Why has nobody in the media offered an alternative to handing over 700 BILLION to Wall Street?

international | anti-capitalism | opinion/analysis

Saturday September 27, 2008 20:05

by wageslave

Are the US government and their pals in media and big business pulling the wool over our eyes again?

The entire media seems to be singing in unison on one of the biggest potential movements of public funds into private hands. And it looks like they might get away with it too. surely there's a better way? Here's one suggestion I came up with in all of 5 minutes to get the ball rolling. I invite your hopefully much better suggestions in the comments

Everyone is saying the US taxpayer should hand over 700 BILLION to the banking sector to ease the financial crisis they colluded in.

Everyone in the media is singing from the same hymn sheet

Why has nobody suggested any alternatives to handing this money over to the wolves?

Alternatives maybe a little like the following one??

Put the 700 billion into a large managed fund. Then whenever the poor unfortunates involved cannot make a payment on their overpriced house, the fund makes it for them. There should be the usual humiliating hoops to jump through that are usually imposed on the poor of course, so most folk will only avail of the fund if they have no other choices.

What this does is
(a) provide a state backed guarantee the mortgages will be paid off
(b) keep these poor unfortunates housed rather than throwing them out on the streets
(c) return confidence worldwide in the financial products sold on the basis of these mortgages
(d) Not give 700 billion directly to the cocksuckers on wall street who caused this

seems like a win win alternative to me!!

comments please!! :-)

Caption: Video Id: XP4g_8OwEpU Type: Youtube Video
Embedded video Youtube Video

Comments (7 of 7)

Oops I forgot to include this.....

Sat Sep 27, 2008 20:14

Here's a quick (and rather amusing) explanation of how the subprime crisis came about. Enjoy!

https://docs.google.com/TeamPresent?docid=ddp4zq7n_0cdj...pli=1

And a proper link to (R.I.P.) George Carlin's IMHO rather relevant youtube clip
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=XP4g_8OwEpU

Decent background analysis to Financial Crisis

by T

Sun Sep 28, 2008 14:07

Michael Hudson has a series of really good articles written over the last few years on the problems that have lead to the present financial crisis. These are well worth reading.

He also do some excellent interviews for which podcasts are available. Probably one of the better ones was this one last year titled.

Fighting Against the Class War (audio-mp3)
- Aug 15, 2007 in Guns and Butter, KPFA
Finance against Industry and Labor: "Liquidity crisis in the banking system; wiping out of credit; demise of the dollar; stock volatility; hedge funds; sub-prime lending, real estate tax versus labor tax, etc."

Another later interview is this one:
The Plot to Shift Taxes Off Wealth onto Wage Earners (audio-mp3)
- Aug 22nd, 2007 in Guns and Butter, KPFA
"AAA rating of subprime junk; inflation; change in world order; privatization of banking system through the Federal Reserve; Alan Greenspan and the 1982 Social Security Committee; junk economics; windfall profits; the law of fraudulent conveyance."

http://www.michael-hudson.com/audio/070815ClassWar.mp3

Embedded audio: http://www.michael-hudson.com/audio/070815ClassWar.mp3

http://www.michael-hudson.com/audio/070921taxplot.mp3

Embedded audio: http://www.michael-hudson.com/audio/070921taxplot.mp3

one novel way to sort this (instead of giving the thieves booty) is a return to the "New Deal"

by debt vendor

Sun Sep 28, 2008 15:44

1999 saw US Congress take apart the Glass-Steagall Act which had underpinned Roosevelt's "New Deal" rolling debt solution to the famine, mass unemployment and financial meltdown of 1929 and thereafter. Destroying the Glass Steagall Act meant the final part of the "Reaganomics" or "Thatcherite" vision of financial institutions unfetterred by regulation came into being. Although of course the bill was signed after joint party talks by Clinton. If nothing else it shows one example of Republicans & Democrats working together before as they are now. Thus commercial and investment banking were no longer seperated. This allowed for huge profits and the appearance of boom built on real estate speculation but also allowed for the emergence of a shadow banking system. That's just one example of how the "New Deal" sorted out the mess the last time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass-Steagall_Act
The Commodity Exchange Act (1936) was another mechanism which has its equivalents in continental European banking laws and is exactly why continental European banking systems aren't going pop now. Though explicitely dealing with grain futures (the first futures to be traded in world history and vital to ending the famine of the 1930's in the USA) there were guarantees that deriviates and credit default transfers be excluded. Those provision were overturned in the year 2000. Had they remained in place then the sub prime debts would never have been traded and bounced from little bank to bigger bank along with their insurance policies all the way to the White House or runs on mortgage lenders in the UK or negligent public spending in Ireland.
It is very ironic that the solution to this crises lies in a return to the models of capitalism in the mid 20th century . if not the complete return to the FDR "New Deal" then the adoption of European systems with all their regulations which the US has been trying so hard to "reform" since the 1980's. We are not seeing the end of anglo-saxon capitalism but we are seeing the end of the neo-liberal nightmare which has done nothing but give a shadow banking mafia an opportunity for a killing. They are going to see that killing signed into law this week. They've brought everyone on a run around the board since the 1980's and are now collecting 700 billion$. It wouldn't have happened if the many "New Deal" laws had not been repealed. But they're not going back to the New Deal. Either with its top down regulation on greed or its bottom up veneer of a social state. Perhaps the temptation to fascism of the 1930's in not an element now. Nor are they choosing the Japanese solution of seeking foreign money by offering negative interest rates. Because they know they would lose their status as global market places shortly afterwards. Instead they are choosing the very British solution of "nationalisation" but without giving it that name. There is very little talk of the conditions - for example ought there be a cap on yields? on executive salaries? how much indemnisation is going to leave the US economy and go off shore? The "New Deal" regulations which stopped speculation and debt trading and swaps probably don't interest people on this site. What they want to hear about is the food vouchers for Walmart and guaranteed jobs in Mc Donalds style New Deal. Well that aint happening.

This time nobody is talking about the starving poor or chalk for the school kids. It's almost as if this 700billion dollars, the equivalent of 2,000 McDonald's apple pies for every US citizen alive with lots of crumbs left over for migrant homehelpers to eat, is coming out of the thin air you see around a hoard of edible gold at the end of a rainbow. Isn't it a pity the Progressive Democrats didn't live to see the day? But they're with Paul Newman now in heaven sharking a pool table.