Making Congress READ the Laws They Pass

Everyone is wrong about the AIG bonuses.

By counterspinyc- Democratic Senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut inserted language into the scam-stimulus bill permitting the AIG bonuses that everyone is now bloviating about. He did so at the request of the Treasury Department. A Congressional majority then voted for the Dodd proposal, and President Obama signed it into law. Those upset about the AIG bonuses should focus on the fact that Congress authorized them.

All the Congressional grand-standing about how bad the bonuses are is rank hypocrisy. One of two things is true . . . Either those who voted for the scam-stimulus bill knew about the bonus provision, in which case they ought to be "falling on their own swords," instead of castigating the government-appointed CEO of AIG, or . . .

They didn't know about the bonus provision, in which case they ought to introduce DownsizeDC.org's "Read the Bills Act," so they'll know what they're passing before they cast their votes.

But, the politicians aren't the only guilty parties in this stupid controversy. The American people are also at fault. Here's why:

We're constantly told that Congress doesn't respond to public pressure and that,
therefore, what DownsizeDC.org is trying to do won't work. And yet, we see
Congress respond to public pressure repeatedly. The only problem is that it's
always pressure about the wrong things! The way to prevent problems like the
bonus-authorization provision is to pass the "Read the Bills Act" (RTBA).

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Time Magazine: Can Marijuana Rescue California's Economy?

Time examines legalizing marijuana as a possible solution to California's economic Crisis.

By Alison Stateman / Los Angeles

Could marijuana be the answer to the economic misery facing California? Democratic State Assembly member Tom Ammiano thinks so. Ammiano introduced legislation last month that would legalize pot and allow the state to regulate and tax its sale — a move that could mean billions for the cash-strapped state. Pot is, after all, California's biggest cash crop, responsible for $14 billion in annual sales, dwarfing the state's second largest agricultural commodity — milk and cream — which brings in $7.3 billion annually, according to the most recent USDA statistics. The state's tax collectors estimate the bill would bring in about $1.3 billion in much-needed revenue a year, offsetting some of the billions in service cuts and spending reductions outlined in the recently approved state budget.

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Should Hard Times Permit High Times?

Advocates of legal pot compare marijuana laws to alcohol prohibition, approved during prosperous times in 1920 only to become unpopular during the Great Depression. Prohibition was finally repealed in 1933, in part due to the cost of reining in illegal booze and the need to recoup lost tax revenue in tough economic times.


New America Media, News Report, Marcelo Ballvé

NEW YORK -- In 1977, President Jimmy Carter asked Congress to decriminalize marijuana possession (it never did). The next year, the Ladies Home Journal described a summer jazz festival on the White House's South Lawn where "a haze of marijuana smoke hung heavy under the low-bending branches of a magnolia tree."

The late 1970's may have been the high-water mark for permissiveness regarding marijuana. But advocates of decriminalized pot believe a confluence of factors, especially the country's economic malaise, are leading to another countrywide reappraisal of the drug.

"There is momentum of the sort I haven't seen since I've been involved in this," says Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the New York-based Drug Policy Alliance, which supports easing marijuana laws.

He says incidents like then-candidate Barack Obama's early admission of pot use or the flap over Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps's bong-smoking may lead to initial public hand-wringing, but in the end they tend to legitimize pot use. So does the growing recognition of medical marijuana.

But, he adds, "the economic crisis is the single most important factor" in this new shift in perceptions.

That's because the ailing economy is triggering a scramble for new government savings or sources of revenue. Nadelmann compares today's marijuana laws to alcohol prohibition, approved during prosperous times in 1920 only to become unpopular during the Great Depression. Prohibition was finally repealed in 1933, in part due to the cost of reining in illegal booze and the need to recoup lost tax revenue in tough economic times.

As he signed a law easing prohibition, President Franklin Roosevelt reportedly quipped, "I think this would be a good time for a beer."

Is our recession-plagued present a good time for a joint? Legalizing, taxing and regulating marijuana, would pull the rug out from under pot dealers in urban America, and create a crisis for them, but it would likely prove a boon for state budgets. In an oft-cited 2006 report on U.S. marijuana production, expert Jon Gettman used "conservative price estimates" to peg the value of the annual crop at $36 billion--more valuable than corn and wheat combined.


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The World Is Rioting Over the Economy - Why Aren't We?

Terrific piece by Joshua Holland!

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet. - Americans are rightfully angry about the economic decline, but with a few small exceptions, quietly so. Why? It depends on whom you ask.

Explosive anger is spilling out onto the streets of Europe. The meltdown of the global economy is igniting massive social unrest in a region that has long been a symbol of political stability and social cohesion.
It's not a new trend: A wave of upheaval is spreading from the poorer countries on the periphery of the global economy to the prosperous core.
Over the past few years, a series of riots spread across what is patronizingly known as the Third World. Furious mobs have raged against skyrocketing food and energy prices, stagnating wages and unemployment in India, Senegal, Yemen, Indonesia, Morocco, Cameroon, Brazil, Panama, the Philippines, Egypt, Mexico and elsewhere.
For the most part, those living in wealthier countries took little notice. But now, with the global economy crashing down around us, people in even the wealthiest nations are mad as hell and reacting violently to what they view as an inadequate response to their tumbling economies.
The Telegraph (UK) warned last month that protests over governments' handling of the crisis "are widespread and gathering pace," and "may spark a new revolution":

A depression triggered in America is being played out in Europe with increasing
violence, and other forms of social unrest are spreading. In Iceland, a government has fallen. Workers have marched in Zaragoza, as Spanish unemployment heads towards 20 percent. There have been riots and bloodshed in Greece, protests in Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary and Bulgaria. The police have suppressed public discontent in Russia and will be challenged again at large gatherings this weekend.
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America Is Broke, And Funding Fantasy Wars at the Pentagon

By Chalmers Johnson, Tomdispatch.com.- Americans don't usually think of the Pentagon as a scam operation -- but it's never to late to wake up and smell the rip-off.
Like much of the rest of the world, Americans know that the U.S. automotive industry is in the grips of what may be a fatal decline. Unless it receives emergency financing and undergoes significant reform, it is undoubtedly headed for the graveyard in which many American industries are already buried, including those that made televisions and other consumer electronics, many types of scientific and medical equipment, machine tools, textiles, and much earth-moving equipment -- and that's to name only the most obvious candidates. They all lost their competitiveness to newly emerging economies that were able to outpace them in innovative design, price, quality, service, and fuel economy, among other things.
A similar, if far less well known, crisis exists when it comes to the military-industrial complex. That crisis has its roots in the corrupt and deceitful practices that have long characterized the high command of the Armed Forces, civilian executives of the armaments industries, and Congressional opportunists and criminals looking for pork-barrel projects, defense installations for their districts, or even bribes for votes.
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Obama's half brother charged for marijuana possession

It sucks when your little brother gets arrested for marijuana possession and you're the President of the United States...not, it should be a non-issue! Unless of course, Obama gets little CARE packages from Kenyan...

George Obama, the half brother of U.S. President Barack Obama, has been arrested by Kenyan police on a charge of possession of marijuana, police said Saturday. Inspector Augustine Mutembei, the officer in charge, said Obama was arrested on charges of possession of cannabis, known in Kenya as Bhang, and resisting arrest.

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Great advice for anyone losing their homes to foreclosure: Stay Put

Follow the law

Wall Street and its co-conspirators on Main Street had a great plan.

 

Step 1: Ram predatory loans down the market with fraud and deceptive marketing.

 

Step 2: Some of the loans will blow up, but in the aggregate it will all work out and besides, the loans will be bundled and sold off to investors (spreading the toxic waste), so who cares?

 

Great plan, but it had a few problems.

 

Problem #1: It destroyed the world financial system (minor detail)

Problem #2 (And he's where it get VERY interesting...) For a loan to be valid, the lender needs to be able to produce the paperwork.

Guess what?

In their mad greed to screw the American people and line their own pockets, Wall Street forgot that little detail.

Many of these loans and been sliced and diced and sold and re-sold so many times that not only is the paperwork not easy to lay hands on, in some cases, it's not clear who actually owns the loan.

Here's where property law comes in.

If the bank can't produce the documents and the real owner of the loan can't be identified, the contract is null and void.

You've got to hand it to Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (and Ohio which produces a lot of great Congresspeople.)

By telling a bank to "produce the note," a homeowner can delay foreclosure by forcing the lender to prove the suing institution is actually the same which owns the debt.

Now, the banks own sloth and disorganization (and inherent dishonesty) can be used against it.

Final word: The media (and Wall Street and its criminal partners in Congress and the former Bush White House) love to call these loans sup-prime.

Here's the old fashioned word: predatory.

 

Many of the loans that were made in the past five years that have created so many problems would have been illegal until Bush & Co not only gutted lending laws, but also literally sued states to stop them from enforcing their own lending laws.

 

Former governor Elliott Spitzer was the ring leader of the state movement to enforce local lending laws...and you saw what happened to him.

 

He's no saint (and truth be told, he's kind of a jerk) but if every politician who went to hookers was busted, Washington and all the state capitals would be ghost towns

 

Why Elliot Spitzer was assassinated

 

Stay Put

Technorati Tags: foreclosure,activism,actions,action,foreclosure advice,Congresswoman Marcy Kartur,Ohio

The Financial Crisis Is Driving Americans to Suicide

By Nick Turse, Tomdispatch.com - Pushed past their breaking points, people are robbing banks to pay the rent, setting homes on fire -- even taking their own lives.
The body count is still rising. For months on end, marked by bankruptcies, foreclosures, evictions, and layoffs, the economic meltdown has taken a heavy toll on Americans. In response, a range of extreme acts including suicide, self-inflicted injury, murder, and arson have hit the local news. By October 2008, an analysis of press reports nationwide indicated that an epidemic of tragedies spurred by the financial crisis had already spread from Pasadena, California, to Taunton, Massachusetts, from Roseville, Minnesota, to Ocala, Florida.
In the three months since, the pain has been migrating upwards. A growing number of the world's rich have garnered headlines for high profile, financially-motivated suicides. Take the New Zealand-born "millionaire financier" who leapt in front of an express train in Great Britain or the "German tycoon" who did much the same in his homeland. These have, with increasing regularity, hit front pages around the world. An example would be New York-based money manager René-Thierry Magnon de la Villehuchet, who slashed his wrists after he "lost more than $1 billion of client money, including much, if not all, of his own family's fortune." In the end, he was yet another victim of financial swindler Bernard Madoff's $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
An unknown but rising number of less wealthy but distinctly well-off workers in the financial field have also killed themselves as a result of the economic crisis -- with less press coverage. Take, for instance, a 51-year-old former analyst at Bear Stearns. Learning that he would be laid off after JPMorgan Chase took over his failed employer, he "threw himself out of the window" of his 29th-floor apartment in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Or consider the 52-year-old commercial real estate broker from suburban Chicago who "took his life in a wildlife preserve" just "a month after he publicly worried over a challenging market," or the 50-year-old "managing partner at Leeward Investments" from San Carlos, California, who got wiped out "in the markets" and "suffocated himself to death."
Beverly Hills clinical psychologist Leslie Seppinni caught something of our moment when she told Forbes magazine that this was "the first time in her 18-year career that businessmen are calling her with suicidal impulses over their financial state." In the last three months, alone, "she has intervened in at least 14 cases of men seriously considering taking their lives." Seppinni offered this observation: "They feel guilt and shame because they think they should have known what was coming with the market or they should have pulled out faster."
Still, it's mostly on Main Street, not Wall Street, that people are being driven to once unthinkable extremes. And while it's always impossible to know the myriad factors, including deeply personal ones, that contribute to drastic acts, violent or otherwise, many of those recently reported are undoubtedly tied, at least in part, to the way the bottom seems to be falling out of the economy.
As a result, reports of people driven to anything from armed robbery to financially-motivated suicide in response to new fiscal realities continue to bubble to the surface. And since only a certain percentage of such acts receive media coverage, the drumbeat of what is being reported definitely qualifies as startling.

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Bail Out the People Movement

Bail Out the People Movement
FIGHTBACK CONFERENCE
Draft Working Paper

Realizing the Fightback – Some Perspective and Plans

Download PDF

The following was adopted at the Jan. 17 Fightback Conference in NYC. It is a work in progress.

 

In many ways, the U.S.-financed genocidal siege of Gaza that many of us have been demonstrating against in recent weeks is a harbinger of the widening war against the workers and oppressed peoples of the planet that is sure to intensify this year. In 2009, more and more lives are going to be devastated by the biggest global economic crisis since the depression of the 1930s.

 

This crisis is the challenge of a lifetime for those of us who have made a commitment to fighting for the rights of people. What we do or fail to do will prove decisive in the coming battle over whose interests in society shall prevail.

 

The election of the first African-American president, Barack Obama, realizes a measure of Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream. But depression-level joblessness, evictions and foreclosures made worse by cutbacks, war, bigotry and racism are not a dream but a nightmare. This is a time of many contradictions. Many people feel that the new president will bring progressive change but at the same time, there are Black youth being summarily executed by police; Proposition 8; new attacks on reproductive justice; one of the biggest bigots presiding over the inauguration ceremony, the prospects of a widening war in Afghanistan and much more.

 

Part of the legacy of Dr. King is the understanding that no election or president--however historical and inspiring--can be a substitute for a mass movement in the struggle against war or for social and economic rights. There are signs that the workers understand this.

This past December the bankers and bosses got hit with a one-two punch. The workers at the Republic Windows and Doors Factory in Chicago occupied their plant to win some measure of their rights. One day after the workers victory in Chicago, the Smithfield meat processing workers in Tar Heel, North Carolina finally won their right to a union after a long and bitter struggle. These battles are part of the first chapter of the Fightback that must and will grow. How can we help the development of the Fightback?

 

There can be no honest discussion about fighting without posing the inevitable question--Is it not time to terminate the capitalist system that appears only capable of trapping the people of the world in a nightmare of endless chaos, violence, misery, suffering, inequality, oppression, environmental destruction and other crises all in the interests of the super rich? How can this question not become the burning question as the absurd rules of capitalism mandate that no effort can be spared to bailout the barons of capitalist finance even while much of the population is pushed into life-threatening poverty? No doubt this unavoidable question will be an essential and welcome part of our discussion during the conference. Even if the question is not openly addressed, it will be the subtext of our deliberations.

 

However, though its direction is most definitely radical, it is not the intention of this document to unite conference participants around a comprehensive ideological position. Nor does it attempt to analyze the capitalist crisis, or address many issues of importance to all of us. This document is a framework for planning action. read more

 

 

Stop Foreclosures and Evictions!

Bail Out the People Movement

Technorati Tags: bail out,bail outs,banks,people,homes,foreclosure,society,government,actions,activism

Make the World Economic Forum work for poor people

At a time when charity dollars are scarce, the best way to fight global poverty is through small "microloans" to individual entrepreneurs, usually women. This proven strategy can be expanded to reach many more hard-working poor so they can lift themselves out of poverty.

Let's ask world leaders to expand microfinance to many more entrepreneurs.

Bob Fertik

Dear Activist,

The WEF Must Focus on Microfinance Ask the World Economic Forum's leaders to prioritize microfinance at their upcoming meeting. Our goal is to gather 10,000 petition signatures by January 21st. Sign the petition now.

In just a few weeks, the world's economic leaders will gather at the World Economic Forum (WEF) Annual Meeting 2009 to discuss the current financial crisis.

We need your help to make sure that the WEF's chairmen use the meeting to help those hardest hit by the crisis - the 3+ billion people around the world currently living on less than $2 a day.

Our goal is to gather 10,000 petition signatures by January 21st to make sure we've caught the WEF chairmen's attention before the Forum begins on the 28th.

Click the link below to add your name to our petition by January 21st:
http://mail.democrats.com/CT00032804MTY3MjA0MwAA.HTML?D=2009-01-08

Microfinance is one of the most effective ways to help break the cycle of poverty by giving the world's poor the financial tools they need to lift themselves and their families out of poverty, with dignity and pride.

But there is an urgent need to expand these services. Right now, the microfinance community is reaching only 10-20% of the estimated 500 million poor entrepreneurs who would benefit from these opportunities.

The leaders of the upcoming World Economic Forum have the power to advance microfinance world-wide and help eradicate poverty.

Please join us in contacting the Forum's Co-Chairs by January 21st to urge them to promote and prioritize microfinance at the upcoming conference.

Sign the petition at: http://mail.democrats.com/CT00032805MTY3MjA0MwAA.HTML?D=2009-01-08

Then help spread the word by forwarding this message to your friends, family and colleagues and asking them to join you before the 21st.

Thank you so much for your help.

Sincerely,

María Otero
President and CEO
ACCION International

Ron Paul: Economic crisis may be a blessing

In an interview with press TV, Ron Paul states that he believes Obama intends to continue the neocon foreign policies of intervention, but suggests that b/c of the economic crisis, the US may be forced to abandon such policies, in much the same way the Soviets were forced to abandon Afghanistan. Paul also discusses his bill to end the Fed.

By Jihan Hafiz, Press TV, Washington

The following is an exclusive Press TV interview with US congressman Ron Paul, a unique conservative politician who wants an end to US military presence on foreign soil, advocates US withdrawal from the UN, NATO and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and opposes the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Ron Paul, House representative of the 14th district of Texas, believes that US foreign policy must be reformed to avoid conflicts around the world.

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Paul Krugman: We're In For a Year of "Economic Hell"

It may take a lot longer than many people think before the United States economy is ready to live without bubbles. And until then, the economy is going to need a lot of government help.

Whatever the new administration does, we’re in for months, perhaps even a year, of economic hell. After that, things should get better, as President Obama’s stimulus plan — O.K., I’m told that the politically correct term is now “economic recovery plan” — begins to gain traction. Late next year the economy should begin to stabilize, and I’m fairly optimistic about 2010.

But what comes after that? Right now everyone is talking about, say, two years of economic stimulus — which makes sense as a planning horizon. Too much of the economic commentary I’ve been reading seems to assume, however, that that’s really all we’ll need — that once a burst of deficit spending turns the economy around we can quickly go back to business as usual.

In fact, however, things can’t just go back to the way they were before the current crisis. And I hope the Obama people understand that.

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U.S. May Give Car Czar Power to Force Bankruptcy

By John Hughes
Dec. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Treasury may adopt a plan that would let a car czar or the Treasury secretary force General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC into bankruptcy if the automakers don’t show they can survive without government aid, a U.S. senator said.
GM and Chrysler would be required to submit viability plans by March 31 or lose any further U.S. support, Carl Levin, a Democrat from Michigan, told reporters in Detroit yesterday. The Treasury plan would resemble a measure passed by the U.S. House last week that was rejected by the Senate.
“I expect that the terms would be similar to the ones that were in the House bill,” Levin said. “The power rests in the hands of either the czar or the Secretary of the Treasury to force bankruptcy by March 31.”
GM and Chrysler are seeking $14 billion to keep operating through the first quarter of next year. Without an infusion of cash, the largest U.S. automaker and No. 3 Chrysler may be only weeks from insolvency.
White House spokesman Tony Fratto declined to speculate on when a plan might be finished, though he said yesterday on Bloomberg Television that the administration wants to make sure taxpayers will get their money back.

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Bushonomics:Americans Rich and Poor Pawn More to Pay Bills

By Sue Zeidler and Tim Gaynor - BEVERLY HILLS, Calif./PHOENIX (Reuters) - Whether it's a Tiffany diamond or a three-year-old lawnmower, more and more Americans from all social classes are pawning their possessions to make ends meet.
Pawn shop owners see strong business across the country, even in unexpected locales like Beverly Hills, the mecca of luxury living and shopping.
"Banks aren't lending so people are coming here for short-term loans against collateral like diamonds, watches and other jewelry," said Jordan Tabach-Bank, CEO of Beverly Loan Co, self-described "pawnbroker to the stars."
"I do see my share of actors, writers, producers and directors," he said, but also cited more visits from white-collar professionals and especially business owners struggling to meet payroll obligations.
"We still do the five-, six-figure loans to Beverly Hills socialites who want to get plastic surgery, but never have we seen so many people in desperate need of funds to finance business enterprises," he added.
In the 70 years of the family business, Beverly Loan, which usually charges 4 percent monthly interest on loans, has never loaned so much as it has in the past few months, he said.
"We're a lot easier to deal with than a bank," he said from his office on the third floor of a Bank of America building near Rodeo Drive. An armed security guard watches over the reception, where case after case is filled with precious gems.
It's less glamorous at Mo Money Pawn, located in the grimy area of central Phoenix, where struggling building contractor Robert Lane waited for the shop to open its doors so he could pawn a table saw he bought for $900.
"It's to get ahead and pay off some of the bills," he says standing outside the store, where he hoped to get $300 for a cherished workshop tool he now rarely uses as work dries up.

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Feds Charge: The $50 BILLION Scam; One Man's Amazing Crime

A powerful New York financial advisor whose handful of clients routinely expected -- and received -- double digit returns, up market or down, may have instead been running a decades long Ponzi scheme that defrauded investors of $50 billion dollars, according to a one-count criminal complaint unsealed in federal court in New York.

Bernard Madoff, 70, a former chairman of NASDAQ, was an investment advisor who catered to a handful of high net worth clients, one of whom told ABC News that Madoff was so sought after that, as recently as two months ago, he was turning down potential new business.

According to a Securities and Exchange Commission document filed in Jan. 2008, and cited in the complaint, the firm had between 11 and 25 clients for the fiscal year ending Oct. 2007 and managed about $17 billion in assets in 23 different accounts.

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ALERT: Write to Congress to Help Needy Families in Economic Stimulus Package

Join us in asking Congress to suspend time limits in the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program as part of the economic stimulus legislation currently under consideration. Cutting families off TANF, the national assistance program for impoverished families with children, at a time of high and rising unemployment violates fundamental social justice and human rights principles and will further strain other safety net resources already taxed to the breaking point (including homeless shelters and soup kitchens).

Congress rightly recognizes that jobless workers need the safeguard of extended unemployment insurance benefits. So too, do TANF recipients at risk of losing their benefits at this tenuous economic moment, need to continue to receive these benefits.

In difficult economic times, the poor are often hit the hardest, and this will be especially true without increased funding for education and job training. In fact, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, food stamp caseloads have increased dramatically in recent months. The Center also projects that the number of poor children could increase by between 2.6 and 3.3 million as a result of the recession.

Write to your senators and representative urging them to remember the most impoverished families in the economic stimulus package by suspending the time limit on eligibility for TANF benefits for at least two years or until the economy has fully recovered.

Time is of the essence. Congress will be acting very shortly on the economic stimulus package. Act now by submitting an e-mail to your legislators.

CLICK HERE TO WRITE TO CONGRESS

Thank you for your support.

Sincerely,

Irasema Garza
President

Founded in 1970 as the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, Legal Momentum is the nation's oldest legal advocacy organization dedicated to advancing the rights of women and girls.

New York: 395 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014
Washington D.C.: 1101 14th Street, NW, Ste 300, Washington, DC 20005
www.legalmomentum.org/

Technorati Tags: legal momentum,congress,petitions,economic stimulus package,families,poverty,activism,actions

The Next Depression?

As the economic crisis continues to deepen, many are wondering if this recession will turn into a depression. Unemployment is up, the dollar is down, and US markets have lost nearly half their share values over the past year. The Real News spoke to economist Peter Schiff.



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Death March of the 401(k)

By Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
From the Cartoonist Group.

Death March of the 401(k)

Technorati Tags: Mike Luckovich,Cartoonist Group,editorial cartoons,political satire,humor,satire,economy

Dow Chemical to slash 5,000 jobs, close 20 plants

NEW YORK – Dow Chemical Co. said Monday it will slash 5,000 full-time jobs — about 11 percent of its total work force — close 20 plants and sell several businesses to reign in costs amid the economic recession.
The company, one of the largest chemical makers in the world, expects the moves to save about $700 million per year by 2010. Dow also will temporarily idle 180 plants and prune 6,000 contractors from its payroll.
“We are accelerating the implementation of these measures as the current world economy has deteriorated sharply, and we must adjust ourselves to the severity of this downturn,” Chief Executive and Chairman Andrew N. Liveris said in a statement.

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Unemployed and hungry in the US

Jobless numbers highest in 15 years, food stamp users hit record 31.6 million or 1 in 10 Americans.



More than half a million jobs were lost in the US in November, the largest loss in a single month since 1974. Though initially the announcement had a negative effect on the markets, by the end of the day Wall Street again forgot about the little guy, the Dow closed up 260 points. The more than 1.2 million jobs lost over the past 3 months, and the 11th straight month of job losses, bring the unemployment rate to 6.7per cent, the highest in 15 years. Also this week the Department of Agriculture released figures that show food stamp beneficiaries increased by 17 percent in the past year. That’s more than 31.6 million or 1 out of every 10 people in the US receiving food stamps or taking part in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. TRNN spoke to Dedrick Muhammad of the Institute for Policy Studies. Muhammad says that 6.7 percent is not the true unemployment number because it does not include the underemployed and those who have stopped looking for work. Muhammad also says that the bailout is a "trickle down" bailout, that by giving money to the wealthiest institutions somehow this is supposed to help the middle class and working class.

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