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Former Texas Agriculture Commissioner, creator of the Doug Jones Average, and perennially witty guy Jim Hightower writes via The Union Democrat of Sonora, California:
If tiny groups of Wall Street bankers, billionaires, and their political puppets are allowed to write the rules that govern our economy and elections, guess what? Only bankers, billionaires, and puppets will profit from those rules.
[...] They've rigged the rules to let them feast freely on our jobs, devour our country's wealth, and impoverish the middle class.
"Take On Wall Street" is both the name and the feisty attitude of a nationwide campaign that a coalition of grassroots groups has launched to do just that: Take on Wall Street. The coalition, spearheaded by the Communication Workers of America, points out that there is nothing natural or sacred about today's money-grabbing financial complex. Far from sacrosanct, the system of finance that now rules over us has been designed by and for Wall Street speculators, money managers, and big bank flim flammers. So--big surprise--rather than serving our common good, the system is corrupt, routinely serving their uncommon greed at everyone else's expense.
[...] A growing grassroots coalition of churches, unions, civil rights groups, citizen activists, and many others are organizing and mobilizing us to crash through those closed doors, write our own rules, and reverse America's plunge into plutocracy. The "Take On" campaign has the guts and gumption to say enough!
[...] The campaign has laid out a five-point [sic] people's reform agenda and are now taking it to the countryside to rally the voices, anger, and grassroots power of workers, consumers, communities of color, Main Street, the poor, people of faith... and just plain folks.
- Getting the corrupting cash of corporations and the superrich out of our politics by repealing Citizens United and providing a public system for financing America's elections.
- Stopping "too big to fail" banks from subsidizing their high-risk speculative gambling with the deposits of us ordinary customers--make them choose to be a consumer bank or a casino, but not both.
- Institute a tiny "Robin Hood Tax" on Wall Street speculators to discourage their computerized gaming of the system, while also generating hundreds of billions of tax dollars to invest in America's real economy.
- Restore low-cost, convenient "postal banking" in our Post Offices to serve millions of Americans who're now at the mercy of predatory payday lenders and check-cashing chains.
There's an old truism about negotiating that says: "If you're not at the table, you're on the menu". The "Take On Wall Street" campaign intends to put you and me--the People--at the table for a change.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Justin Case on Thursday September 01 2016, @11:17AM
Too Big to Fail equals Too Big to Exist
But let's remember it is government that gives these corporations permission to form (and dodge liabilities) in the first place. Don't go thinking government is your friend in fighting BigCorp.com. Every time you hear a politician saying "public-private partnership" you should mentally translate it to the sound of the handcuffs clicking one notch tighter.
After all, why would the people in control of the rules allow the rules to change in any way that causes them to lose their power?
But go ahead, keep wishing if it makes you feel better.
(Score: 4, Informative) by curunir_wolf on Thursday September 01 2016, @03:08PM
Every time you hear a politician saying "public-private partnership" you should mentally translate it to the sound of the handcuffs clicking one notch tighter.
The term (public-private partnership or PPP), is fairly new, but the concept has been around a long time. In the 1930's, they called it "Fascism".
I am a crackpot
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday September 01 2016, @03:53PM
To me, too big to fail means monopoly position: if it is soooo big that they can't let it fail, maybe the rules that have allowed this to happen need to be changed.
Example: when i was a kid, there were allllllll kinds of little mom and pop stores. Now there are few, because the BIG guys have had the rules written in their favour.
Example: the auto business. If Ford alone is too big to fail, maybe Ford needs MORE competition. Maybe all the big auto makers need MORE competition. Instead, the rules have been written in a way so that your "Tesla's" have a real hard time coming into the business (as in competition has almost no way of coming to the point where they can compete).
If more auto makers were allowed to compete, the Big auto makers wouldn't be so big and could fail without too much disruption.
Too big to fail means government failure to regulate the business... OR STAY OUT OF THEIR WAY ALTOGETHER, AND IF THEY FAIL, THEY FAIL: there is nooooo bailout, no saving.
Either get in their way completely so that failure is an option because their competition will pick up the slack/business or get out of the way completely and let them fail.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 01 2016, @04:36PM
Ironically, Ford was the one (and only one iirc) who wasn't too big to fail.
Around 2007/2008, I was saying "let it all just fucking fail." I still think this is the only correct option. Sure, it would have been hard on many people. My hope is that two major changes would happen:
- People would realize that stocks and debt are not money and money is not air or food or houses. Air and food and houses are wealth.
- Responsible companies like Ford would be rewarded essentially.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Thursday September 01 2016, @04:56PM
I'd venture that "too big to fail" should automatically equal to "nationalized", followed by either "public" or "broken apart".
You should never get to privatize any profits, if the taxpayers have to barge in to save you from losses.