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Intro: "Oh, wow - another bank bailout, this time in Spain. Who could have predicted that? ... unemployment soars, banks get into trouble, governments rush to the rescue - but somehow it's only the banks that get rescued, not the unemployed."
Portrait, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, 06/15/09. (photo: Fred R. Conrad/NYT)
Another Bank Bailout
11 June 12
h, wow - another bank bailout, this time in Spain. Who could have predicted that?
The answer, of course, is everybody. In fact, the whole story is starting to feel like a comedy routine: yet again the economy slides, unemployment soars, banks get into trouble, governments rush to the rescue - but somehow it's only the banks that get rescued, not the unemployed.
Just to be clear, Spanish banks did indeed need a bailout. Spain was clearly on the edge of a "doom loop" - a well-understood process in which concern about banks' solvency forces the banks to sell assets, which drives down the prices of those assets, which makes people even more worried about solvency. Governments can stop such doom loops with an infusion of cash; in this case, however, the Spanish government's own solvency is in question, so the cash had to come from a broader European fund.
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And the difference is? ..
Trivial at best.
It is being used as an excuse to cut the social safety net, reduce wages, deregulate and even privatise.
Straight out of the Shock Doctrine.
The question is, will Europe's people wake up to this or will they scapegoat minorities and people who are different to, and weaker than, them?
Yes - it is called fascism.
Lots of uninformed people will call it capitalism - but that is false. In capitalism they meet Larry the liquidator - not Bail out Billy with the tax payers check book.
How come the Wealthiest per capita and among the Largest Middle Class per capita Countries in the Democratic World are Northern European so-called 'Welfare State'... 'High Tax'... 'Universal Healthcare'... 'Wealth ReDistribution' ... 'Happiest Population' Countries..?
American Conservatives who spout off about how 'Wealth ReDistribution is Socialism' are doing just that, spouting off into the open air with hot air.
ALL Taxation is a form of Wealth ReDistribution EVERYWHERE in the world.
In America, how it went helped us prosper greatly as a whole from the 1940's until the 1990's when, thanks to the Reagan Conservatives, it began to turn around into Wealth ReDistribution favoring the Wealthy Corporate Class ever since.
We are where we are now because of that turnaround in 'Wealth ReDistribution' from most Americans to fewer and fewer Americans through the Conservative Flim Flam known as 'Smaller Government.'
For instance, BuSh ReDistributed much of America's Wealth into Iraq and Afghanistan through Haliburton and KBR, etc. while preaching Smaller Government. Complete POLICY FAILURES just to mention two.
Maybe I could agree with the whole Conservative 'Socialism' hue and cry if they would stop forgetting to put the 'Corporate' adjective in front of it.., i.e. Corporate Socialism (freebies) and others like, Corporate Welfare (freebies) and Corporate Republicans and Corporate Conservatives.
You know.. like that.
You assume far too much with that statement. 450 top economists and Bush's own first Treasury Secretary warned us of hundreds of billions of dollars in problems from reckless tax cuts back in 2003. They were wrong, it has been 10s of trillions.
See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/business-economy-financial-crisis/money-power-wall-street/how-much-did-the-financial-crisis-cost/
A little run down on the conservative CBO estimates:
GDP - $2.6 trillion lower than it could have been this year
Unemployment - Peaked at 10.1% in 2009 (lowest percentage of working age adults in decades going back to when far fewer percentages of women were working).
Government Bailouts - $23 trillion (to mostly the people that got us into the mess, and still don't see anything wrong with the changes they lobbied for).
Lost Household Wealth - $7 trillion lost (so far) in the real estate market, $11 trillion decline in the Stock Market (yet the top 1% tripled their take), $3.4 trillion in retirement accounts (mine declined 24% from the type "Blue Chip" 401(k) accounts the Peter G. Peterson Foundation (the big guns behind the 2005 surprise push to privatize Social Secuity) recommended. When are they going to get our "safe" government pensions, too? Those losses nearly equal our GDP
Also the rage that Mr. Eagle's RSN posts vent may have a therapeutic value in his life. Bill Clinton famously said "I feel your pain", and sometimes one can't help but feel Mr. Eagle's subliminal pain. I do hope I am completely wrong in my intuition and that Mr. Eagle's personal life is much more positive than his RSN posts. If his posts prevent either a suicide or a mass murder, then they are worthwhile.
It is easy to get mad about the current economy in general, but if you are still unemployed because of the Republican leadership's obstruction, sophistry, and mendacity, then you have every right to strike-out blindly at a seemingly uncaring world. Even though it is slightly counter-product ive to indiscriminatel y defame innocent and guilty alike, it may also be deservedly therapeutic. We should still post short corrections to all posts we find inaccurate, but we should not discourage therapy, even if it takes the form of mean-spirited rants. After all none of us is an infallible expert, or immune to temporary feelings of reasonable rage at the powers that be.
Possible..?
Yes..? No..? Maybe..?
Has the Western World become a Brave New Orwellian Place while most of us went about our daily lives for decades assuming that 'normal' would simply remain normal because... er... well... that's the way its supposed to be..? And 'LEADERS' were in charge.., Right..?
I mean, isn't America supposed to always just be wonderful America because We are 'special' in the well known history of the world and mankind..?
huh...?
Has Democracy been lost in the wake of relentless successful Corporate Lobby..?
Perhaps we now live in a Brave New Orwellian World where the East.., a.k.a. China, is a Capitalist Dictatorship and the West.., a.k.a. Europe and America, are becoming Post Coup Corporate Cabal Capitalist Experiments in Illusion-Delusi on-Low-Budget-C orporate-Coopte d-Democracies.. ?
One thing occurs to me, perhaps this is a manipulation of the 1% to create a war. Germany had these kind of economic conditions prior to WWII. Could this be a war between the new fascist-monetar y state and the last few reasonable real representative countries still on the planet?
Whatever the case it makes no sense.
Like "Planet Earth" - a wholly owned subsidiary of Mobil-Exxon!
(whose controlling shares my holding companies own)
Just like the man said. This country will fall from within.
The Last Great Empire sinks into the sea just like the Romans.
Yet when banks fail,Wall St fails the US government couldn't move fast enough to bail them out. Presidents couldn't wait to reduce taxes for the rich which have been kept in place.
Walker's attack on the unions & public-employee benefits is NEWS now.
Less well known is that some members of Congress are "working hard" to "improve,sustai n & transform" the USPS by getting rid of 100,000 employees,cutti ng Compensation for injured workers,ending it for those 65 and older,weakening the unions,
and cutting service to the public by closing smaller post offices.
HR2309 and S1789 state that this is the ONLY way to save the Post Office from financial failure when the USPS was set up for failure by the PAEA Congress passed in 2006 mandating that the USPS fund 75 years of retiree health benefits in 10. At 5.5 Billion a year the USPS would no longer be solvent.
3 videos condense what's wrong with these bills.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09ybkkiH2Ho
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=am4wez1ShPY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsPIY9bFFZY
And the voice of those who will be a affected by this is LIMITED to representatives in their district and their unions both of which which may have a different agenda than theirs.
Banks are just ordinary businesses. If they get over their heads in debt and bad investments, they should file for bankruptcy. A court will distribute their assets and they will cease to exist. New banks and more responsible banks will replace them in a few seconds. In this way, a society purges itself of the corrupt and poorly managed banks. If governments bail them out, they never change and we always have bad banks.
But this is not even the real problem. Krugman seems unable to say what is really going on. In 2011 the World Economic Forum ruled that the people of the world were going to have to come up with $100 trillion to "re-capitalize" banks. So now every government in the developed world is transferring wealth from people to banks. The people of Spain will pay off the money borrowed, and the banks will get the money. This is just wealth transfers from the poor to the very rich. It is robbery.
We should stop using the term "bailout." It is not descriptive. It is a distraction. Bailout sounds like a good thing, helping someone in need. What's happening is the re-distribution of wealth from the poor to the very rich. All reports show this. The wealthiest of investors have made trillions of dollars in profits since 2008. People are much poorer. This is the looting of the developed world.
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