Lucas a Republican?

I hate to break it to you, but it looks like George Lucas is a conservative. At least in a fiscal sense.

Talking about President Obama capping the salaries of business CEOs receiving federal bailout dollars, he said:

“I think it would be a good thing for shareholders to unite and say, ‘We are not interested in paying our executives this much money.’ That would work. But it’s not the government’s job to do that. It’s the stockholders job, but of course, they don’t seem to mind [Obama capping bank CEO salaries]. I’m not sure why. I wouldn’t pay somebody that much money.”

He went on to say that the current problem is due mainly to bad mortgages and toxic assets that the financial industry has taken on. I agree there. He also said that it was a problem created in the last eight years... which is a bit of a stretch. The Bush administration didn't do quite enough to halt the "sub-prime" market, though they repeatedly petitioned Congress to look into it.* With that said, this was a mess many, many years in the making. Banks made bad loans... knowingly made bad loans - in an attempt to make a LOT of money with little regard to ethics or what consequences may have lay ahead. For that they should be held account.

However, the federal government also pushed them and certain community groups pressured them, and their implication in the mess should not be forgotten.

* - Links are to blogs, where the White House website was cited. Those pages have been taken down since the new administration took over on Jan. 20.