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'I Can't Believe It's Not Insurance' / 11:41 a.m. Everyone is chuckling during the latest riff by Representative Gary Ackerman, Democrat of New York. He suggests, let's put this credit-default swap stuff into a layperson's terms, because not enough most congress members understood it a year ago. Have you ever heard of that product, "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter?" he asks.
By selling something with no money in your back pocket or wallet, and collecting a premium, you're selling something that can't be called insurance because there's no money to back it up, Mr. Ackerman quipped. "Because if they called it 'I Can't Believe It's Not Insurance,' maybe nobody would buy it. ... It's a funny joke I made up, but all of us who are laughing are crying and getting angry and enraged."
He began his query by likening the credit-default swap business to a sinking raft with two men surrounded by sharks and high waves in a storm, and one sells the other insurance. It's snake oil without the oil in the jar, he added. A lot of various scenarios here all of which lead us all to his pretty obvious point.
Add in the presence of Code Pink demonstrators and you have a day's entertainment as fulfilling as the music provided by the ship's orchestra as the Titanic slipped gracefully beneath the dark, icy waves.
Join me tonight. We'll talk about this and other aspects of global capitalism's slow, gurgling demise.
