Michael Moore Says...

Published on October 1, 2008 By Artysim In Politics

A letter from Michael Moore, on his website here-

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?id=237

Because, well, I think it's interesting, and I know he gets people's blood boiling on this site!!

neener neener,

Artysim

Friends,

The richest 400 Americans -- that's right, just four hundred people -- own MORE than the bottom 150 million Americans combined. 400 rich Americans have got more stashed away than half the entire country! Their combined net worth is $1.6 trillion. During the eight years of the Bush Administration, their wealth has increased by nearly $700 billion -- the same amount that they are now demanding we give to them for the "bailout." Why don't they just spend the money they made under Bush to bail themselves out? They'd still have nearly a trillion dollars left over to spread amongst themselves!

Of course, they are not going to do that -- at least not voluntarily. George W. Bush was handed a $127 billion surplus when Bill Clinton left office. Because that money was OUR money and not his, he did what the rich prefer to do -- spend it and never look back. Now we have a $9.5 trillion debt. Why on earth would we even think of giving these robber barons any more of our money?

I would like to propose my own bailout plan. My suggestions, listed below, are predicated on the singular and simple belief that the rich must pull themselves up by their own platinum bootstraps. Sorry, fellows, but you drilled it into our heads one too many times: There... is... no... free... lunch. And thank you for encouraging us to hate people on welfare! So, there will be no handouts from us to you. The Senate, tonight, is going to try to rush their version of a "bailout" bill to a vote. They must be stopped. We did it on Monday with the House, and we can do it again today with the Senate.

It is clear, though, that we cannot simply keep protesting without proposing exactly what it is we think Congress should do. So, after consulting with a number of people smarter than Phil Gramm, here is my proposal, now known as "Mike's Rescue Plan." It has 10 simple, straightforward points. They are:

1. APPOINT A SPECIAL PROSECUTOR TO CRIMINALLY INDICT ANYONE ON WALL STREET WHO KNOWINGLY CONTRIBUTED TO THIS COLLAPSE. Before any new money is expended, Congress must commit, by resolution, to criminally prosecute anyone who had anything to do with the attempted sacking of our economy. This means that anyone who committed insider trading, securities fraud or any action that helped bring about this collapse must go to jail. This Congress must call for a Special Prosecutor who will vigorously go after everyone who created the mess, and anyone else who attempts to scam the public in the future.

2. THE RICH MUST PAY FOR THEIR OWN BAILOUT. They may have to live in 5 houses instead of 7. They may have to drive 9 cars instead of 13. The chef for their mini-terriers may have to be reassigned. But there is no way in hell, after forcing family incomes to go down more than $2,000 dollars during the Bush years, that working people and the middle class are going to fork over one dime to underwrite the next yacht purchase.

If they truly need the $700 billion they say they need, well, here is an easy way they can raise it:

a) Every couple who makes over a million dollars a year and every single taxpayer who makes over $500,000 a year will pay a 10% surcharge tax for five years. (It's the Senator Sanders plan. He's like Colonel Sanders, only he's out to fry the right chickens.) That means the rich will still be paying less income tax than when Carter was president. This will raise a total of $300 billion.

Like nearly every other democracy, charge a 0.25% tax on every stock transaction. This will raise more than $200 billion in a year.

c) Because every stockholder is a patriotic American, stockholders will forgo receiving a dividend check for one quarter and instead this money will go the treasury to help pay for the bailout.

d) 25% of major U.S. corporations currently pay NO federal income tax. Federal corporate tax revenues currently amount to 1.7% of the GDP compared to 5% in the 1950s. If we raise the corporate income tax back to the level of the 1950s, that gives us an extra $500 billion.

All of this combined should be enough to end the calamity. The rich will get to keep their mansions and their servants, and our United States government ("COUNTRY FIRST!") will have a little leftover to repair some roads, bridges and schools.

3. BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE LOSING THEIR HOMES, NOT THE PEOPLE WHO WILL BUILD AN EIGHTH HOME. There are 1.3 million homes in foreclosure right now. That is what is at the heart of this problem. So instead of giving the money to the banks as a gift, pay down each of these mortgages by $100,000. Force the banks to renegotiate the mortgage so the homeowner can pay on its current value. To insure that this help does no go to speculators and those who have tried to make money by flipping houses, this bailout is only for people's primary residence. And in return for the $100K paydown on the existing mortgage, the government gets to share in the holding of the mortgage so that it can get some of its money back. Thus, the total initial cost of fixing the mortgage crisis at its roots (instead of with the greedy lenders) is $150 billion, not $700 billion.

And let's set the record straight. People who have defaulted on their mortgages are not "bad risks." They are our fellow Americans, and all they wanted was what we all want and most of us still get: a home to call their own. But during the Bush years, millions of them lost the decent paying jobs they had. Six million fell into poverty. Seven million lost their health insurance. And every one of them saw their real wages go down by $2,000. Those who dare to look down on these Americans who got hit with one bad break after another should be ashamed. We are a better, stronger, safer and happier society when all of our citizens can afford to live in a home that they own.

4. IF YOUR BANK OR COMPANY GETS ANY OF OUR MONEY IN A "BAILOUT," THEN WE OWN YOU. Sorry, that's how it's done. If the bank gives me money so I can buy a house, the bank "owns" that house until I pay it all back -- with interest. Same deal for Wall Street. Whatever money you need to stay afloat, if our government considers you a safe risk -- and necessary for the good of the country -- then you can get a loan, but we will own you. If you default, we will sell you. This is how the Swedish government did it and it worked.

5. ALL REGULATIONS MUST BE RESTORED. THE REAGAN REVOLUTION IS DEAD. This catastrophe happened because we let the fox have the keys to the henhouse. In 1999, Phil Gramm authored a bill to remove all the regulations that governed Wall Street and our banking system. The bill passed and Clinton signed it. Here's what Sen. Phil Gramm, McCain's chief economic advisor, said at the bill signing:

"In the 1930s ... it was believed that government was the answer. It was believed that stability and growth came from government overriding the functioning of free markets.

"We are here today to repeal [that] because we have learned that government is not the answer. We have learned that freedom and competition are the answers. We have learned that we promote economic growth and we promote stability by having competition and freedom.

"I am proud to be here because this is an important bill; it is a deregulatory bill. I believe that that is the wave of the future, and I am awfully proud to have been a part of making it a reality."

This bill must be repealed. Bill Clinton can help by leading the effort for the repeal of the Gramm bill and the reinstating of even tougher regulations regarding our financial institutions. And when they're done with that, they can restore the regulations for the airlines, the inspection of our food, the oil industry, OSHA, and every other entity that affects our daily lives. All oversight provisions for any "bailout" must have enforcement monies attached to them and criminal penalties for all offenders.

6. IF IT'S TOO BIG TO FAIL, THEN THAT MEANS IT'S TOO BIG TO EXIST. Allowing the creation of these mega-mergers and not enforcing the monopoly and anti-trust laws has allowed a number of financial institutions and corporations to become so large, the very thought of their collapse means an even bigger collapse across the entire economy. No one or two companies should have this kind of power. The so-called "economic Pearl Harbor" can't happen when you have hundreds -- thousands -- of institutions where people have their money. When you have a dozen auto companies, if one goes belly-up, we don't face a national disaster. If you have three separately-owned daily newspapers in your town, then one media company can't call all the shots (I know... What am I thinking?! Who reads a paper anymore? Sure glad all those mergers and buyouts left us with a strong and free press!). Laws must be enacted to prevent companies from being so large and dominant that with one slingshot to the eye, the giant falls and dies. And no institution should be allowed to set up money schemes that no one can understand. If you can't explain it in two sentences, you shouldn't be taking anyone's money.

7. NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD BE PAID MORE THAN 40 TIMES THEIR AVERAGE EMPLOYEE, AND NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD RECEIVE ANY KIND OF "PARACHUTE" OTHER THAN THE VERY GENEROUS SALARY HE OR SHE MADE WHILE WORKING FOR THE COMPANY. In 1980, the average American CEO made 45 times what their employees made. By 2003, they were making 254 times what their workers made. After 8 years of Bush, they now make over 400 times what their average employee makes. How this can happen at publicly held companies is beyond reason. In Britain, the average CEO makes 28 times what their average employee makes. In Japan, it's only 17 times! The last I heard, the CEO of Toyota was living the high life in Tokyo. How does he do it on so little money? Seriously, this is an outrage. We have created the mess we're in by letting the people at the top become bloated beyond belief with millions of dollars. This has to stop. Not only should no executive who receives help out of this mess profit from it, but any executive who was in charge of running his company into the ground should be fired before the company receives any help.

8. STRENGTHEN THE FDIC AND MAKE IT A MODEL FOR PROTECTING NOT ONLY PEOPLE'S SAVINGS, BUT ALSO THEIR PENSIONS AND THEIR HOMES. Obama was correct yesterday to propose expanding FDIC protection of people's savings in their banks to $250,000. But this same sort of government insurance must be given to our nation's pension funds. People should never have to worry about whether or not the money they've put away for their old age will be there. This will mean strict government oversight of companies who manage their employees' funds -- or perhaps it means that the companies will have to turn over those funds and their management to the government. People's private retirement funds must also be protected, but perhaps it's time to consider not having one's retirement invested in the casino known as the stock market. Our government should have a solemn duty to guarantee that no one who grows old in this country has to worry about ending up destitute.

9. EVERYBODY NEEDS TO TAKE A DEEP BREATH, CALM DOWN, AND NOT LET FEAR RULE THE DAY. Turn off the TV! We are not in the Second Great Depression. The sky is not falling. Pundits and politicians are lying to us so fast and furious it's hard not to be affected by all the fear mongering. Even I, yesterday, wrote to you and repeated what I heard on the news, that the Dow had the biggest one day drop in its history. Well, that's true in terms of points, but its 7% drop came nowhere close to Black Monday in 1987 when the stock market in one day lost 23% of its value. In the '80s, 3,000 banks closed, but America didn't go out of business. These institutions have always had their ups and downs and eventually it works out. It has to, because the rich do not like their wealth being disrupted! They have a vested interest in calming things down and getting back into the Jacuzzi.

As crazy as things are right now, tens of thousands of people got a car loan this week. Thousands went to the bank and got a mortgage to buy a home. Students just back to college found banks more than happy to put them into hock for the next 15 years with a student loan. Life has gone on. Not a single person has lost any of their money if it's in a bank or a treasury note or a CD. And the most amazing thing is that the American public hasn't bought the scare campaign. The citizens didn't blink, and instead told Congress to take that bailout and shove it. THAT was impressive. Why didn't the population succumb to the fright-filled warnings from their president and his cronies? Well, you can only say 'Saddam has da bomb' so many times before the people realize you're a lying sack of shite. After eight long years, the nation is worn out and simply can't take it any longer.

10. CREATE A NATIONAL BANK, A "PEOPLE'S BANK." If we really are itching to print up a trillion dollars, instead of giving it to a few rich people, why don't we give it to ourselves? Now that we own Freddie and Fannie, why not set up a people's bank? One that can provide low-interest loans for all sorts of people who want to own a home, start a small business, go to school, come up with the cure for cancer or create the next great invention. And now that we own AIG, the country's largest insurance company, let's take the next step and provide health insurance for everyone. Medicare for all. It will save us so much money in the long run. And we won't be 12th on the life expectancy list. We'll be able to have a longer life, enjoying our government-protected pension, and living to see the day when the corporate criminals who caused so much misery are let out of prison so that we can help reacclimate them to civilian life -- a life with one nice home and a gas-free car that was invented with help from the People's Bank.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

Comments (Page 3)

Leauki

on Oct 03, 2008

Yea, the rich business man who follows this stuff closely is ignorant but the left wing arm chair zealot is so much better informed.

That keeps surprising me. There are so many well-informed liberals who know so much about the economy but for some reason cannot be successful in business themselves.

I don't know why left-wingers are so quick to throw the word ignorant when they should know better. Smoothseas, if you want to call me ignorant, show your credentials. What is it you do for a living that could conceivably demonstrate that you are more familiar with this crisis than I.

That should be interesting.

Dr Guy

on Oct 03, 2008

I'm one liberal who really never liked the guy that much.

I always knew there was a reason I liked you.

Dr Guy

on Oct 03, 2008

Take a look at forclosure listings. They run the full range from low cost housing to multi million dollar complexes.

Now the $64 question: Is this the first time anyone has ever defaulted on loans? If yes, your point is made (talking point that is). If not, then what is the difference between then and now? Why is this a crises, yet the foreclosures in 1999 was not? I will give you time to find the statitistics and enlighten us all on what the difference is.

Smoothseas

on Oct 03, 2008

If not, then what is the difference between then and now?

The amount of derivatives being used. The fact that Wall St. wrapped what is considered C paper into derivatives and got them Rated as AAA. The fact that more than 66% of the subprime loans made in 2006 went to people who actually had credit scores that qualify them for prime rate conventional loans. The relaxation of usury laws. Increased federal preemption of local and state predatory lending laws. etc.

Why is this a crises,

Because the US relies on foreign investment, and Wall. St. bit off the hand that feeds it.

In a nutshell: The major countries who have been servicing our debt will not buy new treasuries until we take back the bad mbs that Wall. St. sold to them.....That is why the Paulson Plan is centered around these mbs's and needs the taxpayer to in essence buy mbs's.

Nitro Cruiser

on Oct 03, 2008

All this is nice and wonderful (hopefully the mistakes are realized and will not be allowed to be repeated), but back to the topic of this article - Why should 400 people (that wisely have command of their finances) be held monetarily responsible for the crisis? Some people are itching for class warfare, that much is true. What they don't realize is the same philosophy they have a vise grip on can easily be applied to themselves. I say your house is is one of the 400 ugliest homes in town, so you need to bulldoze it now for the greater good of the community. Mob rules, right? This is the root of Moore's socialist agenda, and anyone that can see it for what it is should be outraged or at least frightened by it.

Artysim

on Oct 03, 2008

This was the scam that the banks were running against the poor. Predatory lending. They expected lots of these poor people default because statistically, people who are poor are poor because they're stupid with money. But the scheme fell apart because what happened is that Smoothseas defaults on his property, ARtisym takes posession but there are no buyers for the property because the property value has declined so much. In addition, Smoothseas and millions like him also defaulted causing a huge glut of foreclosed properties with few buyers. On Artisym's books, he has a $1,000 asset (the property) but that asset and $1 will buy him a cup of coffee. So the banks can show that they have a great balance sheet - they've got gazillions in assets in theory but nothing in practice because they can't sell those assets. Without cold hard cash, they can't pay bills and so Artisym goes out of business. Meanwhile, a bunch of other banks see the same problem and pretty soon they come whining to the government asking for the government to buy all these defaulted on assets. If they don't, then there's a chance that a bunch of these banks will fail like Artisym's bank did. If a bunch of banks start to fail, then people will start to flood to the bank to get their money out (or everything over what FDIC covers) which in turn would cause a total economic meltdown. I don't expect the left-wingers to understand this fairly straight forward explaination because it's beyond them to realize that the ultimate responsibility for this crisis are not "the rich" but instead the dead beat poor people who defaulted on their loans and the predatory lenders who preyed on them.

Everything Draginol states above is true, but doesn't go far enough. Yes, people did get mortgages and when they defaulted banks ran into trouble. No denying that.

However, if this were all that had hapenned we would be looking at a situation more similar to the S&L crisis in the 80's than what is going on now.

Instead, we have a crisis in which banks aren't lending to each other, because they don't know how much each other has to give. Not only has this caused banks to run into trouble, this has nearly frozen the flow of credit and lending between banks. The flow of capital globally right now is very, very minimal because everyone's hoarding what they have. This is what has caused the big boys to collapse more than anything else. So why did this happen?

So, let's take what Draginol said and expand on it:

My bank loans smoothseas $ 1000 for a house. Now on my books I've got $ 1,000 in assets right? Nope, that's hard collateral, so I can do what's called "leveraging" which means lending a hell of a lot more than I actually have. I believe Lehman brothers was leveraged 26 to 1 (for every 26 dollars they loaned, they actually only had 1 and so forth) Bear Stearns was over-leveraged, WaMu, Fannie and Freddie, they all were massively over-leveraged. How did they get away with this? They were able, thanks to deregulation, to say that their asset value was "x" number of dollars. That value is something that they created with mathematical models and "voodoo economics" which is a fancy way of saying they lied.

I can state that since smoothseas owes me 1,000 dollars today, by the time he's paid it all back in 10 years I'll actually have $ 10, 0000 dollars, what with the appreciation of the value of his property, inflation, interest blah blah blah.

So, theoretically, I have 10 grand now from my 1 grand loan, even though that's based on the assumption that that asset value will be there years in the future. Most importantly, I have this 10 grand because I tell all the other banks that I have it. Because I'm a reputable bank, and another reputable firm called AIG has guaranteed that my word is good, all the other banks and investors believe me. Then, I take smoothseas mortgage and a bunch of other mortgages and I lump them all together into something called a CDO- collateral debt obligation, which is then sold on the market as a sure-fire way to get a healthy return.

The underlying assumption behind the CDO is that it is backed at the end of the day with hard collateral- smoothseas house- meaning that if things go tits up as a bank I should be able to recoup some of my loss. More importantly, the CDO (lots of others were created that did different things along the same lines) is a VEHICLE. What's a vehicle?

It's a way of taking the debt off my books and claiming profit when there isn't any. So long as people believe what I tell them and buy into it, life is good. All it takes is for a small percentage of folks to default on their mortgages (and in the big scheme it has been relatively small thus far) and the house of cards come crashing down.

If just a few people default on their mortgages it suddenly becomes apparent that I don't have nearly as much capital as I said I did earlier. Then this starts hapenning to other banks as well. Not only that, but all kinds of different funds and investors in the market at large are now having difficulty because this junk paper permeated so much of the market that many investors end up getting burned, even though they made investments on which the risk was supposed to be transparent....thanks to the concept of "slicing and dicing" the risk with fancy mathematical models, but ultimately, was not.

So, not only as a bank have I lied in order to reap massive short term profits, I've also hurt a lot of investors and destroyed confidence in the market. As a bank I can call another banker buddy of mine and ask him for help, but he then says "I don't believe you"

Now here's the real kicker-

All of this hapenned over a year ago. Most folks don't know that the market came extremely close to collapse in August of 2007. The pollyanna's in investment and banking and all the high priced financial advisers basically went "tsk tsk, just a hiccup" They lied then, why should we believe them now?

What hapenned after that was that all kinds of foreign investors, ranging from foreign banks to sovereign wealth funds, bailed out the U.S financial industry. They poured hundreds of billions in to get liquidity in the system again. And for a while, it worked.

Now that even more folks have defaulted on their mortgages since the near collapse of 07, the trouble is more widespread this time. And all those foreign banks and funds that bailed out the U.S are threatening to pull the plug and get out of dodge if steps aren't taken to protect their investment during the first major bailout. This is why the U.S taxpayer is going to be tasked with ponying up 700 billion dollars (to start with, anyway) in order to keep foreigners buying and holding U.S debt. As long as they do that, the treasury can play with the reserve to keep things running, at least for now.

Leauki

on Oct 03, 2008

Why should 400 people (that wisely have command of their finances) be held monetarily responsible for the crisis?

Because they are richer than Michael Moore and anybody richer than Michael Moore ought to be poorer than Michael Moore?

Artysim

on Oct 03, 2008

The greater good. The U.S government is already more than 9.5 trillion in debt, and the average consumer is already tapped out with declining wages (average wages have fallen vs inflation), credit card bills, auto loans, student loans, mortgages, tight labor market (159,000 Americans were laid off last month) rising fuel costs, rising food costs, rising utility costs. 70% of your GDP comes from consumer spending to boot, that's the engine of your economy and the plan is to tax it further.

So, you have a lot of people already struggling just to get by.

Meanwhile, you've got a tiny, tiny fraction of the populace with enough money to do the bailout themselves. Okay, realistically it wouldn't be the "richest 400" but you get the idea. For them, the loss will be that they might have to forego the purchase of a new gulfstream jet or buy 10,000 shares instead of 20,000 shares.

Now just holdup. I know the counter argument to this. That ridiculously small number of people who have so much in assets need all the money they can get, because with it they can create jobs and the like.

Well, it sure hasn't worked out that way.

Almost all major U.S corporations are laying off employees.

So, economy is already in the toilet or headed there very fast.

The smartest guys running the economy lied for years saying "well, we might have a recession but the fundamentals of our economy are sound!" to suddenly perform an about face overnight and tell us we're facing complete collapse. oh, and send 700 billion kthanx. hhhmmm....

Big oil's made a killing these last few years. They've made massive profits and contrary to popular belief it did not go into exploration and new projects. Those investments have stayed pretty constant over the years, with most of their profits going to purchasing more of their own shares to increase shareholder value. Yes, big picture this is supposed to help the economy but it sure hasn't worket out that way!

Also, this year the U.S is poised to spend almost 1 trillion dollars on defense and national security. Yes, I know the actual defense budget is going to be more like 600 billion but when you throw in all the other costs, like the 25 billion the department of energy spends on keeping nukes maintained, the hundreds of billions that go through the state department, and interestingly enough, the treasury (to fight terrorism at home!!) plus Iraq, Afghanistan, all the various contracts and the like, it's gonna come out to almost 1 trillion dollars.

Why has no one considered cutting your military budget for a little while? Hold off on a couple nuclear submarines and F-35's for a year or two.

Nope sorry, joe average working at walmart's gonna have to pay for this!

Dr Guy

on Oct 03, 2008

The amount of derivatives being used. The fact that Wall St. wrapped what is considered C paper into derivatives and got them Rated as AAA.

You misunderstood the question. We were discussing WHO was defaulting. So go back to WHO was defaulting before and WHO is defaulting now. What is the difference? Why the difference? The answer is very simple.

Dr Guy

on Oct 03, 2008

Because they are richer than Michael Moore and anybody richer than Michael Moore ought to be poorer than Michael Moore?

Yep. Sometimes the answer is simple.

Smoothseas

on Oct 03, 2008

Most folks don't know that the market came extremely close to collapse in August of 2007.

http://opencrs.com/document/RL34182 Make sure you read the Open CRS and not just the summary.

Who needs a "Trusty" banker with ties to Wall St. to come for a chat when you can get the information before some "Trusty" Banker or politician puts a spin on it.

Smoothseas

on Oct 03, 2008

You misunderstood the question. We were discussing WHO was defaulting

No this was your question.

If not, then what is the difference between then and now? Why is this a crises, yet the foreclosures in 1999 was not?

However its in the opencrs report from a prior post as is an extremely good explantion of the whole situation.

CharlesCS

on Oct 03, 2008

Actually Artisym was responding to Brad stating:

No, his response was from Leauki's comment:

That's the part I find so fascinating because those people are seen as the victims. They took loans and promised they would pay them back.

He basically tried to point at the few who may actually be in the scenario he created making it seem as if everyone who is seen as the vitim is somehow how he descibes them in his scenario when that is not true.

Here's what truly bites me about these "they are victims" ideas of people who can't afford "something". How often do you come across a person who has financial problems that with maybe a thousand or 2 thousand dollars could allow them a second chance to get it right? How often do you give them this thousand or 2 to help them? If not, then why do you expect someone else to do it just because they can afford it? Were these people forced to take these loans? Were these people forced to buy expensive TV's, eat out all the time, buy Nintendo Wii's on credit cards? Were their lives threatened if they didn't purchase the car with all the extra featured including the nice rims, top notch stereo and leather seats? My curiosity is, if all the people are in real financial burden is it because of utility bills, food, rent and gas? Or is it because of the stuff they waste money on (what we call wants) and are now in debt because of that? The way I see it, they should not be rewarded by having more money given back to them (including me BTW) for creating these delmmas i the first place.

LW said it best: "they are low income for a reason, understand?"

CharlesCS

on Oct 03, 2008

In the end regardless of economic explanations here the simple fact is someone here screwed up and some here expect rich people to bail them out, ironic considering some of those same people seem to think the money from this bailout is somehow coming from poor people when it's obviously not. Those who screwed up should pay the price, but at the same time if the whole conutry is affected, then it's our duty to make sure we don't go down, even if it means bitting the bullet. Pay for the bail out or get screwed, I chose paying.

stubbyfinger

on Oct 03, 2008

I don't like the idea of confiscating money but what if we just ask these 400 people if they wouldn't mind donating for the good of the country? No harm in that. Once you get over a billion in personal wealth and even before that, money can really become a pain in ass and just dealing with it can become a job. They don't have to do anything the money collapses into a black hole that keeps sucking more money into it. That's why they give so much to charity spending it is more work. I bet you could cut the tax payers burden of this bail out in half just by asking.

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