Thanks Ian.

digg

perhaps on the economic side we might try and do things right?

Well, the government has tried pretty much everything wrong, let’s go way out there and try what could actually work.

Among many advantages of your plan Ian, politically speaking, this is a great chance for liberal progressives to show support for the black caucus.

From this morning’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee’s black/white jobless gap is highest in U.S.

Good post, Ian.

O.T.

How come the media and specifically the Sunday morning yak shows had very little on Friday nites breaking news of Palin’s Trooper gate verdict??!!?
Do they feel its out of bounds with the nature of the economic crisis taking ctr. stage??

Good ideas, Ian. Too bad they won’t become law.

Thank you Ian!
Something…..i heard something, about………….
oh, YEAH!
Washington is where great ideas go to die.
But we can hope, we can all hope and those who do, pray!
i wish Barney would come to the Lake one of these days, and you could host him!
:)

The God That Failed: The 30-Year Lie of the Market Cult

According to the cult, not only were markets to be freed from the constraints placed on them after the world-shattering effects of the Great Depression, but all public spending was to be slashed ruthlessly to the bone. (Although exceptions were always made for the Pentagon war machine.) After all, every dollar spent by a public entity on public services and amenities was a dollar taken away from the private wheeler-dealers who could more usefully employ it in increasing the wealth of the elite — who would then allow some of their vast profits to “trickle down” to the lower orders.

This was the cult that captured the governments of the United States and Britain (among others), as well as the Republican and Democratic parties, and the Conservative and Labour parties as well. And for almost thirty years, its ruthless doctrines have been put into practice. Regulation and oversight of financial markets were systematically stripped away or rendered toothless. Essential public services were sold off, for chump change, to corporate interests. Public spending on anything other than making war, threatening war and profiting from war was pared back or eliminated. Such public spending that did remain was forever under threat and derided, like the remnants of some pagan faith surviving in isolated backwaters.

Year after year, the ordinary citizens were told by their governments: we have no money to spend on your needs, on your communities, on your infrastructure, on your health, on your children, on your environment, on your quality of life. We can’t do those kinds of things any more.

Of course, when talking amongst themselves, or with the believers in the think tanks, boardrooms — and editorial offices — the cultists would speak more plainly: we don’t do those things anymore because we shouldn’t do them, we don’t want to do them, they are wrong, they are evil, they are outside the faith. But for the hoi polloi, the line was usually something like this: Budgets are tight, we must balance them (for a “balanced budget” is a core doctrine of the cult), we just can’t afford all these luxuries, sorry about that.

But now, as the emptiness and falsity of the Chicago cargo cult stands nakedly revealed, even to some of its most faithful and fanatical adherents, we can see that this 30-year mantra by our governments has been a deliberate and outright lie. The money was there — billions and billions and billions of dollars of it, trillions of dollars of it. We can see it before our very eyes today — being whisked away from our public treasuries and showered upon the banks and the brokerages.

Let’s say it again: The money was there all along.

Okay, I am already flip-flopping on my endorsement of Krugman for Sec. of Treasury — I now support Ian for that position!

you know he’s canadian, right? *g*

bom dia pups

Kugman got Nobel Prize.

agree with all of your points except this one:

Laws intended to make sure oil prices don’t go up,

as you have been pointing out, you expect prices to go down in the next year. do we really need 55 mph limits to control oil prices? i don’t think so, and if that changes changing speed limits is something that could be done then. of course there are reasons to conserve – not destroying the planet is a good one in my book. but that is a different issue.

Like Las Vegas, what goes to the banks..stays in the banks!

re “pay-go” – i’m ok with it, but only under one condition and that is that the cost of wall street bailouts and economic stimulus packages come out of the war machine budget.

here’s the really important thing – we could make it politically acceptable to many of the people who have been sucking of the war machine teat by tying it to investments in green tech. we re-task the war machine manufacturing, research, etc towards green tech. building windmills instead of bombs, solar arrays instead of tanks, and so on.

one of the most difficult issues for dealing with MIC budgets is that all the states and many communities depend on the war machine for jobs, tax base, etc. this a way to address that issue.

What it’s okay to outsource your and my jobs, but we can’t outsource the jobs of the elite?

;-)

I wonder if some of those states that don’t “overspend’ on social programs are in fact getting extra federal money, either as an alternative way to meet those needs, or as an alternative way to fill well-connected pockets?

Federal Taxes Paid vs. Spending Received by State

Great comment, thanks.

BTW, what does MIC stand for?

I hadn’t considered your point about waiting for the next congress. I was actually applauding Frank for trying to get something going this year. But that quote from Roy Blunt has made me change my mind. IMHO, a public works program is the key.

Good morning Ian, I do have another of your points that I want to contest and that is your proposal to increase the working day to nine hours. While I appreciate a reduction in the number of days worked. Since W has been in office the take for workers has declined. We have continued to improve “productivity” but the workers share has declined. This needs to reverse. Wall street has been driven by greed and not only by bankers. Unemployment is rising and there should be a significant jump after the holiday spending period. Share the jobs that remain reduce the number of hours worked.

i found this out the hard way…lost beaucoup bucks (no bail out) and treacherous broker/dealer/cheerleaders…Liars for CNBC included,that was 7 years ago,and Im still picking up the shattered pieces i was left with

I still think that Wall Street needs to pay for the bailout and one of the ways is by a transaction tax.

daring to dream we hear this on our side of the Pond . . .

Brown was quick to reassure taxpayers that they would get a fair deal from their new ownership of the banks, saying there would be “no rewards for failure.”

. . . No dividends will be paid until the government’s preference shares have been fully redeemed and future executive salary will be based on performance “and long-term value creation,” Brown said.

. . . Among the high level casualties resulting from the announcements are RBS chief executive Steve Goodwin, who will be replaced by Stephen Hester, currently chief executive of British Land. The bank said that Goodwin will not be receiving any severance payment.

U.K. Bails Out 3 Major Banks

if i post a pic of me with Krugman from photo shop,will my email be revealed?It was sent to me in an email

yea…Wall Street broke me,and you can NEVER win in Arbitration…that FARCE IS GAMED and must be shut DOWN ASAP

No dividends will be paid until the government’s preference shares have been fully redeemed and future executive salary will be based on performance “and long-term value creation,” Brown said.

——
how unfair
how will they manage these
http://www.luxist.com/media/2006/04/Twizzle05.jpg

Are ya’ll writing to Frank to demand that he NOT rush through some ill-advised (and punitive) “stimulus”? Are ya’ll writing to Frank to tell him that with a big win in the wings with the coming November election, now is NOT the time to pass some Republican-approved bill of any kind?

They have NO say in this since they are largely responsible. They will soon have fewer seats at the table and it is time they get used to what that means: sit back and let the adults run the show now – and SHUT THE FUCK UP!

Roubini for Emperor, Messrs Welch, Krugman, and Black his Council of Regents *g*

Good morning Ian, I do have another of your points that I want to contest and that is your proposal to increase the working day to nine hours.

During a slow period at work, I did a (half-assed) assessment of what we would save at work by switching to a 9-4:30 schedule w/ a half hour for lunch for all employees. Currently we have flex time so the offices are all open from 8-5 and we all have an hour lunch. I couldn’t provide a true assessment w/o the figures for energy consumption while the buildings were empty. So, it was more an idea. Asked my boss if she wanted me to persue it and the response was non-committal due mainly to the employee union concerns. But if it became a national idea and someone showed leadership and pushed the idea, well that would be inspiring.

apologies. MIC = “military industrial complex” for lazy typists like me

Exactly. Excellent point, and this is real close to torches and pitchfork time, people mobbing in the streets etc.

If they can give 700 BILLION dollars… no excuse me, I believe it was finally 850 BILLION dollars ( with a little side fund of 100 BILLION(!) dollars for George’s “discretionary” fund), to the banks and “others” to keep them solvent, then they could damn well spend it on something as frivolous as HEALTH CARE for the MILLIONS of people in America that have NOTHING!

By the way, did anybody see where that 700 BILLION dollars went (…it went by so fast, I know it was around here somewhere… I must have set it down and forgot where I put it)?

just don’t put krugman in charge of trade policy. he’d be perfect as a foil / devil’s advocate for someone like stiglitz though.

Oh, God, Bush is going to speak at 10:55. There goes the market.

How about this legislation: If your other story regarding the Libor rates being propped up artificially as banks aren’t overnighting, why not have Congress legislate (or the Treasury by regulation)a substitute factor for the Libor in all adjustable rate mortgages in the US? It could be a situation where the Congress must re-examine it every three months to see if there is action on the bank to bank front. This won’t protect everyone from foreclosure, particularly for the newly unemployed or sick, but it might save a good chunk of the market from chaos, and thereby give the credit world another hold to put its toe.

IKES REAL speech was to

the Military Industrial CONGRESSIONAL complex…he chickened ou at last minute

The corporate tax structure needs to be changed so that the tax rate paid by corporations increases as the percentage of jobs outsourced increases. You could allow for up to 15% (or some such) amount of outsourcing before the tax kicks in (to help improve the lot of people in poorer countries) but start nailing them when the percent goes higher.

Also, they should be taxed based on the differential between CEO salary and compensation and their average worker pay. The tax is minimized when the CEO pay is no more than 5x average worker pay but after that, the sky’s the limit. They can still pay their CEOs criminally high salaries – they would just have to pay taxes out the ying-yang to do so.

he really is the Grim Reaper

me likey
so how they gonna keep these

http://www.luxist.com/media/2006/04/Twizzle05.jpg

it’s worse than that. check out hugh’s comment on dean’s post at oxdown:

I am not sure how much the government has spent on its program to help out homeowners. I’m thinking not that much. But here are some other costs:

Bear-Stearns: $30 billion
AIG: $122.8 billion (to date)
Fannie and Freddie: potential liabilities ~$2 trillion
Paulson bailout: $700 billion
Congressional add-ons: $110 billion
Paulson directs Fannie and Freddie to buy more bad paper: $200 billion
Fed currency swaps: $620 billion
Fed’s Commercial Paper Funding Facility to replace money markets (planned for end of November): $900 billion

Some of this money had yet to be spent. Some will not be entirely wasted. Some is in relatively short term loans and should be paid back in 4-6 months. Some involve losses that make take years to work through. But the sums involved are staggering. Just what I have up there is $4.682 trillion, and I have likely left somethings out.

one of the most difficult issues for dealing with MIC budgets is that all the states and many communities depend on the war machine for jobs, tax base, etc. this a way to address that issue.

This in a nutshell is capitalism’s problem. Life and technology move quickly, but because we need our jobs to literally survive, we fight to keep them no matter what they are which is why we constantly shoot ourselves in the foot. The money we are throwing at bankers should be used to ease the transition from one technology (i.e. internal combustion engines) to another.

It also helps to see the “class war” as the rich against the poor, not as people like Bill O’Reilly have it, the poor, acting through government, against the rich. Being a “have” is satisfying only when there are lots of “have nots” and the less they have, the better. The entire arrangement, money, hierarchy, and the rest is truly sick. Were we smart we’d try to arrange it so everyone has as good a time as possible. I doubt it matters at the pearly gates that I own more or less than you, though I could be wrong. Maybe there is a first class and second class heaven which means you can take it with you after all.

foothillsmike @21 – i’d like to know more how that would work. do other stock exchanges do something similar?

sadlyyes @34 – thanks for the correction. “MICC” then.

Increasing the workday is all well and good, but there’s a problem with that in health care. It’s one of those services that someone needs to be around all day. Everyone can’t have the weekend off in that one, so they would of course–have to hire more people. Which is where it kinda falls to pieces, since right now a majority of places aren’t hiring anyone unless they’re a physician or a pharmacist of some type. The support staff as far as they’re concerned? Can go hang. If they increased the wages and cut the hours it would probably go. But the chances of a real across the board (with no exceptions for unionized workplaces) is also that of a snowflake in hell too. There’s no benefit to the worker and they STILL have to keep up the productivity, for all it conserves energy.

I really hold no hope of the health corporations doing anything like this in the future. At least not with this congress in charge and not with the current lack of rules against pulling crap like that.

Being a “have” is satisfying only when there are lots of “have nots” and the less they have, the better

try as i might, i don’t know how to wrap my mind around this.

FDL

Can you take Ian’s post, turn it into a petition, and have the members of FDL sign it and send it our members of congress?

If everyone agreed to follow French rules, we would have human work conditions and everyone would be playing on the same (French) level playing field.

There is no reason NOT to. One cannot complain about lost work time that could otherwise be used for more slave labor. We already make due with the HARD time constraints of 7 days in a week and only 24 hours in a day. Here we’d only be talking about a socially applied limit to fit within the hard physical limit…and all for the better. Less stress, more time off (one cannot complain about American’s not taking enough vacation time AND complain about allowing Americans more time off).

Level the field of competition to be wholly French. Best healthcare in the world and a more humane (and human) work schedule.

Ooooh, I like that one…

The military-industrial complex has successfully designed the system to lock-in over militarization. Virtually EVERY state has a finger in the defense spending pie. Virtually EVERY state would see job losses if we cut military spending. The way to fix this is to spend on OTHER sector jobs and while those jobs start growing, start cutting defense spending. Those that lose their jobs in the defense sector can then be shuttled into the non-defense sector jobs.

One way or another, defense spending needs to be halved.

GREEN technologies could make this up,partially imo

Thanks.

I think your comments about the MIC are right on target.

What does all this do to the govts. debt service costs too.

lol I’m a grad student, part time instructor and a volunteer at a foodbank. I don’t think too many folks would salivate over those prospects

It is my understanding that the UK is doing this. If we had half the UK rate it would generate a lot of dollars and would not be much of a burden.

It comes from a true hatred of humanity or human nature. Most of our movers and shakers come from sufficiently “humble” beginnings to be set on a path to “prove” themselves. Those with inherited wealth have perceived themselves as “superior” for generations. The idea we can do something in this life which distinguishes us from humanity is literally insane. We are not identical. We come in different colors, sizes and abilities but none of our differences matter in the infinite scheme. Unfortunately, and here’s the crazy part, we think they do.

a blast from the past

by Two-Time Congressional Medal of Honor Recipient

Major General Smedley D. Butler – USMC Retired
About the Author

CHAPTER ONE

WAR IS A RACKET

WAR is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small “inside” group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few – the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

And what is this bill?

This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.

Again they are choosing sides. France and Russia met and agreed to stand side by side. Italy and Austria hurried to make a similar agreement. Poland and Germany cast sheep’s eyes at each other, forgetting for the nonce [one unique occasion], their dispute over the Polish Corridor.

The assassination of King Alexander of Jugoslavia [Yugoslavia] complicated matters. Jugoslavia and Hungary, long bitter enemies, were almost at each other’s throats. Italy was ready to jump in. But France was waiting. So was Czechoslovakia. All of them are looking ahead to war. Not the people – not those who fight and pay and die – only those who foment wars and remain safely at home to profit.

There are 40,000,000 men under arms in the world today, and our statesmen and diplomats have the temerity to say that war is not in the making.

Hell’s bells! Are these 40,000,000 men being trained to be dancers?

Not in Italy, to be sure. Premier Mussolini knows what they are being trained for. He, at least, is frank enough to speak out. Only the other day, Il Duce in “International Conciliation,” the publication of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said:

“And above all, Fascism, the more it considers and observes the future and the development of humanity quite apart from political considerations of the moment, believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace… War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the people who have the courage to meet it.”

Undoubtedly Mussolini means exactly what he says. His well-trained army, his great fleet of planes, and even his navy are ready for war – anxious for it, apparently. His recent stand at the side of Hungary in the latter’s dispute with Jugoslavia showed that. And the hurried mobilization of his troops on the Austrian border after the assassination of Dollfuss showed it too. There are others in Europe too whose sabre rattling presages war, sooner or later.

Herr Hitler, with his rearming Germany and his constant demands for more and more arms, is an equal if not greater menace to peace. France only recently increased the term of military service for its youth from a year to eighteen months.

Yes, all over, nations are camping in their arms. The mad dogs of Europe are on the loose. In the Orient the maneuvering is more adroit. Back in 1904, when Russia and Japan fought, we kicked out our old friends the Russians and backed Japan. Then our very generous international bankers were financing Japan. Now the trend is to poison us against the Japanese. What does the “open door” policy to China mean to us? Our trade with China is about $90,000,000 a year. Or the Philippine Islands? We have spent about $600,000,000 in the Philippines in thirty-five years and we (our bankers and industrialists and speculators) have private investments there of less than $200,000,000.

Then, to save that China trade of about $90,000,000, or to protect these private investments of less than $200,000,000 in the Philippines, we would be all stirred up to hate Japan and go to war – a war that might well cost us tens of billions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of lives of Americans, and many more hundreds of thousands of physically maimed and mentally unbalanced men.

Of course, for this loss, there would be a compensating profit – fortunes would be made. Millions and billions of dollars would be piled up. By a few. Munitions makers. Bankers. Ship builders. Manufacturers. Meat packers. Speculators. They would fare well.

Yes, they are getting ready for another war. Why shouldn’t they? It pays high dividends.

But what does it profit the men who are killed? What does it profit their mothers and sisters, their wives and their sweethearts? What does it profit their children?

What does it profit anyone except the very few to whom war means huge profits?

Yes, and what does it profit the nation?

You also put your finger on a problem, hierarchy. War lovers like playing cops and robbers with real bullets, but most cannon fodder do it because they see no alternative to going along, anymore than we can stop the bailout or reverse the failed policies of recent years.

The alternative to hierarchy is equality, but that means we the people become responsible for collective actions. Even were we open to such an arrangement, and I don’t believe we are, we don’t have the technology to make it possible, although the technology is close enough to start thinking about it.

Why isn’t anyone talking about usurious credit card rates and how that affects getting cash from CC Companies into the economy. Other than the obvious problem that the same Companies support Congress

Refocus MIC spending to green energy.

National security is founded on the economy, not weapons.

Thanks for this, Ian:

“You’re a bastard. i.e., Roy Blunt and most Republicans in the House.”

It’s time for the public to get real about the Republican’s “economic theory.” It’s not economics. It’s five parts hate, five parts profiteering.

A little O/T. I am listening to “This American Life” and they are talking about Commercial Paper and the Breaking the Buck/mutual funds. One of the issues they bring up (and has been talked about alot here and other places), is the lack of knowledge about the true status of investments banks.

Why not require the banks to completely open their books to the public, when they take any money from Uncle Sam. This would expose the information that is needed for making a informed decision on what is really going on. Make it know who refuses to give that info, and you soon know which investment bank is solid and which is playing the game (also known as gambling). When the media starts putting this on the air waves (and having P Krugman on our side will help alot, with the Noble prize in his wallet), the public might start to feel a little more secure.

Food for thought.

Another addition to your 9-hour days, Ian, would be to stagger those hours. Some people would add an hour in the morning, others would add the hour to the end of their day. Reducing traffic congestion this way would be a big step in reducting carbon emissions from cars standing still on the roads.

There should also be some immediate capital investment in transit; most systems now have unmet demand they simply can’t service with existing rolling stock. Getting more hybrid buses, trolley cars, and supertrains on the rails/roads right now will help alleviate the bottleneck. Folks who’ve converted from their own solo auto commute to transit need to see it become more pleasant and faster quickly, especially as gas prices fall.

I expect them to go down under the current circumstances since I believe that the money currently being spent will mostly not get to the real economy. A properly done stimulus bill will have money get to the real economy. Besides, there is no harm in driving oil prices down even further, and the long run problem in the economy is still the oil-sprawlconomy link. This bill is meant to not just provide a short term boost, but to start fixing long term problems.

Oh yes, you suggested rapid transit money before I published and I thought I’d put it in in response, you’re absolutely right.