Ilargi is an entertaining, informative and very well informed writer on the current meltdown in global economics. And he continues on form in this post Long Term Pervertion.
While the details are pretty on point as usual, what is new is the tone of voice.
This is the voice of someone who is very afraid of what is happening, it is the voice of growing panic and it reminds me why I am so glad to be on a medium sized island way the hell down in the temperate south pacific with no substantial land for over a thousand miles.
While the details are pretty on point as usual, what is new is the tone of voice.
What would be in the real interest of the people is to let the banks fail, and use these funds to set up a new banking system. There are various ways to do this. Nationalizing the banks is not one of them, because it would transfer the toxic debts to the people. Who are already poor and getting much poorer even without those "assets". It can't be done. There is no way. Tim Geithner couldn't do it after 19 months of thinking, and nobody else can. The banks must be made to fail. But they won't be, because the main shareholders, who are among the richest people on the planet, would never allow it. At least not now. They prefer opening the public spigot more and more, until it breaks. Since they own Washington, that is what will happen.
Another hypothetical -since it won't be accepted- issue that would be in the public's interest is that Fannie and Freddie should be liquidated. Not made even bigger, as Obama is set to do. Fannie and Freddie are both perverted and perverting institutions. They keep home prices artificially high, which is good for banks, and banks only. All homes in foreclosure process that the two GSE's hold should be handed over to the communities they are located in. Nationalize those properties, not the banks. Under very strict regulations, which are necessary to prevent them from turning into objects of political power ploys, the homes, in which the former owners can stay, would be properly assessed and the rent the occupants will be forced to pay, if they choose to stay, can flow into the communities they live in. This is the proper and probably only way, not only to keep people in their homes, but also to prevent thousands upon thousands of US communities from going bankrupt.
But it will not come to pass. It would take money away from the owners of the chilled corpses called banks that guide the politics of the nation.
Another hypothetical -since it won't be accepted- issue that would be in the public's interest is that Fannie and Freddie should be liquidated. Not made even bigger, as Obama is set to do. Fannie and Freddie are both perverted and perverting institutions. They keep home prices artificially high, which is good for banks, and banks only. All homes in foreclosure process that the two GSE's hold should be handed over to the communities they are located in. Nationalize those properties, not the banks. Under very strict regulations, which are necessary to prevent them from turning into objects of political power ploys, the homes, in which the former owners can stay, would be properly assessed and the rent the occupants will be forced to pay, if they choose to stay, can flow into the communities they live in. This is the proper and probably only way, not only to keep people in their homes, but also to prevent thousands upon thousands of US communities from going bankrupt.
But it will not come to pass. It would take money away from the owners of the chilled corpses called banks that guide the politics of the nation.
This is the voice of someone who is very afraid of what is happening, it is the voice of growing panic and it reminds me why I am so glad to be on a medium sized island way the hell down in the temperate south pacific with no substantial land for over a thousand miles.
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