Comments on: Too failed to live not too big to fail

By: Anubis

Anubis — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:02:10 +0000

We are simply trying to reinflate the growth bubble. Mr. Saft, you are correct again. Pumping printed dollars into financial institutions in order to keep assets valuation up near 2005/2006 levels sounds like a modest loss people could live with. Reality couldn’t be further from the truth. These types of policy measures seem at best desperate if not deceptive.

It is clear that corruption and greed are pervade the entire U.S. political/economic system. The U.S. government’s response was initially to make whole (indemnify) the victims of our unregulated business arrangements abroad. This has restored a good deal of confidence around the globe. However, Wen Jiabao has certainly made his concerns regarding U.S. credit worthiness public amidst the backdrop of public anger by U.S. taxpayers responsible for footing the cost of filling a seemingly bottomless pit with dollars.

Karl Marx’s observations on the banking system couldn’t be more contemporary. The lessons we could learn are being ignored by the elite in favor of maintaining the Dollar as the world’s reserve currency and the dubious benefits that accompany that. It is clear to me our government wants to return to the path of inflation, the vehicle with which wealth is stolen from a society. Just look around, how many cannot afford to go movies , eat out, buy clothing, new automobiles or simply repair them. How many lost their homes and now live in tent cities? The economic model of perpetual growth is unsustainable.

By: Joe

Joe — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:03:04 +0000

Good article except the part about returning to growth. There are already 6 billion people on the planet and we are entering peak oil. The world is huge but it is still limited therefore a model based on never ending growth is guaranteed to fail eventually.

By: Crikey McGregor

Crikey McGregor — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 03:06:40 +0000

I have yet to see discussion of the 800 LB gorilla, namely the displacement of sustaining manufacturing, goods and services in the developed world, to the BRIC nations. The collapse of \’our\’ institutions is a sympton and, regardless of the media witch-hunt, only a symptom. All that we had in the Western Democracies we have now duplicated elsewhere at a staggering level of redundancy. Of course each of the BRIC nations have a right to grow their economy I just cannot get my head around the notion we have them do so by giving them ours. Seems China just happened overnight? Not a pennyworth of thought went into this at our end until it was too late.
More simply put: my mortgage with you would not be toxic if I still had my job!

By: Crikey McGregor

Crikey McGregor — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:23:07 +0000

There might be solace in punishing the entities causing this situation but really folks do you think we have time to organically create whole new institutions replacing those that have roots aeons deep? To instantly clone relationships that survived and prospered while on opposite sides of two world wars. Would be nice, but the notion is infantile. We need to learn, with the collapse of religious morality, there will be very little internal restraint within organizations, this year’s plan is the sole mantra. Ethics are optional. Better I think we become better lion tamers or husbands of whatever particular species you are using. Do not however waste effort in expecting the animals to clean up their act…
Oh, when lion tamers get eaten is it the lions’ fault?

By: Robbie

Robbie — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 18:41:46 +0000

If I take pain killers to shield myself of the pain, I run the risk of starting to believe that I am ok when in fact I am just masking the advice my body is giving me to stop doing whatever originated the pain in the first instance. After all these pain killers (cash injections on a gargantuan level) the pain will come back and will be much worse as we will have believed that it had gone away and started doing those things that brought it about in the first place. If a building is collapsing, you take all the people out and let it finish collapsing or even better aid it by pushing it down and leaving space for a new one to be built. Same thing happens in forrests when a big tree falls.

By: Jonesy

Jonesy — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 09:38:38 +0000

Some excellent comments…. just picking up on the retention of discredited management, it makes me shudder when I hear so called banking “elders” stating that bonuses need to be paid otherwise top staff, their decision makers, would leave and go elesewhere; surely that is what is required, let them leave, realise what they have caused outside their greed bubble and join the job seekers.
You don’t rebuild with the same bricks that have already failed.

By: Athoo

Athoo — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 08:19:11 +0000

Hi: I for one believe the Zombies have to fall. Thats how the US has always operated. Let the weak fail and the rest grow stronger as we did in the Airline Industry and others.

One radical thought though – After finding what AIG did with their money. Why not cancel all the CDS deals outright and only honor those where the buyer/seller has a genuine exposure and was not a punter. This way the guys who had exposure and bought the CDS cover is covered and the guy who bought the CDS – cover on the neighbours house and burnt it down and claimed insurance is penalised. Though dont know how far this is legally permissible..but what the heck.. change the law.

Athoo

By: Cornelius Nienaber

Cornelius Nienaber — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 05:45:47 +0000

There is obviously an opportunity here for new banks to form. The only difficulty will be extracting the value out of the failing banks so that this can be injected into the new entities and leave the sick carcasses behind with their ailments.

Where is the new wave of entrepreneurs who could pull this together? Or has the recent climate stifled all forms of enterprise and leadership?

By: Mick McCall

Mick McCall — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 04:51:28 +0000

I think it was John Lennon who best described the current feeling of many Americans.

Help, I need somebody
Help, not just anybody
Help, you know, I need someone
Help

By: Anubis

Anubis — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 12:53:52 +0000

As long as cabinet level posts and their underlings are filled with people like Hank Paulson and his role in securing TARP, which his former employer Goldman Sachs benefited from handsomely, the questions of conflicts of interest will remain. The notion that players from industry need to be the ones in charge of government oversight is flawed.

Clearly Big Business did not do what was good for business. Neither did government or it’s regulators. For all the success we have had, we could have done just as well by pulling names out of a hat. What is more disturbing is each successive administration recycles the same group of people to fill regulatory posts.

It is probably high time for some new blood. We have ignored the academic community for decades regarding climate change, health care and host of other concerns facing civilization. So far they have been right. It is academia that educates our leaders and the very least they present a greater diversity of thought than the same old group thinkers and cronies who have lead our nation for decades. Their voices should be heard. S should that of the common man.

It is becoming painfully apparent that appointments to government are less and less viewed as opportunities to serve and have become positions of privilege for the ruling elite. If you believe I am suggesting we are becoming a banana republic, I urge you to draw your own conclusions.

Ultimately the fate of any society rests with the people and not it’s leaders. Our society must get past it’s dogmatic divisions and unite around the issues that beg for the collapse of civilization.