The country lost five trillion in wealth over the past two years.
The people who caused this financial nightmare have for the most part lost nothing. In most cases, especially at the top of the banking community where the real gambling with the country's equity took place, the biggest bettors got paid the most.
They walked away with billions in spite of the fact that their gross negligence and greed cost millions of working-class Americans their homes, their jobs and incomes, and at least for now, their future or even a small chance at a piece of the American pie.
With their jobs gone, their home gone, their insurance gone, their security gone and now living in tent city it is amazing that these people haven't erupted Watts style on Wall Street. (Yet)
As heavily armed as we are in this country, if we implode again the consequences will be worse than the civil war. There won't be a Mason-Dixon line to separate the combatants in this war; the war between the haves and have-nots.
Political opinions are as likely to split down the middle of the dining room table as well as they will across streets and neighborhoods, towns, cities and states.
We will go fractal. Those who defrauded this country had better figure out how to get that money back into society. Otherwise society will be crippled for a long long time.
Voilà! Along comes a plan for the government to be financed by Wall Street. Talk about a world-class Ponzi scheme. The federal reserve charges a margin to print the money it lends to the Federal Reserve...
The federal reserve charges a percentage to lend the money to Wall Street bankers...
The Wall Street bankers charge a percentage to lend the money back to the government...
The very same government who owns the printing presses which started the process in the first place...
People, we have to smarten up or everything we just did to prop up the banksters will just cost us more money. This latest proposed loop de loop just inflates the currency more than our borrowing is already inflating it. Inflation is, at it’s core, just another tax on the poor.
The problem with financial pigs is that their eyes aren't bigger than their stomachs.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
A stroke of brilliance!
Obama is finally on track.
Although the entire world was caught with our collective pants down
one year ago, we have been "educated".
Obama's most recent proposals put our greedy banksters on notice
that there will be No More Bailouts! Any further gambling with
risky investments will fall squarely on the individual banks involved,
their officers and their shareholders. In other words, those who stand
to gain the most NOW stand to lose the most.
Life is now somewhat in balance. Should a bank CEO lead his cronies
off a cliff, with shareholder approval, then they all take the plunge together.
Shareholders will now have a say in the egregious bonuses paid to
CEOs on short-term, often unsustainable, profits. Masterminds
of previous disasters still employed, which includes most bank CEOs,
will no longer have the benefit of the most self serving compensation
policy ever designed... the "when the bank wins, I win huge and if
the bank loses I still win" policy.
It only took a year and the loss of 13 trillion in national equity to
effect this change.
Hopefully this and more changes to come will prevent another world
disaster like the one we are still digging out from under.
For more blogs from Bob just visit I Love Grants Pass and search for parmsplace.
Although the entire world was caught with our collective pants down
one year ago, we have been "educated".
Obama's most recent proposals put our greedy banksters on notice
that there will be No More Bailouts! Any further gambling with
risky investments will fall squarely on the individual banks involved,
their officers and their shareholders. In other words, those who stand
to gain the most NOW stand to lose the most.
Life is now somewhat in balance. Should a bank CEO lead his cronies
off a cliff, with shareholder approval, then they all take the plunge together.
Shareholders will now have a say in the egregious bonuses paid to
CEOs on short-term, often unsustainable, profits. Masterminds
of previous disasters still employed, which includes most bank CEOs,
will no longer have the benefit of the most self serving compensation
policy ever designed... the "when the bank wins, I win huge and if
the bank loses I still win" policy.
It only took a year and the loss of 13 trillion in national equity to
effect this change.
Hopefully this and more changes to come will prevent another world
disaster like the one we are still digging out from under.
For more blogs from Bob just visit I Love Grants Pass and search for parmsplace.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Legitimate Thieves
You know who I mean. Companies who rely on "small print" to steal your money.
Banks and insurance companies are probably the biggest culprits. Somewhere
in page after page of legalese they slip it to you. The contracts you are forced
to sign because you are required by law to purchase services, like auto insurance for example, are written entirely in the company's favor. After all, they are the ones paying the attorney fees. A common tactic of lawyers is to design run on sentences whose content is so convoluted only company lawyers can figure them out. Somewhere within those often paragraph sized sentences they provide themselves with "weasel clauses" giving them the right to screw you somewhere down the line.
How about credit card companies? These are my personal favorite leaders in the legitimate thief category. They offer what appears to be a good deal up front and then allow you to develop self-destructive habits like overspending. If you were doing fine without something yesterday, chances are you can manage without that something today. But if you own a credit card, why wait? Once you're in over your head these companies increase your rate. You go "hey, how come my interest jumped from 10 to 20% overnight?", and they go "read the fine print”. If you have a credit card and have never read the small print I will summarize it for you here. Essentially they can do whatever they want and you are stuck with it.
Then came the Internet. I try to be careful but at least several times a year I get "educated". The most recent example of internet screwing came to me by way of a company called Ryder Marketing. They offered a "how to make a million online" CD which had some brilliant sales copy and a cheap price, $7.95 delivered, so I decided I might learn something. I was right! About three weeks later I received my disk and before I even opened the package my account was charged an additional $105.00. Long story short, by ordering the disk I was automatically
enrolled in a $1260 year long course payable in 12 easy $105.00 payments. I attempted to have the charges reversed but apparently somewhere in the video "fine print", which I hadn't even viewed prior to the charge, I "agreed" to accept one additional disk per month.
Agreed my ass. Moral of that story (and we can thank the Bush banking gangsters for this) is if you don't know who you are dealing with online, cancel your card after every online transaction. It is your only protection. It turns out even a punk like Ryder has a better attorney than the banks do. (My personal moral to the story is if my money is with Chase, it is no longer safe.)
An interesting note to the Ryder ripoff was my attempt to destroy this guy by posting a scam alert. To my chagrin I had to get in line, and the line was, at that point in time, almost three half-million people long. The guy wasn't lying. He really is making millions online... by stealing! The worst part was his video wasn't worth the substrate it was printed on.
I'm not even going to get into health insurance legitimate thievery except to say the only way for us little guys with small money to survive is to align ourselves with bigger money than the legitimate thieves can muster. Unfortunately, and in spite of all the pitfalls and potential for disaster, the only bigger money in Washington than lobby money is the government's money itself.
We need a government option to keep the health-care legitimate thieves in line.
Banks and insurance companies are probably the biggest culprits. Somewhere
in page after page of legalese they slip it to you. The contracts you are forced
to sign because you are required by law to purchase services, like auto insurance for example, are written entirely in the company's favor. After all, they are the ones paying the attorney fees. A common tactic of lawyers is to design run on sentences whose content is so convoluted only company lawyers can figure them out. Somewhere within those often paragraph sized sentences they provide themselves with "weasel clauses" giving them the right to screw you somewhere down the line.
How about credit card companies? These are my personal favorite leaders in the legitimate thief category. They offer what appears to be a good deal up front and then allow you to develop self-destructive habits like overspending. If you were doing fine without something yesterday, chances are you can manage without that something today. But if you own a credit card, why wait? Once you're in over your head these companies increase your rate. You go "hey, how come my interest jumped from 10 to 20% overnight?", and they go "read the fine print”. If you have a credit card and have never read the small print I will summarize it for you here. Essentially they can do whatever they want and you are stuck with it.
Then came the Internet. I try to be careful but at least several times a year I get "educated". The most recent example of internet screwing came to me by way of a company called Ryder Marketing. They offered a "how to make a million online" CD which had some brilliant sales copy and a cheap price, $7.95 delivered, so I decided I might learn something. I was right! About three weeks later I received my disk and before I even opened the package my account was charged an additional $105.00. Long story short, by ordering the disk I was automatically
enrolled in a $1260 year long course payable in 12 easy $105.00 payments. I attempted to have the charges reversed but apparently somewhere in the video "fine print", which I hadn't even viewed prior to the charge, I "agreed" to accept one additional disk per month.
Agreed my ass. Moral of that story (and we can thank the Bush banking gangsters for this) is if you don't know who you are dealing with online, cancel your card after every online transaction. It is your only protection. It turns out even a punk like Ryder has a better attorney than the banks do. (My personal moral to the story is if my money is with Chase, it is no longer safe.)
An interesting note to the Ryder ripoff was my attempt to destroy this guy by posting a scam alert. To my chagrin I had to get in line, and the line was, at that point in time, almost three half-million people long. The guy wasn't lying. He really is making millions online... by stealing! The worst part was his video wasn't worth the substrate it was printed on.
I'm not even going to get into health insurance legitimate thievery except to say the only way for us little guys with small money to survive is to align ourselves with bigger money than the legitimate thieves can muster. Unfortunately, and in spite of all the pitfalls and potential for disaster, the only bigger money in Washington than lobby money is the government's money itself.
We need a government option to keep the health-care legitimate thieves in line.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Obama may tank faster than the Titanic.
He is championing the right causes but…
Put simply, people are not as gullible as they used to be.
On the war front:
The administration is expanding our wars on and off budget,
increasing the use of agencies like Prince's Blackwater militia in areas
like Afghanistan. Blackwater is part of the CIA assassination program
which uses a private militia to fill in where official government action
could be called into question. They operate above the law, courtesy
of policies established in the Bush administration, and they cost
at least 10 times what our own military personnel would cost.
And the deaths of their forces don't enter into "official" statistics.
On the health front:
It is hard for many Americans NOT to hold obese people
or drug addicts or people with unwanted pregnancies responsible
for their condition. While aids has lost steam as a major contributor
to death in our nation, to fight the disease costs a fortune and it is hard
NOT to hold the indiscriminate drug user or sex deviant responsible for
the consequences of their actions. People who live on Big Macs and
dingdongs at the expense of their bodies earn little sympathy from those
who protect their body's health with a proper diet. Unwanted pregnancies
are a result of raging hormones, but are also a result of a disgusting head
in the sand approach to sex education on the part of our government. The
backward facing Bush administration and religious communities can be held
directly responsible for the lack of responsible sex education but we all share
the burden of these irresponsible policies.
We can't trust the government to solve our problems since they are
in many respects enablers. We can't expect "for profit" businesses like
insurance companies not to capitalize on opportunities created by our own
personal lack of self discipline or self-respect.
So our only answer is to rely upon ourselves, our own good judgment,
and the hope that wisdom and experience will win out.
Geez we are in trouble.
Put simply, people are not as gullible as they used to be.
On the war front:
The administration is expanding our wars on and off budget,
increasing the use of agencies like Prince's Blackwater militia in areas
like Afghanistan. Blackwater is part of the CIA assassination program
which uses a private militia to fill in where official government action
could be called into question. They operate above the law, courtesy
of policies established in the Bush administration, and they cost
at least 10 times what our own military personnel would cost.
And the deaths of their forces don't enter into "official" statistics.
On the health front:
It is hard for many Americans NOT to hold obese people
or drug addicts or people with unwanted pregnancies responsible
for their condition. While aids has lost steam as a major contributor
to death in our nation, to fight the disease costs a fortune and it is hard
NOT to hold the indiscriminate drug user or sex deviant responsible for
the consequences of their actions. People who live on Big Macs and
dingdongs at the expense of their bodies earn little sympathy from those
who protect their body's health with a proper diet. Unwanted pregnancies
are a result of raging hormones, but are also a result of a disgusting head
in the sand approach to sex education on the part of our government. The
backward facing Bush administration and religious communities can be held
directly responsible for the lack of responsible sex education but we all share
the burden of these irresponsible policies.
We can't trust the government to solve our problems since they are
in many respects enablers. We can't expect "for profit" businesses like
insurance companies not to capitalize on opportunities created by our own
personal lack of self discipline or self-respect.
So our only answer is to rely upon ourselves, our own good judgment,
and the hope that wisdom and experience will win out.
Geez we are in trouble.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Drug companies promote drug addiction.
I am not dissing drug companies. They do what they do and they do it well. They create a market for drugs and then they sell drugs to that market.
Just good business.
But they have moved from selling drugs we need to creating a need for drugs.
They are better at it than crack salesman. And they're not against the law. They're free to do whatever their lobbyists can convince Congress they should be able to do. If crack salesman had lobbyists crack wouldn't be against the law. In fact, for most of our history cocaine has been legal. Cocaine was the coke in Coca-Cola.
We are now promoting drugs to children to combat "childhood" depression, or blue days. Blue days are a symptom of childhood.
To put children as young as three years old on antidepressants is, IMHO, beyond ridiculous. It is scandalous. Parents too busy to pay attention to their children's needs follow the prescriptions of "doctors". Doctors are the drug companies first line of offense.
Any doctor who treats childhood as a curable disease should be defrocked and run out of town. Our children are being taught pill popping is the answer for everything. They get started on mood elevators or mood levelers like Ritalin and they end up popping Vicodin like candy when they are old enough to convince a doctor they need medicinal help. And the doctors oblige. In Michael Jackson's case, he was obliged to death.
Alcohol is legal and it is perhaps the most destructive drug available.
Marijuana is illegal and it is perhaps the most constructive drug available.
We have no drug sense anymore. Gimme some Ritalin.
Just good business.
But they have moved from selling drugs we need to creating a need for drugs.
They are better at it than crack salesman. And they're not against the law. They're free to do whatever their lobbyists can convince Congress they should be able to do. If crack salesman had lobbyists crack wouldn't be against the law. In fact, for most of our history cocaine has been legal. Cocaine was the coke in Coca-Cola.
We are now promoting drugs to children to combat "childhood" depression, or blue days. Blue days are a symptom of childhood.
To put children as young as three years old on antidepressants is, IMHO, beyond ridiculous. It is scandalous. Parents too busy to pay attention to their children's needs follow the prescriptions of "doctors". Doctors are the drug companies first line of offense.
Any doctor who treats childhood as a curable disease should be defrocked and run out of town. Our children are being taught pill popping is the answer for everything. They get started on mood elevators or mood levelers like Ritalin and they end up popping Vicodin like candy when they are old enough to convince a doctor they need medicinal help. And the doctors oblige. In Michael Jackson's case, he was obliged to death.
Alcohol is legal and it is perhaps the most destructive drug available.
Marijuana is illegal and it is perhaps the most constructive drug available.
We have no drug sense anymore. Gimme some Ritalin.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
As the story unfolds...
It becomes clearer, day by day, that the Bush
administration consisted of some of the biggest
liars of the century. Guys like Rove, Panetta,
Cheney and, hopefully Bush himself, will
eventually fall under the relentless questioning
of the Justice Department and Congress.
These guys lied us into a war, lied about weapons
of mass destruction, lied to the Justice Department
about political reasons behind the firing of numerous
justices affiliated with the opposite party, lied to
convict a governor of the opposite party of crimes he
didn't commit, and just lied, lied, and lied some more.
No justice could be severe enough to compensate
this country for the damage these people have done
to undermine the world's opinion of our national integrity.
We stand disgraced.
Hopefully these people will stand convicted of their
crimes and be stripped of all benefits unfairly
awarded to people of their ilk and be known
as the common criminals they are.
administration consisted of some of the biggest
liars of the century. Guys like Rove, Panetta,
Cheney and, hopefully Bush himself, will
eventually fall under the relentless questioning
of the Justice Department and Congress.
These guys lied us into a war, lied about weapons
of mass destruction, lied to the Justice Department
about political reasons behind the firing of numerous
justices affiliated with the opposite party, lied to
convict a governor of the opposite party of crimes he
didn't commit, and just lied, lied, and lied some more.
No justice could be severe enough to compensate
this country for the damage these people have done
to undermine the world's opinion of our national integrity.
We stand disgraced.
Hopefully these people will stand convicted of their
crimes and be stripped of all benefits unfairly
awarded to people of their ilk and be known
as the common criminals they are.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Should intimidation have its place in our lives?
Has physical intimidation by one human over another ever been a good thing?
People all over the world live in fear. It is an undercurrent in almost every society. The History Channel says islands in the South Pacific
may be the only cultures to survive into the 20th century without the words fear, greed, want and other motivational words so common in our society even in their vocabulary.
Mostly we fear physical intimidation. No one is immune. At some point everyone gets subjected to a bully in life, even if it was only during childhood. Nobody likes to get slapped around, or worse.
Since it is so commonly accepted it must be a good thing in some respects. You think?
Are Bush, Cheney, Woo, etc. at all right? Are torture or its lesser brother physical intimidation ever justified?
People all over the world live in fear. It is an undercurrent in almost every society. The History Channel says islands in the South Pacific
may be the only cultures to survive into the 20th century without the words fear, greed, want and other motivational words so common in our society even in their vocabulary.
Mostly we fear physical intimidation. No one is immune. At some point everyone gets subjected to a bully in life, even if it was only during childhood. Nobody likes to get slapped around, or worse.
Since it is so commonly accepted it must be a good thing in some respects. You think?
Are Bush, Cheney, Woo, etc. at all right? Are torture or its lesser brother physical intimidation ever justified?
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