Fed to lend to companies in emergency move

WASHINGTON (AP) - Frantically trying to stop the bleeding on Wall Street, the Federal Reserve took a first-time step Tuesday to get cash directly to businesses and hinted that interest rates could come down soon. Stocks continued their free fall anyway and hit new five-year lows.

The central bank invoked emergency powers to lend money to companies outside the financial sector and buy up mounds of commercial paper, the short-term debt that firms use to pay for everyday expenses like salaries and supplies.

The Fed, which has only loaned money to banks before, made the move as the gravest financial crisis in decades wore on and concern spread around the world.

In a speech to the National Association for Business Economics, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke delivered a strong signal interest rates may need to be cut. And he warned the country could be stuck in the economic doldrums for some time.

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Fed to lend to companies in emergency move

What caused this financial crisis? Bad business, deals and management. Who caused this financial crisis? Bad Businessmen. Who has helped to further this crisis? The government of the United Socialist States of America, that’s who!

The politicians are full of excuses, that’s not all they’re full of, but I am trying to keep this *PG* rated, and it’s not really easy, my anger forces me to get up and walk away from the keyboard periodically simply so I won’t post something that may be considered seditious.

I know that BAD BUSINESS caused this but BAD GOVERNMENT has empowered it to new and unheard of heights. This bailout is a joke, and if the Fed cuts interest any further, they may as well be giving money away. Wait… What?? Damn, they ARE giving money away, OUR money! And anyone that even remotely believes that we’re ever going to see a return on this is basically stupid!

“Have faith, this economy is going to recover over time,” the president said in a speech in Virginia. “I wish I could snap my fingers and make what happened stop. But that’s not the way it works.”

Well DUH!! Hey, Pres. Numbnutz, we KNOW it’s going to get better, the last depression was overcome, this BS will be too, but YOU Mr. Bush, you are as much responsible for this travesty as any of the SOCIALIST bastards in the Congress and Senate that sent it to you for a signature.

As a few have pointed out, outrage is wasted on you Mr. Bush, you’re the lamest of LAME DUCKS, it’s almost like your administration is deliberately trying to see just how much damage it can inflict before you’re gone, and your departure from the White House can’t come a moment too soon, for the sake of this nation. You legacy has now been written, George W. Bush, the most dimwitted asshat to ever inhabit the Oval Office, hands down!

This post may anger the few idiots that still claim the title Bush Bot, and there really are a few that haven’t seen this man for the SOCIALIST ally to One World Government that he really is. Mr. Bush will wear the distinctive title of being the man most responsible for bankrupting the United States of America and turning her into the United Socialist States of America. Just keep giving OUR money away, I am actually looking forward to the investigations that are bound to follow you once you are OUT of office.

All we can do now is pray that the damage that you and your buddies have done isn’t fatal to us ALL!

For bailout to work, housing market needs to mend

NEW YORK (AP) - Washington’s financial bailout plan is now law. So the credit spigot will start flowing again, banks will resume lending, and an economic recovery can begin, right?

Wrong. Experts say the most important thing that needs to happen before the $700 billion bailout even has a chance of working: Home prices must stop falling. That would send a signal to banks that the worst has passed and it’s safe to start doling out money again.

The problem is the lending freeze has made getting a mortgage loan tough for everyone except those with sterling credit. That means it will take several months or longer to pare down the glut of houses built when times were good - and those that have come on the market because of soaring foreclosures - before home prices start appreciating.

Housing is a critical component to the U.S. economy and by extension the availability of credit. Roughly one in eight U.S. jobs depends on housing directly or indirectly - from construction workers to bank loan officers to big brokers on Wall Street. A turnaround in housing prices would boost confidence in the wider economy and, experts hope, goad banks into lending again.

“Housing traditionally does lead the economy through a recovery. I think it’s going to be critical for a sustained recovery in this cycle, too,” said Gary Thayer, senior economist at Wachovia Securities.

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For bailout to work, housing market needs to mend

And what do WE do if this doesn’t work?? If the housing market doesn’t kick back into gear?

Last week the wife and I went looking around in far N.E. Dallas county, Rockwall county and over into Hunt county a bit. We went to different developments that are under construction sites, home sites, subdivisions, some free market, some home owners associations, and the thing that struck us almost immediately was this; it’s the middle of the day and 98% of the sites that had been under construction were idle.

There were no workers, no trucks, no tradesman, no nothing. Home sites, just sitting there in various stages of construction, and none appeared to have been active in the recent past.

“Credit, by definition, means trust and faith, and for many reasons trust and faith have been damaged,” said Sung Won Sohn, an economics professor at California State University, Channel Islands.

Sohn said the near certainty of a recession makes it too risky for the thousands of small and medium-sized banks across the country to lend to people like Elliot.

“Banks know the economy is getting worse, so … they will keep being cautious,” said Sohn, a former banking executive.

Therein lies the problem, small to medium banks are the heart of America, and even if they KNOW that a loan default means they take possession of a home property, if THEY can’t sell it, then that particular small to medium banking institution is now in a financial bind.

The solution? It won’t be found in this Wall Street bailout, the *little guy* is hurting, *Mom and Pop* business is dead or dying, and Wall Street, and massive business institutions spend like drunken sailors on shore leave, and Uncle Sam is giving them the money to spend, literally.

Stand by folks, we haven’t seen the last of this bailout thing, in fact, I am fairly confident that we’ll see more, much more. Business is now feeding at the public trough, make it or break it, We, The People are bailing them out, and bankrupting OUR lives in the process.