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[tags]us economy, american economy, what america makes, produces, industrialization, american industry, modern economy, comics, political cartoon, united states, goods, markets[/tags]
“What do we do? Exactly the opposite. We forget about the debt, let it explode. We reduce interest rates to zero to stimulate the economy. We pour money into the economy to get even bigger debts. We donāt privatize; we nationalize, except we donāt call it nationalization. We give it some other name, like ābailoutā or something. Itās essentially nationalization without control. So we pour money into the institutions. We lectured the third world that they must accept free trade, though we accept protectionism.
Take the ātoo big to failā principle, which the House committee is discussing today. But what does ātoo big to failā mean? āToo big to failā is an insurance policy. Itās a government insurance policy. Government means the public pays, which says, āYou can take huge risks and make plenty of profit, and if anything goes wrong, weāll bail you out.ā Thatās ātoo big to fail.ā Well, thatās extreme protectionism. It gives US corporations like Citigroup an enormous advantage over others, like any other kind of protection.
But we donāt allow the third world to do that. I mean, theyāve got to privatize, so that we can pick up their assets. Now, these are happening side by side. Now, hereās the instructions for you, the poor people; hereās the policies for us, the rich people. Exactly the opposite. Is there any reason to think the IMF is going to change it?”
