Where Are Extremist Republicans Now? UPDATE

March 16, 2008

This is an update to a post I placed on March 14, 2008. The “Facts” and “My View” comments are the same from that post. What I have added is some comments from a family member and a famous quote from a well know person.

The Facts

Bear Stearns, one of the biggest brokerage houses in the world, is about to go bankrupt, so the Federal Government is bailing them out by providing money through JPMorgan Chase. Bear Stearns stock has taken a 53% plunge.

My View

How many times have you heard the Bush/Cheney administration and their extremist Republican supporters make a grandstand speech how the federal government should not become involved in the plight of the middle class people when they are about to loose everything they have because of bad decisions? I believe their comment is something close to “everyone has the right to succeed or fail, and it is not the government’s job to decide which”. So where are those ‘holy-than-thou’ idiots now?

Look, we all know what they are and what their agenda is; a double standard has also been present in the Republican Party, but the extremist Republicans have taken it to a new dimension. Everyone knows that, but what is so bothersome is the attitude these extremist have; “what-are-you-going-to-do-about-it’. They do it with a smirk of arrogance on their face, then turn and walk away. We can all thank the often-praised Ronald Reagan for bringing the extremist standard to the Republican Party. He has to be laughing his “arse” off now.

Read an article on the crisis here.

UPDATED Information from a family member:

Well what can be said, Bear Sterns blew up when just two days earlier the CEO was saying everything was fine. But they were saved!  By J.P. Morgan Right? WRONG… They were saved by you and me, the American Taxpayer. The Federal reserve thru the new TSAF used J.P. Morgan as the conduit to pass a $200 BILLION NON-RECOURSE loan to Bear Sterns. Non-Recourse, know what that means? If the borrower goes default there is no-recourse for the lender to get their money back. That’s right… the US taxpayers just gave away $200 billion to a zombie Brokerage/Bank.

My best guess on this is that the $200 Billion will be used to get rid of the very worst of the putrid financial globs of dead meat to make Bear Sterns a little more attractive for an eventual take-over. No one, and I mean No-one, wanted Bear Sterns with their huge liabilities and losses. That $200 Billion that you and I paid just put a new dress on an old hag to try and sell her off. Speculation is that  J.P. Morgan, which was used as the conduit, will be the one taking over Bear Sterns after the worst of the crap is gotten rid of.

AND this is just the beginning! Is it the Feds plan to use Taxpayer dollars to bail out all Wall Street? Socialism for the Rich and connected? Privatize the profits, socialize the losses?  Ohhh the Banks are too big to be allowed to fail? Why? The taxpayer takes it in the shorts in either case and… hey… that’s capitalism at work right? Morgan Stanley is now saying total costs of this whole mess could come to $1 Trillion. Others are saying more. I think its going to be more.. next up to fail – Lehman Brothers ?

As a side note. The Federal reserve is now also taking those poison, weak, near worthless, 25 cent on the dollar value, Mortgage instruments that started this whole mess as collateral for loans to the major banks.  That’s right. The bank gives the tax payer their trash, the tax payer gives the banks new money. If the bank fails, or things get so bad that the only way out the FED can see is to take the rotten meat to itself it will. Than the banks liabilities become the tax-payers liabilities. Ultimately were talking hundreds and hundreds of Billions, minimum, possibly a few Trillion.

A Good read
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/business/16gret.html?hp

Unless there is some improvement in the US and the Global financial situation in the next week or two I expect a large event, either a stock market event, a flight from the Dollar event, or a bankruptcy/insolvency event (most likely from a major bank) maybe more than one, maybe all three, maybe soon…. Maybe this next week?

What we are seeing is the result of 20 years of decreased regulation (there is now virtually no regulation), 20 years of Lassie-faire economic theory, 20 years of “The markets can regulate themselves.  I hope all that is now seen for what it is… a failure.

Bottom line is markets require a “measured” amount of regulation, not too much, but not too little either.

Don’t believe all that “the bottom is in” and “the light is at the end of the tunnel” crap on CNBC and from other TV financial personalities.  Its far from over and will take years to work itself out.  (more on that later)

“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country.

……corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow,

And the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working on the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.” –Abraham Lincoln, November 21, 1864.