Dear United States, Welcome to the Third World!

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http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-brooks18-2008sep18,0,6908905.column

Rosa Brooks
September 18, 2008

Dear United States, Welcome to the Third World!

It’s not every day that a superpower makes a bid to transform itself into a Third World nation, and we here at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund want to be among the first to welcome you to the community of states in desperate need of international economic assistance. As you spiral into a catastrophic financial meltdown, we are delighted to respond to your Treasury Department’s request that we undertake a joint stability assessment of your financial sector. In these turbulent times, we can provide services ranging from subsidized loans to expert advisors willing to perform an emergency overhaul of your entire government.

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We hope you won’t feel embarrassed as we assess the stability of your economy and suggest needed changes. Remember, many other countries have been in your shoes. We’ve bailed out the economies of Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia and South Korea. But whether our work is in Sudan, Bangladesh or now the United States, our experts are committed to intervening in national economies with care and sensitivity.

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IMF finally knocks on Uncle Sam’s door](http://business.theage.com.au/business/imf-finally-knocks-on-uncle-sams-door-20080806-3qp6.html)

David Hirst
June 30, 2008

IMAGINE the Reserve Bank of Australia, concerned that its friends in the city of Sydney (but perhaps Melbourne) who, having wallowed in wealth all their adult lives, were no longer gainfully employable and their wildly extravagant lifestyles were in danger, and, having the powers to intervene in the market, decided to do just that on their behalf.

Imagine them offering to enter the market and buy shares that would prop up the foolish gambles of the bankers, gambles they had encouraged them, until recently, to take by providing them with cheap money.

On top of that, they told this group they would provide hundreds of billions of dollars in credits to these same profiteers on the grounds they were so big and important to the economy they were indeed too big to fail.

Then, imagine, despite pouring untold taxpayers money into stocks and allowing their cronies access to vast sums, the system continued to fail. So they announced they would need greater power and with it more secrecy.

For its growing band of critics has, perhaps unwittingly and in the interest of public good, this has become the principal function of the US Federal Reserve.

If this was to happen in Australia the International Monetary Fund would be hammering at the door of the Reserve Bank. But Australia does not have a President’s Working Group on Financial Markets, commonly known as the Plunge Protection Team, that allows the US Government to prop up the markets by buying shares. But to imagine the IMF investigating the US financial system is unthinkable, or was. But, at the weekend, Der Spiegel reported that the IMF would conduct a full investigation into virtually every aspect of it.

Der Spiegel wrote that the IMF had “informed” Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke of plans that would have been unheard of in the past: a general examination of the US financial system. The IMF’s board of directors has ruled that a so-called Financial Sector Assessment Program is to be carried out in the US.

Excerpt: http://business.theage.com.au/business/imf-finally-knocks-on-uncle-sams-door-20080806-3qp6.html

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And when were you in Australia last?

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We could always put a gun to their heads and call back every dollar we loaned them after WWII, and never saw any return on.

We could always put a ban on imports for all foreign products, absent of hefty tarriff.

We could always pull our military out of all foreign lands, and laugh as they turn to crap.

If I were Bernake, I’d tell them to take a flying $hit for themselves.

I’d do what Vlad the Impaler did, and send them home with their hats nailed to their heads.

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Here is a simple thought to blow your mind.

Q: If you could count $1 a second how many years would it take to reach $700 billion?
A: 23,800 years.

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Mad as Hell!