Hooey Ho Hum

I think the Great Depression of the 21st Century has come and gone. This bailout business is baloney. I think it's dead. Dead probably through unresolvable partisan bickering rather than through a philosophic conviction that it's a bad idea, but dead, hopefully, nevertheless.

I will say that I have the impression that Bernake and Paulson seem quite impressed at their own heroic importance. I hope they get some flack during their testimony.

I don't know if I'll bother to write about this more or not. I can't see that a few billion in bad mortgages should have much affect throughout the financial system as a whole, poison-pill packged or not. A little freeze-up for a bit, maybe; that's happened, but it shouldn't take long for various banks to compute the possible loss and then just continue. It's just not very much money compared to all the money that's out there, and people want to lend and people want to borrow and people can figure out how to do it.

No bailout, because no problem.

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6:00PM

This is interesting:

WASHINGTON - Democrats have decided to allow a quarter-century ban on drilling for oil off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to expire next week, conceding defeat in an month-long battle with the White House and Republicans set off by $4 a gallon gasoline prices this summer.

Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wis., told reporters Tuesday that a provision continuing the moratorium will be dropped this year from a stopgap spending bill to keep the government running after Congress recesses for the election.

Republicans have made lifting the ban a key campaign after gasoline prices spiked this summer and public opinion turned in favor of more drilling. President Bush lifted an executive ban on offshore drilling in July.

"If true, this capitulation by Democrats following months of Republican pressure is a big victory for Americans struggling with record gasoline prices,"said House GOP leader John Boehner of Ohio.

Yup. And it means speculators in oil have to fear more oil supply. They had presumed Democrats where going to get through their more-drill-no-drill nonsense legislation. Dems are whipped, apparently (to my surprise). Prices will head down again. --Crude about $106 just now.

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Note:

Will this mean drilling can commence? Not quite. The states have to lease the lands as well as the federal government, and states won’t likely do so without revenue sharing.... Congress has to approve that action, and right now it still appears that Democrats want to use that to limit production.

I don't know anything about this particular wrinkle. But Democrats lost the first fight due to public pressure, and in the same way will probably lose the second. Depends on how Republicans do November 4.