So to celebrate their 10th anniversary, Google is having a contest. It’s pretty simple: they’re putting up to $10 million dollars towards good ideas that help everybody. The more far-reaching the idea, the more money. You should totally check it out at www.project10tothe100.com
I heard that the Bush administration wants to throw $700 Billion dollars at the travesty of the banking industry collapse. It’s a travesty of epic proportions. Not a tragedy, mind you, as in an unforseeable event with terrible results, but a travesty – something that could have been prevented and was not because of greed, stupidity and a general disregard for concern or accountability of any kind.
In the most straightforward and basic terms possible, the banking collapse is the result of years of mismanaged funds and credit. Now you want to give more money to the corporations who have proved so obviously that htey are incapable of handling the responsibility? In a consumer arena, this is pretty much like a spoiled teenager buying a car, let’s say a sporty little Toyota Celica, and then never making a payment, but always promising to do so. And then, when the Celica is repossessed, saying to this kid “we’re sorry your car got repossessed. But even though you never made a payment, it’s not your fault it got repossessed. In fact, to make sure you can still get around and continue to live the life of freedom and irresponsibility you’ve become accustomed to, we think you should have this $250,000 Ferrari.” and handing over the keys.
Over at Consumerist, Freakonomics author Steven Levitt (along with two economists from the University of Chicago, Doug Diamond and Anil Kashyap) explained it this way:
The Fannie and Freddie situation was a result of their unique roles in the economy. They had been set up to support the housing market. They helped guarantee mortgages (provided they met certain standards), and were able to fund these guarantees by issuing their own debt, which was in turn tacitly backed by the government. The government guarantees allowed Fannie and Freddie to take on far more debt than a normal company. In principle, they were also supposed to use the government guarantee to reduce the mortgage cost to the homeowners, but the Fed and others have argued that this hardly occurred. Instead, they appear to have used the funding advantage to rack up huge profits and squeeze the private sector out of the “conforming” mortgage market. Regardless, many firms and foreign governments considered the debt of Fannie and Freddie as a substitute for U.S. Treasury securities and snapped it up eagerly.
Fannie and Freddie were weakly supervised and strayed from the core mission. They began using their subsidized financing to buy mortgage-backed securities which were backed by pools of mortgages that did not meet their usual standards. Over the last year, it became clear that their thin capital was not enough to cover the losses on these subprime mortgages. The massive amount of diffusely held debt would have caused collapses everywhere if it was defaulted upon; so the Treasury announced that it would explicitly guarantee the debt.
But once the debt was guaranteed to be secure (and the government would wipe out shareholders if it carried through with the guarantee), no self-interested investor was willing to supply more equity to help buffer the losses. Hence, the Treasury ended up taking them over.
One of my favorite local columnists, Holly Mullen, had this to say:
Paulson and Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke announced to America that this last resort at saving the economy was do-or-die. They tell us there is little time to debate their pitch, or to argue its merits. The program is laid out in three (!!) pages. Congress, and by extension, the American people, are supposed to trust these guys.
It feels like every one of us who pays taxes in this country has been pasted with a giant “Kick Me” sign on our back.
The rest of her article can be found here, and it’s worth reading.
And former presidential candidate Ron Paul laid it out pretty clearly in one of the congressional sessions today.
As some of you may or may not know, on October 1st flavored malt beverages, or “bitch beer” will not be sold in grocery stores any longer, and will probably no longer be available in the state.
“Why?”, you ask. Well, let me tell you.
Some uppity member of the state senate, the representative from Provo (not Chris Buttars, the other retard, Curt Bramble) decided that these so-called “Alco-pops” could fall into the hands of teenage drinkers, and should not be so readily available. He sponsored a bill that not only removes these beverages from the grocery stores, making the State Liquor store the only place you will theoretically be able to purchase them after Oct. 1, but also requires special labelling and packaging for these products.
Now, I can only imagine what a pain in the ass it must be for the manufacturers of alcoholic beverages to deal with the state of utah. I mean, they’ve pretty much got to brew beer in separate batches to make sure it’s only 3.2, right? Add to this that it has to be labeled as such, which is an additional expense, and now utah wants to effectively ban these beverages altogether? It’s a wonder we can even get Coke and Pepsi with caffeine.
Now the other part of the problem is this: The state liquor stores aren’t really set up to handle products that require refrigeration, so it’s pretty likely they wouldn’t carry them anyway.
But that may not even matter. Many of the manufacturers have already said that they have no interest in going to the expense of developing new packaging and labeling to comply with yet another “nanny-state” Utah law sponsored by a religous zealot that feels we should all coimply with his brand of morals.
Screw you, Curt Bramble.
Why don’t you sponsor a bill requiring some parenting? I mean, if you really must to go meddling in people’s personal lives and removing all semblance of choice or free-will from them presumably for their own protection, where you (or any government) have no business, if you’re worried that these beer pops are going to be consumed by minors, isn’t the problem a little more far-reaching, involving the parenting they may or may not have received?
EDIT:
The complete text of the new law is here. Want to know if your representative voted for it? Check the official vote tally here.
I don’t think it’s any mystery that I am passionate about voting. People that don’t vote really anger me, and I don’t anger easily. I’ve heard every argument in the book on why people don’t vote, and I just don’t get any of them. I believe that too many men and women have fought, bled, and died to give me this right for me to treat it casually or disregard it entirely.
That being said, I also feel that far too many people vote based on sound bites and media spin. To support all of you, my friends, in making an educated decision this year as I encourage you to vote, I present here a comparison of the Republican and Democratic candidates.
Yes, I know there are several other candidates, and many of you iknow that I’m a Libertarian. Although I absolutely support you voting for one of the other candidates if you so choose, that fact is that under America’s current voting system, our next president will be one of these two men. Here’s why:
Now, I know that there are some issues that are more important to you than others, so what I suggest is determining which issues are most important to you, and then voting for the candidate that is most closely aligned with your own beliefs. Just please, for the love of God and Country, don’t vote based on what your friends say, what you heard on the news, or just because you ‘like’ them – educate yourself, then take action.
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Democrat |
Republican |
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| Barrack Obama, Joe Biden | John McCain, Sarah Palin | |
Iraq |
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| Supports capping troop levels, and wants full US withdrawal by March 2008. While not a Senator at the time, he has opposed the war from the start.1 |
Supports current Administration plan.1
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Foreign Affairs |
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| Supports more monitoring of nuclear technology to make sure it stays out of terrorist hands. Believes more needs to be done to stop conflict in Africa.8 | Believes Iran’s nuclear proliferation is a grave risk, and could further destabilize the region.27 | |
Homeland Security |
||
| Wants Homeland Security money targeted more towards high-risk areas. Supports better protection for chemical plants. Wants more tracking of spent nuclear fuel so it doesn’t end up in terrorist hands.8 | Supports Patriot Act and wants intelligence officials to have all tools they need. Opposes detaining enemy combatants without legal rights.56 | |
Immigration |
||
| Supports a fence along Mexican border. Supports tougher laws to keep illegals from finding jobs. Supports granting citizenship to illegals already here as long as they pay fines and back taxes.21 |
Supports path to citizenship for illegals already in the country, while tightening current border patrol.33
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Economy |
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| Supports tax incentives to companies that keep jobs in the US. Believes NAFTA needs to be renegotiated to protect American economy.21 | Supports lowering taxes to help small businesses.13 | |
Education |
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Supports rewarding good teachers with better pay, and expanding summer learning programs. Wants to increase federal grants for college education.48
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Supports sending federal dollars directly to local schools, cutting back on red tape.13 | |
Energy |
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| Supports more renewable energies, and wants to look into clean coal uses to get the US away from foreign oil dependency. Proposed giving automakers help with health coverage in exchange for more hybrid production.48 | Supports alternative energies, and wants to look at nuclear possibilities.50 | |
Climate Change |
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| Believes global warming will bring devastating consequences if it’s not stopped. Supports capping emissions with incentives to corporations that cut greenhouse gases.8 | Believes nation can’t ignore global warming. Supports cutting emissions through market forces that will bring about cleaner technology.13 | |
Health |
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| Supports universal health care, and believes government should buy prescription drugs in bulk to reduce costs. Wants hospitals to be graded on performance and make a switch to cost-effective, computerized record-keeping.3 | Supports importing prescription drugs to lower costs.36 | |
Social Security |
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| Opposes privatization, and believes the system can be fixed with minor changes.40 | Says Social Security is failing, partially because it’s being unfairly raided to fund other government programs.13 | |
Stem Cell Research |
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| Supports embryonic stem-cell research19 | Supports embryonic stem-cell research35 | |
Same Sex Marriage |
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| Supports civil unions, but not same-sex marriage.52 | Opposes same-sex marriage (believes it’s a state issue)34 | |
Abortion |
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| Pro-choice3 | Anti-abortion (believes it’s a state, not federal issue)33 | |
Gun Control |
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Supports bans on assault weapons and concealed weapons.49
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Supports background checks for gun buyers.57
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