LUCILLE: George Bush and WMW*

The only thing more mind-numbing than Bush's absolute disengagement over the current (and growing) financial crisis is the steadfast, continued support of him by a small minority. Now, that's loyalty - or is it ignorance?

• The master of "What, me worry?*" leadership will always be remembered as the guy who:

• Was positively shocked to find out that gas will probably go up to $4 a gallon this year,

• Believes we're facing a financial "rough spot" (Is that what you call taking $30 billion from American taxpayers to bail out Wall St. fat cats?);

• To this day, refuses to admit we're facing a recession -  won't even use the word  - despite the fact that his own boy, Paulson, has admitted as much;

• Has refused to hold a top-level bipartisan economic meeting to address the growing mortgage crisis (Yes, I said growing. You ain't seen nothin' yet.)

• Is tooling around the world, making speeches about NATO, while Fed Chairman Bernanke is delivering the bad news about the economy.

Hey, Mr. President, forget about simply focusing on some possible future terrorist attack; we are being destroyed right now from within and all you want to do is shuck and jive in Eastern Europe.

You want to know about 1000% more than your uninterested President does? Read on.

Let me start by admitting I am no expert on the "shadow financial system." But I do know one thing: the guys who created this debacle - you know, the ones who keep insisting that these financial instruments (credit default swaps, which were responsible for Bear Sterns' collapse) are too complicated for mere mortals to fully understand - aren't as smart as they think they are.

If they were we wouldn't be in the mess we're in now.

Is Bear Sterns the mine disaster or the (dead) canary in the mine? Who knows? Who knows what other investment banks are on the verge of collapse?

The "great plan" Paulson came up with was not in response to this crisis, as he's led the public to believe. No, he started putting his plan together in March of 2007 in an attempt to make our financial system more like Great Britain's so we could be  "more competitive." You know what happened in Great Britain? Among other things, a top financial institution, Black Rock, went belly up and had to be taken over by the British government. Sound familiar? They are reeling over there. And he wants the same for us?

Yes, Paulson and his friends want less regulation. Yes, LESS. Despite the talk about how his wonderful plan is going to make things better, he actually is calling for less oversight of these maniacs.These guys  only want to give the government the right to step in when the entire financial  structure is ready to collapse and, until that point, they think  that  "market discipline" among Wall Street firms, hedge funds and private equity partnerships will be enough to protect us.

Yeah, like it has so far.

Remember this: all the way back to 2001, Alan Greenspan was warned about the precipitous nature of these "market discipliners". And he did nothing, nada, nyet except support the destructive anti-regulatory ethos and practices of the administration.  Does that make you feel better?

(By the way, one of the main architects of this regulation-free system was Phil Graham, in case you're interested.)

Consider this: Warren Buffet, who is no financial slouch, has called these unregulated financial instruments "the financial equivalent of Weapons of Mass Destruction."

Hey, George! We finally found them!

Comments

[Eric]

Oh, it's so frustrating. So many Americans are not just completely uninterested in this type of thing, but many are completely ignorant and willing to believe whatever the politicians tell them. "Oh, less regulation will fix it, McCain? Ok, that's what I want then. Less regulation it is!" Meanwhile, as you said, it was the lack of regulation that caused the whole damn thing.

We need to take the corporate money out of politics. Citizens simply cannot compete and consumers will always be getting screwed to this laissez fair view of politics.

[Monty]

OK. Let me clarify first that I think George Bush is an incompetent who has greatly let down this country. Since I am a conservative, this may not mean what you might at first glance think or want to believe it means. Among the things it means are as follows (I will not include the war, which I believe was his greatest mistake of all)

1) He never used the veto to prevent unessesary spending put forth by congress. As a result, we have a historically high budget deficit.

2) He was insensitive about the damage to New Orleans. As a result, people think Republicans don't care.

3) He never cleaned up Social Security and Medicaid, and never addressed illegal immigration.

4) He made stupid appointments to the Department of Justice, resulting in enormous and tedious waste of time.

5) As a result, and this will be his worst legacy, and what I blame him most for, Republicans are discredited, people are spouting silly rhetoric about what what republicanism means, and we will have a Democrat in the White House, probably Barack Obama. So, as a direct result of Bush's ineptitude, we will have increased taxes, renegotiated trade agreements, over=bearing healthcare policy, and incompetence in international diplomacy. This is what Obama stands for. We will also pull out of Iraq leaving a debacle which will result in many more dead than if we stay there. And this fiasco may even last for eight years. This will bring with it economic stagnation, an increase in terrorist threat to Americans, and a decrease in economic opportunity in the US. So, what I most blame on Bush is that, as a result of his incompetence, we will have Obama in the White House.

It is often said that Obama is inclusive and is not stating what he stands for. This is not, in fact true. Obama is left of Clinton. His foreign policy is distinctly Jimmy Carter. He will increase taxes. He will renegotiate NAFTA. He will stifle business and opportunity. If we want to see the effects of this kind of economic ideology, take a look at France and Germany. Economic stagnation, high unemployment. Low opportunity for people to get ahead. When I lived in Ireland, Ireland was the poorest country in Europe. Now it is the most affluent. And the farm workers in Ireland are all French, who cannot find work in France and are obliged to go to Ireland to work at the most menial jobs in that country. Now look at places like Argentina and Uruguay.

As to the present crisis..

1) On an inflation adjusted basis, Gas is in line with where it was in the 70's. And, it is not as high a percentage of most people's take home pay as people think. The historically high price has more symbolic value than anything else. The principal cause of it being high is the strong growth rate of the Chinese and Emerging Markets economies as well as the dearth of refining capacity in the US as a result of environmental concerns. Also, gas prices in the US are significantly lower than they are virtually everywhere else, particularly Europe. An exception, of course, is Venezuela, where each gallon of gas costs around 18 cents. Maybe we should model ourselves on the Venezuela economic model.

2) We are facing a very tough credit crunch which will take several years to work through the system. We will, in fact, have positive, albeit low, economic growth in 2008, and more in 2009. So, I would characterize the present situation as a recession with a lot of danger in it, but one that will last for 2 quarters.

As to bailing out the 'fat cats' on Wall Street. The shareholders of Bear Sterns lost virtually all their holdings. Had BS gone to the wall, the effect would have been to bring down JPMorgan Chase, Citibank and the whole system. It would have triggered a collapse in equity prices bringing with it the pension funds owned by all middle class Americans. This would have triggered a depression causing mass unemployment and misery for all Americans, particularly those at the low end. So, it wasn't the 'fat cats on Wall Street' that got bailed out. The Fed (not the Bush administration) acted desiscivly and averted a crisis that would have impacted all 275,000,000 of us including you and me, in a terrible, terrible way.

3) I agree with you that we are in a recession. I also don't believe in 'stimulus packages'. Whether created by republicans or democrats, these are created to give the public the impression that their politicians are resolving the economic crisis. The truth of the matter is that the US economy is very, very resiliant. Recessions are normal. Easing by the Fed takes care of them and will with this one. The growth out of this recession will be slow because of the overhang of the credit crunch.

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[Maxi]

Monty said:
So, as a direct result of Bush's ineptitude, we will have increased taxes
MY RESPONSE: But increased on whom, do you think? I think maybe those who are now bearing a much smaller percentage, as it should be

MONTY SAID:"over=bearing healthcare policy
MY RESPONSE:leave it to someone with a great healthcare plan to dismiss universal health care . . . or even adequate healthcare for the majority of Americans. You do realize that the overwhelming reason people go bankrupt is because of medical costs, don't you? I thought you did! Funny, under the health care plan McCain supports John McCain himself wouldn't be able to get coverage. Of course, he doesn't have to worry about it.

MONTY SAID: "incompetent international diplomacy"
MY RESPONSE: Now, this one has to be a joke. Incompetent international diplomacy? You mean, like turning the entire world against the US? Could it actually be worse? Bush only waited until his last year in office to even think about the Palestinian/Israeli problem. And that's not even touching the torture issue and what it's done to our international stature.

MONTY SAID: This is what Obama stands for

MY RESPONSE: I don't believe there is anything Obama has said that supports this. But even if he has, I can honestly say I believe that even an incompetent boob (other than Bush) would serve this country better by stopping the damage that's been done to justice, international opinion and our treasury. You can't really believe that by cutting taxes and spending more than we bring in, that this country is better. He's encouraged a credit card society - hey, the U.S. can borrow as much as we want, cut taxes - predominantly on the rich - and when the bill comes in, it's the poor slob who's in the White House now who has to take the blame for raising taxes to pay for this free for all

MONTY SAID: We will also pull out of Iraq leaving a debacle which wil result in many more dead than if we stay there. And this fiasco may even last for eight years.
MY RESPONSE: Eight years? Try 15 or more. Just look at the timelines the military and Iraqi governmnt use in Iraq when they discuss our stay there. There is no easy way to end it, but the lesson of Viet Nam is that throwing thousands of more lives - US and Iraqi - at the problem won't solve it and in the end, we'll have to pull out and face the music. I wonder - would you encourage your own son or daughter to go?

MONTY SAID:This will bring with it economic stagnation, an increase in terrorist threat to Americans
MY RESPONSE: by attacking Iraq, Bush has already increased the terrorist threat in this country, as even the military has admitted. Before we were there, Al Qaeda wasn't. They've been able to recruit because we're there

MONTY SAID:So, what I most blame on Bush is that, as a result of his incompetence, we will have Obama in the White House.

From your lips to God's ears!