Arkansas Blog

with more blowback to come, as methinks the state of Florida turned blue today

a Google search of state lottery, state pension fund, lehman brothers, george walker, and jeb bush will provide more details.

It's looking pretty gloomy out there (except to Greenberg, of course). If Obama wins we are screwed. If McCain wins we are royally screwed.

Jim Kunstler has some words to say about the economic meltdown - http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/

"A Ripe Moment
It turns out the real hurricane blew through Wall Street last week, not Galveston. This morning, Manhattan is strewn chest-deep with the debris of banking and at this hour (seven a.m.) nobody knows how far, deep, and wide the damage will spread. The fear, of course, is that we are witnessing a classic "house-of-cards" or "dominos-in-a-row," situation, and that the death of Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch will cascade into a generalized collapse of the entire consensus of value that supports mediums of exchange.
At least one thing ought to be clear: this has happened due to the negligence and misfeasance of the regulating authorities, namely the Republican Party, and that now all the hoopla surrounding Sarah Palin can be swept away revealing that group to be what they actually are: the party that wrecked America. I hope one or two Barack Obama campaign officials are reading this blog. You must commence the re-branding of the opposition right now. The Republicans must be clearly identified as, the party that wrecked America.
Many things happening this week will be interesting to see and hear, but just now an outstanding question is how on earth can the Bank of America buy Merrill Lynch for $50 billion after assuming the liabilities of the tarbaby known as Countrywide? But that little detail may be lost in the din as other banks and bank-like organizations start crashing like sequoia trees in a national forest.
I wish I knew whether this extravaganza of ruin might settle the question as to whether America goes into hyperinflation or implacable deflation, but the net effect is that money is leaving the system in big gobs. And if not money per se, then the idea of money as represented in certificates, contracts, counter-party positions, and gentlemen's agreements. This is the day that America finds itself a much poorer nation. The capital we thought was there, is gone.
A lot of it was actually translated over the years into Hamptons villas, Gulfstream jets, and other playthings that will now go up on Ebay or some equivalent as we turn into Yard Sale Nation in a general liquidation of remaining assets. Of course, the trouble in a situation like this, where absolutely everybody is trying to pawn off assets, is that there are very few buyers on the scene, so the prices of all these things go down down down. Everything is for sale and nobody has any money.
This was essentially the state of things in the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the only escape from that turned out to be the mobilization for war. And in the aftermath of that terrible war, we were the only industrial nation that hadn't been bombed to rubble. What's more, we had a very handsome supply of industrial world's primary resource, oil, at our disposal. So we spent the next thirty years making oodles of things and selling them to people in other lands (lending them the money to buy), until these nations were back on their own feet and solvent. And after 1975, the industrial club picked up a bunch of new members and they all began to clean our clock.
So, as our industrial base waned, and our factories got old and brittle, and our labor force was steeply under-bid by cheaper labor forces, we embarked on a quest for "the new economy." This was represented in successive turns as the information economy, the consumer economy, the high-tech economy, et cetera. They were all ruses, aimed at concealing the truth -- which was that we had become a society no longer producing things of value, no longer generating real wealth. The final act of this farce has been the so-called "financial industry."
That "industry" turned out to be most earnestly devoted to the production of complex swindles. They were so finely engineered that it took twenty years for the swindles to stand revealed, and they were cleverly hitched to the primary thing that the American public vested its identity in: house-and-home. Thus, much of the public finds itself in very real danger of becoming homeless and broke.
We generally recognize that some wicked-massive transfer of wealth occurred in the process of the mortgage fiasco, but it remains to be seen whether any residue of this wealth can actually be retained, as represented by currencies, contracts, and supposed securities. The wholesale settling of debt now underway may leave an awful lot of this stuff with no value.
We should be frightened by the political implications of this Great Implosion of presumed wealth. Some group of somebodies will have to clean up this mess. Moving toward a major election, it is hard to imagine the American people giving the clean-up task to the very group that created the mess -- no matter how many cute little faces Sarah Palin can make on TV. Both parties have so far managed to ignore the gathering crisis of banking and money, but they can't ignore the sequoia trees crashing down around their ankles and shaking the earth they stand on.
At issue now will be the question of legitimacy in all its human social dimensions. Is our money legitimate? Is the authority of our elected officials legitimate? Are our values and ideas legitimate? These are the things that will determine what kind of future we find ourselves in.
So, to begin this process, and to clarify the situation, I urge readers of this blog to identify the Republican Party by its new brand-name: the party that wrecked America. At least, then, we can reinstate one cardinal value into the juddering structure of what we claim to believe: that actions have consequences, that you can't just swindle and loot a society and walk away with the swag.
Spread the word, change the tone of this campaign, and keep posted. This will be a momentous week."

Not to repeat myself, but; I first heard of this in 2005. Anyone who knew anything about mortgages knew that the products being offered were not sustainable. If you have been keeping up with European newspapers you have seen the above senario described in detail for at least six months if not a year. The real news here is that we were kept in the dark by both parties for years.

And here comes that silly punk Greenberg following up the aforementioned smirk at Paul Krugman with another of his off-the-cuff smirking columns, this one about why he loves Sarah Palin. Surely this smug puke understands that he and his kin would be the first rounded up by the religious police and put on ships for Guantanamo when Palin gets to be president.

I moved all my 401K out of real estate the day I heard the words "interest only mortgage". I've known for several years this day was coming, but it's still cold comfort now that it's here.

So, what does it say about the American people who voted for Obama, even less qualified to be President...even though Palin is not exactly running for President and last check Obama is. I wonder what type of backlash Palin would get for yelling at someone to stand up to be recognized several times before being reminding the person is in a wheel chair. Haven't heard anyone here whining, but I bet if Palin did so it would be a mark against her. Gotta love that double standard!
And if Biden had gotten rid of a state trooper who openly admits to tasering his son and then a committee headed up by McCain supporters was named to investigate, would anyone say anything?

I am sure Andrew Sullivan would have nothing to say about it, but then that's not saying much. Andrew is as bad as NYTimes and DK and Huffington.

I have a skinny Tyson chicken in the freezer,,,wonder if Kroger would take it back for cash??

Yeah, muley, Obama is really setting Florida on fire.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/state/article808637.ece

The problem with your googled article is the same with the prog's obsession with Palin, neither Jebbie nor Palin is running for President.

Muley, you remind me of the lunatic Kossack who, upon hearing Palin's name as VP, trumpeted "we're back to blowout, Georgia, West Virginia and Colorado ..." Of course the Kossack was as hopelessly deluded by the Koolaid as you are.

not deluded, just temporarily forgot to factor in irrationality.
i should have added the qualifier of "if the press does it's job" (but that's never a given)
and that a million or so wealthy Florida retirees/property owners and government workers would make the connections between Jeb/Lehman Brothers/GOP and their depressed economy and thus vote accordingly.

still possible, perhaps likely, but by no means a sure thing. for people can be so easily distrac...

Sad thing is, muleboy, I don't know how bad the economy has to get before the gay marriage/abortion zealots will make the connection between the economy and their government. And I really don't want to live through it, either.

But picking through the some times incoherent right-wing rantings on this blog, I've come to 'learn' that somehow liberals/the Clintons are responsible for every bad economic occurrence and every disastrous military excursion this country has ever experienced. Aside from liberals/the Clintons being so baad, all the politicians with a God stamped on their forehead are incapable of being wrong...'cause they say their god said so. Nice gig.

The entire Bush family has a history of looting...then there's the family connection (Saudis) with the 9/11 terrorists (Saudis). (Which is why the Saudi Royal family got a special pass to fly their people out of the country after 9/11.)

Muley, if the press had done it's job, we'd be watching Al Gore pass the baton to some young Dem right about now.

What SPECIFICALLY, in terms of experience, qualifies obama to be chief executive officer and commander in chief?

Obama or McCain will stand in front of the Chief Justice of the U.S. on Jan 20, 09 and solemly swear to do what?

Obama at least thoroughly knows and understands the document to which he will be up holding. If anyone is foolish enough to think a modern politician understands the workings of financial markets then go back to high school and start over. It's the Secretary of the Treasury and chairman of House Ways and Means who will marshal the national government during times of financial crisis. Mostly the Secretary.
Clinton had Robert Rubin, the most brilliant Sec in Ages.
Bush has fired 3 Secretaries of Treasury because they were critical of what he and Cheney were setting up with low regulation and high deficits. The present one is on Cheney's leash.

Dick Cheney is bat shit crazy and is effectively overseeing this economy.
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What SPECIFICALLY, in terms of experience, qualifies McLiar to be chief executive officer and commander in chief?

I don't know. I'm not voting for him. I'm not impressed with his 22 years in the Navy and 20+ years in the Senate on the Foreign Relations committee.

Like I said, what SPECIFICALLY, in terms of experience, qualifies McLiar to be chief executive officer and commander in chief?

I'm talking about the evil twin McLiar that is currently campaigning for president, not the good twin John McCain who evidently died back in 2000 while campaigning for president, victim of dirty tricks at the hands of one Karl Rove and The Appointed One.

McLiar never served in the Navy since he is only 8 years old, being born in 2000. And 8 isn't old enough to get into the U.S. Senate either.

And does Mizriz Palin have even one second of the experiences you think qualify McLiar to be president? Oh, I forgot, she can see Russia from Alaska is her presidential qualification. Was this from her backyard deck or upstairs bedroom- I forgot?

Here is a great place to poll yourself to see how in line your beliefs and ideas are with Obama's. Check the attached URL.

http://www.barackobamatest.com/?fuseaction=home.options