Saturday, September 20, 2008

Flat bailout plan: Some numbers

OK, let's say we have 10 million non-millionaire investors in this country who have maxed out the full $100K of losses 10^7 * 10^5 is 10^12, the same order of magnitude as the current bailout. This depends of course on the structure of investing in this country (how many people will lose $100,000+ ?), and requires a method to pass the losses fairly through individual pension plans and mutual funds.

This is just a matter of bean counting though, and a far easier task than pricing derivatives correctly, which the Paulson plan requires. That is a task that appears on its face to be impossible. Possibly by design.

OK, let's make part of the flat bailout in federally backed tuition loan guarantees at the current prime. Another $50K each? Not everyone will or can use these, so it might not be so expensive.

Alternate bailout plan.

The Iraq war took years to gin up, once W got his enabling act. The bailout of wealthy investors by the federal government took a few weeks to organize. Amazing!

I have a better plan. It's called a flat bailout and it works like a flat tax, in reverse. The federal government indemnifies each individual investor with a net worth of less than $1M up to a flat rate of $100,000 total, nah make it $200,000 per person on the fallout from this whole mess. Everybody else can go to hell, like they're supposed to in a market capitalist system.

I bet this will cost a lot less than half a trillion plus.

Friday, September 19, 2008

Emasculating McCain

John McCain has a new problem.

That's aside from the fact that he picked an unqualified nincompoop for a running mate to satisfy the right, rather than the very qualified nincompoop he wanted. The problem is, she's got more star power than he does. It makes him look very bad (not to mention old and decrepit) and there's no way out.

Already, she gives speeches in front of cheering crowds, who then head for the exits when McCain starts to drone. Already she starts referring to him as "my running mate" like *he*'s the VP candidate. Already his solo speeches are extremely poorly attended. This has to hurt. Maybe that's part of the reason why he has seemed so deflated and un-feisty lately. If he can't control the agenda of his own campaign, how is he going to even *seem* like he can run the nation.

What happened to McCain? He used to be a very different guy!

I think the important moment he was broken was not in the 60's, it was in 2000 during the South Carolina primary. And the guy who did it (Rove) is both running the show now from behind the scenes, AND the one responsible for his disastrous VP pick.

McCain used to be an interesting guy, yes a hero and a maverick. But face facts, the guy is old and losing it. Remember when the famous general von Bismarck became president of his country with a charismatic young right-wing prime minister? But von Bismarck was old and could not control the show any more by mere force of his considerable personality. We all know how that turned out.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Call Them Lies, Barack! Use the word! Words matter!

...

Folks, it's pretty simple:

When John McCain says I'm going to increase taxes on folks making $42,000, he's lying to you.

When John McCain says I called his running mate a pig, he's lying to you.

When John McCain says I want to increase the size of government 23%, he's lying to you.

When John McCain says he never asked for an earmark or pork barrel project for his state, He's lying to you too.

Folks, John McCain is a liar. The straight talk express has become the doubletalk express. He lies to you and me now and will lie to us if he ever reaches the White House. And if that's the kind of president you want, you should go ahead and vote for him. That's not the kind of president I'll be.

Personally, I think we're here you and I, on a mission to restore honesty and integrity to the White House, something that's been missing there for nearly 8 years, and John McCain has shown he's just as bad as the current bunch, and maybe worse.
...

Sarah Palin's tears cure cancer

I was wondering when someone would start a web site for the Alaska governor a la Chuck Norris. Here are my favorites so far:

  • Sarah Palin wears three quarter length sleeves to keep from getting blood on her clothes when she kills liberals.
  • As head of Alaska’s Nat’l Guard, Sarah Palin taught troops in a training exercise to scare a grenade into not exploding.
  • Queen Elizabeth II curtsied when she was introduced to Sarah Palin.
  • Jesus has a bracelet that says, “WWSPD?”
  • Sarah Palin doesn’t need a gun to hunt, because she can throw a bullet through an adult bull elk.
  • Sarah Palin once bagged a caribou by staring it down until it died.
  • Death once had a near-Sarah Palin experience.
  • Sarah Palin cures cancer, because she makes Chuck Norris cry -- and everyone knows that Chuck's tears cure cancer ...

Monday, September 8, 2008

"Obama is a Muslim" = "I am a racist"

Racism is not dead in this country, not by a long shot, but at least certain forms of it are now considered unacceptable, and have to be expressed in other ways. The title of this post is one of them, but there are others. My feeling is that most people who would say the above are part of the 30% who would never vote for a democrat anyway under any circumstances. That is the result of the civil rights movement losing the white racist vote steadily since the 60's via the well-known GOP "Southern Strategy". Now that we have a Black candidate for president, it puts racists in the uncomfortable position of explaining their discomfort about him. And so they come up with these libelous euphemisms ("terrorist", "Marxist") and simply inaccurate ones ("Muslim") because hating those three groups is "OK". At least by some twisted logic.

These people are against everything America stands for. It should be told to their face when they say things like that. Ah but democrats are too polite for that kind of thing.

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Still mystified

She can read a speech prepared for someone else weeks in advance of her selection off of a teleprompter. I am impressed. I'm sure I wouldn't have done it as well. But that's no qualification for office.