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WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
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Topic Author's Original Post - Sep 24, 2008 - 02:04pm PT
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Right now, this day the MSM could do its job; they could research the facts about the present economic turmoil we are in. Media investigators should go back to the beginning and trace the evolution of the problem to the present. They could spot all the decisions, the votes, those in Congress and the administrations that were negligent, corrupted by outside influence etc. They could determine who saw and tried to stop the coming problem and who blocked their efforts. They could lay out the entire scenario from beginning to the present and put it before the American people. The media's responsibility is to keep us informed so that we can make informed judgments about important issues. They could report and let the chips fall where they may. However,`it doesn't appear that's going to happen. No wonder the MSM isn't taken seriously anymore.
All we get is the blame game between the two parties, backing and filling by both parties and ass covering by both parties while the media does nothing more than pass the BS along to us. What a pathetic performance by all of them.
The media is as corrupted as the government, form left to right. They have their political agendas, friends in the government and investments in other issues that determine how they report.
We have become so polarized in the US, that there is no institution that is trusted anymore. Even if a comprehensive, accurate and objective report was published, it would probably not be accepted by either side because, to a degree, each side would find themselves culpable; and they won't accept any responsibility. It's always got to be the evil and incompetence of the other side.
Hold on to your seats because these inept, corrupt and cowardly individuals are now responsible for getting us out of this mess.
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dirtineye
Trad climber
the south
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Sep 24, 2008 - 02:43pm PT
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Well you are a certainly right about corruption in congress playing a MAJOR role in this.
Thye have their hands out, and big biz filled em with money as well as the legislation they wanted passed.
FOr one example:
60 Minutes interviewed a lot of the pathetic shills, aka your congressmen, who allowed the drug companies to stop the government, which runs the two biggest medical insurers, medicaid and medicare, from negotiating prices on drugs, like EVERY OTHER INSURANCE COMPANY in the country does for it's clients.
ALL the interviewees were smug. ALL who worked to pass this abomination against the American people are now working as lobbyists for drug companies, unless they are still in congress.
Interestingly, the dems tried to overturn this part of the bill in 2006, but couldn't get the 60 votes needed to stop a filibuster.
Things should be different after the 08 election.
Keep in mind this is just one small (but with huge effect) example.
IN other news, it turns out that the potentially largest bankruptcy in history will happen in jeffereson country, alabama, because the idiot county commisioners took very bad advice from a wall streeet firm to do a bond deal with variable rate interest.
Now it shows up that ALL the commissioners took bribes in many forms from these wall streeters to get involved with this bad deal.
THE wall streeters want the tax payers to pay. They want people who are not even on the jeffco sewer system to pay.
The wall streeters don't want to accept any responsibility for offering a very bad deal-- they want all their money.
So many politicians are so corrupt, as a general rule, hell it is not a few bad apples spoiling the barrel, it's a few good apples turning rotten by being in that barrel with the hundreds of rotten ones.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Sep 24, 2008 - 02:46pm PT
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There's not much investigative reporting anymore, due to the massive disinvestment by major dailies, weeklies, and networks, all of which are bleeding red ink.
Consumers want infotainment, so they read Drudge or Huffington. Advertisers want those consumers, so they take their dollars elsewhere. And the big, old families that for years were willing to subsidize marginal or unprofitable but respectable editorial outfits have disappeared, replaced by a new breed who want to see returns on their financial dollars or who wish to run partisan operations for eventual patronage returns.
We saw this clearly in the run-up to the most recent war, which took place after most of the major news outlets had shut down all of their overseas offices. Reporting in the 1990s became, and remains today, heavily centered on press briefings conducted by partisan players for partisan advantage.
There are still good, serious investigative journalists, especially in the political fields, but they are under- or unemployed and funded. Investigative work is slow, tedious, expensive, and not guaranteed to pay off.
But I don't know that it would matter. The philosophical differences here are so stark, that I doubt any empirical data could convince free market fundamentalists or critics of banking deregulation. Worse, the basic problem is that NO ONE knows what the hell is in those toxic assets or precisely how they were acquired/traded. For a start, a corporation's internal records are private and not available to outside investigators except under legal duress. That means we have to rely on what insiders tell us. But the insiders don't believe a word of what they're hearing from the other insiders. So the usual sort of investigative reporting--phone calls to well-placed friends inside--is not going to be easy. Enron was bad enough-- right up to the sudden collapse, Business Week, WSJ, and Fortune were running puff pieces on the brilliance of Ken Lay. This is geometrically bigger and more complicated, and would require a geometrically greater investment to sort out.
This is going to take years and years and years, and we'll never, ever get a thorough inside look.
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Ouch!
climber
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Sep 24, 2008 - 03:10pm PT
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It started when we traded the ability to read and think, for 10 second soundbytes on TV and radio, where one piece of fabricated bullshit can completely reverse 10% of the electorate.
There are still some good news people out there but they are simply pissing into the wind to all us single issue selfish voters.
We have all been betrayed but we sat on our asses and allowed it to happen. Maybe we had it too good for too long.
When I think of everything that has transpired during my lifetime, I should have been around for centuries.
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WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 24, 2008 - 04:29pm PT
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Wobblies Ouch! You have been around for at least one century.
In my life: two weeks in the Depression and it was awful. The second World War; I actually remember bits and pieces, particularly VJ Day; Korean War; Sputnik; Moon Landing; Vietnam and disorder; all the Cold War; race riots; civil rights and South blows; more riots over something or other; more race riots; Vietnam protests; Hippies(ugh!); drugs getting out of hand; feminists and free love which was great for the guys and really dumb for the girls in the long run; culture wars and on and on. For pretty much my entire life it's been turmoil.
If I had a time machine, I drop back to Rome and spend my final days in a moderate sized villa overlooking the Med and have a few really pretty slave girls ( I would treat them so well they'd refuse my freeing them. ) There would be some guy slaves too, but they'd work outside. I think the time of Trajan would be about right. I could spend my days lolling about, eating brazed Peacock, hearts of swallows etc. I could entertain myself by enjoying the sight of the ladies and getting a daily massage.
Now and then, I would take the girls into town for a day at the Colosseum for some light entertainment. It sounds great.
Too bad I don't have a time machine.
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Ouch!
climber
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Sep 24, 2008 - 04:34pm PT
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Woody, it just seems that long. My brothers were in CCC and WPA.
I might have been a Wobblie, given the chance.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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Sep 24, 2008 - 04:56pm PT
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Woody, I wholeheartedly agree with you. I would love to read a well thought out and documented article on how we got into this situation. So far all I have seen is rhetoric and a rush rush rush to make a decision. I think we are making a grave mistake with this bailout.
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WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 24, 2008 - 04:57pm PT
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Damn it Locker, where are my shoes? You just can't get good help these days.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Sep 24, 2008 - 05:43pm PT
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Locker,
He'll have to make a trip out there so you can slap some rubber on the bottom of his cast. He's already worn a hole in it "speed cruching"
As far as his shoes go, you only need do the right one.
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Gary
climber
Desolation Basin, Calif.
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Sep 24, 2008 - 06:14pm PT
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Wobblies? Gotta love 'em. They had a great sense of humor.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Sep 30, 2008 - 05:50pm PT
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There has been a multi part series on the front page of IBD. more info than most will dig thru.
This explains it in the first seven minutes. The last couple are just politics.
It's worth pausing it and checking out a few of the charts.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5699325917330021087&vt=lf&hl=en
Might not be up to long. It keeps geting pulled by those that don't want it seen.
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