The bailout

[MrBurns]

Looks like Wall St will get bailed out by the US taxpayer, US citizens must be furious. I don't think anyone on Main St will see any of it.

They say they have no choice, bull****, this will just make the ultimate downfall worse.

There's talk this is contrived primarily to help the Republican campaign contributors and pals.

 

[lesm]

Re: The bailout.

This is the latest via Reuters on the bailout:

TEXT-US House speaker's statement on bailout deal
28 Sep 2008 - 11:40

Sept 28 (Reuters) - The following is a statement issued by U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office on changes to the Bush administration's $700 billion financial rescue plan request. Congressional leaders conducted a marathon negotiating session on Saturday before announcing they had a broad outline of a deal. Here is the statement issued early on Sunday:

Significant bipartisan work has built consensus around dramatic improvements to the original Bush-Paulson plan to stabilize American financial markets -- including cutting in half the Administration's initial request for $700 billion and requiring Congressional review for any future commitment of taxpayers' funds. If the government loses money, the financial industry will pay back the taxpayers.

3 Phases of a Financial Rescue with Strong Taxpayer Protections

- Reinvest in the troubled financial markets... to stabilize our economy and insulate Main Street from Wall Street

- Reimburse the taxpayer... through ownership of shares and appreciation in the value of purchased assets

- Reform business-as-usual on Wall Street... strong Congressional oversight and no golden parachutes

CRITICAL IMPROVEMENTS TO THE RESCUE PLAN

Democrats have insisted from day one on substantial changes to make the Bush-Paulson plan acceptable -- protecting American taxpayers and Main Street -- and these elements will be included in the legislation

Protection for taxpayers, ensuring THEY share IN ANY profits

- Cuts the payment of $700 billion in half and conditions future payments on Congressional review

- Gives taxpayers an ownership stake and profit-making opportunities with participating companies

- Puts taxpayers first in line to recover assets if participating company fails

- Guarantees taxpayers are repaid in full - if other protections have not actually produced a profit

- Allows the government to purchase troubled assets from pension plans, local governments, and small banks that serve low- and middle-income families

Limits on excessive compensation for CEOs and executives

New restrictions on CEO and executive compensation for participating companies:

- No multi-million dollar golden parachutes

- Limits CEO compensation that encourages unnecessary risk-taking

- Recovers bonuses paid based on promised gains that later turn out to be false or inaccurate

Strong independent oversight and transparency

- Four separate independent oversight entities or processes to protect the taxpayer

- A strong oversight board appointed by bipartisan leaders of Congress

- A GAO presence at Treasury to oversee the program and conduct audits to ensure strong internal controls, and to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse

- An independent Inspector General to monitor the Treasury Secretary's decisions

- Transparency - requiring posting of transactions online - to help jumpstart private sector demand

- Meaningful judicial review of the Treasury Secretary's actions

Help to prevent home foreclosures crippling the American economy

- The government can use its power as the owner of mortgages and mortgage backed securities to facilitate loan modifications (such as, reduced principal or interest rate, lengthened time to pay back the mortgage) to help reduce the 2 million projected foreclosures in the next year

- Extends provision (passed earlier in this Congress) to stop tax liability on mortgage foreclosures

- Helps save small businesses that need credit by aiding small community banks hurt by the mortgage crisis - allowing these banks to deduct losses from investments in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac stocks.

Office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- September 28, 2008 ((Washington newsroom 202 898-8300)) Keywords: FINANCIAL/BAILOUT

 

[MrBurns]

Re: The bailout.

Thats better, but let's see what happens over the next week or so.

 

[Green08]

Greenspan criticizing others for their lack of action regarding monetary matters is kind of like Hitler calling someone anti-Semitic.

September 26, 2008 at 3:12 pm

http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2008/09/26/greenspan-calls-for-action-on-financial-crisis/

 

[Green08]

The chance of any money from the bailout into banks which is meant to liquify the system is very low.

They will hold it to look after themselves as deposites dwindle.

So is there any point in a bailout?

``We saw the numbers coming in and we thought `They're not going to make it,''' said Michael Nasto, the senior trader at U.S. Global Investors Inc., which manages $5 billion in San Antonio. Nasto said his traders were fielding sell orders all morning. ``We started accelerating everything and saying, `Get the hell out!' Most people came in today thinking they would pass some type of plan. It caught everyone by surprise.''

To contact the reporters on this story: Eric Martin in New York at emartin21@bloomberg.net; Cris Valerio in New York at cvalerio2@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: September 29, 2008 15:55 EDT

 

[Green08]

If they just did this today why add another $700B??


"By Scott Lanman and Craig Torres

Sept. 29 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve will pump an additional $630 billion into the global financial system, flooding banks with cash to alleviate the worst banking crisis since the Great Depression.

The Fed increased its existing currency swaps with foreign central banks by $330 billion to $620 billion to make more dollars available worldwide. The Term Auction Facility, the Fed's emergency loan program, will expand by $300 billion to $450 billion. The European Central Bank, the Bank of England and the Bank of Japan are among the participating authorities.

The Fed's expansion of liquidity, the biggest since credit markets seized up last year, came hours before the U.S. House of Representatives rejected a $700 billion bailout for the financial industry. ...."
Last Updated: September 29, 2008 14:28 EDT

 

[DB008]

Just got this off MSN Video.
Kramer talking about the bail-out

http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&vid=e6741a1b-9c22-4e19-88e0-6721f6368618

 

[James Austin]

Failure from the get go

Michael West
September 30, 2008 - 8:15AM

"It's not based on any particular data point," a Treasury spokeswoman told Forbes.com Tuesday. "We just wanted to choose a really large number."

The $US700 billion, that is. Paulson and Co. pulled it out of thin air. It was the ``slap in the face'' theory, that markets needed a big slap in the face to right their wrong behaviour.

So out went the Treasury Secretary with Fed chairman Ben Bernanke to chuck $US700 billion ($860 billion) at anyone who wanted to get rid of their worthless assets.

No wonder Congress slapped it back. It was never credible and would have delivered only temporary relief had US legislators embraced it. The left saw it as welfare for Wall Street and the Right derided it as a menace to free and efficient markets. It was both.

Already, the Wall Street banks were concocting plans to ``game'' the regulators, to make off with as much of that rescue loot as they could. As investment bankers do.

Locally, Paulson's old firm Goldman Sachs was speculating last week how it and other investment banks could make a killing out of the deal. There was just about to be $US700 billion handed out after all, with no conditions or oversight on how it might be spent. . . . .


http://www.businessday.com.au/business/failure-from-the-get-go-20080930-4qli.html

 

[bankit]

The attached link could be heavy reading for some but there are some quotes and ideas in it that tell a story all on their own......the culture at the big end of town has to be broken.

Oligarchy. noun - a government in which a small group exercises control especially for corrupt and selfish purposes

http://www.investorsinsight.com/blo...box/archive/2008/09/29/haste-makes-waste.aspx

Enjoy

 

[wildkactus]

How they voted:

Dem: Yea: 141, Nay: 94

GOP: Yea: 66, Nay: 132, Not voting 1

Total: Yea: 207, Nay: 226

 

[communique]

Have a look at this for a different perspective


http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/...topped_the_'inevitable'_bailout_for_the_rich/

 

[Doris]

Ron Paul: Corporation - not free market

..."This will destroy the $US and a world wide economy!

This has nothing to do with a failure of capitalism!

We need more oversight in:

* the Fed Reserve system
* the Exchange Stabilization System
* the President's Working Group ...
- find out what they're doing!
- how much have they been meddling in the market"

Posted 29.09.08

 

[2020hindsight]

How they voted:

Dem: Yea: 141, Nay: 94

GOP: Yea: 66, Nay: 132, Not voting 1

Total: Yea: 207, Nay: 226

60% of Dems said "yea"
33% of GOPs said "yea" (so much for Bush's influence )

All scared of recriminations from the electorate in the upcoming election.

PS Praps the only way to get this through is that they have a "secret ballot" - undisclosed who voted what.

 

[CoffeeKing]

60% of Dems said "yea"
33% of GOPs said "yea" (so much for Bush's influence )

All scared of recriminations from the electorate in the upcoming election.

PS Praps the only way to get this through is that they have a "secret ballot" - undisclosed who voted what.

They can't be to worried if they still find time to take the Holiday off!

 

[Kauri]

The CEO of Deutsche to have said that if Washington passes the bank rescue plan, then "Europe should be ready for a similar solution". Calls for a European "bailout" plan have been muted in recent days but the continued fallout of the newly labeled credit quake could intensify speculation on the need for a coordinated package on the other side of the pond.However,
the odds of a European bailout package being agreed upon are "slim to none" and this does not even include the actual implementation of any such rescue plan. Credibility has already been damaged and some would argue that the individual de facto nationalizations of some European institutions is a form of bailout, albeit at an individual state level - rather than a cross boarder European initiative. ( and there is nothing worse than a cross boarder..)


Cheers
...........Kauri

 

[Macquack]

Ron Paul: Corporation - not free market

..."This will destroy the $US and a world wide economy!

This has nothing to do with a failure of capitalism!

We need more oversight in:

* the Fed Reserve system
* the Exchange Stabilization System
* the President's Working Group ...
- find out what they're doing!
- how much have they been meddling in the market"

When I'm picking my team for the financial rescue (not bailout), first choice and captain - Ron Paul

Services no longer required - G.W. Bush, B. Bernanke, H. Paulson. List to be extended.

 

[wayneL]

The Times:

 

[baja]

Mike Moores view on it.

Friends,

Everyone said the bill would pass. The masters of the universe were already making celebratory dinner reservations at Manhattan's finest restaurants. Personal shoppers in Dallas and Atlanta were dispatched to do the early Christmas gifting. Mad Men of Chicago and Miami were popping corks and toasting each other long before the morning latte run.

But what they didn't know was that hundreds of thousands of Americans woke up yesterday morning and decided it was time for revolt. The politicians never saw it coming. Millions of phone calls and emails hit Congress so hard it was as if Marshall Dillon, Elliot Ness and Dog the Bounty Hunter had descended on D.C. to stop the looting and arrest the thieves.

The Corporate Crime of the Century was halted by a vote of 228 to 205. It was rare and historic; no one could remember a time when a bill supported by the president and the leadership of both parties went down in defeat. That just never happens.

A lot of people are wondering why the right wing of the Republican Party joined with the left wing of the Democratic Party in voting down the thievery. Forty percent of Democrats and two-thirds of Republicans voted against the bill.

Here's what happened:

The presidential race may still be close in the polls, but the Congressional races are pointing toward a landslide for the Democrats. Few dispute the prediction that the Republicans are in for a whoopin' on November 4th. Up to 30 Republican House seats could be lost in what would be a stunning repudiation of their agenda.

The Republican reps are so scared of losing their seats, when this "financial crisis" reared its head two weeks ago, they realized they had just been handed their one and only chance to separate themselves from Bush before the election, while doing something that would make them look like they were on the side of "the people."

Watching C-Span yesterday morning was one of the best comedy shows I'd seen in ages. There they were, one Republican after another who had backed the war and sunk the country into record debt, who had voted to kill every regulation that would have kept Wall Street in check -- there they were, now crying foul and standing up for the little guy! One after another, they stood at the microphone on the House floor and threw Bush under the bus, under the train (even though they had voted to kill off our nation's trains, too), heck, they would've thrown him under the rising waters of the Lower Ninth Ward if they could've conjured up another hurricane. You know how your dog acts when sprayed by a skunk? He howls and runs around trying to shake it off, rubbing and rolling himself on every piece of your carpet, trying to get rid of the stench. That's what it looked like on the Republican side of the aisle yesterday, and it was a sight to behold.

The 95 brave Dems who broke with Barney Frank and Chris Dodd were the real heroes, just like those few who stood up and voted against the war in October of 2002. Watch the remarks from yesterday of Reps. Marcy Kaptur, Sheila Jackson Lee, and Dennis Kucinich. They spoke the truth.

The Dems who voted for the giveaway did so mostly because they were scared by the threats of Wall Street, that if the rich didn't get their handout, the market would go nuts and then it's bye-bye stock-based pension and retirement funds.

And guess what? That's exactly what Wall Street did! The largest, single-day drop in the Dow in the history of the New York Stock exchange. The news anchors last night screamed it out: Americans just lost 1.2 trillion dollars in the stock market!! It's a financial Pearl Harbor! The sky is falling! Bird flu! Killer Bees!

Of course, sane people know that nobody "lost" anything yesterday, that stocks go up and down and this too shall pass because the rich will now buy low, hold, then sell off, then buy low again.

But for now, Wall Street and its propaganda arm (the networks and media it owns) will continue to try and scare the bejesus out of you. It will be harder to get a loan. Some people will lose their jobs. A weak nation of wimps won't last long under this torture. Or will we? Is this our line in the sand?

Here's my guess: The Democratic leadership in the House secretly hoped all along that this lousy bill would go down. With Bush's proposals shredded, the Dems knew they could then write their own bill that favors the average American, not the upper 10% who were hoping for another kegger of gold.

So the ball is in the Democrats' hands. The gun from Wall Street remains at their head. Before they make their next move, let me tell you what the media kept silent about while this bill was being debated:

1. The bailout bill had NO enforcement provisions for the so-called oversight group that was going to monitor Wall Street's spending of the $700 billion;

2. It had NO penalties, fines or imprisonment for any executive who might steal any of the people's money;

3. It did NOTHING to force banks and lenders to rewrite people's mortgages to avoid foreclosures -- this bill would not have stopped ONE foreclosure!;

4. It had NO teeth anywhere in the entire piece of legislation, using words like "suggested" when referring to the government being paid back for the bailout;

5. Over 200 economists wrote to Congress and said this bill might actually WORSEN the "financial crisis" and cause even MORE of a meltdown.

Put a fork in this slab of pork. It's over. Now it is time for our side to state very clearly the laws WE want passed. I will send you my proposals later today. We've bought ourselves less than 72 hours.

Yours,
Michael Moore

 

[Kauri]

The US Senate vote on the Bush administration"s revised $700bn TARP will reportedly take place at 23:00GMT.

Cheers
..........Kauri

 

[Kauri]

word is filtering through that the Wall St. welfare bill has broad senate support.... now fundies... what is that going to do to the market???

Cheers
............Kauri