Copyright Information
All original content is
copyright © 2008-2010
Michael T. Barrett
All other material and brand or product names are copyright and/or registered trademarks of their respective holders.
E-Mail sent to any michaeltbarrett.com address, or the feedback address listed at the top of the page, may be considered for publication unless the recipient is expressly notified otherwise.
Oct
8
Something is wrong with Barney Frank. I’ve suspected for years now that he’s not all there. I don’t know if it has something to do with serving in the House as long as he has, or not, but he’s just not right.
As the discussion of a possible bailout started circulating Washington, Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), who just happens to be the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, was “instrumental” in working to amend the plan so it had a chance of passing on the Hill.
The question is, why would the man who holds a large part of the responsibility for this mess in the first place be allowed to participate in the negotiations for fixing it? It doesn’t make sense. He spent years blocking all attempts to increase oversight at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He spent years working against the best interest of his constituents, his party, and his country.
Oct
7
Do you remember last week, when the U.S. House of Representatives failed to pass the $700 billion bailout and the Dow Jones dropped 777 points?
A whole lot of people, including President Bush, Treasury Secretary Paulson, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told us we needed a bailout bill and we needed it as soon as possible. They said if the bailout bill did not pass, we would be facing a certain financial downfall in our country.
The Senate added the contents from another bill, to make it more appealing for some members, and they passed the bill by an overwhelming margin on Wednesday. Fast-forward to Friday, when the U.S. House passed the revised measure and we were reassured by President Bush, Treasury Secretary Paulson, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and others who told us they had done the right thing. Some didn’t like it, but it was the right thing to do for our country.
Oct
6
Last week, the sky was falling. Congress had to hurry and send any bailout bill to the President’s desk for his signature. Remember. It was mission critical. Without the bailout bill, the economy (ours and the entire world economy) could come crashing down at any moment.
On Friday, enough members of the House of Representatives capitulated and the bailout bill passed. So everything is okay now, right? We’re good to go, yes?
Here are some of the pertinent ‘breaking news’ items I have received from BreakingNewsOn in the past four hours:
AP: President’s top advisers say financial markets remain “extremely strained.”
about 4 hours agoAP: President’s top economic advisers pledge to work globally on financial crisis.
about 4 hours agoBRAZIL STOCKS PLUNGE MORE THAN 10 PERCENT; US MARKETS OPEN. DETAILS SOON.
about 3 hours agoDOW JONES FALLS NEARLY 300 POINTS IN FIRST MINUTE OF TRADING. DETAILS SOON.
about 3 hours agoAP: Official: Treasury assistant secretary to be tapped as interim head of $700 billion rescue.
about 3 hours agoDOW JONES INDUSTRIALS INDEX FALLS BELOW 10,000 POINTS AS GLOBAL FINANCIAL CRISIS WORSENS DESPITE $700 BILLION BAILOUT. DETAILS SOON.
about 2 hours agoThe Dow Jones has fallen 340 points, putting the index below the 10,000 mark for the first time since 2004; Nasdaq composite plunges 4%.
about 2 hours agoThe Dow Jones Industrials has fallen 360 points as the Federal Reserve announces $150 billion in 85-day credit through auction facilities.
about 2 hours agoDOW JONES INDUSTRIALS FALLS MORE THAN 400 POINTS. DETAILS SOON.
about 2 hours agoEurope’s Stoxx 600 falls more than 7%, its biggest drop since 1987, Bloomberg TV reports.
about 2 hours agoDOW JONES INDUSTRIALS FALLS MORE THAN 500 POINTS. DETAILS SOON.
about 2 hours agoThe Dow Jones Industrials has fallen more than 570 points in another dramatic day on Wall Street; index now below 9,800 total.
about 2 hours agoAP: EU presidency says all 27 members pledge “necessary measures” to ensure financial stability.
about 2 hours agoBRAZILIAN SHARES PLUNGE MORE THAN 15 PERCENT. DETAILS SOON.
about 2 hours agoAs the financial crisis worsens across the world, the Toronto stock market (TSX) has tumbled more than 1,060 points (about 10%).
about 1 hour agoArgentina’s Merval stocks plummet about 10.83% to 1.348,77 points; Dow Jones now down 460+ points.
about 1 hour agoAP: The Icelandic government says it will guarantee all domestic savings deposits.
about 1 hour agoAP: France’s CAC-40 share index down more than 8 percentage points near end of trading.
about 1 hour agoAP: President Bush says “it’s going to take awhile” for the financial rescue plan to work.
29 minutes ago
What? On Friday we were told that a vote for the bailout bill would prevent this very thing from happening? What does he mean “it’s going to take a while?” What does that mean? Does that mean the market is still going to crash? Does that mean that even with the bailout bill nothing is going to change? Wow. Then, after following all of the news today, I read the following article from James Doran in The Observer.
Fears are mounting that many Wall Street banks and financial firms will refuse to participate in the US government’s $700bn bail-out package, leaving global markets and world economies in a perilous state for months to come.
‘There is a growing feeling that banks … might instead decide to tough it out,’ said Thomas Caldwell, chairman and CEO of Caldwell Financial, a $1bn-plus fund manager.
Now the banks are going to tough it out? You mean they didn’t ‘need’ the bailout? Wow. I thought our Senators and Representatives spent the past week telling us how bad the banks needed this to help “main street” America.
Were they wrong?
Oct
3
As you know, on Monday, when the House initially rejected the $700 billion bailout, the stock market tanked 777 points. We were told that Congress had to act to “save” the economy.
With the economy on the brink of meltdown and elections looming, a reluctant Congress abruptly reversed course and approved a historic $700 billion government bailout of the battered financial industry on Friday. President Bush swiftly signed it.
Then what happened? The market dropped 157 points for the day. Oh yeah, I should tell you, the market was up almost 300 points when the House vote took place. So, in essence, the market dropped more than 450 points on the news that a bailout deal had been voted on and was to be signed into law.
Great job. We’re paying a high price for socialism, aren’t we? (And I’m not talking about the $700 billion).
Oct
1
Today the U.S. Senate will debate their version of the $700 billion bailout. They will vote on the measure this evening (around 9pm EST).
What they are not telling you, is the Senate version of the bill is nothing more than the House version (which failed earlier this week) with a lot of added pork (and beans).
The original bill was 3 pages. The House version was 106 pages. The Senate version is now 451 pages. You can download it here.
The Senate version raises the amount of FDIC coverage from $100,000 to $250,000, but that can be done without Congressional action, so it’s not a great selling point if you ask me. Basically, the Senate version does nothing but add special earmarks and incentives for Senators who happen to oppose the measure. Isn’t it nice to know that our Senators can be bought so easily? Isn’t it nice to know that they are willing to sell out the interests of the American people for a little pork on their plate. How disgusting.
If this bill was worth the paper it was printed on, Senators would support it on it’s own merits. There would be no need to add incentives to ‘gain their support’.
Call your Senator and demand that they reject this bill and sit down to work an a bill that will actually help the American people.
Update: It was brought to my attention that the “earmarks” in this bill, when in fact, the Senate was simply combining a bill that had been voted on earlier in the week with major support. Of course, this brings up more issues for me. Senators should not need to “sweeten” the deal for this bill, if it’s truly a good bill for America.
Sep
30
As you know by now, the U.S. House of Representatives voted on the $700 billion bailout yesterday.
In the House, a simple majority rules. Bills can pass by a one vote margin. The Democratic Party has the majority in the House which is comprised of 435 members. 235 are Democrats, 199 are Republican, and 1 seat is vacant. In order to pass this bill today, the Democrats simply needed 218 votes.
Since the vote failed earlier today in a vote of 205-228 (1 member did not vote), I have heard talk from all of the major news outlets that the Republicans were responsible for the failure of this bill.
How did the Republicans kill this bill? That argument just isn’t logical at all.
Sixty-five Republicans voted FOR the measure. Because of those 65 votes, the Democrats simply needed 153 votes from their own party, yet only 140 of them thought voting for the measure was a good idea. Along with 133 Republicans, 95 Democrats voted to kill the bill.
Without any help from Republicans, Nancy Pelosi needed 92.7% of her colleagues to vote for the bill. Because of the number of Republicans that voted for the bill, that number lowered to 65.1%. She ended up with 59.6%. Forty percent of her own caucus voted against her. This vote was an epic fail for the Speaker of the House and it showed the true measure of her leadership.
The American people did not want this bill and I commend the 228 Representatives who stood their ground and actually represented the people.
Visit the U.S. House website to see how your Representative voted.
Sep
29
With Congress and the President ready to toss the pending “Bereft Banker BailOut” at our feet, I thought I would see what Republican House members were saying and doing.
In a closed-door session with House Republicans Sunday evening, Minority Leader John A. Boehner called the $700 billion financial rescue deal a “crap sandwich” — then said he plans to vote for it.
Things are not looking good if the Minority Leader of the House refers to the pending legislation as a “crap sandwich” and then says he’s still willing to vote for it. Shouldn’t our Congressmen be voting for the the right solution rather than the best solution they could come up with before some imaginary deadline?
With support from Cantor and Ryan in hand, party leaders – in conjunction with the White House – were expected to start leaning on other members to back the bill.
When you hear that Republicans need to lean on other Republicans to convince them to back a bill, you know the bill is a bad idea. You lean on people when they want to force them to do something. If it was a good idea, wouldn’t they be backing it willingly?
Minority Whip Roy Blunt (Mo.), who negotiated the terms of the tentative agreement for House Republicans, met Sunday afternoon with a bloc of retiring GOP lawmakers in an effort to secure their support for the plan, members familiar with the discussions said.
During that session, Illinois Rep. Ray LaHood, who has battled with party leaders over the years, told his colleagues that they should support the team because none of them would have to face voters in November.
He told his colleagues to support the bill because they are retiring and wouldn’t have to face voters in November. If that isn’t the clearest signal that this bail out bill is still a bad idea, I don’t know what is.
Sep
24
How much is $700 billion?
The U.S. Congress is considering a ‘bail out’ package today to ‘save our economy’. I’m not so sure passage of this bill would save our economy. In fact, I think passing this bill will only postpone the inevitable and do more irreparable harm to our country.
$700 billion is a lot of money. I don’t think the American people have any idea how much 700 billion is. Let’s think about it for a moment.
More than 22,196 years have passed in 700 billion seconds.
The sun is 93 million miles from Earth. If you traveled to the sun (and back) 3,763 times you still wouldn’t have gone 700 billion miles.
There are 1,300 kernels of corn in one pound. 700 billion kernels of corn would weigh 538,461,538 pounds. How many people could you feed with all that corn?
The U.S. imported 3.66 billion barrels of oil last year. It would take 191 years like last year to import that much oil.
The GMC Sierra Pickup in my driveway was roughly $35,000. I could buy 20 million of them with $700 billion. In fact, if I had $700 billion I could buy 4,375,000 homes like the one I own now.
More importantly, however, is the fact that $700 billion amounts to an additional tax burden of $2,300 for every man, woman, and child in America. Our national debt is already sitting at nearly $10 trillion. Every man, woman, and child in America already owes $32,760 for that debt. Should we really be adding this much to it?
Why should we have to pay out of our pockets because of mis-management at Wall Street investment firms? Why should we have to pay out of our pockets because lenders relaxed the rule and made loans to people who could never repay the loans? Why should we have to pay out of our pockets to bail out those would could not manage their own money?
The ‘bail out’ under consideration allows the government to “buy” the bad debt that is currently on the books of these companies that knew what they were doing. This ‘bail out’ is basically the beginning of the nationalization of our banking industry. It’s just a matter of time. These companies brought this on, and we the American people are going to end up paying for it. They gambled with their books and lost. Now they want us, the American people, to foot the bill for them and Congress is helping them.
Should we ‘bail out’ people when they make a bad business decision? Should we ‘bail out’ people that get in too deep? Should we ‘bail out’ people when their investments tank on them?
Why should we ‘bail out’ some companies and not others? What standards should be used to decide which companies are worthy of a ‘bail out’ and which ones are not?
Why not ‘bail out’ everyone struggling with their mortgage right now? Why not ‘bail out’ everyone having trouble paying for gasoline? Why not ‘bail out’ everyone that owes anyone anything?
Can we really afford all of that? Of course we can’t, and we cannot afford this bail out either.
This ‘bail out’ is a really bad idea. Bad business decisions cause businesses to fail. Bad businesses are meant to fail. They fail for a reason. I think it would be better to let these businesses fail and let the companies that didn’t cook their books or make risky investments rise above it all.
We shouldn’t work to ‘bail out’ companies that never lifted a finger to hold the bucket and bail themselves out first. I want no part of this ‘bail out’ and you shouldn’t either. All you have to do is look at the 700 billion holes in the bucket to understand why.