Phil Gramm

Yup - now he is gone again. Via TPM:

ARLINGTON, VA -- Today, former U.S. Senator Phil Gramm issued the following statement:

"It is clear to me that Democrats want to attack me rather than debate Senator McCain on important economic issues facing the country. That kind of distraction hurts not only Senator McCain's ability to present concrete programs to deal with the country's problems, it hurts the country. To end this distraction and get on with the real debate, I hereby step down as Co-Chair of the McCain Campaign and join the growing number of rank-and-file McCain supporters."

Sounds like a lot of whining from the former Senator.

So you thought John McCain was done with Phil Gramm? Well you were wrong:

After Sen. John McCain publicly repudiated his close friend and adviser Phil Gramm's comments about a "nation of whiners" and a "mental recession," the two old political comrades patched up their relationship.

Gramm apologized to McCain for his remarks that gave Democrats an opening against the Republican presidential candidate and provided several days of ammunition for blogs, cable television and radio talk shows. McCain told Gramm not to worry about the expected pitfalls of a campaign surrogate. Gramm will continue as an adviser and surrogate.

Gramm remained a steadfast supporter last year when it appeared that McCain's campaign had collapsed. McCain was a loyal backer of Gramm's failed 1988 campaign for president and did not leave until the candidate dropped out of the race.

So Gramm is to remain an "adviser" to McCain. He apologized to McCain, but not the American people for calling them "whiners" when it comes to the economy. This proves that McCain is standing by his friend and adviser and must believe what Gramm has said. Must be easy when you have a multi-millionaire wife to support your ass.

When you complain about paying $4.00+ a gallon for gas and can't afford health care, food, the mortgage or vacations, you are being "mental" and "whining". That according to McCain's economic guru, and one of the key players in this mortgage crisis (as well as husband of someone closely tied to the Enron scandal), Phil Gramm.

"You've heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession," he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. "We may have a recession; we haven't had one yet."

"We have sort of become a nation of whiners," he said. "You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline" despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth continues in the economy, he said.

So being unable to feed the family is whining? These are the Republican values we hear so much about, and the values John McCain embraces. Starving kids, homeless families and people unable to receive medical care. Just ashame we don't all have multi-millionaire wives.

Last night Keith Olbermann ran this segment on McCain's ties to former Senator Phil Gramm:

Today all the blogs are a buzz about this "breaking news". I guess they should read my blog more often, where I started talking about McCain and his ties to Gramm back in March.

I'm glad this story is finally getting out there. People need to know that the man McCain has said could be his pick for Treasury Secretary is one of the key players in causing this mortgage mess we are in now. It shows that McCain can't be trusted at all. He will destroy this country as much, if not more, than George W. Bush.

Here is his own 3am ad:

Pretty interesting coming from a man who's top economic adviser is considered one of the key culprits in the entire subprime mess.

Speaking of Phil Gramm, let's look at his employer:

The spiraling crisis in the credit and housing markets has kept Gramm in focus, fairly or not. His employer, UBS, revealed yesterday that investment losses tied to the U.S. housing market reached $37 billion over the last six months. For the last three months, UBS posted a $12 billion loss.

Gramm, UBS's vice chairman, said yesterday he was "totally unaware" of his bank's massive holdings of securities tied to subprime mortgages, but, he added, "I'm confident we'll recover."

So Gramm was "unaware" of where a majority of the income was generated from, for a company he helped run? For some reason I just can't buy that. Gramm is just like McCain - nothing more than a liar. They will both destroy our economy even more.

The Politico is just now getting the story out of McCain economic adviser Phil Gramm, and his ties to the subprime mess we are in today. I reported about this on Monday.

All the same, I am glad to see the story get some traction now. People need to know that the man behind McCain's economic policy is the same man that has lead us to the disaster we are in today.

Phil Gramm is McCain's chief economic adviser and was one of the chief architects of the deregulation of the banking industry that helped get us into the mortgage crisis. Now George Bush is proposing sweeping new regulations of the banking industry to help prevent more problems. This appears to go strongly against Gramm's beliefs, as well as the neo-con belief of "smaller government" over all. It is going to be interesting to see how the neo-cons respond to this new proposal.

First the wrong:

On the Democratic side, it's somewhat disappointing that Barack Obama, whose campaign has understandably made a point of contrasting his early opposition to the Iraq war with Hillary Clinton's initial support, has tried to score a twofer by suggesting that the war, in addition to all its other costs, is responsible for our economic troubles.

The war is indeed a grotesque waste of resources, which will place huge long-run burdens on the American public. But it's just wrong to blame the war for our current economic mess: in the short run, wartime spending actually stimulates the economy. Remember, the lowest unemployment rate America has experienced over the last half-century came at the height of the Vietnam War.

Krugman would be right on this, if it was during the Vietnam war. He seems to forget that we now have this new "global economy". Most of our bullets are made in Israel, and now we got our planes being made in Europe. War doesn't benefit our economy the same way it used to. Basically we have outsourced the "benefits of war" to other nations.