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altivoIt is time for us to say enough and kick the fat cats out of government and out of power.
So Washington Mutual, with billions of dollars of liability for bad mortgages, gets "seized" by the government and sold cheap to another giant bank. On the surface they make this look like a good thing but when you examine the consequences, you realize that it's just a coverup to conceal a whole string of very bad, inexcusable things that have already happened. No one will be punished for the bad things, while innocent little people who worked as tellers and accountants and who had deposits will suffer.
JPMorgan Chase takes over all of Washington Mutual's assets at a bargain basement price. They get the responsibility for the bad debts too, which means that their shareholders and depositors are going to be paying for those. Meanwhile, they announce plans to close 10% or more of the branch banks in markets where WaMu competed directly with other banks they already hold. People will lose their jobs with little or no compensation there. And what happens to the top execs who were supposed to be steering the giant company through the shoals of finance? Well, a lot of them had already bailed, taking their money with them. The current CEO of Washington Mutual has only been in that position for three weeks. He was kept completely in the dark about this takeover plan, and had nothing to do with working it out or doing anything else to save the company or help its shareholders and depositors. Guess what he gets out of the deal?
Answer: $7.5 million just for having agreed to take the position, plus $11.6 million in severance pay. For doing nothing other than flying around looking important.
Guess what all those tellers at branch banks that are closed will get? If they are very lucky, two weeks' pay. I'm betting on nothing, though.
I'm finally beginning to understand the rage and blood lust that lay behind France's Reign of Terror, and the mob lynchings that took so many wealthy (and sometimes innocent) people to the guillotine. This sort of thing is absolutely intolerable.
Meanwhile politics goes on as usual, and tries to sweep all this stuff under the rug. The Republican party especially will try to make it out to be a good thing done to save the economy. It isn't. It just shifts the costs around, mostly to save the millionaires from having to pay for their own greed, and instead making the majority of people who had little to do with it take on the burden of the cost. New stresses will appear in other smaller banks, confidence will decline farther, the cost of unemployment payments will increase. Meanwhile, for these millionaires who run the government and the Republican party especially, it's business as usual. I guess it's hard being a pirate, but they figure someone has to do the job. And if the poor people have no bread to eat, then... let them eat cake.
So Washington Mutual, with billions of dollars of liability for bad mortgages, gets "seized" by the government and sold cheap to another giant bank. On the surface they make this look like a good thing but when you examine the consequences, you realize that it's just a coverup to conceal a whole string of very bad, inexcusable things that have already happened. No one will be punished for the bad things, while innocent little people who worked as tellers and accountants and who had deposits will suffer.
JPMorgan Chase takes over all of Washington Mutual's assets at a bargain basement price. They get the responsibility for the bad debts too, which means that their shareholders and depositors are going to be paying for those. Meanwhile, they announce plans to close 10% or more of the branch banks in markets where WaMu competed directly with other banks they already hold. People will lose their jobs with little or no compensation there. And what happens to the top execs who were supposed to be steering the giant company through the shoals of finance? Well, a lot of them had already bailed, taking their money with them. The current CEO of Washington Mutual has only been in that position for three weeks. He was kept completely in the dark about this takeover plan, and had nothing to do with working it out or doing anything else to save the company or help its shareholders and depositors. Guess what he gets out of the deal?
Answer: $7.5 million just for having agreed to take the position, plus $11.6 million in severance pay. For doing nothing other than flying around looking important.
Guess what all those tellers at branch banks that are closed will get? If they are very lucky, two weeks' pay. I'm betting on nothing, though.
I'm finally beginning to understand the rage and blood lust that lay behind France's Reign of Terror, and the mob lynchings that took so many wealthy (and sometimes innocent) people to the guillotine. This sort of thing is absolutely intolerable.
Meanwhile politics goes on as usual, and tries to sweep all this stuff under the rug. The Republican party especially will try to make it out to be a good thing done to save the economy. It isn't. It just shifts the costs around, mostly to save the millionaires from having to pay for their own greed, and instead making the majority of people who had little to do with it take on the burden of the cost. New stresses will appear in other smaller banks, confidence will decline farther, the cost of unemployment payments will increase. Meanwhile, for these millionaires who run the government and the Republican party especially, it's business as usual. I guess it's hard being a pirate, but they figure someone has to do the job. And if the poor people have no bread to eat, then... let them eat cake.
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no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 01:12 pm (UTC)And now that JPMorgan has less competition in the market, they can concentrate on increasing the profit margin. Nice.
Of course, the investment market is always unpredictable, and this time they ran out of money. That is always a great shame. But the value of stocks has plummeted slowly but steadily during the last year worldwide, so this probably was to be expected.
I am not an expert, tho, so I won't speculate any more. I just recently started my pension insurance, and I am playing it moderately safe. :P
Heh, I see you used a Marie Antoinette reference there. You may not be far off the truth there.
But now, with the presidential elections at hand... You have the chance to change things, at least a little.
And do not ever, ever trust the banks. :P
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 02:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 03:12 pm (UTC)One of the nasty little tricks that has been pulled with the bank regulatory and processing structures in this administration has been the removal of your ability to retain cancelled checks as proof of payment and a paper trail on who actually got the money. As a "cost cutting" measure, and without your permission, any check you write can be turned into an electronic funds transfer. The original document that you signed is supposed to be photographed and destroyed. Just try to get a copy of it even, without paying $10 or more for the privilege.
Like the electronic voting machines that are being foisted on us and that leave no paper trail, the transfer of funds is gradually being turned into total vaporware.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 03:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 04:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 01:48 pm (UTC)but yeah, I think the big wigs saw this coming a couple of years ago and bailed out before it was too late. Business is getting ridiculous nowadays. Its very disappointing to see the common folk getting taken advantage of so the big guys can make their quick buck.
"When one makes twenty million, ten thousand people lose" - NOFX
The way this country is run is set up to make sure the common masses can be taken advantage of.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 02:19 pm (UTC)After the great crash of 1929, a lot of sensible curbs and controls were placed on capitalist investment behaviors to prevent the same thing from happening again. Unfortunately, since the Reagan administration started deregulating everything, most of those curbs and controls have been gutted or completely eliminated "because they pose restrictions to profit-making business." Yeah. They posed restrictions to piracy, robbery, and greed is what they really mean. But whenever the subject is raised, they quickly start screaming about "family values" and "patriotic duty" and wave flags around to make people stand at attention and quit asking scary things. It's all a matter of psychological conditioning and mob control, and whoever has the most money (meaning, whoever is the best white collar thief) can usually hold the reins of power.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 02:23 pm (UTC)That is one thing that has always confused me. How does making it hard for your children to get a good start in life, or keeping the workers of your country poor and in ill health even remotely good for families, or patriotic?
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Date: 2008-09-26 02:34 pm (UTC)Don't want anyone to notice that you're removing curbs on risky financial behavior? Easy. Point over their shoulder and shout "Watch out for the terrorist who's about to pick your pocket!" Then when they turn around to look for the non-existent threat, you do what... Why pick their pocket of course.
The game in the current election so far has been to claim that the opposing party (Democrats) have fielded a candidate with "no experience in government" and to brush off questions and criticism by claiming that the incumbent party's (Republicans) candidate is so involved in the current crisis that he doesn't have time to answer questions or talk about policy.
The patriotic distraction card was played by throwing Sarah Palin into the race for vice-president, claiming that as a state governor (for all of 20 months in a state with one of the smallest population densities in the nation) she has more experience than a man who has been serving as a Senator. But they can claim she's in support of "family values" and "patriotism" because she's pro-gun, anti-abortion, and an extreme right-wing religious fruitcake who wants to teach "Intelligent Design" in science classes and eliminate proper sex education from school curricula. Those are all the hot button issues in the US that seem to easily distract the blue collar voters from the reality that they are being robbed blind by wealthy capitalists.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 05:36 pm (UTC)Obsession with "family values". Yes; but perhaps not to the same extent it grips politics in the US. While the traditional family is held up here as the ideal. The people in power accept that unmarried couples with children, and same sex pairings have just as much right to exist. They do not get EXACTLY equal treatment, but we're getting there.
When one mentions "family values" in the UK, it's more to do with that awfully divisive soundbite "hard working families", which is designed to piss off as many childless couples and singletons as possible by implying that they do not work hard.
But they can claim she's in support of "family values" and "patriotism" because she's pro-gun, anti-abortion, and an extreme right-wing religious fruitcake who wants to teach "Intelligent Design" in science classes and eliminate proper sex education from school curricula.
I guess that's the big difference on the East and West Atlantic. They are just not issues here. Guns are banned unless you have a licence; the abortion issue is closed as we reached a nice compromise ages ago, and any politician who dares to bring up personal religious beliefs in an election campaign will only do so once. It's not that being that way inclined is a turn off for voters here. More that wearing it as a badge of honour is considered...rude (I can't think of any other way of putting it.)
I am sorry the presidential campaign has gone this way. Avoiding discussing issues by using smoke and mirrors. It seems so vacuous. :(
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Date: 2008-09-26 06:06 pm (UTC)I do remember that elections in the 50s and 60s, when I was just a kid in school, seemed to involve a lot more discussion of real issues, problems, and potential solutions than they do now. The media carried long position statements and analyses, too, instead of just the most cutesy and insulting sound bites, or laughing at errors made by either side when speaking "off the cuff."
Now all we get are reports of the latter, and nothing about real positions, mostly because the candidates themselves don't have position statements and haven't thought anything through beyond winning the election by any means possible, including cheating if necessary.
Careful with that Axe, Eugene. You might behead someone!
Date: 2008-09-26 01:56 pm (UTC)Careful what you wish for, Alt- once mob rule becomes the norm, it's just a matter of time before someone crazier and more desperate tries to monopolize everything. After all, ideology causes so much chaos...
Re: Careful with that Axe, Eugene. You might behead someone!
Date: 2008-09-26 02:14 pm (UTC)Orwell was right when he wrote "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." That's what it's about. Though he was writing, supposedly, a diatribe against communism, as it turns out the same thing applies even under capitalism. A few people have it all, and the rest of us are just serfs to them. Expendables. Irrelevant. Snot-nosed masses. Insects.
I see no way around it. If we don't want to be walked on like ants, or led to slaughter like chickens, we have got to kick these fat asses out in no uncertain terms.
Re: Careful with that Axe, Eugene. You might behead someone!
Date: 2008-09-26 02:30 pm (UTC)Simon Schama's "History of Britain" was a truly excellent TV series that included a chapter on "The Two Winstons" (Churchill and Eric Blair). Track it down if you can. It's a very insightful look into two polar opposites who put their difference aside to rally around a common enemy
Re: Careful with that Axe, Eugene. You might behead someone!
Date: 2008-09-26 02:41 pm (UTC)Exterminating Hoof Bullet!!!
Date: 2008-09-30 07:42 pm (UTC)Are you sure it's merely the past thirty years? Well, hard for me to judge, since I have no prior experience beyond that time frame.
The "more of the same" comment got my attention... let me ask you, Altivo- who other than "more of the same" would seek the office of the President, or even seek a job in politics? Who would climb the ladder? Who other than those willing to compromise their views to adapt to the party that supported and promoted them would make it that far?
I see no way around it. If we don't want to be walked on like ants, or led to slaughter like chickens, we have got to kick these fat asses out in no uncertain terms.
You know, it's a funny thing- just a few months ago I could have heard myself saying the same thing... so I kind of respect a statement like that because I know the feelings that well up and lead to it.
However, I have a different opinion today. There's nothing we need to do. The thinking that something MUST be done is self-defeating, and is the cause of it all. Our nation is trying to hold on to a game of make-believe. We must act, we must protect, we must get involved.
No, we don't. We needn't do a thing. If anything, the thing to do is ask ourselves where we got the notion this land is OUR land. It's not. It's just land, period. This economy is mostly theories and currency, nothing concrete- which is part of the reason it's so damn flimsy. Everything humans have built is for a show- which must eventually end; clinging to hopes and illusions is only a distraction, a delay.
Orwell was right when he wrote "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." That's what it's about.
Well, at least you think so- and you're entitled to your opinion. I wouldn't be surprised if Orwell once had political ambitions of his own... but I digress. Equality is a human construct, and is thus flimsy and needs to be protected- as such, Orwell wrote an entire book to defend that ideology. Ultimatly those who support equality are doing it to gain support- until they can usurp it for themselves and make their quality superiority.
Though he was writing, supposedly, a diatribe against communism, as it turns out the same thing applies even under capitalism.
It works that way with every government- and thus all systems of it are doomed to failure. The many ultimatly can subjegate that power by force, but that too is self-defeating because ultimatly someone in the mob has aspirations to take control- that is, the purpose of a mob, after all.
...so, in conclusion, I can agree with you on what democracy is, but I disagree anything is to be done. I disagreed with the war, I disagreed with most of the decisions that have been made since, and I disagree any of it even makes a difference in our lives. Whomever gets elected will continue using and enforcing what rules are currently in place and the in-fighting will continue until this heap of contradictions called civilization burns itself to the ground. It looked nice on paper, but was flawed from the beginning. There is no point trying to salvage what is obviously so useless and corrupt. It is important to remember that the end of a nation isn't the end of the world- and neither is the end of "law and order" the end of man... I call it a phase. >_>
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 02:49 pm (UTC)Actually many bills are needed, but actually useful ones won't happen.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 03:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 03:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 04:09 pm (UTC)Simplisticism
Date: 2008-09-30 07:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 05:14 pm (UTC)Was that a reference to that Monty Python finacial-company-turned-pirate-ship? Or just a really big co-incidence?
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Date: 2008-09-26 05:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 07:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 07:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-26 08:01 pm (UTC)Yes, I think you're right. Of course, in those days, there was no income tax, no social security, and generally the financial underpinnings of the federal government were very, very slim.
What the government is proposing to do right now is take (not ask) a loan (with no obligation to repay) from all of us to rescue the executive officers of institutions that are in trouble because they did something stupid: lending money to people who couldn't afford to pay it back. And why did they do that? Because the Federal Reserve kept cutting and cutting the interest rates "to stimulate the economy" and that made it difficult for those bank execs to earn enough money unless they increased their volume. It also made it easy for them to borrow money at, say 1.5% interest so they could lend it out at 6% interest. Too easy. Now they can't get the money back and they are collapsing under their own debt. That's the short story made simple.
A primary cause of the collapse in 1929 was very similar. Borrowing money to invest in the stock market was very easy and very popular. Everyone did it. They did it so much that stock prices inflated like mad, just as they have in the last decade or so, despite the temporary drop after 9/11. When the market prices began sliding, the people who had borrowed couldn't recover the capital to pay it back, and financial institutions began collapsing. I'm very much afraid we are seeing the same thing again, and for much the same reasons.
Despite the popular notion that the 1929 crash happened all at once, that was not the case. Yes, there was a big drop on one day, but it was followed by many aftershocks, each of which lowered the market farther. Each was followed by a brief rally, but the rallies never recovered as much as had been lost. Each successive drop caused more banks and brokerages to be squeezed. As fears turned into panic, ordinary people who had not invested in the markets directly started withdrawing their funds from the banks for fear their bank would fail too. Even banks that had sound investments failed when they didn't have enough liquidity to pay back all their depositors over a period of a day or two.
History tells us that lack of regulation and watch dogs contributed to that crash and the depression that followed. Regulations were put in place to prevent a repeat, and the Federal Reserve was created and chartered in 1934 to also prevent a repeat. Starting with the Reagan administration in the 80s, though, those regulations have been slowly eroded and the Federal Reserve has more and more been a pawn of business interests who demanded cheap credit no matter what. You've noticed, I'm sure, how the market would drop every time the Fed failed to cut rates yet again...
Meanwhile the consumer credit crisis grew because ordinary people couldn't earn much of anything by putting their money in a bank account or CD. Why save money if the earning rate is less than the inflation rate? So they didn't save. They spent it all, and borrowed more at the low rates that the Federal Reserve was creating. Someone had to pay the piper eventually, and the someone is going to be all of us. From where I sit, it is looking extremely nasty.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 02:11 am (UTC)I also love the fact that this government sees me with two sides: "I am not fit enough to do military duty even should they do a draft (unlikely) yet am fit enough to not get disability or any form of medical insurance though them" What part of "I have a suppressed immune system" do they not understand? That is one reason why I am having problems trying to pay off my card because it is hard for me to land a job that doesn't put me around many people. I know I could possibly work at home but all those offers sound too much like scams to me to be worthwhile.
On a lighter note though I noticed your journal title here and was wondering? Since when do horses go "Grr?"
no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 02:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 02:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 03:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 02:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 02:37 pm (UTC)I'm making a fursuit of him now.
Sample chapters here.
'Course he's not as sexy as you are, wuffy. *hugs*
no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 08:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-27 08:40 pm (UTC)Unfortunately, as a result of the absolute browbeating of this older generation, the younger generations moving up are totally uninterested in politics or international affairs, so a total implosion may follow as those people who came of age in the 1950s surrender the reins of power.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-30 11:22 am (UTC)I am happy that the OZ bank regulators have stricter controls, but assistance will still be given to the smaller banks to keep competition healthy.
*It's the same the whole world over...it's the poor wot gets the blame while the rich gets all the gravy..now aint that a blinkin shame*
no subject
Date: 2008-09-30 11:32 am (UTC)