Yesterday, I wrote a diary on this subject, and it drew a few skeptics, but mostly favorable comments.
Essentially, I'm arguing that the neither the Treasury Secretary, nor the President, nor the Fed Chairman, nor the Fed collectively, are the right persons or institutions to properly manage the financial crisis.
I'm also arguing that Congress is making a big mistake giving all this money to Bush. It won't PREVENT a depression. It will cause one.
So, who are the right people/institutions to manage this crisis?
THE STATES.
Collectively, all of the state governors and state attorney generals, as a deliberative body, are the proper authorities to manage this financial crisis.
WHY?
Because the actors in this crisis are corporations, and those corporations are chartered by the states, and the states have the power to revoke charters, place corporations in receivership, re-organize the corporations, fire executives and board members, reclassify stocks and shares, disenfranchise the majority shareholders, and reissue voting stock, creating a wider franchise of corporate power.
Those powers could be used to address the systemic problems in the corporate system, especially if multiple titles and overlapping boards are abolished. THAT is the root of the current (and previous) crises. Not mortgage lending.
And the states, by hiring regulators to oversee this effort, can do something else: Mail out property titles and cancel mortgages. Each of the corporations who handle mortgages will be mandated to carry out reforms and transfer titles. The corporations would do this under state regulation, not the government.
Congress's role: spell out the overall framework and work out the checks and balances for this process, and appropriate the money to the states.
Would Bush threaten to veto it? SURE. SO WHAT? He either signs it or he is overridden. And believe me, a month away from a Congressional election, he will be overridden.
To make it clear: The short term fix is canceling all mortgages. ALL of them. Sound or unsound, foreclosed or in arrears, adjustable or fixed. ALL of them.
100% Equity for every property holder. Zero mortgage payments. Moratorium on writing mortgages anywhere for a short period of time. Dramatically reduced rents for renters. We might also think about breaking up multiple property holdings, in order to put more people in 100% equity homes. We could make vacant foreclosed property available to renters.
Think through the various, everyday realities for REAL PEOPLE under this scenario. It's all good. Sure, some folks will lose some equity. Sure, some billionaires and millionaires will lose a lot. They won't be ruined. They'll be fine. The majority of us would be better off, and most of us would be MUCH better off.
Fractional lending.
Remember, because of fractional lending, the "money" that would be "lost" by banks and real estate corporations doesn't really exist anyway.
Think about where all titles originate. Corporate titles, property titles, government titles. Where do they originate? With us. We created all of this, and we can change it.
For the president to get involved in this situation will change the checks and balances we set up in our system. The authorities that we set up to manage the corporations are STATE GOVERNMENTS. This "bailout" nullifies our sovereign power to assert our authority over the corporations, and presumes to make corporations OUR sovereign masters instead of the other way around.
Look around you. See the beauty? See this wonderful country and all that it offers us? It belongs to US. All of us. Not to the treasury secretary, or the president, or Wall Street, or the fed.
We are the sovereign power. We create the titles and institutions. We pay real money, not leveraged promissory notes. it's time we put the equity where it belongs. Those who would lose under this proposal I'm making, have already been compensated enough.
What would you do with the money in your pocket, if you didn't have to pay the mortgage? How would you use the equity that is 100% YOURS? That's what will put the economy back into prosperity. Corporate backed politicians are always saying " Put the money in the people's pockets, not government!" BUT what they mean is "Put the money in corporate pockets, not the government!"
I say: "Put the money in the People's pockets, not corporations or the government!" We'll get support from progressives and consevatives on this idea.