Wall Street can you fix it?

[xelasnave]

George just called he needs help ..what will I tell him to do..so how can Wall street be fixed ..let it die or prop it up...I reckon all mortgages should be under a moritoriun..no forclosures whilst the mortgagor pays 3% to keep step with inflation..I think this was done in 1929 crash..but this means the banks contain the problem of poor investment without help from others or to the detriment of the mortgagors who arecaught by preditory lending.
alex

[Ian Robinson]

Ditch capitalism and the unregulated free market and ditch the Republican (who had 8 years to fix the underlying problems but chose not to, and instead sat on their hands and let this crisis ....the GREAT DEPRESSION OF 2009 perhaps .... develop.

George blew it big time and is beyond redemption.

Let the poorly managed banks and financial instititions fail, they got themselves into the mess, they should now pay the price for excessive greed and downright stupidity , and for being crooks.

Focus on providing assistance only to Joe Blow and Sue Suburbia to ensure people are not forced out of their homes because of the bad deals and bad investments by greedy morons that the little people had no say or control over.

And send the people who made money at everyone else's cost to jaol for very long times , and confiscate their assets (all of their assets), and NO MORE GOLDEN PARACHUTES .

This is the beginning of the end for american style free market capitalism , only the morons in Washington and NY are too dammed stupid to see it.

[xelasnave]

If a smack addict or a crack freak robs a garage with a gun to serve his disease he gets 5 years in stir... some of these greedy folk calling themselves bankers or investments consultants and those manipulating the mortgage funds do worse..they say let me care for your money and then they steal it...who deserves the longer term..an addict of drugs or an addict of greed.
alex

[ngcles]

Hi Alex & All,

I'm reminded of the "motto" of Species 8472 (Series 3, 4 & 5 Star Trek Voyager -- the enemy of the Borg).

"The weak shall perish"


Best,

Les D

[Ian Robinson]

Originally Posted by xelasnave

If a smack addict or a crack freak robs a garage with a gun to serve his disease he gets 5 years in stir... some of these greedy folk calling themselves bankers or investments consultants and those manipulating the mortgage funds do worse..they say let me care for your money and then they steal it...who deserves the longer term..an addict of drugs or an addict of greed.
alex

A smack addict might harm a few people, greedy folk (who are already obsenely wealthy) calling themselves bankers or investments consultants and those manipulating the mortgage funds can harm many more people , or even bring down entire companies or their nations entire economy , or even ,as in this case, that of the entire global economy .... IT"S A NO BRAINER .... if anyone deserves harsh penal or even capital punishment it's the latter.
The same applies to the congressment and senators in the USA who have been in their payroll for years too. Not very patriotic of them.

[Glenhuon (Bill)]

These guys are gamblers, with other peoples money, the fruits of their labour. A gambler who loses does not, and should not, be bailed out by the rest of us. The US and most western economies are based on trading in ephemera, something that has no physical existence. It had to evaporate one day, and I could see it coming several years ago and I'm not an economist, just your regular Joe Blow. All the BS about days of boom/slump in capitalist economies being a thing of the past was just that, the underlying way the sytem works has seen no real change from before the crash of the 1920's.
Time to look at making REAL changes, and making the penalties for playing monopoly with other peoples assets EXTREMELY severe, cast in stone and unchangeable.
But, it isn't going to happen I'm afraid. Our law makers are so deeply involved with the cause of the problem (ie Funded) that they will baulk at biting the bullet.

Getting off soapbox

Bill

[Lee]

Let it die..... maybe once it rebuilds it will be wiser....
The richest of the major investors around are going to get even richer soon - look at all the cheap shares they can buy and squirrel away!

[norm]

Is this where I should mention Gordon Gekko ???

I say let it drown. Unfortunately its the mums and dads of this world who will pay for it one way or another. The rich will always get richer....

How does the US continue to spend billions per year in defence, space research etc. How deep are there pockets, surely they need to rein in their spending?

The whole share trading, economics is BS....

It's a zero sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses. Money itself isn't lost or made, it's simply transferred from one perception to another.

GG - hehe

Norm

[gman (Grant)]

What I find amusing is that the capitalists of Wall St want the socialists to bail them out for the problem that the capitalists created in the first place.

I say let the government bail out the people with mortgages and let them push the money back up to if they so choose

[Ian Robinson]

Originally Posted by gman

What I find amusing is that the capitalists of Wall St want the socialists to bail them out for the problem that the capitalists created in the first place.

I say let the government bail out the people with mortgages and let them push the money back up to if they so choose

yep.... go figure

[gman (Grant)]

They say that the real issue with this will be that no one in the US will be able to get a loan or a line of credit from the banks.

Well hello, handing out too much cash was the problem in the first place.

Let the government bail out the small man and let the millionaires claim it as a loss gainst their taxable income.

Even better still, have a bank owned and controlled by the government for the people.
(Lets go Back to the Future)

[Ian Robinson]

Originally Posted by gman

They say that the real issue with this will be that no one in the US will be able to get a loan or a line of credit from the banks.

Well hello, handing out too much cash was the problem in the first place.

Let the government bail out the small man and let the millionaires claim it as a loss gainst their taxable income.

Even better still, have a bank owned and controlled by the government for the people.
(Lets go Back to the Future)

OK .... That's a good thing, americans will just have to learn to live inside their means .

Nationalise all key industries , and change their goal from maximum profits for the rich to the maximum community benefit for all.

[GrahamL]

NINJA loans were always going to bite everone on the arse sooner or later
Somone with (No, Income No Job ,Assets) should not be granted a
quarter million dollar mortgage and shouldn't be asking for one imo .

lenders and borrowers are both guilty in this mess;

[Tannehill]

The Great Depression was worse. We recovered. Just because we experience a profound market correction/recession/depression doesn't invalidate the concept of a free market economy. Australia, the U.S., Europe, etc are more alike than different, compared to the former Soviet Union, the old China, Somalia, and Asscrackistan, etc.

There is no doubt that the highly leveraged high-risk financial strategies of the past 20-30 years caused this collapse. The biggest lie in finance used to justify reckless behavior using the argument that, as Mark Twain i think joked "but these times are different." It's not, it's the same forces at work. We accept that.

Every American has a choice about where their retirement, their mortgage, etc gets funded. Or to forego retirement contributions. I had no choice working there in Melbourne, the employer said participation in the super was mandatory. That was so wierd to me. It's my earnings, but Big Brother has decided that I WILL save for retirement, because Big Brother has concluded it is in my best interest. Big Brother is RIGHT, it is in my best interests, but the issue is whether Big Brother should have THE RIGHT to impose upon me what happens to BE RIGHT just because it IS RIGHT.

But....as for Americans, most choose NOT to educate themselves on the issue. On retirement, their choice is to stick it in safe but modest returns bonds, or go with the flow of the 90s era investors (who have no cultural memory of a true auger-in collapse) and ride the higher risk market. But the ultimate decision and responsibility lay with the individual. I know retired folks who followed the conservative recommendations and are gloating now as their bond portfolios - bought years ago when everyone was screaming for stocks - gather in 7-8% consistently.

Ours is a country of extremes. Extreme wealth, extreme poverty. In health care, extremely good care for those with resources, and extremely...absent..care for the impoverished. Accordingly, extreme opportunities are matched by extreme financial devastation. Extremes of personal freedoms; a man with worn and dirty clothes and flip-flops in line at the convenience mart last week was wearing a holstered Glock at his hip as he bought his slurpie; I bought gas...petrol...for $0.89 per liter in USD even now, after Ike. (Funny thing is, I kinda hate guns, and yet I recognized it as a Glock. What's that all about, anyway? )And extreme tragedies consequential to such personal freedomes (school shootings). We have the most odd religious extremists in our country, even as we do battle with other religious extremists abroad.

Our television is total crap. I have 350 channels of it so I should know. And yet I could not escape American TV or American movies or American restaurant chains, etc, while living in Australia. I tried. Hell, that's one reason why I moved to Australia for a year, to escape the homogeneity of American culture. I'll call it culture, okay, so just humor me. That odd kind of life parodied in that Edward Scissorhands movie.

It seems that many Western countries are slowly regressing to the mean. No real rich people, but no real poor people either. Higher taxes, more government regulation of free enterprise, more subsidies for the poor, for having kids, all paid for by higher taxes. Fine, that's their choice. Democracy. Good on them.

But the reasonable people here in the U.S. (the ones you can't see on our TV shows) actually DO realize that they ARE the government. The bail-out (the attempt yesterday) failed because thousands of voters called their legistlators and DEMANDED that they vote NO to the bailout. Most of us WANT these businesses to fail. That's the American way. Make totally selfish and stupid decision. Fine, your choice. IT was a mistake? Then...burn, baby, burn. We'll buckle down and keep working, rebuild ourselves. And, yes, probably install some financial market safeguards to forestall this kind of thing, but don't bet too much that it'll be really that much different afterwards.

What about the poor simple working man who 'was led' to invest in stocks, rather than safe bonds. Who 'was lured' into taking a 0% mortgage for more than his house was worth, just before losing his job working for the sub-prime lending industry? Well, that is unfortunate, but there was no conspiracy or secret cabal of robber-barons spiking his morning coffee before he signed, or forcing him to buy that house that was above his means.

I've read folks abroad blaming the U.S for their country's financial meltdowns. Well, I guess we can't have it both ways, can we? If they were so smart and considerd us so nuts, why didn't they disentangle themselves from us economically long ago? Perhaps they 'were lured' into investing with us by conspiring robber barons who spiked their latte?

Actually I think much of the world likes watching us. Like it's fun to be around that complety nuts school mate who does totaly crazy things and you enjoy being around to watch and enjoy them vicariously, while being very happy it isn't you doing those stupid dangerous things.

America-bashing is the new world sport. Hell, the French have been perfecting this skill since WWII, I think. Others like watching our TV, our news, our politicians, and America's Funniest Home Videos, and the redneck who witnessed the UFO abduct his bloodhound, and Hugh Hefner, and Donald Trump and Brangelina's exploits and Britney's knicker-less drives to the convenience mart. They like being able to shake their heads in disgusted but fascinated awe at those uncultured, ego-ethno-centric Americans and their wierd Brownian motions of policies, values and behaviors.

It's reckless, unpredictable, psychotic, selfish, ugly, beautiful, fun, frequently scatalogical, and utterly and completely American.

So, if you don't like it, rebalance your super, surgically excise everything American you can from your lifestyle, don't buy anything linked to the American culture, say and do what you want, tell the government to kiss your butt if they don't like it, and no one will bother you so long as you don't bother anyone else in the process. Be utterly 100% anti-American if you like. That's your right.

Because that's the American way. I think we more or less invented that concept in 1776 by telling a certain autocrat to shove it where the sun don't shine when he started telling us what to do. Yes, we did borrow some from the Greeks, the Magna Carta, and a few Enlightened philosphers..but that's the American way, too, to borrow and perhaps improve upon on good idea or alternatively to completely muck it up and look like an ass and be the turd in the party punchbowl.

My regards and continued respect for all my Aussie friends on IIS...if I have any friends left after this nationalistic tirade, spawned after working late trying to rebuild my bruised and bleeding retirement fund....whilst dreaming of drinking a flat white on the beach in Sandringham under the Southern Cross.

Hasta la vista, hombres!



Scott in Tucson

[iceman (Mike)]

I have no opinion on the matter but I really enjoyed reading your post, Scott

[Tannehill]

Thanks, Mike!

s

[mcross]

Yeah - some valid points there Scott. Interesting to hear a US perspective.

Mark

[xstream (John)]

I like the way you put it Scott, no different to the way us Aussies would either.

[Ian Robinson]

Originally Posted by Tannehill

The Great Depression was worse. We recovered. Just because we experience a profound market correction/recession/depression doesn't invalidate the concept of a free market economy. Australia, the U.S., Europe, etc are more alike than different, compared to the former Soviet Union, the old China, Somalia, and Asscrackistan, etc.

who / where is Asscrackistan ????

There is no doubt that the highly leveraged high-risk financial strategies of the past 20-30 years caused this collapse. The biggest lie in finance used to justify reckless behavior using the argument that, as Mark Twain i think joked "but these times are different." It's not, it's the same forces at work. We accept that.

Every American has a choice about where their retirement, their mortgage, etc gets funded. Or to forego retirement contributions. I had no choice working there in Melbourne, the employer said participation in the super was mandatory. That was so wierd to me. It's my earnings, but Big Brother has decided that I WILL save for retirement, because Big Brother has concluded it is in my best interest. Big Brother is RIGHT, it is in my best interests, but the issue is whether Big Brother should have THE RIGHT to impose upon me what happens to BE RIGHT just because it IS RIGHT.

mandatory super is great .... provided you stay in the workforce .... it needs to be bigger too .

My regards and continued respect for all my Aussie friends on IIS...if I have any friends left after this nationalistic tirade, spawned after working late trying to rebuild my bruised and bleeding retirement fund....whilst dreaming of drinking a flat white on the beach in Sandringham under the Southern Cross.

Hasta la vista, hombres!



Scott in Tucson

You should consider jumping ship and coming back to the wonderous land of Oz pronto , before the USA becomes the next Argentina and is declared bankrupt by the World Bank.
Ozlandia .... the biggest little country and best place on Planet Earth.

Just make sure you don't bring too many american attitudes with you and you'll get on fine.

PS : why are som many american so apaplexic about Obama and so paranoid socialism by the way ?

[tornado33]

Thank goodness we have the Age Pension here in Australia, I know thats what I will be relying on when I reach age 65, as will a number of my friends. I also thank the fact we have medicare here, so I will get treated (albeit after a wait) if I get sick.

Anyway I do NOT support using taxpayer monies to bail out a stockmarket be it in the US or anywhere else, no matter the cost. If it causes a world wide depression, then at least it will show many in the world how the poor live (when they become them). If the bail out is allowed and a further crash happens than all that much needed public money is gone forever.
Scott