The Massachusetts Senate Race: A Populist Protest Vote Against Wall Street Puppets

Any Democrat now wishing to survive must immediately carry out a sharp anti-Wall Street, economic populist turn. A few ideas in that regard, to be supplemented by the detailed economic recovery program displayed on my website: make Wall Street pay for the depression by enacting a 1% Tobin tax on all Wall Street financial transactions and turnover, including stocks, bonds, and above all financial derivatives.

Claw back any remaining money of the bailout or TARP. Reimpose the Glass-Steagall law to separate commercial banking, insurance, and stock brokerage. Outlaw credit default swaps and adjustable rate mortgages. Enact a 10% federal usury law to limit interest rates on credit cards and payday loans. Stop all home foreclosures for five years or for the duration of the present economic emergency, whichever lasts longer.

Seize the Federal Reserve and make it a bureau of the Treasury, passing to issue 0% federal credit for industry and agriculture, not speculation and financial services; stop federal borrowing and start federal lending. Launch a massive program of infrastructure in the spirit of the Tennessee Valley Authority, featuring 100 nuclear reactors of the most modern type, 1,000 modern hospitals, and 50,000 miles of maglev and high-speed rail, while rebuilding the entire interstate highway system in the water systems of every American city.

This is the kind of program which can create 30 million new jobs over just a few years, creating full employment in this country for the first time since 1945. The only interests that need to be sacrificed in order to get out of the depression in this way are Wall Street interests, and it is time for politicians desirous of survival to begin taking the struggle to Wall Street. Otherwise, we appear to be heading for for a seizure of power by a bonapartist regime of General Petraeus and Mitt Romney, the notorious Wall Street asset stripper and hedge fund hyena who was much in evidence at the Scott Brown rally tonight.'

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