Death by Tax Cut

Dubya's tax policies WERE his economic policies and they were the most irresponsible policies since... Reagan's. Aitch Dub had it right when he called Reaganomics "Voodoo Economics" but true to family form, sociopathic lust for power and position, he sold what was left of his soul by renouncing reality, suspending disbelief and common sense and embracing the fantasy.

When a person "sells" something that they don't believe, that IS evil.

Obama has his finger in the dike. He's temporarily slowed the hemorrhaging of jobs, but has failed to reverse the ongoing trend of another Voodoo invention, The Jobless Recovery. Jobs are not creted out of thin air. They aren't created by rich people bored with sitting on their money. They are created by demend. Most of all though, no matter how many might be created, they must be retained, and this is done by underlying economic policy, not tax policy or "stimulus packages."

The economic policies of the conservatards, especially since Reagan, do not inject money into the economy, they draw money out. Wall Street is a DRAIN with their "financial innovations" that go far beyond stocks and bonds. We have an economy where money does not chase goods as in previous times -- too much money chasing too few goods equals inflation -- we have an economy where money chases money: a Paper Chase, unlike the movie. Nothing is created; nothing is left behind; when the value of the paper disappears, there is no collateral beyond more paper. THAT is why "they" need our social security trust fund.

Unless Obama can change this fundamental policy, this Paper Chase, and I see no evidence that he desires to do so, nothing else he does will matter. We WILL have a depression.

He signed into law another of his should-be-famous Marketable Reform-Like Bills that relies on one of his favorite buzz words: Transparency. Somehow it's reform when banks draw up and sell fraudulent documents powered by saiboat fuel in a "transparent open exchange." The reality is that just like turning the lights on in a roach infested room doesn't make the roaches go away; it just makes them hide. They're still there in all their grossness. The credit default swaps, with no collateral beyond a wink and a promise of tax payer money -- loan sharks include a threat of a broken leg in their deals -- are still there. In all their economy-draining glory.

Bullshitiousness and Douchbaggery, post partisan style

So the evil and wicked pay czar, appointed to serve the socialist fer'ner in the White House has decided that there's no need to go after the bailed out too big to fail banks. And brokerages who paid HUGE fucking bonuses. To the dipsticks who failed in their efforts to collapse the world economy. "Shaming them was punishment enough," according to the Seattle Times. Jeezuz Aitch on a fucking Popsicle stick.

Mr Obummer, when you have no fucking spine, you're supposed to try to cover that up by choosing appointees who do. If you intended to let the motherfuckers off the hook from the start, why waste the time, money and effort in appointing a phony hatchet man. Once again you've done the near impossible and made refuckyoucans look good by re-enacting the commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence by Dubya.

Shame, is NOT a punishment for treason, fraud or any other felony.

Shame is what you do with your puppy when it pisses on your carpet.

UPDATE: This guy's so full of shit...

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Notice how the trained seal never asks about how public shame is punishment enough.

PS Posting from the Droid is a bitch on the small screen.

Our Ever Further Journeying to Banana Republicanism

GM.... Chrysler... the ripple effect that will tear the guts out of our whole economy.

Everything is right on schedule.

You didn't still believe there was ever any intent to save anyone other than the investor class...? Come on.

I'm not forgetting the loans to these companies. They were a part of this. But the efforts were never about saving jobs or workers or retirees. It was all about breaking unions and well... collateral damage/shit happens. PLant closings... job losses... wages cut... benefits cut...

Now what was this I was hearing about the recession ending? ???

Bull shit.

Trickle Up: People Need JOBS

As I continue to stew over the to bail or not to bail debates and the shovelling of our dollars into the gaping maws of too-big-to-fail fraud farms and factories, ie investment banks, something put the Lincoln quote about labor and capitol in my head. Lincoln talked about the "superiority of labor to capital" in his "non SOTU address" to congress in 1861. I've always wondered about the context -- isn't that always what we liberals fail to understand ot acknowledge? we always take the stupid fucking things said by stupid fucking people like Palin, McCain, Limplog, Vannity et al out of context.

So here's the famous Lincoln quote "in context:"

... Monarchy itself is sometimes hinted at as a possible refuge from the power of the people.

In my present position I could scarcely be justified were I to omit raising a warning voice against this approach of returning despotism.

It is not needed nor fitting here that a general argument should be made in favor of popular institutions, but there is one point, with its connections, not so hackneyed as most others, to which I ask a brief attention. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above, labor in the structure of government. It is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital; that nobody labors unless somebody else, owning capital, somehow by the use of it induces him to labor. This assumed, it is next considered whether it is best that capital shall hire laborers, and thus induce them to work by their own consent, or buy them and drive them to it without their consent. Having proceeded so far, it is naturally concluded that all laborers are either hired laborers or what we call slaves. And further, it is assumed that whoever is once a hired laborer is fixed in that condition for life.

Now there is no such relation between capital and labor as assumed, nor is there any such thing as a free man being fixed for life in the condition of a hired laborer. Both these assumptions are false, and all inferences from them are groundless.

Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labor and capital producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labor of community exists within that relation.

Think of all that in the context of today's impending Refuckyoucan Depression II.

Things that make you go,

"Hmmmmmm..."

Keith O played a portion of this tonight. Here's the whole clip.



If this makes you wonder if there's a way out of this mess without a total crash, you're not alone. Especially when you read this little gem from the NY Times. h/t to C&L

Anyone for Kumbaya? ???

OK, so before we all go our separate ways to get re-elected, let's work together to pass a piece of legislation we all hate, eh? So said... well nobody said that, but that's basically what the fuck has been happening. Who's writing this script? Seth Rogan? The Coen Brothers? Taretino? Do they really hate it? or do they just not want to own it? Just like no one wants to own the failure of the legislation, policies and philosophies that dismantled The New Deal, and led DIRECTLY to this mess.

Paul Krugman is all over the place, in terms of teevee, blogs. Ravi Batra is another economist, but one I only hear from when I listen to Thom Hartmann. He hates the bailout:

The current problem is not with banks and financial institutions, but in the housing market. So the remedy should be applied there and nowhere else. There should be a partial bailout of harried homeowners who cannot pay their mortgages. They should be penalized somewhat for their reckless borrowing but still rescued for the sake of the economy. If homeowners are able to make timely payments for their home loans, the banks will be paid and their loans will be secure. The banks will have a healthy balance sheet and will not need any rescue. The housing-market will also stabilize. If some banks still fail, then the FDIC will come to their rescue. The total cost of the home-owner bailout will be less than $500 billion, a fraction of what the government has promised to spend on its multifaceted bailouts—Bear Stearns, Freddie Mac, Fannie May, AIG and now the entire financial sector.

Whenever a crisis appears, Wall Street jumps to the front row to profit from it. America, wake up and say no to the worst plan yet devised for crisis profiteering.

I hate it too, because as Batra explains, it's aimed at the wrong problems/place. It's really simply more of the same thing: Trickle down.

The thing is this: We've been here before. Not literally we, but the country. If Nancy can't find the answers in her cleavage, she should look in one of her grand kids' history books. Under: Great Depression; Franklin D Roosevelt; New Deal.

Recovering from the continued rapings of the past 8 years -- 28 years actually -- is not going to be easy or pretty. Whatever bill finally gets passed is going to have to address bankruptcy re-reform, banking re-reform and keeping people in their homes. Pelosi's not to blame, as Boner and his minions claim, because her speech wasn't nice enough. She's to blame for once again, not sticking true to Progressive, Liberal, Democratic principals and putting together a bill for the PEOPLE of this country. She needs to learn that "the country" is not some nebulous idea that's the product of a good buzz. "The country" is its people.

Oh.... and Senator Morain, stop blaming Obama while you're telling us that this is not the time for blame. I sense a disconnect there. Like between brain and mouth.

Skanky Banky

The Crawman, Jurrasicpork, at Welcome to Pottersville, has been having an ongoing battle with his now former bank, Citizens' Bank. I may be a little late getting on the linky love bandwagon, but better late than never.

JP's was the first blog I ever read, and while I can imagine him being a bit of a curmudgeon, no one deserves to have a bank treat them like shit.

I can relate to a degree; I had my own bad experiences with Bank of Amerika. I watch the services offered by my Versateller account disappear one by one oper the years until they finally did away with them all together. I went in to close my account and the teller didn't even try to talk me into any alternatives; I guess he'd seen enough other disgruntleds that he knew I was gone no matter what he said.

The thing is, us little people supposedly cost banks money. As JP alludes, they're doing us a favor and we should bow down, kiss their rings and asses, and eat their shit like it was ice cream. When we go, it's "Good riddance." They serve the rich, the corporations, and (sometimes) their shareholders. Oh, and Nazi, Fascist, bloodthirsty dictators too.

Next time I hear Thom Hartmann talk about the links between Prescott Bush and Hitler, I hope I can call in and ask him about correspondence in the Federalist Papers about placing a cap on individual wealth so as to avoid what we have now:

A tyranny of the rich (as opposed to royal) minority.