by: Stewart A. Alexander
StewartAlexanderCares.com

March 26, 2009

The new trillion dollar rescue plan, presented by the Obama administration, is like “robbing Peter to pay Paul;” or it’s like robbing the U.S. Treasury to payoff Wall Street and American taxpayers will pay forever. On Monday of this week, Wall Street had a huge rally on the exciting news that they hit the “mother load;” it’s on Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC.

The new bank bailout plan has leaped beyond the billions, taking a $2 trillion leap. According to the New York Times News Service, The bank rescue plan, presented by U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, “could buy up to $2 trillion in real estate assets that have been weighing down banks and paralyzing credit markets.”

Between the Federal Reserve, the U.S. Treasury Department, and the FDIC, the U.S. government will buy risky securities, unwanted bank assets and bad mortgages with a guarantee to private investors that their investment in these toxic assets will be backed by the U.S. government with minimal risk for the private investor. Socialists are claiming that all the risk will fall on the backs of working peoples.

Considering the track record of the government bailouts to save the “free market,” socialists believe an additional $2 trillion will not ease up credit markets and will do little to ease the on-going national economic crisis. Congress has presently invested more than $2 trillion since February 2008 to free up the credit markets; however, the credit markets remain as frozen as Antarctica.

With a little more than 60 days in office, President Barack Obama has done little to show the nation that he has the ability to manage the worst economic crisis the nation has faced since 1929. With more than 60 million Americans being unemployed or under-employed, most working class people are having less faith that bailing out banks and Wall Street will benefit the millions that are financially suffering due to the struggling economy.

In addition to the Wall Street bailouts, President Obama has presented a $3.6 trillion budget that, according to socialists, has failed to outline any real job creating measures. Socialists believe the president’s proposed budget is filled with wasteful spending including hundreds of billions for unnecessary defense spending.

During a nationwide televised meeting with the press, President Obama stated that no one has presented any plans that would cut government spending in lieu of his $3.6 trillion budget; however, Socialist Party USA, a nationwide socialist organization, has produced many proposals to cut wasteful government spending and proposals that would establish job creating programs.

The Socialist Party USA is rejecting the bailout of the financial sector along with more than 85 percent of all Americans. Instead, the Socialist Party has proposed that the government take over the banks and the financial sector, and then delegate the distribution of home loans to a decentralized network of non-profit credit unions.

The Socialist Party is also rejecting the bailout of the automobile industry, giving billions of dollars in subsidies to corporate executives that have already demonstrated poor leadership and management skills. Instead, the SP is proposing the integration of transportation programs that will shift people out of cars and into mass transit. The billions in subsidies would be turned into investments in a publicly owned enterprise that would take over the factories that currently produce cars and would prioritize the production of buses, subway cars and trains for government entities. Such an enterprise would be controlled by autoworkers in conjunction with elected representatives of the communities in which these factories are located

While opposing the bailout of Wall Street and insolvent corporations, the Socialist Party is calling for programs that will provide support to, and help empower individuals, families, and working people as a whole to take power away from the present corporate powers and the capitalist ruling elite.

The Socialist Party has long supported the building of millions of units of low-density, high-quality, low-cost housing. The SP is also calling for a vast increase of Section 8 housing subsidies as one element of major public investment in the construction of low cost, scattered site, community-based, high quality housing.

Socialists nationwide are calling for a federally funded socialized health care system that would eliminate health insurance companies and be controlled by locally elected community health committees. The Socialist Party is calling for a socialized health care system based on universal coverage, salaried doctors and health care workers, and revenues derived from a steeply graduated income tax.

The Socialist Party would also advise President Obama to cut the military budget; to include an immediate withdrawal of all troops from both Iraq and Afghanistan. The SP is calling for deep cuts in the military budget by at least 50 percent and to reallocate the resulting peace dividends for social benefits.

At the present rate of government spending, the U.S. government will possibly triple the size of the U.S. debt within the next decade. Socialists nationwide are calling for responsible fiscal management that will create jobs and benefit working people today and end the wasteful corporate welfare that is now consuming Washington.

For more information search the Web for: Stewart A. Alexander

Socialists Confront the Economic Crisis
socialistparty-usa.org/statements/financialcrisis012509.html

Capitalists Attempting to Redefine Socialism
www.phillyimc.org/en/capitalists-attempting-redefine-socialism

Alexander wants jobs for building and construction industry
banderasnews.com/0812/edop-stewartalexander11.htm

StewartAlexanderCares.com
peaceandfreedom.org/home/
www.sp-usa.org/