what would happen if there were no bailout?

[Bob]

like if the free marketeers who got us into this mess put their money where their mouth is and just let the banks die, what would happen? i don't understand this thing at all, and i don't really trust anyone in the media or politics or anyone who has an opinion about it really to explain it to me because they all seem to either not know what they're talking about, be an interested party, or both. i got a newsletter from a socialist at the subway station today that's made the most sense so far, but i suppose that's what they want me to think

"everyone" seems to "agree" that a bailout is necessary; the discussion in congress isn't whether there should be one, it's how big it should be, but i don't understand why it's necessary. what would happen if there weren't one?

i don't even understand exactly what the crisis even is or how it happened. as near as i can tell, all the big financial institutions played risky complicated money games that backfired, and now their invisible money is gone and everyone is threatening an economic apocalypse if the government doesn't bail them out, but i don't know. it seems to me like the only people who really truly understand what happened here are the same people responsible for it, so i just don't know what to think about it. my only solid port in this storm is the fact that bush is in favor of it, so i know it must be bad, but beyond that, i'm just too lost to have a valid opinion on this.

how's europe doing?

[Echewta]

Do you really want dogs and cats living together? Do you?

[GreenEarthAl]

The super wealthy people fear the emerging revolution (as most humans fear the unknown). There seems to be a change on the horizon. The super wealthy cabal of conspirators who run everything would like it if this change would be simply aesthetic --people would be content if things start to look radically different without actually having to be very different. BUT just in case the people will not settle for anything less than real and actuall change, the super wealthy would like to have many tens of billions of dollars of our children's future tax revenues first to make them feel better about it all.

If there was no bail out then they would not get these tens of billions of dollars of our children's future tax revenues. Which would make them sad.

There is also a lot of hullabaloo about how people will lose confidence in American markets and not invest here (which assumes that anyone has had any confidence in American markets in recent history and that people were even thinking about investing here to begin with).

[Bob]

i dunno though, i feel like it genuinely is more complicated than that. i don't trust what the bankers and conservatives are saying, by any means, but i mean for better or for worse (well ok, worse) these institutions are great big players in the way our economy has decided to work, and i just kind of feel like them going under actually would have some kind of impact on the country as a whole, i just don't fully understand what that impact is.

it's like, everyone's investing in everyone else and the words debt and credit are involved somehow and these guys are sort of the keystone of the whole horrible game, that's my understanding of it. but that's about as far as that understanding goes.

[kaiser soze]

Well in retrospect it shouldn't be the people's fault. I've paid good and well on my debts (just paid off my car, student loans are obscenely low, my only credit card nevers passes $50).

Those with little to no debt shouldn't be penalized. And this could very well be a right-wing argument. Personal responsibility and accountability. PERIOD.

So why am I indebted to these companies that have never done anything for me nor for my future children? Who gives them the right to go on welfare when they're the ones with millions in their bank accounts.

Is this a TRUE potential disaster or a mad dash for some dollars?

Curious how it is happening now

[Bob]

Well in retrospect it shouldn't be the people's fault. I've paid good and well on my debts (just paid off my car, student loans are obscenely low, my only credit card nevers passes $50).

Those with little to no debt shouldn't be penalized. And this could very well be a right-wing argument. Personal responsibility and accountability. PERIOD.

So why am I indebted to these companies that have never done anything for me nor for my future children? Who gives them the right to go on welfare when they're the ones with millions in their bank accounts.

Is this a TRUE potential disaster or a mad dash for some dollars?

Curious how it is happening now

indeed, it's pretty troubling. what i find crazy is how really nobody is fond of the idea of bailing these institutions out, not even the people in favor of doing it, it's just viewed as a necessary evil. i still don't understand why it's necessary though.

everyone's predicting doom and gloom for the economy if these linchpins of the financial world go under, but why??? how will that happen? i'm not saying it won't, i'm just saying i don't get it

[kaiser soze]

It appears that CEO compensation packages have also been tossed around in the bail out.

How about a big fat miserly NO, but it would be nice for me to royally fuck up at work and put my company in a virtual noose and get good...no great money for it :)

[GreenEarthAl]

i dunno though, i feel like it genuinely is more complicated than that. i don't trust what the bankers and conservatives are saying, by any means, but i mean for better or for worse (well ok, worse) these institutions are great big players in the way our economy has decided to work, and i just kind of feel like them going under actually would have some kind of impact on the country as a whole, i just don't fully understand what that impact is.

If they were allowed to "go under" --which is not nearly as debilitating if you're a big international financial institution as opposed to say... a private citizen declaring a personal bunkruptsy in 2008 lets say-- then the GDP and investing in general would be threatened. People are less enthusiastic about investing in things if they can't properly gage the risk:reward ratio. So if you can get away with telling international investors "Don't worry, even if we do tell you we've got these low risk-high reward investments and it turns out we were lying and they were really high risk-low reward investments, you ain't even gotta sweat it homes, we can just keep throwing it on the national debt forever and ever and ever into the future, it's all good. Bob's kids will pay for it later."

[travesty]

Well its a lot more complicated than all of that and it would take a semester of classes to get through how this was all catalyzed during the Clinton administration and was pretty much ignored by everyone as it grew out of hand....but let's get one thing perfectly clear

free marketeers who got us into this mess
could not possibly be more of an incorrect statement. The free market would never have taken on the enormous sub-prime risk on its own, otherwise it would have done it much sooner and more often than it did. Government intervention attempting to help the poor and unfortunate is what spurned this crisis on. Securitization of sub-prime mortgages through the Community Re-Investment Act (wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_Reinvestment_Act)) in the mid-1990's started the ball rolling. The Dems are going to have to swallow some pride and own this fuck up I think. When the Bush Administration tried to tighten things up a bit in '03 the chair of the house financial services committe (D-MA) Barney Frank declared "These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."
Uh Oh!

This crisis in and of itself also has nothing to do with the super wealthy, fear of a revolution, huge compensation packages or any other boogey man buzz word. At the heart of the matter is all comes down to how confident the world and the markets are with our economy and our government and amazingly they are both still considered, as of this evening, one of the safest places to put money on earth but that perception is in jeopardy. In fact, in a recent t-bill auction by the treasury people actually bid a NEGATIVE real interest rate to put money into T-Bills.
T-Bill Auction Results (http://www.treasurydirect.gov/instit/annceresult/press/preanre/2008/R_20080925_1.pdf)

That means that people are actually paying the government to hold their money instead of vice versa. Why? because no other investment tools are as safe right now. It's a bit of a stretch for McCain to say the "fundamentals" of the economy are strong but he's not really that far off. That's good for the government cause the money is cheap, bad for the markets cause it shows no one trusts them. So essentially what Paulson is trying to do is leverage the good faith of the government to collect monies that will be spent to shore up the markets, thus bringing faith back to them and evening things out again. It's a gamble.

Optimistically the government buys a bunch of real estate at a drastically discounted rate and waits for consumer confidence to return, credit availabity to stabilize and home prices to level out. Then it sells the assets, hopefully for a profit, but at least gets out even. That would be great, we could all use a little extra in the kitty to pay down the national debt and this is a good opportunity as long as you trust the government to conduct this process effeciently:D and you also don't mind them artificially controlling the real estate market for a while.:mad:

On the bum end, the Treasury buys all of these bad mortgage backed securities and none of the above happens. Bankers remain gun shy becasue they have had to write down bad debt twice now so they keep lending tight. Foreign investors start pulling their money out of American investmentsbecause the lack of lending won't let the economy grow. Then the treasury gets antzy and starts trying to dump the bad real estate at even more discounted rates, the market is flooded, prices drop even further and the taxpayers are left holding the bag for the difference.(n)

As with any economics model there a million variables and potential scenarios but hopefully that glosses ver the best and worst case scenarios.

Anyhow,

What will happen if there is no bailout? Potentially the exact same things as if there is a bailout....maybe nothing, maybe something good and maybe something bad. That is the trillion dollar question that no one can answer right now.

Depending on how they decide to price these sketchy securities (very tricky) we may just find that there are investors willing to buy these things. The market has a way of shaking things like this out. Keep in mind that as of right now only about 6.3% of securitized mortgages are four months past due (defaulted) but since they have been securitized (bundled) with other good loans, the small amount of bad debt can drag down a whole lot of good debt. Or we could face a run on the banks as Americans, and others loose faith in the treasury and then we wind up back in the '30's where everyone tries to get their money out at the same time which is impossible. The real course probably lies somehere between the two but it's a pretty big gamble to just do nothing. Don't get me wrong, I am no fan of bailouts or government intervention in these kinds of market corrections but this one has some more heads than the last few dragons we've faced.

Hopefully Congress can get up in the morning and find a way to LOAN these companies money at the way low rate the Treasury is getting money for now (essentially free) which will allow the lending markets to remain open while companies work this bad debt off the books. Having the taxpayers purchase these securities is far too risky given our curent national balance sheet. Unfortunately, it is also far too risky to sit back and do nothing.

My$.02

[travesty]

The free market continues to take corrective action on its own without the government getting involved. JPMorgan just bought Washington Mutual.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26893612/

[D_Raay]

The great rush to get this bailout through isn't about saving the markets. It's about sucking in as much capital as possible before the market collapses. As quickly as the Treasury writes the check, the recipient corporations will retrench and shift their money out of the U.S. Dollar. Foreign funds will buy stock rapidly, in companies that hold solid assets, because they need to buy something fast with those dollars.

It is the collapse of the derivitives market that looms, trillions of dollars in "credit default swaps" (62 trillion in the Unites States alone, according to the International Swaps and Derivatives Association), basically insurance bonds against losses in other credit instruments, bundled and sold over and over again, like some kind of world-wide Ponzi scheme. It's not just the taxpayers holding the bag here; it is mutual funds and pension plans and savers from here and other nations who are all about to get flattened. So far, every time the true market price of these bonds rears its ugly head, it is pennies on the dollar, and this unveiling is what they have been fighting off since Bear Sterns.

The great lie is that this bail out will 'unclog' the credit pipes--as if other people are sitting around with trillions of dollars ready to buy out junk bonds at above-market prices. This is an almost laughable theory being presented to the people of the United States. "If we buy $700,000,000,000 of these bad, severely overvalued bonds at above-market prices, then others will buy the remaining $61.3 trillion of bad, severely overvalued bonds at above market-prices." Right. :rolleyes:

But this isn't the dialogue that is happening in the public forum (yeah, I use that loosely). Bush all but confessed that the sins of the world market seizure are borne by the USA, though he makes it sound like an unforeseen consequence, like all gamblers do when the pot goes the other way. And he did a great job of redirecting attention towards mortgages as the entirety of the problem, instead of merely the first crack in a dam made of cheap clay. What he cannot say is this: "It is the derivatives market that has created hundreds of trillions in false wealth, and it is this market that is imploding. We are entering a severe recession that will result in the collapse and restructuring of the economy in ways you cannot imagine, though many people have imagined it and you probably should have listened more. As far as the bailout, if you knew what we know, you'd be looting, too..."

There is not enough money in the world to circumvent a massive correction in the market. Literally. That's the problem. There is not a lot of money, actual wealth, at all. There are just a lot of people saying they have money. They hold up a bond that's worth six cents and declare, "This is worth a dollar." You think it is a damnable offense that some family lies on a mortgage application, exaggerating assets, to get a loan? Corporations like Lehman, Fannie and Freddie, AIG, and the whole line up yet to come all did this to the tune of hundreds of billions. But with every default, more of these toxic bonds get found out. You see, the corporations aren't really losing money; they are just being forced to reveal that they didn't have the money in the first place. This is why "the credit" has come to a standstill. That is the usual consequence of lying to your creditors...

Listen to what Bush said and shake your head free of the patter of hyperbole. You already can't get credit, and frankly you shouldn't go anymore into debt anyway. You already can't find a good job, or at least a job that feels like you contributed something at the end of the day. You already are paying escalating prices for everything, and this new addition of debt will dilute the dollar further, and you will pay more--inflation is simply a form of taxation. It's called monetizing the debt. Either way, we lose. We can't convert our paychecks overnight into Swiss Francs. We won't know when to sell that gold we hoarded, and then it will be confiscated. And we, unlike the rest of the world, have no savings.

Let's just get on with it. Eight years of this administration dangling the Sword of Damocles over our heads, the constant threat of disaster used to provoke our acceptance of the erosion of our Constitution and Bill of Rights, has grown old. We've given up habeas corpus, we've given up the right to peaceful protest, we given up privacy in our homes. We give up a free press. We're okay with torture, now?

So, let's just get on with it, then. Bring the damn crisis. Bring your shock and awe. We'll show you what we got. We'll show you that for all of your divisiveness, we are not a mass of ignorant people incapable of adaptation, courage, unity and faith. Get on with it already. Get on with your master plan so we can plan for our tomorrow.

Yeah, history does repeat itself, and at the end, the empire always loses. It loses because people who require such obscene advantage in life in order to secure success are weak, and they build weak structures, in such a hurry to reach the heavens. But we are more than commerce, or a marketplace. And we are not a nation of people with a Constitution and Bill of Rights--We are a Nation because of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. That is the agreement that binds us. We are sovereign individuals who consent to be a Nation, through agreed upon rules of law and truthful representation. There is no royalty or papacy that dare lay claim to our free will--that is what our founders recognized, that is the experiment of our democratic republic crafted from their humility, and that is the experiment still left undone. That we would choose to avoid for a short time discomfort rather than secure the integrity of that great experiment is baffling. It renders the acts and sacrifices of those before us as lesser deeds, and resigns the promise of those who will follow to the ambitions of empty men.

[travesty]

Well said and I have to agree, but you should have quoted the source.

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=17986969&blogID=436040711

[HAL 9000]

like if the free marketeers who got us into this mess put their money where their mouth is and just let the banks die, what would happen? i don't understand this thing at all, and i don't really trust anyone in the media or politics or anyone who has an opinion about it really to explain it to me because they all seem to either not know what they're talking about, be an interested party, or both. i got a newsletter from a socialist at the subway station today that's made the most sense so far, but i suppose that's what they want me to think

"everyone" seems to "agree" that a bailout is necessary; the discussion in congress isn't whether there should be one, it's how big it should be, but i don't understand why it's necessary. what would happen if there weren't one?

i don't even understand exactly what the crisis even is or how it happened. as near as i can tell, all the big financial institutions played risky complicated money games that backfired, and now their invisible money is gone and everyone is threatening an economic apocalypse if the government doesn't bail them out, but i don't know. it seems to me like the only people who really truly understand what happened here are the same people responsible for it, so i just don't know what to think about it. my only solid port in this storm is the fact that bush is in favor of it, so i know it must be bad, but beyond that, i'm just too lost to have a valid opinion on this.

how's europe doing?


There are some good posts in this thread – especially travesty’s above. But perhaps I can try and give a very simplified view of what has happened without some of the jargon. This is probably oversimplified but I think it is the gist of what has happened.


Following a long period of growth, people became wealthy and had money to invest. Much investment went into property because it had given good returns in the past and this additional investment continued to drive up property prices – this was happening in Europe and the US. As property prices rose, people clamoured to invest and also to borrow money to invest in to property. People in Europe and America (but mostly US) started borrowing a bit more than they could afford in the expectation that property values would continue to rise. Banks staffed by individuals who were remunerated at every level (from bank clerk to CEO) for business volume (but not long term return) were happy to take gambles on the property market by granting extravagant mortgages because they would not be penalised if it went wrong (rewarded for volume only). As a result a bubble formed – house prices became artificially pushed up.
The business of banking involves the manipulation of assets and liabilities in order to allocate capital efficiently to gain greatest returns. This has recently involved the repackaging and selling of debt between financial institutions – the problem is that this has become so complicated that companies are finding that they do not know what assets lie behind the complicated debt products – that is to say, they do not know what the risk of default is on the debt products they buy.
House price rises started to level out – suddenly the returns experienced for the last 15 years were not there and bank shareholders and senior managers realised that such returns were not going to be there in future. The trouble is, lots of people have taken mortgages which are betting on continued growth and now they can not afford the repayments. But to add to the trouble, a lot of people are going to be in ‘negative equity’ – that is the drop in house prices means that their house is now worth less than there mortgage, so the bank cannot cover the mortgage debt by repossessing the house.
So now the banking sector is exposed to potentially huge mortgage default losses – but worse still, because of the repackaging on debt, no one is quite sure which banks are exposed to it and how much they are exposed to. They also don’t know how much debt their competitors are exposed to. So here we have the credit crunch, banks are worried because they don’t know how much debt they or their rivals are in, so they start hording cash, they don’t want to lend it to other banks because they might never get it back – and they really really need it back because they might be exposed to huge debt – so we see inter-bank lending rates sky rocketing.
Why should we care? Well the whole of capitalism is essentially based on the idea of getting society to allocate capital to where the greatest returns lie – this is what drives increasing innovation to deliver returns more efficiently in order to win capital investment. But if the allocators of capital (mainly banks) are scared to lend money then the cost of that lending goes up. Now companies of all types – from WalMart to the small business entrepreneur will find it harder to generate enough return on the money they borrow to pay back interest – and many will fail. Some business will try to cope by stopping growth and cutting costs (job cuts) and some will continue to try to grow and innovate but many of these will fail and go bust. The result is a recession – where economic growth stops. Apart from being a problem for individuals, recession is a problem for governments as it means less tax money coming in and this is a problem because the government is already committed to its long term spending (and probably assumed a certain amount of economic growth in order to meet its spending obligations).
The $700 billion is not being paid by tax payers now but future generations of tax payers – it is tax that you have not yet paid, but you will and so will your children. If we don’t spend it then the result is recession which has much the same impact – ie it runs up deficit - I would imagine that the treasury has run the numbers and found that the cost of recession is greater than $700 billion. So if they don’t spend the money now, your children will still have to bail out the government, and possibly more so. If they do spend the money, it may not be enough to stop the recession but it will definitely improve the efficiency of capital allocation and therefore reduce the impact of recession. I would be fairly confident that the benefit of the bail out will exceed the opportunity cost of not doing it (but I have not seen the figures)And yes this is a problem in Europe too although not so bad as we have less of a housing bubble, but it is a global economy which means that companies all round the world have been trading in the complicated debt products and none of them are sure of their exposure to the US sub prime mortgage market. So the credit crunch is global.

Sorry for being overlong, hope this helps.

Hal

[Bob]

My$.02

Sword of Damocles




.

thanks, this all helps (i think). interesting stuff about the CRA too, i did not know that. that will teach me to open my mouth i guess

everything still sounds like a whole lot of guessing to me right now, though, but i guess that's all anyone can do. i'm sure congress will figure it out

[travesty]

i'm sure congress will figure it out

Not my favorite people to leave this kind of thing up to but I guess it's in their hands now. :confused:

[D_Raay]

Well said and I have to agree, but you should have quoted the source.

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=17986969&blogID=436040711

Oops thought I did, I pasted it rather hastily after reading it earlier.

[DroppinScience]

This is a good article protesting the bailout. And it's not just from left-wingers. The right wing has their own problems with it too.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2008/09/26

Published on Friday, September 26, 2008 by Agence France Presse
Popular Anger Puts Fat Cat CEOs on the Run

by

NEW YORK (AFP) - An angry US public and Congress pushed to snip the rip cord on golden parachutes used by fat cat CEOs to escape Wall Street's mayhem.

Democrats in Congress insisted that an emergency multi-billion dollar government bailout for the financial industry include restrictions on executive pay.

They caught the mood of a nation sickened at watching the titans of finance walk away from Wall Street disasters not only unscathed, but enriched.

"The wealthiest people, those... in the best position to pay, are being asked for no sacrifice at all," read a petition to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, which Thursday, after three days, had 32,600 signatures.

The petition, organized by independent Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont, attacked what it described as the Treasury's attempt to let bungling executives "continue to make exorbitant salaries and bonuses."

Those gigantic pay checks, bonuses, and Midas-like farewells encapsulate what the public sees as Wall Street's greed-is-good philosophy.

For example, the CEO of bankrupt Lehman Brothers, Richard Fuld, was paid 22 million dollars in 2007, including stock options and other compensation, according to a survey published by USA Today.

Martin Sullivan, the chief executive of AIG, who left the insurance giant before it was rescued this month by the federal government, received 14 million dollars, the survey said.

Even punishment for those at the center of the chaos comes with a gold lining.

When the government took over collapsed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, ousted bosses Daniel Mudd and Richard Syron were not allowed 12.59 million dollars worth in severance payments.

Yet they still got out the door with 9.43 million dollars in retirement benefits.

Public anger at such figures underlies skepticism about the entire government rescue.

"We'll never see that money again," said Mathew May, a 24-year-old economics student attending a small demonstration near the New York Stock Exchange. "They deregulated the markets and ran wild. Now we're bailing them out."

Leftist activist and writer Naomi Klein called for protests, saying there was "socialism for the rich and dog-eat-dog capitalism for the rest of us."

"Think about it: they said providing healthcare for nine million children, perhaps costing six billion dollars a year, was too expensive, but there's evidently no sum of money large enough that will sate the Wall Street pigs."

And left-wingers are not the only ones speaking out.

Newt Gingrich, the fiercely conservative former speaker in the House of Representatives, wrote in the National Review that the bailouts, likely to top a trillion dollars, smack of "crony capitalism."

"Doesn't that mean that we're using the taxpayers' money to hire people to save their friends with even more taxpayer money?" he asked.

Forbes, the magazine for and about the rich, also said enough was enough.

"The compensation schemes for Wall Street CEOs should be capped to a small fixed amount," wrote national editor Robert Lenzner.

"The rest should be dependent on performance in a way that does not reward taking greater risk than is prudent. If CEOs don't perform, they should get nothing."

One worker in the New York finance sector, who asked not to be named, said his colleagues were as angry as the general public.

"A lot of people are very upset that managers in their own companies and captains of industry in other areas made some really, really bad decisions," he said.

"The most insulting thing is the golden parachutes where these jackals from Fannie and Freddie, having destroyed the company, walked away with millions ... It all comes down to greed."

If a "bailout" means the richest CEOs walk away even richer, than no, there should be no bailout. The taxpayer needs a bailout much more.

[chromium05]

Fuck the banks.
Fuck the investors.
Fuck Bush ( Shoot me you prick!!!)
Fuck Paulson
Fuck Bernanke
Fuck Brown
Fuck Blair
Fuck Miliband ( especially)
Fuck all Rothchilds
Fuck all Rockerfellas
Fuck all Skull and Bones
Fuck all Freemasons
Fuck all Common Purpose members
Fuck McCain, Palin and Obama
Fuck ALL Zionists
Fuck all US citizens who STILL believe a damn word that ANYONE in your corrupt bastard government says.
Fuck all UK citizens who believe anything whatsoever that anyone in OUR government says
Fuck all europeans who still believe that the EU is a good thing.
Fuck ANYONE who believes that the UN is a "peace-keeping" entity
Fuck anyone who believes NATO isn't the armed wing of the "New World Order"
Fuck anyone who believes that the World Bank and IMF do any good for ANY country.
Fuck anyone who lacks the bollocks to stand up and say "FUCK YOU" to these lying, thieving, murdering bastards.

The time is here. If the c*nts in the US government agree to let this go through, we will ALL feel the effect. All people of ALL countries.

At least in the States, citizens still have the right to bear arms. Only last year, parts of America were under pressure to repeal thier gun laws. Thanks God they didn't.

You will need them.

[travesty]

At least in the States, citizens still have the right to bear arms. Only last year, parts of America were under pressure to repeal thier gun laws. Thanks God they didn't.


Amen brutha Chromium. Hallelujah, someone gets it!

[DroppinScience]

Fuck the banks.
Fuck the investors.
Fuck Bush ( Shoot me you prick!!!)
Fuck Paulson
Fuck Bernanke
Fuck Brown
Fuck Blair
Fuck Miliband ( especially)
Fuck all Rothchilds
Fuck all Rockerfellas
Fuck all Skull and Bones
Fuck all Freemasons
Fuck all Common Purpose members
Fuck McCain, Palin and Obama
Fuck ALL Zionists
Fuck all US citizens who STILL believe a damn word that ANYONE in your corrupt bastard government says.
Fuck all UK citizens who believe anything whatsoever that anyone in OUR government says
Fuck all europeans who still believe that the EU is a good thing.
Fuck ANYONE who believes that the UN is a "peace-keeping" entity
Fuck anyone who believes NATO isn't the armed wing of the "New World Order"
Fuck anyone who believes that the World Bank and IMF do any good for ANY country.
Fuck anyone who lacks the bollocks to stand up and say "FUCK YOU" to these lying, thieving, murdering bastards.

The time is here. If the c*nts in the US government agree to let this go through, we will ALL feel the effect. All people of ALL countries.

At least in the States, citizens still have the right to bear arms. Only last year, parts of America were under pressure to repeal thier gun laws. Thanks God they didn't.

You will need them.

You're not the unabomber of Timothy McVeigh, are you? :eek:

[chromium05]

^^ ha ha - nah - just another individual that's had more than enough of those named above taking us ALL for a ride.

Our lives are worth far more than just being slaves and wealth generators for the elites.

If they truly believe that thier lives are worth more than ours, I'll be first in the queue to show them that I can snuff out thier existence as fast as they can send proxy armies to snuff out the existences of those people unfortunate enough to have been born or live on pieces of land that they deem valuable.

None of them care about any of us. They only care about assets and control.

Therefore, I would not care one iota should anyone decide to hang them all from streetlights.

[chromium05]

Someone prepared to speak out (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=S27yitK32ds) - shame about the time of day

[funk63]

Fuck the banks.
Fuck the investors.
Fuck Bush ( Shoot me you prick!!!)
Fuck Paulson
Fuck Bernanke
Fuck Brown
Fuck Blair
Fuck Miliband ( especially)
Fuck all Rothchilds
Fuck all Rockerfellas
Fuck all Skull and Bones
Fuck all Freemasons
Fuck all Common Purpose members
Fuck McCain, Palin and Obama
Fuck ALL Zionists
Fuck all US citizens who STILL believe a damn word that ANYONE in your corrupt bastard government says.
Fuck all UK citizens who believe anything whatsoever that anyone in OUR government says
Fuck all europeans who still believe that the EU is a good thing.
Fuck ANYONE who believes that the UN is a "peace-keeping" entity
Fuck anyone who believes NATO isn't the armed wing of the "New World Order"
Fuck anyone who believes that the World Bank and IMF do any good for ANY country.
Fuck anyone who lacks the bollocks to stand up and say "FUCK YOU" to these lying, thieving, murdering bastards.

The time is here. If the c*nts in the US government agree to let this go through, we will ALL feel the effect. All people of ALL countries.

At least in the States, citizens still have the right to bear arms. Only last year, parts of America were under pressure to repeal thier gun laws. Thanks God they didn't.

You will need them.

that was fucking epic.

[DroppinScience]

The populist uprising against Wall Street.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/26/news/economy/easton_backlash.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2008092810

I do say I'm not fond of this article using the word "class warfare" in the sub-headline. Uhhh... it's been Wall Street tycoons and their ilk who have been launching "class warfare," not the underprivileged. But still, good to know of mainstream media coverage of this unrest.

[DroppinScience]

Yeahwho's good friend Kucinich knows what time it is.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2008/09/29

The $700 billion bailout for Wall Street, is driven by fear not fact. This is too much money in too a short a time going to too few people while too many questions remain unanswered. Why aren't we having hearings on the plan we have just received? Why aren't we questioning the underlying premise of the need for a bailout with taxpayers' money? Why have we not considered any alternatives other than to give $700 billion to Wall Street? Why aren't we asking Wall Street to clean up its own mess? Why aren't we passing new laws to stop the speculation, which triggered this? Why aren't we putting up new regulatory structures to protect investors? How do we even value the $700 billion in toxic assets?

Why aren't we helping homeowners directly with their debt burden? Why aren't we helping American families faced with bankruptcy. Why aren't we reducing debt for Main Street instead of Wall Street? Isn't it time for fundamental change in our debt based monetary system, so we can free ourselves from the manipulation of the Federal Reserve and the banks? Is this the United States Congress or the board of directors of Goldman Sachs? Wall Street is a place of bears and bulls. It is not smart to force taxpayers to dance with bears or to follow closely behind the bulls.

[QueenAdrock]

Wait, how come you use the word 'fuck' 23 times and then bleep out 'cunt'?

[Bob]

i have a new bailout related question: how is it supposed to work? and by that i mean, why is it expected to work?

i'm reading the news, and they're saying that the plan is for the government to buy up all these shitty debts (bonds? stocks? securities? i should know, but i don't) so that the banks can start lending again, but why will that work?

[Documad]

Yeahwho's good friend Kucinich knows what time it is.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2008/09/29
I'm not a fan of his, but I sort of agree. I don't understand why we can't help the homeowners who might lose their homes. That makes sense. Some whole communities will be seriously hurt if a bunch of homes get boarded up. But I don't want to help brokers who made a shitload of money screwing over common people.

By the way, was it less than a year ago that Hillary Clinton suggested some kind of freeze on foreclosures for a year or so? Imagine if we had done that. It wouldn't have cost nearly as much money.

[ToucanSpam]

Well, it looks like we're going to find out what will happen with no bailout!

[travesty]

i'm reading the news, and they're saying that the plan is for the government to buy up all these shitty debts (bonds? stocks? securities? i should know, but i don't) so that the banks can start lending again, but why will that work?


Like I just mentioned in another thread..... amongst the more educated economists, there is NO consensus that it will work. This is a plan developed by Paulson (Former Wall Street Exec), Bernanke (Formaer Wall Street Exec) and a handful of Capitol Hill Legislators. Just who do you think they were trying to make this plan work for? You? Me? Not hardly. It will only serve to prop up the institutions that SHOULD be failing because of their bad judgement. When the dog shits on the floor you don't give him a biscuit.

[HAL 9000]

i have a new bailout related question: how is it supposed to work? and by that i mean, why is it expected to work?

i'm reading the news, and they're saying that the plan is for the government to buy up all these shitty debts (bonds? stocks? securities? i should know, but i don't) so that the banks can start lending again, but why will that work?


The idea is that the bailout would allow companies to start lending to each other and the public again. At the moment the cost of borrowing has gone up because firms don’t know how shitty these debts are nor where they are - so they don’t know if they lend money to another company, if they will ever get it back.

I high cost of borrowing would have a lot of impacts but those most relevant to the average tax payer are:

- They will find it hard to get a mortgage or will find the repayments higher. This may lead to further reductions in house prices, in which case negative equity becomes a problem (house worth less than your mortgage)
- small (and large businesses) will not be able to borrow to put into effect growth plans (I think this is the biggie as it means a reduction in innovation which is the lifeblood of capitalism). No speculation = no accumulation.
- Businesses experiencing cash flow problems could go bust due to an inability to get short term liquidity (even if those businesses were viable in the longer term). And businesses will experience cash flow problems as unemployment rises and demand for goods and services falls. Some businesses on the edge may get by by cutting back staff (and some businesses will be fine).
- They may be one of those who losses their job as businesses fail.

If you are a bank

- you cannot accumulate money to loan to homebuyers. This is bad because at the moment you still have a massive work force twiddling their thumbs not selling anything. The workforce will start to drain your capital reserves fast until you can fire them all. Houseprices could fall and you will find that the defaulting loans you have made are now partly unsecured due to the lack of value in the underlying property. This is a vicious circle since it is how this whole mess started.


Ultimately though, economies are chaotic systems and are pretty much impossible to forecast accurately. If I were to bet, I would guess at a big rise in unemployment and a year or two of negative economic growth. The big problem for governments is that unemployment raises their expenditure (welfare) and lowers their income (taxation). The result is a deficit which could be very large (many trillions of dollars I would guess). Like the bail out, this cost will be borne by future generations of tax payer.

Many of the above issues would happen anyway, but I think that it is likely that they will happen to a lesser extent if the bailout were to happen. Others disagree and dont think the bail out will help. Ultimately no-one knows because economists are crap at forecasting.

[Bob]

that makes sense, thanks. for that, and for everything else you've said in this and other threads, you're being remarkably helpful, i think i'm understanding it now. assuming you actually do know what you're talking about :)

one thing about this crisis that's really killing me is that the people who are really going to feel the pain from it are the people who had nothing to do with it, and apart from maybe the borrowers who took out the subprime loans when really they should have known better, the people responsible for it aren't going to get off so badly. you won't see bank CEOs in bread lines.

the hit to the job market is fairly worrying to me, because the job market for lawyers was terrible in the first place. considering i don't go to harvard or any of the other top schools, my prospects of getting a decent job after law school weren't very good to begin with, but now? the $100,000+ i invested in this law degree is turning out to be a bad investment after all. where's my bailout? oh i don't get one? oh well, that's ok, if i can't find a job i can always just file for bankruptcy...oh, i can't? hmm. well, where's the welfare office?

[yeahwho]

Many of the above issues would happen anyway, but I think that it is likely that they will happen to a lesser extent if the bailout were to happen. Others disagree and dont think the bail out will help. Ultimately no-one knows because economists are crap at forecasting.

When Alan Greenspan was nailed on his investments a few years back, "foreign currency markets" that told me all I needed to know about his ideas for our economy. He didn't believe in the ideology he was selling us. This is unbelievable. It's transparent and still nobody wants to seriously focus the blame, they want to share it?

Greenspan trickled down on us and told us it was raining, that was his forecast.

[GreenEarthAl]

(R)estricted
The following is not work safe (or anything close to it).

http://www.youtube.com/v/WPc00AB8qJY&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&fs=1