On Oct 2, 2008, at 12:07 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote:
Edmund Storms wrote:
6. As a result, stagflation will come again. The Obama administration
will look a lot like the Carter administration.
It might resemble the New Deal, if things get worse and Obama is
decisive. Or the Hoover administration if he is not. The crisis has
begun before Obama takes office (or is even elected), so people will
not blame him, at least in the initial stages.
Of course it is still far from certain that he will be elected. The
polls remain very close.
An administration is shaped partly by the personality of the
president. Obama is not a bit like Carter. The only president Obama
resembles is Woodrow Wilson, it seems to me. Once a professor,
always a professor. There are some big differences. Obama has low
blood pressure, he is less starchy, and he is not bigoted against
black people. (On that score, Wilson is probably spinning in his
grave.)
By the way, the world's richest man, Warren Buffett, again came out
strongly in favor of the bailout. He is a liberal and no friend of
Wall Street, and he saw the crisis coming long ago, so I trust his
judgment in this matter. I still do not know what to make of the
bailout, but I trust people like Buffett more than I trust U.S.
senators or Pres. Bush, or Obama and McCain for that matter. See:
You need to remember that Warren Buffett is heavily invested in the
financial industry. Consequently, he is going to benefit from the
bailout. In general, the people who will benefit are working very hard
to get this bailout passed with all the advantages to them they can
manage. This is only human nature, The bigger the panic, the more
advantages they can get put in the bill. The people who care about
the general welfare keep advising that congress slow down and study
the details of this bill to make sure it is as advertised. Instead,
there is a big push by people who will gain by getting this passed as
quickly as possible. Coincidentally, the market goes down to make the
point when the first attempt failed. Then the market recovered much of
the loss without any obvious change in conditions. Now that it looks
like the bill will pass, the previous trend downward is continuing.
Apparently, the system is crumbling, which will continue even after
the bill is passed. There is simply too much debt of all kinds that
will not be paid as the recession deepens. The mortgage problem was
only the catalyst. Meanwhile, the bailout bill will give certain
people great power and advantage as the system goes down. In short,
lifeboats are being constructed but too few are available to save the
rest of us.
Ed
Ed
http://money.cnn.com/2008/10/02/news/newsmakers/buffett.fortune/
- Jed
