Hmm.. there is a financial crisis.. that just got waaaay worse because House Democrats and Republicans can't get their rhetoric out of the way and actually work towards a little thing we like to call a compromise.. also referred to as a solution. In Washington though.. they believe that spitting rhetoric in 30, 60, and 90 seconds slots on the House floor can take the place of sitting down and hammering out a deal that may actually benefit us, their constituents.
I hope everyone takes a hard look at their Congressperson and decides whether they proved to you why they voted Yes or No to the bill because of partisan bickering or real qualms/hope for the bill. I don't care their party affiliation, show them that their time is up if they can't get their acts together and work for us, the taxpayers, instead of working for themselves and their party leaders.
Oh boy.. that bunch was really disgusting today. Horrendous. Then they all came out of it whining and pointing fingers at each other like a room full of children. Scratch that, children don't deserve to be associated with that bunch. In fact, scummy lawyers and dirty used car salespeople are more kin to many of those Congresspeople.
Meanwhile, Wall Street lost about 1 trillion dollars, let me repeat that in caps.. ONE TRILLION DOLLARS due to the stupidity and infantile actions of the House of Representatives. Clearly, both Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader John Boehner thought there was a deal.. until a bunch of Congresspeople decided to vote differently. Some, no doubt, were brave individuals who bucked their party's leadership to show their true stance on this very important issue while others were selfish self-serving politicians with an eye only on that 50%+1 in November - no matter the damage done.
Perhaps you can tell from the slightly ranting and rambling nature of this post but I am very angry and frustrated with the House of Rep.s right now. Also I'm disappointed. Very disappointed. I figured that the true villain of this crisis would end up being the Senate. The House of Rep.s is meant as a quicker moving organ of government - beholden to their constituents - to react to a crisis and avert it through quick and decisive action. Meanwhile the Senate is meant as an Upper chamber for contemplation as for what is truly better for "we the people" in the short and long term. As it turns out, the Senate were the brave ones.. they put in long hours and fought against dissatisfaction with the bailout idea to create a more manageable bill that addresses our financial institutions, creates protections for taxpayers, and creates some oversight so the Treasury Secretary doesn't go immediately shovel all the money into his former employer, Goldman Sachs, pockets.
What a waste. To think that even a penny of my taxes go to pay for some of these people then they go out and put our economy in further peril. The Dow plunges nearly 780 points. The markets lost about 11 percent of their worth. The dollar is being set up for a nice devaluing slide very soon, mark my words.
Phew.. that left a bad taste in my mouth just thinking about it. Enough is Enough.
Later!
9 comments:
I agree, congress has at this point let us down and I think some of it is the republicans trying to make themselves seem like supporters of the people and they screwed us over.
Yes I don't want a bail out, but we have to have it or we will have another Great Depression.
Holly: incorrect. If we DO bail them out, we will have another great depression. If nobody is bailed out, we will feel some pain, to be sure. However this is the result of decades of the fed manipulating the money supply and interest rates. Artificially (non-market determined) low interest rates increase the money supply in the form of debt, and therefore cause inflation, as well as a lot of malinvestment.
Who gives a crap that Wall Street lost a trillion bucks? Why is the failure of PRIVATE CORPORATIONS my problem? The market will adjust without them.
if you want to know how the great depression really happened, check this link out:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-515319560256183936
Congress relaxed the laws that allowed the behavior that created the crisis. Just like the savings and loan debacle in the 80s. The whole series of events was set in motion years ago. Waffling on the vote now did not do anything but cause the market to drop closer to where it probably should be anyway. I'm with Toasty Aroma on this one. Take the hit now, it will only get worse later. Ban all the jerks who created the mess from financial markets for life and make them give back all bonuses, options and salary but for the equivalent of minimum wage earned for the last ten years. They have proven they can't be trusted, we would be fools and idiots to give them another 700 billion dollars.
holly: you're right. We do need a bailout, but it needs to bailout those who are suffering not of their own doing but of the institutional linkage to these big gambling banks which are failing. The parties should have been honest up front and made a deal.
@toasty aroma: You are crazy. First off your link which leads to "The Money Masters" is an insane conspiracy theory about how the "Rothschilds" control the world economy.. Craaaaazy stuff. Total free market economics as we learned in the 1920s is not a good idea. Some regulation is needed to make sure that we, the people, are not being taken advantage by big corporate thugs.
@dan brantley: You start off right. This is Congress's fault originally. I'm talking about people like Pres. Clinton and Sen. Phil Gramm who each have a big hand in this mess. The important thing isn't "taking the hit" it is making sure that this won't happen again and they will come runny to Joe Taxpayer looking for a handout.
Erm... how exactly do you "ban" people? And let's face it, if companies want to payout huge dividends to idiots who run them into the ground, that should be their choice. You can't stop Corporations doing this but you we have the possibility right now of telling them off and sending them a message that if you took part in stupid, high-risk loans.. you take a hit. Loan these companies money, and make sure we extract every dime plus fines and fees from them until this market finds its equilibrium point, I say.
And on Tuesday Wall Street had its second biggest gain in history, recouping 600 billion dollars.
Hmmm... will the market take care of itself if we leave it alone?
The scariest words in the English language are "I'm from the government. I'm here to help."
How can you tell if a politician is lying?
His lips are moving.
I'm happy. My congressmen did what I asked. NO BAIL OUT!!!
By the way please stop by my blog and check out the list of PORK that was tucked into that bail out package. I've got a few of them up in the top post. Disgusting.
Keep your panties on...Wall Street will survive even without a bailout. They've already made back a lot of the latest drop.
@dan: Fine, if you hate ALL politicians so much I hope you find an alternate form of authority which doesn't involve them.
@Jenn of J: You're right. Using the bailout plan as a Christmas tree is horrid. Putting pork along with language that could be useful is a travesty. The new version which should hit the House tomorrow should be a lot better because it involves checks, balances, tax credits, FDIC hikes, and no blank checks for banks and brokerages.
@:Panties? How did you... wait a minute, I know that trick! The problem isn't Wall Street surviving it is the credit crunch that Wall Street created being continued. If you got anywhere near a bank thinking about getting a loan for anything you got one response, DENIED. The banking credit industry has wide influence and a lack of confidence in them has created massive panic. We need to calm the system down, punish the idiots, fix the system, and then make sure we don't loose our money doing so. The Senate bill guarantees that taxpayers get back at least as much as they put in, if not more. Good idea!
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