Day: June 22, 2009

Understanding Iran–Intro

This is from Professor’s classroom.

Iran has election….present pres. wins…protests follow….crack down follows that……bloodshed and accusations fly…..

The AP is reporting that after the mullahs warning…the protests continued.

Iran braced for the possibility of more bloody confrontations between protesters and security forces on the streets of Tehran as fresh images of brutality emerged Sunday despite the regime’s attempts to impose a news blackout.Witnesses claimed that numerous demonstrators were injured — and several allegedly killed — in clashes with black-clad police wielding guns, truncheons, tear gas and water cannons on Saturday as protests over disputed elections escalated into Iran’s most serious internal unrest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Authorities did not confirm any deaths, and the reports from bloggers and Twitter users inside Iran could not immediately be verified.

All eyes are on Iran and how the election protesters are handled.

Iran is one of those countries that is mystery to most people…the only info they have is what they read or hear in the media.

Iran?  Yep….the country seems to always be in the news and on the lips of American politicians….some analysts say we need to inject the US into the protests and others say we need to stay out of it…..do not give the Supreme Council any more reason to hate the US.  What should we do?

Iran has made it in the news again…this time it is not about whether the holocaust happened or what to do about nukes…..it is all about the recent election and the protests that followed.

Analysts are jumping for joy over the protests they say it is a show of weakness for the mullahs and a strength of the people.  Many are encouraged by the protests and say that it shows the strength of the moderates.  Personally, I think that it is a bit too optimistic.  Some see the popularity of Mousavi as a turning point in Iranian politics.

Unfortunately, not many people understand Iran and what is happening.  For this reason too much misinformation is out there and people are playing to that erroneous information.

In the next parts of this post I will explain, as best I can, why I feel that this is not as good of news as most seem to think it is.

More Health Care Debate

It seems that there is a lot of bitching and moaning about health care…most of which is being generated by those with excellent health care….but the numbers support Obama….at least in the beginning and for a governmental solution.

In a report by Reuters:

Americans strongly support fundamental changes to the healthcare system and a move to create a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll published on Saturday.

But the Times/CBS poll found 85 percent of respondents wanted major healthcare reforms and most would be willing to pay higher taxes to ensure everyone had health insurance. An estimated 46 million Americans currently have no coverage.

Seventy-two percent of those questioned said they backed a government-administered insurance plan similar to Medicare for those under 65 that would compete for customers with the private sector. Twenty percent said they were opposed.

The debate on health care is getting out of hand…..misinformation is thrown around like beads at Mardi Gras.

From a report published on the wsws.org website:

Obama focused entirely on the rising cost of healthcare, which he presented as a major problem both for the federal government, the largest single payer of healthcare bills, and for corporate America. He declared, “The soaring costs of health care make our current course unsustainable” and pledged to heed concerns “that the ballooning costs of Medicare and Medicaid could lead to fiscal catastrophe down the road.” In other words, the administration is concerned, not about improving healthcare services for the American people, but about cutting costs in order to improve the financial health of American capitalism.The Obama administration has already ruled out the only rational response to the crisis of healthcare availability: the establishment of a single-payer system in which the federal government would guarantee universal access to healthcare as a matter of right. Every other advanced industrialized country has some form of universal coverage. But such a system would eliminate the tens of billions raked in by insurance companies whose “business model” requires that they limit coverage, deny treatment or reject bills—in other words, it would infringe on the “right” of MetLife, Aetna, CIGNA and other giant corporations to make a profit from illness and disease.

There is no difficulty, intellectually or technically, in devising a rational healthcare system. Advances in science and technology make it possible to deliver adequate healthcare services to the entire population at a fraction of the current cost. Every person should have access to healthcare as a basic right and be able to choose their own doctor and receive treatment at a modern, clean, well-run facility, run as a public utility either at no cost to patients at all, or with a modest fee.

Socialized medicine would be nothing but beneficial for small businessmen as well, since it would relieve them of an employee benefit cost that puts them at the mercy of rate hikes demanded by insurance companies. Small proprietors and self-employed professionals would have the same access to the healthcare system as all other working people, unlike the present system where they frequently go without coverage or pay prohibitive individual rates.

Despite the fevered rhetoric of the ultra-right, the Obama administration’s plans have nothing in common with such a restructuring of the healthcare system along socialist lines. On the contrary, Obama has repeatedly sought to reassure the profiteers that their interests will be looked after and that they are better off at the table, working with him, than outside. The for-profit healthcare and insurance firms have taken up this offer with enthusiasm.

The “debate” between the Republicans and Democrats in Congress involves little more than the terms on which hundreds of billions in treasury dollars will be turned over to the healthcare profiteers. The Obama administration wants to offer a public option as an alternative or supplement to private insurance, in the name of promoting competition and “keeping the insurance companies honest.”

The Republicans, and a sizeable number of right-wing Democrats, oppose any public option—largely for ideological reasons, since they fear the establishment of any form of public health insurance, no matter how inadequate, will lead to demands for a fully public healthcare system. One consulting firm recently estimated that 119 million of the 172 million now privately insured would switch to a public health plan that paid Medicare rates and charged premiums accordingly.

If a governmental solution is preferred by the people….why is there so much opposition?

The debate goes on and on…..and still nothing is for certain…will Obama cave to the profiteers and settle for a pale reflection of an honest health care bill that will benefit ALL Americans?  As the debate is now…there is a good possibility that concessions will be made so they can say they past a Health reform bill by the end of the year.  And all this debate will come again and again until the politicians decide that the American people deserve adequate health care.

Obama’s New Bank Regulations

As I have said in the past…millionaires policing millionaires……

The plan outlined by Obama calls for enhanced powers for the Federal Reserve to oversee big financial firms, both bank and non-bank companies; higher capital reserve and liquidity requirements; minimal government oversight of some hedge funds; a privately-run clearinghouse for some forms of derivative trading; and a requirement that lenders retain a small stake in loans they sell to the banks to be turned into securities.

All of these requirements can be easily circumvented by the banks. Moreover, the political forces responsible for enforcing them are bound hand and foot to Wall Street.

The panoply of existing federal regulatory agencies is for the most part to remain in place. Obama made much of the creation of a new body, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which he said would protect consumers against predatory practices by mortgage lenders and credit card companies. However, this agency will have no new powers beyond those previously spread out among other agencies.

The centerpiece of the plan is a proposal to allow the Fed and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to seize and wind down big banks and non-bank financial firms whose failure would pose a “systemic threat.” This is considered necessary precisely because none of the other proposals challenge the ability of banks, hedge funds, insurance companies and other financial firms to engage in speculative practices that are certain, at some future point, to threaten another financial collapse. It amounts to the institutionalization of taxpayer bailouts of the financial system, in place of the ad hoc methods employed in the present crisis.

The comparison of Obama’s plan to the regulatory reforms of the 1930s is specious. In the depths of the Depression, Roosevelt imposed significant structural reforms to rein in the banks and save American capitalism from the threat of social revolution. A cornerstone of these reforms was the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which erected a barrier between commercial banks and investment banks.

Glass-Steagall was repealed in 1999, during the Clinton administration. That was a milestone in the deregulation of the banks. It was part of a process, stretching back to the early 1980s, in which the US ruling elite has turned increasingly to financial manipulation to generate profit and personal wealth, while dismantling huge sections of industry and waging relentless war against the jobs and wages of the working class.

The result has been a colossal growth of social inequality and the emergence of a financial oligarchy that dominates the political life of the country. Both parties are at the beck and call of Wall Street, and are incapable of enacting any measures to rein in its plundering of the social wealth.

Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress have ruled out a return to Glass-Steagall. They have rejected capping executive pay. Nor is there any suggestion of closing down the casino for credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations, structured investment vehicles and other exotic forms of speculation that played a major role in the financial crash.

I have been saying the same thing for months and it is good to see that I am not a lone voice out there calling a turd a turd.

Also, let me see if I have this right……a former head of the NY fed has given more and sweeping power to the Federal Reserve?  Is that about right?  The Fed is far from a rational organization and to give them more power than they have now may be a disasterous move.  Everyone in the media is so concerned with the raising deficits, but few are focusing on what is being done behind the scene and that a repeat of the crap we are now in is not that far fetched.