In today's NY Times, Frank Rich rails on the overwhelming political epidemic that we know as:
passing the buck. While, perhaps, the best example of this was Alan Greenspan's testimony last week on Capitol Hill, there are more than enough examples to go around among Democrats and Republicans, alike. As Rich nails it, citing everything from Iraq, to the Catholic church, to RNC Chair Michael Steele:
"This syndrome is hardly limited to the financial sector."
No One Is to Blame for Anything
By FRANK RICH
New York Times
Op-Ed
April 11, 2010
"I was right 70 percent of the time, but I was wrong 30 percent of the time," said Alan Greenspan as he testified last week on Capitol Hill. Greenspan -- a k a the Oracle during his 18-year-plus tenure as Fed chairman -- could not have more vividly illustrated how and why geniuses of his stature were out to lunch while Wall Street imploded. No doubt he applied his full brain power to that 70-30 calculation. But the big picture eludes him. If the captain of the Titanic followed the Greenspan model, he could claim he was on course at least 70 percent of the time too.
"No One Is to Blame for Anything" Continued
By FRANK RICH
New York Times
Op-Ed
April 11, 2010
--SNIP--
As he has previously said in defending his inability to spot the colossal bubble, "Everybody missed it -- academia, the Federal Reserve, all regulators."
That, of course, is not true.
--SNIP--
But Greenspan is nothing if not a representative leader of his time. We live in a culture where accountability and responsibility are forgotten values. When "mistakes are made" they are always made by someone else...
As Rich concludes it, using Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin as one of his more striking (rightfully so, IMHO) examples of this dysfunctional mentality, he reminds us that President Obama "...will not have the luxury of mass amnesia when it comes to our recent economic past."
...But the Great Recession has affected nearly everyone. Most of its victims are genuinely innocent bystanders who lost their jobs and savings while financial elites cashed in on the crash.
Both as policy and politics, a serious reckoning for those who gamed the system is a win-win. Yet the fear that the Obama administration is protecting its friends persists...
--SNIP--
...That includes Geithner, whom Rubin talked with repeatedly in the weeks before the president released his financial regulatory reform proposal last June.
Americans still waiting on Main Street for the recovery that lifted Wall Street once invested their hopes in Obama. Getting the new era of responsibility only 70 percent right won't do.
# # #
The editors of the NY Times are in agreement with Rich, as well. From this morning's NYT editorial page, the Grey Lady rails at the former heads and directors of Citigroup, specifically with regard to Robert Rubin's and Charles O. Prince's testimony before the Congressional Financial Crisis Inquiry Committee last week.
Who's Not Sorry Now?
Editorial
April 11, 2010
...Mr. Prince says he "could not" foresee the impending collapse, when he could have and should have seen it coming. Certainly, others did. Mr. Rubin has said that under his employment agreement, he was not responsible for the bank's operations...
--SNIP--
Except that the financial crisis was not an accident and they were not powerless. The crisis was the result of irresponsibility and misjudgments by many people, including Mr. Prince and Mr. Rubin. Citi, under their leadership, epitomized the financial recklessness that ruined the economy.
More important, the "apologies" are distractions...
--SNIP--
...A successful inquiry would compel the government to take appropriate corrective action.
The commission has managed to unearth some compelling testimony. (Last week's hearings produced detailed evidence of how the mortgage-investment pipeline came to be stuffed with toxic loans.) But the inquiry can strangely lack vigor. It has not issued any subpoenas for documents -- satisfied so far with voluntary submissions -- and does not administer oaths to witnesses it interviews in private. Lying to a federal investigator is illegal under oath or not, but experience shows that taking an oath is a powerful incentive to tell the whole truth.
The commission is supposed to finish its work by Dec. 15. In the meantime, Congress's efforts at financial reform appear to be weakened daily by politicians who are more concerned with campaign donations than regulating the financial system. This week, for instance, a Senate committee is expected to propose new regulations for derivatives that are more loophole than rule.
Sorry, indeed.
# # #
Meanwhile, amidst the most recent travesty to hit hit us regarding over-the-top Wall Street behavior related to the almost complete regulatory capture of our government (namely: that virtually every major bank in this country has been cooking their books, fully enabled, aided and abetted to do same by none other than the Federal Reserve, itself), it's now being said that: "Fraud (Is) Finally Being Discussed In Polite Company...Now Where Are The Prosecutions?"
Speaking of fraud, and other Wall Street crimes...going full circle, and referring back to the lede in tonight's diary, as House Oversight Committee Chairman Edolphus Towns reminds us, the characters might change--or in some instances as it relates to the Obama administration's holdovers from the Bush era--but the story, like the people in it, remains the same: "No one is to blame." (Still.)
Edolphus Towns Says Fed Officials Were Unhappy About Friedman Waiver To Buy GS Stock, Were Overruled
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 04/10/2010 10:27 -0500
One of the most botched cases of conflict of interest abuse by a Federal Reserve official will forever remain the purchase of Goldman Sachs shares by Goldman Board Member, and FRBNY Board Member (the squid likes to keep its Federal Reserve puppets closely supervised) Stephen Friedman: an act strictly forbidden by the Fed itself. The action was so indefensible it led to Friedman's quitting shortly after disclosure of his transgression leaked. Yet the reasons why Friedman managed to effect this purchase of 37,000 shares of GS on December 17, 2008 is because he was granted a "waiver" by the Fed. A month ago, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Edolphus Towns sent a rather angry letter demanding an explanation from Ben Bernanke why he had allowed this blatant case of semi-insider trading to occur at the highest echelons of shadow government. Today, we find out that Towns is unhappy with the production provided by the Fed, and concludes "that senior officials had misgivings about granting the waiver but were ultimately overruled" and that "we believe a closer examination of this issue is necessary, especially when Congress is considering increasing the Fed's powers. In the coming weeks, we will continue our investigation of this matter and will schedule a hearing to learn more from Mr. Friedman and senior Fed officials about how he was permitted to make windfall profits by trading stock in a company he had a role in regulating." We are not so sure there is any room for confusion - after Goldman told its pseudo employees at the Fed to bail it out at the cost of tens of billions in taxpayer money, why is it in any way surprising that those same FRBNY Goldmanites will not be allowed to profit from Goldman's bailout as well? The is nothing than a clear cut case of power and political capture at the very highest level of the country, by the two most collusive entities, whose sole purpose is the confiscation of middle-class wealth, or whatever is left of it...
After reading this last story, the reality is we're never really told by whom, exactly, the
"senior officials at the Fed" were overruled. But, it's self-evident that it's a very short list of potential individuals.
Regulatory capture. Corruption. Greed. As Frank Rich tells us at the top of this diary, "No one is to blame for anything."
Still (as of April 10, 2010).
How incomprehensible is that?