Re: [RC] Goldman Sachs and the Left

[David R. Block]

Title: "Everything government touches turns to crap"--Ringo Starr

Howdy Billy, I appreciate the lack of time problem, but this probably won't help. Sorry. Well, the Christian suggestion was largely because of the history of the country and the role that the Christian religion has played in its formation, founding, and even fights like the War of Northern Aggression. (Gee, someone might get the impression that I'm from the South....) No slam on other religions intended. "How do you get the system to function as it should?" [Remembering the LAST TIME I cut and pasted and wound up with something you couldn't read. ;-) ] First, it would be nice if everyone all agreed on how the system should function. I don't think that we have that. One wants to eliminate risks. Well, that's a good thing, as far as it goes. However, risk is usually commensurate with rewards (dividends, interest, profit, stock going up), and with penalties (no dividends, no interest, losses, and stock going down). To the degree that one suppresses the penalties, one also suppresses the rewards. So investors make less money, including my 401k. Seeing retirement looming 14 (or so) years away, the bankruptcy of Social Security, the bankruptcy of Medicare, and the soon to be bankruptcy of the US on the back of Obamacare, I really need to make enough money so that if the rest are reduced I can still survive with the major medical condition of Diabetes. I don't like the possibility of decreased yield based upon government regulation. If I do something stupid, I should pay. If the government does something stupid, I should STILL pay? Er, NO.  Another is more interested in that [to me] slippery term "social justice." Righting past wrongs in the here and now by allowing certain "grievance groups" a preferred status, so that their investment is lower although they still wind up with a similar reward as someone paying full fare. In addition, failure to comply leads not only to legal penalties, but also smearing of the companies name as discriminatory towards the given "grievance group." This was the housing market with the Community Reinvestment Act in full swing, Freddie and Fannie singing its praises, and the sub-prime mortgage boom that eventually went bust. (And where I work, we were preparing for the bust back in 2006 already-why no one else could see that freight train flying down the tracks is anyone's guess. We started flagging sub-prime lenders back then in 2006 already. And we were limiting our exposure to them the best that we could.) This is simply "outcome based" evaluation written large. If Everybody has a house, it's all good!! Not really, apartment owners need income, too. It was the derivative products from these sub-prime mortgages that caused the dominoes to start falling as people lost their jobs and then lost their homes and it was found that the houses were over-inflated for the market, primarily due to easy credit leading to a glut of buyers. Some of the buyers should not have been buying. Freddie, Fannie, and the banks should not have made it so easy. But they had to, for the oppressed minorities. Or did they??? Someone else is not allergic to government ownership of large ailing corporations. Or at least SOME large ailing corporations. This is problematic in that the government keeps the role of referee but still becomes a player in the game. If no one else can see the conflict of interest in this, then I'm simply shocked. They also have no problem with extremely large corporations, particularly banks, as they merge failing institutions into healthy ones that were at least as large if not larger than the failing firm. This is the problem of "too big to fail," and the method of handling it only exacerbates the problem. Once again government is circumventing the bankruptcy process for protected groups of corporations, or forcing its own conclusions and outcome on the bankrupt company (GM, Chrysler). Some corporations are made more equal than others in the process. They also seem to want the best and brightest in the government rather than the private sector because their large expenditures have helped cause the wages in the government sector to now exceed the wages in the private sector for the same job. In the meantime, the proles out there are growing leery of trusting the government as it increases fees and penalties, introduces new fees and penalties (Obamacare), and has an insatiable appetite for the peoples money. Even when those people don't have jobs (Unemployment is taxable on the 1040; I was unemployed in part of 1984 and I had to pay taxes on some of the money). There is still a line on the tax form for "Taxable Unemployment Compensation." Talk about kicking someone when they are down!! Still other want "laissez les bon temps rouler." Basically your "wild west" market. How "wild" varies from individual to individual. I like it fairly wild. In a lot of respects, the results of this economic downturn appears to be more government intervention. It is my firm belief that government intervention with the Community Reinvestment Act cheerleading by Freddie and Fannie and thinly implied threats of discrimination suits lead to the bankers willingness to loan to people whom they really should not have loaned to. They were pressured to take unnecessary risk, facing damage and litigation against them and their banks should they fail to go along. Thus, government intervention is one of the prime causes of the failure. But because investigating this would lead to charges of racism, discrimination, and homophobia (Barney Franks' partner was an executive in one of those organizations), such an investigation will likely never take place. In fact, Franks stopped attempts by the Bush administration to regulate (yes, regulate not deregulate) Freddie and Fannie. So blame "greedy bankers" if you want, that's certainly part of it, but don't give the government a free pass. It has very dirty hands and all of this reform bullshit is designed to distract everyone from that fact. David "Everything government touches turns to crap"--Ringo Starr   On 4/24/2010 9:13 PM, bil...@aol.com wrote: David : Writing anything like a lengthy reply is out of the question for me this weekend. I'm taking a short break from a very busy schedule. But the point I was trying to make is, simply, let's say you have all the problems diagnosed correctly. Not that this is gospel truth, but let's just say it is.   What is the solution ?  Convert everyone to Christian faith ? As a modest suggestion, and admitting that for a heckova lot of people that would really be a good thing, nonetheless, that ain't gonna happen. Even granting that we all would be better off if the objective was a more realistic converting of a larger number to Christian faith, there still would be a good % not in the fold   --Jews, Buddhists, philosophical humanists, etc. And, of course, there would be a substantial # who are idiots no matter what you do, or criminals, or obviously flawed human beings.   So, given this kind of reality, with all the problems you have identified, plus other problems which I regard as important, and Ernie and Chris, etc., how do you get the system to function as it should ?   What are the steps to take ?  What is the remedy ?   Billy   -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------         In a message dated 4/24/2010 6:11:04 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, david.r.bl...@verizon.net writes: If you are going to get all technical about it, Ringo Starr is a British Citizen and was speaking of the British Government, you know, the one with universal health care. Oh wait.... That he echoes my GENERAL feeling towards the state and the statist is but a happy convenience. For me, anyway. The tainted SEC is now about to receive more power in this financial reform bill, but you would rather ignore that, evidently, and chase the SPECIFIC rabbit trails of the interstate highway system, the internet, fire departments, and sanitation systems and think of all of the wonderful things that the government has done. But lets not talk about the 800 pound gorilla that is the SEC, and that's about to turn into a 1200 pound [corrupt] gorilla. Heaven forbid!!! Brilliant change of subject. Bravo. [/sarc] And the CDC did so well distributing the Swine Flu vaccine after several deaths had already occurred, some of them in the Dallas area. Really on the ball there. Your health care future foreshadowed. I don't grant virtue to government, because I believe that that way lies the eventual worship of government and man or worship of the Dear Leader. Kind of against my religion there, but then again government today seems to be more interested in not offending Muslims than not offending Christians. I think that the demonization of Christianity and most other religions (but MOSTLY Christianity) by the left and the media (but I repeat myself) has largely shattered ANY moral values. We now live in an amoral society. Those who hold to any historical values "cling to their guns and religion," you know, are backwoods hillbillies, drive pickups with the Confederate flag displayed, and are closeted members of the KKK. So while I would give Christianity as the "where" I would simultaneously state that the populace at large would most likely be unwilling to accept it as the source of values, because the values and those holding them have been smeared relentlessly and all Christians portrayed as a combination of Elmer Gantry, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Jimmy Swaggart, James Bakker, and any other Christian minister caught in any misstep. If the SEC nutjobs were doing this in 2008-2009 (and they apparently were), then those should be fired. Screw SEIU or whatever union they may belong to. They obviously need to be replaced, it's just not so clear that their replacements would not be former ACORN staffers. Since one of them apparently has a salary of $200K+ I don't feel that people should be paid that much to surf porn 8 hours a day. Must have done their "real work" at home. [/smart alec] [This is now the second time that a signature line of mine has apparently led to a post. The first time was when I was chewed out for daring to have a Ronald Reagan quote down there on the week between his death and funeral. Extremely curious, that.] David   "Everything government touches turns to crap"--Ringo Starr   On 4/23/2010 10:44 PM, bil...@aol.com wrote: "Everything government touches turns to crap"--Ringo Starr The Interstate highway system ? The Arpenet which became the internet? The CDC and protection against epidemics? Local fire departments ? Sanitation systems for several thousand cities ? Etc, etc, into the thousands of examples of "virtuous government."   This said, and granting that the Democratic Party's idea of social values is generally hideous and insane, just where are we to get the values which make viable markets possible ? Adam Smith did say, after all, that a market divorced from a source of moral values can only result in a malfunctioning market.   And Lord knows that the market system, even if it is good in principle, is ( 1 ) essentially void of feelings of common good, ( 2 ) is only self-correcting usually, but far from always, and ( 3 ) can be manipulated in 100 different ways by players with no higher interest than maximizing profits.   OK, so where do we get the values that compel markets to show at least some minimum of mortality ?  Structurally, not by reason of good intentions. What is the practical solution ?   Any thoughts ?    Billy   ======================================================                 In a message dated 4/23/2010 7:13:27 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, david.r.bl...@verizon.net writes: And as the SEC has shown, bureaucrats and regulators are easily distracted by internet porn. So the regulations don't help a whole lot if the police are sitting in their offices watching "Debbie Does Dallas" instead of watching Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, et al. Government: the last refuge of the incompetent (and, apparently, office porn viewing). But I understand that it's starting to pay better. And apparently, you can spend 8 hours a day surfing porn sites. So hooray for higher paid incompetent regulators.... Oh wait.... David "Everything government touches turns to crap"--Ringo Starr   On 4/23/2010 11:57 AM, bil...@aol.com wrote:     natrionalreview online   April 23, 2010 4:00 A.M. Goldman Sachs and the Left An impressionistic study in cronyism.   President Obama was in the Big Apple on Thursday, for another lecture on big, bad Wall Street. The dutiful, third-row appearance by Lloyd Blankfein, Goldman Sachs’s CEO, said it all: More than any other firm, Goldman is confident in its ability to cozy up to the Democrats that regulate it, and to favorably shape the current congressional negotiations on financial reform.     "They’ve been wired through the Clinton years, the Bush years, and before that, they have a lot of heavy hitters,” Rep. Peter DeFazio (D., Ore.) tells us. “They’re well connected. . . . They’re aggressive.” DeFazio, along with Rep. Elijah Cummings (D., Md.), urged the Securities and Exchange Commission this week to widen its current investigation of the firm to include securities underwritten by Goldman and backed by American International Group, the bailed-out insurer, to probe for “fraudulent conduct” and “ill-gotten gains.”   “From the beginning, I’ve thought that the deal Goldman Sachs got via Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner on their bad bets through AIG kind of stunk,” DeFazio says. “They got $13 billion from AIG last year. I’m looking for any legal way to recoup that money for the people of the United States.” With former senior aides to Obama, Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.), the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and other Democrats on its payroll, Goldman isn’t fretting about DeFazio and company. As Timothy Carney of the Washington Examiner reports, four of the five in-house lobbyists at Goldman were Democratic staffers on Capitol Hill, with the remaining one a contributor to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Directing Goldman’s Washington shop is Michael Paese, Frank’s former go-to committee staffer, who had responsibility for committee policy related to the banking, securities, and insurance industries. One of Paese’s deputies is Ken Connolly, a veteran of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. And this week, Paese’s bosses enlisted Greg Craig, Obama’s former White House counsel, through the law firm Skadden Arps, just days after Goldman was charged with fraud by the SEC. The relationship between the government and Goldman is fluid and open. Frank’s staff, for one, is a training ground for big-banking lobbyists, and Goldman remains a soft landing spot for supportive ex-officials and former policymakers. Peter Roberson, who worked on the Boston congressman’s capital-markets team, recently left the House Finance Committee’s staff to join the world’s top clearinghouse for over-the-counter derivatives. Frank himself admits that the revolving door is unseemly. After Roberson quit, Frank publicly criticized him, a little tantrum to hide bigger problems. Over on Pennsylvania Avenue, the White House has friendships with many senior Goldman lobbyists outside of the bank’s immediate team of Washington operatives: former House minority leader Dick Gephardt; Janice O’Connell, a former adviser to Chris Dodd (D., Conn.), the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee; and former Tennessee congressman Harold Ford Sr., to name a few. Another Goldman-enlisted Washington warrior is Steve Elmendorf, John Kerry’s deputy campaign manager in 2004. Prominent Republicans, of course, are also part of the operation, with Ken Duberstein, a Reagan White House chief of staff, and Eric Ueland, former chief of staff to Bill Frist, the former Senate majority leader, on board. Altogether, the bank employs 41 lobbyists and 13 outside firms.   According to the Hill, Goldman has devoted $18 million over the last decade to lobbying members of Congress and “millions more to contributing to lawmakers’ campaigns.” It’s an immense, sprawling operation, buoyed by countless buddies inside the Obama administration, as detailed by Michelle Malkin earlier this week. Senior officials such as Mark Patterson, Tim Geithner’s chief of staff, are former Goldman lobbyists. Patterson, in fact, had Paese’s position before Paese. Analysis by the Christian Science Monitor shows that Goldman increased its lobbying by more than 70 percent over the past year, spending $2.8 million in the process, and it doesn’t end with Goldman. According to Public Citizen, a Washington, D.C., watchdog group, 940 former public officials are now registered lobbyists on behalf of banks and investment houses. The Center for Responsive Politics counts 56 former congressional aides on the Senate and House Banking Committees who went on to lobby for the financial sector. For Goldman, the intermingling is policy. A company insider tells Politico that the firm’s Washington operation is “a very conscious, long-term effort that is very deliberate and is intended to address this two-pronged need of understanding the political process and understanding our business.” For all of his talk about reforming Wall Street, President Obama has been powerless to stop the influence of lobbyists on his financial agenda, preferring to put his hand out, rather than up — his presidential campaign collected more than $1 million from Goldman employees, a wad of dough the president refuses to return. Obama’s hesitancy to return his bundle of Goldman cash is shared by Senate majority leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.), who was recently hosted by Goldman’s president at a fundraiser in New York. Other tentacles slither throughout the Democratic caucus. Since 1990, according to OpenSecrets.org, Goldman has donated over $31 million to political-action committees and candidates, with 64 percent of those donations going to Democrats. Despite’s Obama’s tough words at the Cooper Union, the symbiosis between Goldman’s lobbyists and the Democrats that regulate it has long been a work of political impressionism. Close up, it looks disconnected and blurred, but if you step back, the shape of it all falls into focus: Democrats hoard Goldman cash, Goldman hoards Democrats, and the American people lose. _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: Centroids@radicalcentrism.com http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/ _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: Centroids@radicalcentrism.com http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/   _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: Centroids@radicalcentrism.com http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/ _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: Centroids@radicalcentrism.com http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/   _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: Centroids@radicalcentrism.com http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/

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