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Im bowing out

THE U.S., Kuwait and Saudi Arabia had financed Iraq as it battled the newly established Islamic Republic of Iran for eight years. After the war, Kuwait demanded that Saddam Hussein — known as a ruthless tyrant who had gassed his own people — pay back his war debt. Hussein refused and invaded the country instead.


The Iraqi leader was now a villain to his former allies that was 1990
Mere excuse. Iraq had designs on Kuwait for decades after British made up the country of Kuwait for their own reasons. Us propped that up for decades of Iraq pushes and then in early 90’s some idiot in state dept hinted we would look the other way for a bit and sadam believed us and did what they wanted for decades. Whoops, changed our mind.

It’s like saying WW1 was caused by the assignation of a minor and unliked prince.
 
Resisting the urge to harken back to the playground days and say it takes one to know one, but I am too mature for that these days (or am I)? ;)

Kidding aside, klinging to prairie populism did my clan in ND no favors over the last 50 years. Time to update the thinking.
What hell did your kin folk do, to make you feel so superior? Vote for Trump?
 
It's not marketing that fuels debt. It is the human condition. We as a species always want something "more". We have to have something, and when we get it we realize it's not enough, so we want something else. Creditors (Credit card companies and banks) came up with the idea of spending money that isn't yours to get something you want. It feeds right into our desires. Marketing companies saw a way to fuel those desires and we got commercials. And yet, you can be debt free if you want. It takes self-control.
 
It's not marketing that fuels debt. It is the human condition. We as a species always want something "more". We have to have something, and when we get it we realize it's not enough, so we want something else. Creditors (Credit card companies and banks) came up with the idea of spending money that isn't yours to get something you want. It feeds right into our desires. Marketing companies saw a way to fuel those desires and we got commercials. And yet, you can be debt free if you want. It takes self-control.
I’ve been told that jet skis are the key to happiness
 
Damn, this thread took off. Need to go get more charts…
K serious question, @SAJ-99, so why shouldn’t the fed go to say 6 or 8% on interest rates.

Actual negatives of a recession for middle class, who don’t have all things considered much skin in the stock market?

My “adulting” experience has been 08 - 22’

Folks who were 30 in the 70s?
 
K serious question, @SAJ-99, so why shouldn’t the fed go to say 6 or 8% on interest rates.

Actual negatives of a recession for middle class, who don’t have all things considered much skin in the stock market?

My “adulting” experience has been 08 - 22’

Folks who were 30 in the 70s?
Ok more charts. I think @Buckbrush said something like "So they raise rates, what is that going to do?Nothing!", or something to that effect. Just look for the pattern in the chart of Fed Funds rate below. It goes up before the gray bars (recessions) and down during. The couple of times you see it go up not followed by a gray bar (1994 and 2018) sure felt like recessions even if they didn't meet the technical definitions. Rates are the price of money. If you make it more expensive, people stop using it, leading to a recession. That is how you fix inflation in the Fed's mind (Not my theory @BigHornRam).

There is some thinking that recessions are good. A sort of cleansing, purging of excesses. The Fed (and Congress and POTUS, etc) doesn't think so and we didn't get that on this round because the Fed threw money at the problem so fast. Corporate defaults and bankruptcies were very small given the situation. They will obviously raise rates, but can they not cause a recession (i.e. thread the needle) seems to be the debate now. If they can't stop a recession, equities are way overpriced.

Screen Shot 2022-02-12 at 10.26.12 AM.png
 
What hell did your kin folk do, to make you feel so superior? Vote for Trump?
Most of them are great people who I love dearly. And I do not feel superior. It has been hard at times to see them trapped in their own self fulfilling narrative at times. Probably no different a situation than a 28 year old trying to get 60 year old dad to do more active crop pricing management on the family farm. Love, respect, appreciation, but a strong desire to update the narrative.

For families, towns and companies, what got us here is rarely what moves us forward. That is not arrogance or disrespect - it is the same leaning into the future that made this nation a success for 200+ years.

What I find arrogant is the self promoting trope that the only people in the world that do anything of value live on a farm or ranch (and even then only the ones that “see things the right way”) and everyone else is worthless and clueless. But that is not my clan’s issue - but it is for some . . .
 
K serious question, @SAJ-99, so why shouldn’t the fed go to say 6 or 8% on interest rates.

Actual negatives of a recession for middle class, who don’t have all things considered much skin in the stock market?

My “adulting” experience has been 08 - 22’

Folks who were 30 in the 70s?
Id love to see some more realistic rates to reel in this inflation and speculation in the markets. I just don’t know what that would do to our national debt. If we have to start paying 5,6,7% to service the debt over the long term, either taxes are going to increase drastically, or the US will default on its debt. My bet is that rates stay sub 4% and inflation will power forward for quite some time.
 
Raising interest rates are like applying your breaks when approaching a corner. Slows you down and you make the corner safely. Wait to long to tap the brakes and you don't make the corner and wreck. Fed didn't do its job when it was prudent and now we will get to clean up the mess.
I think somebody cut the brake lines.
 
I am curious as to the career fields that the people are in that have these $500k plus mortgages and 2 car payments and student loan debt? I make good money but don't see myself signing any papers with a promise to pay back that kind of money anytime soon.
Now I know why I don’t have any money.
Ht guys took it all.
 
Id love to see some more realistic rates to reel in this inflation and speculation in the markets. I just don’t know what that would do to our national debt. If we have to start paying 5,6,7% to service the debt over the long term, either taxes are going to increase drastically, or the US will default on its debt. My bet is that rates stay sub 4% and inflation will power forward for quite some time.
This is sums up the box we have put ourselves in perfectly. Agree with everything you have said here.
 
Id love to see some more realistic rates to reel in this inflation and speculation in the markets. I just don’t know what that would do to our national debt. If we have to start paying 5,6,7% to service the debt over the long term, either taxes are going to increase drastically, or the US will default on its debt. My bet is that rates stay sub 4% and inflation will power forward for quite some time.
High possibility that is how it plays out.

I have another theory that @BigHornRam will love. It sort of explains everything. Americans haven't been asked to sacrifice anything for multiple generations. No personal sacrifice, no financial sacrifice. I can't really think of one since the 80's. After 9-11, we had an entrenched enemy and were staring at wars that we knew would last decades and eventually cost over $1T. People signed up for the armed forces but there was no draft. The rest of America wasn't even asked to pay for it. In fact, they were given tax cuts. 2008 Financial crisis, more money printed, more tax cuts. Trump comes to office wants to build walls and break down established trade policies which all cost money, but more tax cuts. Americans haven't sacrificed anything for as long as I can remember. No way to show direct linkage, but it might explain why people push against wearing a mask, or Montanans push back when the idea of sacrifice opportunity for quality comes up, or just about anything. If you have never been asked to sacrifice anything ever in your life (or your parents'), they all seem like huge give-ups.

I don't know, we all seem to guilty of it.
But it's just a theory. Prove it wrong. Find me a fairly recent example where this applies "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." Not for the individual, but the collective.
 
High possibility that is how it plays out.

I have another theory that @BigHornRam will love. It sort of explains everything. Americans haven't been asked to sacrifice anything for multiple generations. No personal sacrifice, no financial sacrifice. I can't really think of one since the 80's. After 9-11, we had an entrenched enemy and were staring at wars that we knew would last decades and eventually cost over $1T. People signed up for the armed forces but there was no draft. The rest of America wasn't even asked to pay for it. In fact, they were given tax cuts. 2008 Financial crisis, more money printed, more tax cuts. Trump comes to office wants to build walls and break down established trade policies which all cost money, but more tax cuts. Americans haven't sacrificed anything for as long as I can remember. No way to show direct linkage, but it might explain why people push against wearing a mask, or Montanans push back when the idea of sacrifice opportunity for quality comes up, or just about anything. If you have never been asked to sacrifice anything ever in your life (or your parents'), they all seem like huge give-ups.

I don't know, we all seem to guilty of it.
But it's just a theory. Prove it wrong. Find me a fairly recent example where this applies "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." Not for the individual, but the collective.
Wouldn't it be easier to cut some of that spending instead of raise taxes. Less government subsidies sounds better than higher taxes. We pay enough.
 
High possibility that is how it plays out.

I have another theory that @BigHornRam will love. It sort of explains everything. Americans haven't been asked to sacrifice anything for multiple generations. No personal sacrifice, no financial sacrifice. I can't really think of one since the 80's. After 9-11, we had an entrenched enemy and were staring at wars that we knew would last decades and eventually cost over $1T. People signed up for the armed forces but there was no draft. The rest of America wasn't even asked to pay for it. In fact, they were given tax cuts. 2008 Financial crisis, more money printed, more tax cuts. Trump comes to office wants to build walls and break down established trade policies which all cost money, but more tax cuts. Americans haven't sacrificed anything for as long as I can remember. No way to show direct linkage, but it might explain why people push against wearing a mask, or Montanans push back when the idea of sacrifice opportunity for quality comes up, or just about anything. If you have never been asked to sacrifice anything ever in your life (or your parents'), they all seem like huge give-ups.

I don't know, we all seem to guilty of it.
But it's just a theory. Prove it wrong. Find me a fairly recent example where this applies "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." Not for the individual, but the collective.
I don’t have time to provide an exhaustive list but let’s start with the men and women who did volunteer and gave their life or wellness for the nation, the nation’s first responders, below national median income ICU nurses on 14 hour, 6 day a week, shifts for the last two years, what about the hourly employees, many of them lawful but still disparaged first generation immigrants, shoulder to shoulder still working when to worst of Covid hit so we all could enjoy our burgers and bacon, etc etc etc

I find the majority of Americans willing to rise up and do great things when asked. And while we have not had a world war for a while, bravery, dedication and selflessness shows itself even day if we turn off the cable pundits, social media influencers and political hacks and just watch for it.
 
I don’t have time to provide an exhaustive list but let’s start with the men and women who did volunteer and gave their life or wellness for the nation, the nation’s first responders, below national median income ICU nurses on 14 hour, 6 day a week, shifts for the last two years, what about the hourly employees, many of them lawful but still disparaged first generation immigrants, shoulder to shoulder still working when to worst of Covid hit so we all could enjoy our burgers and bacon, etc etc etc

I find the majority of Americans willing to rise up and do great things when asked. And while we have not had a world war for a while, bravery, dedication and selflessness shows itself even day if we turn off the cable pundits, social media influencer and political hacks and just watch for it.
Agreed, the world War generations were volunteering to fight off evil. Not give up more money to politicians disastrous spending, which is quite the opposite of fighting evil.
 
If I can add a bit of color in support of @SAJ-99’s comment about the lack of sacrifice, I think the key clarifying point is we don’t do collective sacrifice anymore.
I was in freshman band class playing trumpet when someone popped the door open to say someone had blown up one of the Twin Towers. A while later ‘America is going to War!’ Were the headlines. I remember wondering whether we’d trot out the WWII playbook…victory gardens, buy war bonds. Nope, instead the president told us to go shopping.
Since then, it’s mostly been tax cuts, consumption, and the hurt borne by specific segments like @VikingsGuy mentioned—armed forces, first responders, medical staff.

But the major point is we socialize benefits whereas the suffering gets localized. As a consequence we are unaware collectively of the negative impact of the choices we make collectively
 
High possibility that is how it plays out.

I have another theory that @BigHornRam will love. It sort of explains everything. Americans haven't been asked to sacrifice anything for multiple generations. No personal sacrifice, no financial sacrifice. I can't really think of one since the 80's. After 9-11, we had an entrenched enemy and were staring at wars that we knew would last decades and eventually cost over $1T. People signed up for the armed forces but there was no draft. The rest of America wasn't even asked to pay for it. In fact, they were given tax cuts. 2008 Financial crisis, more money printed, more tax cuts. Trump comes to office wants to build walls and break down established trade policies which all cost money, but more tax cuts. Americans haven't sacrificed anything for as long as I can remember. No way to show direct linkage, but it might explain why people push against wearing a mask, or Montanans push back when the idea of sacrifice opportunity for quality comes up, or just about anything. If you have never been asked to sacrifice anything ever in your life (or your parents'), they all seem like huge give-ups.

I don't know, we all seem to guilty of it.
But it's just a theory. Prove it wrong. Find me a fairly recent example where this applies "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." Not for the individual, but the collective.
Unique theory SAJ.

I'm going to recommend @Bigjay73 continue to be cautious and prudent with his real estate search and hope all works out for him and his GF.
 
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