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Thursday, September 25, 2008

Who's MONEY is it anyway? Federal Bail Out

Since I do keep track and watch CNBC obsessively and have a small stock portfolio.. vested in ETF's, made that move this summer after watching the Yahoo versus Microsoft debacle and then the Bear Stearns failure, figure it was safer to buy the Lipper ETF's that move inversely,, lol with the market. Ok so much for the economic jargon
My humble opinion is that we need to keep the facts and figures straight here and not react with a knee jerk reaction and instead remain calm, cool and collected and do some serious technical analysis.
I watched George W. Bush last night and he really didn't say much except acknowledge that the FEDs need to so something or the entire economy was going to collapse.. OOPS, btw, Paulson should be fired now.. he doesn't need the job, so replace him with someone who does give a damn! oops now that is being emotional.Bill Clinton actually presented an excellent analysis of what should and could be done.and before he was on with Larry King, I said what he said,, and BTW, Bill and Hillary as he suggested,, had to have seen this coming because they are financially vested people.. to use an economic term.
More to the point, this so called Bail Out of Wall street is not a bail out and it is certainly not bailing out Wall Street, which will go on with or without the "Federal bail out or is that buy out?"Unfortunately, AIG and Fannie and Freddie regardless of HOW they got there need to be supported by Federal dollars for the stability of the US economy. AIG insures US Property and lives all over the world (whether or not they pay any claims is another matter) and the level of intertwined infrastructure between the USA and the world would be is at this point in time, not to be unwound, therefore, AIG must be included in the buy/bail out. The ramifications of this not happening are more than I could write in this Blog.
Fannie and Freddie hold both GOOD and BAD mortgages directly or via proxy, therefore, in order to make sure the good mortgages, and I mean the regular people who got mortgages based on their credit and income must be protected. There is no way to separate out the good and bad debts in retrospect now, it is too late. A year ago when Jim Cramer and Hillary Clinton suggested to the Government a current review of the sub prime mortgage and over extended credit and lending, a blatant money grab by those institutions, they were ignored totally, which is why Jim Cramer is played over and over again screaming THEY KNOW NOTHING,,, how right he was in that case.
Yes this 700 Billion dollar bail out is needed, but it should be carefully scrutinized by Congress, and all the quid pro quos suggested by Paulson should be totally ignored.The companies that will get the money should have apply for a specific amount of money and any CEO previously involved should NOT be allowed to be involved in the application nor counsel and they should definitely NOT be given a severance package,,, it is my humble understanding they got that last year as a Christmas bonus. :)
And yes. Senators John McCain and Obama should return to Congress and study this and vote on the biggest economic crises for our country since the New Deal,, no make that the Great Depression. About the suggestion that a debate should be held during this, if John McCain decides he wants to dedicate his mind, (the implication about his multi tasking abilities aside..give me break) and his staff and his time to this, it is his decision.Frankly, I think Obama should also do the same thing, sometimes things of this import take full effort and time.
A 700 Billion government purchase of private companies should be carefully looked at,, no giant carte blanche handed over to unknown entities, corporations or prior CEOs.
I think that about covers it..Have a great day :)
Grasshopper izzy