If they are “too big to fail” then they are obviously “too big to get sick.” Guess that’s why Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and JP Morgan Chase are getting doses of the H1N1 flu vaccine from the government ahead of virtually everyone else in the country. The firms are on a special list approved by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, a federal agency. Most doctors here in Los Angeles still can’t obtain the vaccine for their patients.
A tsunami – a tidal wave of devastating proportions –begins with a catastrophic event that is often thousands of miles distant. While attention is rooted on the event itself – say, an earthquake – the wave is submerged in the deep ocean so that the surface is barely disturbed… until the tsunami reaches shallower coastal waters. As the ocean bottom rises, the wave becomes visible, then towering, until it comes ashore and obliterates everything in its path.
I believe a political tsunami of vast proportions is heading towards Washington, D.C. You wouldn’t know it from its inhabitants, who seem to be unaware of what is coming their way. But unless they wake up and take action to redirect the energy of the approaching wave, we’re going to see a cataclysmic change in Washington next year.
One year and trillions of dollars later, the amount of money banks and credit card companies are lending to consumers is shrinking, while big corporations and Wall Street are awash in dough – our dough.
In a week, the nation will celebrate the one-year anniversary of Wall Street’s collapse.
For most, it won’t be a festive occasion. A whopping 16% of Americans able to work are unemployed or are working fewer hours than they want. Spending is way down because people are scared and many are unable to borrow – lines of credit have been slashed and credit card interest rates are skyrocketing. Since household spending amounts to at least 30% of the nation’s economic activity, this has had a devastating ripple effect on the economy.
There’s been a lot of speculation that the Town Hall confrontations over health care reform have been generated by political operatives enlisted by politicians and other partisans who are in the pockets of the insurance and medical industries.