Making billions off the taxpayer dime.
Janet destroys Uncle Warren for bailout hypocrisy and throws a punch at Berkshire's Charlie Munger for general TARP stupidity.
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Warren Buffett Jumped the Squid
By Janet Tavakoli
Fed Economists Gara Afonso and Anna Kovner with MIT finance professor Antoinette Schoar offer new evidence suggesting that although credit terms were tougher for large underperforming banks in the two days after Lehman's bankruptcy, the much-hyped market "freeze" was a myth.
Thomas Paine, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, urged Colonists not to trust the words of "interested men" tied by money and status to British royalty.
Today's interested men defend the bailouts and subsequent absence of felony indictments.
Munger says we shouldn't be "bitching about a little bailout," we should have wondered why the bailout wasn't even bigger.
These enemies of the people include Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger.
Buffett heaped praise on Berkshire's investments in Goldman and Wells Fargo (among others), while overlooking problematic activities within these bailed-out banks. Warren deserves great credit for donating most of his wealth to charity, but one must deduct serious points because some of "his" wealth was appropriated from unwilling fellow citizens.
Charlie Munger's War
Munger suggests we shouldn't be "bitching about a little bailout;" we should have wondered why the bailout wasn't even bigger.
Taxpayers have already been saddled with crushing debt that transferred benefits to those most connected with Washington. Bloomberg News estimates the financial rescue already approaches $12.8 trillion in combined lending, spending, guarantees, and commitments. Taxpayer-subsidized banks that played a key role in getting us into this mess continue to pay their officers handsomely for failure. There were alternatives to Washington's largesse: controlled bankruptcy, conservatorship, and restructuring.
See: Alternative to Treasury Bailouts: One that does not Violate Democracy
Washington's overheated money printing to support the bailouts has the nation in the grips of stranguflation. Lost jobs and reduced salaries combined with rising food and energy prices feel like hyperinflation to those most in need. Meanwhile, deflation has hit middle class investments and pension funds, and uncertainty about the future leaves them vulnerable. Third World America reveals that some former middle class Americans are using credit cards charging high interest rates to buy essential items including food.
Did Warren Buffett Sell A Million Shares Of Moody's Based On Inside Information?