And the worldwide trend towards corporate welfare continues in the Netherlands…

The European Commission said Friday it had approved a Dutch financial bailout plan intended to restore and facilitate the financing of Dutch financial institutions.

The Commission found the Dutch plan to be in line with European Union (EU) rules on state aid for overcoming the current financial crisis.

“The scheme constitutes an adequate means to remedy a serious disturbance in the Dutch economy while avoiding undue distortions of competition,” it said.

Dutch financial institutions were hard hit by the credit crunch due to the drying up of the interbank lending market in the wake of the financial crisis.

The Dutch government adopted a guarantee scheme earlier this month which aims to tackle the liquidity problems of financial institutions created by the drying up of the market of unsecured loans. The plan involves a guarantee of 200 billion euros (261 billion U.S. dollars) in bank loans.

(Article source)

If there were ever a reason to be against something these days, it would be if the Bush administration supported it. This lying, arrogant, useless president (yes, lower-case p), is still touting the wonderful bailout plan as being “good for the country”. I don’t know exactly where he lost my last thread of faith in my belief that he at least meant well, but now I know that he’s just a shill who for some reason is doing everything in his power to dismantle this county, piece by piece.

January 20th can’t come soon enough, but I’m solidly unconvinced that things will truly change after that, either.

Here’s an article from Channel 4 News about the Bush administration’s continuing support of this completely dynamic and non-transparent bill:

The White House, under fire from Democrats and Republicans alike, defended giving billions of bail-out dollars to banks that plan to reward shareholders and executives or even buy other banks.

Allowing banks to engage in such normal business activities could help loosen lending and revive the sagging economy, Ed Lazear, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, said.

He said the administration would not impose conditions beyond those required when Congress created the bail-out programme and authorised the government to buy stock in financial institutions.

…

Despite the gloomy outlook, the White House offered its clearest rejection to date of a second stimulus package to boost the economy. Mr Lazear said “the appropriate stimulus right now” is only what has already been passed by Congress: the 700 billion-dollar (£437 billion) financial industry rescue package.

Support is growing in Congress, however, for billions in federal spending for such initiatives as public works projects, aid for cash-strapped states and new jobless benefits.

Mr Lazear was put before the cameras in the White House briefing room amid a rising chorus of complaints from politicians about the latitude that banks will have when they receive bail-out money from Washington.

That bail-out was originally sold by the administration as a plan for the government to buy toxic mortgage-based assets from financial institutions, to get them off their books and inspire them to resume normal lending.

After passage, though, the administration decided the better course would be to devote 250 billion dollars (£156 billion) into buying ownership stakes in banks.
(Original article here)

Everyone seems to be just simply getting in line and shouting for their own piece of our tax dollars. A public boycott of every company who participates in this charade is certainly in order, just as avoiding a vote for any politician who supports this type of nonsensical action.

I would say that the rest of the world is laughing at us since this article comes from the UK, but since every other country is pulling similar stunts, I think it’s just the ultra-rich that are laughing at the average taxpayers. Goldman Sachs is apparently paying out more in bonuses this year than WE gave them with our taxpayer-funded bailout money.

Goldman Sachs is on course to pay its top City bankers multimillion-pound bonuses – despite asking the U.S. government for an emergency bail-out.

The struggling Wall Street bank has set aside £7billion for salaries and 2008 year-end bonuses, it emerged yesterday.

Each of the firm’s 443 partners is on course to pocket an average Christmas bonus of more than £3million.

The size of the pay pool comfortably dwarfs the £6.1billion lifeline which the U.S. government is throwing to Goldman as part of its £430billion bail-out.

As Washington pours money into the bank, the cash will immediately be channelled to Goldman’s already well-heeled employees.

News of the firm’s largesse will revive the anger over the ‘rewards for failure’ culture endemic in the world of high finance.

Read the original article here.

It’s the same story around the world. Only the already-rich are truly benefiting from these government bailouts. Check out the latest news from Russia’s $200 billion bailout:

MOSCOW: Companies belonging to two of Russia’s richest men are among the first to be awarded loans from a $50 billion government bailout fund intended to help Russian companies repay debts to Western banks, rather than allow the banks to seize assets that had been pledged as collateral.

The plan is integral to Russia’s overall $200 billion bailout package. In keeping with a strong nationalist bent in Russian business policy, a stated goal is to send the aid quickest to those companies at risk of foreign takeovers during the financial crisis.

The result will likely be payouts to already wealthy Russians, though with strings attached.

Read the rest of the article here.

bailoutsleuth.com is posting a series of “where is our money going” articles that describe the dirty details of the taxpayer-funded $700 billion bailout (really, $850 billion). Here’s part one:

Members of Congress are starting to question whether banks that got billions in government bailout money will use some of it to pay year-end bonuses to executives and other employees.

BailoutSleuth decided to take a look at compensation levels for the top officers at those banks, to see how much they were paid in recent years and whether the companies have made any adjustments in response to plunging profits or eroding asset values.

We’ll start with four banks that got $25 billion each by selling preferred stock and warrants to the Treasury Department. The companies on that list are Citigroup Inc., Wells Fargo & Co., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Bank of America Corp.

Although Bank of America got $15 billion in direct government investment, it is in the process of buying Merrill Lynch Inc., which received an additional $10 billion…

Be sure to read the rest of their article, as it’s pretty detailed and twisted. If you haven’t contacted everyone you know to vote against those who voted for the bailout, NOW IS THE TIME!

Discussing the future of the two-party system and what his fans are up to now:

How much I wish this guy could be our president for even just a few days…