Was the Great Wall Street Banker Bailout all just a huge SCAM?

[bvar22]

Peter Morici (University of Maryland School of Business and CNN Financial analyst) was on CNN today,
casually stating that the TARP funds "were NOT used as intended."
He said this as if this was now common knowledge, and indeed this seems to be the overwhelming consensus, that Wall Street Banks did NOT use the $820 Billion Dollars "as intended".

If the above statement is TRUE, then the Obama Administration and "Centrist" Democrat claims of having "Saved the Economy" is completely BOGUS.
If the Wall Street Banks did NOT "use the money as intended", and we did NOT have the "Economic Collapse" predicted in the extortion demand, then there WAS no real threat, and there was NO real "Saving of the Economy".
I haven't heard anyone in The Media connect these two painfully obvious dots,
and, indeed, the Obama Administration is STILL claiming that they "Saved the Economy."
.
.
.
.
NOW, these very same people are telling us that they are going to "Reform Health Care", but we must first give the Health Insurance Industry a Trillion Dollars and MANDATE purchase of their product with NO Publicly Owned/Government Administered Option to "keep them honest".
These very same people are selling this HARD,
and using 45,000 dieing Americans and 45 Million uninsured as hostages.
.
.
.
You can see WHY I have trouble trusting them?


NOW we have Your Children’s Money too !!!
And there is not a fucking thing you can do about it!
Now THIS is “Bi-Partisanship” !
Better get used to it!!
Hahahahahahahahaha!



But don't worry.
We'll fix it later!

[Donnachaidh]

1. Michael Moore covered that in Capitalism

I think the phrase used was "Financial Coup de Tat" or however you spell the frigging thing.

[LiberalLoner]

20. Great movie, wish everyone would watch it.

[Donnachaidh]

30. it should be a requirement - because the problems were NOT fixed with the change of personnel

in Washington. It continues, but with a different team jacket.

[bvar22]

27. I haven't seen Capitalism yet.

though I enjoy all MM's work.

To my memory, he is the only private American citizen that has been attacked from the podium during a State of the Union Address.
THAT alone makes him a hero.

We moved to The Woods in 2006, and haven't been Out to a Movie in 3-1/2 years.

[Donnachaidh]

29. you need to see this -- I was throwing things at the wall while watching it.

Stunned and angry. Thank goodness I've got lots of nerfy stuff - I'd have tremendous holes in my wall after watching this.

[AllentownJake]

2. The Federal Reserve and Fannie and Freddie are actually

doing what the money was originally intended for.

Hank Paulson took a short cut, because he is a douche. He lied to congress, the only thing that is protecting him, is congress doesn't want to acknowledge he lied and tricked them.

It was timed perfectly, during October before a Presidential and congressional election and a Bush Administration official was talking Martial Law.

[bvar22]

3. Easily duped?

or willing co-conspirators?

Those seem to be the most obvious conclusions.

Neither inspires any trust, but maybe its just me.

[AllentownJake]

4. I think it is both in some cases

Honestly, I'm not a fan of Pelosi, but she generally gets a pretty good deal out of things for herself when she does or doesn't do something. I haven't seen the pay-off for her yet, she might loser her gavel over it in November.

I think in the Senate there were the fair share of co-conspirators.

You are going to have to remember.

There are certain things that were not done. Impeachment is off the table, TARP, Looking Forward, that I have a firm belief is a mixture of two things.

1) People in the party who conspire with neo-cons
2) People who don't being threatened.

Hank Paulson threatened Martial Law. If you think you are about to win an election, after 2000 and you have a Bush admin official saying Martial Law might be declared with a Supreme Court who might endorse such a notion...I think you do what they say in order to have the election.

I'm also pretty sure some of the peaceful transfer of power details were worked out during that time frame.

A lot of what we are seeing is a planned getaway for some people. The only problem is they didn't leave. Any deal made should be null and void now.

[bvar22]

10. Self-delete.

*

[AllentownJake]

11. When you get the big boy/girl chair your wold changes

Remember when she became speaker and she talked about all the people that suddenly wanted to talk to her and how happy she looked....

The system has it's own built in controls...

[bvar22]

21. Did you respond before I deleted my post?

It was a targeted attack on Nancy based on my own personal feelings of betrayal.
I deleted it because I needed to check myself, and my feelings about Pelosi were not really the focus of my original post.

I have a great deal of difficulty trusting the Democratic Party Leadership on Health Care Reform.
I had a visceral reaction to hearing the phrase "they didn't use the TARP funds as intended" combined with today's HARD SELL of Mandates without a Public Option.

LESS than 35% of ALL Americans support Mandates without a Public Option.

I see a very easy comparison with the hype preceding and justifying the Wall Street Banker Bailout with the current SELLING of the current HCR.

[AllentownJake]

24. Yes and the message is the same threats not based on rationality

Remember we were promised chaos if we didn't do this, high unemployment, closed factories, etc etc etc.

We got it anyway.

The threat now is if we don't do this the GOP will win in November, they are going to win anyway. Taking their eyes off of the economy and talking about Health Insurance was their mistake.

The justification in December, like the justification now will be, do you know how bad it would be if we didn't do this.

My answer after bluff after bluff is simple.

Let us find out.

[bvar22]

28. No. The "THREAT" was a complete collapse of the Economy.

They were throwing around threats like:
"The Airlines wouldn't be able to fly because they couldn't get fuel on credit."
and
"Most businesses would be shuttered because they couldn't meet payrolls."
and
"There will be no food in the supermarkets."

THAT clearly did NOT happen.

[AllentownJake]

32. Well by that standard

anything above people killing each other in the streets is a convenient victory now isn't it?

Just like anything short of NYC covered in fallout from a Nuclear Bomb is a victory for the Patriot Act.

If the democrats hold onto the House by two seats, imagine what it would look like if we didn't pass HCR.

You see when you set the standard of success as a meteor not hitting the earth, victory is pretty easy to achieve.

What the hell do you think Sarah Palin is for and still getting press coverage...a reminder on how "close" we came.

[bvar22]

39. I think you have missed my point.

Since the TARP funds were NOT used "as intended", the only ones who CAN claim any sort of "Victory" are those who OPPOSED TARP because it was a scam, like the currently demonized Dennis Kucinich who voted AGAINST it.

The funds were NOT used as intended,
yet the predicted emergency "Immediate Economic Collapse" did NOT happen.

[AllentownJake]

40. Doesn't matter

They promised if we gave them money people wouldn't kill each other in the street on a massive scale. To the public, people aren't killing each other in the street on a massive scale.

Rather simple

[bvar22]

41. But thy did NOT use the money as intended.

Nobody can claim with any honesty that "We saved The Economy."
They didn't.
The PROOF is in the statement that "the money was not used as intended."

They pocketed it.
The threat was a FRAUD carefully scripted to transpire during the change of administrations so that each Party could blame the other.
There was NO imminent Economic Collapse.
Some Wall Street Bankers and their well-healed investors would have lost a bunch of money, but America would have survived nicely.
QED.

[AllentownJake]

42. This didn't happen

Seriously, take a peak over in GDP there is a great post of crazy that pretty much shoots down any logic you have.

[bvar22]

43. OK Lets make this very simple.

Hypothesis:
If we don't immediately give Wall Street One Trillion Dollars to free up the Credit Markets, the Economy will collapse.

Experiment: Give them One Trillion Dollars, but do NOT use it to "Free Up the Credit Markets."

Results: The Economy did NOT collapse.
Therefore, the Hypothesis IS invalid.

Clear?

[AllentownJake]

44. Oh, I've been saying that for 9 months now

but you see we gave them one trillion dollars and people didn't kill each other in the streets like in Mad Max.

Anyway, I'm trying to sell sticks that keep away Tigers to a certain group on here at DU. New business venture I've got going, think it will be widely successful

[bvar22]

45. LOL.

You will be able to rely on a record of 100% effectiveness.

[girl gone mad]

46. Even if the crisis had been real..

there were two easy actions they could have take to quickly put an end to it. Instead, Paulson attempted to ram a 3-page bill that he'd written months before through Congress. You do the math.

[bvar22]

48. Paulson's Ransom Demand:

One Trillion $

NO Strings

or the
ECONOMY DIES!

No Fooling!

Do NOT try
to follow!

[Vincardog]

5. I vote for 'willing co-conspirators'

[grasswire]

6. shock and awe baby

Disaster Capitalism is the name of the game.

Look at the eyes of the people surrounding Paulson.

[bvar22]

7. The eyes...the eyes....

That is what struck me so hard about that photo.....willing co-conspirators.
Nancy DOES appear to be experiencing some guilt in the eyes, but the little smile indicates that the visions of power and wealth are overcoming any brief sensations of guilt.

[notesdev]

8. Answer: yes

This crisis was engineered and the payoff for those who engineered it was tremendous (as you can see by the bill they stuck you with for it).

[jody]

9. YES! n/t

[Mari333]

12. they still have other areas to plunder before it's done

social security, medicare, you name it, if they can pull money out of your pocket,they will

that includes mandates on health insurance

[AllentownJake]

15. State public pension plans are being sold on the idea of buying banks

by the FDIC...I wish I was fucking kidding.

[cutlassmama]

33. yes. they have to make sure they get every crumb before the plebians figure it out

[Swamp Rat]

13. The biggest heist in history

:hi: bvar22

[rhett o rick]

17. Is still in progress. nt

[Swamp Rat]

22. Yes, now move along... nothing to see here... except the shiny thing.

[rhett o rick]

36. Are you out of date. Look! It's Tiger Woods. nm

[bvar22]

25. Hi, Swampie.

I've ALWAYS enjoyed your graphics.

I used to hang at Tipitinas, the Camellia Grill, Casamentos, and other Uptown joints.
I really miss the Music, Food, and New Orleans ambiance.
I still grow Creole Tomatoes up here in Arkansas, though I have to get my seeds from New Orleans.
:hi:

[Swamp Rat]

34. Way'at bvar22!

Well, I was born and raised within walking distance of Camellia Grill (where I used to eat lunch everyday when I was in HS). Ever drink a 'chocolate freeze' there? :D

I still live in Uptown NOLA, and it will take more than a dozen hurricanes to make me leave. ;)

Cooter Brown's was the first place to open after Katrina, and after a miserable few months of living in another city, the first thing I ate when I came back was an alligator po-boy at Cooter's.

Crawfish are really expensive right now, mainly because it's still early in the season. However, I may go get a dozen pounds this afternoon, and some Abita beer. :9 :beer:

We Creoles love our Creole tomatoes!... among other things. :9

[bvar22]

35. You're making me smile and hurt at the same time.

"An dey all ax for you."

[Odin2005]

14. We've been ROBBED!

:grr:

[rhett o rick]

18. HEY everyone, look over there. I think it's Tiger Woods. nm

[rhett o rick]

16. We clearly have a bubble economy or in other words a giant pyramid scheme.

As long as we have some growth we can keep it going. But Greenspan cut the banksters loose to speculate with out limits. This inflated the bubble to near bursting. The threat was timed and was real. But paying them off is like bargaining with terrorists. They have our economy kidnapped and will continue the pyramid bubble as long as we keep paying. But sooner or later it has to crash.

[rhett o rick]

19. The only difference between BoA and Madoff, is BoA pays off their Congress. nt

[leftstreet]

23. K&R

[sixmile]

26. Peter Morici is not your friend

He is a free market phony.

[bvar22]

31. Never-the-less....

he DID repeat that statement so casually "The TARP money was NOT used as intended."
He merely triggered my response.
ALL the pundits have agreed that TARP was NOT used as intended.
The Big Banks merely used it to enrich themselves.
Been hearing that for months now....
and YET, the forcasted "Complete Collapse of the Economy" did NOT happen.
.
.
.
So much for the claims of having "Saved the Economy".
and so much for TRUSTING the same people who are promising to fix Health Care by forcing every American to BUY Health Insurance from the incestuous 1st Cousin of Wall Street, the For Profit Health Insurance Cartel.
I don't TRUST them.

Fix it FIRST.
Pass it Later.

[420inTN]

37. Yes. n/t

[RexS]

38. Of course, it was all just a scam to bill the working class and

make billions on the recovery, of course some real billionaires lost all their money...but who fucking cares about them they were just competition anyway! Ahead full!

[Greyhound]

47. What real billionaire lost all their money?

I know that several lost billions, but I haven't of any of them being reduced to even 8-digit estimated* worth.