Economic Fundamentalists, by John Ostrander

John Ostrander

John Ostrander started his career as a professional writer as a playwright. His best known effort, Bloody Bess, was directed by Stuart Gordon, and starred Dennis Franz, Joe Mantegna, William J. Norris, Meshach Taylor and Joe Mantegna. He has written some of the most important influential comic books of the past 25 years, including Batman, The Spectre, Manhunter, Firestorm, Hawkman, Suicide Squad, Wasteland, X-Men, and The Punisher, as well as Star Wars comics for Dark Horse. New episodes of his creator-owned series, GrimJack, which was first published by First Comics in the 1980s, appear every week on ComicMix.

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15 Responses

  1. Russ Rogers says:

    It's not just gross incompetence, but Bush took his cronyism to the level of planned gross incompetence. Regulators were regularly and specifically put in place for their lack of any motivation or skill at regulating. Look at the MMS scandal, the supposed regulators were literally "in bed" with oil companies!And we can't look to McCain and Palin for transparency and reform. For instance, Palin's "Troopergate": Palin promised to cooperate with an Alaskan legislative investigation in July, now teams of Washington lawyers are working to stonewall the investigation any way they can. Seriously, it's like a road company version of the same show that has been playing out in the Bush White House for years! "Troopergate" wouldn't even be a national issue IF Palin had been vetted by her own party.

    • John Ostrander says:

      Palin also bases her staff on loyalty and prizes secrecy in her activities — which is pretty much what the current administration is doing. it's like putting lipstick on Bush.

  2. Jeremiah Avery says:

    Very true about the comic book analogy. Buying a comic and still griping about the quality just sends a message to the publishers that the "fans" are so stupid that no matter what we do, they'll keep buying.This current presidency has really screwed things up. Also, there's enough blame for the "Do-Nothing" Congress we have that haven't passed any major regulations for oversight, nor did Barney Frank give any major warnings regarding the shady lending practices.What do you expect from a bunch of "leaders" that receive their bribes, excuse me "campaign contributions" from these very same people? Obama has some of the former heads of Frannie and Freddie on his team. McCain isn't one to talk either. Too bad we can't place a vote of "none of the above".

  3. Elayne Riggs says:

    Well done, John – I had been hoping you'd tackle this subject, as I couldn't figure out an appropriate comic book connection ;).

  4. Anonymous says:

    Obviously, your tag/bi-line is EXTREMIST-ly Appropriate…Ostrander IS a commie!!! Glad to know what writer's books I won't be buying anymore…That is, if you are allowed to write anymore books from the mainstream. Because, according to you, the young whipper snapper writers, editors, and EICs won't let you join their party anymore because you are "too old" and "don't get" what is hip nowadays. That you are "out of touch"…..I see an interesting parallel with the current presidential election…and oddly enough, you are backing, who? Obama, right? You know, the guy that represents the party that says McCain is "too old" and "out of touch with mainstream America"…hmmm…interesting when you put it that way, huh?

  5. John Ostrander says:

    Update: the Fed and the Bush Administration are announcing a bail-out for the banks and investment firms that will, by the Sec of the treasury's offhand estimate, cost the taxpayers "hundreds of billions" of dollars. Which some Republican leaders in Congress think we should be able to do without tax increases. (Before an election? Yeah, without tax increases.)The city of Detroit also this week asked for a bailout of 25 billion dollars. I mean, as long as the government is in the mood to just give money away, why not? Except, of course, they won't get it because, like, they're a CITY and not something that is really WORTH anything. It's just where lots of PEOPLE live.I never want to hear another fucking thing from the free market apologists. About how the market will regulate itself. Gordon Gecko would've blanched at the greed these Wizards of Wall Street manifested. The government lifted regulations, turned a blind eye to what was going on and literally got into bed with the people they WERE supposed to be regulating. All on the Republican watch.McCain wants a commission to study the mess. Sure he does. A commission can be manipulated or ignored and won't even come into being until LONG after the election. His economic policies aren't different from Bush. This week shows the utter failure of an economic policy he wants to perpetuate. We just nationalized the world's largest insurer, AIG. That's socialism, baby, and it's what the hounds of Wall Street want. Look at how the stock market rebounded at word of the bail-out. Just call it FINAL CRISIS OF THE AMERICAN ECONOMY and double-bag it, folks. We're going to be feeling the aftershocks and effects of this for a long time.

    • Russ Rogers says:

      What I like is that Bush was able to socialize the largest insurance company in the nation without ANY Congressional debate, oversight or consensus on the subject. And yet, we can't social medical insurance because that would take away people's freedom of choice in their medical care. As if the people who can't afford medical insurance have any choice at all. I'm not saying the government shouldn't have bailed out Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac or AIG, especially when things were allowed to get SO bad. But when was there ANY public discussion on the subject? When was any elected representative, besides the President, allowed to weigh in on the subject before action was taken? It seems to me that our President just assumed a great deal of power and made several major, unilateral decisions without anybody questioning his authority. How can the President appropriate HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of dollars in corporate welfare without any legislation involved?

    • Elayne Riggs says:

      Woo-hoo, socialism for the rich on the backs of the middle class and poor! That's 21st century America, buddy!Utterly disgusting.

  6. Neil Ottenstein says:

    And following this http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/arti…"The House yesterday approved legislation aimed at curbing speculation in oil and other commodity markets, saying federal regulators don't have the tools or manpower to track trading abuses." Later in the article it says "The White House said in advance of the House vote that President Bush is likely to veto the bill if it reaches his desk. There "is no verifiable evidence to conclude that oil speculators were behind the rise in oil prices . . . [or] were behind its recent decline," said the White House in a message to lawmakers. " I guess the White House is going to wait until things get really bad here?

  7. John Ostrander says:

    Listening to CNN today, the estimate for the bailout is now at a trillion dollars. Add that to a trillion dollar deficit and the money spent is Iraq on the endless boondoggle of a war. To quote and upgrade the late Senator Everett McKinley Dirksen of Illinois, "A trillion hear, a trillion there, pretty soon you're talking real money."

    • fatmylo says:

      I'm willing to bet the senator spelled "here" correctly.

    • Alan Coil says:

      2 trillion dollars is $20,000 for every family of three. ($6,666.66 per person in the US). Even spread over 10 years, a family of 3 will pay $2000 more a year in taxes. Can you afford it? I certainly can't.

  8. fatmylo says:

    Hey dumb@@@! Do you know anything about economics whatsoever, or should you just get used to me sending snarky comments every time you make a post that shows you are just plain stupid? I understand that you are supposed to know entertainment. You really should not comment about economics. My $0.02.

  9. John Ostrander says:

    Okay, it's a little late to add an update and I'm not sure anyone will see this but right now, as I write this, Congress is debating Bush's $700billion bail out of Wall Street. The Bushies and the Repubs — including McCain — are arguing for a "clean" passage of the bill with nothing else added on. They also are insisting a quick passage because it's so vital we do so — which reminds me of how Bush's war powers got pushed through Congress. So that makes me a bit leery.The Dems want what I think are reasonable requests and some that are vital. They insist that the payment and (I think) severance packages of execs of companies wanting/needing bailouts should be controlled by Congress and capped. You bet. If these are the saps that got their respective companies into the shitter in the first place, then I don't want to see taxpayer money going for their bonuses or multi-million dollar severance packages. If they need a Fed payout, then the execs have to forego that and agree to it beforehand and that should be part of the package. I think I'm going to tell my reps in Congress that. You might want to do the same.

  10. APL (Allan Lappin) says:

    The Daily Kos site reports that when a Treasury Department official was asked "Where did the $700 billion figure come from?", the answer was "We just picked a really, really big number."*sigh*