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http://www.democracynow.org/2013/1/...inee#transcriptquote:JUAN GONZÁLEZ: President Obama is facing criticism for nominating another former Wall Street executive to become treasury secretary. On Thursday, Obama tapped his own chief of staff, Jack Lew, to replace Timothy Geithner. Lew was an executive at Citigroup from 2006 to 2008 at the time of the financial crisis. He served as chief operating officer of Citigroup’s Alternative Investments unit, a group that bet on the housing market to collapse. What follows from then is a discussion about the widespread corruption of the whole instution of wall street and Obama's complicity with "Too Big Too Fail" What will it take to get left liberals to realize that Obama isn't one of them? He was bought and sold by wall street a long time ago. We went from a Goldman Sachs executive who originated too big to ail to a guy whose passion was screwing homeowners and doesn't believe in regulating Wall Street. Related Story: Secrets and Lies of the Bailout The federal rescue of Wall Street didn’t fix the economy – it created a permanent bailout state based on a Ponzi-like confidence scheme. And the worst may be yet to come Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politic...4#ixzz2HoHoDtsS I know that if you were to ask the voters directly, support for financial reform would be nigh universal. Our government has completely abandoned the interests of the American people. How much worse does it have to get? Is there any hope at all?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 00:19 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 01:49 |
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quote:a group that bet on the housing market to collapse Well, at least he saw it coming...
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 00:22 |
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The media is saying he's more loopy than crooked.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 00:28 |
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It really isn't fair to suggest liberals are deceived, unless there was a reasonable alternative whom they could have voted for. Mitt Romney is the single craziest thing I have seen come out of America in a long time and there are a lot of crazy things.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 02:55 |
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Internet Webguy posted:The media is saying he's more loopy than crooked. I assume that's a pun on his signature. Well played. In all seriousness though all of the people I've spoken to that keep up with politics only know about his dumb loopy signature. Nobody knew he worked for Citi in the "gently caress Americans" division.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 02:55 |
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Nolgthorn posted:Mitt Romney is the single craziest thing I have seen come out of America in a long time and there are a lot of crazy things.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:12 |
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Obama is a big fan of USA network television. Convicted Thief tracks stolen goods. Cheating law student dropout plays awesome truth seeking attorney. Sleazy wall street personnel hired to improve the economy.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:19 |
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President Kucinich posted:Obama is a big fan of USA network television. Convicted Thief tracks stolen goods. Cheating law student dropout plays awesome truth seeking attorney. Sleazy wall street personnel hired to improve the economy. Where does Bruce Campbell fit into this equation?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:21 |
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watt par posted:Where does Bruce Campbell fit into this equation? Bruce Campbell is Joe Biden?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:23 |
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quote:In all seriousness though all of the people I've spoken to that keep up with politics only know about his dumb loopy signature. Nobody knew he worked for Citi in the "gently caress Americans" division. I suspect most Americans would really not be shocked to hear that a Secretary of the Treasury used to work on Wall Street, and they may well be pleased to hear that he was apprently smart enough to see that something was up with housing, rather than being an 'all markets are going up all the time' sheep.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:36 |
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President Kucinich posted:Obama is a big fan of USA network television. Convicted Thief tracks stolen goods. Cheating law student dropout plays awesome truth seeking attorney. Sleazy wall street personnel hired to improve the economy. I think the notion is that if they put the most corrupt fucks in power, they'll know all about the loopholes and problems and go after them. It's not like they'd just exploit the system more to their benefit and to the benefit of their buddies.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:41 |
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Cicero posted:You must not have been watching the Republican primaries. Mitt wasn't even half as crazy as the average contender in that race. Maybe not his moderate governor platform but he changed to match all the GOP extremists whims during the primary process just to win. His more balanced governor platform in Massachusetts reflected political reality for running in a state overrun with liberals.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:54 |
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Didn't FDR put someone into power because they were corrupt and they turned into a regulation champion because he knew what to look for?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 03:56 |
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Yawgmoft posted:Didn't FDR put someone into power because they were corrupt and they turned into a regulation champion because he knew what to look for? I don't know about that, but another guy put into power in the expectation that he would be ultra-corrupt and who turned out to be... less than ultra-corrupt, was Chester A. Arthur. He was a mostly forgettable President, however. As to Mr. Lew, this isn't news, nor surprising. Getting liberals to see Obama as a center-right conservative isn't really possible, nor would it change the outcomes. What are liberals going to do? He's already been reelected and Congress has ignored the country since the day it was founded, and they already expect liberals to not show up to vote in 2014 either way. We might as well get some popcorn and take a seat, since we're going to get a lovely live-showing of a train hitting a mountain in the next decade or so, and there's nothing we can do about it.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 04:13 |
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FDR actually was a reformer and implemented major sweeping liberal social and economic changes. Obama is a neoliberal scumbag who has done little but try and maintain the status quo for 4+ years now. You're out of touch with reality if you think pretty much anyone he appoints for almost anything will actually try and reform or improve anything. Especially for a position as powerful as the Secretary of Treasury.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 04:14 |
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Fire posted:http://www.democracynow.org/2013/1/...inee#transcript I'm curious as to where the talent pool for Treasury Secretaries is going to come from, if not the finance industry. Academia is problematic, and even then there are plenty of ties as to the finance industry. (After all, they teach and train the future financial industry employees!) Jack Lew has run the OMB, been in a C level position at Citi, and has been the Chief of Staff to the White House. In terms of credentials, he's golden. And he's also a known element, politically and personally, for the President. I don't understand how his support or underwriting of betting against the housing market before the bust is an indictment against his ability to hold the office of the Secretary of the Treasury. He and his people saw that the whole thing was a loser, and moved against it. I would be far more concerned if he was one of the many wall street insiders that was left standing without a chair when the music stopped. I can't understand your opposition to Jack Lew, it seems to come from a place of moral indignation, which seems to be towards a field and position that really comes down to dollars and cents above all else. In all honesty to day to day powers of the Secretary of the Treasury pale in comparison to his position as the White House Chief of Staff, at least on a practical if not legal level. As Secretary of the Treasury he can be counted on by the administration and the congress to keep the trains running on time and the lights on. We're not at risk of him taking any kind of unilateral damaging action, or being too incompetent to hold the post. And he has all the right education and background to do a competent job. Was there someone on the short, or long, or imaginary lists that you would have preferred? Because from where I'm sitting, he's perfect for the job-- particularly given his chops, and the current political and regulatory climate.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:30 |
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quote:He served as chief operating officer of Citigroup’s Alternative Investments unit, a group that bet on the housing market to collapse. If he was one of the few people smart enough to see and bet on that then this is a great thing.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:39 |
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GAS CURES KIKES posted:I'm curious as to where the talent pool for Treasury Secretaries is going to come from, if not the finance industry. Academia is problematic, and even then there are plenty of ties as to the finance industry. (After all, they teach and train the future financial industry employees!) I agree that it is a problem to find qualified people to regulate an industry without having strong ties to that industry. I remember this issue came up during the Gulf oil spill, when we found out that the people that were supposed to be regulating oil companies were far too close for comfort. As for Lew, the reason he provokes anger is because he has said publicly that he doesn't think deregulation is a problem. It's in his profile that The Atlantic did of him.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:41 |
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asdf32 posted:If he was one of the few people smart enough to see and bet on that then this is a great thing. I think that the entire purpose of the Alternative Investments division is to take the hedge position, or the opposite of what Citi's mainstream investments branch is betting on. I could be misinterpreting the division's name though. It could just be what the bank calls its proprietary trading desk.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:44 |
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visceril posted:I agree that it is a problem to find qualified people to regulate an industry without having strong ties to that industry. I remember this issue came up during the Gulf oil spill, when we found out that the people that were supposed to be regulating oil companies were far too close for comfort. Sure. But a strict pro-regulation, anti wall street guy with the kind of chops needed to run the Treasury is a bit of a unicorn. I'm far more concerned about who's holding seats on the house and senate finance committees creating loopholes than I am Jack Lew signing memorandums from the Secretary's seat at the treasury with a bunch of loops.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:48 |
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GAS CURES KIKES posted:I can't understand your opposition to Jack Lew, it seems to come from a place of moral indignation, which seems to be towards a field and position that really comes down to dollars and cents above all else. I think Fire is mostly just mad at the signals this sends about what Obama looks for in a cabinet member. You're right in that appointing Lew as Chief of Staff was actually way more objectionable than appointing him as Secretary of the Treasury, where having a banker in charge isn't that unusual, and I honestly think that's more worth focusing on. Emmanuel and Daley, his previous Chiefs of Staff, were both ex-bankers as well as former Clinton staffers, so clearly Obama likes to stick with the Washington establishment as much as possible. Lew has a history of union-busting and can be counted among the many bankers who received big bonuses from banks that had just been bailed out by the government. As a Secretary of Treasury, it's not a particularly shocking choice. But as a Chief of Staff, it's a bit of a disturbing choice, moreso when you consider that every single one of Obama's Chiefs of Staff has been an ex-banker. Yes, even Rahm - he did a few years of investment banking in between his government roles. Clearly, Obama doesn't have any problem getting real close with finance execs.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:50 |
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GAS CURES KIKES posted:I'm curious as to where the talent pool for Treasury Secretaries is going to come from, if not the finance industry. Academia is problematic, and even then there are plenty of ties as to the finance industry. (After all, they teach and train the future financial industry employees!) You're trying to understand his opposition to Jack Lew rationally, but you're lending him too much credit. He's from Wall Street - that's enough for some of the progressives here with a warped world view. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 05:56 |
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asdf32 posted:If he was one of the few people smart enough to see and bet on that then this is a great thing. You're operating on a misunderstanding of what happened during the financial crisis. The people that profited off the crisis weren't savvy outsiders that noticed investment firms making a mistake in over-playing their hands. They weren't card-counters taking advantage of casino games that gave them an edge. These people were not hedging. The hedge and meltdown was the entire point of the scheme in these institutions. They took in fees and bonuses for every loan made then bet against them. If anything, the idea that these traunched mortgages would ever balance was the hedge position. The very best light you can paint Jack Lew in is as a pawn in the scheme that may not have been cognizant of what his bosses were doing. I think he definitely does have the credentials to fill the position. That isn't what I worry about. The thing people are arguing with is a view of Jack Lew that may not be present so much on these forums, but is very much present among some of the left wing press. You had Maddow and Klein running puff pieces on this guy like he was monetary Jesus. Now, of course, Republicans are speaking out against him for all the wrong partisan reasons, but that doesn't mean the criticism of him from the left is less valid based on their shared conclusion. ErIog fucked around with this message at Jan 13, 2013 around 06:07 |
| # ? Jan 13, 2013 06:04 |
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asdf32 posted:If he was one of the few people smart enough to see and bet on that then this is a great thing. If he actually tried to do something to stabilize or change the banking system, instead of being one of the many complicit in causing the worst economic disaster since the great depression, then that would be a good thing. But he didn't do anything, and was morally bankrupt to know something was wrong and to not just do nothing about it, but make it worse. This is not a good thing. It is never a good thing to have people that opportunistic, selfish, and short-sighted in any position of power.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 06:12 |
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Fire posted:What will it take to get left liberals to realize that Obama isn't one of them? Fire posted:Our government has completely abandoned the interests of the American people. How much worse does it have to get? Is there any hope at all?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 06:51 |
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Fire posted:America was bought and sold by wall street a long time ago There you go. Nolgthorn posted:It really isn't fair to suggest liberals are deceived, unless there was a reasonable alternative whom they could have voted for. Mitt Romney is the single craziest thing I have seen come out of America in a long time and there are a lot of crazy things. More than Sarah "I can see Russia from my house so I'm good at foreign policy also I'm under investigation for abuse of power" Palin?
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 07:39 |
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It's unfortunate Obama is so cozy with Wall Street, but there is one amusing aspect of appointing Lew as Geithner's replacement. His signature is basically a crazy straw. Our money may look like this shortly, unless he revises his sig: 
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 07:47 |
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That may be better than the guy whose signature looks kind of like "JEWS". It's like when I was in middle school trying to make my signature look good by signing it over and over and trying different things, except he gave up and said "gently caress it, I'm just making some swirls." e: John W. Snow, he signs his 'h' so it looks like a big 'e' Moridin920 fucked around with this message at Jan 13, 2013 around 08:00 |
| # ? Jan 13, 2013 07:57 |
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Broken Machine posted:Our money may look like this shortly, unless he revises his sig:
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 08:14 |
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Moridin920 posted:More than Sarah "I can see Russia from my house so I'm good at foreign policy also I'm under investigation for abuse of power" Palin? Sarah Palin would have made a better president than Mitt Romney.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 08:16 |
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At least Lew was correct in betting that the housing market would collapse. How many Wall Street executives had to get bailed out because they couldn't read the writing on the wall? edit: GCK already covered that. Yeah, I'd rather have Lew on my side than somebody who can't read the market at all. particle409 fucked around with this message at Jan 13, 2013 around 10:41 |
| # ? Jan 13, 2013 10:39 |
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I wonder how many times it will take for us to learn that "Savvy Wall Street execs" are loving horrible because they want to set up the markets to make themselves shitloads of money when they leave the cabinet? Perhaps we could get.. wait for it.. a regulator in the position. The judiciary has a lot of those.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 12:33 |
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Panzeh posted:I wonder how many times it will take for us to learn that "Savvy Wall Street execs" are loving horrible because they want to set up the markets to make themselves shitloads of money when they leave the cabinet? Half the democrats and all of the republicans would fight that tooth and nail. A true reformer would never be confirmed.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 13:16 |
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particle409 posted:Half the democrats and all of the republicans would fight that tooth and nail. A true reformer would never be confirmed. Actually the reason a true reformer would never be confirmed is because the person who appoints that position has no interest in reform. Whether or not confirmation would occur is a non-issue.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 15:11 |
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a lovely poster posted:Actually the reason a true reformer would never be confirmed is because the person who appoints that position has no interest in reform. Whether or not confirmation would occur is a non-issue. Can you back this up? Maybe the unlikelihood of confirmation is a major factor in the decision, and Lew is a secret proponent of reform. As long as we're speculating on motivations.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 15:37 |
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gowb posted:Can you back this up? Maybe the unlikelihood of confirmation is a major factor in the decision, and Lew is a secret proponent of reform. As long as we're speculating on motivations. Can I back up that Obama isn't interested in reforming the financial sector? Sure, the past 4 years, his campaign donors, his re-appointment of Ben Bernanke (someone Bush put there, guess they agreed about some things, who knew), etc etc
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 15:55 |
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gowb posted:Can you back this up? Maybe the unlikelihood of confirmation is a major factor in the decision, and Lew is a secret proponent of reform. As long as we're speculating on motivations. cremnob posted:You're trying to understand his opposition to Jack Lew rationally, but you're lending him too much credit. He's from Wall Street - that's enough for some of the progressives here with a warped world view. Oh cremob, its always fun to see your poo poo and run posts. Maybe one day your posts will include more substance than "I am right and you are wrong, bye!", one day  .(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 15:59 |
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Why do people assume that ultracompetent Wall Street executives are going to act like Wall Street executives when they're no longer Wall Street executives? Of course he did everything to make his bank a lot of money; that was his job. It won't be his job if/when he's Secretary of the Treasury, though! You can't look at someone's record in the private sector to judge what they'll do in the public service because the missions of the two organisations are totally different so of course the same competent individual will act differently in both cases because his role is completely different. We somehow manage to recognise this for trial lawyers (Nobody says "omg he defended a mass murderer! He's a monster!" but for some reason working for a bank and doing your job well makes you a monster.) If Lew is a good banker there's a good chance he'll be a good administrator. We need more competent people like him in public service and less liberal ideologues or whatever utopian fantasy fire fantasizes about.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 16:02 |
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ErIog posted:You're operating on a misunderstanding of what happened during the financial crisis. The people that profited off the crisis weren't savvy outsiders that noticed investment firms making a mistake in over-playing their hands. They weren't card-counters taking advantage of casino games that gave them an edge. These people were not hedging. The hedge and meltdown was the entire point of the scheme in these institutions. You're seriously mixing up parties involved in the housing crisis here. The people making the mortgages and the people who massively bet against them (Paulson in particular, since he's the one Lew is being linked to) were not the same group of people. However the whole thing is a non-story: what actually happened was Lew's unit had some money in Paulson's hedge fund. Lew wasn't out there laying the house money on 'bust', it's just one of the investments his group had. It's not even a negative thing, it's only relevant because people attempt to imply that making money off the housing crisis in the way Paulson did was making money off homeowners (rather than other gamblers at the casino). evilweasel fucked around with this message at Jan 13, 2013 around 16:06 |
| # ? Jan 13, 2013 16:04 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 01:49 |
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Spiderfist Island posted:If he actually tried to do something to stabilize or change the banking system, instead of being one of the many complicit in causing the worst economic disaster since the great depression, then that would be a good thing. But he didn't do anything, and was morally bankrupt to know something was wrong and to not just do nothing about it, but make it worse. Betting against a bubble is stabilizing. If enough people bet against a bubble then there is no bubble. ErIog posted:You're operating on a misunderstanding of what happened during the financial crisis. The people that profited off the crisis weren't savvy outsiders that noticed investment firms making a mistake in over-playing their hands. They weren't card-counters taking advantage of casino games that gave them an edge. These people were not hedging. The hedge and meltdown was the entire point of the scheme in these institutions. Please, what are you recounting to me the Goldman Sachs scandal? Basically all the established players on wall street were destroyed, bought, brought to their knees, or lost serious money in this crisis. If anyone thinks this happened remotely on purpose then you're deceiving yourself. People do dumb things, and this crisis is a bad example of it.
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| # ? Jan 13, 2013 16:07 |
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