Bank Bailouts on the Cheap
Via Noam Scheiber, an Adam Posen piece that I think accurately sums up the appeal of the Geithner Plan while being harshly critical of it:
In essence, the U.S. Treasury’s plan to subsidize private investors’ purchases of the banks’ toxic assets is a too-clever-by-half mechanism to fix the banks while avoiding going to Congress for more upfront on-budget expenditures. One can imagine the discussions at the White House: We have a budget to pass, and cannot give up those goals to give the bankers still more. Figure out some way to do this off-budget. [...]
I know that the very same self-limiting discussions took place at Okurasho, the Japanese Ministry of Finance circa 1995-1998. And they ended with the same result, a series of bank-recapitalization plans that tried to mobilize private-sector monies and overpay for distressed bank assets without forcing the banks to truly write off the losses. Even though the top Japanese technocrats at the ministry were even more insulated from a weak Diet than the congressionally unconfirmed advisers currently running economic policy for the Obama administration, they did worse. Whatever the political context, countries usually try to end banking crises on the cheap, with a limited public role at first, overpaying for distressed assets and failing to change banks’ behavior, only to have to go back in a couple of years later.
The question here is what would Adam Posen have done if he had Tim Geithner’s job? And based on Posen’s analysis, I think the only conclusion you can reach is that he’d have done more-or-less the same thing. Talking about a different issue last week, I heard Tyler Cowen forcefully make the point that you have to think of the political constraints as a real policy consideration. Suppose Geithner had asked congress to appropriate $1 trillion to implement a program of bank nationalization, asset writedowns, and loan guarantees—what would that have accomplished? It certainly wouldn’t have gotten congress to appropriate $1 trillion to implement a program of bank nationalization, asset writedowns, and loan guarantees. It might have derailed the budget and thrown the political momentum on the Hill to proponents of a neo-Hooverite spending freeze program. It might have caused panic. And it certainly would have undermined the credibility of the inevitable effort by Geithner to do the most he can with the authority he already has.
Given all that, why not just skip to the last step and have Geithner do the most he can with the authority he already has? The inescapable conclusion of Posen’s analysis isn’t that Geithner’s plan is likely to be inadequate (though it is) but that Geithner’s plan is essentially inevitable. The best we can hope for is to cycle through policy options in a relatively expeditious manner, rather than getting stuck somewhere along the line or moving backwards out of a sense that “doing stuff” isn’t work so we need to stop “doing stuff.”
38 Responses to “Bank Bailouts on the Cheap”
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March 31st, 2009 at 2:20 pm
David Brooks on Afghanistan:
we’re already well through the screwing-up phase of our operation
Why is it necessary that American policymaking always include a “screwing up phase”?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:27 pm
Two words: President Collins.
Did everyone sleep through the stimulus debate?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:27 pm
What if the current plan were sold just as you describe it, instead of telling us this is a “good” plan.
What if Obama and Geithner said that, yes, nationalization is probably the best answer and start to negotiate from that premise. We would end up with the same plan, but we would have confidence that our leaders have a grasp of reality and are doing the best they can with the current political climate.
As it is, this is the Geithner/Obama plan, and if it doesn’t work or is inadequate, what confidence do we have that their next bright idea will work?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:32 pm
You kind of assume that because you think it’s good policy, and because Congress won’t approve the policy, that somehow that policy (or one very much like it) should be done anyway.
But I guess the question is: do we live in a constitutional republic where the Congress should have say in this?
Or, like the Bush Administration regarded the September 2001 authorization as a general authorization for war and so much more, do you regard the TARP appropriation last fall as a general power to do whatever the hell you want to do when it comes to banks and bailouts and the financial markets?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Hope is in fact a plan.
Hope for the financial sphere that is. For tens of millions of citizens little hope will be offered. There probably isn’t a voter in America who owns less than $20K in stocks that believes for one moment this ‘plan’ offers them any hope.
The choice is simple. Either the economic world is rebuilt upon a foundation of corporate giants and the elites who run and own them, or nothing.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:33 pm
An Israeli Citizen
A Letter to Charlotte Kates – Pro-terrorist Law Student at Rutgers University
The following letter was written to the President of Rutgers State University by an Israeli citizen after reading Kates’ published comments on the Israeli/Palestinian situation !!
Dear Ms. Kates,
I think you are a remarkable woman. You are neither an Arab nor a Jew, you do not study the Middle East, or any associated subject, and correct me if I am wrong, you have never visited this region. Therefore I am somewhat astounded at your expertise and to your comments on Israel being an “Apartheid” state.
I have lived in Israel for many years and I would be delighted to take you on a little virtual tour of our country. Let me first give you a couple of minor points. Israel occupies 0.1% of the landmass of the Middle East and it is the only Jewish state, not only in this region, surrounded as we are by 22 Arab states, but in the world.
Let us begin your virtual tour!!
You have already been through immigration at Tel Aviv Airport with your boyfriend, whom we shall call Ken. You will have filled out a visitors form. This form will not ask you, as it will in many of the countries that surround us, what is your religion, and it will certainly not ask you, as they do in Saudi Arabia, for a “certificate of religion”.
The day is Sunday! You will want to attend a church service. No problem in the Apartheid State of Israel. We tolerate and freely allow worship for all religions. This is more than can be said for nearly all of the surrounding 22 Arab nations. In fact many of them would not even have a single church, let alone a synagogue.
After a lovely service you and Ken would head for a leisurely lunch, maybe at one of the lovely beachfront restaurants in Tel Aviv. You would most likely have returned to your hotel and put on a very casual outfit, as fitting the very hot Israeli summers. This could be a pair of shorts and a tight fitting skimpy t-shirt. No problem in the Apartheid state of Israel. In Israel we allow freedom of dress, especially for women, who are not made to wear bulky long robes, a veil to cover their face, and, wouldn’t it be a pity if you had to cover that lovely coiffed hairdo, as you would probably have to in most of the surrounding 22 Arab states.
During lunch Ken could gaze lovingly into your heavily painted eyes, complete with a good application of black mascara. He would be free to lean across and kiss your lips, finely painted with lip liner, 2 shades of burgundy lipstick and gloss. People would probably think you were in love, especially as Ken has proudly displayed a good wine on the table. Public displays of affection and consuming alcohol in the Apartheid state of Israel is nothing unusual and its not even scorned upon. That’s more than can be said for most of the surrounding 22 Arab states, where your glossy lips would be considered whorish and alcohol is forbidden. But, Ken being a little flirtatious pinched one of the young waitresses while you went to reapply your lipstick. It was harmless and luckily for the young girl in the Apartheid State of Israel, her father and 6 brothers will not take her to the family pool in the evening and drown her, as they would in some of the surrounding 22 Arab states.
After lunch you and Ken drive around. You are even allowed to drive. It is not forbidden in Israel. You stumble across a kindergarten. The children are running around and enjoying themselves. They are not made to sit for hours reciting by rote, pages from religious books. Their games are in the sand pit or on the swings. They are not infested with hate or told the only honor to their lives will be in death. In the Apartheid state of Israel we rejoice in life and living. We do not promote murder and violence by brainwashing our children with hatred, as they do in many of the surrounding 22 Arab states.
By the end of the day you and Ken come across a political rally. Many thousands have turned up. In the Apartheid State of Israel, all the citizens, men, women, Jew, Arab and Christian are free to vote. We are allowed to openly criticize the government and our media, including the T.V. and newspapers, offer, without prejudice, a choice of opinions. Every person has the right to openly agree or condemn the government. This can certainly not be said for most of the surrounding 22 Arab states, ruled as they are by oppressive dictators, where any dissent is met with dire consequences.
Of course, most of the 22 surrounding Arab countries can’t offer you a good old-fashioned homicide bombing as a tourist attraction. This can only happen in the apartheid state of Israel, surrounded as we are, by so many hostile countries, determined, as you are to wipe us of the face of the earth. Where else can you get on a crowded bus, often packed with children and come face to face with some poor, plighted Palestinian ghoul who thinks life isn’t very jolly, having been fed and brainwashed by evil organizations like Hamas, to believe that the only way forward is to murder innocent people. This dehumanized creature will have been fed on a 24/7 diet of lies and hate incitement, he will have been coaxed with the reward of 72 vestal virgins waiting for him in Paradise. His demonic mother will be dancing in the street waving her $10,000 check.
While Israelis are scraping their dead children off the sidewalks, the Palestinians will be lighting fireworks and dancing in the street, to honor this mass murderer as a hero, often to their children who are being systematically nurtured to be the next generation of mass murderers.
The Apartheid state of Israel. Forgive me Ms. Kates but you seem somewhat confused as to the meaning of the word. It usually refers to segregation. Its funny isn’t it that a large section of the Jews who live in this apartheid state had to flee for their lives from nearly all of the surrounding 22 Arab states. These countries not only have no tolerance for Jews, they refer to anyone who is not a Moslem as an Infidel and an enemy. I find it somewhat curious that you find nothing “apartheid” about these countries. Maybe you should do a project on how many churches there are in Saudi Arabia. Let me help you – there are none. It would not be tolerated.
I am proud to live in this Apartheid State. In 55 years we have become one of the most technologically advanced nations on this planet, with many innovations that have made Israel a true leader in many fields. It is tragic that we have to live in a region that feels threatened by our achievements. Israel is not an apartheid state and it is appalling that a so-called intelligent and thinking person like you can go around finding feeble excuses for mass murder. Ms. Kates there is no justification, in any society, for getting on a crowded bus, often packed with children, detonating an explosive belt, often packed with nails and shrapnel and destroying innocent lives. This is not a freedom fighter, or a person seeking justice, but a chronically and irreversibly evil human being.
I can only assume that one day in the near future Ms. Kates, you will chip off that heavy layer of make up and discover your conscience.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:38 pm
I’m reminded of the old Winston Churchill quote : You can always count on Americans to do the right thing—after they’ve tried everything else.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:41 pm
Then they would be spending their time defending what they themselves admit they thing needs to be done, with all of the political blowback Matt describes, without actually getting the current plan underway. And the same critics on the left who agree with what Team Obama has (in this scenario) admitted needs to be done would be complaining about their spinelessness instead of their cluelessness.
In short, probably nothing good.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:45 pm
I’m not sure what to make of any of this, but Dean Baker claims that this whole line of argument about the administration having to go to Congress in order to take over the banks is lame:
March 31st, 2009 at 2:47 pm
I’m wondering if they did stress tests in Japan?
We would end up with the same plan, but we would have confidence that our leaders have a grasp of reality and are doing the best they can with the current political climate.
Because our leaders know you would complain no matter what so why bother?
Actually Obama has said over and over and over what he’s doing but people like you won’t listen. Because you have an axe to grind.
What if Obama and Geithner said that, yes, nationalization is probably the best answer and start to negotiate from that premise.
At the gov’s financial stability website Matt linked to, they link to an article by NYTimes business writer Joe Nocera who thinks the Plan might work.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/28/business/28nocera.html?pagewanted=1&_r=3
He was among the first to say we should do the Swedish Model, before Obama mentioned his knowledge of the experiences of Sweden and Japan and before Senator Dodd freaked people out by talking about it.
Posen:
“I know that the very same self-limiting discussions took place at Okurasho, the Japanese Ministry of Finance circa 1995-1998.”
And yet he is SPECULATING on the converstions, not reporting. Well maybe they learned from Japan? I mean, Obama did mention it.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:52 pm
What if Obama and Geithner said that, yes, nationalization is probably the best answer and start to negotiate from that premise. We would end up with the same plan, but we would have confidence that our leaders have a grasp of reality and are doing the best they can with the current political climate.
In addition to what Aaron said, you might establish confidence in the government, but you would definitely destroy confidence in the banks. Once you announce that you are going to nationalize them, you need to go ahead and nationalize them. If you don’t, you’re going to get a run on the banks. You’ll torpedo any likelihood that anyone is going to participate in the current plan’s auctions, because the banks know that they aren’t going to survive if they do.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:57 pm
Dean Baker is too smart not to understand the difference between depository banks, which the FDIC does have the power to take over, and all of the other kinds of financial institutions, which it doesn’t. It only takes a cursory reading of the relevant section of the US Code to understand this. Companies such as Citi, BoA, and the others we are talking about are mostly non-depository institutions. The FDIC does not have the authority to take them over.
Unless there is a more sophisticated argument that isn’t in the above quote, I call shenanigans. He’s advancing an obviously wrong argument, for reasons I don’t understand.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:02 pm
I think your answer to what Posen would do is clearly and absolutely wrong. He says expressly in the article that what was finally done by the Japanese in 2002 is the thing to do. Your post is simply fallacious on the point. Bad job Matt.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Interesting points, but (whatever it’s real merits) a spending freeze would be quite unlike what Hoover did.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:04 pm
I wonder if we perhaps haven’t over-blamed bad banks and a bad bailout for Japan’s (very relative) economic woes. To what extent do those woes come from more generic problems, such as an over-the-hill manufacturing base and an atavistic agricultural sector? Not to mention a congenitally un-entrepreneurial culture.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:05 pm
As it is, this is the Geithner/Obama plan, and if it doesn’t work or is inadequate, what confidence do we have that their next bright idea will work?
I believe Geithner is on record as stating that Son of TARP won’t be adequate, and that more money will be needed. We shouldn’t lose confidence if there’s still a trillion bucks worth of bank recapitalization needed at some point in the near future, because everybody — including the administration — realizes this is the case. And if by then they’ve got the needed receivership legislation enacted, we should praise them for making preparations in advance.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:09 pm
Geithner could always just pull a Hank Paulson, get the money, then completely change the conditions upon which he’ll disburse it.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:14 pm
I really think that is a misreading. Posen:
I think a fairer reading of Posen is that the “political infeasibility” of nationalization or receivership had to do with BHO not wanting to sacrifice other budget priorities.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:20 pm
I have not heard that. The link Baker has does not say that. It might be true, but Baker doesn’t really support his argument.
What is true is that Obama is seeking legislation that would allow seizure of insolvent financial service firms that perform bank-like activities. That most certainly is necessary, if we want it done.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Look at how the FDIC eats banks; they sneak into town under assumed names so as to not tip anyone off, and then swoop down on the place Friday afternoon.
You don’t announce a policy of nationalization months before you’re even capable of carrying it out. You sneak up on them.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:28 pm
I would go a step further. The first announcement of bank nationalization should be, “We have nationalized the following banks: (list). No other banks require nationalization.”
March 31st, 2009 at 3:40 pm
This isn’t good second-best theory. If the first best option isn’t available, it doesn’t mean that the option closest to it which is available is the second best option.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:43 pm
Good points, and I admit that I lean heavily on Krugman and the blogosphere for what needs to be done here.
Time will tell if Obama is simply being needfully “stealthy” in nationalizing the banks. Perhaps he’s covering all of his bases by trying out these other ideas first – so that when it occurs he can say it was a last resort. Clever if it’s true.
That said, if Obama has a cunning plan then people demanding the proper course of action, bank nationalization as I’ve read, are only doing him a favor. “Now make me do it”, FDR.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Perhaps he’s covering all of his bases by trying out these other ideas first – so that when it occurs he can say it was a last resort. Clever if it’s true.
Rather than a ruse, I find it more likely that he’s genuinely committed to giving these “other ideas” a shot before going the nationalization route.
Nationalization would be expensive, both up front and overall. If the PPIP works, the gubmint stands to make money.
March 31st, 2009 at 4:27 pm
With regards to the banks, they are not “bankrupt”.
Banks need a minimum amount of assets to meet typical depositary withdrawls. This amount is regulated by the Federal Reserve Board.
The problem is that some of those assets are formerly AAA-rated mortgage backed bonds. Most are still producing a reasonable cash flow, but if they had to be sold today on the open market (mark-to-market), they would be selling about 30%-60% of what the bank bought them for. This may put many banks under the regulatory minimums.
There is no “precise science” to regulatory capital minimums. Even with if all the regulatory capital minimums were kept in cash, if enough people pull their deposits from a bank in a big run, the bank could still run out of cash.
Over time, a lot of the previously AAA-rated mortgage backed bonds are going to have to be realized at their actual value, but we won’t really know their true, long-term value will be for 20 years, and the values will likely depend on the economy as well as housing prices.
If the “uncertainty” is whether the bonds will continue to meet regulatory requirements, we certainly could “tweak” the regulatory requirements.
If the “uncertainty” is whether the bonds will start to bring in such little cash that the bank is in true risk of running out of cash, that is a different issue.
I don’t see the need for government to force a marketing of these bonds. Let the banks hold them as long as they want. In the short term, let’s make sure that our regulatory capital rules do not encourage banks to purchase more risky assets, and let’s say that over the next few years we expect banks to slowly discount their risky assets for regulatory capital limit purposes. The banks will need to pump some cash and Federal bonds into their capital (from profit or new equity capital), but let’s make it clear what the discounting schedule looks like. Bank equity holders are going to be hurt by this, and we need to admit that.
The “stress tests” are not a bad idea, we should identify the banks that are so gone that they really are in a real risk of running out of cash in a run.
What we should stop doing is having a new policy every month, especially ones that socialize loss and privatize potential gain.
March 31st, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Why not let CitiGroup remain a zombie bank if they want to? It is not clear why having bankers wasting their time sitting inside brick buildings on someone else’s dime is a problem.
Zombie banks are not likely the cause of the recession.
March 31st, 2009 at 4:53 pm
FYI,
You guys are losing mark-to-market: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-tv/arianna-and-congressman-f_b_181162.html
Watch the clip at around 5min. Barney Frank has finally woken up and seen the light on this one. Not sure why most of you haven’t.
That having been said, I like Adam Posen…he’s a good guy. But he’s completely wrong on this. As I’ve discussed before, our situation is nothing like Japan’s. People that use that comparison don’t know what they’re talking about.
March 31st, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Why not let CitiGroup remain a zombie bank if they want to? It is not clear why having bankers wasting their time sitting inside brick buildings on someone else’s dime is a problem.
Because it’s a very bad idea to have many hundreds of billions of capital tied up in banks that cannot lend. A true “zombie” bank is a bank that has enough income coming in to meet payroll and keep the lights on, but whose devalued assets leave it short of the capital ratios necessary to make new loans. We’d be much better off if that capital were held by institutions actually healthy enough to engage in lending.
March 31st, 2009 at 6:07 pm
As I’ve discussed before, our situation is nothing like Japan’s. People that use that comparison don’t know what they’re talking about.
I’m not rejecting this out of hand, but it would help if you explained what you believe to be the difference.
March 31st, 2009 at 8:36 pm
That’s because I’ve actually read the proposal. There is a lot of alarmism, but it’s just not that significant. There are three changes in it:
1) It makes the specific required assertions for management to claim that an asset impairment is temporary better defined. It doesn’t make it significantly looser, just makes it clearer.
2) If a debt asset is other-than-temporarily impaired for credit reasons (as opposed to other reasons, such as changes in interest rates), then the impairment does not need to be immediately recognized in net income. Instead, they are accumulated in Other Comprehensive Income, and then amortized over the life of the asset. So, the income effect is recognized over time. The balance sheet effect is immediate, and unchanged from the previous rules.
3) It allows for equity asset impairments to be declared to be temporary. This part has produced a lot of screeching that a company that owned shares of AIG would have been able to avoid recognizing the loss. This is bullshit. Sure, management could try to claim that such an impairment is temporary, using the assertions required in point one, but their independent auditors have to approve of that designation. That’s a serious limitation on making absurd claims. Under Sarbanes-Oxley, the auditors aren’t going to just sign off on whatever crap gets asserted.
Barney Frank is dead right in that clip. Arianna Huffington really has no idea what she is talking about. I suspect that her knowledge of actual accounting is negligible.
March 31st, 2009 at 10:23 pm
Ed,
Great link. Thanks for posting it. Man, it’s good to have somebody like Barney in charge of these things. It’s like a troop of paid-off howler monkeys were setting financial regulatory policy for a over a decade. BTW, does anybody else welcome the return of actual balance-of-power rivalries between the Congress and the White House? Paid-off howler monkeys demonstrating “presenting behavior” is what the Republican Congress was like.
I don’t think Barney Frank’s proposal – require mark-to-market, but have a more flexible regulatory response if lenders’ capitalization falls, to take into the different scenarios of what that might mean – is any kind of a loss for us guyz. That seems like a good idea right now, and the fairly anodyne proposal doesn’t seem to represent an loosening of standards, so much as an injection of common sense in place of a one-size-fits-all rule. I like it.
April 1st, 2009 at 1:51 am
Matt,
You ought to read John Hussman’s latest on this, “On the Urgency of Restructuring Bank and Mortgage Debt,
and of Abandoning Toxic Asset Purchases” (my take on it). Dr. Hussman (he has a Ph.D. in economics from Stanford) has been ahead of the curve on the financial crisis for some time, and unlike a lot other commentators, he is highly numerate (a former options mathematician) and an expert in financial accounting. His academic background is also complemented by his hands-on experience as a successful portfolio manager.
As a progressive, you ought to like Dr. Hussman’s preferred solutions, which include recapitalizing insolvent institutions by making bondholders take the hit instead of taxpayers. The less federal money spent defending these bondholders, the more will be available for your (and Obama’s) policy priorities.
April 1st, 2009 at 9:40 am
Led,
Per my friend’s blog:
“Answer to yesterdays question. In 1990, Japanese banks were practically the sole source of credit to Japanese corporates, supplying over 80% of the credit. Last year, American banks provided about 23% of all credit extended.”
If you’d like more in depth on the differences, feel free to comment at ashtonadvisory.blogspot.com . While he has a lot of interesting readers…not many of them are in a position to post comments on his site given who they are in government and the financial world.
Joe,
Many thanks…But I’m going to have to disagree with you (I suppose as usual).
This is what I’ve been saying all along, that we need to take a big step back from this idea that banks can mark all of their assets today. As much as I despise Huffington (although her site is great), she’s totally right in going after Barney in what he’s proposing–which is not terribly different than what it used to be.
“For a bit more information on this subject. Check out this comment by my aforementioned friend Charles James on this blog (it was the post “We need smaller banks”
Ah, how wonderful. Let us create a Wonderful Life and have Jimmy Stewart come calling. It would be wonderful but it is not 1945 and banking is not knowing your teller. It is a bold, international, RISK-TAKING business which operates on many levels with many different products and strategies. “You regulate the hell out of big banks…” Who regulates the hell out of them? I think we should all understand on thing: unless one is INSIDE a bank these days one has very little chance of either understanding or regulating what is going on. No regulatory agency in existence today and no regulatory agency that could be created can be expected to “regulate” the business of banking as we know it today. No regulatory agency that has ever existed has “regulated” the banking business. Every regulator has been and will continue to be an oversight authority very much at the mercy of management to do the “right thing.” Once again, it is a RISK TAKING business and in todays world the volatility assigned to certain risks that financial institutions must take rules out anyone sitting about and proclaiming, “Gee, I wish you wouldn’t do that.” Remember, unless a banker is a crook, he doesn’t deliberately make bad, costly decisions: but we have all made good decisions that have gone bad and today, they go bad very quickly. The speed at which things went from bad to awful was the most surprising event of the past year. Another thing: capital in regard to a bank is almost a myth: a regulatory creation to make all feel good. Confidence, and stemming from confidence the liquidity that is created and maintained is what counts. Banking systems all over the world have been run without any tangible equity for years as a result of official sector actions that have maintained confidence. Sorry to sound so bleak gang, but been there, done that.”
That is what Barney Frank was proposing…Giving the regulators the necessary leeway to work with banks in trouble…because time (in banking) tends to solve all problems.
April 1st, 2009 at 9:42 am
Sorry, those quotes should have begun at “Ah” and ended at “done that”
April 1st, 2009 at 11:56 am
Anyone who thinks Hoover froze spending should check out this link:
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/budget.php
April 1st, 2009 at 10:05 pm
It might have derailed the budget and thrown the political momentum on the Hill to proponents of a neo-Hooverite spending freeze program.
I think that a history lesson is required. Hoover was an activist president who who increased spending on public works and the size of the federal government. For a better example of a spending freeze during depression you have to go back to President Harding. Of course, cutting government spending and lowering taxes helped end the 1920-1921 depression very quickly while Hoover/FDR turned what should have been a deep by short depression into a Great one.
April 9th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
My fellow on Orkut shared this link with me and I’m not dissapointed at all that I came to your blog.
April 16th, 2009 at 10:12 pm
Just a test of the new guestbook form.
I am from Vietnam and now study English, please tell me right I wrote the following sentence: “Combine out and inbound flights with different carriers for cheapest and or.”
With respect 8), Simms.