Ms. Peek, With all due respect, you are wrong about the need of this bailout. Banks are not with their “tits in a wringer” because they are worried about mortgages defaulting. Banks created this problem by creating complex mortgage-related securities using spreadsheets and “fuzzy math.” Like tulips, dot-com stocks and llamas, they valued them based on what ever crazy-arsed price the last bozo paid. Then, they kept borrowing from each other… and then the music stopped. The $700B bailout only passed because another $150B of pork was piled onto this train wreck… tax advantage for NASCAR facilities, removing the duties on children’s wood arrows… our elected officials didn’t even TRY to pretend they were adding oversight or protection for taxpayers! If the government wants to spend fix the economy, how about creating $700B in bonds or backed loans for mortgages, small business loans or federal infrastructure that goes directly to those who need it, rather than laundering it through a couple of billionaires on Wall Street? Please don’t add to the myth that the only way to unlock the economy is to lavish money, without strings, onto Hank Paulson’s rich friends who were probably holding his puppy hostage until this dreck passed.

Ms. Peek, you have GOT to be kidding me… “The good news is that Bill Gross at Pimco, probably the smartest investor in fixed income instruments in the world, thinks the taxpayers have a good chance of making money on those asset purchases. It will depend on what the government pays for them of course, but I think it’s highly likely that these mortgage-backed securities are worth more than the going rate of 25c on the dollar.” If the banks don’t think these are worth anything, how on earth can a few government drones properly assess the value on them? Remember, the government isn’t buying the mortgages directly. I’m assuming you know how mortgage-backed securities work. The problem isn’t the straightforward versions in which the homeowners pay their mortgages, then the mortgage holder pays the investors who supplied the cash. When analysts who think they are too smart to work for a living decide that they want to strip out and sell just one portion of an interest payment stream, then sell off the default risk in an insurance-type model, or arbitrage interest rates against commodities… then the complexities of the real world kick in and suddenly their spreadsheets can’t calculate their models. And this whole thing about buying the “lowest priced assets” first is a joke, trying to make the whole process sound somehow conservative and rational. I can’t wait to see how they consistently develop and apply a risk-adjusted rate of return.

There are some things I have heard in circles that are more frightening than you can ever imagine. This information may have been what paled the team of officials that first sat down when this whole thing was first discussed. Doesn’t anyone wonder what was said in that room that first night? I do. It must have been far more information than what WE heard otherwise the public wouldn’t take exception to what’s at the core of this bill- aside from all the Bull….t inserted. But that’s another story. From what I understand by connecting the dots, the BIS (Bank of International Settlements) which is essentially THE bank for all the Central Banks around the world has requested an audit of the Federal Reserve. If you can imagine how bizarre this is, you might get what’s going on in the background. Let’s remember now, the Federal Reserve is a PRIVATELY owned organization. It is now perceived as being a banking facility of the government because it is now linked to the Treasury. But essentially the Fed was/is a private company owned by some of the richest families in the world, not just America, and it’s charged with the responsibility of printing money FOR the USA government. Something is going on to cause them to request an audit. I liken it to a family squabble. There is something none of us understand in the form of a breech of trust at the highest levels. When systemic corruption or questionable business practices are suspected at that level of banking, it is beyond unconscionable. If this ever settles down, people should be going to jail. Now imagine how fast the escalation of the banks interest rates are at that level of operation. Every day the bill didn’t pass drove the world closer to the brink. Every day the American public fought the rescue plan. Every day the American media who is essentially stupid and are basically pretty people who are propped up in front of a camera spewing anything and everything out of their mouths to attract an audience….coined the inflamatory term of “Bailout” making the public even more outraged. This forced the hand of your government officials to vote against the bill out of YOUR ignorance as to the true nature of the rescue bill, and out of fear of losing their jobs in the next election. They complied with your wishes as the proletariat who were thinking this bill was a bailout. This is what caused the dominoes to tumble, initiating the collapse of your entire world! ALL the BANKS’ interest rates have gone up as a result of the Banker’s Banks losing faith in the whole system, and it was passed down to you, the innocent consumer, because the rates were raised at the VERY top. If the banking practices at the very top were sound this never would have happened. Wall Street was also involved, but not the sole cause. What happened at the Federal Reserve to make the BIS call them on it? This is the question I want to ask. Lesley Stahl? 60 minute piece please? Can you fly to Basel and ask them please? What I would like to know is if the banks could have maintained the interest rates and forfeit the same profit margins they were used to (fat cats) and NOT rock the system would any of this happened? Would we have been able to prevent people from losing their homes? If the government had stepped in earlier, would this have happened? Is there a balancing point where the banks really didn’t have to raise interest rates and effect this disaster? Could they have survived with flat business profits for a few years rather than force the rates up with marginal home owners which caused the crash and burn? Every day the interest is still compounding at astronomical rates that with bring down the entire way of life as we know it if it continues to go unchecked. This is how serious this is. It is more serious at the top. Many banks will not survive compounding interest rates and fail. Many a lowly consumer, will be buried in his own debt which might force you to sell your houses all at the same time and force the prices down even further. But be prepared. Be prepared for civil disobedience. Be prepared to band together as one and help each other to prevent civil disobedience. Things could really change for the worse—-no matter which President you elect. The other thing you should know is that if you actually turn the channel to another country’s TV station and watch THEIR news, or dare yourself to click on a “foreign” website like the BBC or the CBC or a foreign reputable newspaper website like the Globe and Mail you will get another perspective. Everywhere else in the world they are discussing the GLOBAL financial crisis. I have never seen or heard those words anywhere in the American media. Just making a point. Educate yourselves beyond your own borders. The rest of the world is also in trouble because they also bought the fake American dream in the form of those mortgage backed securities. If there ever was a time that we need to practice the age-old “Love thy brother as thyself. It is now.

Liz P, I wondered if you had read this article in Sunday’s New York Times? http://www/nytimes.com/2008/10/05/business/05fannie.html?th&emc=th… Is this the new blame game? CA