Many Democrats, including Barack Obama were angered by John
McCain's role in scuttling the deal reached by Barney Frank, Nancy
Pelosi and Hank Paulson on the $700 bailout of Wall Street. McCain
was criticized for politicizing the "solution".
Excerpt: A Republican rebellion stalled government
efforts Thursday to avoid economic meltdown, a chaotic turnaround
that disrupted the choreography of an extraordinary White House
meeting meant to show joint resolve from the president, the
political parties and the presidential candidates. Instead, the
summit broke up so bitterly that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson
got on one knee before Democratic leaders in a theatrical attempt
to salvage talks.
I have to say though, from my viewpoint deep in the middle of
nowhere, that if it is true that McCain flew into D.C. and managed
to break up the unholy alliance of the Democrats and the Oval
Office then he actually did a good thing. A large majority of
voters are against bailing out Wall Street, and by "against" I
mean bitterly angry. It is hard to imagine what the Democrats are
thinking -- if their deliberative process can be dignified with
words implying human cognition rather than the herding behavior of
cattle.
I don't care what Keith Olbermann or Rachel Maddow have to say
about how terribly McCain behaved in blowing up the bailout deal.
WTF do they know anyway? Stopping this stupid bailout is the right
thing to do and McCain deserves credit for saying NO WAY.
Here is a sample article blaming McCain for saving us from
I don't care what Keith Olbermann or Rachel Maddow have to say
about how terribly McCain behaved in blowing up the bailout deal.
WTF do they know anyway?
Stopping this stupid bailout is the right thing to do and McCain deserves credit for saying NO WAY.
Excerpt: I thought to myself finally an appropriate ad was being aired
especially given McCain’s actions at blowing up the bailout talks
being held in the nation’s capital. I believe he saw himself as
being a man on a mission to save our congress in these crucial
talks and work sessions, but he was anything but.
Instead of being a maverick, John McCain became a bull charging
into a china shop. Left in its wake was not a solution but cracked
pieces of china left on the floor where talks have now broken
down. It will be interesting to see how the market opens up in
the morning. If it takes a nose-dive, we have John McCain and his
fellow Republicans to blame for it. ...
In injecting himself into these critical and vital discussions
today concerning the bailout, McCain and his cronies became the
weapons of mass destruction. He even used his presence at the
White House as a photo-op since that meeting was non-productive.
It was reported on Countdown with Keith Olbermann that McCain did
not even read the first bailout plan put forth by Hank Paulson
which was all of two and a half pages. Yet, yet, he thought he
could offer a constructive solution to this crisis? No, McCain
became the crisis in all of this.
Through his erratic decision to fly to Washington albeit in a non-
urgent fashion thinking he could add something of value, he became
an airplane flying a Kamikaze mission into this delicate process.
Don’t let anyone tell you different.
I can’t help but think that there are many people out there
feeling so hopeless right now, downright angry and extremely
depressed at the way this process was destroyed by Senator John
McCain. I do think that this video from the movie Network,
encapsulates the simmering anger that is being felt across
America. If you wish to take out your anger at anyone, please by
all means take it out on McCain and the entire Republican Party.
Make them pay for our collective misery. ...
Here is something about how stupid the bailout is:
Excerpt: We're being blackmailed into accepting the
responsibility and debt for the worst managed financial
institutions in the history of this country. The starting price,
our debt, is $700 billion dollars.
What's really about to happen is that the failed financial
institutions will be rewarded for their bad behavior. As a result,
they and others will be encouraged to do it again. It's just a
matter of time.
We're under the gun and told that we have just days to make a
decision to bailout these mismanaged entities. The last thing they
want is an open hearing on the problem. Deliberation is deadly for
them.
We're told that our world will collapse; there will be a systemic
breakdown if the president's bailout legislation is not passed.
Without it, we'll all be eating stale beans and rice for the rest
of our lives.
How do you argue with a premise like that - vote yes and you get a
chance to live. Vote no and you'll be soon living in a cold house
or damp shelter, if you're lucky enough to be off the street.
This is the same type of argument that was used to pass the
Patriot Act after 9/11. It had to be passed right away. The
vulnerability to attack was blamed on the Constitution. We were
asked to forget the president's disregard for the many warnings of
just such an attack. The people paid for that egregious error
through the loss of constitutional rights.
Excerpt:
"As of now we [journalists] are, as a group, behaving just as we
did the last two times the administration sought to rush through a
hastily thought out, ill-conceived plan. Why in the world are we
being so gullible and naive?"
Former New York Times reporter David Cay Johnston
"What the proposal actually did...was explicitly rule out any
oversight, plus grant immunity from future review... [I]f Paulson
can't be honest about what he himself sent to Congress... there is
no reason to trust him on anything related to his bailout plan."
Paul Krugman
"If you think the Bailout of All Bailouts...won't saddle American
taxpayers with billions, if not trillions, of risky obligations,
you don't know politics... Never before in the history of American
capitalism has so much been asked of so many for...so few."
Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor
"We are talking about ten thousand dollars per household, and that
money cannot simply go into a black hole of bad debt."
Any bailout is wrongheaded, stupid, counterproductive, and anti-capitalism. That's pretty much understood, I think, by anyone who doesn't work in Congress, high finance, Wall Street, or the corporate media. I don't believe there's any "crisis" going on, except for very rich bastards.
That said, all politics happens in a framework of insanity, and from what I read yesterday as a deal was falling into place, the Dems had squeezed some improvements into this monstrosity, including a much smaller price tag and some actual oversight. What I read about the agreement -- before it was scuttled -- led me to believe it was something akin to hitting a brick wall at 20 mph -- very painful, very stupid, very injurious, but nowhere near as awful as hitting a brick wall at 70 mph, as Paulson and Bush proposed.
Are you seriously suggesting that McCain's presence or proposals will lead to no collision at all, or to a better, smarter collision at a lower speed against a softer wall? I've never seen evidence of anything approaching economic competence or a bright idea from John McCain, and I'd be amazed if he adds anything to the negotiations that doesn't make the final ugliness worse.
I think you're happy to see the bailout get monkey-wrenched, and I can understand that, but at best McCain has delayed a crappy deal by perhaps a few days, to make way for a deal that will undoubtedly be crappier. That ain't heroics to my thinking. Heroics would be flying to DC to block any bailout scheme, and there's nobody anywhere near the cogs or power -- not John McCain, certainly not Barack Obama -- who has that kind of heroics in him or her.
Comment: (9/27/2008) I do think McCain's presence could lead to a better outcome. He is a cranky old guy with a foul tongue in his mouth and nothing to lose by hanging tough right now as the opponent of "socialism". I have experience with cranky old guys.
Dylan Ratigan just outlined a market based solution, which would require government support, but of the enabling kind. Taking as a given that 300 million Americans own $46 trillion worth of real estate which may be worth only $44 or $42 trillion, there needs to be an open, electronic marketplace where mortgage-backed securities can be traded by people all over the planet. The government would operate as a clearinghouse to make sure that trades are completed -- and not broken by bankrupt buyer/sellers. Then the problem would clear itself, with some banks/brokers/funds having to write down their assets on their books, but the money would begin to flow again.
Right now the "market" is "over the counter" and unregulated, and there is no agreed upon price for these securities -- which is why the bailout proposal is so doomed. They cannot even quantify the size of the problem now, and as you reported yesterday, the $700 billion number was just pulled out of thin air because it sounded big.
We saw Washington Mutual get blown up and taken over by JP Morgan -- wiped out the shareholders and bondholders while leaving customers and depositors intact. If the bailout had happened a week ago the government might has squandered $30 billion on WaMu instead of having to pay zero.
McCain and the GOP are taking a popular stance. If Americans are furious at the bailout, then how is McCain a loser? And if President Bush is for the bailout, along with Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank, then why would anyone believe it to be a smart thing to do?
Pelosi, if you recall, was briefed about the torture of suspects by the US and didn't have the guts to disagree, not even privately during the meetings! Reid is a weak reed, and Frank is the Godfather of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So the people in favor of the bailout are heavily compromised personally and have zero professional credibility.
It is too bad that Barack Obama is clueless and trying to drive his golf ball down the middle of the fairway, laying up short instead of going for the green over the obstacles.
Mahdi Abdul FinkelsteinPERMANENT LINK
McCain isn't against the bailout, he just wants the bailout to be branded "McCain". I don't think McCain would have the stones to propose "No bailout", because "No bailout" would be smart and McCain ain't smart, and because "No bailout" is not a viable real-world option with a Congress owned by Bush-Cheney.
I think we're agreed, you and I, that the bailout is stupid, short-sighted, counterproductive and probably criminal. There are several better proposals, including my own favorite, doing nothing.
But Congress has been singing Bush-Cheney a love song since 2001 -- whatever Bush proposes, Congress delivers. So unless we the people take to the street by the millions and probably even if we do, it's a foregone conclusion we're going to see a stupid, short-sighted, counterproductive and probably criminal bailout. And I'm pretty sure that any bailout McCain opposes would be better than any bailout he endorses.
Comment: (9/27/2008) McCain has little to no knowledge of economics (in his own words, 18 times), and isn't exactly the best guy to be in the middle of all of this.
The $700 billion bailout is absurd, and now a more graduated approach looks to be what we are going to get, with some now and if necessary, more late. Also the final version has clauses banning bonuses and severance for execs as well as an equity stake in all these companies for the gov't/taxpayer.
The long and short of it is, without some sort of capital, lenders will crumble and leave millions of americans and American businesses unable to borrow money for short and long term things. Spending in general will grind to a halt, and the global economy will enter a depression. Now, why that money should go to insolvent companies is beyond me, but basically, if they were to collapse and zero the loans, or sell them off at a massive loss, many undeserving people that can't afford their homes would either keep them or get out scott free with the equity they had put in and investors that bought stock would all be left with nothing.
The sounder solutions are also decidedly more complex. A lot of this about restoring investor confidence. That being said, personally I think the dollar is going to be totally fucked after this, but I don't see how we can avert disaster without injecting some cash into the market to demonstrate the market will be caught from it's freefall.
There are a lot of people to blame here, but people like John McCain deserve the brunt of it, having voted against every single regulation bill in his entire career, and having introduced not a single one for oversight, while Obama has introduced many. Wall Street is inherently greedy, and will by nature latch on to and perpetuate anything that makes them gobs of money, even if they know something is amiss. That pressure causes banks to be stupid. The only way to stop this sort of thing is to increase oversight and regulation.
sfgeekPERMANENT LINK
