• Obama gets slapped in the mid-term elections: Sweet justice, don't you think? The democrats got humiliated in the recently concluded mid-term elections; after all chugging along with corrupt / inept officials like Summers and Geithner in charge of the Economy has hurt Americans like anything, and the Americans lashed out in the elections. People are not stupid: Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, the two rich Republican ladies lost in California. Meg Whitman, a former board member of Goldman Sachs lost in spite of spending $146 million dollars of her own money. Carly Fiorina, the loser who had been unceremoniously kicked out form the job of the CEO in HP a few years ago, was trying to bank on the public frustration at Obama and whatever the democrats are doing; it is great that she lost as well. After all, the republicans are worse than the democrats when it comes to serving the poor and the downtrodden.


• The Republican crew members oppose the delaying of the inquiry report from the FCIC (Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission) crew?: While Phil Angelides is no Ferdinand Pecora, it is good that he wants to inquire more into mortgage fraud which the banks did. So the FCIC is going to delay the publication of the inquiry report. Now, who voted against this delay in reporting? The 4 Republican members of the 10 member commission, of course. The inquiry report synthesized so far must be really hollow; the republicans want it published and want to be done with it. Trillions got looted and no one will be caught. What a great American tragedy!


• Elizabeth Warren has been recruited by Obama to shape up the newly forming Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: This is the best thing that Obama could have done. This is one of the best recruitements by the current administration. After all, Professor Warren has shown that she is fearless when it comes to quizzing even Geithner. She will fight on behalf of the American consumer, and the bankers looting the gullible through insane credit card interest rates will be checked. No wonder, Judy and Spencer, two republican congressmen are opposing this recruitment.


• Where actually is the American Economy, and the World Economy? How about the Stock Markets?: Obama will be a one-term President if he does not realize that the economy is tottering. 1 in 7 Americans is full-time unemployed. So, just because we had a 2.5% annualized quarter-over-quarter GDP growth for the 3rd quarter, it does not mean the economy is out of the recession. Millions are still suffering, millions are unemployed, millions are getting foreclosed / being kicked out of their homes. Looking world-wide, Greece had been rescued a few months back; recently Ireland got rescued with a bailout. So, the world economy is not looking good. We have had a strong run-up in the stock markets. So, are we due for a correction?

• The Corrupt Goldman Law of 62: 62 = 24 + 38. Hank Paulson, the ex-treasury secretary, took the ethics waiver so that he could talk to the Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein 24 times, prior to colluding with Ben Bernanke in bailing AIG out. Had AIG not been bailed out, Goldman would not have received its $12.9 billion from AIG (note: this money has been digested by Goldman and not returend to the taxpayer, what was returned by Goldman was another $10 billion in TARP funds which Goldman had taken from the Federal Government directly as part of the $700 billion TARP bailout orchestrated by Hank Paulson). Recently, it was unearthed that Tim Geithner met the Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein a record 38 times between Feb 2009 and March 2010. This is Goldman lobbying with the Federal Government at the highest level. Is it any wonder that Goldman bankers keep taking millions in bonus amount by getting the taxpayers' money recycled through AIG insurance payment, while the average taxpayer is under recession, what with 1 in 7 American below the poverty line, and 1 in 7 American being full-time unemployed? Watch out fellow American, Goldman bankers will rake in record bonus amounts again for 2010; while you struggle to find that next job...


• How to measure success for Angelides and the rest of the FCIC (Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission) crew?: Please, success need not always be defined by how much capital you can accumulate by landing a lucrative job after your government appointment. You guys don't have to follow in the footsteps of the past treasury secretaries like Larry Summers or Robert Rubin or past bureaucrats like Madelin Albright; jockeying for a plum Wall Street job like what Geithner seems to be doing is not the only way success is achieved. Your job is to help the American people fight the corrupt collusion between the government and Wall Street; so please quiz Bernanke & Paulson what they knew about the $12.9 billion Goldman was going to get in insurance payment from AIG, if AIG was rescued? Just don't take the speeches of Bernanke at face value when he says: "... Since nobody knew the exposures of specific banks to AIG, confidence in the entire banking system would have plummeted, putting the whole system at risk." Of course people inside the government, like Hank Paulson, who spoke to the Goldman CEO a record 24 times before rescuing AIG, knew that Goldman was going to get almost $13 billion if AIG was rescued! If this is not corrupt collusion between the Fed (Bernanke) and the Treasury (Paulson) to bail out a plum (yet pregnantly corrupt) bank like Goldman Sachs, then we might as well delete the word "corruption" from the dictionary, for we can't apply it to the most obvious corruption case blatantly glaring at us!


• The recession is not over, full-time unemployment is hovering well over 15%: Judging when the recession is over by simple quarter over quarter GDP growth measurements yields that the current recession ended in the 2nd quarter of 2009. However, has the recession really ended? Unemployment has not reduced since then. Over 15% of Americans are unemployed full-time (official figure is 9.6%) and over 25% are still fully or partially UNEMPLOYED. So how can the economists in NBER declare that the recession is over? Not!

• Goldman Subpeona: In an effort to run out the clock on the Angelides Commission (Financial Crisis Enquiry Commission, Goldman produces 5 terabytes or 2.5 billion pages of documents!


• Afghan War and the recent firing of McChrystal: But when will Bush appointee Secretary Gates get fired? $1 trillion has been sunk so far into Iraq and Afghan wars, while the economy at home totters...


• Dangerous Carly: When will secretary Geithner be fired? After Boxer loses to Fiorina in the upcoming elections and Obama gets slapped on the face with a few lost senate and house seats? While the tea party patriots will turn out in droves in the upcoming elections, the depressed and dejected poor American aka democrat will sit at home...


• More dismal housing / mortgage stats: Even as mortgage interest rates reach historic lows, 15 million Americans find their mortgages underwater!


• Recent stock market correction: Now that Dow Jones has corrected 13% from Mid-April to Mid-June, what is one to do? Is buying 100 shares of a stock you really like and selling one covered call contract a good cash-generating idea during these turbulent markets?

• Dismal Housing Numbers: Foreclosures will jump from 1 in 73 homes last year to 1 in 33 homes this year. Number of vacant homes have jumped five fold in last 3 years --- from 2.7% to 15% of all homes.


• Unemployment Jumps To 9.9%: Even as the economy added 290,000 jobs in April, unemployment went up from 9.7% to 9.9%. Official unemployment in California is 12.6%. Using our franconomics.com multiplier of 1.6, we have 16% actual full-time unemployment in America and 20% actual full-time unemployment in California. In other words, one in six Americans is not working at all, and one in five Californians is idling.


• Recent stock market correction of 10%: Just as selling into rallies is good cashing out, buying while everyone else panicks and sells is good stock-picking strategy.

• Wall Street flushed with cash even as homelessness (foreclosures) and unemployment keeps rising: United Kingdom and France are taxing the bonus of bankers earning at least $41,000 or more (this is the approximate lower limit of bonus amounts that will be taxed in UK, data for France is as yet unknown) in bonus in 2009 at 50%. Albeit, the banks are paying this tax, not the bankers individually. So, why are we not doing the same with Goldman and other banks? Specifically, it is well known that Goldman has set aside more than $16 billion for bonus payments in 2009. If we tax it at even 50% and get $8 billion back, it will be covering some ground on the $13 billion that the US Taxpayers lost in terms of the AIG handout to Goldman last year…





• Think Tanks like CATO Keep Peddling “Greed” and “Deregulation”: One of the overlooked constituents amongst Thought Leaders responsible for the crisis include many Think Tanks of Washington DC. We analyze the CATO institute, whose slogan “Individual Liberty, Free Markets, and Peace” is nothing but a clever camouflage of what Milton “Mr. Greed” Friedman preached all his life: Capitalism, Individual Liberty, Free Markets, and “Greed.” We expose a briefing paper from CATO on the Financial Crisis which claims that “Greed” is not to be blamed for the Financial Meltdown, since it is a “constant;” and neither should deregulation like the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLB Act), for it allowed BofA to acquire Merrill, and JP Morgan Chase to acquire Bear Stearns. In fact, the GLB Act is the reason why “too big to fail” banks like Goldman and JP Morgan Chase are now bigger than before and more monopolistic --- any kind of monopoly is bad for the ultimate consumer --- the American taxpayer. The CATO institute, a parking place for free riding elitists calling themselves “libertarians” also gives away half-a-million dollars every alternate year in the form of a Milton Friedman prize for advancing liberty.

• The recent US treasury announcement that the TARP program would cost $200 billion less: we ask the Congress to pass legislation to tax the bonus of Goldman (scheduled to pay $16 billion in bonus this year) and other banks at 100% and pull it back into the US Treasury: of course this is a pipe dream, considering the fact that all the major Investment banks are big time campaign financiers for ALL politicians, and because of the elitism that prevails in Capitalistic America where star journalists who get compensated in millions tout “CAPITLISM,” etc. etc. The podcast urges the listener not to buy the book from Hank Paulson, the architect of the 700 billion dollar TARP program… Rather, the listener should buy the podcaster's upcoming book, “The 20 Trillion Dollar Value Drain: How Goldman and Other Banks Looted America, And Why They Would Do It Again. ”
• The downward move in the official unemployment rate from 10.2% to 10%: this still translates to 25% real unemployment for All Americans. Also some ethnic groups are suffering, e.g., there is 50% unemployment amongst African American Teenagers.
• The American Recovery and Re-investment Act programs like the $8000 tax-credit (now extended to Spring and Summer of 2010), up to $6500 tax-credit for move-up buyers; and the extension programs for COBRA health care coverage for the unemployed (currently ending for some Californians). However, how about subsidies for the renters, for the long-term uninsured. It seems that the poor always get the raw-end of the stick: the renter who can't buy a home and get the credit, the poor who can't afford health insurance, and the teenager who has to peddle drugs since he can't get a job!
• The Pecora-II investigation headed by Phil Angelides: is 1200 interviews enough??

1. US has gone from being the largest Creditor to become the largest Debtor Nation, with National Debt well over of $11 trillion --- part of it is of course in TARP / TALF / pPiP which bailed out a few thousand Wall Street bankers at the cost of 300 million Americans. Do we need SIGNIFICANT CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM?

2. Federal Reserve has been loading up on Toxic Waste sugar-coated as Legacy Assets… listen into Congressman Grayson grilling the Inspector General of the Federal Reserve and quizzing Fed Chairman Bernanke; and our analysis … we need a REALLY STRONG AUDIT OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE.

3. Our presentation and analysis of the October TARP COP report by Elizabeth Warren: Foreclosures have worsened in the last 6 months. One in eight mortgages is now in foreclosure / default. Each foreclosure costs lenders like Freddie / Fannie to the tune of $120,000. This money ultimately comes from taxpayers like you and me.

4. Analysis of the newly formed Financial Enquiry Commission headed by Phil Angelides, who was no match for Arnold Schwarzenegger in the California Gubernatorial Elections. 5 of the other 9 members are Democrats, and 4 are Republicans.

5. We also give our two cents on the stock market moving up; Dow has closed with a new yearly high. (Disclaimer: Analysis / Recommendation is not investment advice. What you invest / buy / sell is at your own risk.)

While unemployment is pushing 15 million (more like 25 million are really unemployed), and while foreclosures are scheduled to top 12 million households, Fed Chairman Bernanke keeps saying that “we are out of the recession.” Instead of taking cash bonus, should the bankers be forced to pocket bonus in terms of toxic waste which they helped create? Are we being DEEPLY ROBBED by the Plutocracy / Oligarchy that is Wall Street + Washington? How long should we let our tax dollars fund the gas bills (and the bonus and the Swiss bank accounts) of the bankers driving the Lamborghinis? Listen to this eye-opening podcast to find out…

1. Secretary Geithner defending ex-Goldman CEOs / employees working for the US Treasury as deeply honorable men. He also claims that the jobs all these ex-Goldman employees did was complex, for it required complex negotiations with banks etc. However, it is common sense (and also there is great public mistrust) that these folks would not (and did not) take the side of Main Street. Certainly, from our prior podcasts where we have quoted Congressmen ripping Hank Paulson apart on this, it is clear that Congress now regrets passing the 700 billion dollar TARP, which went to "Paulson's Banker buddies"...

2. When the 700 billion dollars were being cooked by Hank Paulson as TARP (of which Goldman eventually got $22.9 billion --- $10 billion directly and $12.9 billion through AIG), there were many opinions as to how the taxpayers' money should be given. Since Warren Buffett had invested $5 billion during those times with Goldman Sachs for preferred stock, let's listen in to what Warren Buffett would have done / how Buffett would have negotiated with these banks, as per one Senate Banking Committee Economist (needless to say, nothing like this happened)...

3. If the CEOs / executives of financial firms deliberately set out to make bad loans / liars loans / NINJA loans (as per a S&L regulator Professor Bill Black, on the Bill Moyer's Journal), where is the Pecora II Investigation? Should we not be investigating these specialty lenders (such as Indy Mac) as a bottom-up investigation approach. Some of those loan specialists who sold these liars loans are jobless today, and would willingly co-operate. All we have to do is ask them...

4. Professor Black: Secretary Geithner is covering up, just like Secretary Paulson did before... This is a serious charge, and is all the more reason a Pecora II needs to get started ASAP (as soon as possible). Also, even though Geithner has gone on record saying that he was never a regulator (we play the sound bite), as per NewYorkFed.org, one of the jobs of the FED is to supervise and regulate depository institutions. Also listen to Prof. Black on how / why Paulson (and Geithner) ignored the LAW OF PROMPT CORRECTIVE ACTION...

5. Also listen in to Obama's speech urging the congress to pass the 700 billion TARP program, after it failed to pass the floor of the Congress: A package has not yet passed... Get this done... Even as you get it done to stabilize the markets, we have more work to do to make sure that Main Street is getting the same kind of help as Wall Street is getting...... This is followed by some FRANCONOMICS.COM questions to the current administration...

Are we in the middle of an ETHICAL and MORAL CRISIS? Where is our PECORA II? Where is the Investigation? What are we doing to find out why this happened? When will some of the culprits behind the crisis be put in jail? Don't give up, listen to the podcast...

1. A lady asking Larry Summers about regulating these banks who have returned the money fast so that they could escape the comp czar, and Summers' response.

2. TARP COP (Congress Oversight Panel) Chairwoman quizzing Secretary Geithner about the conversations between the AIG counterparties (like Goldman Sachs, though the name is not explicitly mentioned in her questioning) and the US Treasury prior to the AIG bailout...Geithner responds that it was more complex than just helping the counterparties, it was about all the others who were insured...We also introduce a Q&A between Congressman Dennis Kucinich and AIG CEO Mr. Liddy which shows, for example, that some of these small time insured --- policemen, firemen, teachers in Ohio --- were short-shafted by AIG, even as counterparties like Goldman were paid 12.9 billion dollars through the AIG bailout...

3. Congressmen Stearns and Quigley quizzing Hank Paulson, the man behind the TARP program, the man who got the ethics waiver from the then White House so that he could talk more than 20 times with Goldman CEO (Hank was the CEO of Goldman immediately before becoming the US Treasury Secretary in 2006) prior to the AIG bailout (these conversations were what Warren was referring to in the dialogue with Geithner, which Geithner dodged well)... Stearns quizzes him strongly about the CONFLICT OF INTEREST, and Quigley quizzes him about MORAL HAZARD (in the context of letting Lehmann, Goldman's competitor fail)...

When we go around the country from Boston to Bay Area, people say that nothing will happen --- the talk has moved on to Health Care --- however, as we explain in this podcast, everyone, including Geithner and Summers, is looking up to the Congress for regulation. As that happens, it behooves the Congress to call entities like the CEO of Goldman and ask him what transpired between him and Hank Paulson prior to the AIG bailout. It also behooves the Obama administration to get the Pecora II investigation started ASAP...

We also introduce Sam Mishra's upcoming book…THE 20 TRILLION DOLLAR VALUE DRAIN: HOW GOLDMAN AND OTHER BANKS LOOTED AMERICA AND WHY THEY WILL DO IT AGAIN... and we also give our two cents on where the Stock Markets are headed. Listen in to enjoy, appreciate, and support this ongoing battle with those who looted us...And spread the word, for they are already doing it as you listen in...Goldman has announced close to 12 billion in bonus payments for 2009!

1.Ben Bernanke renewed for the 2nd time. Dr. Ben is a scholar of the great depression. However, the corruptions in Wall Street have reached the same epic proportions as they were to be during the great depression … so, we need a Pecora like investigation. So who was Ferdinand Pecora?

2. AXIOM: Fire does not need to say: I am hot, I am hot, I am hot. If you come near fire, we feel the heat. So, Bernanke, Summers & Kudlow: please don’t tell us that the economy is turning around, it is back from abyss, it is hot again. If it is hot, we will feel the heat. Now, all we feel is Main Street burning: people losing jobs, homes, families…

3. Capital South Bank of Alabama becomes the 80th bank failure of this year. It was taken into receivership. However, was the PCA (prompt corrective action) law broken by the Hank Paulsons of the world, when Goldman Sachs was not taken into receivership, but bailed out directly and indirectly.

4. We explain the buzzwords circling the Health-Care debates right now: public action or public plan, and death panels.

5. Looks like George W. got away twice, first time by getting less popular votes than Al Gore, and then again by raising the terror alert level just four days before his election again Kerry…

6. Example of one human being pocketing millions, where as millions go without any income? The announced compensation of the new AIG CEO: $3 million in salary + $4 million in stock options. Wow. Capitalism rules!

Tune in to enjoy…

]]> Wed, 26 Aug 2009 10:00:00 EST podcastweeklyupdateaugust26franconomicscom 27:50 http://www.franconomics.com/podcasts/Franconomics-weekly-update-august-9.mp3 In this podcast for the week ending August 9th, we delve into the following data, axioms, proofs, and analysis…

1. July Unemployment Data: 247,000 jobs were lost for the month. Whereas at the end of June, the official unemployment was at 9.5%, and at the end of July, the official rate improved to 9.4%! In any case, this recession has taken its toll on the American jobs lost: employment has fallen by 6.7 million (including 2 million jobs lost in factories) since December 2007. Our analysis on this and on JEC (Joine Economic Committee) Chairwoman Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney’s optimistic response to the BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) jobs report? More Americans are unemployed, month-over-month, and not headed to work. Also, if you include the underemployed, real-unemployment is closer to 25%. In other words, one in four Americans is out of work or almost out of work!

2. What do the revenue projections of CISCO Systems tell us? CAP EX is reducing; in other words, the I component in the macroeconomic equation C + I + G = GDP is going down quarter over quarter. This will not help the GDP to come back up? So what will? Listen to our Action Item directed to the Obama Administration towards the end of the podcast for the right answers to this difficult question.

3.Personalities who made the headlines this week included the good (Sonia Sotomayer), and the bad (Hank Paulson). While it is refreshing that a great Judge like Sotomayer ascended to the US Supreme Court, what is chilling is the fact that ex-Goldman CEO Hank Paulson talked to Goldman CEO Lloyd Finklestein at least 24 times in the thick of the financial crisis, after getting an ethics waiver. We emphasize the recent grilling of Hank Paulson by Congressman Cliff Stearns. In particular why did Paulson not recuse himself when Lehman, a Goldman rival was let go bankrupt, and when Merrill, another Goldman rival was allowed to be gobbled up by BofA? This looks like solid conflict of interest! We at Franconomics.com think that a Pecora II investigation can help all Americans, send guilty bankers to jail, and prevent another asset bubble in the very near future.

4. Economics is all about economic self-interest, right? Some self-interest is required to survive, and thrive. But should self-interest be the one driver that makes the economic world go round? Well, we posit an axiom in this podcast: WHERE THERE IS A LOT OF SELF-INTEREST, CORRUPTION SETS IN. We prove the axiom by using economist Simon Johnson as the guinea pig. Mr. Johnson recommended in a blog this week that Geithner would make a good federal reserve chairman and a good regulator. Please! We give six or seven reasons why Secretary Geithner should never become the Federal Reserve Chairman, and prove the axiom by speculating that did a Guru like Simon Johnson make this blunder, for he sits in Washington DC even though he teaches in MIT Sloan (from where the podcaster earned his MBA degree); because now he wants a powerful position in the Obama administration?

The podcast ends with a summary of action items for the following stake holders:

1. The Obama Administration: You can’t blame businesses for laying people off and not investing in CAP EX. Please boost the G portion by investing in core infrastructure such as more efficient Internet Super-Highways side by side our Interstates (i.e., hard-wired PCs or computers connected to the Internet as public service Internet booths) in the rest areas nationwide. This will also create massive employment in the construction sector. To generate cash for these ventures, instead of taxing the over-burdened American taxpayer, taxing the Goldman Bonus of 2007 and 2008 at 100% and pulling it back into the U.S. treasury could be a good starting point.

2. American Taxpayers (Disclaimer: RECOMMENDATION IS NOT ADVICE): The Government is Full of Wall-Street Insiders, who will try their best to jack up the stock market. But markets do not go up, up, up. The go Up, Down; Up and Down. We recommend that you sell your stock into the rallies, specially those on which you are making money. (Note: the podcaster personally does not sell stocks that are making losses, he holds on.) Also, for non-retirement accounts, where you have to pay capital gains tax, selling stock after holding them for a while ensures you pay lower taxes. For those amongst you facing foreclosures, extended unemployment etc., do lobby with your congressman to get the Pecora II started as soon as possible, so that bankers and other financial criminals who put you in this mess are brought to justice ASAP.

3. Congress: Keep the jack-hammer on the Hank Paulsons and the Libby’s of the world. Please bring on the Pecora II ASAP, and please make it a hard grind on the people who participated in the 20 trillion dollar value drain, as in robbing the poor, gullible, foreclosed, unemployed or under-employed American. As a first step, please put Goldman under the comp czar’s scrutiny by passing legislature, and please consider pulling back the Goldman bonus paid in 2007 and 2008 by taxing it at 100%.

The podcast ends by elaborating the Thought of the Day theme on the home page of Franconomics.com on how to help the homeless titled WOULD YOU LIKE MILK WITH THAT? Please tune in to enjoy…

1. The government announced that the second quarter this year shrank at an annualized rate of 1%, quarter over quarter. The GDP declines for the last four quarters have been -2.7%, -5.4%, -6.4%, and -1.0% annualized, respectively. Since the Great Depression, the economy has declined for four consecutive quarters FOR THE FIRST TIME! The revised data show that the economy grew only at 0.4% in 2008, and not the originally estimated 1.0%. We analyze all this data and provide our opinion on where the American economy is headed...

2. Bank of America settled with SEC by paying a fine of only $33 million over bonus payments to Merill bankers in 2008. Merill pocketed billions from AIG, and BofA pocketed billions of TARP from the government to acquire Merill Lynch. The Merill bankers digested more than $5 billion in bonus payments, and all the administration got back was $33 million in fines! We look under the hood for such abysmal negotiation on the part of the administration.

3. Home price data compared for June of 2009 vis-a-vis June of 2008: Mortgage delinquencies are 10 to 13% nationwide. Media home prices are down year over year nationwide. home resales are down in 3 regions and up in the west (good news, new home sales are down in 3 regions and up only in the mid-west. New homw construction is down. Our analysis: does not matter what Larry Summers says, we are still in the middle of a recession...

4. Geither hints at future tax raises to take care of the balloning federal budget deficit of 1 to 2 trillion dollars. Our take: let's pull back the Goldman and Merill bonus of 2007 and 2008 as a starting point.

The podcast ends with a summary of action items for the following stake holders:

1. Congress: Focus on the American Consumer. How will he be able to spend and boost the C component of the basic macro-economic equation GDP = C + I + G, if he keeps losing money on his home investment, or if he gets foreclosed, or if he loses his job. Support issues like Cash for Clunkers, and to get the federal budget balanced, please demand that all the Goldman and Merrill bonus payments of 2008 and 2007 be pulled back by taxing it at 100%.

2. To the Bankers and their planted reps in all levels of administration: Pecora II is coming, so change radically now. Stop looting the main street folks in the name of crony capitalism. You will not be able to financially engineer fraudulent derivative schemes which allow for coming with begging bowls to bail you out. Also, in the short run, stop jacking up interest rates on credit cards, maintenance fees on bank accounts, etc. Everyone knows what you guys are doing.

3. American Consumers (DISCLAIMER: RECOMMENDATION IS NOT ADVICE, PLEASE READ OUR TERMS OF SERVICE): Educate yourself, and don’t jump in with both feet to buy that new home simply because the government is giving a tax benefit of 8K USD. A mortgage is a loan, and nationwide, delinquencies are as high as 10% at least, and 12% on the average. That works out to 1 in 8 homes is mortgage delinquent, as in, they can’t pay the mortgage. And the government is not going to bail you out, like it bailed out Goldman, or Citigroup, of BofA. The Wall Street bankers, because of their greed, have placed you in this mess (delinquent mortgages and falling home prices). Soo, please ask your favorite politician what he or she is doing in terms of pulling the Goldman and Merill bonus of 2008 by taxing it at 100%, and preventing Goldman executives from consuming multi-million dollar bonus hand-outs again this year, as they have recently announced.

The podcast ends with an advice on how to help the homeless: Give them milk and cookies, and not money. They will use the money to buy alcohol. But if you give them milk and cookies, it will nourish their body and soul in a positive way.

1. DOW breaks past 9000: What does it mean for the economy, and what can an individual investor do?

2. Goldman bought back its warrants by paying the full market price (and interest). But who are they trying to fool? Not the American public! A persuasive case (also partly done in the ACTION ITEMS below) for CONGRESS to pull back the 2008 Goldman bonus for violating the PCA - Prompt Corrective Action Law.

3. Analysis of the Humphrey-Hawkings semi-annual testimony by Ben Bernanke. Congressman Grayson grills him on the half-a-trillion dollar lending to foreign banks. Of course it is part of the $620 billion in expansion of SWAP lines that we cover in the 14 trillion dollar (now 20 trillion) Value Drain or looting of the American taxpayer by the fradulent rich bankers, which we have covered in sufficient detail in the Value Drain-II article (please read it up from the home-page of Franconomics.com, if you have not done so). Also, Bernanke discussed in his article titled "Fed's Exit Strategy" in the Wall Street Journal, and mentioned it to Congress / Senator Chris Dodd that the TALF program will come to the rescue of insufficient credit on Main Street. FRANCONOMICS.COM take? See below under action items...

The podcast ends with a summary of action items for the main stake holders:

1. American Investors (DISCLAIMER: RECOMMENDATION IS NOT ADVICE, PLEASE READ OUR TERMS OF SERVICE): Consider taking profit on your long-term investments by selling into the rallies. Dow is at 9000. But the real economy sucks: unemployment is going up, not down; foreclosures are going up, not down; and house prices are plummeting, not climbing.

2. Congress: Pull back the Goldman Bonus by taxing the 2008 Bonus at 100%, these bankers colluded with Paulson to subvert the PCA - Promt Corrective Action Law, and paid themselves massive bonus. Also, if you allow Goldman to pay its executives big bonus in 2009, no one will want to work for Citi. When the financial system was bailed out as one black box, the black box included Goldman, JP Morgan, BofA, Citigroup. So, how come Goldman is dodging the compensation Czar.

3. Federal Reserve: Don't compete with the U.S. Treasury in terms of sucking up to the banks. Consider lending to the small businesses directly; don't try to fill up the black holes in the balance sheets of banks with scams like TALF; LET THESE BANKS FAIL!”

1. JP Morgan’s Blow-out Earnings Report: Is the Government subverting the Anti-Trust laws by allowing these already "too big to fail" banks get even bigger - - - for JPM gobbled up Washington Mutual and before that, Bear Stearns. Can JP Morgan and Goldman pose systemic risks again?

2. Why did the pPiP plan fail? Our theory: Probably the “street” heard that Goldman was shorting the toxic waste. Nobel Laureate Krugman reported in his July 14 article titled The Joy of Sachs that Goldman Sachs made money both ways here, initially by peddling the MBSs, and when these toxic derivatives got way high in valuation because they hyped it up, Goldman short-sold those before they crashed, reaping huge profts again. So why would anyone buy it up, when Goldman was shorting it, in spite of the extra-ordinary pPiP leverage?

3. Choicest words thrown at Paulson in his recent congressional testimony: Congressman Frank: If you had come up here with Mr. Bernanke and said, ‘I have got a plan, I want to take $800 billion in taxpayer money and I want to give it to my pals in the nine biggest banks of America,’ how many votes do you think you would have got? Congresswoman Kaptur, in reference to her constituencies facing foreclosures and eviction: You ought to come visit Ohio and see the results of your handiwork.

The podcast ends with a summary of the analyses, as in action items:

1. Congress: Thanks for roughing up Hank Paulson. Now, repeal the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. And don't wait for Pecora II to end. Do it now.

2. MIT Sloan and other b-schools: Instead of peddling “financial engineering” courses, give more courses focused on “law” and “ethics,”if you want to create better leaders.

3. Summers & Co: Please understand that GDP = C + I + G. Unless you focus on C, as in the American consumer, which constitutes 70% of the GDP, you have no chances of coming out of the “abyss.”

1. Goldman Sucks: As per an ex-treasury secretary, the current treasury secretary Mr. Geithner works for Goldman Sachs. No wonder the bank’s “risk management” skills are way above competition, as per a BofA analyst.

2. TARP COP’s July Oversight Report: taxpayers lost $10 million by letting 11 small banks buy back their warrants at 66% of market value.

3. Fiscal Budget Deficit: Now at $1 trillion and will climb to $1.81 trillion by Fiscal year end.

4. Foreclosures and Home Prices: Between the 1st quarter of 2008 and 1st quarter of 2009, foreclosures jumped 36%. Nationally, home prices keep falling, and have fallen by 33% since 2006. Housing affordability is increasing, as a consequence.

5. pPiP plan: It has failed?

6. G8 Summit: France supports China in undermining the US Dollar and says this --- “the current international system is outdated.”