End The Fed Demonstrations November 22

[Joanne98]

10/22/2008

Elaine Meinel Supkis

The confiscations of systems and wealth generating locations is beginning. The US has opened yet another window into the awful nothingness of the Cave of Wealth and Death. The 'rescue' amounts are now well over $2 trillion and rising weekly. The 90% losses from Lehman's collapse in the CDO markets is still not being acknowledged nor examined realistically. Bush promises MORE 'free trade' as he and other rulers push yet again for more of the Doha Round process to finish its job of killing the US industrial base. All the taps are wide open and all of this future wealth is vanishing today. Hedge funds are failing fast due to not being hedges at all but scams. The global trade collapse is confusing many mainstream commentators who would love to think that all is basically well, this is just some sort of odd glitch. It is not.

Argentina to take over pensions

Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez has signed a bill that will nationalise the country's 10 private pension funds. The move will put the government in control of almost $30bn (£18bn) of investments and is aimed at protecting them from the global market turmoil. Shares slumped amid fears of the move's impact and critics accused the government of trying to grab the funds.
*snip*
Ms Fernandez said that Argentina needed to protect those with pensions amid falling stock prices around the world. However, expectations of the announcement sent Argentine shares 11% lower and critics said the government simply wanted its hands on the money ahead of a tough budget year.

The minute any government is on the prowl for wealth, no one is safe. It doesn't matter if the government is 'capitalist' or 'communist' or any other possible system. When a government is in trouble, they confiscate stuff. They usually do this unilaterally and get it all rubber stamped or they don't do this at all and there is a violent revolution/coup. The #1 job of any government is to stay in power. They will do this no matter how messy. In a number of 'democracies' the power structure is built up on this system of opposition that is supposed to vacillate between 'left' and 'right' or 'labor' and 'capitalist'.

Due to the great diligence of the lobbyists and the rich, most nations do not have this dual system. Instead, there are very small differences in philosophy or systems which waver between to poles that are so close as to be indistinguishable to outsiders. Even if there are differences, the election process irons this all out and candidates end up sounding exactly the same even if their intentions for rule are not the same at all.

This ends up causing most elections in Europe and America as well as many other places to be all about personalities, skin color, religion or promises of future bribes like tax cuts. The US has seen many years of tax cut promises which have now bankrupted this nation and destroyed our entire power structure. Due to hostile aliens buying most of our debt, we are now in a state whereby the Average Joe and Jane imagines there is no limit to the debt we can take since none of this shows up in the local systems. We see no reduction in our lives, no dire effects. The goods keep pouring in from Asia, the money keeps magically entering into our national banking system and all is well. More tax cuts! We want more and more!

Anyone who talks about this is attacked or ignored. The main story line being run by the right wing is very simple: social security and health care for Americans are bankrupting the nation. The left simply is ignoring overhead costs. Neither side is relishing a realistic conversation with the voters about the dangers of our empire running up huge debts and being the center of global export trade. So let's go back to the news to see how free trade continues to kill America:

Bernanke supports higher spending

US Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke has said more government spending may be needed to combat economic weakness. A fresh round of stimulus would be a good idea, he told the US House of Representatives budget committee. Although Mr Bernanke stopped short of saying the US was in recession, he said the American economy was now in a "very serious slowdown".
Hopes of a fresh economic stimulus package pleased investors, with the main Dow Jones index ending up 4.7%.

Each injection is bigger than the last. Each has less impact. Last year, whenever the Fed or the Treasury injected fake funny money, the markets went totally wild with joy. The stock market shot up so much last September that it reached a peak! Then immediately began its present fall. Back then, all the main speakers on TV and in the mainstream media said that the decline was purely emotional. Of course, having Cramer run around TV screaming, 'There is BLOOD in the streets', was rather hysterically funny.

There was no blood. It was red ink. But to bankers and Cramer, this is their lifeblood.

Fed to Provide Up to $540 Billion to Aid Money Funds

(Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve will provide up to $540 billion in loans to help relieve pressure on money-market mutual funds beset by redemptions.

``Short-term debt markets have been under considerable strain in recent weeks'' as it got tougher for funds to meet withdrawal requests, the Fed said today in a statement in Washington. A Fed official said that about $500 billion has flowed since August out of prime money-market funds, which with other money-market mutual funds control $3.45 trillion.

The initiative is the third government effort to aid the funds, which usually provide a key source of financing for banks and companies. The exodus of investors, sparked by losses following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., contributed to the freezing of credit that threatens to tip the economy into a prolonged recession.

``The problem was much worse than we thought,'' Jim Bianco, president of Chicago-based Bianco Research LLC, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. Policy makers are trying to prevent ``Great Depression II'' by stemming the financial industry's contraction, he said.

The rabbit is out of the magician's hat. The cat is out of the bag. Even the dimmest wits in America are figuring out two things: the bankers are really socialists but are exclusionary socialists. Namely, they want money to be created and handed to them, not to us. They want to use us as collateral. Ask any banker if money can be lent at cheap with no collateral. They will laugh maliciously.

No, to get those cute 1% loans, you need to put up some collateral. And the true collateral here is the US taxpayers and everything they own. Note the top story. All our collective and individual wealth can be suddenly seized. Since the bankers and their buddies own our political system, they will get whatever they need.

The other fact the US public has become dimly aware is, they will NOT be bailed out with this magic money. They will have to pay a price and a steep price. If they ARE bailed out with funny money, this will be extracted in less than five years just like the Bush tax cuts, via inflation of food, fuel and other necessities.

Since there is a lot of propaganda from kindergarden on up poured into brains to convince US citizens that we are NOT an empire, it is hard for voters to understand the profound loss of sovereignty and international muscle the US has suffered during this last 8 years of wild misspending, wild debt accumulation and wild military expansionism.

The bail outs are now at $2.25 trillion!

Paulson announced the plan Tuesday, saying "we regret having to take these actions." Pouring billions in public money into the banks, he said, was "objectionable," but unavoidable to restore confidence in the markets and persuade the banks to start lending again.

In addition to the capital infusions, which will be made this week, the government said it would temporarily guarantee $1.5 trillion worth of new senior debt issued by banks, as well as insuring $500 billion in deposits in non-interest-bearing accounts, mainly used by businesses.

All told, the potential cost to the government of the latest bailout package comes to $2.25 trillion, triple the size of the original $700 billion rescue package, which centered on buying distressed assets from banks. The latest massive show of government firepower is an abrupt about-face for Paulson, who just days earlier was discouraging the idea of capital injections for banks. Analysts say the United States was forced to shift policy in part because Britain and other European countries had announced plans to recapitalize their banks and backstop bank lending. But unlike the British authorities, the Treasury secretary presented his plan as an offer the banks could not refuse.

"It was "It was a take it or take it offer," said a person who was briefed on the meeting, speaking on condition of anonymity because the discussions had been private. "Everyone knew there was only one answer."
*snip*
"I don't think there was any banker in that room who was going to look us in the eye and say they had too much capital," Paulson said. "In a relatively short period of time, people came on board."
*snip*
The Treasury will receive preferred shares that pay a 5 percent dividend, rising to 9 percent after five years. It will get warrants to purchase common shares, equivalent to 15 percent of its initial investment. But the Treasury said it would not exercise its right to vote those common shares.

Note how this story frames it as if the bankers didn't have the slightest idea why Paulson was calling them to DC! Oh, how barking CLUELESS they all were! HAHAHAHA. But they claimed to this reporter, to be shocked, just SHOCKED that things were screwed up and were collapsing after the Lehman bankruptcy and AIG demanded a humongous hand out! Oh, no. They had to be FORCED to take a hand out.

This reminds me of last year's story nearly at this same time frame: the same clowns in that room with Paulson in September were with him last year, too. And he and Bernanke blasted open a new hole into the Cave of Wealth and Death and said, 'This is a new lending window! And to prove it doesn't hurt to use it, we are inviting bankers to use it.' Then the bankers, squealing like pigs at a party eating cake, grabbed money from this new magic window. And they were able to give themselves record Xmas bonuses.

Since then, they are edgy. Will people figure out their latest scam? So they return to the media to tell stories about how their arms were twisted for force them to suck up huge funds in the trillions and then hand themselves a 10% cut in the form of bonuses. 'Look at the bruises our buddy and fellow conspirator made on our arms when he twisted them!' they all cry in unison. 'Oh, it hurts! Oh, it hurts, Precioussss.' Gads, all these gnomes are Gollums, aren't they?

Serial liars. Whiners who don't hesitate to kill us if this gives them one more house, one more car to add to their collections.

Do our rulers know enough to avoid a 1930s replay?

The commodity and emerging market booms are breaking in unison, leaving no more bubbles left to burst. Almost every corner of the world is now being drawn into the vortex of debt deflation.

The freight rates for Capesize vessels used to ship grains, coal, and iron ore have fallen 95pc to $11,600 since May, hence the bankruptcy of Odessa’s Industrial Carriers last week with a fleet of 52 vessels. Cargo deliveries dropped 15.2pc at the US Port of Long Beach last month, but that is a lagging indicator.
From what I have been able to find out, shipping is slowing as fast as it did in the grim months of late 1931. “The crisis is now in full swing across the entire world,” said Giulio Tremonti, Italy’s finance minister. “It is hitting the real economy, the productive forces of industry. It’s global, it’s total, and it’s everywhere,” he said.

This is from the UK. Yes, we are in a classic collapse of world debt accumulation. Note the last word: accumulation. It is not 'growing' but is SHIFTING. From the banks to the governments who then shift it to someone else. So long as the governments of all nations accustomed to shipping things to the US continue to fund the US debts, all will return to 'normal'. This 'normal' is fatal to the US public. But we are not told this since 100% of the US media is totally pro-world free trade.

This fall off in trade isn't due to barriers in the US. It is entirely due to the US public unable to go deeper into debt to pay for imports. The hope is, oil will be cheap again and thus, the US doesn't send so much money to energy commodity nations and resumes buying mostly Asian and European manufactured goods again. But this is an impossible dream except if we can gain access to the 0%-0%-0% system I keep harping on. This is already morphing into a totally anti-capitalist system whereby the government hands out loans to everyone and takes cuts on future profits that are NOT taxes but are partnerships with the government in the position of being able to confiscate whatever they need to keep afloat! Some partnership, eh?

Already, the horrid housing bill I was massively against, is doing this. Anyone foolish enough to sign up for it will regret it for they are now serfs of the state, quite literally. They will have to work off the principal of their house no matter what and gain virtually nothing if they sell eventually. Certainly, their heirs will gain little or nothing. Eventually, all we will pass onto our children will be heavily mortgaged properties!

The upper classes of Britain were in the habit of putting up bigger and bigger mortgages against their properties. So did the Russian ruling class. Then, when things went bad, they all went bankrupt during WWI when they should have had the resources to run up war debts. Even when England ran up huge loans with the US banks, this still sent the entire British landed elites into the doghouse. Most of their estates are now owned by foreign capitalists or the state and are now museums or schools and so on. The Russians were simply killed or driven out and the State took over everything, lock, stock and barrel.

Bush vows big push for Doha deal before leaving

(Reuters) - President George W. Bush vowed on Tuesday to press hard for a successful conclusion of the nearly 7-year-old round of world trade talks during his last few months in office.

"The recent impasse in the Doha Round of trade talks is disappointing, but that doesn't have to be the final word. And so before I leave office I'm going to press hard to make sure we have a successful Doha round," Bush said at a White House summit on international development.

Even with an all-out effort, it would be difficult for negotiators to finish every detail of a new world trade agreement before Bush leaves the White House on Jan. 20.

Bush is a traitor. He should be impeached and put on public trial. In this trial, we must detail how he actively destroyed our entire economy as well as our industrial base. China is flying astronauts and doing space walks, India is going to the moon right after the Chinese went there and Russia is putting our astronauts in space for a fee! And our economy is collapsing, the sea of red ink is deepening. And we have no funds to pay for things like space exploration. The wars we are fighting are not fixing anything real. In Afghanistan, we are totally losing that war.

Continued>>>
http://elainemeinelsupkis.typepad.com/money_matters/2008/10/10222008-elaine.html

[midnight]

1. Is'nt that the most unreliable information you have ever heard...

The main story line being run by the right wing is very simple: social security and health care for Americans are bankrupting the nation.