You’re Under Oath
April 29th, 2010 | Editorial Cartoons | 7 Comments
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There’s a fascinating dual dramatic comedy being played out in the Senate, as the Party of NO tries desperately to halt financial reform on behalf of their Wall Street pals, while in the hearing room next door Goldman Sachs execs demonstrate why we so desperately need the reform. The most amusing (or tragic) exchange occurred when one of the Goldman execs was asked if the bank had a responsibility to act in the best interests of its clients. Long pause. Really long pause. It sounded as though he’d never actually considered the question before. Meanwhile, on the Senate floor, the minority party, led by Mitch McConnell at his Orwellian best, was painting the reform bill as another bailout, and fighting desperately against a consumer protection agency, on the grounds that it would be really bad for consumers if banks were no longer allowed to rip them off. I confess to a grudging admiration for people like McConnell, who can say the things they say without blushing. It’s a valuable quality in a politician, and the Republicans seem to be just a tad better at it than Democrats.
Topics: bank reform, finance reform, Goldman Sachs, Mitch McConnell, opinion, Republicans, Senate
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[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Ed Stein. Ed Stein said: New blog post: You're Under Oath http://edsteinink.com/2010/04/29/youre-under-oath/ [...]
Not to defend Goldman, who if they did defraud investors deserves to be punished, but why is everyone in such a hurry to bash Goldman for betting against a bubble? The reason Goldman did so well was because they were one of the only firms that thought housing prices were overvalued. It is unclear that Goldman does have an obligation to not sell securities to people that want them even if Goldman thinks the security is a bad investment. If an investor comes to Goldman for investment advice, it has a responsibility to provide an honest assessment. But if an investor thinks home values will continue to rise and comes to Goldman requesting to take out a CDS against that position, why does Goldman have a responsibility to say that Goldman thinks its getting the better side of the deal? If Goldman designed securities to fail without disclosing that to investors, that is fraud and they should be punished. But if Goldman simply took the bear position in a bull market, then what exactly did they do wrong? Shouldn’t we instead be wondering why no one else was willing to bet against the housing bubble?
As far as McConnnell and Co. go, I couldn’t agree more.
you give Goldman Sachs credit for being nice? they are sociopaths! the fools got caught with their foots down their throats in the emails about ‘sh*tty deals’. they are part of the greedy crowd of robber barons doing whatever it takes to take your money. their own deals to their own clients. you are generous to blame their clients for not heeding their erudite analyses. they rank with Lay, Nacchio, etc etc etc ad nauseum. throw ‘em in the hoosegow and forget ‘em, then sell off their ill gotten gains their suckers.
by the way, an investor has taken a chance, hopefully an honest chance, and should know it may or may not pay off in the end, so otherwise should not be bailed out of innate stupidity. it is a form legalized gambling.
Notice that I say that if they were being dishonest then they should be punished. Fraud is never acceptable behavior. Lay, Nacchio, etc were convicted of fraud. As of yet, Goldman has been convicted of nothing, and in this country, we presume one is innocent unless one has been convicted in a court of law, not the court of public opinion. What Goldman did with regard to synthetic CDOs and what Lehman did with Repo 105 certainly look shady, but why don’t we let the legal process play out before condemning them?
My point was that Goldman was willing to bet against the bubble. If more people had bet against the bubble, maybe there would not have been a bubble. What Goldman
The things that the big banks did that caused the market meltdown and their behavior during and after for the most part may or may not be illegal but Should Be!
We need MAJOR reform for Banking, Oil, and Many other industries to keep their GREED from hurting the American public and the World again, but the Republicans again do not want reform. We need to let them know on Nov. 2nd that we will no longer tolerate their support of Big Business at the expense of the public. But I fear that with the recent Supreme Court decision allowing Big Business to spend unlimited amounts of money on Political advertising that there will be a lot of uninformed and gullible people that will fall for their propaganda. They will use the Tea Party and other groups to promote their idea of “Free Markets” as the solution to all the problems instead of the truth that De-Regulated Markets and Corporate Greed are what caused the problems.
The idea of “Completely Free Markets” sounds good in theory but like many theories, it does not work in the real world, (unless you are a mega corp. that only cares about profits instead of the people). Corporate Greed Must be kept in check or we will continue to have these same market problems with continued falling wages and eliminated benefits for the average people. I hope that the American people will see through the smoke and mirrors and outright Lies of the Corporate Propaganda commercials, but studies show that he who advertises most Wins.
I assume you’re unaware that Dems took more money from Wall Street in 2008 than Reps. Unless you are only interested in pushing your liberal agenda. Oh, yes, and Obama seems to be in the pocket of Goldman. Look how many of his partners come from there. No wonder the once great Rocky Mountain News went under.
What nonsense!
It is truly amazing how someone can take 2 supposed facts:
1. More Wall St money to Dems in 2008
2. # of Obama “partners” come from GS
and best of all: this actually has something to do with the Rocky Mtn News!!
Having looked at Ed’s cartoon and comments many times now I can’t see whre any of these “facts” have anything to do with his point.
If both #1 and #2 are true, how do they have ANY relevance to the point? What hapeened was during the Bush administration and the Dems are trying to pass some changes and the GOP (at least at the time of the cartoon) was trying to stop any debate, period.
There is no doubt that GS has had for many years a significant presence in both GOP and Dem administrations. How does that change Ed’s point?