Watch your money, there is A Cox in the Henhouse.
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June 2, 2005
Billmon: A Cox in the Henhouse
Comments
Deja vu!
It was Bush appointee Richard Breeden that shut down the SEC investigation into Lloyds of London. American Names were left to fry in the hell that is the English court system. With Her Majesty both plaintiff and judge.
Posted by: John | Jun 2 2005 21:02 utc | 1
This looks to me like W’s stealth precursor to letting pending pension funds default their obligations. It would follow his patterns in Social Security bamboolzle, and going back to entirely ignoring Enron’s defaults to investors and employees.
Corp. America wants a pass on pension obligations, and Cox is just the guy to deliver. It sucks.
USAToday’s financial page has good article on Cox’s predecessor(Donaldson) today which describes much of his very useful/necesary reforms that conservative business interests wish to thwart.
Looks like they succeeded.
Posted by: JDMcKay | Jun 2 2005 21:46 utc | 2
Don’t forget that it was also during Bush pere that an SEC investigation into W’s insider trading in Harken Energy was stopped before it even got to the Commission for an up or down vote for political reasons.
Posted by: moe99 | Jun 2 2005 22:41 utc | 3
Any guess about how important Cox’s views on the expensing of stock options were to this appointment?
Posted by: silence | Jun 3 2005 0:08 utc | 4
Pathetic. Criminally short sighted and dishonest. What a Republican thing to do. Thank god I am out of US stocks.
Posted by: Scott McArthur | Jun 3 2005 1:02 utc | 5
All I can say is to ppl with assets in the US economy is hold onto your hats! It isn’t just this Cox thing but the whole tenor of the BushCo 2nd term appointments tells me that these guys are going for broke. They seem to have the attitude that the shit will hit the fan no matter what so lets clean out the cupboards before it does. I suspect that when these guys have finished ripping social security, the middle calsses retirment funds and most everyone’s only substantial material asset, their home; the S&L debacle will seem like a waz in the Niagara.
But on the other hand winter has set in down here and there’s been a chill wind blowing off Antarctica for the last 4 days so maybe I’m being too pessimistic.
Posted by: Debs is dead | Jun 3 2005 1:05 utc | 6
…and the point appears to be…
that we’d have to increase 5 level of ‘no hope of anything but being macro-lly screwed for the next 10 15 years’ years to even achieve ‘no hope of anything but being macro-lly screwed for the next 10 15 years’.
A condition which no doubt accounts for a great many of the oft recurring Billmon-periods-of-silence.
When I heard of Cox’s appointment my first thought was, what sort of shenanigans are the Busholsheviks up to now. The news reports sounded favorable and his words to Chimp sounded well rehearsed. But who the hell am I to know what’s up?
Then the old barkeep puts it all in perspective with verifiable quotes and I wonder, where the hell does he get the time and savvy to create such a journalistic expose masterpiece in such short time. Thanks Billmon. Not that my knowing can really help do anything about it.
Except maybe use my head and get all my retirement funds out of the stock market and not participate in the American economy, but hey, I own a home and after the Dream House piece I read earlier today by Billmon, I wonder if I shouldn’t just sell out, buy a windmill and 50 remote acres to put it on, so I’ll have just enough energy to keep on reading this blog and playing my guitar.
I think Debs is dead is right on. These guys are totally conscious virtuoso swindlers par non and are ripping we suckers for every last dollar before the there’s no more energy left to keep the fan going and we just drown in the shit they leave behind.
Debs, we up here at 44 N, 73 W just had our first two days of real summer. May was the coldest & wettest I’ve ever encountered here and I thought the sunshine finally heralded something better. So maybe everything is back-assward these days and your chill wind off Antarctica is a good omen.
Posted by: Juannie | Jun 3 2005 3:01 utc | 8
Juannie I hope your right about good omens and that the northern hemisphere has a beautiful summer because in the end the best any of us should hope for is each moment be the best possible for us and ours.
Like many others we bought the block to sustain when the s hit the f right back in the 70’s. It was great fun too until the call of the material lured us back into towns. So there it sits waiting for a group of aging and withering types to decide that the time has come. We have a basic hydro system that would keep an 8 track and a couple of lights going but obviously considerable maintenence and upgrades would be required. I would prefer to hang about where I am at the moment tho which is 1500 kilometres further south and altho pretty moncultural the neigbors are a lot closer that an hour’s bushwalk.
I’m sure that most of the people that inhabit MoA have the skills and nous to be OK no matter what but I still think about the mobs of people that never did get their snouts anywhere near the trough but who will probably end up paying the most.
That is a good enough reason to keep resisting for as long as possible and after that who knows? The human spirit is pretty indefatigable.
Posted by: Debs is dead | Jun 3 2005 5:51 utc | 9