UBERGALAXY

Neatorama asks:

What do you think of the bailout failure and what it may mean to you? Are you fearful for your economic future? Is it because of the failure of the bailout or something far more fundamental?

The thread has procured some interesting comments, which I'm sure will only grow.

Neatorama also reported a few days ago that the new CEO of Washington Mutual, who took the job a mere 17 days before the bank went belly-up, is now eligible for $19 million in compensation.

A corporate bailout would have further rewarded such CEOs - new or otherwise - that were affected by banks and investment firms failing at an alarming rate.

A bailout of these institutions most certainly compensate these same companies who offered illogical sub-prime mortgages and other high-risk investments.

I am the first to admit that I am not a financial genius, and there is a lot I don't know about market fluctuation. I have RRSPs, but they involve extremely low-risk investments. I don't get the highest return, but dammit, it's stable and virtually guaranteed.

When I was first taking out these RRSPs, I spoke to an investment agent with my bank over the phone. He was urging higher-risk investments in stocks, rather than a steadfast GIC. He argued that since I'm young, I could recover the money if it was lost through my employment. Although over the phone, his pitch was high-pressure. It's this kind of high pressure for riskier investments that have put so many people in trouble in the first place.

Sure, people with more financial liquidity can afford to lose money on market ventures, but people like me, who's $1600 of hard-earned cash was being squirreled away in GICs, that was a lot to lose. Unfortunately, with the credit crunch, so many people were coaxed into high-risk investments that could potentially offer high returns. But so many of those precarious investments dissolved with the market's collapse. The burst of the housing bubble is the tip of the iceberg.

The fact is, its disgusting that millionaire CEO's are being compensated and bailed out for making decisions for their investors that they themselves cannot understand the financial implications of. However difficult it may seem, the market needs to correct itself over time with its own market forces in play. The proposed $700 billion bailout would only truly compensate those at the reins of companies that jeopardized the market and its investors in the first place.

The fact that Alan Fishman and his colleagues are being financially compensated while WaMu's investors go without is appalling. So many people who have had their finances tied up in these banks will see not one red cent, while its corporate heads - who undoubtedly make hefty salaries in their privileged positions as it is, are bailed out. As if they need bailing out! Allow me to play the saddest song on the world's smallest violin, as we all shed a single tear for the corporate CEOs of the world.

Those CEOs will easily find employment again - with their experience and education, they can do whatever they want, never mind their equity!

What about ordinary people? What about the folks who've lost their houses and their livelihoods, and cannot afford the cost of job retraining? What about the children of parents who've lost everything?

Bailouts for the Allan Fishmans of the world is a million kinds of wrong - thank goodness that the powers that be voted it down today.

The forces that Adam Smith detailed are real, and are a far better correcter of market forces than any corporate bailout ever will be. Which is not to say that the road will be easy - far from it! - but at least the corporate honchos that got us there in the first place won't be rewarded for it.

This morning Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister of Canada, effectively dissolved Parliament and called an election for October 14. The move was expected this week. Harper's intentions to bully Parliament into an unwanted election were clear as of last fall. This week, Harper's Conservative had already begun campaigning, running shmaltzy ads like this:



Stephen Harper cares about veterans. You can tell because of the soft piano music and the down-home armchair. Apparently you can be meaningful about anything if you wear a sweater vest and lean forward earnestly in an armchair with your elbows on your knees.

Never mind that Harper announced last week that the Conservative government will compensate Canadian veterans who took part in nuclear weapons testing with a paltry $24,000 each. Soldiers who are already deceased will have the money gone towards their estate or surviving family.

Reports the CBC:

Alberta resident Jim Huntley, a spokesman for the Canadian Atomic Veterans Association, said the group wasn't notified about the announcement. The compensation package is insufficient, he said.

"It's not enough. I'm not saying not enough for me. It's not enough for these widows. We've had people that have died 30 years ago from cancer."

The compensation is in recognition of about 900 Canadian soldiers who between 1946 and 1958 were exposed to radiation while witnessing atmospheric nuclear weapons tests, and while cleaning two nuclear reactor accidents at Chalk River. The Atomic Veterans Association of Canada says less than 50 percent of those exposed are alive today, and those surviving members have experienced a variety of illnesses, as well as passing on genetic mutations and other illnesses to their children.

Fifty years of suffering and illness spanning generations cannot be compensated at any price. Regardless of your opinion on the military and its role, I'm sure most will agree those 900 soldiers were exposed because they were following orders, and likely didn't know what they were getting into until it was too late. The $24,000 offered for each individual exposed is not only insulting, it likely doesn't cover the cost of treatments and medications required following exposure in many cases, never mind the cost of a funeral.

The compensation was announced September 2, the same week it was leaked that Harper was to order a fall election. The same week that the sappy veteran ad aired, as well. Compensation may not have been announced at all, if it weren't for the election call.

Desperately, Harper is trying to curry the favour of veterans, knowing full well that the elderly vote in record numbers. Except veterans are increasingly younger, since the Conservatives have been sending troupes to Afghanistan since the US waded into the middle east.

Today, three more Canadians, killed in Afghanistan, were repatriated to C.F.B. Trenton. And, just this morning, Sgt. Scott Shipway was killed in Afghanistan, just days before he was due to return home from his second tour of duty.

The silver-haired veteran is becoming less frequent, as they continue to succumb to age, and younger Canadians continue to be shipped-out to battle zones, many triggered by US invasions in the name of the war on terror. You have Stephen Harper to thank for continuing to extend Canadian missions in the tumultuous Middle East.

With the meager compensation package offered, coupled with the increasingly unpopular war in Afghanistan; a snap election call that the average Canadian agrees is neither desired or necessary; and stack that against Harper's faux-sentimental advertising... what to you get?

Aggressive campaigning, as the parties scramble to encourage an increasingly apathetic public to vote at all. And yes, that includes the coveted veteran.