Chupacabra Report

News that gets my goat..

-While we were busy getting ready for Ike last week, bad weather of another sort was blowing down Wall Street. I actually heard an economist the other day on NPR say that “things today aren’t as bad as in 1929.” Is that scary or what?!

Yesterday the Dow Jones average crawled back up above 11,000 on news that Treasury Secretary Paulsen was looking to resurrect the Resolution Trust Corporation to manage the debris from this financial meltdown. Remember the RTC? It was created by Congress to manage the Savings and Loan Crisis, a greed-fueled scandal from the Reagan era that ultimately cost taxpayers one hundred and twenty-five billion dollars ($200 billion in 2008 dollars.) This new round of bail-outs will easily surpass one trillion dollars, making this the most expensive week in American history. This is a hangover that will last for years.

-I recently heard Senator Obama promise to crack down on predatory lenders. I think this issue could get legs. Predatory lenders have been a key GOP constituency for years. Think pawnshops and payday lenders, who have their own Republican legislators in the Texas Statehouse. Hell, our Governor Rick Perry gave millions from his tax-funded Enterprise Fund to Countrywide Mortgage, the biggest sub-prime lender of them all, to create telemarketing jobs pushing onerous mortgages on unsophisticated homebuyers. Back when Countrywide was circling the bowl, they sent me a mailing offering to refinance my mortgage into a forty-year loan. Sure!

Fasten your seatbelts folks, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride.