Ok, so the Geithner plan is it. I regard this plan as not optimal, but it's what we have, so how do we improve on it? Here's a couple of suggestions along with a discussion on how we can make them happen:
Transparency going forward - The only way to prevent scamming the plan is to force open the process. The taxpayer is the majority funding provider for all the deals. Can we get a seat at the auctions? Can we use FOIA? Can we find support in Congress?
Digging into the Asset History - Can we examine "the tapes" for the assets? Can we find all the CDS ties to the asset? Can we send somebody to physically examine the assets?
Fixing the Toxic Assets - How can we make the assets successful? How can we find the right people for the right homes? How can we make them profitable and have the taxpayer at least break even rather than be left holding the bag?
Grassroots, Baby!
So what was the real revelation about Obama's campaign? Us little people can raise a lot of money. Can we get a stake in this game? Can we put together the right people, organization and funding to actually get some of that "hot-love gov'ment" money that Wall St craves? Are there some organizations which already provide low cost housing to pre-screened people? Community banks? Credit unions? Sugar daddies? Grassroots hedge fund?
Stimulus!
Can we tie stimulus programs to legacy assets? New community centers? Parks facilities? Golf courses! Schools? Take legacy assets in sensitive wetlands and recover them? New Orleans? Green businesses?
Congress/Obama Is Our Ally!
We want PPIP to succeed, but we're obviously still MAD AS HELL about what Wall St did. Rather than have Congress write some law taxing bonuses, how about getting us that seat at the auction and all the contracts for us to pour over and post on the web? How about giving Treasury funding OTHER THAN the FDIC (more on this later)?
Plus, Obama needs our support. He knows the right thing to do, we just need to provide him the political capital to do it. He needs to hear from all of us that we want transparency!
Those Ugly, Ugly Details -
Do you think AIG owns any toxic assets? No, they've only been writing the "insurance" for those assets, so AIG is still going to be busy unwinding those blinding stupid CDSs. And these are potentially more expensive than ALL the toxic assets combined. What does magically converting toxic assets to "legacy" assets do to those CDSs? Who knows? But somehow AIG is like the nexus of evil in this whole mess. Let's push to get AIG-FP (or the whole AIG if rumors about the insurance part being bad too) bankrupt and get the whole mess out where everyone can see it.
Did everyone notice that the FDIC is paying for all of this? Why is that? Is that so Congress is cut out of the loop? I suspect so. Do I really want the FDIC paying for this? (It feels just like when Bush was going to put Social Security into Wall St to re-re-re-inflate the bubble.) Call/write your Congresscritter/Senators/President. Cutting Congress out is wrong, and spending my bank insurance fund is wrong.
Ideas?
Edited to de-legacy the toxic assets!