Echoes Of Iraq War: White House Claims Bailout Will Pay For Itself
Echoes Of Iraq War: White House Claims Bailout Will Pay For Itself
To justify the exorbitant cost of the bailout for the financial industry, Bush administration officials have been repeating the dubious claim that American taxpayers should expect to recover much, if not all, of the proposed $700 billion:
PAULSON: This is not an expenditure. … Money will come back in.
BERNANKE: What’s clear is that the $700 billion is not an expenditure. There’s going to be a substantial amount of recovery.
BUSH: Money will flow back to the Treasury as these assets are sold, and we expect that much, if not all, of the tax dollars we invest will be paid back.
White House spokesmen Ed Gillespie and Tony Fratto appeared on Fox News, repeating that “a lot of that money, and maybe all of it, will come back.” Watch a compilation:
As Paul Krugman writes, “The premise of the Paulson plan — though never stated bluntly — is that these assets are hugely underpriced, so that Uncle Sam can buy them at prices that help the financial industry a lot, without big losses for taxpayers. Are you prepared to bet $700 billion on that premise?”
The White House’s assurances that the bailout will pay for itself is eerily reminiscent of the assurances the Bush team made that the Iraq war would be similarly inexpensive — if not profitable — for America. Take a look at some of those promises:
RICHARD PERLE, Chair of Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board: “Iraq is a very wealthy country. Enormous oil reserves. They can finance, largely finance the reconstruction of their own country. And I have no doubt that they will.” [7/11/02]
PAUL WOLFOWITZ, Deputy Defense Secretary: “There is a lot of money to pay for this that doesn’t have to be US taxpayer money, and it starts with the assets of the Iraqi people. We are talking about a country that can really finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon.” [3/27/03]
ARI FLEISCHER, White House press secretary: “Iraq has tremendous resources that belong to the Iraqi people. And so there are a variety of means that Iraq has to be able to shoulder much of the burden for their own reconstruction.” [2/18/03]
LAWRENCE LINDSEY, White House economic adviser: “The likely economic effects [of a war in Iraq] would be relatively small…. Under every plausible scenario, the negative effect will be quite small relative to the economic benefits.” [9/16/02]
Krugman concludes, “The whole premise of the bailout push has been ‘We’re the grownups, we know what we’re doing, just trust us.’ Sorry, but that’s how Colin Powell sold the Iraq war. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice … you shouldn’t get fooled.”
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We know at least 23% will belive this garbage. Its a game to give the Bush donors a going away present. they get cheap real estate to buy up en mass and they can get back to their slum lord roots. makes me SICK !!
September 25th, 2008 at 10:26 amThey tried hard to push this back until after the election but just couldn’t quite pull it off.
Now their own words come back to bite them in the ass.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:29 amThe Mugging of America
By Jim Quinnby Jim Quinn
23/09/08 “Lew Rockwell” — – On Wednesday afternoon Harry Reid, Democratic Senate Majority Leader, spoke the first truthful words from a politician during this entire crisis:
“No one knows what to do. We are in new territory here. This is a different game.”
I respect him for this comment. We have been listening to Hank Paulson tell us that our banking system was sound for over a year. He was the CEO of Goldman Sachs. He knew the extreme risk taking that was going on. He was lying to the American public. Today, he is being hailed as a hero in saving our country. We should be very careful in declaring men such as Paulson a hero. Union Colonel Joshua Chamberlin, who led his men in a charge down Little Round Top at the Battle of Gettysburg and saved the Union army, is a hero. Hank Paulson, has committed our future generations to trillions in obligations for the sins of his buddies on Wall Street. I know many heroes, and Hank Paulson is no hero.
Author Nicolas Taleb poses the following questions.
Why don’t we realize that we are not that capable of predicting? Why don’t we notice the bias that causes us not to realize that we’re not learning from our experiences? Why do we still keep going as if we understand them?
If our business leaders and government leaders had learned from the LTCM collapse and NASDAQ collapse, we would not be experiencing this current crisis. Instead, Wall Street, Alan Greenspan, George Bush’s administration, and Congress attempted to put off the pain of recession by encouraging more risk taking by companies and citizens. We are now reaping what they have sown.
This has been a remarkable year. The United States has taken actions that will change our country forever. They have taken these actions without citizens voting or Congress passing any laws debated upon in public view. These actions have taken place behind closed doors and in conjunction with the bank CEOs who caused the problems. A multi-millionaire former investment banker, former professor of economics, and our 1st Harvard MBA President have committed at least ONE TRILLION of our future tax dollars to bailing out greedy incompetent criminal millionaire investment bankers. They have done this to avert an Armageddon type financial meltdown. I’m reminded of the rhetoric about weapons of mass destruction before our attack of Iraq. We needed to attack to avert a future nuclear holocaust. Why should we believe them now? Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke’s commitment of your grandchildren’s future so far is as follows:
Bear Stearns Rescue
$29 billion
Tax rebates to Americans
$168 billion
Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac nationalization
$300 billion
AIG nationalization
$85 billion
Government taking bad debt off the books
$700 billion
U.S. banks
FUTURE GENERATION’S BILL
$1,255,000,000,000
Remember, when the government gives you an estimated cost, it is always prudent to multiply it by 10 to get closer to the truth.
Let us be perfectly clear. The U.S. government has no money. We entered this week with a National Debt of $9.65 trillion. The deficit for next year will surpass $600 billion. Every dime of these bailouts will be borrowed. They will be borrowed from China, Japan, and the Middle East. In an effort to keep our corrupt financial system afloat, we have sold another piece of our country. The prestige and status of the U.S. in the eyes of the world community have suffered a catastrophic non-reversible decline in the last nine months. “We The People” had absolutely no say in this decision.
My musings on what has transpired over the last nine months are as follows:
The people who made the miscalculations that got the country into this mess are the same people who did not see it coming, denied it was a big problem, and have now come up with the solution to the problem. This should not give Americans a tremendous feeling of confidence in their government.
The government has used all the missiles in Hank Paulson’s bazooka. What if it doesn’t work? What next? I shiver at the thought.
The Republican ideology of deregulation and free markets has been discredited and thrown into the scrap heap of history. The total lack of regulation in the financial industry let the inmates run the asylum and almost collapsed our financial system.
The Democratic ideology of believing that every American should own a home has proven to be one of the stupidest ideas in the history of our country. The housing implosion, which continues today, proves that many morons in this country should rent forever.
The current crisis proves that a “village idiot” could have done less damage to our country if they had been CEO of any of our financial institutions, rather than the Harvard MBAs now in charge. Their total lack of foresight, vision, strategy, or risk management argues for the elimination of the immoral pay packages of all CEOs. The greed and short-term profit motives of these CEOs and top executives leads to awful decision-making with tragic consequences.
Reliance on computer models developed by brilliant “scientists” that can predict all outcomes in a “Normal Distribution” world should be discredited at this point. Human emotions and Black Swans have proven more powerful than any computer model. How about using thoughtful conservative assumptions regarding any financial transaction. I know, that sounds crazy.
Financial institutions should not create instruments that are so complicated that they can’t even understand them.
I hate to quote Richard Nixon, but when he was told that some corporate goliath was “too big to fail” he responded, “Tell it to get smaller.” I am tired of hearing that every company that has a problem is too big to fail. The government cannot let any company become too big to fail. But, of course they just encouraged Bank of America to buy Merrill Lynch and become way too big to fail.
A total scrapping of the bond-rating system is in order. The companies receiving the ratings cannot be compensating the rating agencies. The false credit ratings misled so many into a false sense of security and contributed greatly to this financial debacle.
It should be clear to the American people that the $1.255 trillion will be borrowed from the Chinese, Russians, Japanese, and Middle East. The United States of America is broke. We have no money. The annual interest charge that the American people will pay will exceed $60 billion per year, $164 million per day, $6.8 million per hour.
As all Americans know, when you borrow from someone, they call the shots. The reckless mismanagement of our country’s finances has put us in the position of asking other countries for favors. We are now begging for capital infusions from China. The Chinese and Middle Eastern countries know they are gaining more power, day by day. The U.S. Empire has begun its long slow decline.
The old dilemma for a country was whether they could fund guns or butter. When the U.S. tried to fund both in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s it resulted in massive inflation and a stagflation economy. With our current foreign wars, massive unfunded liabilities, promised tax cuts from both candidates, and now the greatest bank bailout in history, we are trying to fund guns, butter, and banks simultaneously. The massive issuance of Treasury bills should result in much higher interest rates.
Consumer confidence and trust in their government will fall, not rise because of the actions taken this week. Your leaders have lied and misled you. The massive redemptions from money markets were not panic. It was a rational response to being misled by bankers that money markets were safe and could not lose money.
Based on the actions taken to relieve banks of all their bad debt, American citizens may come to the conclusion that they don’t need to honor their own obligations. The moral hazard message from our leaders is that bad decisions do not have bad consequences.
Does anyone really think that government will run Fannie, Freddie, and AIG better than they were run by their previous management? Will Hank Paulson hire the same Wall Street cronies to manage his new investment portfolio?
Comparing this new RTC to the original RTC used for the S&L crisis seems too simplistic. Bill Siedman, head of the original RTC, described his job as fairly easy and it took six years to complete. His job was to sell off land from bankrupt S&Ls. This new RTC will be taking toxic waste mortgage debt off the books of the banks. I doubt there will be a line waiting to buy this crap.
With congressional leaders like Christopher Dodd, Chuck Schumer, and Barney Frank in charge during the next term I’m not confident that we will avoid another negative Black Swan. They have all shown a complete lack of basic financial knowledge.
Will the government ban all selling if the market continues to fall? Banning short-selling could result in unforeseen results. China has not banned short selling. We certainly won’t see any short covering rallies. It is ironic that naked short selling by Merrill, Lehman, Goldman, and Morgan Stanley was extremely profitable for these firms over the last few years.
The rhetoric about these programs lasting only until 2010 is a farce. These programs will end up becoming a permanent department. Government never contracts. It only expands.
Any legislation that is slapped together in the midst of a crisis with an extremely tight timeline will be flawed and not well thought out. There will be mistakes, omissions and holes. Let’s hope it doesn’t cause another Black Swan to develop.
Hopefully, our citizens will come to their senses and elect more patriots like Ron Paul, whose words in Congress on September 10, 2003 foretold the future crisis:
“Despite the long-term damage to the economy inflicted by the government’s interference in the housing market, the government’s policy of diverting capital to other uses creates a short-term boom in housing. Like all artificially-created bubbles, the boom in housing prices cannot last forever. When housing prices fall, homeowners will experience difficulty as their equity is wiped out. Furthermore, the holders of the mortgage debt will also have a loss. These losses will be greater than they would have otherwise been had government policy not actively encouraged over-investment in housing. Perhaps the Federal Reserve can stave off the day of reckoning by purchasing GSE debt and pumping liquidity into the housing market, but this cannot hold off the inevitable drop in the housing market forever. In fact, postponing the necessary, but painful market corrections will only deepen the inevitable fall. The more people invested in the market, the greater the effects across the economy when the bubble bursts.”
September 25th, 2008 at 10:34 am$700 billion will not pay for itself. But maybe my great- grandchildren would see it differently.
Doing nothing only makes it more urgent and expensive to do something. This is the point we’ve reached. But I feel it’s become so urgent it’s now futile.
Investing in the well-being in the individual, too many people feared of the cost of doing so. But it is the only kind of spending that pays for itself, and it doesn’t cost $700B.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:34 amPut the .25% tax on all securities transactions back on and Wall street can recoup the money itself in 5 to 7 years…..
September 25th, 2008 at 10:35 amAnd we would believe them this time because…?
Oh, wait, we won’t!
PEACE
September 25th, 2008 at 10:35 amKay Says:
Ron Paul isn’t in the running……he’s not the only one who saw this coming.
Even bush saw it coming and tried against all odds to push it back until after the election.
Ron Paul is not clairvoiant.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:39 amBlather, mince, repeat..repeat…REPEAT!!
September 25th, 2008 at 10:39 amBy the way, when this money is “paid back” we demand interest on our “loan”. And that interest rate should be very, very high because these are sub-prime borrowers.
Seriously, we the taxpayers will have that interest added to our debt during the borrowing phase, and we expect all of that interest, plus some, to be returned as part of this package.
High risk, high return. Nothing else is acceptable.
PEACE
September 25th, 2008 at 10:39 amWhat, did they find oil during the bailout?
September 25th, 2008 at 10:41 amWho did we bomb?
If this were even remotely true, then they wouldn’t need our money. They would be bailing themselves out with private funds, like Warren Buffet has provided Goldma Sachs…
September 25th, 2008 at 10:42 amRight. Been there, done that, got the crappy T-shirt (had to pay for it).
Is it any surprise our government officials get such low ratings from the public regarding trust and honesty when they keep selling this kind of snake oil? Just a different topic and a different time.
“Know how to tell when a politician is lying? Their lips are moving.”
Paulson, Bush, and all these guys, are really moving their lips on this one.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:43 amI think $700 billion dedicated to a jobs program for Americans directed toward a 21st century energy infrastructure (renewables) and rebuilding our other infrastructure (roads, bridges, etc). that would put people to work and be able to circulate money from the BOTTOM UP would be far more workable than bailing out the financial institutions. After all, $350 billion has already been thrown at four institutions (Bears Stearn, AIG, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae), with no sustainable positive result!
September 25th, 2008 at 10:43 amTaguba Says: We know at least 23% will belive this garbage.
They lost some members recently. They’re now called the 19%ers… :)
September 25th, 2008 at 10:44 amGreat job of debunking the lie…..bears repeating….
September 25th, 2008 at 10:46 amAll that $700,000,000,000 will do is allow the fatcats in charge to buffer themselves against the inevitible depression and put the entire burden on the ordinary public.
Reminiscent of Nero fiddling while Rome burned….
September 25th, 2008 at 10:47 amStolen Iraqi Oil will pay for the bailout and the war? I wonder how much oil has been stolen so far? Bush and his failed stolen presidency deserves no credibility. 8 years of nonstop failure and lies pretty much wraps it up for me!
September 25th, 2008 at 10:51 amFred Says: Great job of debunking the lie…..bears repeating….
Thanks. We, the little people, get this, but our elected “Representatives” with their Ivy League educations don’t…
We really need to get some better representation from people with both intelligence and life experience (kind of like Obama :)
September 25th, 2008 at 10:51 amAs President Nero was fiddling around in his speech yesterday, he said something profound by accident. (The only way he could ever be profound.)
First he tried to explain AIG, but then remembered Bear Stearns & backed up a little. Paraphrasing, he described how these entities just kept getting bigger & bigger, and then he said it…
‘This is all a huge house of cards, & the walls are caving in.’
Perhaps the most profound & honest descriptor Bush has ever spoken. Too bad he didn’t even know what he just said.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:54 amThe hungrier bush and his minions get , the more I’m convinced this whole scam is just that, the biggest heist in this country’s history.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:54 amThe president and the White House are irrelevant as a result of their lies and disrespect for Americans and our nation.
Dubha is the lamest lame duck ever.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:56 amTrusssst ussssss, preciousssss! Givessss ussss the moneyssss, preciousssss!! We promises to give it back! Trussssst usssss!!!
September 25th, 2008 at 11:01 amYou know, if Bushco had spent the last eight years dealing with the American people in an honest manner, we might believe them now.
But they have poisoned the well so badly that the only people who will buy this bushwah are the kool-aid drinkers. And there are no longer enough of them to matter.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:05 amFearmongering and gross distortions are the hallmark of this administration.
This is what Pres Bush was selling yesterday:
He said that more banks could fail, the stock market could plummet and erase retirement accounts, businesses could find it hard to get credit and be forced to close, wiping out jobs for millions of Americans.
Bad News For The Bailout
Of course, Pres Bush has only the nation’s best interest at heart; he has never, ever, used a bad situation to spread doom, gloom, and fear for for his own political advantage and/or enrich his cronies.
I suppose his end-of-times prophecy will come to pass right after finding those pesky WMD in Iraq, and right before Iran detonate the nuclear weapons they already have. And of course, nobody could have predicted the current financial meltdown…
September 25th, 2008 at 11:09 amBush &co should have been impeached a long time back. This is what I’ve always heard called, “good money after bad”, and that is not a good or wise thing. Boondoggle of a proportion that will change our country forever.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:09 amOT, but Tucker the F’ucker Bounds was just on MSNBC saying that, had Obama agreed to McStain’s Town Hall invitation, this problem could have been avoided. And, in case you didn’t know, the Democrat [sic] Congress forced McStain to suspend his campaign when demanded that J. Sidney return to solve the crisis. Funny, that’s not how I remember it at all!
How desperate are these people getting? Wait, don’t bother answering.
PEACE
September 25th, 2008 at 11:11 amI’ve said it before: At least Bush and his sycophants know about recycling.
All they did was replace “war in Iraq” with “bailout” and the re-used the same old slogans.
Expect the room temperature IQ Bush supporters to be here any minute, defending the bailout. Some people never learn, and can get fooled, over, and over, and over…
September 25th, 2008 at 11:14 amThey saw it coming, they just wanted to sponge as much money off of it as they could before they passed the mess on to the next administration. Probably because they knew that the Democrats are going to win this one and it would screw the heck out the budget that Obama will have to work with.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:16 amMaybe all of it. On second thought maybe none of it.
Work with us anyway, cause we’re so badass and crazee, the result will be less important than the sheer entertainment that the journey affords!
September 25th, 2008 at 11:25 amI love the comment that the Treasurery just needed a really big number. How many of you can go to a bank and just borrow a really big amount on your say so. Maybe NOBODY !
September 25th, 2008 at 11:29 amI don’t see how this bailout plan can be called anything but a crapshoot. Does the government take over the entire bundle or do they somehow unbundle these and “sell” the government only the loans in default? What kind of a deal is that.
It seems to me that some kind of regulation has to be put in place first so these companies can be held accountable when they misrepresent the assets being dumped on the government and lead the government into overpaying for the assets.
Does something need to be done? Yes, and urgently.
Does something need to be done by Friday? No, just by the time Congress adjourns.
This needs to be done right. The Paulson plan was poorly crafted so it needs considerable work and that takes time.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:33 amWhen ordinary citizens complained about their financial problems for which they weren‘t responsible the Republicans called them a bunch of whiners.
When the privileged Republican financiers from Wall Street complained about their financial problems for which they alone are responsible, the Republicans called them victims of circumstance, deserving of charity to be extracted by fiat from the “whiners”.
Not only is Paulson’s ‘plan’ likely the biggest theft in US history, he is attempting it in broad daylight.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:35 amHey, I got a great idea!
Let’s get the Iraqis to pay for it with all their oil!
Who’s with me?
September 25th, 2008 at 11:35 amThere just no way. Basic Life Principle: Learn from your mistakes..
September 25th, 2008 at 11:36 amWhere are the facts supporting Paulson and Bernanke given to the American public ? So far it has been just words, scare words. A little credibility from Barney Franks and Chris Doddgs but haven’t heard exactly why this WELFARE FOR THE RICH is needed. Like Wanda Sykes said, “oversight, hell no, I want receipts !” And I am still angry that bonus and pay to CEO’s had to be forced into the wording, that should have been upfront. I am sick of CEO’s ruining the company and walking away with millions, access to company benefits. What type of Board of Directors writes a contract like that ?
September 25th, 2008 at 11:37 amDoesn’t anyone else worry that a Presidential candidate thought the economy was fine, fundamentally sound all year long til about yesterday ? Obama has had meetings and daily talks with Bernanke over the last few months. That is called keeping your hand on the pulse. Mccain you are so out of touch and your choice of advisors is beyond ridiculous.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:40 amUnless there are specific safeguards in place to properly deploy this initiative, then the 700 billion withdrawal could ultimately be the straw that breaks the the camel’s back of the American economic infrastructure. Over investment of surplus in the housing market points the finger of responsibility at the government, beginning in 2001.
http://www.beyondrace.com
September 25th, 2008 at 11:40 amBush’s supporters share something in common with Bush himself: an inability to learn from past experience.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:41 amI don’t want just most of it coming back, I want ALL of it coming back along with interest to the taxpayers.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:41 amLast night in his speech, Bush blamed this disaster on Bill Clinton when he said that it all started 10 years ago. This problem started during Mr Deregulation, Ronald Reagan’s term. These Republicans never want to take responsibility for their poor decisions. Always blaming others.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:44 amPut the money in at the bottom of the economy by bailing out home owners in trouble and making reasonable fixed rate loans available and the money will filter all the way up the economic chain to the top by capillary action–trickle down has never worked, we need capillary up!
September 25th, 2008 at 11:44 amWhile the comatose media seems to have awakened enough the past two weeks to at least call BS on some of the more egregious nonsense it is strangely comforting to see that the BushBots can still go on Fox “News” and lie without challenge. I even heard auxiliary Fox talking head Juan Williams on NPR this morning claim that the Palin pick was a gamble that paid off for McCain. Either Juan didn’t see the footage of the snowbilly getting faced by Katie freaking Couric last night or he gets paid by the lie no matter with broadcast outlet he is on.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:46 am“… American taxpayers should expect to recover much, if not all, of the proposed $700 billion.”
And the monthly payment on your adjustable rate mortgage ‘could’ go down.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:47 amI remember being in a class on foreign policy representing my agency and we had a speaker representing the Reagan administration which was in office at the time come and talk about how great deficit spending and trickle down was and that we didn’t need to worry about balancing budgets! They were sent out everywhere in the government to pimp for Reaganomics–deficits, tax cutting, trickle down. It didn’t work then. It didn’t work during Bush I. And it is killing us now. McCain has long been part of the trickle down, deregulate cabal.
No bailout–trickle up!
September 25th, 2008 at 11:49 amEven if a lot were to come back–that’s not good enough. We assume all the risk, the reward should be comparable. We want ownership equity in the companies that require help.
September 25th, 2008 at 11:52 amBush not only blamed the crisis on Clinton but the homeowners that bought houses they couldn’t afford. How about the commercial developers that are wanting handouts ? One of the first bailouts was for The Carlyle Group, first at the money train. And lets not forget the 262 page addendum silently added to a Bill in Dec 2000 by Phil Gramm for deregulation of banking. Isn’t anyone else sick of this excuse of a President blaming every and anyone for HIS decisions ?
September 25th, 2008 at 11:55 amCats r Flyfishn Says: Last night in his speech, Bush blamed this disaster on Bill Clinton when he said that it all started 10 years ago.
Let’s say, forthe sake of the argument, that that is true.
Pres Bush had 8 loong years to fix it. Did he? Of course not. What did he do instead? Enact tax cuts for the rich. And now he wants us -you know, us “whiners”- to bail out his deep-pocketed friends. And I thought they were wealthy thanks to their superior intellect and better work ethics.
If they are so godamn smart and hard-working, let them pull themselves out of the hole they put themselves in, in the first place.
Heckuvajob, Georgie….
September 25th, 2008 at 11:56 amThree stages of the Idiot and his attitude towards the economy :
1st stage : economy? what economy?
2nd stage : the economy is sound and strong(2 or 3 months back)
3rd stage : bailout or bust “…without a bailout the economy is in serious trouble…”
WoW! We’ve come a long way, haven’t we GW?
September 25th, 2008 at 12:04 pmOk we are told that this government will be buying stocks in failing companies, hoping the stocks revive, and will be able to pay back our Treasury. How much would be left after repaying interest and loan from probably China to return to our Treasury ? History has shown administrations NEVER repay the departments they borrow from, ie. Social Security. People this 700B is gone once they decide so kiss it goodby.
September 25th, 2008 at 12:08 pm$700BB… $700BBB… prolly just about enough to buy the ENTIRE FREAKIN’ COUNTRY of Paraguay, huh?
September 25th, 2008 at 12:14 pmIf Pelosi and Reid had allowed the impeachment of Bush and Cheney his minions wouldn’t be bold enough to fabricate the evidence needed for the bailout the way they fabricated Iraq’s WMD evidence.
September 25th, 2008 at 12:26 pmIf what he says is true, that this is an investment which will pay for itself, then no bailout is necessary. There is no mortgage crisis.
September 25th, 2008 at 1:14 pmFool me once shame er er shame on you. Fool me twice er er we won’t get fooled again. Goofy grin.
September 25th, 2008 at 1:36 pmAnd I am sure we will greet the greedy Wall Street idiots as ‘liberators’.
September 25th, 2008 at 1:42 pm“The bailout will pay for itself”
“The war will last 6 months, maybe less.”
“We will be greeted as liberators.”
“Mission accomplished.”
“The insurgency is in it’s last throes.”
“Iraqi oil will pay for the war.”
“The surge.”
“The fundamentals of the economy are strong.”
or better yet, these specific classics:
NEW YORK (CNN) — “I have great, great confidence in our capital markets and in our financial institutions. Our financial institutions, banks and investment banks, are strong. Our capital markets are resilient. They’re efficient. They’re flexible.”
– Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, March 16, 2008
“Our policy in this administration — laws shouldn’t bail out lenders, laws shouldn’t help speculators.”
– President Bush, May 19, 2008
“Our economy has continued growing, consumers are spending, business are investing, exports continue increasing and American productivity remains strong. We can have confidence in the long-term foundation of our economy…I think the system basically is sound. I truly do.”
– President Bush, July 15, 2008
September 25th, 2008 at 2:17 pmWe’ve seen this movie before…
September 25th, 2008 at 2:51 pmFREE MONEY 700 billion dollars of free money. Isnt that special.
September 25th, 2008 at 3:20 pm