The Rich Really Get Richer!

[SIUYA 11]

tradewinds and ingot - you are correct i took a very free and easy wording with average, and excluding the rich is a better way of talking about it.

But without getting too much into semantics - I still think the world is still a better place for the system as it stands than ever before for the general (is that a better word ) mass of humanity. Plus when it comes to rich and poor, when then for most of us, we are rich compared to a lot of others on the planet so who are we to complain that others are richer......

The one thing that we all really should make sure of, and fight for is the ability for any common man to become fabulousnessnesessly wealthy, regardless of birthrights..... gee I guess then we better have open border immigration, get rid of the continuation of the dynastic couple who just got married in front of a worldwide audience last friday etc;etc;

A whole other bag of fruits.

 

This is an argument that will go round and round and as Ingot - you clearly have the most amount of time and passion in this subject ..... I will leave it at that. I have more pressing trading issues to delve into.

Enjoy.

[MightyMouse 12]

No - he resigned the role of "head" but retained 433,000 company options, held in a "trust".

 

Cheney Gets 'Deferred' Salary From Halliburton Democrats Question Cheney's Halliburton Payments

 

Will Stolen Iraq Oil Funds and Deals For Cronies Force Cheney Impeachment?

 

It was house-keeping ... symbolically a gesture to appease the politically correct ... tick all the boxes and she'll be apples, mate! Do you really think Cheney would give up his Halliburton game for the mere VP position, that would at best last only 8 years? This is a man who likes money and power, and the VP job was only a small step in the scheme of things.

 

Ha ha. :rofl: :helloooo:

 

Oh ... and he was also a very poor shot!

 

Dick Cheney NRA Gun Photo - Cheney Photo Parody

 

Click on the "Previous/Next" link to see them all!

 

 

 

I am unsure about Greenspan being a Libertarian.

 

For one thing, true Libertarians do not promote the accumulation of unmitigated debt as a policy. Fact!

 

The closest thing the US political system has to a Libertarian, is Ron Paul, and you already know how they treat him! And don't Ron Paul's policies include making the US Gov't balance its books, to stop racking up debt, to practice fiscall competence and accountability and responsibility?

 

Greenspan showed none of this. No, he was certainly NO Libertarian.

 

The stage for the GFC was set before the 2000 tech boom/bust, when those who thought we were in for a never-ending bull market continued to borrow and create their way into insane derivative-driven debt.

 

I remember the analysis of the 1987 stock-market collapse. The single most important cause identified, was the unbridled creation and use of derivatives in financial markets.

 

Fast forward to the year 2000, and the lessons were all forgotten - "it's different this time" ... and even the 1998 collapse of the LTCM Hedge Fund didn't ring any alarm bells with the regulators. Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Bear Stearns, Lehman bros, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, and so on all had their snouts in the derivatives trough.

 

The first hint of trouble came, I remember very well, was when Bear Stearns was unable to sell some of their bundles CDO's. They asked for time. Credit Spreads widened, and suddenly the game was up. In July 2007 I think, BS held about 20 times leveraged CDO's and was unable to get a bid - liquidity had suddenly dried up.

 

Bear was sold for $10/share later ... after indignantly saying the first offer, $2/share was outrageous. It was ... Bear was quoted in its heyday at $133/share ... less than a year earlier!

 

Why had this occurred? because their mates at the Federal Reserve GUARANTEED their losses ... moral hazard again.

 

But the screws are tightening.

 

Firms like Standard and Poors, Fitch, Moodies ... all have one thing in common - they were responsible for rating the risk. They all failed. They - above ALL OTHERS should have been acutely aware of the risk - that is their job ... that is why they charge clients fees ... and they have the lessons of history more acutely in front of their eyes than any of the firms mentioned ... or should have,

 

As soon as the "too big to fail" mantra became common, then the moral hazard genie was out of the bottle. And the biggest fish to date - Goldman Sachs themselves, have along with Warren Buffett, capitalised on this. They are abusing the knowledge that the US Fed Reserve would NOT allow the bigger companies to go down. The Fed guarantees the losses of these biggies.

 

And why? Because per employee, GS might have more "inside men" involved in US Government departments that any other private company. Is this fair to the people who actually do have morality and are trying to do what is right?

 

I have said before, and I say it once again - the Fed should have allowed the "too-big-to-fail" companies to go to the wall. Let the carnage happen. Then they could have spent just a fraction of the money they have, on cleaning up the disaster zone, without the likes of GS, MS, JPM, ML and Lehman etc.

 

And the big three agencies, colluding to cover up the risk - S&P, Fitch and Moodies?

 

The executives should have been, and still should be, gaoled. A total abrogation of fiscal responsibility and assessment, to protect the system.

 

But hey! Disagree if you wish - it won't change anything.

 

The system is corrupt ... there is no one - NO ONE - who will put up the hand and say: "The buck stops with ME." The public service is too top-heavy with vested interests, lobbyists, favors to be repaid, bribes to be settles, graft and corruption widespread. yet the people don't give a hoot. Where are the protest movements? Where are the activists? Where are the watch-dogs in American Society?

 

Voters thought Obama would do it ... but he couldn't even close Gitmo. All Obama has achieved is QE1 and 2 which is only prolonging the timing and increasing the size of the coming collapse. He had a mandate to wind it all back, and to balance the budget, and to hold those responsible to account.

 

Blew it!

 

You see why the rich really get richer? Because they are all feeding at the same trough, and there is no one who is not corrupt to speak out against them.

 

Am I wrong?

 

I am not familiar with Ron Paul, or his policies, but it seems to me that he has been calling for a very long time now, for some kind of austerity and budgetary common sense in Washington. It seems to me that his calls have been for more than 10 years, consistently and fearlessly.

 

But the system is too big now ... and people with true vision and integrity are easy to ignore when the press is echoing the noises from inside the halls of power, and not the small voices of reason from without.

 

I wish we had such strength of accountability in my country, of the kind Ron Paul displays.

 

blog of bile » The Economist calls Alan Greenspan a “lifelong libertarian”

 

Certain philosophies make for great reading, but are not practical.

 

The failure of his views were that he was a libertarian when it came to allowing banks to make profits unregulated profits, but he would not let them fail.

 

Chairperson Born's 11/13/98 remarks

 

Look at the date of the comments of Brooksly Born. She was shot down by Alan Greenspan, then SEC chairman, Arthur levitt, and Treasury Secretary, Robert Rubin and Deputy Secretary Larry Summers.

 

Bernanke is making the same mistake. The Fed, believe it or not, was one of the greatest advocates of allowing the banks to continue trading in the unregulated OTC markets, other than the banks themselves. In all his arrogance, he has convinced congress that he is going to monitor the markets for bubbles and manage the bubble before it bursts.

[johnw 10]

Cheney was no longer head of Haliburton when he was VP.

 

Cheney signed a piece of paper on Haliburton letterhead and moved office.

That is of little interest to Real People.

What matters is his subsequent actions as VP ... those alone describe his degrees of separation/ continuance with Haliburton

 

Greenspan was a libertarian and his desire to let the banks regulate themselves and let market forces take care of any inefficiencies are what set the stage for the global melt down. Regulating the otc markets that the banks trade the CDSs would have prevented the whole mess. He now admits that he was completely mistaken. Personally, I think he should go to jail.

 

The stage for a meltdown was set when Dick Nixon said "I will not pay for a war that I didn't start" and released the dollar from what little was left of the gold standard.

 

The second bullet was fired a couple of decades latter by the famous statement "Deficits don't matter."

 

And you are quite right MM, the Coup de grace was fired by Greenspan when he tried to correct the .dot com bubble by destroying interest rates ... a very childish reaction to a comparatively straight forward problem.

 

Since stupidity is not a crime, Greenspan cannot go to jail.

But it does make you wonder about the caliber of the People who appointed him.

 

Mind you, George served two full terms and it looks like this current fellow is heading in the same direction.

 

NEVER TRY TO SOLVE A PROBLEM WITH ANOTHER PROBLEM

because you will wind up with the multiple compounding effects of both, plus

all the unintended consequences ... which is where we are right now.

[GoldStandard 10]

 

Greenspan was a libertarian .

 

I have to quibble with this statement. Greenspan did express some libertarian leanings when he was much younger (including a well-written paper in support of the Gold Standard), but he has long since abandoned libertarianism for centralized control of the economy by a fiat money fractional reserve banking system.

 

Libertarianism and fiat-money-based central planning are pretty much diametrically opposed schools of thought.

[MightyMouse 12]

I have to quibble with this statement. Greenspan did express some libertarian leanings when he was much younger (including a well-written paper in support of the Gold Standard), but he has long since abandoned libertarianism for centralized control of the economy by a fiat money fractional reserve banking system.

 

Libertarianism and fiat-money-based central planning are pretty much diametrically opposed schools of thought.

 

His idea of a self regulating wall street was not diametrically opposed to libertarianism and in no way a display of centralized control. Apples and oranges.

[leaclement 10]

Economic inequality is a hot topic. Most people are now aware that the rich have got richer, leaving everyone else with less to share.Everyone knows that wealth inequality is a pressing issue in the United States. The income gap between the rich elite and the shrinking class is bigger than it was a year ago. According to Forbes, much of the 400 wealthiest people in the nation saw their net worth boost since this time in 2011.

[Patuca 13]

Its all a game...those with $$$$ and brains catch the falling knives....as prices plunge they are buying...when prices turn around and start rising they sell back to all the less $$ and less brains..who just sold to them on the plunge ...out of fear... Now add the manipulation...the $$$ with brains..engineer the plunges..ps..they are laughing all the way to bank...:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

 

Summary..it is all a manipulated game and the $$$$ with lots of brains..do it over and over again..and the sheeple play the game content to believe the BS ABOUT market pressures..BEING fair and square...:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

 

:helloooo: :helloooo: nobody is listening...the markets are out to get you....what you gonna do?? Play the game??

[Patuca 13]

PSS. ..guess who loaded up on gold and silver now? Guess who ain't. Guess what is soon coming?

 

Guess what the indexes will soon be doing?

 

PPSS :helloooo: it is all a game. They slice the cake both ways...:rofl: :rofl::rofl: they gonna nail the sheeple on the rise of P.M. And nail them on the plunge of indexes... And don't forget...laugh all the way to the bank...Repeat it is a game..it is manipulated..it is NOT fair and square market pressures...same chart patterns as those in 1930 1940 1960...etc..always been that way ...always will be...with the event of hft they can screw the sheeple faster and faster and on the micro level...and laugh all the way to the bank....and now you git hft screwing hft....it is hilarious.....

[Patuca 13]

PSS. ..guess who loaded up on gold and silver now? Guess who ain't. Guess what is soon coming?

 

Guess what the indexes will soon be doing?

 

PPSS :helloooo: it is all a game. They slice the cake both ways...:rofl: :rofl::rofl: they gonna nail the sheeple on the rise of P.M. And nail them on the plunge of indexes... And don't forget...laugh all the way to the bank...Repeat it is a game..it is manipulated..it is NOT fair and square market pressures...same chart patterns as those in 1930 1940 1960...etc..always been that way ...always will be...with the event of hft they can screw the sheeple faster and faster and on the micro level...and laugh all the way to the bank....and now you got hft screwing hft....it is hilarious.....