brainiac conspiracy

Another Round of Fines Should Take Care of it

Repeating a point made earlier today, it's great to be emptying the jails and releasing many thousands of prisoners who pose no serious threat to society since there are still many thousands of people in this country who are a serious threat to society, and who are still running free:

Joseph and Mary Romero of Chimayo, N.M., found that their mortgage note was assigned to the Bank of New York three months after the same bank filed a foreclosure complaint against them; in other words, Bank of New York didn’t own the loan when they tried to foreclose on it.

Glenn and Ann Holden of Akron, Ohio, faced foreclosure from Deutsche Bank, but the company filed two different versions of the note at court, each bearing a stamp affirming it as the “true and accurate copy.”

Mary McCulley of Bozeman, Mont., had her loan changed by U.S. Bank without her knowledge, from a $300,000 30-year loan to a $200,000 loan due in 18 months, and in documents submitted to the court, U.S. Bank included four separate loan applications with different terms.

It's All About Policy

There are very few things that happen by accident in this world. Even so-called "acts of God" like earthquakes and tsunamis are utterly predictable---though we obviously can't quantify specific dates for them---and in the realm of human commerce, everything happens for a reason. All the cant you hear about "invisible hands" and "self-correcting" wisdom has always been primarily intended to immunize the winners from being denounced as immoral greedy assholes who hoard obscene amounts of wealth while millions of peasants starve---because the fact of the matter is, the reason those people can hoard so much wealth is that policymakers allow them to do it.

---Baron V

Victory Lap

Okay, so our vaunted private sector has officially "restored" all the jobs that were lost in the Great Recession. Huzzah! Still, it wouldn't hurt to ask why so many people in America are still suffering.

If only there was a policy fix for this . . .

---Baron V

Nice Gesture. Inadequate Policy Fix. Same Old Same Old

Okay, I get that the administration wants to encourage our plutocrats-in-training to get involved, roll up their sleeves and pony up some part of their fortunes to effect positive social change. (At least that's the story they're stickin' to.) But we've kinda been there/done that before, whether it's the era of the Rockefellers and the Morgans or the era of the Medicis and the Borgias, and while those oligarchs each made important contributions to culture, the arts, education et al, they also amassed obscene amounts of wealth while 90 percent of their countrymen, walled off from their gated compounds, died in the streets by the millions from tuberculosis and plague. In other words, most other Western societies in our history came to the conclusion that relying too heavily on the largesse of rich people was woefully inadequate---and potentially dangerous---to address many of those societies' most pressing social problems. Maybe someone should remind the administration of that.

---Baron V

Today's Worst Person

Ben Steverman:

[P]ut aside the tone-deaf rich and their caricatures in pop culture. Hold the class warfare. High-earning Americans who haven't found the right dodge, or who live in high-tax states, get socked. They contribute more or less like their compatriots in other developed nations, with few of the perks [...]

Consider a married couple living in New York with newborn twins and earning $450,000 a year. Here's roughly what they need to save . . .

I've got another idea. Let's consider a married couple living on the east side of Los Angeles with newborn twins and earning $9 an hour. There are sure a lot more people like that in America than there are six-figure wage earners! And to think these people can't seem to understand why they're so hated . . .

˘ ---Baron V

So Much That Needed to be Done

So much that was basically ignored.

I've been really getting the feeling that the period in our history circa 2008-2010 presented us with a once-in-a-generation window of opportunity to move the needle of the national compass in a profoundly different direction. You know, a Second New Deal! But for whatever reason(s), our political leadership class failed utterly at their jobs, so instead we were given a Second Gilded Age.

---Baron V

Might Be Wrong About This

Regular readers of this lame blog know that raising taxes on America's job creators is a pet peeve of mine, but lately I've come to another realization: If these thieving assholes just paid the taxes they actually owe, we might be able to have nice things and not have to raise taxes on anyone. Just a thought!

---Baron V

Prison is Only For The Poor Blah Addicts

Everyone else is entitled to pillage at will.

If you'd asked me six years ago if I thought that America's culture of kleptocracy would only grow more firmly entrenched as a feature of our economy under a two-term Obama administration, I'd have said you were nuts. But obviously, you weren't, and just as obviously, I was. Oh well!

---Baron V

Better Than Nothing

But not good enough.

Okay, I know that things are getting better. Our policymakers say it's so, so it must be so! All I know is, every day as I traverse the Marxist dystopia, I see lots of people hanging out in coffee houses and restaurants and bars, with nothing to do because there aren't any jobs for them, and for all practical purposes, they've given up looking. There has also been an explosion over the last five years in the number of homeless people, which hasn't abated but which has only gotten worse. And this is an affluent neighborhood! So, our economic recovery is still bogus, unless you have lots of money.

---Baron V

Hump Night Music Blogging

Because our awesome new digital economy looks an awful lot like the old industrial one.

---Baron V

Today's Worst Persons

Time-Warner Cable. Are they the most hated company in America, or what?

---Baron V

Not Rocket Surgery

As long as we have a long-term unemployment crisis---and we definitely do!---we will also have an ongoing foreclosure crisis. When people lose their jobs, they stop earning money, and if they don't get relief, they can't pay their mortgage. I don't know why anyone should be surprised at this, but everyone else who lives in the real world realizes that the recession hasn't ended for anyone but the wealthy, and that the people who govern us---and who could make a difference in our lives---have, for the most part, abandoned us to the mercy of markets that extract profits from our impoverishment. It's yet another reason to check out of the duopoly.

---Baron V

They Rewarded Incompetence

And they are still papering over the fact that without all that free money, the banks would have failed utterly. And even now, trillions of dollars later, they still might fail anyway. I mean, a 25:1 debt-asset ratio makes a joke out of bank regulation. Put it another way: Wouldn't you love to be able to buy a house or a car for only four percent down? Where can we get our zero-interest loan?

(Via.)

---Baron V

Quote of The Day

Oversimplifying a bit, but basically still true:

In the economic crisis after World War I, there was no attempt at intervention or bailouts, and the economy came roaring back. In the S&L crisis, we liquidated the bad banks and their bad real estate bets. Property prices fell, capitalist juices started to flow, and the economy came roaring back. This time around, we did not liquidate the guys who made the bad bets . . . The Bernanke put---the market belief that if anything goes bad the Fed will come to the rescue---has had a profound impact on people and how they act.

It's like this: the reason why we have banks at all is to allocate capital in the most efficient manner. These people failed spectacularly at their jobs, and we rewarded them for it with trillions of dollars to cover their bets. We should not be surprised when (not if) they blow up the world again.

---Baron V

Why Everything is Terrible

Because, over the last 40 years, the people who govern us have allowed the Republic to become a nation of plutocrats and serfs. Something needs to be done about this, and that "something" is not austerity.

---Baron V

Everything is Rigged

I mean everything.

Naturally, there is no prison time, only settlements and fines because prisons are only for poor black people who steal things, not rich white people who steal things. So the looting will continue, and our system of disaster capitalism will keep propelling us toward our species' ultimate demise. It doesn't have to be that way, of course, but we would need a leadership class with the political will to smash the system, and replace it with something more humane---or at the very least, law-abiding.

---Baron V

It Was Always a Scam

Those so-called "defined-contribution" 401(k) plans were promoted from the get-go by the Pete Peterson/Fix The Debt types who've been warning us for decades that Social Security is on the verge of bankruptcy and it won't be there for you when you retire so give us your money instead, etc. This has remunerated them handsomely in form of annual management fees, but for the actual account holders, not so much. This is a feature, not a bug, of such retirement systems.

---Baron V

When You Get the Money, They Call it Welfare

When they get the money, they call it a subsidy. Funny how that works out.

---Baron V

Monday Night Music Blogging

Because our brave new world is the epitome of awesomeness.

---Baron V

We Used To Have a National Labor Relations Board

I wonder whatever became of it.

---Baron V