Daily Dose of Depression (DDD)

 As we struggle to understand and prevent another Hoover or Bush Depression, pay attention to how the Repubs react.

Wall Street Whitewash  By PAUL KRUGMAN
. . . all four Republicans on the commission voted to exclude the following terms from the report: “deregulation,” “shadow banking,” “interconnection,” and, yes, “Wall Street.”

When Democratic members refused to go along with this insistence that the story of Hamlet be told without the prince, the Republicans went ahead and issued their own report, which did, indeed, avoid using any of the banned terms.

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Why won't the GOP's financial-crisis report follow the money?
By Bethany McLean
Slate Posted Thursday, Dec. 16, 2010

Now, get ready for a few of the [Republican F.C.I.C. member’s] primer's breathtaking conclusions. "Put simply, the risk of a housing collapse was simply not appreciated." Shit happens. ("Bubbles happen" is, in fact, the first sentence in the report.) How about some exploration of why consumer advocates—who in the 1990s began warning the Federal Reserve and members of Congress that people were getting loans they couldn't pay back—were ignored? Here's another genius insight: "The panic ended when confidence returned." That one inspired me to check the definition of panic (a "sudden overwhelming fear") to make sure I wasn't wrong to find this a bit redundant. Daylight appeared when the sun rose. War ended when the armies stopped fighting. Hurt went away when the pain subsided.

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December 17, 2010
Explaining the Crisis With Dogma  By JOE NOCERA

. . . When the commission was formed last year, there were high hopes that it could act as a modern-day Pecora investigation — which rooted out Wall Street corruption in the wake of the crash of 1929, and helped create the political groundswell for such key reforms as the Glass-Steagall Act. That investigation was led by Ferdinand Pecora, who held the country spellbound through some two years of nonstop investigations. Clearly, this effort isn’t going to come close to that one.

“I think we can officially stop comparing these guys to the Pecora Committee,” said Michael Perino, author of an engaging recent book about Pecora, “The Hellhound of Wall Street.” Mr. Perino added, “It is disparaging to Pecora.”

Daily Dose of Depression (DDD)

This is from the Evansville Courier and Press:

For those politicians aspiring to be the next governor of Indiana, a big Christmas gift came early this year. Over the weekend, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh announced that he will not return to Indiana from Washington, D.C. to run for a third term as governor.

Bayh, who announced his retirement from the U.S. Senate earlier this year, was widely thought to be a shoo-in for the Democratic nomination for governor — if he chose to run — and a likely fall winner, regardless of opposition. . . .

Bayh's decision not to run opens the door to the Democratic nomination to several candidates, among them 8th District Rep. Brad Ellsworth and Evansville Mayor Jonathan Weinzapfel. . . .

GO HERE

The real gift Evan (Let's Go to War) Bayh provides is not in providing an opening for clones-of-Bayh, complete with marbleized razor hair cuts. What this offers Indiana Dems is a chance to finish the work started but not finished by Obama in this state.  The Dems should  connect with citizens who pay their bills with a wince, look for the jobs that aren't there, take out education loans that weigh like anchors for life, and have trouble voting on  work day Tuesdays because they hold two part time jobs.

In other words, the Dems can take the side of  "you" in the Republican refrain: "I got mine, you get yours."  They should emphasize this:

The latest installment of the groundbreaking work on income inequality by the economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez shows that the richest 1 percent of American households — those making more than $370,000 a year — received 21 percent of total income in 2008.  GO HERE

But we'll see. The timid Dem leaders around the state like the cozy deal they have. Organization Dems don't want to shake the table of goodies and give up the crumbs from the banquet the boot lickers of the rich, the Repubs, scatter like pigeon droppings at their feet.