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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread: Another Step to the Poorhouse

Open Thread: Another Step to the Poorhouse

by @heymistermix.com|  March 27, 201011:39 am| 117 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

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Added to Bobo’s concern over the spread between US debt and corporate debt, it looks like we’re going to make a mere $8 billion profit on the $25 billion stock portion of our Citigroup bailout.

Here’s an open thread to commiserate.

Update: The original post wasn’t clear. We’re going to get $33 billion for our $25 billion investment.

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Next Post: Conservative Woodstock »

Reader Interactions

117Comments

  1. 1.

    Emma

    March 27, 2010 at 11:44 am

    There are heads exploding left and right….

  2. 2.

    C Nelson Reilly

    March 27, 2010 at 11:47 am

    Insider trading!

  3. 3.

    Short Bus Bully

    March 27, 2010 at 11:48 am

    Just goes to show you how bad Dems are with money…

  4. 4.

    valdivia

    March 27, 2010 at 11:50 am

    OT, but have you guys seen this cartoon? This is the most disgusting piece of racist crap i have ever seen. Fuck These Assholes!

    Rant-not-even-begun.

  5. 5.

    Stroszek

    March 27, 2010 at 11:50 am

    So AT&T is claiming that they’re paying 400% of the estimated total revenue from Medicare Part D fixes in the bill. The Firebaggers, of course, are citing these numbers on faith as proof that the bill is a failure (because, apparently, ending Bush’s corporate subsidies is the definition of ‘fail’).

  6. 6.

    gnomedad

    March 27, 2010 at 11:50 am

    It’s the Bush Recovery!

  7. 7.

    Josie

    March 27, 2010 at 11:51 am

    Hmmm – However will they explain the fact that this is good for John McCain?

  8. 8.

    Short Bus Bully

    March 27, 2010 at 11:51 am

    Need to add how this just shows what a gigantic fail TARP was.

    Also.

    Too.

  9. 9.

    Warren Terra

    March 27, 2010 at 11:53 am

    But think: if we’d let the financial sector completely collapse like the House Republicans wanted, we coulda bought the same shares for almost nothing! And burned the stock certificates for warmth!

  10. 10.

    Bob K

    March 27, 2010 at 11:54 am

    @ Short Bus Bully

    Google TARP and look at its time line. This looks like it was Bush/Cheney’s last chance to get their hands in the cookie jar. What better way to leave office than a get out of jail free card for Wall Street and hand off yet another disaster to the next administration?

  11. 11.

    Robin G.

    March 27, 2010 at 11:55 am

    I drank too much last night and now I’m dying. Yet here I am, literally curled on the living room floor within crawling distance of the bathroom, squinting through one eye at BJ and TPM and GOS on the iPhone.

    *That*, my friends, is lefty dedication. Jane Hamsher’s got nothin’ on me.

  12. 12.

    mcc

    March 27, 2010 at 11:56 am

    I feel like one of the huge problems with reporting on the bailout (both by the normal media and the blogs) is it made zero differentiation between money given away, money loaned, and simple guaranteeing of a loan.

    Like back in the Time of Bailing Out you’d out of the blue hear about a “3 trillion dollar” (I’m pulling a number out of thin air here) bailout that would never get mentioned again. If you dug in on that it would turn out that what really happened was the government or the fed or someone guaranteed 3 trillion dollars in loans. Obviously it wasn’t going to be the case that every single loan issued in the U.S. was going to default, but the reporting would make it sound like 3 trillion dollars was just cold given away. And because there was no follow up a lot of people probably thought yeah, they heard a news report about 3 trillion dollars going to the banks.

  13. 13.

    debit

    March 27, 2010 at 11:58 am

    @Robin G.: Have some water, then try to eat something. It’s been years since I had a hangover, but the memory is still fresh. My sympathies.

  14. 14.

    Bnut

    March 27, 2010 at 11:59 am

    @Robin G

    Replace the iphone with a laptop and I’m in the same boat.

  15. 15.

    mcc

    March 27, 2010 at 11:59 am

    So whatever happened to the proposal to create a transaction tax to recover TARP money not otherwise recovered? Is that part of Chris Dodd’s financial reform bill?

    Did said financial reform bill ever make it out of committee? For awhile last week we were hearing it was going to.

  16. 16.

    Der Blindschtiller

    March 27, 2010 at 12:00 pm

    Wow, a profitable investment? According to the logic of Wall Street compensation, does this mean that Bernanke is given the state of California as compensation?

  17. 17.

    Athenae

    March 27, 2010 at 12:03 pm

    God damn it, I had PLANS for that money!

    A.

  18. 18.

    mogden

    March 27, 2010 at 12:03 pm

    But hey, this TARP thing was going to turn a profit! And create 90% private sector jobs! Good thing the geniuses who cooked this up are now in charge of our health care system.

  19. 19.

    Robin G.

    March 27, 2010 at 12:04 pm

    @debit: Am eating and drinking intermittently so that it’s not all dry heaves. Just gotta wait it ou t, i think.

  20. 20.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 12:14 pm

    @mcc:

    Three trillion? Hah! It was much, much worse than that.

    At the height of Bailout Hysteria, twenty three trillion was the number used, as in “US taxpayers may be on the hook for twenty three trillion dollars“.

    Anyone who disputed that 23 trillion dollar number thrown around was labeled an Obama apologist.

  21. 21.

    Llelldorin

    March 27, 2010 at 12:15 pm

    @mogden:

    Read the article before snarking. That’s an $8 billion profit on the $25 billion.

  22. 22.

    Ivan Ivanovich Renko

    March 27, 2010 at 12:16 pm

    @mogden: Errr… I suspect you did not read the linky-thingy. That WAS a profit… a rather tidy one at that.

    edit: Llelldorin got there before me.

  23. 23.

    MikeTheZ

    March 27, 2010 at 12:16 pm

    @Robin G.: @Bnut: I am giving you both a standing ovation. Partly because it’s another excuse to procrastinate on my take home exams…

  24. 24.

    Dr Dave, chemist

    March 27, 2010 at 12:22 pm

    @mogden:

    Reading comprehension and/or financial math fail. As I read the article, this is an 8 billion PROFIT for the government on a 25 billion dollar investment, which by my math is a 32% profit. How many months ago did We The People buy this stock? Looks like an awfully good rate of return to me!

    ETA: looks like a couple of other readers were quicker on the correction than I was.

  25. 25.

    jeffreyw

    March 27, 2010 at 12:23 pm

    That Obama feller sure is a sly ol’ dog.

  26. 26.

    Bubblegum Tate

    March 27, 2010 at 12:28 pm

    So…are there any wingnuts out there claiming that this profit represents SOSHULLIZM? I have faith that at least a couple of them truly are that stupid.

  27. 27.

    Cat Lady

    March 27, 2010 at 12:29 pm

    @mcc:

    Everyone was so used to hearing about Bush cronies and piles of disappearing money here and in Iraq that no one in the MSM ever seemed to care about pursuing those stories. Unless the 3 trillion was going to hookers hired by Democrats, it was all just SOP. What else could be expected from the Bush crime administration? Nothing to see there.

  28. 28.

    Violet

    March 27, 2010 at 12:34 pm

    @Robin G.:
    When I was in college and had a horror of a hangover, a friend of mine gave me some advice I thought was terrible but in fact turned out to be pretty good: go do some hard exercise.

    It seemed absolutely impossible at the time. And I whined and wouldn’t go. But my friend forced me out of my fetal position and onto the track, and I ran around in circles for a little bit. Shockingly, I felt a lot better afterward.

    Keep drinking your water and so forth, but if nothing else is working, try exercise. It works. Really.

    And I’m sorry you’re feeling terrible. Hangovers really suck.

  29. 29.

    nogo postal

    March 27, 2010 at 12:34 pm

    Rev. Billy takes it to Chase for their effort in funding Mt. top
    removal. Built a Mt made of”murdered mud” http://www.revbilly.com/mud-mountain-1

  30. 30.

    Brick Oven Bill

    March 27, 2010 at 12:37 pm

    Umm, mistermix, let us again revisit Mathematics, this time in the form of community profit and loss, using your word, ‘We’.

    ‘We’, through the Federal Reserve, which of course works for ‘us’, lends money to ‘us’, this time in the form of The Banks, at zero percent interest:

    [0%]

    Then ‘we’ in the form of Citibank, or name another, lends our money back to ‘us’ by buying Treasury Bills at three percent interest:

    [3%]

    Then The Bankers, ‘we’, who surely do not have access to the Columbia University records, you know, those records that would show Barry’s claimed country of origin, that the collective ‘we’ are banished from seeing in the name of transparency, make…

    A profit.

    So congratulations to ‘us’. I imagine ‘we’ got five percent:

    [5%]

    And thus The Bankers one minus five percent equals ninety five percent:

    [95%]

    So now we can loan our profits back to ‘us’ and make:

    EVEN MORE MONEY.

  31. 31.

    Mark S.

    March 27, 2010 at 12:39 pm

    If Bobo really cared about the debt, he would be pimping this graph and calling for universal health care. I haven’t read him in a while, but I suspect what he actually argues is making Bush’s tax cuts permanent and destroying Social Security.

  32. 32.

    demo woman

    March 27, 2010 at 12:39 pm

    The Repubs will be upset because they prefer privatizing profits and socializing losses.

  33. 33.

    Mark S.

    March 27, 2010 at 12:42 pm

    @Violet:

    I believe it. There’s something about sweating that seems to get the toxins out quicker. If exercise is out of the question, a hot bath would sometimes make me feel marginally better.

  34. 34.

    Ailuridae

    March 27, 2010 at 12:43 pm

    @kay:

    At the height of the hysteria? Dylan Ratigan used that number in the last two weeks.

  35. 35.

    Ailuridae

    March 27, 2010 at 12:44 pm

    @Brick Oven Bill:

    Your understanding of finance is right up there with your understanding of food stamps. Jeebus, you’re an idiot.

  36. 36.

    Starfish

    March 27, 2010 at 12:46 pm

    @Robin G.: Wait, didn’t you lose a job the other week? Can I complain about you getting drunk off our tax dollars, or are you a Canadian? I need some way to express pregnant lady jealousy.

  37. 37.

    Brick Oven Bill

    March 27, 2010 at 12:51 pm

    Ailuridia;

    ‘We’ will now conduct a exercise of the collective. First:

    Consider zero percent:

    [0%]

    Now consider three percent:

    [3%]

    Now consider that three percent is greater than zero percent:

    [3% > 0%]

    We can do it.

    Yes.

    We.

    Can.

  38. 38.

    wrb

    March 27, 2010 at 12:52 pm

    A friend swore that the key to McDonalds’ success was that the Big Mac special sauce contained a secret super-powerful hangover cure.

    Since being told this Big Macs seem to help. Who cares if it is just the placebo effect?

  39. 39.

    gogol's wife

    March 27, 2010 at 12:53 pm

    @Robin G.:

    Saltines.

    OT: I’m worrying about Tunch now. I hope he acclimates all right.

  40. 40.

    Zuzu's Petals

    March 27, 2010 at 12:53 pm

    How cool is it to have a Prez who h

  41. 41.

    Mark S.

    March 27, 2010 at 12:55 pm

    Jesus fucking H Christ I hate the Ol’ Perfesser:

    Possibly Obama just hates Israel and hates Jews. That’s plausible — certainly nothing in his actions suggests otherwise, really.

    No, wait, it gets even dumber

    But it’s also possible — I’d say likely — that there’s something else going on. I think Obama expects Israel to strike Iran, and wants to put distance between the United States and Israel in advance of that happening. . . On the most optimistic level, maybe this whole thing is a sham, and the U.S. is really helping Israel strike Iran, with this as distraction. The question for readers is which of these — not necessarily mutually exclusive — explanations is most plausible.

    It is possible that Reynolds knows more about law than all nine Supreme Court justices combined, but he almost never blogs about law so I don’t know. What he does blog about is every bit as stupid as Confederate Yankee and Atlas Pam. This man is an embarrassment.

    ht

  42. 42.

    Zuzu's Petals

    March 27, 2010 at 12:55 pm

    Trying again.

    Ahem. How cool is it to have a Prez who hosts an annual seder in his private dining room?

    Edit: Just saw Mark S.’s old perfesser quote @ 40. How ironic.

  43. 43.

    Mnemosyne

    March 27, 2010 at 12:56 pm

    @mogden:

    But hey, this TARP thing was going to turn a profit! And create 90% private sector jobs! Good thing the geniuses who cooked this up are now in charge of our health care system.

    If anyone was doubtful that our educational system is in deep trouble and is no longer teaching children basic skill like reading comprehension, I think all doubt has now been removed.

  44. 44.

    MikeTheZ

    March 27, 2010 at 12:57 pm

    Does someone want to start a book of 250 hangover cures? Research, test them out, explain results will full hilarity ensuing.

    Of course, I need er…”research assistants” because I don’t drink as it is, and even if I did, I don’t think I want to experience 250 hangovers to write a book.

  45. 45.

    demo woman

    March 27, 2010 at 12:57 pm

    @gogol’s wife: Saltines work magic. Unfortunately, I never have them handy when I need them.

  46. 46.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    March 27, 2010 at 12:58 pm

    @Violet:

    go do some hard exercise.

    Right on the money. I learned this in my early 20s doing carpentry, you wake up thinking you’ll die if you go to work, but if you do, you sweat it all out, and amazingly by noon you’re almost completely over it, hungry, ready to go.

    As opposed to staying horizontal all day and nursing it which means that you feel crappy for the entire day.

    These cowboy types I worked with sometimes would live that way, drink themselves into a stupor, then be on the job the next day, throwing up and sweating and saying well, that’s what you get, it was like a penance, and by noon be all better. And then they’d go and do it again.

  47. 47.

    MikeTheZ

    March 27, 2010 at 12:59 pm

    @Zuzu’s Petals: The juxtaposition of Mark S.’s instapundit excerpt with that article is too much for my take home exam fried brain.

  48. 48.

    jeffreyw

    March 27, 2010 at 1:00 pm

    Nice to have good help around the house.

  49. 49.

    Robin G

    March 27, 2010 at 1:00 pm

    @Starfish: I did, so I got drunk on my friend’s dime. She mixed the drinks. “Chocotinis,” she said. “Harmless girly drink,” thought I. Not so. Ow.

    I have heard the Big Mac hangover remedy rumor as well. I usually do well with McDonald’s hashbrowns, but today they didn’t work. I also just did fifty pushups but they made me dizzy. I have the sneaking suspicion that the day is going to be a total loss.

  50. 50.

    MikeJ

    March 27, 2010 at 1:04 pm

    @MikeTheZ: Put the two together. He’ll end the seder with, “Next year in Jerusalem, motherfuckers! Get Gates in here right now, tell him we’re invading!” /wingnut

  51. 51.

    Gordon, The Big Express Engine

    March 27, 2010 at 1:05 pm

    @Robin G: The exercise thing works. Aerobic, not just lifting. Then take an alka-seltzer and start pounding water and gatorade

  52. 52.

    JGabriel

    March 27, 2010 at 1:05 pm

    @Short Bus Bully:

    Just goes to show you how bad Dems are with money…

    To be fair, the initial investment was made under Bush. Of course, it wouldn’t have been necessary if he hadn’t crashed the economy …

    .

  53. 53.

    demo woman

    March 27, 2010 at 1:06 pm

    @Robin G: Then I suggest the sofa, the bucket and the video cure. You might add a blanket also.

  54. 54.

    Bubblegum Tate

    March 27, 2010 at 1:06 pm

    @Mark S.:

    Nothin’ wrong with a nice schvitz, either. I can’t speak to it personally, but some hard-drinking friends of mine say it’s an excellent form of detox.

  55. 55.

    PeakVT

    March 27, 2010 at 1:07 pm

    We’re going to get $33 billion for our $25 billion investment [in Citibank].

    That’s nice and all, but the reason Citi and the other big banks have (appeared to) recovered is that they haven’t been reigned in. We are still living in an economy that is dominated by the finance industry. It would be a better deal for the American people if the finance industry was cut down to size and the government lost money.

  56. 56.

    arguingwithsignposts

    March 27, 2010 at 1:07 pm

    @Mark S.:

    Possibly Obama just hates Israel and hates Jews. That’s plausible — certainly nothing in his actions suggests otherwise, really.

    Plausible? WTF? Now we know why the ol’ perfessor doesn’t do jury trials. He’d be laughed out of court.

    I used to think law school was something that really bright people got into. After seeing the shite these law “professors” put out on their blogs, I’ve come to realize not so much.

    wanker.

  57. 57.

    kdaug

    March 27, 2010 at 1:08 pm

    @Athenae:

    Hey Athenae, I used to follow you over at First Draft.

    How you hanging now that BG is over?

  58. 58.

    Fergus Wooster

    March 27, 2010 at 1:08 pm

    @Robin G: I find that a steaming bowl of Pho works well, but I don’t know how available that is in MW land. Surely better than McDonald’s.

    Short of that: a mug of hot beef broth and tomato juice + a dash of Worcestershire + a dash of Tabasco + one shot vodka + one eggyolk + a good stir = cured. In my experience.

  59. 59.

    valdivia

    March 27, 2010 at 1:09 pm

    @Zuzu’s Petals:

    so so awesome. I love me my President.
    Obot forever.

  60. 60.

    Fergus Wooster

    March 27, 2010 at 1:10 pm

    @arguingwithsignposts:

    I used to think law school was something that really bright people got into.

    Never been to a Federalist Society conference, have ya?

  61. 61.

    WereBear

    March 27, 2010 at 1:11 pm

    @Robin G.: Dill pickles, and water. Together they soothe the smooth muscles of the stomach and rehydrate with a dash of electrolytic minerals like the pickling salt.

  62. 62.

    Liberty60

    March 27, 2010 at 1:14 pm

    Off-topic in an open thread…
    Digby has this hilarious accounting of songs from the tea Party; apparently they are jealous that Will I Am is like, so totally cool.

    The other day I dubbed Michael Bérubé “the Woody Guthrie of the teabag movement,” for his moving epitaph for the United States of America, called “The Night The Country Died.” It seems his readers were moved to contribute their own efforts to the new teabag protest ouvre.

    Here’s one example:

    The despot’s heel is on thy shore,
    Free Market, Oh Free Market!
    His torch is at thy boardroom door,
    Free Market, Oh Free Market!
    Avenge the patriotic gore
    Shed by Obama, Reid, and Gore,
    And be the battle queen of yore,
    Free Market, Oh Free Market!

    Read the whole thing- its yet more evidence for the Rightwing = Stalinist meme. Doesn’t this sound pretty much like Soviet Agit-prop, with stout workers singing lustily about marching with their wrenches and tractors and whatnot?

  63. 63.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 1:15 pm

    So I guess I was the only idiot watching that McCain-Palin rally? Her speech was twice interrupted by protesters; she told the first one “Stick around, young man, maybe you’ll learn somethin’!” to wild cheers, while he was roughed up, fell to the ground, and two rather large men dragged him out by his arms.

    Mavericky!!

  64. 64.

    TR

    March 27, 2010 at 1:15 pm

    I’d also strongly recommend Alka-Seltzer for a hangover. Followed by lots of water and Gatorade.

    As far as food goes, chicken sandwiches and fries always seem to help me.

  65. 65.

    TR

    March 27, 2010 at 1:15 pm

    Oh, and Brawndo. It has the electrolytes hangovers crave!

  66. 66.

    mcc

    March 27, 2010 at 1:17 pm

    @JenJen: I’m curious about this “conservative woodstock” today. Specifically I’m wondering if they will manage to have actual participants at the rally outnumber the media people sent to cover the rally plus operatives running the rally itself.

  67. 67.

    pcbedamned

    March 27, 2010 at 1:17 pm

    Sorry if this has been published before, but if it has not, this really need to go viral:

    Message From US Marine

    Excellently thought out and well written. And something every one of the ‘new revolutionaries’ need to see.

    @jeffreyw:

    That is toooo cute!

  68. 68.

    valdivia

    March 27, 2010 at 1:18 pm

    @JenJen:
    thanks for watching so we don’t have to! do tell though.

  69. 69.

    Three-nineteen

    March 27, 2010 at 1:19 pm

    The despot’s heel is on thy shore,
    Free Market, Oh Free Market!

    Are you supposed to sing that to the tune of Greased Lightning?

  70. 70.

    Svensker

    March 27, 2010 at 1:20 pm

    @Robin G.:

    Like Violet tol’ ya, get up offa that thang:

    Relieve some preshah

  71. 71.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 1:21 pm

    @Ailuridae:

    The New Populists are hucksters.

    I only listen to consistent over–twenty-years populists. The rest are following a fad, and cashing in.

  72. 72.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 1:24 pm

    @valdivia: @mcc: Palin had just finished saying how McCain gets all mavericky up in there, fightin’ corruption and back-room deals, when a young man, sitting up in the rafters, in a blue oxford and khakis yelled something. I rewound several times, but couldn’t make it out. It sounded like he was asking why McCain voted for the TARP bill. Maybe. Again, it wasn’t clear, but it also wasn’t clear that he wasn’t a Hayworth supporter. He certainly didn’t look like a DFH, for example. :-)

    The cameras zoomed in on him, he was cupping his mouth and booing. Then, he was roughed up, fell to the ground. That’s when Palin said “Stick around young man, maybe you’ll learn somethin’!” and two very large men were dragging him out by the arms while he continued to yell. “Stick around!” Ummm, Sarah, it doesn’t look like he has that option.

    A few minutes later, there was another protester dragged out, while Palin said something about how she hopes the media can see now who is really engaging in violence, and the crowd erupted in cheers. Mind you, the protesters were yelling, but weren’t engaging in violence, but the men dragging them out seemed to be.

  73. 73.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    March 27, 2010 at 1:24 pm

    Pretty funny, at TPM

    Right Wing Burning Man

    So, if Burning Man is something where people go into the desert and lose all of their habitual daily routines and normal ways of being, for Tea Baggers does this mean that they go somewhere and experiment with standing around being well-informed, non-hysterical and polite?

  74. 74.

    arguingwithsignposts

    March 27, 2010 at 1:24 pm

    @pcbedamned: Thanks for that awesome read. The 101st chairborne really don’t have a clue who they’re messing with.

  75. 75.

    JGabriel

    March 27, 2010 at 1:31 pm

    Robin G:

    I have heard the Big Mac hangover remedy rumor as well.

    Dude, doesn’t anyone know how to cure a hangover anymore? Clue: a Big Mac is not the cure.

    Three Anacin (two Excedrin work too, but Anacin is better because it doesn’t have acetominophen), a mulivitamin, a B-complex vitamin, and food. If you have neither Anacin nor Excedrin, nor generic substitutes, then 3 aspirin plus coffee or a caffeine pill can be substituted.

    If the hangover is really bad, then you’re going through alcohol withdrawal and a little hair of the dog will help ease it, so add a bloody mary, a glass of wine, or shot of vodka to the above if needed — but just one or two, don’t go getting drunk again, that’ll just push the hangover to the next day.

    .

  76. 76.

    MikeTheZ

    March 27, 2010 at 1:33 pm

    @JenJen: The extent of my watching that was the clips shown on Olbermann/Maddow, and I spent the duration of those clips doing my best to ignore the talky talk to watch McCain look like he was mentally reciting swear words. Though I did get a good laugh when Palin said McCain would “win this one.” McCain looked like he was just going to walk up behind her and throttle her for bringing THAT up.

  77. 77.

    Violet

    March 27, 2010 at 1:35 pm

    @Robin G:

    I also just did fifty pushups but they made me dizzy.

    Pushups won’t work. Go for a run. Really. If you can’t do that, find some other kind of aerobic exercise where you can push yourself – treadmills, elliptical trainer, bike, swim – something. It’s the aerobic exercise that moves it all through.

    It really does work. But first you have to get off the couch.

  78. 78.

    The Main Gauche of Mild Reason

    March 27, 2010 at 1:36 pm

    [Watching news reports of teabagger protests] Am I the only one totally fucking mystified about what is animating the Tea-Baggers? I mean, these guys have to be the most privileged protesters in the history of the world! At best, some are unemployed or dealing with bureaucratic nonsense. Where’s the oppression?

    As far as I can tell, the whole thing is a loose coalition of sundry misanthropists that would normally just scare little kids or pay their utility bills in pennies who relish being around others like themselves.

  79. 79.

    DougJ

    March 27, 2010 at 1:37 pm

    Don’t forget we’ve still got $26 trillion in liabilities on this deal.

  80. 80.

    Martin

    March 27, 2010 at 1:38 pm

    @Stroszek: So, the Dems have figured out how to actually pay for Medicare D without raising taxes on voters and people are pissed about that?

  81. 81.

    Svensker

    March 27, 2010 at 1:40 pm

    @The Main Gauche of Mild Reason:

    Am I the only one totally fucking mystified about what is animating the Tea-Baggers?

    An old friend, who just cut off all his lib friends on FB, just sent out an e-mail asking us to give him some time to “mourn the DEATH OF AMERICA” before he can be civil again.

  82. 82.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 1:50 pm

    @MikeTheZ: You’re talking about yesterday’s rally. The heckling and removal by force of the protesters happened today, at another rally, around noon eastern.

    From the look on Cindy McCain’s face, both yesterday and today, one would be led to believe that she really wishes her husband would retire already. :-)

  83. 83.

    Susan Kitchens

    March 27, 2010 at 1:51 pm

    Don’t know if this has been posted before, but I found a link to this at the GOS, clicked through to read the whole thing, and heartily recommend it to you all:
    An article I wish I would never have to write – To those calling for a civil war, this Marine wants you to stop, and think…

    But this government of ours is a democracy. We vote for our representatives, and they vote in our interests. Sometimes, the votes don’t go our way. That’s life, better luck next time. Exhaust your legislative options, and then focus on gaining the required votes and/or seats to achieve your desired legislative vote next election time. That’s the way things work.

    But the SECOND you start committing acts of violence and vandalism, then you’ve usurped that Constitution. You in a way have assaulted it. And then you and I (I being every servicemember who has sworn to defend said Constitution) will have a MAJOR PROBLEM.

  84. 84.

    JAHILL10

    March 27, 2010 at 1:53 pm

    @ PeakVT at 55

    Not to get all 11th dimensional or anything, but I’d much rather the US government get its money back, and then some in this case, and THEN regulate the crap out of Citi.

    We couldn’t do it before because the feds would be accused of sinking an already sinking ship. Now that things have stabilized, we get our money out, and then pass tough FinReg. No economic collapse and they still have to take a haircut rather than go back to business as usual.

    I just hope the fighting mood of the Dems lasts long enough to get this done. Its a political winner, so that should make it easier. Let’s see some Republican stand up before the midterms and argue that the banksters need protecting from the mean ole government. They’ll get laughed off the stage.

  85. 85.

    MikeTheZ

    March 27, 2010 at 1:55 pm

    @JenJen: Wait, there was another rally of Fail? Oh, man, this keeps getting better and better

  86. 86.

    Violet

    March 27, 2010 at 1:59 pm

    @The Main Gauche of Mild Reason:

    [Watching news reports of teabagger protests] Am I the only one totally fucking mystified about what is animating the Tea-Baggers? I mean, these guys have to be the most privileged protesters in the history of the world! At best, some are unemployed or dealing with bureaucratic nonsense. Where’s the oppression?

    It’s only mystifying if you try to make sense of what they’re saying. If you ignore the words and look at the makeup of the crowd and clear undercurrents that run through it, it’s obvious they’re pissed off that the country isn’t run by white men anymore. The President is black, the Speaker of the House is a woman and they just accomplished something that hasn’t been able to get done by a whole bunch of white men who have tried for decades.

    The teabaggers look around them and see their neighborhoods being filled by a bunch of brown families, many who speak languages other than English, and they literally “don’t know what’s happened to their country.”

    They can’t make all those brown people “go back to their own countries” – although Lord knows they’ll try whenever immigration reform comes up for discussion – so they’ll rail away against whatever the President tries to do.

    That the President accomplished something as huge as this is downright scary to them. It means he’s not only the President, but he’s a President who gets things done. If that’s the case, that means he might open the borders with Mexico and let them all come here and steal their houses. Or he might make white people move to – heaven forbid – Europe and live in small apartments. There’s no end to what this man might do.

    So they fixate on whatever the latest issue is – right now it’s healthcare. Even if it helps them, or they are currently on Medicare, it must be BAD. Why? Because the President is black and he got it done. That’s why.

    It’s not complicated if you look at it the right way. They don’t really know what they’re saying. But they are angry that “their kind” is being marginalized (they think). And they’re “not going to take it anymore.” So out they go to their protests.

  87. 87.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 2:02 pm

    @MikeTheZ: Oh, yeah! I gave my best possible synopsis in post #72.: :-)

  88. 88.

    gogol's wife

    March 27, 2010 at 2:06 pm

    @Robin G: @demo woman:

    I agree with demo woman. And for the future: keep the Saltines on hand. Don’t drink anything with both alcohol and chocolate in it.

  89. 89.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 2:14 pm

    @Violet: Awesome post, Violet, as usual.

    Along those lines, did you happen to see Charles Blow’s Op/Ed?

    There may be a short-term benefit in this strategy, but it’s a long-term loser.
    __
    A Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday took a look at the Tea Party members and found them to be just as anachronistic to the direction of the country’s demographics as the Republican Party. For instance, they were disproportionately white, evangelical Christian and “less educated … than the average Joe and Jane Six-Pack.” This at a time when the country is becoming more diverse (some demographers believe that 2010 could be the first year that most children born in the country will be nonwhite), less doctrinally dogmatic, and college enrollment is through the roof. The Tea Party, my friends, is not the future.
    __
    You may want “your country back,” but you can’t have it. That sound you hear is the relentless, irrepressible march of change. Welcome to America: The Remix.

    That last paragraph is so full of win.

  90. 90.

    The Main Gauche of Mild Reason

    March 27, 2010 at 2:15 pm

    @Violet:

    Oh I don’t doubt some of it is motivated by that. But I think a significant amount of it is sort of the dark inverse of the Obama movement phenomenon.

    You have various people that are alienated by modern society for a variety of reasons. They just don’t feel right. Some are engineers or programmers who hate their jobs. Others spend too much time commuting and not enough with their family. A LOT of them are greedheads who have always taken society’s idea that the point of work is to make lots of money and never once thought about an occupation they enjoy or one that gives them a sense of purpose. Only, they’re sort of jerks and not particularly introspective. So it can’t be something wrong with their life, it must be some external thing. So the Tea Party movement gives them some “reason” for why they feel bad (“the government is intruding on my life!”) and makes them feel less alienated by doing something “important” (see all the revolutionary war imagery, etc).

  91. 91.

    liberal

    March 27, 2010 at 2:16 pm

    We’re going to get $33 billion for our $25 billion investment.

    Does that include the $300B in loan guarantees as a cost?

    Don’t have the time to research whether those guarantees are still in force.

  92. 92.

    liberal

    March 27, 2010 at 2:18 pm

    @Warren Terra:

    And burned the stock certificates for warmth!

    The big issue was never the stockholders, but rather the bondholders.

  93. 93.

    liberal

    March 27, 2010 at 2:19 pm

    @Violet:

    The President is black, the Speaker of the House is a woman and they just accomplished something that hasn’t been able to get done by a whole bunch of white men who have tried for decades.

    I don’t think it’s that concrete. Meaning, they dislike the Democratic Party in general because to them we Dems represent blacks, women, and other uppity groups who don’t know our place. But they’d feel the same way if it was a white male president (e.g., Clinton).

  94. 94.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    @liberal: They would have been just as awful if Hillary had been elected, IMO. But a white male? I just don’t think so. They’d be loud, for sure, but they wouldn’t be questioning his citizenship, and they wouldn’t be screaming “I want my country back!”

    @Violet: @The Main Gauche of Mild Reason: A good NYT piece about unemployment among Tea Party ranks here.

  95. 95.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 2:26 pm

    @The Main Gauche of Mild Reason: On that note, here’s a very good piece from the NYT about unemployment among the Tea Party ranks.

    (Sorry to double-post, somehow my last edit got caught in moderation limbo)

  96. 96.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 27, 2010 at 2:27 pm

    @Liberty60: Um, those are obvious jokes. Michael Berube is a card-carrying member of Big Liberal Academia specializing in cultural studies.

  97. 97.

    The Main Gauche of Mild Reason

    March 27, 2010 at 2:29 pm

    @JenJen:

    Wow, that makes it seem even more like the bizzarro conservative flip side of Obama volunteering. I knew a lot of people who started volunteering after they lost their jobs.

  98. 98.

    Parole Officer Burke

    March 27, 2010 at 2:36 pm

    @Robin G.:

    Unemployment + Booze = Trouble

    Careful, there.

  99. 99.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 27, 2010 at 2:36 pm

    @liberal: I also have been extremely puzzled by trying to figure out what the tea partiers are actually so angry about or threatened by. They have such a weird understanding of freedom and liberty. And they basically think that they _earned_ whatever it is they have, but people who have other political views than theirs didn’t pay their dues, just want a handout, etc.

    I think the underlying issue is that they think Democrats believe in jacking up their taxes, taking their stuff, and giving it out for free to slackers, negroes, and Mexicans; they see themselves as targets and never as recipients of benefit from “government.” It’s aggravated by Obama’s skin color but doesn’t arise from it: they just believe that this is what it means to be a liberal and/or Democrat. And, what’s worse, they believe it so wholeheartedly that pointing to the fact that they are NOT in fact paying any more in taxes–and actually they’re paying LESS–just does not compute.

    In other words, they’re stupid and angry and it can’t be fixed until they just wither away. I’m looking forward to that.

  100. 100.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 2:45 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    I think it’s tied to the financial collapse. If you believed that unregulated markets led to infinite prosperity, it had to be devastating to watch it crash and burn.

    They never believed in government, but they did believe in Bush-era capitalism. With that a smoking ruin, they got nothing left.

    The NYTimes analysis of the tea party demographic explains a lot, too.

    People without college or additional training are at 10% or better unemployment. People with a college degree are at essentially full employment (5-6%), and those with a post graduate degree are doing as well as they always were. People with no high school diploma are at 25% unemployment.

    The combined unemployment rate is 9.7, but education is the determing factor.

  101. 101.

    JenJen

    March 27, 2010 at 2:46 pm

    Re: my earlier posts about today’s McCain-Palin Rally: Video of protester being ejected here.

    Love how Sarah implores the man to “stick around” and then he’s dragged right on outta there. I bet everyone there immediately assumed the guy was a DFH, but my money’s on him being a JD Hayworth supporter.

    There was a second protester later, haven’t found video of that yet.

  102. 102.

    demo woman

    March 27, 2010 at 3:00 pm

    @JenJen: Thank you. I just read the article and shook my head. There is no doubt that they are organizing against their interests but how do you change that belief.
    Wow..just wow.

  103. 103.

    Liberty60

    March 27, 2010 at 3:05 pm

    @The Main Gauche of Mild Reason:

    Am I the only one totally fucking mystified about what is animating the Tea-Baggers? I mean, these guys have to be the most privileged protesters in the history of the world! At best, some are unemployed or dealing with bureaucratic nonsense.

    Yes. The brave Patriot Citizens who are unemployed are furiously demanding that Congress withold unemployment assistance.

  104. 104.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 27, 2010 at 3:19 pm

    @kay:

    I think it’s tied to the financial collapse.

    Do you think they’re that sophisticated? I think they’re just lizard-braining about the idea of a “takeover.” They won’t have “liberty” if the government does “takeovers.” When the government does things for you, it makes you soft and weak and dependent, unless you think you earned those things, which makes them, like, different. Basically their view is that a liberal government (1) takes things away from them, (2) makes them do things they don’t like by telling them it’s for their own good. Oh, and (3) lets gay people do dirty things and lets women kill babies, which is completely incompatible with everything else they believe, but, you know, they’re kind of dim.

    Frankly the prospect of a “government takeover” of very many things (including both health insurance and banking, two of the least sympathetic institutions in modern society) is about as scary as the Spanish Inquisition using the dread Comfy Chair.

  105. 105.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 3:42 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    There were a LOT of people who thought that consumer debt house ‘o cards we were living in was “an economy”. These are those people.

    They’re conservatives. They never trusted government. Now they can’t trust “their betters” in the bidness world, either.

    So where do they go? Crazy, that’s where.

  106. 106.

    Mnemosyne

    March 27, 2010 at 3:59 pm

    @demo woman:

    There is no doubt that they are organizing against their interests but how do you change that belief.

    I wish I knew. I waded into the comments at Yahoo! News for a story about the government putting tighter regulations on the fees that merchants can charge you for gift cards and people were complaining that the heavy hand of government was going to prevent corporations from taking advantage of them. I wish I were kidding.

    When people have gotten things so turned around that they actually prefer to be cheated out of their money by a private corporation than have the government pass laws to prevent it, I honestly don’t know what can be done.

  107. 107.

    sparky

    March 27, 2010 at 4:44 pm

    uh, ok, right. yeah, super, fabulous.

    know what? you can have the 8 billion. i think i’ll take the 11 trillion as of last September.

    what happened here? someone spike the punch? crowing about the 8 billion is like Hannity getting excited about empty mustard gas containers in Iraq as evidence of WMD.

  108. 108.

    Mnemosyne

    March 27, 2010 at 5:08 pm

    @sparky:

    Yes, sparky, it’s completely plausible that the US government is spending more than four times the entire budget for the entire country just on the bailout. Anyone could easily believe that the US government spent $11 trillion on the bank bailout alone when the country’s entire indebtedness is $14 trillion.

    Seriously, do you just Google “Obama fail” and buy into any bullshit that pops up?

  109. 109.

    Nellcote

    March 27, 2010 at 5:50 pm

    @Ailuridae:

    Dylan Ratigan used that number in the last two weeks.

    He’s a teabagger. And was more amusing when he was on cnbc.

  110. 110.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 5:50 pm

    @sparky:

    The 23 trillion dollar figure came about by taking the maximum guarantee and assuming that every asset guaranteed was worth nothing.

    I know why the TARP watchdog made the 23 trillion claim. Treasury wasn’t cooperating with the oversight board and the board wanted to get their attention, so went to media with a HUGE number. That makes sense. I approve of the TARP oversight board politicking like that. They’re responsible for oversight of TARP, and I thought it was a smart move, to scare Treasury into compliance. It worked, too. Media obligingly reported the 23 trillion.

    But why did anyone else buy that number? Its a ridiculous number.

  111. 111.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 5:57 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    This is going to be one of those enduring myths.

  112. 112.

    Mnemosyne

    March 27, 2010 at 6:00 pm

    @kay:

    I can understand people worrying that if all of the banks failed simultaneously and if every one of their assets turned out to be worthless, the government would be left holding the bag for an amount that was more than quadruple the annual budget, but that’s not even close to the same thing as claiming that the government actually spent $11 trillion in real money on the bank bailout.

  113. 113.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 6:06 pm

    @sparky:

    Read your link, sparky. A loan is different than a guarantee and I don’t know what a “commitment” means. Your link lists them all as “costs”.

    But that isn’t what they are.

    You can be angry that the feds backed the banks assets with a guarantee, and potentially faced losses of 11 trillion, if every loan went bad and every asset was deemed valueless. You can’t claim you lost 11 trillion dollars on that transaction, because that worse case didn’t happen, and you didn’t lose the money.

  114. 114.

    kay

    March 27, 2010 at 6:14 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Absolutely. I can even understand anger that they backed the banks with a federal guarantee. If you think back, before the hysteria, that IS what people were mad about: that the banks got a federal guarantee, and regular people didn’t. That’s a rational objection, and it’s true. Banks and lenders got special treatment. Individuals went bankrupt and lost their homes.

    But, that somehow morphed into “taxpayers lost 11 trillion dollars”, or, “banks owe us 23 trillion dollars”.

    That’s not true.

  115. 115.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 27, 2010 at 6:33 pm

    @Liberty60 #62:

    Here’s one example: The despot’s heel is on thy shore,Free Market, Oh Free Market!His torch is at thy boardroom door,Free Market, Oh Free Market!Avenge the patriotic goreShed by Obama, Reid, and Gore,And be the battle queen of yore,Free Market, Oh Free Market!

    Now *that*’s a McNaughton!

    I particularly admire the care taken in rhyming “gore” with “Gore.”

  116. 116.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 27, 2010 at 6:59 pm

    @JenJen #95: You know, back in 2002-03 during the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq (and, hell, for that matter back in 1990-91 during the lead-up to Desert Storm), the Limbaughs and Boortzes and Hannitys of this world never stopped saying that the (DFH)(leftycommiepinko) anti-war protesters were all too lazy to get a job and were all suckling at the public welfare teat and protesting good old Murrican values, while the true patriots were all hard at work in an office or a shop or an assembly line, *much* too gainfully occupied to take to the streets.

    Hmmmm. . . .

  117. 117.

    Craig

    March 28, 2010 at 11:47 am

    Many moons ago during the Clinton era, I attended a few militia meetings just to see for myself what the movement was all about. It was mostly middle-aged men whose income had plateaued at $30,000 a year. They deserved so much better due to their talents and abilities, so why were they just getting by? It must be someone’s fault: of course, it was the Bilderbergers, the New World Order, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Rothchilds, etc. Same with the Tea Party movement.

    Me? I voted for McCain and Palin and I’m rather glad they lost. Palin has shown herself to be a quitter when things get tough. She’d prefer to be in the limelight getting applause, rather than rolling up her sleeves and performing the boring, thankless task of governing.

    Health care? I listened for months to conservatives say that the President’s plan was socialism. Funny… when the conservative Heritage Foundation proposed FORCING people to have health insurance in 1994, it wasn’t considered socialism.

    http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=4896&type=0
    http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/48xx/doc4896/doc23.pdf

    Go to appendix A of the pdf link. It’s a proposal from the Heritage Foundation in 1994 on their letterhead. “All U.S. citizens and permanent residents would have to be covered by a federally qualified health insurance plan.”

    Sounds like an expansion of government to me. I guess the definition of conservative has changed a bit since then.

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