- Friends,
-
- Let me cut to the chase. The biggest robbery in the history
of this country is taking place as you read this. Though no guns are being
used, 300 million hostages are being taken. Make no mistake about it: After
stealing a half trillion dollars to line the pockets of their war-profiteering
backers for the past five years, after lining the pockets of their fellow
oilmen to the tune of over a hundred billion dollars in just the last two
years, Bush and his cronies -- who must soon vacate the White House --
are looting the U.S. Treasury of every dollar they can grab. They are swiping
as much of the silverware as they can on their way out the door.
-
- No matter what they say, no matter how many scare words
they use, they are up to their old tricks of creating fear and confusion
in order to make and keep themselves and the upper one percent filthy rich.
Just read the first four paragraphs of the lead story
- (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/22/business/22lobby.html ) in
last Monday's New York Times and you can see what the real deal is:
-
-
- "Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700
billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for
ways to profit from it.
-
- "Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner
of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages.
-
- "At the same time, investment firms were jockeying
to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of
financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions
of dollars a year in fees.
-
- "Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury's proposal
to buy up bad assets of financial institutions."
-
-
- Unbelievable. Wall Street and its backers created this
mess and now they are going to clean up like bandits. Even Rudy Giuliani
is lobbying for his firm to be hired (and paid) ( <http://tinyurl.com/4rcd98>http://tinyurl.com/4rcd98
) "consult" in the bailout.
-
- The problem is, nobody truly knows what this "collapse"
is all about. Even Treasury Secretary Paulson admitted he doesn't know
the exact amount that is needed (he just picked the $700 billion number
out of his head!). The head of the congressional budget office said he
can't figure it out nor can he explain it to anyone.
-
- And yet, they are screeching about how the end is near!
Panic! Recession! The Great Depression! Y2K! Bird flu! Killer bees! We
must pass the bailout bill today!! The sky is falling! The sky is falling!
-
- Falling for whom? NOTHING in this "bailout"
package will lower the price of the gas you have to put in your car to
get to work. NOTHING in this bill will protect you from losing your home.
NOTHING in this bill will give you health insurance.
-
- Health insurance? Mike, why are you bringing this up?
What's this got to do with the Wall Street collapse?
-
- It has everything to do with it. This so-called "collapse"
was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with
people's home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their
homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it's because too many working
class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn't afford. Here's
the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because
of medical bills.
- (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/02/business/02insure.html )
-
- Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health
coverage, this mortgage "crisis" may never have happened.
-
- This bailout's mission is to protect the obscene amount
of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It's to protect
the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It's to make
sure their yachts and mansions and "way of life" go uninterrupted
while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the
rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400
million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately
and save us all another half-trillion dollars!
-
- I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading
it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They
are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we
have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something
-- NOW! Here's what you can do immediately:
-
- 1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama ( http://my.barackobama.com/page/s/contact2
) . Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop
up Bush and Cheney and the mess they've made. Tell him we know he has the
smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what's the best route to
take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the
leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to
insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the
people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives,
not the barons of Wall Street.
-
- 2. Take to the streets. Participate ( http://truemajority.wiredforchange.com/event/distributedEventCalendar.jsp
) in one of the hundreds of quickly-called demonstrations that are taking
place all over the country (especially those near Wall Street and DC).
-
- 3. Call your Representative in Congress and your Senators.
(Go here to find their phone numbers: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/
). Tell them what you told Senator Obama.
-
- When you screw up in life, there is hell to pay. Each
and every one of you reading this knows that basic lesson and has paid
the consequences of your actions at some point. In this great democracy,
we cannot let there be one set of rules for the vast majority of hard-working
citizens, and another set of rules for the elite, who, when they screw
up, are handed one more gift on a silver platter. No more! Not again!
-
- Yours,
- Michael Moore
- MMFlint@aol.com
- MichaelMoore.com
-
- P.S. Having read further the details of this bailout
bill, you need to know you are being lied to. They talk about how they
will prevent golden parachutes. It says NOTHING about what these executives
and fat cats will make in SALARY. According to Rep. Brad Sherman of California,
these top managers will continue to receive million-dollar-a-month paychecks
under this new bill. There is no direct ownership given to the American
people for the money being handed over. Foreign banks and investors will
be allowed to receive billion-dollar handouts. A large chunk of this $700
billion is going to be given directly to Chinese and Middle Eastern banks.
There is NO guarantee of ever seeing that money again.
-
- P.P.S. From talking to people I know in DC, they say
the reason so many Dems are behind this is because Wall Street this weekend
put a gun to their heads and said either turn over the $700 billion or
the first thing we'll start blowing up are the pension funds and 401(k)s
of your middle class constituents. The Dems are scared they may make good
on their threat. But this is not the time to back down or act like the
typical Democrat we have witnessed for the last eight years. The Dems handed
a stolen election over to Bush. The Dems gave Bush the votes he needed
to invade a sovereign country. Once they took over Congress in 2007, they
refused to pull the plug on the war. And now they have been cowered into
being accomplices in the crime of the century. You have to call them now
( <http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/>http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/ )and
say "NO!" If we let them do this, just imagine how hard it will
be to get anything good done when President Obama is in the White House.
THESE DEMOCRATS ARE ONLY AS STRONG AS THE BACKBONE WE GIVE THEM. CALL CONGRESS
NOW.
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