Whining and the Bailout...

I hear whining about losing money and stocks and bonds. I can understand the whimpering from Joe Public who has lost retirement money and savings in the Wall Street meltdown, but that small outcry is being overshadowed by the screams of millionaires and billionaires, outraged that they could lose so much in a system that was raped by their own kind!


Profiteers, outrageous risk takers, inside traders, speculators, greed and negligence all played a huge part in the debacle we're all watching unfold. Sure, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac contributed heavily to the mess with the usual lack of government oversight, which John McCain pleaded for years ago, but the Democrats blew off, and now want to blame this mess on the Republicans and Bush. The blame needs to be spread on Wall Street and the government, a cross between greed and inaction, with the usual pork barrel politics and favoritism thrown right in the mix.

Frankly, I don't give a rat's ass about the big buck investors, the millionaires and billionaires who lost their ass. They thought they were so damned shrewd and had the world by the ass and could make a buck no matter what. Tough crap if their predictions were wrong. Get in the freaking bread line if you have to; Father Joe's still serves good meals daily! My heart goes out to the little guy who got screwed because the government didn't do anything to reign in speculation and wild aggressive moves on Wall Street, and once again let the financial sector run the regulators, rather than the other way around.

If the regulators had been doing their jobs, and keeping a watch on the pulse of the financial sector, this should have never happened. If the government hadn't been so idiotic to try and make home ownership possible to people who could never own a home, and allow creative home mortgage deals that made no sense at all, the mortgage meltdown wouldn't have happened. If banks and the regulators had insisted that Private Mortgage Insurance be purchased on all mortgages with 20% down or less, we'd not have to bail out tens or hundreds of thousands of mortgagees and bank loans. I hear the creativeness resulted in few mortgages being covered by PMI; shouldn't there be some fraud investigations underway to see how many fraudulent mortgages were made? Will there be some accounting for this mess or will it all be swept under the rug as long as it uses the taxpayers money?

And, finally, what the hell are we bailing out the assholes who profited from this mess anyway? Check out the Internet and see how much the top dogs from Wachovia and WaMu stand to make when the takeovers are completed. It's sickening. The directors of some institutions bought or received lots of extra stock when it was worth zero recently, so they pay no tax...then when the banks are bought and the stock zooms in value, they get fat again, and still leave the poor investor screwed.

Check out Wachovia Bank's directors securities filings and see how each of them got big blocks of "Phantom Stock" October 1, as they waltzed out the door leaving their director jobs behind. All while the Wachovia investors got squat. Pretty nice, huh?

http://google.brand.edgar-online.com/?sym=wb

Lastly, what's the deal with Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Wachovia? The Wells deal would involve NO taxpayer involvement and leave FDIC out of holding the bag at all. The Citigroup deal would leave taxpayers liable for a good part of the assets and losses. The FDIC yaps out of both sides of its mouth (or other lower orifice) and says it is committed to the best deal for taxpayers, yet also says it supports the Citigroup deal which will cost us money. It can't be both, numbnuts! If it costs us zero, it's a good deal; if it costs us money it isn't! Good God, did they let the inmates from Station B-11 at Tri-City start running the FDIC too?

Okay, now I'm whining, but for reform in our economic system where there is accountability. You know, like when you spend all the money in the cookie jar and there is no more, you eat what's on the shelf until payday? Beans and Spaghetti-o's if that's all there is, but you make it through. You don't spend your neighbor's money and buy steak, lobster and caviar, and then when he can't eat, just glare at him and say...whoops...and not even sorry. That's the way you get your ass kicked, and we need to kick some asses in Washington and Wall Street so this can never happen again.

That's my view. I hope you make it safe and sound through this mess. We're doing okay, but only due to some good financial planning way ahead of time, which meant leaving the stock market behind and staying with IRA's. Slow growth, perhaps, but safe and not sorry is reassuring in these tough times.

Obama as Commander in Chief?

I'm not about to get into the political arena and tell anyone who to vote for. That, as always, is an individual choice and something that should be considered very carefully, free from the rhetoric you hear from the political arena, and the TV ads that seem to assail you from every angle, and will until the votes are counted.

Forgetting about anything else; the facts are that Mr. Obama is not Muslim, he was sworn in on the Bible and not the Quran, and he does say the Pledge of Allegiance. He's a one term Senator and does not have the requisite experience to become the leader of this great country.

Let's talk about military experience. Obama....zero. Not one minute of experience to be Commander in Chief of our military. That speaks volumes of why he's already stated he'd powwow with every hostile nation. I'd be very concerned he'd likely give away the store while he's at it. Even his Democratic political rival, Senator Clinton, took him to task for even suggesting such an absurd thing. Meeting with the leader of Iran? And Cuba? Then what. Normalize relations while Iran builds nuclear weapons and sit back as they ready the fire button? Then run around in circles and ask his advisers what to do since they're now a "friendly" nation? Mr. Obama postulates such absurd ideas and then backpedals after the ideas backfire. Easy enough during election campaigns when rhetoric is cheap, but how to backpedal when you're the leader and you've committed yourself, is a "whole 'nother ballpark" as they say.

Since he has no military experience, and hasn't bothered to even go to Iraq to meet with top military personnel there, he has no idea what's going on except what his own advisers tell him. Come on, Mr. Obama, get off your duff and go see first hand what's going on in the real world. If you aspire to lead our troops, you at least owe them the courtesy of going into their territory and spending some time. Or, are you afraid to do that?

Mr. Obama has no idea what military missions are all about, nor does he have a clue what combat is like. Put him in Iraq in the middle of a serious situation and you'd have a real mess to clean up, if you know what I mean. You just can't trade exuberance for experience, and John McCain has experience. Not that John McCain is perfect in any sense of the word, but if I had to face an enemy, I'd rather have McCain behind me and Obama in front of me rather than the other way around. At least I'd know where my backup was and could depend on it being knowledgeable and solid!

I don't know where this election will end up, but I do know that combat veterans will think about their experiences, and those of their sons and daughters, and who they want to be at the helm of the country. One candidate promises to pull all the troops out post haste, while the other says we'll stay and win and then come home. I don't know if either is 100% correct, but running away won't solve the problems in Iraq any more than it did in Vietnam. Neither Obama nor McCain created this situation, but one will have to be the one to help solve it. And, for my money, I'd choose the one who's been there and done that to be the best choice to make the right decisions.