Dear Tim,
Congratulations on the release of your book. I assure you that I will read it and review it here at my blog.
Given your positions formerly as head of the New York Federal Reserve and Secretary of Treasury, you will certainly receive enormous media attention and exposure in touting your book and your take on dealing with the crisis of 2008. To wit, I see just this morning that The Wall Street Journal is running your editorial entitled The Paradox of Financial Crises.
Tim, let’s cut the bull$hit.
During your tenure and now in this editorial you and your colleagues — including your predecessor Henry Paulson — would like to frame the debate for the American public as one in which people are either for or against the Wall Street bailout. I firmly believe that is a false premise and an incorrect reading of the American psyche.
I personally believe the only thing worse than bailing out the Wall Street banks would have been not bailing out the banks. But an honest review of the bailout goes much deeper than that. Let’s navigate and address the unanswered questions, concerns, and anxieties that continue to rile many people in our nation. These issues revolve not around the topic of bailing out the banks as your editorial this morning would like to entertain as the center of the debate.
Come on, Tim, let’s get real.
America is a forgiving crowd but only after meaningful accountability and truths are revealed. These virtues and the pursuit thereof are where you and your colleagues both in Washington and on Wall Street have failed America and continue to do so.
You want historical cover impacting your legacy as Treasury Secretary for bailing out Wall Street, then address the following:
1. The massive regulatory capture of Washington by Wall Street that allowed for real scandal, corruption, and fraud to propagate like never before.
2. The fact that the same players in banking and regulatory circles who drove our markets, economy, and nation into a ditch going into the crisis almost uniformly remained in place post crisis.
3. The serious degradation of the rule of law, violation of property rights, and all consuming cronyism that has now gained acceptance as ‘business as usual’ in America.
4. The flow of funds from Washington that went into the front door of the Wall Street banks and seemingly right out the back door in the form of executive compensation with little to no impact on life on Main Street.
5. The revolving door that promotes a system of payoffs and kickbacks between our financial and political elites.
6. The fact that not one individual of substance on Wall Street was ever held to account for the control fraud that will forever define this period.
There you go.
Tim, let’s dispense with the platitudes and pandering that are all too frequently proffered as meaningful journalism these days. Who in the media will have the balls to pose these points or will we be forced to continue to swallow more of the same “nonsense on cents?’
What say you, Tim?
Do those in the audience have other questions or topics the Secretary should be compelled to weigh in upon?
Navigate accordingly.