$700,000,000,000

So was Herbert Hoover during the Great Depression. It made no difference to anyone of the time.

Wow, we managed to do to ourselves what Al Qaeda couldn't. (9/11 --> extended depression)

ironic isn't it?

meh so tl;rd we're all screwed for the next 5~10 years right?

i never understood why the government helps bailout people who dunno wtp they're doing, hell wasting tax payers' money as if it were their own

might as well stock up on food that'll last a few years, we're gonna need it if a Depression does sweep through the USA

i dont get why some of you keep blaming bush. yes he is the president, but he is simply the scapegoat. he doesnt make the law, he is simply putting his vote in.
i am not saying he is a good president or anything but for those who keep pushing the blame on him doesnt know what they are talking about.

It's because of the way he spent so much of America's money on a losing war. He recklessly spent money in other places as well.

iRAQ RECONSTRUCTION

-$142 million wasted on reconstruction projects that were either terminated or canceled. [Special Inspector General for Iraq, 7/28/08]

-“Significant” amount of U.S. funds for Iraq funneled to Sunni and Shiite militias. [GAO Comptroller, 3/11/08]

-$180 million payed to construction company Bechtel for projects it never finished. [Federal audit, 7/25/07]

-$5.1 billion in expenses for Iraq reconstruction charged without documentation. [Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction report, 3/19/07]

-$10 billion in spending on Iraq reconstruction was wasteful or poorly tracked. [GAO, 2/15/07]

-Halliburton overcharged the government $100 million for one day’s work in 2004. [Project on Government Oversight, 10/8/04]

KATRINA

-Millions wasted on four no-bid contracts, including paying $20 million for an unusable camp for evacuees. [Homeland Security Department Inspector General, 9/10/08]

-$2.4 billion in contracts doled out by FEMA that guaranteed profits for big companies. [Center for Public Integrity investigation, 6/25/07]

-An estimated $2 billion in fraud and waste — nearly 11 percent of the $19 billion spent by FEMA on Hurricanes Katrina and Rita as of mid-June. [New York Times tally, 6/27/06]

-“Widespread” waste and mismanagement on millions for Katrina recovery, including at least $3 million for 4,000 beds that were never used. [GAO, 3/16/06]

DEFENSE CONTRACTS

-A $50 million Air Force contract awarded to a company with close ties to senior Air Force officers, in a process “fraught with improper influence, irregular procedures, glaring conflicts of interest.” [Project on Government Oversight, 4/18/08]

-$1.7 billion in excessive fees and waste paid by the Pentagon to the Interior Department to manage federal lands. [Defense Department and Interior Department Inspectors General audit, 12/25/06]

-$1 trillion unaccounted for by the Pentagon, including 56 airplanes, 32 tanks, and 36 Javelin missile command launch-units. [GAO, 5/18/03]


Ohhhhhhh its bush's damn fault all right. It's not that america just needs someone to point a finger at. It IS his fault.

Load of fuckin good that did. The economy is about to implode. Stock market is about to crash we;re fucked.

ONLY IN AMERICA
Do you find retarded people running the country

It's easy to be cynical about America and take it for granted.

For comparison, Hitler took power in 1933 and Germany was hated and burned down by 1945.

Stalin murdered 30 million of his constituents along with almost every single founder of the Soviet Union; the closest comparison would be the murder of the Founders of the American nation by its president. Stalin's successors, while not quite as evil, ran a society where the entire population was on welfare and there was no incentive for anyone to work.

Pol Pot murdered 1/4th of Cambodia, disproportionally targeting the educated. Decades after his regime, the country still severely suffers from a shortage of professionals such as doctors.

Africa is almost entirely run by dictators and bandit chiefs who war with each other and live in wealth while the continent is dying of AIDS, starvation and thirst.

I could go on for about two more pages, and that's just the stuff that readily comes to mind. "Only in America," huh? You seriously should think before you say things, because that's just plain ignorant. People in America complain about how bad they have it, but they don't understand that they're lucky to have plenty of inexpensive food in a nearby grocery store.

Load of pineapplein good that did. The economy is about to implode. Stock market is about to crash we;re pineappleed.

And it looks like the recent actions in the stock market have proven this. The DOW now dropped below 9000 for the first time since 5 years ago, and the S&P got close to dropping below 900.

what's worse is that if harper get's in for Canada, we'll have to pay for you're governments screw-ups too! (FAIL) thats why you should vote NDP!

October 9, 2008

Dow Jones ($INDU): 8,579.19, -678.91 (-7.33%)
Nasdaq ($COMPX): 1,645.12, -95.21 (-5.47%)
S & P 500 ($INX): 909.92, -75.02 (-7.62%)

And to top it off, these three hit their record closing highs exactly one year ago. How wonderful. All the harder to get into college and find a job if this continues

We learned about that in class the other day. That's enough to:
run a small country for 20 years
provide health care for America for 6 years
buy 7 hubble telescopes
there are other examples but I forgot them

>.>

People need to learn to not be silly...the banks/companies should have just refused loaning money, then we wouldn't be in this pickle.

But guys, this isn't just an American crisis. It's a global crisis. :[ It's not just America that's suffering...And if people would learn that low stocks =/= time to sell, maybe the stock market wouldn't be crashing lololol. (As in, I would buy like crazy right now if I had the money. T.T)

People need to learn to save their money and stop living paycheck-to-paycheck buying pomegranate they can't afford. Minimum payment =/= full cost, so they need to stop kidding themselves. This isn't just administration failure, guys. This is intelligence failure... The government isn't the one who's kicking the asses of these businesses. They kicked their *own* asses, for making stupid promises to lend to people who can't pay back. :[!

[edit]: For the record, lol, my money is in a safe bank (Wells Fatty-go) and if I were to buy stocks it would either be in oil or necessities (like...diapers). And my family has always placed strong emphasis on saving $$, not buying shiny new Plasma televisions and stuff. Aaand I am currently studying to become a person that will one day work for an oil company. Hmm...

Eh, buying like crazy is not that of a good idea as some major companies are going BANKRUPT because they have too much debt... Dont buy cheap stocks without doing reasearch. Also pomegranate is good for your health. And caviar can be bought for 5 USD a can in a part of Russia, where I lived. ..........Sigh stupid Americans. I miss caviar. I wanna go back to Pre-WW1 Russia.

Eh, buying like crazy is not that of a good idea as some major companies are going BANKRUPT because they have too much debt... Dont buy cheap stocks without doing reasearch. Also pomegranate is good for your health. And caviar can be bought for 5 USD a can in a part of Russia, where I lived. ..........Sigh stupid Americans. I miss caviar. I wanna go back to Pre-WW1 Russia.

LOL CAVIAR wtp? XDD

No no I know you don't buy random stocks--especially not service crap at this point (any sort of service investment is a BAD idea because services are kinda faltering right now). But things like well-off medical companies (like Tenant or something...UNLESS Obama gets presidency and rapes them hard with health care stuff) and oil (if it drops below $50 a barrel, its an amazing investment because it will *always* go up) are really good to buy.

Lots of companies are safe right now, too. It's not like ALL pomegranate has hit the fan yet. :3