“the interregnum of despair”

[stilltrucking]

There’s no risk this would become standard practice, because outgoing presidents rarely want to leave before their terms expire. But we still need a procedure for the quicker transition of power in troubled times like these.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/11/opinion/11cooper.html

[mtmynd]

it's pretty dang sad that the country dislikes Dubya so much that most everyone would just as soon see Obama take over... tomorrow. but Dubya is just not the type of person that garner's much respect... from anyone. the absolute worst prez in our lifetime... maybe even longer.

((how did he get voted into office ... two times???))

rhetorical.

[stilltrucking]

Rhetorical yes
but still a dam good question.

[UMBERTO UMBERTO]

The fault, dear Brutus, lies not . . .

( you can fill in the rest) . . .

It's the alleged "electorate", the fans of Sarah Palin, Africa as a country, the lies in my other post in Bush's "assessment" of his performance ( which will be swallowed, if anything factual is ever swallowed-- as "fact") that scare me.

With "democratic and free elections" like those ( the first two Bush terms) who needs authoritarian governments?

It appears that unregulated "free" market capitalism, Republican principles of conservative fiscal policies and an emphasis on individual responsibility ( all those concepts are paraphrased or echoed word-for-word from Bush speeches) isn't "pushing America forward" under the 8-year BUSHAREGNUM:

(paste)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02253.html


Somali pirates might have given us a more profitable, rational and peaceful eight years . . .


--UU

[stilltrucking]

That is a hoax about Palin and Africa as country.

NEW YORK — MSNBC was the victim of a hoax when it reported that an adviser to John McCain had identified himself as the source of an embarrassing story about former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, the network said Wednesday.

David Shuster, an anchor for the cable news network, said on air Monday that Martin Eisenstadt, a McCain policy adviser, had come forth and identified himself as the source of a Fox News Channel story saying Palin had mistakenly believed Africa was a country instead of a continent.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/1 ... 43517.html

Speaking of Palin here is a guy who thinks she is wonderful

She has a website called Orwell Today strangely enough.

And she also says that Obama is not a USA Citizen. How did Orwell become the darling of of these wackos?

I think it was Kerry and his mismanaged campaign that did it Cecil. The republicans had better TV production values. Obama got more smarts in his big toe than Kerry got in his skull. Obama out maneuvered them. Kerry just sleep walked through the campaign until the last couple of weeks.

[mtmynd]

I think you're both right.

George W. Bush had to be President. Looking back at it, it was his destiny and the destiny of this country. His Presidency was certainly far bigger... far greater than Dubya could ever be. His Presidency dwarfed him. His Presidency shocked everybody into believing Dubya knew how to run this country and pick his administration. He failed miserably at both and he was undoubtedly the worst President this country has seen in this past century, at least. But the Presidency of George W. Bush had to be. Why else would he be President for 8 years? There is no logical answer to that question which will drive historians to battle and fatigue in attempting to decipher the question of "Why?"... Why 'W"..? To try an answer the 'why' is to indulge in some kind of intellectual game that has no ending. Who enjoys a game that never ends? His Presidency was illogical... beyond any semblance of intelligence. It was meant to be.

We have heard all thru this campaign period the word 'change' pounded into our psyche for months. This incessant preaching of that word was being done by both candidates. "Change..." they spoke of over and over, relentlessly. And guess what? They are correct. This world is undergoing a drastic and never-before witnessed time of massive change on a scale that is completely new and different from any change that has come before. It's that important. More important than the candidates themselves could ever possibly conceive. This change is so momentous that in four to eight years we will not recognize the world we see today, and if we do take it in because it won't last long.

What we have taken as absolute Truth and what we have lived as the only way anyone should live, will be challenged over and over. For all the changes that must happen, there will not be enough present day capital to pursue it. The entire financial network, globally, will be unable to fulfill the needs and necessities of billions of human beings wanting, nay, needing this 'change' that has been promised, if not fully understood, by their leaders.

We all know certain things that must be done to save not only humanity, but to save the very planet we inhabit. If we don't there will be terror and unrest, revolution that will spin the lives of all of us totally out of anyone's control. We know we must get a handle on 'it' but we're like little children given the keys to an 18-wheeler without knowing how to start the engine.

Let's just briefly list some things this, our humanity, needs in the near future-

1) Our children must be the first t0 get medical care and healthy food, followed by a worthwhile education if there will be a future for humanity.

2) Followed by all mothers/women and men must have access to good and affordable healthcare to sustain the reproduction of the our human race.

3) Sustainable energy... one that doesn't poison our environment and is affordable for everyone.

4) Take a honest and serous look into what in the world has diminished us and eliminate them for things that enhance our lives.

5) A renewed belief in the arts and sciences to bring us fresh new ideas that will replace the unnecessary burden that has slowed down our path to a future that should be seen and not veiled by stupidity and ignorance.

We all know, if not explainable, that good work doing good things for a good wage is mandatory. It's what brings us humans contentment. We needn't stress and worry and make ourselves sick (dis-eased) if there is a better way. There is.

The one thing that will prevent us, humanity, from attaining these few things to improve our collective lives is our present conviction that economy is necessary. How can the world's economy pay for healthcare, housing, energy, education, transportation, defense,\ and too many to list other things that we rely on to live in our modern times..? That economy is too small. It hasn't kept up with the population and their needs. The present day economy is elitist... it doesn't favor all the people. The current economy is for a minority when we compare it and it's needs to serve the people. How many people around the world do not have any economy to purchase their needs? Our current economic idealogies are limited to only a few... far too few to be of any good for the world. Indeed, today's economy is primarily for so few that the economy is a servant to those few and they control the machine that makes the economy their tool to give or take without the say-so of the commoner.

Surely a world that is so needy for change, must have an alternative to our present day economy to make those needs happen. Afterall, all economies rely on the zero to measure their wealth and availability. It's an abstract that nothing else in the natural world needs , an economy to sustain life.

We cannot provide the much needed change the world demands if we cannot change our perceptions of economy.

[enough]

[UMBERTO UMBERTO]

I was probably a little unclear, Truck-- I meant the "alleged electorate" was likely to believe Africa was a country, not Palin necessarily, though I wouldn't put it past her . . .

In speculation about why Orwell is the darling of someone on the right:

Everyone likes to claim a dystopia ( or the literary creator of one . . .) because said dystopia has scare value . . . like "terrorists" and "insurgents" . . .

Just another speculation, you understand.


UU

[stilltrucking]

Sure Osama Bin Laden is the Emmanuel Goldstein of the errorists But there is the right and then there are the whackos. You know the people with the tin foil hats. Obama is going to be a feeding frenzy for them.

For example:
Obama is not a citizen his birth certificate is forged. Therefore he cannot be president because he is not a natural born citizen. We are living in such interesting times.

But the bottom line is that Kerry was a doofus candidate. His campaign staff ran a stupid campaign. Can we blame the electorate for that?

The book Primary Colors about the democratic primary campaign of 1992. The author was a reporter for Newsday who was covering the Clintons. He said they thought Kerry was stupid. And that he was sleep walking through the campaign.

You know the electorate has been duped before, over and over. It is the job of a campaign staff to dupe them better than the opposition. Obama ran a smart campaign, Kerry a stupid campaign. There it is.

As Adlai Stevenson said to the woman who told him that every intelligent person in the USA was going to vote for him. "That is not enough madam, I need a majority." quoted from memory.

P T Barnum was not born yesterday But you know the electorate get born everyday.

Palin in 2012, oh boy.

[stilltrucking]

I missed your reply Cecil.




I can not think of a better person to lead us through the catastrophe than Obama.

RE: 2004
Sure you could say it had to happen that way because that is the way it happened so how could it be any different?



Sure it might all come crashing down in the next four years because they are not telling us the truth about the vulnerbilities in our financial system. Nobody talking about the hundreds of trillions of dollars in credit default swaps that are coming due. AIG now asking for more money because the first batch is coming home to roost. I suppose they will nickle dime us now. Five billion here ten billion there so on and so forth.

The one change I am hoping not to see is a nuclear war. We are always closer to it then we think. Baring that I think we will muddle through the colapse of the ecconomic system. Can you believe Alan Greenspan a fan of Ayn Rand was shocked to see where his policies have taken us?


I am not sure how coherent this is I cut it up and moved it around a lot. I will read it later.

All you are saying is good Cecil assuming we don't burn it down in a nuclear holocaust.

"It came to me one rainy august morning like a flash, we might all wake up tomorrow in a pile of smoke and ash." Peggy Wilson, waitress and song writer, Atascadero California


All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth and a subscription to JSTOR

[tinkerjack]

Black Hole

Dec 10, 2008
Black Hole AIG Needs Another $10 Billion

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/ar ... ers=aig,gs

After all the money AIG's had shoveled at it, why does it need another $10 billion? Because, as the Wall Street Journal reports, the money its gotten from the government are supposed to pay off its bad CDS bets -- essentially, the money went to retiring the underlying CDO --- but it's also stuck $10 billion on what were just bad bets, not necessarily designed to help clients manage risk.

CDS is Abrev. for Credit Default Swaps. So there are 62 trillion dollars out there waiting to come home to roost. It is a practice that was outlawed a hundred years ago because they caused the panic of 1907. But in their infinite wisdom the people who are now in charge of getting us out of this mess pushed hard to get the law changed so that CDS could be sold again.

As of last year, according to an industry group, there were not $62 million, not $62 billion, but $62 trillion worth of credit default swaps out there. That's more than four times as much as the GDP of the entire U.S. economy.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business ... 10-07.html

Not to panic
it is just money
and you know it says right on it
"In God We Trust"

[mtmynd]

this gets me - $62 trillion worth of credit default swaps... it's lost. $62 trillion lost. somebody has to know where that much is. it's way to big to hide. couldn't put $62 T in a bank... it wouldn't fit in a mattress... it'd take a huge digging machine to bury that much... where in the hell is $62 trillion ? lost? lost my ass. it was never there to begin with. it was pure fucking lies that made up that figure. nobody will ever find or recover $62T but somebody sure can incarcerate those that lost it. never happen. too many people caught in the loss to incarcerate. how do you lock up lies and loss that big? now way. the global economy takes the loss and passes it on to the people of the world. just so an entitled few could have the prestige of knowing that they were once worth billions of dollars. my gawd, we're stupid.

[stilltrucking]

They are like side bets in a crap game Cecil. Somebody bet that a certain stock would be worth x amount of dollars on a certain day. When that day comes around somebody has to pay off. The person who made the debt does not have to own the stock or buy it. He merely bets on the price. Something like that.

Here it is clear as mud.

Credit Default Option: A put option that makes a payoff in the event the issuer of a specified reference asset defaults. Also called default option.

Credit Default Swap: A bilateral over-the-counter (OTC) contract in which the seller agrees to make a payment to the buyer in the event of a specified credit event in exchange for a fixed payment or series of fixed payments; the most common type of credit derivative; also called credit swap; similar to credit default option.

http://www.cftc.gov/educationcenter/glo ... ry_co.html