Simple Arithmetic All Democratics Should Have On The Tip Of Their Collective Tongues

[ThomWV]

As you get the chance to talk to folks about the most recent fiscal outrage from this Republican Administration see if you can work this into the conversation. There are about 300 million people in the United States. A Billion dollars works out to a bit over Three Dollars per head* for every man, woman, and child in the country. That means that the AIG 85 Billion dollar bailout cost my wife and I $566, it cost my son, his lady, and his three children $1,415 - to be paid, with interest, for the rest of their lives. This is just for the most recent outrage. There have been others of course. In total Bush and Paulson have arranged roughly $400 Billion in bailouts thusfar - that works out to more than $1,300 per person.

Three dollars per person per billion. Keep it in mind. This is not chickenfeed.

* On Edit: $1,000,000,000(dollars)/300,000,000(people) = $3.33 per person

[bigscott]

1. imagine if people were told

they just had a tax increase of $566 per couple - so much for your $300 per person rebate check huh???

motherfuckers

Peace

[madinmaryland]

2. It is estimated that the war in Iraq will cost us $2 trillion. That is money

that can NEVER be recovered. By your math that works out to be $6,500 per person.

:wow:

At least with the bailouts, the people working for those firms will retain their jobs and thus still be paying taxes into the system. There is some positive to come out of it.

[City Lights]

3. Reuters says the total is $900 billion so far.

FACTBOX: Government bailout tally tops $900 billion
Wed Sep 17, 2008 4:07am BST

(Reuters) - The U.S. Federal Reserve stepped in to rescue insurance giant American International Group from bankruptcy with an $85 billion loan on Tuesday, the latest in a series of bailouts and loans for the financial and housing sectors.

The action brings the total tab for government rescues and special loan facilities this year to more than $900 billion.

Following are details of actions and amounts.

* $200 billion for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The Treasury will inject up to $100 billion into each institution by purchasing preferred stock to shore up their capital as needed. The deal puts the two housing finance firms under government control.

* $300 billion for the Federal Housing Administration to refinance failing mortgage into new, reduced-principal loans with a federal guarantee, passed as part of a broad housing rescue bill.

* $4 billion in grants to local communities to help them buy and repair homes abandoned due to mortgage foreclosures.

* $85 billion loan for AIG, which would give the Federal government a 79.9 percent stake and avoid a bankruptcy filing for the embattled insurer. AIG management will be dismissed.

* At least $87 billion in repayments to JPMorgan Chase & Co for providing financing to underpin trades with units of bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers. U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said over the weekend he was adamant that public funds not be used to rescue the firm.

* $29 billion in financing for JPMorgan Chase's government-brokered buyout of Bear Stearns & Co in March. The Fed agreed to take $30 billion in questionable Bear assets as collateral, making JPMorgan liable for the first $1 billion in losses, while agreeing to shoulder any further losses.

Continued... http://uk.reuters.com/article/governmentFilingsNews/idUSN16126320080917

This is a great way to frame the debate and I'll be using it in a LTTE I'm working on. Thanks for the idea!

[Bandit]

4. Obviously you don't recall their chant "We Don't Care".."We Don't Care".."We Don't Care"

That is only a small drop in the bucket compared to every other expense they have added to our Debt..Bush* has added more to our National Debt than almost every other Administration COMBINED.

[Psst_Im_Not_Here]

5. Is there a way that we at DU

can come up with simple daily talking points? Simple, easy to remember, short statistics that will have an impact on our daily conversations? Like the above? Is there someone willing to do this on a daily or weekly basis? Like, "Did you know that John Mccain voted X-times against regulating the banking industry?"

I would gladly do it, but, right now I'm in the middle of trying to sell a house and move. maybe after I get it on the market things will slow down for me, but, right now I can't. Any volunteers? I think it would be helpful and effective.

Everyone I've been talking to recently is talking about the bailouts and how disgusting it is. My father said "Can you imagine if I went to the gambling boats and lost everything then asked for the gov't to bail me out?" He's a fiscal conservative. AND it's a valid point that most everyone is thinking. If we could turn it to our favor it could be HUGE.

[Psst_Im_Not_Here]

6. Kick

For the good info! :kick:

[Festivito]

7. YES! Also good for looking at how good a federal program is.

I generally use $4 per person for a good program, and $3 for a bad program: one I don't like just to see if it is worthwhile to me.

My Detroit city politics works this way also. We have 900,000 people. That's $10 each for the mayor's 9M$ payoff for which I got a first-run movie ticket's worth of TV entertainment surrounding his controversy.

Well, he had to go anyway.

Right now the powers that be in the city are trying not to have an election because at 3M$ it will cost too much. That's $3 to me... worth it.