After only a few weeks in which the new 'Fake Pecora Commission' questioned Robert Rubin on perhaps the most egregious Banks of them all, Citi-Group, is now being welcomed back by the Democrats with open arms, as Vice President Biden will be the 'Key Note Speaker' for the 'New Come Back Kid.'
Rubin (who never really left) is back into the Washington policy-making scene next week, with a splashy relaunch of the Hamilton Project, housed at the Brookings Institution. As founder of the project, Rubin will deliver the opening remarks and speak on one of the two panels.
How stupid is this? Could the 'timing be any worse'? OMG. Only a few weeks ago, we head Robert Rubin who cleaned up with $250 million dollars, until he was finally fired, from Citi-group make this 'hollow statement' to the Financial Services Inquiry Commission:
"We all bear responsibility for not recognizing this, and I deeply regret that," Rubin said in his prepared testimony. Except that saying that everyone is to blame is the next best thing to saying that no one is. Prince, Citi’s CEO from 2003 until November 2007, and Rubin, who served on the board into 2009, also sought to defend themselves by characterizing the financial crisis as an unpredictable event, a "black swan" born of some inconceivable confluence of factors. That brought this memorable outburst from Commissioner Bill Thomas, a former Republican congressman:
"What do you get paid for if it isn’t having some intuition, understanding, knowledge?" he asked. "Or do you just do what everybody else is doing because everybody else is doing it, and if you don’t do it then you won’t make money — because I do think it’s all about money. And it was big money on the way up, but never at any point is it on the way back down. What I’m saying is that when I get this kind of argument as to what what happened in hindsight, it’s listening to someone blame the inferior quality of leather in a pair of shoes based on the feed that some person supplied to a feedlot feeding the cattle to produce the leather."
I realize that 'all of this is nothing more than grandstanding' by Republicans and Democrats alike, but it still does not answer the the simple question that I am asking Mr. Rubin:
If you are so sorry, Mr. Rubin, (including all your pals on Wall Street who let Main Street and our manufacturing base die, after going after the very homes we live in for nothing more than greed/profit when all you were warned and warned again, kept cooking the books...) how about cutting the rebop on how you are so called bearing: 'responsibility for not recognizing this, and just how much you deeply regret that," and instead giving the money back that you stole under fraud and false accounting standards?
Yeah, that will happen right after 'the Rapture' and 'President Palin' ascends to heaven on the Wings of the Tea Party as the 'Real America' shows up again out of the old 'Leave It To Beaver' Episodes.
As for Rubin himself, what is the man who's been almost exactly 180 degrees wrong on the major economic issues of his time thinking these days? Well, in an essay published by Newsweek late last year, Rubin worried about too much spending on job-creation, opposed forcing the riskiest derivative contracts onto public exchanges, resisted an accounting reform that would require financial institutions to assess their assets based on actual market prices rather than just making things up, and warned against what he calls impractical proposals to break up "too big to fail" banks. His most pressing concern was the federal deficit. All in all: A decidedly Wall Street rather than Main Street agenda.
And now, on top of this fabulous new 'come back' of Robert Rubin and the Hamilton Group, with our own Vice President giving 'his big OK smoochy Rooney' to Robert Rubin, we have none other than the Republican Party, Mitch McConnell, stepping up to the plate and setting the 'narrative' to strike into the hearts of the 'populists' outrage against Wall Street.
I warned people that this is exactly what would happen, because President Obama has refused to stand up, 'except in pretty speeches' and dragging out Paul Volcker as the 'Smoke and Mirror Decoy' for any true reform, when everyone knows, that President Obama, and Senator Dodd's reform bill is a bunch of bullshit. The 'roots' of the bill do not address the most important elements: Too Big To Fail....the Bail Out Wall Street/the Banks in Perpetuity....the much needed Derivative Risky Betting that has not been addressed, the spectacular disappearance of President Obama standing directly behind Elizabeth Warren for a solid, much needed 'Consumer Protection Agency' NOT PUT UNDER THE FEDERAL RESERVE, the intense failure of helping Main Street or even addressing etc...etc....
Mitch McConnell is now presenting what I would call the 'ultimate Dog Whistle' for the Tea Baggers/Party by presenting these 'key talking points and phrases, while, naturally, what is really going on is that as the Republicans have always done, protecting Wall Street. They have no new ideas....what he is doing is what I warned about for this past year:
If President Obama continued to 'refuse to fight for and step up to honest real reform' the Republicans would find a way to 'steal this wedge issue' (even though they have no honest intention of following through on it) and that is the point.
This is more about the 'narrative' ...........this is more about what people 'will just hear' instead of 'investigating' on there own, but in the end, what this is really about, is both parties: Democrats and Republican 'Courting and Wining and Dining' Wall Street to get as much money as they can from Wall Street for the upcoming elections.
In the end, neither party is showing any real honest courage or need for 'protections' that are so sorely needed for the American people or for, God Forbid, holding those accountable that caused our entire nation to lose over 11 million jobs, 16 million foreclosures, loss of hard earned equity and credit, loss of their retirement/life savings, holding the SEC, NYSE, and the Banks and Regulators accountable.
In fact: NO ONE IS BEING HELD ACCOUNTABLE. And both President Obama and Mitch McConnell are doing nothing more than 'giving lip service' to the taxpayers, hoping that 'Wall Street' will be the one to write them on their 'dance card' if they can both figure out a way to 'pretend that reform' is happening, so the American people 'believe it is' but never, ever having any more intentions than to 'keep the status quo' going full steam, because after all, that is the real game:
'Tell the masses/taxpayers/tea baggers what they want to hear,' and then make certain when the 'final bill' comes forward - nothing has changed, and in fact, 'we' get screwed even further.
In a floor speech this morning, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell threw cold water on the prospects of detente, establishing a hard line of attack against the Dodd bill, and indelibly marking the party line: "We must not pass the financial reform bill that's about to hit the floor." The crux of his criticism is that the bill institutionalizes... taxpayer-funded bailouts of Wall Street banks." He knocked the expansion of power at the Fed and Treasury, while sounding the alarm on Wall Street accountability. If the outline of his speech sounds familiar, it's because it is the exact argument pollster Frank Luntz urged Republicans to make earlier this year in a widely publicized memo.
"Roadmaps" for shutting down banks: The bill would require large institutions to periodically submit plans for systematic shutdown to be used in the event of disaster. Higher capital requirements and restricted trading activities could be be used to punish companies that failed to submit adequate "funeral plans." These plans are supposed to help oversight agencies understand the best way to start dismantling the institution and selling assets quickly in a dire scenario -- it's an information and transparency measure, not a structural change. Liquidation: Under the Dodd bill, the FDIC would take charge of selling off pieces of large financial institutions that go bust, but the Treasury, Fed and a panel of bankruptcy judges would have to sign off on liquidating an insolvent firm before action could be taken. (The judges aren't a part of the Frank bill.)
So back to the issue at hand. When McConnell talks about "the tax payer," at least for the first $50 billion, he means the banks. And when he says "let them fail," he means don't seize and dismantle. As far as "institutionalizing" bailouts, a more accurate characterization is probably that the bill establishes a protocol for rescue scenarios. But that doesn't mean it incentivizes them.
Read more: http://swampland.blogs.time.com/...
Here is the horrifying 'New Tea Bagger Tap Into the Anger/Hate of Wall Street Meme Video......from Mitch, if you can stand to watch it:
Talk about 'painting himself into a total corner, sorry President Obama, but now that the 'truth' is coming out, especially all the facts, figures, and 'who you chose to surround yourself with' the WaMu scandal...which only took 3 very very long years to come to the surface, in Congress is making President Obama 'look like the very savvy businessmen' he is working with: Geithner is crowing about the government's "success" once again:
America is close to turning the page on this economic crisis. While far too many Americans are still out of work and face deep economic hardship, we have now reported three quarters of positive growth and the beginnings of job creation. Timothy Geithner
And then after he makes such blatant lies he has this to say?
The true cost of this crisis, however, will always be measured by the millions of lost jobs, the trillions in lost savings and the thousands of failed businesses. No future generation should have to pay such a price.
Six to eight out of ten loans made out of that WaMu office were fraudulent. These lost jobs, lost savings and thousands of failed businesses were not an accident, they were not "unforeseeable" and they were not "unavoidable" or "part of a business cycle." Read the above again: Six to eight out of ten loans made out of that WaMu office were fraudulent. Fraud is supposed to result in criminal charges and prison time. Yet no indictments have issued, none of these banksters have gone to prison, and not only have the people responsible not been prosecuted they've gotten rich off their scams and kept the damn money that they stole! That is welcome news. The best way to protect American families who take out a mortgage or a car loan or who save to put their kids through college is through an independent, accountable agency that can set and enforce clear rules of the road across the financial marketplace. The best way to protect American families is to prosecute fraudulent conduct and put the scammers in prison where they belong. These people don't care about fines, just as Pfizer didn't - they pled guilty to the same felony twice, treating it as "a cost of doing business" as it was about one percent of their market cap.
http://market-ticker.denninger.net/
The fact is neither President Obama, or Mitch McConnell address the 'real reform' that is necessary for 'real protection of Americans' but the fact the President Obama did not take the 'lead' in an honest and forthright manner, treating again, exactly by 'letting Congress take the lead' and hiding behind Paul Volcker who is being used a a 'puppet' for 'fake credibility' and throwing Elizabeth Warren under the bus, while having the 'nerve' to have Vice President Biden as the Key Note Speaker to 'Revive and Welcome back Robert Rubin and the Hamilton Project, and of course, having Pete Peterson set up the new 'Deficit Hawks Commission' to go after Social Security and Medicare, in order to pay off the 'toxic debts' of Wall Street/the Banks......going after the 'elderly and the so called 'entitlements' that people worked and paid for all of their lives, STINKS TO HIGH HEAVEN.
How can they even call themselves Democrats? The 'Working Mans/Womans Party? That's what I really want to know.
It is all about the 'narrative, and now that Mitch McConnell has 'tapped into the populist anger' that President Obama refused to address, unlike FDR, and the REAL PECORA COMMISSION DID' that made real reform possible in our nation, then I can only say this:
Welcome back Robert Rubin, and no one is being fooled by any thing that Vice President Biden, or President Obama are embracing, and the last thing that either party is embracing, is the courage to change, the courage that our forefathers had, to make certain that the very last people that have a voice anymore in our government, are the very people that elected them, and depended upon them to act as a 'sacred public servants' who made 'oaths of office' to protect the American people above all.
When President Obama decided to play 'both sides' and hide behind Summers, Geithner, Bernanke and all the rest of the 'Rubinites' what did we expect to happen?
You stand up for accountability, responsibility and change, or you don't, and now............the Republicans, just as I said they would, are going to 'fill that void' that President Obama left wide open, and it does not matter, that 'they caused it' most 'Americans' are so angry by where they have been driven, to despair, watching as Wall Street/The Banks are getting away with Fraud, over and over again, that this is the price we 'will pay' for a President that 'remained silent' when we needed him most.
Main Street or Wall Street? I think we know by now. No guessing from this point on. The dye has been cast, and it was cast because President Obama has failed to lead and stand up for 'strong financial reform.'
Now the Republicans are 'stepping in' to 'pretend' that they are the 'answer' to the very same people that they were part and parcel of destroying. This is the price of 'silence'...this is the price of not standing up and making the 'tough decisions' when our nation needed this at it the heart of despair and needed more than all, to 'trust' in Candidate Obama, who promised above all, to up lift the 'Middle Class and fight for Main Street.'
Thanks.