CEO: Fannie/Freddie Bailout Makes America 'More Communist than China'

[babsbunny]

http://businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080908171808.aspx

Rogers Holdings chief tells CNBC Europe U.S. brand of socialism is meant only for the rich.

By Jeff Poor
Business & Media Institute
9/8/2008 5:24:06 PM


Has America created its own variety of communism with the U.S. Treasury Department’s bailout of two beleaguered government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs), Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE)? According to Rogers Holding CEO Jim Rogers, the answer is yes.



“America is more communist than China is right now,” Rogers told CNBC Europe’s “Squawk Box Europe” September 8. “You can at least have a free market in housing and a lot of other things in China. And you can see that this is welfare for the rich. This is socialism for the rich. It’s bailing out the financiers, the banks, the Wall Streeters."



Rogers, known for launching the Quantum Fund with left-wing heavyweight George Soros, said the bailout was not benefiting homeowners or helping average citizens improve their standing for a home mortgage.

[dysfunctional press]

1. socialize the risk, privatize the profit...it's the american way.

too bad that 85% of the population is too stupid to understand what that means.

[Bob Dobbs]

2. China DEMANDED the bailout.

They are a major owner of the FM&FM MORTGAGE SECURITIES (not the stocks, which were rendered worthless by the takeover).

Reformed economist Michael Hudson explains it all here: http://www.counterpunch.org/

"Fannie and Freddie have been loading up on risky mortgages for ages, under-stating the risks largely to increase their stock price so that their CEOs can pay themselves tens of millions of dollars in salary and stock options."

Much more at link.

[Indenturedebtor]

3. They would have done it with or without China

But the truth is that to not do it would have required a financial restructuring here and around the world. I'm not necessarily against that idea though ;)

[Bob Dobbs]

4. Read the info at the link, there's a lot more to it.

http://www.counterpunch.org/

[Bob Dobbs]

8. New link. Counterpunch has moved the article.

http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney09082008.html

[Indenturedebtor]

14. Read it last night - great article thanks

I don't know whether to be glad or sad to hear many of the conclusions that my Wife and I have come to over the last few years expressed by an expert. Our personal situation was described to a T in that article. Leveraging debt in the hopes of getting ahead, etc etc. Now we're going bankrupt and are determined to get out of the game altogether hehe.

Very good article.

Edited to add:

However, I think that even without China's official pressure regarding F+F - we still would have bailed them out. As is mentioned in the article, our entire financial system revolves around our debt pyramid, and F+F is at the center of that.

[Hawkowl]

5. Execute the CEO's

Then we would at least have accountability on par with the Chinese.

[izquierdista]

6. "Left-wing"???

Why is this adjective used to describe Soros? They could put his ethnicity, religion, age, or some other equally irrelevant adjective in here, but they decided they needed to describe him as "left-wing"? I think of "left wing" as synonymous with "socialist", certainly not a fitting description of someone who beats capitalists using the rules of their own game.

Just another example of how leeeeee-beral has become an epithet, kind of the way that German fellow with the funny mustache used to rail about in the '30s.

[Romulox]

9. The "left wing" of the Democratic Party has moved WAY right. The Dems have embraced Soros

"certainly not a fitting description of someone who beats capitalists using the rules of their own game. "

Ummm, George Soros is a currency speculator. Donating to the Dems doesn't change this fact.

[izquierdista]

11. I know that

Currency speculator is not a job description you find in centrally planned economies. You only find currency speculators in capitalist countries that have handed over control of the money supply to the "free market" i.e., speculators. If he is so "left-wing", how is it then that he is such a very successful capitalist? :think: :think:

[Romulox]

13. That's exactly the point. He's not "left wing".

George Soros isn't anything even approaching "left wing", and neither is the Democratic Party. But when you compare a far-right party to a center-right party, the center-right party will appear "left wing", if only by comparison.

[zbdent]

7. remember legislation which made sure that poor little credit companies were protected

from all those powerful average joes who might declare bankruptcy?

(Yes, I'm aware that some Dems signed it, too ... railroaded)

[Romulox]

10. Railroaded? LOL. MBNA is Joe Biden's top campaign contributor.

http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/contrib.php?cycle=Career&cid=N00001669

[L. Coyote]

12. iT IS NOT COMMUNISM IF YOU BAIL OUT THE RICH INVESTORS

and leave the bankrupt homeowner swinging in the wind.