Actually, it's nothing like that. Blaming the bad economy on bad ECONOMIC policies is actually--what's the word, oh yeah--logical. Blaming it on the fact that Obama got nominated or made a speech that day is stupid.

Well this downturn isn't over, it's just stalled for a bit. My guess is we will spend the next few weeks hovering around 6,600 - 7000.

As for Obama, he deserves some of the credit, as does Geitner, and yes, a small bit goes to President Bush, Bernanke and many others. I consider the original TARP a bit of a failure, but without it, we'd be in a far worse situation than we are now, but regardless, this isn't a one pony show and many people have worked to fix the situation. All in all, both administrations have taken the hands on action oriented stance that was needed, and I applaud both for it.

But make no mistake, there have been mistakes in this administrations handling of the crisis too, mainly the foolish financial stability plan they announced that sprung this thread and de-stabalized the market. They did a good job in showing the 4 areas they wanted to address, and that was about it, they said so very litle on HOW they were going to do it, and what they did say was total garbage.

Since that debacle, they came out with a very detailed, and in my opinion positive, plan to address the mortgage issue, which was 1 of their 4 phases. They fleshed out their plan for stress testing, another 1 of their 4 phases, another positive. They also went directly against what they outlined in another phase (thank god) and essentially nationalized Citibank as I've thought they should from the jump. Now, with the capital overhead they need, Citi is stable and will hopefully remain so. Either way, if they had came out with this plan, given us the details they eventually did on the mortgage fix, given us the details they eventually did on the stress tests, and not told us all this crazytalk about subsadizing toxic asset purchases the plan would have been a calming factor instead of inducing instability because of all the question marks.

There is a definite cause and effect there, and the blame also was on democrats who supported those same policies.

The key here is that day after day, the hypocrites in the GOP (not all of them) blamed Obama for every fall of the market. Therefore, since they apparently believe he alone is solely responsible for the market, he should logically get credit when it rises too.

And the important point to make as well is that almost every critic of Obama neglects to point out what their plan is. Don't like Obama's plan? What's your alternative? I'm not hearing much from the GOP other than "tax cuts" which is their solution for when the economy is good and when the economy is bad and therefore is no solution at all.

I don't know if I buy that. There are certainly some Republicans simply playing politics with no real ideas and there are Democrats that are the same way. There are however many Republicans that do have plans and ideas, same with Democrats. I guess what I'm saying here is, many politicians are nothing more than playing the game of politics, others however do have ideas and solutions ... they're not always right, but they have ideas.

I know I've had plenty to say on the issue, and I've been pretty vocal about what I wanted done, most of which actually has been to some extent, just not always handled in the manner I would have liked. Overall I'm still pretty happy with Obama's first couple months.

Freddy came out and requested an additional $30.8 billion. This was expected, it leaked out a few days ago that they'd need more money at the same time their CEO said he was quiting (estimated between $30 and $35 billion at the time), but in reality, everyone knew they would as soon as we took them over.

To understand what's going on here it's important to understand the agreement that the US has with Freddie and Fannie due to it's takeover in 2008. The government is required via the deal to inject cash in any quarter where the companies liabilities exceed their assets with a cap of $100 billion per quarter. The government originally set asside $200 billion, Freddy has drawn down $13.8 Billion under the program thus far, Fannie has drawn down nothing but will have to soon.

The question here is: Will the $200 Billion be enough, and if not, will they raise the injection limits?

Hi, my name is Freddie, and I'm a cash-o-holic.

Indeed, and the surprise increase in forclosures won't help.

The Stock Market crash hit Warren Buffett hard last year.
He lost 25 BILLION DOLLARS and is no longer the richest man on earth. He's in 2nd place now.

His friend William Gates III is BACK ON TOP!

FED now wants to buy toxic papers for 750b USD.

I need to look more into the plan before I can really comment, but this will certainly do two things:

1) It should keep the doomsday scenario of deflation away.
2) It will cause the dollar to lose significant ground against other currencies.

It's going to be very interesting when the economy starts stabilizing and the FED has to start working to curb the runaway inflation that naturally wants to follow a period like this. I feel bad for everyone putting money into bonds, T-Bills or anything else with locked in rates as the next 5 years should see some pretty hefty inflation.

so mr economist...besides the people who have enough extra $ to hide it in the stock market for years...how will regular/poor people fare who have to fare or live on their paychecks / debts / credit / friends, etc... for the next 5 years....

and what can the President do to help these people out over the next 4 years....

Well, he's already done part of it.

- Anyone making under $75,000 a year doesn't pay taxes on the first 6+% they make (that's the tax credit in the stimulus you may have heard about).
- He got rid of the AMT for this coming year, which helps the middle class save thousands come tax time.
- Responsible people with limited income SHOULD be saving via investments in their 401k and other retirement plans. Assuming they have over 10 years until retirement, they should consider a more aggressive plan, investing higher in stocks to help battle inflation and thus protecting their retirement.

The dollar's value won't impact Joe the Plumber too much, unless he's taking an overseas vacation. The biggest impact will be in gas prices, which everyone should know by now are heading back to $100+ a barrel in the summer of 2010. Plan accordingly.

In general, Obama will keep the tax rates low for anyone making under $75,000. More than that, the only thing he can really do is make sure the economy starts growing again so unemployment begins to recede and salaries start to grow.

In the end, this isn't socialism, and Obama won't be handing out money to the poor. All he can do is let them keep more of what they earn and get the economy through this mess.

well that is good and this is the only one that is ??? as people with limited $ might not be able to save unless they are previous debt free and have a low overhead but I agree that people with any extra income should do the 401 K
Responsible people with limited income SHOULD be saving via investments in their 401k and other retirement plans. Assuming they have over 10 years until retirement, they should consider a more aggressive plan, investing higher in stocks to help battle inflation and thus protecting their retirement.

Again, you can't help everyone. If people spent beyond their means, or lost a job and no longer have means ... all you can do is make sure the economy starts adding jobs so they have a chance at earning money and paying down their debt.

I agree with that but I was just pointing out to you, not him, that I think only people with excess, not limited, money can do the 401K.

To a point, you're correct. But many employers allow you to deposit a tax-free portion of your salary into a 401k, so you never see the money and thus don't have a chance to spend it.

Fed launches bold $1.2T effort to revive economy- AP

With the country sinking deeper into recession, the Federal Reserve launched a bold $1.2 trillion effort Wednesday to lower rates on mortgages and other consumer debt, spur spending and revive the economy.

This article didn't explain this and I didn't feel like copy the link and everything else >>>>

but how in the hell are consumer debt rates going to go lower... > is there any provision to force the loans at a lower % cause, because it seems that firms aren't lowering anything....or do I expect them to ever unless they are forced!

Knee jerk reactions!

So I did read a bit into that "Geithner 500b-1000b USD" Toxic paper plan.
As it looks the private investor has a risque of 10%....90% is the staate. So the private investor is actually only the RTPW "Rate The Paper Whore". Well looking at the plan like this its at the end not that much different from that what we in Switzerland did. Its a high risque bailout......and if it goes wrong public will bleed hard for it.


Does actually somebody can tell me how big the US/FED/FDCI etc programs are now?

700b first bailout
500b-1000b Geithner plan
up to 1000b FED support
800b Obama support program
I guess 250b Fannie and others
180b AIG
I loose the overview.

Well the fun then really starts when East Europe will start to drop.............

You're looking at it in the wrong way. Many of these numbers are honest to goodness ballparks, with little basis in reality. To get a true overview, you have to do some substansial digging into four factors:

1) How much money was proposed to be spent under the given plan?
2) Is any of that expected to be paid back or recouped in time?
3) How much to-date has been spent?
4) How much to-date has been paid back?

I could be entirely wrong here, but judging by what I have read, by large it's not even possible to dig for that information, as the people who are spending the money are not held accountable in any way, at least not to the public. And apparently often not even to congress, or to the president.

That's exactly the thing that upsets so many people right now, even at congress level: They have no idea where the money has been going, and where it will go in the future. Because nobody is giving them that information, even when they ask for it.

That depends really on which program we're talking about, but to a point, you're right. There isn't a lot of transparency into where the original TARP money went, but by contrast, there should end up being a lot of transparency into the 800 billion stimulus package.

You can find figures here and there, like how much AIG has gotten, how much they've paid back, how much Freddie and Fannie have got so far, etc. But you do have to really dig, and in some cases, especially TARP, no matter how much you dig, you just find more dirt.

So far I count with the worst case (all programs used to its full level; no money back)

I know its a dark view.....though I really start to think that money is gone and just pay to support the level-down of the Economy not that fast and hard.
Like a house where a storm did crash a part of it. The money now is to fix part of the damage but you loose definately a room or two you cant rebuild. Maybe in 10 years then when you saved your money.

Well that doesn't make any sense. You can't count like that, it's not based in reality for two reasons:

1) We haven't paid out all that money as of yet, and it's entierly logical to assume that some plans never will use all the money they COULD have used.
2) Of the money we have paid out, billions have already been paid back.

How can you discount that? Doing so is simply not looking at reality, but at an unnessecarrily grim distorted reality. I mean, if you want to do that, then be my guest, but it's not a fair nor accurate window into the situation.