Video: Idiots React to Coronavirus

This….is….excellent: via Paul Joseph Watson on YouTube:

 

From the “You gotta be kidding me” file: House just voted on 2 bills that would undercut new financial regulations

This one somehow snuck past me.

I happen to read on Populist Jim Hightower’s website about this one here and I went and looked it up and sure enough; there it was in black and white:

The story:

WASHINGTON –– To Wall Street, this town might seem like enemy territory. But even as federal regulators and prosecutors extract multibillion-dollar penalties from the nation’s biggest banks, Wall Street can rely on at least one ally here: the House of Representatives.

The House is scheduled to vote on two bills this week that would undercut new financial regulations and hand Wall Street a victory. The legislation has garnered broad bipartisan support in the House, even after lawmakers learned that Citigroup lobbyists helped write one of the bills, which would exempt a wide array of derivatives trading from new regulation.

The bills are part of a broader campaign in the House, among Republicans and business-friendly Democrats, to roll back elements of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, the most comprehensive regulatory overhaul since the Depression. Of 10 recent bills that alter Dodd-Frank or other financial regulation, six have passed the House this year. This week, if the House approves Citigroup’s legislation and another bill that would delay heightened standards for firms that offer investment advice to retirees, the tally would rise to eight.

Both the Treasury Department and consumer groups have urged lawmakers to reject the bills, warning that they could leave the nation vulnerable again to excessive financial risk taking. The House proposals stand little chance of becoming law, having received a much chillier reception in the Senate and at the White Ho

via House, Set to Vote on 2 Bills, Is Seen as an Ally of Wall St. – NYTimes.com.

You believe those greedy bastards? Jim Hightower is not amused and rightly so:

Audio:

[podcast]

Partial Quote:

On the day before Halloween, the ethically-challenged members of our lobbyist-haunted House of Representatives did a perverse imitation of “Profiles in Courage,” turning that body into “Profiles in Spinelessness.”

In particular, they cravenly caved in to an outrageous and dangerous demand by Wall Street whiners. Such financial powerhouses as Citigroup just hate having their profiteering recklessness restrained by the regulatory reforms passed after their 2008 financial meltdown. Even though the shockwaves from that Wall Street collapse continue to devastate America’s middle class, the banking elite have completely recovered – including recovering their swaggering arrogance and ability to sway money-hungry congress critters with rich campaign donations. — Read the rest at Jim Hightower’s site

I am shocked that more Conservatives are not swinging from the trees on this one here! To their credit, there are some Democrat Party house members that are opposed to this bill and rightly so. This is the same idiotic crap that brought down the stock market and killed our economy; thank goodness there is some semblance of sanity up on the hill.

Sure enough the Bill passed the house, But it is not expected to make it through the Senate and the White House has said that they would veto the thing, if it made it to the President’s desk. Which in this instance is a very good thing. However, this is not the point. What is the point is this: Those same bastards who caused the great meltdown of 2008, are now lobbying our Government to put things back as they were, so that this sort of thing could happy again. That my friends is enough to make an economic populist, like myself, to want to bite a nail in two! 😡

The people that caused the Wall Street meltdown and downturn in our economy ought to be brought up on treason charges, and lined up against a wall and shot! 😡 But, instead, they are trying to buy their way back to lawlessness. This my friends, is an outrage.

Great opinion piece on the Federal Reserve Bank by George Will

I highly suggest that you read it.

Quote:

Because Ben Bernanke’s public persona is as mild as milk, the transformation in American governance in which he has participated is imperfectly understood and hence insufficiently deplored. The change is dramatized by two recent developments.

One was the campaigning by several constituencies for and against what supposedly were the two leading candidates — Larry Summers and Janet Yellen — to replace Bernanke as chairman of the Federal Reserve. The Fed can no longer be considered separated from politics.

[….]

The Fed has become the model of applied progressivism, under which power flows to clever regulators who operate independent of political control. The Fed is, however, a creation of Congress, which may not forever refrain from putting a bridle and snaffle on a Fed that increasingly allocates credit, wealth and opportunity.

via George Will: The Fed has become a creature of politics – The Washington Post.

There are some of us, who believe that we should end the fed and go back to the gold standard. I happen to be one of those people.

So, why did gold crash?

I am not an expert on the subject, but I think here might be a good reason as to why:

Who killed the gold?

 

 

In the wake of gold prices cratering in recent days, more than a few prominent experts have already started pinning the blame on Western central banks — especially the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank (ECB). According to numerous analysts, the central bankers are desperate to salvage their fiat currencies and eliminate competition as “monetary authorities” continue to create ever-greater quantities of euros and dollars out of thin air.

Some experts, whistle-blowers, traders, and former officials say the Fed dumped as much as 400 or even 500 tons of “paper gold” on the market — metals that it might not even have — as part of a naked short sale aimed at driving down the prices. Other analysts, especially among the establishment, pointed to the ECB chief’s recent suggestion that struggling European authorities in countries such as Cyprus would have to sell their precious metals to keep receiving bailouts

via After Gold Crash, Experts Point to Central Bank Manipulation.

I do not really want to veer into Alex Jones territory; but it does seem interesting that gold plunges, there’s an attack and the stock market dives too. The events might not be related; but it sure does look a bit suspect to me.

Hope and Change: Government drops probe of possible inside trading by media companies

Hmmmmm… Maybe Cornell West has a point:

The dismissal of an investigation into major media companies suspected of giving clients a sneak peek at crucial data drew great surprise on Wall Street, where traders make their living profiting from blips of information moving at the speed of light. Federal authorities had been pursuing allegations that various media companies — including Bloomberg LP, Thomson Reuters and Dow Jones and Co. — leaked key economic data to select investors, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday. But the investigators dropped the probe, according to the paper, in part because they could not conclusively determine that investors were able to use the advance look at the numbers to extract profits. Wall Street analysts pronounced that explanation baffling, noting that in modern markets — fueled by high-frequency trading and robotic transactions — a mere fraction of a second can be enough to execute trades worth billions of dollars. — Government Drops Insider Trading Probe Of Media Companies, Baffling Investors

How much you want to bet that these companies told Obama, “You want our support? You had better call off your dogs on this probe.” How much you want to bet that this is what went down? I would be willing to bet you a nice steak dinner, with all the trimmings that is what happened here. This is why I did not support the Democrats this time around; because I knew this is what was going to happen. Believe you me, it would not have been any better with Hillary either; she is bought and paid for like the rest of them.

This is why I won’t be voting for Democrats in 2014 or 2016; because they are two sides of the same coin. Bought out, corrupt, self-serving vermin is all that they are, anyone that believes anything else; is crazy.

Trickle down recession

This is what happens when Washington DC scares the living crap out of everyone:

SINGAPORE: Oil prices fell in Asian trade today on signs of weaker US energy demand and as positions hardened in a fiscal showdown in Washington that could push the world’s biggest economy back into recession.

New York’s main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in January was down 16 cents to USD 87.72 a barrel in the morning and Brent North Sea crude for January shed nine cents to USD 108.72.

A weekly US government report released yesterday showed a surge in supplies of gasoline and other products, indicating softer demand in the world’s biggest oil consuming nation.

The supplies of distillates, which include diesel and heating fuel that are closely watched at the onset of winter, rose by three million barrels, while gasoline inventories leaped by 7.9 million barrels, five times more than forecast.

“Oil prices fell… after data showed a huge increase in gasoline stockpiles in the United States last week,” Phillip Futures said in a market commentary.

The political impasse in Washington over avoiding mandatory fiscal cliff of tax increases and spending cuts in January that may toss the US economy back into recession was casting a cloud on sentiment.

via Oil prices down in Asian trade – The Economic Times.

This is what happens when you scare the living crap out of everyone with a chicken match. If you are invested in oil, get out while you can. On the other hand, gas prices are going to come down and for we middle class, that is a very good thing. But, for those in the market, it sucks. Good time to get out of futures and get into gold or something.

Oh yes, and the Democrats are owning this one too.

Good luck with that!

From marketwatch:

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — A council of federal regulators charged with identifying risks to the financial system unanimously voted Tuesday to introduce three proposals urging the Securities and Exchange Commission to impose new regulations on the $2.7 trillion money-market fund industry.

Good luck with all that. There are too many people; left and right making serious millions with the flawed system.

So, don’t expect any changes like this.