Presidential candidate Ralph Nader has a good video about the wall street bailout, I’ll play you a short clip and also a clip of Chomsky talking about capitalism in the real world .

Nader is right, the bailout is yet another example of socialism for the rich which has been the game that’s always been played.

I recommend this CD of Noam Chomsky talking at Harvard in 96.
Chomsky explains that the free market theory sold to the public is just a fantasy. He shows how in the real world, different rules apply to the rich. the rich make sure they have the nanny state to take care of themselves. We are being played for fools. Let’s get the word out. Send this link to others: http://Tinyurl.com/BailoutTruth

(from the FEC/NYT)
G. T. Boisi, Director, Freddie Mac – McCain $70,100, Obama $0
A. M. D’Amato, former Senator, Freddie Mac lobbyist – McCain $30,800, Obama $0
W. M. Lewis, Director, Freddie Mac – McCain $0, Obama $4600
H. M. Allison, President, Fannie Mae, former McCain (2000) finance director, McCain $0, Obama $2300
B. Gaines, Director, Fannie Mae – McCain $0, Obama $2300
J. P. Kenney, Director, Freddie Mac – McCain $2300, Obama $0
H. P. Swygert, Director, Fannie Mae – McCain $1000, Obama $1000
R. R. Glauber, Director, Freddie Mac – McCain $0, Obama $1000
D. H. Mudd, outgoing President, Fannie Mae – McCain $1000, Obama $0
J. C. Sites, Director, Fannie Mae – McCain $1000, Obama $0
L. Freeh, former FBI Director, Director, Fannie Mae – McCain $200, Obama $0
29 lobbyists, others – McCain $63,500, Obama $4,800
Total McCain $169,000, Obama $16,000

I think if people don’t look at this distinction then you basically come to the point where you’d have to ban everyone with a job giving political donations just in case the candidate is smeared by an association with a company, even if it is only the janitor who donated.

However, this post is about one set of firms and the scale of financial ’support’ they have given to the people now charged with bailing out their economic sector – and my underlying point is that this is clearly not a ‘one off’ and this is just one small part of the donations that have been received from organisations right in the thick of this mess.

For example, Obama and McCain have both received over $22 million from finance / insurance / real estate ‘donations’ during their 2008 campaign, and you’re trying to tell me that has nothing to do with their support of this bailout and will not influence them one bit? Please.

http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.php?cycle=2008&ind=F

Dig around the Open Secrets blog and you’ll see that my point is entirely vindicated almost everywhere you look. For example, the 1999 Financial Services Modernization Act reveals that campaign contributions “may have influenced the votes of politicians who, a decade later, are now grappling with the implosion of the giant banks they helped to foster.” Those members of Congress who supported lifting Depression-era restrictions on commercial banks, investment banks and insurance companies received more than twice as much money from those interests than did those lawmakers who opposed the measure:

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2008/09/money-and-votes-aligned-in-con.html

I’m happy to accept that my post only touches the tip of the financial iceberg that the US economy has already crashed into, but if you think that Dodd and co. are showing all their cards then you are clearly mistaken.

Some good points, but the $ 700 bn is surely related to ‘public limited corporations’, and NOT the now state-backed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac ?

Or does the fact that FM*2 were ‘corporations’ before ‘conservatorship’ kicked in, means that they are involved in the bailout ?? Maybe I’m being thick, but I thought the whole point of, in effect, taking FM*2 in public ownership was to draw a line under that problem.

And when that wasn’t enough, they had to come up with ANOTHER plan to sort out ‘the rest’ of the problem ?? Maybe that is not the case, and I don’t resile from your view that this is a ‘foul-up’ of the first degree by these people on the Senate Banking Committe, but I think you may be firing your ammo at the wrong person.

The real villain of the piece for me is Phil Gramm who championed the reckless rush to de-regulate, which is now coming back to bite the Americans on the ‘derriere’. .

Yes and here too it is exceedingly important that we do not stop a silly and dangerous slide into protectinism and a new Nationalisation disaster. This is precisely where the British Conservative Party has been at its best moderating the mood of the day with its instinct that in any system there is value and we should keep it .It is just as possible to interpret this problem and due to over regulation and unreal markets as to free markets systems .

Anyway great stuff Bravo