Thread: Bailout could include Credit card and car loan debt.

An eager offer to participate in the new economy
by David Sarasohn, The Oregonian

Monday September 22, 2008, 4:40 PM

Somewhere, deep in the innards of my house, is an old microwave oven. Buying it seemed like a good idea at the time, but I've concluded that it doesn't brown well, heats unevenly and tends to emit an unsettling screech when it's unhappy.

In fact, I've decided it was just a bad investment.

So I've been trying to get in touch with the Bush Treasury Department, to see if it would like to take the microwave off my hands. I'm not greedy; I'll make them a deal.

That's the clear implications of the details of the proposed $700 billion buyout now on the table. Originally, this was supposed to be a government bailout of a mismanaged mortgage situation, trying to keep the housing market from collapsing entirely. This would be ambitious -- and unprecedented -- enough, but it seems that the companies have requested, and the administration agreed, to include other dubious holdings, such as car loans and credit card debt.

This is now not just a housing support. It's a Wall Street yard sale.

These are, of course, the credit cards that credit card companies were sending out in waves to any address they could find, including pets and dead people, for years, while they've relocated to states that let them charge 30 percent interest. In 2005, facing waves of unpaid obligations, they got Congress to toughen the bankruptcy laws, talking solemnly about the sacredness of contract, although a huge number of the defaults were driven by medical disasters.

Now, that congressional fix being insufficient, they want the taxpayers to buy their worthless credit card debt. After all, just like nobody could have imagined that giving mortgages to people without incomes would be a bad idea, who would have suspected that covering the country with credit card offers could create a problem?

You can see why they think they deserve relief from their investment.

Which gets me back to my microwave.

I bought it in good faith, seeking to advance the market stimulate the economy. But its temperature just didn't rise as high and fast as I'd projected, and I've had to reclassify it on my books. (Actually, it's now reclassified underneath several boxes of my books.) It's now, in fact, a non-performing asset, which right now raises one immediate question:

Would the secretary like to pick it up, or should I send it?

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonia ... ipate.html

The Bush administration widened the scope of its $700 billion plan to avert a financial meltdown by including assets other than mortgage-related securities.

The U.S. Treasury submitted revised guidance to Congress on its plan late Sunday as lawmakers and lobbyists push their own ideas. The department also adjusted its new plan to insure money-market funds to limit protection to balances as of Sept. 19, after complaints from bank lobbyists.

Officials made the changes two days after unveiling plans for an unprecedented intervention in financial markets in an effort to halt the deepening crisis. The change to potentially allow purchases of instruments such as car loans, credit-card debt and other devalued assets may force an increase in the size of the package as the legislation proceeds through Congress.

“The Treasury’s thinking is to make it as big and wide as possible so they have the flexibility to act if need be,â€

OK...THIS IS GETTING FRIGGIN RIDICULOUS. THEY SENT OUT THE CREDIT CARDS TO ANYONE AND THEIR PET FISH...THEY CANT PAY IT NOW THAT WAGES ARE SO DEPRESSED AND SOME ARE LOSING THEIR JOBS. THEY HAVE NO MONEY SAVED....PARTLY BECAUSE OF THE OUTRAGEOUS CREDIT CARD COMPANY INTEREST AND FEES....AND THEY WANT WHAT? THE TAXPAYER TO BAIL THEM OUT?

DID THEY SHARE THE PROFITS THEY WERE MAKING WITH THE TAXPAYER? UM...NO. WHY SHOULD THE TAXPAYER BE FORCED TO BUY THEIR LOSS WHEN THEY WERE NOT INVITED TO SHARE IN THE PROFIT. OH HOW NICE. A BUSINESS THAT IS ALL PROFIT AND NO LOSS. THEY ARE STARTING TO SOUND LIKE THE HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES THAT WANT OUTRAGEOUS PREMIUMS, BUT WHEN SOMEONE GETS SICK THEY DONT WANT TO PAY. WHY IS THIS CHIT ALLOWED?

WHY IS IT ALLOWED!!!!!!!!!