Sibby confuses fascism with crippled people

In a beautiful example of how common sense is not a conservative value, Steve Sibson saw this news story that I had thought about posting over the weekend, but decided not too because well, there's really nothing there, and went on a delightfully deluded tirade about socialism and fascism again. And we all know how well those turn out.

Anyhow, the story reports

The Justice Department has filed a civil lawsuit against the developers of six multifamily housing developments in Sioux Falls, claiming housing discrimination.

According to the complaint, defendants include Equity Homes Inc., PBR LLC, BBR LLC, Shane Hartung, Scott Snoozy, Myron Van Buskirk, Wayne Hansen, Martin McGee and Sertoma Hills Villas Association Inc.

The six complexes are East Briar Apartments, West Briar Apartments, Kensington Apartments, Beverly Gardens Apartments, Sertoma Hills Apartments and Sertoma Hills Villas.

The lawsuit alleges that the developers violated the Fair Housing Act by designing and building units that didn't accommodate the special needs of elderly and disabled tenants.

You see, not a whole lot there? Just some landlords who didn't feel like accommodating for elderly people and people with disabilities. This, and I'm assuming here, probably has a lot to do with staircases and those cool automatic door buttons. Not a big deal, nothing too hard to fix.

But Steve automatically sees this as the gigantic Federal government coming in and taking ownership of these buildings I guess. He called it "Communism." I think dear Steve is just very confused. A lawsuit is different than a bailout or a buyout.

He then goes on to cite this story from the Argus about how local developers are having a difficult time getting lines of credit for projects. Well, who isn't? Times are tough. And though we are on the road to recovery, we're not there yet. This isn't the 1990's, Steve. Remember those days? Clinton was in office and times were good.

Anyhow, Steve's rant doesn't include much analysis - just a lot of copying and pasting and misguided political understanding of governmental systems. If he had gone on to read the rest of the story, he might have heard William Baker, President of First National Bank explain

For a typical residential development loan, that can be tough these days, even in Sioux Falls. Such loans are commonly structured with a developer borrowing money to buy a piece of land and a credit line to build houses. The developer pays off the credit line and original loan as he sells houses.

If houses aren't selling, the bank doesn't get paid back.

"They want to see projects that are capable of servicing the related debt," Baker said. "I just think that's good banking."

If anything, the article talks about how capitalism has failed and left us with things the way they are and how banks are doing what they can with what they have.

Nothing about fascism, nothing about Communism or socialism. Just an article about how times are tough and banks have trouble lending to anyone, even developers, because there's no guarantee that they'll sell the houses or fill the apartments and have the money to pay the bank back. Steve claims that government intervention is the problem here, but without government intervention, these banks would have gone under and wouldn't have been able to offer credit to well, anyone. Steve should be thanking Barack Obama if anything.

This is just one example of the logically-unsound scare tactics the Republicans have had to resort to as they see their grasp on power (and reality it would seem) slip away.

By the way, Steve, if you'd be so kind as to send me your address, I have a few Political Science textbooks from college I'd be more than happy to send you. That should help clear up the confusion between capitalism and socialism for you. I know it's a toughy.