It's not just 'em. It's all of us. They are the foundation of the house of cards that is the economy.

__________________
1984 300TD

Well, like I said, these sort of things are par for the course. We have had a good run and now we have lean times. You cannot bulletproof everything and everyone.

__________________
01 Ford Excursion Powerstroke
99 E300 Turbodiesel
91 Vette with 383 motor
05 Polaris Sportsman 800 EFI
06 Polaris Sportsman 500 EFI
03 SeaDoo GTX SC Red
03 SeaDoo GTX SC Yellow
04 Tailgator 21 ft Toy Hauler
11 Harley Davidson 883 SuperLow

Think if they die that there assets will evaporate?

I think Krugman made an excellent case. If the banks can't find shareholders -- private citizens willing to buy stock for a share of ownership -- the taxpayer should get those shares of ownership if it is providing the funds. Doesn't have to be forever but some aspects of banking (credit default swaps) have gotten bizarre and foolish behavior should not be rewarded with free money.

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

Carter supposedly never actually used the word "malaise" but I will.

There is a malaise among many in our country, such that the highest goal they've set is to be rich - rich, I tell you, no matter how they do it. Having a good idea that people gratefully shower with money or doing it the old fashioned way by providing products and services in an outstanding manner are somewhat passe.

And so we have characters like Milken and Ivan Boesky and the characters taking home 6 and 7 figure checks on the proceeds of peddling credit default swaps.

Not a lot of rhyme or reason to the money but oh boy, it buys products that actually have value, products in which real skill and labor were devoted. Thus the value of money deteriorates. Sort of like counterfeiting.

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

I think if they die, there will be no one to buy assets, of which there are few anyway.
In this economy, wealth is created by promise of payment. If no one will believe the promise, wealth isn't created.

__________________
1984 300TD

Their assets dried up, thats why they died.

Not the other way around.

__________________

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
Jimi Hendrix

The true problem is greed, gluttony, pride, envy lust, sloth, and maybe some anger.

And my personal belief, that the wellspring of the 7 deadly sins in man is his fear.

Fear is the true problem.

The true answer is compassion.

__________________

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
Jimi Hendrix

There will be buyers, just not at current market prices. That is what these plans do, BTW, prop-up inflated, unrealistic prices. If prices fall to the amount people are willing to pay then shazzam! Buyers will appear. So what it it's pennies on the dollar?

But let's go with yours and Krugman's plans. Why wont you greedy bastids send me stock certificates for all of these banks and other companies that we, the taxpayers, have bought? I don't mind fractional shares, just send them to me and let me worry about managing my own portfolio.

If we are agreed that the current management is not competent, and Congress is incompetent (when was the last time the gov was debt-free in the USA?), then who ya gonna call?

Don't forget sloth.

This ignore feature is really an amazing thing.

Look at the double header response by Bot right after mine.
And I am sure at least one of them is some sort of personall attack on me,
made in such a way as to barely slip under the forum rules.

Well at least we can count up another mark on the troll meter.

__________________

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
Jimi Hendrix

The whole financial market is caught up. There are going to be very few buyers capable of buying. Very few of them are going to be capable of lending, which is the real problem. If the government got into the lending business, then these guys can fail all the way to heck. Like I said, wealth is created by the promise of payment. It's not as simple as if a car company goes down.

Here's two reasons why. As a small investor, you don't have any power. You can't get rid of the board or the CEO or demand operational change. The sedond reason why is that as a private stockholder, you are not motivated to save the economy. Your motivation is to protect yourself. It's a reasonable motivation to be sure, but not one conducive to bringing the economy back on its feet.

I would call the Treasury Dept., who is full of Geithners who are bestest buds with the SOBs who screwed us all, because those are the only people who get treasury jobs because money is power. Then I would hope that somewhere, someone would put some reasonable (ie pandering) rules in place to shamelessly garner public support and votes.

__________________
1984 300TD

Actually either solution works, but the "let em all go bankrupt" approach requires an economy in turmoil, mass unemployment and business stagnation for a decade or so, as we saw in the thirties, before all the rainbow stew and free bubble-up starts flowing again. I've heard mass employment is politically unpopular, in fact, history shows it many times leads to a very broke and unhappy populace who may turn to socialism of a much worse kind, essentially what FDR prevented by regulating capitalism back in the '30s. Krugman is merely pointing out how to quickly restore liquidity to the economy, which could very well prevent the bad stuff. Afterall, the man did not win his Nobel by spending his time posting on car OT forums, so we know he's not an idiot.

Getting a Nobel in economics means you are automagically right, huh?

Resolve Milton Freidman's Nobel with Krugmans. When you figure that out, get back to me. until then, I'll just ignore arguments based on an award.