Re: [A-List] Into the Abyss

[kaliyuga@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]

> If anything is clear about the present economic crisis it is that the
> parallels with the beginning of the Great Depression in 1929 are both
> substantive and striking. Thus, in both cases is / was the ground for the
> crisis laid and preceded by 1) a housing bubble that imploded, 2) the
> crowding out of real investment by speculative investment, 3) an mounting
> imbalance in world trade, 4) a prolonged assault upon labour, 5) a
> profound
> polarization of wealth and increase in inequality, and 6) a more or less
> total lack of regulation of the financial system.
>
Hmmmm....it's so transparent, one wonders if it has not been deliberately
created.  Now the Federal Reserve (a private company, not associated with
the U.S. Government, much less under the direction of the 'people' in this
country) can step in and 'rescue' the economy by taking greater control
over banking institutions not previously under their authority.  And WE
will be grateful to them.

No one can tell me that the Fed did not see this coming.  There was
certainly enough data on the explosion of the securitization and
derivatives market, encouraged by ridiculously low interest rates - which
Greenspan provided.  Even I, at least 5-6 years ago questioned whether or
not the securitization process is inherently bubble producing, precisely
because it is unregulated and unrestricted as to size.  I make no pretense
to economic competence, but if I could see an issue, I cannot but think
that Greenspan, et al., did as well.  In the meantime, the wealth of the
middle class which was largely held in the value of their personal
residences is disappearing.  One out of 10 homeowners is under water -
meaning they owe more than their house is worth.  What better way to
enslave a people than to put them further in debt.

One has to ask another question.  Why Bear Sterns?  Had the Fed made their
discount offer to the investment banks BEFORE Bear was close to collapse,
could they have been 'saved' by J. P. Morgan?  I read somewhere - I'll try
and find it - that Bear had refused to participate in something that
earned them the ire of the other banks.

Maggie