Ben Bernanke needs to calm down
September 23, 2008
Bernanke urges fast action from Congress
Is it just me, or are we rapidly becoming a Communist country. Seems like we’re picking up these banks and institutions faster then they can fail. Now, I’m all for a little Socialized Democracy, but when the Feds pick up a $1,000,000,000,000.00 tab, it’s starting to feel a bit more like government run/owned institutions.
It concerns me greatly that Bush, Bernanke, and Paulson are all urging that the bailout be passed through congress immediately without “[weighing} down a proposed $700-billion financial system bailout with unrelated provisions that would delay addressing key issues”. Some examples of the “Weight” suggested by house Democrats and Republicans are:
Limit executives’ compensation at the financial firms getting bailed out.
Bankruptcy protection for homeowners.
Corporate governance rules.
Foreclosure protection.
Now I’m no big city financial analyst, but it seems to me that these are all valid stipulations that should go along with the bailout. With Billions in Mortgages to be owned by the public, we should at least protect our own interests. Now that John Q. Taxpayers mortgage is owned partially by himself (as a taxpayer), why would he want to foreclose on his own home?
I see no reason that Congress shouldn’t delay this bill while sorting out it’s finer points. The last thing we need is more blank checks to be given to organizations that, quite obviously, had no idea what to do with their money.
September 23, 2008 at 11:53 am
What we’ve effectively done (or will do soon) is sanction the creation of a command economy, especially since it is the financial institutions themselves that are going to be controlled by the government. When other countries nationalize certain industries, be it power, transportation, or oil, we scream and yell and call them Nazis. Or worse than Nazis: Nazis without nice uniforms and without white faces. Command economies, the hallmark of not socialism, but communism itself, are notoriously prone to malfunction and corruption, because they try to control a volatile world market by formalizing certain protocols of trade, i.e. a grain chit is required for a shoe leather chit, and a car chit for a copper chit, and a toilet paper chit for a industrial machinery chit, and so on and so on. This always seems like it would work, but it just doesn’t, and damn it, that’s sad, because in a lot of ways the command economy model seems so intelligent, just like having the Treasury, regarded as an intelligent, responsible institution, take over the economy. I find it odd that people are so ridiculously short-sighted, criminally even, to think that it is a good idea to multiply the government’s responsibility for “free” trade (whatever the hell that will even mean if this goes through, probably the same as being a free black in Mississippi in 1920…or 1720). Don’t we invade countries for disrupting the free flow of trade? Don’t we work ourselves up to a lather: Venezuela, Libya, Iran, Russia, Burma–these are our enemies, the very antithesis to our being, our “protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism”! And who calls the shots in those countries? Why don’t we just call the Treasury our new junta and give them all peaked caps and a bunch of medals. Yay! We’re the Democratic Republic of the Congo!
September 24, 2008 at 9:00 am
“Now I’m no big city financial analyst, but it seems to me that these are all valid stipulations that should go along with the bailout. With Billions in Mortgages to be owned by the public, we should at least protect our own interests. Now that John Q. Taxpayers mortgage is owned partially by himself (as a taxpayer), why would he want to foreclose on his own home?”
Love it!
And to add to our malcontent:
If it’s Wednesday, it must be gov’t conspiracy day…
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Current-Comedy-9-22-08-E-by-mikel-weisser-080923-245.html
(sigh)
“Army Times reported it, Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman echoed it, and now everyone’s message board from Ron Paul to Nine Inch Nails is buzzing with the fact that a unit from our forces in Iraq, the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team, is being deployed to … the US. That’s right, now the enemy is us.”
“The article goes on to say that the unit is being prepared if ‘called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control. The soldiers are learning to use so-called non-lethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds.’ Flaunting the once sacrosanct Posse Comitatus Act prohibiting the use of US soldiers against US citizens, the Bush move is the first time an actual active army fighting force has been designated to a strategic planning military group known as the US Army North. That’s right from the Northern Command, every conspiracy theorist’s worst nightmare, the same folk who bring you the martial law drills every year.”