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Obama Needs To Walk His Talk
Barack Obama today has an OpEd in more than 30 international papers about the economic situation and on steps to take to better it. Headlined A time for global action Obama writes:
My message is clear: The United States is ready to lead, and we call upon our partners to join us with a sense of urgency and common purpose.
I am quite sure that people around the world do not want the U.S. to lead here. Why are those who essentially created the mess believe they are the best capable to solve it?
At home, we are working aggressively to stabilize our financial system. This includes an honest assessment of the balance sheets of our major banks, and will lead directly to lending that can help Americans purchase goods, stay in their homes and grow their businesses.
The Geithner plan is to subsidize the purchase of 'toxic assets'. That subsidy will lead to – again – miss-pricing of those assets. How can that further an honest assessment of balance sheets?
The G-20 should quickly deploy resources to stabilize emerging markets, substantially boost the emergency capacity of the International Monetary Fund and help regional development banks accelerate lending. Meanwhile, America will support new and meaningful investments in food security that can help the poorest weather the difficult days that will come.
Just what Africa and other poor areas need. More IMF pressure to 'open' their economies and more heavily subsidized U.S. agricultural products that destroy their local farming communities.
Rigorous transparency and accountability must check abuse, and the days of out-of-control compensation must end.
Then why does the Senate, under White House pressure, now stalls high taxes on bonuses in bailed out companies?
This G-20 meeting provides a forum for a new kind of global economic cooperation. Now is the time to work together to restore the sustained growth that can only come from open and stable markets that harness innovation, support entrepreneurship and advance opportunity.
"Open and stable markets …" So why did the U.S. president just signed a law that will, against the letters and intend of an international agreement, no longer allow Mexican truck drivers to ferry loads inside the U.S.?
Obama has lots of great words in that well written OpEd. But where are the actions that support those shiny words?
Unless Obama walks the talk on this, and there is no sign that intends to do so, the world will not take him seriously.
American Notes for General Circulation
by Charles Dickens
Chapter XVIII: Concluding Remarks
[…] THERE are many passages in this book, where I have been at some pains to resist the temptation of troubling my readers with my own deductions and conclusions: preferring that they should judge for themselves, from such premises as I have laid before them.
But I may be pardoned, if on such a theme as the general character of the American people, and the general character of their social system, as presented to a stranger’s eyes, I desire to express my own opinions in a few words, before I bring these volumes to a close.
A prominent feature is the love of ‘smart’ dealing: which gilds over many a swindle and gross breach of trust; many a defalcation, public and private; and enables many a knave to hold his head up with the best, who well deserves a halter; though it has not been without its retributive operation, for this smartness has done more in a few years to impair the public credit, and to cripple the public resources, than dull honesty, however rash, could have effected in a century.
The merits of a broken speculation, or a bankruptcy, or of a successful scoundrel, are not gauged by its or his observance of the golden rule, ‘Do as you would be done by,’ but are considered with reference to their smartness.
I recollect, on both occasions of our passing that ill- fated Cairo on the Mississippi, remarking on the bad effects such gross deceits must have when they exploded, in generating a want of confidence abroad, and discouraging foreign investment: but I was given to understand that this was a very smart scheme by which a deal of money had been made: and that its smartest feature was, that they forgot these things abroad, in a very short time, and speculated again, as freely as ever.
The following dialogue I have held a hundred times:
‘Is it not a very disgraceful circumstance that such a man as So-and-so should be acquiring a large property by the most infamous and odious means, and notwithstanding all the crimes of which he has been guilty, should be tolerated and abetted by your Citizens?
He is a public nuisance, is he not?’
‘Yes, sir.’ ‘A convicted liar?’ ‘Yes, sir.’
‘He has been kicked, and cuffed, and caned?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And he is utterly dishonourable, debased, and profligate?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘In the name of wonder, then, what is his merit?’
‘Well, sir, he is a smart man.’
Posted by: Dolce | Mar 25 2009 4:27 utc | 15
those are very pertinent questions, parviz, and in my own awkward layman way, i will attempt to answer them.
Q.1: How do you ´nationalize´ failed corporations, in practical terms, while simultaneously avoiding a Dow 3000, a total loss of U.S. credibility and even trans-national lawsuits?
first, if i was Obama, i wouldn’t call it nationalization, maybe receivership, and i would hope, by being bold and explicit, Obama would actually start restoring some of that credibility we’ve steadily eroded or in some instances never had in the first place. to avoid knee-capping market plunges, just keep the markets closed for a couple of days. if not handled properly, it could blow up in his face, but the DOW is probably going to head further down anyway. really it’s just a matter of time.
Q.2: How do you “value the assets”? What makes you think that there is even a market for toxic waste, now or in the future? Why nationalize entire corporations when only some parts of those corporations are poisoned and the other parts relatively healthy? (I can give you many examples).
I have no idea how to value the rotten grizzle that these fuckers called filet mignon, but at some point the failure of the rating agencies needs to be addressed. and honestly why should i care whether there’s a market for this crap or not? if the toxicity is really that bad, how is the solution to back overvalued shit assets with taxpayer assurances? there are plenty of real things these behemoths own, like buildings. well, those are ours now, right? and all Obama has to say is, receivership, bitches, ’cause i got 300 million enraged citizens to back me up.
Q.3: How is “selling them off” after ´official´ nationalization any different from selling them off after the current de ´facto´ nationalization Obama has already implemented?
the de facto nationalization has not been already implemented. the only thing being sold is a giant pile of shit to the US taxpayer. i don’t care how these monsters get broken up and distributed. if it happens by any means i will be dumbfounded with hope for the future.
Q.4: Why should anti-trust laws in future be any more effective than in the past?
what, you mean like breaking up standard oil? talk about negative, parviz, this question is defeatist bait masquerading as a practical concession. anti-trust laws are like muscles, they atrophy without regular use, so the key is to keep flexing that muscle. like many people have been saying, why are these institutions too big too fail? if we accept that phrase to be true, then we’re on the hook, and it’s over. the only thing left to do is wriggle around uncomfortably impaled waiting for the trophy fish to snap us up so the good old boys in the big boat above us can reel it in.
Q.5: Who is going to run the ´nationalized´ corporations? The Paulsons and Geithners and other ´qualified´ individuals? Or do you bring in recent economics graduates with fresh faces and dump a $ 15 trillion economy into their laps and hope they´ll just happen to turn out like bunch of Mahathirs or Manmohan Singhs?
i’d like to start by figuring out who is NOT going to run the reckless institutions in temporary receivership, and at the top of the list is ANYONE with ties to Golden Sacks. don’t worry, they will be easy to identify by the giant crossed out dollar signs tattooed on their foreheads.
as for those recent economics graduates, of course they’re not capable of running giant corporations, because what they learned in their economics classes is currently being rewritten before their eyes, and their text books rendered obsolete. sustainability might be a buzzword now, but unless it becomes our predominant philosophy, the world where you, parviz, can type intelligent questions about the complexity of economics and i can read and answer them an ocean away won’t exist.
anyway, that’s it. off to sleep myself.
lambent1: yes, i think that perhaps parviz is inspecting the elephant’s tusks, while i hang from its tail, staring at its giant asshole.
Posted by: Lizard | Mar 26 2009 5:15 utc | 48
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