Gimme a “clean” 700 billion and I promise I’ll go on the wagon. Just one more hit. Pleeeease.

oouuu-weee
sure does stink over there in McCainVille

Cheney was the CEO of Halliburton until Bush brought him onboard as VP – resulting in unlimited (no-bid) cash transfers to Halliburton.

Paulson was the CEO of Goldman Sachs until Bush brought him onboard as Treasury Secretary – resulting in unlimited (no-oversight) cash transfers to the banksters.

“This is a stick-up. Give us all your money and don’t make a sound, and you won’t get shot!”

Probably all just a coincidence, right?

From last thread:

Perfect metaphor for bailout is Sarah Palin’s rape kit scheme. First you get raped, then you pay for it.

hey Davis likes a good yachting party too

http://cache.gawker.com/assets…..inRF2.jpeg

Great post as usual. C-Span rocks. Caller says it is lipstick on a pig for Goldman Sachs to change into a bank holding company. Former CEO Daddy Warbucks is allowed to give the bank pigs taxpayer money, but apparently not the hedge fund pigs.

you pay for it,and EVERYBODY else too….teh sukkky

chris hedges has new post up at truthdig. worth the read, especially if he is right. here’s a bit:

The rhetoric of the two presidential candidates about the crisis has been filled with pious outrage about the abuses of Wall Street and short on actual solutions. John McCain and Barack Obama know, after all, who funds their campaigns. The financial industry has given $22.5 million in the current election cycle to Obama and $19.6 million to McCain, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. And the financial industry has come around to collect. Two of the biggest financial groups in Washington, the Financial Services Roundtable and the Mortgage Bankers Association, have been holding meetings with McCain and Obama’s economic advisers. They are working with the campaigns to protect the unregulated power of financial industries and at the same time to shift bad debt to taxpayers. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Financial Services Roundtable, made up of the very banks and firms that got us into this mess, has developed draft legislation. The Roundtable has called a meeting this week with the chief executives of more than 50 banks, brokerages and insurers. The three-day meeting includes private, closed-door sessions on Thursday with Obama economic adviser Ian Soloman and McCain adviser Ike Brannon. Those hovering around Obama—economists like Paul Volcker, Robert Rubin, Lawrence Summers and Laura Tyson—bear as much responsibility for the dismantling of government regulation as those advising McCain.

at the moment, i’m more interested in what is true than what various people consider politically useful. so my question is this. is hedges describing the real world?

I have to say, the news the whole weekend was like something from a bizarro universe. The brazenness of the Shock Doctrine fiasco is just right out there, isn’t it?

oops. sorry, it would help if i gave the link to the chris hedges‘ article at truthdig.

now they are saying 1.8 T R I L L I O N..cant write enuf zeros

One of the articles I link above has some info on both sides of the aisle on these issues. Forget which link, though, as I’m in the middle of working on another piece at the moment…

First you get raped, then you pay for it.

in case you or other firedogs missed it – Naomi Klein on Maher
2:28 Minutes of Truth to Power

unbelievably clear and easy to under stand

has been since 9/11 imo

Last night on 60 Minutes Obama never once said that the current economic meltdown is the consequence of “Republican” economic theory and policies. He came across as professorial and detached. Why does he refuse to name the Republicans and specific Republicans for this mess? This detached professorial approach will not capitalize on the angst and anger of the American people. You can bet McCain will try and take advantage of it.

Did you catch the Ron Paul interview on of all shows, Glen Beck? Did the planet reverse directions on its axis?

Did McCain turn a blind eye…

Seems that he is blind to pretty much everything, that might hinder his utterly unprincipled run for the WH, or put the lie to anything that he’s actually blurted right out loud.

After blasting golden parachutes, and the big payoffs for executives who fail, he claims to be unaware of Carly Fiorina’s severance package, other than he thinks that while at HP, the “thinks she did a good job”.

maybe a “heckuva job”?

Christy,

call me pollyanna, but the fact so many of your links are from TradMed are taken as a very good sign by this dfh

and then there’s THIS on WaPo Front Page this am . . .sheeple my ass :D

No matter how cynical you are in dealing with these bastards it is never enough. The freakin’ “Homeownership Alliance”, give me a break, it should have been “Let Them Eat Cake Alliance.”
This bailout is just more of the same. It is going to be the biggest swindle in the history of the WWWWWWWWWWoooooooooorrrrrrrrllllllllldddddd!

When Charles Ponzi did it, he was fingerprinted, photographed for his mug shot, and sent to prison.

It’s time to pressure every media talking head to ask McCain point blank, WHO is the person who devised the strategy for the Ponzi Scheme? Surely Phil Gramm can tell him this person’s name.

bwaaahaaahaaaa!

when I saw “Homeownership Alliance”, I saw “Teapot Dome”

He wants the Rs to vote for him. Fool.

Come on lucky number seven!

-Mr. Hanky Paulson

fromJohn A

They admit outright that earlier this decade they paid $2m to the man who is now John McCain’s campaign manager in order to buy influence with John McCain as Senator and as possible president (they also paid him to derail legislation that would have increased federal regulation of the banking industry). There should be a campaign to demand that McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, give ever penny back to the American people. There had better be an ad about this out by COB Monday, and calls for Davis’ resignation.

my question wasn’t directed to you specifically – more for anyone who has an answer. but just want to say, i’m not trying to go “both sides” on you. i’m not really trying to get out any side, just to figure out what is going on as best i can.

and I think he’s successfully playin’ the Villagers – see Harwood’s comments this morning – “rational”, “calm” “reasoned”

McSickly looks,(lately) very badly in my estimation,will Obama demand to see the medical records

Why does he refuse to name the Republicans and specific Republicans for this mess?

i wish he would too. but then he’d have to name the democrats too (or someone else would) and that would make life very difficult for him. he’s in a tough spot right now, and i cut him slack for leaving that info out – so long as he helps us find real solutions and not, as he did with fisa, to push horrible legislation and call it roses.

That doesn’t mean that the Rs will vote for an uppity black man who is waaay liberal.

well said

If Nelson is still here, you asked on previous thread for 800 numbers.
1 (800) 828 – 0498
1 (800) 459 – 1887
1 (800) 614 – 2803
1 (866) 340 – 9281
1 (866) 338 – 1015
1 (877) 851 – 6437
I keep that on my desk top. (just a helpful hint.)

they might if they are loosing do re me

Picture Hank Paulson as Charles Ponzi – in a mugshot.

Charles Ponzi looked like a successful businessman before he went to jail!

Do you mean both Krugman and Bill “William the Bloody” Kristol agreeing that this bailout stinks to high heavens?

Thank you!!! I appreciate it.

Being a Rethug means sticking your head in the trough – and making room for your friends, too…share the wealth…but only with R’s.

sure would like to see Gramm’s mug shot, after I see him doing the Perp Walk Strut

why is it that at MSNBC, the only blog in the world seems to be Politico.com?

I could do quite nicely without hearing from these in-the-bag chumps, thank you very much.

Today’s comments were from some guy desperately trying to lower the expectations bar for McGramps for Friday’s debate.

Yep – I heard from my cousin in Kansas and had to convince her to stick around and fight for our side instead of running off to Canada…she’s one scared person right now.

G’morning, Christy! Great post. Keep the sunlight shining right on ‘em.

and the stench is oh so fresh!

hey good mornin……they pay big bux to play….1st investment=BushRanger

I agree but then those Democrats that signed on to Republican theories need to be called out as being wrong. McCain has no problem criticizing generic Republiclans. Why can’t Obama attack the underlying premise of Republican economic theory and practice and criticize anyone that bought into the snake oil?

and Drudge

heat on opponents unless you want PrezPalin with the shooter pulling the strings

But, at that level, they are obviously seeing it as ‘the gift that keeps on giving’…

Rep DeFazio on CSPAN waving key to Treasury around, excoriating Paulson

okay FrenchToast comming up

yep. the only color that may matter in the end is green

overheard yesterday at work “can’t believe it, but I’m gonna have to vote for Obama, can’t afford the risk of McCain”

60+, churchgoing, white, Republican, texan, male – rewarded by his waitress with an extra large piece of coconut cream and a smile :D

of course…it is exactly like the mafia…made men

Baby needs new shoes

O.K. but then why hasn’t Obama pointed out that the architect of this economic meltdown is McCain’s chief economic advisor, Phil Gramm?

Gramm contributed at least $7,500 towards the sequel, a satire of the Nixon White House called “White House Madness” that featured the crazed president wandering around the White House in the nude. Gramm never saw that money again. Shot in ten days on a soundstage crudely modeled after the Oval Office, “White House Madness” tanked at the box office.

Like the rest of Gramm’s endeavors, his soft-core porn career was a complete disaster.

Other world news:

*For the second time in a week, there were reports of Pakistani military firing on US helicopters.

*Thabo Mbeki is out as Pres. of South Africa.

*Ehud Olmert is out as Pres. of Israel.

*In what seems reminiscent of the 90’s. About a dozen tourists have been kidnapped in Egypt.

*Venezuela’s Chavez announces the purchase of military planes from China.

-G

Nice to know that we don’t have to call it Freedom Toast any longer.

if it wasnt so cold there inthe winter,id be long gone,looked in 2003,when the dollar was strong

today i bet…..

Olmert is Prime Minister.

-G

You are welcome.
What I do is write out my talking points, and then put the phone on “speaker” so that I can keep reading articles or whatever until I get a live body, then pick the phone up and go into my questions and thoughts. I also find it help to start with Good Morning, How are you doing today? I find that most people are more receptive to listening when the conversation starts on a positive note. :)

man i need comfort food ,very worried

good mornin smart gal

O.K. but then why hasn’t Obama pointed out that the architect of this economic meltdown is McCain’s chief economic advisor, Phil Gramm?

He has, but only recently. Surprisingly enough, it hasn’t gotten a lot of media attention. /s

why is it that at MSNBC, the only blog in the world seems to be Politico.com?

because it is the school paper at Kewl Kidz High – Mike Allen is Jughead to Van de Hei’s Archie, and everyone knows John Harris is Reggie Mantle

now they are saying 1.8 T R I L L I O N..cant write enuf zeros

The face value of the American mortgage market is $12 trillion. If housing values decline by 40%, a figure mentioned a lot these days, that’s $4.8 trillion in losses that will have to be eaten by someone or someones: homeowners, banks, financial markets, and taxpayers.

Don’t know about the smart, just what works for me.
I’m mostly lurking and cleaning today.
Just popping in when I have something helpful to add.

DeFazio
” we should not be rolled by Wall Street exec masquerading as Secty of Treasury”

Cliff Stearns (R-FL)
equally alarmed

Be curious to know who directed the McShame campaign to attempt to creat a link between Obama and Raines. Seems like a very traditional rethug strategy of attacking the opponent on your weakness.

also from hedges’ piece here is a list of reform demands in response to the current crisis. some of them i haven’t seen suggested here yet. what do you-all think of them?

1. No bailouts without conditions and reciprocity in the form of stock warrants.

2. No more lobbying for any company that is bailed out.

3. No golden parachutes or get-out-of-jail-free cards for guilty executives.

4. No bailouts without public hearings.

5. Reduce the moral hazard in U.S. mortgage markets by introducing covered bonds for the majority of mortgage products, as is done in Western Europe. That gives institutions that finance mortgages an incentive to be prudent, because they cannot just unload them and wipe their hands clean of the liability, but are instead on the hook if the homeowner defaults.

6. Maintain neighborhood stability and housing security by passing a law with a sunset clause allowing below-median-value homeowners facing foreclosure the right to “rent to own” their homes at fair market value rates.

7. Avoid future housing bubbles by removing implicit government guarantees for new mortgages that exceed thresholds of greater than 15 to 20 times the annual fair market rent value of the home.

8. Make the Federal Reserve a Cabinet position, so it is accountable to Congress, as well as make sure all Federal Reserve Bank presidents are appointed by the president and answerable to Congress.

9. Reduce conflicts of interest by taking away power for auditor and rating agency selection from companies and placing it in the hands of the SEC to be administered on random assignment.

10. Implement a securities speculation tax, starting with derivatives, to deter casino-style capitalism.

He has, but only recently.

P-a-c-i-n-g – pls recall that before the Paulson Money Bomb, the Obama campaign had done a very good job of setting up the debates (including appearing to concede certain contingencies)so that the Economy was scheduled for the final debate – the one that people will take in to the voting booth

Ooh. Linky? Stearns is my Congresscritter. I’m working hard to get his Democratic challenger elected, but I did call his office this morning to urge him to not give in to the Paulson plan.

The dollar is crashing.

http://dollarcollapse.com/

smart money is on Arthur B. Culvahouse, Jr. (Davis’ gunsel)

He was just on the floor of the House
around 7:38 am et

Why can’t Obama attack the underlying premise of Republican economic theory and practice and criticize anyone that bought into the snake oil?

because that would include most (all?) of his own economic advisors. he’s better off, if he’s really going to try to do right, in trying to bring them around instead of attacking them now.

i don’t believe i’m actually going to write this. but….

i think the current crisis is so immediate and so critical that i’m willing to put aside attaching blame to people – so long as we can correctly blame the bad policies that brought us to this point and come up with some good policies that we can get implemented asap.

fuck. i don’t believe i just wrote that.

I think the Financial Services Roundtable and the Mortgage Bankers Association would have a stronger argument if their business slogan wasn’t Crooks R Us.

The danger we face is that Democrats will put a little lipstick on Paulson’s pig of a plan, pass it, and pat themselves on the back.

I will put up again something from yesterday. We need to be thinking about what we would replace Paulson’s plan with. Saying it’s shit is not enough.

What Treasury should be doing at the moment instead of this $700 billion boondoggle is assessing what the various tranches of mortgages are worth. As the bubble became more frenzied, less and less info and credit worthiness were needed for the loans. Then the individual loans were combined and mixed good and bad to get an acceptable rating from the ratings agencies. So in general the later tranches are likely to be more toxic than their earlier counterparts.

Treasury can start by saying something like the base value of any tranch is the face value minus 40% minus a figure based on a sliding scale of tranches of various ages. Now this may seem arbitrary (because any valuation will be to some extent) but it would allow holders of mortgage backed securities to actually come up with a real value for these assets and provide an agreed upon basis for financial companies around the world to see how good or how poor their positions are.

Under the current plan, Paulson would be buying the securitized instruments not the mortgages themselves. This is insane. If the money is going to be spent, then the government should get title. This would also help in turning around financing to long term fixed rate mortgages on these properties.

Now if these mortgages are going to be so converted to fixed types, somebody is going to have to write those mortgages. This means forcing regular banks to make such loans and hold a certain percentage of them for their life. If others are passed on, then there have to be strict rules about how they are bundled and rated, and to what extent any leveraging can be done off them.

Next I would plain and simply nullify the credit default swaps. I would require that companies that sold these refund the fees to buyers.

I would then give financial institutions 30 days to assess their exposure based on the guidelines I had set up.

And only after I got a chance to look at and run the numbers would I start talking ballpark figures for the money I thought I would need to address the problem.

Along with this, I would re-impose Glass-Steagall, usury laws, and leverage limits and increase reserve requirements for financial institutions. I would limit derivative exposure of an institution to some figure, say 25% of its net worth. I would require transparency to the government and stockholders on the positions that an institution holds. Finally, more for commodities markets, I would limit who could trade in them, i.e. keep the commercial and physical speculators and throw out the non-commercial traders.

Thanks. I’ll dig out the transcript later.

Daddy Warbucks want more lipstick for his pigs. There is something called “troubled assets” that will raise the cost. Instead of the $7×10**11 bailout, the cost will be much greater for us peasants.

I am getting a little troubled myself!!!!

The Bush administration widened the scope of its $700 billion plan to avert a financial meltdown by including assets other than mortgage-related securities.

The U.S. Treasury submitted revised guidance to Congress on its plan late yesterday as lawmakers and lobbyists push their own agendas. The department also adjusted its plan to insure money-market funds to limit protection to balances as of Sept. 19, after complaints from bank lobbyists…

Treasury officials now propose buying what they term troubled assets, without specifying the type, according to a document obtained by Bloomberg News and confirmed by a congressional aide.

Saying it’s shit is not enough.

agree completely.

this, i think, is one of the lessons from the fisa fight. we have to have an alternative proposal to put forward. if i had a re-do on fisa, i’d push for holt’s original bill.

p.s. great list.

digg

Thanks Christy.

Nixon … the crazed president wandering around the White House in the nude

Ewwwwww! Brain bleach, STAT!

Along with this, I would re-impose Glass-Steagall,

I could easily be wrong, but AFAIK, this was essentially done over the weekend. The last two US investment banks, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are now chartered as banks. Sounds to me as though you can chalk that up as a victory.

I am not qualified to judge the rest of your list, but it sure sounds excellent.

You are welcome — the McCain lobbying express has been a bit of a pet exposure project of mine this year. *g* All that access to power, what else don’t we know?

If the GOP really thought our economy was near collapse, they would be pulling our troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan.

As Liberals, I think that’s an important boundary for us. I don’t feel the need to even consider supporting any legislation about corporate welfare, until Congress gets us out of Iraq and Afghanistan.

After that, I think it’s vital we talk about who will pay for this?

Does this take universal health care off the table? It sure looks that way.

Are we going to get rid of the Department of the Fatherland Homeland Security?

It was coherent and intelligent, just like everything else you write.

Well here are some of my thoughts about these ideas.

1. No bailouts without conditions and reciprocity in the form of stock warrants. (I want the titles; stock warrants are more paper; and even 100% of nothing is still nothing)

2. No more lobbying for any company that is bailed out. (More would be needed. They could still lobby through trade organizations or the upper echelons could just give lots of money as they do now)

3. No golden parachutes or get-out-of-jail-free cards for guilty executives. (I would want a pledge to actually go after the CEOs past and present. Oh wait, wasn’t Paulson CEO of Goldman Sachs?)

4. No bailouts without public hearings. (No time. Congress is going to adjourn in two weeks)

5. Reduce the moral hazard in U.S. mortgage markets by introducing covered bonds for the majority of mortgage products, as is done in Western Europe. That gives institutions that finance mortgages an incentive to be prudent, because they cannot just unload them and wipe their hands clean of the liability, but are instead on the hook if the homeowner defaults. (I like this idea but would also restrict how many times derived instruments could be put together off them.)

6. Maintain neighborhood stability and housing security by passing a law with a sunset clause allowing below-median-value homeowners facing foreclosure the right to “rent to own” their homes at fair market value rates.

7. Avoid future housing bubbles by removing implicit government guarantees for new mortgages that exceed thresholds of greater than 15 to 20 times the annual fair market rent value of the home. (There are a lot of other things that need to be done as well to reform financial markets not just this. See my 75 above)

8. Make the Federal Reserve a Cabinet position, so it is accountable to Congress, as well as make sure all Federal Reserve Bank presidents are appointed by the president and answerable to Congress. (Flat out federalize it)

9. Reduce conflicts of interest by taking away power for auditor and rating agency selection from companies and placing it in the hands of the SEC to be administered on random assignment. (Ratings agencies need to be done away with. They abetted the financial practices that led to the meltdown)

10. Implement a securities speculation tax, starting with derivatives, to deter casino-style capitalism. (Derivatives need much stricter limits in terms of what they can be written on, how many generations of them can be written, i.e. derivatives written on derivatives written on . . . etc., transparency in who holds what, and limits on the ratio of derivative exposure to a country’s net worth.

Blue Texan has a new post up entitled: McCain Doesn’t Regret Financial Dergulation; Says It Was “Helpful”

I could easily be wrong, but AFAIK, this was essentially done over the weekend. The last two US investment banks, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are now chartered as banks.

They are technically under increased oversight by the Fed but Glass-Steagall was about separating off more speculative, investment activities from the more routine, commercial operations of what regular banks do. Actually some of Paulson’s moves allowing financial companies to use the assets of their commercial or insurance divisions to collateralize their investment positions was a further weakening of the Glass-Steagall principle.

thanks. i like your suggestions much better than the original list.

i may be wrong about this, but my understanding was that one of the goals of g-s was to build fire walls between different parts of the financial markets – so that if one part blew up it would be less likely to bring the whole system down with it.

This is really excellent stuff. Now if only I could get my US Senators on the phone.

Please feel free to ignore this, but it seems pretty obvious that Paulson is desperate to insulate Wall Street from 200 years of U.S. Bankruptcy law.

OT, future regulation it seems to me has to pass the test of functioning as an early warning system. It’s clear that Bernanke and Paulson thought last week’s infusion of cash, along with the AIG bailout, would “work.” They have no clue where all the cash they keep pumping in, is going.

I think we have to better understand the problem, where the cash is leaking, before we just throw money at it.

Thanks.

What concerns me is the calculated way that Paulson, etal, laid in wait in the tall grass until just now, before the debates and with such a short time left before the election to ask for this much $. Seems they were not blessed with much foresight for the heads of the Treasury and the Fed, eh?

As I believe selise was the first to point out this is the essence of the Shock Doctrine.

Lindsay has an new post at Silo entitled: Kissinger’s “Lessons” for Palin: Lobbying in Disguise?

Shock doctrine — exactly

A very interesting article here. I have thought for a while that this adm has put idiots in place to hurt our ecomony/country on purpose. There must be laws against this? McCain cries against earmarks yet wants to bail out companies that are just way too big. No company should be so large that it takes 700 billion to bail them out. How about helping them with 25% of their problem? Why foot the entire amount?

Make no mistake: The working people, who are the victims of the financial parasitism of the ruling elite, will foot the bill to bail out those who have enriched themselves by plundering the social wealth. The massive expansion of budget deficits and the national debt as a result of this plan will be used to justify a brutal assault on basic social programs, education, housing and the wages, jobs, pensions, and health benefits of the working class.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2…..-s22.shtml

Bush’s 1st Chief of staff came directly from General MOtors and they have had trouble since day one. By shrinking the auto co. with buyouts they are getting rid of union workers that made $30 or so an hour and replaceing them with wages of $15. an hour wage and (Delphi) hiring immigrants and paying them $7. an hour (in Mi). Who would ever go on strike that made only $7. an hour? You just could not afford to. The unions are now impotent in my view.

GM gave millions of dollars to buy outs, gave millions to United Axel when they were on strike and they then did buyouts and GM gave away dividends up until this year. How can any one run a failing company that way and have their hand out for corporate welfare? I’ve seen the clip “Who killed the electric car” and that is another made decission they made.

They used to be a good place for an all American jog, good pay, health benefits, paid holidays, retirements packages but a couple years ago they were being trashed by a Republican reporter: is Gm in the insurance business or in the business to make cars?

Why should we bail out compainies that took our jobs overseas? Why? Why?