“I think they know how big it is, but they don’t want to say how big it is. It’s so big they can’t acknowledge it,” said John H. Makin, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute, referring to administration officials. “The lesson from Japan in the 1990s was that they should have stepped up and nationalized the banks.”
- From today’s NYT.
Freddie deBoer calls bullshit on a few of them.
The answer may surprise you.
How Karl Marx was right and Ben Bernanke is wrong.
SI is reporting that A-Rod flunked a steroids test back in 2003.
Is offering new tax breaks to homebuyers and carbuyers really a sound way to pull us out of our current recession? Some Senators seem to think so. Not everyone else is sold, however:
Adam Posen, deputy director of the Peterson Institute of International Economics, said that homebuyers would have trouble getting access to mortgages because of the continued tightness in the credit markets and that the car buyer incentive fell short by not focusing on fuel-efficient vehicles, and that the money might be better directed at mass transit.
“They are also structurally unsound,” Mr. Posen said of the two provisions, “reinforcing the attempts of industries that are too large – housing construction, automobile production – to survive based on government distortions.” He called them both “terrible, pandering ideas.”
More commentary here.
Stephen A. thinks the Yankees should sign Manny, which is reason enough to convince me they shouldn’t.
Hank and Hal are breaking the bank, committing roughly $426 million to three free agents over the last 10 days or so. The economy in NYC should suck next year but the baseball should be good.
Always listen to the man on television:
“Peter writes: ‘Should I be worried about Bear Stearns in terms of liquidity and get my money out of there?’ No! No! No! Bear Stearns is fine! Do not take your money out. … Bear Stearns is not in trouble. I mean, if anything they’re more likely to be taken over. Don’t move your money from Bear! That’s just being silly! Don’t be silly!” —Jim Cramer, responding to a viewer’s e-mail on CNBC’s Mad Money, March 11, 2008
Manny Ramirez thinks the Yankees are getting ready to make him an offer.
