Treasury Secretary Tim “Turbo Tax” Geithner is still at it pressing for more control over Wall Street. Appearing before the House Financial Services Committee today, Geithner bandied about terms like systemic risk, consumer/investor protections, international coordination, and of course greater regulatory power. But as is his custom, Geithner had no specifics and was unwilling or unable to answer questions challenging his fundamental argument that government needs more control of financial institutions yesterday
You can find the entire hearing at C-SPAN
Rep David Scott (D-G) surprisingly asked a fair question. Since insurances companies are already regulated at the state level, and were not at the heart of the financial crisis, is there a conflict in this broad extension of government power?
How does Geithner respond? “Excellent question. Let me just start by saying what we need is better, smarter, tougher regulations.” That is not an answer. Nor did he address the main part of the question in his elaboration. Unfortunately, he was not pressed on the matter either.
Rep. John Campbell (R-Cali.) following up a line of questioning about Geithner’s proposal for resolution authority and the framework for that authority stressed, “my concern, Mr. Treasury Secretary, would be that if you have, that this is a pretty extreme authority of receivership. But if you have that authority without the complete information and perspective of a full regulatory framework, wrong decisions could be made.”
“We designed this proposal to fit within current laws… so that, I mean, current regulatory structure. You could move on this proposal… alone, and once you do the broader regulatory redesign we’re proposing, you could come back and make sure they fit… you could do it that way,” Geithner responded.
Geithner even went further claiming it was a great tragic failure of the country that the government didn’t possess the proposed broad authority at the start of the economic crisis and that it was in the interest of the country, for Congress to do everything it can to make sure they’ve got broader tools to manage this effectively. Basically, just give us the power now and we’ll discuss details later.
This guy was the President of the N.Y. Federal Reserve since 2003! It was his job to supervise and regulate financial institutions and he failed! Just look at the bang up job he did to help call attention to the pending economic crisis during his watch. Bear Sterns and Lehman… Fail. Either through malfeasance or incompetence he failed to pay $35,000 in taxes using Turbo Tax - software the majority of Americans use to file. Not to mention he masterminded the bail out of AIG to the tune of $170 billion of our tax dollars! He now believes he and the government should be given absolute authority over every financial institution in this country without a speck of proof that even bailing out AIG was in our best interest? Without detailing the conditions on this new power?
What business decisions are too risky to pursue? Would a business investment be too risky? Would an acquisition merger be too risky? Perhaps not going through with a merger is too risky. How much is too little capital, how much is too much? Enough is enough!
Wake up people! These guys in office are just manipulating your frustration and helplessness to further their own political agendas. The government doesn’t care they spent $170 billion on AIG because it’s not their money. The government knew about and approved the AIG bonuses before they were ever outraged. But by portraying AIG as greedy, fat cats the government can fool you into agreeing with this power grab among others as if it serves AIG right. But hey, nevermind the government is getting ready to shell out another $30 billion to evil AIG. No, government isn’t looking out for you and you don’t have to look out for big government.
it’s coming whether you like it or not.
