Your reading today, targeted at getting your blood boiling, is this piece from EconMatters surveying all of the money that the government (in various guises) has disbursed to backstop Wall Street and its status:
In light of the recent S&P downgrade of the U.S. sovereign credit rating, the nation suddenly looks more dire financially than before the downgrade ( (at least psychologically, as the country still has the ability to borrow at its pre-downgrade low interest rates.) So it would make tracking down Wall Street bailout money still outstanding a good start to reclaim some of the lost treasure.
However, more than two years after the bailout, there never seems to be a straight answer to these two questions: (1) Where has Uncle Sams’ bailout money gone? (2) Has the money been paid back yet?
The short answer is that nearly $5 trillion has been deployed to bail out Wall Street, we’re continuing to pour money down a rathole, and there are few prospects for it getting much of it back.
See the linked post for the longer answer.
In related news Long Island property values remain high and luxury retailers in New York can’t keep enough inventory in stock it’s flying off the shelves so fast.
The other day I stumbled across something that Frédéric Bastiat wrote that may reflect some light on the situation:
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.
I guess my blood would boil if was not already exhausted from repeatedly making two of the points above:
1. Look at Wall Street, the private and public unions and the trial lawyers and you have three huge – axis – of Obama’s campaign contributions. Big Money, Big Unions, Big Torts. Hope? Maybe. Change? Nada.
2. Since my office is in New York I have commented previously. What recession? Its shameful.
While I honestly don’t understand this bailout story very well, it does make me mad enough to go out and join the next street protest.
http://www.mnfaireconomy.org/2011/08/11/big-noisy-crowd-gathered-at-our-piece-of-the-pie-rally/
The connection may be a bit loose, but it is good enough for me. Besides the protests I have attended (anti Iraq war, GOP convention) are usually a good time.
http://www.takeactionminnesota.org/_assets/document/8-10_Wells_Fargo_Action.pdf
Nothing really new to me, and it’s too damned hot today to get steamed this time. (This is why I reserve most of my steaming for the night-time.)
Drew, the Big Money backs both parties, so I don’t think we can pin that solely on Obama. And the (R)s have their own axis of weasel backing them. Six of one….
“Drew, the Big Money backs both parties, so I don’t think we can pin that solely on Obama.”
Well, we can adapt a game I once made up for Bithead. We’ll call it the Drew Game. It would go like this. Pick any headline and see in how many moves you can connect it to Obama in a derogatory fashion. Each move will be called a Drewbie.
Liked the quote when I saw it yesterday. Gets back to the morality issue. Who among us thinks the big banks are all really solvent? Yet, as soon as they were making “profits” again they were handing out the big bonuses. What sector other than the banking sector can do that?
Steve
What sector other than the banking sector can do that?
I’ve been around plenty of doctors that fucked up and then demanded payment for it. You doctors are little better than banksters, steve, if at all. Greedy bastards the lot of you.
Some are, but we dont have the ability to precipitate trillions of dollars of losses around the world in a couple of years.
Steve
“Drew, the Big Money backs both parties, so I don’t think we can pin that solely on Obama.”
I know; I didn’t say they don’t. The point is there is no “change” and if you want to know where government “stimulus” is going to go under Obama, follow the donations, and then ask yourself if you really want to waste that “stimulus” money after all.
Some are? SOME? Lord, where are the ones that aren’t? They must be working in the Third World for Doctors Without Borders or some such. I have dealt with literally dozens of doctors in the last 4+ years, and when it all comes down to it each of them have been greedy bastards.
Some are, but we dont have the ability to precipitate trillions of dollars of losses around the world in a couple of years.
How many trillions are you guys getting every year? About two trillion or so out of the US economy every year IMS. The biggest long-term structural problem with the nation’s economics is the ever growing protion of the GDP dedicated to healthcare.
But let me guess – that’s all the fault of Republican nurses, right?