breaking news -- financial

[lagilman]

-- $700 billion bailout bill fails in House. Dow down by nearly 600 more than 700 points.

Put on your seat belts, everyone. The storm is not pending, the storm is now.

suggested reading before leaping into the fray, because it's the least overtly biased in either direction as I can find on quick search

This thread is now open for comments, questions, yowls and whimpers. Keep it polite, and don't throw accusations you can't support. And if you're not a financial advisor, please state so before offering financial advice.

EtA: since someone asked: my so-called credentials. /tongue in cheek (mostly)

Comments

[filamena.livejournal.com]

I hear Iceland is beautiful.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

The mass whimpering in the background represents folks, like us, sitting on the edge of "retirement" . . .

[naienko.livejournal.com]

Taking donations to buy an island in the South Pacific.

[kriz1818.livejournal.com]

Wondering why *all* their heads don't implode from the panic-vacuum that's developed inside them.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

The best advice I've seen is don't freak out yet. This whole thing was railroaded through in the same way the war in Iraq was--right down to the phrases used. It's not over and it won't be over until some sort of solution is found.

The thing we have to hope for is that that solution is better than the one that just got voted down. That is the big woolly mammoth in the room.

[lagilman]

Freaking? No. I haven't freaked out yet, and don't expect to. Worry? Oh yeah. Especially, as Jim said above, if you were counting on your stocks in the next year or so. This isn't a fake crisis, it's a very real one, created of many layers of stupidity on the part of many people.

(and the ride is going to be bumpy for a while, even if they come up with a hail mary that connects. This won't go away overnight, or even in the next month)

I'm hoping for the "hah, we were just kidding, here's the new, better proposal" to come out of Paulson's back pocket. I'm not holding my breath, mind you, but I'm hoping.

[lagilman]

Why would they do such a stupid thing

probably because it was not a good plan, and the voters were almost overwhelmingly against it.

That said, I suspect that "not a good plan" is better for the American economy, and the global economy, than no plan at all. We can talk all we want about letting the dust settle, etc, and making people take responsibility, but everything I've read suggests that risks destroying even more lives all along the fault lines, without any hope of protection. Hopefully, they will be able to get something that addresses the massive failures of the first plan, but... see above post re: not holding my breath.

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

Even the people who voted for it prefaced their vote with statements about how bad a deal it was. And it only "lost" by 13 votes.

Am I reading the news right? That they're going to vote again?

[lagilman]

But melting.

[smoemeth.livejournal.com]

As I just posted in my journal, as you contact your Congresscritters once again as the re-vote looms, don't forget that they're all up for re-election once again.

I made sure to mention this little factoid in the email I just sent to my Representative ... I wasn't pleased with how she voted, and fo' sho' I'm going to remember that next month.

[smoemeth.livejournal.com]

That's what I don't get -- if it's such a bad deal, then don't vote for it!! Make a deal that doesn't suck.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

>That said, I suspect that "not a good plan" is better
>for the American economy, and the global economy, than no plan at all.

I think that was the basis for the leadership agreeing with this. When you find out you have to jump, you take the least-bad choice . . .

[lagilman]

Those hoofbeats you hear are from all the horse-trading going on down in DC right now.

You know, when I studied the politics of the Great Depression back in college, I didn't think I was having a practice run....

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

I'm seeing this as the capstone of the neocons' plan. Loot the Treasury and bolt. The whole $700 billion thing rips my gut the same way the "must invade Iraq nownownow" thing did. The tagline I saw somewhere, "Give us $700B or the economy gets it," sums it up for me. This is the biggest holdup in the history of the world.

I know you're not freaking out, Suri. We're all so worried we're sick. The markets are being markets, i.e. brainless mobs run entirely by their emotions. Unfortunately, that also describes Congress. I wish we had real leadership, someone who isn't part of the crime syndicate that got us into this in the first place, to step in and say, "All right. That's enough. Here's the sensible way out, and here's what we do first."

The bill just defeated was nothing even remotely resembling a sensible way out. The fact it was apparently the best of a whole lot of bad options...hey, this is BushWorld, where "least worst" is the best you ever hope to get.

What/where is Jim's comment? I can't find it here.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Ah so. Right above my post. Yep. GMTA.

[smoemeth.livejournal.com]

I was just at R&C's getting lunch and *everyone* was talking about the vote, and what's happening to the stock market.

It boggles my mind that my Congresswoman voted for this -- she's supposedly a reasonably progressive Democrat, for frak's sake!! :P

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

My rep voted Nay. She said 100% of the calls to her office were against it.

She's a Blue Dog, so sometimes I want to smack her, but she represents this district pretty well on the whole.

Did you know we met her? When she was campaigning, we ran into her in a restaurant in Willcox. Dad actually liked her, though I don't think he could bring himself to vote for a Democrat.

[lagilman]

I'd be a lot more impressed with senators who voted no on this "because the voters don't want it" if they'd been listening to us all along instead of rolling over to the White House every chance they got.

Everyone's talking about how bad this plan is. I agree. But nobody with financial training or experience has -- to my eyes, at least -- stepped forward and said "not doing anything is a valid response that will keep things from cratering globally and long-term." If I've missed that, please someone give me a link? I really want to hear that. Badly.


(edited, as usual, for typos)

[lagilman]

The problem is, everyone wants something different, so it's all compromises that satisfy nobody, and no senator wants to be seen as voting for it when that vote will cost them their seat (a few have gone on record as saying "this has to be done and if it cots me my seat so be it." Even if you don't agree with them, you've got to respect that)

[windrose.livejournal.com]

Agreed.

We're in this mess because deregulation flat-out does not work. I don't like all the particulars of the bailout, but a flawed plan is better than no plan at all. Also, flaws can be fixed at a later date. If we do nothing at all, the economy will tank, period, end of story.

*Edited to fix typo.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

I thought the hoofbeats were the Four Horsemen . . .

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Technically, representatives rather than senators, at this point.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen anything like that. The consensus I've come across (no doubt the same one you've seen) is that something has to be done, and I've seen some interesting proposals, but mostly they're all just flailing and screaming.

As I said in another lj, Glenn Greenwald's take on it makes the most sense to me. We need real leadership and we need knowledgeable input from trained economists--and I don't mean the Party flacks who have been running wild in the frat house for the past eight years. Will we get that? Or will we just get more headless-Chicken-Little-ism?

If this were fiction, Ye Ed would bounce it back with, "Readers won't buy this premise nohow. Nobody is that stupid."

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

The white one's mine.

[lagilman]

the two names I've heard bandied about as being the logical leaders for this are Bill Gross (he who offered to do with without salary) and the unfortunately-named Lawrence Fink. I don't know enough about either one of them to give a thumbs up or down...