UGH, another heavy duct tape moment - financial bill creates ‘permanent bailout'

[dc dalton]

Yeah, Democrats, Republicans same thieving 'fuck you middle' America SCUMBAGS that don't give two shits about anything but their rich buddies.

http://rawstory.com/2009/12/taibbi-obamas-big-sellout/

Taibbi: Obama’s sellout to Wall Street creates ‘permanent bailout’

If passed as it is, the financial reform bill winding its way through Congress will create a "permanent bailout mechanism," and will give complete control over future bailouts to the White House, says columnist Matt Taibbi.

In a video preview of an upcoming Rolling Stone article, Taibbi explained how the Obama administration started selling out to Wall Street interests almost as soon as the 2008 election was over.

"The really big thing that's in these bills that's really, really scary is that it kind of outlines a permanent bailout mechanism," Taibbi said. "If it survives in the way that it was originally conceived, it's basically going to formalize an arrangement whereby the government is expected to bail out the top 20 to 25 largest financial companies. ... It will be entirely up to the White House to determine whether or not these companies are in trouble in the future, so there won't be any congressional role in deciding when and when not to give a bailout."

Taibbi's words echoed the concerns of some in Congress that, far from ensuring that America's financial system will be healthy, the financial reform being proposed will make Wall Street more dependent on taxpayers than it is already.

US House Rep. Spencer Bachus, the ranking Republican on the House Financial Services Committee, said in October that the financial reform plan would create a "permanent bailout authority." And Paul Volcker, the Jimmy Carter-appointed former head of the Federal Reserve who is widely credited with successfully fighting off inflation in the 1980s, said the Obama administration's proposed financial reform would maintain the "too-big-to-fail" mentality and could lead to further bailouts.

Taibbi also said that President Barack Obama gave key economic positions away to Wall Street insiders instead of keeping on progressive voices from his presidential campaign.

During the campaign, Obama was primarily advised by people like Austan Goolsbee from University of Chicago and Karen Kornbluh who is a well known progressive economist. Obama gets elected, the very day he gets elected those people are basically off the team and he brings in a whole bunch of people from Wall Street.

Primarily he brings in his former college buddy Michael Froman who is a Harvard classmate of Obama's. Froman was a high-ranking Citigroup executive. He puts Froman in charge on November 5th of running the economic transition team. He was in charge of hiring people for the White House to run economic policy.

Froman also brought in Jamie Rubin to be his number two. Rubin is the son of Bob Rubin who is a big Citigroup executive as well.

Rubin probably more than any other person -- single person -- was responsible for the financial crisis by deregulating the economy in the White House. He also had a major role in helping to destroy one of the world's biggest companies. You know, Citigroup. He has like one of the worst track records you can possible find in the country and yet he was the guy who was basically the architect of the entire Obama policy. Obama put him in charge of everything. The crew that's running the policy in the White House is basically all tied to Bob Rubin.

A couple of weeks after he hires these Citigroup people to run all those hires, they announced the Citigroup bailout which is a massive $300 billion giveaway to Citigroup...

Time to burn Washington to the freaking ground .. no other solution I can see

[S&WM&P40]

This is almost the same as leaving a crack head to guard your valuables while you go away on vacation. Wouldn't this put the government in charge of some major companies and give them even more power to do with as they please?

[bighornjd]

Time to burn Washington to the freaking ground .. no other solution I can see

I might be able to find some matches but unfortunately i can't buy any gasoline. I'm out of money. My government bailout check must have gotten lost in the mail...

[buster2209]

A "financial reform bill" my arse!

More like a "middle class ass fukin bill!"

Roll on the revolution, I'll cough up money for gasoline......

[phillyd2]

Any thought of the other side of the coin? What IF the big boys were allowed to fail at the end of Bush II and the whole system went down due to the panic?

What are we really against here? .gov intervention via bail outs / regulation or .gov non intervention allowing Wall Street / banks to do whatever they please? Or do we just want to limit the size of any in the financial industry to be too big so if they fail it would not effect the economy as a whole. But then we would be back to massive .gov intervention.

Instead of the Twinkie populist rants I would be very interested in hearing possible solutions. What would you guys do if you were King of America? Well, I mean after you banged a few supermodels.

[bighornjd]

Any thought of the other side of the coin? What IF the big boys were allowed to fail at the end of Bush II and the whole system went down due to the panic?

What are we really against here? .gov intervention via bail outs / regulation or .gov non intervention allowing Wall Street / banks to do whatever they please? Or do we just want to limit the size of any in the financial industry to be too big so if they fail it would not effect the economy as a whole. But then we would be back to massive .gov intervention.

Instead of the Twinkie populist rants I would be very interested in hearing possible solutions. What would you guys do if you were King of America? Well, I mean after you banged a few supermodels.

Let the sons-of-bitches go bankrupt just like us little guys would if we used poor business practices. If the greedy CEO's weren't bleeding these companies dry maybe they wouldn't be in this situation. It's called capitalism, plain and simple. A company's purpose is to supply and market a product or service that is useful and desirable to it's customers. If it can't do this and do it efficiently enough to be profitable then it's existence is unnecessary. Another business (or group of smaller businesses that compete against each other to do it more efficiently) will come along to provide the needed product or service. Usually cheaper for the consumer and more profitable for the company which is how an economy is sustained. Taxing the shit out of the working class and pulling money out of thin air to prop up a dying corporation filled with financial leeches that consumes way more than it contributes to society is a good way drain the whole damn economy until there is nothing left. At which point we are all forced into slavery to support the .gov so that they can make an attempt to keep us all alive in our FEMA camp shelters.

Sound like a familiar narrow road we're headed down with no place to turn around in sight?

[dc dalton]

Instead of the Twinkie populist rants I would be very interested in hearing possible solutions. What would you guys do if you were King of America? Well, I mean after you banged a few supermodels.

Well how about this, you fuck up, make dumb fucking decisions with your business you go into bankruptcy and the courts divvy up the assets for the investors?

That's what would happen if I made dumb decisions in my business OR if the local auto parts store made dumb decisions!

Why are the rules any different for the 'big businesses' than they are for the 'mom and pop' ... why do MY tax dollars get used to reward some asshole CEO, or CFO that decided to 'risk it all' on a VERY risky play and got their dicks caught in a wringer? Why are MY tax dollars given to them for fucking up, all while they take their multi million dollar pensions for a job well done?


I'd trust a good federal bankruptcy judge before I'd trust one of these fuck ups OR their 'buddy' in Washington that gets them their bail out.

Everyone here talks about 'pure capitalism' and 'free markets' .. well you know what? BOTH those concepts also include 'eating a bullet' when you fuck up!

Fuck them! No one is 'diapering my ass' when I did something stupid with my business and no one should be helping them!

[pyld]

Any thought of the other side of the coin? What IF the big boys were allowed to fail at the end of Bush II and the whole system went down due to the panic?

Please define "the whole system went down."

Instead of the Twinkie populist rants I would be very interested in hearing possible solutions.

Let it fail.

Or, done the math--we are into it for a few trillion and mortgaged our future potentially beyond recoverability. Without a definition on "went down" (stop laughing), this discussion is moot. I'd argue that the "collapse" of the system would have been a historical blip (not particularly "fatal") and certainly less damaging than the long term systemic damage that we are doing to the economy with the level of stimulus spending.

[phillyd2]

Please define "the whole system went down."

Umm. lets say 1929 when they were really allowed to fail.

[phillyd2]

Really? Nobody at all concerned about the whole banking system going off the cliff and them calling in your mortgage tomorrow? All credit stopping in a instant which means most businesses closing their doors? All invest stopping cold? Really don't see the difference between the corner hardware store closing and the top ten banks going belly up? Letting them eat the bullet even if your head gets blown off in the process?

You guys sure got some great slogans here but I seriously doubt anybody really thought about what real life would really look like the next day.