Big Banks as Beggers

A few years back the big banks went before the government to request to be "bailed out". Basically, they were insolvent and wanted the government to lend them lots of money. This was done under Bush and was called TARP. The theory seemed to be that banks that had made bad loans on mortgages should sell those loans to the government. Treasury Secretary Paulson went before congress and basically told them that the world would end if the government did not buy these loans. Currently, the government owns over 80% of all mortgages because of this program.

YouTube - Congressman Brad Sherman: Martial Law if We Voted No [1]
.

I do hope you watch the whole video, it is only ten minutes. The TARP bill allowed half of our bailouts to go to foreign banks and the truth is, we do not know how much did and will be told. In fact, Federal Reserve Chairman Greenspan later told congress quite specifically that he did not have to tell them and did not. The second really interesting point was that Mr. Sherman pointed out that he was being called by people who worked on Wall Street basically begging for the bail out.

What began this market failure was the deregulation of the banking industry which was strongly supported by Greenspan. Mr. Greenspan did not believe in any financial regulation and was a follower of Ayn Rand. We therefore have two things going on that are fascinating and are largely responsible for our current financial problems. One was the belief that regulating business is wrong and that is why none of these bankers responsible will ever go to jail for the horrible things that they allowed and promoted. If you are a supporter of this "libertarian" perspective (it is not libertarian, it is objectivist and practically a religion) then why regulate begging?

In the past few years cities have put restriction on begging in public. There is one city that is even attempting to outlaw feeding the homeless in City parks or property. The bias seems to be when the poor ask for a handout but not when wealthy supporters ask for one. Think about it this way, millions are losing their homes; but, the people that lent the money after having asked for deregulation were bailed out and put the cost on you and I.

The problem seems to be that there is no justice. Justice is when we are all treated the same regardless of wealth, color, religion or sex. Nope, Mr. Trump summed it up best. He said if you owe someone a thousand dollars, you have a problem; but, if you owe them a Billion dollars, they have a problem. We call this blackmail.