Posted on 11/07/2009 6:27:16 AM PST by Daisyjane69
Given the source, I was skeptical. I expected 55 straight minutes of Republican-bashing.
I was wrong. Much to my surprise this video placed the blame exactly where it belongs...on the merry band running the Clinton financial team. And for good measure, they hit Obama with a few whacks as well (since he has some of the culprits in his cabinet NOW!)
But along with Elizabeth Warren (who is a watchdog now), Brooklsey Born tried to be the canary in the mine. I don't have much use for these gov't types, but it's possible that these two gals are two honest to goodness public servants. And they are each getting the same amount of cooperation from the powers that be, it appears.
Make a pot of tea or coffee, grab a pastry or donut and prepare to not want to miss a second of this.
bttt
This goes to EVERY SINGLE PERSON on my email list who said to me:
“It’s Bush’s fault.”
Every last one.
Did you see the Dylan Ratigan video he also lays blame on clinton for the repeal of glass steagall
http://bluelori.blogspot.com/2009/11/wall-street-bankers-largest-theft-in.html
Brooksley Born is a brilliant woman and what they did to her to keep her quiet was unconscionable.
Her warnings about what was to come if the CDS mess wasn't regulated was spot on...over 10 years ago!
Any person involved with silencing her...including Greenspan...should be hung up by the Buster Browns.
No, but I’m not surprised, either.
http://thestrangedeathofliberalamerica.com/foreclosed-blame-bill-clinton-redux.html
and the guy that wrote and sourced this is a big-time Obama voter...not some right winger!
Bump.
Wouldn't that have been the Gramm (R, TX) Leach (R, IO) Bliley (R, VA) Act?
Saved for later...
Also deserved for his time as a community organizer extorting guaranteed-never-to-be-repaid loans from Citibank.
There’s plenty of blame to go around.
But beyond CFMA, the biggest problem is the erosion of personal responsibility in this country. Canada's biggest banks did not face collapse - because personal responsibility was maintained across the board in their financial system (including consumers). And we have seen our political leadership - Dems and Pubbies alike - spend money like there is no limit whatsoever - the Dems just are much worse, but both are truly bad in that regard. Until we hold our political and corporate class accountable - and demand the same from citizens and consumers as well - all the regulations and legislation in the world won't avert the next disaster.
do me a favor and after you all watch it, post back. I’d like to hear the opinions of everyone else.
Looks and sounds like nothing more than anti-free market propaganda, with well meaning lefties being led down the garden path by conservative economists. It turns out to be an apology for Clinton, not a fixing of blame on him.
The reality is that the CRA, a massive “micro-managment” of the economy by government is far more important in creating the current crisis (although many other government interventions contribute as well).
Even the heroine of the piece is a show-piece for government intervention.
This thing isn’t analysis, it is propaganda for more government meddling and destruction.
If you want to understand what happened, you are far better off reading Thomas Sowell’s “The Housing Boom and Bust”.
'ZACTLY!!
To look at this as solely a Republican or Democrat debacle is to look at it through blinders.
Am watching the program now, and have not completed it yet.
This program seems to be more of an overall indictment of capitalism and deregulation, how government should run more of our financial system.
The government requirements are the largest CAUSE of our problems, like the Community Reinvestment act of Congress and Jimmy Carter.
I disagree completely.
I see nothing that apologizes for Clinton’s administration; rather I see a complete indictment of it (and Alan Greenspan, btw), compounded by Obama’s utilization of many of the same bad actors.
With all due respect, I own and have read Dr. Sowell’s book.
If you review this video again, you’ll note that it’s point is that the OTC derivatives were completely mysterious, deliberately so (regardless of their genesis via real estate or other causes, which there were certainly) and Ms. Born’s attempt to bring sunlight were thwarted.
You’ll note the last 5 minutes of this documentary:
Neither Summers nor Rubin are willing to be interviewed for this piece.
Greenspan admits he made a philosophical mistake.
And all the rest confess that, they should have listened to Miss Born. Because she was right.
And the worst is probably yet to come, given the state of so many zombie banks, holding not only bad loans on their books. But the investment banks are holding hundreds of TRILLIONS of dollars of derivatives (probably worthless) on their books.
Especially since Sheila Bair (a Republican, btw) is ALLOWING banks to break existing law by continuing to carry bad loans on their books.(roll on over to KD, market-ticker. This is his life’s work, sounds like)
This is fraud. That is not the same as capitalism.
That’s the way I saw it, too! Clinton gets let off the hook because he’s led down the path by the evil free market mavens.
I think it is well done as propaganda. The bad-guy vs. good guy, or “prophet in the dark”, drama essentially carries the thing and helps both disguise and inculcate the pro-government assumptions behind it.
Thomas Sowell would be laughing his a$$ off!
“And the worst is probably yet to come, given the state of so many zombie banks, holding not only bad loans on their books. But the investment banks are holding hundreds of TRILLIONS of dollars of derivatives (probably worthless) on their books.”
Agree with this. Although banks are unloading as many bad loans back onto the government which forced them to make them in the first place under the CRA.
I stumbled on this show a couple of weeks ago and had the same reaction....at first I thought “oh great! let’s hear about how GW is to blame for everyting!”
My goodness - they didn’t blame Bush once!
And whaddya know? There was Geitner and Sumners in the thick of it - acting like chauvenist good ‘ole boys picking on the smart lady -who turned out to be right!
AND, if you will notice, the problem starts with LTCM after being heavily affected by the RUSSIAN financial crisis. I remember VERY CLEARLY the encouragement of feds to our investment community to help out the newly freed Russian economy. This could have been set up by the “men behind the curtain” in the guise of the KGB after the fall of the USSR.
I know, sound like tinfoil hat stuff, but ...
Are you on facebook?
Brookesly has a page - very interesting too.
Did you know she was considered for AG before Reno got it?
In retrospect I’m thinking Waco would have been different had Brookesly been in charge.
not on facebook.
But thanks, lady. I was starting to think I had watched a different documentary than everyone else.
I’m all for capitalism. But I’m NOT for the Wild Wild West when only one side has bullets for the pistol!
The issues that they prevented her from addressing is contributing to COLLAPSING pensions from sea to shining sea.
And we taxpayers are gonna get stuck with this bill, too!
I didn’t like how they went after Rand, as if part of Rand’s philosophy was that fraud was part of “free market” and should not be regulated.
That was one theme throughout the show I thought was ridiculous - that part of “free market” belief was acceptance of fraud.
But other than that - I was surprised at their criticism of a DEMOCRAT president’s team.
While it is true Brookesly was advocating regulation - most people will agree that common sense regulation should protect citizens against deception and fraud.
She was concerned about the potential of a domino affect if these products went bad - and she was right.
Of course Sowell was right about the boom and bust - but that is what made the swaps go bad - and when the swaps went bad it created a financial black hole.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/161199
“There’s plenty of blame to go around.”
Yes, Clinton and the banksters got help from the Republican congress. Clinton got to corrupt the loan industry standards to turn the banking system into a racial quota low income housing scam in exchange for banksters being paid off with the repeal of that key banking law.
Everyone was unhappy when it all came crashing down except the banksters, Congress and Clinton. The Left is downright giddy with the opportunity it presents to destory the country.
Is it true there's are more "derivative" debt than there is money - in the world? That we owe more than exists?
Just finished watching the entire show and now see this WHOLE piece as just a SLAM at free enterprise and ANY sort of free market libertarianism that Ayn Rand thought.
This is TYPICAL of PBS and I would NOT recommend this to anyone. This film completes itself with HENRY WAXMAN lecturing a contrite Alan Greenspan, about how WRONG free enterprise truly is and the absolute need for GOVERNMENT CONTROL, or as I call it, MARXIST control of our system, to “protect us” from ourselves.
What BS.
I am a right wing conservative who admires Brookesly.
She was a class act among ruthless sharks.
Those guys show what happens when really smart arrogant people think bad things won’t happen just because they’re in charge.
Here’s a good article about swaps...
http://www.newsweek.com/id/161199
Oh, and I forgot to mention the way that Odumbo rides in as a hero on a white horse at the end, promising “new regulations”.
What a load of CRAP.
Whew! By any chance were these derivatives made up of the bundles of sub-prime mortgages? (a Carter innovation with Freddy and Fannie complicity and Barney Frank’s imprimatur)
Thanks...this video held me rather spell bound!
I didn’t like the whole Rand angle either.
I was never taught that free market principles meant you had to accept fraud.
I was of the understanding both parties in transactions were to be aware of the value and terms of the products.
“While it is true Brookesly was advocating regulation - most people will agree that common sense regulation should protect citizens against deception and fraud.
She was concerned about the potential of a domino affect if these products went bad - and she was right.”
I couldn’t agree more, Scotswife! And, I didn’t know she had been offered the AG job, but now wish she had taken it!
Well sure!
That’s the problem with that market - they took the mess that was Fannie/Freddie and spread the virus and magnified it.
That was the funny part - I thought.
Notice who Obambi’s advisors are?
They’re the bad guys.
It sounds like that may be true - problem is - it’s very hard to document and verify.
Which was kind of the whole point she was trying to make.
“Just finished watching the entire show and now see this WHOLE piece as just a SLAM at free enterprise and ANY sort of free market libertarianism that Ayn Rand thought.”
I agree with you in general. In particular if the derivatives were made up of the sub-prime mortgages which were forced on to financial institutions by the government.
The problem is the greed and power factor...
I think all the failing institutions including GM should have had no bail out $ and let it all fail. Consequences of the greed, fraud and deception can be a better lesson than government rescue.
YES!
In other things Ms. Born has written, she predicted this very thing, as it was “only” 24 TRILLION when she wanted to deal with the problem.
According to the documentary:
(go to 9:45 on the time remaining)
In 2007: 595 TRILLION dollars in derivatives
Yes, you read that right.
I’d be happy if the Schmuck in Chief would enforce the laws already on the books.
Like immigrations, we don’t need anymore stinking laws. We need LAW ENFORCEMENT.
The whole idea of free enterprise has to operate on a level of “respect” for both the producer and consumer: The consumer has a need for a good or service and the producer can provide the good or service to the consumer at an ACCEPTABLE price! The consumer can say “No” to the purchase and walk away and seek the goods or service from another producer! The producer can’t hold a gun to the head of the consumer and force them to buy!
In our currently corrupt system, a third party now in our system is the GOVERNMENT that determines what is FAIR and places rules on the producer to LIMIT the amount the producer can earn, and thereby LIMITS what the producer will make available to other consumers.
I know this isn’t the whole system, but it shows rudimentary structure of how it works.
I think this reinforces the concept that capitalism without morality will not work.
However, I was on the exercycle ... did she really base her entire desire to regulate this industry on two (count them ... 1 ... 2) incidents over the course of ten years? One lawsuit (P&G) and one fund collapse (LTCG) in a market how big? That doesn’t sound like a huge problem.
In hindsight, perhaps it was. Perhaps regulation was called for.
But the real trouble is that immoral people are willing to take unacceptable risks with other people’s money.
And the problem with the derivative market is that 99.9999% of America doesn’t have a clue what they actually are.
I often suspect the architects of CDS’s don’t even know what they are either.
So - the value of that market exceeds the value of our entire economy? Possibley the world economy?
Does that sound right?
There is something very wrong with those products!
Yeap just another anti capitalist hit piece by PBS.
Don’t take this personally or the wrong way, but, with all due respect...you’re nuts.
Capitalism thrives on a level playing field. If presented that way, there is NO better system. It WINS ten times out of ten every time on a level playing field. Key word being LEVEL.
You’ve not only missed the putt, missed the green—you’re on the wrong course.
This is about investments, the details of which were being deliberately hidden from the investors (go back and watch that part about no computers, no pencils, no paper, and no yellow pads). And they see to it that NO regulator ever gets to see the books, nothing ever sees the light of day. Just “trust me?” Are you shitting me?
I recommend you visit pensiontsunami.com and poke around. I don’t have time to dig it up now, but I will this weekend: video exists of salespeople selling these very derivatives to teachers of the Milwaukee school system (some rule about videotaping these transactions in Wisconsin, evidently) and you can see for yourself how rosy and safe they sold these investments to be. All without never being under a single regulator. They weren’t worth the paper they were written on. This is the system you are defending.
The contributions of these teachers are GONE, as are those of their retirees. Due to the laws in place, the taxpayers are funding this incredible shortfall.
Soon, it will bankrupt the state of Wisconsin.
Mark....thanks for the review. ANYTHING PBS puts out, you have to take with a pillar of salt.
my parents - along with millions of other investors, had never heard of swaps. But their influence reached into their retirement as well - due to the products their advisor invested in, as well as from the derivative-induced crash that was inevitable.
Have they learned their lesson?
No - it’s still going on - and they’re inventing new derivatives.
Look at what just happened to Harvard - the “smart” folks don’t know how to manage these transactions either.
As far as I can tell, they’re a fancy way of selling insurance fraud.
I don’t see it. This video blames lack of regulation of the derivative market for *all* of our problems. Deregulation of the market.
It says NOTHING about congressional REGULATION of the housing market causing the housing collapse.
The only thing I feel that Greenspan did really wrong was keep interest rates too low for two long. Debt should hurt.
This piece blames REGAN for our mess and portrays Clinton as a poor doop that followed in Regan’s footsteps. It is a leftist hit piece.
I mean, what other regulations do you want to do away with?
Weights and measures, next?
I’m no fan of stupid regulations. Hell, the other day Obama and his cronies came down on a cereal mfg just because they listed “antioxidant” on their box, finding it a violation of some kind. To protest, I bought a box of that cereal WITH the warning on it. Just to prove a point.
But let’s not confuse ourselves and equate financial anarchy with freedom and liberty, as though they are twins. Because that is just dumb.
Investors have the right to know that their products have crossed at least one set of hairy eyeballs, to make sure things are on the “up and up.”
Kindest regards....
~dj
No, it doesn’t blame Bush.
It says, “It’s Regan’s fault! It’s Capitalism’s fault! Ayn Rand was a bad influence! We need more Socialism and government regulation!”
I thought the video well done, although it somewhat glosses over Congress’ role in this mess (both the Republicans in the late 90s, and the Dems today). The act of prohibiting any INVESTIGATION of oversight rules is unconscionable, and to have not reversed that is beyond that.
Clearly, the biggest fallacy in Greenspan’s thinking was that he didn’t believe financial companies would leverage themselves so highly that they would go under— he thought the “market” would prevent that. The underlying cause was that compensation packages were no longer based on actual creation of wealth, but in churning paper profits (the ultimate Ponzi scheme) everyone is happy as long as the market goes up....
hh
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