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By Stephen Pizzo (about the author) Page 2 of 2 page(s)

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The administration, of course, argues that going into partnership with troubled banks is only way to get liquidity into hundreds of insolvent banks.

Really? FDR wouldn't disagree, and neither do I.

The traditional way banks get liquidity is customer deposits. Therefore, if the goal is to get banks back on their feet, and to do so in a sustainable manner, the way to do that is to do whatever it takes to assure that Joe and Jane Sixpack have jobs. And that those jobs provide salaries sufficient for families to live on and with something left over to put in the bank each month. (Duh!)

But remember, this is a Reagan "trickle down" administration. They believe that the way government creates a robust economy is to do whatever it takes to assure that the 2% of the folks at the top are fat and happy. That way, these trickle-downers believe, the rich will hire more gardeners and housekeepers thereby stimulating the economy, top down.

That didn't work when Ronald Reagan tried it and it didn't work for Bush either. And it worked even less for the rest of us. Because it takes a lot more than a few hundred thousand gardeners and housekeepers to clean up messes of this size so the American economy can bloom again. It takes tens of millions of carpenters, road, dam and bridge builders, daycare workers, teachers and factory workers to do that.

Trickle UP works, Roosevelt proved that. Trickle down is a fraud, and we are living the consequences of that cynical, bankrupt philosophy today.

Meantime our $10 billion a month is at least doing for the Iraqis what we can only wish the Bush administration would do for us.

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Stephen Pizzo has been published everywhere from The New York Times to Mother Jones magazine. His book, Inside Job: The Looting of America's Savings and Loans, was nominated for a (more...)

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