$500,000,000,000 Bailout? Please Read! We MUST Call!

[Yes We Did]

As you all know by now the government is about to offer a $500 Billion bailout for the financial sector, essentially rewarding them for their unethical and imbecilic behavior.

While I understand it is necessary, I also understand that the actual number will likely be closer to One Trillion by the time it's all said and done.

One Trillion Dollars.
One Trillion Dollars.

Are you freaking kidding me?

What I have not heard in these proposals is what is going to be done for the people who got mortgages from these companies; you know, the ones who are about to lose their homes...

So, this is the question. How the hell can they expect us to bail them out for homes they are going to take away.

Please try to keep this kicked so we can get as many calls out as possible. This is our future.

...We are going to pay off their debt, and then they get to foreclose on the properties they screwed up on? Is it just me, or is there something SERIOUSLY wrong with that?

Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe I'm not as informed as I think I am. Maybe I should just trust that they wouldn't do that; make us pay for homes that we don't get to keep. Maybe they are actually really good companies and really care about us.

And maybe pigs & pit bulls wearing lipstick can fly.

I don't pretend to know everything about this, and I could be missing something. However, what I do know is that if we don't call them up and tell them they need to add a provision that these companies cannot foreclose on the homes they offered bad loans for, they are going to think we are stupid enough to just sit by and watch the biggest fleecing of the American people in history of this country.

We MUST act! We MUST call now; BEFORE it is too late!

I am listing the toll free numbers to the Capitol Hill Switch Board below.

Call and ask for:

Henry Paulson - Treasury Secretary
Ben Bernanke - Federal Reserve Board Chairman
Chris Cox - Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman

Capitol Hill Switch Board
1-800-828-0498
1-866-220-0044
1-866-340-9281


Also, Call our party leaders at the numbers below, and while you are at it, call the new "regulator" McCreepy.

Nancy Pelosi
[phone]

Harry Reid
[phone]

Obama, Barack
[phone]

John McCain
[phone]

I know this is a lot to ask today, but we don't have time to screw around. They are selling us down the river damned it, and I at least want a fucking paddle!

Go Get Em!

[begin_within]

1. The merger of government + corporations, still privately owned, = FASCISM

[ima_sinnic]

2. it is $500,000,000,000 (nt)

[Yes We Did]

6. Thank you.

Didn't want to believe it was that many...

[Egnever]

3. if its billions you are missing some zeros

[Yes We Did]

5. Thank You...

Wasn't quite sure; that's a lot of zeros

[Egnever]

Sure is

more than I will ever see in my account to be sure

[Yes We Did]

19. I know... I sat there looking at it...

So I tried to see on google, but they don't post that many zeros unless it's in the code. LOL.

[Egnever]

23. LOL

[EnviroBat]

4. We need to organize a fucking financial revolution!

STOP PAYING YOUR TAXES RIGHT NOW. MAX YOUR DEDUCTIONS. DON'T PAY THESE FUCKERS!

[Neshanic]

7. Deja vu....Brought this item up yesterday, be carefull. Phrase carefully.

[liberalhistorian]

8. In addition to doing this, I intend to also

call my senators and my state's lone congresswoman (a Dem, as is one of the senators), and make clear my extreme displeasure. I'm going to have some fun with my repub senator, John Thune (the one who beat Daschle in 2004). He was strongly opposed to the expansion of SCHIP, saying it would be "harmful to private insurers." Never mind that he represents US, not private companies no matter how much they may line his pocket, or how harmful those private insurers are to too many of his constituents. I'm going to ask his staff about the blatant hypocrisy evident in his stance on that issue as opposed to his support for federal bailouts for incompetent greedy fatcats. I'm going to ask them how he can reconcile his bleatings about the importance of the free market, letting the free market work, the fed'rl gubmint is eeeevil, taxes are eeeeevil, smaller gubmint, git the gubmint out of our faces, yaddayadda, blahblahblah.

Oh, I can't wait to have some fun with this. Judging from the reaction of many of my fellow state citizens, I sure wouldn't want to be one of his staffers right now. Or the staffers for the other two, Johnson and Herseth-Sandlin, for that matter.

[Yes We Did]

13. Call everyone you can.

We must be heard on this.

[Neshanic]

9. This will be well north of 1T, and take a decade to fix.

[Yes We Did]

12. Try two, three, or four decades.

This is bad. This is really bad.

[Neshanic]

14. I am trying to be optimistic, but I do think you are correct.

[Yes We Did]

16. I hope I'm wrong. n/t

[Neshanic]

20. Here's to hoping!

[Yes We Did]

21. Well, I made my calls.

You have to argue with the operators to get the numbers.

[MuseRider]

10. They don't think we are stupid

they don't think about us at all.

Regulations if they get bailed out? Pshaw, the corps regulate themselves don't they?

[orwell]

11. I read last night...

...that the RTC S&L bailout came in at 1.4 trillion after all was said and done.

Same shit, different year.

And still we never learn.

[Neshanic]

17. And the bonus. Hundreds of thousand of assets, buildings, pennies on the dollar...

The Western Savings and Loan building in Phoenix, a magnificent structure, finished just as the place went under. A person paid less than a luxury home for it. I will look up the numbers and get a pic. I was stunned when some guy bought it from the RTC for basically nothing. It was the palace of excess.

The RTC kept the chef and cafreteria staff on, and I worked in an office right next to it. A cafeteria that only Keating would accept. The meals were about $1.50, on fine china and linen. We had lunch there every day. The RTC subsidized it.

[redqueen]

15. And NO bonuses or any compensation other than salary for execs.

And cut their salary, too.

[Yes We Did]

18. You think making 1000 times your workers make is wrong?

What's wrong with tht?

and as I said... lipstick wearing pigs can fly too.

[redqueen]

22. IMO we should have a maximum income.

Nobody can make above x dollars... any extra has to be forfeited to the state for redistribution.

[Yes We Did]

24. HUH?

I usually agree with you, but that sound a little... um... communistic to me.

What I do think would be great is that if a CEO could not make more than 50 times the LOWEST paid employee at a company, and not more an 10% of overall revenue.

That way, if they are going to make out like a bandit, so does EVERY other person at the company.

That way, if the CEO makes $10,000,000 then the lowest paid employee must make at least $200,000. I think that would be a wonderful solution.

I mean... I'd scrub toilets for that.

[redqueen]

25. Heh... yeah. I'm not ashamed of it either.

I like your idea too though. It's a good start anyway.

[Yes We Did]

27. I mean, I can see your point too...

But I guess it depends on how much is too much.

Who decides? And once you have made as much as you can make, what is the motivation to continue?

Let's face it; this is a me-first country. If 911 couldn't change that, then I don't see what can.

I'm hoping an Obama presidency, but not too confident.

[redqueen]

29. Dunno... referendum maybe?

I'm done supporting the idea of people living like kings. Don't care how un-pc it is.

And as for motivation... that's such a bs idea... that people only do things to get filthy rich. Sure some types are like that, but most aren't, most just want a decent life. Let's just hope the types that are greedy a-holes die off, because they suck.

[Yes We Did]

30. Not all of them are like that though.

Take Opray, Steve Forbes, Pat Croce, the Jolie-Pitts as examples. MANY of the really rich donate millions upon millions each year.

I think what would be better would be to do away with the taxable income threshold. What was that... a flat tax. And if you make less than say... 50k a year you don't pay any federal income tax.

yeah, combine that with my other idea and that would be perfect.

If the CEO makes $10 Million, then the janitors have to make $200K and anyone who makes under $50K pays no taxes, and all those making above pay the same percentage of their total income.

[kentuck]

26. The stock market seems to be doing quite well without the bailout?

Just talking about it seems to have made them all giddy with dreams of the Big Rock Candy Mountain.

Congress should tread very carefully and slowly at this time. Or they will all pay the price, including the Democrats that go along with this scam. Especially the Democrats that go along. This is my personal line in the sand. They can kiss my ass goodbye.

This is the last desperate effort by this Administration to rob the people of their last dime. They have given everything else to the oil companies and now they want to take the Social Security fund as collateral for this huge welfare subsidy for banks. In my best Senator Ted Stevens imitation, NO! NO!! NO!!!

[Yes We Did]

28. My only question...

What happens IF we don't bail them out? I am by no means a financial expert, so I really don't know what the end result would be.

[wowimthere]

31. K&R... Homeowners should have more answers. The banks are

getting their free pass. What about the American who is going to be foreclosed on?

[Yes We Did]

32. They get a free pass too... To the homeless shelters. n/t

[gmoney]

33. A trillion is only a thousand billion...

that's just like a million million!

Oh, wait... this isn't Zimbabwe.

That IS a lot of money then!

[Yes We Did]

34. Since they are so happy to hand out money...

I could use $20K or $30K to pay off my debts too.

[gmoney]

38. It's like the old saying...

You owe the bank $20 thousand, that's your problem... you owe the bank $20 MILLION, that's THEIR problem.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

35. This kind of ignorant OP hurts everyone

The government will not be out 500 Billion or a Trillion dollars.

The government may well make money on the deal, and will certainly not lose 100% of capital used in any scenario.

But if you feel a great need to hassle law-makers to encourage them to hasten a fucking depression rather than doing something worthwhile, go for it.

[Yes We Did]

36. Excuse me?

So... by making sure that when they pass this the companies don't STILL foreclose on the people paying the bill, that is a bad thing?

I come on here trying to do some good, and you come in and either misunderstand my point, or just know something I don't. Either way, my intentions were good and you have no right to talk to me like that; free speech or not, it's just rude.

How does them adding something to this bail-out (which is essentially a done deal) to protect tax payers a bad thing?

If I misunderstand something, fine. Expain it.

But you don't have to act like a jerk.

[Yes We Did]

37. And further more... "Hassling lawmakers"...

It's called voicing your opinion. That is what we do. How else are you going to be heard, and how else are they going to understand the concerns of voters if we don't tell them what is on our mind.

It shocks me to hear such comments from you. Really, it does.