Dem Politics - Does Any of This Make Sense?

So Wednesday and Thursday I threw up a bit while relaxing after my day of trading.

Why?

Because I had the unfortunate circumstance of listening to the Democratic Convention where a train of politicians, including Clinton and Biden, pontificated about how change "starts from the bottom up", clearly trying to tie themselves to the "common man" theme.

Please.

Joe Biden is the quintessential Washington DC insider.  He has more tenure than just about anyone in the Senate, and has a voting record that shows quite clearly that he has absolutely no understanding of the plight of "Joe Sixpack", but boy, he sure understands special interests, lobbyists and spending money the government doesn't have.

Biden tried to play the "Barack is not an elitist" (yeah, ok, everyone gets to go to Harvard, right?) card, but got absolutely nowhere with it.

Clinton?  He (and she) attacked the Republicans, of course - what else would you expect?

But let us look at what was not said by any of the speakers, including Barack himself:

• How about locking up the fraudsters in the banking system?  Lenders?  Realtors?  Appraisers?  How many ENRON-style corporate structures will Barack Obama's administration stomp on and send off the bad actors to prison?
• There was a nice comment about bankruptcy reform and protecting pensions.  Where is the commitment to JAIL those executives - and WALL STREET FOLKS - who have put these pension funds in a critically underfunded condition in the first place?
• What are we going to do about the fact that it appears the FDIC may need as much as $500 billion to bail them out from all the bank failures?  The $800 billion Paulson "bazooka"?  Where are we going to get the money and why should we pay for any of it when 80% of America got nothing from the fraud that led to this mess?
• Where was the mention - and condemnation - of Democrats getting $70,000 worth of "extra-good mortgage benefits" from lenders who financially raped millions of Americans?  Why did Bank of America get to write huge parts of the housing bailout bill - in your Democratic Congress?
• How about the fact that if you want to increase the affordability of homes you must shrink, not expand or "stabilize", the price of houses?
• Was there anything of a message having to do with the fact that we, as Americans, have spent ourselves into a hole from which we must extract ourselves, and that this will of necessity require less spending and more saving by both individuals and government?    All I heard was "more more more" - an extension of the failed policy of our government and private sector to spend that which they do not have.  In short - where's the money going to come from to cash all these checks that Obama and the rest of The Democrats wrote?
• Could there be an attempt at an honest evaluation and debate on Medicare, Medicaid, and other entitlements?  Admission and discussion of the fact that we simply do not have the money to provide health care on demand irrespective of ability to pay?  Lots of promises were made here, but nowhere did we hear about how we're going to cover the bill.
• Did I hear a discussion about how we pay for government, moving away from a tax code crafted by the lobbyists, for the lobbyists, instead of for The American People?  How about The Fair Tax Barack?  Which is more important?  "K" Street or Main Street?  Claiming that you're going to give a tax cut to 95% of America can only be accomplished by running even bigger deficits, and we've had 20 years of that failure too.  Where are you going to get the money?

Finally, let's talk about American Inventiveness.  What was the last "big innovation" to come out of America in terms of technology? 

There hasn't been one in over ten years.

The Internet?  Long time ago.  Laser and inkjet printers?  Long time ago.  Personal computers?  Even longer ago.  Ipods?  Please.  Cell phones?  1980s.

It is technological innovation that drives GDP growth, in the end.  Take a look at history, and that is what you will find.  Trains, then automobiles, telephones, mechanical refrigeration, etc.  Each technological innovation has resulted in major steps forward in GDP and the common weal of the world.

In the last 20 years we have gone from a nation that innovates in technology to one that innovates in finding new ways to steal.  And make no mistake, that's what "financial innovation" really is - its a way to steal.  All this "innovation" produces nothing and relies on the gullibility of the "investor" to believe that 2 + 2 can be made to equal 5.  This is the history of our last 20 years of "innovation" in America, and I heard nothing - absolutely nothing - from the Democrats that indicates that they recognize this as a problem or intend to stop it.

Oh sure, the usual Democrat talking points were out.  Iraq, among others.  Melissa Ethridge singing "Give Peace a Chance" conflated with "God Bless America"; she obviously didn't get the memo that occasionally you have to help God out with a rifle or two.  Make sure you send the tape of that performance over to Putin and Mevdeved; I'm sure they will will appreciate The United States' new position on the recent Russian armed invasion of foreign lands, especially now that Russia has announced an intention to screw with Eastern European oil supplies.

It is time for America to ask - if The Democrats want the brass ring for four years, what are they going to do to address these problems?

Specifically:

• Will you lock up the fraudsters who sold people 2 + 2 = 5?  All of them?  Realtors, mortgage brokers, investment bankers?  Auction-rate Securities sellers who peddled that crap as a "money market equivalent"?  In short, the entire structured-products "business" that is the financial equivalent of a perpetual motion scheme?
• Will you make certain that the bill for the losses created by these "innovations" does not go to the taxpayer? If Fannie and Freddie need to be "rescued", will you instead place them in rundown and open sustainable underwriting - 30 year fixed, 20% down in hard cash, 36% DTI - via Ginnie, instead of rewarding the levering up of a couple of gigantic hedge funds?
• Will you work to complete the correction of housing to affordable levels for all Americans - with "affordable" defined as, once again, 20% down, 36% DTI, 30 year fixed money?  The definition that, incidentally, leads to the homeowner having a clear title to their home before they retire?  Or will you continue to push the "status quo", which has you renting your house from the bank for eternity and beyond.
• Will you stop the influx of illegals to our nation and remove those who are here?  You say you want to stop outsourcing of jobs and illegals taking American jobs, but what I don't hear is that your administration will deport the 20 million who are here - an act that would force wages higher for Americans (supply and demand here - fewer workers, less labor supply = higher prices - that is, wages.)
• Will you stop the outright lying in our economic statistics?  GDP was not positive in 2Q; to get there you must believe that inflation was 1% and financial firms grew their profits tremendously in that same period.  Both assertions fly in the face of reality.  3, 4% price inflation as reported by the alleged CPI?  You can't be serious; everyone who buys groceries or gasoline knows those numbers are a lie.  This robs everyone as it gives justification for not only lower "cost of living increases" but also lower interest rates - decimating savers.
• Will you stop The Fed from peddling "moral hazard" as economic policy?  Market discipline - the risk of actual bankruptcy - is the only mechanism that exists to keep folks on the straight and narrow when it comes to risk management.  The last 30 years have proven that "Fed Intervention" simply leads to bigger bubbles and bigger messes.
• You said you want America to be independent of foreign oil.  That's something we must do.  How do you intend to accomplish it?  Natural gas won't get us there and neither will nuclear power standing alone.  But there are ways to make it happen; I've outlined some of them in Musings in the past - in 2006.  Yes, that's a rough outline.  Where's yours, given that The Democrats have been responsible for blocking nuclear energy development for the last 30 years.

The DNC and Barack Obama have both been getting copies of my Tickers, and some special edition letters, for months - not to mention the Petitions.

Show the more than 50,000 regular readers of The Market Ticker that you deserve their vote.