted by: Picric at April 07, 2013 07:20 AM (XMAfO)

22 I just finished "Dinner with Churchill". I am not a foodie but I am a fanboy of Churchill's. I really enjoyed it despite the shattering revelation that Churchill often only pretended to be in his cups for advantage at diplomatic dinners, and did not actually spend the majority of his day "in the grip of the grape" as it were. I hate it when they destroy your heroes like that! He did enjoy his champagne at breakfast and every other meal however! Despite that a great read for history buffs and those interested in the culinary habits of the elites in the 20th century.

Posted by: Ray Van Dune at April 07, 2013 07:21 AM (qIFL7)

23 Well. There are 6554 discrete listings for campaign contributions made by residents of Fall River, MA since 1/1/10 to state level PACs and candidates. Less than 10% of them are to republicans. I'm in the process of finding them, copying the donor info over onto a spreadsheet along with the candidate or PAC they donated to... And that's just for one city. Eyes bleed.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:22 AM (p0uh1)

24 Fall River alone ought to take me 9 hours. There are three more cities and 14 more towns to do. And that's just state-level donors. If anyone has an easy way to use the FEC website, I'm all ears.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:22 AM (p0uh1)

25 The problem with all the strategies we talk about here to win elections is, they are conceived by rational people and meant to influence rational people. What we need is a two pronged attack: put our candidate everywhere on the web and in popular trash magazines and TV, and ridicule--not refute--the democrat. Celebritize our candidate and tabloidize theirs.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:24 AM (p0uh1)

26 Tolkien could write a drinking song, sorta. Although he does go on a bit.

His elegaic poetry was... well, just read:

Gil-galad was an Elven-king.
Of him the harpers sadly sing:
The last whose realm was fair and free
Between the mountains and the sea.

His sword was long, his lance was keen.
His shining helm afar was seen.
The countless stars of heaven's field
Were mirrored in his silver shield.

But long ago he rode away,
And where he dwelleth none can say.
For into darkness fell his star;
In Mordor, where the shadows are.

What you just heard was a fleet of Vogon ships hitting Warp Nine the fuck out of here

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 07:25 AM (QTHTd)

27 So what have you all been reading this week? Err, umm, Prince Valiant, the lead comic in the Reading Eagle. "Val" gets shot in the second frame, in full color. Shouldn't I alert some progs to this outrage?

Posted by: t-bird at April 07, 2013 07:25 AM (oJQ+J)

28

It Didn't Start With Watergate by Victor Lasky.

Published in 1976, this book points out that FDR, Truman,  JFK,  and LBJ committed far more transgressions against the constitution and political enemies than Nixon. Had there been a willing media to expose and torment them as they did Nixon maybe we would be living in a better country today.

Now reading,

JFK: The Man and The Myth also by Victor Lasky. Published in 1963, it was a bestseller up until the assassination. 

Posted by: drowningpuppies at April 07, 2013 07:26 AM (012vu)

29 It's like when ace was all up in our business for saying, generally, Michelle Obama is ugly. He used to get a hair across his ass about that. Well guess what: that's what's gonna win elections. Calling them ugly, stupid, gaffe-prone, weird, out of touch, etc.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:27 AM (p0uh1)

30

I've bought some books on Kindle, but I want my how to manuals to work without batteries. Especially since kindle battery charge don't last long.

Posted by: Ook? at April 07, 2013 07:27 AM (OQpzc)

31 You can't write a story about a space elevator without a cameo by Herr Einstein.  Maybe Albert can use the special relativity button to go back in time and reason with SMOD.

Posted by: Fritz at April 07, 2013 07:28 AM (WM+rJ)

32 Okay. Gonna stop thread jacking now. Sorry Oregon muse!

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:28 AM (p0uh1)

33 I know it doesn't count as a book, but it's as long as a book at > 170 pages. Pretty interesting stuff. It's called "Joint Publication 1: Doctrine for the Armed Forces of United States". Published in March. Available as a PDF at dubdubdub.dtic.mil/doctrine. Lot's of other interesting stuff there at that Joint Electronic Library.

Posted by: and irresolute at April 07, 2013 07:28 AM (DBH1h)

34 Still reading Dickens' Great Expectations.  I could never get in to his other books, but this seems a little bit more accessible.  It is just interesting enough to pick up, but boring enough that I can quickly fall asleep.  Kindle price: FREE

Posted by: Matt in Maine at April 07, 2013 07:30 AM (dcLM4)

35 Well guess what: that's what's gonna win elections. Calling them ugly, stupid, gaffe-prone, weird, out of touch, etc. Imagine a TV show where they just get their asses taunted. I'd have it following the late night news where they only suffer sneering ridicule. With the libs having to spread their 'talent' thinly amongst 5000 local and national outlets, should be easy to staff with quality.

Posted by: t-bird at April 07, 2013 07:31 AM (oJQ+J)

36 "Deregulation!" Remind me again, who was president during the deregulated, economically booming 90s?

Posted by: BuddyPC at April 07, 2013 07:32 AM (jfUIE)

37 Newt Gingrich.

Posted by: Truman North at April 07, 2013 07:34 AM (p0uh1)

38 There was no President during "deregulation" because there never has been any "deregulation".

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:34 AM (53z96)

39 A good, free, short ebbok on the 2008 financial collapse is The House That Uncle Sam Built by Steven Horwitz & Peter Boettke. You can get it from fee.org

Posted by: BornLib at April 07, 2013 07:35 AM (zpNwC)

40 Yes, Bethany McLean's take, she briefly mentions the CRA, mischaracterizes one of the few heroes of the effort Armando Falcon, is abysmally miopic, It is is better than Sorkin's take 'Too Big to Fail' but Morgenstern's 'Reckless Endangerment' is the best treatment of the subject, burn it with fire.

Posted by: luigi vercotti at April 07, 2013 07:36 AM (Jsiw/)

41 Why are men cursed to have to go to weddings of their wives friend's kids that they know no one at? Then after they get drunk, they get mad that you are tired of the bad food and band and would like to go home, drink and read the ONT? Women are strange people. They have no priorities.

Posted by: Billy Bob, the guy who drinks in SC at April 07, 2013 07:36 AM (wR+pz)

42 Didn't post news this morning so here is the Daily Deals

http://is.gd/AO9ri9

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:38 AM (53z96)

43 Currently reading "The Hawkline Monster" by Richard Brautigan. Brautigan is not a great writer but his clean, whimsical style keeps drawing me back in. He was "The Hippies"(TM) favorite author though supposedly hated hippies. The last books of his I read a few weeks ago were "A Confederate General in Big Sur" -maybe his best. And- "In Watermelon Sugar", which seems to be his vision of the afterlife as a kind of mill-town commune. ACGIBS- works because the whimsy is tethered to a realist situation. IWS- not so much as far as working or tethered to reality. Some interesting parts but the untethered whimsy makes you feel that you're essentially reading about, well, nothing. "The Hawkline Monster" must've been his publisher's attempt to break him mainstream. but an attempt that failed because pretty much any used bookstore you walk into has bunches of remaindered first editions. I just started THM so I'll see how it goes.

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 07:38 AM (G9qZk)

44 Buy the ¢99 book or I shoot the hamster!

Posted by: some guy named dave at April 07, 2013 07:38 AM (VwC86)

45

Then after they get drunk, they get mad that you are tired of the bad food and band and would like to go home, drink and read the ONT?

 

Easy: if I don't want to be there, it's in everyone's best interest that she does the driving and I do the drinking.

Posted by: USS Diversity at April 07, 2013 07:39 AM (5wHPS)

46 former Imperial Marine Corps officer Logan Riley with his former teammates, the Rogues, as he sets out to find an Imperium Security Agency operative who has disappeared while investigating an assassination attempt on the emperor.
So it's an inside look at the Obama administration then, eh?

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 07:39 AM (VwC86)

47 Reading She Wolves, the Six Women Who Ruled England Before Elizabeth I, by Helen Castor. Good read. Very informative but not in a dry way. Just finished Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick. Peaches recommended it and I concur. I had four ancestors on Mayflower and this was a great read, lot of stuff I did not know.

Posted by: bigred at April 07, 2013 07:40 AM (mIcI8)

48 Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 11:09 AM (GVxQo)


This is where I got my first read on The Lord of The Rings

http://is.gd/ZZu6ZZ

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:41 AM (53z96)

49 I've been studying up on Ibn al-Ash`ath's revolt.

This is mostly from "The Arab Kingdom and its Fall". It's a translation of Julius Wellhausen - yes, THAT Wellhausen, the guy who gave us the Documentary Hypothesis for the Torah. Also this book is, like all the best history books, out of copyright and so free, bitchez.
http://archive.org/details/arabkingdomandit029490mbp

The deal here is that the Arabs, just before 80 / 700 AD, had been winding down some civil wars which had been going on for almost two decades. In the meantime the king of "Zabulistan" - basically Kabul - had decided, screw you guys, and kicked out an Arab army. So the governor al-Hajjaj sent over Ibn al-Ash`ath with another (Iraqi) army to bring Kabul back under heel.

Ibn al-Ash`ath handled things carefully, but al-Hajjaj wanted more direct action. Ibn al-Ash`ath showed his troops the letters he'd received. The troops figured - waaaait a minute, maybe this whole war is more about al-Hajjaj ridding himself of his future rivals than about making taxpayers out of these local sheepshaggers.

So they mutinied, turned home, threw al-Hajjaj out of Basra, very nearly unseated the caliph himself. But, since the mutineers were back at home in Iraq, a lot of them made separate deals with al-Hajjaj so they could desert. Ibn al-Ash`ath's army disintegrated and he ended up having to seek refuge way back in Kabul.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 07:41 AM (QTHTd)

50 "So Kindle prices will be high as long as we're willing to pay them."

That ignores one major factor in eBook pricing; mainstream publishers hate eBooks, because it radically reduces the need for a publisher at all. (Although now programs like CreateSpace are doing the same for paper copies.) Aside from a certain sense of romance in being published by a 'real' publisher, which is largely a generational thing and will ebb as time goes by, publishers don't really offer that much unless you're a hugely successful writer who sells millions of copies. Not nothing, but not as much as people think.

In any case, eBooks are a huge problem for traditional publishing houses. Their answer is to make them as unattractive as possible, mostly by artificially high pricing and, if at all possible, restrictions on sales. (Five of the six major publishing houses, for instance, outright embargo eBook sales to public libraries.) This might be understandable if they were merely buying time in order to come up with permanent strategies for this brave new world. Sadly, they instead just seems to be trying to turn back the clock, which obviously is doomed to fail.

Making this even more true is that ultimately these pricing strategies place the interests of the publisher above and at odds with the interests of the author. This is especially true for mid-rank authors who could make a lot more direct selling eBooks cheaply while keeping a far higher percentage of the proceeds.  In the end, the publishing cabal as we know it today will crumble. At that point prices will be set much more directly by the author and market forces will more have more effect.

Another issue involves families owning rights to older books by deceased authors; say the works of mystery or sci-fi writers of the '40s. Rather than receiving a small sum from a traditional publisher who intends to hold the rights but not actually publish anything, these families can now directly package those works and sell them collectively as eBooks. This both makes them more money, but just as importantly, ensures that these books remain read and the author more greatly remembered. This hasn't really started happening on any real scale, yet, but I expect to to at some point.

Posted by: Ken Begg at April 07, 2013 07:44 AM (CsEQl)

51 Not about books but it is about fiction so.... Saw two horror movies this weekend. One had critical acclaim out the wazoo. The other had zero critical acclaim. Guess which one was better... "Evil Dead" is a state of the art remake. Very gory and zero humor. No spoilers but it has a very clever spin on the "final girl". Also, stick around till the credits finish. I think if you've never seen the original that you're going to enjoy ED more. The callbacks take you out of the movie and the changes from the old movie do the same. The main problem is that the actors have zero charisma, which is needed in this kind of flick. Worth seeing but it's no classic. "The Collection" is a sequel to the movie, "The Collector". The most common comparison is that "The Collection" is "Aliens" to "The Collector"s "Alien". Again this is a state of the art, I would call it a gory thriller, more than a horror movie. Very gory with some grim humor. "The Collector" weighs in at 88 minutes and is a lean, mean, ratchet up the tension machine. It's been called a "torture-porn" movie but it's not really tp, a category of movie I dislike. Anything that you might call torture occurs off-screen or is implied. It's the first movie since "Seven" that effectively exploits the creepiness of the killer as we more often see the results of his actions rather than the actions themselves. The result is a roller coaster movie that keeps you on the edge of your seat the whole time. You don't really need to see "The Collector" before seeing "The Collection". The story concerns a rescue team that goes into The Collector's lair when he kidnaps a multi-millionaire's daughter. Their guide is a guy who has just escaped from that lair. This is all established within the first 10 or so minutes. As a gore index, "The Collector" probably fewer graphic kills than, say, "Olympus Has Fallen" but the creepy factor is sky-high. Definitely worth your time if you like this sort of roller coaster movie.

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 07:45 AM (G9qZk)

52 "Still reading Dickens' Great Expectations."

I remember reading A Tale of Two Cities when I was about fifteen years old, it took about an hour reading and reading the first dozen pages trying to make sense of it, then all of the sudden the language clicked and then I breezed right through the rest. I then read A Christmas Carol and The Pickwick Papers, by then I had enough Dickens to last a lifetime, never did read Great Expectations.

Posted by: lowandslow at April 07, 2013 07:45 AM (Fz2C7)

53 For a pro-publisher perspective, here's Charles Stross the SF / Cthulhu author:

http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/03/ why-i-dont-self-publish.html

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 07:47 AM (QTHTd)

54 After being forced to read Dickens in Hifh School English Lit class I never picked up another book by him.  I hated his writing.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:47 AM (53z96)

55 Ah, yes, Dickens; paid by the word and it shows.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 07:48 AM (QTHTd)

56 You know it might be interesting to see a first class editor go through a Dicken's novel and see what results.

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 07:50 AM (G9qZk)

57 Have you got to the part of Great Expectations with the flying killer monkeys yet?

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 07:50 AM (VwC86)

58 34 Try "Our Mutual Friend". Some of Dickens' most memorable strangely delightful characters.

Posted by: Tuna at April 07, 2013 07:51 AM (M/TDA)

59 vic once you skip all of that the book isn't so long.....my oldest boy read every fricken' word...he even understands the elven launguage......ugh.....for such a cool kid he can be such a NERD..........

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 07:51 AM (GVxQo)

60 i loved tale of two cities........

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 07:52 AM (GVxQo)

61

Just finished an anthology of pulp-fiction adventure stories from early to mid 1900's. On Kindle it was only a couple of dollars for 25 short stories. I don't know as that any were incredible, but none were truly awful or anything either.

 

Started the Dresden Files book Ghost Stories that I got on Kindle for Christmas but hadn't gotten to yet. Made the mistake of starting it at about midnight which made it really difficult to put down and get to sleep so I could make it to church this morning. 

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 07:52 AM (wbeNt)

62 Easy: if I don't want to be there, it's in everyone's best interest that she does the driving and I do the drinking. Posted by: USS Diversity at April 07, 2013 11:39 AM (5wHPS) I tired that plan, it always comes back to bite me in the ass. It is a no win situation. I get drunk she gets madder and I am still stuck at the fucking party, because she is too drunk to drive. A good drunk can drive himself home in his own neighborhood less than two miles from home, a drunk woman? Good chance she will run into a car in the parking lot.

Posted by: Billy Bob, the guy who drinks in SC at April 07, 2013 07:52 AM (wR+pz)

63 Truman North--what's the FEC website and page in question? I might be able to help. Or email me at firstname dot lastname AT gmail. Re: Kindle prices, the truth is a *conspiracy* just like those OregonMuse books say. See, the mainstream publishers don't want ebook adoption. They want you paying money for physical paper books, because that's what they understand (or think they do) and their hindbrains haven't caught up to current events. They claim it takes extra work to convert a print book manuscript to electronic format. Yes, really. Well, if little ole me with a full-time job can format ebooks all by myself in three hours (and with fewer errors) I don't know what their problem is. Protip: if you see a book where the paper version is the same or more expensive than the Kindle version, you are probably dealing with an indie writer. (And they should be supported just like the fossil publishers should be shunned). And the more market share the legacy publishers lose, the higher the chance they will realize they are doing things wrong. Maybe.

Posted by: Sabrina Chase at April 07, 2013 07:54 AM (wfSF5)

64 I'm working on a novel about a discount plastic surgeon. The working title is A Sale of Two Titties.

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 07:55 AM (VwC86)

65 With the TTS app on Kindle I'm listening to Dicken's Nicholas Nickleby. It's *long*.  Parts are very funny, parts are predictable, nothing's horrible.  I have to agree with  the commenter (Miss Marple?)  who said that in general Dicken's clearly had "issues" about adult women. This book actually has an adult woman who is presented as a kind and generous human being, but that does seem to be rare for his books.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 07:55 AM (wbeNt)

66 once you skip all of that the book isn't so long.....my oldest boy read every fricken' word...he even understands the elven launguage......ugh.....for such a cool kid he can be such a NERD..........

Posted by: phoenixgirl at April 07, 2013 11:51 AM (GVxQo)



He would then love the character "Astrid" in the book Dies The Fire by S.M. Stirling.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 07:56 AM (53z96)

67 Heh. Andycanuck's comment reminds me of reading Henry James (portrait of a Lady) - so dull. Also not a fan of Dickens, Melville, or James Fennimore Cooper.

Posted by: Y-not at April 07, 2013 07:56 AM (5H6zj)

68 What Ken Begg said above. All true.

Posted by: Sabrina Chase at April 07, 2013 07:57 AM (wfSF5)

69 @64 I'm working on a novel about a discount plastic surgeon. The working title is A Sale of Two Titties. Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 11:55 AM (VwC86) Me, I'm working on a novel about the Famous Tennessee Tobacco Spitting Contest. The working title is "Great Expectorations".

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 07:59 AM (G9qZk)

70 Re: Charles Stross. He ends his piece: "The only sane way to do it would be to hire someone else to do all the boring crap on my behalf. And do you know what we call people who do that? We call them publishers."

Only an already established, at least somewhat successful author with a now extant fanbase, would claim that he was hiring the publishers. (For the record, I really like a lot of Stross's stuff, although the multi-novel length series that ended up with Dick Chaney being a Fu Manchu-like supervillain--really--was either out and out satire or, more sadly, horrendous self-parody.) For newly starting authors, the relationship is entirely the opposite; the publishers have all the power.

I do think Stross is inadvertently correct, however. I think eventually writers will actually hire companies to handle chores like editing, advertising, etc. That will be a radically different system for the huge majority of authors than what publishers offer them now.

Posted by: Ken Begg at April 07, 2013 07:59 AM (CsEQl)

71 Posted by: Sabrina Chase at April 07, 2013 11:54 AM (wfSF5)

So what you, and Ken up above are basically saying is that time is passing them by, but they just don't get it.

Sort of the old Buggy Whip makers...

Posted by: HH at April 07, 2013 08:01 AM (XXwdv)

72 That is exactly correct. High eBook prices are just drowning men clutching at straws.

Posted by: Ken Begg at April 07, 2013 08:01 AM (CsEQl)

73 I'm torn though. If I make the plastic surgeon a nose specialist I thought Beak House would work too.

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 08:01 AM (VwC86)

74 There is only one thing I give credit to the current administration for and that is the DOJ (corrupt as it is) filing suit against a number of those publishers for fixing prices and collusion on e-book prices.


Baen was the best when they sold direct before Baen himself died.  Now they have moved to Amazon and joined the rest of the gouging crowd.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:06 AM (53z96)

75 2 Truman North, If we had not rejected St Al of Gore all would have been okay

Posted by: Harlekwin15-I'd buy that for a dollra at April 07, 2013 08:06 AM (mPhIq)

76 I didnt know but Ibn al Ashaith, from Holland, who I thought have covered much of the major players.

Posted by: luigi vercotti at April 07, 2013 08:09 AM (Jsiw/)

77 I am reading "The Big Fisherman" by Lloyd C. Douglas.  Douglas also wrote "The Robe", which was made into a motion picture starring Richard Burton.

Actually,  this book was also made into a movie by the same name, starring Charleton Heston,  with a sequel "Demetrius and the Gladiator" starring Victor Mature.

I went looking for my copy of "Quo Vadis" on Easter and couldn't find it,  but I had this edition (which actually may be a first edition) which I bought at an auction.  It has wonderful 40's style illustrations of scenes from the story, such as Peter being called to be an apostle.

I am about half-way through.  So far,  it's a very circuitous plot including a runaway Arab princess sworn to kill her father, Antipas,  who had married her mother for treaty purposes and then dumped them back in Arabia.  Also there is HER boyfriend searching for her,  Simon Peter and John and James, some Romans who are fairly nice in private but brutal in public, and assorted characters of slaves, innkeepers, shoppers, and people healed by Jesus.

Very 40's writing style with lots of description since this was written before the age of TV,  when attention spans were longer.  It's a good story and a good exercise of MY attention span,  which I noticed has become shorter since my involvement in computer comment sections.

PS: My sister used to say Charleton Heston wouldn't star in any movie unless the logo had those big, block, architectural letters (such as EL CID).

Posted by: Miss Marple at April 07, 2013 08:10 AM (GoIUi)

78 I got one of the earliest version of the Kindle. Wife read that the developer of said product was adamant that it shouldn't be backlit, trying to replicate the reading of an actual book. That person is an idiot. So we bought these awkward book lights that are supposed to clip on the Kindly, they take two hearing aid-type batteries that are kinda pricey and not super-easy to find either. Bottom line, both our Kindles are collecting dust. Wife reads on out iPad and I read the old-fashioned way. Currently reading a collection of short stories by Orson Scott Card 'Keeper of Dreams' I think is the title....liked the first story, second one is boring me a bit.

Posted by: ghostofhallelujah at April 07, 2013 08:12 AM (XvrTA)

79 #77 TL; DR

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 08:12 AM (VwC86)

80 30 Especially since kindle battery charge don't last long. ------- Turn the wireless off when you're not using it.

Posted by: Assault Citizen Anachronda at April 07, 2013 08:12 AM (U82Km)

81 Bottom line, both our Kindles are collecting dust. Wife reads on out iPad and I read the old-fashioned way.

Currently reading a collection of short stories by Orson Scott Card 'Keeper of Dreams' I think is the title....liked the first story, second one is boring me a bit.

Posted by: ghostofhallelujah at April 07, 2013 12:12 PM (XvrTA)


Get a Samsung Galaxy Tab 2.  I got one for my wife and she hasn't picked up the Kindle since. But be aware that because of back-light the batteries do not last near as long as the Kindle before they must be recharged.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:14 AM (53z96)

82 Turn the wireless off when you're not using it.

Yeah, this.

Kindle batteries last for weeks even when you're reading it every night. It's the wireless that drains it.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 08:15 AM (QTHTd)

83 If I find a book I want with a backwards Kindle price like that, I buy the paperback, cut the binding off with a band saw, and run the pages through my autofeed scanner and turn it into a PDF. I think I got the whole King of Thrones 5-book series at Costco for $8, Amazon Kindle price is $40.

Posted by: Socratease at April 07, 2013 08:15 AM (G4FoI)

84 Sorry, I meant "Game of Thrones".

Posted by: Socratease at April 07, 2013 08:18 AM (G4FoI)

85 @ 73 Well...I have thought that I'm might write a novel of historical fiction about the inventor of Kleenex. The working title? "The Picknose Papers"

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 08:18 AM (G9qZk)

86 I can't get used to reading books on my Kindle.  I just don't like it.  I still go and get my books the old fashioned way - borrowing them for free from the library.  I like the feel of the pages in my hand. I like turning the paper.  I don't like scrolling.


So.



I am currently reading "The Imitation of Christ" by Thomas a Kempis.   I somehow had the time period for this writing messed up.  I did not realize that he was a contemporary of John Huss, who was martyred in 1415. I thought he was earlier somehow. 

I am also reading a mystery novel by Louise Penny entitled "Bury Your Dead" which is apparently one in a series of books featuring detective Armand Gamache, set in Montreal.  Reviews of this bestseller say "it is superb! - brilliantly provocative -  an elaborately constructed and remarkably moving piece of literary fiction."

So far I'm not feeling it.  I hate when they have all those little French words in there, all italicized and stuff.

Posted by: mama winger at April 07, 2013 08:18 AM (P6QsQ)

87 There was no President during "deregulation" because there never has been any "deregulation".

Glass-Steagall was effectively repealed in the late 1990s.

We got regulations on honest practices (like redlining unemployable jerkoffs) and deregulation for crooked banks.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 08:20 AM (QTHTd)

88 "The Picknose Papers"
I don't know. We might have to have our lawyers meet because the chapter in my book that features the penis enlargement surgeon is called "The Pick-Dick Papers".

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 08:20 AM (VwC86)

89 Kindle  books are too damned high

http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-KM912_mcmill_G_20101019115123.jpg

Posted by: Jimmy McMillon at April 07, 2013 08:21 AM (53z96)

90 Just want to quickly thank Oregon Muse for posting my book. Buy! Anyway, I'm reading The Federalist Papers for the first time this week. Started late last week but caught up with some other stuff. I'm not past Jay's may contribution, but it's already turning out to be a very compelling explanation. Can't wait to get to Madison.

Posted by: David at April 07, 2013 08:22 AM (6Oj/Y)

91 I have both a Kindle and a Fire and find myself reading on the Kindle in daylight and switching to the Fire to read a bit in bed at night. I do like how the Kindle mimics the dead tree page and with the wi-fi turned off the  battery lasts forever. The Fire has to be re-charged every few days, though it's good for taking one last peek at the HQ when I've turned off the computer for the night.

Besides objecting to the prices, I'm not happy that Amazon won't let me use mt points on e-books.

Posted by: Retread at April 07, 2013 08:23 AM (zxitI)

92 Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 12:20 PM (QTHTd)


Repeal of Glass-Steagal had absolutely NOTHING to do with the collapse.

Posted by: Jimmy McMillon at April 07, 2013 08:23 AM (53z96)

93 I will recommend the Hell out of this one:

Marko Kloos' "Terms of Enlistment."

http://tinyurl.com/d4wl5tf

Marko is a close friend and a great writer; the story is engrossing.

Posted by: Cranky J Anne at April 07, 2013 08:24 AM (sZk6y)

94 oops, sock off

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:25 AM (53z96)

95 @ 88 Fine, fine. I'll just start on my biography of New York's cheapest male prostitute: "Nickel-ass Nickleby"

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 08:28 AM (G9qZk)

96 Repeal of Glass-Steagal ["that separated commercial and investment banking" - Rickards] had absolutely NOTHING to do with the collapse.

Care to back this up?

Nouriel Roubini thinks otherwise. Same with James Rickards (hedge fund manager) here: http://tinyurl.com/8ho36zt

There are plenty of other economists who aren't Paul Krugman who think that Glass-Steagall needs to be put back on the books.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 08:30 AM (QTHTd)

97 I admire people who have the discipline and imagination to write.  I wouldn't have any idea how to fill three pages, much less three hundred.  I don't think I know that many words.

Posted by: mama winger at April 07, 2013 08:32 AM (P6QsQ)

98

Posted by: David at April 07, 2013 12:22 PM (6Oj/Y)

 

I'd forgotten to mention that I was listening to that  with  TTS  as well. Got to #46 yesterday and could have just cried. The authors stated repeatedly that they though that *what has indeed happened* was so far out of the realm  of probability as to be ludicrous (because they trusted the American people to never put up with anything so monsterous) but acknowledged the possibility anyway. Their solution? An armed citizenry rising in popular revolt. Yeah. No pretty way to fix this.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 08:32 AM (wbeNt)

99 the top 1% are doing very very well. If you aren't part of that, well whose fault is it?

Posted by: occam at April 07, 2013 08:34 AM (Vns6X)

100 There are plenty of other economists who aren't Paul Krugman who think that Glass-Steagall needs to be put back on the books.

Posted by: boulder toilet hobo at April 07, 2013 12:30 PM (QTHTd)



I don't give a shit what he says.  All that did was made some of the savings and loans go down due to CRA as well.  Government regulation is what caused the collapse.  And all of those other 'economists" are idiots.  They probably write for The Financial Times.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:35 AM (53z96)

101 I'm paying the $15 for the new Dresden Files books but anything else Butcher writes better be in the $10 range or I'm skipping it. I like authors who make one of their books cheap so you can try them out. I've made lots of impulse purchases that way. Our Mutual Friend is still my favorite Dickens. If you want to avoid the reading thing, the BBC production from the 90's is very good.

Posted by: waelse1 at April 07, 2013 08:35 AM (skfq4)

102 The problem was with the regulations that mandated the selling of these loans, which necessitated the packaging of these loans, there were other rules,
like closing of the Basel window, much of this uncovered by Morgenstern.


Posted by: luigi vercotti at April 07, 2013 08:35 AM (Jsiw/)

103 99 Occtard, No 1%er ever called me "racist"

Posted by: Harlekwin15-I'd buy that for a dollra at April 07, 2013 08:35 AM (mPhIq)

104 It's not too hard, mama winger.

Here, let me give you an idea for a story... there's a specialist in cryonics but as the kicker he works in Harlem. You can call it The Frozen Peep.

Posted by: andycanuck at April 07, 2013 08:36 AM (VwC86)

105 Just finished "Boomerang" by Michael Lewis. It puts the debt crisis into global perspective- it's a quick, entertaining read. I'm now reading "The Bible of Unspeakable Truths" by Greg Gutfeld.

Posted by: Moonbeam at April 07, 2013 08:36 AM (Dt+R8)

106 With all of this in mind, I would think the solution is obvious: we must drastically reduce the size, scope and power of the federal government. *** I wonder what a side-by-side comparison of org charts, Bush and Obama, would look like. Heck, throw Clinton's in there as well.

Posted by: Niedermeyer's Dead Horse at April 07, 2013 08:38 AM (piMMO)

107

I am back in my trashy romance novel mood, so I have been re-reading the "naked" series by Sally MacKenzie. Despite the word "naked" in the title there is very little nudity and unlike a lot of romance novels, the main characters very rarely consumate things until almost the end of the book. So, on the trashy scale they are probably about a 2.

 

 

I really want to read a thriller, but I have spoiled myself on Brad Thor and Vince Flynn so now I am impatiently awaiting their next releases, due out this summer I think.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 08:39 AM (RZ8pf)

108 Somehow, we gotta take the "cool" factor out. I have no idea how to do that.

--

I'm beginning to think that we do that by illuminating the libertarian bent of conservatism.  The young folks are increasingly gangbusters for all things libertarian.  We need to solidify the that link with voting for Republicans.  Although, I'm ready to throw the whole heaping helping of R's right about now.

Posted by: Lady in Black at April 07, 2013 08:39 AM (3V9LU)

109 The Bible of Unspeakable Truths looks like a good book.  I bookmarked the page and will check it from time to time to see when the Kindle price reaches reasonable levels.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:40 AM (53z96)

110 106 NDH,

Clinton's would look smaller it was an uncowed GOP with a horn dog...

Bush tried to buy Donk alliegence inth e GWoT with leviathan....

how'd that work out for us?

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:40 AM (LRFds)

111 I really want to read a thriller, but I have spoiled myself on Brad Thor and Vince Flynn so now I am impatiently awaiting their next releases, due out this summer I think.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 12:39 PM (RZ8pf)


Start on the Ghost series by John Ringo.  You get thriller and trashy; real trashy.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:41 AM (53z96)

112

I let too many of the comments on Amazon reviews of books sway me sometimes, does anyone else do that, think they want to read a book and then read the comments and realize that it would be a waste of money?

 

 

Some of the comments are obviously grudge types, or stupid, but I am often impressed by the people who do the "3" and "4" comments because they manage to give a balanced review of the book instead of being overwhelmingly for or against it. Well the ones that actually take the time to spell out their rating.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 08:42 AM (RZ8pf)

113 MY wife bought a kindle last fall. Never a reader before she has taken to it like a fish to water. Her preferred genre is the "romance" novel. She has read about 70 books in a little over 6 months. I can't believe it. I read a excerpt of one of her books the other day and now I know why she is a voracious reader. This stuff is porn! It would be like me hitting the Pr0n websites for 6 or so hours a day. It has been good in the fact that I have been getting laid like a sailor on leave, but still....

Posted by: Truck Monkey at April 07, 2013 08:42 AM (jucos)

114 Well there's an offering, by Albert Ashforth, the Rendition, that takes place in Kosovo, and the Albanian enclave in Munich, much like those that Liam Neeson deals with in "Taken' the hero is an ex?? Special Forces type, Alex Klear, who is involved in a 'rendition' of a KLA warlord, in 2007, and the back story after he is captured.

Posted by: luigi vercotti at April 07, 2013 08:43 AM (Jsiw/)

115 The CRA did not "force" banks to make loans.  That is a complete myth.

“Let me ask you, where in the CRA does it say to make loans to people who can’t afford to repay? Nowhere.”
-FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair

Posted by: Herbert Hymenhopper at April 07, 2013 08:44 AM (3r0S0)

116 "Great Expectations"?  I read that about 6 months ago.  I came to the conclusion that Pip was an idiot. 

He utterly failed to protect the "portable property."

With all of Magwich's money that he was spending he somehow failed to receive an education.


Posted by: Al at April 07, 2013 08:45 AM (V70Uh)

117 The only problem with the TARP guy's book is his workplace crush on Elizabeth Warren.

Another thing you'll notice with most of these "why the crash happened, or what happened at a particular firm during the crash" books is that the authors do their due diligence on those persons who are Republicans or donated to Republicans, and are not quite so eager to finger Democrats.  It's not as bad as playing name-that-party in an AP story, but it is there.

Case in point, the guy behind Ameriquest is routinely described as a donor to Republicans, but in only one book (and I forget which one) do we learn that he also gave generously to Democrats and that Gray Davis-yes, THAT Gray Davis, presided at his wedding.

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 08:45 AM (Q9qpj)

118 Can we haz gun thread?

Posted by: Billy Bob, the guy who drinks in SC at April 07, 2013 08:45 AM (wR+pz)

119

Vic, I just read the reviews of the first one on Amazon and thanks but no thanks. I'm not into that trashy, it sounds really creepy.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 08:46 AM (RZ8pf)

120 I really want to read a thriller, but I have spoiled
myself on Brad Thor and Vince Flynn so now I am impatiently awaiting
their next releases, due out this summer I think.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 12:39 PM (RZ8pf)

---------


Have you read the Dan Silva books?  I love him.

Posted by: mama winger at April 07, 2013 08:47 AM (P6QsQ)

121 115 Hubert Shitenslurper,

right-o...and barky Choom never sued for "redlining"

GFYS

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:47 AM (LRFds)

122 “Let me ask you, where in the CRA does it say to make loans to people who can’t afford to repay? Nowhere.”

-FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair

Posted by: Herbert Hymenhopper at April 07, 2013 12:44 PM (3r0S0)



You need to google/bing up the regulations that were put in place to implement CRA.  They do in fact force banks to lend to people who could not afford it.  They do that by restricting the bank activities and make it easy to sue them.  The only case our deer idiot leader had was one of those. Back when the collapse happened I posted links yo those regulations.  They are easy to find.



If that stupid lazy SOB can sue a bank and win that should tell you something.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:47 AM (53z96)

123 The CRA did not "force" banks to make loans. That is a complete myth. ----------------------------------------------------- Bullshit. It sure as hell did. The whole purpose of the program was to get people who should be renting into homes of their own. Most of the time they had very poor or no credit at all. Federal auditors were ready and will to pore over the records of banks who did not comply. Under that threat, most institutions fell in line and "got with" the program. Try again.

Posted by: Truck Monkey at April 07, 2013 08:47 AM (jucos)

124 Reading "Classic English Rhetoric" and finding many Dickens quotes.

Dickens, apparently, was meant to be read aloud.


Posted by: Al at April 07, 2013 08:48 AM (V70Uh)

125 For the stupid troll:  What the CRA did was force Fannie and Freddie to have a certain, often-increased percentage of the loans on their books be to those traditionally "underserved" homebuyers who could not fucking afford to buy homes.

Fannie and Freddie did so by buying subprime second mortgages.  Which you would no, you stupid fuck, if you were anything more than a transcriber of talking points.

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 08:48 AM (Q9qpj)

126 Daniel Silva.  Excuse me.

Posted by: mama winger at April 07, 2013 08:48 AM (P6QsQ)

127 122 Vic,

add in the GSEs acting as defacto risk laundry organizations and you set up a financial bomb...

that people like Mr Mau mau insist the GOP take the fall for the housing bomb while letting guys like Shitenslurper here argue "we had NOTHING to do with it!" is the sorta help we can 'rely on" from the "moderates"

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:49 AM (LRFds)

128 Zombie book recommendation: Flu, by Wayne Simmons.

Posted by: eman at April 07, 2013 08:49 AM (Q0gEg)

129 Vic, I just read the reviews of the first one on Amazon and thanks but no thanks. I'm not into that trashy, it sounds really creepy.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 12:46 PM (RZ8pf)



LOL, yes, it is borderline porn, but it is also a good action thriller.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:49 AM (53z96)

130 As soon as the financial crisis erupted, the finger-pointing began. Should the blame fall on Wall Street, Main Street, or Pennsylvania Avenue? On greedy traders, misguided regulators, sleazy subprime companies, cowardly legislators, or clueless home buyers?

LAWYERS!

In fact, Barack Obama in particular. He was lead attorney on the lawsuit that made all of the banks start to make bad loans which then lead to the bundling.

Posted by: AmishDude at April 07, 2013 08:49 AM (xSegX)

131 Reckless Endangerment by Gretchen Morgensen is a good book, and she is actually a pretty straight shooter--which makes he a crazy right wing nut by New York Times standards. She is the one person who picks on the one guy who could be referred to as "patient zero" of the financial crisis.

Former CEO of Fannie Mae--check.
Got low interest personal loan from Angelo Mozilo--check.
Gave out backdated stock options--check.
Wanted to be Obama's Treasury Secretary--check.


Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 08:50 AM (h5CN9)

132 130 AmishDude,

for a guy who never published and never developed a big setr of casework he sure was hot to sue banks eh?

You know you're getting close to the truth when the moontards yelp like you kicked 'em where men would have balls.

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:51 AM (LRFds)

133

Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 12:50 PM (h5CN9)

 

Would that be Barney Frank's boyfriend who ran a brothel out of their shared home?

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 08:52 AM (wbeNt)

134

I tried one Daniel Silva, I think it wasn't what I was looking for at the time so I couldn't get into it.

 

 

I was reading some David Balducci for a while, but the last one of his I read bored me to tears and the main character was so dull and uninteresting I found myself rooting for the bad guys. Don't ask me the title, I can't even remember it.

 

 

I sometimes read James Patterson, but he really cranks them out and by this point they seem like the exact same book with a different title. And, I find that he has some trouble writing human relationship things well, so he often skips over it, like in the last one I read the main characters get in a huge fight, the guy moves out and then suddenly he's back, she realizes it was a misunderstanding and that's that. It was weird and ill timed.

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 08:53 AM (RZ8pf)

135 Jamie Gorelick has to be involved with Obamacare, right?  I mean, since she is basically to government fuckups what Merrill Lynch has been to financial ones.

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 08:53 AM (Q9qpj)

136 And guess what Mr diddlehopper, all those regulations are STILL in place and Barky Tutmose - I is still pushing them.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:53 AM (53z96)

137 133. Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 12:52 PM (wbeNt)

Good guess, but no.

Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 08:53 AM (h5CN9)

138 135 Guy who wonders WTFIGO sometimes,

yeah well if she's not you can count her and frank raines as Perfesser emritusi of the Great Donk Implosion....


Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:54 AM (LRFds)

139

Was it Franklin Raines?

Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 08:54 AM (RZ8pf)

140 136 Vic,

was told flat out by two different realtors the banks are reinflating the bomb....

you have to figure Bark would be thrilled to have a fake growth spurt as his legacy

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:55 AM (LRFds)

141 Posted by: ParanoidGirlInSeattle at April 07, 2013 12:54 PM (RZ8pf)

Nope.

Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 08:55 AM (h5CN9)

142 I found this kindle book called Amy's heat. It's about incest, both Hetero and Homo, and bestiality told by a young girl in late 60's Mississippi. Whoever wrote it must have been a farm boy. His descriptions of sex with various animals is as detailed as it is disturbing. I think the author was going for a Redneck Fifty shades of gray vibe.

Posted by: G. Uldinshaurs at April 07, 2013 08:56 AM (G6kli)

143

Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 12:53 PM (h5CN9)

 

Ah, thanks. Makes me mad enough to spit nails that Frank and Dodd (two of the three people most responsible for this mess) have the gall to name a bill supposedly fixing it (but actually making it worse) after themselves.  It's pretty much a perfect example of our current government.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 08:56 AM (wbeNt)

144 It most certainly was the incredibly incompetent Franklin Raines. I don't think there are two more inept people that F. Raines and J. Gorelick. Thanks to Bill Clinton.

Posted by: Truck Monkey at April 07, 2013 08:56 AM (jucos)

145 was told flat out by two different realtors the banks are reinflating the bomb....

you have to figure Bark would be thrilled to have a fake growth spurt as his legacy

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 12:55 PM (LRFds)



Yep, I posted a link in the morning news a few days ago of Barky calling for more inner city loans from banks.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:57 AM (53z96)

146 @137 Former Mondale campaign manager and Clinton butt buddy?

P.S. Probably my favorite part of the Fannie Mae story is when they forced it to fire all the lobbyists.

For those of you familiar with the Game of Thrones, there is a scene when Littlefinger is slyly inferring blackmail when he tells Cersai that "information is power."  She responds by ordering her guards to seize and murder him, stops them with another curt command, and then informs him that "POWER is power."

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 08:57 AM (Q9qpj)

147 “Point in fact,” she said, “only one in four higher-priced first mortgage loans were made by CRA-covered banks during the hey-day years of subprime mortgage lending.  The rest were made by private independent mortgage companies and large bank affiliates not covered by CRA rules.”

Sheila Bair - FDIC chair and Republican

Posted by: Herbert Hymenhopper at April 07, 2013 08:57 AM (3r0S0)

148 Walk into a bank and you will see the big CRA poster on the wall right near the entrance. You can't miss it and it can't miss you either. When the housing collapse hit the Democrats sounded red alert, raised shields, and engaged the cloaking device. The once clear image of a guilty Democrat morphed into a fuzzy image of a guilty Republican. The effect is still there.

Posted by: eman at April 07, 2013 08:58 AM (Q0gEg)

149 Whoever wrote it must have been a farm boy. His descriptions of sex with various animals is as detailed as it is disturbing.

I think the author was going for a Redneck Fifty shades of gray vibe.

Posted by: G. Uldinshaurs at April 07, 2013 12:56 PM (G6kli)


Good Lord!  I don't think I could read a book like that w/o puking.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:58 AM (53z96)

150 It has been good in the fact that I have been getting laid like a sailor on leave, but still....

Posted by: Truck Monkey at April 07, 2013 12:42 PM (jucos)


LOL. So you're giving her gift cards to Amazon for her birthday, for your birthday, for Easter, and just because it's Thursday afternoon, aren't you?

Posted by: Retread at April 07, 2013 08:58 AM (zxitI)

151 Zombie book recommendation : EX books by Peter Clines.

Posted by: Rutger at April 07, 2013 08:58 AM (G6kli)

152

Posted by: G. Uldinshaurs at April 07, 2013 12:56 PM (G6kli)

 

Uhm, ew. I'm a farm girl but, just ew.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette, assault Hobbit at April 07, 2013 08:58 AM (wbeNt)

153 147 Shitenslurper,

Tell you what Hubert Shitslurper post you bank data and I figure and promise I'll just fuck up 25% of your assets...

again Go fuck yourself.

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 08:59 AM (LRFds)

154 No point in arguing with the troll

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 08:59 AM (53z96)

155 Damn, Scanner, and I listened to that audiobook last week...I recall that his predecessor did all the same things he did, just on a smaller scale.

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 08:59 AM (Q9qpj)

156 109- Vic- I bought it as soon as it came out in paperback. I'm a "book" person- if it's a book I intend to keep, I buy hard-back, and if I know I am just going to read it and pass it on, I wait for the paperback. Anyway, TBoUT is pretty entertaining and it has short chapters, so it's a good book to take to work to read on breaks or at lunch.

Posted by: Moonbeam at April 07, 2013 08:59 AM (Dt+R8)

157 Posted by: Retread at April 07, 2013 12:58 PM (zxitI) ------------------------------------------------------------ My checkbook is open. It's not like their expensive or anything. $2 to $5 a book. Cheaper than smoking or therapy.

Posted by: Truck Monkey at April 07, 2013 09:00 AM (jucos)

Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 09:01 AM (Q9qpj)

159 Uhm, ew. I'm a farm girl but, just ew. You know why girls are given a horse, or trained to ride, right? I knew my fair share of farmboys who's first experience was with a cow or horse. Honey, they are men. They have sex with dolls, and anything they can rub against.

Posted by: Rutger at April 07, 2013 09:01 AM (G6kli)

160 146 @137 Former Mondale campaign manager and Clinton butt buddy?

Yep.

Posted by: Scanner Dan at April 07, 2013 09:01 AM (h5CN9)

161 was told flat out by two different realtors the banks are reinflating the bomb.... you have to figure Bark would be thrilled to have a fake growth spurt as his legacy *** The next thing you know, Detroit will be the hottest real estate market in the country. Right?

Posted by: Niedermeyer's Dead Horse at April 07, 2013 09:01 AM (piMMO)

162 161 NDH,

while designed to work on weak minds jedi mind Tricks can't force you to walk into Lava...

speaking of Volcanos how's Gerg?

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 09:02 AM (LRFds)

163 Gun thread is up

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 09:04 AM (53z96)

164 while designed to work on weak minds jedi mind Tricks can't force you to walk into Lava.. *** That won't stop them from reporting it as such.

Posted by: Niedermeyer's Dead Horse at April 07, 2013 09:04 AM (piMMO)

165 The fact that a guy who actually thought Mondale should be the next president ended up lighting the fuse that blew up the economy just seems so...appropriate.


Posted by: The guy who wonders what the fuck is going on, sometimes. at April 07, 2013 09:05 AM (Q9qpj)

166 You wingnuts are arguing with Sheila Bair.  I just quoted her and nothing else.

Posted by: Herbert Hymenhopper at April 07, 2013 09:05 AM (3r0S0)

167 My comments quoted here are not even relevant to the discussion, as I was speaking in my role as the head of the FDIC, which has absolutely nothing to do GSEs.

Posted by: Sheila Bair at April 07, 2013 09:08 AM (Q9qpj)

168 You wingnuts are arguing with Sheila Bair.

First, she's a lawyer.  Look it up, she has the stink of the J.D.

Second, the FDIC she was protecting at the time was sued twice by Judicial Watch.

A good soldier protecting the system.

Next?

Posted by: AmishDude at April 07, 2013 09:10 AM (xSegX)

169 I'm working an eBook on Michelle Obama's White House reign - working title -

"The Decline and Fall of the Bovine Empire."

But seriously folks.......

Just finished "The Personal Memoirs of US Grant" on the Kindle.  As a writer Grant is crystal clear as befits someone whose written word (as in orders to his troops) can mean life or death, victory or defeat.  He can get a bit swamped in maneuver details as when he's chasing Lee to Appomattox Court House and the original maps in the ebook version were unintelligible - couldn't read them either.

He stopped writing (and died) just as the postbellum politicking began.  Secretary of War Stanton made a clear effort to discredit both Grant and Sherman as potential political rivals.  Grant's opinion of President Johnson gave criticisms I had never heard before and somewhat justified impeachment.  Mark Twain was Grant's publisher.

Half way through Grant I came across "The Civil War Military Machine" - a big picture book on military technology.  I highly recommend this book to anyone reading about the Civil War as it explains so much of the limitations soldiers and sailors had to work under.  Details matter - like a horse/mule drawn supply train had a maximum range of 100 miles unless it could obtain forage on-route.  A double line of attackers on foot could cover the 200 yard range of the muzzle-loading rifles of the defenders in 2 minutes.  Each defender could get off 4 shots in that time.  Attacking cavalry took 30 seconds seconds to cover the same ground.  Few ironclads could reach design speed and sometimes had trouble going upstream in a river.  I'm not a gun nut by any means but this book was a real help in understanding how the war was fought.

For something different (very!),  try "Intimate Acts with Strangers" eBook by a guy (a pooner) writing about the very proficient prostitute (a poonette) he fell in love with on first assignation.  She divorced her husband and quit the trade to be with him.  Somewhat disorganized and self-indulgent, but better than average erotica in places.  Ultimately a love+lust story that almost makes his case.

Posted by: Whitehall at April 07, 2013 09:12 AM (1+mGd)

170 Why doesn't the GOP try to repeal the CRA?  It is still in effect.

Because even they know it is a toothless law. 

Banks won't loan to anyone with a less than perfect FICO score now.

Posted by: Herbert Hymenhopper at April 07, 2013 09:13 AM (3r0S0)

171 Hey hubert....

post your bank data.....

you're telling me if I just scuff up 25% I am gangbusters buddy

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 09:14 AM (LRFds)

172 I never really considered Brautigan a hippie. He was older than most hippies and into alcohol, not pot. I did like his work. His daughter, Ianthe Brautigan, wrote a good bio of him called "You Can't Catch Death".

The interesting thing about Dickens is that he wrote for common folks. It just shows how we've gotten used to that short sentence, Hemingway style, of writing.

Posted by: notsothoreau at April 07, 2013 09:14 AM (Lqy/e)

173 170 Hubert Shitenslurper,

Right and they are advertising for Pigford III on billboards because the donk ass motherf**er is concerned about finances...

again Hubert GFYS

Posted by: Harlekwin15-Emergency back Up Angst ID at April 07, 2013 09:15 AM (LRFds)

174 To get back on topic here I present the Kindle editions of a long forgotten series of book that became a cult:

http://is.gd/lbFMeK

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 09:32 AM (53z96)

175 Amazon Prime. Less than a $100.00 bucks a year. Free shipping of Amazon items. Free streaming video of films and tv series. One Amazon Prime eligible e-book to borrow for free each month. You have to "return" any previous book you borrowed for that month. It's a great way to try out series.

Kindle now has a side lit e-reader as well as the newer Kindle Fires.

Disclaimer, my brother works at Amazon.

As to reading I recommend D-Boys and D-Boys: Counter Assault if you are into Spec-Ops stories. The first in the series D-Boys has a great twist on the genre.

I believe Baen still sells direct as does O'Reilly for tech books. O'R ain't cheap but you can get some great bundles from them and daily deals of 50% off if you sign up for e-mail. I got 8 books on JavaScript programming for less than $150.00 which is a great deal for those type of specialty books.

Posted by: whatmeworry? at April 07, 2013 09:48 AM (Q3WfW)

176 Most of Brautigan's early works are out of print. I'd describe those writings as "Poesetry". His later books were attempts at literary mash-ups (i.e. a "Goth/Western") and we fun reads but kind of hit or miss.I first read him in an introduction he wrote for a book of the Beatle's song lyrics:

"Earlier this year here in Montana the Yellowstone River was flooding down below the Carter Bridge. The river kept rising day after day until it was flowing through houses. They became like islands in the river and there was a strange awkward loneliness to them because these were places where people had been living (laughing, crying, love and death) only a few days before and now they were just part of the Yellowstone River.

Every time I passed by those houses on my way into town, I would get a very sad feeling and some words would come to mind. They were always the same words, "The silence of flooded houses." They repeated themselves over and over again. I soon accepted them as part of the way into town.

I'll use those words for something, someday, I would think afterwards, but I didn't know what that something would be or when that day would come. Eleanor Rigby picks up the rice in the
church where the wedding has been,
lives in a dream.
Waits at the window, wearing the face
that she keeps in a jar by the door,
Who is it for?

Father McKenzie, writing the words of a
sermon that no-one will hear,
No-one comes near.
Look at him working, darning his socks
in the night when there's nobody there,
What does he care?

Eleanor Rigby died in the church as was
buried along with her name.
Nobody came.
Father McKenzie, wiping the dirt from
his hands as he walks from the grave.
No-one was saved. One could say a million things about these songs. Your could go on for years talking about the Beatles. You could chop down a whole forest to make space for the pages.

Some of the songs in this book are like the silence of flooded houses.

This is all I have to say.

Richard Brautigan
Pine Creek, Montana
October 11, 1974"

Posted by: whatmeworry? at April 07, 2013 09:56 AM (Q3WfW)

177 Chit. "Proesetry".

Posted by: whatmeworry? at April 07, 2013 10:02 AM (Q3WfW)

178 Just finished reading The Elfish Gene by Mark Barrowcliffe, a Brit who really got into Dungeons & Dragons when he was growing up.  It's sort of a coming-of-age memoir.  It was a book-club selection.  I didn't think I would like it that much since I'm not a gamer, but I found the D&D stuff quite interesting.  Definitely gave me greater insight into men in general and teenage boys in particular. 

Posted by: biancaneve at April 07, 2013 10:23 AM (6bYlh)

179 Well, that's more or less what keeps bringing me back to Brautigan- his clean, simple, evocative prose or "proesetry". That's a very hard thing to do as a writer- write very simply and directly yet with power. When he connects that prose to something meaningful to him, the result is almost magical. His best books, that I've read so far, find that connection. "A Confederate General in Big Sur" - a slice of a life free from the constraints and responsibilities of society. "Trout Fishing in America" - a whimsical elegy for a simpler, earlier America "Sombrero Fallout" - self-loathing, self-destructiveness, and the pain of lost love Serious topics yet these are humorous books with laugh out loud passages. Yet sometimes the whimsy, and oddity for oddness' sake is just too much. I don't know....Brautigan strikes me as a writer who mastered his form but never found his great theme. but i guess I'll see as I meander through his stuff.

Posted by: naturalfake at April 07, 2013 10:24 AM (G9qZk)

180 i've been trying to convince people for years now to stop paying hundreds of dollars for one to ticket to listen to somebody make music. a couple of empty theaters/stadiums and those ridiculous prices would come down. but who listens to me besides nobody ? concert after concert is sold out...{sigh}.

Posted by: el polacko at April 07, 2013 10:30 AM (oFtyF)

181 I read Morgenson's book. Funny how often the names Dodd and Frank came up... and not for writing the 2010 banking financial regulation bill. Only in America Barackistan can two corrupt politicians have such a heavy hand in causing the lending industry to implode and then get to write the laws to regulate that industry.

Posted by: Peregrine Took, Hobbit SOB at April 07, 2013 10:43 AM (erlzv)

182 Drat! The strikeout feature over "America" didn't work.

Posted by: Peregrine Took, Hobbit SOB at April 07, 2013 10:44 AM (erlzv)

183 Barney Frank's famous lies that you only saw on Fox.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMnSp4qEXNM

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 10:50 AM (53z96)

184 Interestingly enough, "reckless endangerment" goes a little light on the political corruption behind the crisis - it does not *ignore* it, but unless you know the players you get a much more "even handed" view of reality than reality itself. For example, as you'd expect from a NYT reporter, Morgenson suffers from "Name That Party" syndrome. Conservative parties and appointees tend to be named as such, liberal parties and appointees frequently go un-labeled, for you to assume they were apolitical. The book has considerable value, but be aware that it was written with filters.

Posted by: Merovign, Dark Lord of the Sith's Other Mobile[/i][/b][/s] at April 07, 2013 11:10 AM (bxiXv)

185 109 The Bible of Unspeakable Truths looks like a good book. I bookmarked the page and will check it from time to time to see when the Kindle price reaches reasonable levels.

I really enjoyed Gutfeld's "Lessons from the Land of Pork Scratchings," available cheap used these days. Sort of a personal memoir of how he found his place in Britain, and professionally.

Posted by: Splunge at April 07, 2013 11:15 AM (bKA83)

186 When it comes to Name That Party, I've come to assume a lot of writers don't even realize they're doing it. Rather, they regard being openly Republican or conservative as such an unusual and odd thing, they regard as worthy of special note. Like mentioning that a person was an amputee or had facial tattoos.

Just part of living in the echo chamber.

Posted by: epobirs at April 07, 2013 11:30 AM (kcfmt)

187 I've been enjoying the Skullduggery Pleasant series by Derek Landy. The title character is a living skeleton, a man who was murdered and came back in skeletal form out of sheer orneriness and something else nobody has been able to identify. He is a detective who investigates crimes committed by members of the secret world of sorcerers who live among us.

I picked up the seven volumes as an audiobook set and was disappointed to find that the production had changed hands with the fifth book. The reader for the first four made Skullduggery sound a lot like Hugh Laurie playing House, which suits the character's deadpan humor and expansive ego. The reader also put a lot into another character with a severe Texas accent, Billy Ray Sanguine. The new reader just doesn't have the same strength of voice or command of accents.

The main perspective of the series is a teenage girl who ages about a year with each book. In the beginning she is being protected by Skullduggery as his recent;y deceased uncle's will make her the target of some very bad people. She then becomes the skeleton's apprentice as a detective and sorcerer. Oh, and she may be destined to destroy the world, which she finds very troubling.

Posted by: epobirs at April 07, 2013 11:44 AM (kcfmt)

188 Don't usually comment but I have to say that "The Last Centurion" by John Ringo was written for morons. I think y'all will love it.

Posted by: alo89 at April 07, 2013 11:47 AM (IacRz)

189 Yes that was a great book.  I have every one of his books except that new Ghost one that is co-written.

Posted by: Vic at April 07, 2013 11:52 AM (53z96)

190 Book thread now? The only books being discussed on this thread should have ballistics tables in them. Or poon.

Posted by: Herr Morgenholx at April 07, 2013 12:00 PM (G230Z)

191

Good comments on the financial crisis and related books.  Uh - except for the characteristically dim commenter who appears not to understand how markets, regulation, and human rational behavior work (hint:  once CRA-related patterns of coercion via lawsuit and guvamint body language - Boston Fed "study", Fannie and House Dem brass - very little if any direct compulsion is required).

 

Not that I ever come across anyone (incl. my non-stupid and somewhat financially savvy brother) who demonstrates the least undertanding of 2008, but I do feel it's important not to OVER-state the importance of CRA.  It was the foundation stone, but would have remained just another in the long list of idiotic, unconstitutional, pernicious, wasteful guvamint interventions without the massively amplifying securitization that followed.  Sort of the fission starter of a thermonuclear design, if you will.  The tritium were the creation and promotion of the unsound securitized packages.

 

In this drama there were several actors, but none of this was possible without 1) CRA to start 2) constant, critical, insane, called-out-along-the-way, reckless GOVERMENT/GSE action.  Wall Street and Main Street - as ALWAYS - are merely rational actors, playing on a field (an increasingly bizarre and distorted one) defined by law and regulation.  So the reckless, greedy behavior of the banks/others/consumers in the housing bubble should have been allowed to meet their usual end - ruin for those involved.  Ah, TARP!  So once AGAIN, GOVERNMENT intervention is the main culprit.  (Barofsky's critique appears to validate - surprise!!! - the most obvious and basic reason many House GOPers opposed TARP - to the typically stupid sneers of many "moderate" GOP types .....)

 

It's arguable that the federal income tax home mortgage deduction is an unwise distortion that has led to over-investment in residential assets (for decades).  If it is a distortion, it's at least a sustainable one, that hasn't led to outsized distortions throughout the economy.  Fannie and Freddie and few other GSEs have been around a long time, and for most of that time it's pretty clear they were no more a problem than the federal tax benefit.  Any "damage" or opportunity costs, I'd argue, have been pretty subtle and non-catastrophic.

 

But in their insane, irresponsible, weaponized mode - CRA-onwards, that is - the GSEs clearly became a huge problem.  And it wasn't any sort of recondite mystery:  in the early 2000s I played recreational ice hockey with a guy who was fairly senior at Fannie Mae (non-financial guy, technical).  I recall clearly his saying that he and his colleagues were unloading their options pretty quickly even as Fannie's stock was one of the stars of the market - all the career financial friends of theirs on Wisconsin Avenue were sounding the alarms way back then that things were insane and bound to collapse.

 

THAT is how obvious, and indefensible, all of this was, even at the time.  Thus the feeble/failed efforts by Bush/others to rein it in a bit.  (so, rank-and-file GSers at Fannie were heading for the slit trenches well before 2008, but it takes books by financial writers to actually begin to shed SOME light on "the story"?  A nice metric for a collapsed information system in our society)

 

But in an orwellian "press" environment (love the comment above about how even Morgenstern falls prey to the name-that-party mental illness), with an amazingly dumbed-down electorate (I speak here of the "educated" segment, specifically), what's the hope?

 

To put it in concrete terms, Gorelick, Raines, Tenet - just to pick three outstanding examples - presided over the greatest calamities in their respective spheres of responsibility ever seen.  And far from being shunned, and broke - they all prospered, and moved on and up (the Gorelick saga is, even in an era of everyday "unbelievable" things, truly unbelievable).

Posted by: non-purist at April 07, 2013 12:33 PM (afQnV)

192 When I was in B-school in the mid-90s, I had a finance professor (Dr. Michael Malone) who made a big deal about how GSEs were set up to ruin the country financially.

He was absolutely correct.

Morgenstein's book was buried the lede a good bit.  Details prevented her from getting to the underlying political issues of corrrupt, vote-buying, money-grubbing Democrat politicians.

The book is a good start but the final summation hasn't been written.

Posted by: Whitehall at April 07, 2013 01:29 PM (1+mGd)

193 "I dislike the price, too, but there is something consumers can do: if you think something costs too much, DON'T BUY IT!" I don't buy it, but rather put it on my wish list. It's my signal to Amazon (or rather, the publisher who actually sets the price) that I'm perfectly willing to pay good money for bits that cost them nothing but not *that* much money.

Posted by: Ace's liver at April 07, 2013 02:09 PM (8T0N0)

194 78 I got one of the earliest version of the Kindle. Wife read that the developer of said product was adamant that it shouldn't be backlit, trying to replicate the reading of an actual book. That person is an idiot. So we bought these awkward book lights that are supposed to clip on the Kindly, they take two hearing aid-type batteries that are kinda pricey and not super-easy to find either. Bottom line, both our Kindles are collecting dust. Wife reads on out iPad and I read the old-fashioned way.

Currently reading a collection of short stories by Orson Scott Card 'Keeper of Dreams' I think is the title....liked the first story, second one is boring me a bit.

Posted by: ghostofhallelujah at April 07, 2013 12:12 PM (XvrTA)

http://tinyurl.com/cjp5ngj

this is bettern sliced bread for the old kindle.

just the right light, and plugs into the kindle for power.

Also provides good protection, and you can stand the kindle up to read it.

Posted by: redclay at April 07, 2013 03:13 PM (/CogT)

195

The great online magazine City Journal ran an article in the year *2000* (that's two-zero-zero-zero) predicting the CRA would lead to disaster:

 

<a href="http://www.city-journal.org/html/10_1_the_trillion_dollar.html">The Trillion-Dollar Bank Shakedown</a>

 

Note they say that the CRA had been on the books since the '70s but was toothless until BJ started to enforce it.

Posted by: FOAF at April 07, 2013 05:04 PM (Kz60W)

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