My perspective is that a series of government policies, regulations and deregulations, since at least back to 1938 have led to the situation where mortgage lenders were pressured to lend to those who could not afford it, and then given the ability to come up with new ways to do so while minimizing their own risk. These policies came from both sides of the asile, and many of them worked when they were first instituted, but they continued with insufficient oversight and became detrimental as conditions changed, especially in the last few years.

Perry, I did not object to the Bush tax cuts. Also I believe that they were beneficial to more than just the higher income people. Perhaps if I had the job I would have cut taxes differently, but I was okay with that part of what the President did and DID NOT protest it.

I assume your argument is that I support the Bush policy because I didn’t object to his tax cuts. I would like to point out that President Bush’s policy was more than just tax cuts. While Republicans like to lable Democrats as “Tax and Spend” Liberals, President Bush was a “Cut and Spend” Republican. Experience shows that a cut and spend policy can be even more immediatly destructive than a tax and spend one. Spending must also be cut and at the very least made more efficient and cost effective. President Bush did the opposite and grew public spending. That, I did not agree with and I DID protest it.

You may dissagree with my position, but while responding to your request for my record on President Bush’s tax cuts I thought I would flesh it out a little to give a more complete picture.

Link please, to some regulation that has those requirements as you stated.

I think anyone with a job that is working as hard as they can should be able to apply for and achieve a mortgage. If they aren’t able to get a job, or can’t work, then their is other assistance designed to help with that. However, just because every gainfully employed person should be able to take out a mortgage does not mean that they should be able to get one for a 4 bedroom 3 and 1/2 bath house with a pool out back. If they can’t afford it, then they shouldn’t be given it. Instead they should be given a mortgage for what they can afford.

Mortgage lenders were regulated into a bad situation. When they came up with solutions to stay afloat that were just as bad or worse the government didn’t regulate them because they couldn’t, without taking a long hard look at the policies which caused the situation. That is the way I view this situation.

Perry, on taxes what we as Americans forget is that we the people have that obligation to create the societal framework and the laws. That is how this nation started, of the people, by the people, and for the people. Not of the taxes, by the taxes, and for the taxes. Most Republicans and Conservatives know that we can’t get rid of all taxes. However, they know we should take back a lot of them, a long with a lot of the responsibility for our own lives and the world around us. They want to at least get closer to the Constitutional government we started with. You can argue that is a bad thing but I think our founders did pretty well with it and I think we could too.

Timothy, you don’t seem to understand the origins on Wall Street of the toxic assets that have set off the downward economic spiral in which we find ourselves. With proper government oversight and regulation, this would not have happened, or at least it would have been lessened.

On taxes, you Republicans don’t seem to realize that you have an obligation to the people to provide an orderly societal framework based on the law. With your idea of ultra-limited government, we would continue the chaos that we now experience. Taxes are used to provide the needed protection within the law. This is not to say that government revenues can also be poorly handled, so an observant citizenry can play the watchdog role to guard against this possible abuse of public monies.

I agree that rising health and education costs are a major problem. I think we should look at what is causing those costs to rise. We shouldn’t implement elaborate programs to solve those problems until we have a comprehensive picture of what is causing the dramatic increases in cost that seem to be out pacing the rest of the economy.