Why didn't THEY think of this???

So, apparently the 700 Billion -that Bush and his cronies want you and me to pony up to bailout Wall Street isn't so forthcoming...

There's another proposal that came out of the meetings that was so revolutionary - so, out in left field, that no one saw it coming! The proposal? Oh, yeah, have Wall Street bail itself out.

Have the fat cats that have been playing with all this money and basking in their greed for lo these many years, finally have to pay the piper for their debauchery. Everyone knew that the market has been inflated for quite some time and that there were going to need to be corrections. But no one did anything about it.

Borio and Lowe(2002) as written by Kevin J. Lansing in his Federal Reserve Bank SF(FRBSF) Economic Letter dated 14 November 2003... also argue that emerging bubbles can be more readily identified if central banks look beyond asset prices to include other variables that signal a threat to financial stability. Specifically, they find that episodes of sustained rapid credit expansion, booming stock or house prices, and high levels of investment, are almost always followed by periods of stress in the financial system.

HMMM...I'd say this is STRESSS!!!!! wouldn't you?

That same letter, which holds the subtitle -Should the Fed React to the Stock Market?
He quotes Borio and Lowe "If the economy is indeed robust and the boom is sustainable, actions by the authorities to restrain the boom are unlikely to derail it altogether. By contrast, failure to act could have much more damaging consequences, as the imbalances unravel" (p. 26).
Borio, C., and P. Lowe. 2002. "Asset Prices, Financial and Monetary Stability: Exploring the Nexus." Bank for International Settlements. Working Paper 114. http://www.bis.org/publ/work114.htm

This was 5 years ago, 700 Billion dollars earlier and GW and the Republicans chose to do NOTHING!

I think that there must be consequences for those for whom this proposed bailout is to benefit. Exactly what those consequences are, I am not sure as I am not privvy to the inner workings of the system. I do believe in the No golden parachutes, though - you've already gotten yours. (that's a consequence? Boo hoo)
Guess you'll have to struggle like the rest of us peons to make our retirement accounts add up and hope that we have enough to carry us through old age.

It is heartening to see our representatives finally show some backbone, but in the end it may all just be for show and we, the lowly taxpayer, end up footing the bill again for the excesses of the greedy who have taken their money and run...

More commentary on Sarah Palin...gotta love this stuff

OP-ED COLUMNIST

Lipstick Bungle

By CHARLES M. BLOW

Published: September 20, 2008

Support for Sarah Palin among Republicans seems just as superficial as she is. When asked why they liked her, the answers described a talk-show host, not a vice president.

some thoughts on freedom...

I recently had the privilege and honor of standing with the Patriot Guard at a ceremony at Fort Logan in Denver, Colorado.  These folks come from all walks of life to stand and honor those who have given their lives in service for this country.  I do not believe our presence in Iraq is justified, but it was not the decision of those who are coming back in those caskets. This was a most moving experience from the horse-drawn caisson to the release of a dove by the parents of the young man killed in action signifying their release of him to a better life.  

The Patriot Guard stands between Fred Phelps and his people when they protest at these funerals.  Now, Fred Phelps is not one of my favorite people for other reasons, but this goes beyond the pale when he will bring other people and especially children to protest at a funeral of a person who has been killed in service for this country.  This country where we, at present, still have the benefit of speaking out against the things we think are wrong,  still enjoy most of our privacy (thanks GW), and if you are of the common, heterosexual variety, you still get to enjoy the benefits of inclusion in the greater society.  The common, homosexual variety is becoming more included but still to a lesser degree at this writing.

Thoughts from Eve Ensler

Subject: Eve Ensler on Sarah Palin...

   *Eve Ensler, the American playwright, performer, feminist and

  activist best  known for "The Vagina Monologues", wrote the following about Sarah  Palin*.

    I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was amember of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular

thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it's their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in  person or touched one.  Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears. I don't like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.  But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story -- connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.

    I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may 

never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would  have on the rest of the world.  Unfortunately, this is not a joke.  In my  lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected  to the presidency with regularity.   Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a  metaphor. In her  world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or  evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the  arctic,  the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of  cancers, are all part of God's plan.  She is fighting to take the polar  bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin's view,  is here  to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot  and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is  here to be  taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, "It was a  task  from God."  

 

 

    Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women  who are  raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a  right to  determine whether they have their rapist's baby or not.   She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I  imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that  makes.   Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather  she has  tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with  people  who think  independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of  ambiguity and  difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next  president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse  populations on the earth.   Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting  rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds  of wolves  from the air.   Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But  when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is  declared  in God's name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that  is the  end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything  America  has ever tried to be.

       I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this  election in  our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not  just of  the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create  policies to  save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will  determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or  whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and  attack. It  will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or  invest  our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and  destruction.  It will determine if money gets spent on education and healthcare or  whether  we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether  America  is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear,  fundamentalism  and aggression. 

       If the Polar Bears don't move you to go and do everything in your  power to  get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after  Palin  spoke at the RNC, "Drill Drill Drill." I think of teeth when I think of  drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of  domination. I  think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the  brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent.  I think of pain.   Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the  floor of  the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and  peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?

       Eve Ensler

   September 5, 2008

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Indecision 2008 - What the ?!?!?! (from the Daily show with Jon Stewart)

Sarah Palin and the gender card ...

How many...

Has anyone ever done a survey of the right-to-life folks to see how many of them support the death penalty?  I'm curious...does anyone else see the irony?

I wonder....

I wonder how many of the Right-to-Life folks who are so vehement that women not have abortions who have been raped or are the victims of incest, have thought about the trauma they are inflicting on those women by forcing them to carry the seed of the bastard who forced himself on them for nine months knowing that they are sharing in creating something they had absolutely no say in.  That's inflicting additional trauma on the victim- how dare those who have never had to deal with this type of trauma, decide whether someone who has, should have to carry to full term the child of their assailant.

You hear these people talk about those childless couples who would love to adopt these children of these victims.  I believe there are plenty of children waiting to be adopted in this world already.  The problem is that these so-called 'childless couples' want newborns - they are not willing to adopt older children.  They don't want to adopt someone else's problem.  How shallow is that?  Either you want a child or you don't.  If you are given the opportunity to adopt you take it.  You are not given a guarantee when you get pregnant that your child will be healthy or without problems, so why should it matter?  

You, who have not gone through the  trauma, do not get a say in whether those that have are to keep their baby full-term or are allowed to abort it and move on with their life and heal from their trauma.  That is their personal choice and should remain so.

No woman should have to die in a back alley ever again because of someone's religious beliefs.  This is where the true separation of church and state must exist.  What must prevail is the understanding and thought process that takes into account what is right and just for all people not just those of your own religious beliefs.  You may have your beliefs, but you may not inflict your beliefs on me.