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Bank bailout: The greatest swindle ever sold
Salon.com ^ | May 27, 2009 | Andy Kroll

Posted on 05/27/2009 3:26:55 AM PDT by Scanian

On Oct. 3, as the spreading economic meltdown threatened to topple financial behemoths like American International Group (AIG) and Bank of America and plunged global markets into free fall, the U.S. government responded with the largest bailout in American history. The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, better known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), authorized the use of $700 billion to stabilize the nation's failing financial systems and restore the flow of credit in the economy.

The legislation's guidelines for crafting the rescue plan were clear: The TARP should protect home values and consumer savings, help citizens keep their homes, and create jobs. Above all, with the government poised to invest hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in various financial institutions, the legislation urged the bailout's architects to maximize returns to the American people.

That $700 billion bailout has since grown into a more than $12 trillion commitment by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve. About $1.1 trillion of that is taxpayer money -- the TARP money and an additional $400 billion rescue of mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The TARP now includes 12 separate programs, and recipients range from megabanks like Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase to automakers Chrysler and General Motors.

(Excerpt) Read more at salon.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: 0bama; 0bamaisfailing; bailouts; banking; bho44; bigteapartyjuly4; buygoldnow; buygunsnow; donttaxmykids; donttreadonme; gwb; idiocracy; livefreeordie; madashell; robbery; takebackamerica; tarp; time2partyagain; truthmatters0; whatthehell
"The six biggest ways (we know about) that TARP scams taxpayers."
1 posted on 05/27/2009 3:26:55 AM PDT by Scanian
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To: Scanian

Senator Obama voted in favor of the bank bailout, then as President Obama denounced it as a bailout for Wall St.

How does this work on people?

I could not get this Salon piece to come up. Does it go into the liberal policies that caused the mortgage meltdown and the efforts by Republicans to put more oversight on fannie Mae and freddie Mac that were blocked by Democrat Socialists?


2 posted on 05/27/2009 3:49:52 AM PDT by reaganator
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To: Scanian

“The legislation’s guidelines for crafting the rescue plan were clear: The TARP should protect home values and consumer savings, help citizens keep their homes, and create jobs. Above all, with the government poised to invest hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in various financial institutions, the legislation urged the bailout’s architects to maximize returns to the American people. “

“The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” President Ronald Reagan


3 posted on 05/27/2009 3:54:20 AM PDT by NTHockey (Rules of engagement #1: Take no prisoners.)
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To: Scanian

Back in Oct, before even the first vote was taken on TARP, Rush told us that the bill would make the Sec. of Treas. the most powerful man in the world...that he had a blank check from a $700B account with absolute and unquestionable authority to spend when and how he saw fit....and Congress signed off on it!

Does anyone remember the story that was floating around at the time about how that figure of $700B was reached? The story said that Treas. came up with that amount because they wanted to get the attention of the populace and politicians and needed a “really big number” to accomplish their aims. Was that story ever debunked, or did it just go down the memory hole like so many other stories that showed the ineptitude and corruption in DC?


4 posted on 05/27/2009 3:59:30 AM PDT by Roccus (The Capitol, the White House, the Court House...........America's Axis of Evil)
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To: Scanian
MELTDOWN

1. The subprime mortgage crisis reached a critical stage during the first week of September 2008, characterized by severely contracted liquidity in the global credit markets and insolvency threats to investment banks and other institutions.
2. Reserve balances from banks in the Federal Reserve System began increasing over required levels of about $10 billion at the beginning of September 2008, just after the Democratic and Republican national conventions, and just before the stock market crash and presidential debates.
3. Clinton, Obama Harlem meeting 9/11
4. On Friday afternoon September 12, Hank Paulson told Wall Street that the government would not step in to save Lehman.
Barclays walked away from the negotiating table on September 13th or 14th. There was physically not enough time, before the opening of the markets on Monday September 15th, for Lehman to negotiate anything with anyone else. Lehman was forced to file for Chapter 11 on Monday September 15th, and a few days later Barclays was able to cherry pick Lehman's best assets and business units and buy them for a reduced price.
5. HEADLINE
Wall Street Meltdown: The Sky Is Falling
By: Pamela Leavey
September 15th, 2008 @ 9:09 am
6. 16/09/09 "The Scotsman"
-- - SLAM. Slam. Slam. Slam. Like a scene from a gathering of Mafia dons, the doors of 30 black Lincolns slammed shut as their besuited occupants stepped out into a Manhattan downpour – and into a global financial storm.
That storm broke yesterday, with stock markets tumbling around the world. In London, the FTSE 100 plunged almost 4 per cent to 5204.2. Scotland's banking giants were among the biggest victims. HBOS slumped 17.5 per cent; Royal Bank of Scotland lost 12.2 per cent. In the US, the Dow Jones industrial average suffered its biggest fall since 9/11
7. On The Financial Crisis McCain Gives Speech, Obama Holds Press Conference
Added by Mark Nickolas on Sep 19, 2008
8. Rupert Cornwell: Wall Street meltdown rekindles Obama's fire Out of America: After a summer in which the Republican candidate has made all the running, events are at last starting to fit the Democrats' script.
According to James Campbell, the mid-September financial crisis hit the 2008 presidential election like a bolt out of the blue, transforming it from a horserace in which John McCain had a real chance of victory into a one-sided contest in which Barack Obama enjoyed a decisive advantage.
9. Sunday, 21 September 2008
Bill Clinton: He's really, really glad to see John McCain
Exerpt:
John McCain, in suspending his presidential campaign to (eventually) head back to Washington from New York to help the push for a financial rescue plan, may have nixed a planned appearance on "Late Night with David Letterman" and cancelled a chat with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
But McCain wasn't about to snub his old friend, Bill Clinton, this morning. And the ex-president, for all his expressions of support for Barack Obama and predictions of victory in November for his fellow Democrat, continues to give the impression he's definitely hedging his bets.

Ummm. NO. The deal was sealed.

5 posted on 05/27/2009 4:01:15 AM PDT by MestaMachine (Will global warming make hell hotter? Or is hell freezing over? That is the ???)
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To: Scanian

One thing for sure. They aren’t bailing banks out. They are paying off political cronies.


6 posted on 05/27/2009 4:01:45 AM PDT by freekitty (Give me back my conservative vote.)
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To: Scanian

TARP and the subsequent bailouts, along with 0bama’s $1.2 trillion budget, have been the greatest slap to the face of the American people in the financial history of this nation.

These elitist A$$bags have trampled the Constitution, destroyed the financial future of the US, saddled generations yet unborn with debt they can not hope to pay, and done it all in the name of advancing the Marxist agenda of the 0bamanauts under the direction of the anointed one.

It is truly disgusting.


7 posted on 05/27/2009 4:29:59 AM PDT by PubliusMM (RKBA; a matter of fact, not opinion. 01-20-2013: Change we can look forward to.)
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Comment #8 Removed by Moderator

To: freekitty

Could someone please explain how only $1.1 million is a taxpayer expense and the other $ 11 trillion comes from “the Government and the Federal Reserve”. Just WHO funds the federal government and the Federal Reserve? Is it space aliens or some greek god?


9 posted on 05/27/2009 4:40:51 AM PDT by laconic
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To: laconic
Could someone please explain how only $1.1 million is a taxpayer expense and the other $ 11 trillion comes from “the Government and the Federal Reserve”.

It's just a case of misreading one letter:

"That $700 billion bailout has since grown into a more than $12 trillion commitment by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve. About $1.1 trillion of that is taxpayer money -- the TARP money and an additional $400 billion rescue of mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac."

And, you're right, all $12T is taxpayer dollars being dumped down the toilet to pay off big campaign donors. This is the biggest case of grand theft, Congress, in the history of the world. Sadly, our government has turned out to be more corrupt than Arafat or even the Russian government, and no liberal in the United States cares.

10 posted on 05/27/2009 4:57:21 AM PDT by TurtleUp (So this is how liberty dies - to thunderous applause!)
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To: Scanian
That $700 billion bailout has since grown into a more than $12 trillion commitment by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve. About $1.1 trillion of that is taxpayer money -- the TARP money and an additional $400 billion rescue of mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The TARP now includes 12 separate programs, and recipients range from megabanks like Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase to automakers Chrysler and General Motors.

Now would be a good time to email a nice thank you to Jorge Bush and Mr. Paulson ! They really went in the tank for the American people.

Now I'm off to go puke!!!

11 posted on 05/27/2009 5:04:43 AM PDT by org.whodat
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