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G20 to the rescue, but at a cost to the US and Europe's global influence
lol, of course. People cheer the bailouts a couple of years ago, then are now against more bailouts. Well, what did anyone think would happen when we started bailing everyone out? Now whenever any country or institution is in trouble, they just play the "Armageddon card" - and you have a congress full of idiots in this country who have no idea about finance (some of the questions during the hearings for people like Jamie Dimon do not exactly give one confidence) and don't know how to respond but to throw money at the problem, because anything unpleasant or any sort of difficult decision might mean they may not get re-elected and get all the payoffs from the same institutions who just played the "Armageddon card".
It would continue to appear that the intent is "reflation at all cost", but whether that will be successful is one thing and how many long-term problems that will cause (although that doesn't matter, because all the politicians are only focused on the short-term anyways - eventually, it's another administration's problem.) That said, I still say one should invest with *some* protection against the potential eventuality that the only game plan is reflation at all cost. Things like the above story make me less interested in government bonds.
""Frankly, we are not here to receive lessons in terms of democracy or in terms of how to handle the economy."
Haha - but I'm sure he'll get plenty of lessons from Tim Geithner, who got laughed at by Chinese students and thinks people upset about the debt in this country are "just being political" but still has a great desire to tell everyone else WTF to do.
G20 is dysfunctional. They have all the talk but when it comes to action the action falls short of words. The pledged amounts are tiny. Still G7 is the key to any meaningful effort.
Well now, let's keep an open mind here... I'd almost bet that our housing fiasco would have been not quite so bad if we had let our mortgage taker-outers rate themselves too. On average, they'd probably have been a little more honest than Wall Street was...
Comments
It would continue to appear that the intent is "reflation at all cost", but whether that will be successful is one thing and how many long-term problems that will cause (although that doesn't matter, because all the politicians are only focused on the short-term anyways - eventually, it's another administration's problem.) That said, I still say one should invest with *some* protection against the potential eventuality that the only game plan is reflation at all cost. Things like the above story make me less interested in government bonds.
""Frankly, we are not here to receive lessons in terms of democracy or in terms of how to handle the economy."
Haha - but I'm sure he'll get plenty of lessons from Tim Geithner, who got laughed at by Chinese students and thinks people upset about the debt in this country are "just being political" but still has a great desire to tell everyone else WTF to do.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/europe-launches-ban-all-policy-criticism-scrapping-use-rating-agencies
Plus: "And in the most bizarre of twists, they would prefer if they were allowed to rate themselves:
LAWMAKERS CALL FOR EU TO ISSUE SOVEREIGN CREDIT RATINGS"