Saturday, May 23, 2009

Antitrust - More Empty Political Rhetoric Instead Of True Reform. Washington Does Not Realize The Ground Is Permanently Shifting Beneath It.

This type of silliness easily convinces me there is absolutely no serious concern for transformational policy in Washington. Instead more rhetoric. Live Nation and Ticketmaster? You have got to be kidding me. The world wouldn't skip a beat if these two firms fell from the face of the earth. If the government is serious about enforcing antitrust laws that have been on the books for over one hundred years, break up the large banks. Oh, but why would that happen? The pig men serve at the pleasure of the state. To the tune of nearly $4 billion in gifts over the last ten years. And countless lobbyist and private sector jobs for retired officials of the state. The revolving door of corruption. Including plenty in the current administration and Congress such as the Clinton's daughter working at a hedge fund, the former head of the Senate banking committee as now vice chairman of UBS and the current White House chief of staff minting millions as an investment banker with absolutely no qualifications or experience but lots of political connections. It's good to be the king. Not much longer though.

Big budget deficits weren't possible until Washington destroyed interstate banking laws in the 1970s - usurping powers of the states. We now have an environment where the federal government is bailing out the mega banks and the mega banks are in return bailing out the government by buying their debt. It has got to be the biggest Ponzi scheme in this country's history. We wrote of this before but for some reason, it isn't getting any press anywhere. I remain very surprised no one is writing about this.

There is no way to reduce risk without repudiating current economic ideology. Bureaucrats and banksters are simply transferring risk back and forth in a game of monetary badminton. The state bails out banks. The banks bail out the state. The state bails out banks. The banks bail out the state. Washington and Wall Street malfeasance and moral bankruptcy has destroyed the economy. And, now politicians responsible for said behavior are to the rescue? That is hilarious if it weren't so frightening.

So let's follow last weekend's post on interstate banking laws and go a step further. Do you think the government could play such fiscally irresponsible games with our money if we had free markets in the banking sector? Can you imagine if interstate banking laws were again passed to encourage banking competition and to remove systemic risk? That means only small and medium-sized banks would compete in the market. A distributed financial sector we have talked about as a better solution to distribute capital at the point of need. There would be no need to bail out mega banks because there wouldn't be any. Would a local community banker be funding Washington's meddling power games around the world or would they finance trade that moved a local manufacturing plant in that community to some far off land? Hardly. These are the games of the pig men and politicians. A local banker would never support such an endeavor because a) propping up Washington malfeasance would not benefit his or her business or society and b) sending a factory to a far off land would negatively impact his or her business and likely impact local friends and relatives in the community. It would be economic suicide.

What is truly amazing is that the government believes handing out other people's money as favors is going to solve a problem caused by too much handing out of other people's money for favors. A substantial root cause of the problem is Washington malfeasance. More of Washington surely isn't the answer. At least not more of Washington in its current form. More of a Washington that serves the people might be a step in the right direction. That isn't even close to a reality today. A return to State's Rights are part of an economic solution to unchecked Washington power which has led to this crisis. Yet now we have the Department of Homeland Security issuing terrorist alerts citing people espousing views of State's Rights are possible right wing extremists. Please spare me the absurdity. I guess our government no longer embraces freedom of thought or speech or timeless Jeffersonian ideals. Are we ready to tear down the Jefferson Memorial and instead embrace a memorial to fear mongering and attacks on civil liberties? I am surely not right wing or left wing or any wing by any stretch of the imagination and surely not an extremist. But then this really isn't about right wing or left wing or freedom. It's about power and control. And labels such as right wing or fanatic are used as a form of attack to marginalize dissent and intellectual thought so critical to democracy. It's a form of modern day book-burning. Something that seems to be in vogue with many politicians. In a democracy, dissent is embraced by its leadership. It is how we resolve crises, hone the blade of peer review and embrace intellectual thought. Progressive ideals seeking to empower the people have always been attacked by the status quo as were Susan B. Anthony, Martin Luther King, Thomas Jefferson, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and countless others who agitated for change. No. Anyone who has studied the history of the state realizes that controlling dissent is about power and fear not morality or liberty.

Washington and their pig men are unaccountable to the sovereign. All one needs to see this is the economic policy of the last generation and the utterly corrupt responses to this crisis. We need new leaders, substantially greater transparency into Wall Street and Washington to know what seamy games are being played with our government, a return to State's Rights to check power in Washington and a return to the rule of law. Our rule of law has often been dismantled by those seeking power and personal gain over the betterment of this country's citizens. Washington is the last and greatest monopoly and the awakening to this fact has begun. All things will pass in due time.

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posted by TimingLogic at 9:57 AM