I've been obsessed with this bailout, as many others have been. Here are two bits of info that will serve us well.

The latest from William Greider on "Reclaiming the Economy for the People" - an excerpt:

The much-celebrated "Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights" is a fresh example of how the Democratic Party tries to have it both ways--avoiding the tough votes while mollifying the folks. The credit card reform measure imposes new rules on the industry and does away with many of the most outrageous gimmicks bankers use to extract more money from debtors. Banks cannot raise interest rates retroactively on old credit card balances or pile on hidden fees or fail to give advance notice for rate increases. These and other changes are worthy.

The achievement seems less courageous if you know that Congress was largely ratifying the regulatory rules already adopted by the Federal Reserve last year. Or that the legislation gives the industry another nine months to gouge their customers before the new rules go into effect. Or that Visa and MasterCard, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase are free to raise future interest rates to the sky--without limit. That is the industry's intention, as bank lobbyists reported after the bill was passed.
To read more... http://www.alternet.org/reproductivejustice/140489/we%27re_screwed_on_everything_from_health_care_to_the_economy_if_the_dems_don%27t_shape_up/

I'm a Democrat, so don't get me wrong here. The party has taken a turn, however, so there no longer appears to be a party that actually represents all our basic interests. We need people who represent us.

Of interest may be the list of the banks "too big to fail", who are now in deep water (i.e. failing):

American Express*
Bank of America
BB&T*
Mellon Bank*
Capital One*
Citigroup
GMAC
Goldman Sachs*
JPMorgan Chase*
KeyCorp
MetLife (ours!)
Morgan Stanley*
Northern Trust*
PNC Financial
Regions Financial
State Street Corp*
SunTrust Banks
US Bancorp*
Wells Fargo

* Just announced they would be repaying the federal government TARP money, wriggling free of some of the (important) regulations imposed on them.
Bold are banks that are still in excessive financial distress.

10 Large Banks Allowed to Exit U.S. Aid Program
Taxpayers — many of whom probably never imagined that banks would return their bailout money so soon, if ever —stand to make several billion dollars from their investment in the 10 banks. So far, the Treasury has collected about $1.8 billion in interest payments. It also might reap as much as $4.6 billion as the banks seek to expunge other government investments, known as warrants.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/business/economy/10tarp.html?_r=1&th=&adxnnl=1&emc=th&adxnnlx=1244646313-MQZ/au2Gimq2uiR6UP23qQ

So what's so inviting about this? We don't appear to be out of the woods yet by any means, but we did manage to collect some interest - $1.8 billion in fact - on OUR tax money, which is a new concept BTW. In this article they invite us to read more about the Treasury (which makes our money), however, they simply go on about the finer details such as the people running it. They have not indicated who OWNS our treasure chest, i.e. The Federal Reserve - Federal in name only. It is not the American People. It is a Private Bank. We don't actually know who owns it, but whoever does collects the interest on our tax generated federal dollars... until this recent event. Should we nationalize the banks that are "Too Big to Fail"?

Nationalizing Our Failing Banks
By Thomas Ferguson & Robert Johnson
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090309/ferguson_johnson

In this and many other national issues, I'll repeat, neither party is representing The People any more. It's obvious that we may need a new Third Party that represents our real interests (what shall we name it?), or we can put pressure on our representatives to get them back in line by writing to tell them what we expect of them: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm beginning with the group that is most beholden to the corporations, the Senate. Bottom line: we won't vote for them if they are no longer representing our interests. They can be Replaced.

Emily

Reclaiming Our Economy via Real Democracy

The posting does not allow for "bold" type. The banks that are still in very deep water are Bank of America and Citigroup.