How about puting money in peoples hands by lowering the interest rate to 4%.

If the banks are nationalized, the government will become the owner of the banks’ good and bad assets and it will have to assume the banks’ contractual obligations towards their creditors, investors, and account holders. In particular, any contractual guarantees given by the banks to the owners of now-worthless risky “innovative” financial vaporware will become de facto contractual obligations of the government towards these owners.

If we ignore small-fry investors, pension funds etc., these owners are greedy trillionaires who bought the financial vapor ware with full knowledge of its risks. If the “financial system” goes bankrupt the trillionaires of the country (and of the world) will lose humongous amounts of money and hence will lose much, if not most, of their economic and political power (but they won’t be reduced to misery, far from it; yes, smaller investors who chose "risk" will also go down in flames and they will deserve it, even if not as badly).

That’s why the trillionaires have mobilized bribed economists, journalists, and politicians and ordered them to call wolf about the horrors of letting the “financial system” fail. “Saving the financial system” is indeed the obfuscating phrase invented by these bribed economists, journalists, and politicians to try saving this neo-feudal class of trillionaires that is “essential“ to what “America stands for” and to “how things should be after we help them out”, as the “radical” Paul Krugman has put it in print repeatedly.

As you may remember, in the middle ages whenever the feudal class created a mess they “rescued themselves” for the “sake of the country” by taxing the hell out of the serfs and the bourgeois, but now with “the triumph of liberty” all of that has changed… yeah right!

Nationalizing the banks will open the gates to all kinds of pompous declarations by congress demoblicans about the government’s solemnial duty to honor the contractual commitments that came with the “act of nationalization” bla bla bla, so they can save their trillionaire friends amidst an apotheosis of self-righteous complacency and flag waving.

Let’s not give them that chance to demonstrate so much friendship. There is no need to save the trillionaires, regardless of how much money they have given to economists, journalists, and politicians and of whether the flow of bribes may stop if the trillionaires fail for good. The banks should be allowed to go through an orderly bankruptcy that preserve their real-economy presence and protect the savings of their non-reckless customers up to say 200k per account and up to say 1 million total net worth per person (IRS-declared), where a sliding scale could be used that reflect how "aggressive" the interest-gathering strategy chosen by each account holder was and the extent to which the account holder chose risky “lucrative’ financial-speculation products over investments in actual production. The necessary paper trail is available…

One should fire everybody in the *failed* banks' upper management (because they failed, duh!) except for whistle blowers and those essential to day-to-day operations, for those managing customer accounts, and for those having expertise in evaluating loans applications by companies that produce actual goods, be they trinkets, essential insurance products, etc.

Social criteria like protecting pensions could also be used by simply dividing the amount invested by each pension by the number of people the pension represents in order to determine what the pension can get in terms of protection and for which individual accounts (since pension-holders who chose especially reckless financial-speculation products should be protected less).

So it’s not time to nationalize the losses of this self-anointed neo-feudal class of trillionaires masters of the universe. Rather, it’s time to shut down their failed banks, to let the greediest investors bite the dust, to claw back any bailout money given so far to them and the banks, and to use this money to jump start the flow of credit into the economy after “nationalizing” (hiring back!) the banks’ existing experts in locating, evaluating, financing, and following-through worthy entrepreneurial ventures in real production and giving them a new institutional backing and responsibilities.

This crisis must teach harsh lessons to the most reckless of investors and bankers, and spare those investors and bankers who tried the hardest to stay away from the greedy madness of the last 30 years, even if only for moral reasons.

Consider, if, with the money we gave them, we bought shares in Citi and B of A, we'd own them outright. I favor buying shares instead of giving them or loaning them money. We should get the same deal as Buffet got on his loan to Goldman.

thong-girl

Of course, the BIG question is whether the Obama administration thinks the citizenry has more power to help or hinder his agenda than the forces that operate against us and that he seems attached to. We've seen how little effect our voices have had with Obama so far on some critical issues, like pleasing the Republicans with the stimulus package by cutting urgently-needed programs, keeping the tax-cuts for the wealthy, and elsewhere his stated intention to not prosecute those in the CIA who tortured and even killed illegally-held prisoners.

I suppose all we can do is try our utmost to get his attention and his respect. We've had plenty of experience with one president ignoring us, and this one is headed down the same road. We'll have to do more than just "speak" with words...

If Jefferson were talking about this with Adams, he might say,

"no matter what we do, we can't get these folks to behave. if we let government handle the money, we'll just get fatter and lose our competitive edge, but if we leave the morons and thieves, who are now in charge of the banks, continue to get all of it, we'll be taken over by Canada."

thong-girl

"Klein isn't ready... to embrace the recent market interventions as a shift in American policy, and instead implored her audience to work for a deepening, rather than deadening, of democracy in these tense economic times.

Towards taking this forward "tj" adds "The problem with this piece -- and the mantra itself -- is that we seldom get to the nitty gritty of how to organize to build power to force the Obamas of the world to do the right thing... Too few people... get involved in the work, blood and pain of organizing. Many are willing to talk and complain about it."

And "jclientelle" (joe) adds "You describe and pinpoint two big problems that lie at the middle of the progressive agenda. First we have to figure out what to do, and with whom, and then we have to disturb our lives to do it... I am willing to work hard, but think we need to try new methods. Is there another more creative, more motivating, less traditional way to get there? "
Is there a more creative way than for two or three prepared to start the journey? Waiting until it looks good and jumping on the band-wagon, including Obama's is another alternative... really?

Unless I missed it, on this CD forum, is there a way for people to meet, to move beyond the complaining and on a one on one basis "to figure out what to do, and with whom"? JT, jclientelle and those prepared to roll up their sleeves, through my previous post, I would like to hear from you.

I'm just going to quote directly from the International Marxist Tendency's recent manifesto on the crisis. They have the right idea:

1. No more bail outs for the rich. No reward for the fat cats! Nationalize the banks and insurance companies under democratic workers’ control and management. Banking decisions must be taken in the interests of the majority of society, not a minority of wealthy drones. Compensation for nationalized banks and other companies must be paid only in cases of proven need to small investors. The nationalisation of the banks is the only way to guarantee the deposits and savings of ordinary people.

2. Democratic control of the banks. The boards of directors should be composed in the following way: one third to be elected by the bank workers, one third to be elected by the trade unions to represent the interests of the working class as a whole, and one third from the government.

3. An immediate end to the exorbitant bonuses, all executive pay should be limited to the wages of a qualified worker. Why should a banker be worth more than a doctor or a dentist? If the bankers are not prepared to serve on reasonable terms, they must be shown the door and replaced by qualified graduates, many of whom are looking for work and willing to serve society.

4. An immediate reduction of interest rates, which should be limited to the necessary costs of banking operations. Cheap credit must be made available for those who need it: small businesses and workers buying homes, not the bankers and capitalists.

5. The right to a home; an immediate end to repossessions, a general reduction of rents and a massive building programme of affordable social housing.

http://www.marxist.com/imt-manifesto-on-crisis-part-one.htm

Klein is typical of the head-in-the-sand Obama worshippers. She still thinks we can "push" Obama to do the right thing.

She and her ilk haven't figured out that Obama is bought and paid for by the corporate plutocracy that runs this country.

We must abolish the government and replace Congress and the White House with representatives from We the People.

frances

Why stop with nationalizing the banks? Nationalize the oil and coal industries as well.

Dear Patriots:

What we are dealing with is the most successful, well-organized and ruthless parasitic "International Crime Syndicate" the world has ever seen. Stealing billions is not enough. Now they are into trillions!

Yesterday's gangsters used guns to steal millions and risked being shot. Today's International Criminal Syndicate wear a suit, tie, and use a pen to steal trillions as they waive their middle finger to working families struggling to survive!

These terrorist maggots have massively infiltrated the world's financial and political institutions. Good luck asking these criminals nicely to "cease and desist”.

Instead, what is desperately needed is a heavily armed special "strike force" (Let's put the Blackwater thugs to good use for a change) coupled with well advertised public tribunals created in order to identify, round up and bring these criminals to justice!

Then, once convicted, let’s reinstitute public hangings. I guarantee you these cowards will think twice before "ripping off" the world's working people to the extent we have seen--ever again!

"When once a republic is corrupted there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption . . . every other correction is either useless or a new evil".

-Thomas Jefferson

Noam Chomsky has said the American people are distinctly to the left of their government. A nation of progressives is trying to drag their sluggish, doped-up government to the left--with an even more Right-slanted media fighitng us all the way. It's frustrating as hell, and our economy might well go down the tubes for a while--but I think we are going lickety-split, for such a big and messed-up country.

Ta'alik
So many beautiful thoughts and ideas. How about using BO's tactic of using the internet to mobilize? Email him and your representatives in government continually, sure you'll automatic responses that tell you nothing, but sheer numbers should tell them something and possibly get a reaction.

I believe it can be fairly stated that a crime wave, the likes of which this world has never seen, reached it's pinnacle during the nightmare years of George W. Bush's rule. But, that is not to say it began there, it did not. It began at the end of WW2, with the onset of the so called "Cold War", which in my mind was the first of the great shocks in what Naomi rightfully calls the Shock Doctrine. It actually goes even further back to the end of the 19th century, when industrialists ruled the world...and still do to this day. But, the greatest of all was the invention of the Cold War...which almost immediately followed the dropping of the two most vicious weapons of war ever devised, the atomic bombs. The creation of those weapons pointed the way to the single greatest industrialist opportunity of the 20th century, nuclear energy of all stripes...be they insane war machines, or "swords into plowshares", one of the constellation of greed fueled stars in the nuclear firmament. These systems, protected from Congressional scrutiny (as if that would have made any difference) by "national security" claims, poured trillions of unaudited dollars into corporate coffers over the first 50 years of the nuclear age.

This is my opinion, based on years of reading. The Cold War was a profit engine the likes of which this country had never seen. By demonizing the Soviet Union, and playing them in ways that furthered the interests of the Cold War Industries, the world was left on the edge of annihilation for decades, decades that saw children like myself (at the time...not now!) ducking and covering in fear under our school desks, facing away from the glass...as if any of this would have helped in the fusion firestorm of say, a 1 megaton device detonated at 5000 feet over a nearby AFB (in this case, the now defunct Norton AFB in San Bernardino, CA, which was a Military Airlift Command Base). The Cold War profiteers terrorized generations of children, and adults, into a submission that allowed the insanity to continue for decades.

There is so much to write about this era, and the following era's that have only made matters worse, but in different ways. Although, the reality is, that vision of thermonuclear death is as valid today as it was during the Cold War. We are in a far worse state now...but to tell the truth, only courage can end this, and only forthright criticism and demanding of rights will ever begin to make any of it right.

Thank you Naomi for continuing to not back down. We all need to follow your example, and NOT LET THE DISASTER CAPITALISTS WIN. The Constitution must win, even if it must be dug out of it's grave to do it. The time is now, not tomorrow, and if each of us can develop critical thinking, and unerring questioning of compromised authority, perhaps there's a slight chance. Only slight though...for we are a long way down a very dark and sorrowful road.

As a reality check, I re-post this e-mail from a sister and brother in-law. The great majority of my nine siblings agree with him. Make no mistake about it - this stunningly ignorant and idiotic statement is the predominant view in the USA.

-USAn

----- Original Message -----
From: Martin Zurflueh
To: Martin Zurflueh
Sent: Friday, February 06, 2009 11:51 AM
Subject: What we SHOULD be spending (borrowing) money) for:

It appears our career politicians in Washington that brought us this economic mess have no inkling to realize that they caused it (Barney Frank, etc.), much less to see how delicately precise and wise our next steps need to be. Instead we are watching the news about a “stimulus” package that is loaded with expensive crap right after we heard that the first round of stimuli 100% wasted a vast 78 billion dollars on thin air! That’s right $78,000,000,000 of your tax money was flushed down the toilet on NOTHING!

Government is our problem. Getting them out of the way is THE solution. We the people hold the drive and tenacity to unleash economic growth in this nation. Yet 53% of Americans just voted out of total ignorance to grow the size of our crushing government by leaps and bounds, forcing more and more of bureaucratic tentacles into our lives, businesses, and paychecks. Government is choking small business.

Merely a matter of weeks ago, we were profoundly aware of what the cost of gasoline was doing to each and every one of us in big ways. And yet with all this rescue spending talk it is hard to find evidence of the fact that energy is perhaps THE biggest threat to our economy besides the federal government itself!

If we are going to sink this nation into more unfathomable debt, the one thing it should be spent on immediately is the one thing that 100% can save us from destruction. All we hear these losers in Washington talk about is so called “green” energy. Can someone show me windmills and solar panels that provide reliable CHEAP energy 24/7/365 for the masses?!?!? Energy must be cheap, especially in times like this when we need to RECOGNIZE our incredibly dire and dangerous predicament. If this nation becomes much weaker due to the monumental stupidity of our leaders, then the entire world will enter into an era of chaos unlike the globe has ever seen. Just because we are the USA does not mean we cannot fail! We’ve been riding the coat tails of success reaped from wisdom used far too long ago.

Should we always be seeking better and cleaner energy sources? Absolutely. But when you are THE largest civil and democratic super power in a world of brutal communist nations getting rich from USA sending them jobs and oil money for decades, you do not toss proven current energy out the window UNTILL you have completely developed a proven alternative that can power the ENTIRE nation reliably. Russia, China, and Venezuela are not going to stop using oil while we cripple ourselves watching the jackasses in Washington chase windmills.

Natural gas is clean and this nation has huge amounts of it. It can power cars and even big rigs. It can heat our homes. Nuclear power is clean and today’s reactor designs have minimal waste as much of it can be recycled back into use. These reactors are also very safe. The designs do not rely on people or computers to shut down in an emergency. A pipe melts and gravity forces water to flood in, shutting down the process.

These two forms of current technology are proven and can power almost all of our nation! We should be pouring every dime we can spare IMMEDIATELY into making this a reality ASAP! This should have been done decades ago!

And I cannot think of anything more powerful for fixing the ill job market than this! Millions of good paying energy and multi-year construction jobs followed by bountiful cheap energy would put trillions of dollars into American’s pockets. Imagine how prices would drop if the cost to drive, ship goods, heat and cool your house, and run a business was dirt cheap! Prices would fall. You’d have much more money left to spend which creates even more jobs, which creates even more jobs, etc. etc. etc.

Now this makes sense and is so blatantly obvious. WHY aren’t we doing it? Because the same people that created the mess are “fixing” it and using the power we foolishly gave them to secure more control over us for as long as they can preserve it.

If you think high gasoline prices were hurtful before, imagine the effect if gasoline is over $6 a gallon when millions of people are out of work. Imagine prices for goods and services skyrocketing when companies are already laying off masses of workers. And most of all, imagine what nations like China, Russia, Venezuela, and Iran could do to us if we are still TOTALLY vulnerable to them due to our foolish reliance on foreign oil.

Make no mistake about it – nuclear power, natural gas, and domestic oil should have been the colossal topic of the day when borrowing more money to spend on “the economy”.

We the People had better wise up because it is almost too late.

How can Klein believe that the election of Obama represents anything even remotely approaching the kind of critical-mass of political consciousness required for a citizenry to organize, challenge, and overthrow an entrenched oligarchy which, to boot, still controls the mainstream mass media?

It took 8yrs of accelerated neofascist outrages, plus the implosion of the middle class's economic security by Bush and The Company Congress, to get the US electorate to become 'brave' enough to choose even a milquetoast reformer like Obama for president.

Obama's real or imagined intentions aside: the newly elected Congress itself remains just as dominated as ever by a combination of oligarchy-worshippers on the right and incompetent, career-corrupt politicians on the left.

Much as I personally agree with the values Klein exhorts all of us to demand, I think she's naive to expect the present US electorate --the very 'sovereigns' who chronically elect their own betraying governments-- to now suddenly focus and rise up in sufficient numbers to demand actual progressive change.

Even for the more politically active, younger voters who helped get Obama elected, a majority of these voters, too, are still deluded by the magical belief that "taking back their government and economy" is what they JUST DID on November 4th; and, by the novice illusion, that progressive advancement simply requires enough citizens to vote for noble slogans enunciated by non-threatening, nice-looking, high-sounding candidates.
For truth's sake if nothing else, let's admit that Obama's issues analyses during his campaign were at best rendered superficially while other, equally dire issues lacked any meaningful campaign analysis altogether.

Since the historically-fatal impediment to all self-governing democratic republics has always been mass-citizen passivity, driven in turn by citizen ignorance and mass-credulity, I must ask of progressive pundits like Naomi Klein:
from what new engine of political consciousness can any rational observer now expect average Americans to demand specific, democratic improvements in the conduct of their government?
How is an alarmed but impotent citizenry's vote for 'change' or 'improvement,' alone, anything more than herd-mentality theatre?

Ms Klein needs to deal with the fact that there is no longer sufficient mass-political citizen consciousness in America, nor the possibility for its potential re-creation thru reform of a corrupt and entrenched mass media, for the average person to cognate demands for a moral society, or a representative government, or a fair economic system.

There is now in America an immoveable, Mammon-manipulated need for oligarchs and serfs alike to feel personal gratification, at best, and a detachment of individual concern for the Commonweath, at worst. The American polity envisioned by its more humanely enlightened framers is now at the brink of failing fully and irretrieivably.

In recent years, too much evidence has accumulated for the more honest of us, to avoid the conclusion that America's moral and epistemological configuations have degenerated to become a virulently anti-human disease -- not necessarily worse than all other nations' similar diseases, but now, finally and fatally undercut in thepromise that our country could be humanity's standard bearer of Do Unto Others decency in all affairs.

I think Naomi Klein, well-intended a progressive spirit that she is, is wrongly telling US citizens to rescue their elected rescuers -- and to that I say Bullshit!

The world and especially its leading narcissist nation, America, equally need an immediate revolution in mass cognition and material behavior; a revolution grounded in human-savvy self-flexibility, reason-based metaphysical hope, uniform political and economic justice, and environmental species-durability.

Advice to Naomi Klein: America as-it-is, is never going to make the needed revolutionary leaps it needs to. So please spare us your pleadings to us, that we in turn endlessly exhort our just-elected reformers to talk and act honestly.

Use your creative brains and public position, instead, to imagine and advocate ways of stimulating and empowering rational peaceful democratic citizen revolution.
Name the entire, rotten structure for what is is.
Understand this: Nothing else stands a chance of making any difference.

Thank you, ATLAW. I appreciated your level head. Change should be gradual - though not so slow and tentative that we do not allow it to happen. Nationalizing banks...? A bit too risky. It could turn out much worse than Wal-Mart's treatment of its employees, and regionalizing grocery stores, because we've invested too much. Pun intended.

Better to concentrate on health care, education and the environment for now.

-

I am grateful to Naomi for her voice to be heard so distinctly out there. However, the financial derivatives death star must be put into receivership. Even Putin alluded to this in his speech at Davos. It is a $700 trillion plus death star not much different than in star wars.

http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/02.09/storm.html

Here are the links to a two-part critical review of Naomi Klein's THE SHOCK DOCTRINE: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. This socialist perspective is from the World Socialist Web Site at http://www.wsws.org.

A superficial analysis of global capitalism—Part 1
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein, Allen Lane: 2007
By Nick Beams
27 February 2008
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/feb2008/kle1-f27.shtml

A superficial analysis of global capitalism—Part 2
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein, Allen Lane: 2007
By Nick Beams
28 February 2008
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/feb2008/kle2-f28.shtml

Damn right, Naomi. Feet to the fire!

Klein I find to be quite a bit less than the liberal Democrat world makes her out to be. Her 'Shock Doctrine' really says nothing more than Big Problems are used as Big Manipulations by the Big Manipulators. That's great, but not exactly an amazing revelation.

There are a lot of academics exhorting us to force Obama some how to be a good boy, but so few Left organizers at the ground level. All these Left academics make for nice reading and what all, but where are they when it comes to organizing much of anything? They hardly even show up at the minute antiwar protests that they leave for others to organize!

I have yet to see anyone actually sit down outside the White House and refuse to budge until Bush--er, Obama--makes good on what the voters elected him to do.

That is what it is going to take. Thousands sitting down outside and not taking no for an answer.

If you are not willing to do that, it is over.

The good, functional solutions to the finance-resource-climate crises sound in content more and more like what used to be called socialism. Maybe that's because "socialism" should be thought of as "societiology" - the teachings of how a global society with no external competitor can work well.

What's been demonized into a negative label called "socialism" is nothing more nor less than "government of the people, by the people, for the people". It's in fact written in stone - at the Gettysburg address.

That's what the the Pennsylvania Avenue address should be about.

And how about some simple confrontational attitudes to public lying, in general and on economics in particular? - That would solve a lot of problems right off.

*

(Deep respect to Naomi Klein for the massive and penetrating work she's doing. She brings kudos to jews, after Israel's evaporated lots of it. Klein is living proof Israel is not representative of jews.)

(Pardon me for being blunt here, and veering ever so slightly off topic (but not really, seeing how Israel manipulates USA and its finances - e.g. by year after year receiving some US $ 7 million a DAY in "military aid" = 2.5 bn in 2008 only ): Damn Israel, for spreading the murderous meme that massacres are ok if only the "media-war" can be won.)

Nationalization is an altogether bad idea. The angry calls for nationalizing the banks are temporary emotional outbursts. It shows that people are mad. But this too shall pass. Bank nationalization will not solve the problem. In the hands of government employees, banks will be over-staffed by cronies of politicians. They will become top heavy and chronic loss-making organizations and will deliver poor service to their depositors and customers alike. A visit to a nationalized bank branch in your neighborhood will be similar to a visit to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Does any one really want that?

We should all calm down and come up with a smarter idea. Identifying the underlying disease is the first step towards its cure. In my view, unfettered free market capitalism, the dominant ideology of the several past decades, has run its course. We are witnessing the demise of the Milton Friedman's Chicago School of Economics. But it does not mean that we must now resort to the communistic ideas that have failed miserably around the world.

There is a middle way that we should consider. Now is the beginning of the era of Private-Public partnership model. With both the Government and the investing public jointly owning the banks and having their representatives sitting on the boards, the interests of both the private investors and the public-at-large will be better looked after. This is the "middle way" solution that is the way of the future.

Once again, after reading more of these articles about NATIONALIZE THE BANKS!!! I have to say this just doesn't make sense. I recently watched a lecture by Naomi Klein and I thought the shock doctrine idea was very interesting. But I would argue that the current "crisis" being used as an excuse for nationalizing the banks would be exactly the sort of shock doctrine she describes. I don't think the federal government and corporatism are distinctly separate or have ever been and using a lot of hype and sensationalism for nationalization would be a federal power grab.

Anyway, I've pointed out before on these articles that the decisions for the bailouts were already made and planned last year. This is just a continuation of the plan. The banks have already failed. They were the big brokerage banks on Wall Street. They are gone now, history, it is over, done... A consumer bank like BOA has customers everywhere using their cards, machines and banks. That is their business and it is doing as good as ever. They need money because the politicians in Washington talked them into buying ML because it would be the patriotic thing to do and part of their plan to save the overall economy. A condition of that agreement was the bailout money this year to help BOA deal with the ML acquisition. There is no need to seize banks, what's done is done. It is one thing to say the government can seize a failed company but in this case the government itself has damaged a perfect good company with their intervention and what right would they have to then seize it?

There's a lot more complicated aspects to it. One aspect that is also not mentioned in a lot of these articles is the root of why the banks are in trouble and our economy. Some would be accounting laws, like mark-to-market. That is a big story this week, where is the outrage on Commondreams over that? Also companies using operating earnings and not including write-offs, as well as the repeal of Glass-Steagall under Clinton. All of these problems are not going away if you nationalize the banks.

And one other major problem is that there would not be subprime loans for asset-backed securities if Americans did not go into debt so much. I'm glad to hear Obama talking some about this. People have to be smarter with their money and their buying. I've heard people on CD complain about BOA because they charge fees for overdrawing your account or because they require a minimum balance that the person didn't realize. I think Americans today have become reckless and thoughtless with their money and banking. The blame lies not just with the banks but with Americans lack of commonsense with their personal finances. There was a time I think when people balanced their checkbooks, read contracts with banks before signing them, and SAVED money, lived within the means that made sense for them. Everyone has contributed to this problem and it is too easy to just blame a couple corporations and destroy them using the fed power to get revenge.

There are some very serious root problems that would not go away after that and the only thing we would have different would be a much more powerful federal government and when the next George Bush comes along is that really what you want? Wait until that guy (or gal) uses the Federal Bank of America to fund a war and pay Blackwater with money from it...

"With a total of more than $7 trillion in estimated corporate handouts so far, the world is witnessing the largest transfer of wealth in history."

Transfer of wealth or HEIST?

I agree Naomi, let's put his feet to the fire and throw some more kindling on it!

He made promises to us. We'll ensure he keeps them. It's called accountability!

Of course, he's a lawyer. They are not known for their integrity. We must be watchful.

The RED FROG GOD will save us all if the worst comes to the worst. Check out:

www.dangerouscreation.com

Don't nationalize. If we nationalize, we are handing then over to politicians and their corporate and financial backers. Give each American equal shares of non-transferable stock in the banks and corporations we buy instead.

duplicate removed

I don't know if I agree.
I don't know if I want a government run by people like Bush and Cheney to have access to my bank.
How about re instituting the Anti Trust Laws that didn't allow any one bank to be national.
E.G. Every State had it's own banks.
So for example...Bank of America used to be only in California not in all the 50 States and certainly not an International Bank.
That seemed to work well for a long time.

Naomi Klein: Insightful, great article!
Magarulian: Great counterpunch!
So many thoughtful, intelligent comments, and I have shared many of the same ideas.
The bottom line for me...I can only start with myself. I can only live now. I can live only if I have hope. I agree with Sunyata and Leea.

And don't forget Congress !

Gandhi said:
"Be the Change you wish to see in the World."

Not: "Sit back and let the Government change things for You"

He was suggesting each individual has the responsibility to live/act in a healthful way that benefits their community and that includes telling elected representatives what you want them to do -and demand legal action or vote them out if they don't. It takes fortitude and perseverance and collective action. The impetus is on each one of us to start with our self and extend support to each other in word and deed for greater change to "trickle-up."

We don't have the luxury of trying things out for another eight years -economic collapse and global catastrophe are looming.

Sunyata Satchitananda
Daka—Sacred Intimate
Certified Tantric Healer ~ Certified Reiki Practitioner
www.mythiclove.net/sunyata

All I can say regarding banks is, my banker told me they didn't have enough money to loan to retirees, people on limited incomes or those trying to save their homes. However, right after the bailout, they proudly announced to their customers that banking just got easier as they had bought another bank, adding thousands of ATMs we could use without penalty!

I mentioned this to another customer of the bank and she said that my bank had also intended to buy one of the biggest casinos in Las Vegas as a good investment, but the legal eagles told them that PR wise this wasn't a smart idea at this time, so they dropped the idea (or shelved it, perhaps?)

To quote another old curmudgeon, "Bah! Humbug!"

Ms. Klein. Awesome insightful lady! She needs to be on O'Bama's cabinet helping keep these financial crooks honest....or in orange suits.

Klein has reiterated the recurring progressive mantra that we have to make Obama (or anybody else for that matter) act right. And she is exactly correct. That message is not particularly new, but she has always put it into clearer context than most.

The problem with this piece -- and the mantra itself -- is that we seldom get to the nitty gritty of how to organize to build power to force the Obamas of the world to do the right thing.

The one example that Klein gives is Argetninian workplace co-ops, which are featured in a movie by her and her husband. That may be a good example, but it fairly specific to a unique situation that few outside those co-op organizers and the movie-makers and viewers are not familiar with.

In the U.S. we have political parties, unions and NGOs that are continuously trying to put together a power agenda and a progressive movement and continually failing to do so. There are many reasons for thi -- one being that they are mostly organized and staffed by middle-class people removed from the consequences of the situation.

At the bottom, organizing power groups -- whatever their form -- requires risk, resources and continuous attention to the project. It is vey much a form of warfare. Usually, but not always, the warfare is non-violent.

It is always costly -- financially, spiritually and physically -- for the people involved.

That's the part of "we have to push the bastards" story that is usually left out. It is a bloody, corrupting project -- literally and figuratively -- to understand and change power and financial relationships.

That is why we are losing the battle for democracy and economic justice. Too few people are unwilling/unable to get involved in the work, blood and pain of organizing. Many are willing to talk and complain about it.

In my town a few days ago, rioting individuals overurned a cars smashed the windows of a PNC bank and a Starbucks. Anarchists in our midst??? Has the revolution finally come???

No, it was just some good old working-class yinzers that were happy about the "Stillers" winning. The media noted the event and dismissed it as harmless fun, and the police are pursuing it as a low-priority incident.

But, a few years ago, a couple fed-up people really did break some windows - a marine recruiting center and a couple Starbucks nearby. Oh! the hue and cry brom the media and business owners to capture the terrorists who did it!

---USAn---

Obama is looking for outside advisors. Naomi and Nader should be first on his list.

It has long been the goal of the GOP to put massive pressures on public "entitlements."

I think we need to be careful how this "push Obama to implement change" argument is stated. Obama isn't caught in between, he isn't a sort of progressive politician that simply needs to be prodded to do the right thing. He is a right wing politician who wants to deceive the left into believing he supports them, and he needs to be challenged the same way we should have been challenging Bush.

While we are in the nationalization mood, we may want to consider nationalization of energy production.

Nationalization only means effective control. We control the energy production, we can direct the production to cleaner and more sustainable processes.

"She said that, "if we want a healthier, more just, and more peaceful world we must go out there and make them do it." And she urged readers, listeners, and interested voters around the world to go about that by demanding "war-levels of funding to fight Global Warming, exploitative health care, inequality, and poverty."

I must say that the above reasoning is the crux of our problem and the real force in the maelstrom. I would never subscribe to the above statement. If we want a healthier, more just, and more peaceful world, we must make ourselves do it, and they will follow.

What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)

Leea

The goal of the Bush administration was to bankrupt the government and the economy, then turn it all over to the Democrats so they would have to take down Social Security and Medicare, and We The People would become nothing more than Serfs to the Filthy Rich.