WTF Has Really Been Happening?

Plenty!

It is painfully obvious that we have been fed a steady diet of airy nonsense that in no way informs us about matters that impact our lives. With all the talk of bubbles - - the housing bubble, the internet bubble and whatever bubble lies ahead, you would think that bubbles, being what they are, would provide at least a modicum of transparency.

But government intransigence and corporate corruption have combined to produce conditions that hid weaknesses and left the country close to financial collapse. Will we be able to stave off economic implosion? And how should tax dollars be spent - - on Wall Street, on defense, the housing market, the auto industry? There are more questions than answers, but the current administration has been far better at making excuses than providing facts and solutions. And President Bush is spending most of his time of late trying to enhance his weak executive credentials for posterity.

He rails against the NY Times for "gross negligence" and biased reportage because an article blamed him in great measure for the country's economic woes. The president insists however "the most significant factor leading to the housing crisis was cheap money from abroad" that encouraged lenders to make risky loans. But along with other problems, regulatory disorder and the commitment of Bush and his supporters to free-wheeling "market forces" contributed mightily to the meltdown.

Tracking lenders who allowed people of dubious credit-worthiness to get in way over their heads was a regulatory step never taken. Many in the sales force seemed to care only about collecting their commissions. Worst of all the banking-brokerage connection allowed iffy loans to be repackaged as triple A investment instruments. Even low-end financial observers, and I count myself among them, could discern the fallacy of such an approach. Now with all the publicity about the Madoff "Ponzi schemes", the mortgage crisis smacks of similar castle-in-the-air shenanigans only without the obvious intent to defraud - - just over-arching stupidity and greed.

Incompetence is a word often used to describe the Bush years and it's as good as any, but there's a kind of malevolent character to the administration that imparts a sinister quality to it conduct. The only thing I remember from Daphne du Maurier's novel, Jamaica Inn, was the protagonist finding a drawing the town's minister had made showing him in the pulpit as a wolf addressing a congregation of lambs. Oddly, that picture from the long-ago past keeps coming to mind, perhaps because these past eight years have been so shrouded in secrecy, so infused with duplicity even as the White House intoned a message of righteousness and a commitment to national defense.

But how righteous is signing a bill that makes it harder to claim bankruptcy while credit-card companies raise rates, shorten payment windows and exact large late-payment fees, ensuring that card holders will never be able to get out from under and often stand to lose their homes, their cars and the ability to maintain their health insurance? And how can no-strings funds for financial institutions be justified while every stumbling block available is placed in the path of the working class when it asks for help.

In a Financial Times article (12/20/08), http://www.ft.com/, Krishna Guha wrote that "The Fed said...it would offer low-cost three-year funding to any US company investing in Securitized Consumer loans..." This would "include hedge funds, which have never been able to borrow from the US Central Bank before, although the Fed may not permit hedge funds to use offshore vehicles to conduct transactions." Seriously - - The Fed would restrict (maybe) the use of "offshore vehicles"? What in the world is this all about? And why are offshore transactions even on the table? And hedge funds...

This past Sunday, the NY Times, listed some defense programs that could be cut back or eliminated, freeing up billions of dollars. My personal favorite for elimination is a Missile Defense System that has never lived up to expectations. In the face of other pressing needs the defense budget is one place to look for savings.

Norman Solomon of the Institute for Public Accuracy quoted recently from a speech by Martin Luther King - - "A nation that continues to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death." Between unscrupulous market manipulators and war profiteers our country has become spiritually endangered.

FINDING A VOICE by Ann Davidow