Gee Medea, no thoughts about the Obama gang and how you feel they are doing? What exactly are our options though in this de-frauding of the people? Pretty much everything Obama promised he has backtracked on and I don't think anyone thinks he will do anything different than the previous criminal administration?

cheers,

thong-girl

The bonuses are a canary in a coal mine. The real problem is that when a Bush is replaced by an Obama, Wall Street is still apparently in charge. The bailout proposed by Obama (yes, the buck stops with him) is a continuation of the largest theft in history.

In 2000, we saw the dangers of third parties. Today, we are seeing the dangers of the duopoly. Rage is fine, but nothing will happen until... until, what?

Yes, rage is fine, but nothing will change until people like Medea are bypassed and alternative (to the Democrats) organization is actually built. One rather thinks that Hell would freeze over before Medea would lead us in that direction.

odoco
Quite simply - what's the plan?
The rising anger on the left, the general awakening to the economic morass, is genuine. But what is the plan?

Thong Girl 11:02 is correct - nothing will change until we begin to formally prosecute those who have manipulated, prostituted, polluted and destroyed the economic system. They nailed Madoff because he was 'outside' of the system - an easy target, but they haven't even mentioned holding anyone legally accountable for grand theft nation who reside within the contaminated halls of Wall Street.

The corporate structure, the military industrial complex, American imperialism, all combined - now controls our destiny as a people, as a nation, as a world.

So - what is the plan????

Lawrence Summers, one of the gangsters that engineered the deregulation that created this hellhole, claims the AIG bonuses are protected by legal contracts the government can't possibly break even though the suffering taxpayers are cutting the checks for the crooks that ran the company into the ground.
Meanwhile, ex Goldman-Sachs CEO, NJ Governor Corzine, who bought his own election, convened a secret meeting of his own appointees, to break the Union contract:

//www.philly.com/inquirer/business/20090326_N_J__leaders_get_more_powers_to_furlough_workers.html

Wonder if this is happening everywhere beneath the radar?

Keep up the fight, MB, but let's not ignore the facts on the ground. For all your hard work and dedication... we're still occupying Iraq with no end in sight; we're sending more and more soldiers to Afghanistan to die and/or be maimed for nothing; the world's greatest thieves continue to be rewarded; and the "angry public" still refuses to take any action besides upping the "Idol" ratings and helping Wal-Mart and McD's earn ever more profits.

The corrupt powers-that-be have no reason to fear "us," and, hence, have no reason to change their criminal enterprise known as the system...

My rage overrunneth today at hearing Hillary’s comments on the War on Drugs that has escalated into a war on America’s citizens and has now overflowed into Mexico in so extreme a fashion that even the media is taking notice. Of course what is happening in Mexico is no different than what happens to any nation that the US has bound into a political straightjacket to provide resources and markets for the US; what is different about Mexico is that the product in question is a contraband – a product that was recommended for decriminalization 40 years ago by the Schaefer Commission – yet here are the ostensible “liberals” of today spouting the same blinkered intransigence as conservatives of yore.
You gotta fight
For your right
To PA-ARTY!

I believe there is a Consensus that the two Supreme Court decisions Corporation = Person and Money= Speech have allowed the present corporate rule.

There seems to be no chance this Supreme Court will overturn those rulings. Twenty years in the future is a possibilty of a different Supreme Court.

Without money both Corporations and Governments cease to exist, both must be starved as much as possible.

"But these solutions alone will not fix the underlying problems with the corporate system that forced us into this mess. We need to create a new legal and regulatory framework that aligns corporations with social needs..."

In other words, create a new template, one that declares the public interest to be more important than the demands of private interests.

The same template Ronald Reagan and the Republicans destroyed 30 years ago for which both parties now hold disdain.

if everything stopped tomorrow, the school\job\paycheck\bills cycle, the vulnerabilities of the individual would quickly return to front-and-center: shelter from the elements, air to breathe, water to drink and food to eat...shelter and food are the keys...each involved, once again, in the sharing of minimal shelter and the provisioning of local, communal food...planting, gathering, rationing...we were not born to work, we were born to live...

the problem we're facing isn't a dying economy, but a dying planet due to our economy...

for whatever it's worth, Obama is having his virtual town hall meeting today. Their other big press release today was Tim Geithner talking (vaguely) about new financial system regulations. Go to www.WhiteHouse.gov and tell them to go big or stay home. End the tax dodges, including expensing stock options for CEOs, etc., regulate hedge funds, end credit default swaps outright, re-establish Glass-Steagall or something a lot like it, restrict executive pay. In addition, include mortgage relief in any new proposed stimulus or bank bailout. This means if you are a bank getting taxpayer dollars you have to do all of the above, plus go back and renegotiate ALL subprime mortgages down to more favorable terms. The banks and the investors would have to swallow the losses, however, no bank wants a foreclosed house on the books. A homeowner in the home with a 30 yr fixed is always better for the bank (and the homeowner) even if fees are waived and interest payments are lower. Even if down payments are lower due to this special circumstance. It's better for everybody.

Of course all this would require Obambi to grow a pair...Email him anyway. At least you can say you tried.

[ _____ The psychopaths in the pathocracy ARE behind it all, _____ ]

These fiends are beginning indirectly to show themselves, as times devolve into worse impacts that majority of those asleep begin to awaken. We will know them by their [ bitter ] fruit, as we know tress by their seed.

Regardless if you do believe this FINANCIAL CRISIS was planned ( and far from accidental ) -- the fact is that the elitist people in power are clearly still in power -- and they are the TEAM of arsonists who lit the Global HOUSE ON FIRE

Please see my postings about the absolute dissolute depth of depravity unplumbed ever before in human history :

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/03/26
TIME-STAMPs : npwr.luv March 26th, 2009 2:50 pm and npwr.luv March 26th, 2009 2:48 pm
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/23-0
TIME-STAMPs : npwr.luv March 23rd, 2009 12:27 pm and npwr.luv March 24th, 2009 11:42 am
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/22-6
TIME-STAMP :npwr.luv March 22nd, 2009 4:49 pm and

"In short, during good times, moral, intellectual and personality values devolve to the point where a society is ripe for manipulation by snake-charmers and con-men of Rasputin-like charisma. Individuals become emotionally volatile, egotistical, and intolerant of other cultures. The resulting suffering necessitate great mental and physical strength to fight for existence and human reason. Slowly, what has been lost is relearned. Difficult times give rise to the values necessary to conquer evil and produce better times."

The most important job of politicians, like ◎bysmal and Hillary -- IS just smoke and mirrors to evade detection of the real culprits behind it all.

Namaste

Media, some of us have raged all of our adult lives although I have yet to rage in pink. This shyt takes forever. The tragic comedy that is unfolding in Washington and Wall Street will be the last hurrah! My voice will be among the raging in an effort to save as many as possible. At that point I will stop raging and turn completely to Spirit and accept the inevitable.

The public is barking at the wrong tree. Executive pay, bonuses, lack of regulations, lack of accountability, etc. are merely symptoms of the disease. The root cause is the Congress being run by the highest bidder. Until elections are publicly funded, and corporate donations are made illegal, nothing will change.

"In fact, the one silver lining of this economic debacle is an opening for instituting populist policies that could rein in some of these corporate excesses."

Reign in the elites by 10% and you get back 10% of your surplus that they steal from you (and your progeny). Umm, let my dog do the math: Reign in the elites by 100% and you get back 100% of your surplus. More doggy treats for all!

Dark Musings That Won't Go Away

The US, in growing numbers, is more and more approaching the exact same point that Afro-Americans were reaching circa 1963. By then there had been 5-6 years of dilligent non-violent protests over the inequity of American life for those protesting.

The ethical and moral courage of the protesters were both noted and admired BUT NOBODY FROM JFK OR THE CONGRESS AND SENATE, TO THE NON AFRO-AMERICAN AVERAGE MAN ON THE STREET SO MUCH AS LIFTED A FINGER (UNLESS IT WAS A MIDDLE ONE) IN RESPONSE TO THE SITUATION.

Back then thoughtful and concerned Afro-American leadership warned that things were getting ready to explode and they too were patronized, marginalized, and pretty much ignored. Nobody could have predicted that the explosion would start in Watts, then move to the North and Mid-West of the country (Gary, Detroit, Newark) but it did.

Back then there was a distracting war on the other side of the earth too, and the elites (who never cared much about it before when they were doing the inflicting) suddenly got very concerned over violence, law and order, and civil unrest.

Today, those sensitive and activist souls in IVAW, Code PInk, The Granny Brigade, and others are giving us similar warnings concerning issues from the wars of aggression, to corporate and elitist greed, to the lack of responsible government regulation, to the gloom of desperation and despair hanging over the the growing millions of newly homeless, jobless, physically and emotionally disabled veterans, and tent city dwellers.

As with Afro-Americans in '63, these dissenters to the status-quo have a President, Congress, and Senate who tell them "We hear you loud and clear", "We're mad too", and "we gotta do something about this" while doing absolutely nothing of real substance to address the ills that ail the nation.

So, when and where will the explosions that start to tear away at what is left of the fabric of society occur this time? Will desperate homeless people being hassled once too often by police finally go beserk and riot?

Will angry and desperate disabled vets finally get tired of waiting for needed care and take up weapons and use their training to "rage against the war-machine"? How about all the newly arrived immigrant labor for whom there is no work at any price?--they have nothing to go home to and nothing for which to look forward.

Which gated communities of privilige will be the first to be lit up by angry torch-carrying mobs? Sanibel or Hilton Head Islands? Cape Cod or the Hamptons? How about Greenwich Connecticut or Scarsdale NY? Which fancy-schmantzy corporate offices will catch the first RPG (rocket propelled grenade) attack? AIG, Citigroup, the NY Stock Exchange, Bank of America, or maybe Wells Fargo?

Medea and those like her are correct and increasingly they have reached the end of their collective relevence. There is too much dry tinder of rage out there just waiting for the next spark of elitist indifference to begin a holocaust-like conflagration. The elites will then respond with forceful measures which will have the same effect as pouring gasoline or some other accelerant on a flaming heap.

We all are in serious, serious trouble and too few seem to comprehend the desperation of our situation.

Poet

Unfortunately, much of this rage will be directed against the Democrats--and rightly so. The voters wanted Hillary, and the Democrats gave them Obama.

Never set a man to do a woman's work. ;)

Magic Book:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diSdwgtYBRc

Whew, there's more to be raging about: During O'Bama's town hall meeting Thursday he had to belt out some more of his famous O'Bama-Lies:

"Obama says the ideal path to universal health care is to build on the current system"

Build on a failed system?

"rather than scrap what has existed for generations."

We scrap other obsolete stuff, and plenty of unobsolete stuff, so that's not an argument.

"Asked why the U.S. couldn't opt for a European system, Obama said the United States has a legacy of employer-based plans that have filled the needs of a majority of Americans."

At double the real cost? Excellent, O'Bama!! USans willingness to pay double is a problem in itself. It's called: "what's the matter with Kansas, and the 49 others too?"

"He said the country has a set of institutions that aren't easily transformed."

Cutting the cost of healthcare in half will be a welcome institutional transformation that we've been waiting a couple decades for. Meanwhile, becoming a fascist police state perpetrating war without end and effective enslavement of the people to elites is a very traumatic, unwelcome institutional transformation that O'Bama's sponsors are jamming down the people's throats.

"He said the biggest driver of the nation's long-term deficit is Medicare and Medicaid."

Medicare/Medicaid's contributions to the federal budget deficit are the result of profiteering by the private suppliers. The programs actually have an extremely low administrative overhead compared with private insurance, which has cost inflation well beyond Medicare/Medicaid's. We demand Medicare for all, then we're going after the profiteers.

So there you have it. O'Bama is there to steal your cake and throw crumbs back at you. He can't reform finance, he can't reform the military, he can't reform energy and he can't reform healthcare. Is it time for the revolution yet?

The hundreds of billions in bailout money that have been given and will continue being given by the Fed and by the federal government to the banks “to save the financial system” are a de facto immense transfer of wealth from the general population to the richest 1%, 0.1%, etc, a transfer that intends to keep this upper crust as rich as it was before the financial bubble bursted and vaporized the upper crust “shrewd” investments in “innovative financial instruments” (and yes, what middlemen like “greedy bankers” and “Wall Street” do with some crumbles of the bailout money should be ignored since many Americans have mixed feelings about “the financial system” because their pensions and life-time savings could come back to life if the stock market recovered).

This immense transfer of wealth to resuscitate the upper crust that was started by Bush Jr and that Obama wants to continue, is especially pernicious as the upper crust is being given hard cash taken from tax payers who have just seen their savings and pensions shrink by about 50%. This means that upper-crust owners of financial vaporware are in the process of exchanging their worthless toxic assets at face value for hard cash taxed directly from those whose savings have been depreciated by the crisis created by the financial gamblings… of the vaporware owners!

Aside of the immense injustice and irony of this, the main macroeconomic consequence of these bailouts then is that the upper crust will emerge from this crisis even stronger relative to everybody else, by taking hard cash from everybody else.

However, if the citizenry is thoroughly informed about and become loudly outraged by this massive and immensely unjust transfer of wealth towards the richest Americans (which follows with a vengeance that started by Reagan in the 1980s), Obama will have no choice but to propose remedies, e.g., propose to tax back much if not all of the transferred money after the stock market stabilizes and the toxic assets' real value becomes clear; and he could even be pushed to claim an sizeable portion of the “regenerated wealth” for the taxpayers as “interest” earned by the “invested” taxpayer money.

The left must remind Obama vociferously that during his campaign he actually promised to redistribute wealth *in the other direction* and it should inform relentlessly the general population and in very clear and concrete terms about how the taxpayer money that is being used “to save the financial system” is, intentionally or not, “saving” from ruin America’s upper crust.

It is fine if Obama does not want to risk the eventual chaos that could follow a massive wave of bank bankruptcies, and it is also fine if he feels he cannot risk the “societal disorientation” that could arise if the upper crust of billionaires were to lose 95% of their fortunes if most banks went bankrupt or are even nationalized and the upper crust's toxic assets became terminally worthless.

What is not fine is that the left does not confront Obama publicly with the concrete consequences for the nation’s income distribution of his plans to “save Wall Street and the bankers”.

And it is self-defeating for the left to continue distracting the citizenry with denunciations of “the excesses of Wall Street and the greedy bankers” without stressing much more that the real scandal is that we are all being taxed in order to pay for the resurgence of America’s self-anointed neo-feudal upper crust that is now staring at trillions in worthless toxic assets which nobody wants.

Summarizing, the left must inform and educate the citizenry i) that the bailouts are an immense tax levied on all Americans to bring back from ruin an upper crust that is now de facto broke; ii) that the government should demand “investor rights” for every bank bailout that relies on taxpayer money; and iii) that any individual investor who will be saved through the deployment of taxpayer money should be compelled to “give back” most of what he/she will manage to recover or "earn" when the stock market recovers (i.e., that he/she should be taxed to repay with interest the “bailout help” he/she got from the taxpayers).

keepitsimple
erplus -
"Obama will have no choice but to propose remedies" for the taxpayers??

From the time he announced his cabinet/staff appointees, it was abundantly clear that Obama is owned, and controlled, by the Banksters & MIC. He has been consistently proposing THEIR remedies with an A+ on THEIR score card. How could you possibly expect a different outcome?