Wonkette

Congressional Democrats will save the economy this Friday by letting Henry Paulson, the new president, do whatever he wants about anything, policy-wise. Mostly this will involve giving a trillion dollars to his friends on Wall Street in exchange for some junk mortgages which Paulson will re-sell, to no one, because they’re junk mortgages. On the bright side, the dollar will plummet under the weight of all this new debt, meaning inflation will soar, meaning one trillion dollars will be the new 27 cents. Cheap! So who should pay for this, the worst proposal of the Bush Administration since the Iraq war? Let’s see if we can tabulate a trillion dollars worth of sucky people’s money to take for the big Money Bonfire of 2008. MORE »

By the Comics Curmudgeon

Hey everybody, are you enjoying the total implosion of late-stage capitalism? Are you watching your 401K lose digits by the day? Are you concerned that George W. Bush’s drunken meandering bullshit might not actually turn this thing around? Are you wondering, in other words, what the future post-apocalyptic meltdown will look like? Fortunately, there is an entire class of people whose job it is to imagine the most extreme scenarios, and depict them, through art, for us to look at in horror. I’m talking of course about political cartoonists! Join us for a guided tour of the hellscape, after the jump. MORE »

Staunch conservative baby harvester Rep. Michele Bachmann sez: “First we were told that Bear Stearns was too big to fail, then we were told that Freddie/Fannie were too big to fail, then we were told that AIG was too big to fail. What’s next, Starbucks too big to fail?” Ha ha ha, oh heavens, we think that might be a slap at the dreaded Liberals! Bachmann, as always, has hit upon something brilliant here that could carry the Republicans into landslide victories this fall: The government is flooding the economy with cash, ergo the Democrats must be behind this, and they will continue to bail out their “San Francisco values” companies if you elect them. “What’s next, STARBUCKS?” Marvelous. [ABC News]

Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, the two largest independent investment banks to not have been brutally murdered yet, are… moderately fucked? Both companies’ stock prices have been dropping a solid 10-20% each of the last few days, but supposedly that will curtail when people calm the fuck down. WHICH WILL NEVER HAPPEN, which is why Morgan Stanley will now be sold to the Chinese government for two crusty dildos and a pack of Luckies. MORE »

America’s president, George W. Bush, was supposed to go to a fundraiser today but he had to stay home and send Dick Cheney in his stead to stand around the buffet table and shovel shrimp cocktail into his pockets. Why? Because of the economy, which George Bush is “concerned” about! He even talked about it, on the teevee. MORE »

Sarah Palin barely survived Charlie Gibson’s interview, but she did survive, and now she’s in much safer hands for her Second Interview, this time with Sean Hannity. Part one airs tonight at 9 p.m., so be sure to not watch that at all. Fox has released some excerpts from the interview, and there appear to be many questions about this “terribly fucked economy” that average Americans like Ken Layne are losing their minds over. So let’s check out the canned answers that some McCain intern programmed Palin to rattle off. MORE »

• GO GET YOUR MONEY PEOPLE: Collapsing investment banks are yesterday’s news, trendsetters! Now we can turn our attention to the biggest possible commercial banks failing miserably, like, say, Washington Mutual. And when that collapses on Sunday, probably, it will likely drain up what’s left of the FDIC’s insurance fund. The FDIC can always get more money from the Treasury, or we can just have a BANK RUN!!! EVERYONE RUN TO THE BANK!!! PANIC! CHAOS FIRE OBAMA BURN!! [AP]

The McCain campaign has farted out this new ad which, impossibly enough, is the least offensive spot we’ve seen from Walnuts in a while. And yet, so offensive, still! He tells us that Barack Obama’s only solutions for the financial collapse are “talk and taxes.” His very next sentence is, “I’ll reform Wall Street and fix Washington” — two crisp, granular economic policy proposals to contrast Obama’s cerebral, tax-and-spend hippie blather. Finally, Walnuts says, “I’ve taken on tougher guys than this before.” What ever could that mean? [YouTube]

The Democratic presidential candidate constantly condescends to Ordinary Americans by saying, “you’re smarter than Washington gives you credit for,” and “I have great faith in the intelligence of the American people,” and by asking voters to “read” and “think about” things. OH SNOOZE. Well, here is his latest bit of elitist propaganda: two minutes talking into a camera about how everybody’s poor but he has a Plan to fix it. This ad would have improved by at least 50 percent if he had worn a bear suit, talked to a parrot, or been “disrespectful” to whatserface, the one with the snow shoes. ["Plan for Change" ad via Mike Allen]

Something from yesterday about your favorite Barack “Tax & Hope” Obama: “WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrat Barack Obama says he would delay rescinding President Bush’s tax cuts on wealthy Americans if he becomes the next president and the economy is in a recession, suggesting such an increase would further hurt the economy.” There, ARE YOU HAPPY NOW, “Investor Class”? MORE »

What is dumb Fox News doing now, hmm? It appears they aired a segment over the weekend called “Will High Gas Prices Cost Your Kids Their Education?” This, presumably, was to explain this secret classified report: If you have to spend more money on one thing, there is less money to spend on another thing. Fox News illegally leaked this homeland security information and, in doing so, spelled “education” as “eductaion.” We hope that this was not meant as satire — which the New Yorker magazine invented only last week and now look, IT’S EVERYWHERE — because a child’s education is no laughing matter. The thought of children being so illiterate that they cannot spell a common, phonetic word… well, just imagine living in a country of adult retards! [YouTube via Think Progress]

• BRILLIANT HUNKS: “Clinton and Obama are both policy wonks and people it is clear you could trust an economy to (unlike Bush and McCain, who are all about giveaways to the rich, their own social class). But Clinton and Obama are also hunks, whom men admire for their lithe physicality and over whom women swoon. In a bad economy, Americans seem to want to be saved not so much by a man on a white horse as by a brilliant hunk.” Interesting idea, but find us a single American male who admired Bill Clinton for being “lithe.” (Thanks to Operative Bruce for the tip.) [Informed Comment]

Jesus, we almost feel sorry for John McCain having to deal with these hacks on the right who are agreeing with Phil Gramm’s characterization of America as a “nation of whiners.” Here’s Fred Barnes, executive editor of Bill Kristol’s Weekly Standard, calling Gramm’s comments “straight talk” and saying that American’s are “whining all the way through” the current Great New Depression. Surely keeping this issue alive and expanding on it is a great way for the Republicans to overtake Barack Obama in the polls. [YouTube via Think Progress]

NATION OF RETARDS IS BETTER: John McCain’s advisers are more brilliant than you or me or me or you; we know this. That is why — in an election where massive economic despair is easily the biggest issue on unemployed, homeless, bankrupt voters’ minds — McCain economic adviser Phil Gramm said we are in a “mental recession,” not a real one, and we are also a “nation of whiners.” Savvy. Politics at its best. [WP/The Trail]