World Financial Crisis Part 6

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Mon, 2011-05-23 15:05

#52

NDPP

You Need To Be Watching What's Developing In Spain Right Now - by Gregory White

http://www.businessinsider.com/spain-protest-spainrevolution-2011-5

"...From outside looking in, it resembles the situation in Egypt in many ways.."

Spain Spins - by Farooque Chowdhury

http://www.countercurrents.org/chowdhury230511.htm

"...Slogans cited above reveal a reality, a reality of indignation and aspirations and this has put neoliberalism on the dock in Spain. This is a reality, neoliberalism is facing in countries. In Spain, the neoliberalism is being implemented under the stewardship of the socialists.."

Thu, 2011-05-26 07:05

#53

epaulo13

Signs of a Spanish Spring

By Sam Robson

Source: SocialistWorker.org

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Quote:

TALK ABOUT the atmosphere in Puerta del Sol.

OBVIOUSLY, IN the evenings, when the square is packed full of thousands of people chanting and so on, it's amazing. The atmosphere is a confirmation of everything we believe as revolutionaries. Effectively, a mini-city has been established, and you can see how, when people take power into their own hands, even if it's only in one small area, the we have the potential to run things.

Everything is organized through a central assembly, which is divided into smaller assemblies to deal with different aspects of the movement, such as actions, future plans, food, communication and so on.

The assemblies are all open and consist of hundreds of people. In that sense, the size is a problem--so each assembly has a series of commissions which deal in more detail with logistical matters. But these are also open to anybody to participate.

Within the camp, there is a cleaning schedule so that the plaza is cleaned constantly. There is a child care center, a library, free food and water distribution, a first aid tent and blanket distribution for the night. There's also been, from the start, a decision not to drink in the camp, because at first, the demonstration was dismissed by some as a big "botellon"--a big drinking session.

The whole idea projected at first was that only young people were involved. It is true that most of the people are young, but there are people of all ages and types. For example, I'm a teacher, and of the 50 or so staff at the school where I work, at least 10 have been here, and several have been at various times until the early hours of the morning....

http://www.zcommunications.org/signs-of-a-spanish-spring-by-sam-robson

Thu, 2011-05-26 08:45

#54

Slumberjack

Yesterday we had the nauseating smugness of Jim Flaherty declare that the Greek government had been lax in their attempts to impose the necessary structural changes upon the population there. Much more needs to be done apparently to satisfy the global financial oligarchy. The dire implications for the people of Greece are quite evident to most of us of course. I couldn't help but to wonder if Flaherty and the government he represents had to face the specter of hundreds of thousands of Canadian citizens battling toe to toe with police in the streets, Molotov cocktails flying hither and thither, that it all mightn't serve at the very least to wipe the smugness from his face.

Fri, 2011-05-27 03:28

#55

epaulo13

EU: Politics Financialized, Economies Privatized

May 26, 2011

By Michael Hudson

Breakup of the euro?

Is Iceland’s rejection of financial bullying a model for Greece and Ireland?
This article is an excerpt from Prof. Hudson’s upcoming book, “Debts that Can’t be Paid, Won’t Be,” to be published later this year.

Quote:

At issue from Europe’s vantage point – at least that of its bankers – is a broad principle: Governments should run their economies on behalf of banks and bondholders. They should bail out at least the senior creditors of banks that fail (that is, the big institutional investors and gamblers) and pay these debts and public debts by selling off enterprises, shifting the tax burden onto labor. To balance their budgets they are to cut back spending programs, lower public employment and wages, and charge more for public services, from medical care to education.

Quote:

European bankers had their eye on the sale as much as $400 billion of Greek assets – enough to pay off all the government debt. Failing payment, the ECB threatened not to accept Greek government bonds as collateral. This would prevent Greek banks from doing business, wrecking its financial system and paralyzing the economy. This threat was supposed to make privatization “democratically” approved – followed by breaking union power and lowering wages (“internal devaluation”). “Jan Kees de Jager, Dutch finance minister, has proposed that any more loans to Greece should come with collateral arrangements, in which European state lenders would take over Greek assets in the event of a sovereign default.”[4]

Quote:

Financial power is to achieve what military conquest had done in times past. Pretending to make subject economies more “competitive,” the aim is more short-run: to squeeze out enough payments so that bondholders (and indeed, voters) will not be obliged to confront the reality that many debts are unpayable except at the price of making the economy too debt-ridden, too regressively tax-ridden and too burdened with rising privatized infrastructure charges to be competitive. Spending cutbacks and a regressive tax shift dry up capital investment and productivity in the long run. Such economies are run like companies taken over by debt-leveraged raiders on credit, who downsize and outsource their labor force so as to squeeze out enough revenue to pay their own creditors – who take what they can and run. The tactic of this financial attack is no longer overt military force as in days of yore, but something less costly because its victims submit more voluntarily.

Quote:

Criticizing Prime Minister George Papandreou’s delay at even to start selling state assets, European financial leaders proposed a national privatization agency to act as an intermediary to transfer revenue from these assets to foreign creditors and retire public debt – and to pledge its public assets as collateral to be forfeited in case of default in payments to government bondholders. Suggesting that the government “set up an agency to privatize state assets” along the lines of the German Treuhandanstalt that sold off East German enterprises in the 1990s,” Mr. Juncker thought that “Greece could gain more from privatizations than the €50 billion ($71 billion) it has estimated.”[3]

http://michael-hudson.com/2011/05/eu-politics-financialized-economies-pr...

Fri, 2011-05-27 21:50

#56

epaulo13

Police Violence Dismantling Barcelona Camp #spanishrevolution #acampadabcn #yeswecamp

chris pinchen

27th May 2011

Police Violence Dismantling Barcelona Camp #spanishrevolution #acampadabcn #yeswecamp

Today, Friday May 27th, Barcelona has woken up to news that the "mossos" - Catalonia's own police force - were dislodging protestors from Plaça Catalunya, the city's main square and epicentre of protests since Sunday #15M demonstrations in Spain. A summary of events and graphic material.

Quote:

Local and national media has been reporting on events all day. Videos, pictures and messages from the square have been widely distributed via Twitter and Facebook. There is a lot of talk and indignation in the street, many are truly shocked. Images with people in wheelchairs about to be violently hit or terrified looking people piling on the floor with blood on their clothes are not helping the local government's case for public support.

Below is Madrid's Plaza del Sol supporting Barcelona this evening:

Fri, 2011-05-27 21:52

#57

Fidel

Thanks, epaulo13. That is a lot of people. I hope they listen to the people and not bankers.

Good article and analysis from Michael Hudson @#54 as well.

Fri, 2011-05-27 22:36

#58

epaulo13

Fidel wrote:

Thanks, epaulo13. That is a lot of people. I hope they listen to the people and not bankers.

Good article and analysis from Michael Hudson @#54 as well.

..totally my pleasure fidel. i guess no one needs to ask where the young people are at in spain. out in front taking on capital head on, trying to build a new way of life and inspiring a hell of lot of people.

..i’ve always appreciated hudson for his ability to see and describe the brutal nature of our global economic system.

Sun, 2011-05-29 05:20

#59

Fidel

N.Y. mortgage probe is expanding Strauss-Kahn can look forward to having new cell mates

AG Eric Schneiderman probing big time Wall Street banksters for fraud under New York State's Martin Act of 1921. Criminal activities detailed in Angelides and Levin reports.

Thu, 2011-06-02 14:49

#60

epaulo13

The Federal Reserve Cartel: The Eight Families

by Dean Henderson

Global Research, June 1, 2011

(Part one of a four-part series)

The Four Horsemen of Banking (Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo) own the Four Horsemen of Oil (Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch/Shell, BP and Chevron Texaco); in tandem with Deutsche Bank, BNP, Barclays and other European old money behemoths. But their monopoly over the global economy does not end at the edge of the oil patch.

According to company 10K filings to the SEC, the Four Horsemen of Banking are among the top ten stock holders of virtually every Fortune 500 corporation.[1]

So who then are the stockholders in these money center banks?

This information is guarded much more closely. My queries to bank regulatory agencies regarding stock ownership in the top 25 US bank holding companies were given Freedom of Information Act status, before being denied on “national security” grounds. This is rather ironic, since many of the bank’s stockholders reside in Europe....

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=25080

Sun, 2011-06-05 07:46

#61

epaulo13

China has dropped 97 percent of its holdings in U.S. Treasury bills, decreasing its ownership of the short-term U.S. government securities from a peak of $210.4 billion in May 2009 to $5.69 billion in March 2011, the most recent month reported by the U.S. Treasury.

Treasury bills are securities that mature in one year or less that are sold by the U.S. Treasury Department to fund the nation's debt.

Until October, the Chinese were generally making up for their decreasing holdings in Treasury bills by increasing their holdings of longer-term U.S. Treasury securities. Thus, until October, China's overall holdings of U.S. debt continued to increase. Infowars.com

FACTS & FIGURES

G20 leaders, in their November 2010 gathering in Seoul, expressed concerns over the stability of the dollar as a global reserve currency. Xinhua

Critics say the Fed is creating currency as a method to combat the liquidity trap. But they say the bailout plans have led banks to invest in foreign currencies which may lead to currency wars while China redirects its currency holdings away from the United States. Canada Space

The U.S. officially hit its $14.3 trillion debt ceiling on May 16, 2011. WSJ

The debt ceiling is a statutory limit Congress imposes on the amount of money the Treasury may borrow. Realclearpolitics.com

http://www.presstv.ir/usdetail/183216.html

Sun, 2011-06-05 08:32

#62

epaulo13

EU: Class War Declared

June 2, 2011

By Michael Hudson

Quote:

The conditionality for the new “reformed” loan package is that Greece must initiate a class war by raising its taxes, lowering its social spending – and even private-sector pensions – and sell off public land, tourist sites, islands, ports, water and sewer facilities. This will raise the cost of living and doing business, eroding the nation’s already limited export competitiveness. The bankers sanctimoniously depict this as a “rescue” of Greek finances.

What really were rescued a year ago, in May 2010, were the French banks that held €31 billion of Greek bonds, German banks with €23 billion, and other foreign investors. The problem was how to get the Greeks to go along. Newly elected Prime Minister George Papandreou’s Socialists seemed able to deliver their constituency along similar lines to what neoliberal Social Democrat and Labor parties throughout Europe had followed – privatizing basic infrastructure and pledging future revenue to pay the bankers.

Quote:

What actually is devalued in austerity programs or currency depreciation is the price of labor. That is the main domestic cost, inasmuch as there is a common world price for fuels and minerals, consumer goods, food and even credit. If wages cannot be reduced by “internal devaluation” (unemployment starting with the public sector, leading to falling wages), currency depreciation will do the trick in the end. This is how Europe’s war of creditors against debtor countries turns into a class war. But to impose such neoliberal reform, foreign pressure is necessary to bypass domestic, democratically elected Parliaments. Not every country’s voters can be expected to be as passive in acting against their own interests as those of Latvia and Ireland.

Most of the Greek population recognizes just what has been happening as this scenario has unfolded over the past year. “Papandreou himself has admitted we had no say in the economic measures thrust upon us,” said Manolis Glezos on the left. “They were decided by the EU and IMF. We are now under foreign supervision and that raises questions about our economic, military and political independence.”[2] On the right wing of the political spectrum, conservative leader Antonis Samaras said on May 27 as negotiations with the European troika escalated: “We don’t agree with a policy that kills the economy and destroys society. … There is only one way out for Greece, the renegotiation of the [EU/IMF] bailout deal.”[3]....

http://michael-hudson.com/2011/06/eu-class-war-declared/

Sun, 2011-06-05 22:06

#63

NDPP

Down, Down Down - by Mike Whitney

http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney06032011.html

"...we are headed into a Depression because policy makers have made another Depression unavoidable. A policy-driven Depression is different from a financial crisis. It is a matter of choice..."

Wed, 2011-06-08 16:19

#64

Doug

US debt gets to 100% of GDP earlier than expected

Oops.

A recent Treasury report noted that national debt will exceed the size of the economy this year -- a first since World War II. A year ago, the Treasury had estimated that notorious record wouldn't be hit until 2014.

Now the expectation is that total debt to GDP will top 102 percet this year, up from the earlier estimate of 96.4 percent.

Wed, 2011-06-08 19:00

#65

NDPP

What Are You Going To Do On June 14 To Rebel Against Economic Tyranny?

http://ampedstatus.org/acts-of-resistance-what-are-you-going-to-do-on-ju...

"...The big banks have sold us out. Democrats and Republicans have sold us out..."

Fri, 2011-06-10 05:33

#66

George Victor

Krugman on why small business and the unemployed are being ignored :

Rule by Rentiers
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Who benefits from economic stagnation?

Mon, 2011-06-13 16:05

#67

epaulo13

The Financial Road to Serfdom

How Bankers use the Debt Crisis to Roll Back the Progressive Era

by Prof. Michael Hudson June 13, 2011

Financial strategists do not intend to let today’s debt crisis go to waste. Foreclosure time has arrived. That means revolution – or more accurately, a counter-revolution to roll back the 20th century’s gains made by social democracy: pensions and social security, public health care and other infrastructure providing essential services at subsidized prices or for free. The basic model follows the former Soviet Union’s post-1991 neoliberal reforms: privatization of public enterprises, a high flat tax on labor but only nominal taxes on real estate and finance, and deregulation of the economy’s prices, working conditions and credit terms.
What is to be reversed is the “modern” agenda. The aim a century ago was to mobilize the Industrial Revolution’s soaring productivity and technology to raise living standards and use progressive taxation, public regulation, central banking and financial reform to distribute wealth fairly and make societies more equal. Today’s financial aim is the opposite: to concentrate wealth at the top of the economic pyramid and lower labor’s returns. High finance loves low wages.
The political lever to achieve this program is financial. The European Union (EU) constitution prevents central banks from financing government deficits, leaving this role to commercial banks, paying interest to them for creating credit that central banks readily monetize for themselves in Britain and the United States. Governments are to go into debt to bail out banks for loans gone bad – as do more and more loans as finance impoverishes the economy, stifling its ability to pay. Yet as long as we live in democracies, voters must agree to pay. Governments are sovereign and debt is ultimately a creature of the law and courts....

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=25250

Tue, 2011-06-14 07:42

#68

epaulo13

"Don’t Believe the Hype About U.S. Debt": Sally Kohn Says Increasing the Debt Is a Good Idea

Quote: JUAN GONZALEZ: Vice President Joe Biden met with congressional negotiators last Thursday to discuss ways to curb the federal deficit and permit new borrowing after August 2nd, the day the U.S. government is expected to reach its $14.3 trillion borrowing limit. Democrats are pushing for new taxes and the elimination of many tax loopholes to be part of any deficit reduction deal, while Republicans want to see steep spending reductions but no new taxes.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re joined by Sally Kohn. She’s a community organizer, a political commentator, founder and chief education officer of Movement Vision Lab. And she wrote an op-ed piece, a very interesting op-ed piece, in USA Today called "Don’t Believe the Hype about U.S. Debt."

Well, what do you say about the debt?

SALLY KOHN: You know, this is the time when we should be worrying about other things than public spending. I mean, the fact of the matter is that corporations are sitting on record levels of capital. They’re not spending it. There’s new news out that, if anything, they’re not spending it on jobs; they’re spending it on new, you know, manufacturing equipment. So the problem is, in this situation, like it or not, government is the spender of last resort. And the irony with all this, when everybody says, "Well, government should be tightening its belt, so is everyone else," you know, we let corporations—we actually encourage corporations in this country to borrow and carry debt ratios sometimes three, sometimes four, 14, 50 times higher than government.

AMY GOODMAN: Give us examples.

SALLY KOHN: You know, Boeing, IBM, JPMorgan. JPMorgan has a debt-to-income ratio of 50 to one. The United States government? One to one. So, why is it that debt is good for private corporations, for successful private corporations, so they can invest in the future of their business, but not good for the government, especially at a time of anemic tax receipts, because we’ve cut taxes, among other things, and because the economy is sluggish? Why shouldn’t we use government to invest in the future of our nation and the future of our citizenry?....

http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2011/6/13/dont_believe_the_hype_about_u...

Mon, 2011-06-20 21:16

#69

epaulo13

..here is a link to a list of countries by external debt. it clearly shows that canada is not in a financial crisis as compared to most other countries. i am nowhere near being an economist but even i can see that by instituting austerity measures it is quite possible that the government will trigger a crisis there by requiring even more austerity..or so they will argue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_external_debt

Wed, 2011-06-22 11:51

#70

Slumberjack

Europe and America: The Global Debt Crisis

Quote:
We estimated in 2009 that the world had about 30 trillion USD in ghost assets. Almost half went up in smoke in the six months between September 2008 and March 2009. For our team, it's now the other half's turn....To gauge the extent of the coming shock, it is worth knowing that even US banks are starting to reduce their use of US Treasury Bonds to guarantee their transactions for fear of the increasing risks weighing on US government debt.

Quote:
Remember that these agencies have never forecast anything of importance. If they downgrade willy nilly today it's because they have been caught at their own game. It's no longer possible to downgrade A without affecting B's rating if B is no better off. The "assumptions" on the fact that it's impossible for any particular state to default on its debt have not withstood three years of crisis: this is where Wall Street and the City have fallen into the trap which threatens all aspiring sorcerers' apprentices. They have not seen it would be impossible for them to control the hysteria kept up over Greek debt. So today it's the US Congress, with the bitter debate on the debt ceiling and massive budget cuts, that the consequences of the misleading articles in recent months about Greece and the Eurozone enlarge. Once again, our team can only stress that if history has any sense, it's certainly a sense of irony.

Thu, 2011-06-23 01:07

#71

epaulo13

The Zombie Economists collection was created in reaction to the world economic crisis and most particularly my country's crisis provoked by bad government and bad European policies and most of all by the conservative agenda and it's liberal economic behaviour. So I pick my iPhone and create these Zombie Economists in Sketchbook Mobile and filter them trough PicGringer and iDarkroom. These illustrations were all made in my iPhone 4. 16 photos items are from between 14 Mar 2011 & 28 Apr 2011.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jafundo/sets/72157626490626797/

Wed, 2011-07-20 15:59

#72

M. Spector M. Spector's picture

Quote:
The financial sector realizes that the game is over. The financial interests from America to Greece, Ireland and Europe are all insisting that governments pay off the bad bank loans that they've taken onto their balance sheet by increasing taxes and pushing the economy into a depression. In the United States, president Obama has bought the idea that the only way of getting recovery is to cut wages by about 30 percent and he's doing that in two ways. At the Federal Reserve he's empowered the Federal Reserve Chairman, Bernanke, to lower interest rates, flood the economy with money, [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_easing#QE2]QE2[/url], $600 billion have flown out of the country, to push the dollar down. When you push the dollar down the main victims are consumers because oil prices and raw materials prices and machinery prices and shipping all have a common cost.

[url=http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article28612.htm]- great interview with left-wing economist Michael Hudson[/url]

Sat, 2011-07-30 15:29

#73

Doug

This is a bad sign.

Bad news, stock-market bulls: Corporate insiders are selling their companies’ shares at an abnormally fast pace.

In fact, one measure of that selling activity shows insiders of NYSE- and AMEX-listed companies recently were selling at the fastest rate since data began being collected in the early 1970s, four decades ago.

Sun, 2011-07-31 04:28

#74

NDPP

US One Step From Default As Senate Blocks House Plan (and Vid)

http://rt.com/news/house-republican-debt-vote/

interview with former Congressperson Cynthia McKinney who tells of her campaign to have citizens press for "an end to all US wars and an immediate end to the bombing of Libya"

Tue, 2011-08-02 20:11

#75

epaulo13

Worries Rise Over Spain and Italy Debt
By LIZ ALDERMAN AND MATTHEW SALTMARSH
Published: August 2, 2011

PARIS — As Washington finally signed off Tuesday on a last-minute deal to raise the U.S. debt ceiling, investors turned their attention back to the serial debt woes in Europe — and they did not like what they saw.

The grand European plan that came together barely two weeks ago, aimed at once again bailing out Greece and preventing its ills from spreading to bigger European economies, no longer seems so reassuring. Suddenly, the wolves are back at Europe’s door.

On Tuesday, traders renewed their attacks on Italy and Spain, the third- and fourth-largest economies in the 17-nation euro zone, pushing their borrowing costs, at least for now, to the tipping point that led Greece, Ireland and Portugal to apply for bailouts. Some people now fear that Italy and Spain could run out of cash to meet their debt obligations in a matter of months if, like the others, they are shut out of international markets....

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/03/business/global/pressure-builds-on-ita...

Tue, 2011-08-02 20:21

#76

epaulo13

Italy’s Financial Problems Join Political Ones
Published: August 2, 2011

ROME — After weeks of uncharacteristic and increasingly unsettling silence, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is expected to address Parliament about the economy on Wednesday. On Tuesday, the financial markets pummeled Italy, sending interest rates on its benchmark 10-year bond well above 6 percent.

Most alarming to economists is that Italy’s position in the markets is deteriorating even though the Parliament passed austerity measures last month. The country’s financial woes have arrived in a feverish climate of judicial investigations, lurid rumors and rising popular anger with politicians who keep their privileges while imposing spending cuts on other Italians....

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/03/world/europe/03italy.html?ref=global-home

Tue, 2011-08-02 20:51

#77

Northern Shoveler Northern Shoveler's picture

A really neat global game of hide the pea. Which shell is it under? Come on make a bet on the market, any market take your pick.

Tue, 2011-08-02 23:59

#78

epaulo13

Russia’s Economic Interests (Part 1)

August 2, 2011

By Michael Hudson

quote:

So the main task at hand is to explain a better policy – one that aims to overcome poverty to spur a thriving domestic market, and to elevate low-income families into an economic resource rather than a burden.

How much poverty is unnecessary? Is poverty simply the result of bad economic policy?

For starters, it is necessary to distinguish between how much poverty is “economically” justified and how much is unnecessary. There are many ways to get rich, and countries are experiencing various kinds of poverty. The good news is that much of today’s poverty does not stem from technological or other “objective” causes such as low productivity. Rather, it stems from special interests carving out privileges to extract income without any technologically necessary cost of production, but simply by ownership of “tollbooths”: land, mineral rights, or basic monopolies and banks privileged to create credit.

Poverty and austerity are the result of special interests monopolizing the economic surplus at the expense of the economy at large. The main rentiers falling into this category are the financial class, landowners and natural resource owners at the top of the economic pyramid. It is to them that the bottom 90% are indebted and must pay interest, rent, user fees and other access charges. Rent seeking is an economically unnecessary burden – and one from which the classical economists sought to free society. The idea of a “free market” from the Physiocrats and Adam Smith down through John Stuart Mill and the 19th century socialists was to free industrial capitalism from the rentier class that itself was a carry-over from Europe’s feudal epoch.....

http://michael-hudson.com/2011/08/russia%E2%80%99s-economic-interests-pa...

Sat, 2011-08-27 11:17

#79

M. Spector M. Spector's picture

Capitalist economist [url=http://www.thepaltrysapien.com/2011/08/nouriel-roubini-karl-marx-had-it-... Roubini[/url] is sounding like a Christian Scientist with appendicitis* these days:

Roubini wrote:
[color=blue]Karl Marx had it right. At some point capitalism can self-destroy itself. That’s because you can not keep on shifting income from labor to capital without having an excess capacity and a lack of aggregate demand. We thought that markets work. They are not working. What’s individually rational…is a self-destructive process.[/color]

* as Tom Lehrer would say.

Sat, 2011-08-27 15:06

#80

M. Spector M. Spector's picture

[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/aug/22/capitalis...'s Plan B[/url]

Richard Wolff wrote:
Last week, Democratic governors in New York and Connecticut repeated the austerity politics of Greece's Prime Minister Papandreou and Portugal's former Prime Minister Socrates. In doing so, they likewise imitated the austerity politics of their Republican and Democratic counterparts across virtually all 50 states.

Austerity for labor and the public is everywhere capitalism's Plan B. Even capitalists now see that capitalism's Plan A failed.

You will recall that Plan A entailed a crisis-response program of bailing out the banks, insurance companies, large corporations and stock markets to achieve "recovery". The theory behind Plan A – we used to call it "trickle-down economics" – was that recovery would spread from financial markets and financiers to everyone else. It never did. So now the same servants of capitalism who imposed Plan A are dishing out Plan B.

Sun, 2011-08-28 08:04

#81

ruth67

NDPP wrote:

Welcome to The Collapse - by Linh Dinh

http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/12/welcome-to-the-collapse/

"The collapse will not be televised. Ignored and alone, each of us will experience it singly. As blemish and accusation, you will be photo-shopped from the American Dream group portrait. The lower you slip, the more invisible you become. The disconnect between what's real and what's broadcast will become ever more obscene by the day.."

" The disconnect between what's real and what's broadcast will become ever more obscene by the day.."

Sun, 2011-08-28 22:25

#82

epaulo13

Published on Sunday, August 28, 2011 by Inter Press Service

First Federal Reserve Audit Reveals Trillions in Secret Bailouts

by Matthew Cardinale

The first-ever audit of the U.S. Federal Reserve has revealed 16 trillion dollars in secret bank bailouts and has raised more questions about the quasi-private agency’s opaque operations.

"This is a clear case of socialism for the rich and rugged, you’re-on-your-own individualism for everyone else," U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, an Independent from Vermont, said in a statement.

The majority of loans were issues by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY).

"From late 2007 through mid-2010, Reserve Banks provided more than a trillion dollars… in emergency loans to the financial sector to address strains in credit markets and to avert failures of individual institutions believed to be a threat to the stability of the financial system," the audit report states....

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/28-3

Mon, 2011-09-05 03:13

#83

epaulo13

Dylan Ratigan (rightfully) loses it on air

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIcqb9hHQ3E&feature=share

Wed, 2011-09-14 11:45

#84

epaulo13

Euro SOS Debate

September 12, 2011

By Admin

During the the Global Policy Forum (Russia), Jeffrey Sommers and Michael Hudson discussed the future of the EU with Bloomberg columnist Matthew Lynn. (video)

http://michael-hudson.com/2011/09/euro-sos-debate/

Wed, 2011-09-21 16:08

#85

epaulo13

Russian Ripoff

September 20, 2011
By Admin

Michael was recently interviewed on the Renegade Economists following his visit to Medvedev’s Global Policy Forum.

Listen here

Transcription

Karl Fitzgerald: Michael Hudson, our old friend here on the Renegade economists, from the University of Missouri in Kansas City, has just returned from Russia speaking at the Global Policy Forum. Michael, tell us about the GPF.

MH: well that’s organized by President Medvedev more or less as an anti-Davos. Whereas the Davos invites many of the financial people to figure out how to run the West further into debt the subject of this forum was Russian poverty and how to overcome the fact that in the last 20 years the neo-liberal program that promised that Russia and the rest of the soviet republics would get rich has simply driven them all into debt and impoverished them.....

http://michael-hudson.com/2011/09/russian-ripoff/

Thu, 2011-09-22 12:09

#86

Northern Shoveler Northern Shoveler's picture

The global markets are collapsing like a house made out of a deck of cards. The hedge fund speculators are on the move again looking for a new bubble.

Quote:

To support a stronger economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at levels consistent with the dual mandate, the FOMC decided to extend the average maturity of its holdings of securities.

"The committee intends to purchase, by the end of June 2012, $400 billion of Treasury securities with remaining maturities of 6 years to 30 years and to sell an equal amount of Treasury securities with remaining maturities of 3 years or less. This program should put downward pressure on longer-term interest rates and help make broader financial conditions more accommodative," the FOMC statement said.

Amidst all this, 'significant downside risks to the economic outlook' in the US have brought global markets into jeopardy.

Along with global indices, oil prices sank below the $85 a barrel mark. Associated Press reported that Benchmark oil for November delivery was down $1.35 at $84.57 at midday Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Given that oil traders look upon stock markets as a barometer of overall investor sentiment, plunging global equities weighed on oil prices.

In the domestic market, mirroring the global sell-off, the BSE Sensex at one point plunged by 749 points, or 4.4 per cent, to touch 16,316.03. Given its biggest drop in the last 12 months, the 30 share index was in a free fall with none of the stocks advancing and some of them declining in the range of 6 to 9 per cent on an intraday basis. To add to the woes, the rupee dropped past 49 against the dollar to its weakest in nearly 25 months following a global sell-off in shares and as the US dollar extended gains against major currencies.

http://businesstoday.intoday.in/story/sensex-falls-over-700-points-on-fe...

Quote:

NEW YORK (AP) -- Stocks are plunging in midday trading, extending a rout around the world. Indicators across the financial markets show that investors are worried that the global economy is in for a long slump.

At 11:45, The Dow is down 359 points, or 3.2 percent, at 10,765. The Standard &Poor's 500 index is down 33, or 2.8 percent, at 1,133. The Nasdaq composite is down 63, or 2.5 percent, at 2,475.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/US-stock-futures-plunge-as-apf-3012705529....

Fri, 2011-09-23 05:19

#87

Fidel

M. Spector wrote:

[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/aug/22/capitalis...'s Plan B[/url]

Richard Wolff wrote:
Last week, Democratic governors in New York and Connecticut repeated the austerity politics of Greece's Prime Minister Papandreou and Portugal's former Prime Minister Socrates. In doing so, they likewise imitated the austerity politics of their Republican and Democratic counterparts across virtually all 50 states.

Austerity for labor and the public is everywhere capitalism's Plan B. Even capitalists now see that capitalism's Plan A failed.

You will recall that Plan A entailed a crisis-response program of bailing out the banks, insurance companies, large corporations and stock markets to achieve "recovery". The theory behind Plan A – we used to call it "trickle-down economics" – was that recovery would spread from financial markets and financiers to everyone else. It never did. So now the same servants of capitalism who imposed Plan A are dishing out Plan B.

So they admit that socialism for rich people doesn't work. So now they have to resort to Plan B, which is to forge ahead with socialism for rich people, but this time they will have to kick hell out of labour and the rest of the population with "austerity measures." And so Harper and Cameron are just warning Canadians and Brits ahead of time to get us used to the idea.

It's not an easy thing for governments to have to tell people that government is going to have to kill them for their own good.

Fri, 2011-09-23 21:37

#88

epaulo13

Eurozone endgame: all that is solid melts into air

by Jérôme E. Roos on September 24, 2011

With Greece on the verge of default, Italy sucked into the storm, and French banks drawing ever closer to collapse, the euro has finally reached its endgame.

All that is solid melts into air. What we are experiencing at present will define our era for centuries to come. Precisely ten years after the final collapse of the Soviet Union and the demise of state communism, we are now approaching the endgame for the European Union and the potential demise of European capitalism. The train of economic integration has come grinding to a halt. These are tectonic shifts in world history. But our leaders seem largely oblivious to it.....

http://roarmag.org/2011/09/eurozone-endgame-all-that-is-solid-melts-into...

Sat, 2011-09-24 19:30

#89

epaulo13

Meltdown: the men who crashed the world
The first of a four-part investigation into a world of greed and recklessness that led to financial collapse.

Meltdown

In the first episode of Meltdown, we hear about four men who brought down the global economy: a billionaire mortgage-seller who fooled millions; a high-rolling banker with a fatal weakness; a ferocious Wall Street predator; and the power behind the throne.

http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/meltdown/2011/09/201191410551861...

..eta: got to say this is an excellent investigation..so far. if we are ever to get a look at what really happened this, i think, comes close. i look forward to the following 3 parts.

Sun, 2011-09-25 14:32

#90

NDPP

Specter of Global Depression Haunts IMF, World Bank Meetings, - by Barry Grey

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/sep2011/econ-s24.shtml

"The inability of policy makers to provide a solution to the crisis stems fundamentally from the fact that it is a crisis of the capitalist system itself, and no measures can be considered by governments beholden to the banks and coporations that challenge the wealth and power of the corporate-financial elite.

Instead, all factions within the bourgeoisie, however bitter their differences, seek to extricate themselves through the impoverishment of the working class...'

Sun, 2011-09-25 20:58

#91

Fidel

BoC Governor Art Carney calls for massive expansion of European bailout Hey-hey yyayee, Ralphy boy!

Carney, Waugh spar over new banking rules Really?

Mon, 2011-09-26 22:35

#92

Doug

So he's telling it like it is but I still want to shoot the messenger.

Here's a pretty remarkable interview with independent stock and forex trader Alessio Rastani on the BBC this morning, in which he's either being perfectly candid about how traders are viewing the Eurozone crisis, or he's just trolling. Anyway, he's a sociopath.

Mon, 2011-09-26 23:06

#93

epaulo13

The Dutch Policy: it’s all about the economics!

by Pierre E. Laernoes on September 26, 2011

By ignoring the adverse effects of laissez-faire economics on the environment and on social disparities, the Queen’s speech from the throne ignites indignation. As is tradition in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, on the 3rd Tuesday of September of every year, the ‘puppet’ Queen reads out the so-called “Troonrede” (her speech from the throne) to the nation. This document presents the main policy line that the Dutch government will carry out that following year....

http://roarmag.org/2011/09/the-dutch-policy-its-all-about-the-economics-2/

Wed, 2011-09-28 01:50

#94

epaulo13

..after watching part 2 it has become clear that they are not going to get to the root of the problem. they are blaming a few bad apples. no history of deregulation and no real criticism of the economic system. still there things of interest and i found it worth watching.

pt 2/4 Meltdown - The Secret History of the Global Financial Collapse.2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqBlVBhv0ag

pt 3/4 Meltdown - The Secret History of the Global Financial Collapse.2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBhAvUTW5ZE&feature=related

pt 4/4 Meltdown - The Secret History of the Global Financial Collapse.2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZwMIIJLWOw&feature=related

Wed, 2011-09-28 02:02

#95

NDPP

"NATO members are at the absolute heart of the World Financial Crisis. The colossal squandering of incredible - and in some cases unaccountable - sums in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya are fundamental to the lack of fiscal control in these economies. Not a single media pundit has mentioned it...'"

from: 'Money to Explode' - by Craig Murray

http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2011/09/money-to-explode/

Tue, 2011-10-04 17:14

#96

Doug

Rich socking their money into "catastrophe" portfolios

“We have to explain to our clients, it’s not about making money these days, it’s about keeping wealth,” said Ivan Adamovich, head of the Geneva operations of Swiss bank Wegelin.

Uh-oh!

Sun, 2011-10-09 11:02

#97

epaulo13

More bank bailouts coming: “what are we fucking stupid?!”

Next week, they will start throwing hundreds of billions of dollars at the banks again. But there is one difference from 2008: this time, we’re awake.

Get ready. It starts this weekend. Dexia, the Franco-Belgian bank, got sucked down the rabbit hole last week. With investors now accepting the inevitability of a Greek default, the cross-hairs of global speculators have finally turned on those ultimately responsible for the crisis: the irresponsible lenders, the casino capitalists who thought they could make a quick profit by betting on subprime mortgages and government bonds during the boom years....

http://roarmag.org/2011/10/more-bank-bailouts-coming-what-are-we-fucking...

Mon, 2011-10-10 22:20

#98

Doug

Topeka City Council considers decriminalizing domestic violence to save money

This comes because the county made the decision for its own budget reasons not to prosecute domestic violence cases and left it to the city which had its own ordinance. Both levels of government are trying to make the other pay for prosecutions.

Thu, 2011-10-13 07:19

#99

Fidel

Apparently when we say that the Greeks are about to 'default' on their debt, it's not accurate according to Dr. Michael Hudson. He says for the last several centuries it is law that sovereign debts must be entered into democratically. Icelanders have rejected the notion that they will accept criminal levels of debt to bail out Euro banks. The Greeks are saying the same thing only out in the streets. The Greek people are saying to the EU that they will need an army to come confiscate Greek real estate, lower wages and basically take it out of the hide of labour. Greeks and Icelanders are saying to the EU by their no votes in referenda and protests in the streets that they will have to send in an army to wage class warfare on labour, and that the people will repudiate those illegal debts as soon as democracy is restored.

And EU banksters and their crooked friends on Wall St. are saying, we want to impose these contrived debts on Greek and Icelandic and Slovak labour etc, and cut labour's wages in half, and basically make it so difficult for the people to live that they will have to emigrate and vacate the real estate grabs of the superrich and bankster in the same way Latvians were impoverished in recent years and tens of thousands of youth fleeing the country for better lives anywhere else.

And the Greeks are basically saying to the EU in the same way that Stalin said to the Pope: How many soldiers do you command? Come get some, fascist bastards!

Mon, 2011-10-17 11:58

#100

Doug

Philadelphia-area school board sells ad space on school walls

Starting three weeks ago, the 16 elementary, middle, and high schools are being adorned with - some say defiled by - advertisements as large as 5 by 10 feet. By month's end, 47 should be in place. Ultimately, 218 are to appear on walls and floors, and shrink-wrapped over lockers, locker-room benches, even cafeteria tables.

Mon, 2011-10-17 12:04

#101

Slumberjack

It's nothing that can't be countered with a little creative graffiti.

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