You’re going to get fucked, and you’re going to like it.

Bloomberg:

Nov. 24 (Bloomberg) — The U.S. government is prepared to lend more than $7.4 trillion on behalf of American taxpayers, or half the value of everything produced in the nation last year, to rescue the financial system since the credit markets seized up 15 months ago.

…

The money that’s been pledged is equivalent to $24,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. It’s nine times what the U.S. has spent so far on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Congressional Budget Office figures. It could pay off more than half the country’s mortgages.

The Dear Leader also promises to get in on the action:

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I’d like a simple explanation.  I’d like to be able to hang it all around Phil Gramm’s neck.   But, as is so often the case, it’s a lot more complicated:

Citigroup insiders and analysts say that Mr. Prince and Mr. Rubin played pivotal roles in the bank’s current woes, by drafting and blessing a strategy that involved taking greater trading risks to expand its business and reap higher profits. Mr. Prince and Mr. Rubin both declined to comment for this article.

When he was Treasury secretary during the Clinton administration, Mr. Rubin helped loosen Depression-era banking regulations that made the creation of Citigroup possible by allowing banks to expand far beyond their traditional role as lenders and permitting them to profit from a variety of financial activities. During the same period he helped beat back tighter oversight of exotic financial products, a development he had previously said he was helpless to prevent.

But wait – there’s more!

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WTF?

From the people that brought you GE Capital’s participation in the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program – FDIC is now insuring ‘Stored Value Cards’.

Exsqueeze me?

Yes, that would be Stored-Value-Cards (and other non-traditional access mechanisms). According to the definition provided by the NY Fed these are:

… one of the most dynamic and fastest growing products in the financial industry. Anyone who makes purchases with a merchant gift card, places phone calls with a prepaid telephone card, or buys goods or services with a prepaid debit card is using a stored value card.

In other words, gift voucher cards, pre-paid telephone cards and any other prepaid debit cards.

More after the jump.

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AIG CEO Edward Liddy demonstrates how easy it is to put one over on the Bush Administration, explaining to Larry King that tattletale signs were removed from the secret Phoenix retreat for a simple reason:

“We are really cutting corners. We’re doing the same thing the American taxpayer is doing. We are tightening our belts. We didn’t use any signage.”

They probably stiffed the waiters, too.

ABC Catches AIG Executives Hosting Another Posh ‘Junket’ At Luxury Hotel [Think Progress]

So your retirement account has been wiped out?  Your largest asset is now the half tank of gas left in your Honda?  Nice to know that AIG is spending your money on things that will make your life better:

Even as the company was pleading the federal government for another $40 billion dollars in loans, AIG sent top executives to a secret gathering at a luxury resort in Phoenix last week.

Again?

Reporters for abc15.com (KNXV) caught the AIG executives on hidden cameras poolside and leaving the spa at the Pointe Hilton Squaw Peak Resort, despite apparent efforts by the company to disguise its involvement.

Optics, optics, optics …

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President-Elect Barack Obama will be holding his first—

Whoa. President-Elect Barack Obama? Is this shit for real?

Guess so. And the new Leader of the Free Universe will be holding a press conference shortly, where he’ll remind us that Presidents didn’t always speak English as a second language. He’ll also remind us that we’re completely, totally fucked. Yes we can let GM go bankrupt!

Obama v. Congress: The Auto Industry Bailout [Ambinder]

The last bits of economic data before the election just came out.  And… it’s a recession.  (You knew this, but the Commerce Department just fessed up.) 

3rd Quarter GDP: 0.3% FAIL.  Initial jobless claims this week?  Well, there are 479,000 new socialists out there.  (Welcome!  Coffee and danish out in the hall if you want some — help yourself.)  Oh: and Exxon Mobil beat expectations on its earnings this morning and had a record-breaking quarter.  (This is a recording.) 

Hopey can spin all three numbers today.  Geezer and Tailbunny have to find a radical professor at Northwestern to harp on (UIC and U of C are tapped out for that at this point) — don’t you worry… National Review is on the case as we speak.

And there it is.  Only two things can save the old man now: something that allows Geezer to spin terrorism (Osama or Mahmoud popping off, the military killing al-Qaeda’s number two for the sixteenth time, etc.), or a massively effective vote suppression effort (which has been a big pile of nope thus far, the efforts of GOPers notwithstanding).  Both still could happen.  But: my cautious optimism meter is ticking upwards, slightly.