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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: carranza2 who wrote (297598)	3/22/2009 9:00:35 AM
From: LindyBill	3 Recommendations Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793955

These things do not happen today. They develop over time. You know what Keynes said. "In the long run........" :>) I came after you and Unk because I felt both of you are too "doom and gloom" right now. We are all in agreement that Obama and his boys are leading us down the garden path. But we are all off in the "La La Land" of fiat money and assets, where nobody knows what will happen. I very much hope that part of the proposed bank solution is to allow the banks to go to some sort of "mark to model" on these sausage loans. It would be well to explore allowing people to hand over the keys of homes they are upside down on and let both themselves and the banks off the hook of foreclosure.

To: carranza2 who wrote (297598)	3/22/2009 9:13:46 AM
From: unclewest	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793955

The bandits who built the ponzi smelled the collapse coming and got all they could. I just opened today's paper to this story - istockanalyst.com Banks Lend Heavily to Insiders Amid Credit Crunch, Bailouts Saturday, March 21, 2009 9:51 PM (Source: The Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, N.C.))CHARLOTTE, N.C. _ Banks nationwide hold $41 billion in loans to directors, top executives and other insiders, a portfolio that experts say should be stripped of secrecy. Insider lending to directors is particularly troublesome because it could cloud the judgment of people charged with protecting shareholders and overseeing bank management, the experts say. At Charlotte-based Bank of America, those loans more than doubled last year, to $624.2 million _ the biggest dollar jump in the country. The largest of them likely went to three directors or their companies. The surge came during the third quarter as credit markets froze, the government prepared to infuse banks with billions in tax dollars and the board approved the purchase of troubled Merrill Lynch.

To: carranza2 who wrote (297598)	3/22/2009 12:30:52 PM
From: Alan Smithee	Respond to of 793955

Have you noticed the Yen and the Swiss franc in the last week? I've noticed! My daughter is living in Switzerland at the moment. Check the Euro also.

To: carranza2 who wrote (297598)	3/22/2009 5:58:16 PM
From: rich evans	Respond to of 793955

Bernake says things are OK. Dollar not subject to imbalances. In the United States, as in all countries, economic growth requires investment in new capital goods and the upgrading and replacement of older capital. Examples of capital investment include the construction of factories and office buildings and firms' acquisition of new equipment, ranging from drill presses to computers to airplanes. Residential construction--the building of new homes and apartment buildings--is also counted as part of capital investment.4 All investment in new capital goods must be financed in some manner. In a closed economy without trade or international capital flows, the funding for investment would be provided entirely by the country's national saving. By definition, national saving is the sum of saving done by households (for example, through contributions to employer-sponsored 401(k) accounts) and saving done by businesses (in the form of retained earnings) less any budget deficit run by the government (which is a use rather than a source of saving).5 As I say, in a closed economy investment would equal national saving in each period; but, in fact, virtually all economies today are open economies, and well-developed international capital markets allow savers to lend to those who wish to make capital investments in any country, not just their own. Because saving can cross international borders, a country's domestic investment in new capital and its domestic saving need not be equal in each period. If a country's saving exceeds its investment during a particular year, the difference represents excess saving that can be lent on international capital markets. By the same token, if a country's saving is less than the amount required to finance domestic investment, the country can close the gap by borrowing from abroad. In the United States, national saving is currently quite low and falls considerably short of U.S. capital investment. Of necessity, this shortfall is made up by net foreign borrowing--essentially, by making use of foreigners' saving to finance part of domestic investment. We saw earlier that the current account deficit equals the net amount that the United States borrows abroad in each period, and I have just shown that U.S. net foreign borrowing equals the excess of U.S. capital investment over U.S. national saving. It follows that the country's current account deficit equals the excess of its investment over its saving.