Monthly Archives: September 2008

Who not to blame for failed bailout

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wall-street-bailout protest
COLORADO SPRINGS- We held posters that read SEIZE THE FED, JAIL NOT BAIL-OUT, FORECLOSE ON WALLSTREET, NO REWARD FOR HIGH RISK, and of course NO BUSH BAILOUT. When we got rebuttals, it went like this: “Why do you bring Bush into this? Bush doesn’t have anything to do with the bailout.” We needed to complain to Barack, apparently.

Bush supporters come in either the biggest pickup trucks or the rustiest. There’s probably no socio-economic divide between the voters who wanted Bush for a drinking buddy.

A Vectra Bank representative came outside to ask us if we could move from under their sign, so as not to give the false impression we were protesting their bank, particularly at a time when depositors might easily be spooked into a run on the bank. We moved nearer the Wachovia Bank, perhaps a better juxtaposition anyway.

We were prepared for the inevitable, can you suggest something better? From Karl Denninger at Market Ticker, who credits Janet Tavakoli:

1–Force all off-balance sheet “assets” back onto the balance sheet, and force the valuation models and identification of individual assets out of Level 3 and into 10Qs and 10Ks. Do it now. : (In other words, no more Enron-type accounting mumbo-jumbo and no more allowing the banks assign their own “values” to dodgy assets)

2–Force all OTC derivatives onto a regulated exchange similar to that used by listed options in the equity markets. This permanently defuses the derivatives time bomb. Give market participants 90 days; any that are not listed in 90 days are declared void; let the participants sue each other if they can’t prove capital adequacy. (If trading derivatives contracts can damage the “regulated” system, than that trading must take place under strict government regulations)

3–Force leverage by all institutions to no more than 12:1. The SEC intentionally dropped broker/dealer leverage limits in 2004; prior to that date 12:1 was the limit. Every firm that has failed had double or more the leverage of that former 12:1 limit. Enact this with a six month time limit and require 1/6th of the excess taken down monthly. (Ed: The collapse in the “structured finance” model is mainly due to too much leverage. For example, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had $80 of debt for every $1 dollar of capital reserves when they were taken into government conservatorship.)

Obama favored by lawn sign thieves

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obama-lawn-signCOLORADO SPRINGS- Obama lawn signs have been reported disappearing over the weekend from the city’s old north end neighborhood, along Nevada Avenue north from downtown. Very angry Obama supporters showed up first thing Monday morning at party headquarters to get replacements.

The Little President Who Cried WOLF!

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Let’s be honest: we all knew when Bush stole the election in 2000 that he would bankrupt America, and stick the taxpayers with the bill on his way out. This is about as unsurprising as discovering that the sun has set in the evening.

Will Wall Street’s meltdown turn America into a police state?

Who knew the GOP was gay? ChristoFascists blaming gays for financial meltdown. Myself, I’m more likely to believe it’s God’s judgement on all the phonies pretending to be Christians. Or karma. The filthy rich have been screwing us for generations, now it’s our turn. Pitchforks and torches are about the best investment you can find these days.


The Shadow of the Pitchfork [EXCERPT]

Elite Panic Attack as Bailout Goes Bust by Chris Floyd

The vote by the House of Representatives to defeat the Wall Street bailout plan is the first act of political courage that the Congress of the United States has mounted in the last seven years. The fact that it was due largely to right-wing Republicans afraid of going down with the sinking ship of the witless leader they have followed blindly throughout his reign is a delicious irony — but the whys and wherefores of the vote are not important. What matters is that one of America’s moribund institutions has flickered to life long enough to derail a disastrous action that would have shoved the nation even deeper into the pit of corruption and ruin where it has been mired for so long.

Nothing — absolutely nothing — could be politically safer than opposing George W. Bush. And yet the entire Democratic leadership, Barack Obama included, lined up to support a cockamamie plan proposed by this scorned and shriveled figure, a plan that was transparently nothing more than an audacious raid on the Treasury by Big Money hoods and yet another authoritarian power grab by a gang of murderous, torturing, warmongering toadies. This was the plan and these were the people that the Democrats decided to fight for.

What’s more, the Democrats stood shoulder to shoulder with the president on what is apparently the only issue that can now stir Americans to genuine anger and widespread protest: a direct threat to their bank accounts. Wars of aggression like the Nazis used to wage; elaborate tortures like the KGB used to practice; concentration camps, lawbreaking leaders, diminishment of liberty, the slaughter of a million innocent people in a land destroyed by an illegal and pointless invasion — all of that stuff is pretty much OK, easily swallowable, worth no more than a shrug or perhaps a frowny “tsk tsk” before going on to the sports pages or flipping over to another channel. But put out an open ploy to steal their money and give it to the filthy rich — and baby, it’s pitchfork time! Yet here, as the public face of just such a ploy, is where the Democrats chose to make their stand.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Sept 30 notes, thomasmc.com.

US Capitalism as seen from the South

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APUNTES DEL TIO SAM – PANCASAN Listen to the music and watch the pictures… you don’t have to understand Spanish to understand this history. Arlen Siu was the young woman seen briefly in the film and sung at times with the group whose music was played with the clip. Arlen Siu, Martyr Fighter who died trying to free her country from the US.

Two better Vice-Presidential choices- Rosa Clemente and Matt Gonzalez

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You don’t have to choose between a crazy fundamentalist Right Wing woman, Sarah Palin, or a slimy used car selling crook and Zionist, Joseph Biden. Check out two much better and quite different VP possibilities, Rosa Clemente and Matt Gonzalez…

Compare Rosa Clemente Green Party VP candidate speaks at Convention to Sarah Palin. What woman from ‘the common people’ do you prefer here? And compare Matt Gonzalez Ralph Nader’s running mate 2008 He was born in McAllen, Texas. Yoo-Hoo! Compare him to that dry drunk ‘Texan’ we now have in the White House screwing up the world! Yes, and compare Matt to slime ball Joe? Who do you really want in office?

‘Commie’ Gorbachev still trying to build social democracy by way of Reaganism!

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gorbachev-lebedevOne of the most pathetic figures of our times is certainly that of Mikhail Gorbachev, the Russian ‘commie’ boss who fell in love with Margaret Thatcher and Ronnie Reagan and had his love dashed on the rocks of reality. What a world class dummy (ventriloquist dummy even)! So what’s he doing almost 2 decades later?

He’s still doing the same! Gorbachev to form new Russian party Note that it is not really Gorbachev who is forming this new political party though. It is one of the Russian billionaires Gorbachev helped create from shared Soviet national wealth, Alexander Lebedev. Lebedev is kind of a combo figure; part Bill Gates, part exKGB, part pseudo communist of the past, part crooked Russian businessman (tycoon is what they pleasantly presently call these mafiosos).

Gorbachev doesn’t get it at all, and for somebody supposedly who studied marxism-leninism he sure is a lame brain. He simply doesn’t understand that capitalist social democracy is something built on imperialism and the shared exploitation of wealth ripped off through exploitation of the poorer capitalist Third World countries, and not through pretty flowery words about democracy, etc. There never would have been a spread of Scandinavian social democracy without the Scandinavian countries being blocked with imperial powers like the US, Britain, France, and Germany in a common capitalist economy based on exploitation of the poorer ones.

Gorbachev’s new political formation is likely to get her about zilch Russian support, but it will allow him and Lebedev to parade themselves as great Russian ‘democrats’ at functions where folk like Bill Gates, Al Gore, and Jimmy Carter might show up at. These guys are kind of like Hollywood even… All shine and no substance.

PS- And if you read closely, Mikhail is now a business man himself having invested with Lebedev in major Russian newspaper. Watch out, Rupert Murdoch! You have liberal competition!

Not Sons of Bitches, Dems are bitches

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When the Democrats were the minority they seemed so weak. Now in the Majority they’re positively wimps. Pundits tell us it’s a lack of leadership. Why would the corporate media overlook who’s at the whip? It would seem clear that the corporations writing the legislation, funding the campaigns, and paying for the free lunch, are driving the agenda. The GOP is paid to play the white hats, and when a bill is unpopular, the Dems are pushed forward to play the creeps.

On the proposed bailout ripoff, the Dems were not the sons of bitches, they’re just the bitches. I heard a Dem scare-mongeree explain that in spite of loathing the idea of a solution which benefited the wrong people, the bailout was our only option. “All economists agree we have to do this” he said, ignoring quite a few who have urged the opposite. The interviewer interrupted to announce, this just in, the vote had failed and as a result the DOW had plunged by 700 points. She wanted his response: “Oh. My. God.”

As Bush and his GOP team stand in the shadows, the Democrats are thrust forward to “lead” the support for this criminal legislation. Whether the bill won or lost, either way the Democrats would come out looking like shits.

I’m reminded about how an invading army flushes out defenders still hiding. Send your captives into the buildings to spring the booby-traps. Make them open the doors to draw the fire. Among thugs in prison the dirty work is done by the bitches.

Except for Democracy Now, the media won’t report the authentic Democratic efforts to lead. Here’s Dennis Kucinich on the floor of Congress speaking against the bailout and asking: why, why why:

“The $700 billion bailout for Wall Street, is driven by fear not fact. This is too much money in too a short a time going to too few people while too many questions remain unanswered.

Why aren’t we having hearings on the plan we have just received? Why aren’t we questioning the underlying premise of the need for a bailout with taxpayers’ money?

Why have we not considered any alternatives other than to give $700 billion to Wall Street? Why aren’t we asking Wall Street to clean up its own mess?

Why aren’t we passing new laws to stop the speculation, which triggered this? Why aren’t we putting up new regulatory structures to protect investors? How do we even value the $700 billion in toxic assets?

“Why aren’t we helping homeowners directly with their debt burden? Why aren’t we helping American families faced with bankruptcy. Why aren’t we reducing debt for Main Street instead of Wall Street?

Isn’t it time for fundamental change in our debt based monetary system, so we can free ourselves from the manipulation of the Federal Reserve and the banks?

Is this the United States Congress or the board of directors of Goldman Sachs? Wall Street is a place of bears and bulls. It is not smart to force taxpayers to dance with bears or to follow closely behind the bulls.”

Michael Moore is more charitable about the Democrats’ actions yesterday. Here’s his update:

Friends,

Everyone said the bill would pass. The masters of the universe were already making celebratory dinner reservations at Manhattan’s finest restaurants. Personal shoppers in Dallas and Atlanta were dispatched to do the early Christmas gifting. Mad Men of Chicago and Miami were popping corks and toasting each other long before the morning latte run.

But what they didn’t know was that hundreds of thousands of Americans woke up yesterday morning and decided it was time for revolt. The politicians never saw it coming. Millions of phone calls and emails hit Congress so hard it was as if Marshall Dillon, Elliot Ness and Dog the Bounty Hunter had descended on D.C. to stop the looting and arrest the thieves.

The Corporate Crime of the Century was halted by a vote of 228 to 205. It was rare and historic; no one could remember a time when a bill supported by the president and the leadership of both parties went down in defeat. That just never happens.

A lot of people are wondering why the right wing of the Republican Party joined with the left wing of the Democratic Party in voting down the thievery. Forty percent of Democrats and two-thirds of Republicans voted against the bill.

Here’s what happened:

The presidential race may still be close in the polls, but the Congressional races are pointing toward a landslide for the Democrats. Few dispute the prediction that the Republicans are in for a whoopin’ on November 4th. Up to 30 Republican House seats could be lost in what would be a stunning repudiation of their agenda.

The Republican reps are so scared of losing their seats, when this “financial crisis” reared its head two weeks ago, they realized they had just been handed their one and only chance to separate themselves from Bush before the election, while doing something that would make them look like they were on the side of “the people.”

Watching C-Span yesterday morning was one of the best comedy shows I’d seen in ages. There they were, one Republican after another who had backed the war and sunk the country into record debt, who had voted to kill every regulation that would have kept Wall Street in check — there they were, now crying foul and standing up for the little guy! One after another, they stood at the microphone on the House floor and threw Bush under the bus, under the train (even though they had voted to kill off our nation’s trains, too), heck, they would’ve thrown him under the rising waters of the Lower Ninth Ward if they could’ve conjured up another hurricane. You know how your dog acts when sprayed by a skunk? He howls and runs around trying to shake it off, rubbing and rolling himself on every piece of your carpet, trying to get rid of the stench. That’s what it looked like on the Republican side of the aisle yesterday, and it was a sight to behold.

The 95 brave Dems who broke with Barney Frank and Chris Dodd were the real heroes, just like those few who stood up and voted against the war in October of 2002. Watch the remarks from yesterday of Reps. Marcy Kaptur, Sheila Jackson Lee, and Dennis Kucinich. They spoke the truth.

The Dems who voted for the giveaway did so mostly because they were scared by the threats of Wall Street, that if the rich didn’t get their handout, the market would go nuts and then it’s bye-bye stock-based pension and retirement funds.

And guess what? That’s exactly what Wall Street did! The largest, single-day drop in the Dow in the history of the New York Stock exchange. The news anchors last night screamed it out: Americans just lost 1.2 trillion dollars in the stock market!! It’s a financial Pearl Harbor! The sky is falling! Bird flu! Killer Bees!

Of course, sane people know that nobody “lost” anything yesterday, that stocks go up and down and this too shall pass because the rich will now buy low, hold, then sell off, then buy low again.

But for now, Wall Street and its propaganda arm (the networks and media it owns) will continue to try and scare the bejesus out of you. It will be harder to get a loan. Some people will lose their jobs. A weak nation of wimps won’t last long under this torture. Or will we? Is this our line in the sand?

Here’s my guess: The Democratic leadership in the House secretly hoped all along that this lousy bill would go down. With Bush’s proposals shredded, the Dems knew they could then write their own bill that favors the average American, not the upper 10% who were hoping for another kegger of gold.

So the ball is in the Democrats’ hands. The gun from Wall Street remains at their head. Before they make their next move, let me tell you what the media kept silent about while this bill was being debated:

1. The bailout bill had NO enforcement provisions for the so-called oversight group that was going to monitor Wall Street’s spending of the $700 billion;

2. It had NO penalties, fines or imprisonment for any executive who might steal any of the people’s money;

3. It did NOTHING to force banks and lenders to rewrite people’s mortgages to avoid foreclosures — this bill would not have stopped ONE foreclosure!;

4. It had NO teeth anywhere in the entire piece of legislation, using words like “suggested” when referring to the government being paid back for the bailout;

5. Over 200 economists wrote to Congress and said this bill might actually WORSEN the “financial crisis” and cause even MORE of a meltdown.

Put a fork in this slab of pork. It’s over. Now it is time for our side to state very clearly the laws WE want passed. I will send you my proposals later today. We’ve bought ourselves less than 72 hours.

Yours,
Michael Moore

The specter of world wide depression raises its head

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specterWe are so self centered in the US! As our government’s military deficit spending collapses the American capitalist economy we seem to forget that the crisis is a global one now. The Democratic/ Republican team have dragged down the global economy and not just our national one.

Stock markets all across the globe have been crashing due to what is termed in the Big Business press as being a ‘credit crunch’. Look everywhere, whether it be China, Russia, Japan, Iceland, Germany, France, or wherever, and the Almighty Dollar is dragging them all down. Something much more than a ‘credit crunch’ is involved in this international meltdown of the global economy.

Actually, what we are seeing and experiencing is the normal global capitalist economic cycle in motion. The downsides are just not very much fun for most of us, and, in fact, neither are the ‘upturns’ either. There is no such thing as ‘regulated capitalism’ since the regulators always ultimately turn out to be the capitalists regulating themselves, and that is no real regulation at all. There has got to be a better way!

Hate attack on US Muslims during religious service at mosque; result of newspaper spread hate dvd, ‘Obsession’?

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The US newspapers have hidden away a story that underlines how disgusting and irresponsible
was their spread of the anti- Muslim dvd, ‘Obsession’. I am referring to an attack on a Muslim mosque in Dayton Ohio by some thugs who sprayed chemical gas into a room full of children. Chemical irritant empties Islamic Society of Greater Dayton’s mosque

What a group of pathetic cowards these men are, and what a cowardly police force it is to not call this a hate crime. What a cowardly media we have in the US to have had them spread these dvds throughout the country that practically invited hate crimes like the one in Dayton to be done. Muslim Children Gassed at Dayton Mosque After Obsession DVD Hits Ohio

JUST SAY NO to the WS Bailout Bandits

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Plaza of the Rockies brokersMEET -AFTER WORK- TUESDAY at the corner of SMITH BARNEY and MORGAN STANLEY, where DAIN RAUSCHER meets BOOZ ALLEN HAMILTON at the Plaza of the Rockies Building. That’s where Colorado Springs needs to voice its objections to a bailout for the Wall Street extortionists. Don’t hand over America’s wealth to the money traders! Scribble your sentiments on the back of whatever poster-board is lying around your office and meet at TEJON & COLORADO from 4:30-5:30PM. Bring determination to tell them NO! (You can RSVP with TrueMajority.)

Some poster suggestions from ML:

Eat the Rich
Eat the Oligarchs
Eat the Plutocracy
No Corporate Welfare
Socialism for the Rich
Bailout is a Sellout
Fight them on Wall Street so we don’t have to fight them on Main Street
Scrape the GOP off the Treasury
No welfare surge for the rich
Are you better off than you were 4 years ago?
Let the Banks Burn
Jail (arrest) Paulson
FEDup USA
Give bankers bail-not Bailout
Rescue Main Street not Wall Street
Back-STABilization
Private Debt=Private Liability
$1 Trillion Bailout = 20% Inflation
No cash for crooks!
Don’t blame me- I voted for Kucinich
Leverage This
Bailout: The Audacity of DOPES
No Cash for Trash
You Broke it- You Bought It

Democrats Sell Out America To the Lowest Bidder

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I used to think that people who voted Republican were the stupidest people on earth, now I’m beginning to suspect it’s actually the elected Democrats. Here they are railroading through a bailout that 2 out of 3 Americans oppose, and acting like they are some sort of heroes for bankrupting the American taxpayers against their will. I will never vote for a Democrat again.

Are we under Martial Law?

Real life VAMPIRES exposed!

Economists: bailout will NOT fix the economy, it’s just a gift to the filthy rich.

McCain is an even bigger fraud than Bush. After making such a big deal about returning to DC to “save America,” he doesn’t even show up on Capitol Hill, says he can “just phone it in.”

I don’t want John McCain gambling away America’s future, do you?

Is McCain dying of cancer?

McCain’s “surge” succeeds, again.

Palin supports cross-border raids into Pakistan, the very thing McCain attacked Obama for supporting, during the debate.

I’m not even curious, obviously Fort Hill, SC Mayor Funderburk has sold his soul to the Devil.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Sept 29 notes, thomasmc.com.

I need help buying the Wachovia building downtown…

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I’ve got like 50¢ American, a couple of 20 peso notes and a Canadian quarter, I need about a dollar more… If I wait until next week when CitiGroup goes under I can probably get it for standing outside singing until they flip the deed my way and of course the keys.

My plans for it are either to offer a free shelter, aka Flophouse, got the idea from the notion that their executives have already flopped there…

OR,

Turn it into a Capitalist Re-Education Center. I wouldn’t call it that, of course, I would simply put an advertisement in the Gag-zette, offering a Commissions Only job for Experienced Stockbrokers.

Then have the Keyboards on the computers hotwired, also the mouse, the coffee cups, the Executive Plush High Back Office Chairs with armrests and cupholders, so that every time they try to complete a trade on Short or on Margin or any other form of “hey, I ain’t got the bread to cover this byotch if it don’t pay off right, but I’m betting all my money and yours too on it paying off” bullshit…

They get a painful electric shock in randomized places, and subliminals on the screen telling them not to do it again.

Of course, so many of them are Masochists that they’ll get a freaky little thrill out of it, and ALL of them are so damned greedy they would last a couple weeks before figuring out that something isn’t quite normal…

Seven hundred times N,OOO,OOO,OOO!

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Is the strategy to pay this ransom, then have the robbers intercepted as they make their escape? What other excuse will Democrats Pelosi and Reid offer for coming home with a bag full of 140,000,000,000 wooden nickels? That money’s gone if we don’t STOP THEM! STOP THEM NOW!

We hear pundits say the bailout sum is beyond comprehension. Nonsense. It’s our prosperity, our health, the pursuit of happiness we offer our children and take for granted. Gone. Unless there is still time to shout down the miscreants in Washington. As we see the politicians of every stripe complicit in this heist, and insufficient outcry in the streets, isn’t it hard not to conclude Americans are getting what they deserve? If you have any gut feeling that you DO NOT WANT TO STAND IDLY BY, listen to Michael Moore: (although the DC email/phone connection appears to have been pulled.)

Friends,

Let me cut to the chase. The biggest robbery in the history of this country is taking place as you read this. Though no guns are being used, 300 million hostages are being taken. Make no mistake about it: After stealing a half trillion dollars to line the pockets of their war-profiteering backers for the past five years, after lining the pockets of their fellow oilmen to the tune of over a hundred billion dollars in just the last two years, Bush and his cronies — who must soon vacate the White House — are looting the U.S. Treasury of every dollar they can grab. They are swiping as much of the silverware as they can on their way out the door.

No matter what they say, no matter how many scare words they use, they are up to their old tricks of creating fear and confusion in order to make and keep themselves and the upper one percent filthy rich. Just read the first four paragraphs of the lead story in last Monday’s New York Times and you can see what the real deal is:

“Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for ways to profit from it.

“Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages.

“At the same time, investment firms were jockeying to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions of dollars a year in fees.

“Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury’s proposal to buy up bad assets of financial institutions.”

Unbelievable. Wall Street and its backers created this mess and now they are going to clean up like bandits. Even Rudy Giuliani is lobbying for his firm to be hired (and paid) to “consult” in the bailout.

The problem is, nobody truly knows what this “collapse” is all about. Even Treasury Secretary Paulson admitted he doesn’t know the exact amount that is needed (he just picked the $700 billion number out of his head!). The head of the congressional budget office said he can’t figure it out nor can he explain it to anyone.

And yet, they are screeching about how the end is near! Panic! Recession! The Great Depression! Y2K! Bird flu! Killer bees! We must pass the bailout bill today!! The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

Falling for whom? NOTHING in this “bailout” package will lower the price of the gas you have to put in your car to get to work. NOTHING in this bill will protect you from losing your home. NOTHING in this bill will give you health insurance.

Health insurance? Mike, why are you bringing this up? What’s this got to do with the Wall Street collapse?

It has everything to do with it. This so-called “collapse” was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with people’s home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it’s because too many working class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn’t afford. Here’s the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because of medical bills. Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health coverage, this mortgage “crisis” may never have happened.

This bailout’s mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It’s to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It’s to make sure their yachts and mansions and “way of life” go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars!

I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something — NOW! Here’s what you can do immediately:

1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama. Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop up Bush and Cheney and the mess they’ve made. Tell him we know he has the smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what’s the best route to take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives, not the barons of Wall Street.

2. Take to the streets. Participate in one of the hundreds of quickly-called demonstrations that are taking place all over the country (especially those near Wall Street and DC).

3. Call your Representative in Congress and your Senators. (click here to find their phone numbers). Tell them what you told Senator Obama.

When you screw up in life, there is hell to pay. Each and every one of you reading this knows that basic lesson and has paid the consequences of your actions at some point. In this great democracy, we cannot let there be one set of rules for the vast majority of hard-working citizens, and another set of rules for the elite, who, when they screw up, are handed one more gift on a silver platter. No more! Not again!

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

P.S. Having read further the details of this bailout bill, you need to know you are being lied to. They talk about how they will prevent golden parachutes. It says NOTHING about what these executives and fat cats will make in SALARY. According to Rep. Brad Sherman of California, these top managers will continue to receive million-dollar-a-month paychecks under this new bill. There is no direct ownership given to the American people for the money being handed over. Foreign banks and investors will be allowed to receive billion-dollar handouts. A large chunk of this $700 billion is going to be given directly to Chinese and Middle Eastern banks. There is NO guarantee of ever seeing that money again.

P.P.S. From talking to people I know in DC, they say the reason so many Dems are behind this is because Wall Street this weekend put a gun to their heads and said either turn over the $700 billion or the first thing we’ll start blowing up are the pension funds and 401(k)s of your middle class constituents. The Dems are scared they may make good on their threat. But this is not the time to back down or act like the typical Democrat we have witnessed for the last eight years. The Dems handed a stolen election over to Bush. The Dems gave Bush the votes he needed to invade a sovereign country. Once they took over Congress in 2007, they refused to pull the plug on the war. And now they have been cowered into being accomplices in the crime of the century. You have to call them now and say “NO!” If we let them do this, just imagine how hard it will be to get anything good done when President Obama is in the White House. THESE DEMOCRATS ARE ONLY AS STRONG AS THE BACKBONE WE GIVE THEM. CALL CONGRESS NOW.

The End of the World As We Know It, and McCain Feels Fine!

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McCain’s Maverick Momement. Despite all the tooth gnashing on both the left and the right about McCain scuttling the bipartisan Wall Street bailout agreement, I believe he has in fact shown us the smartest move in the current campaign season. While 2 out of 3 Americans are adamantly opposed to a bailout, Congress — owned lock, stock and barrel by Wall Street — was ready to give the blackmailers anything they demanded. The “news” media was of course cheerleading them on, with Wall St. being their biggest customer and all. But McCain saw in those polls the others had ignored an opportunity. In a single defiant move, he gave himself “populist” cred with a majority of the population. Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather kill myself than vote for McCain, but he, or at least his campaign, has shown himself smarter by half than Obama’s tepid response. Don’t be surprised if McCain’s poll numbers spike in the next few days.
the bill

People. People who hate people. Are the ugliest people, in the world. And the most racist country on the planet is Israel, where even the Jews discriminate against other Jews.

Big surprise, McCain came off as a complete asshole at the debate.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Sept 27 notes, thomasmc.com.

Sympathy for Sarah Palin’s self mockery

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Even with the official CBS transcript cleaned up, the Couric-Palin interview remains a riveting embarrassment. Fortunately online videos have archived poor Sarah Palin in all her Bush-league ignobility, if you can bear it. Don’t the Republicans appear to be unfathomable mockeries of themselves? Yet they elicit sympathy as they are seen being mocked.

If a person says something so irresistibly stupid that a bystander cannot fail to laugh, even if it’s embarrassed laughter, and if a third party characterizes the laughter as mockery, who comes out the winner?

(I once watched someone walk out of the bathroom with a tail of toilet paper sticking from his pants. Wherever he turned people were stifling their laughter, especially as he looked into our faces for what we found so funny. Finally he discovered the toilet paper, and I still ache at the memory of anticipating his next eye contact. I have no question who emerged the loser.)

But let’s resume our previously scheduled laugh track:

1. The Interview

COURIC: You’ve cited Alaska’s proximity to Russia as part of your foreign policy experience. What did you mean by that?

PALIN: That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and on our other side, the land — boundary that we have with — Canada. […]

COURIC: Explain to me why that enhances your foreign policy credentials.

PALIN: Well, it certainly does because our — our next door neighbors are foreign countries. They’re in the state that I am the executive of. And there in Russia —

The entire world has got to be referencing Miss South Carolina’s famous “US Americans, SUCH AS” essay answer. But these days who can doubt Ms. Upton was plenty qualified to be Miss Teen USA. It seems so long ago now, what was it? Early 2008? Now she could stand in for GOP running mate.

I’ll address the […] in a moment.

So now even some media talking heads are piling on, as if they cannot bear NOT TO call Sarah Palin on her obvious lack of qualification beyond the wading pool. I think the moral outrage is refreshing, and I love watching Wolf Blitzer for example, cling to the party line in the face of a colleague’s truth talking.

But I have to wonder, where were the dissenters when George Dubya was performing his interview follies? Did these now-malcontents think George Dubya was doing just fine? Were his answers making them proud? Was Dumbya’s imbecility just opaque enough that these same pundits could reassure us in good conscience that they thought Bush was the right man for the job?

2. The Debate
For yet other TV news personalities, next week’s Vice-Presidential debate cannot come soon enough. I’m sure their eagerness matches overwhelming public anticipation for Palin’s moose-in-the-headlights face plant. Oh My God is that going to be some Reality Television! It’ll be the Special Olympics, in the Roman Coliseum, costarring the Honorable Senator from Delaware as the lion.

I do not envy Joe Biden as he tries his best to be a kindly Ray Bolger Lion enlisting Dorothy’s help to find his heart. (Do you doubt that’s a task tailored for him?) While everyone knows he’s expected to eat her.

No, I think Senator Biden is going to prove his worth as a politician if he can pull this off. It’s hard enough for a man to play a woman in tennis without being seen as ruthless cad, or worse, a ruthless patronizing cad. You have to lob your serves, declare long balls to be in, spoil your swings, take foolish risks, fall behind in the score, and still rally for the win. Or not. To win.

I’m intending here only to contrast stronger athlete versus weaker, against a duel of experienced versus fish-out-of-league. But certainly sexism is going to be an elephantine domestic hazard for a rich white male, if not likely an imposing statesman chauvinist.

But mostly I do not envy Sarah Palin. She may be stupid. She may be stupid as a pit bull, as her hockey boast turns out to be more than literal. In a dog, Palin’s quality describes tenacity, in a human it distills into temerity. To judge from her interview performances so far, Sarah Palin doesn’t know much. I think it’s also clear, to paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, Sarah Palin knows what she doesn’t know.

Would you have the courage to ascend a stage knowing what Sarah Palin knows? I’d sooner go up against Mohammad Ali.

* […]
Here’s the unexpurgated snippet:

PALIN: That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and, on our other side, the land-boundary that we have with Canada. It’s funny that a comment like that was kinda made to caric– I don’t know, you know reporters…

COURIC: Mocked?

PALIN: Yeah, mocked, I guess that’s the word, yeah.

3. “Mocked”
It was the worst acting I’ve nearly ever witnessed. Sarah Palin didn’t want to be seen accusing reporters of mockery, because a proper victim doesn’t point the finger. Nor could she be seen choosing the precise word which she wanted Couric to interject. So Palin started the word “caricature” but interrupted herself and then waited for her interviewer to finish the sentence.

Now if Couric was genuinely trying to fill in Palin’s phrase, she would have had to suggest “mock” in the present tense. Not “Mocked.”

And if Palin had really intended to use the word “caricature,” she would have had to preface it with something like “paint a caricature” to make sense. Although, should I presume to straighten Palin’s English mis-usage? Maybe she was about to invent the word “caricaturize,” the way I’m self-satisfied with misusage.

I am confident enough, however, to conclude that Couric was holding the “mocked” term at the ready. And Couric was probably plenty embarrassed at the awkwardness Palin displayed in delivering her cue. And to further taint Couric with complicity, it was imperative that “Mocked?” be conjugated in the past tense because it is declarative of a deed done, not timidly alleged.

Mockery has been an Election 2008 keyword ever since the RNC, where Rudy Giuliani led the Republicans in unspoken ridicule of the Democrats. “Community Organizer.” Arms punctuating the term as if it was a question. Pause for laughter. That was mockery, and yet ever since their convention, the inherently accusatory “mock” has been attributed as a perpetration of the Democrats. When Barack Obama criticizes McCain, it’s mockery.

Of course, if Obama so much as debunks an accusation of McCain’s, it’s mockery. But isn’t that due to the simplistic dishonesty of the Republican lie? Someone accuses you of being a Martian, any refutation is going to be a mockery of their intelligence. It’s a brilliant trap.

Probably there are a wonderful variety of words to describe it, but the media is keeping it simple for the American public. One slander fits all: MOCK. Specifically, Dems Mock GOP. I’ve yet to see it the other way around.

4. “Pushback”
Here’s another term that the media has been happy enough to adopt en masse. What does it mean? You tell a lie, you are called on that lie, you PUSH BACK. Tada!

Refutation doesn’t cut it, because you don’t actually make a case to justify your initial lie.

Repudiate fits. So does reject. So does deny. But those words explain a little too much about what you’re doing. If the media reported that the Republicans were standing behind their lie, and rejected what’s on record as contradicting the lie. They wouldn’t get far in the court of public opinion.

And the news reporter’s current function of avoiding having to challenge untruths would become untenable.

PUSHBACK gives the illogical untruth longer legs. It turns the debate into a shoving match, where arguments are treated as having equal weight. Push and push back. Playground verbal exchanges of nonesense. I know you are but what am I?

The return of the Bush magic flashing tie

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crazy magic necktieMcCain showed up to the OLD MISS debate wearing Dubya’s crazy strobe necktie! Diagonal stripes of particular inconvenient width create signal noise on the interlaced television picture producing mesmerizing patterns of juxtaposed RGB. What might have passed for a Technicolor wardrobe malfunction in earlier days is a deliberate fashion faux-pas today.
In the false, phony, Franglais, trompe d’oeil sense of that f-word.

I doubt it’s beyond anyone’s French to call the mischievous upstaging device a trompe tête.

President Bush has worn that tie when Karl Rove might have judged it more prudent to hypnotize the TV audience sooner than let them focus on what Bush wasn’t saying.

But I’m trying to reconcile what I noticed AFTER the debate. I’m curious about why subsequent replay footage of last night’s debate depicts the errant accessory without the noisy interference. If digital equipment can filter the dissonance, why was it not cleaning up the necktie during the live signal?

Was the flashing tie meant to interrupt the audience’s flow of thought during the debate, but not the viewers’ reception of the pundits’ already vetted after-spin? Would there be a reason to mess with one signal, but make sure another was completely clear?

And if the noisy element is manipulable, might it have been actually carefully crafted? Noise, but shaped noise, with not the chaotic effect of an IED, but a directed disruption like that achieved with a shaped charge.

And not a subliminal message in Morse Code I should think, but visual counterpoint to the audio. In the form of an optic buzzer, pressed if what’s being communicated by the speakers threatens to have an effect that contradicts the programmed message?

He should have quit while he was ahead

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john-mccain-wins-debateBefore the debate, before John McCain even announced he’d show up after all, his campaign staff released this announcement on the internet. I’m sure it’s like a newspaper writing obits ahead of time. Maybe McCain’s people wish they’d prepared a version for coming in second.

Today’s best question: Should McCain have quit while he was ahead?

Bolivian president talks about US subversion in his country

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CheThe Bush Administration and US government are promoting a terrorist campaign against supporters of the Bolivian president, Evo Morales. In fact, the US government is promoting and fomenting Civil War there, as it backs Rightist elements that have engaged in racist witch hunts against the indigenous community, whom in their great majority are backers of the ‘Change’ that their current president is trying to bring about. You tube has an interview with Morales just recorded this week. Check it out.

This American Life -live it in fear

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This American LifeDid New York City based NPR need to hype fears of an economic collapse to Main Street USA, who’s so far not spooked by the bogeyman in Wall Street’s closet? NYC called in help from partners in the Chicago, the radio program THIS AMERICAN LIFE. Together they fashioned a monster to scare the heartland.

TAL Reporter Alex Blumberg collaborated with NPR in creating a story defining “commercial paper,” the money market, and the cryptically un-ominous “Breaking the Buck” to an audience who might not otherwise be standing on their chairs. They interviewed a treasurer in Arizona who had been trembling in the privacy of his office at the prospect of a Wall Street meltdown. He was monitoring the signs as they crossed his computer screen in the form of zillions of numbers. We were made to imagine a Matrix-like cascade into which, if you peered closely, perhaps with eyes unfocused, you could hear Godzilla’s heartbeat outside your door.

They even referred to the looming danger as a monster. Was this a reflection of American life, or a projection?

Democrats give Pentagon $612.5 billion for 2009

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war-terrorism-bigger-budgetWhile trying to get the Republican Party to pass Bush’s public give away to Wall Street, the Democratic Party has also been busy on another front to help bankrupt the US public.
 
This Wednesday the House passed a bill that gives the Pentagon $612.5 billion to keep its worldwide murder machine running on deficit spending. See House passes $612B defense bill, includes troop pay raise Between the House and Senate, less than 50 Senators and Congressmen opposed this military-industrial Welfare Program Bill, truly once again illustrating that the Democratic and Republican Parties are united against the American people. It simply makes little to no difference to try to distinguish minor differences in the personalities involved in the crooks representing these two parties. The def acto leaders of both parties are George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

Hang the Wall Street Extortionists!

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Extortion is a crime. The only thing we should bring to Wall St. is a gallows. I rarely agree with Joel Stein, but I guess even a broken watch can be right twice a day. The bailout won’t fix anything, it will only transfer the debt from the guilty to the innocent. And that debt is still going to bring down the economy either way. It’s like moving a big pile of radioactive waste from a nuclear power plant, to the grocery store down the street. The power plant’s problem is solved, because now the problem is yours. The only thing a bailout will accomplish is to encourage the guilty to try and get away with it again.

Why is it the Republicans think everthing that happens is an opportunity to help the filthy rich get out of paying their fair share of taxes?

Class War. Bush wants a trillion dollars to hand over to the filthy-rich, but threatens to veto bill that would give a pittance to the poor.

China cuts off US credit line. Today the Great Depression begins.

Bailout deal reached, until McCain arrives and scuttles it so his campaign can have center stage. [video]

McCain lied. He hasn’t suspended anything.

Egomaniac John McCain declares himself winner of debate, before it even occurs.

John McCain, the antibipartisan. Didn’t the last guy also claim to be a uniter, not a divider? And McCain thinks we’ll fall for that again?

AntiChrist to endorse McCain this Sunday. [NYT] Make no mistake about it, this is nothing less than the Dominionist Theofascists challenging the Constitution of the United States for authority over all our lives.

If Palin has “nothing to hide,” then why the big coverup?

Conservative columnist who supported Palin now says Palin should quit campaign.

CNN anchor decries McCain campaign’s sexist treatment of Sarah Palin.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Sept 26 notes, thomasmc.com.

EAT THE RICH!

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Wall Street protestMy favorite visual from Thursday’s Wall Street action: EAT THE RICH, invoking Peter Richardson’s Class War cult classic. The bastards are making a grab for $700 BILLION in this salvo. Which proposition is the more preposterous?

What’s with the Wall Street building garbed in the Stars and Stripes? Odd enough that the architecture impersonates a courthouse or mausoleum. Is the stock market a federal agency? Draped in Red, White and Blue it looks like the command center of the Capitalist empire.

Democrats push Bush Treasury giveaway to super rich while Republicans block it

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What can be more pathetic and abjectly servile than the Democratic Party seen pushing to pass Bush’s bailout of the bankrupt private sector with public monies, while the Republican Party itself blocks it? And the Republicans are the minority in both the House and Senate, too! See the Denver Post’s GOP rebellion stalls bailout and Reuter’s White House calls in big guns as bailout battle rages Yes, the ‘big guns’ are being turned on the Republican Party resistance and not any resistance from the Democratic Party which is rolling over and playing dead for Bush once again.

Expect the same politics if Obama gets in the White House, since the Democrats are the party of the super rich just as much as the Republicans are. Despite all the pretense of supposedly opposing neocon programs, the Democrats are on board. The financial shenanigans and criminality of Wall Street and the DP response to them is just one more case in point. The Democrats are out to bankrupt the US Treasury arm in arm with Bush and Cheney.

George Saunders on Sarah Palin

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Excerpt from “My Gal” by George Saunders, one of my favorite funny but twisted authors.

“Explaining how she felt when John McCain offered her the Vice-Presidential spot, my Vice-Presidential candidate, Governor Sarah Palin, said something very profound: “I answered him ‘Yes’ because I have the confidence in that readiness and knowing that you can’t blink, you have to be wired in a way of being so committed to the mission, the mission that we’re on, reform of this country and victory in the war, you can’t blink. So I didn’t blink then even when asked to run as his running mate.”

Isn’t that so true? I know that many times, in my life, while living it, someone would come up and, because of I had good readiness, in terms of how I was wired, when they asked that—whatever they asked—I would just not blink, because, knowing that, if I did blink, or even wink, that is weakness, therefore you can’t, you just don’t. You could, but no—you aren’t.”

The article devolves into the usual George Saunders weirdness, but it’s worth a few minutes, if for no other reason than to get a taste of Saunders himself! Read the full article in The New Yorker online.

When policemen don their gas masks

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COLORADO COLLEGE- A friend of mine, not without influence at CC, shared my alarm at the police security buildup at the Denver DNC.
Mass response
Ultimately however, he considered the development to be of concern chiefly to those inclined to protest. Less relevant to those disinclined.

To those already disinclined? It’s a growing number.

He’s a lawyer. What would he have to protest?

I know our sense of well being with our system of government is predicated on an atmosphere of civility, where we count on justice to prevail. If we are wronged, law will intervene. Or, we can march straight over to some municipal building, register our grievance, and initiate the mechanisms by which to achieve redress. These rights are granted us by the Bill of Rights. Citizens concede our recourse to violence, and likewise, the state agrees not to obliterate us with its disproportionate might.

But what happens when some part of those agreements are abridged? Let’s say a court rules we cannot have redress. Let’s say the court decides against the law? What then? What if we are denied access to our representatives who legislate the laws? What if the enforcers shrug us off? To where do we take our voice? So quickly, a mutual agreement to remain civil, becomes rule by brute force. You voted for who? You expected what? Says you and whose army?

Hundreds of paramilitary police lining the street to fend off handfuls of political dissidents is more than overkill. Corporate and government strongholds are already impenetrable. Offices and lobbies and parking facilities restrict public access. Legions of combat police on the sidewalk is an altogether other escalation. It says, stay at home, you have no recourse. Behind us is a dead end. You’ll just get in the way.

Masks
Helmets and batons protect the police from the people. Gas masks protect policemen from who? From their own excessive means? In warfare the use of gas is forbidden.