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On Shills, Technocrats, Politicians and the Sinking Ship
Three months ago I made fun of an ABC News report about the stock market. The occasion back then was the rise in the Dow Jones above 13,000. ABC has a panel of thirteen “experts.” All thirteen were in agreement; this time the move in stocks was the real deal. All thirteen experts were convinced that stocks had no where to go but up for the rest of the year. Of course they were all wrong.
These are the faces of ABC’s experts. If you watch TV, you may recognize them. I don’t think these folks are experts. They are shills. If they did not see problems looming a few months ago, they are either blind, or they were just lying.
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These very same experts (and most of the politicians in Europe) are selling a few other stories. I think they are as wrong today as they were back in February.
The big lie today is about Greece. Almost every story I read on this topic is the same. If Greece is forced to leave the Euro very very bad things will happen, including:
1) Serious hardship will befall the Greek economy. Unemployment will rise, the economy will fall.
2) Contagion will spread from Greece. Countries such as Spain and Italy will come under attack. Their ability to float new bonds will be impaired. The cost of debt will hinder their ability to grow; unemployment will rise.
3) If Greece goes into the toilet, there will be capital outflows from Southern Europe to Germany. These capital flows will undermine the banks and capital markets of countries in the EU.
4) If the Euro Zone is unstable, then the global stock markets will fall. As equity markets tank, the global economy will go back into recession (or worse). Therefore there is no option but to save Greece.
This is complete horse shit.
1) Greece has been in a recession for five years. There is not one chance in a hundred that it is going to get out of recession anytime in the next five years if it stays in the Euro. The kindest thing that the leaders in Europe could do would be to kick Greece out. Greece should never have been in the Euro in the first place. Mistakes were made. Mistakes are always expensive, but the worst mistake is not recognizing that a mistake was made.
2) Contagion? What is going on today if not contagion? Every country in Europe is already infected. The disease has now spread around the globe.
3) Capital flight will happen if Greece goes turtle? Over the past two months reported capital outflows from the PIIGS exceeds $200 billion. (I think it is much higher than that.) German and Swiss bond yields have gone negative the past few weeks. There are border guards surrounding Switzerland these days to keep hot money out.
4) The US stock market has lost a cool $1 trillion since the May 6 Greek election ($357 billion on Friday alone). Global stock markets have fallen another $1T in the same period. The book losses on other asset classes is enormous. If you add up the losses in the past three weeks, it easily exceeds $3T (5% of total world GDP).
The best thing the politicians could do for the voters they represent is to just let Greece go. Yes there would be costs, but the costs of pretending that there is a viable option to keep Greece in the Euro will be ten times the cost. If all of Greece’s debt were wiped out, the cost would be $250 billion. By my calculation, the world has already paid a price 12 times higher than that in just the past three weeks. If the game with Greece continues, the cost will be $10 trillion and a global depression. The pundits and pols are saying that the worst case is a Grexit. I say the worst case is another effort to keep Greece in.
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The blow up in Europe (and damn near every corner of the globe) the past month has led most observers to conclude that another round of Federal Reserve intervention is a just few weeks away. The pundits believe that Ben Bernanke will rise up and push some monetary buttons and all will be well again.
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How can supposedly bright people believe that another four month - Fed induced sugar high can do any good at this point? This is as stupid as the forecast that stocks were going to keep rising a few months ago. The Fed is powerless to change things; the markets have already done more than the Fed could ever do.
What might the Fed do next according to the seers? Promise to keep rates low for a long period of time? Ridiculous. We have been living with ZIRP for four years. It hasn’t worked. It's not going to work.
The Fed could extend Operation Twist, but that would not do anything either. The ten-year is at 1.45%. Who in their right mind would think that pushing the T-bond to 1.2% would make a difference? Only a fool.
Some are pushing for another round of pure QE. The Fed would buy up another $600 billion of Treasury bonds and mortgage paper. It would print the money to pay for the purchases. That thinking is insane. If the Fed were to announce a big QE program, the markets might rally for a week, but when reality sinks in, and the downside of further monetary expansion is realized, the markets would resume their slide.
Don’t believe in the pundits out there that make it on TV every day. They are either shills for their employers, blind and stupid or just flat out lying. Don’t believe in the politicians or central bankers who are pushing the case for more monetary gas. Those folks are so pregnant with their past mistakes, they can’t possibly change direction. Rather than admit their mistakes, they will double up and make the same bad choices again.
There is only one option left for policy makers. Get real. Greece has to go, Spain too. Printing money will not work, that has to stop. Yes, that direction is painful. It will cost the Germans a bundle to make things right, but that is cost it must bear. After all, Germany did create this mess, and Germany benefited from it for a dozen years. The rest of the world will suffer as well. But what is the alternative?
The ship is sinking. The captains are embarrassed that they have put the ship on a reef. They don’t want to admit to past sins so they refuse to put the lifeboats in the water for fear that the passengers will lose confidence. What those captains are actually doing is insuring that all the folks on board will drown. I would like to see a few of those captains go down with the ship, but it is unnecessary that all the passengers (seven billion) drown too. We are on the edge of a very hard landing. I don’t think it can be avoided any longer.
The next two weeks are critical. Either the globe goes through yet another round of "extend and pretend" that won’t work, or we let some boats sink. A year after those boats and their captains sink, the world will be a much better place. If the decision is made to keep the sinking ships afloat, we will pay for it with another decade of deflation.
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Excellent rant, but like all rants, it's not balanced by reflection.
This whole thing is being driven by one thing: derrivaitves. They will do ANYTHING to keep the derriviative monster from getting out of his cage. This is why Jim SInclair is calling for "QE to infinity". QE makes no sense, and Bernanke has said as much. But in the context of 1.2 Quadrillion in side bets it doesn't have to make sense, it only has to stop the first domino from falling.
You're the only one who cares about the Greeks. They couldn't care less when the whole system is at stake. I gotta say I can't disagree with that. The Greeks need to take matters into their own hands and just leave.
Of course, Europe is such a mess the first domino will probably be a French Bank (leveraged 100:1). But there's already so much dysfunciton and acrimony the EU won't be able to move quickly eneough to stop it, and it will spread across the globe in hours. The derivative payouts wll bankrupt one bank, which will tirgger CDSs that bankrupt somebody else ... ad nauseum.
The idea that these all cancel out and everybody will be paid is absurd. That requires a large fraction of the 1.2 Quadrillion already exist somewhere so the payments can be made. But it doesn't exist, so it would have to be printed by the Fed or loaned into existence by the banks. But the banks are the ones going out of business, and the Fed can't print 100 Trillion quickly enough to save them.
Hyperinflaton has already happened, its just sitting there in the notional value of derivatives. When it is converted to nominal, that will be hyperinflation for the rest of us.
That's my rant.
If tiny Greece with 1,5% of European GDP can potentially bring an end to the Euro, then how stable can the whole thing be?
It's like saying that removing one single window from a house can cause it to collapse.
If greece leaves and survives and then thrives, I wonder what the other piigs decide to do. Greece's only shortcoming is that it has not made plans and not prepared for her departure from the Euro.
Derriviativtes ? Spell check anyone ?
like all rant's "it's one sided and presupposes an answer." and that's why all financial analysis is garbage basically. the simplest expression is Ben Bernanke himself: "we need to prevent another Japan" yet "we are pursuing the exact same policies that created the Japanese policy." In other words "saying you're going to do something different and actually doing it" are two very different things. Japan didn't have a hyper inflation. Is a hyper inflation what Ben Bernanke wants? Obviously not. In short "there's a fundamental contradiction between the words and the actions" hence "we get Japan." Having said that there was STILL ACTION. Europe and China sat around and did nothing. Now we see the result. I can't possibly tell you how the contradiction of "not wanting Japan but getting Japan" will turn out. Clearly "we have Japan" because in spite of massive spending beyond all measure interest rates have plunged. To me it's not contradictory "as we have Japan as an example." And maybe in the end to point is to be Japan anyways. Who knows. My view is i really don't care about your view...but i do care about any data you wish to share. That would be interest rates, production rates, pricing levels, spending obligations, policy responses, profit figures, anything that "moves markets", etc...etc. when i listen to what passes for analysis it's simply too esoteric for me to think it matters...and comes overwhelmingly with the bias of the author. why should i care if the USA fails? Or the Euro-zone? Or the Chinese property market? I can't do ANYTHING if i don't have the proper data set from which to make a judgement. Anything prejudiced by preferable outcome bias (BUY GOLD! ATTACK IRAN! MY WIFE IS HOT!) might work at socialite convention but doesn't create anything "useful" or "tradeable" from which to make a decision or non-decision on. And that's MY rant!
I expect the derivatives market will just be a massive fail, not a financial Armageddon. Contracts will be declared null and void in different sectors over time by Governments. Margin loses will be large and markets will be badly roiled by the resultant imbalances. But I find the scenario where derivative contracts are paid out into financial oblivion unrealistic. How is that going to be tolerated by the meddling Central Planners?
Agree. The prob is the dollar itself, and dollar-denominated actual debt. IranWar will blow it all up. That'll be Armageddon, and not just financial. Civil War II. Invest in lead.
Civil War II is unthinkable.
Here in the south there is just too many People who know each other.
And yes the Stars and Bars fly peacefully alongside of Starrs and Stripes.
Well yes, fiat currency is a sad store of value. It would be pointless for a person who didn't see that as obvious to to roam ZH.
And yes, sadly war does seem to be an economic strategy. It took me more years than I care to admit to see that. I hope you are wrong about the immediacy as it would be madness.
That 1.2 quadrillion doesn't exist except in the air between computers. I hope someone prints a drawing of what 1.2 quadrillion would look like -- and how long it would take those Heidlebergs to print that amount. Oh, and what would happen if that amount ever got into circulation and was somehow used to buy real things.
That kind of money divided by 300,000,000 mil people...
It will certainly kickstart this ailing nation. Even if it is just created out of nothing.
All you need is the Fed Wire to start pumping up every single checking account in the Nation. That should not take too long.
Me? I would retire the student loan followed by other smaller loans.
Then go forth and make improvments to the building and lands that will be useful years down the road when we have no money.
Nice rant.
Well said. I disagree that the rest of us will see hyperinflation though. The only way would be if the Fed physically printed dollars and sent every citizen a stack. Or maybe something similar to the 400 bucks all taxpayers got a couple years ago, except keep moving the decimal point to the right. I agree that it will spin out very quickly, so I think such an audacious action would only add to the chaos. Just my two cents, either way the currency dies and we're facing interesting times.
Ahhhh. Liz Ann and her pearl necklace. Glad I don't watch any of this shit anymore. Any one who does is either slumming or stupid.
It took millions of dead men and two world wars to cripple Germany last time. This time they've crippled themselves. Truth is stranger than fiction.
Thanks for the nice rant Bruce. Here we are at another critical juncture in the history of the West and we are "entertained" with shills, liars, panderers, and a parade of fools in the MSM.
It is very unfortunate, but we so deserve everything we are about to get.
"People get the kind of government they deserve?"
Au contraire, mon ami.
I get the kind of government that THEY deserve.
Bruce:
I'm reading chapter 9 of SURVIVAL+: Structuring Propserity for Yourself and the Nation by C.H.Smith. All you describe and the reason for it is explained in that chapter. It's the full-spectrum defense of the status quo dog-and-pony show, in order to convince everyone to sit tight and stay tuned. This is the chapter that convinced me beyond any doubt that voting is part of the full-spectrum defense of the status quo.
Survival+ : Simulacrum and the Politics of Experience
http://www.oftwominds.com/blogapr09/survival7-04-09.html
The central banks have to come up with something to support the market for government debt (at the end of operation twist). Without some new plan (never to called QE you can be sure) the debt market would collapse at the first auction. Prior to the 2008 crash the USA deficit was about equal to the trade deficit, so they could rely first on the Japanese, then the Chinese to buy their debt (and OPEC). The size of the deficit over the last 4 years is far greater than the trade deficit, hence the need for central banks to pick up the slack.
When this game fails, and it will, it will be epic. Two choices - real hyper inflation or crushing asset and wage deflation.
Holding the obligations (promise to pay with a kicker) of another party who happens to be wheelchair bound, is deaf and dumb and calling them assets is no way to run a hedge fund. Some people just need to learn the hard way but it's ok, those of us on the outside may not know quant math but simple math will do, if you hold any of this paper or your future financial life is predicated on said paper paying your way.....you're fucked.
You know what term I'm SICK of hearing?
Bank recapitalization. What the FUCK does that mean, other than bailing out stupid cocksuckers whose business model is based on fraud and deception. Why can't the sons of bitches FAIL? Well, the only answer I can come up with is this: Banks are nations and the citizens are collateral.
There is a number of banks with very bad loans.
Commercial loans. Including one charter member of the fed itself.
There are however credit unions and other banks that are very well run that they don't need any money.
then the banks really are in trouble then cuz "they get their money from lending and you and i and everyone else is flat broke." the collapse of the euro zone should "do the trick" as they say and rationalize both the complexity and the size issues of Wall Street. Simply put there is no human understanding of risk in systems such as these. There is how a MARKET understanding of risk...and those (like Governments) who presuppose "the bankers will find a way to bail us out" are the ones making the biggest mistake of all.
You can think of it as a modern feudal system with Banks as King as they literally own the currency. The serfs pay tribute (interest) to the King for use of the King's currency in our debt-based money system. It's trickle down economics on the grandest scale.
In our debt-based system - money is ONLY created as loans from the King (banks). Therefore, the banks solely determine where new money gets allocated (think largest corporate borrowers). Is it no wonder we have such poisonous concentrations of wealth in our society.
Now, say the gov't wants to stimulate a lagging economy. In our system, the money gets allocated to the banks. In a non-debt based system, you could send a stimulus check to every household and then the stimulus would actually work and get to Main Street.
Folks, the problem is with the very core of our financial system - the Banker as King - Federal Reserve system.
Jamie Dimon is using the newly created money to refresh his banks 'excess reserves' so as to maintain bank "solvency" and perpetuate the Banks as King system status quo.
The people get the bill in the form of a devalued dollar (devalued savings, commodity inflation) -- you see, the newly printed money is free for the King Bank but is a costly tax on the population.
It's all a rather simple exercise -- the parasitic banks steal from We the People. But our country is so complacent and dumbed down -- that MBAs and Economics majors are, ironically, the last people to recognize what's going down because they have been indoctrinized and go on television blathering on about the failures of We the People rather than helping the public understand that they are being stolen from. PATHETIC!
Interestingly, Ron Paul has consistently won the 30 and under vote in the primaries.
The young instinctively know that they have been born into debt servitude. They may not be able to explain all the details - but they know, instinctively, that Ron Paul is fighting for We the People, rather than the status quo system of Fed Bankers as King.
It used to be that only the man of the household had to work to comfortable support a household. Federal Reserve theft has gradually devalued the dollar so that now, generally, both spouses have to work.
There is nothing 'American' about the FED. The Constitution says 'all men created equal' Folks, the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 created a superior class of citizen - the banker class. the Act gave ownership of the currency and financial system to a cartel of private bankers. It is, literally, unconstitutional.
The Federal Reserve system is a poison to Americans’ standard of living to the benefit of the banker class.
The King decides what is money, and gives it official status. This is necessary in order to collect taxes. Otherwise, there can be no taxes levied and paid.
TAX FARMING has morphed into RESOURCE WARS.
Another ruse by Kings and Wannabees to get/keep/expand privilege.
I guess it was a good thing I only received a Minor in Economics. When I graduated from college 13 years ago I ended up working a fairly decent paying job as an Operations Manager working 60+ hours a week salaried. All I could think about was "if this is the American dream, somebody fucking shoot me"! I'm sure this crosses the minds of the young that are actually employed and they see right through the free country BS. As for the unemployed young......they see retarded 60 year olds that don't even know how to maintain a speed limit and think...."how is this fuck who is worth 90 times (monetarily speaking) what I am maintain a cushy job while I can't find employment at BK, for Christ's sake he can't even read a fucking speed limit sign"! I know because I too was and am unemployed.
I know what you mean. Though I get paid in the top 10% income level (so they say) I worked 3600 hours last year ... some dream. My father earned about $30k a year in the early 70's and never had to work such ridiculous hours and was able to provide a much better standard of living for a family of 7. John Williams SGS CPI makes sense in the context of what I know for fact, govt numbers do not.
this is simply false. The MARKET is King since the Banker must still MAKE A PROFIT. That means "he can get all the money he wants from the Government stooge" but if he can't wheel around and lend it at a profit he FAILS ANYWAYS. "And that's when things get REALLY fun" as they say!
Just like the picture of the ship half submerged ,engine room and electric generators underwater ----with all the lights onboard still ablaze, so the Fed and politicians are touting continue to spend, vacation, and have a good time, but the reality is the financial ship is going down and the lights are dimming fast.
Perhaps a relevant historical analogy for the current situation is what happened when the austro-hungarian monetary union broke up after WW1 and countries had to go to national currencies.
http://www.princeton.edu/~ies/IES_Essays/E191.pdf
And interesting related background on that Union can be found at
http://mises.org/journals/scholar/ebeling3.pdf.
Thanks for that excellent history.
Is there anything left to steal or any remaining wealth to transfer? If so, there is your answer to the immediate future. Once the last drop has been drained, then extend and pretend will be over.
Absolutely correct! All of this charade about protecting the economy, housing, jobs etc is an enormous lie. My sense is that there is still some benefit for the banksters to extend the game a while longer - what do they have to gain by letting the system collapse now?
Bruce states that what is the point of another operation twist (since rates are already so low)....I think the only purpose of this is to enable the fed govt to continue borrowing obscene amounts of money to prop up the dead economy (had nothing to do with lowering long term rates). It only worked because the Fed promised to keep short term rates at 0% to 2014, so their primary dealer friends load up on short term paper whilst the Fed exchanges short for long term paper (with no apparent increase on their balance sheet).
I look at what is going on with total astonishment....
i look at it and say 'let's start loan sharking the Government" myself.
This is all being done deliberately. this is an ECONOMIC TAKE-DOWN of the UNITED STATES of AMERICA. deliberate, purposeful, preplanned by the european shareholders of the Federal Reserve Bank, thru the mechanism of debt. declare the debt faudulent & get on with rebuilding.
Lynnybee you are one smart chick - I hope some of your kids and grandkids are listening to you - even if only 1 listens, there's hope in the next version of the USA, or some lesser version of (some seceded states) it.
Even here, your insight is much appreciated, as some ZHer's know the financial side but some don't know the political side driving it.
It's a big picture and hard to comprehend. I would venture to guess we don't know 1/100th of the true crimes committed against the people.
Why would the owners of the Federal Reserve want to destroy their own currency and deliberately lose control of everything? Do they have Munchausen syndrome? Are they masochistic?
MF
Hi Max,
Henry Ford put it thusly...
“It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning. The one aim of these financiers is world control by the creation of inextinguishable debt.” Henry Ford
He's right.
1. They inflate the money / debt system after they've leveraged to the hilt to increase their percentage of the overal wealth even as they inflate the value away (they increase their relative monetary wealth in spite of inflation).
2. When debt satruation is hit, they transfer trillions in bad debts to the sheeple and trillions of dollars from the sheeple to their front corporations. They label themselves TBTF and tie everyone else to their quadrillion in derivatives (imagine the commissions!) and the destruction weeds out their competition and concentrates monopoly powers in their front corporations. That's why the market fell 10% in about 15 minutes while Congress voted to NOT break up or limit the size of the TBTF&Jail banks and banksters.
3. Eventually, when they've maximized the looting, they will raise interest rates and collapse the economy, buying everythng up for pennies on the dollar. They crown themselves feudal lord Muppet dominators and we lick their boots or we don't eat. There won't be much talk about the Constitution or Bill of Rights or Inalienable Rights when your baby daughter can't eat without bankster government assistance - and they don't want to hear about these things called citizen rights...
4. Once they've rolled up 90% of the nation's wealth up under their front corporations, they hyperinflate to "balance their books" - but by then it won't matter to the homeless, starving masses.
5. Some argue that they'll unleash some bio warfare agent to kill off 90% of us "useless eaters" so we don't run around trying to make claims on their dwindling resources. The oligarchs plan to get theirs and Darwin our *sses out of the picture.
Survival of the psychopathic, cruelest "fittest," right? That's what they teach us, after all.
what do you mean by destroy their own currency? If you mean devalue the currency -- why would they care, they get unlimited amount of money FOR FREE.
They will gladly devalue the currency in order to retain it's ownership.
Max Fischer closes in on clarity...won't be long now folks.
because as much as they are lucky as all hell to get those interest rates to "at or near zero" and keep them there "they're still the same incompetent buffoons that we all know and love...and eventually this inherent beauty will shine through too!"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=gzhK8LpTUEg
Max Fischer
Why do you assume the owners of the Fed are American based?
Paul Warburg, who was very instrumental in the creation of the Fed was German and widely acknowledged to be working on behalf of the Rothchilds.
Do you know who are the top 3 individual holders of Fed stock?
(I mean after all the holding companies, etc are stripped away).
Does anybody know who ultimately pulls the strings of the fed (and don't give me this ... there's 12 regional banks BS, ultimately there are humans behind it and it certainly isn't Bennie who makes $400K a year).
I suspect that somewhere in Ben Bernanke's office is an encrypted bat phone whereby he gets conference calls from the real movers and shakers. After seeing how so much of the 13 Trillion the fed lent out went to Europe, it appears the true underlying owners of the Fed have major stakes in the EU.
Would that be because they are based in europe.
Who knows. The fed is this black box we have no true visibility into.
It got its charter 100 years ago because the banksters bribed Congress.
We all know Congress is nothing but cheap whores who sell out readily, well it was no different 100 years ago.
Their theory is: easier to globalize a world of atomized individuals, than a world of Nations with strong middle classes. Creative destruction. via Soros, Rothschild, Warburg and Co., all members of the same trans-national Tribe. A Tribe which has always regarded the "Time of the Nations" as transitory, an affliction (cf.: "Holocaust"), a prelude to their Universal Rule.
It really is shocking how many people don't realize this. Universities and Kenesian economics are necessary to ensure there are enough useful idiots who actually believe the lies to propagate the myth. These idiots would pass a lie detector because most of them believe what they are saying!
Everyone talks about the federal reserve like its some kind of secret stand alone entity. Bullshit. It's secret alright but it's not standalone It's an extension of the BOE with the Rothschilds at the top. IMF, BOE, fed reserve, ECB, Goldman, JP Morgan - all top organizations for the cartel. Funny how the Fed was the one bailing out Europe through the IMF. They knew we were the biggest pig to slaughter without anyone even knowing. What other country can you slip a few trillion dollars by without anyone asking questions....
"It really is shocking how many people don't realize this."
I have dinner regularly with a bunch of guys and they all have 7 figure + net worths. They think I'm off my rocker for the stuff I try to explain to them.
For them, they see a system that worked in their favor and they flat refuse to believe what they are seeing is an orchestrated mayhem of our financial system rigged to move wealth north of the middle class. They simply see it as a temporary hiccup on the road to better times. Nothing to worry about, whoever gets elected next will fix the problems.
It frustrates the shit out of me to see otherwise intellegent folks bury their heads in the sand over the issues that will need to be addressed going forward. But the last thing they want to do is to rock their own boat. There is no sense of urgency for them. In fact, no sense of peril, either.
They are so fucking brainwashed by the boobtube and the MSM they actually ridicule anything put forth 'on the internet'. To them every website is run by and visited by lunitics and gets an automatic 90% discount on the old credibility meter.
Unfortunately, they represent a far larger portion of the general populous as far as their views go than people who are curious about what is really unfolding.
I find it rather sad...
same here. I see it all the time from a millionaire brother and co-worker as well as others who don't have near as much in 'net' value. The hiccup syndrome is a common economic theme among them.
since they are the 'haves' in the system... they have no motivation to understand how it works ... they probably just think they are brilliant
That's the largest problem, useful idiots who've gotten paid. Unfortunately, in this society only the people who've achieved "success" are deemed worthy of even speaking to the issues, much less making decisions.
One of americans greatest strength is also a weakness- optimism. The view that tomorrow is always going to be a better day oftens blinds people from reality. Well, that and really shitty educations
Reminds me of my mother-in-law who is a realtor. I actually love her to death but she believes housing is coming back. I could ask her how the NASDAQ is doing over the past 13-14 years......but I keep my mouth shut. Not to mention, the housing market has a lot more head-winds going forward when compared to the NASDAQ. Although both are doomed in my opinion.
Amen, but notice nobody is talking about the JPM ig9 short position. If they remain massively short, they must be taking it on the chin. If things get worse in June, they will need to take a massive Q2 mark to market hit. How many others with trillion dollar balance sheets are in trouble? Europe's got about a dozen banks alone over a T. I don't think this stuff is being held up for any other reason than to let the right people out the right doors at the right time with (most) of their clothing still on. There were never enough chairs... and the politicians that believe there are...well they are either naive, not in the loop or both.