politico post

So....RTL and Ancient Sons (it's armeniacapalooza!) at West Capitol Bowl tonight. Go to this show. It will be fun. I will be out of town. Also, if you don't agree that West Sac is the Best Sac, Baby Grand is having their CD release show at Old I. And will be on NPR today at 2, right? I'll link to the archive of that later.

I was listening to wednesday's Democracy Now this morning, and they have these two economists on who were tearing shit up. Here's the link to the transcript. I found it interesting that they are the only ones I've heard disagreeing with the media party line that the government HAD TO bail out AIG. This was my favorite part:

AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, John McCain tried to strike a populist tone on the campaign trail. 

SEN. JOHN McCAIN: While employees, shareholders and other victims are left with nothing but trouble and debt, the people who helped cause the collapse make off with tens of millions in severance packages. Disgraceful. I’ve spoken out against the excess of corporate executives, and I can assure you that if I’m president, we’re not going to tolerate that anymore.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Hudson? 

MICHAEL HUDSON: That’s his constituency. His constituency are the people who have caused the crisis. That’s who he’s representing. Now, of course, you’re not going to come in and say, “I’m going to support the people who have caused this crisis at your expense.” If you’re going to bail out your constituency, you’re going to say exactly the opposite. So what he’s saying has no reality at all. 

These are the people who sang, “There’s no money for Social Security. We’re going to have to privatize it. We’re going to have to turn over your Social Security to Bear Stearns, to AIG”—to the very people who have shown how they’re mismanaging money. Imagine if the Republican program had gone through and Social Security had been privatized and these were the jokers who were managing your Social Security. They’d stick you with the losses. 

So, these are his constituency. He knows he’s not telling the truth. He’s not paid to tell the truth. He’s pretending that it’s a crisis that has to be bailed out, that it’s the financial system. But it’s not the financial system that’s being bailed out; it’s the debt system. And it’s the debts that the homeowners own and the industry owns. And now the government is coming on the side of the creditors, who are going to close down the industries, sell them off to pay the debts, foreclose on the houses, sell them off to pay the debts. And the economy is going to shrink and shrink. That’s the program that they’re standing for.