It's almost like they don't want to pass any bill??

like one day on the internets means anything if we cant nudge it in the slightest

Wow - Pelosi has more faith in illiterate Americans than I do.

As an illiterate scanner of CR, I'll do my best to understand the details.

I'm sure CR (and Tanta?) will help us.

"The former Georgia congressman also demanded that the final version of be bill be posted on the Internet for 24 hours before Congress votes on the package."

Website to track individual expeditures, posting emergency legislation on the internet ahead of time. These sound like the actions of an honest democracy.

Bulls make money, Bears make money, and pigs...

... get bailouts.

Sigh.

I sure hope they're looking for cover to kill it, rather than trying to appease everyone by claiming "we let everyone review it and this was the best we could do". Which is BS. The best they could do would be to try to stop pouring money into a broken system, and finally get around to fixing the system.

Reuters reporting that part of the Dermocrats' plan is a brand-new tax on Wall Street!  
[via DRUDGE].

That's called being unclear on the concept! As I said the other day, the Democrats in Congress don't understand what problem they're supposed to be solving, and they can't help reverting to bad habits. It's deeply saddening, to say the least.

Interesting Take on Bailout Talk:

TPMCafe | Talking Points Memo | Is the Crisis Real?

Gist of the article is that all the talk of the bailout is actually causing the credit freeze. Why get raped by guys like Buffet when the Gov't will give you a free ride?

$700B is 1/8 of the non SS debt. That's a big increment in a short time.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi | Contact Us  for Pelosi Contact

My greatest hope is that the Dems would grow a pair and stand with the 150 House Republicans and the few Dems who think this Bill is a total POS that needs to be scrapped in its' entirety.

If that can't happen, I hope they'll use McCains' suggestion of capping CEO pay for those firms that choose to participate at 400K.

Methinks a 400K cap on CEO pay would be enough to discourage any private entity from participating in the rape of the american taxpayer.

This will turn out to be the biggest looting in financial history. Along with all that toxic crap bought up by the US Govt, will be some real gems that will be sold off by Hank for cents on the dollar to his Pig Men mates at auction. I would say hundreds of billions worth.

The Treasury/Govt/Taxpayer will be stiffed with all that toxic crap nobody will ever want.

Nice one Hank.

Don't the brits have an excise tax on deriative transactions. Don't they make billions off The City of London with this tax? Is this what the Dems are calling for?

El Cliffo -- what do you know about this and reasons why it won't work? Seems interesting, tell me why this shouldn't be considered.

Three pages takes McCain a week (and still counting). And we only get one day? Guess that says something about McCain.

"Transparency" best refers to the clothes these clowns are wearing.

The emergency seems to be quite real but I'm happy to say a lot of us are holding hands as we let the ship sink with the financiers lashed to the mast. Can't live forever. Fiat money always dies this way.

I still want to see Paulsonstein genuflecting and begging Pelosi. Now there'a youtube moment to savor.

Why do we not talk about means testing for Social Security and Medicare ?

Won't mean didly squat. It's a done deal.

10 to 1, the last call every congress critter made on Friday before the close was to their broker. You don't think they live on what we pay them, do you?

Angry renters
we are talking about the gov debt not the full external debt

I agree with MP on this one, she is afraid. President Bush also seemed afraid in his address to the nation. John McCain's body language seemed to indicate fear as well during the debate. Barack Obama was inscrutable. I think that the populace is frightened by these events and has converted that fear into anger.

People are looking for someone to blame for all this turmoil and that is not healthy. Let us be careful that no scapegoats are chosen because we are afraid and angry. This crisis is worldwide and although it was made by men, men may not have very good solutions for it. We have to improvise, innovate and muddle through, just as we have always done.

If we are to have no regrets about how we handle this then let us think before we lash out in anger.

These are just my impressions for what's it worth.

tbapple-

Of course they don't want to pass this! Unlike the other WS Bailouts, notably the Fannie/Freddie last month, people _are_watching this time.

The Dems will look really_ BAD_ when they come out full force for this one like they did on HR3221 because PEOPLE ARE WATCHING this time. They NEED the Repubs. on board to share the blame and, so far, the Repubs aren't budging.

CDG writes:
Why do we not talk about means testing for Social Security and Medicare ?

OK, let's talk about that at the same time we talk about opt-out.

So easy to know who to blame.
Bush, Paulson, Republicans and all the other Wall Street pigs.

There will be blood in the streets before this is over

Yes Rubin did nothing to help move this along.

El Cliffo,

The 1%ers broke it.
We have to fix it.
They have to pay for it.
We have to make sure of it.

Just a thought:

If the first "installment" is small -- $250B has been in view --- it may still be possible to implement a more aggressive (as in rooting out the rotten enterprises from the system) after the election.

I'm guessing that we're going to have Democratic control of the presidency and certainly of Congress next year. Perhaps they will resort to GD-style measures.

tax on Wall Street

It's called STET

Short memories, folks!

------ quote follows:

Published on Friday, September 26, 2008 by CommonDreams.org
How Wall Street Can Bail Itself Out Without Destroying The Dollar

by Thom Hartmann

... there's another way: Create an agency to fund the bailout, loan that agency the money from the treasury, and then have that agency tax Wall Street to pay us (the treasury) back.

It's been done before, and has several benefits.

In the United Kingdom, for example, whenever you buy or sell a share of stock (or a credit swap or a derivative, or any other activity of that sort) you pay a small tax on the transaction. We did the same thing here in the US from 1914 to 1966 (and, before that, we did it to finance the Spanish American War and the Civil War).

For us, this Securities Turnover Excise Tax (STET) was a revenue source. For example, if we were to instate a .25 percent STET (tax) on every stock, swap, derivitive, or other trade today, it would produce - in its first year - around $150 billion in revenue. Wall Street would be generating the money to fund its own bailout. (For comparison, as best I can determine, the UK's STET is .25 percent, and Taiwan just dropped theirs from .60 to .30 percent.)

But there are other benefits.

As John Maynard Keynes pointed out in his seminal economics tome, The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money in 1936, such a securities transaction tax would have the effect of "mitigating the predominance of speculation over enterprise."....

Note the similarity to the idea that if we charged five cents per email message, spamming would no longer be profitable.

Speculators equal spammers? Yeaah!

anonymous

-sad but true

But 24 hrs to review will make it better.

I just got an email from my friends telling me if I don't start saying things in a language they all understand, they're just going to delete and ignore every message I send. Great answer - head in the sand. Since when did laziness become such an awesome pasttime?

Hey Brian, thanks for the story.

I'm frugal as all hell but I could't live on the straight salaries that congress is paid.

I want to pay them each 2 mil a year. It would be interesting to watch the transition.

Those new fees will be on all banks and will get passed on to us savers and investors.

Great point!

on the proposal to use a tax as a backup to warrants to make sure the taxpayer doesn't lose money on the bailout, let me remind you of this statement, copied from Bloomberg news:

``We will not agree to a bill that bails out Wall Street at the expense of taxpayers,'' said House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio.

Boehner should have more careful about his duplicitous demands, for he really did not want Wall St to pay. He couldhave accepted thursday's Frank/Dodd bill, but nooooooooo.

Now he has to eat this potential tax on Wall St or eat his words of concern about the tax paying citizenry footing the bill.

I think this is why pelosi wants the bill out in public for a day.

look at the link I posted about the tax proposal. It is not a STET tax to be imposed now. It is a provison for a tax to be applied in 5 years if the CBO says the govt lost money on the bailout. It is conditional, for the future. It is taxpayer protection

They are about to kill medicaid
ju | 09.27.08 - 8:54 pm | #

________________________________-
Yep, this was the GOP's and Grover Norquist's plan all along.

So, Hank agrees to 'warrants' from companies receiving help. Why didn't they go the 'preferred stock' route?

Or maybe we can simply secede from the union, one state at a time.
azurite | 09.27.08 - 9:43 pm | #

Sarah and Todd Palin like that idea.

i just called feinstein's sf office and the answering service seems to have been overwhelmed.

we need to keep the pressure up on this shills for Wall Street

But no one has truly defined the problem which this bill is supposed to solve.
Without the problem clearly defined including the need for such urgency, no one can make an infomed decision.
Thus, the only "vote" I can make is no.

I can accept a crash or bailout with provisions for certain, eventual, taxpayer profit. Let's choose our poison wisely.

This crap has got to stop. The DEMS are defending the rich and the GOP is protecting Main St.? Private equity can pull this load let the free market work!

on the real economy side we've lost Nevada recently

Page not found

next is CA and FL

MP

all due respect . . .

yes, the economy is going down the tubes. nothing will stop that. but how it goes down the tubes matters. I'd rather have Japan post 1990 than U.S. post 1929.

mckinly

Congress might as well tell Bush to be smart as to call a bank holiday. Same effect.

Re:
We will not agree to a bill that bails out Wall Street at the expense of taxpayers,'' said House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio. The lead negotiator for House Republicans, Missouri Representative Roy Blunt, said the caucus isnot moving on any kind of artificial time line.''

I dont trust Mr. Mark Foley/Lover Boehner, I find it impossible to conceive that he has Americas interests at heart! I think he is looking for opportunity to add in something or play ball with his rebublican scum suckers!

On the surface of it all, I am finding it hard to beleive this is going to pass quickly. All you need is a few filibustering senators to grind this to a halt. Surely there are a few in safe states that do not like being rushed to pass this bill.

Hey Everyone-
Don't worry. John McCain's back in town and is available by phone if anyone needs him. We're going to be just fine.
Back in Town, but Not on Capitol Hill - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com

sorry joe schmoe the japanese were a nation of savers......we have no savings in the US. In addition while Japan was failing, the rest of the world was growing.

When we go down, we take everyone with us. We have no choice and Japan in the 1990's is not an option for us

joe shmoe writes:
Why@zirp

so savers and citizens do better when there are no or minimal regulations or taxes on wall st . . . oh, wait, that's how we got in this mess!
joe shmoe | 09.27.08 - 9:54 pm | #

Taxes on WS are counterproductive, regulation and criminal penalties are much more inspiring! Some bankers need to go to jail, maybe a lot of bankers need to go to jail. We don't have debtors prisons but we do send people to prison for fraud. There is a reason for that, as a person can become a debtor for reasons beyond their control (illness, etc). Fraud is always deliberate.

I've had 95 calls in support of it if that gives you any indication."

seb must have voice throwin skilz...and we all thought he was monotone.

Don't know if this has been discussed on another thread.
But just got to read a NYT article (via Yves Smith) on the AIG/GS connection.
Behind Biggest Insurer's Crisis, A Blind Eye to a Web of Risk - NY Times

GS had a 20bil wipeout if AIG went down. Lehman and AIG bailout were both being discussed with a GS dude and others.
Leh was allowed to tank. Hands off AIG then suddenly hands on and bailout

Is Buffett's deal with GS contingent on a bill being passed??

Anybody know for certain?

Peter Jones: 'This has the feeling of potentially a world order-changing event'
Peter Jones: 'This has the feeling of potentially a world order-changing event' - Scotland on Sunday

..But right now, we are on the beach with President Bush and Prime Minister Brown. The sky is darkening as the tsunami rears itself up. And if it hits, there is nowhere to ru

mmckinl-

I totally agree. Throw the insolvent under the bus. Who needs them?

Get back to small community banks that make loans that they themselves are responsible for .

We'll need a good portion of that 700 billion to pay off FDIC. And put some of that $$ towards something of value like....oh, I dunno....infrastructure, new energy solutions.

Something like.....real jobs that have real value? Instead of throwing it at Wall Street Crooks.

Disgusting and waaayyy too transparent as to where these pols sentiments lie.

This is utter bullshit PR by Paulson -- what the fuck is the hurry and why speed up the panic and flame it, fuel it, pump it, hype it -- this smells like Lady MacBeths loin cloth:

One Republican said that the message from government officials is that “the economy is dropping into the john.” He added: “We could see falls of 3,000 or 4,000 points on the Dow [the New York market that currently trades at around 11,000]. That could happen in just a couple of days.
“What’s being put around behind the scenes is that we’re looking at 1930s stuff. We’re looking at catastrophe, huge, amazing catastrophe. Everybody is extraordinarily scared. It’s going to be really, really nasty.”
Bailout failure 'will cause US crash'
- Telegraph

“What’s being put around behind the scenes is that we’re looking at 1930s stuff. We’re looking at catastrophe, huge, amazing catastrophe. Everybody is extraordinarily scared. It’s going to be really, really nasty.”

Does this mean the bloggers have carte blanche?

Are they trying to stampede the herd?

Is it Mad Max time?

I'm freaking out.

The unit’s revenue rose to $3.26 billion in 2005 from $737 million in 1999. Operating income at the unit also grew, rising to 17.5 percent of A.I.G.’s overall operating income in 2005, compared with 4.2 percent in 1999.

Profit margins on the business were enormous. In 2002, operating income was 44 percent of revenue; in 2005, it reached 83 percent.

nuf said

There is still a problem with the plot. Where is the leadership? Why are the Pres. and Treas. Sec. fanning the flames, with comments like, "this sucker could go down." If people believed this they would have sold everything last week, right?

If they have to pass this, I at the very minimum want to see it hashed out over several weeks. There is too much rush,rush and secrecy right now, and too much intrigue with the hand washing Paulson could be seeking with GS.

Let Paulson step down. Take all of October to negotiate. Then vote on it. Many people could grudgingly go along.

I think the opposition we're seeing now is also based on long, left-over resentment from the Patriot act and the Iraq war. The American public has seen enough of what rushing into things brings us.

proshares (i have no position in them)

if theyre synthetically long an equity total return swap, or similar...

you understand counterparty risk...

next, question is what hair is on the swap...if it were me, id have built in language allowing breakage at fair value if my hedging became too expensive

furthermore, we dont know the tenor of those swaps, and when they end, there may not be new counterparties to establish new positions with because no shorts = no easy hedging

(the market maker exceptions dont apply here where the end user is net short)

finally

inv companies required to mark to market to the extent possible

if their counterparty is suffering ratings downgrades or even the equivalent thereof then they have to apply a haircut to their swap side value to reflect credit risk.

"Bitch set me up"

the unthinkable is possibly going to happen: GWB is going to get to go on TV and tell the nation, "I told you so."

In the quarter that ended Sept. 30, 2007, A.I.G. recognized a $352 million unrealized loss on the credit default swap portfolio.

Because the London unit was set up as a bank and not an insurer, and because of the way its derivatives contracts were written, it had to put up collateral to its trading partners when the value of the underlying securities they had insured declined

the funny thing is....Someone, or group is probably winning Huge in this game.... who is it?

Thanks, Nova.

For those interested:

The NC State pension fund...

Figures provided to The Insider by Lang show that, as of June 30, the pension fund held 3,197,515 common and preferred shares of Fannie Mae; 1,105,989 shares of Freddie Mac; 2,860,203 shares of insurer AIG; 1,701,070 shares of investment bank Lehman Brothers; and 3,123,151 shares of savings and loan Washington Mutual

Source: poster Nova

to the extent that the public employees funds are not subject to normal (erisa, public company reporting) actuarial provisions, youre SOL

very serious issues

lots written about it

some cases serious underfunding

i get pitches (im an exotic finance product engineer and securities / tax lawyer) from for example orange county teacher's pension plans for screwball bond issues to shore up the underfunded plans

nitwit ideas like issuing non-tax-exempt muni bonds and making a spread

pigme

Nova

Re: BKK, LOL

must eat dinner before food is only available on breadlines

I'm going to tell you again that public pension plans OFTEN (but not always) are SERIOUSLY UNDERFUNDED.

If someone is a plan participant they may have a right to various reports including actuarial funding assumptions.

A few of em could hire a consulting actuary for a few thousand to give them a reality check.

Not pretty.

I have to admit that the bailout proposal seems to be improving as time passes - I do think the Congress is hearing the public's anger. This is almost a "Horton Hears a Who" moment.... everyone screaming in unison not to stick the tax payers with the debt bomb.

Most of these people want to keep their jobs and perks. I think when their staffers are exhasuted from fielding 98% negative phone calls, they do sweat.

mp,

Cash-flow is of interest to me, i.e, where will it flow and why? How does one even probe where it is now? It (money) seems to be morphing into a new state with new properties...

There is a commercial on LA radio for a sweet seminar teaching us how to get rich buying foreclosures. The dude sounds like the old Don Lapre or Carlton Sheets scammers.

Apparently there has never been a better time to buy real estate in the history of America.

There are probably no seats left though...dude said it was filling up fast.

From POLITICO
"[McCain] told the group that Pelosi had a choice: She could either allow her negotiators to craft a package that Republicans would accept, or she could make it a partisan vote by attaching the plan to a must-pass stop-gap funding bill that lawmakers from both parties would be compelled to support.

If she chose the latter category, McCain told the Republican leaders that they could vote against the hugely unpopular measure and he would help them make that vote a campaign issue on the trail."
-Watch the politicians work-

Pew Study Finds States Face $2.73 Trillion Bill for Retiree Benefits
Pew Study Finds States Face $2.73 Trillion Bill for Retiree Benefits - The Pew Charitable Trusts

States have promised at least $2.73 trillion in pension, health care and other retirement benefits for public employees over the next three decades, according to a report released today by The Pew Charitable Trusts’ Center on the States.

Pew found that states’ long-term price tag for retiree health care and other non-pension benefits is about $381 billion for state employees alone (excluding obligations for teachers and other local government workers). About 97 percentof that 30-year obligation was unfunded at the end of FY 2006.

mp-

That's one of the things that MOST pi$$e$ me off about this: It won't help. It's too late way, way too late. Like YEARS too late.

So save the $$ and do something useful with it that WILL help. Like FDIC and jobs.

Apparently, the problem we've got isthat these politicians do not want to help us, their real constituents are WS and they will throw every last one of us under the bus in one futile attempt after another to save WS.

she has the votes if she want to pass it, coward move, she's not doing it because she wants a more open, transparent process, it's a cheap political stunt. gimme a break, you are majority madame speaker, act like it. loser.

"Gordon Brown warns short-selling ban may become permanent"

That is the quickest way to hand dubai or any other financial center with proper markets london's crown.

MoT: 20k? I must admit I might bite on something like that.

I'll gladly take my share of the 700 billion in cash.
Small bills please.

Re: Cox wants to relax mark-2-market

Way too many conflicts of interest and on-going collusion. This all helps Warren, but... fraud is fraud and that doesnt re-build confidence in a broken system!

I don't know about Cali, CSC, but they announced today that WA State pensions had lost 47 million with the WAMU failure, after a 17 million dollar loss last week with AIG.
If it's CALPERS I would go to their website and see the latest news releases.