by Burke McKay

Created on: September 26, 2008

Today is Wednesday, September 25, 2008. Last night President Bush addressed the nation, after months of denial, to tell us all that our "strong economy" was about to go "China Syndrome" {meltdown is the common term today, but we've already been having one of those}. Now, so that we can avoid a catastrophic economic upheaval, the government has to bail out major financial and banking corporations to the tune of $700,000,000,000 {$700 BILLION}.

All day today, I've searched every legitimate source I can to find the actual text of this legislation, but so far, I've come up empty, except for http://www.economicpopulist.org/?q=content/text-bail -out-act-congress-take-action-now , and because I'm not familiar with the site I can't cite it as authoritative. I have also been unsuccessful in my search for those corporations that will receive this money, however Al Jazeera does list 4 that are under investigation by the FBI for fraud, and an array of other violations of fiduciary trust { http://english.aljazeera.net/business/2008/09/200892 3192028595733.html }. News sources, such as CNN, Fox, and ABC News, are indicating that the House has already agreed on this "Bail Out", calling it a "done deal".

My first fundamental problem with this "Bail Out" is the sense of urgency attached to it. For months, some would argue years, more and more people have become aware that our economy was anything but strong. Like good Americans we kept on plugging forward, doing our best to "stay the course" while the US conducts a War on Terrorism {in two theatres; Iraq and Afghanistan}. The bleeding our economy has taken from this War on Terrorism has been monumental, but on top of that major corporations have been playing with the equivalent of 24 hour Margin bonds {circa mid to late 1920's} which resulted, along with other economic forces, in the Crash of 1929 and the Great Depression. Put simply those bonds facilitated the gravitation of the money of the many into the hands of the few, and the rest is history. Last time it was margin bonds, this time it is fractional marginal lending and the sub-prime mortgage market, but the result seems to be going in the same direction.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/763654 2.stm

The article cited above from BBC.co.uk seems to put it best in the following quotation:
Those in favour of the deal have argued that:
The deal would boost global financial stability
Increase investor confidence
Prevent a global slowdown
Encourage banks to lend to each other,

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