The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and
controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance
Cicero,55 BC
Federal Government Was Culprit in Housing and Economic Crisis, Says Congressional Report
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the chief culprits in the housing crisis because they encouraged people who could not afford payments to borrow money, according to a congressional
report released Tuesday.
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American capitalism gone with a whimper
Source: Pravda.RU
It must be said, that like the breaking of a great dam, the American decent into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple, excuse me dear reader, I meant people.
True, the situation has been well prepared on and off for the past century, especially the past twenty years. The initial testing grounds was conducted upon our
Holy Russia and a bloody test it was. But we Russians would not just roll over and give up our freedoms and our souls, no matter how much money Wall Street
poured into the fists of the Marxists.
Thomas Jefferson
“"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation,
the banks....will deprive the people of all property until their children wakeup homeless on the continent their fathers conquered....The issuing power should be taken
from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs."
Those lessons were taken and used to properly prepare the American populace for the surrender of their freedoms and souls, to the whims of their elites and betters.
First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives.
They care more for their "right" to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about
our rights and about our "democracy". Pride blind the foolish.
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Plan to audit Fed steamrolls ahead
U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, long has opposed the power held by the Federal Reserve and its ability to manipulate the nation's economy and over the years has
launched proposals to get rid of the quasi-governmental agency, without significant support.
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Obama Wants to Control the Banks
There's a reason he refuses to accept repayment of TARP money.
I must be naive. I really thought the administration would welcome the return of bank bailout money. Some $340 million in TARP cash flowed back this week from four small banks in Louisiana, New York, Indiana and California. This isn't much when we routinely talk in trillions, but clearly that money has not been wasted or otherwise sunk down Wall Street's black hole. So why no cheering as the cash comes back?
My answer: The government wants to control the banks, just as it now controls GM and Chrysler, and will surely control the health industry in the not-too-distant future. Keeping them
TARP-stuffed is the key to control. And for this intensely political president, mere influence is not enough. The White House wants to tell 'em what to do. Control. Direct. Command.
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OBAMA, GM: YOU BREAK IT, YOU OWN IT
GM, now renamed Government Motors, has a new CEO: President Barack Obama.
By replacing the head of the company and demanding a restructuring of its board in return for further TARP aid, Obama has taken upon himself the responsibility for the future of the company. As Gen. Colin Powell said when Bush was considering invading Iraq and toppling the Saddam Hussein government there: "If you break it, you own it." Now it is Obama's company.
This move will backfire big time! The auto giant is very, very unlikely to be saved by this current TARP infusion. Doubtless it will need more in the near term. But the resentment now focused on the management of the company will then turn to Obama. Having demanded a replacement of the management, it is he who will be held responsible for the company's future.
And each time GM asks for more money, Obama will face a choice: take personal responsibility for laying off 100,000 auto workers or anteing up the additional cash. By inserting himself so deeply into the management of the company, Obama makes himself central to its future. If Obama lets the company fail, having already extended credit, he will have all of Michigan on his case. If he keeps coming up with more and more tax money, he will earn the contempt of the voters.
Socialism has its price. By taking over the management of a company, you become the determinant of its fate in the public's mind.
Obama does not seem to realize that government takeover is the beginning, not the end, of the problem. He should have stuck with being president and left making cars to others.
And, as the new CEO of General Motors, what will his policy be on corporate compensation? Will the public tolerate his letting his new company pay salaries sufficient to attract the talent necessary to salvaging the firm? Or will he have to rely on a bunch of kids right out of school, willing to work for one or two hundred thousand a year, for the company's salvation?
When it comes to the hard work of cutting retiree health benefits, reducing salaries, laying off workers and closing plants, is Obama willing to resist calls for his intervention? Is he up for taking the blame for all the "heartless" measures GM will have to take to salvage its future? He has put himself squarely in a position to pay a steep political price for his assumption of power at GM.
Most troubling is the sense that Obama cannot have thought this through. He can't have planned this. President Clinton used to say at strategy meetings that we needed to think three or four moves ahead and not just "kick the can down the road." Obama is clearly not following his predecessor's advice. He realized GM needed money. He knew the public would have a fit if he gave it. So he decided that he would appease his electorate by exacting blood from the company's management and directors by using his guillotine on some of its old gray heads.
But, had he thought before he acted, he would have realized that it would have been far better to have criticized GM from a distance even as he extended more money -- rather than to, in effect, take over the company.
The president's protestations that the government does not want to own a car company are quite beside the point. It's his now, and he better figure out what to do with it.
Obama Pushes Keynesian Policies While Economy Spirals
A free market economist and university professor says President Obama, his advisors, and his Democratic supporters in Washington are being heavily influenced by the failed
ideas of late British economist John Maynard Keynes, who advocated government spending as a stimulus for economic activity
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Confidence...Where?
As Queen Pelosi declares that White House and Congressional policies are instilling confidence in the Amercian public, unemployment raises, foreclosures continue and banks continue to fail. One has to wonder just exactly who she is talking about.
The linked story below reveals just how out of touch she and the majority of our elected officials are with the people who they work for. It's goes way beyond rational thinking when trying to figure out how they think. There is no doubt that most of them have college degrees, as a large portion of them are lawyers, but their common sense seems to be lacking.
I've long been of the thought that they don't really represent the constituents that send them to Washington. But with the recent chain of events I'm absolutely sure of it. They care
only about their power and staying in office. Well, I think they've over reached. The attached article, while mind boggeling, really should not be surprising given the person they picked to occupy the Oval Office.
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Bank Crisis in Terms I Can Understand
The financial crisis explained in simple terms...
Heidi is the proprietor of a bar in Berlin . In order to increase sales, she decides to allow her loyal customers - most of whom are unemployed alcoholics - to drink now but pay later. She keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the customers loans). Word gets around and as a result increasing numbers of customers flood into Heidi's bar.
Facts Don't Lie
Taking advantage of her customers' freedom from immediate payment constraints, Heidi increases her prices for wine and beer, the most-consumed beverages. Her sales volume increases massively. A young and dynamic customer service consultant at the local bank recognizes these customer debts as valuable future assets and increases Heidi's borrowing limit. He sees no reason for undue concern since he has the debts of the alcoholics as collateral.
At the bank's corporate headquarters, expert bankers transform these customer assets into DRINKBONDS, ALKBONDS and PUKEBONDS. These securities are then traded on markets worldwide. No one really understands what these abbreviations mean and how the securities are guaranteed. Nevertheless, as their prices continuously climb, the securities become top-selling items.
One day, although the prices are still climbing, a risk manager (subsequently of course fired due his negativity) of the bank decides that slowly the time has come to demand payment of the debts incurred by the drinkers at Heidi's bar.
However they cannot pay back the debts.
Heidi cannot fulfill her loan obligations and claims bankruptcy. DRINKBOND and ALKBOND drop in price by 95 %. PUKEBOND performs better, stabilizing in price after dropping by 80%.
The suppliers of Heidi's bar, having granted her generous payment due dates and having invested in the securities are faced with a new situation. Her wine supplier claims bankruptcy, her beer supplier is taken over by a competitor. The bank is saved by the Government following dramatic round-the-clock consultations by leaders from the governing political parties. The funds required for this purpose are obtained by a tax levied on the non-drinkers.
Finally an explanation I understand...
Federal obligations exceed world GDP
As the Obama administration pushes through Congress its $800 billion deficit-spending economic stimulus plan, the American public is largely unaware that the true
deficit of the federal government already is measured in trillions of dollars, and in fact its $65.5 trillion in total obligations exceeds the gross domestic product of the world.
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