Only the rich are going to suffer in the coming economic collapse.

[pnwmom]

:sarcasm:

That's why my sister, a bank employee for 15 years, just lost her job (along with her whole division). Her house (about $150 K) would be a bargain in much of the country, but she doesn't know how she'll sell it or where she will go. Her town's economy has been in recession for years.

If the U.S. economy is allowed to collapse, millions more will be joining her in the unemployment lines. None of us is immune.

[lapfog_1]

1. And yet there are apparently dozens of DUers

some with a long history of association with DU, who either don't believe that there really is a crisis... or think that we don't really need to address it.

And I feel for your sister... she is one of three such personal stories of very recent layoffs that I've read here today. Not a friend of a friend or some people in my town said... but DUers are saying "my friend, my sister, ME" when they write about this crisis.

It's a real crisis. I don't care if some rich bastards make off with some of the money, I don't want to see this get worse.

[snappyturtle]

3. We've been in a crisis for several years now. The problems wax and

wane. It is not fun. However, I do not want the rich to get richer off of the situation. We have to end this once and for all.

[Dorian Gray]

23. Sadly

there are too many her who are cheering on an economic crisis. The OP's sister is such a sad situation, and I really feel for her. I fear that more and more of us will end up like her, too. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and I truly hope that this crisis is averted.

[lib2DaBone]

32. Oh Yes.. we are in a crisis.....have been for 2 years...

But it's time to wake America up... wakey wakey Hockey Moms.... You evangelical turds.... (IMHO) lol

[TahitiNut]

2. There are folks who've been in that boat for years ... unemployed and black-balled ...

... lost their home and over $100,000 in equity ... had to sell and donate personal property ... and went belly up.

Those folks felt all alone. Canaries in the coal mine. Homeless people on the street or having to move in with family.

But it wasn't enough of an "emergency" ... Bush was elected and RE-ELECTED and (Heaven Forbid!) we didn't act rudely to family or neighbors or voted for him. (Wouldn't want to have upsets.)

I've been on DU since early 2002 ... and I've read a LOT about what folks "would do if" ... draft, whatever. At the same time, I've read a LOT about the newest cell phones, HDTVs, cameras, SUV (don't diss my SUV!), travel, 401Ks, IRAs, and other pleasures of affluence. (But I DESERVE IT, dammit!)

I've read personal attacks of the most vile and despicable kind ... almost always from an "identity politics" devotee.

I've said repeatedly that WE have become a nation of criminals and cowards ... unwilling to step up to the necessities of reasserting the sovereignty of We The People and, if necessary, leaving our blood in the streets. (I'm just as much a part of "WE" as anyone.) But all I hear is "THEY" ... until someone drops into that same boat.

WE have a lot to learn.

[lonestarnot]

5. I'm feeling the they in we.

:)

[pnwmom]

6. Martin Luther King never advocated violence and neither will I. n/t

[TahitiNut]

7. Nonetheless, Dr. King left HIS blood in the streets!

In your eagerness to nay-say, you fail to realize that non-violent civil disobedience WILL attract violence. Read up on Gandhi. Mass killings.

Do you REALLY want to see non-violent protest?
Look!

[bean fidhleir]

19. Very, very, *very* well said, TN. As usual of course.

It's been an education over the years watching what goes on here among the supposed "cream" of the politicratsia.

But TJ saw it coming in 1784: "Our rulers will become corrupt, our people careless. A single zealot may commence persecutor, and better men be his victims. It can never be too often repeated, that the time for fixing every essential right on a legal basis is while our rulers are honest, and ourselves united. From the conclusion of this war we shall be going down hill. It will not then be necessary to resort every moment to the people for support. They will be forgotten, therefore, and their rights disregarded. They will forget themselves, but in the sole faculty of making money, and will never think of uniting to effect a due respect for their rights. The shackles, therefore, which shall not be knocked off at the conclusion of this war, will remain on us long, will be made heavier and heavier, till our rights shall revive or expire in a convulsion."


Thinking of Heinlein's dictum about "makers, takers, and fakers", I wonder how well DU would assay out - 10K?

[Truth2Tell]

4. Your sister could be helped by that same 700B

without giving any of it to Goldman Sachs.

They have fooled you into thinking that if we don't stop this at the top, it is guaranteed to then hit the bottom. Save the 700B to help working people. Let the top rung fail, then bailout at the next level.

Why has DU suddenly become so enamored with trickle-down economics?

[Beregond2]

8. I'm appalled by the attitudes I'm seeing here about this.

Where people are getting the idea that stabilizing the credit system is somehow "bailing out the rich" is beyond me. EVERYTHING in this country is dependent on credit, from the top to the bottom. And guess what, the rich did not create this problem; the common people of America did by voting for Republicans and Republicans-lite. So we can just stop all this man-the-barricades crap, OK? It's time to pay the piper for thirty years of stupidity.

[aquart]

10. Yes, but we have to make sure it's the piper who will be paid.

And currently, I don't see a single thing to assure me of that.

[bean fidhleir]

20. I think those who support the giveaway have an obligation to explain to the rest of us

IN DETAIL exactly what will happen, and why, if there is no giveaway. And defend your explanation, of course.

I think that if you try, you'll either change your mind or find yourself in the embarrassing position of trying to defend greed and plutocratic oligarchy. Because those are the only factors that make a giveaway "necessary".



We can choose not to bail out the greedy. We can say "okay, any working stiffs who lose their jobs because of this can collect up to 18months unemployment AND have a moratorium on major bills until you're on your feet again". And poof, no problem. Many people who were paper millionaires a few months ago will become actual paupers, various banks, mortgage companies, and so forth will close their doors forever, and other little ripples will occur. But that's all.

Right now, those greedy criminals are trying to extort money by threat. We need to not give in. We need to let them shrivel up. Protect the innocents, but let the guilty ROT. And tell them to be thankful they're not doing it in prison.

[Realityhack]

33. That is one of the most ignorant posts I have ever seen on DU. n/t

[bean fidhleir]

34. Any ignorance is in you, not in what I wrote.

Nobody in favor of the giveaway can explain what will happen without the giveaway because all the dire consequences are just choices. "If you don't hand over your wallet, we'll be forced to eat your children".

If you think that's not so, then get busy with the explanation. And if you can't explain, stfu.

[MadHound]

22. I'm appalled by the lack of in depth economic knowledge around here

How people are screaming for a "Bailout, bailout" without thinking just what this bailout will do to our country. If we float this 700 billion plus bailout, how are we going to pay for it? Oh, yeah, we're going to paper the country with this, selling 700 billion plus worth of US Treasury bonds.

Two things will happen when this takes place. First of all, macro econ 101, inject that much liquidity into the system and you're going to get high inflation, devaluing the dollar. Second, with eleven trillion plus worth of debt, at some point in the relatively near future, US Treasury bonds are going to be downgraded. Which means that government won't be able to get anymore funding. Which means a situation much worse than what would happen if we didn't do the bailout. No thanks.

We're at a place of hard choices, but let's not make matters worse by being stampeded into making the worst choice. This is what the Bush administration is good at, stampeding us into making the worst choice, the Patriot Act, Iraq war are just a couple of examples. Let's learn from our mistakes and not repeat them.

[blindpig]

29. The question is, who pays?

Yes, it's time to pay the piper, but why should the American people foot the bill? Hard time are coming regardless, make no mistake. Why compound them by giving in to the extortion of the uber rich?

Cheap credit is history, passage of anything like this abomination will not change that as it would guarantee a serious drop in the value of the dollar.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

30. It's tribalism - a) Bush is for it and b) it helps bankers, and therefor it must be bad.

If Bush came out and said that he opposed ripping the entrails out of small children, or it became apparent that doing so would harm "the rich", a sizeable number of DUers would become child-killing advocates overnight.

[Beregond2]

31. Bingo.

And look at all the people who are still using the 700 billion number, despite that no longer being on the table, talking about lack of oversight when that has been addressed, the massive debt burden, ignoring the fact that this is, in effect, a LOAN, etc. They aren't paying attention, just reacting emotionally.

As for the idea that we can just allow a depression to happen and pay everyone unemployment to get through it...that isn't even worthy of a response. Do these people know nothing about where money comes from? About how much time it takes to rebuild an economy once you let it collapse?

Even if you assume that doing nothing MAY turn out all right, is that a risk we have any right to take?

Maybe having been brought up by parents who lived through the Great Depression has made me over-cautious, but I think ANY price is not too high to pay to prevent the risk of a major economic collapse.

The idea that this is some kind of right-wing conspiracy to fleece the public one last time is absurd too. Is it really likely that a Republican administration would propose something that flies in the face of everything they stand for if they weren't convinced catastrophe was imminent?

[aquart]

9. That's right.

My opposition to a bailout is that I have no reason to believe it will work. The Paulson non-plan is structured like the free for all that lost billions in Iraq. That money isn't in the hands it was intended for, it's in secret accounts in places with bank secrecy laws.

I don't want the current staffs of those offenders working on the bad paper because I think it will take years to unbundle it so we can find out who owns and owes what. I see a mess because they've been insanely careless.

Yes, the innocent are going to suffer. That is going to happen no matter what. We have been living on air and debt for years.

But the Paulson plan was an invitation to INCREASE the amount of the disaster, not lessen it. And when my Congress talks about adding "some" oversight, I have to remember they thought the FISA court was "some" oversight.

I want due diligence and I want PUNISHMENT. And I don't want "some" anything. I want draconian oversight. The kind you give criminals you don't trust an inch.

[pnwmom]

11. I don't think there are any DUers who support Paulsen's plan.

That's beating a dead horse. The division is between those who, like Obama, think we have to take some measures to prevent the economy from collapsing; and those who think, like some of the Republican congresspeople, that we should just sit back and watch.

[TahitiNut]

13. Agreed ... but remember that no 'oversight' is possible when the regulating agency refuses

... to both regulate and be transparent in doing so. We've had BOTH the failure of regulation and the FAILURE to assert Congress' subpoena power. The Executive Branch (including agencies) has been flipping the bird to Congress for nearly 2 years ... and the GOPhers just weren't interested in oversight before then.

[aquart]

18. Which is why they can't sell me on this yet.

They have to convince me that Wall Street will no longer be the Wild Wild West. Because if we can't stop this lunacy, they'll need more money next week.

In the days of honor, Bush and Cheney would have shot themselves by now. And all those CEO's.

[radfringe]

12. like it or not

When they fall, we get squished.

the economy does not exist in a vacuum at the top, in one way or another, for better or worse - it effects all of us.

I'm no fan of this bailout, and I'd like to know what the alternatives are other than doing nothing.

I also want to know what the plans are for what happens next. Pouring water on a fire may put it out, but it doesn't guarantee that it won't erupt again. We have to know and understand how this started, where it started and what can be done to prevent it from happening again.

Assume we do go with this bailout plan and it works - then what? then what - back to biddness as usual? If there is to be regulation - what kind? How long before some mccainiac repub starts up again with deregulation mania?

whether it's a bailout, some other solution, or doing nothing - there needs to be long term planning, not short sighted quick fixes

if you don't like the bailout - what are the alternatives and what will the consequences be?

[Turbineguy]

14. A heavily armed society

in turoil.

Somebody told me yesterday ammunition has gone up 30 percent in the past two months.

There's lots of reasons to be in favor of the bailout even if you don't "like" it.

Even as dense as Bush is, I think he understands the implications of a collapse beyond just what it will do to his place in the history books. Paulson certainly understands it.

[IamyourTVandIownyou]

15. Go to work for privately held companies only.

Do not work for anyone on Fall St.

[Two Americas]

16. all the more reason

All the more reason to not bail out the fat cats.

Bail out the American people.

The economy is us, the people, not the bankers and investors, not the predators that caused the problem. Sooner or later we will need a New Deal relief program. That is the solution - help the working people, you don't help those few who are preying on the working people. That is insanity, and history will condemn us if we do it.

"Help us or we will hurt you" - that is what we are being threatened with.

Favoring the bail out is the most conservative political position a person could possibly take. I am amazed that so many Democrats are taking it.

There will be hard times either way, bail out or no. Wiith a bail out things will be much much worse for much longer.

Freedom, or slavery. That is what this is about.

[tavalon]

17. I was all set to blast you on this one

Thanks for the sarcasm tag. We will all feel this, some brutally but all will feel it.

[My Good Babushka]

21. I agree with Two Americas

Bailout or no bailout. The credit is going to dry up for everyone, I'm pretty sure.

[bean fidhleir]

26. "The credit is going to dry up for everyone, I'm pretty sure."

Why? What *IS* credit?

The reality is that it will only "dry up" if politicians allow it to "dry up".

Imagine that government says "okay, if you get turned down by 3 banks but you're good for the money, you can come down to (e.g.) the local Social Security office and get the loan there."

[mmonk]

24. Recommended.

Without credit extension, we're all in a heap of trouble.

[KG]

25. i'm not so sure i'm against a bailout., but 700 billion? where did they come up with that number?

why not give every american $1 million to pay off their bills, it would be a whole lot cheaper.

[mmonk]

27. Not that simple.

Doubt it will make banks loosen up lending to other banks, especially if they don't know the value of their balance sheets.

[W_HAMILTON]

28. Yep.

It's like at my job. We are slowing down, so all the regular employees are getting their hours cut back. We've been cut back so far, that right now we may all lose our benefits (due to working only 24 hours instead of the necessary 30 hours). Did the managers' hours or salary get cut? Did the useless general manager (who probably makes 4x what I do) salary get cut? Nope, it's the little guy that feels the brunt, because the "rich" are the ones with the power, and what do you think they are going to do? Take pay cuts? Hah, of course not; they're just going to cut OUR hours and lay US off.