Buzzflash
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Mixx it!
RedditThe 2008 election has many unusual aspects, but none is more bizarre than the sorry spectacle of the bailout for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
American voters are like the lambs being led to slaughter and at the very height of the presidential campaign. Yet not a peep of protest from John McCain and Barack Obama, not even a hint of the righteous anger injured taxpayers will rightly feel as they figure out the deal for themselves. The rescue of the two giant mortgage firms is another huge expenditure of the public's money--one or two hundred billion dollars this time--to reassure bankers and financiers the government stands by them in their troubles, whatever the costs.
Think about it. Candidates Obama and McCain are wagging their fingers at the governing system in Washington, both warning they intend to make big changes if elected. Meanwhile, business-as-usual doesn't wait for the next president. The financial system needs the capital right now, and so Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has opened up the spigot. Obama and McCain meekly bless the deal. This sequence of events makes them look look the political goats, their grand talk of change pushed aside by what Wall Street demands. The 2008 election may be close, but it looks like the status quo has already won.
There is a lot more pain and embarrassment to come. The nation is in the midst of an historic financial crisis--more bank failures are ahead and probably another bailout of even larger scale. Yet the two major parties act as though this subject is too complicated for ordinary Americans to understand. Neither candidate has found the nerve (or decency) to explain the full dimensions of what the country is facing. Both men are no doubt told to say as little as possible, for fear of touching off more panic among investors. Voters can safely be left in the dark.
Facing the crisis honestly would not fit very well with the flag-waving campaign themes. The United States is financially busted and utterly dependent on lending from foreign powers--both friends and rivals around the world. The government rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could not be put off until after the election, as insiders had hoped, because foreign creditors were beginning to back away from lending any more capital to the two failing US firms. The major creditors are led by China, Japan and other Asian nations, plus oil-rich Arab states and even Russia. The Bank of China has reduced its $376 billion in lending to Fannie and Freddie by 25 percent since July and other nations threaten to do the same.
So the Treasury arranged a deal that throws Fannie and Freddie shareholders over the side, but promises to protect the creditors, foreign and domestic. Bill Gross, chief investment officer of PIMCO, the mammoth bond house in California, issued an ominous warning in advance. If Washington didn't "open up the balance sheet of the US Treasury" and pump lots of public money into the ailing financial firms, the major lenders would sit by and let the great deflation of Wall Street proceed to its ruinous climax. Without the big lenders, credit would dry up through the US economy and the destruction could prove bloody historic for all. The Treasury Secretary heard the message.
How much more capital does Wall Street need to get well? Maybe as much as $500 billion, some experts estimate. What's frightening is that even that great amount might not provide a cure for anytime soon for the real economy, where unemployment rises along with mortgage foreclosures. Thus, Washington puts up unlimited billions for financial repair, but has been rather penny-pinching about paying for economic stimulus aimed at work and production. Obama now proposes a new stimulus package, but the pitiful sum of $50 billion. McCain talks up more corporate tax cuts.
If Americans had a functioning democracy, both of these guys would be competing furiously to get real.
Share this article
- Atrios
- Arts and Letters Daily
- The Caucus
- Campus Progress
- Crooks and Liars
- The Daily Gotham
- Daily Kos
- Echidne of the Snakes
- Ezra Klein
- FAIR
- Feministe
- Feministing
- Firedoglake
- Glenn Greenwald
- Gothamist
- In these Times
- Hendrik Hertzberg
- Huffington Post
- Hullabaloo
- Matthew Yglesias
- Media Matters
- Mother Jones
- My DD
- New York Review of Books
- Openleft
- Pam's House Blend
- Pandagon
- Political Wire
- The Progressive
- RaceWire
- Real Clear Politics
- Roberto Lovato
- Romenesko
- Swing State Project
- Talking Points Memo
- Ta-Nehisi Coates
- Tapped
- Tech President
- Tompaine
- The Washington Note
- Utne Reader
- Wonkette
- ZNet
RSS
One disaster at a time. We've got to wake people up to the insanity proposed by McSAME/PALIN. Give OBAMA/BIDEN a chance, they'll hit on this by the end of the week...if not the day.
Republicans have had 8 years to prove their policies would work. Yeah bang up job...I think I just heard a really loud FLUSSHHH!!! That's the sound the USA will make if McSAME is elected.
ENOUGH!!!
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:12pm
I guess the problem is Barack has only tried to keep the focus the issues. But too many people are easily amused by pointless diversions.Why do they seem to hate at least half of America? Do you remember PURPLE HEART BAND-AIDS? That from a camp with a National Guard dodging cheerleader! While McCain was busy crashing 5 planes, and finishing 5th from the bottom, Kerry was getting wounded while saving the lives of his men in battle. Yet Republicans in their American lovin' moral majority, saw fit to ridicule Kerry for not speaking clearly enough and somehow talking down to people that might want to have a beer with Bush. McCain has a rich heiress wife too, yet Kerry's wife is somehow different. They ooze hypocrisy, and one of the symptoms seems to be blindness to all of their own two-faced crap. I guess McCain calling his wife a "cunt", or making crude jokes about Hillary and Chelsea(lay off families) or saying exporting cigarettes to Iran is "a good way to kill them" while he laughs acting so Presidential, all of that is okay by the Republicans. Just watch the "flip-flops" and "I don't knows" from McCain's own mouth on last week's Daily Shows.
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:15pm
ENOUGH!!!
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:12pm
gripe gripe gripe
All we have to do is print more money.
It's free!
Fire up the presses! We got bills to pay!
Posted by Benchrest at 09/08/2008 @ 3:17pm
Republicans have had 8 years to prove their policies would work. Yeah bang up job...I think I just heard a really loud FLUSSHHH!!! That's the sound the USA will make if McSAME is elected. ENOUGH!!!
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008
while i shudder to think of president mccain,
a lot of this falls on the deregulatory mania of the clinton years.........
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 3:18pm
You'll notice few of our "Get the government out of everything" Righties here....
will complain too much about this Government take-over of a financial organization!
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 3:22pm
If Hillary supporters you would care about the policies she stands for, and not vote hormonally. She torpedoed her own campaign by running a bad campaign. I mean read some of the posts out there, you think a black man got a better shake that Hillary. The only reason she wasn't drummed out of the race in March, like any other candidate male or female would have been, is because the press loves talking about the Clintons. She couldn't win past March and she put herself in debt knowing that. I mean she didn't even run her campaign decisively, but that's his fault. I see.
Please wake up and check into Palin, you'll be helping to elect the Anti-Hillary.
Is it sexist to expect a VP candidate to go on Meet the Press like her male counterpart would've already done? Why didn't McCain pick a more qualified Republican woman, given that there are dozens? I guess he likes former beauty queens. If she were a man she would've been torn apart by now with her record, what's really sexist?
Shouldn't we have the elite minds of the Nation be our leaders. Did any of those people ever get to have that beer with good ole boy DUBYA? Is it "elite" to wear a 300,000 dollar outfit once to give a speech about being humble and working for the poor?
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:22pm
a lot of this falls on the deregulatory mania of the clinton years.........
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 3:18pm | ignore this person | warn this person
I know it's not all Bush. But McCain's own economic policy writer Phil(whiners)Gramm helped do away with regulating mortgage lenders, and put into place "The Enron Loop-Hole" that has allowed for "Oil Speculators" to screw us all. While they collect beyond record profits. It is "mental" indeed.
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:26pm
BTW, my previous "elite minds of the Nation" I meant the USA not the website.
Sorry.
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:27pm
Hardly anybody is asking one of the salient questions out there: What about the poor bastards who bought Freddie and Fannie stock after the original Paulson Sunday sermon in July? For that matter, what about the poor bastards who bought the common stock a long time ago, thinking, "GSE's can't fail, of course..." There's something fundamentally rotten going on here, but only Jim Cramer of the noisy "Mad Money" show had the temerity to say something about it, something about insider trading and that callous leak to Barron's a few weeks ago. Honestly, is anybody else paying attention? Some of us aren't just bailing out this operation with our taxes -- we also paying with a stock scam of major proportions. Double whammy.
Some government.
Posted by barnesgene at 09/08/2008 @ 3:33pm
you gotta see this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUfH03dDVeg
Posted by leftofcenter at 09/08/2008 @ 3:36pm
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:26pm
Okay, if you're NOT CONSHAME, you're doing a pretty good imitation of her spam-fests......
You're at a 10, and we need you at a 5....heheh
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 3:40pm
"What about the poor bastards who bought Freddie and Fannie stock..."
Posted by barnesgene at 09/08/2008 @ 3:33pm
In the words of Cheney.
"So?"
Posted by Benchrest at 09/08/2008 @ 3:40pm
Obama on FM and FM,
Q: Are you addressing attacks on you and your campaign? A: We've done as well as we can in the internet age where lies travel fast and truth has to play catch up.
Q: Privatize entirely, or make it a TVA type fed agency? A: I don't favor continuation of neither fish nor fowl approach. We can't have managers and investors who soak up huge profits in boom times, but know taxpayers will bail them out. I want to wait and see what is being proposed by the administration. We haven't had enough disclosure of the assets of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac yet. Then it will be a top priority of my transition/administration, should I win.
Q: Have you been briefed on specifics of the plan? A: I spoke to Paulson, last night. Previously, with Bernanke. Today, I spoke to my advisors. I'll reach out to Chris Dodd and Barney Frank to find out what their assessments are. Right now, Paulson is comfortable that their plan is within the powers given to them by Congress, nothing additional. Let's wait and see the details of the plan, before we pass judgment.
Q: Have Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae been forthcoming? A: I'll let Treasury Department brief you. No doubt what took place was in many instances irresponsible, but may have been legal, and took advantage of the structure, but management didn't maike decisions designed to help them reach liquidity... management bonuses, profits led to problems. How do we make sure that special interests lobbyists are not able to block basic regulation? We must change the culture in Washington.
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:41pm
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac cannot collapse: Obama Reuters Published: Monday, August 25 DAVENPORT, Iowa - U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Monday the government cannot allow mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to collapse because such a failure would damage financial markets.
The Democratic White House contender criticized the two companies for enjoying profits while the housing market was booming and then expecting U.S. taxpayers to come to their rescue.
But he said that their role in the financial system is too important to allow them to fail - even if he believes that they should be punished.
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:42pm
a lot of this falls on the deregulatory mania of the clinton years......... Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 3:18pm
Which began during the RayGun administration, as did most of the rest of the malfeasance of the right.
Sorry, I will never forgive voters for electing such an inflexible, right-wing buffoon...twice!
It set the stage for Bush II's imperial presidency and Gingrich's "Contract with America."
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 3:48pm
Why would you be surprized that Obama would not condemn this move? There are two reasons for him not to do so, one good, one atrocious. The good reason is that if the bailout isn't undertaken at this point, mortgage lending comes to an end right here and that just can't be allowed to happen for the sake of little people. The bad reason is that if he objects to the fact that taxpayers have been forced into this solution by horrible management, he'll expose just how much the Democratic Party shares responsibility with the Republicans for this and every other bi-partisan disaster visited on the American people over the last eight years, whether it was the gutless funding of the war, the sellouts on FISA, NAFTA and campaign finance reform or the bellicosity toward Afghanistan, Iran and Russia. Puzzle no more. Obama IS McCain and McCain IS Obama. Silence from one guarantees silence from the other. Progressives should vote for Nader.
Posted by john lowell at 09/08/2008 @ 3:55pm
Posted by john lowell at 09/08/2008 @ 3:55pm
john, do you think progressives are socialists?
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 4:04pm
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 4:04pm
I think your breath smells, and that you need to cross your legs.
Posted by john lowell at 09/08/2008 @ 4:09pm
Posted by john lowell at 09/08/2008 @ 4:09pm
You know, there's this thing called "the Internet"....
you can find more than ONE insult on it!
LOL!
Seriously, you often address "progressives" and tell them how to vote...do you consider them socialists or not?
(Yes, we will refrence your post on Ms vanden Heuvel's thread)
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 4:14pm
a lot of this falls on the deregulatory mania of the clinton years......... Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 3:18pm
Which began during the RayGun administration, as did most of the rest of the malfeasance of the right.
Sorry, I will never forgive voters for electing such an inflexible, right-wing buffoon...twice!
It set the stage for Bush II's imperial presidency and Gingrich's "Contract with America."
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 3:48pm
Actually, federal deregulation started, at least, with the Carter Administration's deregulation of airlines and, if memory serves, interstate trucking. In fact, aides of Senator Ted Kennedy were a major part of this effort.
Posted by cka2nd at 09/08/2008 @ 4:27pm
Posted by CanWeQuestionPalin? at 09/08/2008 @ 3:26pm
oh, no,
no question that mr. gramm has got very, very dirty hands.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 5:15pm
Sorry, I will never forgive voters for electing such an inflexible, right-wing buffoon...twice! It set the stage for Bush II's imperial presidency and Gingrich's "Contract with America."
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 3:48pm
me, neither.
but let's be fair.
clinton repealed glass-steagall and that was a huge step towards where we have arrived.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 5:17pm
interesting thing.
James Johnson, who until recently was the chair of obama's vp commitee,
ran Fannie Mae from 1991 -1998.
hmmm.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/08/2008 @ 5:19pm
I think it is a privilege to read William Greider on this blog.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 5:56pm
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 3:22pm
Sorry to disappoint you Mask, but I'm a "rightie" who dreams of a world without the Federal Reserve. The privatization of profit and socialization of loss is the very sinkhole of our liberty.
Neither candidate will take this on, because of the allure of printing up money out of thin air. Plus, they know that the electorate is clueless about what's really going on.
Sad but true. We don't stand a chance.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:13pm
Actually, federal deregulation started, at least, with the Carter Administration's deregulation of airlines and, if memory serves, interstate trucking. In fact, aides of Senator Ted Kennedy were a major part of this effort. Posted by cka2nd at 09/08/2008 @ 4:27pm
OK. Maybe we should add Carter to the pile as well, though the most egregious evisceration of the nation's regulatory apparatus came much later, most notably on the current administration's watch.
I need to do some fact checking. Which aides in particular do you recall were deregulation boosters? Was Kennedy himself involved? Seems unlikely.
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 6:17pm
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 3:48pm
Jackwells, may I respectfully suggest you read up on your history. I certainly appreciate your opinion, but I think you need to go back further to the establishment of the Federal Reserve. Blaming Clinton or Reagan is woefully off track. The problem started in the years before WWI.
Do you think it's interesting that no one around you, or in the media, or in entertainment can tell you anything about the Federal Reserve?
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:18pm
The impact of the Fannie/Freddie bailout will have a much greater DIRECT impact on us than the election of either candidate.
Yet ask around in the coffee shop... Who can describe even partially what happened this weekend?
Greider is a brave man, and smart. He knows better than to refer to the Federal Reserve even once in his astute article above.
I shall cease too. It is not healthy to take on the Fed.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:28pm
Do you think it's interesting that no one around you, or in the media, or in entertainment can tell you anything about the Federal Reserve? Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:18pm
I'm not sure the Fed falls in the same category as, say, the FCC or the CAB (now defunct), or any of the other less glamorous regulatory agencies.
The scope of the Fed puts it in a category of its own. I think today's announcement bears that out.
Posted by jackwells at 09/08/2008 @ 6:30pm
haha, regulatory agency?! Sorry, but that's really funny.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:32pm
Jackwells, you don't really know what the Fed is, do you?
And please know I am not talking down to you. I didn't either until a couple of years ago. Please at least take a look at "The Creature from Jekyll Island."
It provides a good basis for further study into the truth about our money system. It is very eye-opening stuff.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:38pm
------------------------------ If Americans had a functioning democracy, both of these guys would be competing furiously to get real. --------------------------------------
Holy mackerel! Took Mr. Greider a while to see the clay feet of the Colossus into which he turned -- until most recently -- Obamamammamia on this magazine specialized in genuflecting before an updated version of the Nowhere Man.
Posted by WWW at 09/08/2008 @ 6:51pm
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 4:14pm
That shut his ass up.
Posted by Benchrest at 09/08/2008 @ 7:31pm
I appreciate the mostly civilized debate here. I appreciate the person who called this the Privatization of Profit and the Socialization of Losses. Exactly. I'm not up on my FM & FM history, but I learned these were created as PUBLIC agencies under FDR to get the economy moving, which were then PRIVATIZED (i.e. CRONY-IZED) probably before his body turned cold.
I appreciate the gentle banter going back through history, Clinton, Reagan-Bush, Carter, Woodrow Wilson (the Fed), etc. trying to figure out where to place the blame, properly. I suggest this link:
HOW MUCH U.S. HISTORY DO YOU KNOW? A Labor Day Quiz By Peter Kellman
Some of the info (with typos) under Nazis Parading Down Mainstreet goes into more detail on some of this, particularly efforts going back to the Colonial and post-Colonial days to get ACTIVIST JUDGES to subvert the Constitution and to remove strong public regulation on corporations.
Corporations are, of course, created in Law, by public institutions, i.e. government. Nobody's crying about "big government" when they hand out corporate charters, only when they try to regulate what they doth created.
Posted by dilbert_g at 09/08/2008 @ 8:21pm
The Great Depression was partially about corporations having too much power and the banks failing - perhaps its time we all re-read more about that era and find what businesses survived. Isn't it interesting how history repeats itself. Don't you find it odd that we are not allowed to receive a list from the FDIC to say which banks are failing? They don't!
We are experiencing MODERN DAY SLAVERY, as the middle class is being eliminated and the oil barrons rule the earth. Isn't it ironic Obama is running for office at this time?
Can you find anything in the grocery store that isn't wrapped in plastic (made from oil) and has labels with ingredients only a scientist can decipher? The modern day drug pusher is your local pharmacist and health insurance company, and we all have some reason to need drugs per the Dr's. Is it the drugging of Americans so we don't fight back.
Fifty plus years ago we knew the oil would be running out in 2010, solar energy for homes was a thing of the future (but Wall Street would loose stock money), paying off your home was fashionable and we all owned the roads in the U.S.
There was a movie out about that same time that depicted a presidential election (in the future) and how the computers were "adjusted" to elect the next president, just as the party had planned. Hmmm.....
Ethics is sooo far forgotten and greed had raised it's ugly head so high that all is fair until Wall Street gets abused profusely.
McCain says middle class makes around $5,000,000 a year - what do you think!?! Last I noticed, 5% of the population made that.
Have a great dinner - hopefully there are no nitrates in your food - read the label (nitrates are fertizilers and used in jet propulsion fuel). What happened to the FDA?
Posted by MrsBearSquashYouAllFlat at 09/08/2008 @ 8:36pm
Did McCain pick Sarah Palin because he wanted a beauty queen?
John McCain did not choose Sarah Palin.
Max B. found a video from Focus on the Family. The COUNCIL FOR NATIONAL POLICY picked Sarah Palin, and offered to throw Evangelicals behind McCain if he accepted that. Little appreciable experience on her part, but she SYMBOLIZES their vision of "Christian morality" (sole issues: abortion, gays), and she will OWE them big time if they win.
That puts CNP in power and in the drivers' seat. Christian Right? Conventionally, yes.
But one of their main financial benefactors is Rev. Sun Myung Moon. Read Gorenfeld on him. Fascist links. Preaches that HE replaces Jesus, and America is a Great Whore.
Other members are Reconstructionists who want OLD TESTAMENT Law to replace the too-liberal U.S. Constitution.
Even scarier is CNP's links to the World Anti-Communist League. Remember Iran-Contra? Raped and murdered nuns and priests? Killing Catholics all over Latin America, labeling them "communists" for caring for the poor and Social Gospel? Teachers? Nurses? Social Workers? Labor? Human Rights activists?
Gen John Singlaub (ret) headed the WACL, participated in CIA and Ollie North's ops, training death squads, not just in Nicaragua, but El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, prob Venezuela, etc. Tens of Thousands murdered, I think El Sal alone was 70,000.
Do we want more of that? HERE? Blackwater is part of that CNP now. We've read how they have taken over domestic "security" in crisis situations, with or without permission of the govt, particularly Katrina.
I hope that's a sufficiently bleak vision. Anti-Abortion Catholics must realize these folks are Catholic-haters who tortured women and sliced fetuses from the womb and impaled them on stakes.
Posted by dilbert_g at 09/08/2008 @ 8:36pm
The Left (or Left-out!) intelligensia are pleading: give Obama/Biden a chance. They have had chances, many of them, on FISA, drilling in the coastal waters, nuclear power, single-payer health-care, repeal of Taft-Hartley and more. Obama tells us how "intelligent" the American voter is! Puke!
Only Ralph Nader has been right, not just on the Iraq and Afghanistan invasions, but on every issue facing our country, right for more than 40 years. Yet, the Left and the enfeebled unions keep supporting the better of the worst candidates. "When will they ever learn!"
Posted by goedel at 09/08/2008 @ 11:09pm
For those of you who don`t know about the fed read the creature from Jekyll Island it tells the story of some good ol boys like Rockefeller, Paul Warburg and others got together and put the Federal Reserve plan into action.It is quite a compelling story on how it works to do just what it was set up to do,let the tax payers pay for their FUCK UPS while they reap millions from us.What till you get to the chapter on Fiat money, it`ll blow your mind.Mcwars only hopes the fed is left with enough money to play war with Russia because he really doesn`t understand economics.Obama is in a caveat because he is damned if he does and damned if he does not say or do anything.I say Obama needs to speak up on this and give us all the change he said he would give us.
Posted by crease at 09/09/2008 @ 12:38am
you can find more than ONE insult on it!
Posted by Maskdelta at 09/08/2008 @ 4:14pm
but these are best:
http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/Shaker/index.html?
THOU HATH NOT SO MUCH BRAIN AS EAR WAX.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:44am
I think it is a privilege to read William Greider on this blog.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 5:56pm
agreed.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:45am
because of the allure of printing up money out of thin air.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:13pm
actually, that air is rather thick.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:46am
Do you think it's interesting that no one around you, or in the media, or in entertainment can tell you anything about the Federal Reserve?
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:18pm
no, it's scary.
hey, can you lend me 5 bucks?
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:47am
haha, regulatory agency?! Sorry, but that's really funny.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/08/2008 @ 6:32pm
no way.
it's my favourite print shop.
and the saudis and russians and chinese agree.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:50am
I say Obama needs to speak up on this and give us all the change he said he would give us.
Posted by crease at 09/09/2008 @ 12:38am
the voter must be soothed, not educated.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:56am
jekyll island is beautiful.
st. simon's, too.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 12:57am
mr crease,
i think you'll appreciate this:
"Finally, we test whether Federal Reserve policy has exhibited a pattern of partisan bias in presidential election years, with results that suggest the presence of such bias, after controlling for the effects of inflation and unemployment."
http://utip.gov.utexas.edu/papers/utip_42.pdf
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:01am
oh, yeah.
what happened to M3?
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:07am
Given the choice that we will end up spending 2.1 trillion in Iraq I'm not terribly upset by the Fannie/Freedie bail out. What upsets me the most is that they were used by this administration to make fat cats profits and allowed to ship funds out of country to foreign investors. If we are going to pay for this scam we should get some regulations in place and if there are any future profits we should be advantaged by them. I'm not opposed to federal programs that encourage home ownership, just please set some rules and there shouldn't be greed for motives. If there is any profit benefit it should accrue to the federal government.
Posted by lachatte at 09/09/2008 @ 01:13am
And where are the liberals on the spectacularly crippling costs of Fannie/Freddie bailout? On capitulation to corporatism? On privatizing profits, but socializing losses? This latest dwarfs all other issues, subsuming rights into privileges that can be set aside.
Costs: $220 billion (or double the S&L bailout or cost of 1 Iraq invasion + 2 years military occupation fighting resistance, but not counting debt service or vet med longterm costs).
Hi-end: $1 trillion, or 1-Iraq invasion + full (including longterm) costs of military occupation to date.
But we've been told US can't afford a 2nd Iraq-size war.
All this without any congressional debate. All by exec fiat.
This bailout could, at the very least, make universal health care insurance impossible for a very long time.
The Owners worldwide are lining up for their handouts right now. After they collect, the real effects will start to be felt, as the American people start to realize they've just received the biggest screwing in US history.
The "unrest" this realization will engender will call into play the police apparatus that has been constructed under Bush.
When Sweden opted for corporatism (Saltsjöbadsavtalet 1938), they cut the unions & Social Democrats in on the deal. No such approach now with US corporatism, where the M.O. is screw you & call out the cops.
And there will continue to be little congressional discussion, as both parties are too frightened to say much, just as there'll be little more than passing mention in the election debates. Too complicated for little people to comprehend. Much too frightening. Very bad for TV ratings & ad revenues.
But more than the US will suffer as this one reverberates.
Posted by sloper at 09/09/2008 @ 01:21am
Who knows where the violence will lead as the pains hit home.
But expect few peeps from progressives like Obama, the Clintons and their allies. They're all too scared.
Posted by sloper at 09/09/2008 @ 01:22am
Posted by lachatte at 09/09/2008 @ 01:13am
We haven't "spent" anything lachatte! You are still looking at it wrong. Our 'money' is nothing but debt and it is printed out of thin air.
What appears to you now as rising prices is actually the diminishing spending power of the dollar. See? that way it can be blamed on entities like "big oil" and "greed".
We are paying for Iraq and Wall Street moral hazards through inflation, not taxation.
You see, raising taxes for all of this would be political suicide. So through collusion between the government and the banking cartel known as the Federal Reserve, the 'money' is fleeced from us in the most unfair of taxation - inflation.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/09/2008 @ 01:25am
at least we can still hide inflation on the backs of brown people!
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:26am
Fed and Treasury Update – Friday, September 05, 2008
Weekly data from the Fed showed an extraordinary decline in the level of custodial holdings of GSE paper for foreign central banks. It was the 7th weekly decline in a row. The long awaited great FCB dumpoff is here. They didn't buy many Treasuries either. Could this be the beginning of the end of the world as we know it. Carrying coals to Newcastle, the Fed drained liquidity from the market on Friday for the fourth day in a row.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:27am
FCBs cut their holdings in custody at the Fed this week. A sell signal remained in force on the short term indicator in the chart and the intermediate FCB indicator joined it. Over the past 6 months we have again begun to see these indicators have the close correlation with stock prices that they enjoyed up to the summer of 2007. The correlation was broken for about 9 months, but now appears to be back on track. I strongly suspect, therefore, that with indicators in gear to the downside, it's bad news for both stocks and bonds. So far, the panic into Treasuries has masked the effect in that market, but stocks are feeling the pain.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:28am
what happened to M3?
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:07am
LOL! good question... Wait, do I hear black helicopters? GULP!
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/09/2008 @ 01:28am
Total Fed FCB custodial holdings of Treasuries and Agencies fell by $9.5 billion on the week. Holdings of Treasuries for FCBs rose by just $250 million. That's a bad sign. It follows a record buying binge, and the very least signals the usual short term cyclical pullback in buying. It's possible that the surge may have exhausted the pool of dollars available for recycling back to the US in the form of purchases of Treasuries and Agencies. The recent fall in the price of oil, and in oil consumption, is probably hitting producing nations which run trade surpluses with the US, hard. This could be the beginning of the long awaited slowing of dollar recycling.
More ominously, FCB holdings of GSE paper fell by $9.7 billion, the 7th weekly decline in a row, now totaling $27 billion. In the 4 years since I began collecting this data, there's never been a string of more than 2 weekly declines. As a result the quarterly (not annualized) rate of increase in that category dropped to just 0.4%, a new low. It compares with the recent peak of 10.6% on April 30 and the record 15.6% reached in May 2007. The rumblings that we have heard that FCBs are cutting back on their Agency holdings appear to be true. This is something we'll want to continue watching closely, because without this subsidy, the secondary mortgage market and thus any chance of a housing recovery, will be in even deeper trouble than they already are.
<<<<<>>>>>
"hey honey,
let's plant some turnips."
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:29am
Given the choice that we will end up spending 2.1 trillion in Iraq I'm not terribly upset by the Fannie/Freedie bail out.
Posted by lachatte at 09/09/2008 @ 01:13am
hmmm?
ever think where that "money" is coming from?
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:31am
well, at least it's raining.
first real rain in two months.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:31am
I can't help but believe that somehow Bush put Barney Frank up to this nonsense.
Now if I can just figure out how the neocons got those charges placed in the world trade centers without anyone noticing.
Posted by bleedingheart at 09/09/2008 @ 01:36am
inflation.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/09/2008 @ 01:25am
alas.......
those frikkin' cpi numbers are oh so magical.
my bag of rice ain't gone up no 3.1%, that's for sure.
you know, not that long our wages and environmental controls were tolerable enough to support a domestic industrial base.
no need for china.
but these are what people blame for the exodus........
imagine where we would be at if the chinese weren't brought into the game.
we'd have to rename the dollar store the c-note store!
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:41am
rain, nice.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 01:42am
Glass Steagall, Nafta, the 1996 telecommunications act among others is why I supported Obama and not Hillary.
Posted by mrsanfran at 09/09/2008 @ 08:16am
Glass Steagall, Nafta, the 1996 telecommunications act among others is why I supported Obama and not Hillary.
Posted by mrsanfran at 09/09/2008 @ 08:16am
hey,
you understand.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 10:40am
ah,
the lambs are silent.
hey, did you see that sarah palin had sex with a grizzly bear?
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 11:29am
Obama is in a caveat because he is damned if he does and damned if he does not say or do anything.I say Obama needs to speak up on this and give us all the change he said he would give us.
Posted by crease at 09/09/2008 @ 12:38am | warn this person
Read an article this morning that said that Fannie and Freddie made political contributions of approximately $200 Million over the last decade. These contributions were made to insure lack of oversight. Obama, according to this article has received at least $125,000 in contibutions to date from Fannie and Freddie. Obama was asked by Olbermann last night what he thought of the bailout and we was very evasive and very wishy washy.... $5 trillion of debt representing about 50% of the home mortages in US....whats the price tag and how is the taxpayer going to pay for this? Why should we pay for this?
This is a story of corruption that has deep, very deep roots. Neither Repubs or Dems have clean hands. Don't expect Obama (or McCain who has already flipflopped on bailouts) to take a stand other than hey...its not my problem.....or issue.....
Posted by OneVote at 09/09/2008 @ 12:21pm
actually Obama just said on national news program that both parties are complicit and it is a failure of both parties but ultimately resulting form inept bush policies....
with today's highway fund bailout from all taxpayers on top of taxpayers funding bailout of FNM and FRE, we are now a state hybrid system very similar to China...where govt. controls vital industries, banks, etc..and the rest is privatized....china just like U.S. monitors its' citizens, china just like US disallows protests, bush arrested 800 protesters at GOP convention....
remember china has no unions and 90% make pennies a day, in contrast to the few owners you see in the news the new "middle class"
remember when voting what GOP has done...
if you are gay lesbian or at least open-minded, palin's preacher preaches converting gays to straight and they are sinners....google it, look it up yourselves....
Posted by jrs112 at 09/09/2008 @ 12:42pm
OneVote ...
Can you give the source for that article? URL? Something? About Obama getting a total of $125K from F&F.
Thanks.
Posted by sloper at 09/09/2008 @ 12:46pm
We should nationalize Bear Stearns, Freddie & Fannie and the auto industry now whining for a bailout - with no compensation. Socialize the gains. We should also socialize the oil companies, with no compensation, as part of our national social security. When do the taxpayers get ANYTHING for these bailouts?
This is a chance to get rid of large chunks of privatized capital. Obama and McCain want business as usual. What a surprise. Capitalism doesn't wait.
Posted by ElyDog at 09/09/2008 @ 1:30pm
Fannie & Freddie: Buying friends in D.C. The two mortgage finance companies doled out $174-million over the past 10 years to Washington lobbyists, report says. By Allan Chernoff, CNN senior correspondent Last Updated: September 9, 2008: 8:44 AM EDT NEW YORK (CNN) -- When it came to buying influence in Washington, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were among Corporate America's biggest spenders.
The two mortgage giants paid $174 million to lobbyists over the past ten years to ensure the political climate would remain friendly to growing the mortgage business - even as the housing bubble began showing signs of bursting, according to a report by the Center for Responsive Politics, a watchdog group.
"They tied up almost every lobbying firm in Washington, whether they used them or not, over the past several years," said Joshua Rosner, a financial analyst with Graham Fisher & Co. and long-time critic of both companies.
Freddie Mac (FRE, Fortune 500) spent over $94.8-million on lobbyists since 1998, making it the nation's 12th-largest lobbying client, while Fannie Mae (FNM, Fortune 500) bought $79.5-million of influence, the 20th biggest spender, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
"They wanted to fend off regulation of their enterprises," said Massie Ritsch of the Center.
Until recent months, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac largely succeeded in that effort - functioning with relatively little oversight as they aggressively grew their portfolio of mortgages to try to increase earnings.
Campaign contributions bought influence as well, including donations to the presidential candidates.
Sen. Barack Obama is the No. 3 recipient of Fannie and Freddie campaign dollars, having collected $123,000 from the companies since he first ran for the Senate in 2004,
Posted by OneVote at 09/09/2008 @ 2:17pm
continued.........
according to the Federal Election Commission and the Center for Responsive Politics.
The former chief executive of Fannie Mae, James Johnson, was the original head of Obama's vice presidential search team. Johnson resigned from Obama's campaign amid controversy over discounted home loans he had received.
Sen. John McCain has received $19,000 from the two companies in the past ten years.
His campaign manager, Rick Davis, formerly led the Homeownership Alliance, an advocacy group for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's mortgage businesses.
"We had the Keating Five," said Rosner, referring to McCain and four other senators who had supported the head of the failed Lincoln Savings and Loan Association nearly 20 years ago.
"This is closer to the Keating 535," added Rosner referring to all members of Congress. "Those legislators who have cost shareholders, preferred shareholders and taxpayers potentially hundreds of billions of dollars, I think we ought to hold them accountable."
Regulators, in taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are suspending the companies' efforts to buy influence.
"All political activities, including all lobbying, will be halted immediately," said James Lockhart, head of the new Federal Housing Finance Agency that will oversee the companies.
While Fannie and Freddie are now in a government conservatorship, it will remain for Congress to decide the companies' ultimate fate.
One of the few critics of Fannie and Freddie, Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., called Monday for the mortgage companies to be restructured and lose their government backing.
"For years, these two mortgage giants have used taxpayer guarantees to gain enormous profits and lobby Congress to look the other way while they failed homeowners," said DeMin
Posted by OneVote at 09/09/2008 @ 2:19pm
continued......
These mortgage giants must be broken up and forced to survive in the marketplace without taxpayer guarantees," he added. "Allowing them to survive into the future with explicit government backing will only bring more harm to American homeowners and greater debt to American taxpayers."
First Published: September 9, 2008: 8:42 AM EDT
Posted by OneVote at 09/09/2008 @ 2:23pm
As another article on this page says, and says it all..State Capitalism
Posted by Chabuka at 09/09/2008 @ 4:37pm
Since we're apparently in a nationalizing mood I think it's time we nationalize the oil, gas and nuclear power industries. See if McCain and Obama keep quiet about that.
Posted by wgc1 at 09/09/2008 @ 8:00pm
Why should we pay for this?
Posted by OneVote at 09/09/2008 @ 12:21pm
because if you don't the chinese, saudi and other asian central banks will abandon the dollar and things will fall apart very quickly.
sad, but true.
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/09/2008 @ 9:54pm
At the end of the Reagan administration, there was a scandal brewing the public had to pay for. Neither party mentioned it during the campaigns. It cost us, the taxpayers tons of money. It was the S&L mess.
We are just proving that learning anything from history is nothing any Republican administration is ever likely to indulge in. Democrats will gladly go along or the Republicans will blame them for the whole mess. After all everyone knows that the Republicans are the fiscally responsible ones.
Why do Republican voters so enjoy being lied to? I wish I knew.
Posted by kalpal at 09/10/2008 @ 11:58am
74 posts and dead thread.
be silent, lambs.
hey, sarah palin has challenged vladimir putin to a bout in THE OCTAGON!
Posted by frosty zoom at 09/10/2008 @ 12:08pm
psssst, Kalpal, the fed could care less which party controls congress or the white house. the sooner you understand that the better. the fact you don't is part of the problem.
Posted by freiheit1 at 09/10/2008 @ 3:57pm
If the government can take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which will cost tax payers tens of billions of dollars, surely the government could nationalize the oil companies to offset the cost.
Posted by RichB at 09/10/2008 @ 8:06pm
I'm with "ElyDog." Here's what I responded the last time William Greider wrote about Fannie Mae:
'I agree with William Greider: Make Fannie Mae what is was before, a regulated non-profit agency.
Deregulating Fannie Mae and then creating Freddie Mac for "competition" has only created another corrupt oligopoly. This trust has gone bust. The reformers of the 1930s knew what they were doing!
This terrible two-step corruption dance, in which Republicans lead the push to deregulate, and then Democrats lead the push to bailout, has got to stop. This kind of foul bipartisanship is good for nobody.'
Posted by JakobFabian at 07/15/2008 @ 07:02am
All I have to add to this is: What's good for Fannie Mae is good for Freddie Mac, too. If we're going to bail out a financial institution, then this financial institution should serve the public interest - as a nonprofit. It shouldn't be encouraged, by creative deregulation, to dream up new schemes for making money out of money that doesn't exist.
Posted by JakobFabian at 09/11/2008 @ 08:59am
Just to be clear, this was not a rescue of Fannie/Freddie- this was a rescue of the banks who are exposed to trillions of their near worthless derivatives (cdo's etc). The Bear Stearns "rescue was the same deal- a rescue of JPM, Citi, Morgan, and Merrill. Those banks are insolvent, and hiding hundreds of billions in losses in "level 3" accounting shadows. The bust of the biggest credit bubble in history will result in a Depression worse than the 1930's. Prepare your family.
Posted by monday1929 at 09/11/2008 @ 11:05am
Just to be clear, this was not a rescue of Fannie/Freddie- this was a rescue of the banks who are exposed to trillions of their near worthless derivatives (cdo's etc). The Bear Stearns "rescue was the same deal- a rescue of JPM, Citi, Morgan, and Merrill. Those banks are insolvent, and hiding hundreds of billions in losses in "level 3" accounting shadows. The bust of the biggest credit bubble in history will result in a Depression worse than the 1930's. Prepare your family.
Posted by monday1929 at 09/11/2008 @ 11:06am