Talkback: Dumbest Moments in Business

Some of the biggest blunders in the Corp. World,were created by weakling boards of directors,who sat meekly by,
while rock star status c.e.o’s and
c.f.o.s bled their companies,and
shareholders dry.Where courage,and confrontation were needed to stop the bleeding,they were as dumb as ostriches with their heads in the sand.What an avoidable tragedy for all.

Electing Obama and his cadre of tax cheats let loose the mother of all pork pie Congresses. No the business and financial community has to deal with higher taxes, huge deficits, an incompetent Treasury Secretary, and a Congress that thinks they can simply tax their way to prosperity.They wouldn’t loan $30B to California, but they’ll hand it out to AIG for free.

The guys that bought the$ 999.00 apps for there Iphone have to be the dummest for the CENTURY. Buying an apps that costs more than there phone. Those rich folks don’t care about spending they probably never worked a day in there life. They depend on there rich pappis to just keep bringing in the money. But look at all those CEOs now

All good “dumb moments”! For me though, it has to be AIG taking their execs. & mgmt. to a posh resort for massages, dinners, and relaxation after they had bankrupted and were given bailout availability!

I’d like to say all of the above but the biggest scumbags are Gramm, Cox, Paulson and Greenspan. Maddof is in a different catagory. GVMNT aiding and abeting criminal activity is first.

Jerry Yang is an idiot. That was the, flat-out, stupidest business move in the last 50 years! Yahoo stockholders should sue Jerry Yang into bankruptcy.

Bailing out the corporate thieves responsible for the economic meltdown is probably the most regrettable government decision in at least the last hundred years. Writing a check for $700 Billion dollars in taxpayer money and handing it over with neither strings nor oversight amounts to more shameless abuse and thievery.

If the American people do not demand a full and total accounting for every penny, we deserve the mess that is certain to follow!

Allowing government officials, politicians and corporate criminals to loot and plunder billions of dollars without even the slightest hint of punishment, disdain or penalty creates a lethal environment where corruption and greed expands and becomes our inevitable undoing. — Steve Ford

When Secretary Paulson decried that the fundamental of the economy were strong. That was just prior to Bear Sterns implosion.

And, Our Lame Duck President backed that theory with vigor.

Can’t trust the government…

When you rely on spin nobody wins.

I’m confused why the Ballmer / Yahoo deal is spun to suggest Ballmer made a dumb move. It’s common in a hostile takeover to offer a premium, so shareholders will force the board to accept the offer. And to say Ballmer should have foreseen the future – Well, if he could do that, he wouldn’t need his day job, right?

I agree with the other people who said the dumb move was Jerry Yang not accepting the offer – But again, not because he couldn’t predict the future (shame on him!), but because it caused outrage amongst the shareholders (which was the intended result of Ballmer’s offer) and eventually cost Yang his job.

While I agree that it was stupid of the big 3 to send their CEO’s in private jets to beg for money, I find it incredibly ironic that Congress of all people is telling them they’re being irresponsible with money.

Great article on the 21 dumbest moves in busines. For me I think the dumbest move was the approval of the 700 billion dollar package to bail out these businesses that deserve to fail. As I mentioned in my previous postings we needed to let some of these big businesses go down in flames for others to realize that they need to straighten up and don’t depend on the government to bail them out. As we have seen (rumors of course…lol) not every business used their part of the bailout to turn around their business.

It seems to me by looking at these 21 mistakes it just takes lots of money to run a business, not much brain power!!

Having the big three drive a car to Washington was stupid. I would rather have them on a private airplane, with their management team planing and preparing for the future.

They wasted hours of valuable time tring to impress a group of Congressmen who fly on our tax payer money all the time. Including flying home at nights.

The dumb mistake was not the private airplanes, it was the drive.

My vote goes for “Yahoo turns down payday”. Jerry Yang proved he was dumber than dumb.

You missed the point on the oil speculators. I guess it didn’t occur to you that those doing the speculating were running for cover to try and survive these last 5 months? The run up and run down has nothing to do with real demand; only paper demand of people who can no long find the money to play with.

The dumbest moment in business was the Democrats under President Bull Clinton imposing the legislation which allowes people who had no ability to repay housing loans to take them out and thus start the sub prime mortgage crisis.If low income people need assistance it should be delivered by government in a transparent way not offloaded to private enterprise in a way that undermines the entire financial system

I guess the dumb and dumber never learn. Here is another dumb move. Today CNN reports that the Feds bail out GMAC Financial Services for a tune of $6 Billion dollars. Who ownes one of the largest sub-prime lenders? GMAC, that’s who. Ever heard of Ditech? This sub-prime lender lent 125% of the homes value putting many homeowners owing much more than what thier house was ever worth. Way to go Feds. $6 Billion awared to a company that owned a sub-prime mortgage company. The root of several problems.

Not one mention of AIG? Congress gives them $50 billion a week after the request, another $35 billion a few weeks later, and with no oversight! Congress and the media then proceed to publicly humiliate the Big Three for asking for $30 billion. The auto industry provides over 1 million jobs, versus AIG’s 50,000 or so. The auto industry made mistakes, most notably their fight against emissions and fuel economy, but to the best of my recollection they didn’t invest the majority of their assets in subprime mortgage securities. Regardless, as a source of funding for both AIG and the Big Three, I think I am entitled to shares of each.

this may not be the dumbest in business but it sure is in law enforcement. i’am so sick of seeing bernard madoff smiling in a baseball cap all over town. this crook stole 50 + billions of $$$$ , i’am sure that is more than what all the inmates in all our prisons have stolen in their lifetimes!!!! this crook should be wearing orange , he should look like a carrot. with so much steel wrapped around his body that two body would have a hard time holding him up. but o no, only in AMERICA can all of this crooks steal tons of money and be treated like KINGS!!!! just another wall street GENIUS $$$$$$$$

It seems a lot of your “business” blunders are actually political blunders, or errors of understanding public perception. Real business blunders are those like … taking a mortgage out that you can never afford to pay, or don’t understand, or lending huge sums to people who can’t make the payments… now that’s a blunder.

However… the bigest blunder is the one we see over and over again… folks buy into the feeding frenzy of the business flavor des-jours, and somehow convince themselves that the value of that (dot-com stock, house, gallon of gas, or pork belly) is really 2X what is was last year. So they buy in… and when it corrects… they lose half of what they put in.

It’s really sort of a mob mentality… or some weird peer pressure sort of a deal.

Did anyone notice that Congress can’t do simple math? They approved 300 Billion to stop 300 Thousand foreclosures? That’s one Million dollars per foreclosure. This makes it obvious that the rich in Washington are bailing out their rich friends, not the average homeowner. They could have just bought the houses for average homeowners free and clear; no mortgages to worry about.

They give away all this taxpayer money to financial institutions with no accountability. It seems so hypocritical to give so much money away to one PUBLIC company, but to hold Congressional hearings and require viability plans for other PUBLIC companies to receive taxpayer money.

(1) Government encouragement or even coercing of a “subprime” (read “likely deadbeat”) mortgage market, and (2) a bailout that did not and will not cure that which cannot be cured – i.e., being owed money by people highly unlikely to be able to repay. Policies like this in the past would have us still driving Reos, Maxwells and Stutz Bearcats, or even horses and buggies. While Darwinism shouldn’t be applied to people per se, it certainly should be applied to businesses.

The “award” goes to Congress. Here we are facing the worst economic crisis in 60 years, and all they can think of is pork…..the toy arrows are the ultimate sign of indfference, ignorance and incompetence.

The dumb business moments started with greed. To many in this country want it all, but are not willing to pay for it. Our ads make it all look so easy. Now we need to pay for the life style we wanted.

You got the Automakers for Flying in to beg for money. How about AIG taking billions then spending about half a million on a “retreat” for those responsible for the near collapse of AIG?

The tax cut on wooden toy arrows gets my vote. You use $700 billion of taxpayers money that is supposed to rescue the sub-prime mess to cut taxes on wooden toy arrows? That’s almost as criminal as the CEOs getting paid millions to fatten themselves at shareolders expense, which is almost as criminal as Madoff’s ponzi scheme. But for dumbest clown act, I think the award goes to the pork-barrel toy arrow tax cut.

The dumbest move was Paulson’s three page “Grand Scheme” to fix the economy. It simply proves the Bush Administration (and Congress) has been completely out of touch with a problem which has been brewing for several years across at least 3 administrations and it chose to it ignore until we reached the edge of the depression abyss. This has shaken my confidence in deregulation and oversite passed by Congress and encouraged by GHW.Bush, Clinton and W.Bush.

How about the combined forces of thousands of dumb decisions by people who bought more house than they could afford, or bought a house with no money down, or the thousands of greedy bankers who sold these lousy loans to people and then chopped them up into little unrecognizable pieces and sold it to the rest of the financial system. Yes-government could have done a better job, wall street should have done a better job, but ultimately – Mr. and Mrs. America should have known better than to purchase a house for $300,000 if they make only $30,000 a year.

How’s this: Books and booksellers are struggling. Amazon comes up with what should be a great answer, an e-reader called the Kindle. Promotes it like crazy and then….in October says that they are sold out until after Valentines Day! Genius? Only if turning lemonade into lemons earns a prize.

Well its just gotta be Three stooges turning up in their executive jets looking to be bailed out without a doubt !!!

Merrill Lynch Chief Executive John Thain asking for a $10 Million bonus because the company didn’t lose as much money as expected was a joke!

I find it interesting that more than half of these so-called “dumbest moments in business” were not in business at all—they were GOVERNMENT idiocies. It’s telling that people have begun to equate the two.

I also love that back when oil was at $150 a barrel, everyone in government had an idea what to do about it. Virtually all of them were wrong. Fortunately, the disagreement led to the government doing what it needed to do—NOTHING. And now oil is at $40 a barrel. Gee, it’s almost as if markets work or something.

The omniscient Alan Greenspan expressing his shock at how badly the economy is tanking – classic

No doubt about it.
The bailout (TARP) was the dumbest moment in business

Why does everyone hate Detroit so much?

How could ANYTHING top Paulson’s request to personally and without oversight or recourse dispose of $700 billion?

Paulson’s gaff is Numero Uno in any language.

DUH??!!!

The dumbest move in bussiness is “the kneejerk”. consumers follow “the golden advice” that someone creates in order to get quickly ahead. Let’s stop the everlasting quest for quick and easy wealth and put in a hard honest da of work, each and every day.

I think the dumbest business move this year was either the auto manufacturer CEO’s flying into DC on corporate jets asking for money OR AIG executives spending $2K a day/night at a resort in San Diego while they were also asking for a government bailout. Sickening!

Didn’t care that they came in style on private jets.
But showing up without any plan ?
That was, for me, the dumbest moment of the year.

Being curious as to the holdings of major Mutual Funds, I looked at the third quarter report of fund Dodge & Cox for explanations of holding large shares involvement in Ford, GM, AIG, Fannie Mae, et al. They reasoned: “While in each of these cases we believe that our assessment of the strength of the company’s business franchise and its long-term prospects was justified, in the end the regulators crafted arrangements to address broader systemic concerns at the expense of each company’s shareholders.” An explanation not worth the paper it is written on.

I agree with Mike about the inflated cost of oil. There is somebody who thinks that the average American is just stupid if they think that we’re going to buy that line of bull that the prices fell because of a lack of demand by the consumer. If someone believes that I’ve got a piece of oceanfront property I’d like to sell them in Idaho.

The basically dumbest move in business
is business itself and those who run
these mutli-billion or trillion comp’s
get mega salaries, prec’s, bounes, and
they have the gual to wonder why the average U.S. taxpayer/citizen could
careless, attempting to scare us, when
they can’t fool us. doesn’t want to help them. Maybe it does sound wild.
But if the U.S. gave each of us 1.5
million tax free dollars the taxpayer.
Cost would be large but less than these
endless gonna be bailouts. We will pay
off our mortages, cerdit card, cars,
and pump moneyback in. The American
citizen can and will take care of their
business. Only lets reverse the helping
hand and give it to those who pay it.
Thanks just a though that might just
work.

I’d like to vote for ALL these idiots and their idiotic moments!

But, you know, something inside tells me that all of us fell asleep at the switch and we let these folks act with hardly a word of protest… So add us to the list for letting them…

Lowering interest rates to make it easier for people to borrow while banks are refusing to lend is counter-intuitive. Shouldn’t interest rates be increased to encourage banks to lend?
Also, one of the unintended consequences of such cheap money is further devaluation of the dollar and eventually rampant inflation. Also, it has driven away billions in foreign investment.

The dumbest move was by the American people in thinking that the wolves on Wall Street were protecting their interests. I guess its OK though since the same courtesy is extended to polticians. The politicos helped themselves to billions of dollars of pork in passing the $700 billion resuce effort. In the words of Buffalo Sprngfield “It’s time we stop, look around and see what’s going down!”

Detroit will evolve into what ever the market will support or else it will fail. It’s that simple. The bailout money will have no affect on it’s rise or fall. It will however, be an additional burden on the poor old taxpayer.

Any politician, economist, or pundit who opened their mouth, couldn’t comprehend that we were in a housing bubble, that high home prices are unsustainable, and that these people who made the choice to get these loans need to be saved qualifies as a stupid business statement.

The biggest blunder of 2008? Letting greedy and perhaps crooked people play in the US candy store without public supervision.

Not setting guidelines for the Bailout money so that the banks can not tell or wont tell the taxpayers where the money went Also paying large bonusus to CEO’s who ran their companies in to the ground

The total failure of the media to notice how during an election year, despite mounting evidence to the contrary, the government kept saying how rosey everything was with the economy.

Just three weeks after the election on Dec. 1 2008 comes the news from the government that the country has been in recession since Dec. 2007. How could they not know this for a whole year? Or even the previous six months?

Is the government really that incompetent?

Or was this officially withheld to give the Republican party a fighting chance during the election?

I’m amazed the media still hasn’t noticed how coincidental all of this is.

I think Steve Hargreave is making the dumbest mistake – does he really think decreased demand caused that big of a fall in the price of oil? Oil was speculated up with “funny money.” Now that the funny money is gone, so is the ability to use it to leverage the price of oil – you’re all a bunch of idiots.

Does anyone know if the bankers and brokerage houses flew on private jets when they were testifying over things in the last year? I think missing the Madoff thing is far bigger than the Detroit guys taking a private jet personally. Maybe I’m biased being a true blue Michigander.

Long term dumbest: millions of options for CxOs. What a rip-off. the CxO can make risky and riskier decisions, gambling that one or more will cause stock price to rise, thereby pocketing millions and millions into their person bank accounts. No downside to them if the risky decision causes bankruptcy – they still get millions in golden parachute. Heads Cxo wins; tails, Cxo wins. That’s the dumbest game around, and no one is saying a thing, specially not the CxO (who says, “this pay is needed to hire the best”…as the ‘best’ drives business to bankruptcy….hey, I’ll drive to bankruptcy for $1M and save company $40M!!!).

The dumbest political comment in 2008 made by AK Gov. Sarah Palin as she labeled Small-Town America as Real America during November Election Campaign.

Don’t let Barney Franks off as his love for FNMa,etc. made him blind to sensible business practices

Most of the dumbest moments don’t really have a penalty for the people who made the blunder, so you can’t really say they were dumb. How can you say some of these executives blundered when they stole enough money to make themselves mega-rich for life. Using those tried and true burglary tools of stock options and compensation committees, they made no blunders. Blunders imply a penalty or loss, they had none, unless you consider having 500 million dollars instead of a billion a hardship?

I think the leader of dumb moments is the fact that Paulson failed to include any reporting requirements when giving almost $200B to banks, especially afetr they had already proved that they were could not be trusted based on past performance and the lack of oversight by the Feds. I also think that the audacity of Gov. Blagojevich to think that he could make a business of selling senate seats should rank high in business blunders as well as political blunders.

The dumbest thing I have seen this year is the act of Hank Paulson’s in handling of the financial crisis of the US. I think he was the worst selection of all the cabinet posts by Bush Administration in the history of American Economy.

The way he delivered his policy statements to the media was the lowest of all at that level of duties and responsibilities of this country.

I don’t buy the oil fundamentals logic. The collapse of credit markets for heavy leveraged buying seems to be why the speculators were forced out and the prices are dropping.
Would not be surprised to find out the the bail out money that nobody wants to discuss who is getting is going to funds that jacked our gas bills for the last few years speculating in oil.

Yankees paying C.C. Sabathia 160 million

Countrywide’s Mozilo can’t be too dumb, he walked away with $100,000,000 as a reward for bankrupting his company. Who says America is not a great place.

bwahhaah pulling up to a food bank in a limousine. seriously, these big shots have got something to learn about life. I hope they feel some sort of struggle at least once in their life to bring them some humanity.

I seem to be the only one on the list who thinks it’s the blunderheads at the SEC, who REPEATEDLY ignored all warning signs for everyone involved. The only significant activity they took all year was against short sellers. Yeah, that’s it….it’s the short sellers….has nothing to do with the SEC raising the leverage restrictions on Wall St. from 12-1 to about 40-1 in 2003, who subsequently collapsed under the weight of all the debt.

No, that wasn’t the problem….it was the short sellers….IDIOTS. If the SEC can’t be held accountable to do their jobs as regulators, there will never be any confidence in the investment community again. EVER.

It is totally unfair that the Auto Execs took first place for their road-trip when none of the Bankers were even required to make a road-trip to testify or even made to appear in public during normal business hours to get their billions.

Nardelli couldn’t cut it under Jack Welch at GE, so he goes to Home Depot and runs that stock flat for five years. Who were the idiots at Chrysler that thought this loser was their ticket to profitability? The only thing he does correctly is take the money and run. What a con man.He has been an embarassment to every company he has “managed”. Chrysler should fire him, but it probably would take all of their bailout money to do it.

Congress, giving the money to the auto industry without requiring a bankruptcy filing. When will round 2 of the handouts begin. August/September 2009. What don’t they see?

For starters, a president who is asleep at the wheel and has been for his entire two terms; auto executives who make millions a year for steering their companies right into the toilet; and, last but not least, a bank bailout with no accountability…I have no way to determine which moment in business is the dumbest! There are too many to choose from.

#22

The “Mainstream” Press reporting on the mortgage crisis in a manner that resembled a drunken teenager driving full speed down the highway with his eyes closed. Completely ignorant of the topic upon which they attempted to report, the uninformed, hysterical mis-characterization, particularly of the subprime sector, sent congress and the public into a panic, further exacerbating the problem. Opportunistic homewowners, sensing a way to avoid paying their mortgages, piled on, resulting in plummeting home values unprecedented in American history.

The dumbest of all is our government bailing out money hungry people “considered intelligent” in the banking and insurance industries. Sorry, when I gamble in Vegas or Atlantic City and loose, I don’t ask the government for my money back so that I can go on vacation using my private jet! Let the economy do what it does best. Punish greed and stupidity (eventually) and give the assets to the smart companies who didn’t “risk-it-all” and are still very strong.

Next dumbest are those people who purchased houses on interest only or variable rate mortgages. Sorry, but this one is not the government’s fault here! Those who over extended themselves because they wanted a bigger house while those like myself purchased what we could afford. No Cadillac, BMW, or Mercedes here!!!

This is the most egregious – giving the automakers and the United Auto Workers a $17b gift that can never be paid back. GM will get the needed reductions in their debt but the labor unions feel they have an entitlement to wages and pension above Toyota and Honda. The union never negotiated in good faith. Obama will give them more money because he is indebted to the unions for their votes. It is only prolonging the inevitable structured bankruptcy that is needed to renegotiate the union and dealership agreements. Don’t give them one dime more!

It would have to be the incredible parties and lavish bonuses the companies continued to shower upon themselves after crying for help.

What no mention of Joe the Plumber or the choice of Sarah Palin as running mate?

The UAW’s ownership of a golf course resort that loses millions of dollars a year and is supported by the workers union dies.

It looks like an American list – but the launch of Terminal 5 by British Airways in London’s Heathrow Airport at the end of march should get an honorable mention.

The dumbest business blunder was all of these bailouts. Our money, our jobs, our homes, paid for it. Not theirs or those of the people granting these bailouts. Bad business is bad business. Why reward bad business with the shirts off our backs?

I just find it disconcerting that well over half of the “Dumbest Moments in Business” deal with government decisions. This article may have well been title “Dumbest Moments in Government”. But I suppose the two are pretty much synonymous now.

Like someone mentioned earlier, I’m surprised this list didn’t include George W Bush’s approval of a Fannie Mae conforming loan limit increase earlier in the year.

Bush was supposed to reign in the big loans to keep inflated lending practices under control. Instead, he did the exact opposite. It’s all the more reason to believe that daddy’s connections probably had something to do with his being accepted into a top MBA program and ultimately graduating.

Dumbest moment? That would be the entire year of 2008, where Democrats and Republicans spent all their time blaming each other for problems, rather than fixing them, thus allowing (1) the lending crisis (2) the oil price crisis, and (3) the lack of regulation by the SEC, thus the Madoff crisis etc etc . Stop pointing fingers and use your hands to get to work fixing all of this mess!!

The Big Three Auto Makers arriving in private corporate jets SEPARATELY when coming to ask Congress for money.

Here are some of the worst predictions that were made about 2008. Savor them — a crop like this doesn’t come along every year.

1. “A very powerful and durable rally is in the works. But it may need another couple of days to lift off. Hold the fort and keep the faith!” — Richard Band, editor, Profitable Investing Letter, Mar. 27, 2008

At the time of the prediction, the Dow Jones industrial average was at 12,300. By late December it was at 8,500.

2. AIG (NYSE:AIG – News) “could have huge gains in the second quarter.” — Bijan Moazami, analyst, Friedman, Billings, Ramsey, May 9, 2008

AIG wound up losing $5 billion in that quarter and $25 billion in the next. It was taken over in September by the U.S. government, which will spend or lend $150 billion to keep it afloat.

3. “I think this is a case where Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE – News) and Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM – News) are fundamentally sound. They’re not in danger of going under I think they are in good shape going forward.” — Barney Frank (D-Mass.), House Financial Services Committee chairman, July 14, 2008

Two months later, the government forced the mortgage giants into conservatorships and pledged to invest up to $100 billion in each.

4. “The market is in the process of correcting itself.” — President George W. Bush, in a Mar. 14, 2008 speech

For the rest of the year, the market kept correcting and correcting and correcting.

5. “No! No! No! Bear Stearns is not in trouble.” — Jim Cramer, CNBC commentator, Mar. 11, 2008

Five days later, JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM – News) took over Bear Stearns with government help, nearly wiping out shareholders.

6. “Existing-Home Sales to Trend Up in 2008″ — Headline of a National Association of Realtors press release, Dec. 9, 2007

On Dec. 23, 2008, the group said November sales were running at an annual rate of 4.5 million — down 11% from a year earlier — in the worst housing slump since the Depression.

7. “I think you’ll see (oil prices at) $150 a barrel by the end of the year” — T. Boone Pickens, June 20, 2008

Oil was then around $135 a barrel. By late December it was below $40.

8. “I expect there will be some failures. I don’t anticipate any serious problems of that sort among the large internationally active banks that make up a very substantial part of our banking system.” — Ben Bernanke, Federal Reserve chairman, Feb. 28, 2008

In September, Washington Mutual became the largest financial institution in U.S. history to fail. Citigroup (NYSE:C – News) needed an even bigger rescue in November.

9. “In today’s regulatory environment, it’s virtually impossible to violate rules.” — Bernard Madoff, money manager, Oct. 20, 2007

About a year later, Madoff — who once headed the Nasdaq Stock Market — told investigators he had cost his investors $50 billion in an alleged Ponzi scheme.

10. A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can’t Win, the title of a book by conservative commentator Shelby Steele, published on Dec. 4, 2007.

Mr. Steele, meet President-elect Barack Obama.

I think this list was much funnier in previous years (ala Business 2.0). It had 101 items (including smaller ones you wouldn’t normally hear), and all headlines were puntastic. Can you bring that style/writers back?

How about Thain of Merrill Lynch asking for his 10 million dollar bonus for NOT bankrupting the company, just making the buyout happen.

Mr. Peter Valdes-Dapena:

If you think your snide remarks qualify as ‘journalism’ you’re sadly mistaken. Have you considered a career as an SNL comedy writer?

I can’t determine the Dumbest. It’s like counting the leaves in the jungle at night. All this economic and political demolition is getting to me. I may run for office next time if I do lose my sanity and honesty.

I’d like to correct Rick from Irvine. The Community Reinvestment Act was PUSHED through by Clinton in 1999

Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 was signed into law by Bill Clinton.

While plenty of blame can be cast on both parties so far my research indicates the Democratic party earned most of the blame.

They claimed that they had no money, but fly in their own jets, now give me a break here.

The Dumbest Moment in Business for all of 2008 was President Dubya pretending to care, or even have any idea, of what was happening in economics and the financial markets.

“Does ANYONE really think demand has dropped enough to reduce prices by 70%???”

I do. I simply don’t believe in very popular notion that speculators drove oil to those high prices. In order for that to happen oil speculators would have to take physical delivery of millions of barrels per day. However, numerous investigations showed that it was not the case.

And oil contracts had nothing to do with it either. There were as many people betting oil prices would go down as those betting that it will go up.

As for the dumbest move of the year, I nominate Fortune’s decision to devote disproportional time and space to just one company, Apple.

Uhhh…hmmm…the title of the article is “The 21 Dumbest Moments in BUSINESS” and yet thirteen of the twenty-one are due to ineptitude of politicians, regulators and/or journalists. If one were to remove the blunders of the leaders of the Big-3 (who aren’t much smarter than politicians), you’d have to say that the business people fared pretty well this year.

This stupid article of course. It has been shown over and over again (not surprisingly ignored by CNN) that it was not an Obama adviser that flip flopped on NAFTA but a Clinton adviser instead.

You ought to be ashamed of yourselves CNN.

I nominate this useless dribble as the Dumbest Business Moment of 2008

What about the collapse of WaMu? The largest bank failure in American history.

There’s no doubt that the banking/financial industry caused a sub-prime mortgage problem. But, I think they were recognizing the problem, and, given time, would have worked through the problem without bringing on the world’s financial crisis. But, the greedy oil companies decided that a $1.50 a gallon was not giving them a big enough piece of the pie. Now, everyone knows that it takes a barrel of oil 6 months in the system to become a few gallons of gas. The price of gas should never skyrocket like it does. The greedy oil companies forced gas to over $4 a gallon overnight. The financial industry may have loaded the gun. But, it was the oil companies that pulled the trigger and caused the worldwide financal crisis.

Richard Fuld drives Lehman into the ditch. Fuld got rich and destroyed a historic firm in the process.

The republicans arrogant decommissioning of the laws and regulations put into place after the DEPRESSION to prevent it from happening again. Oops, what did they think would happen, history wouldn’t repeat itself?

The Big Three arriving in private jets. What were they thinking? A bumper sticker “My other car is a private jet” applies here.

It’s amazing how many people have been successfully brainwashed into thinking that democrats, through the community reinvestment act, are responsible for “giving loans to unqualified borrowers.”

Subprime mortgages had exited for years, but never resulted in a problematic bubble until the advent of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 and Credit Default Swaps, which allowed banks to profit on bad mortgages as they were sold off to wall street investors with false “guarantees.”

But, the subject is very complicated, leading people to seek simple answers –hence the “democrats & and qualified buyers” ad hominem.

Let’s look at one of the dumbest moves made this year: Bush’s OK for the increase in Fannie Mae comforming loan limits.

Talk about pissing turpentine onto a brush fire….just as it was clear to basically anyone that the mortgage industry had ballooned to dangerous levels, our Ivy League MBA president decides to make it so that the bubble grows even bigger.

The logic defies reason.

Again, anyone who thinks ths subprime mess can be blamed on “Dems giving loans to poor people” is bordering on illiterate.

The day should be starting Back-Beautiful-World while Gasoline Highest Price in USA is < $1.20!

The idea come from Dr. Shixin Li, Columbia, MO (lishixin@gmail.com)

How about the “talking heads” that labeled each momentary rise in the crashing markets as….

It’s an opportunity to buy” or “the market appears to have bottomed” ?

At least get the facts straight! It’s not a Dodge Aspen as you say, but rather a Chrysler Aspen. Yes the Aspen will be discontinued but why would you think that it won’t be replaced with another hybrid vehicle? My money says it will….

I live in Vermont. From the point of view of the common guy who has been looking at struggling thru huge increases in living costs, like heating fuel, groceries and other basic needs. I know that handouts to us will be few and far between. So for the auto makers top dogs to show up in Washington in seperate company jets was just incredibly ignorant. I am sure that many people like myself felt that they had been pushed further into the mud by this display of arrogance. I don’t believe that they have been punished enough for the years of customer abuse.

You forgot paying executives millions of dollars for driving their industries into the tank.

People who have purchased Chrysler automobiles with a guarantee of $3.00 per galon from Chrysler this summer. Major blunder, since the gas is around $1.60 at the moment

Number 17 calls Madoff’s machinations “the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history.” Wrong–the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history is the Social Security system. If it weren’t being perpetrated by the government itself, it would be as thoroughly castigated as Madoff’s abuses.

Detroit’s dummest moment is when they thought with their planned oblesence I’d buy their cars forever; but after 15 of theirs I switched to Hondas; now I’ll never go back…at any price.

Not only the auto execs flying into Washington in their privates jets, then back for round two (some in soon to be discontinued) hybrids, but Chrysler’s CEO statement that the problem is they built car too well. But the bigger mistake was when Congress bailed out the 2 of the big 3 automakers. Looks like Ford didn’t need help. I guess Toyota, Honda and Volkswagen don’t need help either. What ever happen to Capitalistic “the strong will survive” mentality?

How about Congress actually thinking that Wall Street would have average American’s best interest in mind instead of their stock holder’s wallets on their mind.

Or that W. Bush, McCain or Phil Gramm together wouldn’t have a ‘Recession’ of their mental capacity to see what was right in front of their faces.

Lastly War is not always good for business. As we can see this never ending ‘war on terrorism’ and ‘war on drugs’ has done nothing to save our economy.

Bill Gates –
Made his money by being an American in a free market society then went on to lay off American workers while building a large facility in India, worked with the Chinese government to repress their people, and pushes for more H1-B visas to bring in low paid employees rather than hiring Americans and now…. Wants to give advice on the economy. Where is my can of bug spray

The dumbest biz move so far for 2008 is the JUDICIAL SYSTEM of NY allowing Madoff to return to his GD $7 million apartment under house arrest. House f-in arrest?! I think I could stand it–somehow! WTF!

As the economy is meltng down, John McCain declares the fundamentals of the economy are sound. Cost him the election.

When the banking industry succombed to the pressure from the Democrats to make housing loans to unqualified people just to feather their political nests which resulted in the collapse of the banking and real estate industry which started the bailout mess is the dumbest moment (and should be prosecuted).

I’ll limit myself to two choices, for the sake of brevity:

Both belong to the author of the article, for completely dismissing the rage against oil speculators. Others in this section have already shown why this rage was valid, so there is no need to repeat it. Does ANYONE really think demand has dropped enough to reduce prices by 70%???

Secondly, I nominate the poo-pooing of global warming skepticism, in the face of overwhelming scientific (non-junk science) evidence against the global warming propagandists. Ever notice that (now that the Earth has been cooling for 7 years, correlating with sunspot inactivity more than CO2 output), the popular term is now “climate change”? A crock? Indeed it is.

Elliot Spitzer. $4,000 a night for a hooker and he still gets caught, so much for a discression premium.

The dumbest thing is the world “fiscal leaders” including those of the US and Australia not learming from history!
So, what have we learned in the last two millennia?

“The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.”

Cicero – 55 B.C.

Wachovia! Any of their calamity of errors!

The method of transportation of the Auto folks was bad – but the fact that they came before Congress with no plan is the height of arrogance. I don’t blame our legislators for not giving them a boost.

That Jim Cramer idiot on Mad Money making glorified claims to ‘KEEP YOUR MONEY IN BEAR STEARNS.’ NBC deserves to be shot. Im quite surprised CNN didnt go for it.

The Rage Against Oil Speculators comment is laughable. It is no coincidence that oil started dropping as banks started failing due to lack of liquidity. Without liquidity, there’s no way to continue to drive up oil prices.

The 350 BILLION DOLLARS THIS STUPID ADMINISTRATION PROPOSED AND THE MORONIC CONGRESS APPROVED TO GIVE TO THE INVESTMENT BANKERS WITHOUT ANY STRINGS ATTACHED. They even approved that Paulson could distribute it as he saw fit without any kind of oversight.

They put no limitations on the way the money could be used whatsoever and they first thing it was used for was massive party given by AIG at the expense of some 440 million DOLLARS

THE ADMINISTRATION AND CONGRESS CAN NOT BEAT THAT ACT OF STUPIDITY, I DO NOT THINK, BUT NEVER UNDER ESTIMATE THIS ADMINISTRATION OR CONGRESS.

All three executives are useless. They must be kicked out as a main condition of getting bailout money

When Bernanke the Fed Chairman announced in May or June that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are healthy, then two months almost collapsed. I’m an ordinary citizen who thought those two companies were about ready to collapse find it mind-boggling for someone who is supposed to provide wisdom and vision to make such an announcement.

Definitely the posting of Steve Jobs obituary and coincidentally a similar mistake happening at 2 different newspapers/websites for the same person and secondly Yahoo not accepting Microsoft deal

My investment in Freddie Mac, believing that the Fed would not intervene.

Dumbest moments in business? Stop pointing the finger at banking, automotive or government for that matter. Take a hard look in the mirror folks. A significant number of Americans have lived beyond their means for years now. What did you really expect. Time to pay the price.

Maybe I’m mistaken, but that seems to be a Chrysler SUV in the second picture not a Dodge

I’m with Pete Atkins in Iowa.

The illegal seizure of Washington Mutual by FDIC who then sold it to JPM for a ridiculously low amount of money.

How about S&P and Moody’s bond rating services? They had been making food money rating the repackaged Alt. A and subprime mortage paper as the safest AAA rated debt suitable for pension plans and other conservative investors for years. The fruit of their efforts was harvested this year just like Madoff’s relatively small time scheme took years to deveop.

AIG, Merrill and Countrywide may have invented this junk but it could have never been resold to a trusting public in such financial market crippling magnitude with out the glowing endorsement of “independent ” bond rating firms. S&P and Moody’s should take their share of lumps for their willingness to over rate the junk as AAA rated debt in the name of their own profit.

The Auto executives rolling into DC in private jets cannot be the dumbest moment because they still got bailed out. I have at least one thing that could be termed dumber…congress bailing people with private jets out.
Rolling up in private jets would easily have been the dumbest move only if congress turned them down because of it.

Congress’s presumption that they can fix anything…….

The dumbest moment this year in business and everything else, was selecting BARACK OBAMA to be the next president. Ohh well, you all will learn in two years when he falls flat on his face.

The bailouts of course. How is America now different from the socialist countries?

What about the AIG sales executives who got the lavish retreat right after the company sucked down billions of tax dollars?

The dumbest moment…Hmmmm, let’s see..AIG’s $443,000 preplanned party in the middle of getting bushels of taxpayer money. And then going back for more, and getting it without hardly a question.
The worst person…Brenie Madoff the robber baron. And all the greedy CEO’s who think they deserve tremendous paydays & bonuses.

Dumbest move was bailing out anyone! We are not a bank for mis-managed businesses, for people that purchased homes they could not afford, OR for union workers that get paid an obscene amount of money per hour to make a car. Until the bleeding hearts of Congress start realizing that we cannot be everything to everybody…we will always be in an economic mess.

Congress is no better than the auto execs. They get all the perks in the world and vote themselves a raise. They really get it too!!!!

AIG being bailed out, then having a lavish “retreat.” Once caught, they do it again.

The fact Paulson gave the first reward (read that: Welfare check) to his former employer, Goldman-Scahs while our biggest worry was Brittneys weight!

Really though, the idea that they were able to sidestep the real issue of a no-strings-attached GIMME of 700 billion + dollars to paper pushers yet made it seem like actual employers like the auto companies were te bad guys for asking for a LOAN.
GovCo sure knows how to lead this country around by the nose!

The dumbest thing of all is how you could miss naming all of those under-worked, over-paid morally-retarded empty suits on Wall Street. For example, besides Madoff, how about that bald-headed clown who retired from the NYSE and manipulated himself a retirement package worth hundreds of millions of dollars? He was extremely well-paid for just being in the right place at the right time.

Furthermore, since you have a group of hill-billys on Capitol Hill that actually think they’re in a position to tell people how to run their businesses, Congress is fair game too: Bob Corker and Richard Shelby deserve special mentions because of their total stupidity, lack of common sense, and general economic cluelessness (based on their behavior during the automaker loan request hearings). Those fools are actually blaming the working class for all of the greed and corruption in this country, while failing to acknowledge their own culpability. It’s truly frightening to have idiots like this handling our national affairs.

And people actually wonder why the rest of the world despises the United States….

When a graduate of Wall Street decides that his former competitors like Bear Stearns, Lehman and Merrill Lynch can tank but good Wall Street customers like Freddie, Fannie and AIG must be rescued, and when it makes sense to spend a boatload to protect Wall Street jobs while vacillating over the survival of the nation’s automobile manufacturers and largest employers.

I agree with Pete Atkins comment. survival of the fattest, that is the truth. If it was upto me, I would put them all on a diet starting with cutting the Automobile CEO’s to 50,000.00 max salary. Get rid of all the excess management layers, the regular autoworkers in their union are making already ENOUGH without having to get a 4 yr College Degree which is almost useless now in this country with our manufacturing jobs exported far away. And companies still expect Americans to have the cash to continually BUY products now made in China, etc…

The dumbest moments of the year were the press and congress making an issue out of the corporate jets. The jets are completely irrelevant to the bigger issues. Since the feds are more in debt than the auto companies, congress should insist on selling Air Force One and require the President to travel in a small fuel efficient car. Congress drug the “little three” executives down to their level.
Congress more interested in their own PR rather than whats best for the country. Their should be NO bailouts.

I should think that it’s pretty clear oil prices tanked for the same reason they skyrocketed, the oil speculators. They’re the ones that drive the global oil market. OPEC cut production recently, and yet the price per barrel is still low. Demand has probably stayed roughly constant, and it’s the speculators that are wagering on supply and demand. Oil prices have gone down solely because the people buying and trading oil, the speculators, don’t think that in this economy people will pay 3.50 per gallon.

The Dumbest move was bailing out AIG or any of these firms that don’t fully understand the risks of their derivative positions. Even after the bailout the heads of AIG continue their lack of cost control. We will be paying for AIG for many years to come.

Yahoo’s Non acceptance of Microsoft’s offer.

I’d like to buy lunch for the guy who bought 90 day Crude Oil future contracts in July when it hit $147/ barrel. It would be great to know how much they lost. It has to be one of the best “buy high” moves of all time.

The lamest thing of all is this article. Your staff writers have a mediocre grasp of the complex realities of the business world in general, and the automotive industry in particular.

Giving the banks billions of dollars with no strings attached and no stipulation on how the money is used has to top the year’s stupidity list. Banks inflated the value of these assets and should be forced to take their medicine.

And let’s not forget former Lehman exec George Herbert Walker’s email scoffing at the notion that Lehman execs would have to give up a combined $10B in bonuses for the year.

The entire compensation structure on Wall Street should finally be flagged as stupid, along with the practice of commission-based mortgage brokering and the sale of home loans as asset pools.

Statements that CEOs (especially poor performing CEOs) must make gazillions to attract talent are stupid (and false, just more pigs at the trough).

bailing out auto companys

I was disappointed to see that the major credit card companies are not being held responsible for their role in the demise of the US economy. With credit card interest rates at 29.99% or higher…whatever happened to usuary laws?

Abandoning the market and failure to rcognize that you can’t repeal the business cysle — the market would have fixed the recession eventually (with pain) but we would be better off in the long run — we have created a mess of givernment (I hesitate to call it government any more) debt and interference that will haunt us for generations to come. The Rebublicans should be ashamed of themseleves and the Democrats will likely be even worse.

Speculation with oil is actually very smart move of fathers of the nation who have huge interest in this field. They tried to milk whole world right at the end of their powerty. They think only about own pockets and have no shame in front of american people.

Dumbest moments in business? How about the last 28 years of cutting wages and benefits and expecting that people will still have money to buy things with? How about believing that inflating house prices is the path to prosperity. Or perhaps cronyism inflating managers salaries while they run companies into the ground and cut worker wages. The biggest and dumbest of all is bailing out predatory financiers who claimed to believe in survival of the fittest till their turn came then it turned to survival of the fattest.

The Bank’s bail out is the dumbest.
All the CEO’s got paid.
Wait, the dumbest would be us, for giving this money to the banks.
Sound like Prescott Bush (web search Required)

Tonya, It sounds like you are whining just like Phil Graham said.

As a small business owner if I make bad choices I lose my clients or do not get paid. An employee who screws up loses their job. However, the CEO’s of the large corporations that loose money not only make millions in regular pay, but end up with mulit-million dollar bonuses.

Not only should management of a corporation not receive million dollar bonuses when they are laying off employees, but they should not retain their jobs.

THE BAILOUT!!!!!!!

Paulson’s activity need to be in very interest of Federal court. Ha has to answer for all idiotic decision he made. It was definitely not a mistakes but corruption and crime. And who stays behind him????

Thain asking for a $10M bonus. The justification was his quick action mitigated potential investor losses. Brilliant leader.

I have to take some level of exception on the blunder about Oil prices and speculators. Oil prices have fallen by 75% in a matter of months. Certainly oil consumption has not fallen that far globally. I would be surprised if it has fallen 25%. I still smell a rat.

So many choices, so little time

Top of the list should be expectation that the U.S. Congress and governmental agencies could even begin to solve this mess and micromanage the Big 3 and other management fiascoes into profitability. They can’t handle their own business, why should we expect they can manage the nation’s banks, automakers, and any other industry foolish enough to accept bailout money?

The citizens of this country have forgotten the scariest words ever uttered, “Hello, I am from the government and I am here to help you.”

Paulson either idiot or had personal interest in every dumb decision he made.

The decision to let Lehman Brothers fail. It was a sign that no one at the Fed actually understands derivatives.

The arrogance of the AIG executives is astounding.

So the auto executives are considered “dumb” for flying their private jets to ask for a bail-out, I guess the self-righteous members of Congress are considered “smart” for using private jets while preaching global warming and “we should all be green”. I am sick of these self-righteous hypocrites in Congress and their CNN supporters. How about the list of the Dumbest Moments in Congress? You’ll need at least 100 just for starters.

Dumbest move was bailing out anyone! We are not a bank for mis-managed businesses, for people that purchased homes they could not afford, OR for union workers that get paid an obscene amount of money per hour to make a car. Until the bleeding hearts of Congress start realizing that we cannot be everything to everybody…we will always be in an economic mess.

The executive branch, and the two legislative bodies for conveniently looking the other way while the wheels were coming off the nation’s economy. Greed has a way of going over the top when it comes to vested interests.

I want to know which 8 fools bought that ridiculous screen saver for the iPhone…possibly one or more of these folks:

Bernanke
Paulson
M. Sullivan (ex-CEO AIG)
B. Madoff
Mozilo
H. Greenberg (another ex-CEO of AIG)
C. Cox
Beyonce

Only one of these folks has an excuse…

Dumbest Moment in 2008 is Lack of Accountability

Subject: Replace persons – at the top
is the responsible action to take for those responsible for oversight and with the moral and legal authority to prevent and remedy business activities causing the current world wide financial crisis.

No outcry for senior members of the US Congress to resign?

Starting first with Chris Dodd, Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.

Wagner as head of General Motors did not create the “financial bubble”.

The “banking community” under the oversight of the Senate Banking committee allowed financial bubble to develop, and allowed it to grow until it burst, taking the whole world into financial paralysis and causing the greatest reassessment of assets – ever.

The logic of not calling for the resignation of individuals really responsible for the world’s financial mess is a dumb moment.

It takes intestinal fortitude, a characteristic in short supply for politicians and members of the media.

To add to number two (2)- The Car Execs Driving to DC for their $$, I will add this note.

They not only drove seperately to DC, BUT they went through Butler, Pennsylvania. This lovely hairbrained detour was captured by the Pittsburgh and other local news channels.

I have friends in the Detroit area. Amazingly enough, once you get on the Ohio Turnpike, it becomes the PA Turnpike and you drive clear to Breezewood PA without exiting. (Our corp headquartes are in the DC Area, I make that trip too). Butler PA is some 20 minutes drive off their track.

Yeah sure… Lets give these folks some money. Their CEO’s and Execs don’t live in big enough houses yet anyway and they might need to hire more attorney’s to shovel all the B.S. from their Michigan Snow Job

The biggest mistake is that the present
admin has not sent any of these crooks to jail and tasken all their illegal stock gains. Just like the savings and loan , junk bonds, and tech scandles these pillars of society have done more harm than terrorists. I wish Biush would go after them

How about AIG’s multimillion dollar junket after receiving its first round of bailout money?

One of the biggest blunders from where I stand, is the corporate powers that be OKing the purchase of Golden West by Wachovia. Spending $25 Billion to acquire $42 Billion in potential bad loans is not my idea of a good deal, and caused the eventual collapse of Wachovia Bank.

I think that when the principal managers of a company fly or drive to some place, going separately is a safety policy.

Shouldn’t remark that as inappropriate.

The dumbest of all is Phil Gramm. His comments about the USA being a “nation of whiners” and this being a “mental recession” is so typical of Phil Gramm. Back in the mid 90’s when the government could not quite do it’s job by deciding on the federal budget and when on vacation during this time many government employees suffered during the 5 months that it took congress to do it’s job. I know of a few folks working for a VA hospital that did not get paid during these 5 months, but congress still got their pay. So, when a couple of our elected officials from Texas were asked if they would also turn down their paychecks for the greater good Chet Edwards said that he would, but Phil Gramm said “Hell No, I’ve got a mortgage to pay and a kid in college”. Just another example of our typical FAT CAT politicians that have been up there too long and need to retire such as Joe Biden and EDward Kennedy. Obama why didn’t you chose Chet Edwards to be your running mate?

The AIG soiree, the Countrywide CEO email slip, the Detroit to DC jetset, Paulson’s shift of funds to purchase stock are all examples of the arroagance of the business aristocracy.
These are not dumb events, they are intentional by a class of people that believe they have inherited the earth.

Oil speculators rage…not so dumb. What was and still is dumb. All should realize the world market is driven by oil and has been for the past 30-40 years at a minimum. Not realizing is dumb…. business. Not realizing what actually has happened in todays speculative markets is dumb economics.

How about simply the confusion in the stock market, which led to business failures. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason for most of the drops, other than feeding on news from themselves.

Typical…these executives think that they are beyond reproach and that the American public (as well as our leadership)are to stupid to notice whats going on. Well, they are right to some degree, but not in this instance. It’s ashame that people in those postions care so little about the “lower class”. That’s why their companies are in the position that they’re in. My vote…NOT ONE RED CENT..sorry to the labor force, but the union helped put them there!

How about Verizon Alltel acquisition continuing through? Talk about a hit per subscriber add (see ATT’s cash hit every sub add just on the Iphone, or VZ’s hit on every Blackberry Storm).

I mean 28B in new debt, for 7M new subscribers – in what are deemed to be, second tier (rural) markets. What is that per subscriber?

I just don’t get the value add, and VZ’s not eliminating a huge player anyway. Somebody walk me through the logic on continuing on with this deal. I don’t have any holdings in VZ.

What can anyone say about this list?

Most galling and appalling is that so many of these magic moments involved our government — from its thorough failure to regulate itself to blind, incompetent leaders (the Shrub, McCain, Gramm) and managers (Cox, Paulson).

We may not be a nation of whiners, but rather a flock of sheep — make that lemmings — stupidly believing, and following our nation’s “deans of disaster” into the abyss.

As for the businessmen referenced (I note that no women were mentioned here!) — their stockholders bear the same responsibility for oversight as do U.S. citizens for our government. The fact that many of the CEOs – most glaringly those of the automakers – still have jobs speaks volumes about what got us into this mess.

My first reaction was exactly the sentiments of Nancy Currier on AIG party money. How did you miss that?
But close to that was executive year end performance bonuses as high as $38 million for “not losing as much as they could have this year.” Now that’s a topper! Only in corporate America.

Greed is a major factor in conspiracies…enough said.

Without question the approved 700 B bailout even though the majority of public disappoved. Time for another tea party? We in the US are so preoccupied with ourselves we have become ignorantly complacent. BTW..the Roman Empire lasted 500 years, not 50…any comparison is ludicrous.

The dumbest moments are everytime the media, CNN being one of the worst and congress continue to belittle the American auto industry at a time when it needs the support of everyone. Manufacturing is the backbone of a nation and should be treated as such especially by those with the biggest mouth. We could be using this oppurtunity to even the playing field with the foreign manufacturers if everyone played their cards with the US in mind.

The writer called Madoff’s “the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history”. Madoof is at best a poor 2nd (to the U.S. Social Security).

Wachovia announces that starting in February my APR on my credit card will be 30% When I am done paying off my credit cards I will kiss Wachovia good riddence and go to cash only

What is really disturbing is the goverment collusion with all of this. We have the best politians money can buy.

How about nominating the sub-prime lending debacle. Without it, the Big 3 guys wouldn’t have needed a trip to D.C.

What about when congress announced that they were going to buy billions in stock from the major financial institutes a few days before they actually bought it? Buy high and sell low, good move congress.

Yang with Maduff a close second. Arrogance trumps both.

I think AIG’s executives’ $400,000 soiree to the St. Regis Resort one week after being given an $85 billion loan should be included…right up there with the car makers flight to Washington.

test

Ever heard of the Fall of the Roman Empire? We are living it!

I’m a little baffled that AIG’s mid-bailout shenanigans didn’t make the list.

I nominate: “The Great Bank Heist of 2008” (http://tinyurl.com/bankheist-2008)

Congress, which got the ball rolling on a worldwide economic holocaust with the leadership of Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd, is the same economically ignorant bunch, still led by Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd, that are being trusted to fix the mess it created. Unbelievable.

Oil speculators rage…not so dumb. The price started dropping July 15th as congress voted for the anti- speculation bill and obviously scaring the speculators out of the market. The bill has sat in front of the senate since as the rest of the speculative financial market crashed. When you can’t commit highway robbery for the most common commodity in North America you can’t re-finance your bad mortgage deals.