The Boogeyman versus the New Bretton Woods
Lots of people are posting this YouTube, but no one, as far as I’ve seen, has contextualized it.
This seemingly organized snub took place, after all, at the end of the attempt on the part of the G20 to find some global solutions to our present economic crisis. The snub occurred after Bush welcomed his guests with a radio address pre-empting some of the demands those guests were making.
This is a decisive moment for the global economy. In the wake of the financial crisis voices from the left and right are equating the free enterprise system with greed, exploitation, and failure. It is true that this crisis included failures by lenders and borrowers, by financial firms, by governments and independent regulators. But the crisis was not a failure of the free market system. And the answer is not to try to reinvent that system. It is to fix the problems we face, make the reforms we need, and move forward with the free market principles that have delivered prosperity and hope to people around the world. [my emphasis]
And the snub came during a summit in which Bush championed the adoption of a passage in the Declaration that came out of the summit that, once again, insisted the free market was working fine (this could have–and probably did–come straight out of Administration statements leading up to the summit).
12. We recognize that these reforms will only be successful if grounded in a commitment to free market principles, including the rule of law, respect for private property, open trade and investment, competitive markets, and efficient, effectively regulated financial systems. These principles are essential to economic growth and prosperity and have lifted millions out of poverty, and have significantly raised the global standard of living. Recognizing the necessity to improve financial sector regulation, we must avoid over-regulation that would hamper economic growth and exacerbate the contraction of capital flows, including to developing countries.
And the snub came after the rejection of international regulation to control those purportedly functional free markets.
8. In addition to the actions taken above, we will implement reforms that will strengthen financial markets and regulatory regimes so as to avoid future crises. Regulation is first and foremost the responsibility of national regulators who constitute the first line of defense against market instability.
This meeting should have been the foundation of a new Bretton Woods–the start of new cooperation to prevent the kind of meltdown we’re seeing. But Bush–a dead-ender to the last–refuses to see the catastrophe in front of him, and certainly refuses to work with others to solve the world’s economic crisis.
No wonder they wouldn’t shake his hand.
There. Fixed it!
Wonderful analysis as ever, EW. (what else is there to say?)
Barbara must be so proud.
They’ve been reading Obama’s books. They didn’t want to do the antiseptic squirt thing from the assistant.
So that’s why German radio’s commentators were talking about Bretton Woods recently. I just kind of caught the mention and, being preoccupied with something else, didn’t really pay all that much attention to the commentary. That, and the language was pretty arcane anyway, such that I couldn’t really get it that well.
They all knew what this G-20 conference was about. Our TradMed did its usual job of throwing sand in everyone’s face.
Let’s also get one thing straight here – none of this catastrophe was accidental, unanticipated, or surprising. If simple bloggers can figure out years in advance that this disaster was coming, you can be sure that people in the Repug/Street think-tank world (who actually get paid a lot of money to be right, y’know) knew long in advance exactly what their policies would result in.
This was all done in furtherance of their ideology and in furtherance of their politics.
They knew damned well years ago they had no chance of winning this fall. (Which is why the Bushes decided to punk McCain by letting him be the first major party presidential candidate to lose to a black man. Punking him has been so much fun over the years, they couldn’t resist another opportunity.)
Watch for the meme coming out of the right, once things get really tight after the new year and inauguration: “give it to the n*ggers and everything goes to hell instantly”.
Frankly, given the So-called PATRIOT Act and its providing for enhancing any criminal charge by adding a terrism charge, you can be sure that the Repugs in charge of this mess will be saying thankyous with their bedtime prayers for the fact that I and guys like me are not in DoJ.
I’m confused – not to be a jackass or anything
To what end? To corkscrew them into the ground? i think there’s an easier explanation: incompetence and greed.
wasn’t there a whole primary season that decided this? The R’s have a pretty shallow bench – who else would have run?
The core of the Republican ideology is that a very few people – their friends – are the only ones who deserve to prosper. As to the rest of us, it’s not just a big F-U, but also a big “and we’ll make things work to keep you being the ones being f’d.”
As it is, setting things up to prosper in that narrow distribution (a very few very rich and everyone else screwed) takes not only gathering a lot of money unto them, but also destroying the wealth of others.
That destruction also can be used (particularly when your friends run the media) to place the blame on the Dems. The Repugs knew there would come a time when things would go to crap – their policy and practice was to make sure it happened about now.
As to knowing the election would go Dem – they know their policies are unpopular in the extreme. They knew someone preaching change would do well. They knew a Repug could not reasonably preach change and still keep the base.
As to McCain – have you already forgotten how he had to fly commercial, have staffers take a month off without pay, and had no money in the till? And that was about a year ago. He went from there to defeat, among others, Mittens (who has more money than he knows what to do with), Rudy the Thug (a certifiable hero), and Huckster the Fundie. How did that happen?
Maybe a bunch of guys sat down in a nice room, all leather chairs, dark wood, and such and decided “if someone’s got to take a fall, let it be the old guy who won’t be around next time.”
Oh, I agree with you that those who will never, ever be known publicly decided to let McCain take the fall — while figuring out how to get in the good graces of whatever Dem was likely to win.
It’s hard to know whether the looting is accelerating as Jan 20th arrives, or whether the incompetence really is this pervasive.
But I do have a question about Mittens, if anyone can explain:
Didn’t he make his millions buying up companies to grab the parts of the carcasses that he wanted, and then leave the devalued remains to whatever economic parasites were willing to take them off his hands with as little trouble as possible to him/Bain?
Assuming that I’m correct, isn’t Romney one of the jackasses arguing that the auto industry should go down – while also having plenty of incentive to hope they do so that he can come in for ‘assets’ at fire sale prices?
I mean… am I correct to see Romney’s views as a classic ‘financier’ view: “I make money from money, and for someone like me, crippled industries are like a source of easy revenue…” Or am I too harsh?
Yeah, lucky us seeing it ahead of time and having to watch the slow train wreck unfold 8-p
The thing that makes most sense to me is that some of those jackasses (and I mean Feith, Wolfowitz, Perle…) have more brains than judgment and couldn’t find their way out of an open paper bag. They may have ‘intellect’, and they can operate within fairly rigid institutions and social structures like Think Tanks and DoD — but they have very little fluid intelligence, and their thought processes are remarkably rigid. It would seem that PNAC and other ‘GroupThink’ social networks would be especially important to that kind of temperament.
As near as I’ve ever been able to reckon, not a single one of them ever served in the Peace Corps. None of them ever went off to India and hung out in an ashram. If they traveled, it was to either Israel or to familiar places where they didn’t have to be very clever or look out for themselves.
Which seems to have made them particularly vulnerable to spies in their midst; very vain and easily swayed by anyone who told them what they wanted to hear (i.e., Chalabi).
Contrast any of these clowns with Barak Obama’s mother — a woman who spent years working on microloans in Indonesia. Or contrast any of these idiots with Chris Dodd, who was in the Peace Corps. (Or even with Jim Webb, who was in the Marines and appears to have little patience with butt-kissing).
I’m not convinced that the neocons actually foresaw the disasters they’ve wrought — I think they’re so f*cking damn stupid that they were used by people who DID see the logic quite clearly, and very likely relished leading the neocons (and the rest of us) down the Primrose Path.
But yeah, the video clip is one little reminder that Karma is nothing to mess with.
Personally, I don’t think they cared about “disasters they’ve wrought. Everything I’ve seen further reinforces my view, as Wilkerson said, that they (from memory) “cared more about Israel than America.” They were likudniks. From their POV, using US as proxy to do their wetwork in ME, I’d bet they consider that an accomplishment.
Only time I ever saw Pearle smile was in meetings w/Likud people in Israel.
Excellent synopsis, with which I happen to agree.
Although it’s taken me years to connect all the dots.
And their intense beliefs have made them extremists, which means they’re not good at processing any information that contradicts their dearly held views. (Extremism, by my definition, hampers clear thinking; in this instance, the extremism stemmed from ardent Likudnik affiliations.)
Bush in the video on this post is a Cautionary Tale; here’s what extremism and bullying leads to — ostracism.
(May I be struck by lightning before I ever meet such a fate!)
I first saw that video on ThinkProgress, then Marcy’s expanding on it here. FWIW, it’s not clear to me at all that it’s not Bush doing the shunning. Perhaps, but I couldn’t tell by that thing. Bush didn’t look one of those folks in the eye.
Has he looked anyone in the eye since Putin?
Bob in HI
You mean maybe “This is what you get from governance by candyasses”?
;-))))
Well, I never managed to synthesize it as succinctly as you have.
Thanks!
That’s what I say, too. This is the first time I’ve seen it, and he’s the one brushing people off and not reaching out. He’s checking things off the “get’r’done” list.
But clearly everyone else on the stage could give a good GD. No one seems particularly miffed about it.
Bush wails a classic Republican profiteer in chief’s sham lament, as the reins handover to the other party, with a subtext of Republican poorly dissimilated concern about how far the Democratic party will explore oversight during a time when BO likely will improve international controls within existing trade agreement frameworks. But his human rights record and even the old europe disparagement, plus the swift cybercrime prong of homelandSec’s work, detract from his credibility.
Three words.
Twelve Step Program.
G-20 snub…
Intervention
Bush came in an asshole, he’s going out an Asshole.
OT, I don’t seem to be able to copy the DTCC chart I have referenced in a couple of diaries and I would really like to see it in a spreadsheet. The chart is here. If anyone can get it into a spreadsheet, could you send it to me: masaccio68 at gmail dot com.
Sorry, figured it out.
Prostratedragon, thanks for the link.
On a side note, CR reports that Treasury has put up a site for TARP data. DOT has spent $159B on asset purchases from 30 non-bridge loan-making, non-working-capital-lending, non-plan-to-Congress-submitting banks as of the 17th.
So what are you saying, pd, that things are going swimmingly?
With a drag suit and weights.
De nada, masaccio.
It’s a fitting visual to accompany this report that has the US intel community theorizing that the just as the Presidency got nicely imperial, the Sun has Set on empire.
The good news is that we led the way – other states are just in danger, the US was actually taken over and run by criminals for 8 years – 4 of them under a re-election mandate.
“[The United States} will no longer be able to ‘call the shots’ alone, as its power over an increasingly multipolar world begins to wane.”
The report seems to conflate the rejection of the US model of unbridled capitalism tied at the hip to the ability to buy government with a rejection of liberalism and democracy, but it’s still interesting stuff.
As Obama considers whether or not to prosecute humanitarian and constitutional crimes by the Bushies, he needs to think through the need for global partners and the effect of the US rejection of the rule of law, even as more and more information creeps out from other countries and sources on those partnerships.
It wouldn’t hurt for him to re-think the Clintons roles in illegal rendition to torture while he’s at it and before he makes Hillary his sum certain.
And isn’t that what we’ve just gone through under bushco?
So we almost didn’t keep ourselves democratic, and now look at the world!
And thus … bush as no longer the “lone ranger” but instead the “loner” – full stop.
The US has plenty of problems, but I’m currently listening to Obama’s “Dreams of My Father” and his retelling of childhood experiences in Indonesia sure suggest that he recognizes better than most Americans the absolute necessity of being tough in a world filled with bullies, thieves, and envious charlatans.
Bush’s ’strong’ is cartoonish; Obama’s much more grounded in an historical perspective.
Obama’s Dad taught him to box in Indonesia, including the importance of counter-punching. Can you imagine Bush boxing? I suspect that first he would talk tough, and make threats. Then he’d start punching. However, after getting hit, he’d start crying, and if that didn’t work, he would try to cheat. If those don’t work, his next recourse would be to (a) run away, or (b) assume the fetal position. Or maybe try to get some other kid to fight for him.
Obama would clean his clock.
Bob in HI
I sincerely wish you would consider doing up a special Mary diary on this topic with sources.. so you and others could link to a collection of references when mentioning Clintons involvement.
Iraq war = falling dollar = $4 gas = higher interest rates = lower house prices; I wonder to what extent, if at all, the Iraq folly was fingered at Bretton Woods for being if not the cause, but at least a huge factor, in the current economic situation.
Um, was this really a snub? He looked just as disinterested in shaking hands as everyone else did. I wonder what the backstory is here.
Speaking of BW II, nothing in the past two years (and we all know there’s been plenty) has grabbed my attention like this: Japanese float idea of Yen-denominated Treasuries.
As far as I can tell, the only reason we didn’t long ago become Argentina is because, our currency being the reserve currency, our debt was denominated in our own currency. Once other countries start clamoring for denominating our debt in other currencies, I suspect “this sucker could go down”.
Speaking of which, a G20 quote from Bush I thought did not get enough play:
(italics mine, Depressions [sic])
So now we know what they were telling Bush back in September. That we were facing something worse than the Depression. I am quite sure Paulson said the opposite to Congress at the time, and has continued to do so.
It’s useful to know what they are actually thinking, at least in private…
I showed this to a co-worker who immigrated from Italy and still keeps close watch on Italian politics. She says that there is no way Berlusconi would not have shaken Bush’s hand. Watch again. Bush is not shaking their hands.
Maybe no one tried because they knew in advance he doesn’t care to shake hands.
BTW, check out the diary by wmtriallawyer over at DailyKos on The Quiet Transition You are NOT Hearing About.
I love to see competence from Democrats!
Bob in HI
Looks to me that he’s not offering his hand to any of them. It’s almost as if he’s snubbing them rather than the other way around. W looks bored with the whole thing. What does he care? He’s got his.
Fair enough.
Though I imagine teh animosity over the fight was probably mutual.
I presume they told him repeatedly that his fuck-ups had caused this global disaster. That’s pretty much what they were telling him beforehand–all polite and like.
This is a really good, informative post Marcy… thanks. Given me pause to reconsider several of my assumptions.
Yep.
(pounds forehead on wall)
After Enron (I lived in Ca. @ the time) I moved all my savings/retirement to Euros. Among other reasons, EU agreements requiring considerable (though as it turns out not enough) oversight, capitol reserves of participating nations… what they were at least trying to do looked to me like necessary due diligence to protect against what’s now unfolding w/US economy/$USD etc.
Point being, because of that move I payed pretty close attention to EURO economics since then. I mention this because as mortgage bond scam began to unfold a few months ago, a number of EU finance ministers advocated interest rate increase, AFAIC the right response to tighten credit access given role very cheap loans played in fast-and-loose “financial instrument” pyramid schemes that got us here.
Those guys (advocating higher interest) lost that debate. All kinds of back channel innuendo strongly suggesting this happened as a result of Bushco strong arming. I didn’t (and still don’t) understand what persuasion was enforced to sway them, just another out-of-sight BushCo initiated cause-and-effect that’s discernible only from what’s not explicitly said.
Whatever the reason, they buckled. And payed a huge price, being now much more integrally entwined in downward spiral then had they stood their ground on interest rates.
Anyway, here we are now.
I’m reminded, (I’m travelling & don’t have my Bush-libray-links-of-malfeasance at my fingertipes) around late ‘03 or early ‘04, with Iraq costs spiraling way out of control (from $25b “max” to +/-$200b in 18 mos), Bush continued rounds of not just massive tax cuts, but tax incentives for offshoring manufacturing, security (Haliburton left our shores), etc etc.
And I remember thinking that all that was unfolding…
* these guy’s visceral hate of what they called “welfare state” (Bush’s war on Soc Sec. had begun)
* Utter vapid Iraq invasion justifications
* All the other politcally dominated decisions coming out of W’s WH, entirely contrary to even basic common sense
… watching this I began to wonder if bankrupting US wasn’t their intention, as a means to kill their hated “welfare state” once an for all. Seemed almost like an insane notion. Then on bunch of sites/blogs I relied upon, whole bunch of pretty smart, well informed commenters/bloggers were echoing the same thing.
The extent of current econ mess blows my mind… really. It blows my mind. At this stage, as more and more bad paper percolates onto S&P’s books, we’re looking broker and broker. Just 2 months ago, all available #s and best econ advise I saw suggested CitiGroup & BofA 2 best capitalized of US institutions. Now looks like CG going toes up.
Occurs to me as this all unfolds: I have heard no talk in cirlces that matter of prosecution… not ratings agencies, purveyors of CDOs, or any other players. Instead, seems like Treasury replenishing savings of these guys (at taxpayer expense) for rainy-day emergencies.
It’s like once (at least fairly) reliable US institutions, en totale, are on Acid.
It’s like once (at least fairly) reliable US institutions, en totale, are on Acid.
Hear, hear!
This comment is a good summary of what the Bush era boils down to: Evil or incompetent, or both?
My not very nuanced take: Profoundly but not exclusively evil (evil here including the anti-democratic, Cheney-power-fixating, atmospherics of smaller government except for helping ‘my base’).
And so driven by ideology (trickle down & voodoo) that they’re incapable of appreciating, never mind rousing themselves to do, the right thing (cf. 375 economists yelling ‘yoo hoo, 1933, Keynesianism’ etc.)
Would Sarah Palin be able to pardon Stevens?
Just a wild-arse guess here, but I don’t think she can pardon him for *Federal* crimes. She probably could pardon him for State crimes, however.
Just my guess,
Bob in HI
That makes sense, I have no idea what powers governors have wrt pardons.
US requests $300BB in “financial aid” from Gulf States.
But perhaps Prince Alwaleed is not in a good mood?
So we are a third world asking for handouts now.
This is not pretty and it makes me think it is going to get much worse before it gets better if we are asking for handouts already.
Financial aid for the wealthiest nation with the most expensive military.
Now, if we can’t post a windfall tax on our own oil companies, but we’re begging from our oil buddies in the ME, then waht does that amount to? And if were one of the Sheikhs being asked, why wouldn’t I say, “Tax Exxon.”
What Would Bandar Do?
From the TARP data linked to above:
$25B in assets purchased from Citigroup during the program history.
From the latest news updates:
Citigroup to Hold Unscheduled Board Meeting Friday
Who, praytell, would be a buyer of this woolly mammoth?
Ah Prof. Foland, do our posts go together?
They certainly do!
And AnnaNOLA–
Financial aid for the wealthiest nation with the most expensive military.
this is in fact precisely the quid pro quo:
There are 8 persons in reception line. Only #5 and #7 even bother to look at him, #5 only as he turns past gwb to the next-in-line, and #8 looks for a second or so. The other 6 do not even acknowledge his presence. Seems to be by pre-arrangement.
Reminds me of warring persons who suddenly discover who has been creating their mutual animosity and hostility…the war stops and the culprit is squeezed out…put on “ignore”.
It’s as if bush and the rest of them are moving in different “dimensions” – as if they aren’t “aware” of each others’ worlds. Which makes me wonder if indeed some kind of “message” had been pass along previously. So bush looks at his shoes and walks by… as all the others interact with each other.
They’re moving in different worlds.
I still buy EW’s hypothesis!
You know, throw in the recent developments about piracy and the lack of naval response thereto, and I get a really unpalatable feeling. Must be just my own rather dark and devious turn of mind.
For those who might have missed the “Blowback’s a B*tch” post over at Main, I refer to this article linked by Elliott and this one by Selise.
rule number one in self preservation training
NEVER SHAKE HANDS WITH A LEPER
meet george bush, the world’s first “Leper in chief”
anybody else get the idea that george figured out what the rest of his life is gonna be like ???
ain’t no fun waitin round to be the biggest fuckup on the planet
OT — So here’s a thought. The oil companies have had a few years of totally unprecedented profitability. What are they going to do with all that on-hand cash? Why aren’t they buying the car companies? Or the banks for that matter? Or securities now that the prices are so depressed?
One person at calculatedrisk suggested that oil companies take up the cell phone model: the car is free, if you sign a contract to buy gas from Exxon for the next fifteen years for it!
Between Citigroup, the Arab States and princes, treasury action, Paulson and TARP II no-go, and the on/off auto manufacturer bailouts, it’s hard to keep track of everything going on tonight. Which I am pretty sure is a bad sign.
You think the Citi blow might wait until the depths of Turkey weekend?
Good, good point.
Looks like the components of the free market system all failed, which to me sounds like the free market system failed. Conservatism didn’t fail either. I wonder what else didn’t fail.
That is a Public Shunning of a man soon to be Internationally Rung-Up for War Crimes.
And, they all know it.
It’s just that Smirky isn’t taking it well – acting instead as if it is he who is shunning them.
We may see Justice after all, especially if the ’retroactive’ Torture Pardons for Bush and his Policy Henchpeople (tucked into in the DTA and MCA) are Exhibits A and B in a Defense Cover Brief Charge…
So, this is the Photo Op that catalogues the dis-association of the ’dignified’ New Bretton Woods Leaders from the Frumpy, Awkward, Discredited Boogeyman, himself.
Will it go anywhere?
A musical summation:
I couldn’t find the excellent but somewhat different version by the Hot Club of Detroit on-line.
(Hopefully the database error I just got does not produce 68 copies of this post when I resubmit it.)