A Crisis Without Criminals
My husband has a friend who worked on Wall Street packaging crummy mortgages into bundled securities and selling them to unsuspecting buyers. We’ll call him Boris. Boris is a real person. He was probably making $500K a year, and really needed that income to pay for the house in the Hamptons, private school for the kids, and a 6,000-square-foot penthouse apartment in NY. Boris had, and still has, a lifestyle to maintain. So he did what everyone he knew in the business was doing: he sold worthless, bundled junk to any buyer because it was rated well, and he wasn’t the one who rated it. In the downturn, his company (which will remain unnamed) let many of their brokers go. Boris did not end up on the streets. He found an equally high-paying job helping a new institution to recognize risky investments. After all, he knew exactly what they looked like.
Did I mention that Boris thought the whole thing was pretty funny at the time? That he was getting away with such a blatant ripoff and making tons of money doing it? The many brokers and executives running Wall Street knew EXACTLY what they were doing. But they didn’t stop because it was all highly profitable. And NOT ILLEGAL.
Even those massive bonuses that the execs paid themselves, $5 MILLION for Martin Sullivan, the departing CEO of AIG, were not illegal.
So Congress is giving them a verbal lashing. “Ow! Stop it! That hurts!” Our country and the world’s financial systems are tanking horribly and they get a verbal lashing. Sullivan keeps the $5 million and my husband’s friend Boris keeps the house in the Hamptons.
And now we get Neel Kashkari, our 35 year old boy genius to manage the Office of Financial 
Stability worth $700 billion of taxpayer dollars. A little youth obsession anyone? Wasn’t there a more senior, seasoned, wise choice for this position? Not that I’m nervous or anything, but Kashkari is the same age as Boris. And it may be me, but he’s got the look of mad ambition. Gawd I’m tired of mad ambition. It’s so 2007. And so McCain.
Green Values for the Coming Downturn
So, yeah, the stock market is tanking — again — and we need to prepare ourselves for the coming shift in our economic environment. Translation? Things could get really ugly before they get anywhere near improving.
A voice from 1933:
“We are flat cold stony broke and no place in the world to get any money. Have been living mainly on boxes of food from the Red Cross and received the last one yesterday as they have stopped giving them out. We owe 6 months rent. Resources all drained. I wonder what will happen now? God help us.”
If you’ve been reading duh pookie for a while you’ll know that I’m a member of the Green Party. I have never believed the Greens would become a major political force, that’s not really possible with our political system. But what the Greens do have is a set of core values that I can ascribe to. They’re listed here with my two cents thrown in:
- ECOLOGICAL WISDOM: Stop killing everything already! There are only about 1000 mountain gorillas left on the planet. Rainforest destruction continues. Uh, bad. Rainforests make oxygen. Oh. Right.
- NON-VIOLENCE: This includes global non-violence whenever possible, and defense of the vulnerable. If we’re going to send massive numbers of soldiers all over the planet, wouldn’t you rather see them stopping atrocities than bullying the middle east over oil?
- DECENTRALIZATION: Our federal government is ridiculously bloated and top-heavy. This is a Libertarian tenant as well.Smaller government is better government.
- COMMUNITY-BASED ECONOMICS: Sustainable economics. This is going to become hugely important and should’ve been all along.
- GRASSROOTS DEMOCRACY: I hope we see big time grassroots democracy via the Internet.
- SOCIAL JUSTICE AND EQUAL OPPORTUNITY: This means people need to share, at least share what they can afford to. A surprising number of people have trouble with this.
- RESPECT FOR DIVERSITY: Straight up. People should be judged on their merits without bias.
- PERSONAL AND GLOBAL RESPONSIBILITY: Do your personal actions reflect your personal responsibility? If you’re anything like me, this is easier quoted than enacted!
- FUTURE FOCUS AND SUSTAINABILITY: “Our actions and policies should be motivated by long-term goals. We seek to protect valuable natural resources, safely disposing of or “unmaking” all waste we create, while developing a sustainable economics that does not depend on continual expansion for survival. We must counterbalance the drive for short-term profits by assuring that economic development, new technologies, and fiscal policies are responsible to future generations who will inherit the results of our actions.”
- FEMINISM AND GENDER EQUITY: This one is covered by the others and could probably be dropped. However, all discussion of access to birth-control has dropped off everyone’s political messages. Even the Green Party. Doooood! Family planning is key! International Planned Parenthood needs you! (Or at least your money…)
Why are these values important in a downturn? Because not one of them is “make a ton of money no matter what it does to the environment, or anyone else.” If the big suppliers and distributors fail, I hope we have enough of a farmers’ market to supply what we need. I hope we’ll help each other out. I hope that when it’s all blown over, ten years from now, that some of these values have helped to shape what comes next.
Live Smart: Check Out Meta Efficient Blog
If you’re like me, you spend some time every day stressing over the question, “Where the heck are the electric cars already?!” Okay, maybe not every day, but this question drives me crazy since it’s clearly LONG PAST HIGH TIME that electric vehicles were available. The Chevy Volt is now pushed out to 2010 0r 2011. So I did some research. While I was following link after link, I stumbled across MetaEfficient: A Guide to Optimal Things and their roundup of 100% electric vehicles. It’s a great list. They left off the space-age, three-wheeled Aptera, which is looking like a highly stylized choice for the trendsetter. But if you just want to know what’s available now, this is your list.
MetaEfficient also reviews computers and peripherals for the greenest energy use. They reviewed
rooftop wind turbines. How cool is that? Or how about a review of Japanese soaking tubs versus hot tubs? Nice! I love this site for all the great info about terrific products that I wouldn’t otherwise know about. In today’s world, with climate change and our bad, bad dependence on foreign oil, MetaEfficient is a smart site to check out.
With Freedom and Liberty for All
Ugh. The debate tonight? Can’t watch. Palin’s too much for me. The Bailout? No use thinking about it. The House will vote to pass it anyway. Rigged voting machines? Matt Groening’s got that covered! Gavin Newsom? Yeah, he’s just nice to look at. Yow! But what am I thinking about then? Well, glad you asked! Here’s a bittersweet story. I don’t know much about Del Martin or her wife Phyllis Lyon, but I am sentimental about their long life together.
According to Wikipedia:
On February 12, 2004, Martin and Lyon were issued a marriage license by the City and County of San Francisco after mayor Gavin Newsom ordered that marriage licenses be given to same-sex couples who requested them. The license, along with those of several thousand other same-sex couples, were voided by the California supreme court on August 12, 2004.
“Del is 83 years old and I am 79. After being together for more than 50 years, it is a terrible blow to have the rights and protections of marriage taken away from us. At our age, we do not have the luxury of time.” —Phyllis Lyon
However, they were married again on June 16, 2008, after the California Supreme Court ruled same-sex marriage legal. Once again they were the first couple married in San Francisco, in fact the only couple married that day by the mayor.”
Aren’t they adorable? They had been officially, legally married for only three months when Del Martin died. They’d been together 55 years.
If you live in California, vote NO on Prop. 8.
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