Someone wrote in to say that it would cost less than the current British rescue package to simply pay 250,000 pounds to every home in the UK. On the understanding that those who have ‘toxic’ mortgages pay them off and the rest buy cars. That way the whole economy gets a huge boost, the ‘toxic debt is wiped out and the motor industry has customers.

What do YOU think?

Greedy Wall Street actors took pushed their luck by seducing “We the People” with promises of quick riches funded by tricky loans, credit card teasers rates, and a story line in which greed is good and markets always go up.

As demand turned into a gold-rush like madness, equity markets and housing prices bubbled-up in a scam fueled by “buy-now-pay-later” leveraging that was shilled by realtors, loan brokers, financial advisors and media pundits.

After pocketing the lending transactions fees, Wall Street repackaged the shaky loans, sold them off as in bundles mislabeled AAA by complicit rating agencies, and packeted more transaction fees.

Then Wall Street repackaged the repackages, sold them again, then sold insurance on repackaged-repackages, and pocketed more transactions fees.

As with all Ponzi scams, the gig was up when the ability of the marks to keep playing the game came to an abrupt and inevitable end.

Wall Street’s loans went south with tumbling real estate prices and they couldn’t cover the insurance payouts for the bad loans they sold, so they cried alligator tears to “We the People” and announced that should they fail, they would take “We the People” down with them into a Great Depression II.

With some gentle nudging from insiders, “We the People” bought the story and bailed out Wall Street to the tune of trillions of our dollars, thus driving ourselves into unimaginable debt and undercutting our children’s’ future, our standing in the world, on our nation’s security.

Wall Street, still rich but on the hook for a lot of bad paper, started hiding their money so credit dried up, businesses bellied up, and millions of “We the People” lost our jobs.

Scared, confused, and addled as to the underlying causes of the financial crisis (namely Wall Street’s con artistry), “We the People” lowered our Fed interest rates and printed more money in order to “free up credit” and stimulate lending by the hoarding financiers on Wall Street.

Now Wall Street is beginning to reap renewed profits based on transaction fees from “We the People” who are buying bargain-basement real estate whose value has collapsed and “We the People” who are re-mortgaging our lives to take advantage of the lower rates on loans that “We the People”are guaranteeing.
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Flush with bailout money and renewed transaction fees, Wall Street is now claiming that they are once again solvent and “We the People” need take no further action to save our nation. Wall Street says the storm has passed and they’re ready to get back to business as usual.

“We the People” are finally figuring out what happened and we are trying to re-regulate Wall Street in order to prevent being taken hostage by Wall Street in the future but Wall Street is having none of it. In an orgy of “free market” rhetoric, cooking the books, market manipulation, and political arm twisting, Wall Street is gearing up to forestall any attempts to change their usual business practices.

The net outcome of Wall Street’s gaming is that they grow richer still, while “We the People become yet poorer and face a future of unimaginable indebtedness.

BUT, says Wall Street, don’t worry, because “We the People” are invited to join their game again with whatever money we have left. And if “We the People” are out of money, for a small transaction fee we can always borrow some more at remarkably low interest rates guaranteed by…you guessed it…”We the People”.

Just remember that since “We the People” were unable to change the game, the rule remains “caveat emptor”.

There is a process for banks in the predicament of Citi and co. Yet that process is not being followed. The banks are already on shaky ground and yet they act as though they have all the cards. Could those cards be all the former Citi employees now a part of Obama’s inner circle. Starting with Paulson (Goldman Sachs) under the Bush adminstration, and now continued by the Obama administration, the banks continue to be dealt with on terms roughly dictated seemingly by them.

Finance is finance and one does not have to be a banker to unravel this mess. After all, it was the bankers that got us here, so how do they magically now possess the ability to get us out of this when they couldn’t prevent it. There are institutions with financial knowledge and prowess on the scale of Wall Street that have individuals qualified enough to deal with this mess.

As for no bid contracts, a process actually created by Cheney during 41′s term I think, Haliburton and again Cheney, saying that oversight was all that was lacking kinda misses the point. That’s just me though.

As for Darth Cheney’s Haliburton excesses, I’ll just state that this just shows the necessity of oversight. Taking advantage of Cheney’s oil industry experience without allowing Cheney to steer policy in a way that advantaged a company in which he retained a financial interest would have been quite possible if President Bush had been interested in oversight. As we all know, he wasn’t. President Obama doesn’t appear to be that loose, thus far he has a fairly tight and disciplined hold on his administration where the buck stops on only one desk — his.

That the banking industry is even allowed to engage lobbyist after having received bail-out money is only the beginning of the insult. How they muster the gall, something the appear to be in great supply of, to then fight its lender, the US gov. on terms of the Chrysler negotiations is beyond obscene. Translation, treat us the way we want to be treated but bankruptcy for everyone else.

President Obama if he is looking, should really recognize the error of his judgement. There can’t be two sets of standards in dealing with the banking crisis or rather large banks vs. any other corporation or business. The banks clearly demonstrate a sense of entitlement in their dealings with the administration. Had the banks been treated as the law actually requires, this discussion would not be taking place now.