McCain Rushing Back to D.C. to Help with Economic Crisis???

(You can stop watching the first video at about 1:35 min., when it moves on to the subject of McCain's competency w.r.t. Iraq):



I'm so glad McCain's "suspended" his campaign and is trying to back out of the first debate so he can help cope with the crisis! Phil Gramm was key in pushing through the deregulation that led to the current financial meltdown. If my life savings weren't at stake, McCain & Co. would be hilarious.

Here's Barbara Boxer on his years of "experience" in dealing with our financial system (she gets to that subject after about the first minute in):



The Wall Street Journal reports, "Sen. Chris Dodd, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, said Thursday that [the] bipartisan meeting with President Bush at the White House on the mortgage rescue plan was nothing short of a disaster. . . . 'I am not going to sign on to something I just saw this afternoon,' Dodd said . . . . [t]he whole meeting 'looked like a rescue plan for John McCain . . . .'"

Bloomberg reports, "Hundreds of Economists Urge Congress Not to Rush on Rescue Plan."

Here's my solution. We don't have to enact any new legislation that no one's had a chance to review. We simply repeal the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, the law enacted after the crash of 1929 that was carefully designed to protect against exactly this kind of meltdown and that worked just fine until the Republicons repealed it, and make it apply to all kinds of depositaries without exception.

P.S.: If you were somewhat surprised by the revelation that the Bush Admin had a financial "Patriot Act" all ready just sitting on the shelf waiting for an opportune meltdown, see this and this.

Please VOTE

All credit to Rolling Stone; please do go there, 'cause there's more good info, e.g. here and here.

E-Mail from a Nigerian Named Paulson . . .

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Tuesday, September 23, 2008 5:11 AM
From: XXXXX
To: XXXXX

Dear XXXXX:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of [XXX] billion USD. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gramm, lobbyist for UBS, who (God willing) will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a former U.S. congressional leader and the architect of the PALIN / McCain Financial Doctrine, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. As such, you can be assured that this transaction is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully,

Minister of Treasury Paulson

(Thanks, All Spin Zone! {via Truth2Tell})

"WE DO NOT SUPPORT GOV'T BAILOUTS OF PRIVATE INSTITUTIONS. Gov't Interference in the Markets Exacerbates Problems in the Marketplace . . .

and causes the free market to take longer to correct itself." (Emphasis supplied.)

From the 2008 Republican Party Platform adopted earlier this month.

P.S.: Did you catch (from The Washington Post), "The White House budget office said yesterday that it has decided not to incorporate mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into the federal budget, citing the temporary nature of the Treasury Department's takeover and 'the level of federal ownership' of the firms."

The Food Shark

If you're going to Marfa for Open House this year, keep your eye out for my friend Adam Bork, video artist and alt-rock musician, and for his Food Shark, which serves the best falafel in town. Somebody told me he's getting famous.

Army Unit to Deploy in October for Domestic Operations

Per Democracy Now (citing Army Times), "[b]eginning in October, the Army plans to station an active unit inside the United States for the first time to serve as an on-call federal response in times of emergency. The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent thirty-five of the last sixty months in Iraq, but now the unit is training for domestic operations. The unit will soon be under the day-to-day control of US Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command. The Army Times reports this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to Northern Command. The paper says the Army unit may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control. The soldiers are learning to use so-called nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds."

Anyone ever heard of posse comitatus?

And don't forget those those "detention centers" Halliburton's been building in the U.S.

Dem. Rep. from Washington State, Jim McDermott

Wish I could say, I watch so you don't have to; but I alone can't keep up.

Of Course, Konservative Keymasters Know . . .

it doesn't matter who the V.P. or even the P. is; all that matters is, can they be managed.