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I also disagree with your assumption that money was transferred to the wealthy through tax cuts. Tax cuts, by percentage, went to the lower income brackets so that the burden on the wealthiest actually rose with the tax cuts, becoming even MORE progressive.
Why don't you check out page nine in Lilly's report? There is an impressive graph there, claiming that fewer than 15,000 American families got one quarter of the nation's personal income growth bewteen 2002 and 2006. That's staggering, if you ask me. Lilly also claims that while the bottom 90% of Americans got a modest raise of $305 between 2002 and 2006, it is almost certain that most or all of that income raise went to the richest of the bottom 90%. If it wasn't the Bush tax cuts that gave the very richest people such stupendous raises, then where did those amazing raises come from? Particularly in view of the fact that the richest Americans got so much richer while middle-income America became poorer.

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It's a fairly complex topic that I'll admit I don't fully understand despite having learned a bit about them when I had a securities license with the NASD. Believe it or not, I started my career as a securities broker before becoming a software engineer years later.
If you don't understand why the banks made those swaps in spite of having worked as a securities broker, are you sure that those swaps make any good economic sense at all? Haven't they just been a way for banks to increase their nominal assets and short-term profits?

Maybe it was Clinton who forced them to make those swaps? Sorry, couldn't resist. I remember when I got a 25-page rambling document into my hotmail inbox, claiming that it was Clinton's fault that 9/11 happened. Hey, I'm not saying he was perfectly blameless, but... come on. I suppose Clinton caused Russia's intervention into Georgia, too? Okay, I'm not saying he was blameless. And I guess he was the one who caused the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the massacre at Virginia Tech, the derailment of that train in Los Angeles, and the fury of Katrina and Ike. Wow. I remember the Clinton years as a period of optimism, prosperity and peace. Who'da thunk he would be found guilty of every disaster that has happened to the United States since he himself left office?

I know. That was unnecessarily provocative. But I'm tired of how some people blame Clinton for everything that went wrong in America after his presidency was over, while at the same time they can find no fault with the people who were actually in charge of the country while the problems and disasters happened.

Ann