by Ellen Brown
Hat tip: web of debt
March 18th, 2010
As the states’ credit crisis deepens, four states have initiated bills for state-owned banks, and candidates in seven states have now included that solution in their platforms.
“Hundreds of job-creating projects are still on hold because Michigan businesses and entrepreneurs cannot get bank financing. We can break the credit crunch and beat Wall Street at their own game by keeping our money right here in Michigan and investing it to retool our economy and create jobs.”
–Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero in the Detroit News, May 9, 2010
Struggling with 14% unemployment, Michigan has been particularly hard hit by the nation’s economic downturn. Virg Bernero, mayor of the state’s capitol and a leading Democratic candidate for governor, proposes that the state relieve its economic ills by opening a state-owned bank. He says the bank could protect consumers by making low-interest loans to those most in need, including students and small businesses; and could help community banks by buying mortgages off their books and working with them to fund development projects.
Bernero joins a growing list of candidates proposing this sensible solution to their states’ fiscal ills. Local economies have collapsed because of the Wall Street credit freeze. To reinvigorate local business, Main Street needs a heavy infusion of credit; and publicly-owned banks could fill that need.
March 19th, 2010 | Posted in Web-Only Content | Read More »
by Staff (of Daily Bell) Report
hat tip: Daily Bell
Monday, March 15, 2010
China has succumbed to hubris. It has mistaken the soft diplomacy of Barack Obama for weakness, mistaken the US credit crisis for decline, and mistaken its own mercantilist bubble for ascendancy. There are echoes of Anglo-German spats before the First World War, when Wilhelmine Berlin so badly misjudged the strategic balance of power and over-played its hand. Within a month the US Treasury must rule whether China is a “currency manipulator”, triggering sanctions under US law. This has been finessed before, but we are in a new world now with America’s U6 unemployment at 16.8%. “It’s going to be really hard for them yet again to fudge on the obvious fact that China is manipulating. Without a credible threat, we’re not going to get anywhere,” said Paul Krugman (pictured left), this year’s Nobel economist. China’s premier Wen Jiabao is defiant. … “Some say China has got more arrogant and tough. Some put forward the theory of China’s so-called triumphalism’. My conscience is untainted despite slanders from outside,” he said. Days earlier the State Council accusing America of serial villainy. “In the US, civil and political rights of citizens are severely restricted and violated by the government. Workers’ rights are seriously violated,” it said. “The US with its strong military power has pursued hegemony in the world, trampling upon the sovereignty of other countries and trespassing their human rights,” it said. “At a time when the world is suffering a serious human rights disaster caused by the U.S. subprime crisis-induced global financial crisis, the U.S. government revels in accusing other countries.” And so forth. Is the Politiburo smoking weed? – UK Telegraph
Dominant Social Theme: The Chinese are acting uppity. Too bad for them.
Free-Market Analysis: So China and the West are headed for a protectionist spat over an under-performing yuan? We have some difficulty believing this. China and America in particular have a 21st century symbiotic relationship, though the hostile posturing may be helpful to the political classes. In fact, the rhetoric has apparently been kicked up a notch, according to the Telegraph, as follows: “Beijing [has shown a] willingness to up the ante. It has vowed sanctions against any US firm that takes part in a $6.4bn weapons contract for Taiwan, a threat to ban Boeing from China and a new level of escalation in the Taiwan dispute.”
March 15th, 2010 | Posted in Web-Only Content | Read More »
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