Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumWilliam Greider: Hillary Clinton is Whitewashing the Financial Catastrophe
http://billmoyers.com/story/hillary-clinton-is-whitewashing-the-financial-catastrophe/<Candidate Clinton is essentially whitewashing the financial catastrophe. She has produced a clumsy rewrite of what caused the 2008 collapse, one that conveniently leaves her husband out of the story. He was the president who legislated the predicate for Wall Streets meltdown. Hillary Clintons redefinition of the reform problem deflects the blame from Wall Streets most powerful institutions, like JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs and instead fingers less celebrated players that failed. In roundabout fashion, Hillary Clinton sounds like she is assuring old friends and donors in the financial sector that, if she becomes president, she will not come after them.
The seminal event that sowed financial disaster was the repeal of the New Deals Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which had separated banking into different realms: investment banks, which organize capital investors for risk-taking ventures; and deposit-holding banks, which serve people as borrowers and lenders. That laws repeal, a great victory for Wall Street, was delivered by Bill Clinton in 1999, assisted by the Federal Reserve and the financial sectors armies of lobbyists. The universal banking model was saluted as a modernizing reform that liberated traditional banks to participate directly and indirectly in long-prohibited and vastly more profitable risk-taking.
Exotic financial instruments like derivatives and credit-default swaps flourished, enabling old-line bankers to share in the fun and profit on an awesome scale. The banks invented guarantees against loss and sold them to both companies and market players. The fast-expanding financial sector claimed a larger and larger share of the economy (and still does) at the expense of the real economy of producers and consumers. The interconnectedness across market sectors created the illusion of safety. When illusions failed, these connected guarantees became the dragnet that drove panic in every direction. Ultimately, the federal government had to rescue everyone, foreign and domestic, to stop the bleeding.
Yet Hillary Clinton asserts in her Times op-ed that repeal of Glass-Steagall had nothing to do with it. She claims that Glass-Steagall would not have limited the reckless behavior of institutions like Lehman Brothers or insurance giant AIG, which were not traditional banks. Her argument amounts to facile evasion that ignores the interconnected exposures. The Federal Reserve spent $180 billion bailing out AIG so AIG could pay back Goldman Sachs and other banks. If the Fed hadnt acted and had allowed AIG to fail, the banks would have gone down too.>
The article also includes the now revised opinions on 2 major bankers from when Glass-Steagall was repealed during the Clinton administration who now say it was a mistake: former Citibank CEOs John Reed and Sandy Weill.
Hillary still refuses to admit that even as former bankers do. The millions of dollars pouring into her campaign, SuperPacs and the Clinton Foundation from Wall Street override the best interests of the country.
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
7 replies, 1390 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (21)
ReplyReply to this post
7 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
William Greider: Hillary Clinton is Whitewashing the Financial Catastrophe (Original Post)
BernieforPres2016
Apr 2016
OP
yourpaljoey
(2,166 posts)1. And it's all unfolding in real time
CorporatistNation
(2,546 posts)3. How Sweet It Is...
Finances? Finances... Look at these shenanigans!
Rosario Dawson ... WHY She Supports Bernie...
&nohtml5=False
yourpaljoey
(2,166 posts)5. It will not be pretty
bbgrunt
(5,281 posts)2. kick!
moondust
(19,988 posts)4. K/R
reddread
(6,896 posts)6. An agent of NO change.
we cant.
beedle
(1,235 posts)7. K/R