Fins,
What was the alternative? You say the government didn't have a stake, but they did, a huge one! They had FDIC insurance and to see WAMU just go bankrupt and become worthless would have actually resulted in a bigger bill to the govenrment. If you take the governments insurance, you take the regulation and oversight. The FDIC prevents a massive run on banks, which would have probably happened this week, one of the factors that caused the great depression.
True capitalism would have seen many financial institutions fail to exist this week, but can the rest of America withstand the 10 year funk that would result from that, probably downright depression with deflation.
Luv
Luv,
We have not absorbed, or abolished a bubble, we have moved it to the nation's general debt. The bubble still exists and the cancer is now being absorbed into the rest of the body. Our nation is not an episode of "House," where an autocratic Doctor has all the answers.
This decision was initially made by Bernanke, acting alone. After the Federal Reserve spent itself into insolvency, the Treasury got involved. The story last week was not that AIG tanked, but that the Fed itself became insolvent.
Bernanke (a student of history) himself says the Federal Reserve lacks the legal authority to do what he has done. He acted alone in bailing out AIG, spending $85 Billion of OUR money.
Our politicians are unwilling to undertake the kind of Carter era austerity program necessary to even service the increased debt. The rest of the World knows this and knows the only way out is to inflate our currency until the debt is payable in worthless dollars.
(a big war would do quite nicely to perform just such an economic destruction and yesturday we started shooting at an ally. Ahmadinejad would be smart to put away his Borat impersonations until after the election)
To put this debt in perspective, our deficit will run around 10% of our entire nation's Gross Domestic Product next year. It is clearly unsustainable. The results are predictable:
- stratospheric debt levels
- uncontrollable Dollar inflation
- Worldwide run on the dollar
- the loss of Dollar as the worldwide reserve currency
When the Dollar loses its status, we are at that instant a deeply insolvent third world debtor nation. Maybe you and I can sneak into Mexico and start a landscaping service.
I hope we don't get there, but that is the risk we face with this plan.
Now, is it necessary? JP Morgan paid 1.9Bn for WaMu's assets worth 307Bn. The incredible deal JP Morgan got was based on the -39Bn in bad mortgage assets. BUT, and a big BUT, is if this bail out goes forward, that -39Bn can be monetized at the Fed Window (or whatever mechanism they use) and passed along to the taxpayers. One heck of a deal, paying 1.9Bn for 307Bn of assets, wouldn't you say?
What about the 7.0Bn TPG Capital just put in to bail out WaMu? They did this in good faith, but now that money has vanished as the government stepped in and gave the asset to another party. Is that fair?
And that is where the problem lies. Who can you trust? How can you invest, if the government can step in and change the rules of the market, simply taking and handing out assets?
Bernanke did all that he had power to do, he opened the Fed Window. Beyond that he, and Paulson, are acting way beyond their authority and we do not even know if this action is needed. We are told the entire value of sub-prime, adjusting and defaulting mortgages is 500Bn, so why do we need 700Bn to fix that? Those assets have some value too. It doesn't make sense and the people we have elected to represent us have not even been given the opportunity to see this deal before they are asked to vote for it.
The banks have the money, the Fed gave them the money, they have my deposits at 3% and are lending them out short term at 35%. The disparity is the direct result of a lack of trust. What the government is pulling increases uncertainty. Ultimately protecting the American people is about stability. That stability might be the result of letting some deadbeats get the arse's kicked out on the street, along with many of those who originated those loans.
Instead, hedge funds are all over trying to hire the hot-shot investment bankers who figured out how to leverage mortgage derivatives 30 to 1.
We have to let the system work by following the rues of the game. It is the only safe way to restore confidence. We could do this by putting money directly into the banks, it is legal and the mechanism is understood by all involved.
This rush to do something off the books and outside our Constitution is typical of Bush's administration. Instead of Colin Powell, it is Paulson claiming there is yellow cake uranium under Main Street.
A public debt is a public curse - James Madison
A wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.... - Thomas Jefferson
If we can prevent government from wasting the labors of the people, while under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy. - Thomas Jefferson
Sorry about the serious thread creep.
