Clubbing the Bailout

The Club for Growth condemned the massive government bailout proposed by the Treasury and the Bush administration as unnecessary, unfair to taxpayers, and fraught with serious costs to the American economy

Eighteen months into the credit crunch, many largely capitalized financial services firms are experiencing serious difficulties but the overall economy continues to grow. GDP growth over the past 12 months was 2.25 percent and 3.5 percent when excluding the drag imposed by the housing sector. Even within the financial sector, many banks are doing well.

Regional bank indices had risen significantly since the lows of last July-prior to the bailout announcement-and thousands of community banks are thriving. It is extraordinary that a massive government intervention in the economy is considered inevitable when the economy is not even in a recession.

At the same time, socializing economic risks come at a great cost to the American economy by misallocating capital, inviting political manipulation, and putting taxpayers on the hook for possibly a trillion dollars. Such a large takeover by the government will surely be accompanied by adverse, unintended consequences. Already, other companies and industries are lining up at government's door asking for their own bailout. And if the government incurs $700 billion in debt to finance the purchase of bad bank assets, the danger that it will eventually monetize that debt and trigger dramatic inflation is very worrisome

"The Treasury's bailout proposal will likely cause more harm than good," said Club for Growth President Pat Toomey. Instead of launching the largest government bailout since the Great Depression, the government should be implementing policies to stimulate the economy. These include, at a minimum, cutting the tax on capital gains, cutting corporate taxes, reviewing and considering repeal of FAS 57 which requires banks to mark-to-market most securities, and emphasizing the need for a strong dollar."

"Finally, many politicians are using the current struggle to make free-market capitalism the scapegoat for the economy's troubles, when in fact, government played a major role in getting us into this mess in the first place. Free-market capitalism is alive and well, and we should be embracing its tenets, not rejecting them."

Source

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Why Henry Paulson must be "contained"

Both parties in Washington are about to screw us over on an unprecedented scale. They are threatening us with fiscal apocalypse if we don't fork over $700 billion to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and allow him to dole it out to whomever he chooses in whatever amount he chooses - without public input or recourse. They are rushing like mad to cram this Mother of All Bailouts down our throats in the next 72-96 hours. And right there in the text of the proposal is this naked power grab: "Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency."

Stop. My question for fellow conservatives: Do you trust this man? I don't. Do you trust Hank Paulson's judgment? I don't. Listen to what he said about the subprime crisis in April 2007:

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said... the housing market correction appears to be at or near its bottom and that troubles in the subprime mortgage market will not likely spread throughout the economy. "We've clearly had a big correction in the housing market. Retail housing was growing for some time at a level that was not sustainable," Paulson said in a speech to The Committee of 100, a business group in New York promoting better Chinese relations. "I don't see (subprime mortgage market troubles) imposing a serious problem. I think it's going to be largely contained," he added.

Much more here

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Former Clinton Staffers Jump to McCain Camp

MSNBC reports on the former Hillary staffers now supporting McCain and making strong arguments against The One. One must wonder if (officially) pro-Obama Hillary urged these loyal staffers to not do this. It would be unusual for Clinton loyalists to do something against her wishes. Some gems from the former Clinton supporters:

"Obama really doesn't have the experience," said Miguel Lausell, senior national political advisor to Hillary Clinton. "We don't know what he's going to be doing. We don't really know where he's coming from, and that's the big difference."

Luchy Secaira, former Sen. Hillary Clinton Delegate-at-Large, said that stance on women's issues is all talk and no action. Secaira said that Obama's rhetoric on the Equal Pay Act is not backed up with hiring practices in his Senate office. "We need to look no further than Sen. Obama's own senate office, where it's been documented that he pays women less on his staff than males on his staff," said Secaira. "He talks the talk but doesn't walk the walk."

"The Hispanic community has nothing to fear, because they know John McCain," Secaira added. "He has fought against his own party on behalf of the Hispanic community and was an integral part in trying to bring forth comprehensive immigration reform."

Source

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ELSEWHERE

Has Sarah swung Mac on ANWR? "Alaska's congressional delegation seemed confident that if Sen. John McCain wins the presidency, he would sign off on a bill opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development. There are, however, a lot of ifs. The race for the White House is neck and neck, and Congress doesn't have a bill giving the go-ahead to oil development in Alaska's far north."

Inquest into British police shooting: Police ruled victim out as suspect 20 mins before they shot him! "Jean Charles de Menezes was ruled out as a suspected suicide bomber just 20 minutes before he was shot dead by police, an inquest into his death has heard. The innocent Brazilian was killed on a Tube train at Stockwell Underground station on July 22, 2005 after being mistaken for one of the four terrorists who had tried to blow themselves up on London's transport system the previous day. Two firearms officers who shot him in the head a total of seven times at point blank range have said they were "convinced" Mr de Menezes was about to detonate a suicide bomb and that "an instant killing was the only option" otherwise "everyone in the carriage was going to die". Yet an officer in the Metropolitan Police control room directing the surveillance teams who followed Mr de Menezes made a note which said: "Not identical male as above discounted. Surveillance to withdraw to original positions."

Another Dem talking point proven false: "The Democrats want you to believe that the Iraq War turned the world -- especially the Muslim world -- has turned against us because we toppled an evil killer of Muslims. Their prescription was to pull out our troops. So how do we explain this from the Jordan Times? AMMAN - Jordanian Muslims' support for Osama Ben Laden has dropped dramatically this year, with only 19 per cent expressing confidence in Al Qaeda leader, compared to 61 per cent three years ago, according to a study.

For more postings from me, see OBAMA WATCH (2), TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and Paralipomena

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The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialist) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party" (In German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei)

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