Protect Insurance Companies: Will Ferrell
September 22, 2009 9:39 pm

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Krugman Pans Sarah Palin's Hong Kong Speech On Maddow: Absence Of Facts Didn't Seem To Matter In Palin's Speech
September 25, 2009 9:44 pm

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Michael Moore Musings, Dylan Ratigan On Reasons For Leaving CNBC
September 25, 2009 9:46 pm

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5 Ways the Government Used Our Money to Save Big Banks and Screw Us
September 26, 2009 9:48 pm

By Nomi Prins and Christopher Hayes, The Nation

......Imagine a couple living in a three-bedroom house outside the Twin Cities. Call them Joe and Katie Hazzard. The Hazzards own a small off-track-betting (OTB) business and have some investments and a mortgage on their house. But business is terrible (no one has extra money to make bets); Katie recently lost her job; their investments have hemorrhaged value; and they can't make their mortgage, car or credit card payments. So they ask their local bank for a loan. "No dice," says the bank. "We can't give you money to pay your debts because you're no longer a good credit risk for us." That's more or less what happened to the banks last fall: they couldn't and wouldn't lend to one another.

Capital Injections and Direct Loans

So the Hazzards go to the Federal Bailout Bank, which says, "Here's some money. Do with it what you want, and someday down the road, if and when you're out of the woods, you'll have to pay us back with a little bit of interest." That's roughly what the $700 billion TARP was: a direct injection of capital to purchase preferred shares, which is really more like extending a loan than making the investment the government said it was, with some very light strings attached.

But then Joe says that the handout isn't enough. It turns out that not only does he own a gambling business; he has a bit of a gambling habit......

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