(noon. – promoted by ek hornbeck)
The CEO’s who control the top institutions in our banking and finance system are a clear and present danger to the survival of the United States. The sooner President Obama figures that out and acts accordingly, the sooner we’ll be able to start formulating rational solutions to the banking crisis and start digging ourselves out of this hellhole they’ve put us all in.
Unfortunately, Obama’s Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is not part of the solution, he’s part of the problem.
Robert L. Borosage, Co-Director of the Campaign for America’s Future:
Faced with the failure of the Paulson-Bernanke banking bailout, the Obama administration has decided to double down. The new plan, described in broad outline by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner on Tuesday, antes up another $1.5 trillion or more to keep the banks afloat. But it won’t convince many that they are seaworthy.
The plan isn’t likely to get the administration where it needs to go for two simple reasons. It is wrong about where we are starting from. And it is wrong about where we’re going to. If you don’t know where you are and don’t know where you are going, it is very hard to get there.
The plan won’t admit where we are: the major banks in the US are insolvent.
The plan won’t get us where we need to go: we need to restructure – and downsize – our financial sector.
Ryan Grim at HuffPo points out one of many counterproductive aspects of the plan in New Treasury Plan Weakens Crucial Wall Street Accounting Rules:
The financial plan announced by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner appears to have accomplished, through a backdoor path, one of the top priorities of Wall Street bankers: ending so-called ‘mark-to-market’ accounting rules that many economists consider essential.
A counterproductive plan filled with counterproductive policies.
Mr. President, who IS this guy?
And what the FUCK is he DOING????
As Susie Madrak at Crooks & Liars notes, Geithner’s protecting his Wall Street buddies, that’s what he’s doing:
The Obama administration’s new plan to bail out the nation’s banks was fashioned after a spirited internal debate that pitted the Treasury secretary, Timothy F. Geithner, against some of the president’s top political hands.
In the end, Mr. Geithner largely prevailed in opposing tougher conditions on financial institutions that were sought by presidential aides, including David Axelrod, a senior adviser to the president, according to administration and Congressional officials. He resisted those who wanted to dictate how banks would spend their rescue money.
Obama’s made some mistakes so far, but appointing Geithner is one of his worst mistakes. He’s going to keep on protecting Wall Street no matter what the consequences are for the rest of us. The man is a Wall Street snake and he’ll always be a Wall Street snake.
If this guy was Secretary of the Treasury . . .
we might have a chance to get through this. But he’s not. Tim Geithner is, and as long as he remains Secretary of the Treasury, we don’t have a fucking prayer of addressing this banking crisis effectively.
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would have been my pick too. 🙂 I must say a lot of Obamas appointees have left me cold.
and it means the boss is a fox. Which might explain all of the swooning O’bots.
People who have loyalties to other entities than our government are running our government and the industries that control our economy.
This is one facet of the problem, Budhy’s diary about the CIA is another, but the REAL problem is that we have powerful entities like Skull and Bones, the Bilderberg Group, the “Family”, the Unification Church, the Knights of Malta, etc. who have entirely too many people highly placed and capable of doing enormous damage.
They have their own mercenary armies for hire now – Blackwater is only one of many. Most intelligence agencies have been well and truly infiltrated. Hillary is a member of both the Bilderberg Group and the “Family”.
Our governments are shells of their former selves. The power structures are forever changed. Obama appears willing to look the other way. Rove is still walking around free and has been subpoenaed by Congress twice.
and incremental tinkering won’t work any better for Tim Geithner than they did for Hank Paulson.
The Establishment Villagers are still trying desperately to prop up a financial pyramid even as it tumbles in an avalanche upon their heads. We are not in the beginning of just another recession and market correction; we are in the midst of a systemic collapse. Think of 1789 in France. Think of 1848 in Europe. Think of 1917 in Russia. Think of 1929 in the U.S. and much of the world (not quite a systemic collapse, but a damn near thing). Think of the 1980’s in the Soviet Union. Think of the 1990’s in the former Yugoslavia. In our current case, unregulated, predatory finance capitalism has failed catastrophically for the second time in less than a century, and something needs to be designed to replace it.
Geithner, Ben Bernanke, and Larry Summers are victims of Old-Think and are essentially servants of the financial looting class. It is inconceivable that they would dare to challenge the interests of the Financial Masters of the Universe. And so they create more or less out of thin air a digital trillion dollars here, a digital trillion dollars there, until it almost adds up to real money.
And even after injections of these trillions of dollars worth of free public digital money and guarantees, the financial institutions that have been ruled and looted by the Financial Masters will still be insolvent. Is risking an eventual collapse of the dollar and subsequent hyperinflation a reasonable price to pay for trying to shore up the deep red balance sheets of hopelessly mismanaged and bankrupt firms?
So here is my fantasy on coming up with a solution: lock Paul Krugman, Paul Volcker, Joseph Stiglitz, and Nouriel Roubini in a room. Provide them with the finest cuisine and the best wines. Give them access to any data that they desire. Let them bathe and shave on occasion. But don’t let them out of the room until they have reached a consensus solution on how best to redesign the U.S. financial system.
And then implement that solution–swiftly and ruthlessly, even though doing so will mean opposing, upsetting, and removing the Financial Masters of the Universe from their perches of insider power.
Now, about those contracts for new guillotines as part of a fiscal stimulus package to provide employment and bolster public confidence….
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to look at what Krugman said about the plan.
Those thoughts seem to be goin’ round today.
The last couple of days have gotten my keyboard fired up for Freedom!
peace,
Ron
SEC couldn’t find first base in Fenway Park
and it’s right on track.