Stupider than Shit
Yeah, rude headline for some of you. You don't have any idea how rude yet. As what little remains of the United States circles the drain for perhaps the last time, you think we should be worried about being polite and civil? Fuck that shit with a rusty saw, baby.
You want to know why Democrats, liberals and progressives keep getting rolled like the easiest, stupidest mark in the world? First is the fact that they don't disagree about the basic goals of governance. Here, the relevant goal is the establishment of an unassailable, all-powerful corporatist-authoritarian state at home. (Scroll through the archives if you're interested in finding the numerous essays on that subject. I frankly don't have the patience or interest for holding anyone's hand at this point.) Second is the fact that:
THEY'RE STUPIDER THAN SHIT.
Fasten your bleeding eyes on this:
The Bush administration is not genuinely intelligent by any measure, but these criminals are shrewder than hell. Why do you think they made the initial proposal in the extreme form they did? Because they know that if they finally give the Democrats a few "safeguards," if they "attach a few strings," and perhaps if they allow for "independent oversight," the Democrats will give them the momentous bailout they want -- all to be paid for by American taxpayers for the next hundred years (assuming the U.S. survives in any recognizable form, which becomes more doubtful by the hour). The Democrats have already announced to the world that is exactly what they'll do.
The Democrats, liberals and progressives fall right into the trap, as they do every single fucking time.
At this point, does anyone believe "strings" or "oversight" are worth a goddamned thing? Let me remind you of something that no Democrats and none of their defenders wants to be reminded of: the Iraq catastrophe. The Democrats have had the biggest "oversight" mechanism in the world -- or to be precise, in the Constitution -- since early 2007. The Democrats could have cut off all funding for this criminal war and occupation. They will not do it.
They could have impeached Bush, Cheney and several more of the leading criminals. They will not do it.
Add in the pattern the Democrats followed in the FISA debacle, with regard to the Military Commissions Act, and on a host of other questions, and you see what the Democratic opposition is worth. In a word: nothing.
Add in this: everyone, including every Democrat, now agrees that this is a "crisis" requiring action yesterday. Paulson, the Treasury Department, and the other players will have to be able to act immediately, and to act on a massive scale. And they'll get all that -- but with some "oversight." How long will it be until the "oversight" catches up to what these criminals have done, if it ever does? After the fact, will the oversight mechanisms be able to reverse the actions of Paulson and others? What will be the additional costs of having to reverse some/most of those actions after the fact, if it can even be done?
Given the record amassed by this administration -- and given the record amassed by the most pathetic Democratic Congress ever imagined in this or any other world -- "oversight" and "safeguards" aren't worth shit.
I'm not done. So the central piece of this extortion scheme, the $700 billion check, will be supplied, covered with the blood of Americans. IT WILL BE PROVIDED TO SOLVE A PROBLEM THAT CANNOT BE SOLVED.
Once again, Mike Whitney -- and for fuck's sake, try to get your brain in gear:
In brief: the Bush administration will get exactly what it wanted all along.
Stupider than shit. That's an insult to shit.
WE ARE COMPLETELY FUCKED.
This is your world now. Make yourself at home, and get used to it.
You want to know why Democrats, liberals and progressives keep getting rolled like the easiest, stupidest mark in the world? First is the fact that they don't disagree about the basic goals of governance. Here, the relevant goal is the establishment of an unassailable, all-powerful corporatist-authoritarian state at home. (Scroll through the archives if you're interested in finding the numerous essays on that subject. I frankly don't have the patience or interest for holding anyone's hand at this point.) Second is the fact that:
THEY'RE STUPIDER THAN SHIT.
Fasten your bleeding eyes on this:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement today that Congress will take action this week, while adding that Democrats want more oversight of the proposed federal program. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama also said lawmakers must insist on more oversight.Make sure you get the message. The Democrats will provide the check, it just won't be a blank check. The Democrats want "independent oversight." But the money will flow -- to insolvent financial institutions, precisely those institutions responsible for this debacle, and to buy up bad debts which will thus not be allowed to wash out of the system.
Pelosi said that the administration's $700 billion proposal "does not include the necessary safeguards."
"Democrats believe a responsible solution should include independent oversight, protections for homeowners and constraints on excessive executive compensation."
"We will not simply hand over a $700 billion blank check to Wall Street and hope for a better outcome," she said.
The Bush administration is not genuinely intelligent by any measure, but these criminals are shrewder than hell. Why do you think they made the initial proposal in the extreme form they did? Because they know that if they finally give the Democrats a few "safeguards," if they "attach a few strings," and perhaps if they allow for "independent oversight," the Democrats will give them the momentous bailout they want -- all to be paid for by American taxpayers for the next hundred years (assuming the U.S. survives in any recognizable form, which becomes more doubtful by the hour). The Democrats have already announced to the world that is exactly what they'll do.
The Democrats, liberals and progressives fall right into the trap, as they do every single fucking time.
At this point, does anyone believe "strings" or "oversight" are worth a goddamned thing? Let me remind you of something that no Democrats and none of their defenders wants to be reminded of: the Iraq catastrophe. The Democrats have had the biggest "oversight" mechanism in the world -- or to be precise, in the Constitution -- since early 2007. The Democrats could have cut off all funding for this criminal war and occupation. They will not do it.
They could have impeached Bush, Cheney and several more of the leading criminals. They will not do it.
Add in the pattern the Democrats followed in the FISA debacle, with regard to the Military Commissions Act, and on a host of other questions, and you see what the Democratic opposition is worth. In a word: nothing.
Add in this: everyone, including every Democrat, now agrees that this is a "crisis" requiring action yesterday. Paulson, the Treasury Department, and the other players will have to be able to act immediately, and to act on a massive scale. And they'll get all that -- but with some "oversight." How long will it be until the "oversight" catches up to what these criminals have done, if it ever does? After the fact, will the oversight mechanisms be able to reverse the actions of Paulson and others? What will be the additional costs of having to reverse some/most of those actions after the fact, if it can even be done?
Given the record amassed by this administration -- and given the record amassed by the most pathetic Democratic Congress ever imagined in this or any other world -- "oversight" and "safeguards" aren't worth shit.
I'm not done. So the central piece of this extortion scheme, the $700 billion check, will be supplied, covered with the blood of Americans. IT WILL BE PROVIDED TO SOLVE A PROBLEM THAT CANNOT BE SOLVED.
Once again, Mike Whitney -- and for fuck's sake, try to get your brain in gear:
The system is at the breaking point, and despite Wall Street's elation from the proposed $1 trillion dollar bailout to remove toxic mortgage-backed debt from banks' balance sheets, the market is still correcting in what has become a vicious downward cycle. This cycle will persist until the bad debts are accounted for and written off or until the exhausted dollar-system collapses altogether.Bush and the Republicans moved the goalposts and reconfigured the field -- and the idiot Democrats have fallen for it all over again. The Democrats can add all the strings and oversight they want, but they will have provided a monumental amount of money extorted from Americans for generations to come, all to solve a problem that cannot be solved, and with no meaningful method of controlling or directing what happens.
...
The problems cannot be resolved by shifting the debts of the banks onto the taxpayer. That's an illusion. By adding another $1 or $2 trillion dollars to the National Debt, Paulson is just ensuring that interest rates will go up, real estate will crash, unemployment will soar, and foreign central banks will abandon the dollar. In truth, there is no fix for a deleveraging market anymore than there is a fix for gravity. The belief that massive debts and insolvency can be erased by increasing liquidity just shows a fundamental misunderstanding of economics. That's why Henry Paulson is the worst possible person to be orchestrating the so called rescue project. Paulson comes from a business culture which rewards deception, personal acquisitiveness, and extreme risk-taking. Paulson is to finance capitalism what Rumsfeld is to military strategy. His leadership, and the congress' pathetic abdication of responsibility, assures disaster.
In brief: the Bush administration will get exactly what it wanted all along.
Stupider than shit. That's an insult to shit.
WE ARE COMPLETELY FUCKED.
This is your world now. Make yourself at home, and get used to it.
posted by Arthur Silber at 8:15 PM
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