Jun 09 2011
Well, you’ve got your diamonds and you’ve got your pretty clothes And the chauffeur drives your car/ You let everybody know/ But don’t play with me, ’cause you’re playing with fire
(I wrote about this two days ago posted on another board and today its making headlines. Just goes to show that the bloggers are way ahead of the game.)
Aug 28 2010
As our own Dharmasyd essayed about today, Glen Ford writing at Black Agenda Report said on Wednesday “We Are Cornered: There’s No Way Out Without A Fight”: “Obama and his Democratic legislative allies have successfully shielded their Wall Street masters from anything worthy of the name financial reform.”, and “The pace of finance capital deterioration quickens, accelerating the timetable of the Right’s offensive. As the hunger grows, Wall Street’s servants become more aggressive and demanding, and there is nothing in the Democratic Party, as presently constituted, to stop them.”
Ford closed his essay with: “One truth remains: only a massed people can defeat massed capital. If the American Left is capable of bearing that in mind in the critical times ahead, it might just escape the cul-de-sac and make some modest contribution to the world.”
Ford is right about many things, but wrong about one thing.
There is more than one truth.
Apr 25 2010
Warren Buffet gave a prophetic pronouncement back in 2003 about the Derivatives market, seeing the exponential dangers of this “paper-thin” type of investment.
Buffet did not mince words. He called them “financial weapons of mass destruction“:
Buffett warns on investment ‘time bomb’
BBC – 4 March, 2003
The derivatives market has exploded in recent years, with investment banks selling billions of dollars worth of these investments to clients as a way to off-load or manage market risk.
But Mr Buffett argues that such highly complex financial instruments are time bombs and “financial weapons of mass destruction” that could harm not only their buyers and sellers, but the whole economic system.
[…]Some derivatives contracts, Mr Buffett says, appear to have been devised by “madmen”. […]
Feb 09 2010
Midterm Momentum Is All GOP’s
November Is Looking Grim For Democrats, And It Could Still Get Worse
by Charlie Cook, via nationaljournal.com, Tuesday, Jan. 26, 2010
Whenever someone asks if the 2010 midterm elections will be “another 1994” it makes me roll my eyes. No two election years are alike — the causes, circumstances and dynamics are always different to anyone who takes more than a casual look.
But 1994, and for that matter 2006, were “nationalized” elections, elections where overarching national dynamics often trump candidates, campaigns, local political history and natural tendencies.
Often in these elections, inferior, underfunded or less-organized candidates and campaigns beat more amply funded and better-prepared candidates and campaigns.
The primary difference between this year and previous nationalized elections is that this one looks so bad for Democrats so early.
These kinds of years also see states and districts that normally fall easily into one party’s column inexplicably fall into the other’s hands.
There is no reason to believe that 2010 is not just as nationalized as 1994 and 2006 were, or for that matter 1958, 1974 and 1982. To be sure, the causes, circumstances and dynamics are different, but the trend line is the same for each. At least today it is.
Oct 24 2009
If you missed Dylan Ratigan’s interview today with Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) — well you missed a lot!
They spell out in stark relief the very REAL need for serious Wall Street Regulation — NOW! (and still!)
Or we risk a repeat of the same Bubble-driven collapse of Trillion Dollar Derivative Bets, that occur in the dark, beyond the reach — or even the Watch — of any Govt Regulator, or even the Public scrutinity.
Nothing has changed, they can STILL Gamble Trillions in Derivatives, and let US the Taxpayers pick up the Tab, whenever their Bets GO Bad!
Link to MSNBC Clip to the Ratigan Cantwell Interview
Definitely a “Must See”, in my opinion.
So much so, I transcribed much of it, to help peak your interest …
Oct 20 2009
FRONTLINE INVESTIGATES THE ROOTS OF THE FINANCIAL CRISIS
FRONTLINE Presents
The Warning
Tuesday, October 20, 2009, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS
In the devastating aftermath of the economic meltdown, FRONTLINE sifts through the ashes for clues about why it happened and examines critical moments when it might have gone much differently.
In The Warning, airing Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2009, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS (check local listings), veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk (Inside the Meltdown, Breaking the Bank) unearths the hidden history of the nation’s worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. At the center of it all he finds Brooksley Born, who speaks for the first time on television about her failed campaign to regulate the secretive, multi-trillion-dollar derivatives market whose crash helped trigger the financial collapse in the fall of 2008.