zero hedge Fri 2009-10-23 19:30 EDT

A Stern Opponent Of Funding The FDIC's Depleted Deposit Insurance Fund, And Monetization Is... Alan Greenspan?

What a difference twenty years makes. The man whose actions basically lead to the eradication of the American middle class in its aspirational pursuit of buying massive SUVs, Prada bags, and 3rd investment properties, compliments of cheap credit, in order to appear ever so much like the upper class yet ultimately drowning itself in debt, Alan Greenspan, is probably the most critical reason why America's debt service will be nearly 90% of GDP within several decades. The adoption of his actions by the current deranged operator of the reserve currency printing press, is merely a continuation of a multiple decade long process of keeping inflation contained at the expense of devaluing the US currency, as the global liquidity pyramid recently hit one quadrillion, and continues to grow exponentially, yet...

Alan Greenspan; FDIC's Depleted Deposit Insurance Fund; funds; monetize; Stern Opponent; Zero Hedge.

Fri 2009-10-23 09:42 EDT

America's soul is lost, collapse inevitable - MarketWatch

Paul B. Farrell

Jack Bogle published "The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism" four years ago. The battle's over. The sequel should be titled: "Capitalism Died a Lost Soul." Worse, we've lost "America's Soul." And, worldwide, the consequences will be catastrophic. That's why a man like Hong Kong contrarian economist Marc Faber warns in his Doom, Boom & Gloom Report: "The future will be a total disaster, with a collapse of our capitalistic system as we know it today." No, not just another meltdown, another bear-market recession like the one recently triggered by Wall Street's too-greedy-to-fail banks. Faber is warning that the entire system of capitalism will collapse. Get it? The engine driving the great "American Economic Empire" for 233 years will collapse, a total disaster, a destiny we created.

America s Soul; Collapse Inevitable; lost; MarketWatch.

Fri 2009-10-23 08:55 EDT

Is Goldman Sachs Evil? Or Just Too Good? -- New York Magazine (2009-07-26)

Joe Hagan

(Goldman Sachs, Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, Rolling Stone, John Rogers, John Whitehead, AIG, Neil Barofsky, Troubled Asset Relief Program, Morgan Stanley, Hank Paulson, Lloyd Blankfein, John Thain, Lehman Brothers, Standard & Poor's, Tim Geithner, JPMorgan Chase, Jon Winkelried, David Solomon, Richard Friedman, Jamie Dimon, Robert Rubin, Dan Jester, Eric Dinallo, Hank Greenberg, Edward C. Forst, Neel Kashkari, Edward Liddy, Stephen Friedman, Sidney Weinberg, TARP, Joseph --Stiglitz, Lucas van Praag, Frank Suozzo, Mike Morgan, Matt Taibbi, Edith Cooper, Byron Trott, Warren Buffett, Barney Frank, John Thornton, Michael Lewis, Larry Summers, Barack Obama, Rahm Emanuel, Robert Hormats, Eliot Spitzer) Inside Goldman Sachs, America's most successful, cynical, envied, despised, and (in its view, anyway) misunderstood engine of capitalism. [2009-07-26]

2009-07-26; Goldman Sachs evil; good; just; New York magazine.

naked capitalism Tue 2009-10-13 20:47 EDT

Guest Post: The REAL Battle Over America's Banking System

George Washington of Washington's Blog

...the battle isn't between bankers versus outsiders. It is between the giant New York money-centered banks and the rest of the country...monetary reformers argue that letting banks create credit and money and then charge high interest rates creates massive levels of debt for states and taxpayers. They argue that the power to create money should be reclaimed by the government and taken away from the private banks...

America's banking system; Guest Post; naked capitalism; real battle.

The Guardian World News Mon 2009-10-12 10:02 EDT

Ex-Wall Street financiers face criminal action

Former Bear Stearns hedge fund manager Matthew Tannin's private jottings show concerns about 'blow up risk' to investors...Tannin and his boss, Ralph Cioffi, ran two funds holding $1.4bn of clients' funds that collapsed in July 2007, an event widely viewed as the first clear signal of America's sub-prime mortgage crisis and the global credit crunch. The meltdown of these funds sparked a chain of events that contributed to the demise of Bear Stearns, an 85-year-old Wall Street institution, in early 2008. They have been charged by US prosecutors with defrauding customers by hiding the true condition of investments as prospects steadily darkened.

Ex-Wall Street financiers face criminal action; Guardian World News.

Sat 2009-10-10 14:19 EDT

A financial revolution with profound political implications

Robert Fisk

The plan to de-dollarise the oil market, discussed both in public and in secret for at least two years and widely denied yesterday by the usual suspects -- Saudi Arabia being, as expected, the first among them -- reflects a growing resentment in the Middle East, Europe and in China at America's decades-long political as well as economic world dominance. [dollar losing reserve status]

financial revolution; profound political implications.

Willem Buiter's Maverecon Sat 2009-10-10 14:00 EDT

Expect little and you may yet be disappointed

Willem Buiter

...the most disappointing development this year was the performance of president Barack Obama and his administration - and my expectations were modest to begin with...On the fiscal side, Barack Obama is presiding over the biggest peace-time government deficits and public debt build-up ever. According to my back-of-the-envelope calculations there is about a 10 percent of GDP gap between the medium and longer-term spending plans of the Obama administration and the taxes the Congress is willing and able to impose. The reality that you cannot run a West-European welfare state (with decent quality health care, decent pre-school, primary and secondary school education for all), rebuild America's crumbling infrastructure, invest in the environment and fulfill your post-imperial global strategic ambitions while raising 33 percent of GDP in taxes, has not yet dawned on the Obama administration or on the American people at large...Clearly, the qualities one needs to get elected to high office in western democracies are not qualities that are likely to be helpful once you have achieved high office and are expected to govern and lead. To survive the selection process to become president you have to be able to stitch together a coalition of special interests that can provide sufficient financial and sweat equity resources to win this grueling race to the top. Once you get there, you should shed the unfortunate baggage you accumulated on your way up and govern in the interest of all the people. Few can do that. Apparently Obama is not one of them.

disappointment; expectations; Willem Buiter's Maverecon.

Sun 2009-09-20 14:12 EDT

America's Exhausted Paradigm: Macroeconomic Causes of the Financial Crisis and Great Recession | The New America Foundation

Thomas Palley

This report traces the roots of the current financial crisis to a faulty U.S. macroeconomic paradigm. One flaw in this paradigm was the neo-liberal growth model adopted after 1980 that relied on debt and asset price inflation to drive demand. A second flaw was the model of U.S. engagement with the global economy that created a triple economic hemorrhage of spending on imports, manufacturing job losses, and off-shoring of investment. Deregulation and financial excess are important parts of the story, but they are not the ultimate cause of the crisis. Instead, they facilitated the housing bubble and are actually part of the neo-liberal model, their function being to fuel demand growth based on debt and asset price inflation. The old post-World War II growth model based on rising middle-class incomes has been dismantled, while the new neo-liberal growth model has imploded. The United States needs a new economic paradigm and a new growth model, but as yet this challenge has received little attention from policymakers or economists.

America's Exhausted Paradigm; Financial Crisis; Great Recession; Macroeconomic Causes; New America Foundation.

naked capitalism Sun 2009-09-13 15:35 EDT

Is economic boom around the corner?

Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns

...growth underpinned by high debt accumulation and low savings can continue for a very, very long time. In the United States, by virtue of America's possession of the world's reserve currency, an increase in aggregate debt levels has been successfully financed for well over twenty-five years...it is wholly conceivable that we could experience a multi-year economic expansion on the back of renewed monetary and fiscal expansion...Marc Faber: ``Don't underestimate the power of printing money''...but NDK continues to ``disrespect the power of printing money. There are few transmission mechanisms to get that printed money into the real economy.'' pebird comments (paraphrasing Faber?): The US (and Europe) per capita wealth must be driven down to a global benchmark - that is what globalization means. Which is easier - bringing 800 million Chinese plus 500 million Indian workers up to Western standards or 400 million Western workers down to global standards?

corner; economic boom; naked capitalism.

Bruce Krasting Fri 2009-09-04 19:11 EDT

Debt Repudiation -- On the Table

Bruce Krasting

In the Week in Review section the NY Times had a piece by David Streitfeld titled ``When Debtors Decide to Default''. I thought it was an important story. The NY Times put the issue of Debt Repudiation on the table. Exactly where it belongs. The author also contributed a new adjective to describe many of America's troubled borrowers, ``Ruthless Defaulters''. This definition comes to us from the ``lending'' side of the equation. I think that is a misguided definition by the industry. I don't think they know what they are up against. Yet...Debt repudiation is the biggest systemic risk we face...the default rate on mortgages in excess of $500k is going to explode this fall...the CC numbers would follow. Broad based debt repudiation is a distinct possibility.

Bruce Krasting; Debt Repudiation; table.

Tue 2009-06-16 00:00 EDT

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis: America's Love Affair With Malls Ends; Toxic Drywall; Halted Projects; and Vacant Dealerships

America's love affair; Halted Projects; Malls Ends; Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis; toxic drywall; Vacant Dealerships.

Tue 2009-04-21 00:00 EDT

Financial Bailout: America's Own Kleptocracy

by Michael Hudson, 2008-09-20

America's; Financial Bailout; kleptocracy.

Tue 2008-09-09 00:00 EDT

Joe Bageant: Why Rednecks May Rule the World

``We all understand that there is a political class which dominates in America, and that Sarah Palin for damned sure is not one of them. And the more she is attacked by liberal Democratic elements (translation: elite highly-educated big city people) the more America's working mooks will come to her defence.''

Joe Bageant; rednecks; rules; world.

Wed 2008-05-14 00:00 EDT

A Litany of Horrors by Tom Engelhardt and Chalmers Johnson

A Litany of Horrors, by Tom Engelhardt and Chalmers Johnson; RAND corporation; "America's University of Imperialism"

Chalmers Johnson; horror; Litany; Tom Engelhardt.

Wed 2008-04-02 00:00 EDT

Generation Squeeb: Barack Obama's Reverend Wright controversy, and America's squid-heart

Generation Squeeb: Barack Obama's Reverend Wright controversy, and America's squid-heart, by Matt Taibbi

America's squid-heart; Barack Obama's Reverend Wright controversy; Generation Squeeb.

Fri 2008-03-28 00:00 EDT

AlterNet: The Wright Controversy Revealed America's Gutless, Panicky, Deeply Insecure Side

by Matt Taibbi; "A society at peace with itself wouldn't have reacted in the way it did to the partly true/partly crazy remarks of Obama's former pastor."

AlterNet; Deeply Insecure Side; panicky; Wright Controversy Revealed America's Gutless.