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McCain blasts Fed for bailing out failed banks
Times Online ^ | September 19, 2008 | Hannah Strange

Posted on 09/20/2008 9:30:11 PM PDT by kingattax

Senator John McCain mounted a fierce attack on the Federal Reserve today for bailing out failed financial institutions, telling it to get back to “its core business of responsibly managing our money supply and inflation”.

Speaking to a business group in Wisconsin as Henry Paulson, the US Treasury Secretary, unveiled details of a government rescue plan that would cost "hundreds of billions of dollars", the Republican presidential nominee said the Fed should “get out of the business of bailouts”.

The Fed engineered an $85 billion takeover of insurance giant AIG earlier this week, before which it pledged to prop up mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to the tune of $200 billion. Today, after consulting with Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, Mr Paulson urged the government to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to take toxic mortgage assets off the books of financial firms to restore financial stability. That call came hard on the heels of an earlier Treasury announcement that Treasury it would siphon up to $50 billion from the country’s Exchange Stabilization Fund for a temporary guarantee program to shore up the U.S. money market mutual fund industry.

Mr McCain’s opposition to the bailouts is a gamble as many within the financial sector – and in the public at large – view the rescues as essential to prevent a wider economic crisis.

(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: aig; banks; economicpolicy; financialcrisis; mccain; mccainpalin; mccaintruthfile
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1 posted on 09/20/2008 9:30:12 PM PDT by kingattax
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To: kingattax

The public knows what this is about and McCain is saying what they are thinking.


2 posted on 09/20/2008 9:32:45 PM PDT by Harry Wurzbach
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To: Harry Wurzbach
the main cause for the Great Depression was the combination of the greatly unequal distribution of wealth throughout the 1920's, and the extensive stock market speculation that took place during the latter part that same decade.

http://www.gusmorino.com/pag3/greatdepression/

3 posted on 09/20/2008 9:33:37 PM PDT by Flavius (war gives peace its security)
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To: kingattax

I like what McCain is saying here. Color me impressed.


4 posted on 09/20/2008 9:34:55 PM PDT by TheWasteLand
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To: kingattax

John should let former headlines do his speaking in future ads. Show where the blame lies and how he recognized and tried to deal with the issue before it became a crisis. Barry is clueless about the economy. Grabbing all the wealth and redistributing it has been a socialist/communist goal for a long time. He can not be allowed to win, and the U.S. has no business using our money to bail out all the businesses that are in trouble now.


5 posted on 09/20/2008 9:35:32 PM PDT by Blogger
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To: kingattax

Amen McCain, the Fed needs to mind the Monetary Policy!! Could Palin be rubbing off?


6 posted on 09/20/2008 9:35:44 PM PDT by ABQHispConservative
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To: Flavius

yeah if you believe the keynesians


7 posted on 09/20/2008 9:35:45 PM PDT by ari-freedom (We never hide from history. We make history!)
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To: kingattax

straight talk....not sure it’s politically possible


8 posted on 09/20/2008 9:36:05 PM PDT by wardaddy (Sandra Bernhard should not be allowed around livestock unsupervised.)
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To: Harry Wurzbach

This is most likely the One and only time I will agree with McQueeg on anything.
On a happier note... GO SARAH!
You da babe!


9 posted on 09/20/2008 9:36:14 PM PDT by acapesket
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To: Flavius

Anyone can make money in America. We may not all be billionaires, but we can do well. The stock market is a bit out of control; however. Redistributing wealth via unfair taxes (you think it won’t happen?) Will KILL the economy. Dead.


10 posted on 09/20/2008 9:37:29 PM PDT by Blogger
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To: Flavius

Surviving banks, unsure of the economic situation and concerned for their own survival, stopped being as willing to create new loans.


11 posted on 09/20/2008 9:38:45 PM PDT by Flavius (war gives peace its security)
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To: kingattax
"the Republican presidential nominee said the Fed should “get out of the business of bailouts”."

Damned right! GO McCain-Palin!!

12 posted on 09/20/2008 9:40:08 PM PDT by Jim Robinson
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To: kingattax

Gotta admin - I’m confused. It seems to me they should fail - but these are supporting financial instruments throughout our economy. Have any economists written a what if scenario if AIG did fail anyway??


13 posted on 09/20/2008 9:41:22 PM PDT by RushingWater (Pres. Bush honors Mexican sovereignty over our own - Pardon Ramos/Campeon/Hernandez)
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To: kingattax

In summary, while blame for this economic fiasco is deservedly widespread, multiculturalism bears a much larger share of the shame than it’s gotten so far.

14 posted on 09/20/2008 9:41:32 PM PDT by wardaddy (Sandra Bernhard should not be allowed around livestock unsupervised.)
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To: kingattax

I’m not convinced that his policy is correct under the unusual circumstances we find ourselves; especially if the whole financial system collapsed. However, it is probably a good political ploy to campaign on this because the general public doesn’t think much of these large banking concerns anyway. Most people believe they are living high off the hog what with their ridiculous compensation, golden parachutes and cronies on the boards of directors. And they are right. The CEOs and their buddies are really incompetent crooks. But whether it would have been wise to have let the whole financial system collapse is something else again. We don’t know at this point whether this will work. And if it doesn’t work and it just starts again McCain will have been proven right both in theory and politically. It will just have been throwing good money at bad. We will have to wait to see what happens. I’m agnostic. We could yet be selling apples on the street corner.

Regardless, something has to be done about the way these large banking concerns have been run. Even the Keystone Cops could have done a better job. Did even one of these clowns actually look to see what kind of crap they were buying? Evidently not.


15 posted on 09/20/2008 9:44:00 PM PDT by RichardW
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To: RushingWater

It would be bad, but necessary. Eventually the market will have to correct itself in the form of a recession/depression but the longer we wait and the more institutions we “bail out” the worse it will be. We’ve been living far beyond our means with a completely consumption based economy that can not sustain itself.


16 posted on 09/20/2008 9:44:10 PM PDT by djsherin
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To: RushingWater
Have any economists written a what if scenario if AIG did fail anyway??

Oh, I imagine at least a rough draft was done at the Fed.

17 posted on 09/20/2008 9:47:04 PM PDT by Moonman62 (The issue of whether cheap labor makes America great should have been settled by the Civil War.)
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To: ABQHispConservative
Amen McCain, the Fed needs to mind the Monetary Policy!!

One of the responsibilities of the Fed is to be the lender of last resort.

18 posted on 09/20/2008 9:48:06 PM PDT by Moonman62 (The issue of whether cheap labor makes America great should have been settled by the Civil War.)
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To: kingattax
I'm listening to Bob Brinker, got in on the tail end of part of his monologue. He said that something in the financial market immediately precipitated what fell out on Thursday. I wish I understood more what he was talking about.

The bailout does not make me happy, and liberals are mad because they are bailing out the big guys who go off with their golden parachutes and leave the little guy out in the cold so to speak. I'm not defending people who borrowed more than they could afford, but I was young once, and reading through all those papers is confusing even if you have some college background. But shouldn't lenders have to be accountable, too?

You know how Hillary liked to tout "it takes a Clinton to clean up after a Bush". Then it came to me that maybe what has happened has turned that on its head. It takes a Bush to clean up after a bunch of Democrats, with Republican enabling, these huge monsters who weren't even real companies. Didn't McCain support some of this himself way back in Congress?

Where would we be now if the Feds hadn't been frantically putting together this package to bail out these institutions?

Then the other side of it, we've been plunged more billions or trillions into debt, and what if these institutions don't start showing in the black and paying some of this back?

I tend to take a gloomy view on things, but either way we lose. It's like a runaway train. Are our leaders really acting for our better good or are they making a desperate gamble to shore up the economy, save face, and prevent a worldwide collapse?

Anybody got ONE fair and balanced link that isn't too complicated to explain what really went down?

19 posted on 09/20/2008 9:49:37 PM PDT by Aliska
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To: djsherin
Eventually the market will have to correct itself in the form of a recession/depression but the longer we wait and the more institutions we “bail out” the worse it will be.

No you don't need a complete meltdown for an effective correction.

We’ve been living far beyond our means with a completely consumption based economy that can not sustain itself.

You're mostly right and eight years of W has made the problem worse.

20 posted on 09/20/2008 9:52:44 PM PDT by Moonman62 (The issue of whether cheap labor makes America great should have been settled by the Civil War.)
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