NEW YORK TIMES | Rick Santelli: Tea Party Time
The New York Times posted an article about the Tea Party:
Yesterday Rick Santelli, who reports from the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade the for CNBC, unleashed a rant against Obama’s newly announced housing bailout plan, intended to help some homeowners refinance mortgages and avoid foreclosure. The clip was quickly linked to and embedded in Web sites everywhere, and provoked intense reaction that pretty much broke along partisan lines.
Peter G. Voisin said:
Tea Party Instructions.
1. Read the Constitution. (http://www.constitution.org/constit_.htm)
2. Use it when you are attacked for limited government and “playing by the rules”.
3. Change your voter registration to “Independent”. Let that be the majority party in America. No lobby money. No party money.
4. Sit back in you chair and watch the “leeches” go crazy.
Definition of “Leeches”:
Any institution that “feeds” off the taxpayer and creates NOTHING.
The Congress
The Media
The Banks
Wall Street
Only the taxpayer create something through their labor or their savings.
Because Congress, Banks, Wall Street, and The Media are not “creators” they have no understanding of real value in our society.
The national budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; the arrogance of the authorities must be moderated and controlled. Payments to foreign governments must be reduced, if the nation doesn’t want to go bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.
Cicero (106 BC - 43 BC), 55 BC
(When does the wisdom start in our public education system? Do we need to spend MORE money on it?)
February 20th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
Andy said:
I agree with your plan, Peter.
I am disappointed, but not surprised, that the reaction ‘broke along partisan lines.’
I have witnessed years of leadership-changes as my country has become sold into debt, its defense over-stretched, and the liberties of the American people stripped away ever-so-slowly by two sides which pretend to be pitted against one-another, simply to keep the People divided and suppressed. Neither the Democratic nor Republican parties have anything to show for the platforms they so cleverly disguised as “choices.”
The ’silent majority’ WILL wake up, and there will be no more “left-versus-right.” The new struggle will be one of “freedom-versus-control.”
Sadly, I do not believe my fellow Americans truly want their liberties, but I challenge them to prove me wrong:
“Freedom versus control”
—choose a side.
February 20th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
peter said:
Let me ask you a question. Where was the objective media when billions of ad dollars were spent on all the TV and Radio stations and magazines touting the no downpayment, no doc loans? There wasn’t one intrepid reporter in the entire country that could see this Economic Disaster of Biblical proportions coming?! In the past 20 years objectivity has been replaced by advocacy. So when Santelli advocates the position of him and his co-workers, he is criticized by the WHITE HOUSE for exercising his FREE Speech. What the hell is going on?
And, if I hear one more damn politician say they “inherited” this economic melt down one more time I’m going to scream. THEY WERE RIGHT THERE! Dodd, Schumer, Pelosi, Reid, Frank — along with their Republican counterparts — were right there. They, in fact, had the fiduciary responsibility to make sure disasters like this didn’t happen. Now they blame the previous administration. How revisionist can you get? Yet the “objective” media never calls them out on the fact that this Congress and government officials were right there. Calls should be going out for impeachments, dismissals of non-elected government oversight officials and restructuring of U.S. Treasury, SEC, FDIC, Fannie, Freddie and the Fed. Instead we just throw our childrens’ and grandchildrens’ as yet unearned income tax dollars at fixes and plans that are not well-thought out and likely won’t work.
I edit a dealer “advocacy” trade publication for the automotive retail industry. At least I am honest about my position, instead of trying to thinly veil my advocacy like NYT, Washington Post, Fox News, NBC and others. Below is a column for one of the leadership experts who regularly contributes to my magazine. You and GIBBS ought to print it out and READ it. Sure people are hurting. Everyone is hurting. What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.
We cannot strengthen the weak by doing for them what they can and should do themselves.
A Wake-up Call to Whiners!
By Dave Anderson
If you still don’t believe that we’ve devolved into a society of victims, whiners and wimps, the buzz of bawling and babbling in the Big Easy during the recent NADA Convention would have convinced you otherwise. I am addressing this article to whiners. While you are probably not one, you most likely know one. If this is the case, please feel free to share these four points with them. It may not shake them out of their denial, but you’re likely to feel better as a result. If fact it was therapeutic for me just to put these thoughts down on paper.
It is more about decisions than conditions. Everyone is blaming conditions for their current, sorry state: the economy, the government, the past president, the manufacturer, their co-workers, the competition, the banks and the list continues ad infinitum. Without question, external factors can impair your business. However, it is your inside decisions, more than outside conditions that have the power to either compound your misery or accelerate your recovery. The fact is, during the robust times, many of you made the decision to do the following: stop recruiting; fail to hold others accountable; avoid tough decisions; neglect controlling expenses, incur new debt, let up on training, take your customers for granted, stop prospecting for new business, ignore personal growth, bond with bunglers, confuse tenure with loyalty, reward mediocrity, freeze in a comfort zone and calcify in a mold. How convenient, to commit these leadership sins and then blame what you can’t control when business turns south! Get a grip! Of course the outside conditions are relevant, but they’d be far less so if you had made better inside decisions. Start making better decisions now and you can limit the damage that external conditions inflict on your business.
Although you wouldn’t know this by listening to the news, there are still plenty of businesses out there having fun and making money. They are those who have chosen to focus more on the quality of their decisions that can move them forward, than a list of conditions that justifies their failures. The adage is true: “Adversity causes some men to break and others to break records.” You can’t break records if you’re blaming conditions!
2. You aren’t as good as you thought. I would like to particularly address the young, cocky, know-it-all sales managers who got into this business in the middle of a strong economy and were propped up by hot product helium and zero percent financing. The favorable outside conditions may have convinced you that you were God’s gift to our industry. Surprise! You’re not, so I hope that you didn’t embarrass yourself by mistaking a bull market for brains. Fact: The good times made you look better than you were. To be fair, the down times are probably making you look worse than you really are as well. Learn from these times. Sharpen your skills, humble yourself, listen more than you speak, admit and correct your failures and commit to going back to the drawing board and proving yourself over again each day.
I know this will come as a surprise to those who are products of today’s “everyone is special”, “don’t keep score” and “every player gets a trophy” entitled times, but here’s the reality. The chances are quite good that you are not that special; rather, you are one of many. You may have talent and potential, but unfulfilled talent and potential are two of the most common tragedies known to man. Simply having these assets makes no one special. Converting talent and potential into results is what is special! You’re not special because you show up, but because you step up! And here’s a newsflash: In the real world, we do keep score and not everyone goes home a winner. Anyone who told you otherwise: teachers, parents, friends, bosses and the like, fibbed to you. One of the best things your mentors could have taught you is that life is filled with absolutes: There is right and wrong; winning and losing; winners and losers, success and failure. However, just because you’re losing doesn’t make you a loser. Losing is a temporary condition, being a loser is a state of mind. But the key that prevents you from devolving from losing into becoming a loser is to toughen up, straighten up, grow up and accept responsibility for your life.
3. Lose your sense of entitlement. Let me suggest what your company owes you: a fair wage, a safe place to work, competent and character-based leadership, training to improve your skills…and that’s about it. Incidentally, you’re not owed the next promotion simply because you have the most tenure. Nor are you due a raise because you’ve been at your desk for another calendar year. These things must be earned and not assumed. And perks ranging from donuts on Friday, free coffee in meetings, turkeys at Thanksgiving or a candy cane at Christmas are offered at the free will of your employer. You don’t have any of these things coming.
Now let’s talk about what you owe your company: (1). When you’re at work, “be there”! Don’t run your personal life or agenda on company time. This includes severely limiting personal phone calls, text messaging, and Internet usage. If you don’t like this or feel too restricted by it, then you should join the other 7.2 percent of the workforce looking for a job at this moment because, contrary to what you may think, it is not your employer’s responsibility to dedicate itself to making you happy. (2). Stop pacing yourself and budgeting your efforts. Give 100 percent of your efforts to your job each day and don’t try to cash royalty checks from what you did, once-upon-a-time. (3). Care! Stop bringing your hands to work while you check your head and heart at the door. Look for ways to improve every aspect of your organization. Do what is required, and then some. Speak well of your organization and its people when you are away from the job. (4). A positive attitude and sense of gratitude for your job. There are eleven million people out of work in America at this moment. Your workplace may not be Shangri-la and your boss probably isn’t Ozzie or Harriet, but there are plenty of folks who would trade their unemployment slips and eviction notices with your paycheck in a heartbeat. You can say “thank you” for the opportunity you have to come to work each day by following the four points previously outlined in this section and others like them.
4. This storm is too long to wait out. Don’t be naïve: This downturn isn’t going to turnaround anytime soon. The economy hasn’t even bottomed out yet, and it won’t begin the process of a slow, methodical recovery until that happens. Because of this, you’ve got to stop waiting for the things around you to change and begin to change more of the things around you. You’ll need to move farther, faster than you have in the past as you seize opportunities, cut losses and adjust your course. Shelve your longer term forecasts for a time and put a business plan into place that works today, in this market. Stop waiting out the storm, get out there and dance in the rain! Get proactive. Revive your killer instinct. Get the upper hand back on your business. Focus on what you can control. The shelf-life for whiners in these current market conditions is becoming increasingly short.
February 21st, 2009 at 6:23 am
nadine said:
EXCELLENT!!!!!
February 22nd, 2009 at 7:40 am
nadine said:
That “excellent” is meant for the write up prior to my comment….not the one a the top!
February 22nd, 2009 at 7:42 am
s coombs said:
revolution is in the air—- need speakers @ tea party—-ron paul– peter schiff—and peters website to run against the’ bankers very best friend’ chris the lousy piece of lying shit dodd is up and running and raised 23,000 sat— and peters hat is not offically even in the ring yet — website set up by some ron paulers just in case—- we might want to take the country back— while there is still somthing left
February 22nd, 2009 at 10:59 am
Phil said:
Finally! The voice of America.
http://www.ricksantellismyhero.americasgottaknow.com
February 22nd, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Andrew Ottiger said:
Rick Santelli’s Rant Is Ironic!
Was it lost on everybody that the support Rick Santelli has received for his rant about the “subsidizing of the “losers’ mortgages” and bailing out “failing institutions” started on the floor Chicago Board of Trade?
Well what about all these whining “populist” traders on the CBOT? They too are “losers.” Who wants to hear from a bunch of “loser” traders who made bad market picks? If they were profiting in this market you would not hear a thing from them. Seriously. Catch a falling knife lately? Holding any worthless CDS contracts? Yields move against your position? Get burned on some indices bets? You should have shorted the market. I certainly don’t want to subsidize you.
Is it completely lost on Mr. Santelli that a major contribution to this financial mess is from “loser” traders and institutions who bet against the market and have/are suffering losses? Many are employed by or get most of their business from the “failing financial institutions.” Without the “failing financial institutions,” there would be no market and no floor on which to place one’s soapbox – yet alone a floor to trade on.
Too many of these institutions allowed too many junior traders and clueless senior traders to become “losers” by over-leveraging and entering into these trades and swaps that they had no business entering while threatening the very thing that is most valuable to the American economy - our markets and the flow of capital and credit. They are now under-water. Ironically, just like the “losers” who bought houses that they did not have a snowball’s chance in hell of paying.
The ownership society is out to lunch.
February 25th, 2009 at 8:43 am