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CR has posted the "bailout plan," as it currently stands.
Glenn Greenwald has an important response, as does gjohnsit over at DKos.
But here's all you need to know. Hank Paulson is asking for $700,000,000,000. That's $2,333 from every man, woman, and child in the United States.
In exchange for that money, Paulson is unwilling to accept any demands to make markets more transparent, limit executive compensation, or assist homeowners fighting foreclosure. The sole purpose of that $700,000,000,000 is to bail out Wall Street and only Wall Street, but not to fix it, or our larger economy.
He is asking to be absolutely unbound by any law when he spends that money.
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.
The only "string" attached is a semi-annual Congressional report--one in which they would have zero leverage to influence his choices.
Within three months of the first exercise of the authority granted in section 2(a), and semiannually thereafter, the Secretary shall report to the Committees on the Budget, Financial Services, and Ways and Means of the House of Representatives and the Committees on the Budget, Finance, and Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate with respect to the authorities exercised under this Act and the considerations required by section 3.
Paulson didn't even have the class to call this a "review"--which underscores the degree to which he wants to be unbound by any and all review, legal, congressional, or anything else.
Hank Paulson--one of the CEOs who got us into this mess--is asking each and every American to give him $2,333 to do with as he sees fit, with absolutely no strings attached.
No.
No Right Turn photo by greefus groinks
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Please send this link to everyone you know and compel them to watch it:
http://breadwithcircus.com/
You can’t know how outraged to be if you don’t understand the game.
No!!! is exactly right. We have to start calling Monday. The American taxpayer deserves to know more about this before, if ever, it is approved. No more free giveaways to Hank Paulson and his cronies on Wall Street.
For that same $2333.00 we could give a person struggling to pay their debts about $200.00 a month.
This is absolute bullshit from these people. Why the hell would I be willing to give one of the architects of this bloody mess almost a trillion dollars with no strings. Bushco are laughing all the way to the bank.
The Financial Meltdown, Explained!
http://current.com/items/89322....._explained
Same game, different name.
it is the shock doctrine, without a doubt
The can see the handwriting that says Obama. And they want him bound hand and foot before he even gets sworn in!
Speaker Pelosi, don’t get fooled again!
Patriot Act, FISA, AUMF, PAA, FAA — all these have been rammed at Congress when you are busy trying to go on vacation or get re-elected. Don’t be fooled by this “bailout” — it’s Shock Doctrine pure and simple. If you fall for this foolishness, you and Barack Obama will have your hands completely tied. Nothing will be accomplished for the next four years except paying this bill.
Whatever happened to Pay/Go, anyway? Make Uncle Hank find a revenue stream for this sweet deal for his friends (and himself). Don’t pass this onto the next President!
Do your job!
http://news.goldseek.com/LewRo.....020175.php
Some changes in the law and corporate governance could have prevented the current financial crisis. First, reverse the 19th Century Supreme Court ruling to treat Corporations as citizens and remove the corporate veil from Officers. This change would fundamentally change the mindset of Directors and Officers to act more responsibly and within the law. Remove the cozy relations between Directors/CEO’s on multiple boards. Make Corporations responsible to their customers first and profits and shareholders second. Remove the incentive of CEO’s for tactical leadership to strategic leadership, as in other parts of the Corporate world.
Given the ethical and intellectual shallowness of the 110th Congress, don’t expect these bailouts well thought out or in the best interests of the citizenry!
their entire purpose was to pillage the middle class, to take our assets and redistribute them to the wealthiest people on the planet
wby?
not to give them assets but to take them from us so their is a greater devide, they are robber barons and all they want is a rober baron economy
From the article I posted above:
“there’s no reason for the banksters to quit until they own everything or the dollar sloughs off its remaining value, whichever comes first.”
Self-dealing taken to the stratosphere, methinks.
You realize that any time taken by Congress to even think for one moment about this breathtaking scheme will be called “dithering” and will be blamed when the inevitable collapse actually does occur.
The Bush Administration is asking for another off-budget spending plan the size of the Iraq war.
The masters of the universe, who own and control the World Bank and IMF have simply done to us what has been proven to work on every third world nation they have done it to before…loan so much money that you end up controlling all the assets, and the government.
Ask Henry Kissinger how it works.
Politics and politicians are are a total side show. Meaningless.
This sounds pessimistic, but I fear that no matter how much money we sink into that blackhole to bail out Wall Street, this economy cannot be fixed without some serious regulations put in place. Coupled with the bottomless pit known as the Iraq War, there is not enough money. Note, too, that the term “inflation” has not even appeared yet — and it will also be borne by all Americans through escalating prices and lowered values.
I am going to make some very strong phone calls Monday morning. “NO” just cannot be spoken loud enough.
these maggots eliminated the regulations that were there to prevent this exact scenario
and mccain is at the heart of it
he has the NERVE to now go on about “deregulating the health care industry” when exactly the OPOSITE is called for in ALL industry
c and l;
Glad to see the outrage here.
I am so cynical at this point I think it would be just desserts to hand this mess back to the Republicans, let McPalin have it.
As I understand it, Senators Dodd and Schumer were given a briefing last evening. They reported it as a somber affair that depicted the meltdown of the western world in only a few days; urgent legislative authority is being requested.
Also last night I got to see Kevin Phillips on Bill Moyers. Without naming anyone, Phillips scoffingly described things as a matter of a bunch of arsonists setting fire to things, and then showing up to volunteer as firemen to puts things aright. He pointed out how Paulson is involved with Goldman Sachs (I think that was the investment firm stated), and his plan to save the economy is neatly aimed to save the financial industry.
Friday evening here in Athens Ohio Governor Strickland our former Congressman) shared what he had spoken with Senator Sherrod Brown about earlier in the day. Senator Brown had been part of the meeting the night before having to do with the economic crisis. The word “crisis” and “quickly” kept being repeated. How critical it was that congress move on this this week. NOW.
then I heard Senator Dodd on Hardball say that “the oxygen had left the room” during that meeting. He also expressed this sense of urgency.
Reminded me just as it did Glenn of that push for the 2002 war resolution vote…it has to be now..now …nnow before the mid term election.
WTF?
These corporate welfare kings and queens need to be held accountable, investigated, the goods confiscated. Why is that these people are willing to share their losses with the American taxpayer but not the profits? These are the same people who vote against a health care for all, access to an equitable education system, and living wages.
NO NO NO to these corporate welfare kings and queens. Investigate
arbusto@4: re corporations as persons…this is a devastating misunderstanding long gone uncorrected.
In his spellbinding Chapter 6—“The Deciding Moment”—Mr. Hartmann tells how corporate personhood was achieved.
“…Orthodoxy has it the Supreme Court decided in 1886, in a case called Santa Clara County v. the Southern Pacific Railroad, that corporations were indeed legal persons. I express that view myself, in a recent book. So do many others. So do many law schools. We are all wrong.
Mr. Hartmann undertook instead a conscientious search. He finally found the contemporary casebook, published in 1886, blew the dust away, and read Santa Clara County in the original, so to speak. Nowhere in the formal, written decision of the Court did he find corporate personhood mentioned. Not a word. The Supreme Court did NOT establish corporate personhood in Santa Clara County.
In the casebook “headnote,” however, Mr. Hartmann read this statement: “The defendant Corporations are persons within the intent of the clause in section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment…which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Here, anyway, corporate personhood was “provided”— in the headnote, instead of the formal written decision of the Supreme Court. But that’s not good enough.
What is a “headnote?” It is the summary description of a court decision, written into the casebook by the court reporter. It is similar to an editor’s “abstract” in a scientific journal. Because they are not products of the court itself, however, headnotes carry no legal weight; they can establish no precedent in law. Corporate personhood, Mr. Hartmann discovered, is simply and unequivocally illegitimate…”
Above from http://www.rockisland.com/~rwbehan/ [if link n/g can google author Thom Hartmann’s book Unequal Protection…chapt 6.]
The court reporter who inserted the the idea “corps have status of persons” had past, strong ties to the railroads, who were the 1886 case defendants.
This cannot stand.
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.
blatantly, drastically, unprecedentedly unconstitutional.
I generally don’t trust Congressional Dem’s any farther than I could throw the collective lot of them, but I simply cannot imagine that this provision will be allowed to stand.
To the Barricades.
I am sick about this manipulation of fear. It is time for Obama to have his FDR moment and we DFH’S have to lead the charge.
” Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
My children had more sense than to o.k. such a demand at age 8.
How is this different from Bush’s executive orders demanding that none of his administration be subject to any law for acts committed during his administration? (i.e. torture, illegal wire-tapping, lying to lead nation into illegal war, OLC writing legislation, Stormtroopers manhandling and arresting reporters (Amy Goodman’s face will be forever imprinted upon my mind’s eye!)… on and on.
And who wants this imperialistic power? The same handlers that were supposed to be responsible for seeing that no such meltdown happened.
NO! NO! NO!
Thank you EW! (do you ever sleep?)
Don’t wait until Monday. Click my name for the fax I sent to Dodd this morning. They are working on the bill now. It could be presented to Congress in what they hope is final form Monday morning.
In that opening quote demanding protection against any review or to be accountable under any court of law, what better warning could we have from Paulson that he has and/or intends to commit illegal acts in trying to rescue the Big Money Boys?
What can we the people DO before it’s too late?
re Healthcare. A bit of missing hstory. As a teenager I had actual, insider {I won’t say how] knowledge for years of hospital shenanigans. My recalls are from connection to 1 of the finest, Eastcoast hospitals, an old, non-profit institution.
This H never turned away anyone from excellent emergency care. All walk-ins were treated/overseen by the best physicians… because for any doc to have the right to send his private patients into this H, he also had to serve a rigid number of volunteer hours monthly in the H.
In the 1950’s things changed. Congress passed laws making for-profit Hs very attractive to profiteers. Area Hs began sending emergency patients who could not pay, to this “no one refused” H…by taxi, car, ambulance or even ambulant. This H began to be overwhelmed, especially after pressuring “friends” of the H for more and more donations. This H thru the 1970’s continued their policy of always giving care without regard to ability to pay. From then to now I do not know what is their status, altho an internet check shows they are still very active [they opened another H in a very affluent area and I believe maintain the original H via donation funding from the affluent area].
I well recall the administrators [mostly docs] worry and frustration and angst and desperation to continue service to all vs. paying the costs for medecines, supplies, etc.
Hs have become legal rackets since the ’50s. The earlier legislation had to do w gov’t subsidies and accounting/tax benefits that enabled large profits to be hidden in creative “costs”.
BTW, I received hospital emer. med care for infection in Quebec abt 1955. Asked abt paying and was told no charge “This is a free hospital” run by IIRC the RC Church. Never forgot it.
You would think that for 700 billion, the Dems could at least get something for their troubles. Is a resignation of Bush & Cheney too much to ask for?
Unfortunately, with Pelosi, Hoyer & Reid at the helm, were pretty screwed on this one, don’t you think? They appear to be fundamentally compromised by their corporate contributors and their fear of the right wing noise machine. Our congressional leadership’s only interest seems to be “winning” the next election so they can get bigger offices, better parking spaces, get invited to better parties and maybe extort a couple more $K a year from their corporate lobbyist palls. I’ve always thought that it would be good politics for Obama to start taking these clowns on (or at least the corruption they represent). This might be a good place to start- He’s going to have to do this eventually anyways if he really wants to accomplish anything meaningful if he gets elected. And by meaningful, I mean anything that isn’t another Bush era give-away to corporate America.
Breaking: CNN.com reporting Fed judge orders Cheney to preserve records.
We can dream, can’t we?
CNN.com reporting Fed judge orders Cheney to preserve records.
“No problem, Your Honor. I’ll just have one of my aides give you directions to the landfill they were taken to after shredding.”
Jim,
Great letter to Dodd. Thanks for all you do.
This sure as hell sounds like another chapter in the “Shock Doctrine”. Krugman just said No Deal. This is classic panic legislating.
As these asshats say, “This could be an opportunity” What seperates them from the anarchists? $$$$$
Jim, your letter to Sen. Dodd was excellent!
I’m going to try an e-mail to him at the Senate Banking Committee. We should flood that committee with e-mails.
There is something more sinister going on here. Hank Greenberg, founder and builder of AIG (forced out 2005) was on Charlie Rose this week (Monday?) It’s online in 2 segments now. He said that about 6 to 8 weeks ago he began trying to write and call the CEO of IGA, Bernanke, Paulson. He repeatedly offered his help, advice, whatever he could do to save IGA. He had financiers all over the world calling him to help, offering money for a buy-out. HE GOT NO RESPONSE FROM ANY OF THEM!!!
So, what is the REAL reason Paulson wanted the gov (we taxpayers) to bear the burden of AIG’s collapse? Why not work with Greenberg and the group of backers to right the ship of AIG?
www.charlierose.com (search site for Greenberg)
How do you see this, Jim? Plunger? Anyone?
I wish to second Jim’s comments, only in a more forceful tone:
Do Not Wait Until Monday!!!
It may be too late by then. Our Congresscritters are working on this right this very moment and will continue through the weekend!
Monday is probably too late. The deal maybe signed, sealed and delivered before Monday when the markets open again!
What’s the total so far?
Bear Stearns?
Fannie Mae? Freddie Mac?
AIG?
How many more are out there?
It’ll easily be more than a trillion dollars
What does a trillion look like?
http://www.pafoa.org/forum/ima.....b11356.jpg
http://i125.photobucket.com/al.....-Stack.jpg
Not about Paulson specifically but …
The Dark Side of Wall Street and the planned economic collapse of America
and
The Alarming Parallels Between 1929 and 2007
Thanks ew.
I’m faxing your post to my Congressional representatives.
digg
Not just No. Hell No.
They have to stabilize the value of the underlying mortgages, or else it’s all yet another patch-up on a doomed shell game.
ew, I hope someone is faxing your posts and Ian Walsh’s to the Black Caucus and to the Unions. We need them to bring their weight to bear in this fight.
From CREW’s site, here’s the Court Order and its accompanying Memorandum Opinion.
It’s called a feudal system, overseen by an absolute monarch. It has a very long, very old pedigree. Exactly why these clowns should be so nostalgic for it is beyond me, because it probably has been responsible for more suffering, deprivation, and misery than any other long-lasting system devised.
You’d have to be truly evil to want the return of that kind of “government”. Oh. Wait.
The last Republican I liked said, ” … and that Government of the People, by the People, and for the People shall not perish from the Earth”. These “people” never did like that line.
(Ever had one of those times when a correctly-spelled word just looks, um, wrong? Well, “people” is a very strange word, when you think about it. -e-o- ? Where’s that from?)
Thanks, I’ll have to read that tomorrow. Too much football on the tube now.
from that “Dark Side” link:
So I’m not the only one who sees a conscious return to absolutist monarchy in this. I was starting to wonder.
The US GDP is $14 trillion. This bill gives away 5% of the GDP with zero oversight and no recourse if Paulson simply chose to take all the money for himself and run away. (He could merely have a friend write a $1 IOU to himself and then “sell” it for the $700 billion.)
In case folks think the above quote of the proposed legislation sounds familiar, you can find similar language in…wait for it…Sub-prime Mortgages!
And they thought we couldn’t be fooled again. Hah!
Krugman: No Deal
Don’t forget the toll-free numbers to the capital switchboard
Make a call, ask for the congressperson or senator, talk to their staff, hang up and then hit redial, do it again…. over and over again
Dang it Foland, you smoked me.
Ok, here’s Calculated Risk’s view of the bailout.
Why are we expected to bail these fuckers out. They refuse to help those losing their homes, but we have no choice but to pay up. I am so far beyond disgusted…. spit.
EPU’d from Ian’s post downstairs.
I’m expecting darth to tell the judge to go cheney himsef any minute. It isn’t going to happen. I’d bet there is a shredder parked outside going 24/7.
There is no way this bill will pass in its current form
Way too much power given to a single person
no real oversight
did you see that number at the end of the bill $11 trillion dollars in debt!
No Taxation (loans) Without Representation
Dear Humans
It’s all about trust, or lack of it. America has now completely trashed its already tarnished reputation in the rest of the world by screaming the virtues of the ‘free market’ and then dropping all adherence to those principles when the first major salvo was launched against their inadequately regulated financial sector.
To say that this has been a long time coming would be an understatement. All the seeds of destruction were in-place years ago. The coupling of voracious greed in a unsupervised and deregulated soup has now lead to unbridled fear and panic as the shaky unsupported edifice is torpedoed by harsh economic reality. The massive US deficit, it’s gargantuan overseas borrowings and its maniacal spending on illegal wars and tax cuts for the rich were the harbingers of doom.
The problem is that this easily foreseen disaster is going to infect not just America but many innocents abroad. Maybe that is why the rest of us should have a say in how the worlds super-power is governed by giving the vote to America’s creditors; the world.
Shouldn’t the people who created this mess be held responsible
If McSame want to fire someone why not start on wall street!
Democrats.com has a petition demanding that Bush and Cheney resign. I like their style.
I’m surprised that EW hasn’t labeled it with her most pejorative diss: “Pixie Dust Legislation”.
Here’s my email and FAX to Pelosi, Feinstein, and Boxer:
I emailed all of my people. hmm, fax from the desktop?
I also smell the odor of last August when they pushed and harassed and gave congress the bums rush on FISA - remember that? The terrorists were at the gates!! They were going to attack the Capital!! Remember THAT? I do. And we fought and scratched and clawed and we still lost. That never should have happened and the exact same thing is going on here. “Do something NOW!!” “The world is going to melt down if we don’t do something NOW!!”
This looks like a time for the internets to unite. If they are overwhelmed we will matter.
This can not stand.
New post — Is Palin a Bircher?
Not just “do something NOW” — but “do exactly what I say say without reading it or thinking about it NOW”
This is my latest update to entry 87 of my scandals list which deals with the housing bubble:
Oh and those previous 4 reasons?
One more time the dems are being scared into this.
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.
No oversight. Zip, zero, nada AND Obama is supporting it.
I’m disgusted.
While at Salon checking out Greenwald, you might also take a look at Andrew Leonard’s history lesson going back to the thirties, at the end of which he comes out of the closet:
Basically, either stand up as citizens, or forget about it.
A History Lesson from the Great Depression
First it was Bear Stearns, then Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and now AIG, a company that has insured bad loans and collateralized debt instruments all over the globe. But rather than allow these corporations to fail, the Fed has chosen to bankrupt the U.S. taxpayer instead, trading one potential disaster for another. Billions of dollars have been handed over to these corporations from the U.S. Treasury in exchange for toxic assets. Literally trillions of dollars more are at risk. This is not responsible government. It will be a disastrous financial burden for those who can least afford it.
Now we, the people, are beginning to pay for all the failures of the Bush administration. After Enron, it was evident for all to see that the Security and Exchange Commission, headed by another Bush crony, wasn’t minding the store. Instead of taking decisive action, the Republican Congress chose to focus on 9/11 and the threat of terrorism, ignoring all else. The media and the public (and the Democrats) followed like lambs. There were laws on the books to oversee the financial institutions, including Fannie and Freddie, but both sides, thanks to lobbyists filling their coffers, looked the other way as fiscal improprieties were committed.
I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
Thomas Jefferson, Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin (1802)
There is a better way out of this. The federal Reserve has already blown through half of its 800 Billion reserves in baling out others such as Indy Mac. Paulson wants 700 billion + which will be just jacks for openers. Rather than creating 700 Billion out of thin air to keep this corrupt system afloat, Congress which is in charge of weights and measures currently states that all of our countries physical gold holdings ( real money ) are only worth $42.50 per ounce. Why, when the rest of the world says that gold is worth $900 per ounce?
Get the price of our gold in line with the rest of the world and but out the Federal Reserve and cut off the heads of this hydra that has been sucking this country dry for nearly 100 years. I find it quite odd that Mr. Cox of the S.E.C. can call a halt to short selling banks, but when ot comes to real money, it is manipulated beyond belief when the real proce of gold should be well past $2,000 per ounce with an economy that is currently running an inflation rate of 13%.
If we don’t take a stand now, our children and their great grand children will be slaves to the banking masters. Our Constitution never called for a central bank, but a US Treasury with coin in gold and silver. Getting rid of the Fed would be a major step in the right direction. Even Greenspan agreed that the statists hated gold as a monetary unit because they couldn’t expand the economy fast enough to suit them. The problem today is that politicians have become parasites sucking on the teets of the bankers for without them, it is the people who end up controlling their lives and not government, and that’s the way it should be.
I would only want comment from Hank Greenberg under oath in court, based on what has been long suspected about his role at AIG. Here’s a sample from when the troubles first appeared. Civil settlements eventually ensued, but the more recent troubles at AIG probably date from practices during the earlier period under Greenberg.
Whatever else Greenberg might have achieved as a business innovator over the years, his involvment in exactly the sort of operations that have led to the present crisis ought to keep his offers for help unaccepted until a long list of others has been exhausted.
Of course by the same standard Henry Paulson certainly should be disqualified as the lead proposer and prospective Führer.
MD, do you have a link to a representative covenant? (As a renter I’m lucky enough not to have one of my very own.)
One of my main working assumptions is that not only are Those People essentially conmen, but they are also exceptionally cheap and insulting ones.
Twas only snark…I hope. *g*
This is nothing like the Patriot Act. That could be rammed through simply by stimulating fear/hate receptors. This time the implications of the collapse are still unknown, and will certainly not create the palpable shock like 9-11 did in the public. Meanwhile, voters have already been feeling the consequences of the Republican economy for years. There is not going to be any public backing for giving the Bush administration $700 billion no strings attached. This should be an easy one for Democrats to turn to their advantage and make the election a landslide. Should be.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....27990.html
it’s about time someone called this exactly what it is
BLACKMAIL !!!
There is an alternative to this disgraceful ripoff. Hillary Clinton today proposed a return of the Home Owners Loan Corporation, a New Deal program that helped people pay their mortgage payments. It’s a winner for the people, but of course it would require Dems in Congress to actually take a stand for the people. The lenders have already made a pile of money on these mortgages. It would be unconscionable to bail them out now that they’re reaping the long-term consequences of their irresponsible greed. Let’s help the people, not the financiers. Let it trickle up instead of down, if there is to be any trickling.
Hyperbole and hyperventilating. All the Democrats have to do is say fuck you to Bush and it’s over for the Republicans. You think Obama doesn’t read Paul Krugman? Okay, it’s scary: they can always whiff at this fat pitch over the middle, or, perhaps more appropriately when talking about the Democrats, be called out looking. But judging by the initial cognizance of what a scam this is here and on the op-ed pages of major newspapers, we should alloy our anger with optimism.
Sorry, my @77 was a response to Hmmmmm’s link @74.
plunger, thanks for this. I’ll pass it on. — lab
In the NYT article on this I saw nothing that discouraging, except for Schumer’s statement that the bill ”is a good start.” Pelosi and Obama say a stimulus has to be part of any bill. And compare what a Bush kamikaze like Boehner (It’s pronounced ”BANER”. Really) says with McCain’s queasiness about the political ramifications. McCain is not yet on board with his party line of granting a wish list.
Mr. Boehner added, “Efforts to exploit this crisis for political leverage or partisan quid pro quo will only delay the economic stability that families, seniors and small businesses deserve.”
Aides to Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, the Democratic presidential nominee, said he was reviewing the proposal. In Florida, Mr. Obama told voters he would press for a broader economic stimulus.
“We have to make sure that whatever plan our government comes up with works not just for Wall Street, but for Main Street,” Mr. Obama said. “We have to make sure it helps folks cope with rising prices, and sparks job creation, and helps homeowners stay in their homes.”
Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Republican nominee, issued a statement saying he, too, was reviewing the plan.
I was referring to the huffington article
Is anyone giving a reason for the “no review by any court of law” provision?
Of course I hope you’re right. But if the money guys (who run Bush) are threatening the Ds that they’ll crash the economy if they don’t get what they want, then they’re holding all of us hostage and the Ds may see capitulating as necessary to save us (in the aggregate).
There’s been a lot of pushback on the D positions. It’s a fight now, not a love-fest.
I admire your deadpan.
Speaking of which, technical critique is ongoing at Calculated Risk. CR points out that under the circumstances, Paulson’s proposal amounts to something called a reverse Dutch auction, which is just about the worst kind imaginable for the situation. I.e.:
We think of auctions as being organized by someone who has something to sell, and solicits bids from buyers. The bidding starts from some price that is minimally acceptable to the seller, in that although she’d like more, she’ll take this price. The price on offer rises as bidders compete with each other by proposing prices above the current offer, with the highest ultimate bid taking home the goods.
A reverse Dutch auction does a double switch on this standard kind of auction. Reverse, in that it is organized by a buyer who solicits offers from sellers —both governments and firms use reverse auctions for procurement of goods and services all the time— and Dutch in that the offering bids start out high and are bid down until the lowest bid that the auction organizer will accept; the deal is then made at that price.
Dutch auctions are used in situations like treasury auctions, where the organizing seller has a great deal of something to sell, and many prospective buyers no one of whom will take more than a portion of the thing (T-bills, say) being sold. Then the Dutch auction amounts to ranking all the buyers bids from highest to lowest price and allocating the T-bills to them from the highest until the bills run out; all of the bidders pay whatever that low runout price was, so any buyer who’d been willing to pay more gets a bargain.
Now try to wrap your mind around combining those two reverses, and add in the fact that the goods Paulson is conducting this RDA for aren’t a lump of identical T-bills that all the selling “banks” have, but a lot of pretty much uniquely formed topiary shitpiles for which he, Paulson, is absolutely guaranteed to be the High, Low, and Only Bidder in the Universe for the next decade or more; it’s like having a separate RDA on each lot of mortgages or mtg securities against that massive bailout fund. And note in addtion that the $700B is the size of the fund, not the maximum total expenditure; if someone can be found to park the damn things, the resulting freedom to the fund balance can be re-spent. The word “churn” comes unpleasantly to mind.
That’s the incisive reasoning by which CR has concluded that the minimum cost to the taxpayer will be the full amount $700Billion. No calculator needed.
NYTimes Makes a Funny
That’s the problem.There’s a list a mile long that the dems should’ve said fuck you to.I’m surprised they havn’t called this a national security issue,or a continuity of gov issue and write some pixie dust/secret memo to do whatever they want to
Some of the previous EO’s had property forfeiture stuff built into them. What happens when you cross that with this monstrosity?
Thanks for your links, John. So far I’ve read The Dark Side of WS. Will go to the other one now.
I must also learn more about Paulson, Bernanke and Cox. hmmmm, all were big dogs at Goldman Sachs??? And GS is one of the 2 houses still afloat.
You can find the rating for any bank by this link:
www.TheStreet.com At that site go to tab “ratings”. At “ratings”, plug in the main word in the bank’s name. Result is A, A-, B. . .etc. If your bank is D or E, it’s time to get out. (mine is now C+ and I’m looking around).
Anyone here seen the online video or read the book, Confessions of An Economic Hit-Man ?? World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and World Trade Organization team up, seduce nations into huge debt they can never pay, and thereafter control them. Are we there yet??
In view of the hustle for an Emergency Bailout To Save The World, I suggest that Paulson/Bernanke tell the POTUS and VPOTUS ” that I will ONLY sign 30 seconds after they both resign from office and President Pelosi is installed;and Paulson/Bernanke, too…or some such.
Wouldn’t they agree? to save the world? Wouldn’t you agree if you were in their position?
In view of the hustle for an “Emergency Bailout To Save The World”, I would suggest that Paulson/Bernanke tell the POTUS and VPOTUS ” that I will ONLY sign 30 seconds after they both resign from office and President Pelosi is installed…Wouldn’t they agree? to save the world? Wouldn’t you agree if you were in that position?
In view of the hustle for an “Emergency Bailout To Save The World”, I would suggest that Paulson/Bernanke tell the POTUS and VPOTUS ” that I will ONLY sign 30 seconds after they both resign from office and President Pelosi is installed…Wouldn’t they agree? to save the world? Wouldn’t you agree if you were in that position?
Thanks again, John, for the links at 36 . The article by Kuttner (alarming comparison between 1929 and present collapse) is shattering.
Both refs saved to disk for further study. Don’t know what good it will do me, but at least I’ll understand to some degree how the SOB’s stole America!
I’ll bet that in the unlikely event that a MBS bond were bought from a trustee at a price below its face value, some of the owners of the bond who were supposed to get the cash payouts from it might try to sue to recover any shortfall in the contracted payments.
But like I said, in a reverse Dutch auction, run by insider no less, that event is unlikely. Even so, we all know that no stated reason is likely to be the real one, which is to blow yet another hole into our system of governance, the traitors!
The only thing I don’t get is why Paulson didn’t also ask for unlimited blowjobs.
Can someone explain what will happen if we don’t do anything at all about this “crisis”?
Well, exactly. But usually there’s some at least distantly probable cover reason offered, and I haven’t heard one yet this time. Puzzling over what kind of lipstick (forgive me) they could put on that pig.
ever get the impression you are watching a train crash happening in slow motion?????