Who would have thought....

That famed 70s Ranger righthander Doc Medich was this cool. I mean having Gatorade sponsor you is one thing...

Seriously?

This will end well.

Wasteful Government Spending

Every day they blow doing stupid things like this is another trip around and slightly down the toilet bowl. When we had preferred stock - it meant that the taxpayer would get paid interest on the tens of billions of dollars of money we were giving them. Now we're just getting the 1 cent dividend. In essence, they've just flat out given the money to the banks. How the hell do these people still have jobs? Why are they getting bonuses instead of cardboard boxes?

Obviously the current government doesnt have the courage to solve this problem and deal with those who've taken the economy here. I'd hoped that, perhaps, we'd elected someone and something more than this.

In the end - the reality is that John McCain couldnt really be any less effective than Obama and the Democrats are being right now. Giving them MORE money does not help. Nationalize them. Fire the executives. Seize their assets. Put a swath of them in prison. That GM isnt bankrupt yet, that Bank of America thinks it's solvent, these are fantasies being encouraged by members of this administration who dont want to face the reality - and the longer we go without doing something about it the worse it gets.

Edit: oooh - imagine that - the nobel prize winning economist agrees with me. Hey - Obama - quit being a jackass. Seize the banks - reset ALL mortgages to 4% - reset ALL credit card debt to 8% - and let the dammned thing FIX ITSELF. There's a limited time for us to be able to get out of this - and that time is before all the guys just like AIG fail as spectacularly.

Reality

The big banks are insolvent.
Worrying about whether we use the term 'receivership' or 'nationalization' is crap.

First we take over the banks - and we fire the executives that were responsible.
Then we take over the insurance companies that are also insolvent.
Then we take over the brokerages and hedgefunds - that are more insolvent than the other two put together.

Talking about what we want to put back into the public sector is a discussion to have AFTER we clean up the mess. Burn that bridge when we get to it.

A little simplistic

but a good visual primer on the mess. Once you've seen it - i want you to remember the bit about 'leverage' - and imagine how much debt is 'owed' by the hedge funds and banks and insurance companies (now that you have a big number in your head - go ahead an leverage your imagination 30x).

Legal Technicalities

So North Dakota passed a dumb law.

"The bill declares that "any organism with the genome of homo sapiens" is a person protected by rights granted by the North Dakota Constitution and state laws."

So.. um... if i have 400 of these in a jar do i get 400 exemptions on my taxes? Hell of a lot easier way to get a free house than this. If I carry them around in a little battery operated cooler? or what about a liver transplant - that liver is an 'organism with the genome of homo sapiens'...

Was this country always so full of stupid people? or is this a relatively recent development.

I'm sensing a pattern

Obama stuffs Justice with RIAA lawyers
then the MPAA lobbyists push for a billion network sniffer project into the stimulus package
then they continue to invoke the bush state secrets protections in absurd ongoing court cases
then Geithner has a total crap plan with no specifics on how he's going to spend a trillion dollars - but Obama comes out to reassure people he has no intention of doing what Sweden did and nationalize the banks...

Maybe he's in over his head.

The Downward Spiral Revisited

So on the one hand, we have congressmen trying to plug the hole in the bucket - but realizing that the hole is $4t and they dont have the cash... then you have unbelievable morons at CNBC asking for stock tips from two of the only experts who saw this coming as if nothing has really changed... and now news that Geithner has won out over the more extreme thinkers (like Krugman) and we're going to end up with some bleeding Japan-esque downward spiral into 10 years of misery and what looks like 10 trillion dollars of responsibility (that you know will be called in). This makes the RTC fraud from Bush I look Mickey Mouse.

If you're not paying attention to how bad this situation is... this thing is so much uglier than Obama laid out to the American people. Though he was the best choice for having the ability and balls to fix it... it seems that even he doesnt have the cajones to change the system the way it needs to be changed. I guess it's all just going to get really really really crappy around here.

Monday

So Obama wants to cap executive pay at bailout banks at 500k... but not retroactively (only those who take addl money)...

Someone at the NYT decided to breakout how much it costs to be an executive - what with the mandatory upper east side flat and house in the hamptons.

"A personal trainer at $80 an hour three times a week comes to about $12,000 a year."

"Total cost for three gowns: about $35,000."

Poor Bankers... having to do without a $125,000 driver?
And a Nanny? The last thing these people should be doing is breeding...

Happy Monday