also noting that the OIL price fluctuations had a lot to do with fluctuations in us dollar....if us dollar is becoming less and less of value, then OPEC will begin to demand a more stable currency, like EURO....its best interest for oil to be pegged at us dollar for US

All you're doing bhutocracy is making it ok for them to do what they are doing in your mind. And this mindset will allow them to continue. If the people of the US and the world for that matter lay down and let it occur then you're right we all deserve what we get in the end. That's greased up and fucked.

The general public spoke their mind on the matter of this $700 billion dollar deal. Polls showed 98% disapproval and the phones were ringing off the hook with people telling them not to pass it. They did it anyway. And they keep on issuing more money. They obviously don't give a shit what we think.. With that mindset do you think they are going to give a shit what you think when they sign away the constitution? Bush sure didn't when he put the wheels in motion.. Hell he wasn't even going to tell us about it. Luckily because of some "conspiracy theorists" we found out.

Oh and about the oil. If you honestly think that the price of oil just magicly goes up and down. You're fooling yourself again. It's all manipulated. The whole damn stock market is.

What, you mean giving away $10,000 of tax money for every man, woman, and child in the United States to the bankers who engineered this depression isn't going to magically make it go away? Man, you have to watch the news! Once we give them every dime we have, everything is going to be better. duh!

If everyone on TV says something, and every politician agrees, doesn't that make it true? Like the Iraq war. No one can say that wasn't a success that ended in 6 weeks.

Seriously though, obviously I agree with you. Watching our government give away all our money to these crooks makes me more and more mad every day. It's like you just wake up every day and it's "oh, today they're giving $350 billion of OUR MONEY to CITI with absolutely no debate or warning, great". It's insane.

We're watching America be literally given away to the richest people in the world, and because they've lowered gas prices to calm us down while they're robbing us we think things are about to improve. We should be on the street with pitchforks right now, everyone. Every banker, politician, and media figure involved in this should be in fucking jail for the rest of their lives. Including our lord and savior Obama, whom I supported before he became Barack Obailout. (Barack Obailout copyright 2008 [db]).

Watching this unfold, I can't help but be reminded of the line in that Andrew's Sisters song, "What you gonna do when everybody's insane".

Really, how can anyone with a third grade education not realize that this is going to destroy America and every other country that has been dragged in. There will be no such thing as a middle class in ten years, or less.

If you've ever wondered why every police department in the country is now strongly militarized, and why they've built all those massive detention centers around the country, it has nothing to do with Muslims or Mexicans. It's because they planned and began to engineer this a long time ago, and they are ready to fight us viciously the day we all realize what has happened.

3rd world war on the horizon?

Speaking of the stock market - often folks refer to playing the markets as if it's gambling.

But actually it's far worse, since the stock market is more akin to pyramid scheme.

A casino has the cash to pay every winner at full face value. And the gamblers know upfront to a large extent what the risks are.

In contrast, if even a small fraction of people choose to sell a stock, bond, etc the price typically falls rapidly leaving late sellers with far less, or even nothing.

The stock market serves a legitimate purpose, but it's not a place for most laypeople...

401K plans and similar do most people a disservice in the longrun - it's lazy money, and the financial folks know it - they skim off a bunch in fees, and then trade like the dickens, often taking big risks along the way, to bulkup their bonuses even more...

And they were able to get away with that because as long as losses were moderate and there was always more money coming in - most contributions into 401Ks and other personal retirement plans is on auto-pilot.

As people wise-up to the reality, many will choose to keep contributing, but will change their distribution to a far more conservative mix of government bonds, CDs, money market, etc.

Ron

There is nothing wrong with a private lending institution. its a good way to make money. but when you lend, you take a RISK, and YOU should have to foot the bill. Not the rest of us.

right now, its damned if they do and damned if they dont.

financial situation is serious right now. If the government does not continue helping out the banks and financial institutions, well you should seriously consider leaving no more than the amount insured in bank deposits (50k ?)

with that aside, there are so many fingers to put and blame for this economic crisis. Regardless, the printing of money will have consequences down the road....each crisis is a continuation of a previous.

when the dot com bubble bust, money began flowing into real estate, bankers were making quick bucks, by issuing loans and mortgages to people who did not even have collateral, or income stream.

the system itself is not to blame, but the human entities involved and the different incentives creates different agendas for everyone in the system....for example, banks were closing new mortgages and loans and getting paid around 3~5% cut from each sale....then to make things worse, these debts were securitized and sold to investors, who were expecting a return of around at least 10% on these subprime loans, because big reputable rating agencies gave the loans a very excellent grade, who were in turn "bribed" by the issuers of the security.

also after the enron incident, strict changes were made in accounting principles, meaning banks had to record paper losses on financial derivatives as actual losses....these are the so called "write-downs"....write down do not mean its a complete loss, these derivatives were so complex in nature, it became extremely difficult to model the pricings, event the people who wrote softwares to do the task were lost....we were just recording what the program was telling us.

anyhow, dont quote me, there are books and books to read on this interesting event.
then comes along the ibanks, and other major financial instituions buying the bad loans thinking that its perfect. the risk has spread worldwide by this point.

Government bailout hits $8.5 trillion

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...MNVN14C8QR.DTL

Your mindset isn't doing anything to stop them either. If you're watching youtube videos and posting on forums, but lack the will to do anything for yourself because you don't think it's going to make a difference you're not doing a single thing more than I am. You're here crying now, after the fact with a defeatist attitude. I've been talking about getting out of debt, having a cheap car, don't spend outside your means etc for a while. Also some time over the next 12 months would be the time to put some cash into oil and oil services stocks, or preferably both, so own both the commodity and the guys providing them drilling equipment. Y'know... helpful advice.

*OR* I could rail pointlessly on the board about how things are fucked and how nothing you do is going to matter because things are going to get THAT BAD. The irony of the situation being that one of us is providing advice that may add value to the economy and one is bashing it down and decreasing sentiment and feeding into the negative feedback cycle and helping make things a self fulfilling prophecy.

The general public don't know what they're talking about. The general public voted Bush in TWICE and gave him a 90% approval rate after 9/11.

Don't talk about oil please, you'll just embarrass yourself.

so.... 8.5T is the last figure I heard... 60% of the country's annual GDP right thur...:Oh crap:Oh crap

Wow I am glad I took the 47 minuttes out of my day to watch the "Money as Debt" film. I did not have a clear understanding of how the system is fundamentally flawed until now.

Really an eyeopener. Can strongly recommend it to everyone who wonders how money is created and used on a larger scale.

I'd be willing to embarrass myself if you think that's why I would do on the topic of oil if you wish. What would you like to discuss? The 30 year t-bills that were sold to the Saudi's? How the "Working group" manipulates the oil price to fluctuate the value of the dollar? How it's a hidden tax on the American people? How we have enough oil on US soil to provide us with it for the unforeseen future? Where would you like to start?

You should now take 3 hours and watch "The Money Masters" it' gets more into detail and it predicted what we are going through right now, why, who, and it was made in the 90s.

Aaand... You just did. Yeah.. oil is abiotic.. right.. Or theres a super secret stash thats bigger than Prudhoe Bay.. that "THEY" are keeping secret. NEVERMIND that if that were the case the companies involved would go under for violating company law.. and I don't mean mums and dads.. I mean serious elites would bring these oil companies down for non disclosure. "They" would be VERY pissed off at "They" for screwing "They" over.

It could actually come to that. So many politicians around the world have been alluding to this and at least one member of Obama's economic team has flat out said a 1 world currency would be great.

We live in interesting times... :2 cents:

They will buy for $700 billion, not lend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dude what rock do you live under? It's common knowledge these oill companies have been sitting on untapped oil leases since they made the deal with the Saudi's back in the 70s. That was the whole damn argument here recently about the oil drilling ban recently. Those companies have been sitting on leases of land for years and not doing anything with them. The only reason the wanted the ban lifted is so they could get more leases to sit on. Look it up you dont have to believe me.

Oh they're sitting on leases, there is still lots of oil left to drill in the US.. It's just not "enough oil on US soil to provide us with it for the unforeseen future?" There is a big difference. If you think sitting on leases is the same as being able to pop the cork open on a couple of wells in 6 months and oil will be flowing for the next 30 years you're wrong. Also if you're talking oil shale you're also not aware of the actual situation as it comes to bringing it to market.

The 7.7 trillion is not actual cash that is being provided by the Federal Government, it is a type of insurance for that amount and if all goes well the actual cash amount will be paid back with interest over a period of time, just has been done in the past.

Peter Shiff is always right :)

People are being told it's just 700 billion or whatever which is the point of this thread. What they are doing is buying up the losses on the worthless "bets" that were made and combining them with real assets. What real assets? Everyone's mortgages.

The 700 billion is actual cash which is still not entirely used up so when people are told that 700 billion of tax payers money is being used (at least at this point) that is the actual amount not 7.7 trillion.