The public is angry. Why should the public pay for the bankers mistakes. Iceland blogger Halldor Sigurdsson

Who cleans up the mess when ignorant, greedy bankers rack up massive debt then go broke? The people of Iceland made a strong statement Saturday. The sins of big bankers and government regulators shouldn't fall on the citizens. By a 93% to 2% margin, they voted down a proposal requiring them to cover bad debt incurred by one of the nation’s oldest and largest banks. Covering the debt would have cost Iceland's 317,000 citizens around $17,000 each.

Iceland's national referendum was the first opportunity for the people of any nation to vote directly on who pays when the financial elite fail.

As citizens voted, Iceland's Prime Minister was dismissing the importance of the vote and promising to negotiate a payment scheme obligating citizen subsidies for bad debt created by Iceland's beyond-bad bankers.

Icelanders are struggling with a collapsed economy. Businesses are failing at a startling rate, unemployment is soaring, and the prospects for the future are simply not there. Yet the British and Dutch governments demand that their swindled citizens receive compensation from beleaguered Icelanders. Where were the British and Dutch central banks and politicians while their citizens were being fleeced? Aren't the rulers of these countries aware that the failed Icelandic bank was owned by wealth investors, not the citizens?

Michael Collins

"There
are two ideas of government. There are those who believe that if you
just legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, that their prosperity
will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea has been that if
you legislate to make the masses prosperous their prosperity will find
its way up and through every class that rests upon it."  William Jennings Bryan, 1896

Populism is broadly defined
as "political ideas and activities that are intended to represent
ordinary people's needs and wishes." The majority are  deliberately
held down by the financial elite.  Removal of the financial elite is
the vehicle to realize the "people's needs and wishes." (Graph)

The
statement from William Jennings Bryan is pure populism. It becomes less
pure as he proceeded with his speech. He used a metaphor of burning
down the nation's big cities since they were, he claimed, the
stronghold of the financial elite and support for the gold standard for
currency.

In practice, populism almost always entails anger and resentment.

Triumph of the Money Party

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Health Care Reform DOA. Why the Surprise?

They Did what they Always Do

Michael Collins

The Money Party is a small group of enterprises and individuals who have most of the money in this country. They use that money to make more money. Controlling who gets elected to public office is the key to more money for them and less for us September 30, 2007

Dr. Howard Dean, MD, just said pull the plug on the current health care reform effort. The cure is worse than the disease according to the good doctor.

Why the surprise?

Last week the president announced that he's sending 30,000 troops to
Afghanistan without a declaration of war by Congress and without
Afghanistan posing a direct threat to the United States violating both
the United States Constitution and international law at the same time.

The bailed out Wall Street failures are paying back just enough of
their loans to the Treasury Department to allow a new round of huge bonuses.
At the same time, they continue to get tons of cash through the Federal
Reserve. Pay back a few billion, get seven trillion dollars  in credit.
Not a bad deal.

In the Business section of the New York Times on Nov. 10, Edward Hadas, Martin Hutchinson and Anthony Currie analysed the structure of US manufacturing wages and found them to be too low, American Wages Out of Balance, A more accurate title might have been Creative Ideas on How to Screw the American Middle Class

The piece speaks for itself, but first a hat tip to Massaccio on Firedog Lake for the find.

Goodbye, GM
by Michael Moore - June 1, 2009

I write this on the morning of the end of the once-mighty General Motors. By high noon, the President of the United States will have made it official: General Motors, as we know it, has been totaled.

As I sit here in GM's birthplace, Flint, Michigan, I am surrounded by friends and family who are filled with anxiety about what will happen to them and to the town. Forty percent of the homes and businesses in the city have been abandoned. Imagine what it would be like if you lived in a city where almost every other house is empty. What would be your state of mind?

It is with sad irony that the company which invented "planned obsolescence" -- the decision to build cars that would fall apart after a few years so that the customer would then have to buy a new one -- has now made itself obsolete. It refused to build automobiles that the public wanted, cars that got great gas mileage, were as safe as they could be, and were exceedingly comfortable to drive. Oh -- and that wouldn't start falling apart after two years. GM stubbornly fought environmental and safety regulations. Its executives arrogantly ignored the "inferior" Japanese and German cars, cars which would become the gold standard for automobile buyers. And it was hell-bent on punishing its unionized workforce, lopping off thousands of workers for no good reason other than to "improve" the short-term bottom line of the corporation. Beginning in the 1980s, when GM was posting record profits, it moved countless jobs to Mexico and elsewhere, thus destroying the lives of tens of thousands of hard-working Americans. The glaring stupidity of this policy was that, when they eliminated the income of so many middle class families, who did they think was going to be able to afford to buy their cars? History will record this blunder in the same way it now writes about the French building the Maginot Line or how the Romans cluelessly poisoned their own water system with lethal lead in its pipes.

So here we are at the deathbed of General Motors. The company's body not yet cold, and I find myself filled with -- dare I say it -- joy. It is not the joy of revenge against a corporation that ruined my hometown and brought misery, divorce, alcoholism, homelessness, physical and mental debilitation, and drug addiction to the people I grew up with. Nor do I, obviously, claim any joy in knowing that 21,000 more GM workers will be told that they, too, are without a job.

Senate Millionaires Kill Mortgage Assistance for Citizens

The United States Senate took a swipe at the spirit of May Day in a spectacular show of callous indifference when it voted down a bill to provide limited assistance to citizens at risk for losing their homes.  The final vote was 45 in favor, 51 opposed to Senator Richard Durbin's (D-IL) mortgage assistance bill.  The original version of the bill covered some but not all of those requiring assistance.  The final version was even more restricted.  It applied to only homeowners currently in foreclosure as a result of actions prior to the start of 2009.

The denial of assistance to citizens by Senators is ironic given the fact that the origins of the current economic crisis came from Senate legislative actions in 1999 and 2000.

ENABLING ACTS FOR AN ERA OF GREED

The Money Party at Work

Michael Collins

Huge majorities in both houses of Congress voted for legislation to allow the biggest bank heist of all time.   But this time, it was the banks pulling the heist.

Our financial system looks ruined beyond repair.  The credit default swaps crisis is 40 or so times bigger than the real estate meltdown over subprime derivatives.  The top 25 banks in the United States are loaded down with $13 trillion in credit default swaps and the deal is coming unraveled.  If we accept the highly dubious assumption that the debt from the financial meltdown needs to be repaid by us, were looking at $43,000 a citizen right now.  And we're just starting.

It didn't get that way by accident.  There was special legislation that enabled the current crisis.

<Update: Ramara just joined ePm. Originally published 2009-03-18 09:25:35 -0500This is now being posted under her name, but as I originally edited it I am leaving the intro as was. Welcome Ramar! carol>

Ramara will be posting with us directly in future, but this time she asked me to post this for her. Here are two posts which appeared first on Daily Kos (the most recent on Mar. 15, 2005, with a link to the earlier one. With her permission I am posting the first one which is linked in the most recent commentary so that our readers can be fully tuned in.

Health Series:  Fetal Alcohol Syndrome

Saturday my son will turn 24.  He lives in a group setting here in Tucson, receives SSI, and I don't know if I will hear from him so we can do something to celebrate.  He receives case management through the mental health network, and that treatment is court ordered.  The court order expires next month, and I worry that his treatment providers will not seek to have it renewed for another year.  Last time he was not committed, he spent most of his time living on the streets.  Occasionally he was in jail because he missed court dates or violated the restraining order I have.  When he was in jail I breathed easier because he was off the streets.  He needs the structure of the court commitment and the restraining order in order to function at all.

The recent furor over the $165 million in bonuses paid to AIG executives -- allegedly for "retention" even though 11 of 17 recipients are now no longer at the firm -- has resulted in a whirlwind of activity on Capitol Hill and from the White House, resulting in statements and claims that virtually every last dollar of those ill-gotten gains (the bonuses) will be recovered.

According to this piece on Reuters, U.S. to claw back AIG bonuses, lawmakers eye tax,

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration turned up the heat on AIG (AIG.N) on Tuesday over its employee bonuses, saying the embattled insurer will be forced to repay U.S. taxpayers before it gets another bailout of $30 billion.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner laid out the conditions in a letter to congressional leaders as irate lawmakers moved quickly toward legislation that would slap a heavy tax on $165 million in bonuses paid by American International Group Inc.

[...snip...]

Beyond the bonuses, anger flared anew on Sunday when AIG disclosed that Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) and a host of European banks were the major beneficiaries of $93 billion in payments from the insurer -- more than half of the U.S. taxpayer money spent to rescue it.

The ongoing bruhahas -- which I strongly suspect won't be the last ones related to this burgeoning crisis -- are not completely unexpected. For some interesting reading regarding clawbacks and the "polluter pays principal" see the following Journal articles by Michael Thomas:

Use Clawbacks to Fund Wall Street Bailouts, by Michael Thomas
		Attorney Michael Thomas shares his insights from working with dot com and venture capitalists and witnessing first hand how they cleaned up the dot com bubble mess using clawbacks. He has some suggestions for the Wall Street One Percenters.
Read more...
Use Polluter Pays Principle to Fund Bailout, by Michael Thomas
		Michael Thomas recognizes that the Bailout bill that failed to pass in the House on Monday was at best, a compromise. Instead of a 700 billion dollar bailout, Thomas suggests that there is a viable alternative for funding the bailout through the concept of the "Polluter Pays" principle used in Super Fund Cleanup legislation.
Read more...

Check 'em out, and keep an eye open for more "good stuff" as it comes along on both the ePluribus Media Journal and over here, on our Community Site.

This is an Open Thread.

Bumped and promoted. Interesting and worthwhile bit of reflection from the national gadfly.  It was originally posted the other day (I lost the timestamp). -- GH

My 'day job' has me traveling today.  I am in rural MA, but I could be anywhere.  Looking at this hotel and the surrounding...um...civilisation, I am actually nowhere.  That has nothing to do with the city, though.  It has everything to do with the effect this economy is having on the people.

I've traveled for business for a couple decades now and I have this habit of getting up at the crack of dawn, showering, getting dressed and being the first one down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast.  It gives me a little mental edge to know that I'm prepared and ready for the day and I avoid any risk of becoming - that dumbass that rolled into the meeting late with his necktie crooked and his cell phone unmuted.

N'en déplaise à ces fous nommés sages de Grèce, En ce monde il n'est point de parfaite sagesse; Tous les hommes sont fous, et malgré tous leurs soîns Ne diffèrent entre eux que du plus ou du moins. - BOILEAU

Whatever these crazy appointed sages of Greece, In this world there is no perfect wisdom; All men are mad, and despite all their care Differ among themselves as more or less.

Wearing 'almost homeless' sign, ex-executive seeks work

Paul Nawrocki says he's beyond the point where he cares about humiliation.

The Money Party (7):

Bailout Blackmail

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promoted, cho--

OK let's review. Last Spring, Bush said their was no recession. This summer, 'a few bumps in the road' - this fall, "Stormy weather", now, well their might be a depression, but my tax break will fix it.
My opinion of these changes reflect that there is indeed a serious recession and possible depression occurring, but our news media doesn't cover the issues.
At least BBC has covered the newest element of our spiraling economy - Bush's own 'Hoovervilles' are here.

Yesterday I posted about the accumulating research that Prozac and other anti-depressant medications are being prescribed far too widely as a mood enhancers or stress buster perhaps and are hardly more effective than placebos, except for physical and their drain on patients pocketbooks. Now I would like to call attention to similar reports about cholesterol-lowering statins which do not live up to their claims.

Extensive marketing campaigns by pharmaceutical companies directly to consumers has put pressure on doctors to presceribe them, especially when the time spent on patient visits is so limited these day. Going along with the patient is no doubt the easier road for the pressured phycisian, particularly when the drug companies give them personal incentives to prescribe their products. This is compounded by the fact that drug companies routinely are slow to release negative experimental results, and there is weak regulatory control from the FDA under the present Adminstration.

I believe that that the marketing of prescription drugs directly to consumers through paid commercials and other promotionals by the pharmaceutical companies should be banned and there should be oversight of how Big pharm is "lobbying" the medical profession. Financial grants to the medical profession and "non-profit" research should be redirected through government agencies who have oversight powers and can insight upon standards. The high cost of prescription drugs in the United States, is one of the main health-cost inflators and is either passed on directly to the consumer or passed on through in higher insurance rates. That is not the subject matter of the articles I am posting, just my thoughts about why these latest results are so important.

My original post follows following this update.