All your wooden arrows belong to us

I think I remember reading something about this in the Federalist Papers. That, and the thing about rum.

Or maybe it was Schoolhouse Rock.

Long live democracy

SEC extends short-sell ban for financials

Expired

New thread in 3, 2, 1 ...

Can't even contact congress critter as the site much like senate.gov is dysfunctional.

Thus exposing the fundamental flaw in out system. No, means try again and yes means yes forever.

phones on voicemail; only option too-late snail mail.

Injuns!

thhhhhhhwwwack

system shutdown. "Server error" all day

What about apples tax break provisions needed when they are shot off the taxpayers held with arrows by Congress (after they are into their 6th scotch of the day)?

Elevator, elevator, we got the shaft! Go taxpayers!

Well, that makes me feel better about the Senate.
Hank Paulson's Mom

Did you know that you are the mother of Satan. Does that make you Mrs. Satan?

Thead Music

(duh)

The great shaft of 2008.

er, Thread Music, I meant

must be getting tired

Nemo beat me to it.

"
The $700B (or more, considering the revolving feature of the bill), will be GONE by Jan 20, 09, since Paulson can ask for the final $350B next week and the Congress would face a Bush veto of a Congressional rejection of Paulson's request."

That gives Congress political cover to openly reject the last $350B.

How sad, truly this week shows America who controls the reigns of power.

This is the path toward hyperinflation. I would much prefer a depression over that.

Reported from last thread: a flash from the past (CNN, 2000): the New York Debt Clock.

NEW YORK -- The plug was pulled on the National Debt Clock, which has kept track of the federal government's red ink since the electronic billboard near Times Square was erected in 1989.

In its final moments Thursday, the sign read: "Our national debt: $5,676,989,904,887. Your family share: $73,733." [...]

[T]he clock, which calculated the second-by-second increase in the debt based on data from the U.S. Treasury, began doing a strange thing this year.

Rather than cranking higher, it started ticking in the opposite direction, shaving off roughly $30 a second at last count, with a newly frugal Washington to thank.

"When the public debt was rising at the rate it was a decade ago, it was a great idea. But now it just becomes a basis for complacency," said Lou Crandall, who follows Treasury financing at the Wall Street research firm Wrightson & Associates. [...]

Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore has outlined a plan that he says would eliminate the debt by 2012.

Senior economic advisers to Texas Governor and Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush agree with the principle of paying down the debt but have not committed to a specific date for eliminating it.

Sweet Jesus.

Unbelievable.

Maybe we can use the wooden arrows to knit the wool into scarves and sweaters and sell them to the chinese.

Kind of like a Mary Magdalene Circle project on every other Tuesday morning.

Of course, the sweaters and arrows are kind of a neat accessorizing of my leather/collar/Steeltoe boot motif for five years down the road.

This country is so ______________.

(You fill in the blank)

I feel the '70's coming on.

This is the path toward hyperinflation. I would much prefer a depression over that.
Trainwreck | 10.01.08 - 10:56 pm | #

Not inflation... by a loooong shot.

They really need to increase the diameter on those wooden arrows.

The next time you think we're ever going to have a flat tax or any simplified tax code, remember the arrows.

The great thing about a big debt is we own the world. (Remember: You have a small loan the bank owns you. You have a big loan, you own the bank.) I've got dibs on Tahiti.

Troy writes:

Actually, I am not rabidly anti-bailout, since the bulk of taxes are paid by, or will be paid by, considering our now-$10T deficit, wealthy people.

not so

social security taxes are regressive and so is inflation...

middle class will get hit more than benefit..bet on it

Elvis:

Fine, but I'm up for Andorra.

It's got pretty views of um eh well, somewhere.

Well, it's cheaper and kills less than the fiasco in Iraq.

Citizen Scotto - Poor math skills?

There will be $Trillions lost in credit.

This is spit in the ocean.

Very immoral, but spit none-the-less.

Bond Girl --

I have a really bad feeling about the FDIC thing. I think it is really a facility to use the FDIC to back loans as with Wachovia, but on an even larger scale.

I think you are exactly right.

In fact, this part is probably "Plan B: Let the FDIC do it"

Oh, Sheila!

"What is this like the financial Twilight Zone or something?"

No it's the Shaft.

...And now that the Senate has passed an ammended Senate version, it goes back to the House...

Hey Senators: are you feeling just a little bit, you know, dirty?

Senate Motto:
There's nothing that hookers and blow can't clear up.

• this discussion if over. the people lost and the people will pay

God help us one and all

We totally got taken by Paulson. Ask for $700 billion, get an unlimited amount on the side.

Nemo wrote:

does that implicitly give Treasury unlimited authority to raise the cash? Or how does that work?

like this
big hairy guys with knuckles draggin the ground and the letters FDIC approach you from behind, stick a gun in your ribs and shout

"nobody moves...nobody gets hurt"

then the cash is stuffed in bags

Im curious...what has really changed here, aside from the FDIC nonsense which doesnt address the real issue at all, and the arrowheads, which might be slightly more effective, assuming we shot them at the bankers.

Given what they attached here since last Monday, what honestly is any different about the world that would make the house turn around and now decide that this is a good idea, when the public, if anything, is even more against it.

Elvis - this is 46-72 months of feel good; and the realtiy sets in

1890s re-visited.

bloody hech

I sat in a waiting room with little one while middle one had a class.

Listened to the parents talking about the market. Astounding.

Parent #1: "I couldn't bring myself to look at the 401k balance."

parent #2: "I did. I think it'll come back."

Parent #3 (a complete asshat): "Good news for me. The market dropped 770 points and the next morning, the deposit goes into my 401k so it buys before it goes up 400 points. It's great dollar cost averaging. Don't worry about retirement, it'll never happen now. Besides, nobody wants to retire at 67 because then you won't stay sharp. Working keeps you sharp."

And out of curiousity, when I left, I checked out the parking lot. My 8 year old minivan was the worst in the lot, full of SUVs and upscale coupes.

FDIC: Board Meetings
FDIC Board Meetings
Location
Board Room on the sixth floor of the FDIC Building located at 550 - 17th Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.
Date
October 7, 2008

Description
Pursuant to the provisions of the “Government in the Sunshine Act” (5 U.S.C. 552b), notice is hereby given that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s Board of Directors will meet in open session at 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday, October 7, 2008, to consider the following matters:

Summary Agenda: No substantive discussion of the following items is anticipated. These matters will be resolved with a single vote unless a member of the Board of Directors requests that an item be moved to the discussion agenda.

Disposition of minutes of previous Board of Directors’ meetings.

Memorandum and resolution re: Proposed FDIC Strategic Plan, 2008-2013.

Discussion Agenda:

Memorandum and resolution re: Restoration Plan, Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on Risk-Based Assessments,
and Designated Reserve Ratio for 2009.
The meeting will be held in the Board Room on the sixth floor of the FDIC Building located at 550 - 17th Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.

This Board meeting will be Webcast live via the Internet and subsequently made available on-demand approximately one week after the event. Visit FDIC Board Meetings & Advisory Committees to view the event. If you need any technical assistance, please visit our Video Help page at: FDIC: Video Help.

GE and Goldman just raised money at 10% (minimum). Just how do these dingbat senators expect tapped out consumers and borderline insolvent businesses to continue to get credit at historically low rates?

The bailout is a swindle to protect the asset values of the wealthy.

What a sham.

Elvis - this is 46-72 months of feel good; and the realtiy sets in

1890s re-visited.

bloody hech

I'm going to google depression 1890s and see what hits to track your reference.

If you're right, let's all join Buffet on the Gravy Train.

And then jump off, again.

(repost from previous thread)
I like this comrade thing, but better get out before the McCarthyism (whats the new name going to be). Unhappily home is no better (Just a different kind of McCarthyism).

Was standing in line today, to buy Jamican Jerk Chicken in the trenches of downtown NYC. Middle aged African women talking. "I didnt want to write about what I thought was happening".

They know the deal. They've seen it/experienced it before.

Saying back home:
Elephants make love/fight we get stomped.

Why can't any honest media step forward and expose this bailout as the sham it is.

Finance has loaded too much debt on the productive economy. The excessive debts can't be paid as they exceed the underlying productive capacity of our economy.

The bailout perpetuates the excessive debts. This foolishness will hinder our growth in the future.

What a sham.

mp:

That probably would've scared some of this bunch.

Not a crew that I generally try to run with, but the kid benefits from it, so...

Misean wrote

i coulda used a little more cowbell...

--

they were saving 100 basis point in case the senate didnt draw another white line of credit on the mirror

sorry
additional cowbell is lying in wait somewhere into the future

something tells me the younguns aren't all fired up about casting their first vote for the old white guy who tells all those boring war stories...
zuzu's petals | 10.01.08 - 11:15 pm | #

That's happened every year for the past 4 Pres elections. They just never show up to vole. Nothing will change this year either.

why are the futures down 1% after this thing passes? There seems to be some kind of schizo thing going on with how the world is reacting to the inevitable passage of the Shaft Act of 2008.

Dollar cost averaging and diversification the first two D's of the 3D plan, the last D being, take your pick: devastation, depression, divestiture or just plain dumb.

FYI Elvis, Ive been out of the market for quite some time. It's a complete casino now. Im just trying to figure out why we nearly melted down when this didnt pass, then melted back up, and now that we are going to pass this, we are sinking back down again. Is this starting to turn into a recognition that even when we pass this, it isnt going to fix the problem, and it's just going to piss away future growth by handing it's present values to those needy banker types?

I monitor the Las Vegas market closely for the past two years.

Today is the big day. For the first time there is a Y2K+ vintage home (2005, 3BR, 3 Bath) available for under $100,000.

ZipRealty, Inc. - Sign In

Such a home would have been on the market 2 years ago for $325K.

Also, there are now 42 homes below 100K in the areas I monitor. There were none below $250K two years ago.

Based on my stats, prices in Vegas are now at 33% to 40% of what they were 2 years ago.

Thanks a $trillion Hank's Mom! I think you are on to something.

"Why can't any honest media step forward and expose this bailout as the sham it is."

Hell, that's too much thinking. I'd be happy if they just pointed out how much pushback the constituents are mounting. That seems to be uniformly ignored or downplayed.

Uniform, uniform. At least you can count on something.

Deposit Plan Will Cost Banks More - NY Times

"The F.D.I.C. board, for its part, will propose raising premiums for its member banks on Oct. 7 to shore up the insurance fund, and that increase may not be the last, Ms. Bair said. Banks that the F.D.I.C. deems risky will have to pay higher rates."

So the FDIC limit increase to $250k will actually mean that the banking system will need even more cash, and will be less inclined to lend as premiums rise.

And you're telling me that this is a sweetener and that it increases the chance of passage in the house? I just find this whole exercise absurd.

"Troy writes:
I believe spending bills must originate in the house and this one was the first one available."

So that's how it's not against US Constitution. Interesting... so what will the House vote on then?

The total unfunded liability for these two programs--that is, the amount of promised benefits in excess of expected revenue--is $100 trillion. That is trillion with a 'T,' or about 140 Wall Street bailouts.
Forget Iraq Costs

Sounds like a good idea for a gov't sponsored "flu epidemic." In the evilest terms.

Doom, thanks for the role listing.

Seems like opposition only among the wingsters.

Sorry to see Webb's name on the yes side.

Voting no on the bill is a win/win. Defensible to either voter. But, a no vote is much easier than a yes unless you are Hanker Paulson's Mom or you unwaveringly support the president.

Someone on public radio reads CR...there was specific mention today of these wooden arrows; I think it was was Marketplace.

its been said much better than me - all these jokes about shafts and the taxpayer, but really, NOBODY in congress, with the tremendous opposition to the bill, forsaw the redicule they would get??? Why don't they just pin stickers to themselves saying "idiots r us???"

What? There are still toys made in America??????

Seriously. The provisions sound a bit odd. But doing away with what was originally a rediculous tax sounds like a very good thing. Same for the film maker's tax. We're going to be looking at higher unemployment in the next year, we need every incentive to promote business in America.