Lords of Disorder: Billions For Wall Street, Sacrifice For Everyone Else

[xchrom]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/02/27-5




The President’s “sequester” offer slashes non-defense spending by $830 billion over the next ten years. That happens to be the precise amount we’re implicitly giving Wall Street’s biggest banks over the same time period.

We’re collecting nothing from the big banks in return for our generosity. Instead we’re demanding sacrifice from the elderly, the disabled, the poor, the young, the middle class – pretty much everybody, in fact, who isn’t “too big to fail.”

That’s injustice on a medieval scale, served up with a medieval caste-privilege flavor. The only difference is that nowadays injustices are presented with spreadsheets and PowerPoints, rather than with scrolls and trumpets and kingly proclamations.

And remember: The White House represents the liberal side of these negotiations.

[woo me with science]

1. K&R

[tk2kewl]

2. k&r

[MotherPetrie]

3. K&R. and to be specificy by "we" you mean the bankers' fellow oligarchs in the WH and congress

[djean111]

4. I don't believe the liberal side is represented at all, but yeah.

[hfojvt]

5. the closing line, sadly, does not seem to be true

"That leaves the public with a clear choice: Demand solutions that are more just and democratic – or submit willingly to the Lords of Disorder."

How is the public supposed to demand? We make our choice at the ballot box, and neither party listens to "the public". As the article stated earlier.

"And remember: The White House represents the liberal side of these negotiations."

[lark]

7. Meaning both parties are part of the problem?

That's my take on this. The rich control Obama and the Dems, just have better control over the Repugs. Both are complicit in the failing fortunes of the working class. With Obama, the trajectory just isn't as steep.

[JEB]

6. Since they want class warfare,

perhaps we should give it to them.

[lark]

8. Don't think the country is there yet.

Occupy was the start and it got squashed very flat, very fast, because it was recognized for the real threat to the oligarchy that it was. Sad.

[econoclast]

9. Wrong

Unfortunately, your argument is based on a FALSE premise. Government does NOT give TBTF banks 83 billion a year. The Bloomberg article you implicitly reference is just plain wrong. While perveived TBTF banks can borrow less expensively than others .... Govt doesn't give them 83 billion a year. The lower rates come from at lenders expense, not the Gov.'s. and voluntarily at that.

In fact Dodd Frank was marketed in part as providing an an end to the TBTF issue

[Purplehazed]

10. Not quite.

The government doesn't hand the banks 83 billion in cash.

The government is guaranteeing the banks through the FDIC which is funded through taxes. The lower rates from the lenders is not really an expense because they are guaranteed to be to be paid back by the government if the big bank defaults. Banks that don't participate have to borrow at a higher rate because the lender has to figure in a certain level of default.

So the big banks make 83 billion in profits by using the credit rating and guarantee of the US and they don't pay anything for doing it. That amounts to a subsidy.

[econoclast]

11. No. Exactly wrong

Subsidy .... But it is a subsidy granted by those who lend to the perceived TBTF banks.... NOT by the govt.

In fact Dodd Frank as much as says that TBTF is a thing of the past.

So....to the extent banks pay taxes on these profits, THEY are subsidizing the Govt. not the other way around

There is a subsidy but it isn' coming from the govt.