Koios
Recreational Kibitzer
- Nov 12, 2012
- 2,841
- 117
- 48
Pretending that the Republicans nearly destroyed the economy doesn't make it so. Neither the Republicans NOR the Democrats destroyed the Economy, the Banksters did.
Hank Paulson held a gun to Congress' head in 2008: "There will be Martial Law if we dont get the Banker Bailouts". Bankers OWN and RUN the United States.
Pretending they don't doesn't make it so.
That's a bit simplistic, not to mention scapegoating.
Vital elements of Glass-Steagall were eliminated, which was signed by Clinton, and urged by Greenspan, who was himself carrying the water for bankers, actually thinking they might better stablize the banking industry with a novel idea: credit default swaps. I think they actually thought it would help protect the finacial sector. But who knows? Anyway, to most folks in DC, it seemed a good idea at the time, and it passed ... near the end of Clinton's second term.
However, what happened was, banks went hog wild lending to anyone with a pulse, or any EU country that wanted it, as if it were Germany, or any city or county with debt they wanted to refinance, the unemployed wanting homes, you name it -- WITHOUT SUFFICIENT LIQUIDITY backing the risk (the thing in Glass-Steagall that needed eliminating for credit default swap to be legal).
The lending gone wild was not something predicted, but it became very apparent to regulators as being a huge problem, developing at an alarming rate. However, the fees earned from the not-actually-backed-risk loans, were making bankers rich. So instead of correcting the problem, Bush 43 and Paulson further gutted Glass-Steagall, and actively sidelined all regulators sounding any alarms, the most vocal of which, a woman in charge of regulating the Commodities Exchange, was taken down in Congressional hearings, with good old Al Greenspan brought back in to add weight to the forces trying to quiet her.
And whadaya know, what she warned of, came soon after, and we're still climbing out of the clusterfuck.
do you have a link for this? i would like to read it.
Four of them, actually. But here's part one of four: Video: Money, Power and Wall Street: Part Four | Watch FRONTLINE Online | PBS Video