$3 Trillion Gone...Nothing to See Here...Move Along...

by: David Sirota

Wed Apr 01, 2009 at 12:15


So the tab is now in - about $3 trillion of taxpayer resources have gone out the door to Wall Street banks (and that doesn't include trillions in additional loan guarantees). Many of us - including me - were hoping that once George W. Bush left office, there would be significantly more oversight of and strings attached to the money. Not so, says the government's top watchdog, the esteemed progressive, Elizabeth Warren:
David Sirota :: $3 Trillion Gone...Nothing to See Here...Move Along...
Six months after the Troubled Asset Relief Program was signed into law, lawmakers and oversight officials, worried about the trillions of taxpayer dollars at stake, said Tuesday that the Treasury Department had not resolved problems regarding the program's accountability and transparency, nor a communications strategy.

"Our concern right now is that we do not seem to be a priority for the Treasury Department," Elizabeth Warren chairwoman of the Congressional Oversight Panel told a Senate Finance Committee hearing today.

I might feel a bit better about all this if the government's special inspector general overseeing TARP funds wasn't also saying that he's concerned that bailout cash is being stolen and/or misused:

US authorities have launched more than a dozen criminal investigations into possible fraud involving bank bail-out funds, the special inspector-general for the troubled assets relief programme told Congress on Tuesday.

Certainly, it's good that criminal investigations are happening - but the fear is that if those are happening without much disclosure, they may only be netting a tiny number of infractions that are actually being committed. And I think that's a justifiable fear when the government's top watchdog is saying that the Treasury Department under Bush and now Obama is refusing to provide basic information to her panel.

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$3 Trillion Gone...Nothing to See Here...Move Along... | 19 comments
White House gatekeeper Rahm Emanuel (4.00 / 3)
People like Elizabeth Warren and Sheila Bair aren't considered even though Obama know of their good work. Rahm had/has close ties to Freddie Mac so anything that exposes him for aiding and abetting Wall Street is swept under the rug:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/...  

3 Trillion dollars to keep (4.00 / 6)
Obama's banking buddies fat and happy -- for now, of course. When they have more "toxic assets" they want to foist off on the taxpayers, Obama will obligingly reach into his wallet and pay them off. (They must be good people -- they went to Harvard too!)

Yet $50B for the auto industry was unthinkably large.

What fraction of 3 Trillion is $50B? My handy dandy calculator says 1.7%.

I love how a little arithmetic can sometimes put things in correct perspective.

Did I say (4.00 / 4)
Obama would reach into his wallet?

Silly me, he's always reaching into our wallet!

[ Parent ]
In what way (0.00 / 0)
are the automotive industry's problems comparable to the financial industry's problems?

Show your work.

[ Parent ]
I've made my case over and over (0.00 / 0)
in the comments, especially in the Quick Hits.

If you're really interested, check them out.

[ Parent ]
Pretty dire outlook, no? (0.00 / 0)
Click

What a car company with a future looks like  (Paul Goodman) 6 comment(s)

and you get

Sorry!
We were unable to locate that page. Please return to the front page.

[ Parent ]
Main Street vs Wall Street (4.00 / 1)
Who says that WS is more important?  If nobody is working, there is nobody to lend any money to.   Who the hell died and left them boss?  

They're asking for another four years -- in a just world, they'd get 10 to 20. ~~ Dennis Kucinich  
[ Parent ]
for one thing (0.00 / 0)
Financial institutions are sort of important for keeping credit and money flowing through the country. And once they're cleaned out, stop taking stupid risks and are properly regulated, they'll be up and running in the black in short order. Wall Street's problem is short-term viability and protecting stakeholders, which, contrary to the popular belief here, extends far beyond Wall Street itself.

OTOH, GM has been bleeding to death for decades and its management has been incapable of figuring out how to stop it the entire time. GM's problem is long-term viability. Sure, we can pour billions into so they can make payroll... but then, sure enough, three months later, they're back for more.

If you've got a plan for long-term viability, then I hear there's opening at the top of GM.

[ Parent ]
Not so... (4.00 / 1)
They knew exactly how to stop the bleed.  All they had to do was dump all the retirees in the streets and bust the union. With Obama's help, that is exactly what will happen; and when it does, taxpayers will assume GM's pension liabilities.  

Unlike the banks, manufacturing never defrauded their investors out of trillions.  And in a consumer based economy, one needs employed consumers earning a living wage.  You can buy in to trickle down economics all you want.  It doesn't make it so.  

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

[ Parent ]
Bloomberg -- "U.S. govt and the Fed have spent, lent or committed $12.8 trillion" (4.00 / 2)
Financial Rescue Nears GDP as Pledges Top $12.8 Trillion -- http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/...

The U.S. government and the Federal Reserve have spent, lent or committed $12.8 trillion, an amount that approaches the value of everything produced in the country last year, to stem the longest recession since the 1930s.

New pledges from the Fed, the Treasury Department and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. include $1 trillion for the Public-Private Investment Program, designed to help investors buy distressed loans and other assets from U.S. banks. The money works out to $42,105 for every man, woman and child in the U.S. and 14 times the $899.8 billion of currency in circulation. The nation's gross domestic product was $14.2 trillion in 2008.
...

"The president and Treasury Secretary Geithner have said they will do what it takes," Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chief Executive Officer Lloyd Blankfein said after the meeting. "If it is enough, that will be great. If it is not enough, they will have to do more."

...


My handy dandy calculator speaks again (4.00 / 3)
and it says that the unconscionably large $50B proposed auto industry bailout is only 0.4% of $12.8 Trillion.

I can't stand those greedy thieves in Michigan and other unfashionable states! I couldn't be happier Obama has sicced his Wall Street corporate raiders on them!

[ Parent ]
Why not (0.00 / 0)
bail out the Seattle-PI and Rocky Mountain News?
[ Parent ]
10 years of global warming abatement (4.00 / 1)
If you do the math, that $3 trillion works out to about ten years of the probable cost to the US of doing some serious work about global warming - and that's if we do it all through government spending. If you also rely on regulation and beefed-up standards, you could be looking at half of what the government could have to pay.

The big bi-coastal shoving match isn't New York vs. Los Angeles. It's Wall St. vs. Bourbon St.

Start using the Larger Number! (4.00 / 1)
David, in your commentary I would ask that you consider using the Larger Number (See Bloomberg) every time you comment on the financial industry bailouts.  

This relates to your earlier postings about the difference between the activist class and the mass media market(s).  I don't see any real penetration into the mass media about the extent of the guarantees that have been made by the Fed.  I suspect that most people don't have any idea just how much of their money has already been pledged, or what kind of risks the Fed and the Treasury have already incurred, or what they may yet incur.  Typically what I hear on NBC Nightly or on NPR is something about TARP being $700 Billion, and there's some discussion about the "proposed" Geithner plan which "may" end up costing 1 trillion.  If the fed is mentioned, it's mentioned the same way you referred to it here; that the numbers discussed don't include the guarantees issued by the Treasury and the Fed.  

Well, if those guarantees are worth 400% of the actual monies already expended, don't you think you should include that?  Isn't that, in fact, more important, because it is in fact the vast majority of the monies taxpayers can expect to have to cover?  It seems to me that that is the number that ought to be receiving the bulk of the attention.  

i second that -- it's all guaranteed and is as good as spent already -- the total keeps growing, too (4.00 / 1)
i hate that tv still uses the 700 billion lie, and 3 trillion is just another lie and minimization. The Bloomberg link also says over 4 trillion has been spent outright anyway -- not 3.

people need to know the full extent of this thievery.

[ Parent ]
and the chart in the link i posted is worth spreading around too -- (4.00 / 1)
it lays out just how many different ways various branches and departments are throwing our money away by the shipload.
[ Parent ]
Sen. Chris Dodd, in response to my inquiry on the MLN videofeed (0.00 / 0)
which can be viewed at
http://www.myleftnutmeg.com/sh...
said he was "intrigued" with the idea proposed by Elizabeth Warren for a "Consumer Financial Products Safety Commission".

He also said he supported a Systemic Risks Regulator, but not within the Federal Reserve, as well as a "clearinghouse" to regulate "exotic instruments".

Not Ideas About The Thing, But The Thing Itself -- Wallace Stevens

a "clearinghouse", tho, is a place where things are sold -- not regulated -- no? (4.00 / 1)
he's worthless -- they're all wholly-owned subsidiaries of these companies.
[ Parent ]
Praise be to Saint Paul (0.00 / 0)
Your parsing of a dictionary definition has persuaded me to oppose this effort.
[ Parent ]
$3 Trillion Gone...Nothing to See Here...Move Along... | 19 comments
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