Day: June 18, 2009

Millionaires Policing Millionaires

There was lots of speculation on just what the Pres. was going to say about the regulation of Wall Street and now it is official.

As reported by the AP:

Obama’s plan would do little to streamline the alphabet soup of agencies that oversee the financial sector. But it calls for fundamental shifts in authority that would eliminate one regulatory agency, create another and both enhance and undercut the authority of the powerful Federal Reserve.

The new agency, a consumer protection office, would specifically take over oversight of mortgages, requiring that lenders give customers the option of “plain vanilla” plans with straightforward and affordable terms. Lenders who repackage loans and sell them to investors as securities would be required to retain 5 percent of the credit risk — a figure some analysts believe is too low.

Obama’s proposal would require the Federal Reserve, which now can independently use emergency powers to bail out failing banks, to first obtain Treasury Department approval before extending credit to institutions in “unusual and exigent circumstances,” a change designed to mollify critics who say the Fed should be more accountable in exercising its powers as a lender of last resort.

But the proposal also would do away with a restriction imposed on the Fed in 1999 when Congress lifted Depression-era restrictions that allowed banks to get into securities and insurance businesses. The Fed, as the regulator for the larger financial holding companies, had been prohibited from examining or imposing restrictions on those firms’ subsidiaries. Obama’s proposal specifically lifts that restriction, giving the Fed the ability to duplicate and even overrule other regulators. At the same time, the new consumer agency would take away some of the Fed’s authority.

The regulatory overhaul ended up eliminating only one agency, the Office of Thrift Supervision, generally considered a weak link among current banking regulators. The OTS oversaw the American International Group, whose business insuring exotic securities blew up last fall, prompting a $182 billion federal bailout.

The failure to merge all four current banking agencies into one super regulator could open the door for big banks to continue to exploit weak links in the current system. Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, a leading Democratic voice on Wall Street issues, praised the administration’s plan but said he would consider further consolidation.

Basically as always it is all about Wall Street…..millionaires policing millionaires……To give the Fed more power is just idiotic…..the Fed is anything but rational.  Keep in mind that the Fed was a prime player in the crisis we have now…..do we need them having more power to do it all over again?

Do They Have An Idiot Button?

Of course, I am talking about the GOP.  These guys and gals just keep throwing buzzwords around and not alternatives to Obama’s proposals.

One of the most used…lately…is “socialism or socialist”.  This tactic may have worked 25 years ago but today it has nothing on it.

Demonstrators outside Obama appearances are waving signs denouncing his supposed embrace of “socialism.”

“When you hear people saying, `socialized medicine,’ understand I don’t know anybody in Washington who is proposing that, certainly not me,” he said at a town-hall meeting on health care.

“Socialized medicine would mean that the government would basically run all of health care. They would hire the doctors, they would run the hospitals. They would just run the whole thing. Great Britain has a system of socialized medicine. Nobody is talking about doing that, all right?”

Obama is leaving it to Congress to take the lead in designing a health care plan. He has endorsed broad proposals, supported by many Democrats, to create a government-run health plan to compete with private insurers.

Republicans claim such a system would lead to government rationing and denial of care and could drive the private companies out of business.

That is the ploy being used……”the government will come between a doctor and his patient”  cute saying but someone needs to actually explain how that will happen.  Sorry, but saying so does not make it so.

Sorry Irene, but no where in Obama’s proposal does it smack of socialism.

After watching the debate on health care, as well as other proposals, I have found that the Repub strategists are pushing the same idiot button as the politicians.

Is It Really Global Warming?

Or if you want……climate change.

I have been hit on here by many on the right that say that I am ignorant or stupid or just plain wrong on the global warming thing.  I have looked at both sides of the question and say what I think…but then that is an opinion just like my critics have their opinion.  It is an argument that will continue for decades longer because NO ONE has a spine.

But beyond that opinion…who is right and who is wrong?

In a recent issue of Time Magazine a report has been published with predictions of what is to come.  Now with that said, why not write these down and see if they come true….then maybe we can put the debate to bed.

The predictions from Time are:

Water Woes. Precipitation will generally become heavier in northern areas, and will tend to fall in severe downpours, leading to more widespread flooding. Meanwhile, the South — and especially the Southwest — will become drier. That’s alarming because the Southwest and Southeast, where populations are growing faster than in any other U.S. region, are already struggling with drought.

Heat Index. Get used to sweating. Under a business-as-usual course, by the end of the century, Washington, D.C., could average as many as 90 to 100 days a year above 90 degrees Fahrenheit, up from around 30 to 40 days now. Southern Florida and southern Texas could see more than 160 days a year above 90 degrees Fahrenheit.

Polar Thaw. Climate change is being felt first in the Arctic regions, which explains why Alaska is warming at twice the rate of the rest of the country, and could warm by as much as 13 degrees Fahrenheit in the next 50 years. That will melt sea ice and severely affect already endangered species like the polar bear and the walrus. And warming could ruin the state’s valuable fisheries — as sea temperatures warm, the habitat for cold-water fish like salmon and trout could all but disappear in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.

Northeastern Exposure. Warming will make skiing, ice-skating and snowmobiling pastimes of the past in many areas of the Northeast, decimating the multibillion-dollar winter-sports industry. The center of maple-syrup production will shift from New England to Canada, and production of apples and other produce that depend on cooler winters will decline.

Early Deaths. All those heat waves will take a serious toll on human health, with a significant increase in deaths due to high temperatures. The poor and the young will be most vulnerable.

The list is out there…..now we must watch to see who is right in the climate debate.