Thursday, April 1, 2010
Geithner: Pickpocketing Trillions from the People to Give to the Oligarchy Was "Deeply Unfair", But We ... Um ... Had To
Tim Geithner told the Today Show that:
It's "deeply unfair" that some financial institutions that got taxpayer-paid bailouts are emerging in better shape from the recession than millions of ordinary Americans.
Geithner also argued that President Barack Obama had no choice when confronted with a financial crisis.
"As the president has said, we had to do some very unpopular things," Geithner said. "People looked at what had happened.""It's not fair. It's deeply unfair," he said. "He (Obama) had to decide whether he was going to act to fix it or stand back ... and that would have been calamitous for the American economy."
There are only a couple of minor inaccuracies in Geithner's statements:
- The government hasn't done anything to fix the economy
- Geithner's entire approach is wrong, because the economy can't recover until many of the "financial institutions that got taxpayer-paid bailouts [and] are emerging in better shape" are broken up
- The government has been anemic in addressing unemployment
Moreover, it is not like their approach fell on them and they couldn't do anything about it. Geithner, Summers, Bernanke and the boys made a conscious decision to side with the oligarchy at the expense of the people.
As Simon Johnson and James Kwak write:
[There was a] point at which the government had to decide if it would defend the financial oligarchy from populist outrage, or whether it would reform the financial system that brought us the financial crisis and severe recession. We do not think it was an easy choice. But ultimately Obama and his advisers chose to bet on the bankers they knew. The result has been even larger banks and an even more concentrated financial sector.Geithner also told the Today Show that he hopes skeptical voters will note legislation moving through Congress to bring reforms to the financial system.
He's banking, of course, on the fact that many voters won't realize that the legislation is a placebo containing no real medicine.
Geithner ended the interview with this pearl of wisdom:
"What happened in our country should never happen again," he said. "People were paid for taking enormous risks. It was a crazy way to run a financial system." Geithner said, "It's the government's job ... to do a better job of restraining that kind of risk-taking."Indeed ... too bad that Geithner and the boys are still encouraging that kind of risk-taking.
Geithner was, of course, largely responsible for much of the failure of the government to restrain risk-taking in the first place.
As William Black points out:
Mr. Geithner, as President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York since October 2003, was one of those senior regulators who failed to take any effective regulatory action to prevent the crisis, but instead covered up its depth.Geithner was also complicit in Lehman's accounting fraud .
And pushed to pay AIG's CDS counterparties at full value, and then to keep the deal secret.
And as Robert Reich notes today, Geithner was "very much in the center of the action" regarding the secret bail out of Bear Stearns without Congressional approval.
Indeed, the list of Geithner's hinky actions grows longer by the day as new facts emerge.
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"What happened in our country should never happen again," ---Yeah Timmy, they said the same thing in the 30s. They even passed the Glass Stegal Act to keep investment banks from colluding with commercial banks. But your fellow traveler Greenspan got it repealed in 1999. It to a few years but you broke the nation's back. Nice job.
ReplyDeleteLike him.
ReplyDeleteNot that anyone on the bought-and-paid-for MSM would mention it.
S
"People were paid for taking enormous risks. It was a crazy way to run a financial system." Geithner said, "It's the government's job ... to do a better job of restraining that kind of risk-taking."
america is not a free country, this country is about economic slavery.
ReplyDeleteIt kind of pisses me off that zerohedge has elected to clamp down on what they may deem as unwanted comments. to this i say, it is truely a shame. it would appear that they have weeded out most of the gold bugs and others they perceive to be too conspiratorial in their outlook on things.
ReplyDeleteoh well. it was fun while it lasted. free speech is losing ground at a fast rate these days. a sad commentary on life in amerika. the days go by, our money is stolen and our country is destroyed but no one, dares to name names and say what is really going on and who it is that is doing it.
we cannot bring ourselves to that forbidden place. but we must. we have to. or. it is all over but the crying. you simply do not have any idea who you are dealing with and the forces that are at play here in all of this.
the history we learned in our government schools was not the true history. our lives are not our own. our minds are not our own. people are systematically brainwashed and they don't even know it nor do they care.
the band pokerface understands all of this. they know the real truth. in one of their songs, they sing, i would rather die than be your slave. is this the future for many of us, who see things are they are? God forbid it.
I hope against hope but at this point, to be perfectly honest, i don't have much faith in the amerikans now. they are fat and lazy and distracted and above all else, they are entertained.
as George Carlin said one time in one of his bits, the tables are turned and the game is rigged and nobody seems to notice and nobody seems to care, etc etc.. such is life in amerika these days.....God help us to wake up to what is really going on. God help us now.
Let me get this straight. The banks lent all their money knowing they would not get paid. They earned BILLIONS in bonuses for a job well done. The bill was due and the public covered their debts – and then some. This was so that the banks will lend us our own money with interest.
ReplyDeleteHow much is rope?
We should only support functional markets, and not specific institutions. We need a commercial paper market, letters of credit and acceptance process, a bond underwriting market, etc. Specific institutions would have to apply for the privilege with certain capital requirements, internal controls, etc. and be limited to 10% of a particular function market or process. Banks are suppose to act in a fiduciary capacity and not game the system. Banks were given their power by the State with their charter. Their charter can be altered or eliminated. We need to push for functional regulation. Banks are the oil the lubricates our capitalist system; we need to change the oil and filter.
ReplyDeleteWe all know the whole system is completely corrupted. The question is, how long are we going to continue to put up with it? There has been no accountability whatsoever. These people get on the news and just say whatever.
ReplyDeleteAll of this insanity regarding the big banks REALLY is about a White House Coup similar to the one they tried back in 1933 that failed. The current one has been ongoing for decades as they knew well their weaknesses and wanted to make sure they would succeed this time. How I know it's a WH Coup is because I spent more than 26 years in a family who are directly involved.
ReplyDeleteThe BNib Banks were behind almong many others with 911 that was supposed to kick off a series of other operations ending with Martical Law. Martial Law by the way is up ahead if you haven't noticed. It's all about the Coup and that's their goal. This was explained to me in much detail back in the 90's while I was still married. They are paying for the Coup with the proceeds of sales of huge Drug shippments. The family I was in are also involved in this too:
Mexico drug plane used for US 'rendition' flights: report Sep 4, 2008
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5j6QonBKKMo2gw1e3ql-xUcQEZbVg
Clyde O'Connor is family. He is my ex-sister-in-law's brother. His partner and my ex-brother-in-law is Bruce Adreani who is the money man behind Clyde. Believe it or not, Bruce and Clyde were at my house in the 90's when they talked about going into the air distribution business in Florida. Who setup their new Florida business was Obama while he worked at a law firm known to have Shadow Government connection in Chicago. Obama has been found to own more than 130 properties which I know from the family to be payments for criminal services rendered.
The Drug business in the Chicago area is huge as it is used as a distribution point because corruption is well controlled. I was told back in the 90's that Chicago gets a $100 million dollar shipment of Cocaine each week, that's more than $5billion per year. Many Politicians are involved and are also well known to the Public and are involved which includes Prostitution Rings supporting Death Angel Operatinos and Child Theft for Sex Slaves. The Operations here in the Chicago area that I'm aware of is protected by a huge army of Federal Criminal Element with direct CIA links also with the Big Banks. How they operate will more than astound you!
There is alot more but for another time....
Marty Didier
Northbrook, IL
At this point I am having a hard time trying to describe how I feel about what has happened to America.
ReplyDeleteI have almost come to believe that many people have simply given up and do not care much about what happens anymore.
One thing though that I have grown tired of in all of this is all the negative comments about Americans by other Americans. Blaming each other is only making the situation that much more intolerable.
Our social fabric is in tatters, guns, drugs, mass killings, political corruptions, economic calamities all are every day events now a days. We even had a guy DRIVE A PLANE INTO A IRS BLDG!! You through all this in on top of having to make a living, paying bills, raising kids, having a relationship and a job and all the rest of it, American society is all but maxed out. Or so it seems. Plus the American people are some of the hardest working, creative and industrious people of this era.
So rather than looking at the American people as "fat and lazy or too distracted or self involved or entertained". Maybe it is the American people are victims and never really stood a chance against the oligarchic, monopolistic, dynastic and epic forces at work today!!
Just sayin, have a good!!
the line has been crossed and yall know what to do,so quit pussifooting around and clean house.so you lost some funds big deal-they are just paper,if yall dont do something you'll wish the rest your days ya did!
ReplyDelete