The Captain of the Street

SAVE AMERICA
OPEN THE DOORS
AMERICA IS A COUNTRY OF IMMIGRANTS
IMMIGRANTS WILL SAVE AMERICA
GIVE CITIZENSHIP FOR EVERYBODY WHO BUY A HOUSE BY CASH

Paulson, bernanke, and Greenspan should be shot!

Nader Statement on Bailout, Mcain/Obama Meeting With Bush

Bailout is Big Mistake. Crackdown on Corporate Crime. Protect Homeowners.

Ralph Nader and Matt Gonzalez vigorously oppose Bush's $700 billion taxpayer bailout of Wall Street.

"This is not just a bailout of Wall Street" says Nader, "It's a bailing out of the bankrupt Republican and Democratic policies that have led us to where we are today with Senators John "Deregulation" McCain and Joe "MBNA" Biden leading the way.

Full Statement from Ralph Nader:

Today at 4 p.m., Senators John McCain and Barack Obama will meet with other Congressional leaders and President Bush to join the stampede to bail out Wall Street with Main Street and Elm Street's money.

Unfortunately, their rhetorical flourishes to crackdown on Wall Street and protect Main Street will not be met with substance.

The bailout ignores the needs of millions of swindled families facing foreclosure, and it squanders an opportunity to bring about real regulatory change, shareholder power and taxpayer equity that would prevent economic crises like this from happening again. Wall Street's wildly overpaid bosses are addicted to speculative gambling with other people's money. When a drug addict is facing overdose, you don't give them more needles.

We need to protect homeowners and our neighborhoods first. That's why Nader/Gonzalez support introducing a law with a 5-year sunset clause that would provide homeowners facing foreclosure the right to rent to own their homes at fair market value.

Wall Street is out of control. We need to bring some sense of accountability, transparency, and law and order back to Wall Street's crooks and speculators, or they will desperately seek socialism to bail out their criminal corporate capitalism, going to the taxpayer trough in Washington DC each time. That's why Nader/Gonzalez support a Wall Street speculation tax, starting on derivatives, which would make Wall Street less like Las Vegas, and generate enough funds to eliminate the tax burden on the first $50,000 of income for every working American.


www.votenader.org

Please explain statement on page 29 of the 9-29-08 issue:

"Treasury also temporarily extended insurance to money-market funds."

Ken Whyite
561-624-4358
kwhite2680@aol.com

This creep looks like he is setting up the Bush crime family to make a final raid of the pockets of the American working people before they take a boat to Bermuda, Absolutely not a penny to the "free market" whiners.

Ballad of Komrad Hank (Gorgy Busz's Kommerz Sekretary)
(Tune of Beverly Hillbillies)

Come and listen to a story about a fine komrad named Hank
A szwanky Goldman banker, who ably kept his partners fed,
Then one day he was laughin at some AIG fools,
And up through the ground came a toxic derivative krude.

CDSs that is, fools gold, Wall Street tea.

Well the first thing you know ol Hank buys billionz of CDOz n szhares,
Taxpayers said "Hank move away from here"
Said Zheleznodorozhny is the place you ought to be"
So he loaded up the junk and shipped it overseas (to Moscow that is).

Szwimming pools, Oligarchs , and everything.

Well now its time to say good by to Hank and all his bailout kin.
And they would like to thank you kapitalist fools fer kindly droppin in.
You're all invited back again to this socialist locality
To have a heapin helpin of state hospitality
Set a spell, Take your white shoes off.

Do swidania, y'hear?.
http://williambanzai7.blogspot.com/

"Radical" In Which Way?

Although I understand the need for quick action, I do not understand how Mr. Paulson can take action without looking at the causes. Being a global financial services veteran including in the investment banking world, global compliance policy implementation after 9/11 and strategy in a large European Global player, I can only conclude the following:

- This package rewards bad behaviour and actually punishes Banks like the ones in Europe that have not taken such risks; there is no reason why the people that are responsible will stop doing the same thing. And it is going on as the "misinformation" attacks on the Fortis share in The Netherlands probably by hedge funds in the last few days demonstrate;

- It does not solve the problem that current "After The Fact" Regulatory Oversight is an illusion in a world of fast electronics, computer programs automatically bidding against each other and where margins are small;

- it does not solve the problem of most global players' dinosaur ICT-infrastructure that by no means is able to detect, let alone block problems before "your name is in the newspaper";

In other words, this package does not solve the fundamental problem of risk management in a largely global, high speed, electronic financial system.

Tony de Bree
www.tonydebree.com

SAVE AMERICA
OPEN DOORS
AMERICA IS A COUNTRY OF MIGRANTS
MIGRANTS WILL SAVE AMERICA
GIVE CITIZENSHIP FOR EVERYBODY WHO BUY A HOUSE BY CASH

It is amazing, that a college football star, can become Treasury Secretary of The United States. It say's a lot for the versatile abilities of the Treasury Secretary.

Comment: Paulson is not to be trusted - he has snake eyes - he has the swagger of a RICH MAN - there is something dark about him - the SECURITIES & EXCHANGE guy, (no I can't remember the names) looks like a wimp, all afraid - the whole bunch should be let out to dry - but they won't because this Nation is run by guys just like these and McCain is a part of the 1% in this Nation who enjoy financial bliss - you people who can't even pay for your homes, drive used cars, if you had a medical emergency you'd be in bankruptcy before you were released from the hospital astonish me, voting for McCain as if you truly had someting in common with him. Why don't you wake up and stop trying to relate to a class of individuals who wouldn't even (and don't) give you a ride if you were bleeding on the side of the road. Every person in your tribe ain't your brother or sister, wake up - GREEN is the preferred color.

WALL STREET's RECKONING!
(Yet, it Took 10 Years to Raise MinWage $1.00)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S27yitK32ds


"Rule one: Rush the decision. Time the game to fall in the week before Congress is set to adjourn and just 6 weeks before an historic election so your opponents will be preoccupied, pressured, distracted, and in a hurry.

Rule two: Disarm the public through fear. Warn that the entire global financial system will collapse and the world will fall into another Great Depression. Control the media enough to ensure that the public will not notice this. Bailout will indebt them for generations, taking from them trillions of dollars they earned and deserve to keep.

Rule three: Control the playing field and set the rules. Hide from the public and most of the Congress just who is arranging this deal. Communicate with the public through leaks to media insiders. Limit any open congressional hearings. Communicate with Congress via private teleconferencing calls. Heighten political anxiety by contacting each political party separately. Treat Members of Congress condescendingly, telling them that the matter is so complex that they must rely on those few insiders who really do know what's going on!"

Well said LindaMJ......Ditto......... forgot one thing.........where are the impreachment charges for this administration and criminal charges for the rapping of American taxpayers monies?

Persons should be impreached and held over for crimes against the US, to spend $700,000,000,000 and no one be held accountable, and we the taxpayers have to pay this debt back, while Bush and his administration and Paulson live in the lap of luxury!!!! Criminal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The cover of Newsweek (dated 09/29/08) was correct: King Henry indeed. Section 8 of the $700B bailout plan reads ???Sec. 8. Review. Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.???. In effect, ???write me a check for $700,000,000,000 with no accountability, no questions, and no recourse???. No one should have such power over $700 billion of American taxpayer???s money. Certainly not this Administration, given its??? track record over the past six years.

Now is the time for Congress to stand up and do the right thing. To ask for an equity stake in a bail-out situation is standard practice, common sense, and reasonable. Capping the pay of executives who ran a failing company used to be common sense, and Congress should not cave on this point. Negotiating terms which are favorable to the purchaser (in this case, the American taxpayer) when there are few other buyers in the market is standard practice, and good business; let's invest in our infrastructure, which has been abysmally ignored for too long. Let???s earmark a small percentage of future profits from the sale of the assets we are buying towards health care for all Americans. Let???s allow workouts on mortgages for taxpayers who can afford a lower monthly payment. Demand transparency in the investment and financial markets for those companies we buy. The American taxpayer and Congress cannot, should not, and must not fold to the 'just trust us' mentality now being floated by Paulson and President Bush. The nation, and Congress did just that once before almost five years ago and again too many times since when swayed by a demand for urgency and a fear of the boogey man behind the curtain, to great folly.

This situation is not the worst that could be happening right now. Pundits keep saying that if we do not act the whole economy will suffer. Here on Main Street we are actually more stable than the gurus would like to let on. As long as the fed keeps reserves on hand to keep inserting money into the market that will allow banks to lend to borrowers for that new car, house and business we will keep moving forward even if it is at the pace of a snail. However if we divert the reserve funds to bail out companies the gov't will not have enough liquid asset without borrowing from another country to keep the market alive. The program to sell off these illiquid assets would take to long to regain any financial compacity to restore our marketplace. The gov't should allow these companies to sell off their own illiquid assets for the standard 66% of the appraisal tax value, and if they can not function after this measure they need to sell off some of their physical assets until either they recover or a competitor takes their place.

Why is Wall Street billions in the hole?

How about because the people running the show have been busy putting billions into their own pockets ... like over $60 billions in the past 2 years.

Times Online 12/12, 2007

Goldman Sachs shares $18.8bn bonus pool.

Average payout for 30,000 staff is put at $600,000. ....

Goldman Sachs staff began celebrating a record year for bonuses today as its rival Lehman Brothers awarded Richard Fuld, the bank's chief executive, a $35 million Christmas present ....

Last year Goldman paid out $16.5 billion in total bonuses, worth on average $640,000. [Since secretaries, receptionists and other junior support staff will unlikely to get anything close to the average, that means senior staff and executives are into the millions] ....

Bloomberg 11/18 2007

Shareholders in the securities industry are having their worst year since 2002, losing $74 billion of their equity. That won???t prevent Wall Street from paying record bonuses, totaling almost $38 billion. That money, split among about 186,000 workers at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch & Co., Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Bear Stearns Cos., equates to an average of $201,500 per person, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The five biggest U.S. securities firms paid $36 billion to employees last year. ....

And this is after

USA Today 12/20 2006

All told, this year???s bonus pool for Wall Street executives hit $23.9 billion, the New York State Comptroller???s office estimates. That???s a 17% jump from last year???s bonus pool of $20.5 billion, and it works out to an average bonus of $137,580 for every person employed in the financial services industry.