Why the F$%k was Larry Summers in the Democratic economic press conference this week?

[Ken Burch]

This is the wack job that had to quit as president of Harvard because he said women couldn't learn math, FFS!
And the guy who drove away Cornel West, the preeminent African-American academic while he was there.

Why the hell would OUR Congressional Democratic leaders want anything to do with him?

His presence was an insult to our own SPEAKER, in case anybody hadn't noticed that.

And the guy doesn't even have any economic ideas other than that Dems should obey Wall Street. He isn't on the side of our voters on anything.

Lawrence Summers is A failed economist whose presence is an affront to women, workers AND academics. People like that have NO place in the Democratic party.

C'mon, guys, we can do better than him!

[madrchsod]

1. the democrats have their collective heads in the sand

or their staffs do not pre-screen anyone? who knows.

[SoCalDem]

2. and no Paul Krugman.. a REAL economist

why?

because paul would have told them their idea was full of shit..

All that needs to happen is for the government to RE-regulate lending institutions and go back to making loans the way they did back when things were "normal"..

There's no reason on earth why a home loan should be more than say 7% for the RESIDENCE ...and there should NEVER be interest-only , variable rate home loans ..EVER..

2nd homes & income residential housing could have higher rates as a ceiling, but NO "housing loan" should ever exceed 10%, but people should never have an open credit line that exceeds their income..

Credit cards should never be allowed to charge more than 10% interest

Real credit checks need to be happening again, too.. Paycheck stubs, tax returns & bank statements.. and the PITI should NEVER exceed 25% of one's take-home income.

Any more than that, and you are ASKING for trouble..

No less than 20% down should be the norm, and re-financing & equity loans should never remove more than 50% of the equity in a home.

[Ken Burch]

3. There's got to be somebody here who has an explanation for Summers' presence

The man is clearly way to the right of the party on all major issues. His main allegiance is to Wall Street. Again, why do our "leaders" want a man who is not only classist, but clearly contemptuous of women and people of color, to have an important place in Democratic policy-making?

[SoCalDem]

4. Probably because most of our dem "leaders" still think that they can woo and win

the mushy middle and even sway some conservatives.... as long as they don't "appear" to be "leftist".. In doing so, they end up with NO real conviction about anything...just another politician with his hand out for campaign loot..