See? ... this is why it was stupid .. (0.00 / 0)

to bow to Tauscher to begin with .. and why the unions are dumb to back Specter just because of EFCA .. it leaves him to f--k up a lot of other stuff .. like this

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by: Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 14:06:15 PM CDT

I wish I could say you're being (4.00 / 3)

hyperbolic. Remember those quaint days in the primary when the big issue for a few weeks was how to fight corporate power?

Obama won't fundamentally challenge it, I don't believe. Here's Sheldon Wolin:

He is probably the most intelligent president we have had in decades. I think he is well meaning, but he inherits a system of constraints that make it very difficult to take on these major power configurations. I do not think he has the appetite for it in any ideological sense. The corporate structure is not going to be challenged.

http://www.truthdig.com/report...

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by: david mizner @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 14:13:25 PM CDT

Obama's speech to CEOs yesterday was all about the govt working to help corporations -- (4.00 / 1)

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/... -- Obama's Remarks to the Business Roundtable --

... I don't like the idea of spending more government money, nor am I interested in expanding government's role.

I've always been a strong believer in the power of the free market. It has been and will remain the very engine of America's progress - the source of a prosperity that has gone unmatched in human history. I believe that jobs are best created not by government, but by businesses and entrepreneurs like you who are willing to take risks on a good idea. And I believe that our role as lawmakers is not to disparage wealth, but to expand its reach; not to stifle the market, but to strengthen its ability to unleash the creativity and innovation that still makes this nation the envy of the world.  ...

And at these moments, government has stepped in not to supplant private enterprise, but to catalyze it - to create the conditions for thousands of entrepreneurs and new businesses to adapt and ultimately to thrive.

That's why we laid down railroads and highways to spur commerce and industry - to stitch this nation together. That's why, even in the midst of civil war, Lincoln launched a transcontinental railroad, and Land Grant colleges and the National Academy of Sciences. That's why we initiated universal public high schools and passed a GI bill to nurture the skills and talents of all our workers. That's why Eisenhower built an interstate highway system, and Kennedy pointed us to the moon, knowing that the exploration would lead to unimagined innovations here on Earth.
...

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by: amberglow @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 14:36:33 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

"taxpayers committed more than $11.6 trillion to prop up financial firms" and counting -- (0.00 / 0)

Bloomberg -- Banks' Bondholders May Be Next to Share Bailout Pain -- http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/...

except it's only us who are being pained -- they're all profiting and will continue to.

... after taxpayers committed more than $11.6 trillion to prop up financial firms.  ...

The housing thing rewards banks and lenders and servicers even more -- not homeowners in trouble or already foreclosed. It's not even intended to help the majority of those in trouble but just a fraction -- http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03...  

--

... Q. Who is eligible?

A. The plan is only going to help those who earn enough money to pay their modified loans. So the newly jobless may not get any relief. Nor will people who overextended themselves to such a degree that there's no hope they'll ever repay their loans. ...

that doesn't necessarily mean all participants are required to modify your loan.

What they must do, however, is examine all loans at risk of default or those at least 60 days overdue. The mortgage servicer is required to perform a calculation that will determine whether it will cost more to foreclose or to modify the loan (the servicer, lender or other owner of the loan will receive a financial incentive to modify). If the calculation shows that the modification will cost less, the lender must go ahead and modify the loan.

There may be cases where a modification is not possible. Loans that have been packaged into a security, for example, and sold to an investor that is not owned or backed by a government-sponsored entity like Fannie Mae may fall into this category. About 17 percent of mortgages fit in this category, according to Inside Mortgage Finance. ...

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by: amberglow @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 14:29:28 PM CDT

Evan Bayh... (0.00 / 0)

 ...is the kind of person who makes me seriously question any qualms I might have about waterboarding.

   

"We judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their actions. It is a great convenience." -- Howard Zinn

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by: Master Jack @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 14:34:20 PM CDT

The financial "industry" made much progress in getting control over ... (0.00 / 0)

... our government during the clinton years thanks to jackasses like robber rubin and larry summers.  Of course it got much worse in the bush years after the 2002 wall street scandals when they bought their way out of jail by bribing our politicians who simply put on dog-and-pony shows to give the public the impression that something was actually being done to reign in wall street.  We saw how serious those efforts were when the people that were supposedly cracked down on, wall street, gave bush more money than any other group in 2004 to get him reelected.  And then we saw once bush was able to steal the 2004 election that the first thing on his agneda was something that he never talked about during his campaign: privatizing social security.  But once wall street was able to bribe its way out of breaking the law in 2002 primarily by giving heavily to the republicans which was likely engineered by rove, they no longer had any fear of being caught and they accelerated their looting becoz then they knew whose government it was:  theirs.  They own the government and we are under their rule.  That should be obvious at this point being that the more money they steal off of us, the more of our money their government gives them to steal off of us.  

It would be a lot easier to have faith in mr. hope if he didn't appoint a bunch of rubinites, who facilitated and enabled this whole mess, to clean it up.  Notice how there was no outcry by the republicans over having the secretary of treasury caught cheating on his taxes ... none at all over that absurdity ... and that's becoz wall street wants geithner in there, he's one of their boys.  obama's too smart to have appointed these bastards by accident, it is very purposeful that these scumbags are in power becoz they represent the same interests that obama does.    

We needed someone principled and moral enough to be willing to be a one-term president to clean up the incredible mess that has been left by a criminal administration to make sure this never happens again.  And step one to that is accountability, which obama has no appetite for.  So, what we are left with is another self-serving politician that is running for reelection as soon as he gets elected ... a fraud IMO who is not principled enough to effectuate the message he ran on:  change.

Z  

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by: Z @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 15:05:48 PM CDT

Sounds like the kind of thing to organize a phone-calling Action Alert around, Chris - (0.00 / 0)

- "Call Evan Bayh(/Ben Nelson/Arlen Specter/etc.); Save the Cramdown."

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by: rollthehardsix @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 15:22:32 PM CDT

i found out (0.00 / 1)

wall street ran this country for sure, when they got the first bailout in september of 08', the congress and senaters came on tv to talk about how smooth it was to work together to get the bill passed, they all said it was fun to go to work, every day your congress should work like this , they said, seeing congress get along so well showed me how much they owe to wall street, congress fights tooth and nail over every bill except a wall street bill-

and than to see the detriot three go to capitol hill a week later and beg and whine and apologize, it made the power of wall street and banks stand out even stronger-

And if you take this along with our unconditional support of israel, maybe jewish bankers really do run the world???

whatever you think people owe you, that is what you owe people

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by: eomonroe00 @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 16:07:13 PM CDT

I'd say yeah (0.00 / 0)

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by: Z @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 19:38:17 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

september of 08' (4.00 / 1)

This is and always was Obama's bailout.   If he had stayed on the campaign trail instead of dropping everything to ram this through, I don't think it would have passed.

While I am likely to be one of the people really hurt (public pension and 403b retirement savings) by this, I think it would have been better to let them die.  The cronyism and handwashing is so rampant, there is no way any of them have the ability to manage this without getting huge campaign contributions or free mortgage loans of their own.  

They're asking for another four years -- in a just world, they'd get 10 to 20. ~~ Dennis Kucinich  

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by: dkmich @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 05:42:49 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Once they are "too big to fail" (0.00 / 0)

Haven't we already admitted our nation is enslaved to their success?
The Captains of industry have waged a war of mutually assured destruction against their own country (except that multi-nationals are too big for any single country).  
It is reflected in this "Going Gault" movement (talk about an "entitlement mentality).

Does the new David have the courage to combat a Goliath so big that slaying him could bury the nation in dead meat?  

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by: triangunation @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 16:40:08 PM CDT

Obama is just a bystander. Congress is the Enabler-in-Chief (0.00 / 0)

of the takeover of the federal government by the financial services sector of the economy.

That's because the large majority of Congressional representatives of both parties have sold their votes to the banking and financial services industry and big business sector in exchange for campaign contributions.

This buying and selling of influence explains why Congress diverts taxpayer dollars into trillion dollar bailouts of corrupt bankers even though just about every thinking person knows that these bankers fraudulently solicited the investment of pension funds and 401(Ks) funds into mortgage backed securities they knew were worthless so that they could siphon off this money into their own pockets in the form of undeserved bonuses and salaries.

It is the most devastating, far-reaching financial swindle in history made possible by the corruption of Congress by the "moneyed interests" that the Founding Fathers warned us about.

By far the worst part is seeing the nation's lawmakers continue to fawn over their campaign contributors and their lobbyists as they pick over proposed legislation to remove anything that might offend their financiers.

The fact that upwards of $10 trillion has been approved for bank bailouts and less than $1 million for a job-creating stimulus tells us all we need to know about who controls Congress.

 

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 18:27:02 PM CDT

He's not a bystander Nancy when he takes action by bringing aboard ... (4.00 / 3)

... the rubinites geithner, summers, and orszag to run the treasury.  These people have been neck deep in this disaster and yet obama has them running the treasury as an appendage of wall street where they can offload their bad bets on the American public.

I don't mean to jump on you, Nancy ... and this may not apply to you ... but I think many democrats make way too many excuses for obama.  He's no innocent bystander when he purposefully empowers pro-wall street forces within our/their government.

Z  

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by: Z @ Fri Mar 13, 2009 at 19:45:01 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I agree (0.00 / 0)

with your summary of Obama's pandering actions to incorporate into his administration the enablers of the financial collapse.

But it is ultimately Congress that writes the laws of the land.

And these laws enable the financial services/big business sector to control the federal government and divert taxpayer dollars into the pockets of corrupt financiers.

If Congress were not controlled by this sector, it would pass laws that protect and defend the interests of the American people.

Compared to their influence, Obama is second fiddle, a mere bystander, despite his own panderings.

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 09:37:03 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Chris: "The Financial Services Industry--Not the US Congress, Run The Country" (4.00 / 1)

Chris,

   I find your lede to be misleading, leaving the rest of your diary astry, ightlysl:  Your points of contention do not support your premise:  "Obama does not run the country".

1.  Obama did not vote for the Bankrupty Bill in 2005 as a Senator.

2.  While a good size of the Democratic House pushed for the ineptly phrased, "cramdown", Obama did come out for this proposed legislation to help homeowners--pretty forthrightly. (While different Democrat Senators have supported the legislation, their voices have been drown out by the GOP, moderate & Blue Dog Democrats, and the MSM.)

3. Though, I am not making a terribly significant point; it remains clear that it is important to delineate the thrust of your argument, by replacing the lede. Ironically, you make a caustic and trenchant run-down of the financial service industry, followed by the Congress' unwillingness to buck the industry's power with the referencing of the CQ piece.

4.  Nevertheless, the main gist of your diary is dead-on and disturbing.  Let me be clear:  Congress--especially the Senate--are being pimped by this power sector and it's lobbyists.

I realize Obama has eaten at the trough. And needs to do more on this front.  Most important: Obama needs to stand up the financial and banking industry, using the populist energy against this industry.

Question:  Do you think that they worry that they will not get any funding in future elections from this sector?

Note: I am happy to see Dodd and others say they will take lobbying or PAC money for fund-raising--at least the most troubled banks. Don't they realize that if they shrink the financial and banking system--which is in their power--that they won't be co-dependent on this craven institutions and individuals.  Just wondering aloud, 'Can different liberal and progressive instituions, along with the increased prowess of fundrasing by the progressive net-roots help them attain office?'  I think so!  

 

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by: Jason Cataldi @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 03:46:48 AM CDT

*astray slightly (0.00 / 0)

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by: Jason Cataldi @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 03:49:14 AM CDT

Editor's Corrections on my Comment to Chris's Diary Post (0.00 / 0)

Again, point 1. should read *astray slightly.

In the Note section of my comment, the words Not Be ought follow after the word will, in the first sentence.

Sorry, for missing those corrections the first time around.

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by: Jason Cataldi @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 10:15:09 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

a reminder, from 07 -- Obama's finance funders -- "that's not how it is with Barack. We're already at the table." (0.00 / 0)

Finance Companies are this administration's owners -- like Oil and Gas and War-related ones were Bush's.

NYMAG April 07 -- Money Chooses Sides -- (and don't miss the browser header: How Barack Obama Struck Fundraising Gold ) --

http://nymag.com/news/politics...

... The courtship of Robert Wolf is, of course, part of a larger story: How Obama, from a standing start three months ago, built a fund-raising apparatus as powerful as Clinton's. How Obama's people, tapping a national hunger for something new and fresh, along with the unease of many Democrats about Clinton, ginned up more money for use in the primaries than she did. How they kicked her ass on the Internet and tapped twice as many donors overall. How they even held their own against the Clinton machine in New York. How Obama, that is, won the money primary-or, at least, its first installment-and arguably turned himself into the race's co-front-runner.

... Two weeks after his dinner in Washington with Obama, Robert Wolf found himself supping there with the senator again, in a private room at the Ruth's Chris Steakhouse near Dupont Circle. But this time, their meal was by no means à deux. Around the table sat the members of Obama's embryonic New York finance committee: fund manager Jim Torrey (whose daughter is on the staff of this magazine); Provident Group partner Brian Mathis; Citibank executive Michael Froman; private-equity manager Jamie Rubin; and Orin Kramer.

...  Many of Obama's baby bundlers cut their teeth in Bill Clinton's administration. Mathis and Froman both worked in the Treasury Department, while Rubin, son of Bob, had been a staffer at the Federal Communications Commission. There was also Josh Steiner, another Treasury hand and now a partner of Steve Rattner's at the Quadrangle Group. And others had no Clintonian association, but were emerging fund-raising powerhouses, such as former Goldman Sachs golden boy Eric Mindich.

At the heart of the next-gen cadre were Froman and Mathis, both law-school classmates of Obama's. Together, they recognized that, whereas the Clinton fund-raising corps represented the financial elite tossed up by the LBO and M&A booms of the eighties, they were in a position to mine the vein of freshly minted money spawned by the hedge-fund and private- equity eruptions of the new millennium. The players behind those booms had no loyalties, and owed no debts, to the Clinton dynasty. They were looking for a candidate to call their own.

"In Barack's speech in Selma [earlier this year]," a baby bundler says, "he talked about the Moses generation and the Joshua generation in the civil-rights movement. It's sorta the same story here." He continues, "If we all lined up for Hillary, we wouldn't have even gotten into the anteroom, let alone had seats at the table-there's no more room. It would've been, 'You have an idea? Send us an e-mail and we'll have someone get back to you. Oh, and don't forget to send those checks.' But that's not how it is with Barack. We're already at the table."

Then there was Julius Genachowski, who for years was Barry Diller's go-to guy at InterActiveCorp. Genachowski connected Obama to another pool of money: technology and media. Co-hosting fund-raisers in New York and Washington (with former FCC chairs Reed Hundt and Bill Kennard), he helped raise more than $600,000. ...

By early March, when Obama hit New York on a fund-raising swing, the sense of momentum was palpable.  ...

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by: amberglow @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 12:14:22 PM CDT

Solid Punch, Though It Did Not Land (4.00 / 1)

Amberglow, I did not read any of your other comments on this matter, so I will just reply to this comment.

1.  Again, I  never contended that Obama did not receive a lot of money from the financial industry.  (I said that he ate at their trough; and will in the future--hope to a lesser degree.) You can check my original ocomment.

2. Also, in a previous comment, I said that if Obama did not fix the banking and finincial crisises that there is good potential he could lose in 2012. Again, you can check my comments on this matter. I suggested Dean Baker to Geithner at the Treasury.
That said, this does not mean Obama has been a door-mat to this powerful and elite industry.

A.  While Silicon Valley has been the major fund-raising nerve center for the Democratic Party and new innovative liberal and progressive net-roots, it still very hard to win national elections--let alone the Presidency of United States with the recent infrastructure currently.

B.  So, against 30 plus years  of powerful interest groups and lobbyists, it is going to take time to lessen their strength.  (I might add that Obama's passed pretty strong Ethics Reform dealing with hegemonic matter.) That said, I rather have had the Dems get the majority of money from "Wall St." than the Republicans.

C.  At any rate, while we been introduced to Treasury-speak via Geithner, the problem of fixing these insolvent banks are not easy. Joseph Stiglitz recently wrote a very excellent piece, step by step, on how to fix these instutions. Josh, over at TPM, has been really trying to dig into the different "plans" and why they may not have been inacted. Still, whatever the systemic risk to nationlize the banks, I am with Krugman, Baker, Nourbini, Stiglitz, etc.  (If I had my choice:  public hangings (and I don't support the death penalty) of this derelict and treasonous group of people--not all, but too many.)

D.  While Rubin, Summers,Greenspan, Goldman, Citigroup and some of the retreads that got us into this mess, and are using their power to influence policy is unfornute.  Though, it seems Summers went through some reform.  Again, like David said in a post here, there is a lot of talented people outside of Wall St. and Washington.  I second that.  I think reformers should come from the outside.  Yet, Yglesias made an excellent point the other day: we do have a lot of career civil servants that serve in different government departments.  The military was the best example, followed by the State Department. The Treasury Department. . . well, what can one say.

E.  Still, I was not aware that Obama repealed the Glass-Steagal law; that he signed a huge omnibus bill pushed by the Republican Majority that included the Commodities and Securities Modernization Act. (Call me naivee, but I did not think Clinton wanted to sign that bill--even with Greenspan and Rubin cheering him on. There was no choice.) I don't recall Obama allowing the biggest bubble and evil instuments of finance to pluder our economy under his watch.

* Though, I do not recall Obama signing the Bankruptcy Bill.
* I do remember him proposing legislation for home-owners--though weak; still, it something. Hopefully, we can build on it. (Yet, we have seen our moderate and Blue Dog Democrats trying becoming an obstacle.)
* In his budget: 1. An end for off-shore tax havens and other accounting gimeckry. 2. Capital gains to be increased modestly. 3. Hedge Fund Managers to pay  income tax.  4.  Has allowed for Barney Franks and others to investigate illegality of different executives. 5. A tax and trade that does not sit well with Cerebrus, I am sure; nor with Levin, Byrd, and Rockfeller. (Maybe Dems are the party of "dirty coal", too.) 5. While, entitlements are on "the table", I guarantee Peterson and his PAC, will not get their wishes on Social Security.
The list can go on.  Wall St. and its counterparts have pitted, vested interests in all of Obama's moderately  progressive budget.
Bottom Line:  If 60 Democrats came to him with strong policy proposals to right this ship more aggressively, he would sign it in a second.

Note:  I think, we will see much stronger regulations in the financial sector, including its shadow brethen. If we can get that done--and Bernanke is calling for it--this huge industry, will keep shrinking. And their power will be lessened. . . . Until then, neo-liberalism still lives on to a large degree in crafting solutions to difficult problems.  Sad

PS  This was not meant to be a battle of semantics.
PSS  Unless, there is true campain finance reform, we are always going to have problems.

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by: Jason Cataldi @ Sat Mar 14, 2009 at 18:12:26 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

it wasn't a punch at all -- (0.00 / 0)

it was a reminder -- and not meant as a response to you alone.

we're seeing the absolute refusal to restrict or regulate the very institutions and industry who paid Obama's way and are now getting trillions and trillions of our money with no end in sight -- many of these same firms funded his rise and it's necessary for all to know that (they don't).

Obama would not be President now if it wasn't for the "money primary". It's not about him not being responsible for a vote on the deregulation in the past -- it's about what they're doing now -- and following the money.

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by: amberglow @ Sun Mar 15, 2009 at 13:59:05 PM CDT

[ Parent ]