Doctor Buzzard

Common Sense! There’s something that the movers and shakers in Washington and on Wall Street might use a good dose of… Too bad its in neither interest to do the right thing which was the first thing they should have done to begin with. Choosing Instead to take the US taxpayer for a ride down the Argentina rose garden path… Some who have been down that road (most notable the Argentines) are still covered in rose colored thorns. A tremendous public debt and an economy about as vibrant as a dead cat.

Now the word on the street is that they have a new found a new chief executive officer over at Citigroup… Edward Kelly, a well-known investment banker, has been named the US bank’s chief financial officer, replacing Gary Crittenden, who moves over to become chairman of Citi Holdings, a new unit created in January to dispose of the bank’s ‘non-core’ businesses. For those of you who don’t know Ed, he’s known as a no nonsense high powered attorney (who knows where the bodies are buried and how to lower those into a hole who are not yet counted among the stench of the living dead) . While with the Carlyle Group they preformed a commendable job with Ingenio’s Keen and Nightflirt (porno and long distant loan shark operation (talk about putting the fox in charge of the hen house).

Watched the ABC’s Sunday’s Morning, in astonishment, with George Will and Robert Reich in actual agreement, for like the first time in a month of Sundays… (Let’s see in dog years it may already be 2012 on the Mayan Calendar)

Robert Reich’s Blog: In the Wake of AIG: Obama’s First Priority

What’s particularly embarrassing for the current Administration is that it had promised to undertake the Wall Street bailout far more transparently and effectively than the way the Bush administration went about it. The Obama Administration had assured the public that, among other things, taxpayer money would no longer be used to backstop Wall Street bonuses. (It’s worth noting, in this regard, that the related plan put forward by the Obama Treasury to limit executive pay in Wall Street firms that received bailouts turned out to be riddled with holes.)

We’ve also learned that much of the 170 billion has been used by AIG to pay off AIG’s putative obligations to other Wall Street banks such as Goldman Sachs. Goldman has maintained that it got no bailout money from the Treasury. But in fact it received some $13 billion through AIG. More troubling is that the original plan to bail out AIG was concocted at a meeting held last fall, run by then Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson who, before becoming Teasury Secretary, had been CEO of Goldman Sachs. Also attending the meeting was Lloyd Blankenfein, the current CEO of Goldman Sachs. Also at the meeting: Tim Geithner, then head of the New York Fed.

None of this would be nearly as awful if the Wall Street bailout were working. But here we are six months after it began and it’s still the case that almost no loans are being made to Main Street. This week the Fed is launching its own program to get loans to consumers financed by private investors, in effect by-passing the big Wall Street banks.

Long story short here both Robert Reich and George Will agreed that the proper solution was chapter 11… Which was the PNN position from the very beginning.Lord Save US from the Midnight Senate ( Do not stick your toe into a blackhole) « Doctor Buzzard

It looks as if we may not only have a problem with massive data but also useless data. In the current banking crisis some say its a problem of liquidity… Complexity would address this as the by product of useless functions that produce toxic securities which should be allowed to fail if the system is to survive at an optimum level. Throwing an infinite money or any amount of massive data simply will not work. The system is self correcting, as in the invisible hand of Adam Smith…

Anything else simply provides a slush fund for the politically correct well connected of the DC Wall Street sophisticate snobbish elite.

Is this really the beginning of the end or the next really Great Depression? In ten thousand years from now who will really know or care but in a few short weeks taxes are due so here are some tips from a big time blogger banker friend… Whom just wrote a book or something.
My Best Tax Tips! | Wide Awake in Wonderland

Nontheless, despite my pledges that THIS is the year I hire a pro, there I am on April 14th: installing TurboTax, rifling through mountains of paper, and drinking heavily.

However, along the way, my pain is your gain. I have picked up some tips, and with April 15 on the horizon, I thought I’d share them with you.