aka Bob Basso
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Friday, March 20, 2009
1327 Obama - AIG smoke screen
Glenn Beck
I've been telling you for weeks to not be distracted by the "big news of the day" because it's usually just a smokescreen. But on Wednesday, I fell for it myself.
While everyone — including me — was taking sides on the AIG bonuses, something much more important was happening: The Fed announced it will pump a $1 trillion into the system by buying debt from our treasury.
....
That last line of defense was just hung over "patient America" yesterday, but we were all — and that includes me — too focused on AIG to notice.
Here's what this means: We're borrowing money from ourselves to pay for programs we can't pay for.
And that's why the price of gold shot up about 75 bucks in 18 hours. Investors aren't stupid. They know the risks this poses, especially to inflation and our dollar.
video clip
I've been telling you for weeks to not be distracted by the "big news of the day" because it's usually just a smokescreen. But on Wednesday, I fell for it myself.
While everyone — including me — was taking sides on the AIG bonuses, something much more important was happening: The Fed announced it will pump a $1 trillion into the system by buying debt from our treasury.
....
That last line of defense was just hung over "patient America" yesterday, but we were all — and that includes me — too focused on AIG to notice.
Here's what this means: We're borrowing money from ourselves to pay for programs we can't pay for.
And that's why the price of gold shot up about 75 bucks in 18 hours. Investors aren't stupid. They know the risks this poses, especially to inflation and our dollar.
video clip
Thursday, March 19, 2009
1328 Obama - Ayn Rand
Wall Street Journal
by Yaron Brook
Ayn Rand died more than a quarter of a century ago, yet her name appears regularly in discussions of our current economic turmoil. Pundits including Rush Limbaugh and Rick Santelli urge listeners to read her books, and her magnum opus, "Atlas Shrugged," is selling at a faster rate today than at any time during its 51-year history.
There's a reason. In "Atlas," Rand tells the story of the U.S. economy crumbling under the weight of crushing government interventions and regulations. Meanwhile, blaming greed and the free market, Washington responds with more controls that only deepen the crisis. Sound familiar?
The novel's eerily prophetic nature is no coincidence. "If you understand the dominant philosophy of a society," Rand wrote elsewhere in "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal," "you can predict its course." Economic crises and runaway government power grabs don't just happen by themselves; they are the product of the philosophical ideas prevalent in a society -- particularly its dominant moral ideas.
Why do we accept the budget-busting costs of a welfare state? Because it implements the moral ideal of self-sacrifice to the needy. Why do so few protest the endless regulatory burdens placed on businessmen? Because businessmen are pursuing their self-interest, which we have been taught is dangerous and immoral. Why did the government go on a crusade to promote "affordable housing," which meant forcing banks to make loans to unqualified home buyers? Because we believe people need to be homeowners, whether or not they can afford to pay for houses.
The message is always the same: "Selfishness is evil; sacrifice for the needs of others is good." But Rand said this message is wrong -- selfishness, rather than being evil, is a virtue. By this she did not mean exploiting others à la Bernie Madoff. Selfishness -- that is, concern with one's genuine, long-range interest -- she wrote, required a man to think, to produce, and to prosper by trading with others voluntarily to mutual benefit.
Rand also noted that only an ethic of rational selfishness can justify the pursuit of profit that is the basis of capitalism -- and that so long as self-interest is tainted by moral suspicion, the profit motive will continue to take the rap for every imaginable (or imagined) social ill and economic disaster. Just look how our present crisis has been attributed to the free market instead of government intervention -- and how proposed solutions inevitably involve yet more government intervention to rein in the pursuit of self-interest.
Rand offered us a way out -- to fight for a morality of rational self-interest, and for capitalism, the system which is its expression. And that is the source of her relevance today.
Dr. Brook is president and executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute.
by Yaron Brook
Ayn Rand died more than a quarter of a century ago, yet her name appears regularly in discussions of our current economic turmoil. Pundits including Rush Limbaugh and Rick Santelli urge listeners to read her books, and her magnum opus, "Atlas Shrugged," is selling at a faster rate today than at any time during its 51-year history.
There's a reason. In "Atlas," Rand tells the story of the U.S. economy crumbling under the weight of crushing government interventions and regulations. Meanwhile, blaming greed and the free market, Washington responds with more controls that only deepen the crisis. Sound familiar?
The novel's eerily prophetic nature is no coincidence. "If you understand the dominant philosophy of a society," Rand wrote elsewhere in "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal," "you can predict its course." Economic crises and runaway government power grabs don't just happen by themselves; they are the product of the philosophical ideas prevalent in a society -- particularly its dominant moral ideas.
Why do we accept the budget-busting costs of a welfare state? Because it implements the moral ideal of self-sacrifice to the needy. Why do so few protest the endless regulatory burdens placed on businessmen? Because businessmen are pursuing their self-interest, which we have been taught is dangerous and immoral. Why did the government go on a crusade to promote "affordable housing," which meant forcing banks to make loans to unqualified home buyers? Because we believe people need to be homeowners, whether or not they can afford to pay for houses.
The message is always the same: "Selfishness is evil; sacrifice for the needs of others is good." But Rand said this message is wrong -- selfishness, rather than being evil, is a virtue. By this she did not mean exploiting others à la Bernie Madoff. Selfishness -- that is, concern with one's genuine, long-range interest -- she wrote, required a man to think, to produce, and to prosper by trading with others voluntarily to mutual benefit.
Rand also noted that only an ethic of rational selfishness can justify the pursuit of profit that is the basis of capitalism -- and that so long as self-interest is tainted by moral suspicion, the profit motive will continue to take the rap for every imaginable (or imagined) social ill and economic disaster. Just look how our present crisis has been attributed to the free market instead of government intervention -- and how proposed solutions inevitably involve yet more government intervention to rein in the pursuit of self-interest.
Rand offered us a way out -- to fight for a morality of rational self-interest, and for capitalism, the system which is its expression. And that is the source of her relevance today.
Dr. Brook is president and executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
1329 Obama - more chump change
Almost the same chump change as the bonuses, but no outrage. Well, Dodd actually said this: "Naturally, I knew nothing about this, and I’m now seething with anger at the injustice.” SURE!! Chrissy
from ScrappleFace
AIG, which has received $170 billion in taxpayer cash from the federal government since September, gave more than $585,000 to Congressional and presidential candidates last year, favoring Democrats 3-to-1 over Republicans.
President Obama and Sen. Dodd were the two largest recipients of campaign contributions from the beleaguered company, and the only politicians to garner six-figure amounts from AIG in 2008 — $103,100 for Sen. Dodd and $100,332 for presidential candidate Obama.
from ScrappleFace
AIG, which has received $170 billion in taxpayer cash from the federal government since September, gave more than $585,000 to Congressional and presidential candidates last year, favoring Democrats 3-to-1 over Republicans.
President Obama and Sen. Dodd were the two largest recipients of campaign contributions from the beleaguered company, and the only politicians to garner six-figure amounts from AIG in 2008 — $103,100 for Sen. Dodd and $100,332 for presidential candidate Obama.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Monday, March 16, 2009
1331 Obama - panties in a wad
from NY Times
WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials and Republicans alike were nearly universal in condemning the $165 million in bonuses that the American International Group, which has received more than $170 billion in taxpayer bailout money from the Treasury and Federal Reserve, is to pay executives in the business unit that brought the company to the brink of collapse last year.
“There are a lot of terrible things that have happened in the last 18 months, but what’s happened at A.I.G. is the most outrageous,” said Lawrence H. Summers, President Obama’s chief economic adviser
$165M/$170B --> 1/10 of ONE percent - GOOD GRIEF!
WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials and Republicans alike were nearly universal in condemning the $165 million in bonuses that the American International Group, which has received more than $170 billion in taxpayer bailout money from the Treasury and Federal Reserve, is to pay executives in the business unit that brought the company to the brink of collapse last year.
“There are a lot of terrible things that have happened in the last 18 months, but what’s happened at A.I.G. is the most outrageous,” said Lawrence H. Summers, President Obama’s chief economic adviser
$165M/$170B --> 1/10 of ONE percent - GOOD GRIEF!
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