Bye Bye Banks and Wall Street

[JWBear]

The version we are using now, yes.

[tracilicious]

The Daily Show had an interesting guest on last night. I forget her name, she wrote a book about the Great Depression (or as Jon says, the first Great Depression). She said she thinks it can still be avoided as long as taxes aren't raised. She also mentioned that the volatility of the stock market is a really bad sign. And she said Lyndon Johnson is the root cause of our current troubles.

[Morrigoon]

They are the people who helped hijack the party. I was Republican because I believed in smaller government, less gov't interference in our lives, and lower taxes. Doh.

[Disneyphile]

I think getting out of this stupid war will save us billions. So, whoever will get us out of that is going to make a massive impact. Therefore, it's a damn good thing that Bush isn't in office for another four years to continue his war game at everyone's expense.

[Morrigoon]

I have my doubts as to our ability to exit at this point, but it's a worthy goal.

[Kevy Baby]

Originally Posted by Disneyphile

I think getting out of this stupid war will save us billions. So, whoever will get us out of that is going to make a massive impact. Therefore, it's a damn good thing that Bush isn't in office for another four years to continue his war game at everyone's expense.

Originally Posted by Morrigoon

I have my doubts as to our ability to exit at this point, but it's a worthy goal.

We can (and will) exit. We can't do it quickly as this will create a vacuum which will create greater threats on US security.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Finally got around to listening to the episode of This American Life about the freeze and the bailout. While obviously an oversimplified view, it once again does an excellent job of giving an overview of the mechanisms involved. Their conclusion was that while nothing is ideal, the current method being used (the treasury getting actual stock in banks in return for bailout money instead of buying worthless debt at made up prices from them) has a much higher chance at success in terms of restoring market confidence and liquidity with relatively little risk to the treasury.

It also detailed how exactly things turned from investing to gambling, and how regulation might have had a chance at preventing this (the key thing being the lack of regulation on "credit default swaps", which I won't attempt to explain myself). And while regulating the CDS market doesn't guarantee that investors wouldn't have found some other way to do that kind of gambling, it would have been better than letting it run free. As someone on the show put it, just because there's still the risk someone might break your window, you still start by closing and locking your back door.

[BarTopDancer]

Cookies.. Get your cookies!

[lizziebith]

All of my local markets still have a good supply. I bought 2 bags yesterday! I'm going to keep one (in the freezer?), and open the other...

[Andrew]

I found four bags of Circus Animals at the Mountain View Target (at 2/$5) and, after receiving assurances that they had more in the back, bought them all. Considering freezing two. Still no Iced Oatmeal.