Nemo wrote:

show me

How you did that?

so does this make 172 or 174 for the cycle?

kleinvieh macht auch mist

» Obama: ‘Break Out Your Pitchforks And Head For The Banks!’ - Big Government
Yeah

PS - We wholeheartedly believe that a reckoning of restructuring needs to occur, but you’ll forgive us our skepticism as to this government’s motives or abilities

Sunflower Bank, N.A. will pay the FDIC a premium of 0.59 percent to assume all of the deposits of Bank of Leeton

'splain pleezze

No monkey over here. Just a few unpaid interns who I can convince to press F5 repeatedly. People are desperate out of school these days.

Just think of all the new stationery they will have to buy.

There should be a policy against getting pigged by banks this small.

fudge_hend wrote:

People are desperate out of school these days.

YouTube - Kramerica - Darren's Internship Journal

EHP:

PAUL VOLCKER: Oh, thats a subject obviously that has occurred to me,
and I think executive compensation or Wall Street compensation, whether
theyre executives or not, has gotten grotesquely large, and its the kind
of a game you keep up with the other people, and thats the way you measure
your success to an extent that I think is harmful.

I would certainly accept what the government talks about and what a

lot of private people are talking about in trying to introduce compensation
practices that only rewards mature, only a period of time, and you wouldnt
get the rewards if the actions youre taking today dont look so good three
or four years out in the future. Thats all useful.

How you get the mindset changed that somehow you`re entitled to $10

million a year, or whatever, almost regardless of what happens? I think
its very difficult. But I dont think you can do it by the government
just announcing...

CHARLIE ROSE: So how can you do it?

PAUL VOLCKER: Well, you know, I`d like that think coming out of this

really difficult recession would create a different mindset. Thats no
specific action, but I would think in effect that business opinion, public
opinion, would have an effect on directors responsibilities.

But I`ve been on boards of directors. They are extremely passive in

this area. Its very hard, they find, to tell their chief executive, you
know, youre not going to be in upper 20 perc ent -- percentile, because
were a good company and we cant stand -- if youre below the midpoint
thats a terrible thing, so that spirals everything up.

But somebody`s got to say, you know, that kind of criteria ought to go

out the window.

Sounds like the words of warning were there- now that wall street started right back to normal, the Obama admin release the Volcker plan to make changes.

in other words, they didn't learn, so eff em.

This is even more illuminating: Charlie Rose - Paul Volcker warns against big banks becoming too big

A lot of banks may be too big, and try to be sure that there are other lively competitors in the market.
Now this gets interesting.

Someday this war's gonna end...

There is nothing in the Charlie Rose interview, or anything else I have read from Volcker, that suggests he would set up a 'national mortgage bank' and totally throw away the existing system. The essence of his reform is about separating the 2 main types of banking, not nationalizing the entire system. It's not even re-instating Glass-Steagal, because things have moved on since then.

scone wrote:

The essence of his reform is about separating the 2 main types of banking,

How? The IB side of the TBTF is broke/insolvent, without access to the Fed window and retail deposits.

Perhaps, then, the bill in congress should have focused on reigning in costs instead of expanding coverage by forcing people to buy expensive health plans from private firms.

I'm really not the right person for you to engage in a health care debate since I already said I'm not particularly opposed to government-run health care plans. Don't take my disparagement of the piece of crap bill they're working on in congress as some sort of blanket condemnation of nationalized health care.

I pay approx. $11,000 a year for 2 people.

somebody has to pay retail

How? The IB side of the TBTF is broke/insolvent, without access to the Fed window and retail deposits. - B

This is what Volcker says:

The kind of reform I've been advocating is acceptance of the fact that the core of the system remains commercial banking. If that breaks down then you have an enormous crisis. And commercial banks have expanded into areas I don't think are so central. I would cut back their so-called capital market activities—hedge funds, equity funds, commodities trading, trading in derivatives. They're all legitimate functions, but they're not so central. And I don't want to protect all those functions. I don't want to protect everybody because when people act like they're protected, you get in trouble. So let's leave the capital markets to their own devices without any expectation of government protection and keep the existing safety net for the commercial banking system.

Here's the link, it's Charlie Rose writing up the interview:

Paul Volcker: The Lion Lets Loose - BusinessWeek

IMO, this is not a man who wants a revolutionary socialized banking system. This is reform of specific problems only.

Dead Shtick wrote:

Do you believe that a national entity, insuring everyone, every condition, and every procedure could do so for less than this?

Assuming that we in the U.S. have similar management capabilities as our developed nation competitors, that should be a breeze:

Health care system - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Australia 3,137
Canada 3,895
France 3,601
Germany 3,588
Japan 2,581
Norway 5,910
Sweden 3,323
UK 2,992
USA 7,290

I have personal experience with a number of these systems in Europe and prefer ANY of them over my present provider.

The argument and discussion is perfect for basic money system status quo...who can run the Fed...an ex-Fed chief or the current Fed chief...no one is saying bring back Greenspan you notice...this is like the argument that Obama was going to be better than Bush...do we pick A or B of a crummy system...oh let's argue...yeah let's pick this one...who already ran the Fed...oh no...let's stay the course...

Right, that's the split:

Investment banks explicitly not TBTF and consumer toxic-waste dumps like FNM/FRE/BAC/C. Most of the dirty 19 could split into two units.

scone wrote:

This is reform of specific problems only.

But reforming those specific problems, will KILL the TBTF 19. How do you implement without murdering the ?

Salina Kansas? Find your own way home...

greenchutes wrote:
Investment banks explicitly not TBTF and consumer toxic-waste dumps like FNM/FRE/BAC/C. Most of the dirty 19 could split into two units.
It could be interesting (in the traffic accident sense) to see how these will reconfigure themselves in anticipation...

greenchutes wrote:

Most of the dirty 19 could split into two units.

But half of those units are broke...

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

It could be interesting (in the traffic accident sense) to see how these will reconfigure
themselves in anticipation...

probably in the same way they reconfigured for the credit card chages.

I have no reason to care about executive compensation. Quite simply; shareholders should crack down on it if they are so upset about it. But people don't really pay attention to whats in their pension fund; what stocks they are buying, etc. etc...

Bogle wrote a great book on this awhile ago... "Death of Capitalism" I want to say it was called? He warned about corporations giving gross compensation, and most of their stocks are in mutual funds who have a back-scratch type of attitude. But most people are still trying to strike rich and retire on stocks... so...

Citizen AllenM wrote:

look at how mad the progressive left is getting

The progressive left got made when Obama starting picking certain people for certain important posts.

That was a really long time ago.

Blackhalo wrote:

But half of those units are broke...

Right, the consumer banking half. Those are the parts the consumer will either "ringfence" or continue to infuse. The profitable halves will be the ones taxpayers don't basically own.

RE wrote:

I don't believe that at all. Doesn't jive with what I've read and experienced. Links, studies?

Can't be bothered-

Cinco-X wrote:

. . . most Republican Congress Critters are far more liberal than the average Republican nationwide.

I don't know whether to laugh or to cry, but it hurts and I think I broke one of the legs on the chair.

scone wrote:

There are some links that suggest it's not so hard.

I've read quite a few proposals, but have yet to see any that do not result in Separating IB from regular banking is a good idea but I suspect it is a lot harder to put that cat back in the bag than letting it out. I thought perhaps, you might have heard of some workable methodology that I had not. To me, Volker is the right guy with good ideas but I think he'll find that TBTF will not give up that easily, and that Glass-Steagall will be what he ends up having to do. But if there is a magic bullet out there I sure would like to know what it is.

Tesla Motors lands $465M loan with feds to build Palo Alto plant - Inside Bay Area

While I would love to have a Tesla roadster I can't imagine a manufacturing plant in Palo Alto is the most cost effective location. I'm guessing 'manufacturing' is loosely defined here and its more of an assembly plant.

Hey, I'm just following the theme. The rest of the civilized world has national health care, tiny cars, and strict gun control. If we're gonna go that way, let's go big.

I've posted this before, but we have about 12 minutes before we will know more about the banking system. Here is a recent article about the Senate's health care bill that discusses many of the different provisions that offer care providers incentives to improve their performance. You could read it in the time remaining before the next update.

How the Senate bill would contain the cost of health care : The New Yorker

If you think the article is optimistic bs, please let me know that, too.

scone wrote:

If the money = speech ruling is not somehow thwarted, the Vampire Squid from Hell and it's brethren can buy as may Congresscritters, Presidents, and laws as required. Not only will they own your sorry ass, they will own the world. Effectively, Lord Blankface will be a heartbeat away from the red button.

I agree with that completely. The competition for lobbying dollars has been intense up till now. From now on it will be open season for corporate dollars as you can't get elected without them. As I said yesterday, we are moving quickly from Oligarchy to Fascism.

Didn't somebody close a joint automobile manufacturing plant over near Fremont?

Baby boomers...this is your destiny...

Smog in the Western U.S.: Blame China? | Greenspace | Los Angeles Times
well duh

scone wrote:
If the squid pays the military and the cops, you are fucked, my friend.
Blackwater -> Xe -> Redwater

If congressmen can sell their vote, why can't I?

Voters' unions?

suicide bombers against banks.

scone:

I disagree. We have very strong institutional, cultural and legal constructs in place to prevent such a thing. The republic has survived far greater crisis than those it faces today. It will survive this, as well. The bankers will go first, and most politicians are smart enough to see this.

... and with the cost of Internet won't it be easy for challengers to mount challenges to the corporate democracy? They still need citizens to vote for them...

CR: "...Small ones count too..."

Words that Madoff's mistress used to comfort him.

JP wrote:

For measurable results in medical care, US is #33 in infant mortality (immediately behind New Caledonia, Cyprus, and Brunei), and we are #38 in life expectancy (immediately behind Cuba, Denmark and Chile.)

I understand that part of the health care problem has been with us a long time and it is still shocking, but I was just trying to illustrate how much money the federal government already pays out for health care and related insurance.

We already have a nationalized health care system - in effect. It's just a really bad one.

Got to go now.

....a heartbeat away from the red button.

Odd, but I seldom hear the button brought into the debate over qualifications for the highest office. I think about it every four years: Do i want so-and-so to have control over two thousand nuclear weapons?

In the last years of the SU, control over the "black suitcase", the chyornii chemodan, was formally had by Gorbachev, but a knowledgeable person told me that the suitcase was connected to nothing. It was the Chief of the General Staff who had operational control.

RE wrote:

Linda McMahon says she will spend $50 million on bid for Connecticut Senate seat - ABC News

I don't suppose she intends to donate it to charity in the name of goodwill

Sheila baby...You're so HAWT! right now!

That McMahon? Damn it. Every time we try to find a bottom...

Nuke wrote:

We have very strong institutional, cultural and legal constructs in place to prevent such a thing.

Sigh. No. Simply asserting something does not make it so. The Supremes have essentially made it possible for anybody to buy as much advertising as they want to get a candidate elected. That's the gamechanger, because it makes possible a total dismantling of the constructs you are referring to.

Many people have been predicting a 'final showdown' between the corporate world and Western governments, such that the struggle would define the 21st century. This is the first shot over the bow. The end result might be something like the world of Aliens, where the corporation is the government, and the military.

sportsfan wrote:

We already have a nationalized health care system - in effect. It's just a really bad one.

Kind of like Backwater. We've outsourced it to a really expensive 3rd party, for politically convenient reasons at the expense of US labor being competitive globally.

3

With all these bank closures, talk of the pizza industrial complex ain't gonna seem so in the near future.

Sigh. No. Simply asserting something does not make it so.

I've got 200+ years of history, not simply conjecture and a movie reference. Time will tell, but I have faith in the system.

pavel:

Who has it now?

I don't know.

scone wrote:

anybody to buy as much advertising as they want to get a candidate elected

That worked so well for Michael Bloomberg, Advertising is a black hole: how much money do you want to lose?

Must have been Misean.

bearly wrote:

Does anyone ever do an audit to measure Sheila's accuracy in these matters ?

Dude! Audits are SO last millennium.

Nuke wrote:

The republic has survived far greater crisis than those it faces today.

Pompey said something similar when Ceasar crossed the Rubicon.

Bubblisimo:

Touche. However, Rome stood for over 4 centuries following Caesar.

Rajesh wrote:

That worked so well for Michael Bloomberg, Advertising is a black hole: how much money do you want to lose?

You don't understand. The blood funnel enables an infinitely deep pocketbook. Sooner or later, the squid owns them all. It might take several election cycles, even a generation, but that's the way it has to end unless it's stopped. Sooner of later, your vote will mean nothing. And that's the only leverage you have if the squid owns your job.

Treason and a bloodless coup is what has occurred.

One per time zone. My "four" is looking good.

(Unless AK or HI count.)

scone wrote:
That's the gamechanger, because it makes possible a total dismantling of the constructs you are referring to.
Yes. We're beyond an epidemic by a virulent bug; it's AIDS or a similar retrovirus that hijacks the immune system. Maybe this is what it takes to break the hold money has over our society - slavery to money is slavery to those who have it.

fudge_hend wrote:

I can't imagine a manufacturing plant in Palo Alto is the most cost effective location.

Close to port, probably could go into an old chip plant rather cheaply; downside is sorta wack location for rail access.

YouTube - Miles Davis Bitches Brew

Creative music of the highest calibre

Shine, Perishing Republic

by Robinson Jeffers

While this America settles in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily thickening to empire,
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops and sighs out, and the mass hardens,

I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make fruit, the fruit rots to make earth.
Out of the mother; and through the spring exultances, ripeness and decadence; and home to the mother.

You making haste haste on decay: not blameworthy; life is good, be it stubbornly long or suddenly
A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less than mountains: shine, perishing republic.

But for my children, I would have them keep their distance from the thickening center; corruption
Never has been compulsory, when the cities lie at the monster’s feet there are left the mountains.

And boys, be in nothing so moderate as in love of man, a clever servant, insufferable master.
There is the trap that catches noblest spirits, that caught—they say—God, when he walked on earth.

Robinson Jeffers, "Shine, Perishing Republic" from The Collected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers, edited by Tim Hunt. Copyright © 1938 by Robinson Jeffers, renewed 1966 and © Jeffers Literary Properties. With the permission of Stanford University Press, Stanford University Press

I don't really know the area, but I hope it works out. I'm a fan of what they are trying to do. I just didn't think it seemed like a very competitive location considering other depressed manufacturing areas.

Cinco-X wrote:

Wasn't "The Body" and independent?

Very much so - and not just in name only.

Cinco-X wrote:

The Eastern Empire lasted until the 1400's

Will our equivalent be Iraq and Afghanistan?

scone wrote:

No wonder the aliens don't show up for first contact.

Aliens got ?

C'mon CR, post the billion bucker at number 3.

C

dryfly wrote:

Very much so - and not just in name only.

I liked him, in Predator, and as your governor. Had the sense to get out too-

The Eastern Empire lasted until the 1400's

Don't forget "3rd Rome", the heir to the Byzantine Empire, Russia.

scone wrote:

If you are young, you can't imagine how stunning that is to my generation.

....what difference does age have to do with THAT? If our current President were competent - now THAT would be "Change You Can Believe In".........

Black Star Ranch wrote:
"Change You Can Believe In"
Shortchange, I can believe in.

scone wrote:

If the major religions went along with that, as "God's will," then it's really game over.

I find it hard to imagine any entity more jealous of power. Still, I guess there was a Church of England... which led almost directly to the American Experiment.

I really didn't think Brown would be able to pull it off.

People are certainly feeling out of sorts about the situation.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

People are certainly feeling out of sorts about the situation.

I know; I certainly didn't get all bent out of shape after the 2006 or 2008 elections. What gives?

Blackhalo wrote:

Competent leaders at that level... It does not usually end well.

True; Nixon was quite competent. Very scary-

Cinco-X wrote:

Nixon was quite competent.

And just a little bit nuts... I like the "Get smaller." quote though. I was thinking more along the lines of Lincoln, JFK, RFK, Regan (before Hinkley).