Sen. Jane Harmon was just on with Schuster saying Obama is pushing hard for House Vote..

even with the pork in it that Harmon says she is against she says there are enough child credit and tax rebates for Americans in it that she feels it outweighs the "race car tracks and arrow tips" pork that was put in there. She says she will vote for the package even though she's one of the "Blue Dogs."

I saw Obama a snip of Obama really pushing for this bill. I don't know why he's pushing so hard when he knows it will do nothing. Why does he have to be so aggressive with it by calling and strongarming house Dems to vote for it?

Wouldn't it be better just to call for support in his speeches and let the bill pass or go down (because it's a bad bill) on it's own? That way he doesn't risk any wrath either way. :shug: What could his strategy be in being so aggressive?

and I guess global warning is not real either...

that would have made it a better bill. Barney Frank was on CNBC this a.m. and he said "if we had more time we could have come up with a better plan," but we don't so this is the best we could do given the time we have.

Nadin it reminds me of when they rushed through the Iraq Resolution, Patriot Act and the rest. They don't give enough time so the people get hurt in the end while the "Fat Cats" get the bail out. This bill as it stands will bail out the Fat Cats first...and the little trickle to us will only make things worse in another month.

and the power he is getting is pretty standard

And yes I wish they had more time, but they don't

And this is NOT the first bill to deal with this mess

THAT is the reality

This is critical to make the crisis less deep... not go away, just less deep and buy the time until we have a congress that can do what needs to be done

I don't like this bill, but it is a faustian choice

I'll take the recession over the depression

And given how far the fire has gone... yes that is not overkill or fear... Ah all those courses on US and European History and the great depression...

By the by... how much do you think they have thrown willy nilly at the market so far?

A lot of bad stuff is gonna go down before then. Maybe we can hope that after the election (Obama wins) they will ram through something that will really work. And, that's the hope of many here. I just don't trust what's in this that won't benefit Bush before he leaves. So many economists who have been correct about this crisis (predicting it years ago) think this bill is very flawed and really wanted to have more imput. But, Congress (Dems & Repugs) ran around just like they did with every fear mongering Bush and Cheney have done and rushed to give them pretty much what they wanted with a few "safeguards" that Bush will ignore with a "signing statement" anyway.

It's just a bad bill..and I hate to see folks have false hopes that it will stave off the bad that's coming after the bill is signed.

anybody who is honest will NOT tell you this will bring happy days overnight

But it MIGHT help to lessen the effect of the bad things

By the way... since you didn't answer my question... we have thrown into the market over 2T over the last year or so, willy nilly... like oh Hoover did until he finally got some things that were targeted, and not well funded, but targeted. They bought time back then, and this is what it will do.

You prefer that we continue to throw money willy nilly instead of a targeted approach? Oh and those 2T do not include Bear Sterns or the other "bailed out" organizations.

By the way.. many of those economists who are opposed are supply siders... (chicago school) or Austrian School (libertarian)

The Austrian school made similar comments early in the Great Depression. The Supply Siders were not around then

Supply-side economists love this bill because it takes money away from those at the bottom and gives it to those at the top.

The Chicago School statement was signed by liberal, libertarian, socialist and conservative economists alike. They oppose the bailout based on nonpartisan, standard-theory economic principles. Yes, some of them may also believe in trickle-down economics. So do Bush and Paulson, who are on your side in this debate.

Why is it that you reject all criticism on grounds that some ideologues you disagree with are against the bailout, yet you have no problem being on the same side as Bush and other ideologues who oppose just about everything DUers are for?

by the way are you accusing Krugman of being a supply sider? ANd he is just ONE example of the people who RELUCTANCY would vote for this

He is quite the Keynseian

By the way.

Now I will continue to ask you

WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO GET THE LEGISLATION WE NEED? I AM TIRED OF THE EXCUSES

that other plans would be better.

Plans that I support, like direct capitalization and debt-for-equity.

Krugman believes that we need to act immediately, but this bill won't stop the problem.

I think that there are many tools we have at our disposal right now that would buy us enough time to work out a better deal.

ETA: Krugman also believed that there was no speculation in the oil market. He was saying that as recently as June, and he was completely wrong.

and you don't

By the way... you have yet to answer what are you intending to do to get the bills we need after this is in the books

Assuming the RNC House Republicans don't crash the US (and world) economy.

I wonder if you will be one of those applauding on the sidelines...

suspend the mark-to-market rules. The Fed could provide liquidity.

If the bill isn't passed, we detach the hike in FDIC limits and send that through in a quick vote.

IF those actions aren't successful, Bush can declare a bank holiday and temporarily stop the runs on banks.

The reality is that small banks are benefiting from this situation. Capital is flowing from the large, dysfunctional banks into small local and medium regional banks. They are doing well.

You talk about the economy crashing and me cheering on the sidelines. Don't be so petty. What do you think is going to happen when (not if) this plan is fails? Our problems will be significantly worse. I would hope to avoid riots in the streets and worse when credit remains frozen and we've just blown 1 Trillion in a futile effort to prevent the crisis. Massive currency deflation is not something I want to see happen in America in my lifetime.

And the American taxpayer is still setup to lose.

Paulsen can choose to sell whatever assets he wants. He can also choose what price the U.S. government pays for them. It is soley his decision with no guidelines on these matters.

and the wealthy at a fair rate again - in other words, what a coincidence that what they "don't have time for" are the provisions that would make the Corps and wealthy pay for some of this instead of laying the entire burden on the working/middle class.

Of course, the upper 1% and the Corporations would rather send the entire world into a depression than to give back one penny to the "commons" that makes their wealth possible in the first place. So they are holding us hostage until we guarantee that their profits and gains are protected.

only less engaging.

and you have to still answer the question, how are you going to try to get the progressive legislation we need passed?

Oh wait, I don't get it, we are powerless :sarcasm:

That is money that we will not have to do things like Green energy, funding schools, fixing health care.

I think it's imperative that we oppose this bill.

You have bought in to the lie that this has a good chance of solving the liquidity crisis. At most it's a temporary fix and the money that we give them is not coming back any time soon.

just like the depression era houses, it is coming back

Just like Chrysler it is coming back

It was structured the same way not that you'd know that

If you bothered readying a book, you'd find this up

Now answer the question. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO GET THAT LEGISLATION WE NEED?

I guess you will put me on ignore, after all DOING SOMETHING more than just talking a little revolution is not your thing... or perhaps I will

To stop wasting my time

You need to read up on Credit Default Swaps and derivatives. These banks were leveraged 40 to 1 in many cases, with no underlying asset.

There is simply no way to get the money back and it's ignorant to repeat that lie.

It may not happen before I leave this world, but it will

that could deal with this new "Computer Model/Black Box Trading" and "Hedge Funds" and the rest..

This Time! it really could and will be different... Those other models are well before COMPUTERS!

These banks are leveraged 40 to 1 on bad mortgages.

Many of these CDS's were unfunded insurance policies against housing prices falling. They were bets.

Like if I take out an insurance policy for my neighbor's Ferrari. He totals it and I demand that the bank pay up. There is no underlying asset, just an unhedged obligation. This is the kind of junk that the banks want to stick us with.

There is no chance that we will get close to the 700B back. We could get something back, but even then it will be a matter of years, and all that time we are stuck with the interest rates.

office. The big banks are threatening to crash the economy-the fuckers. That would give Bushco the excuse it needs to impose martial law.

Free clue this is world wide

and people in other countries are looking for leadership- the kind Barack Obama is showing.

but being dragged that Far Right? What does that mean we need to do after the election to get him BACK?

:shrug: That's my worry with him.

Is Jane trying to make it look like she's CHANGING HER VOTE
"for the good of the country"? B.S.!!!!

She didn't mention she voted for it before, but by adding she is a "Blue Dog," I guess maybe she could have been implying she's a "maverick." :shrug:

all around the country?

And after the torture scandal, how can anyone trust Harmon to tell them the time?

I worry about Obama coming on so strong to intervene in this Wall St./Main St. Crisis that he didn't have a part it..and worried his supporters like Bob Rubin (Clinton/Reagonomics) were corrupting him...but I could see a case being made that if Obama goes far Right he can pick up Independents and it doesn't hurt him except with folks like me.

So...yeah...I guess I can understand some of it...but it still bothers me that we were told by "Move On" and other "Liberal" sites that if we support Obama we will own him. Right now it looks like Obama is tacking so far Right I worry we can ever pull him back... :-(

about the credit freeze.

The credit freeze may be a rip off but it's very real to the heart and soul of American business.

Obama has a lot of support on Wall Street.

There are political games going on.

It's not just one thing. And I left MoveOn long ago when they booted the best advisor they ever had because of their own stubbornness. Being rich doesn't make you liberal.

A personal example of someone you deal with who doesn't watch FOX who is really in desperate need?

:shrug:

my apologies if this was another DU'er

She's been working to develop 20 acres into a green development for the last fifteen years.

All of us have been out there doing everything from stream reclaiming to walking the plots inch by inch to clean them up of the garbage left behind by the previous owner.

She's dead in the water. If this lasts another two weeks, she'll lose the land. She has A-1 credit, she's already been approved for a refi loan -- it's just that there are NO loans here right now and with no notice at all. In other words, she couldn't have done anything to prevent this. Fifteen years of her life.

My uncle's store just got their credit lines cut by one half. A friend just got her business AmEx account yanked because after ten years, they decided she was carrying too much debt. That's hilarious, all by itself.

Bad things are happening to people who run small business. They will be the casualties. Paulson's buddies will be fine no matter what.

Is that what you are saying? Are you saying they think this is the "Quick Fix" that's going to make them sound and whole in their investments? :shrug:

But, the powers that be have the power to freeze credit. This is a hostage situation.

I've posted this ten times now.

Do you "quick fix" people not understand that small business provides most of our new jobs?

Do you not understand that small business is the beating engine of our economy?

Seriously, what part of "small business is grinding to a halt" do you not understand?

Maybe it's abstract for you. It won't be for long.

I know this is global and accelerated three weeks ago

It is not a conspiracy

But that is ok

After that, you are correct

yet we do BioTech Investment in Overseas Markets...we can't even get funding for two big clients from Germany who have products that our own Corrupt FDA has actually APPROVED that would help get "synthetic bone" developed in Germany that would reduce our using Cadaever bone (Gravediggers using Grandma's bones to sell to US Companies that put that in our mouths for Dental Implants and bone grafts) or..

"Wound Dressings" that use products from "natural sources" like SILVER which has been an anti-biotic used for bacteria for centuries or "Bee Honey" which is now being touted by our Indian firms. (Yeah...maybe we can save our Bees if we bet Bio Tech and Big Pharma involved in saving their little wings)!!!

Just saying. We are small business, too and we have never been able to get funding from Bushies so we aren't dependent on anything but our Product Sales to cover our payroll of 30 employees. Even in NC...we can't get the VC's to invest in us because we aren't "BIG Enough" but we are doing OKAY! Yeah we could use a line of credit because we are "growing" but we've had to deal on our own.

Just WHO is getting this investment they talk about that "pulling the plug" would hurt. We haven't gotten it and our worth is 6 Mil in Sales and 15 Mil in Value.

We aren't getting ANY HELP from any of this....

Just so you know where I'm coming from.

Jane "I didn't know about torture" Harmon?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/08/AR2007120801664.html

Hill Briefed on Waterboarding in 2002
In Meetings, Spy Panels' Chiefs Did Not Protest, Officials Say

By Joby Warrick and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, December 9, 2007; Page A01

In September 2002, four members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group, which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA's overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk.

Among the techniques described, said two officials present, was waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill. But on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials said.


CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said in an interview two months ago that he had informed congressional overseers of
CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said in an interview two months ago that he had informed congressional overseers of "all aspects of the detention and interrogation program." (By Charles Dharapak -- Associated Press)

"The briefer was specifically asked if the methods were tough enough," said a U.S. official who witnessed the exchange.

Congressional leaders from both parties would later seize on waterboarding as a symbol of the worst excesses of the Bush administration's counterterrorism effort. The CIA last week admitted that videotape of an interrogation of one of the waterboarded detainees was destroyed in 2005 against the advice of Justice Department and White House officials, provoking allegations that its actions were illegal and the destruction was a coverup.

Yet long before "waterboarding" entered the public discourse, the CIA gave key legislative overseers about 30 private briefings, some of which included descriptions of that technique and other harsh interrogation methods, according to interviews with multiple U.S. officials with firsthand knowledge.

With one known exception, no formal objections were raised by the lawmakers briefed about the harsh methods during the two years in which waterboarding was employed, from 2002 to 2003, said Democrats and Republicans with direct knowledge of the matter. The lawmakers who held oversight roles during the period included Pelosi and Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) and Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), as well as Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan).

Are you a financial advisor or have a background in finance?

You will have a lot of good reading there. OOP'S...forgot Paul Krugman and Galbraith's Son...and hundreds of others..but the links are there.