Good one. How the heck do we communicate this to the public? Congress does not care.

Great catches as always. You find news few other people notice and show how important it is -- I wish we had more Genesis's!

The SEC, FDIC and Fed are I believe independent of Congress except for the Senate's confirmation of key people. Although if a senator is sufficiently motivated any of these can be manipulated through threatened legal action. See http://www.slate.com/id/2087640/ for a brief synopsis of how Joe Lieberman rallied the Senate into bullying the FASB to ignore stock-option accounting ethics.

Meanwhile OCC and OTS are directly under Treasury.

I'm not trying to exonerate Congress by any shot. They don't want to own it so they don't touch it and we all lose. I agree completely with you that the people have to make them own it whether they touch it or not.

The formality of it is however that, unlike the Executive, Congress has no nuanced ability to affect these agencies. It only has clubs, those being the threat of legal action and the threat of funding cuts. The Executive has more immediate power than Congress to affect how these agencies operate.

The threat of filing bills to take away their punch bowl is a more powerful "incentive" than anything else.

I can't connect to the ticker.

Any problem? Or is it on my end?

Looks like a temporary routing problem; give it a few minutes and try again.

You need some friends in mainstream media. I think this is just about as big a problem with the media as it is with the congress. Get Russert all oiled up and ready to go on some of these issues, see if people don't start thinking. Just imagine if Karl was Russert's producer. For a few weeks ratings would go up and then after that they wouldn't be able to get Sunday morning guests.

I emailed Fishers remarks to my local newspaper - St Louis Post - business writer. Did not even receive a reply. I have sent stuff to my congressman, no reply. I don't have time in my day running a company, originating loans, taking care of my children, etc. - but if someone were to put together something resembling the million man march in size to protest this BS, well count me in for that. I'll show up in DC. I'll take 3 days off.

I think it just about has come time for the pitchforks and torches. I'm not ready to get the bucket of tar and bag of feathers but I'm close.

Spreads between IB debt and treasuries have reduced since March....does this mean that they will have to unwind "other comprehensive income"?

Quote:

The election will come and whoever takes office will preside over an all-on economic meltdown; the solution out of Congress will be protectionism to "stop the greedy bastards that are destroying our country", whether it be in oil or other imports. The lessons of Smoot-Hawley will be relearned, and more.

The question I have is - why would ANYONE want to be President in 2008? Are they all too stupid to know what is coming down? Or do they think they can keep the plates spinning for another 4 years?

Quote:

...why would ANYONE want to be President in 2008? ...[D]o they think they can keep the plates spinning for another 4 years?

I suspect that they think that the economy will be on the upswing by 2011, so they'll be able to run for re-election as the person who "cured the recession."

I'd take the job, based on that theory.

Yeah, I think Obama is smooth enough to lay the blame on previous administrations. He'd be real smooth if he took the blame all the way back to guns and butter in the 60's with LBJ. Blame it on all administrations from then to now.

The problem is how can he do that and lay the blame in the past and still try to appease everyone with a bigger government philosophy. Gov't health care. Hell we can't afford what we have.

I'd really like to be able to figure out how this will end because I at this point would seriously consider telling everybody to **** off and just make the cash and leave. Watching these idiots at rally's talking about how the government needs to provide healthcare and thinking that then it will be free just blows my ****ing mind. Find me a hundred thousand doctors that want to work for free and then maybe we can talk about it. Until then someone has to pay the ****ing bill.

You can either figure out how it all ends or you can do your damndest to stop it.

go talk to former President Carter about that theory. . . . . Reagan won by a landslide. . . . . .

I will soon be posting questions (first pinned thread on "breaking news") for the house hearing on BSC. Although house still expects a hearing, Chairman Franks has not yet responded to second request for hearing. While we wait, I have been asked to "participate" in legislation being written to "reign in" the Fed. I hope some congressmen will find the courage to push this forward in a bi-partisan way. Only time will tell and/or if it will be too late. However, I continue to remind them, via links about CDS, of the urgency. I send as much info as I can, walking a fine line between them listening to me or tuning me out.

Mr. D:

Do you REALLY think anyone in positions of leadership is really listening to the things you and a handful of others are saying?

BTW: You mentioned the Mayflower Compact and socialism in one sentence. Would you elaborate on how/why it was the new world's first flirtation with socialism? I'm curious because it was never mentioned as such when I was in school twenty years ago (actually, it was barely mentioned at all).

As always, good analysis.

Thanks for sharing it.

John

1) squeeze equity from their houses -- without the burden of monthly payments. One new product offers a one-time payment. In exchange, the company shares in as much as 50% of any future gain or loss in the property's value, typically collecting proceeds when the house is sold."

2) Moody's implied-ratings group paints a completely different picture. Using CDS market prices, Munves's unit assigns implied ratings of Caa1 to both MBIA and Ambac. That's seven notches below junk and 15 below the official Moody's rating."

3) "Merrill Lynch & Co., Citigroup Inc. and four other U.S. financial companies have used an accounting rule adopted last year to book almost $12 billion of revenue after a decline in prices of their own bonds. The rule, intended to expand the 'mark-to- market' accounting that banks use to record profits or losses on trading assets, allows them to report gains when market prices for their liabilities fall."

-----------

The Second Great Depression is coming.

Templar, you can either be part of a solution or you are part of the problem.

Obviously you think that whining and complaining is a "solution." My answer to you: If you're going to take that perspective you're entitled, but around here and especially in the threads in "Ticker" if this is your perspective you need to sit down and shut up.

As for Thanksgiving, try here:

http://musings.denninger.net/2006/11/tru....

Gen,

Are you getting anywhere close to pitchforks and torches yourself? Or do you truly see a way to influence what is otherwise inevitable - to keep it from happening. Cause if its pitchforks and torches I'll meet you there. I wonder how close you can get to the Capital before they arrest you.

BTW - I'm talking my book. I'm long pitchforks and torches. ;)

I don't believe in the "no win" scenario.

I do believe that we may get the worst of all possible outcomes, but if we do, it will be precisely due to people like the poster above who prefer to sit and whine instead of act.

What an excellent way to start my Monday: the Ticker. By coincidence, I live in an Olen property here in Las Vegas; Igor's suite when he comes to town is literally 30 feet from my balcony. I have not seen him lately and the windows haven't been cleaned in quite some time.

On to the FED. Are they broke? Anyway, at least some of the "Hide the Sausage" game has been actually put in the mainstream media.

Finally, in a prior post, Karl said: "I do believe that we may get the worst of all possible outcomes".

I choose to substitute the word WILL for MAY. And this is not sitting or whining; nothing can stop what WILL happen; the system must be completely sanitized regardless of the consequences. Then we can perhaps actually trust a balance sheet or cash flow statement. Not shower humans with millions of dollars for mediocre performance.

i wouldn't necessarily call the ECB liars. given what's going on in the markets and economy, the normal reaction is to lower rates so the fact that they're not raising rates means that while inflation is an issue, clearly the economy/markets are in trouble.

the wrong move is to raise rates at this point in time because the economy is weaker than inflation is strong.

Wrong Team.

Price inflation inevitably leads to either wage inflation or economic collapse. You HAVE TO take the recession that you bred with overly-loose monetary policy and the sooner you do so the less TOTAL damage you receive.

Gen....

Genesis:

You took the wrong meaning from my earlier post. I was referring to the futility of your calls for action, not that the calls were flawed. Yes, we need to return to honest numbers, not accounting gimmicks, for these folks, even if it means a lot of people finally take the bath they so richly deserve.

If I disagreed with your outlook on things, I certainly wouldn't be spending any valuable time here.

Thanks for the info about the MF.

John

There is no futility to action.

You can lose, but action is never futile.