Sunday, Bloody Sunday

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/01/pelosis-pac-pays-bills-for-spouses-firm.

America has borrowed its way to third world status. With Fannie and Freddie facing a massive margin call, the Treasury had no choice except a bailout. We can't afford to miss any payments if we want to keep borrowing. If the USA was in a position to stop borrowing from the world on such a gigantic scale, this bailout would restore some confidence to the financial markets. As it is, we just got another advance from our line of credit with the world which we will use to borrow even more at higher interest rates. It may be comforting to think the USA is too big to fail; but I believe we just witnessed a preview of exactly that.

At last, the government has come to the rescue in a very big way, $200 billion to bail out Fannie and Freddie. Didn???t some of us correctly make that prognosis? Indeed it is the tax-payers??? money, but how many of them have benefited in the mean time?

The stock market responded upward instantly, with Dow Jones reverses its sliding trend. Naturally so, the world markets are being dragged along, moving northwards for the first time after weeks of dismal performance. But the question is how long will this trend be sustainable when the world economy continues to be sluggish? Could it just be a momentarily flash again?

Just wait and see. (Tan Boon Tee)

Privatize the profits, nationalize the losses. transfer wealth from working Americans to the wealthy elite. The good old USA is fascism running at its best.

It is a big systematic problem. Each of government systems has its inherent problems that are very hard to deal with. The toughest and common among them is lazy persons. I have not seen a report about how many job openings there are nationwide monthly while the government reports unemployment rate. In fact, there are many job opportunities ever day, but American people do not want or are qualified for. They do not want hard jobs or "dirty" job or job that need skills or special knowledge. But they do want a office job, they do want to have good life, they do want a house if possible.

These are the people who call democrats big spenders. These are the people who decried welfare payments to the poor who might otherwise starve, but give welfare payments to the rich because they are too big to be allowed to starve. There is a word for this.

OMINOUS SIGN BEHIND PAULSON???S ACTIONS

http://pacificgatepost.blogspot.com/2008/09/secretary-paulson-reasures-foreign.html

And as usual the taxpayer is on the hook in the biggest bailout ever, and forever after that.

That the financial system is bursting at the seams because of the trade deficit is extremely disturbing. It means that we're perilously close to the edge of an economic tailspin that could greatly increase the unemployment rate and wipe out the retirement savings of millions of people. It's a market failure that must be addressed and not just papered over. One way to do that is to accelerate the shift away from using foreign oil. Business as usual just won't cut it much longer.

That the financial system is bursting at the seams because of the trade deficit is extremely disturbing. It means that we're perilously close to the edge of an economic tailspin that could greatly increase the unemployment rate and wipe out the retirement savings of millions of people. It's a market failure that must be addressed and not just papered over. One way to do that is to accelerate the shift away from using foreign oil. Business as usual just won't cut it much longer.

You are on target. The Chinese and Saudis insisted upon it. We had little choice in the matter.

Look, the real issue is this. I own a small business in the midwest & the onus is on me to be responsible & profitable. If I am not, I have no one to blame but myself. I understand that the failure of Fannie May & Freddie Mac would have world wide implications. With that said the GOVERMENT has failed in its duty to properly manage their federally backed business. You would think that with the amount of financial exposure/risk involved that the GOVERMENT would have watched a bit closer ???

Look, its very simple. As a small business owner the onus to be responsible & profitable is on me...NOT the goverment. As a matter of fact I would be MORE profitable if the goverment would allow me to keep & distribute the gains in a responsible manner, not sending it overseas or allowing the pork distributions our congress encourages.

The real question is for how long can we as a Nation continue to follow the demented Republican policy of reducing taxes while expanding Government spending to unprecedented levels on the bases of IOU's to foreigners.

The letal convination of uncontrolled Government spending, and Wall Street corrpution scandals, can very well end up undermining the confidence the International investors had in the U.S.
The real reazon that Fanny and Freddy Mac are now beeing bailed out by the U.S. Trasury is simply because foreign investors were sending a CLEAR SIGNAL that they had it up to here with American fiscal irresponsability and corruption. No new foreign money was forecoming to these lenders, or any other in the sector.

A financial meltdown, and a run on the U.S. Dollar was on it's way if there was no intervention by the Trasury. After the .com collapse in the late 90's when the NSDAQ was as high as 5,000 points the private investor class left the markets never to come back. The same could hapen now to the International investors if we don't change the way we do business.

blackcourt: The U.S. Treasury had to step in or else these foreigners that buy our debt to finance the stupidity of U.S. consumers and the U.S. government would go away and we would be in a world of hurt. The U.S. is like a junkie only with debt. We borrow, borrow, borrow at every level needing an ever greater fix to satisfy our consumption apetite. We can't get off the debt. Basically we're screwed as a nation. We've sold our souls for overconsumption.

Of course, it's beneficial to the overseas markets; everything that we do well enhances the overseas markets. I really don't know why some of you reporters think the American people are stupid or ignorant; we certainly don't need the press to tell us what we already know. How about facts that we don't know???