Bush Mouthpiece Admits: They’ve Been Sitting on this Plan
Hidden in an article reporting that Cheney’s going to go hunt up some support for the $700,000,000,000 bailout is this admission that the Bush Administration has been sitting on it for some time:
Fratto insisted that the plan was not slapped together and had been drawn up as a contingency over previous months and weeks by administration officials. He acknowledged lawmakers were getting only days to peruse it, but he said this should be enough. [my emphasis]
Which raises three questions for me:
A) First, as we’ll discuss today in the book salon on Woodward’s War Within, the Bush Administration refused to admit Iraq was FUBAR even while, for seven months, they were drumming up a new strategy because it was FUBAR. They did so because they didn’t want to affect the mid-term elections. So has the Bush Administration been formulating a plan to bail out their buddies, in secret, because they didn’t want to let the voters know how badly they had fucked up the American economy before November?
B) And if that is true, how much worse has the economy gotten–and how much more expensive will the bailout be–because the Bushies were trying to hide yet another colossal Republican failure?
C) Or, did they simply not tell us about their fuck-up so they could spring the $700,000,000,000 surprise on us on a Friday and demand results by Monday? The Shock Doctrine at work!
Though, I guess "A" and "C" are not necessarily either/or propositions.
I lean toward a LIHOP explanation (which fits into Shock Doctrine). Don’t forget the Executive Order sitting
on Bush’s deskin Cheney’s safe allowing for imposition of martial law and cancellation of the elections in the event of a “crisis”. They’ve totally shot their wad with the military and can’t start anything anywhere else. This is all they’ve got.That will lead to the complete destruction of the Republic Party. Hey, that’s a good thing!
From democracynow.org:
Army Unit to Deploy in October for Domestic Operations
Beginning in October, the Army plans to station an active unit inside the United States for the first time to serve as an on-call federal response in times of emergency. The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent thirty-five of the last sixty months in Iraq, but now the unit is training for domestic operations. The unit will soon be under the day-to-day control of US Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command. The Army Times reports this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to Northern Command. The paper says the Army unit may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control. The soldiers are learning to use so-called nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds.
Can they do that? *thinking, “posse comitatus, posse comitatus, where have I heard that”
posse comitatus was rescinded not too long ago, they can now use american forces against americans
you can thank bush for that
I was afraid I’d heard of something along those lines. Think of everything, don’t they? Wonder why they were anticipating civil unrest, given the nearly terminal level of apathy we’ve sunk to. Must’ve been something pretty bad. Soon anything bad yet?
hi……Jim ,that might be whats comming
And, how many Market insiders and lobbyists were invited in on the planning and deliberations? Kinda like the super secret energy policy talks that Cheney shredded all evidence of.
Wow, have we as a nation been fleeced good!
Next, they’ll want payback for the forensic kit…
“With all due respect, Senator.” (All your $700B is belong to us.)
Of interest: Meltdown: Voters blaming GOP for financial crisis
Can I choose D) All of the above?
I also like this quote from the linked article:
He’s saying that if the executives of the companies being bailed out don’t get their big bonuses, the companies wouldn’t participate. Doesn’t that mean that those execs are willing to destroy their companies and our economy for personal profit?
But they are being patriotic – if they don’t accumulate obscene wealth how are they going to be able to hire some of the peasants
Precisely true. Thus, any institution that would not take part in the bailout didn’t really need the bailout in the first place.
Otherwise, they, being the LOSERS in this situation, wouldn’t be in any position to impose conditions.
Let them sink. Let them all sink.
“It’s best to nuke them from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.”
Naomi Klein says the shock doctrine also comes into effect after the bill passes when they buy the shitpile (with money we haven’t earned yet) and hire the guys who made the shitpile to dispose of the shitpile.
This, from the people that brought you Blackwater – another fine privitization effort – lucrative contracts for connected Wall Street financiers who have hauled in compensation in the 10’s of millions and 100’s of millions MAKING the shitpile.
wow, if this didn’t come from naomi I would give it no credibility at all, from your link;
Naomi Wolf.
oops
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..28393.html
i’m confused.
according to naomi wolfe it is established mccain will not survive his term in office
by “established”, naomi cline is saying medical health indicates his cancer is more pervasive then the public is aware
plus his father died at 70
and his grandfather died at age 61
Americablog dot com has been hitting on the McCain cancer recently. Dermatologists are weighing in saying that McCain’s 4th cancer was different from the first three and the public should know more about it. The location was thin skin on temple which sometimes is associated with brain tumors and rapid cancer growth. The secondary tests shown to reporters for three hours with no note taking were the kinds of tests that implied the doctors didn’t like what the initial tests revealed, but the results of the secondary tests may have been missing from the medical records because nobody seems to have seen them in that three hours.
naomi WOLFE, naomi WOLFE
I think I have a subconsous desire for the other naomi
Re: McCain’s surgeries for melanoma cancer.
Long ago my mother died of melanoma cancer which first manifested itself in a black mole on her upper arm. Surgery scooped it out. She died 6 months later with the cancer spread throughout her organs.
The fact that McCain’s cancer has returned 4 or 5 times indicates to me that it is in his blood stream or bones, or both. Modern day radiation and chemo treatments have probably caused remissions.
What is that large lump on McCain’s left jaw?
Why does his physical size seem to be disappearing? Compare pictures 2005 to today’s. He now looks to be a skeleton covered in skin.
I’m not a basher of the aged – I’m 74 years old. I have previously posted here at EW that IMHO McCain will not live past his second year in office if he is elected.
How can we demand that his medical records be made public?
I agree – hence the Bushwithboobs – a perfect puppet once they get rid of McCain
Here’s the link to the Naomi Klein piece at Huff Post. A must read.
As Dems Craft Bailout Bill, They Ought To Point Fingers
by Corn
And now Darth Cheney’s on the scene. This is looking more and more like that last ”Star Wars” movie.
EPU’ing myself..chasing threads:
“
I’ve been listening to Paulson and Bernanke. The bottom line is that Paulson believes that in order to “save the economy”…”credit” must be available to all businesses and people in the US (and overseas investors)…and that the assets that they want to take control of would be artifically sold at a “blue sky” “hold til maturity” rate that they will in effect, make up..
Gawd. He’s saying that what is needed is to lend businesses and people…money they need, because they don’t have it….
That is the whole damn problem. Our economy is based on zero. It is based on nothing….credit..is just giving you money that you don’t have based on a made up value, and then someone else makes money off of it by charging interest on the invented value…but there is never a bottomline of value. This is so screwed up.
Give America more “blue sky”….Perhaps it is the only way to keep the scam going, but for Goddess’s sake…there is nothing backing the so called credit. It is good money after bad…what a friggin’ mess.
I’ll gladly pay you on Tuesday for a hamburger today.
Unf’ingbelievable.
It seems to me that this is one more instance of Bush and his handlers looking for a way to “tie the hands” of the next president: leave the US Govt so strapped that no meaningful social planning is possible, medicare is doomed, and social security further undermined.
Will the Dems have enough backbone to fend it off?
Do modern congressional Democrats even have backbones?
So the part of government that works for the people gets drowned in the bathtub. But the part that works for the aristocracy, not so much.
Got that right. I think this is all a big scheme. I mean where is the PROOF that we need 700 BILLION? Just because Hanky Panky Mr. Goldman Sachs Wall Street asshole says so???
They figure Obama will win (in a landslide) so they figured they’d clean out the Treasury so he’d have nothing to work with, thereby getting nothing accomplished and getting voted out in 4 years rather than 8.
Health care is easy. It already has a cash flow, so it should be no financial burden on the Government. A single payer system should save money by:
1. Eliminating Marketing & Sales costs in Medical Insurance
2. Eliminating Marketing & Sales expense in drugs
3. Eliminating Marketing & expense costs for hospitals
and it will show the lie, once and for all, that the private sector can deliver utility services are lower costs than the public sector.
One other point this disclosure brings out. Just a few minutes ago, Paulson lied through his teeth and said that the plan was put forward expecting input to follow from Congress on how to set up oversight.
Yeah, right. That would explain why they included the language specifically outlawing oversight. He’s welcoming discussion of oversight now because he knows it’s the only way his grubby paws will ever get close to the money. He can count on Bush to do a signing statement stripping out the oversight.
@11
Which is the whole problem with the bailout–it is, by design, intended to continue to prop up this failed system.
Late to the show today, but are we not remedying the burst bubble by building another bubble around it?
That is the most concise explanation I’ve heard.
It’s a get past the election and hope that the voting machines do their magic bubble.
Paulson’s former firm to be among largest beneficiaries of bailout: bank
rest at Raw Story
And the Raw Story piece is based on this Bloomberg piece.
ooo thanks
“…the $700,000,000,000 surprise on us on a Friday and demand results by Monday?”
These motherfuckers remind me of that old National Lampoon ad except it’s Cheney pointing a shotgun at the dog saying, “Approve my bailout or I’ll shoot this dog.”
you know, the shock doctrine works for both sides, fdr used it (knowingly or not) to get the new deal
this time the catastrophy will help save our country, expose the despots, the robber barons and the crimminals and possibly innoculate us from their future escapades
we can only hope…we do live in ineresting times, that is for sure
The question for me is just where in the hell has the 700 $bill gone? It had to be around at some point so who the hell has it? Is it in Dubai, Hong Kong, Paraquay, The Caymans?
We know that the buggers have been ripping us off but where have they hidden it?
I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
The mother of all Friday news dumps, followed on Saturday, when they hoped no one was paying attention, by the admission that — oh yeah — foreign assets are included too. They wanted permission to bail out the entire world and keep the good stuff for themselves.
Guess what. We’re paying attention.
There seems to be some “I’m not buying your argument Paulson and Bernanke” going on…because they have no idea what the values of anything actually is…
This is a Hail Mary pass by the Administration…
If you knew the values, it would make sense…this is absolutely the Emperor’s new clothes that will be offered in “reverse auctions”…
Why don’t they know the values??? How can they come up with a figure of 700 billion, if they have no idea what anything is worth?
A, because they wanted to wanted to do C before they get wiped out in the November elections.
OT but check this out:
Right now, five military veterans — from Veterans for Peace — are occupying a 35-foot high ledge at the National Archive Building and have raised a 22×8-foot banner reading, ”DEFEND OUR CONSTITUTION. ARREST BUSH AND CHENEY: WAR CRIMINALS!” The veterans currently risking arrest have declared their intention to stay on the ledge, fasting for 24 hours ”in remembrance of those who have perished and those still suffering from the crimes of the Bush administration,” according to a written statement.
On the ledge, the veterans have brought with them a portable PA system, and they are broadcasting recorded statements from prominent Americans for the impeachment and/or arrest of George W. Bush and Richard Cheney. Other impeachment activists are at the entrance of the National Archives distributing ”Citizens Arrest Warrants” to those waiting in line.
This is the type of boldness that activists have displayed across the country to bring much-needed attention to this movement.
From VoteToImpeach.com
cool cool cool cool cool!!!!
REMINDS me of my college days!
COOL!
This isn’t going to cost the american taxpayer anything because we are going to recover the money from Iraq oil revenue
I was watching Bernanke on the hearings this morning. It is great to see him in person because his voice quivers when he lies.
The sad news is, this administration has no credibility, and they feel the need to push a one-sided bill and lie about it, even in the face of a crisis.
Unlike WMD, the markets tell us this is a real crisis, so we do not have to take the administration’s word on that.
Everything else, you cannot count on their honesty.
Why does everybody need loans?
That is the bottom line. The economy is based on BS.
Stop the gambling.
you can’t start a business without a loan ls, for instance, how could I buy product to supply a store if I couldn’t get a loan, however the loaner needs to take the chance, not the public
if the loaner thinks it’s a safe bet and they will earn dividends, they can take the bet and lose or win the vigorish
True. But, the assets that they are talking about buying and selling..have no designated value. They have no idea what the instruments they will buy and sell are. They keep saying that they want to free up money to led to people who need it…
Part of the problem, is that most of the people who need it are already in the sh*thole for “credit”, because they are defaulting…they won’t even “qualify” for a loan…that includes businessowners all over the country. They are not addressing that.
New business loans are built on lending against something of a defined value. That is different.
Because these banks got themselves into deep doo – debt – so they need to borrow or sell their “junk” assets” so they can stay afloat.
LET THE BANKS FAIL
LET THE government take over all the mortgages and set them at a reasonable rate. All mortgages shall be a the SAME nominal rate END OF STORY
Outlaw derivaitives and credit swaps
Close the BS stick market.
Invest in US gov bonds for retirement. GET OUT of the gambling casino BS market
Bernake and Paulson are criminals and need to go to jail along with the heads of wall street firms and banks including ALL top management. STOP THE FRAUD.
This would wipe out the retirement funds for who. We are talking school teachers, municipal workers, state workers, private citizens from all walks. Not sure that this is a viable strategy.
Anyone who invested their retirement funds in the market was GAMBLING with the future. They lose. You should be buying US government, State or City Savings bonds.
ANYONE WHO INVESTS in the market ENABLED this fraud and participated in it.
GET you money out of the market and buy US gov bonds.
That is the biggest bunch of shit I have seen all day; and I watched a few minutes of the hearing, so that is saying something. That is simply a ridiculous and reactionary statement completely untethered from reality.
Not really.
Time to re evaluate the capitalist “wealth creation” model and the myth of the “american dream” which is another scheme to get enormous interest from people for decades because they feel they must own a piece of land, some bricks and mortar.
The “market” is a rip off scheme gamed by the insiders.
We’re gonna have to go back to bartering to straighten this crappola out.
A good reason for their having known it and hidden it, is that they know they’ve literally broken the Fed and have been trying to hide that from th world. This post (from one of the most reputable post-ers over there) pretty well explains it, so I won’t try.
Even though I said to anyone who’d listen, beginning at the beginning of the Cheney junta, that the only way out of these tax cuts would, at the end of the day, be to inflate the currency. Which, FWIW, was the same reason I told anyone with a steady job (not in the financial sector) that even at the peak of the real estate market, they would be able to make out by buying. Not because the market would keep going up, but because there would have to be inflation to get us out of this mess and the best place to be during an inflationary episode is owing money. The dollars you borrowed in 1999 will only be worth 50 cents in 2009 and, if your pay barely keeps pace with inflation, you’ll still be able to pay that loan off with those half-price dollars.
funny scribe, I said the same thing but there is something I had not considered;
much of the money was never produced, never distributed, never made it to market and never will, it just evaporated
this will make up for the dollars that have been printed and will be printed to add to the eocnomy
money can indeed just evaporate
This would be good if wages kept up w/ inflation. But if Energy, food, med, etc take an ever increasing % of income things can go to shit.
It’s quite simple. They know that Congress needs to get out of town and go campaign, particularly the House. By waiting until the last week of the session, they think they can steamroll this turkey through.
Fratto insisted that the plan was not slapped together and had been drawn up as a contingency over previous months and weeks by administration officials. He acknowledged lawmakers were getting only days to peruse it, but he said this should be enough.
heh. kinda brings to mind how ‘quickly’ the patriot act was bound and offered up….
The first Bushville should be on the Bush Brush Ranch.
Here’s an approach to reigning-in CEO compensation that seems to have some merit in these troubled times:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/t…..810644.ece
Don’t think for a minute that the banksters aren’t getting nervous about the inevitable blow-back from we the people.
I have the fix. In general terms (the details can be worked out by those in government), corporate taxes are directly tied to the differential between CEO pay (and compensation) vs that corporation’s average worker pay. The larger the disparity between CEO pay and average worker pay, the higher the corporate tax. When CEO pay is down between 6 to 10x average worker pay, the tax is at its minimum. As the size of the disparity goes up, the tax increases.
Thus, CEOs can STILL pay themselves obscenely, they just have to pay bigger corporate taxes.
Also, there would be heavy tax penalties for off-shoring jobs or off-shoring the company to try to avoid taxes.
Perfect!
no because that would facilitate the failure of that corporation which might be publicly owned’
I say ceo’s cannot be paid more then some derivitive based on the average salary of their workforce
Did I see someplace yesterday that the average pay on WS is $279,000?
that’s hard for me to believe if you consider their staff but I guess it might be true
Well, maybe that is true.
$521,000 is the average pay of Goldman Sachs employees and that includes secretaries
Ta, ta ta,
Ma, ma, ma,
The, the, the,
Buh, buh, buh…
Hank Paulson
Paulson keeps saying “the taxpayers are on the hook anyway!”
Isn’t this false? If the money is necessary so that poor schmucks with their McDonalds franchises need money for new paint, then why not let these aristocrats fail and then put the 700 billion into community banks and public works projects all over the country?
He means that the taxpayers are on the hook for the massive Bush deficit.
So we increase the deficit even more? By another $700 billion+?
The only bad thing that ultimate can happen if the SEVEN SISTERS are left with the bad loans is that THEY will fail to be able to collect on them. That would affect the markets, of course, and our pensions (401K’s, etc.). But Congress could devise ways of locking in the payment rates for home-owners and small business properties and assisting them in repayment at pennies on the Paulson dollar. I’m personally in favor of a modern day version of the “homesteading Acts”…using the new Supreme Courts interpretation of Eminent Domain.
In addition, laws could be created to protect retirement assets and investments up to say $300,000 while allowing the “Super Rich” strong incentives not to speculate or gouge further.
And the corporate executives should walk away with ONLY the amount that is insured for the rest of us. No “golden parachutes” when they have trickled down golden fluidity on the rest of us.
And certainly NO retroactive or prospective immunity for corrupt acts by Paulson, Bernanke or any other of the Bush cronies…and their friends in the Financial community.
And Fratto is telling a “little” lie. This “plan” is merely stage two of the strategy they’ve had for near-on a decade. It’s their “exit strategy” to squeeze the last drops out of the public and create a perpetual deficit crisis so that NO public services (education, health care, infrastructure, Social Security, unemployment) can EVER be supported via taxes. It’ll all go to bailing out the rich.
Paulson also said “it’s all about the taxpayers” and I say you bet it is and you can’t have my money. I am e-mailing as fast as I can and my major point is that these greedy criminals can go to jail or go live under a bridge.
O.M.G. I made a comment on Kos the other day saying this very thing, but I thought I was a conspiracy theorist!!!! Wish I were.
When Paulson says that the regulations were outdated and not up to the complexities of today’s market dynamics and financial exotica, he’s simply lying.
The regulations that had been in place up until Gramm had them removed served to prevent precisely what has transpired. Only in their absence were these exotic debt instruments able to exist.
View the Enron example – where too much complexity blurred the reality of the balance sheet – as the template they followed to pull this ponzi scheme off.
This was ALL intentional. All of it.
well, actually he was right, but not in the sense he was indicating
more trade needs more regulation not less, so as we globalized our economy it was indeed outdated but the answer was to reinforce and strengthen regulation not relax it
SO
bush has been able to live with himself because he’s had his puppeteers telling him history will judge him a great president
I kind of think he doesn’t believe that anymore
if we can get him to realize his legacy is going to remain as the worst president in history, I bet he will start throwing his handlers under the bus
let’s see if that happens, it would be fun
I don’t believe that Bush is capable of acting independently from his handlers.
this depends on what you mean by “capable”
no, he cannot act reasonably without direction, however he is a vindictive man and that vindictiveness is not a derivative of his handlers, he might well throw them under the bus, not in a “capable” fasion that might save his legacy but in a vicous example of his nature
Those are not handlers – they are mommies. Mommies take care of you and don’t make you think and have everything all nice an comfy.
Does Wall Street owe the country an apology? Well, you know Wall Street is an abstraction. Obfuscate, obfuscate, obfuscate.
Naomi Wolf: A must read…chilling as usual
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..28393.html
scribe @ 33.
You’re right. If you are paying off debt with inflated dollars you come out ahead ….. IF your pay goes up too.
The trick here? Our pay won’t go up, in fact, they will CUT pay using the massively over supplied labor pool. Who are the chumps? Its us.
Heh, I guess the White House is losing its touch-it shoulda’ been called a “rescue” not a bailout!
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/…..ut-rescue/
Barnes=asshat
i wonder if Nancy is rethinking her table ware YET???!!!
Dems CAN and need to stand up to this. Talking at the gas station in Smalltown, IN this morning before work — folks in this overwhelmingly conservative town seemed unanimous in their distrust of this bailout.
I’m sure Dems will feel like they have to pass Bush’s legislation or they will be smeared as doing nothing in the middle of a crisis. But I think they can play this to their advantage if they just grow a hint of a spine.
NPR even mentioned this morning that the Paulson plan grants unprecedented power to the executive branch that makes the Patriot Act seem like nothing.
When Republicans are telling you to hurry up and pass legislation, you should reflexively put on the breaks.
Oy. Dow down 102 plus.
Must be time for St McCain to mumble about fundamentals again.
Just the thing I need to see before going to get my blood pressure checked.
Fortunately, the implications of this have already been fully reflected in my prescription bill …
Blue Texan is at the Mothership with:
McCain To Put Palin On Chopper, “Raise Hell” In Washington
me staying here, this seems far more interesting and educational
They should have determined what the actual value of the instruments they want to peddle are…prior to trying to put this plan into action.
Makes you wonder if a 250,000 property is actually worth about 40,000…the whole scam is coming home to roost.
Congress needs to stop and find out what the bottom line is before jumping into this fire.
We were sort of liveblogging this over at McCain’s Cronies but that has gotten to be a long thread.
I can not stress enough that Paulson is talking about assets classes or shit paper. He is not talking about equity (stock) in the financial companies or the mortgages which are at the base of all this. He also talks about “market mechanisms” forgetting or more likely ignoring that it was a reliance on such mechanisms that got us into this mess. I would say again that reverse auctions are bogus. It will be the government which can and should establish the price on mortgages. This would be the case as well in a reverse auction so why do one if it is superfluous?
If anything this hearing shows that Paulson and Bernanke are not capable of dealing with this crisis either honestly or intellectually. With Paulson especially he wants the money to shore up a laissez-fire system that produced this meltdown and will produce others.
absolutely
Question: Is Bunning cluelessness inadvertently exposing these guys for the robber barons they are?
The facts that the WH has known about and been working on it is infuriating
Congressional investigators could have been looking into this and been given the opportunity to come up w/ safeguards. There used to be laws on the books prohibiting frauds and scoundrels from involvement w’ grants etc. With a hurry up scheme there is no telling what crap the people who will be handling our money have been up to.
Since this whole ill-advised bailout means that the Paulson is to buy shitty assets/securities from his best buddies at Gold-Sachs, etc, rather than pay some bullshit above-value arbitrary amount so taxpayers take the main hit, I say the government offers to buy the securities for however many pennies on the dollar a hedge fund would be willing to pay for them. THAT is the fair market price.
The banks then have to sign down on their hit and keep the losses privatized.
And, of course, limit CEO pay and kill all golden parachutes.
Since the sky is going to fall and the sun not come up Saturday unless Congress signs Paulson’s total package, I keep asking myself, “Why is Bush Inc. going to Congress now, why not just issue another Executive Order?”
Then I remember Addington’s facial expression at the House Judicial Hearing on torture when Rep. Davis of Alabama ripped into him about not consulting Congress on multiple issues, reminding Addington that “now it’s all on you, ya got it all” (paraphrased), meaning all the responsibility for the misdeeds rests on the executive branch. It appeared to me that Addington had an AHA moment. Now I think Addington saw that he must devise ways to hang the demo Congress with blame on future bad decisions. In my opinion this bailout is as colossal a mistake as the unjustified attack on Iraq, and the consequences may be worse.
Fratto said Paulson’s plan had been in the works for 6 to 8 weeks. Now they demand that Congress understand the complexities of the situation over a weekend and sign onto the plan on Monday!
Congress should just say NO as EW’s earlier article states. Then Congress should postpone adjournment (they were out all of August – – what are we paying them for??). Then Congress should take their good time to properly study this whole mess and draw up their own plan or just let Wall Street pay the consequences for their own deeds!
What will schrub do with all the info these companies have on their customers? I can see where our/other countries privacy may be invaded. With the gov owning all those assets they will also own all our financial info? That is all that the tax man doesn’t already own. Now they will know what we have bought, charged, financed and where we did it at? They can collect this info and put it into the GOP campaign voter datebase “Voter Vault”? And then have controll over who it is auctioned/sold off to? Will US companies have prescendant over foreign companies? Will they sell/auction them off to foreign customers?
How the hell can this be completed in 1 week. I just don’t see it happening.
Yes, this is the Oct surprise a little earlier though.
Bunning is kicking Paulson’s butt IMO
Oh boy, now Paulson is being asked by Kentucky Senator…how long were you CEO of Goldman?…he almost choked…(’99-06)
You made the statement that you didn’t know what was going on..
P: You’ve got to see it up close to have it make sense.
You didn’t know that people were doing things while head of your firm..
Do you know if foreign investors are going to go along with a massive debt issue? Have you spoken with any of them?
P: When I’ve had a discussion with Central Banks and foreign ministers around the world, they are complimentary of our plan.
You won’t be here after 1/20/09, I’m gonna have to answer to my constituents…if this plan does not work, and I am frightful almost to the point of panic, because I don’t see a solution in your plan.
P: I got here 2 years ago, I run toward problems, and I’ve worked with the Fed and the FCC, Congress, etc., to address these issues…this is my plan to deal with this situation, which is unprecedented…
How much money was lost to the treasury by the BushCo. tax cuts, does anyone know the figure?
Paulson says the Treasury has to buy paper because a systematic approach is needed but earlier he was saying there couldn’t be a systematic approach because all the assets classes he keeps talking about have to be treated differently. And his most powerful argument? He just believes very strongly that . . .
Re Bunning he’s Alzheimers so he forgets the questions he’s not supposed to ask and asks them anyway.
http://www.brookings.edu/artic….._gale.aspx
Excellent article on how much the tax cuts have/could cost
Oh thank you!
Personally, I think this is an early “October Surprise.” I think they were trying to time this out for October, but the week before the debates seemed good enough, and the shit was hitting the fan a little earlier than they had planned. Although, this time I think they’ve overplayed their hands by having the same people responsible for allowing this to happen ask for huge amounts of money to fix it and insisting that it must be done with the speed of light, making them look like they had neither foresight nor any particular competence. If they were competent, they would have seen this coming sooner and not informed Congress as late as this summer that our financial markets were still fundamentally strong.
that doesn’t make sense, as an october surprise they would be guaranteed a loss in the election
comming now they have some time to mount a defensive and offensive, they have more time to recover
I think rather than an October Surprise, they were really REALLY hoping to keep a lid on things until after January so that the whole mess could be dumped on Obama’s lap, or, failing that, hold out until after the election for the same thing.
Hold off first, in hopes of blaming the new guy for the problem, or, failing that, drop it in his lap after the election so as to tie his hands. For the GOP, on some level or not, this is win-win: they pass the bailout and create HUGE bathtub for the Federal Government to be drowned in. They fail and they blame any ensuing economic mayhem on the new guy.
http://www.brookings.edu/opini…..ogoff.aspx
Good article writeen 9/17 regarding the need for a bailout and the probable prices needed to fix the system – much less than Bush wants.
As I wrote in the McCain thread, it is important to realize that Paulson is a Christian Scientist. I think this is the reason that he has such boundless confidence that if he just wills it hard enough (and with our $700 billion) he can shape the markets the way he wants them to be regardless of the unsoundness of his ideas.
I wish I knew how many times today Paulson has mentioned “stabilization of the markets”, “protecting the taxpayers”, and “transparency”. The first one does not mean what he thinks it does and in practical terms he means the opposite of the other two.
They’ve known all of this was coming since before 9/11. It’s all part of the same conspiracy. Paulson knew he would be installed as Treasury secretary in 2006 before 9/11. These thieves are the masters of the universe. They plan impeccably, decades in advance.
If Paulson’s lips are moving, he’s lying.
It’s time for Americans to grow up.
SCREW credit ratings. What do you need credit ratings for except to own debt and be a slave to a bank.
If the government provided all mortgages at a standard rate, if you have a job they look at you income and see if you can swing it… end of story. Same with a car. Automakers offer term contracts to customers if they want them and their business.
Banks have been screwing us with the schemes for decades. Time to end their party.
Who care about the “markets”?
These are casinos. We need to close them down. All the brokers and players are their to suck your EARNED income in fees. Then they made up “financial instruments” so they could play with each other… so this is was you get.
They’ve been working on this for months, and that 3 page piece of bullpucky that Paulson initially trotted out was the ultimate result?
This administration is obviously filled with traitors and/or morons. There is no other possible explanation.
This could also be (D) a corollary of (B): with the firestorm they are realizing they have to sound more sane and on top of it, so suggesting that they have been looking at this for weeks and months makes it superficially sound better, until you consider that options (A-C) immediately pop into thinking people’s minds.
If their lips move – they are lying.
This is nothing short of a scheme to move trillions of taxpayers EARNED income to the slackers of wall street.
Paulson just in a weasely way said that his bailout plan will be privately managed and that contracts will be awarded non-competitively. He could also have said that he would be hiring the very people who created this mess for the clean up.
he did say it, the plan says he can do whatever he wants with no criminal repercussions, he could hire Attila the Hun even though the man is dead and we couldn’t arrest him for fraud
The Dems should get united and come out with a plan for the next quarter only and let the next congress deal with this. This problem cannot be solved in 1 week.
What sane person would give unfettered authority to Bush & cronies to solve a problem they caused? That’s like giving the criminal the authority to pronounce his own jail sentence.
only the insane, and those who think they might lose their seat in power if they refuse
we have to let each and everyone of them know, including republicans but certainly democrats, they will LOSE their seat in power if they allow this take place
Sitting on this plan for weeks? Why? My guess is the “why” would lead us to the potential for the charge of a crime of disloyalty to our sovereign nation. Who was involved specifically?
And still no mention of the OCC
the OCC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O…..e_Currency
An insider’s answer to your main question.
http://billmon.dailykos.com/
Good article he has there. To reprise something i said a while back as this situation was in kneepants, it’s as if George Bailey (James Stewart) reached into his pocket for the reassurance of Zuzu’s petals, and came out with Carlota Valdes’ broken necklace instead.
Pre-planned destruction of our economy. They have no comprehensive plans. Watching this hearing, what I am not getting is any answers…
Since I’ve only been able to list on and off today, has anyone heard a question asking how they came up with this figure?
that would be “listen”, although I’m not listing too badly today actually….
All I have heard asked was could they get by with less or dole it out over time. The reply basically was that the markets would not have full confidence – only it took a blizzard of words
Paulson didn’t answer the why it’s so urgent question very well. Here’s some info on him.
Thank you for the link at 117 to the RawStory article and its 59 comments. It surely is all I ever wanted to know about Paulson, and then some!
The Senate should have handcuffed him as he came in their chamber door.
Paulson now saying how he didn’t want to be made dictator but that the circumstances call for it so none of his decisions should be reviewable or contested.
Sure has that appearance.
And who is Herr Cheney looking out for, actually? Which Saudi’s, Israelis, Chinese, Indian, and Wall Streeters is BushCheney really bailing out?
This is a Neofeudalist Coup that fundamentally mocks, sabotages, and destroys the US, its Constitution, and democratic principles. Checkmate.
The hearing is adjourned. The lying and half truths have paused for now.
OK, will probably be on C-SPAN later. I read the opening statements.
I would actually believe that once Bear Stearns went, buying up all the debt, especially with the recent example of the RTC, would be a vivid possibility at the Treasury Dept. Keeping it secret from the public would be simply avoiding the moral hazard of the markets working it out on their own. If they have actually been working on it for months, there is more reason for us to want to know more details about it.
Where’s my bailout, Hank?
http://www.buymyshitpile.com/
Admittedly Paulson asked for the rescue package for Fannie and Freddie before he had to use it, but those have an explicit government guarantee.
Good gracious, 126 is incoherent.
If you do not let the private players know that you have a bailout plan, they have the incentive to work things out for themselves and you have less probability of using said bailout plan. If the private players know you will come to the rescue, there is a moral hazard issue. There may have been moral hazard to start out with because every one of these companies may have thought they were too big to let go. Once Lehman was not too big to let go, the paralysis of fear began.
William Timmons Sr. represents the nexus between Johnny Mac and Freddie Mac.
Johnnie Mac’s transition team leader is in the pocket of Freddie Mac.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/….._0923.html
Its Bush’s last hurrah, the “Shock Doctrine” on steroids, the final assault against the middle class, national socialism, a final “fuck the people” and lets get on with our mind boggling program of corporate welfare and sewing up all surplus value in a tiny cadre of elites. The Goldman Sachs boys were ahead of the curve on the secondary mortgage crisis eighteen months ago.
Right! Debate later, out the door with rational behavior and deliberation, no need to scare the people, Iraq showed that if K Street can keep Congress terrified the common media outlets are irrelevant. The terrorist blame game already tumbled the 4th Amendment, why not pauperize the citizenry once and for all before the jig is up. The Referees have become the players in a final assault against a government of rational principle in another stunning blow to due process.
Sorry if this is redundant. But the only position to take in any kind of realistic Congressional response to the Paulson plan: Impeach Bush! Blah, blah, blah…Paulson rides herd on the Congress.
Someone should have been counting how may times we heard the wod “quickly” from Friday to today. I could not believe it when Paulson said that he welcomed “oversight” today during the hearing. That is hogwash pure hogwash Then he went onto say that if you place “punitive” measures on this legislation that it “makes their efforts ineffective”. You can’t have it both ways….you either are or are not looking out for the American tax payers.
———————————————————————
“Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
DOES NOT SOUND LIKE MUCH OVER SIGHT WAS WELCOME LAST FRIDAY OR OVER THE WEEKEND
Would it be possible for Congress to move the inauguration up one month, or is that unconstitutional?
Follow the money made during this administration, oil, defense, banking. Mission Accomplished
EW your question for the last thread was “who” told the people who were called to testify in the Troopergate to ignore subpoenas. Is the most likely suspect Edward O Callahan?
apologies to everyone up front if i’m repeating something already said, but i don’t have time today to read all of these scores of great comments….
but…
i was just thinking that $700,000,000,000 is a heckuva lotta money.
i was also curious about their ‘excuse’ to nab it in order to ’save’ the economy for us little folk.
but why should we assume we have to bail out wall street in order to ’save’ the little folk?
$700,000,000,000 is a LOT of money (and zeroes; pain to type, but it makes such an impact!).
IF we’re all so concerned about the little folk, why don’t we just take that money, prop up all those 401Ks and pensions and retirement funds that are at stake, and all those foreclosures, while we’re at it, and gosh, see if we have any left over?
so wall street dies, so what? i’ve always felt the stock market was an abomination, frankly, encouraging this kind of unbridled greed and the notion of getting something for nothing. those ‘values’ they trade are so abstracted from the real commodities and services they supposedly represent, not to mention the actual human lives the reflect, it just does not even resemble anything like reality anymore.
i’m certain i’m not alone in having NO pity for these bloodsuckers. they made their beds, let ‘em lie in it. better yet, let them die in it. it’s about as much grace as i can offer beyond the bathtub they’ve been dragging us to all these decades.
This is more and more looking like a new episode of Austin Powers playing DR. Evil. I want 700,000,000 billion dollars if you want to save your world. Did I (Paulson) say “billion” I meant “trillion”
Paulson wipes out his own credibility.
Krugman:
“I’m not playing gotcha here. This is telling: if Paulson can’t be honest about what he himself sent to Congress — if he not only made an incredible power grab, but is now engaged in black-is-white claims that he didn’t — there is no reason to trust him on anything related to his bailout plan.”
Those who got us into this mess should be kept far away from any bailout.
This barefaced lie exposes the bill as the bluff we all suspected it was.
precisely why i suggested what i did at 143. which, come to find out, is something similar to what nouriel roubini suggested just last night on cnbc:
use that $700,000,000,000 to shore up the endangered 401Ks and pensions and retirement funds and stabilize the foreclosure situation. THAT is where an injection is most needed for the economy.
then we can talk to wall street if there’s anything left over.
sheez; talk about entitlement!!
There’s no need to rush through any bill engineered by Goldman Sachs mandarins. It can wait till the first session of the 111th Congress is sworn in early next January. After all, Bush sat on the current bill for months.
What makes them excitable, is the failure of the linchpin in the putative quality of the junk bonds taking so much space in their portfolio, viz., AIG. Suddenly, Goldman Sachs is no longer credit-worthy. However, their people in Washington DC, led by Paulsen, already, by fiat, have gotten away with bailing out AIG, as well as Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. This precedent is what they’re banking on to pressure the current Congress to fold to their will seemingly well before the end of the current session. Well it shouldn’t be allowed to happen. Tell Goldman Sachs and the Saudis to deal with it!
The other demonstration that they are bluffing is the repetition of peculiar statements about banks not wanting to “participate” in being…saved. Every day we go without a bill makes the situation more precarious: for them.
Good Fresh Air interview on the financial mess…some of the lies, etc.
It’s been the plan all along, part of the “drown the government in the bathtub” idea. They are some of the most sociopathic people in our society.
Leave the Dems or any other party such a mess that it takes them their entire time in office to dig out, and no social programs can be implemented or continued because of lack of funds. Hurt and kill the poor and middle class people as much as possible by stealing as much as possible from them.
How are they going to feel like they are rich unless everyone else is in abject poverty and suffering on the streets? Sadistic.
Funny thing is, the reality is that as far as health care is concerned, it would actually SAVE money to make it universal, so this could really be used as an excuse to put it in. “We can’t afford the private insurance companies running health care any more, with their profit taking. We need to nationalize health insurance so it costs less and people don’t have to go to the ER for basic health care, which costs more.”
Sounds good to me!
Great points, EW– can’t take time to read all the comments first, because I’m at work, but have you considered that this crisis may have been designed to reduce Obama’s options and nail his feet to the floor?
I’ll bet that one could compile a pretty good file on things the Republicans have been doing for the past year or two to box in the next Democratic president so he can’t do the things they would otherwise want to do. Is it a flaw, or a design feature?
Bob in HI
There is poll on MSNBC > Politics asking Who’s to blame for the current economic crisis? If anyone gets bored, go answer the question and then notice the Top Answer By Location map. It reads like an election map. It’s sort of funny.
You cannot change what you don’t accept and in my humble opinion we STILL are not talking about the fact that one of the things these lenders did was tack on a bunch of illegal (and unregulated) fees. Then they “forced” people into foreclosure by not talking to them. I know people who’s pay off was 10k more than it was supposed to be. They had a house on the line and if they could afford it, they just paid it to avoid negative remarks on their credit. In other cases people paid fees until they finally when into foreclosure but the trick for these companies were these LONG foreclosures where they would not allow any communication or contact. This meant they they could tack on an extra 2-3 thousand a month until the foreclosure date. So that by foreclosure the pay off was 3 times the original amount. Then they would value the loan as far more than it was really worth, and far more than the buyer who was having trouble making the original payment and likely was not going to be able to make the “new” pay off. It was an easy way to make money as long as you kept selling these packages that made loans look like they were worth thousans more than the actual value.
I am sick of hearing every night about the “credit risk” and not about these illegal fees, and how they forced people into foreclosure by violating RESPA and TILA laws. They did this to thousands of people and the back log of cases made it so that most folks paid these outrageous fees or lost their houses. But these houses weren’t worth the pay offs. Eventually someone is left holding the bag.
WE aren’t having THIS discussion. Until we do, we have no accountability and the problem will not be fixed.
This gets right of the irony of this so-called Christian administration. Used to be Judeo-Christian ethics were reflected in legislation in this country against usury and in favor of debt forgiveness every 7 years via traditional bankruptcy. How ironic that this ethical and legislative tradition has been dismantled under Bush who had depended so on a fundamentalist Christian constituency to mask his fundamental totalitarianism.
Its a special kind of hypocrisy that Bush enjoys. I am sure Dante had it charted.
Buffett buys $5bil worth of Goldman
What does he know that we don’t?
a diarist over at daily kos who’s taking a class from john yoo says their monday class was canceled because yoo “was called to DC to look at the Mortgage bailout bill.”
rest easy, america. yoo is on the case…
Why doesn’t Paulson have a wedding ring?
He also has a Palin habit of sticking out his tongue (when he is lying)
File under tired scorched earth threats: “Write us a check for 700 Billion or we will all go down together.” How many Wall Street deals have been closed over such threats in the hey day of this credit bubble. I am just thinking that Wall Street deal closers really don’t have such power over my life. Yeah, what a spending plan they promote. First they rob equity with deregulation, now they want to rob customers by using tax revenues for a bail out. Wooooeeeeeee!!!!
I first heard the term arbitrage capitalism in the comments of one of emptywheel’s posts. Now I am really getting an idea of how this works. Ya, it was Nixon who slaughtered the gold standard.
Barney Frank just said (interviewed by David Shuster on Countdown) “I can guarantee you we will be passing regulation legislation that will prevent this from happening again”. It took him a bit to get there, but his sound bites were pitch-perfect. “This has been caused by the lack of sensible regulation that has been a centerpiece of the Republican philosophy since Reagan.” He went on to give concrete examples of deregulation.
Shuster’s interview wasn’t exactly friendly, either.
And we are not even into “October Surprise” territory yet.
I believe this surprise might innocultate us from the october surprise the administration might have had planned
I think any “surprise” they come up with now will have americans yelling at the top of their lungsl
“do NOT let THIS administration be in charge of THIS event!”
Hurry, hurry, hurry — pass this plan right away, the plan I’ve had in my desk drawer for months.
More and more like the AUMF every day.
all of the above.
I think it was probably more like two to three years…”, I’m not an economist, but even I knew this was a distinct posibility since 2005…
Anyone that tells you that you have to do something immediately is a used-car salesman…buyer beware!
New Post Alert
Conyers Cranky Over Oil Fraud; Drills DOJ With Letter
Totally OT but a mxsquirrel at thinkprogress wrote some woids I edited for meter – if anyone will contribute a classic Chuck Berry guitar part I’ll return w/ this song. Read on…
Deep down in Arizona close to Mexico
Way back up in the cactus where it never ever snows,
There stood an ancient mansion made of gold and wood
Wherein lived a corrupt bastard named Johnny McCain,
Who never learned ’bout Sunni or Shia so well,
But he’ll pretend to chase Osama to the gates of Hell.
Go! Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Johnny McCain!
He would carry his bribe money in a gunnysack
Go sit ‘neath a tree and count his Keating kickbacks,
Old K street lobbyist’d see him sittin’ in the shade,
Laughing at the bullshit and the flip flops he’d made,
The people passing by, they would stop and say,
Oh my but that old mummy really hates him the gays.
Go! Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Johnny McCain!
Once, Arizona couldn’t host a superbowl,
‘Cause the leaders there were all a group of white supremacist trolls.
Ev Meacham, angry fascist, was a goose-stepping man,
A millionaire, a senator, straight from the Ku Klux Klan.
McCain was a maverick when it came to MLK,
Then Ev the cracker donned his robes against the holiday.
Go! Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Johnny McCain!
His momma told him someday you will be an old man
And you will be the leader of a murderous clan
Many people blown to bits from miles around,
To see you launch the nukes and take all of the rest of us down,
Maybe someday, you’ll see the mushroom clouds bright,
Sayin’ “Johnny McCain, he pushed the button tonight”!
Go! Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Go! Johnny! Go!
Go!, Johnny McCain!
aquarius 74 @152
Ok, I was talking with a “reasonable” woman at work today, and I nearly fell over when she opined that the Repugs actually WANT McC to bite the dust in office so that the automaton can be puppeted by Darth again!!
I have to admit, I thought about this more than once throughout the afternoon! Whad’ya think, folks?
Gee your really think so?
McCain won’t make a year if elected. I give him 3-7 if not.
Poor, John “the wicker man” McCain. I feel for the poor old fool.
Much to think about in your comment.
Consider: McCain gets elected, dies, Palin becomes pres., Who does her handlers pick as VP who will be Cheney II…? (Addington as Atty Gen’l??)
A blogger wrote that a student of John Yoo’s at Berkeley says his Monday class was cancelled because Yoo had been called to DC about the Meltdown Mess. Is this warning that Bush/Cheney are going to utilize Exec Privilege again and skip congressional action to get the $700 billion AND guarantee of no oversight or court action?
…..maybe that is the reason for putting the 3rd Army unit on US soil in preparation for crowd control…..
Thanks to all posters here, all your views help to sort out what is most probably really going on in our country. Keep up the good work!
Boys, look me in the eyes.
The answer is still no.
No.
This economic crisis has deep roots in the system itself, I discovered this article on the net which helps to underestand the root cause:
http://democracyandsocialism.c…..ssion.html