Monday, September 29, 2008

In a time of crisis

thank god we have experts like Megan to explain this stuff to the layperson.

House votes down the bailout:

Democrats voted for it pretty narrowly -- 140 to 95. The Republicans shot it down 65 to 133. I find it hard to believe that they're voting their conscience; they're voting their electoral interest in November. I hope their constituencies enjoy the bank panic.
Actually, what I hope is that I'm wrong, we don't need a bailout, and after a period of liquidation, everything will settle down. If so, I will happily confess my error. But I'm very much afraid that I am not wrong, and things are about to get pretty grim.
About to? Maybe now we'll finally have that recession you keep joking about, eh, Megan?

Meanwhile, back in the Old Country . . . :
We clearly need better regulations. But bank runs are complicated creatures. There is no single cause of this, and there will not be a single solution, either.
And let's not blame the banks, or especially their executives, or the economic 'philosophies', as if naked greed deserves the word, they used to justify their obvious mistakes. This kind of thing just happens, like Hurricane Katrina.

So what happens now?:

Ummm, I know it's my job to tell you, but I'm clueless. I hear rumors it's all the Democrat's fault for voting in favor of a plan the Republicans voted against, and other incoherent claims.

Y'know, if we'd only listened to experts like Megan we could have avoided this whole mess in the first place.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

A journalist friend who spends way more time on politics than I do...

Shouldn't she at least name her source, especially if the person actually is an established journalist? I mean, it's obvious to us all that Megan gave up trying to demonstrate why she should be paid for her writings while countless other politico-bloggers aren't long ago, but you'd think she'd at least take the opportunity to give a little credence to her mini-rant.

And I know I shouldn't be disappointed by The Atlantic anymore, but how the hell can any publication that still wants to claim any respectability let a writer on its payroll get away with crediting a fairly detailed allegation against a political party to an anonymous "journalist friend"? High school teachers apparently have more rigorous citation standards than Sully's editorial regime.

Anonymous said...

Besides which, I don't think, if I was someone paid to run a politico-blog (or at least an econo-blog with political overlaps), I'd publicly and casually admit that someone else "spends way more time on politics than I do."

Anonymous said...

My dog has more coherent opinions about this than McBrainFart does.

I always knew an MBA was a completely useless degree, but it is even more useless in the hands of a natural-born idiot.

Anonymous said...

I've not found one single piece of insight or information in any of her posts about this so far. And this is supposed to be some kind of economic expert? Though I am enjoying the extreme hypocrisy of Megan calling out politicians using a grave situation for personal gain, considering she built her audience on a blog called "Live from the WTC."