Mike Whitney

Worst Theft in U.S. History, Notes & Quotes

by: fairleft

Thu Oct 02, 2008 at 14:44

Keeping up with the media lies and distortions, notes and quotes on the worst theft in U.S. history:

The LIBOR Card

Probably the major corporate media lie is the credit freeze lie, pushed all day long by all the big corporate media. The sophisticated believer in those lies plays his LIBOR card and what is an advocate for 'duh people' to do? Well, if you are reading Dean Baker, you'd know that in fact the LIBOR is actually not at a very high level right now:

Bloomberg reports that the three month London Interbank rate (LIBOR) closed at 4.05 percent on Tuesday. In the same chart, we can find that it was 5.23 percent a year ago. Those interested in a little more history can find that the LIBOR rate was over 8.0 percent for most of 1990 and actually topped 9.0 percent on some days in September of 1989.

Also, as Baker points out, while it's true the overnight interbank lending rate is at a 'record' level now, records have only been kept since 2001! And then there's the relevance of the bailout to loosening credit, but that's another note.

The Big Picture

Horrifically, the bill does nothing for the big economic picture, pulling a severely distorted economy out of what looks like a severe recession. Here is that big picture as described by Paul Craig Roberts, with a key focus on how financial assets are now a way overboard multiple of the real economy:

There's More... :: (4 Comments, 1524 words in story)

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