Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
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August 23, 2006
The Bush Boom Party is Over

The U.S. housing bubble is popping. Interest rates are up and will not go down soon. Many people who recently signed Adjustable Rate Mortgages will learn that they can not afford their houses. But by then housing markets will be down and foreclosure will come. More offers will further turn down the market prices. Construction workers will lose their jobs. Homebuilders will shut down.

This will get really nasty next year when $1 trillion in ARMs are in for readjustment. Finally the Bush boom party is over.

The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes and condominiums dropped by 4.1% in July from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.33 million – the lowest level since January 2004. Economists were forecasting the pace of sales to fall to 6.55 million.
The fragile housing market…. 
Resource Investor

Some illustrating headlines:

Housing affordability drops to record low, home builders say 
Market Watch
Affordability conundrum: Prices dip, yet homes remain out of reach
Palm Beach Post
Affordable homes still scarce here
Los Angeles Daily News
Luxury housing market sliding
phillyBurbs

Chill cast over KC housing market 
The Kansas City Star
It’s a housing market for buyers
Arizon Daily Star

Debtors on Borrowed Time
Press of Atlantic City
Homeowners feel pinch of mortgage rate
Washington Times
Study Warns of Homeowner "Rate Shock"
Consumer Affairs

Stalled housing market clouds Lowe’s outlook
Houston Chronicle
Weak housing-market hurts Toll Brothers’ profit
The Salt Lake Tribune
Dollar May Decline on Speculation of Cooling Housing Market
Bloomberg

Posted by b on August 23, 2006 at 15:59 UTC | Permalink
Comments

ps, do you work?

Posted by: annie | Aug 29 2006 4:00 utc | 101

Theres a school of thought that argues that conditions in the hoods have deteororated to a large extent due to upwardly mobile Black folks moving out to the burbs.
Maybe thats how we end up with the “people who got left behind” syndrome i.e Katrina/Superdome.
People in the hood have been betrayed and abandoned by everybody else. Larger society sees them as a lost cause. Nobody wants to have anything to do with peeps in the hood.
The way people in the hood are treated is as important a measure of society as anything else. Because it defines everybody else. People just do not understand how their point-of-view and aspirations are so powerfully shaped by the way society treats people in the hood.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Aug 29 2006 4:30 utc | 102

@jony
I’ve heard the same argument made about how we treat people in our prisons. I think you can apply it to any group of disenfranchised people; you do not need to restrict your observations to this group or that. By any measure, a smaller and smaller portion of the privileged in society exemplify hideous values in their treatment of a growing number of marginalised, underprivileged… whether you focus on the black, female, Hispanic or any other demographic slice of that population.
That the underprivileged have also internalised the same hideous values that are currently being used to oppress them and swell their ranks is perhaps more pathological than the sickness the “elites” suffer from. But I’m with annie when it comes to the casual labelling of this person or that. It’s divisive, counterproductive, and ultimately serves only the interests of the labeller.

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 29 2006 4:40 utc | 103

felix cohen, february 1953:

Like the miner’s canary, the Indian marks the shifts from fresh air to poison gas in our political atmosphere; and our treatment of Indians, even more than our treatment of other minorities, reflects the rise and fall of our democratic faith.

Posted by: b real | Aug 29 2006 4:53 utc | 104

@gylangirl, I’d respond if you had a handy email address, or another venue to suggest. A-blog OT perhaps?

Posted by: jj | Aug 29 2006 5:12 utc | 105

@Monolycus,
Hear you loud and clear. And as you point out, the trend does not look good.
To add a few other thoughts, some problems/issues are corrected by adjustment. Others are more organic. And others are chronic. And others are intractable or at least perceived to be. And as we study the particulars of each slice of the demographics in order to understand its nature, we might ask : is this a slice or is it a cross-slice ?
THIS IS AN OPINION:
To cut to the chase, the prospects of the underpriviledged in the hood is the most intractable social issue in the nations history. And it is as organic in its context as the riddle of the chicken and the egg.
ANOTHER OPINION:
Society’s continuing loss from its treatment of people in the hood undermines society itself far far more than any harm that can be attributed to people in the hood.
Sorry if any of this sounds like labelling but how does one talk about the intractable without using the particular label.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Aug 29 2006 5:54 utc | 106

maybe we should send tanks and rockets to attack and batter the people of the hoods, barrios and reservations till they emerge victorious, full of pride and renewed purpose.
and maybe then, we can begin the task of learning to check our moral superiority.
and we might thank them for having saved us.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Aug 29 2006 6:55 utc | 107

women who work is not a new thing. the lie is that women didn’t work before the 1950s. most women did work, whether in factories or on farms or in family stores. work wasn’t as separted from other parts of life. during WWII women were recruited for jobs that were “male” jobs and then told to stay home when the war was over to give the GIs jobs.
anytime females became the majority in a particular job, before the 1970s, that job was downgraded and so was its pay. Secretarial work began as an exclusively male position. Secretaries were considered something like asst. managers who also could expect to rise to other managment positions…it was a pathway to promotion. With widespread use of the typewriter, secretarial work became “automated” and females took those jobs because they were considered more dexterious. So, women have been in the workforce for generations. Only the very rich women did not work.
the housing market that the GI bill created, i.e. Levitttowns, made homeownership possible for more people than ever. the lack of competition from Europe as it rebuilt after the war gave the U.S. a huge advantage in trade. Then the 1960s with a huge baby boom with dads and careers who were educated under the GI bill and who could own a home. but the homes were no where near as large. most families who owned cars owned one of them.
WWII really created the American middle class, and made it possible for families to have enough money and a job apart from farming or shopkeeping that made it worthwhile to send children to college. Once both those men and women were educated, they looked for work. The influx of the entire baby boom, in general, into the work force seems like a better indicator of rising prices.

Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 29 2006 11:48 utc | 108

Only the very rich women did not work.
i just called my mother. i ask her,
mom, when you were growing up and raising us, was it your perspective that only very rich women didn’t work?
“what what are you talking about.”
“i am having a discussion about women in the workforce. the quality of jobs, women who worked, is it your perception that women who stayed home to raise their families were primarily rich.”
“no, i don’t agree.”
It was just the white upper middle class women who didn’t work. What changed is they got uppity and demanded careers, delayed marriage, and even divorced. But the married ones mostly quit the paid workforce once they had kids……The upper middle class women who do stay are mainly the DINKs [double income no kids] or the divorcee single moms.
some rich white women got uppity and entered the workforce, mostly quitting when they had kids. that’s all there is to this story!
somebody’s drinking kool aid.

Posted by: annie | Aug 29 2006 15:35 utc | 109

if you scroll down there is a US department of laborchart entitled female labor participation rate.
between the years of 1960 and 1993 the number of married working women almost doubled from 31.9% to 59.4% .
women’s bureau

During the 1970’s, women joined the work force in increasing numbers. The Bureau worked for women’s greater access to employment and training as well as to careers of their choice. Another emphasis was the recruitment of women to nontraditional jobs in the trades, professional specialties, and the upper levels of corporate management, which generally paid higher wages and offered mobility and good fringe benefits.
In the 1980’s, the multiple-earner family became the norm.

in 1960 69.1% of married women were not working. they all weren’t rich.

Posted by: annie | Aug 29 2006 16:20 utc | 110

labor chart again sorry

Posted by: annie | Aug 29 2006 16:25 utc | 111

@ JJ,
sorry, I can’t correspond because it reveals my real name.
I think annie likes to go off on tangents. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t address the issue at hand.
All I was saying was the the temptation to place the blame for the problem of rising cost of housing at the feet of married employed women –[single women have absolutely nothing to do with Debs’ original remarks]– is damaging to women.
Just as the temptation to place the blame for falling housing prices on blacks moving into the neighborhood is damaging to blacks.
Blacks do not cause your neighborhood property values to drop. Married women working outside the home do not cause your neighborhood property values to go up. To make either of these arguments is to demonstrate a prejudice against blacks and against employed married women. It is neither a neutral nor a valid economic analysis of housing prices.
At any rate, housing prices are now dropping so maybe Debs and annie will cut working wives a break. According to your theory, lower prices must mean all these uppity women must be returning to domesticity now, huh guys?
LOL!

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 29 2006 20:48 utc | 112

Blacks do not cause your neighborhood property values to drop.
True. I remember reading a survey a few years ago that confirms this.
Also, I would add that on the long run, it is more damaging to Whites when they expediently subscribe to such beleifs than it is to Blacks. Because moral superiority and the hysteria of race is very bad food for the mind.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Aug 29 2006 22:26 utc | 113

I think annie likes to go off on tangents
gylangirl likes to twist the meanings of peoples statements to ignore the points they are making, ascribe labels to them, make herself right against evidence to the contrary, and laugh while she’s doing it.
All I was saying was the the temptation to place the blame for the problem of rising cost of housing at the feet of married employed women –[single women have absolutely nothing to do with Debs’ original remarks]– is damaging to women.
no, that’s not all you were saying, not by a long shot.
btw, it is not damaging to women to look at, notice, or acknowledge millions of additional women in the workforce and question the effects they may be having on society and/or the market. your insistence in using the word blame to prop up your accusations of sexism is transparent and disingeneous. jj using your statements to taint the reputation of moon w/ accusations sexism, by implication setting yourself and another poster as above others in understanding and superior judgement on what is or is not sexism is not only insulting and degrading, it’s an ego trip.
wtf kind of life have you lived that justifies you to assume the mantle of knowing what is damaging to women? more than other posters of this site?
the topic of this site is the bubble bursting on the market. it is not off topic to address the hows and whys of the demand for housing. not once have i stated women entering the workforce are to blame, or even primarily the cause of said demand. and yet, any consideration of this huge influx of millions of workers whether married or single has not prompted you to even acknowledge their effect on any aspect of society.
i have thus far avoided stating what the obvious implication of this glaring ommision on your part implies. even as you so callously, blindly make rediculous statements like Only the very rich women did not work as if the gains and inroads women have made during the last few decades have amounted to virtually nothing. your position is both demeaning and insulting, not just to me but to my entire generation and the one that proceeded to make those inroads.
our effect on the housing market, still i do not know. but i will damn let you call it sexist if we made an impact whether the end result contributed in an untenable situation or not.
laugh all you want, you won’t be the last one laughing, you are making a fool of yourself.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 0:42 utc | 114

i’m with annie entirely on this. gylangirl was the one who took the conversation off on a tangent. it is naive (at best) to think that women’s increased purchasing power over the last few decades would not have an effect on the economic climate of this country – in the housing market as well as many others. and i agree, the superior tone taken by her and jj was offensive to the bone.
sorry to do this anonymously; i don’t want to become embroiled but have been watching from the distance and could not hold back any longer.

Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 30 2006 1:47 utc | 115

Sorry you feel that way annie and Debs. My opinion remains the same.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 2:00 utc | 116

not debs.

Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 30 2006 2:05 utc | 117

Coward, then.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 2:06 utc | 118

hardly, aren’t you the one who told jj you couldn’t send your email address because you would reveal your real name? what’s the dif?

Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 30 2006 2:09 utc | 119

the diff is that I stand by my statements, I am not ashamed of them.
By your reasoning, you may as well call everyone with a non-link moniker a coward.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 2:13 utc | 120

who’s the coward? cat calling the kettle black. if you had any grace you might admit at the least women made an impact somehow on the market. you might admit the womans movement help make huge gains into the workforce in ways other than letting uppity women get their rocks off. you might admit radical movement in the kinds of jobs and salaries open to women albeit still not equal, you might admit some movement in your thinking as i did over the course of this thread by simply being open to another viewpoint, one i hadn’t even considered although it was staring me in the face in my line of work.
but know, you are just sorry i feel this way. your opinion remains the same. and you have the audacity to call someone else a coward.
you should feel ashamed of yourself. the next time you want to make sweeping statements about the posters here, rethink what determined tenacious defenders you may encounter.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 2:18 utc | 121

the reason i gave for making these statements anonymously had nothing to do with being ashamed of them. if you had read carefully, you would have seen that it was to avoid becoming embroiled. i have posted many a time here and elsewhere with a link to my email address. so on that note, i will excuse myself and leave you to cowardice.
perhaps there are some truths here, gylangirl, that come a little to close for comfort and that is why you are clinging to your position? perhaps it is easier to do that than to call into question your own choices and lifestyle? i have nothing against your choices and lifestyle, but i do object to the tone you took with annie and your intractible position on something that is inarguably correct – that women’s increased earning and spending ability has had an effect on our market economy – as much as any other demographic.

Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 30 2006 2:31 utc | 122

I have tried to use facts to elucidate the sexism in Debs original post.
I think if you take a course in monetary policy you will understand my point that housing prices are affected by much bigger factors than whether a couple buying a house has two incomes or one.
That being said you and annie have been putting words in my mouth for some time now, as if I am dismissing wholesale the contributions of women to the economy. I have not done so.
I consider myself a feminist. As a feminist, I am saying these things to educate you on insidious sexism disguised as rational economic analysis. If instead of taking the hint, you prefer to take offense when sexism is pointed out to you, and you prefer to make digressive personal attacks about my choices and lifestyle, that’s your problem.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 3:04 utc | 123

I originally told myself I wouldn’t touch these comments with a ten foot pole, but, I have read annie’s comments and they make 100% sense to me. Annie sums it up very well:
“by implication setting yourself and another poster as above others in understanding and superior judgement on what is or is not sexism is not only insulting and degrading, it’s an ego trip.”
Question: Is the term “sexism” strictly or logically defined? Are insurance companies “sexist” because they may charge woman higher rates for health insurance due to statistical analysis? In a similar vein, is it sexist to charge a man more for his life insurance policy because of his statistical average shorter life span than a woman?
Just asking.
For the record, this is my first post on this subject and I am who I am.

Posted by: Rick Happ | Aug 30 2006 3:11 utc | 124

Rick,
Just because someone finds a remark sexist and supports that argument, why do you think that person is insulting or degrading or superior or ego tripping?
I have as much right to my opinion on commentary as the next person. I think many more epithets have been launched in my direction tonight. I’ve actually been holding back a few choice epithets for annie but it would be rude of me to behave similarly.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 3:18 utc | 125

must be that time of the year 😉

Posted by: b real | Aug 30 2006 3:47 utc | 126

Hey, I frankly do not think Debs had any sexist intent in his comment that sparked this. But my first reading of his comment had me uncomfortable for a brief moment due to how he phrased the point.
And so Gylan feels more uncomfortable about the comment than me does. Perfectly understandable. Shes a woman and it strikes closer to home.
But its all good.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Aug 30 2006 3:53 utc | 127

Just as the temptation to place the blame for falling housing prices on blacks moving into the neighborhood is damaging to blacks.
this would not be an appropriate analogy. the influx of women’s purchasing power is what may have created a higher demand for housing, thereby being partly responsible for the higher prices.
“Just as the temptation to place the blame for rising housing prices on blacks moving into the neighborhood is damaging to blacks.
all better now?
hmm, so you are trying to educate me. because you are such an authority on womens issues?
as if I am dismissing wholesale the contributions of women to the economy.
The sad fact is that not enough married women earn income to make a difference. !!!!
SO even these ones who bothered to work after college do not stay in the paid workforce continuously.
from the US labor statistic link above Labor force participation rates correlate positively with continuous years in the workforce. This makes sense if you consider that at any given time the labor force participation rate is simply a snap-shot of those in the workforce at that moment. In other words, even in 1993 when nearly six out of ten married women were in the workforce, those six women could change from year to year and month to month.
what that means is for ever married woman who exists the workplace, another replaces her, so the impact remains the same.
Those prices have got nothing to do with wifey working outside the home – because generally she doesn’t !
i hardly think i twisted your words. you claimed women beside rich (or upper middle) ones already worked (no comment regarding the kind of work they did, or the improved wages), then you trivialized the contribution of the rich one’s. And they are a small proportion of the population of working women ….It is not enough to impact the price of housing.
This whole business of closing down debate on the analysis of the impact of the large scale entry of women into the workforce that has occurred in our lifetimes, on the grounds that such analysis seeks to ‘blame’ women, and is therefore sexist, is so fucking destructive to the economic independence that women were seeking when they fought to get into and remain within the permanent established labour force
really, i couldn’t have said it better myself.
the next time you try to educate w/hints , try listening to yourself.
I’ve actually been holding back a few choice epithets for annie but it would be rude of me to behave similarly.
oh, no time to worry about rudeness. let it all hang out. i’m just trying to educate you dear.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 3:54 utc | 128

gylangirl,
I guess being a man I wonder how much a sexist I am for even thinking men and women are different. That is not to say that I think women are less than men, or women should be in any way socially restricted in opportunities, or should be paid less for equal work. But this conversation about women affecting housing prices I didn’t see as sexism but rather just an examination of statistics. I didn’t see “blame women” as a centerpiece to anyone’s argument. That is why I brought up the insurance company fees for an example. If insurance companies were required to statistically average both men’s and women’s health problems and charge a single rate to both sexes, it would probably be a higher rate than what I am paying now. Would me saying that women’s higher health costs caused that increase to my new rate make me a sexist?
I am not being sarcastic here, but am I such a sexist by your standard that I am missing the point?

Posted by: Rick Happ | Aug 30 2006 4:01 utc | 129

Okay Annie. Here goes.
You are a lousy debater. You cannot follow an argument, nor understand a comparison, nor pick up on sarcasm. You are quick to take offense and slow to see the big picture.
If that bothers you, you can go have a cup of tea with Guthman Bey’s mother. Not that you would pick up on what I’m really saying to you with that last sentence.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 4:03 utc | 130

Well, if being entitled to an opinion is enough to justify tangents and pissing everyone off, then I qualify for that as well. Ah, entitlement… just because we can do something doesn’t mean we should.
Gylan and Jj, you two have very fine minds and have provided a lot of thoughtful fodder here in the past, but as soon as the subject of gender comes up (or is inserted), you both get wacky and combative. We’ve all got our pet triggers and they make us less, not more, effective. I have homosexual friends who are the LAST people in the world I would go to for productive input about gay rights… I tune out Debs the second he starts talking about the character of his hated white Americans… and I stopped reading White House press releases about how to deal with terrorism.
All of these are real problems, just as sexism is a real problem, but there’s a fine line between expertise and obsession. Far from increasing awareness or outlining solutions, your approach primarily produces eyerolls and resistance to what your saying.
Oh, and I am not anonymous. You can call me a coward, you can call me a sexist, you can call me anything that makes you feel better… I sleep about the same either way.

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 30 2006 4:07 utc | 131

To be honest, Rick, I haven’t given much thought to insurance rates except that when I was single and non-pregnant, I was paying a hefty fee because the assumption was that I should be lumped into the same category as pregnant women merely because of my age.
I do think that we live in a racist patriarchal system, where being white male has meant never having to think about it. I do think that we are all racist, not intentionally, but culturally. I have tried to be open to what it means to be racist and to examine my life and learn from those who have more understanding of racism than I do.
I have also learned from feminists about sexism. Now there are some very radical feminists who I disagree with. But for the most part, I have had to periodically upgrade my thoughts on what is sexism, having come across feminist arguments that were new to me.
I am an admirer of Riane Eisler’s and Edward McCaffery’s writings on how sexism in our culture makes life harder on both women and on men, reducing their leisure freedom and their life expectancy. Which brings us back around to your question about charging higher rates for men’s shorter lifespans: cultural sexism is actually causing the phenomenon that makes you pay higher rates on your insurance.
So it would actually pays guy to think like a feminist and address these cultural sexisms.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 4:22 utc | 132

well, i’m not anonymous either. like rick, i wasn’t going to touch this discussion with a ten-foot pole, but after following b real’s link and reading gylan girl’s attack on annie, i am beginning to understand why i was feeling creeped out earlier in the thread. i remember being appalled last year when i read the remarks about r’giap. but knowing him personnally and knowing with certainty that he is far from a misogynist, i decided it wasn’t worth dignifying with a response. in both cases, the attacks reveal more about the attacker than those attacked. jeez, gylan girl, i wish i could be as smart as you.

Posted by: conchita | Aug 30 2006 4:39 utc | 133

@ Monolycus,
I am disappointed that you find my defending my position with others a ‘wacky obsession’.
How are my on-topic housing prices arguments a tangent, and say oh I don’t know…Rick Happ’s insurance rate comments… not a tangent?
And did I call you a coward? That particular snarky comment of yours is unwarranted. Why would I call you a coward?
After all, you’re signing your posts, right?

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 4:41 utc | 134

Well, conchita, sorry to say you are not.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 4:42 utc | 135

gylangirl, exactly how are you signing your posts if you are not leaving an email address? if people want to hide behind screen names here i’m sure they have their reasons. but to accuse someone who writes anonymously of being a coward when you are similarly writing anonymously seems hypocritical – no?

Posted by: conchita | Aug 30 2006 4:44 utc | 136

You are quick to take offense and slow to see the big picture.
you mean your big picture. i believe i tried numerous times politely to approach this subject after you had made sexist accusations.
You are a lousy debater
the proof is in the pudding darlin’. if i’m lousy, what does that make you?
nor understand a comparison
oh, i think i have a grasp on your comparisons
nor pick up on sarcasm
hmm, sugar coating your insults won’t make them disappear. at least i own mine.
You cannot follow an argumentwifey

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 4:48 utc | 137

gylangirl, go ahead, keep digging.

Posted by: conchita | Aug 30 2006 4:48 utc | 138

Annie,
Actually I’ve picked up on your dismissive attitude toward married women like me for a long time.
My use of the term ‘wifey’ was sarcasm. Knowing, as you do, that comment was coming from an actual wife you might have picked up on that… but no.
conchita,
I give as good as I get. Want some more?

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 4:57 utc | 139

hmm, excuse me, calling you that was below the belt. when i heard you use that sarcasm it cut like a knife, not into me, as i am unmarried, but to each and every working wealthy married woman who’s income you seem to think doesn’t impact the system. who got uppity and decided a career would flush out her reality.
really , i don’t want to become what i despise. sorry for calling you that, really

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 5:01 utc | 140

no thanks, gylangirl. save it for someone more deserving. sad that if you are going to treat people this way that you don’t do it someplace like the corner where you’d have a much larger and more appropriate receptacle.
like annie, i support myself and have to work in the morning so i am off to have a bath and a decent night’s sleep. i leave you to your pomposity.

Posted by: conchita | Aug 30 2006 5:10 utc | 141

g’nite, conceita.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 5:12 utc | 142

an actual wife? as opposed to what other kind.
your dismissive attitude toward married women
sat whaaaa??? do you have any supporting evidence for this? i cannot even remember a thread that approached the subject. some of my best friend are wives! what the hell kind of grasp is that girl? pleeease, grace us w/an example.
frankly, i had no idea you were married until i was having a phone conversation w/a poster late today and the subject came up, maybe it’s cuz i generally gloss over some of your comments. and missed several weeks away this summer. really, you are amazing me!
what on earth evidence do you have on this. certainly not on this thread? it is you who have been dishing the contributions of married women, not only the impact their finances have on their marriages, but in society.
once i ask one of my best friends why she didn’t just take off from work during her pregnancy. we were w/other people. she launched into me “how can you even suggest this, do you think my financial contribution to this household means nothing?” really, her name is rhonda bellmer, she is school superintendent in the town of healsburg calif. one of my college roomates, first person in her working class family to ever attend college. her husband is an administrator at santa rosa JC. the conversation took place in our 20’s, i will never make that mistake again.
soooo, i dismiss married women, i agree w/conchita, dig deeper.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 5:15 utc | 143

@ annie,
it’s been a long nite. i’m not sure what you think you called me, i didn’t hear it. perhaps your take on my comments was just a misunderstanding. perhaps we were both trying to make the same points defending women’s rights and saying it different ways.
i am sorry it came to severe blows like this but it is hard to ignore the personal attacks when i was trying to make a valid point and i wish i had just ignored them.
apology accepted.

Posted by: gylangirl | Aug 30 2006 5:31 utc | 144

[Oh wait let me guess, do you think the economic expansion is also the fault of married women earning a living?]
i’m just curious gylangirl. do you think the addition of millions of women in the workforce, the improved quality of their jobs, and the improved wages has accounted for any economic expansion. lets cut the blame theory, just spit it out.
can you hear any sexism in this earlier grilling of debs.
i was just reviewing the thread, wondering when you made the wifey statement, although i am quite certain it was before i realized you were married. this earlier statement is an example of what i felt were very sexist statements i let pass at the time bcause i didn’t feel pointing them out would be productive. i felt all along you failure to acknowledge the inroads of women was sexist, but am not accoustomed to slinging those kind of accusations. but since you have mentioned you think that we are all racist i assume you include yourself. being so open to examination i wondered if you have considered your own sexism.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 5:35 utc | 145

@gylan
I knew better than to post while angry and did it anyway. I was not calling your concerns a “wacky obsession”, I said specifically that we all have our triggers, and this subject is one of yours… and it does cause you respond more defensively (wacky) than you ordinarily do. I’ve watched this before with just about everyone here when we come close to their pet projects, and if you had not made consistently insightful posts on other topics I would be tempted to tune it out entirely.
Unfortunately, I have been feeling very irritable lately and have been spoiling for a fight, so my approach was a bit more antagonistic than my actual observation was, and that was where my belligerence about anonymity came from.
My bottom line is that annie, jj, Debs, conchita, Rick, yourself and everyone else here all have made wonderful contributions in their turns and have proven to be valuable to this community. Let’s not allow personal hot-buttons to degenerate our overall camaraderie or we will get nothing down in the future.
No lasting offense meant to anyone. I just think maybe this aspect of this thread should be put to bed for now so that we can deal with it from a fresh perspective in a little while.

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 30 2006 5:45 utc | 146

we are cross posting. i called you a wifey. a term i have never heard prior to this thread.
lets chalk it up to education.
most important, lets try not to pit members of our own family against eachother. we are not the enemy here, lets give other posters the benefit of the doubt. accusations such as racist, and sexist, especailly after one has come back and qualified ones statement, as debs did, they hurt. we all all just babes in the woods. this impending doom that might befall our society, which will hurt scads of homeowners, cnnot be blamed on any one segment of society, and people cannot be blamed for trying to insure for their future. to examine the causes of the increase in demand, is different than examining the people who took advantage of the demand.
anyway, we will meet again on these threads, and i harbor you no ill will. i can tell by your passion you care very much for feminist issues and your heart is in the right place. not that you will be taking any advice from me, but rethink the assumptions about the other posters. i try to take one thread at a time. if there is any assumptions i make about us, it is that we all want to see the world w/out blinders, and be part of the solution. maybe we learned a little about eachother we didn’t know (i know you hold close and don’t let go, like me) calling it a night. no hard feelings. maybe we both come away a little wiser
ciao

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 5:48 utc | 147

ps, apology accepted. and i’m sorry too, but all in all, maybe we got somewhere.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2006 6:04 utc | 148

Damn, I missed a good wrangling. I’m reminded that genuine intimacy only comes from working though conflicts,what Robbins calls “crazy wisdom”, in a good fair fight. It clears the stale air and reenergizes us like the ions after a storm. You guys/gals are the salt of the earth as far as I’m concerned, eveyone here.
Now lets all remove our clothes and drink! hehe…
It is a true saying, that a man must eat a peck of salt with his friend, before he know him. ~Cervantes

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Aug 30 2006 6:55 utc | 149

Well, I feel better now. [Robbins any relation to annie you think, Uncle?]

Posted by: beq | Aug 30 2006 11:48 utc | 150

sorry I missed the fight (that’s a joke) but since someone emailed me asking if I was the anonymous poster who was avoiding becoming embroiled — just want to be on the record to say that’s not me. I’ve made too many remarks in anger that I’ve later regretted…don’t want to be thought to be making ones I didn’t. :/
but people discussing this issue might be interested in something that is tangential to the original question but central to women and work. It’s this little book called Get To Work. fwiw- Most of the commentors on Amazon who were protesting apparently hadn’t read the book.
the book really does lay out the problems for females in American society if they trust traditional norms, rather than becoming self-sufficiently employed.
Uncle $cam- you first with the naked drinking….

Posted by: fauxreal | Aug 30 2006 13:08 utc | 151

There’s probably less than meets the eye here, and Guthman Bey will surely get a chuckle out
of another “imminent collapse of the dollar” as international reserve currency” story, but, who knows, someday the little boy crying wolf may
indeed be communicating a crucial warning.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Aug 30 2006 13:27 utc | 152

I don’t deny that the US itself with its lumbering belligerence has been pushing countries slowly in that direction. But as long as the overall USD reserves held by foreign central banks keep increasing month after month and as long as even Hezballah is paying out its reconstruction monies for displaced persons in Yankee Dollars… that immininent collapse of the Dollar Empire is unlikely to be upon us.

Posted by: Guthman Bey | Aug 30 2006 13:45 utc | 153

Private property in the means of production, meaning decentralization of important investment decisions, implies the inevitability of economic swings and anarchy in production. The irreducible spread between the increase in the capacity of social production implicit in capitalism and the limits it imposes on the capacity for consumption by the masses, gives these fluctuations and this anarchy its periodic crises of overproduction. Neocapitalism, the third stage in the development of capitalism, cannot evade these fluctuations and these crises any more than could free competitive capitalism or classical imperialism. It can only amortize the most serious crises into more moderate recessions, at the cost of permanent inflation. ERNEST MANDEL, DECLINE OF THE DOLLAR: A MARXIST VIEW OF THE MONETARY CRISIS 114 (1972)..
around & around & around. you’d think somebody’d have the guts to quit.
but there’s always war. that helps.

Posted by: slothrop | Aug 30 2006 15:22 utc | 154

@Guthman
Fox News. Really? What next… we’re going to be treating the New York Times as a credible resource now? So, according to Fox News, Hizbollah has paid out some $12,000US for Lebanese recovery. And according to Guthman, this $12,000US is the difference between a robust and dwindling economy? Boy, I’m having trouble adding that one up today.
Someone asked me recently why they saw footage of US greenbacks changing Hizbollah hands one night while they were watching CNN. I think a better question would be why CNN would choose to show that footage than what that footage itself means.
And Fox News. Really?

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 30 2006 15:22 utc | 155

of course they’re paying in us$. that’s not surprising at all.

Posted by: slothrop | Aug 30 2006 15:25 utc | 156

The idea that, when it comes to hard news (as opposed to spin) Fox News is less (or more) reliable than other US news sources, is not born out by the facts. Google “Hezbollah and Lebanon and $12000” and you get the same story from hundreds of news organisations. You will also find that to be the case for 99.9% of all stories reported on Fox News.
The footage that CNN shows means exactly what it showed: That at Hezbollah offices in Beirut and in the South of Lebanon people who had their homes destroyed by the Israelis received the amount of $12,000 in cash, an that means Greenbacks. Quite straightforward really.
Nor was this my point.
But you got my point quite well, I believe, you are just irritated by it.

Posted by: Guthman Bey | Aug 30 2006 15:46 utc | 157

@Guthman
“But you got my point quite well, I believe, you are just irritated by it.”
Actually, I didn’t. Was it your contention that the discovery the paltry sum of 12K US dollars changing foreign hands was definitive proof of the strength of the US economy? If this was what you were suggesting, then yes, I would be irritated.
12K US dollars might go a long ways towards rebuilding a single farm or buying lunch for a few thousand refugees for a day or so, but to trumpet this anecdote as definitive proof of the economic might of the USA is tantamount to calling those trailers in Iraq “proof” that the Ba’ath regime was concealing weapons of mass destruction.
The sum cited is so paltry, in fact, that I’m a little disappointed that those opinions already predisposed in a certain direction can be purchased so cheaply. But, hey, it’s good to see that you can cherry pick “evidence” to support a happy mauvaise foi just as easily as you can do it to support an apocalyptic one.

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 31 2006 3:31 utc | 158

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