The U.S. Election

[TheEdge]

And if we hadn't rolled back the New Deal banking regulations, we wouldn't be in the mess we are now

That is the killer point.


The New Deal was the Answer and still is - Tried and Tested!

BACK TO THE NEW DEAL: RESTORE THE GLASS-STEAGALL FIREWALL

Scribblers like Friedman and von Hayek were paid by finance oligarchs to wage a relentless
war against that heritage of the Franklin D. Roosevelt New Deal, the set of policies which
allowed humanity to survive the Great Depression of the 1930s. The current crisis would not
have been possible in the present form if the institutional safeguards enacted during the New
Deal had been left in place, as they should have been. These safeguards represent permanent
features of civilization, and they need to be restored. The best example is the repeal of the
Glass-Steagall Act under the Clinton administration in 1999. The Glass-Steagall Act was a
classic piece of New Deal legislation which established that being a commercial bank and
being a stockbroker are mutually exclusive activities that could not be legally combined in the
same company. Commercial banking was one thing, and stock brokerage was something
completely separate. Naturally, the greedy financiers and their spokesmen clamored for the
repeal of Glass-Steagall, and they finally got their wish. Now less than 10 years later all of
the Wall Street banks, seemingly without notable exceptions, are bankrupt and insolvent
institutions that cannot not survive without a massive infusion of taxpayer money. We need
to restore Glass-Steagall, which will mean among other things that Goldman Sachs and
Morgan Stanley will not be eligible to become bank holding companies after all. If you don't
like your tax bill next year, you should thank Newt Gingrich and others who made it their
business to destroy and roll back the achievements of the New Deal in the name of the
8
despicable ideology of monetarism as preached by Friedman and von Hayek. Newt, by the
way, is now calling for an immediate deflationary crash to find out what the real prices of
housing might be. This is like doing experiments on your own flesh, and Newt should go to
the funny farm.


BACK TO THE NEW DEAL: RESTORE THE UPTICK RULE

Another example is the uptick rule. This New Deal measure meant that it was illegal to sell a
stock short if it were continuously in decline. The speculator had to wait until there was an
uptick, meaning a trade in which the stock in question increased in price; only then could a
short sale be carried out. Another piece of bitter irony inherent in the present crisis is that this
uptick rule was abolished by the feckless and incompetent Chairman Cox of the Securities
and Exchange Commission at the beginning of last summer, just in time for the explosion of
the world credit crisis which has led to the current world economic depression. Incredibly
enough, Chairman Cox of the SEC has been unable to pull himself together long enough to
permanently re-impose the uptick rule. Instead, he has drawn up a list of 799 financial
institutions and banks whose stock will now be illegal to sell short for at least 10 days,
although one suspects that this prohibition will be prolonged indefinitely. This crackpot
expedient reveals the true nature of the current monetarist regime. Shorting and destroying
General Motors, which actually produces something useful, is fine, but no shorting of JP
Morgan Chase, which is a public menace that produces nothing but toxic paper. The longterm
roots of the current crisis go back to August 15, 1971, when Nixon, Kissinger, Arthur
Burns and George Shultz wantonly destroyed the Bretton Woods system of fixed currency
parities, ushering in the new world of financial risk which is now collapsing around us.

[TheEdge]

This is the answer to our economy. If we don't rein in the Federal reserve they will have complete control of the money circulation.


NATIONALIZE THE FEDERAL RESERVE AS A BUREAU OF THE TREASURY


The present crisis ought to provide the death warrant for the failed Federal Reserve System.
When the Fed was created back under Woodrow Wilson, its Rockefeller and Morgan
sponsors promised that the Fed would protect us against all future financial panics. The Fed
failed once in 1929-1933, and now it is failing again for a second time. The Fed is worthless
as a firewall against depression. We must therefore seize the Fed, audit it, nationalize it, and
operate it in the future as a bureau of the US Treasury. From now on, we must go back to the
Constitution, meaning that the size of the money supply and short-term interest rates will have
to be determined by public laws of the United States, passed by the House and the Senate and
signed by the president. Using this method, we can mandate new initial credit issues of $1 to
$2 trillion to be used exclusively as low interest (.5% to 1%) and long-term (30 to 40 year
maturities) credit for productive purposes only – manufacturing, farming, mining, commerce,
energy production, infrastructure, and the other things we need. We should stop having the
Fed lend money to Citibank at 2% and then having the Treasury borrow that same money
back for 4% to 5% in the form of Treasury paper. Nationalize the Fed, and let the Treasury
finance itself, cutting out the parasitical middlemen like JP Morgan Chase, Goldman,
Citibank, and the rest. The taxpayers will be the big winners.

[Iron Lizard]

Yes do that and also always use to edit button instead of double posting.

[Tanegashima]

there certainly were fantastic New Deal programs, programs I don't necessarily disagree with, especially regarding our infrastructure...which is something the federal government is obligated to manage. Also, early New Deal reforms, banking reforms, stock market reforms were all necessary and I don't disagree with them. But there were literally hundreds more programs that were entirely UN-necessary like EVERY New Deal cultural program:
The Federal Art Project
Federal music project
on and on and on...all total b.s. AFAIC

I do agree with you, however, on the New Deal banking regulations. Every program, no matter how out of control, does some good.

Also, I don't see why everyone is getting on my case, I was never ever ever for the bailout. I'm totally against corporate welfare.

Why don't we just do what Nixon proposed? Just give a welfare check to EVERYONE regardless of income and whatnot? I mean he was totally serious.

Social Security needs to be abolished, and rebuilt from the ground up too...

[Dirt Ball Gamer]

I blame Henry Kissinger for about 76% of all the rotten shit happening in the world today. I say feed im to the hogs

Unrelated but I found this at Kuchinich.gov. Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich, one of the leaders in challenging the Wall Street bailout plan, reacted to the Wall Street bailout legislation that the Senate will consider later today.

"True American values of fairness, frugality and faith are being sacrificed to greed. The Senate took a dreadful bill that failed on the House floor, made no substantive changes to help homeowners or enact substantive regulatory protections for investors, and instead attached tax provisions that have absolutely nothing to do with the underlying financial crisis. The legislative process is devolving into fraud."

"Among the tax credits are tax credits for banks. Keep in mind the government will have to borrow $700 billion from banks at interest, to give banks a $700 billion bailout, and in return the taxpayers get $700 billion in toxic debt. The Senate "improves" on the bailout by giving banks even more money. It is the height of cynicism to tell homeowners in foreclosure that we are going to help them by giving them a tax break! The problem is that they can't pay the mortgage and their homes are in danger, not that they need foreclosure tax breaks.”

The Senate proposes to make one significant change to the original bailout legislation: implementing a temporary increase in the limit on insured banking deposits by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Kucinich supports such an increase.

Yesterday Kucinich sent a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Congressman Barney Frank, Chairman of the Financial Services Committee, suggesting a change in the legislation that would empower the Treasury to compel mortgage servicers to rework the terms of mortgage loans so homeowners could avoid foreclosure.

[j_factor]

I was one of the few who supported Kucinich for president. He may not have a great image or stature, but damn, he sure does know his shit.

[InternalPrimate]

I was one of the few who supported Kucinich for president. He may not have a great image or stature, but damn, he sure does know his shit.

I concur.

[Dirt Ball Gamer]

Ugh, watching the VP debate was like slow torture. I'd rather be waterboarded than suffer through that again. Why can't they just have a real debate instead of making it into the political equivalent of The Price is Right? Sara Palin looks like she could suck the bend out of a river but good lord she can't even directly answer questions at all. She has to start talking about soccer moms and good ol beer drinking Americans an McCain is such a maverick etc, gimme a break

[TheEdge]

I only watched the first 10 minutes of the debate before I sensed myself becoming increasingly angry, disappointed, and ending with a hollow depressed feeling.

At that point I had to turn it off and play Shadow Dancer for a little while.

[Rusty Venture]

See I don't understand McCain and his attempts at spin.

McCain says Obama is inexperienced but then he picks a VP with hardly any experience herself. I still think he picked her simply because he wanted some "celebrity" status for his campaign.

Seems to me McCain does a lot of "look at what he is doing!" and then turning around and doing the same thing.

[Iron Lizard]

It makes perfect sense. Think about it. No matter who McCain picked for VP his choice would not sway Obama voters. So why try to impress Democrats. McCain needs to impress his own party. After all actually seem to vote.

I think of it like new coke. They made new Coke because Pepsi was selling very well , not as well as coke, but well enough to scare the Coke Company. So Coke came out with new Coke to impress Pepsi drinkers but instead it had the opposite effect. Coke drinkers vanished and Pepsi drinkers didn't like it either. So instead of giving us new coke they gave us Palin.

Why try to impress the left with someone who they might like? Obama supporters still won't vote McCain even if had he picked someone like Lieberman. Instead they picked a gun Loving, snowmobile riding, abortion hating crazy lady that the is what the crazy (but voting ) part of the right seems to like.

I agree though it painful to listen to her talk at times. They keep setting obvious traps for her and she keeps falling for them. Supreme court cases, the Bush Doctrine how the hell does she not know anything about these things. Honestly I was amazed Biden didn't destroy her last night. What was his excuse? She managed to come off looking only retarded but not totally retarded.

[esb09]

I nearly broke my TV last night trying to watch that atrocity.

She said "General McClellan", and she didn't really mean that. General McClellan was a Civil War General who ran for President in 1864. There is no General McClellan in the U.S. Army currently.

"Gosh, by golly, we'll whip those rebels at Antietam!". I half expected her to say that.

Biden didn't destroy her because if he did, they would have screamed OMG SEXISM! YOU HIT A WOMAN! A WOMAN WHO WEARS GLASSES!

I'd feel reassured if something bad happened to Obama and Biden became President. With Palin, I'd be scared to death.

BTW, I don't feel like this is the lesser of two evils anymore. After seeing Obama at the first debate I actually feel like I'm voting for the better man.

[TheEdge]

ObamaCrimes.com

ActIndependent.org


EDIT: They just passed the Wallstreet Billionaire Bailout in Congress and the market went down.

Hilarious. Cant wait till the people are homeless and actually fight back.

[Rusty Venture]

It makes perfect sense. Think about it. No matter who McCain picked for VP his choice would not sway Obama voters. So why try to impress Democrats. McCain needs to impress his own party. After all actually seem to vote.

I think of it like new coke. They made new Coke because Pepsi was selling very well , not as well as coke, but well enough to scare the Coke Company. So Coke came out with new Coke to impress Pepsi drinkers but instead it had the opposite effect. Coke drinkers vanished and Pepsi drinkers didn't like it either. So instead of giving us new coke they gave us Palin.

Why try to impress the left with someone who they might like? Obama supporters still won't vote McCain even if had he picked someone like Lieberman. Instead they picked a gun Loving, snowmobile riding, abortion hating crazy lady that the is what the crazy (but voting ) part of the right seems to like.

I agree though it painful to listen to her talk at times. They keep setting obvious traps for her and she keeps falling for them. Supreme court cases, the Bush Doctrine how the hell does she not know anything about these things. Honestly I was amazed Biden didn't destroy her last night. What was his excuse? She managed to come off looking only retarded but not totally retarded.

My theory on running for President is to have the strongest running mate possible. Not some crazy "Creationism should be taught in Science class" woman who thinks being near Russia qualifies as "good with foreign affairs".

Obama picked a good running mate, someone who balances out his lack of experience. Why McCain picked someone who offers little beyond the election is beyond puzzling....plus, what happens if he croaks and she becomes Pres? Is she gonna bumble her way through the Presidency just like Bush did?

At least if Obama gets killed by the mole people/robots/cyborg frogs his VP actually has *some* idea of what to do.

[esb09]

I hear you on that, Rusty.

If something terrible happened to Obama and Biden came on TV I'd feel very reassured.

If something terrible happened to McCain, and I saw Palin on the TV, I'd be MORE scared.