Re: I'm feeling very centrist today
 

It didn't matter. Eva likes to kick back and talk Eastern religion when she's kicking back. I learned this when Alva Noe first introduced us.

Re: I'm feeling very centrist today
 

All the folks you name had already built, or were supported by, strong movements that had specific goals. They weren't just pissed off.

Re: Speaking of not good
 

That was quite a bitch-slapping.

Re: Speaking of not good
 

Grayson is always fun because he doesn't pull any punches. And PJ is incapable of anything except faux-intellectual posing.

But I'm not that keen on Grayson's first bit. You hear a lot that no one has been held accountable or prosecuted, even from people whom I respect, but that always sounds to me like waiving a pitchfork. I'm not sure why it so hard to accept that people/markets can fuck up without doing anything criminal (and yes, Paulson and Magnetar, and Goldman's role with them, look terrible in retrospect, but are they criminal?)

That said, I do not know why anyone in senior management at Citi or BoA is still employed.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

It's definitely greed, but it's also responding to the incentives that our policy makers have put in place. It's hard to see how anyone could resist parking their excess cash with absolutely zero risk at the Fed when they are earning a return, especially when the Fed seems fine with below implied target inflation.

Maybe this should go in the Cooking thread
 

Back to earlier discussions, here's a pot cookbook.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA300_.jpg

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Yes, but what causes that policy?

Re: Speaking of not good
 

I understand why you say this about Citi, but why BoA?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

That's really the rub, isn't it? If it just Fed in competence? Well, they haven't been as incompetent as the ECB, for example. Is it the revolving door? Gotta be a factor. I guess one would hope that interests other than the banks would factor in too, especially as the banks can profit from a healthy economy too.

But that the party that is, in Grayson's words, a wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street has been vehemently against the fed risking any upset of the bank's free money machine to try to stimulate growth. Of course, it also helps that this aligns with their political interests.

Is it just me, or do there seem to be more unholy feedback loops around these days?

Which is not to say that there aren't very real and legitimate disagreements about policy and their likely effects. Sometimes it's just hard to disentangle those disagreements from the political interests of the people on each side.

Re: Speaking of not good
 

Well, in fairness, much of BoA's mess was inherited from Merrill and Countrywide, but BoA management took those messes on willingly and voluntarily. (Well, for Merrill at least initially voluntarily).

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

http://www.tumblr.com/photo/1280/113...6b85M321r4cih1

Occupy Herbstreit

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

I am a sufficient dweeb that my first thought, before seeing the link, was, "well, yeah, the Securities and Exchange Commission has had definite struggles, but I don't know if they were sudden or fast."

Meanwhile, this has to say something about Reuters' IQ, according to Sebby's law.

Re: Speaking of not good
 

There was some pretty heavy pressure from Treasury and the Fed.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

It is quite amusing to see the Right struggle to invent a boogie man here (speaking generally... Reuters is hardly right wing). And quite telling about their lack of ability to counter anything that isn't presented in simple soundbite fashion.

That OWS can't come up with a single coherent message is not going to be its undoing, but its strength. The Right wing smear machine seems incapable of dealing with an enemy whose argument is so fluid and multifaceted. They are so conditioned to distilling things to simple points that they find themselves unable to deal with a bunch of screwballs who aren't saying much more than, "We're mad!"

Soros is far too intelligent and organized in his social movement donations to have dreamed up and bankrolled something so disjointed (nevermind how accidentally effective it seems to have been so far in terms of getting attention). He offers direct policy prescriptions. That Reuters would stoop to suspicion of Soros in this shows the Fox News effect at work. They're trying to grab the Glenn Beck audience. Which is pretty fucking sad.

Re: Speaking of not good
 

Merrill has made BoA a lot of money. But yes, it also came with a monstrous pile of losses.

And Countrywide was purchased before the collapse, and ensuing Fed pressure. Ken Lewis said he "Saw value" in it. Fucking idiot. Almost as dumb as that shmuck who bought Golden West for Wachovia.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

By the way, Adder... Do some research on Greece's largest bondholders' recent refusal to take a 21% haircut.

We're all busy obsessing over hippies in the park, while 4000 miles away a time bomb's ticker is drawing down into single digits.

But hey... Car sales were up! Yay! Recovery!

Re: Speaking of not good
 

Seems to me that what you both are seeing is a problem with political institutions, not society. There so many veto points that it is very hard to change things, even in the face of clear problems, because determined minorities stand in the way.

eta: "...in effect Senators representing a quarter to a third of the nation's people hold a veto over all items of public business, and have repeatedly exercised it..."

for Club
 

Holder in more trouble over Operation Fast and Furious.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Who does the NYPD report to? Whomever pays them, apparently.

Re: for Club
 

Ty we all agree bush should have been impeached. but that is now moot. The question is whether Obama, if reelected, shouldn't be. Bush was bad and "he did it too" is not somewhere someone with your posting history can go to.

Re: for Club
 

He's going to get nailed for lying to congress. Watch.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Hank, you must be shocked: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...10-14-15-24-47

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

i get all little people confused. what are the 90%?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

The people not in the top 10% of income.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Have bare tits been a feature of these protests?

Any good sets?

This should be uncontroversial
 

And stimulative:
Even accounting for the ASCE being biased (I don't know who the Urban Institute is).

This isn't "big government." This is basic needs that benefits business as well as individuals. Why can't we figure out how to put together a combination of revenue, infrastructure spending and our bloated military and health care expenditures that provides for this?

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

It's always been a good way to sell art. E.g.,

http://www.artofeurope.com/botticelli/bot5.jpg

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

that's your old?

http://www.whitneygaskell.com/mt-sta...dess%20two.jpg

Re: This should be uncontroversial
 

And in other news, Boeing and Lockheed Martin have issued a study showing that the US needs a massive increase in military spending to ensure air superiority.

Seriously, I agree with you, I just think the source is funny.

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

No, but I'd rather look at it than yours, which looks like it was extruded by someone who ate lots of grains. YMMV. NTTAWWT.

On the NYPD
 

It's hard to tell what led up to this, but this sure looks like an officer of the NYPD punching a non-violent woman in the head. Or I guess it's actually a guy.

Still, they seem to be trying to make themselves look bad. In front of a whole bunch of cameras.

Re: On the NYPD
 

The account I read had the guy saying he gave the officer a look.

Re: On the NYPD
 

Oh, boy. I wonder how Atticus feels about this one.

Re: On the NYPD
 

Well, heck, totally worth running him down, grabbing him and punching him in the face then. Clearly there was no choice.

Lemony Snicket on #OWS
 

This.

eta And this:

http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmo....jpg_large.jpg

Re: My God, you are an idiot.
 

Re: Lemony Snicket on #OWS
 

Because you "know" which loans are bad and your "client," despite being a massive financial institution itself did not "know."

Re: Lemony Snicket on #OWS
 

The client buying the securities doesn't usually have visibility to the details of the individual mortgages in the pool. The person making the pool of mortgages backing the securities almost certainly would.

Re: Lemony Snicket on #OWS
 

Click on the link I embedded in the photo and you will see what is being referenced.