You Suck

Roy, watching the debate and noting that its somewhat open format gives both candidates “an opportunity for endless filibustering, especially on matters like the Wall Street bailout where both… are more interested in misdirecting our attention from the massive heist their parties are about to engineer than in explaining the situation,” concludes, appositely, that “[t]his country’s fucked.” I concur.

Really, with Democrats like these, who needs Republicans? Oh, I know — and I’m sure someone will be along shortly to remind me — that I’m an asshole, can’t be pleased, am boringly leftwing, and don’t I know about Hope? and Change? But before someone accuses me of being a crypto-Greenie, and thus being a rank rodent from the get-go, just waiting for any excuse to jump from the good ship Democrat, deluding myself that it has wrecked on the Cape of False Hope (because guided by the starry-eyed?) when anyone can see that it’s a smooth sail until port in November, lemme just say again that I’m still gonna vote for the fucker. (However, to conclude the out of control — and admittedly trite — nautical metaphor, I do plan on jumping ship immediately after it docks, and then doing my best to sink the heap unless a major retrofit and crew change is undertaken.)

But that vote is getting harder and harder to cast. I anticipated having to hold my nose at the ballot box, but a hazmat suit now seems more in order:

Sept. 28 (Bloomberg) — U.S. presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama each deserve credit for a breakthrough in talks on a $700 billion plan to revive the credit markets, their advisers said today.

And:

Mr. Obama, too, went from offering broad critiques of the proposal, and general outlines for changes, to calling Mr. McCain on Wednesday with the idea that they could present a united front on the issue, laying out the areas of common ground on a way forward. (Both have called for greater oversight and for assurances that taxpayer dollars not be used to enrich executives, among other provisions.)

And:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama on Sunday tentatively supported the $700 billion plan to bail out the U.S. financial system.

“This is something that all of us will swallow hard and go forward with,” McCain said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The option of doing nothing is simply not an acceptable option.”

“My inclination is to support it,” said Obama, his Democratic rival in the November 4 U.S. presidential election.

[…]

Both candidates refused to be pinned down on the economic plan during their first presidential debate on Friday. By Sunday, with a tentative deal in place, each gave general support with comments that the taxpayers had to be protected.

Later at a rally in Detroit, Obama called the bailout an “outrage.” “But we have no choice,” he said in prepared remarks. “We must act now. Because now that we’re in this situation, your jobs, your life savings and the stability of our entire economy are at risk.”

Supporters tried to play up their candidate’s roles.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told “Fox News Sunday” said Arizona Sen. McCain played a “decisive” role in getting balky House Republicans to focus on negotiating a compromise. McCain cut his campaign short last week to return to Washington to deal with the crisis at a White House meeting.

But Democratic Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts told the same program it was Obama who took the lead at that meeting while McCain remained silent.

They’re actually fighting over who gets credit for it. But then what else is ‘Unity’ and post-partisanship about? Aside the obvious ego and careerist jostling over who did the right thing, it’s all such quintessential American bullshit: in times of crisis, close ranks, wave the flag, [re]sell your soul to Mammon (by selling out your countrymen), be fucking stupid:

This is not a Democratic problem or a Republican problem – this is an American problem. Now, we must find an American solution,” said Senator Barack Obama.

Riiight. The partisan blame-game, a superficial and short-term exercise, can indeed be a part of ‘Unity’ and kissy-kissy bi-partisanship, which is the substantial and ongoing project. It’s all in an American politico’s day’s work — and what work! This latest is nothing less than the hugest corporate welfare bill in the history of the universe.

I can’t help but think, in light of what American leaders like Mr. Hopey, who are allegedly reliable liberals, have done (and are doing) for ‘love of country’, if it wouldn’t be better for some (Democrats at least) to abandon their patriotism and adopt Disraeli’s hierarchy of party over country. Maybe then they actually could do America some good. But, nooooo. Even if I could excuse Hopey’s latest excusion in moral and political FAIL on the grounds that he’s trying to court independents (who are always assumed to be deeply conservative if not reactionary, and in this case specifically assumed to be investment bankers and their admirers), then there’s the problem of the Congressional Democratic Leadership, which should be twice shy when George Bush says there’s a crisis and demands instant action and a blank check. But, again, noooo:

Convincing their colleagues to back the plan despite thousands of angry phone calls, e-mails and letters pouring in from angry constituents proved a tall order for leaders in both parties.

“Now we have to get the votes,” said Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the majority leader. He said the measure could pass the Senate as early as Wednesday.

[…]

Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., said he was inclined to oppose the bill. But he added: “A lot of people are going to hold their nose and vote for it, because they’ve been put in a bad position and they don’t have any other option.”

Leaders in both parties were scrambling to put the most positive face on the deeply unpopular plan. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. said it wasn’t a bailout but a “buy-in” for taxpayers to rescue the economy.

Still, lawmakers in both parties who are facing re-election were nervous about embracing such a costly plan proposed by a deeply unpopular president that would benefit perhaps the most publicly detested of all: companies that got rich off bad bets.

Not nervous enough. Obviously, we have one last chance to exert some pressure. I suggest we do it. Again. I plan on calling Mrs. Lincoln, Mr. Pryor, and Mr. Berry first thing in the morning. I ask that you call your Congresspeeps, too. If the bill passes anyway, then we start thinking about pitchforks and torches, ‘Tilden or blood,’ and building a new Bonus Army camp on Wall Street (where we’ll exchange recipes, my favorite being spit-roasted government-teat-suckled kleptocrat). In for 70 trillion pennies, in for extracting several pounds of the… umm, corporate structure, as it were.

Seriously, though, that Congress could even be thinking about giving 700$ billion to the wealthy criminal class just shows how deeply to heart both parties have taken the philosophy of “socialism for the rich, free enterprise for the poor.” Obama had enough presence of mind during the debate to mention how trickle down economics doesn’t work, yet… that’s exactly what this bailout is all about, and he and his party are going along with it: throwing money at people like this, horrible people who should be set on fire and then maybe or maybe not extinguished with fresh urine, and hoping that the benefits will in turn trickle-down to people like this, the decent if understandably pissed-off people who’ve repeatedly been pissed-on even when the economy was supposedly “great.” The Congressional Democrats (and maybe even quasi-Populist Republicans) could, at minimum, throw a legislative monkey-wrench into what amounts to the latest and greatest Business Plot, but being strategic reactionaries when it would actually benefit their constituencies really isn’t their bag (on the other hand, when the initiative is, say, the potential impeachment of war criminals, they are pleased to respond with an instant and adamant “No!”). Though alternatives to the bill exist there’s really no need to hurry (hence George Bush’s and Paulson’s insistence that everyone act now before it’s too late!!1!); yet, rushing headlong is exactly what they are doing, closing their ears to the sound of millions of Ackbars yelling, “it’s a trap!”

What the dirtbags want is pretty obvious even to retards like me. This WSJ article from relatively early in the “crisis” hints heavily at what the malefactors of great wealth expect from their prostitutes in government who, perversely, pay to get fucked:

In such circumstances, governments almost invariably experiment with solutions with varying degrees of success. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt unleashed an alphabet soup of new agencies and a host of new regulations in the aftermath of the market crash of 1929. In the 1990s, Japan embarked on a decade of often-wasteful government spending to counter the aftereffects of a bursting bubble. President George H.W. Bush and Congress created the Resolution Trust Corp. to take and sell the assets of failed thrifts. Hong Kong’s free-market government went on a massive stock-buying spree in 1998, buying up shares of every company listed in the benchmark Hang Seng index. It ended up packaging them into an exchange-traded fund and making money.

Plainly, they loathe remedies one and two, are neutral on three, but favor with finality the fourth solution, Hong Kong’s — unsurprisingly, as it is the best means to implement their longtime inverse Robin Hood strategy of stealing from the poor to give to the rich (i.e., themselves). But then as good social Darwinists (aka libertarians), it’s only natural that they feel they deserve a second or third or eleventieth chance when the stakes are billions of dollars; it’s the little people who should perish after a first “bad decision.”

So much for the “philosophical” and personal reasons behind the dirtbags’ desire for the bailout, now to address the political calculus. Thom Hartmann cuts it to the quick:

For Grover “Drown Government In The Bathtub” Norquist, this bailout deal will work out very well. At a proposed cost of $4,780 per taxpayer, it’ll further the David Stockman strategy of so indebting us that the next president won’t have the luxury of even thinking of new social spending (expanding health care, social security, education, infrastructure, etc.); taxes will even have to be raised just to pay for the bailout. It’ll debase our currency, driving up commodity prices and interest rates, which will benefit the Investor Class while further impoverishing the pesky Middle Class, rendering them less prone to protest (because they’re so busy working trying to pay off their debt). It’ll create stagflation for at least the next half decade, which can be blamed on Democrats who currently control Congress and, should Obama be elected, be blamed on him.

Bingo.

A more leftwing Congress and presidential candidate would reject this bailout because it’s the morally and ideologically decent thing to do. But beyond that it’s also the most politically conscious (in the sense of the politician’s first instinct: self-preservation in the form of re-election) thing to do. Alas, this candidate is a Clintonoid centrist and serial triangulator, as is the Congress. And they are falling into the trap just like their role model did. Obama is personally appealing, as was Bill; perhaps that will be enough to save him if not us (as for the Congress, forget it; 2012 is the next 1994). A while back, Zizek observed:

In the UK, the Thatcher revolution was, at the time, chaotic and impulsive, marked by unpredictable contingencies. It was Tony Blair who was able to institutionalise it, or, in Hegel’s terms, to raise (what first appeared as) a contingency, a historical accident, into a necessity. Thatcher wasn’t a Thatcherite, she was merely herself; it was Blair (more than Major) who truly gave form to Thatcherism.

The parallels are obvious: Reagan=Thatcher, Clinton=Blair; Obama’s well on his way to being Clinton II, institutionalizing Bushism, W. himself being a more bugfucky version of Reagan. Imagine the whole country and its historical trajectory as JFK’s exploding head: back, and the to right; back, and to the right. Overton Window. You know the litany. Yeah, blah blah blah: but it’s the fucking truth.

Give the Republicans, specifically Bush, credit for doubling-down on the evilness factor, going like Mr. Burns from everyday villainy to cartoonish super-villainy: they were worried that the trillion-dollar war wasn’t enough to hamstring the next president, thus the acte gratuit of demanding an extra 700$ billion of a Congress eager to please. As for me, I take a sort of solace in the symmetry of it all. Even after the Emperor had exhibited the beginnings of the cruel tyrannies which would eventually make his reign infamous, the Roman Senate offered to give Tiberius blanket approval to his all future proposals. At the time, still human enough to be horrified at the principle and leery of the precedent of it, he said no. But of course eventually he acted as if he’d said yes. Plainly the U.S. Congress has their historical analog, and George Bush has his. Most of the especially awful Roman Emperors left empty treasuries and heavy debts, which forced their heirs into doing more awful things to replenish the coffers which in turn they’d inevitably squander and… the trajectory is obvious. The heavens fall. I know it’s a very Glibertarian thing to fantasize about the apocalypse, but I can’t help myself. First thing I’m gonna do when the Vandals come and the Empire implodes? Shoot the Glibertarians who caused it all.

Update: Holy shit! The fuckin’ audacity:

One of the more contentious issues was how to limit the pay of executives whose firms seek government aid, a top priority for Democrats and even some Republican lawmakers. But it was a concern for Mr. Paulson, who worried about discouraging firms from participating in the rescue plan, which seeks to convince companies to sell potentially valuable assets to the government at relatively bargain prices.

MOAR: All this is pretty much right. And someone pat Ben Stein on the head; this is a righteous bit of populism (RTWT, it’s really that good). See also Ian and Sterling.

Exactly.

 

Comments: 150

 
 
 

Shoot the Glibertarians who caused it all.

Come now, HTML. Surely you’ve gotten the memo?

It was the liberals and the coloreds.

 
LA Confidential Pantload
 

The Republicans are just acting according to nature: they seen their opportunities and they took ’em. To judge from their eagerness to embrace catastrophe, it would appear that the Democrats have traded in the donkey for the lemming.

 
 

but it’s the fucking truth.

And no one can see it but you! The fools! They’ll be sorry! They’ll all be sorry!

Don’t worry about Hope, man. I think you just need to tone down the maudlin despair.

 
 

No offense dude, but the without the bailout, it’s actually mostly poor and middle class who will have to suffer.

I know you know something of history. Regardless of the crisis, even in times of complete societal collapse, the rich and powerful will always find a way to isolate themselves from the problems. At the very least, the rich will ensure that they are the last to starve to death. You must know this?

This crisis is no different. Without the bailout, the rich and powerful investors will still have more money than the poor and middle classes. They will still have the resources to find future incomes. They will still have savings. It’s sucks that money has to be tossed that way, but such is life. I’m sorry.

 
 

we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. i mean economic collapse.

obama will win, and we can expect eight more years of republicans howling about out-of-control spending, entitlement programs, balanced budgets, etc.

you saw their convention. it’s as if the last eight years never happened.

 
 

“This is something that all of us will swallow hard and go forward with,” McCain said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The option of doing nothing is simply not an acceptable option.”

From which of his 9-12 homes did he make this statement?

“My inclination is to support it,” said Obama, his Democratic rival in the November 4 U.S. presidential election.

Given that Robert Rubin, former Clinton SecTreas and current CEO of Citigroup is his economic advisor, I would daresay that he is so “inclined.”

 
Dragon-King Wangchuck
 

Is the American economy fucked? Looks like it. And the only “hope” is a huge bailout, to be administered by Bush cronies. It’s kinda like folks left homeless after Katrina having to rely on FEMA.

But I agree with cokane. The bailout may suck shit but if shit sandwich is all that’s being served, it’s better than starving. Not that it doesn’t still taste like shit.

My gripe with the post, is that I don’t believe that this is the point where the GOP went from everyday villainy to cartoonish super-villainy. They burnt that bridge when they started claiming waterboarding wasn’t torture.

 
 

Bitch about the bailout all you want – and many have and will (especially if they aren’t, y’know, economists) – but if you noticed, there was a really good reason why neither Obama nor McCain could discuss the bailout during the debate:

THERE WAS NO BAILOUT PLAN TO DEBATE DURING THE DEBATE. It was under negotiation as the debate was taking place!

Thank you. That felt good.

 
 

It seems to me that the huge, suppurating pustule on the face of this whole thing that no politician or media type wants to even look at much less discuss publicly is the effect of this disease on the continued solvency of the US govt itself – it’s ability to continue to adequately service its current debt (in the opinion of its various creditors) as well as its ability to continue to be able to borrow to cover expenses.

Perhaps it’s this that has Congressional Dems (and Obama) effectively painted into a corner – the understanding that we’re fucked either way but maybe slightly less fucked if they pass something that constitutes an acceptable “gesture” to our creditors that we’re willing to do something significant to address their concerns. Perhaps Congressional Dems see this as the only opportunity they’re going to have for a long while to get even some meager crumbs for the rest of us – we’re fucked to that extreme.

I mean, as far as I can see, either way interest rates are shortly going to have to rise to a level that Chinese space-walkers will be able to shake hands with them.

Aww, fuck! Gotta go make another deposit in the porcelain ATM.

 
 

we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. i mean economic collapse.

Now that we have Terror whipped, Depression is next on the agenda.

 
 

TESTIFY!

I agree. This nonsense that the entire country is going to burst into flames instantly unless we hand billionaire executives large sums of money is ridiculous.

Yes, in times of trouble the poor get the shaft. Well, I hate to break it to, you know, the economists, but giving large wads of cash to executives who managed to screw their companies beyond belief will not do anything to help the poor. They will still be poor.

I know you know something of history. Regardless of the crisis, even in times of complete societal collapse, the rich and powerful will always find a way to isolate themselves from the problems. At the very least, the rich will ensure that they are the last to starve to death. You must know this?

So we should help them? If they are going to be ok, why don’t we bail out the poor people?

This is something I haven’t understood yet, and maybe some, you know, economist can explain it to me…

The problem here is that there are a great many mortgages that are about to fail, and that’s what is creating this crisis. The current proposal is that the government should buy all these mortgages to insulate the banks from them. This, however, doesn’t stop the homeowners from losing the homes.

Now, regardless of how you feel about people taking out loans they could never hope to pay off, if a bunch of people lose their homes there will be a huge glut of empty buildings on an already depressed housing market. Which will slow construction, jobs, material buying, etc–which will lead to a slower economy.

If we take that 700 billion (or less, one would hope) and use it to either a) refinance those homes or b) subsidize the payments, then the mortgages won’t be bad, the banks won’t be failing, and we won’t be leaving poor people homeless while giving large lumps of tax money to rich people.

Of course, I’m not, you know, and economist.

 
 

Silver lining? The kleptocorporatists have whined for mommy for all to see- they’re not even hiding it anymore. So, at least when it comes to intellectual standing, the glibertarian think tank cottage industry has taken a huge hit. We can pretty much shove the bailout bill in their faces from now on whenever they’re whining about taxes for public transit and such.

I know, I know…not a huge thing to take away from this, but there it is.

 
 

Anybody want my shit sandwich? I’m, uh…, fasting today.

 
 

Even though it’s easy enough to do, and I’m guilty too, you can’t get so pissed off that you take your eye off the ball.

As much as I long for a righteous mob, it’s a stupid fact that about 1/4 of Americans are “conservative/libertarian/proto-fascist” and they’ve got to have their say, too. Up ’til now, they’ve gotten it through voter suppression and a captive media.

The question is: “How badly do you want to get fucked over?” I’m too old to survive the McCain-style lovemaking.

 
 

This is just the start of the hoseshit.

If you believe that there is some worth in electoral politics, then decide now how much energy you can devote to it, and what your position is. If you believe that electoral politics are corrupted to the point of meaninglessness, then so be it, foreswear electoral activism.

In either case, we should focus on personal networks and personal or family survival. We should start saving more. We may want to consider savings in places other than banks, and in kind other than money.

We may also want to consider that in a real shitstorm, most of us will end up dead.

 
 

Your concern is noted.

 
 

Anonymous @ 15:26:

Thanks for saying what I was thinking.

Give the money (diligently and with care, of course) to those who most immediately need it and let it filter up the economy (reverse-osmosis distilled condensation theory). It eventually gets back to the greedy bastard titans, does it not?

And if they have to fly first-class for a while instead of private jet, listen carefully. That’s me quietly ululating in commiseration.

All this talk about populist appeal. Can we see some real populism, please?

 
 

Update: Holy shit! The fuckin’ audacity:

HTML,

It’s a panic situation. Why would you expect humans to act rationally?

 
 

[…] The awesome HTML Mencken of Sadly, No breaks down the bailout. […]

 
MysteriousTraveller
 

I work in the financial industry and I’m still trying to figure out how this became an emergency that’s threatening to bring the world to it’s knees overnight.

It took years to get into this mess. Why can’t they take a couple of weeks to think about how to get out of it?

 
 

waaah blah dogma-fart.

 
 

I work in the financial industry and I’m still trying to figure out how this became an emergency that’s threatening to bring the world to it’s knees overnight.

I do as well. I don’t really get it either. The situation has done nothing to us so far other than increase our trade volume and bring in more commissions.

Yes, if enough banks fail, that would be a disaster. There’s ways they could be propped up for a week or two, even so.

 
 

Finally, this election is getting interesting – not from anything the contestants are saying or doing, but from how many people are (apologies to Burroughs) gazing at the end of the amerikan fork and seeing just what is on the end of it. Maximize the alienation and real change might follow!

Question for the day: is the big O FDR or Kerensky?

 
 

I work in the financial industry and I’m still trying to figure out how this became an emergency that’s threatening to bring the world to it’s knees overnight.

Anecdotally at least I can tell you accounts receivable at my husband’s company have ballooned and he’s had folks tell him they’ve been told by their finance people not to pay ANY invoices in the short term. I’ve also heard about companies losing credit lines with suppliers they’ve used and paid for years. Not emergency level, and certainly a few weeks to bring a good plan to the table would be better, but some people are pretty worried about the tight credit.

 
 

The way I understand it, it’s not the $11-something trillion in mortgages themselves that is the problem. It’s the $65 trillion in worthless “check-kited” paper that’s been built on top of them and their housing-bubble-inflated value. Apparently, the current “worst case scenario” for mortgages that are likely to end up in default is something like 3%. That totals to about $350bn. That seems doable.

Of course, if the US economy collapses and another couple million or so of us peons are thrown out of work, our mileage may vary.

 
 

The way I understand it, it’s not the $11-something trillion in mortgages themselves that is the problem. It’s the $65 trillion in worthless “check-kited” paper that’s been built on top of them and their housing-bubble-inflated value.

OK. We shouldn’t discount the sheer amount of debt that the US is in, either.

 
 

Limiting the compensation of top executives might discourage thei firms from participating? How about this – agree to a minimal salary and benefits or we freeze-n-seize all your assets and transport you to Gitmo on a meathook? Is that better for you?

 
 

You all better watch out, because Obama is threatening to arrest people who criticize him.

The fact is that his Missouri campaign took off the Hope shirts and put on the brownshirts when his allies promised to criminally charge anybody who attacks Obama’s plans or character.

This has been criticized by freedom-loving Missourians like Governor Matt Blunt.

 
 

It went from a long-term problem to an overnight crisis because the Nitwit-in-Chief and his army of gnomes lied to the public, saying everything was just peachy until circumstances forced them to admit that it had reached the level of full-on panic.

This whole thing is a shit sandwich, and we’re going to eat it, but I tend to rely on the expertise of those guys who have been right for the past 8 years. So, when Paul Krugman and Neil Roubini are saying that yes, it is a giant shitstorm and we need to break out the raingear, I believe them. The Republicans, as always, will seek to parlay this to maximum political advantage because they don’t give a crap about reality or governance or any of those things. The Democrats are trying to keep the shitstorm down to a gale instead of a hurricane and will probably suffer for their efforts at avoiding calamity for all of us. Such is life.

HTML Mencken’s outrage, however, translates to what? What would you prefer? Nothing? Krugman and Roubini both are saying that would be worse than what we got. I believe them.

Besides, they haven’t voted on anything yet so there is still plenty of time for the Republicans to pull the football away at the last second.

 
 

HTML,

Whatever, dude.

Clem

 
 

What is a suggested alternative?

I liked the idea of giving them some money to keep the economy from collapsing, until January to see how things are then, ie, 150 or so. What happened to that suggestion?

.

 
 

If firms don’t want to participate because they will be limited in the compensation they receive, … um, fuck ’em. I wonder what their shareholders think about that. They’re lucky we’re not asking for the keys to their summer house(s), which is what any self-respecting entity with $700 billion would be doing.

 
 

If firms don’t want to participate because they will be limited in the compensation they receive, … um, fuck ‘em. I wonder what their shareholders think about that.

Do the shareholders have any pull if it’s a week until the doors shut?

 
 

Remember the “review board” that was supposed to provide accountability and oversee the Treasury Secretary in the execution of the bailout? Here is the composition of that board from section 104(b) of the bill:

(1) the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System;
(2) the Secretary [of the Treasury];
(3) the Director of the Federal Home Finance Agency;
(4) the Chairman of the Securities [and] Exchange Commission; and
(5) the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

No punch line needed.

 
 

atheist —

So, if US GDP is roughly $13tr, then household debt is roughly $13tr, non-financial corporate debt is roughly $6tr, Federal Debt is $5.3 tr (hmm . . . I thought it was more like $9.4tr. Oh, well. Close enough!) and financial sector debt is roughly $15.5tr. Let’s see, that adds up to . . . (skritch-skritch of pencil on back of envelope) . . . . ummmm . . . . about $47 trillion dollars.
Heh-heh.

So, the $700bn amounts to about . . . (skritch, skritch . . . carry the four . . . . skritch, skritch) . . . . ummmm . . . 1.5% of the total.

Heh, heh.

Will you take a personal check?

 
 

FDR or Kerensky?

I’ve been thinking FDR or Gorbachev. FDR reinvented the Mercan state, Gorby recognized that the USSR was in deep trouble but ended up presiding over its demise. (Yeah, sure, oversimplifications.) I don’t see the Big O presiding over secession (though if the left coast split off I wouldn’t cry, being as I am therein), but he sure could preside over the end of the Empire as we simply cannot afford the 800+ foreign military bases anymore … and that could lead to turbulence.

Please don’t fasten your seat belts, rapid reactions may be necessary.

 
 

Will you take a personal check?

But, MaineMan, what’s $700 Billion between freinds?

 
 

Actually, if the debts are divided like that, then doesn’t that mean the $700 Billion will do absolutely nothing to counter the overall US debt? Basically, $0.7 Trillion will just get shaved off the Financial sector debt, and attached to the Government debt, right?

 
 

Jeebus, Bubba. That ruined my morning.

I would like to make some sort of joke to redeem this comment with pithy snark and the like, but I’m all out.

Where the fuck did we go wrong?

 
 

Jeebus, Bubba. That ruined my morning.

Blame Snag for ruining my yesterday.

 
 

As far as Obama being the new FDR, one thing to remember is that Congress will be hamstrung by the Republican senate minority. They now have established that they will filibuster every item, large or small, by default. People forget that the filibuster rule was intended for extraordinary situations, not to be the dominant mechanic of our whole legislative process. At any rate, until we get close to the ’10 election they will be blocking everything and condemning the “do nothing” Dem Congress.

 
 

God dammit Bubba – not another fucking blog I’ll have to check every day. Cut it out, willya?

 
 

I hear yuh, but ultimately, so? Last week, the Congress passed $600+Billion for defense spending and no one said a word. What do we peons get out of that, except some dead neighbors and some pissed off furriners? The Federal Government has basically become a giant vacuum, hosing us reg’lar folks and giving all the gold dust to its friends in the tank. The only real difference between the Dems and Repubs (aside from the fact that the Dems aren’t 99% batshit crazy) is that the Dems might allow us to have some sort of healthcare in return for our fealty and the tax dollars they are shaking us down for. So I’m voting Dem. The shake down will continue, but it’s possible we non-CEO’s might get 2 cents on our $1 investment with the Ds.

 
 

Ahem… on reading further in the bill there is a congrssional “Accountability Panel” (section 125) which appears to not be a complete joke. Please excuse my prior insolence.

 
 

Actually the $700B isn’t what bothers me about this… if we borrow it all at once and then pay it off over a period years it will put a crimp in spending, but it’s not a backbreaker. And if we get the eff out of Iraq that would free up ~120B/year…

What bugs me no end is the lack of punitive conditions for the people who made the mess. Dissolve the companies, nationalize them and sell ’em off to the highest bidder, clear the decks of all the executives with even a taint of the scandal, make them pay back the obscene bonus money received for false profits, and so on…

And if they balk at our conditions and try to hold the national economy hostage to their petty egos, then FUCK THEM. Call it a matter of national security and run roughshod over the mofos.

 
 

filibusters [etc]

Yes, eidos, that’s extremely plausible, and works towards the Gorby concept — Obama essentially convinces the world community (i.e. the people who hold the credit notes) that the US system is terminally broken, but fails to convince the declining oligarchs. Not a happy prospect.

Not the only scenario out there, but a scary one.

 
 

Last week, the Congress passed $600+Billion for defense spending and no one said a word. What do we peons get out of that, except some dead neighbors and some pissed off furriners?

That’s a subsidy to American business, which employs regular yokels, although I gather a portion is going to the Cayman Islands via KBR.

 
 

So, when Paul Krugman and Neil Roubini are saying that yes, it is a giant shitstorm and we need to break out the raingear, I believe them

Don’t know about Neil but Nouriel Roubini is not exactly overjoyed with the bailout plans as written.

 
 

I work in the financial industry and I’m still trying to figure out how this became an emergency that’s threatening to bring the world to it’s knees overnight.

Then you haven’t been paying attention because people like me have been railing about this since at least 2003.

Make no mistake: consumer debt, including mortgages, is a rock around the throat of the world economy.

 
 

“not exactly overjoyed” above is supposed to link to-
http://tinyurl.com/4nokgz (RGE monitor)

 
 

Fine, let’s have four more years of the shit we’ve had to put up with this decade because the clearly better choice isn’t FDR.

Look, I’d love true socialism to return to America as much as anyone, but it ain’t there yet and it probably never will be. And the system is such that there is lterally no point at all in voting for anyone outside the two main parties. This needs to change, give other ideologies a chance, but it hasn’t, and so RIGHT NOW you have a choice between two men, a melting aristocrat who wants the job for its own sake and nothing else, or a youngster who seems to want the job for some other reasons as well.

Yes, Obama’s fucked up on things like FISA, sure he’s as venal as any other politician, but (assuming you’re sick of the Bush regime shit) he’s your only choice. ONLY. You vote for him, or you vote for McBush. And staying home is a vote for the Republicans. This isn’t a magical kingdom where you get to build your own candidate from scratch, this is an election with two choices. You can be pragmatic, and go for the guy who’s the best and most progressive choice, even if the only reason he’s significantly further left than the other guy is that the GOP have gone so far right, or you can get butthurt and passively support the status quo.

 
 

Jesus H. Fucking Christ, Nimrod. I said I was voting for him, even though he sucks.

 
 

The strangest thing about all this is that McCain is still trying to take all the credit for the deal. Hey, if he wants to attach his name to a bailout that 70% of the American public thinks is the dumbest thing since Pet Rocks, let him.

 
 

My alternative plan:

Afghanistan now produces 95% of the world’s opium. The total “at the farm gate” cost of this is about $2 billion. So, the US govt buys the whole crop, has it processed into heroin (the CIA can do this in-house, as I understand it), puts ordinary US citizens on a daily dose of the heavily cut stuff, gives the Wall Street types a single dose of the 100% pure, top of the line stuff (we’ll call it “The Ultimate Bailout’), then exports the rest at a huge profit.

In other news, Whackovum Bank is now circling the drain and Heather Locklear has been arrested in California for parking while seriously wasted.

 
 

Just a teensy reminder that the $700 billion is on top of:
$30 billion to Bear Stearns:
$200 billion for Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac
$85 billion for AIG

For a grand prize total bailout of….. $1.015 trillion!!

(Not to mention$25 billion in loans to the auto industry just passed by the House.)

 
 

You might have some luck with Blanche, HTML, but I’ve given up on Pryor. He’s a neocon for all intents and purposes.

Also, “The rich stay rich” works only up to a point. If the dollar collapses, only the smart rich will be left. The Retarded Rich, a large portion of the current crop thanks to 8 years of GOP government handouts, will be crushed.

 
 

At least the fucking bill could have included a $150 a head bounty on mortgage brokers.

 
 

For a grand prize total bailout of….. $1.015 trillion!!

Why that’d be another 10% on top of the total existing US debt!

 
 

cokane said,

September 29, 2008 at 14:56

No offense dude, but the without the bailout, it’s actually mostly poor and middle class who will have to suffer.

WHAT HE SAID!

It sucks, but what can you do? Stomp your feet, hold your breath, let the entire market collapse and take every pension, 401k, IRA, and job with it?! Put the blame where it is due: glibs and repubs and blue dogs. Just because the leading Dems are required to support the bailout of Big Shitpile does not make them responsible of the disaster happening (except the blue dogs).

It’s like blaming the doctor because he had to amputate your legs after a car accident that smashed your legs.

 
 

Um, WHAT RB SAID!

This stupid bill does little to nothing for poor people.

…unless you really believe in trickle down 101?

 
 

At any rate, until we get close to the ‘10 election they will be blocking everything and condemning the “do nothing” Dem Congress.

Yep. Possible GOP majority by ’10, GOP President in 2012, then continued financial rape until some form of major collapse. Republicans have the ‘party over country’ thing down to a fine art.

 
 

Though alternatives to the bill exist there’s really no need to hurry (hence George Bush’s and Paulson’s insistence that everyone act now before it’s too late!!1!); yet, rushing headlong is exactly what they are doing, closing their ears to the sound of millions of Ackbars yelling, “it’s a trap!”

Or, to put it another way

 
 

Parrotlover77 said,
September 29, 2008 at 17:45

It sucks, but what can you do? Stomp your feet, hold your breath, let the entire market collapse and take every pension, 401k, IRA, and job with it?!

Yes, because THAT’S THE INEVITABLE END ANYWAY. After this bailout, Republicans and their Blue Dog abettors will continue to push the financial system to make as much short term gain as possible, just as the last 8 years have been. They are going to take every dime until the thing falls apart.

This thing has been an obvious bubble for at least two years, but no action was taken. The next bubble, eight to ten years out, will be obvious then too, but nobody will make the hard decisions anymore. Just like things had to go to pure shit for FDR to fix the joint, things will have go to pure shit before folks with something other than this quarter’s returns will get in charge again. This bailout just buys another six years and adds to the height of the fall. Why not take the medicine now?

 
 

There will be no next bubble. It takes easy credit for that, and there isn’t any left.

We will bail out Wall Street and then it will all crash down anyway, because house prices stil have a long way to go before they deflate. When they say that the taxpayers will get their money back they are blatently lying. The economy will sink into a very bad recession and those of us who haven’t spent the last eight years raiding the Treasury will suffer and grow poorer.

We are not the ones being bailed out. The economy will crumble anyway.

 
 

Just a teensy reminder that the $700 billion is on top of:
$30 billion to Bear Stearns:
$200 billion for Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac
$85 billion for AIG

For a grand prize total bailout of….. $1.015 trillion!!

(Not to mention$25 billion in loans to the auto industry just passed by the House.)

Okay, I now believe Obama will win over McCain.

The Republicans are clearly looting America before handing it over.

Boy, are you people fucked.

 
 

The fact is that we need to get rid of these regulations strangling our businesses and these requirements to cover people who are way in over their heads. The people who are in over their heads need to be worked to make up for their debts.

 
 

Boy, are you people fucked.

And they didn’t even buy us a drink first.

 
 

Strangulation?

Great Idea, Gary!

 
 

We need better fake Garys.

 
 

The people who are in over their heads need to be worked to make up for their debts.

If that’s real gary (and it sounds like real gary) then he’s proposing concentration camps right here.

 
 

More and more these days I’ve been wishing I were single, because it would be a lot easier to pick up and move to New Zealand if I didn’t have to convince another person that it may be our best response to the last 8 years.

 
 

One more thought about filibusters, etc: On the recent nutsiness, it was the House Repugs that went berserk, demanding tax cuts etc, and a Dem majority can squash them like bugs. The Senate, where the major filibuster power is, could potentially be different.

Not being Pollyana-ish here, just clarifying. The Big O’s political challenge obviously is to avoid a rout in 2010. Not sure he can, but …

 
 

Since when did Obama ever stand up for much other than his communist mentors ideals?

 
 

Ok, fake gary. But quality fake gary.

 
 

I thought you were supposed to make me laugh. All you did was bore me. Ho-hum. Democrats and Republicans are sucking the money out of the taxpayers pockets and no one gives a damn. News at 11.

 
You Can't Put Lipstick On A RePIG
 

cokane hit the nail on the head, methinks.

Although a fan of the trickle-up theory that several posters have promulgated, there is one more factor to consider.

Without the bailout, many more banks will fail. That is a given. We also know that FDIC insurance covers about 1% or so of the potential losses. Just a few large banks have to fail out of hundreds and FDIC will be tapped out. You know what that means, don’t you?

They will have to bailout the FDIC by printing, oh let’s say, $700 billion worth of more T-bills.

I am as sick of this whole thing as anybody here. The fatcats get away with murder and Norquist’s dream gets closer. But Bushco probably planned at least the outline of this happening. Remember, the only thing Bushco is good at is bankrupting companies and having taxpayers bail him out. Still batting 1000 on that achievement.

 
 

Loony libs are running scared at a Plethora of Palin Domination soon to reign down on Joltless Joe this week! Ding dong dilly, libs, it’s the Cool Coach once again, telling you that the more you throw mud at the great work the McCaniacs have done to save the economy, the more voters will see that Obummer is the candidate of hate and failure! McCain has pulled even with Obummer in the polls, and the only way to go from here is up, up, up! Don’t forget about the Bradley thing, too!

Badoodle-boo yeah! Wall Street is saved, Super Sarah is rolling, and you just got served a SPREAD of TRUTH! Urban out!

 
 

If Obama is elected, there will be a great depression. Obama doesn’t have the brainpower or humility to figure out good solutions to our problems.

 
 

If Obama is elected, there will be a great depression.

That sucks because I wanted an awesome depression.

 
 

Can we have a Tropical Depression? I like fruity drinks and beaches with white sand.

 
 

If McCain/Palin wins we’ll have a psychotic depression and a post-partum depression.

 
 

For some reason I am reminded of the Violent Femmes song “Dance, Motherfucker, Dance!”

 
 

Umm, this is INSANE.

If I can’t pay my mortgage, and I’m falling behind on all my bills, debts and obligations, so I start paying them with my credit card, how exactly is this going to appease my creditors?

Jeezus Christs Tits in a Mason Jar, folks, HTML is only wrong to the extent he UNDERSTATES the case.

We are borrowing the money to bail out our financial sector. How does that actually help the economy? Somebody? Anybody? Bueller?

I’d truly LOVE to hear the conversation between the Treasury and buyers at the auction for these bonds. What do you think their going to have to give away in order to get England, Canada, China and Germany to buy this toilet paper? Why would ANYONE think that the US will be able to pay off their debts in thirty years? How stupid/desperate do these poor fucks need to be?

Sure, if the American consumer market tanks, China and many other developing economies are going to contract. But that’s the lesson here. If it’s unsustainable, you need to recognize it before it all just blows up in your face…

mikey

 
 

Man, you better take some Thorazine before reading the rest of the weekend news: 1: Salary Caps are tied to a tax loophole — so they mean nothing. 2: Congress also just gave “$25Bn to the auto industry for making bad business decisions.

Look, there needs to be some government led bond stabilization here, but $350Bn is way too much — maybe $100Bn from this congress and another $100Bn from the next — but not all this money all at once.

 
 

FDR or Kerensky?

Bear in mind that it’s far more likely that a modern-day American Kerensky would be followed by a lurch to the far, far right rather than to the far, far left.

Such happy thoughts. Happy thoughts everywhere.

 
InsaneInTheCheneyBrain
 

Great Depression TWO: The GREAT DEPRESSIONING

 
 

Righteous Bubba said,

September 29, 2008 at 17:01

Jeebus, Bubba. That ruined my morning.

Blame Snag for ruining my yesterday.

Is Snag one of Bible Spice’s kids?

 
 

We are borrowing the money to bail out our financial sector. How does that actually help the economy? Somebody? Anybody? Bueller?

If it gets to the point where large banks start defaulting, then, it seems to me, yes the financial crisis really could hurt the middle class and the working class. However, it is not clear to me that there’s an actual danger of that scenario, at least not immediately. Hell, the financial sector of the economy probably could use a decent trim.

What worries me is, if the root of the problem really is the sheer amount of debt that the USA is in, this plan will do absolutely zip to fix that.

 
 

ahem

That’s

GREAT DEPRESSION II: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

 
 

My congresscritter (the Honorable Ed Perlmutter- CO7) just sent me a survey asking me for my opinion on the bailout bill…. I pretty much told him I’d happily use the bill to wipe my ass, if only it weren’t already covered in shit.

Ed may be a milquetoast nobody of a congressman, but he’s my nobody.

 
 

I predict the following will result from this “bail-out”:

(a) The whole edifice is going to come tumbling down anyway. Maybe in a couple years, but possibly even now – apparently the $700 billion are already judged to be insufficient.

(b) The resulting strain on the US budget outlook is going to be used to destroy social security.

(c) To distract the population and destroy capital that can be replaced productively, the next administration will start at least one major war (duh!).

In other words, I don’t see why this thing should be supported.

 
 

I thought you were supposed to make me laugh.

You’re thinking of Retardo Montalban. Those days are long over.

 
 

Gosh, you’d think there might be some sort of crisis going on with this capitalism thing or something.

 
 

And no one misses it more than me. But a lot of shit has happened. I don’t feel the funny much anymore.

(Though I did read something by Adam Yoshida this morning that almost brought it back. Almost.)

 
 

I’m too old to survive the McCain-style lovemaking.

It’s not rape if there’s no intent to cause death or major organ failure! Erm, and, uh… starving to death in the street after being financially raped doesn’t count. Nyah!

 
 

Yoyoyo homieeez its da Ole Perf in the hizzzy droppin da Heh. all up in you grillz, Indizzile if ya feels me

 
 

But a lot of shit has happened. I don’t feel the funny much anymore.

Not saying it’s a bad thing. I know where you’re coming from.

 
 

Breaking, the Bailout vote didn’t pass.

 
 

JiSM3 via TP:
I’m a Teddy Roosevelt Republican. I believe our leaders belong in the arena — in the arena — when your country faces a challenge.

Barry X via GangStarr:
In the arena… or rather colliseum
Theres people gatherin by multitudes to see one
Perpretrator fall to the dust after the other
Quickly disposed of at the hand of a known brother

 
 

I don’t feel the funny much anymore.

I propose WINGNUTZ IN PARTY BARRELZ.

 
 

So, are they going to keep fiddling with it, I guess?

 
 

Call your rep and according to how they voted either tell them thanks or tell them they’re fired.

 
 

Breaking, the Bailout vote didn’t pass.

Good news. Gives us more time to put pressure on the government, and on the media. More time to ask the questions we’ve asked here publicly.

 
 

2:00 pm : The current Emergency Economic Stabilization Act vote tally comes at 207 for the plan, 226 against, with one vote remaining. A total of 218 votes were needed to pass the vote. House members can still change their vote, and as a result the number of yes votes did tick a few points higher.

Democrats voted 141 for, 94 against. Republicans voted 66 for, 132 against.

All three of the major indices hit multi-year lows. At session lows, the Dow, Nasdaq and S&P 500 were down 6.3%, 6.7% and 7.2%, respectively.

Finanshal Nooz.

 
 

stryx said,

September 29, 2008 at 19:53

JiSM3 via TP:
I’m a Teddy Roosevelt Republican. I believe our leaders belong in the arena — in the arena — when your country faces a challenge.

I propose a challenge: Obama and McCain enter the Thunderdome.

Only one man leaves.

 
 

So, are they going to keep fiddling with it, I guess?

Fixed.

 
 

Here’s the thing… Everybody keeps talking about bailing out the banks. Seems to me it won’t be much longer before there’s only one bank.

 
 

Call your rep and according to how they voted either tell them thanks or tell them they’re fired.

I’m a politics ‘tard – where can I look that up?

 
 

What worries me is, if the root of the problem really is the sheer amount of debt that the USA is in…

That won’t be a problem once we revert to a hunter-gatherer economy.

 
 

I’m a politics ‘tard – where can I look that up?

House.gov, though the servers appear overloaded right now.

 
 

Hell, the financial sector of the economy probably could use a decent trim.

Oh…I see…700 Brazilians…

I thought they said billions.

 
Ann Althouse's Wine Box
 

Every day we talk about a bailout, the closer we get to a real nationalized banking system. Keep talking, please.

 
 

House.gov, though the servers appear overloaded right now.

Thank you.

I just realized – I’m such a goober that I routinely conflate politics with governing.

Or is that so dumb in this age?

 
 

The House has reportedly shot down the bailout for billionaires by a 228-205 vote.

So…yay?

 
 

HT —

As Katrina bore down on NOLA, I spent a lot more time than I should have drinking and chain-smoking in the dark while watching Bourbon Street through the webcam till it finally went offline sometime during the wee hours. I just kept thinking, “It’s all going away.”

Same feeling these days.

Yeah. The funny is kinda hard to find lately.

 
 

Seriously folks, the vote went this way because we let them know we’re very unhappy.

Or maybe they saw that friggin’ awful liar Wank Paulson opening his eyes WEEEAL big when he was about to tell a fib on 60 Mins last night. Christ.

Either way, if you’ve ever wanted to convey the verbal or written equivalent of a threat to kneecap someone … have at it.

 
 

Spam filter or something preventing my giving Sam tghe URL www DOT utah DOT gov SLASH government SLASH contactgov DOT html

 
 

Spam filter or something preventing my giving Sam tghe URL…

Thankee.

 
 

I was originally in favor of some kind of bailout, knowing how fast a bad market can snowball into a shitstorm of terminal entropy – psychology is a major factor in the stock-market … but the more I see the malignant tinkering go on, & the faster I see the jackpot swelling, the nastier this stinks. Some of the amendments are just downright harmful – or senseless except as brute venality.

It sort of looks like they WANT some sort of nebulous uprising so they can whip out all their new crowd-control toys & ring in martial law – that’s how egregious & loathsome the “New & Improved Mega-Bailout” is at this point.

“Let Them Eat Drywall!”

Unfortunately mikey nails another one out of the park: the Greenback is hella overvalued right now, & in light of all this crazy hurling of moneybags off the back of the Fed-wagon that’s about to commence I’d be VERY surprised not to see it get its guts ripped out on the currency market.

“What the fuck, white-eyes? You give away buku boatloads of our dough to your crazy-stupid richy-rich crony bumboys – then you come & ask us for ANOTHER pile of fast credit? You still owe us big-time for the LAST one, fools! Starts to look like you just want to dick us around. Starts to look like you need to learn who really needs who here. Maybe it’s chop-chop time for your fat white ass now!”
A dollar-dive would be the starting-gun for stagflation MUCH worse than in the 70’s – which would shrivel the value of the tax-base America needs just to minimally function. Which, by the way, would also render this whole bailout two-step totally futile. America’s creditors would probably give it the choice: renegotiate your debt total up into line with the Nouveau Yank-Yen, possibly with some token interest-relief to soften the blow – or repay if you don’t want to lose access to future credit … with no way in hell to pony up, America would renegotiate – right into total insolvency.

The tightening credit-sphincter is going to cause a lot of hurt to America’s already weak economy – but I don’t see any sustainable alternative, period. Too many folks spending money they never had & never were going to get, & too many businesses now chronically addicted to all that funny-money.

I’m scared that America is well on its way to a credit crisis that’ll make the banking & sub-prime crises look like a walk in the park. Credit Default Swaps clock in today at $45 trillion & have recently gone as high as the 60’s: there literally isn’t enough economic firepower on the entire planet combined to hold that back if it tips over. Another abstruse jerry-rigging of money-management to make a fast profit that needs to be put under control, like derivatives … & looky looky: Wachovia just followed WaMu into the Palliative Care Ward.

JP Morgan & Chase will soon be the ONLY solvent big bank left – that is, if IT can stay in one piece long enough to win the sweeps-week episode of “Survivor: Wall Street” … exciting times, alright. Waking up on the edge of an abyss can’t be anything BUT exciting.

Umbrella, no.
Hard-hat, definitely.

 
 

Excuse me. Um, Congress? Got a minute? Thanks.

Listen, I, uh, well, every morning I produce a good sized pile of shit.

It’s like clockwork. So I started to think about it, and I realized that I had an asset here I was just “flushing down the drain”, as it were. Y’know?

So I started saving it up, and I started a firm to broker these assets. I established a par value of ten thousand dollars a gram and opened an exchange. You can buy future turds, you can buy turds short, you can even buy insurance on the value of your future turds.

Well, here’s the thing, Congress. Nobody’s buying my shit, and it’s got my balance sheet all “clogged up”, if you know what I mean. And I think you do.

So here’s what I think is necessary at this point. I need you to pass legislation that REQUIRES the American taxpayer to purchase my shit at a fair market rate. As soon as I get this backlog of under performing crap off my books, I’m sure the poop markets will ease up and there will be substantially less friction making it difficult to make crap transactions.

Thanks for your consideration of this matter.

Oh. Your campaign contributions are in the mail…

mikey

 
 

What worries me is, if the root of the problem really is the sheer amount of debt that the USA is in…

That won’t be a problem once we revert to a hunter-gatherer economy.

Oh yeah? YOU try paying your mortgage with blueberries and fiddleheads.

 
 

The Great Orange Satan should have the details of who voted which way posted shortly. Meanwhile, yeah, everything in the markets is down 5%-7% across the board.

Except Gold.

And, presumably, marijuana and heroin futures.

 
 

Holy shit. The Dow’s down 527.

 
 

Marijuana futures are up in smoke and heroine futures are blown as well.

 
Trilateral Chairman
 

And, presumably, marijuana and heroin futures.

I was actually thinking about what stocks would go up under these circumstances (more or less as an intellectual exercise; I’m not putting any serious money anywhere right now). My first thought was big pharma, particularly those with the current patents on psychotropics. Then I realized (1) most people aren’t going to be able to afford the drugs, and (2) the Wall Street guys are all on coke anyway, so it won’t matter.

Guess my cash is going back under the mattress.

 
 

674 29-Sep H R 3997 On Concurring in Senate Amendment With An Amendment

Thanks much – and color me gobsmacked, my Blue Dog rep actually voted No. Time to give him another call and say “good boy, now get the next one right too.”

 
 

Hey mikey –

I get what you’re saying. Ever since my colon cancer surgery a few years ago, my crap transactions have been stuck in a boom-and-bust cycle. It’s become way too dangerous to light up a smoke in the production area. I ‘d like Congress to do something about that for me, too.

Which reminds me . . .

HT? We need to keep in mind that, like gold, poop jokes are always a safe haven in bad times.

 
 

Oh yeah! Almost forgot! Has anybody heard any updates on the Heather Locklear bust?

 
 

Considering the financial meltdown has already destroyed my business, my retirement, and made a healthy start on destroying my fucking occupation entirely, at this point I favor letting all the banks drown also.

At least then, I can beat the bankers shitless when we meet in the breadlines, or in the post-apocalyptic wasteland

Bitter doesn’t begin to describe it.

 
 

who was it who said “Fear can’t hurt you. But sometimes, you get so scared you hurt yourself.”?

 
 

in the post-apocalyptic wasteland

Shopping list:

-dirt bike
-bedroll
-automatic pistol
-jerrycan
-waterjugs
-blue heeler
-leatherman
-tarp

 
 

Credit Default Swaps clock in today at $45 trillion

From what I’ve read, total OTC derivatives show up at about 600 Trillion. That’s forty fucking years worth of the entire GDP, being tossed around as speculative debt and purely imagined value. Surely, no sane person could think that it was all good? There isn’t enough money in the real world to finance the fantasies of traders. If, every time they’re shown wrong when they “believed it would be worth ‘X'” they just come crying to Daddy Warbucks at the Treasury, and are given more of the real stuff to grease the sleds of their delusions, then We the People are going to be on the hook for every stinking scrap of used toilet paper they produce.

I’m getting to the point where I want to say “Let ’em fucking fail.” That way, the execs can’t squeeze their multimegabuck bonuses out on their way down the pike. The pieces we’ll have to pick up are the same ones anyway. If we have to pick them smoldering from ashes, at least there will be no question of equity. I have an incredibly hard time imagining that a plan conceived by people “just wanting to come up with a really large number” will really fix much of anything anyway. I have a hard time believing that it will do much more than stave off the shitstorm until after the election, if that. I have a hard time believing that it was ever supposed to anything more.

 
 

“But we have no choice,” [Obama] said in prepared remarks. “We must act now. Because now that we’re in this situation, your jobs, your life savings and the stability of our entire economy are at risk.”

Hoo boy! That’s rich!

As a native of said city, I can assure you that nobody’s job in Detroit hinges on anything related to this financial crisis, and hinges entirely on a combination of corporate, legislative and union malfeasance.

 
 

nobody’s job in Detroit hinges on anything related to this financial crisis

Get out. There are still people with jobs in Detroit?

 
 

-blue heeler

Awright, we’re not entirely lulz-less today.

 
 

Get out. There are still people with jobs in Detroit?

You’d be surprised. Half of the shit the city receives is undeserved, economically and socially speaking.

Granted, I haven’t been back in over 5 years, so maybe things really have changed. OTOH, I think my grandpa said that same thing, and even my own dad…

 
 

My friends that grew up there, and vacated some ten or fifteen years ago, don’t paint a terribly rosy picture of the joint. They haven’t been back much, if at all, either, though.

 
 

Glenn Greenwald quotes Professor Nouriel Roubini saying that Congress didn’t consult professional economists many of whom have presented on the RGE Monitor Finance blog forum plans that were more fair and efficient and less costly ways to resolve this mess.

O, but that would mean politicians would have to consult with those icky experts when they have more important things to consider: themselves and the November elections.

 
 

“But we have no choice,” [Obama] said in prepared remarks. “We must act now. Because now that we’re in this situation, your jobs, your life savings and the stability of our entire economy are at risk.”

They just keep sayin it and sayin it and sayin it louder.

But none of ’em, not one single fucking one, explains why it might be true.

Frankly? I don’t believe it.

I think thing’s would be pretty much the same tomorrow and next week either way…

mikey

 
 

mikey, I’m curious about the meth-based micro-economy you had talked about earlier.

It seems a safer investment right about now….

 
 

Oh yeah! Almost forgot! Has anybody heard any updates on the Heather Locklear bust?

Ummmm… it’s bigger since the surgery?

 
 

Swaps and Derivative are rather simple to understand. Did you know that you can payoff all the sub prime loans for $536,964,808,868. If you payoff the loans of those that had been late in the last 12 months it would be $227,136,207,581. Its a ponzi scheme look at the banks Revenues and compare them with their net income the annual reports are available online. nomedals.blogspot.com

 
 

Marijuana futures are up in smoke and heroine futures are blown as well.

I’m curious about the heroine futures…Nancy Drew?, Wonder Woman?, Sara Palin?

 
 

The Ben Stein column stunned and amazed me. He actually sounded outraged that we’re being dragged through the slough of despond by the unprincipled greedheads.

What next? Will Rush Limbaugh denounce the bailout?
Sheesh. I’ve got to remember to check for cats and dogs living together on the way home. . . .

 
 

Right fucking on HTML.

 
 

Time to drop the $700 Billion meme. That bill failed last week.

It’s $250 Billion as of the current bill.

 
 

Watch me play!

 
 

(comments are closed)