Soros

Information Landmine's favourite billionaire once again demonstrates why he's earned that status and respect with a new article in the Financial Times explaining why the Bush bailout of Wall Street is, like so many Bush administration initiatives, a jaw-droppingly awful idea. Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke ought to (but probably won't) read and learn.

Sign the Petition to Stop the Giveaway

Congress is on the brink of making a one-sided deal to give George W. Bush a blank check to bail out his pals - offering nearly (or perhaps more than) a trillion taxpayer dollars to Wall Street to cover its bad debts. That works out to somewhere between $2000 and $5000 from every American family. So what do the taxpayers get in return?

Nothing. No new regulation or oversight to help avoid this kind of crisis in the future. No public interest givebacks to help people whose homes are in the hands of the banks. Perhaps most shockingly of all, the taxpayers get absolutely no share in the profits if and when these finance giants bounce back, even though we are now assuming a great deal of the risk.

This is worse than a bad deal - this isn't a deal at all. This is a blank check to some of the richest companies in the world.

Please sign a new petition calling on key members of Congress to impose a few sensible conditions to this bailout in order to protect the American people.

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/no_blank_check/?r_by=911-1064733-qk4puCx&rc=paste

They Break, We Buy

Gretchen Morgenson, writing in the New York Time, nails it.

To quote John Lydon: "It's a swindle!" And it's your money and your future, US taxpayers, that is being swindled away.

Happy?

Ain't Capitalism Grand?

Congratulations, US taxpayers: you get fleeced by Wall Street bankers preaching rabid market fundamentalism and then you get to pay their huge, multi-million dollar salaries from your pocket and your childrens' pocket when their cronies that you elected (or failed to stop from stealing two consecutive elections) step in and open up the Treasury to pay for Wall Street's mistakes and excesses. Meanwhile, if your home gets repossessed because the bankers sold you a bad mortgage, that's your tough luck!

The World Turned Upside Down

It's beyond question we're living in strange and uncertain times when the Daily Mail starts lambasting 21st century capitalism for its contradictions and excesses.

I briefly had to double-check the website address to make sure this wasn't the People's Weekly World.