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The G.O.P. Economic Meltdown

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"The great cause of this [financial] crisis is the incredible greed and selfishness
that exist in the ruling elite of America. They have no shame."
— Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, in 2009 speech

The solution to this intentional economic disaster is
Reason-Based Taxation [WMail #9 April 2001]

Timeline of The G.O.P. Economic Meltdown Early History   •   Bush Bankrupting The Country   •   Obama Fixing The Disaster Historical  Events 1792 March-April: U.S. financial crisis dubbed the 'Panic of 1792', during which securities lost 25 percent of their value. 1873 Sept 20: The financial 'Panic of 1873' swept the New York Stock Exchange in the wake of railroad bond defaults and bank failures, triggering the worldwide Long Depression that lasted 65 months (until March 1879). 1893 June 27: The financial 'Panic of 1893' was a crash of the New York stock market caused by a run on the gold supply, the worst economic crisis to hit the nation in its history to that point. 1907 Oct 21: The financial 'Panic of 1907' began with a run on the Knickerbocker Trust Company of New York, dragging stocks down 37%. 1910 Nov: The secret meeting of U.S. bankers and financiers and government officials on Jekyl Island in Georgia to design a central bank for the U.S. 1913 Dec 23: Enactment by Congress of the Federal Reserve Act that created the Federal Reserve central banking system in the U.S.; immediately signed into law by President Wilson. 1929 Oct 24: Beginning of the stock market crash – referred to since as 'Black Thursday'. 1929 Oct 29: Further decline of the Dow Jones Industrial Average index; the infamous 'Black Tuesday' collapse of the New York stock market that began America's 'Great Depression'. 1932 March 4: Start of hearings by the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking and Currency on the causes of the stock market crash. Generally led by committee counsel Ferdinand Pecora [1882-1971], the hearings became known as the 'Pecora Commission'. The hearings were instrumental in passage of the Glass-Steagal Acts, the Securities Act of 1933, and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934; the commission ended hearings on 4 May 1934 and issued their final report.    "The Hellhound of Wall Street: How Ferdinand Pecora's Investigation of The Great Crash Forever Changed American Finance" [2010] by Michael Perino Penguin 8¼x5½ pb [9/2011] for $11.56 Penguin Press 9¼x6¼ hardcover [10/2010] for $12.99 1932 July 8: The Dow-Jones Industrial Average index hit bottom at 41.22 points, a loss of 89.19 percent since September 1929. 1933 March 4: President Franklin D. Roosevelt sworn into office. 1933 May 27: In response to the economic crisis, Congress passed the First Glass-Steagall Act. 1933 June 16: Congress passed the Second Glass-Steagall Act, which founded the Federal Deposit Insurance Company, and separated commercial (consumer) banking from investment (speculative) banking. 1934 May 4: End of hearings by the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking and Currency on the causes of the stock market crash, and publcation of the 'Pecora Commission' final report.    "The Pecora Report: The Report On The Practices of Stock Exchanges From The 'Pecora Commission'" [1934] by U.S. Senate Committee on Banking and Currency CreateSpace / Aquitaine Media 10x7 pb [9/2009] for $25.95 1935 Aug 14: The Social Security Act was signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. 1936 Feb: The Secretary of The Treasury and the Comptroller of The Currency were removed from the Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve, so that the federal government actually has no vote on any matter. National Debt in 1980: ONE TRILLION DOLLARS which included the entire VietNam War 1981 Aug 13: Kemp-Roth Tax Cut signed into law by President Ronald Reagan. 1982 July: Collapse of the Penn Square Bank in Oklahoma City, the first of 139 Oklahoma banks that failed at the end of the Oil Boom Bubble in the 1980s. 1982 Oct 1: Congress passed the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act, which deregulated the savings & loan industry (cause of the Savings & Loan Crisis of the 1980s & 1990s); signed into law by President Reagan on 15 October. 1986 Oct 23: Tax Reform Act of 1986 signed into law by President Ronald Reagan. 1986 Nov: Wall Street arbitrageur Ivan Boesky pled guilty to securities fraud; he also revealed details of insider trading deals with financier Michael Milken and others, which led to an S.E.C. probe of Wall Street investment bank Drexel Burnham Lambert. Boesky served two years at Lompoc Federal Prison; Milken served 22 months at Pleasanton, California; both were banned for life from working in the securities industry. 1987 Jan 8: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index closed above 2000 for the first time. Mid-1987: Beginning of the Reagan-Bush Savings & Loan Crisis; 747 U.S. S&L/thrift banks failed. The total cost is estimated at $160 billion {$230 billion in 2010 dollars} including Bush 41's direct bailout of $125 billion {$180 billion in 2010 dollars}, paid for by taxpayers. 1987 June 2: President Reagan announced his nomination of Alan Greenspan to succeed Paul Volcker as chairman of the Federal Reserve; Greenspan served for 18 years. National Debt in 1992: FOUR TRILLION DOLLARS after the Reagan-Bush Years Clinton's First Term: Increase of National Debt slowed to 25 percent, reaching 5 trillion dollars. 1998 April 3: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index's first close above 9,000. 1999 Nov 12: Sen. Phill Gramm [GOP-TX] successfully gutted the Glass-Steagall Banking Acts of 1933 with passage of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, a major cause of the subprime mortgage meltdown of 2008. 2000 Dec 14: Sen. Phil Gramm [GOP-TX] pushed through the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, deregulating all derivatives trading (a major cause of The Enron Scandal in 2001); signed into law by President Clinton on December 21. Clinton's Second Term: Increase of National Debt slowed still further; Clinton balanced the budget and created a Treasury surplus.          "[Clinton] was the first Democrat to be re-elected since Franklin D. Roosevelt and, during his eight years in office, the nation enjoyed the greatest peace and prosperity in its history. Unemployment fell to the lowest rate in modern times, while inflation declined to a 30-year low and welfare rolls shrank. Crime fell to levels unmatched in half a century and home ownership increased to historic highs. Clinton submitted the first balanced federal budget in decades and banked a staggering surplus. He failed to reform healthcare but elevated environmental protection to unmatched levels."          — Tim Rutten, Los Angeles Times, 23 June 2004 George W. Bush  Bankrupting  America Official National Debt in 2001: 5.728 TRILLION DOLLARS on the Monday after George Dubya Bush took office 2001 April: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #9 "Reason-Based Taxation" 2001 Dec: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #18 "The Stock Market Casino" 2002 March: The NASDAQ Composite index bottomed in the 1900s, a drop of 62% since March 2000. 2002 July 1: The NASDAQ Composite index closed at 5-year low of 1,403.80; DOW down to 9,109.79. 2002 Oct 9: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index bottomed at 7,286.27 (down 2.9% for a 5-year low). 2003 June 3: Mysterious federal ceremony claiming Republican victory in ending regulation of U.S. banks. 2004 Feb: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #40 "Paleo-Capitalism" 2004 April: Hearing at the S.E.C. that gave the five top Wall Street investment banks permission to release capital reserves to invest in 'exotic instruments'. 2005 Sept: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #54 "F*** The Fed" 2006 Feb 1: Ben S. Bernanke sworn in as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, succeeding longtime Fed Chair Alan Greenspan. 2006 June: Henry Paulson sworn in as Secretary of Treasury, kept by Obama thru 2010. 2006 Sept: Nouriel Roubini of N.Y.U. warned at the I.M.F. meeting that the U.S. faced a severe housing crash, soaring oil prices, declining consumer prices, and defaults on mortgages worth trillions of dollars. 2006 Oct 19: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index closed above 12,000 for the first time, at $12,029.50. 2007 April 2: New Century Financial Corp. of Orange County, California -- second largest sub-prime lender in the U.S. -- filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy. 2008 March 14 (Friday): The Fed announced a 28-day 'backstop' loan agreement with JPMorgan Chase to prop up the liquidity of Wall Street investment bank Bear Stearns; the Fed announced later that evening that the loan guarantee would not be available on Monday, triggering a panic among investors. 2008 March 16: JPMorgan Chase agreed to buy Bear Stearns at $2/share, but foisted $29B of sub-prime paper onto the Fed. 2008 March 17 (Monday): The stock price of Bear Stearns plunged to $30 per share; JPMorgan Chase eventuslly paid roughly $10 per share for Bear Stearns (minus the toxic paper foisted on the Fed). 2008 July: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #78 "The Robber Barons" 2008 July: All-time high average U.S. gasoline pump price of $4.11 per gallon. 2008 Sept 7 (Sunday): Henry Paulson agreed to a government takeover (i.e. bailout) of Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac; actual cash outlay was eventually $34.2B to Fannie Mae and $51.7B to Freddie Mac – while $5.4 trillion in outstanding and very risky mortgage debt remain on the books. 2008 Sept 9: Lehman Brothers stock plunged 45 percent. 2008 Sept 14: Under pressure to complete negotiations started in November 2007, Bank of America bought Wall Street investment bank Merrill Lynch for $50 billion worth of BofA stock, or about $29 per share (a 38 percent premium over book value, but a 61 percent discount to the September 2007 market price). 2008 Sept 15 (Monday): Giant stock broker/mortgage lender Lehman Brothers filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy. 2008 Sept 15 (Monday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index fell 504 points, the largest one-day loss since 11 September 2001. 2008 Sept 16 (Tuesday): The Fed agreed to a 'secured loan facility' for up to $85B to insurer A.I.G. in exchange for 80 percent equity in the company. 2008 Sept 17 (Wednesday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index dropped 450 points: down 8% for the week, and then back up on Thursday & Friday. 2008 Sept 17 (Wednesday): Gold rose $70 per ounce, the largest one-day jump in history. 2008 Sept 18 (Thursday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index climbed 410 points. 2008 Sept 19 (Friday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index climbed 368 points. 2008 Sept 21 (Sunday): Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, the last two major investment banks in the United States, both confirmed that they would become traditional bank holding companies, bringing an end to the era of investment banking on Wall Street. 2008 Sept 23 Capitalist Warren Buffett bought $5B of stock in Goldman Sachs. 2008 Sept 25: The U.S. Office of Thrift Supervision siezed Washington Mutual Bank after a ten-day run withdrew 9 percent of assets; JPMorgan Chase paid $1.9B for Washington Mutual Bank later that day. 2008 Sept 26: Wachovia Bank stock plunged 27 percent, while depositers withdrew $5B (1 percent of assets) on the same day. 2008 Sept 29: The F.D.I.C. announced the takeover of Wachovia's operations by Citigroup, a temporary measure intended to prevent Wachovia from failing. 2008 Oct 3: Wells Fargo agreed to acquire failing Wachovia for $15.1B in stock, which nullified the Citigroup deal. (Citigroup is pursuing claims for $60B in damages.) 2008 Oct 3: Congress passed a $700 billion Wall Street bailout bill. 2008 Oct 6 (Monday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index plunged below 10,000 for the first time since 2004. 2008 Oct 7 (Tuesday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index dipped over 500 points. 2008 Oct 6-7: Global stock market losses of $6.5 trillion (per Time Magazine, 10/2008) 2008 Oct 8: The I.M.F. predicted that the U.S. economy will grow just 0.1% next year, its worst rate in 18 years. 2008 Oct 8 (Wednesday): Nikkei Index plunged 9.4 percent; Indonesia shut down the country's exchange after the key index plunged more than 10 percent; Moscow's MICEX stock exchange shut down until Friday after losing more than 14 percent in the first half-hour of trading; Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index lost 5.2 percent; India's Sensex sank 4.3 percent; South Korea's Kospi Index lost 5.8 percent; Taiwan's key index fell 5.8 percent; and Singapore's benchmark tumbled 5.5 percent. 2008 Oct 9 (Thursday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index fell as low as 8,955.84 and ended the day down at 9,006 points. 2008 week of Oct 6-10: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index suffered the worst week in a hundred years, falling 18 percent. 2008 Oct 13 (Monday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average index jumped 400 points by 8:30 a.m., up 976 points by end of day (biggest one-day point gain ever), and the S&P index rose 104 points (also the biggest one-day point gain ever). 2008 Oct 23 (Thursday): Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan warned of a 'credit tsunami'. 2008 Nov 4: Democrats won the national elections for President and for many Senate & Congress seats; Barack Obama won the election for the U.S. Presidency with 52% of the popular vote, and with 365 electoral votes to John McCain's 173 electoral votes. 2008 Nov 10: The Federal Reserve & Treasury paid out another $27.5 billion for A.I.G. losses, making a total of $150B. 2008 Nov 17 (Monday): Japan declared a recession, the first since 2001 – and most people there blame the U.S. 2008 Nov 19: U.S. Senate hearing on the automotive crisis, with unsworn testimony by the heads of Chrysler, Ford & General Motors. 2008 Dec: Secret, interest-free loans by the U.S. Federal Reserve of $1.2 trillion to troubled 'too big to let fail' banks – including $107 billion to Morgan Stanley, $100 billion to Citigroup, and $91 billion to Bank of America – that were not revealed until August 2011. 2008 Dec 9: Negotiators revealed the terms of an emerging deal between the Bush White House and Congress under which a short-term $15 billion bailout for the Big Three would be overseen by a federal trustee (or 'car czar'). 2008 Dec 19: President Bush announced approval of the automaker bailout plan, which would give loans of $17.4 billion to G.M. and Chrysler, 2008 Dec 31: At year-end, the Dow Jones Industrial Average index had fallen nearly 34 percent, the worst since 1931; the S&P index was down 38.5%, the worst since 1937. Official National Debt in 2009: 10.626 TRILLION DOLLARS on the day George Dubya Bush left office (an 86% increase). The true Republican National Debt: 25 TRILLION DOLLARS on the day that Dubya left office — an increase of 336 percent in eight years, giving George W. Bush the inenviable record as the person who ran up the most debt in the history of Mankind !! Barack Obama  Fixing  The  Disaster 2009 Jan 20: Barack Obama sworn in as the 44th President of the United States. 2009 Feb 13: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was passed in Congress; no Republicans in the House and only three Republican Senators voted in favor. The bill included $288 billion in tax cuts, $357 billion for federal spending programs, and $144 billion to state & local fiscal relief. 2009 Feb 17: The 'recovery package' bill was signed into law by President Obama, adding $787 billion and 3.5 million jobs to the floundering American economy. 2009 March 9: The Dow Jones Industrial Average Index bottomed at 6,547, a 12-year low. 2009 April 30: Chrysler Motors and 24 affiliates filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after talks with lenders broke down. 2009 June 1: General Motors filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. 2009 June 10: Chrysler Motors and affiliates emerged from bankruptcy (backed by $6.6B in financing from the federal government), and immediately sold several divisions to Fiat of Italy. 2009 July 10: General Motors ended bankruptcy proceedings. 2009 Nov: "The stock market is down 26% since 2000. (Inflation-adjusted, it's even worse.)" — Time Magazine 2009 Nov: "There are six times as many Americans seeking work as there are job openings." — Paul Krugman, in The New York Times 2010 May 6 (Thursday): The Dow Jones Industrial Average Index had a record freefall event: in half an hour the stock market dropped more than it has ever dropped, all at once, 998.50 points, managing to end the day down only 347 (-3.19%). 2010 May 7 (Friday): The unstable Dow Jones Industrial Average Index plunged another 140 pts, and closed down 672 points (-5.71%) for the week. 2010 Aug: Working Minds Philosophy Essay #92 "Reason-Based Taxation 2010" 2010 Nov 17: The General Motors post-bankruptcy IPO, the biggest initial public offering in U.S. history, raised $20.1 billion: 478 million common shares at $33 each for $15.77 billion and $4.35 billion in preferred shares. 2011 Jan 27: The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission released its "Final Report On The Causes of The Financial Crisis In The United States" {see below}. 2011 Thursday Aug 4: The Dow Jones Industrial Average index fell $512.76, the steepest point decline since 1 December 2008; S&P 500 futures fell 0.6 percent to $1,191.7. In worldwide trading over the next 24 hours London's FTSE 100 declined 3.5 percent to 5,393.14, Germany's DAX shed 3.8 percent to 6,172.00; France's CAC-40 lost 2.5 percent to 3,238.80; Japan's Nikkei 225 stock average slid 3.7 percent to 9,299.88; Hong Kong's Hang Seng index dived 4.3 percent to 20,946.14; China's Shanghai Composite Index lost 2.2 percent to 2,626.42. 2011 Friday Aug 5: The Dow fell 5.8 percent for the week; the S&P 500 fell 7.2 percent for the week and is down 10.8 percent since July 22; the NASDAQ Composite index fell 24 points, or 0.9 percent, and is down 11.4 percent since July 22. 2011 Aug 5: Standard & Poor's did not like Congress's solution to the artificial debt ceiling crisis and downgraded the long-term credit rating of the United States government from AAA to AA+. 2011 Friday Aug 19: U.S. stocks fell for the fourth week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average index closed at $10,817.65, down 4 percent for the week and down 15 percent since July 21. The S&P 500 stock index closed at $1,123.53, down 4.7 percent for the week (all ten industry groups that make up the index fell). The NASDAQ Composite index fell to 2,341.84, down 6.6% for the week. 2011 Oct 31: Major hedge fund M.F. Global filed for bankruptcy; considered the first U.S. victim of the European sovereign debt crisis.

B o o k s

	"Final Report On The Causes of The Financial Crisis In The United States" [2011] by the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission Kindle Edition from PublicAffairs [9/00] for $9.99 PublicAffairs 8¼x5½ pb [1/2011] for $9.78 Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission official website
	"Wall Street and The Financial Crisis: Anatomy of A   Financial Collapse" [2011] from the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations official report [4/2011] 5.7MB .PDF file free download

Recent Additions

	"Fooling Some of The People All of The Time, A Long Short (and Now Complete) Story, Updated With New Epilogue" [orig 2008, rev 2010] by David Einhorn, Foreword by Joel Greenblatt Author Einhorn warned of the dangerous & illegal practices at Allied Capital in 2002; influential Allied got the SEC to investigate Einhorn and his Greenlight Capital hedge fund for market manipulation instead; that battle lasted six years. The S.E.C. found in June 2007 that Allied had broken the law; the first edition of Einhorn's book was published in May 2008. Wiley & Sons 'updated' 9x6 pb [12/2010] for $10.44 Wiley & Sons 9¼x6¼ hardcover [5/2008] for $19.77 official book site
	"Reckles$ Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led To Economic Armageddon" [2011] by Gretchen Morgenson & Joshua Rosner Times Books 9¼x6¼ hardcover [5/2011] for $16.95
	"Age of Greed: The Triumph of Finance and The Decline of America, 1970 To The Present" [2011] by Jeff Madrick Knopf hardcover [5/2011] for $16.66
	"Money For Nothing: How CEOs and Boards Are Bankrupting America" [2011] by John Gillespie & David Zweig Free Press 8½x5½ pb [1/2011] for $11.70
	"Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came To Rule The World" [2011] by William D. Cohan Anchor Books pb [DUE Jan 2012] for $12.21   Doubleday 9¼x6 hardcover [4/2011] for $16.94
	"Fallen Giant: The Amazing Story of Hank Greenberg and The History of A.I.G." [2006] by Ronald Shelp, with Al Ehrbar Wiley & Sons 2nd edition 9x6 pb [8/2009] for $11.41 Wiley & Sons hardcover [10/2006] out of print/used
	"Hoodwinked: An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why The World Financial Markets Imploded – and What We Need To Do To Remake Them" [2009] by John Perkins Crown Business pb [DUE Nov 2011] for $14.00   Crown Business 8¼x5¾ hardcover [11/2009] for $16.10
	"Failure By Design: The Story Behind America's Broken Economy" [2011] by Josh Bivens, Foreword by Lawrence Mishel Cornell Univ Press 9x6¼ hardcover [1/2011] for $12.89 official book page
	"Punching Out: One Year In A Closing Auto Plant" [2011] by Paul Clemens Doubleday 8¼x5¾ hardcover [1/2011] for $17.13
	"All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of The Financial Crisis" [2010] by Bethany McLean & Joe Nocera Viking 9¼x6 pb [11/2010] out of print/used Portfolio 9x6¼ hardcover [11/2010] for $18.27
	"The Zeroes: My Misadventures In The Decade Wall Street Went Insane" [2010] by Randall Lane Mixed reviews on Amazon, but apparently well-written as well as accurate. Portfolio 9x6½ hardcover [6/2010] for $18.54
	"Diary of A Very Bad Year: Confessions of An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager" [2010] by Keith Gessen based on two years of interviews with hedge fund manager 'HSM' Harper Perennial 8x5¼ pb [6/2010] for $10.19
	"Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook The World Economy" [2009] by by Barry Ritholtz, with Aaron Task, Foreword by Bill Fleckenstein Wiley & Sons 8¾x6¼ pb [7/2010] for $11.29 Wiley & Sons 9¼x6½ hardcover [5/2009] for $16.63
	"The Financial Crisis of Our Time" [2011] by Robert W. Kolb Oxford Univ Press hardcover [1/2011] for $27.41
	"Blue Blood & Mutiny: The Fight For The Soul of MorganStanley" [2007] by Patricia Beard Harper Perennial 7¾x5¼ pb [10/2008] for $12.19 William Morrow 9x6 hardcover [9/2007] out of print/many, many used
	"The Buyout of America: How Private Equity Will Cause The Next Great Credit Crisis" [2009] by Josh Kosman Portfolio 8½x5½ pb [11/2010] for $12.48 Portfolio 9¼x6½ hardcover [11/2009] for $14.33

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	"Funny Money" [1985 New York Times besteller] by Mark Singer The whole amazing story of Oklahoma City's Penn Square Bank, whose collapse in July 1982 staggered America's banking industry. Mariner Books 8¼x5½ pb [6/2004] for $10.40 Knopf hardcover [5/85] out of print/many, many used
	"Belly Up: The Collapse of The Penn Square Bank" [1985 national bestseller] by Phillip L. Zweig More-factual, less-dramatic account of the Penn Square Bank collapse of July 1982. Ballantine Books 8¾x6 pb [8/86] for $24.30 Random House Value Publng 9x6 hardcover [12/85] out of print/many used
	"The Predators' Ball: The Inside Story of Drexel Burnham & The Rise of The Junk Bond Raiders" [1989 national bestseller] by Connie Bruck Penguin 7¾x5 pb [6/89] for $10.88
	"The Coming Crash In The Housing Market: 10 Things You Can Do Now To Protect Your Most Valuable Investment" [2003] by John R. Talbott The author took a lot of flak back in 2003 for his warnings - BUT he was very right, as recent events have proven; the book also negates Bernanke's excuse that "no one could have seen the collapse coming" McGraw-Hill 9x6 pb [4/2003] for $12.77
	"Too Big To Fail: The Hazards of Bank Bailouts" [2004] by Gary H. Stern {former Fed-MN CEO} & Ron J. Feldman {current Fed-MN sr VP}, Foreword by former Fed Chair Paul A. Volcker Brookings Institution Press 9x6 pb [3/2009] for $19.62 Brookings Institution Press 9¼x6 hardcover [3/2004] out of print/used
	"The Big Con: The True Story of How Washington Got Hoodwinked and Hijacked By Crackpot Economics" [2007] by Jonathan Chait The author, a senior editor at New Republic Magazine, reports that American politics was hijacked by a tiny coterie of right-wing economic extremists, going back 30 years, when supply-side economics took over the Republican Party and made cutting taxes the G.O.P. answer to all political and economic questions. Mariner Books 8x5 pb [9/2008] for $11.66 Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 8½x5½ hardcover [9/2007] for $21.37
	"The Trillion Dollar Meltdown: Easy Money, High Rollers & The Great Credit Crash" [2008] by Charles R. Morris PublicAffairs 8x5½ pb [2/2009] for $11.16 PublicAffairs 8¼x5½ hardcover [3/2008] for $15.22
	"The Subprime Solution: How Today's Global Financial Crisis Happened, and What To Do About It" [2008] by Robert J. Shiller, professor of economics at Yale University Princeton Univ Press hardcover [8/2008] for $11.53
	"Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity & The Sub Crime Scandal" [2008] by Danny Schechter Cosimo Books 8½x5½ pb [9/2008] for $13.45 Cosimo Books 8¾x5¾ hardcover [9/2008] for $29.95 official bookpage
	"Bear-Trap: The Fall of Bear Stearns & The Panic of 2008" [2008] by Bill Bamber & Andrew Spencer Brick Tower Books 9x6¼ hardcover [9/2008] for $5.14
	"The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs" [2008, rev 2009] by Charles D. Ellis Penguin Revised Edition 8½x5½ pb [9/2009] for $13.60 Penguin Press 9&FRAC12X6 hardcover [10/2008] for $25.05
	"Meltdown: How Greed and Corruption Shattered Our Financial System and How We Can Recover" [2009] by Katrina vanden Heuvel and the editors of "The Nation" Magazine, Introduction by William Greider Nation Books 7x5 pb [1/2009] for $12.44
	"Plunder and Blunder: The Rise & Fall of The Bubble Economy" [2009] by Dean Baker The author is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC; the book "documents the fundamental policy changes since 1980 that destabilized the economy and eroded the broad prosperity of the post-war period" Polipoint Press 8½x5½ pb [1/2009] for $10.85
	"Meltdown: A Free-Market Look At Why The Stock Market Collapsed, The Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse" [2/2009] by Thomas E. Woods, Jr., Foreword by Rep. Ron Paul Historian Woods, of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Alabama, writes with typical Libertarian wrong-headedness – de-regulate everything and things will get better, which is how we got into this mess in the first place!.
	"House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess On Wall Street" [2009] by William D. Cohan In early March 2008, the monetary fabric of investment bank Bear Stearns, one of the world’s oldest and largest, began unraveling; ten days later, the bank no longer existed, its assets sold under duress to rival JPMorgan Chase. Anchor Books 7¾x5¼ pb [2/2010] for $11.53 Doubleday 9½x6 hardcover [3/2009] for $18.45
	"The Crash of 2008 and What It Means: The New Paradigm For Financial Markets" [2009] by George Soros PublicAffairs 7½x5 pb [3/2009] for $10.17
	"Fool's Gold: How The Bold Dream of A Small Tribe At J.P. Morgan Was Corrupted By Wall Street Greed and Unleashed A Catastrophe" [2009 New York Times & Wall Street Journal bestseller] by Gillian Tett Free Press 8½x6½ pb [4/2010] for $10.88 Free Press 9x6 hardcover [5/2009] out of print/used
	"Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, The Toughest Firm On Wall Street" [2009] by {Wall Street Journal reporter} Kate Kelly This riveting hour-by-hour account of the brutal final weekend at Bear Stearns goes behind the stock prices and into the meeting rooms of top executives. As word got out that the firm was in trouble, a wave of panic selling sent the stock plummeting to $60 on the second day of the crisis, to bottom out at two dollars a share in a fire-house-sale offer from rival JPMorgan Chase. Ace/Portfolio 8¼x5½ pb [2/2010] for $12.00 Portfolio 9x6 hardcover [5/2009] for $18.94
	"The Looting of America: How The Game of Fantasy Finance Destroyed Our Jobs, Pensions & Prosperity, and What We Can Do About It" [2009] by Les Leopold Chelsea Green Publng 8¼x5¼ pb [6/2009] for $10.17
	"And Then The Roof Caved In: How Wall Street's Greed & Stupidity Brought Capitalism To Its Knees" [2009] by David Faber {market news analyst for CNBC} Wiley & Sons 9¼x6 hardcover [6/2009] for $17.79
	"A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Inside Story of The Collapse of Lehman Brothers" [2009] by Lawrence G. McDonald, with Patrick Robinson Three Rivers Press 8x5 pb [6/2010] for $10.69 Crown Business 9¼x6¼ hardcover [7/2009] for $17.82
	"In Fed We Trust: Ben Bernanke's War On The Great Panic" [2009] by David Wessel Author Wessel – Wall Street Journal economics editor – gives Bernanke credit for preventing The Great Panic from morphing into something even worse. Crown Business hardcover [8/2009] for $17.81 U.S. Federal Reserve Page at Maison d'Κtre Philosophy Bookstore
	"It Takes A Pillage: Behind The Bailouts, Bonuses & Backroom Deals From Washington To Wall Street" [2009] by Nomi Prins Wiley & Sons 9¼x6½ hardcover [9/2009] for $17.13 author website
	"This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly" [2009] by Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth Rogoff "This is quite simply the best empirical investigation of financial crises ever published. Covering hundreds of years and bringing together a dizzying array of data, Reinhart and Rogoff have made a truly heroic contribution to financial history. This single marvelous volume is worth a thousand mathematical models." — Niall Ferguson Princeton Univ Press 9¼x6¼ hardcover [9/2009] for $19.25
	"The Murder of Lehman Brothers: An Insider's Look At The Global Meltdown" [2009] by Joseph Tibman Brick Tower Books 9x6¼ hardcover [10/2009] for $16.47 author's weblog
	"Capitalism Hits The Fan: The Global Economic Meltdown and What To Do About It" [2009] by Prof. Richard D. Wolff of UMass Olive Branch Press 9x6 pb [10/2009] for $12.24 Richard Wolff 'Capitalism Hits The Fan' lecture on DVD [2009] Media Education Foundation hour-long color DVD [3/2009] for $19.95 author's official website
	"The Sellout: How Three Decades of Wall Street Greed & Government Mismanagement Destroyed The Global Financial System" [2009] by Charles Gasparino HarperBusiness 9x6¼ hardcover [11/2009] for $15.39
	"How Markets Fail: The Logic of Economic Calamities" [2009] by John Cassidy Picador 8¼x5½ pb [11/2010] for $10.88 FS&G 9x6 hardcover [11/2009] for $18.48
	"After The Fall: Saving Capitalism From Wall Street and Washington" [2009] by Nicole Gelinas Encounter Books 9½x6½ hardcover [11/2009] for $16.29
	"Too Big To Save? How To Fix The U.S. Financial System" [2009] by Robert Pozen, Foreword by Robert J. Shiller Wiley & Sons 9x6¼ hardcover [11/2009] for $19.28
	"Economic Meltdown Funnies" comic book [Red Sun Press 2010] Co-written by Chuck Collins & Nick Thorkelson; drawn by Nick Thorkelson available only at the official book site sponsored by Institute for Policy Studies [est. 1963] Program On Inequality & The Common Good, and Jobs With Justice [est. 1987], and Working Group on Extreme Inequality [est.2007]
	"Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry's Road From Glory To Disaster" [2010] by Paul Ingrassia Random House 9x6½ hardcover [1/2010] for $17.16
	"The Road From Ruin: How To Revive Capitalism and Put America Back On Top" [2010] by Matthew Bishop & Michael Green Crown Business 9¼x6½ hardcover [1/2010] for $17.82
	"Freefall: America, Free Markets & The Sinking of The World Economy" [2010] by Joseph E. Stiglitz W.W. Norton 9¼x6¼ hardcover [1/2010] for $16.34
	"On The Brink: Inside The Race To Stop The Collapse of The Global Financial System" [2010] by Henry M. Paulson Business Plus 9½x6½ pb [2/2011] for $11.60 Business Plus 9x6¼ hardcover [2/2010] for $15.94
	"13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover & The Next Financial Meltdown" [2010] by Simon Johnson & James Kwak Pantheon hardcover [3/2010] for $16.17
	"Slapped By The Invisible Hand: The Panic of 2007" [2010] by Gary B. Gorton Oxford Univ Press 9¼x6½ hardcover [3/2010] for $31.95
	"The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine" [2010] by Michael Lewis A character-rich and darkly humorous account of how the combination of ridiculously easy money, investment broker and shareholder greed, non-regulation, and toxic derivatives caused the free fall of the American economy. Movie rights purchased before publication by Paramount Pictures for Brad Pitt's Plan B company. W.W. Norton 8¼x5½ pb [2/2011] for $9.57 W.W. Norton 9¼x6 hardcover [3/2010] for $15.34
	"The Devil's Casino: Friendship, Betrayal, and The High Stakes Games Played Inside Lehman Brothers" [2010 New York Times bestseller] by Vicky Ward Wiley 8½x5½ pb [4/2011] for $11.20   Wiley 9¼x6½ hardcover [3/2010] for $18.45
	"The End of Wall Street" [2010] by Roger Lowenstein Penguin Press 9½x6½ hardcover [4/2010] for $9.99
	"The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of The XXIst Century" [2010] Edited by Michel Chossudovsky & Andrew Gavin Marshall contributors include Ellen Brown, Tom Burghardt, editor Michel Chossudovsky, Richard C. Cook, Shamus Cooke, John Bellamy Foster, Michael Hudson, Tanya Cariina Hsu, Fred Magdoff, editor Andrew Gavin Marshall, James Petras, Peter Phillips, Peter Dale Scott, Bill Van Auken, Claudia von Werlhof & Mike Whitney Global Research Publrs 8¼x5½ pb [5/2010] for $17.13
	"Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten The World Economy" [2010] by Raghuram G. Rajan Princeton Univ Press 9¼x6 hardcover [5/2010] for $17.79
	"The Rise and Fall of Bear Stearns" [2010] by Alan C. Greenberg (former CEO & Chairman of Bear Stearns), with Mark Singer Simon & Schuster 8x5 pb [5/2011] for $9.99 Simon & Schuster 8¾x6½ hardcover [6/2010] for $16.44
	"The Great American Stickup: How Reagan Republicans and Clinton Democrats Enriched Wall Street While Mugging Main Street" [2010] by Robert Scheer Underlying these essays by leading scholars is the premise that the U.S.'s problems can be understood only in a broad historical context, that they arise not from cyclical phenomena, but structural distortions of the economy. Nation Books 8x5½ pb [9/2010] for $10.85
	"Overhaul: An Insider's Account of The Obama Administration's Emergency Rescue of The Auto Industry" [2010] by Steven Rattner Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 9¼x6½ hardcover [9/2010] for $17.82
	"Bought and Paid For: The Unholy Alliance Between Barack Obama and Wall Street" [2010] by Charles Gasparino Sentinel 9¼x6 hardcover [10/2010] for $17.79
	"The Monster: How A Gang of Predatory Lenders and Wall Street Bankers Fleeced America - and Spawned A Global Crisis" [2010] by Michael W. Hudson St. Martin's Griffin pb [9/2011] for $10.98   Times Books 9¼x6¼ hardcover [10/2010] for $17.16
	"Griftopia: Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and The Long Con That Is Breaking America" [2010] by Matt Taibbi Spiegel & Grau pb [8/2011] for $10.88   Spiegel & Grau 9¼x6 hardcover [11/2010] for $15.71 out of print/used

Motion Pictures & TV/News DVDs

"Wall Street" [Fox Dec 1987] Bud Fox, a young and very ambitious stock trader, courts the powerful stock speculator Gordon Gekko, who takes the boy under his wing. Bud becomes immersed in the fast life, the big time, but soon is asked to take actions that even he finds offensive. Co-written & directed by Oliver Stone; co-written by Stanley Weiser; starring Michael Douglas {won Oscar & David di Donatello Best Actor awards}, Charlie Sheen, Hal Holbrook, Martin Sheen, Terence Stamp, Sean Young, Daryl Hannah, James Spader, Saul Rubinek & Sylvia Miles; Fox widescreen color Blu-ray [2/2008] for $13.99 Fox widescreen color DVD [9/2007] 2 disks for $9.49 Fox color VHS [1/96] out of prodn/many, many used Varese Sarabande soundtrack CD [10/93] out of prodn/used {with "Talk Radio" [1988]} 11"x17" poster available for $14.99 at AllPosters.com full credits at IMDb • movie entry at Wikipedia

	"60 Minutes: The Bailout" [C.B.S. Sept 2008] 11-minute segment aired 28 Sept 2008; featuring Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson C.B.S. color DVD [10/2008] for $17.95 episode/segment not listed on IMDb
	"Frontline: Inside The Meltdown" [P.B.S. Feb 2009] Written & directed by Michael Kirk; reported by Jim Gilmore P.B.S. Home Video color DVD [6/2009] for $18.99 episode credits at IMDb
	"Frontline: Ten Trillion and Counting" [P.B.S. March 2009] P.B.S. Home Video color DVD [5/2009] for $18.99 episode credits at IMDb
	"Frontline: The Warning" [P.B.S. Oct 2009] Written & directed by Michael Kirk; reported by Jim Gilmore P.B.S. Home Video color DVD [1/2010] for $18.99 episode credits at IMDb

"Two Trillion With A T: How You Bought Wall Street" Special Report [Fox News 14 March 2009] Hosted by Bret Baier; exclusive interviews include George W. Bush, his Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, House Banking Chairman Barney Frank, and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, among others Fox News 42-minute color DVD [6/2009] for $19.95 not listed on IMDb • official movie site

"The Last Days of Lehman Brothers" [BBC2 U.K. Sept 2009] On a weekend in September 2008, U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson summoned the heads of Wall Street's biggest investment banks to decide the fate of failing Lehman Brothers, while recently-demoted Lehman CEO Dick Fuld spent the weekend desperately trying to rescue his company through a merger with Bank of America or U.K.-based Barclays. Fuld's empire - and with it, the stability of the world economy - was teetering on the verge of extinction. Directed by Michael Samuels; written by Craig Warner; starring James Cromwell, Ben Daniels, Corey Johnson, Michael Landes, Alex Jennings & James Bolam DVD/Blu-ray not available • full credits at IMDb • movie entry at Wikipedia

"American Ca$ino" documentary feature [indep Aug 2009] This film finally explains how and why the global financial system crumbled from the subprime loan market 'bubble' and over $12 trillion of our money vanished into the pockets of Wall Street titans. Co-written & directed by Leslie Cockburn; co-written by Andrew Cockburn; faeturing Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, Mayor of Baltimore Sheila Dixon, former Senator Phil Gramm, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson & Congressman Henry Waxman DVD/Blu-ray not available at Amazon • full credits at IMDb • official movie site Working Minds Philosophy Essay #18 "The Stock Market Casino" [Dec 2001]

"Capitalism: A Love Story" [Dog Eat Dog/Weinstein Oct 2009] Back in 2008, Michael Moore described his next film as being about 'the wonders of capitalism'. However, fate provided him with the 'G.O.P. Meltdown', the still-rolling collapse of the U.S. and worldwide economy. The American Dream is looking like a nightmare for more and more ordinary people whose lives have been turned upside down, as families pay the price each day with their jobs, their homes and their savings – the disastrous impact of unregulated corporate dominance and scared politicians seeking re-election over mystified & angry citizens across America. Co-produced, written & directed by & starring Michael Moore; interviewees include Cong. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, Cong. Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, Wallace Shawn & Elizabeth Warren, with archive footage of Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Martin Luther King, Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, Ronald Reagan & Franklin Delano Roosevelt; won 2 awards at the Venice Film Festival Starz / Anchor Bay widescreen color Blu-ray [3/2010] for $24.99 Starz / Anchor Bay widescreen color DVD [3/2010] for $17.99 full credits from IMDb • official movie site

"Plunder: The Crime of Our Time" [Globalvision indep May 2010 release] After his controversial docufilm "In Debt We Trust" [2006] and the book "Plunder" [2008] {above}, director Schechter interviewed bankers of Wall Street and released this film in May 2010, with the companion book "The Crime of Our Time" due in September 2010. produced by Ray Nowosielski, directed by Danny Schechter DVD available on producer website not listed on IMDb • official movie site

"The Crime of Our Time: Why Wall Street Is Not Too Big To Jail" [2010] by Danny Schechter Disinformation Company 8½x5½ pb [9/2010] for $13.57

"Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps" [Fox Sept 2010] A young Wall Street trader teams up with disgraced former Wall Street corporate raider Gordon Gekko on a two-tiered mission: To alert the financial community to the coming financial doom, and to bring to justice the person responsible for the death of the young trader's mentor. Co-produced by Edward R. Pressman, Oliver Stone & Michael Douglas; directed by Oliver Stone; starring Shia LaBeouf, Michael Douglas, Carey Mulligan, Susan Sarandon, Charlie Sheen, Josh Brolin & Frank Langella, cameo by Nouriel Roubini Fox widescreen color Blu-ray [12/2010] for $22.99 Fox widescreen color DVD [12/2010] 2 disks for $15.99 full credits at IMDb • movie entry at Wikipedia

"Inside Job" [Sony Pictures Classics Oct 2010] "If you're not enraged by the end of this movie, [then] you haven't been paying attention." — Mary & Richard Corliss, in Time Magazine A comprehensive analysis of the global financial crisis of 2008, thru exhaustive research and extensive interviews with key financial insiders, politicians, journalists & academics. Co-produced, written & directed by Charles Ferguson; narrated by Matt Damon; featuring Congressman Barney Frank, Raghuram Rajan, Nouriel Roubini, George Soros, Eliot Spitzer, Paul Volcker, many others; won Oscar for Best Documentary Feature, D.G.A. & W.G.A. Awards, New York Film Critics Circle Award Sony Pictures Classics widescreen color DVD [3/2011] for $14.99   credits at IMDb • official movie site

"Too Big To Fail" TV movie [H.B.O. May 2011]   Directed by Curtis Hanson; based on the book by Andrew Ross Sorkin; starring Ed Asner, Kathy Baker, Billy Crudup, Paul Giamatti {as Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke}, Topher Grace, Dan Hedaya, William Hurt {as Hank Paulson}, Matthew Modine, Bill Pullman & James Woods {as Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld} HBO Studios color Blu-ray [not yet released] for $25.99 HBO Studios color DVD [not yet released] for $19.99 full credits at IMDb

"Too Big To Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought To Save The Financial System – and Themselves" [2009] by Andrew Ross Sorkin, columnist for The New York Times Viking 9¼x6½ hardcover [10/2009] for $13.00

L i n k s

'Stop Bush' Page at Working Minds website

2008 U.S. Elections Page {moot} at Working Minds website
2010 U.S. Elections Page {moot} at Working Minds website
2012 U.S. Elections Page at Working Minds website

The solution to this intentional economic disaster is
Reason-Based Taxation

Spirit of America Bookstore's G.O.P. Economic Meltdown Page
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