Liberty Belle Log
August 11, 2007
Editorial:
Crash Landings--From Bridges to Wall Street
The incompetence, negligence and utter failure of this White
House to protect the American people is now alarmingly
apparent.
While administration officials focus debate solely on threats
from terrorism, other dangers that pose equal or greater
imminent danger to people across America are being ignored.
Collapse of a bridge in Minnesota is symptomatic of our aging
infrastructure. Like the proverbial canary in a coal mine, the
devastation in Minnesota is a harbinger of disasters yet to come
– unless money is allocated to restore the 160,000 other
bridges across America that have been found structurally
deficient or over-burdened (including thousands with the
identical design of the failed Minnesota bridge).
Many dams are also at risk of cracking and causing
widespread flooding. Have we learned nothing about the
critical importance of prevention from the failed levees in New
Orleans? How many other cities must we wait and see drown
before we take action to protect people’s lives and property?
Bridges and dams aren’t the only things facing collapse in
America today. Leading economic experts are sounding the
alarm over collapse of the housing market, sub-prime lending
and the overall U.S. economy. Even Wall Street gurus and
prominent Republicans are now speaking out citing the critical
need for action. Yet the Bush administration is either asleep at
the wheel, or responding with intentional—and callous—
neglect.
Urgent and real dangers are facing all of us here at home.
Bridges that fall into rivers don’t single out victims based on
economic status, race or religious affiliation. A collapsing
economy strikes the pocketbooks of both rich and poor.
Links to several important articles on our collapsing
infrastructure and economy are provided below. Please read
and pass onto your friends.
Please urge all voters to pay close attention to which
Presidential candidates are addressing (or dodging) these
important issues – and which ones are offering real solutions to
protect us here at home. – Liberty Belle
ROADS TO RUIN
Minnesota Bridge Collapse
CNN NEWSROOM (8/2/07) …Is the Minneapolis bridge
incident merely the tip of the iceberg? A warning shot about
America's infrastructure… According to the American Society
of Civil Engineers, they have been warning about this since at
least 2001… according to a 2003 report, 27 percent or
160,000-some-odd bridges that are either structurally
deficient…or functionally obsolete…that's why you should
care no matter where you live in the country. But that is just
part of the infrastructure. …according American Society of
Civil Engineers, we need to spend between $1.3 and $1.6
trillion for aviation, for runways, for clean water, for dams.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0708/02/cnr.02.
html
August 11, 2007
Editorial:
Crash Landings--From Bridges to Wall Street
The incompetence, negligence and utter failure of this White
House to protect the American people is now alarmingly
apparent.
While administration officials focus debate solely on threats
from terrorism, other dangers that pose equal or greater
imminent danger to people across America are being ignored.
Collapse of a bridge in Minnesota is symptomatic of our aging
infrastructure. Like the proverbial canary in a coal mine, the
devastation in Minnesota is a harbinger of disasters yet to come
– unless money is allocated to restore the 160,000 other
bridges across America that have been found structurally
deficient or over-burdened (including thousands with the
identical design of the failed Minnesota bridge).
Many dams are also at risk of cracking and causing
widespread flooding. Have we learned nothing about the
critical importance of prevention from the failed levees in New
Orleans? How many other cities must we wait and see drown
before we take action to protect people’s lives and property?
Bridges and dams aren’t the only things facing collapse in
America today. Leading economic experts are sounding the
alarm over collapse of the housing market, sub-prime lending
and the overall U.S. economy. Even Wall Street gurus and
prominent Republicans are now speaking out citing the critical
need for action. Yet the Bush administration is either asleep at
the wheel, or responding with intentional—and callous—
neglect.
Urgent and real dangers are facing all of us here at home.
Bridges that fall into rivers don’t single out victims based on
economic status, race or religious affiliation. A collapsing
economy strikes the pocketbooks of both rich and poor.
Links to several important articles on our collapsing
infrastructure and economy are provided below. Please read
and pass onto your friends.
Please urge all voters to pay close attention to which
Presidential candidates are addressing (or dodging) these
important issues – and which ones are offering real solutions to
protect us here at home. – Liberty Belle
ROADS TO RUIN
Minnesota Bridge Collapse
CNN NEWSROOM (8/2/07) …Is the Minneapolis bridge
incident merely the tip of the iceberg? A warning shot about
America's infrastructure… According to the American Society
of Civil Engineers, they have been warning about this since at
least 2001… according to a 2003 report, 27 percent or
160,000-some-odd bridges that are either structurally
deficient…or functionally obsolete…that's why you should
care no matter where you live in the country. But that is just
part of the infrastructure. …according American Society of
Civil Engineers, we need to spend between $1.3 and $1.6
trillion for aviation, for runways, for clean water, for dams.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0708/02/cnr.02.
html
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
MONEY MATTERS
“Economic Meltdown”
MSNBC In an emotional outburst, a Bear-Stearns analyst warns
that people across America are going to lose their homes if the
Federal Reserve does not take action, and accuses the Feds of
being “asleep” at the wheel, shouting repeatedly, “He has no idea
how bad it’s like out there…They’re nuts. They know nothing!”
He warned, “In the fixed income markets, we have
Armageddon…We’ll spend billions in Iraq to build homes and we
have thousands of people losing their homes right here…This is
not the time to be complacent!” http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=SWksEJQEYVU
American Home Files for Bankruptcy After
Shutdown
Aug. 6 (Bloomberg) -- American Home Mortgage Investment
Corp. became the second-biggest residential lender to file for
bankruptcy protection this year, adding to signs that late
payments have spread to homeowners with good credit records. ..
American Home specialized in mortgages for people who fall just
short of top credit scores. More than half a dozen competitors
have declared bankruptcy this year as defaults spilled over from
``subprime'' borrowers with the worst repayment records to those
with more reliable payment histories.
A Brief History of Financial Insanity
Excerpt:
James Kunstler offers this blunt assessment of the financial
market collapse:
“..a financial sector rigged for the falsification of reality eventually
enters a danger zone where reality implacably reasserts itself,
expectations dissolve, and all that remains is the sour odour of
fraud..
“ This long episode of market mania, running for seven years,
was based on the idea that non-performing loans could be turned
into money by removing them from their point of origin and
dressing them up in respectable clothes -- like taking all the winos
in downtown Los Angeles, putting them in Prada suits, and
passing them off as the faculty of the Harvard Business School. It
was a transparently ludicrous racket and the wonder is that
America proved to be so utterly bereft of regulating authority --
not to mention plain decency and self-restraint -- at every stage.
“ It's really hard to account for the stunning failure of
responsibility.
http://thepriceofeverything.typepad.
com/the_price_of_everything/2007/08/a-brief-history.html
The Sub-Prime Crisis Is Really A “Sub-Crime” Crisis. It Is Time
To Investigate and Prosecute This Scandal.
There comes a time when the frame of a news story changes. It
happened in Iraq when the “war for Iraqi freedom” became seen
as a bloody occupation, not a beneficent liberation. It is happening
as the war on terror is increasingly perceived as a war of error,
and when voting problems are reframed as electoral fraud.
And it will happen in the economic arena too, when we see the
“subprime” credit crunch for what it is: a sub-crime ponzi
scheme in which millions of people are losing their homes
because of criminal and fraudulent tactics used by financial
institutions that pose as respectable players in a highly rigged
casino-like market system.
http://www.newsdissector.com/blog/2007/08/10/subprime-or-
subcrime-time-to-investugate-and-prosecute/
Note: These are excerpts from the Liberty Belle Log, an
independent media publication covering national political issues.
To receive a free subscription to the full edition of Liberty Belle
Log, please send an e-mail to writerink@cox.net
“Economic Meltdown”
MSNBC In an emotional outburst, a Bear-Stearns analyst warns
that people across America are going to lose their homes if the
Federal Reserve does not take action, and accuses the Feds of
being “asleep” at the wheel, shouting repeatedly, “He has no idea
how bad it’s like out there…They’re nuts. They know nothing!”
He warned, “In the fixed income markets, we have
Armageddon…We’ll spend billions in Iraq to build homes and we
have thousands of people losing their homes right here…This is
not the time to be complacent!” http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=SWksEJQEYVU
American Home Files for Bankruptcy After
Shutdown
Aug. 6 (Bloomberg) -- American Home Mortgage Investment
Corp. became the second-biggest residential lender to file for
bankruptcy protection this year, adding to signs that late
payments have spread to homeowners with good credit records. ..
American Home specialized in mortgages for people who fall just
short of top credit scores. More than half a dozen competitors
have declared bankruptcy this year as defaults spilled over from
``subprime'' borrowers with the worst repayment records to those
with more reliable payment histories.
A Brief History of Financial Insanity
Excerpt:
James Kunstler offers this blunt assessment of the financial
market collapse:
“..a financial sector rigged for the falsification of reality eventually
enters a danger zone where reality implacably reasserts itself,
expectations dissolve, and all that remains is the sour odour of
fraud..
“ This long episode of market mania, running for seven years,
was based on the idea that non-performing loans could be turned
into money by removing them from their point of origin and
dressing them up in respectable clothes -- like taking all the winos
in downtown Los Angeles, putting them in Prada suits, and
passing them off as the faculty of the Harvard Business School. It
was a transparently ludicrous racket and the wonder is that
America proved to be so utterly bereft of regulating authority --
not to mention plain decency and self-restraint -- at every stage.
“ It's really hard to account for the stunning failure of
responsibility.
http://thepriceofeverything.typepad.
com/the_price_of_everything/2007/08/a-brief-history.html
The Sub-Prime Crisis Is Really A “Sub-Crime” Crisis. It Is Time
To Investigate and Prosecute This Scandal.
There comes a time when the frame of a news story changes. It
happened in Iraq when the “war for Iraqi freedom” became seen
as a bloody occupation, not a beneficent liberation. It is happening
as the war on terror is increasingly perceived as a war of error,
and when voting problems are reframed as electoral fraud.
And it will happen in the economic arena too, when we see the
“subprime” credit crunch for what it is: a sub-crime ponzi
scheme in which millions of people are losing their homes
because of criminal and fraudulent tactics used by financial
institutions that pose as respectable players in a highly rigged
casino-like market system.
http://www.newsdissector.com/blog/2007/08/10/subprime-or-
subcrime-time-to-investugate-and-prosecute/
Note: These are excerpts from the Liberty Belle Log, an
independent media publication covering national political issues.
To receive a free subscription to the full edition of Liberty Belle
Log, please send an e-mail to writerink@cox.net
| ©2007 Our Back Fence and Marketing Strategies of California Web Design 760-917-1251 Webmaster@WalterDavisEnterprises.com |