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A Pig By Any Other Name

by Open-Publishing - Friday 12 September 2008

Edito Trade-Exchange Rates USA Daveparts

By David Glenn Cox

With pseudo-intellectual, sycophantic stealthiness, steeled stiletto daggers of subterfuged surrogates stand stunned, shocked and savaged by serrated subliminal wounds inflicted by non-existent weapons of their own invention. Ask me not what he said for I know what they were thinking!

Meanwhile, back at the pig ranch, another American brokerage house is on the deathwatch. Lehman Brothers is dying and the death rattle has set in. It is now only a question of time before she becomes fodder for the carnivores of Wall Street to feed upon her carcass, now that they have finished with the bones of Bear Stearns.

Wedged in between the story of the Treasury Department taking control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the anticipated failure of Washington Mutual, lies another story. Buried along with the erupting oil scandal in the Interior Department, it becomes easy to see how the story of the collapse of the American banking industry can be overlooked.

We’ve watched as, one by one, American industries have been eviscerated until they weaken and stagger towards collapse. The American electronics industry, the hand tool industry, the industrial equipment industry, and now even the American auto industry go begging, hat-in-hand, to Washington for a loan. Congress should ask, “What have you done with your profits?" earned from generations of success in the American heartland. They will not ask, because the answer is: they invested them overseas to escape the high cost of American production.

While GM fingers the edge of its hat, looking for new money, its divisions overseas move ahead with plans to build new factories in India and China. It’s GM’s North American division that has become its poor relation. While Ford struggles with slow sales in North America, it stands fully against tariffs on foreign autos that might hurt sales of its 51% ownership of Mazda. Chrysler, once one of the truly great American brands, has now been cast aside by her German suitor like a stripper who has grown too old; she typifies the decline of American industry. Not that it can be done better somewhere else, but that it can be done cheaper somewhere else.

A corporate pledge of allegiance to be said: I pledge allegiance to the flag, of the United States of the buck. And to the people who make it work? I just don’t give a fuck!

A collapse in the housing market, a collapse in the auto market and a systemic collapse of the banking industry and the pundits ask: Could we be sliding into a recession? Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were first created to breathe life into a collapsed housing market. The Securities and Exchange Commission and a host of other agencies were established to return faith, lost after the last collapse of American banking system. And government programs to create jobs were the only salvation for the auto industry.

The false ideology of trickle-down, supply-side economics has finally reached the bottom of the hill. A faith-based, Reverend Ike scheme whereby the rich tell the poor, “You too can be rich, if only you wait until I’ve had my fill.” We’re only exporting the jobs Americans don’t want! We’ll create new, high-wage jobs, better jobs, just you wait and see! Why, if we cut taxes for the rich it will prompt more investment to help create those new jobs! We might have to cut back on entitlements to have any hope of balancing the budget!”

The time has come to throw cold water on the pig. When you export jobs you import poverty. When you make other nations prosperous, that wealth must come from somewhere. Want to take a wild guess from where? Importing poverty is an expensive proposition; lower wage workers pay less in all taxes, less in sales tax, less in property tax, and less in income tax.

They cannot help to fix the economy because they have so little part in it. The arrows of the Wal-Mart economy point in only one direction. Until the policies change the United States will grow weaker and weaker. State budgets strain under increased demands and lower revenues. Meanwhile the growth area of the economy will be in collection agencies, repo agents and law enforcement.

The stock market swung yesterday, 340 points first down, 170 then up; 170 as the vultures circled and the chickens in the barnyard ran for cover. Already the talk has begun, Who’s next? J.P. Morgan ? Citi Group? Meanwhile events at Washington Mutual have been described as a walk on the bank as opposed to a run. An orderly disintegration and still the pundits ask, are we slipping into a recession?

I don’t know, what would you call it? Millions of Americans losing their homes, major industries teetering towards bankruptcy, 11 failed banks this year with two more major banks that might not last out the month. The largest mortgage banking institutions in the world taken into receivership by the government. The budget deficit is soaring. Gee, I don’t know; does the word recession cover it?