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To: kabar
Geithner wasn't the Treasury Secretary in 2007-8. TARP was pushed by Bush and Paulson.

I never said Geithner was Sec Tres. He was head of the NY Fed and was instrumental in arranging the "marriages" of many of the banks. He worked extremely closely with Paulson and was part of the team to come up with TARP.

So was the auto bailout.

Never said I agreed with the auto bailout...

It is just more kicking the can down the road and bailing out the big banks and insurance companies. Instead of being held accountable, the taxpayer picked up the tab.

you do realize that if the government had let all the banks and insurance companies go the "Great Recession" would have been thousands of times worse right? The impact of the huge amount of derivatives would have wiped out many trillions more of wealth (of you and me not just banks) and the global economy would have completely collapsed. Credit markets would have frozen for years. It would have made the Great Depression look like a mild dip. Oh and the vast majority of TARP finds have been repaid.

The huge Porkulus bill and increased spending has led to an additional $6 trillion being added to the national debt in four years. We will pay a fearful price for this "masterful handling" of the fiscal crisis.

Again this was Obama and Congress not Bernanke and Geithner and I agree that the Porkulus bill was a disaster.

Holding interest rates artificially low is helping to debase our currency and will eventually lead to the rest of world going to a different reserve currency.

We are still in a very slow recovery so low rates is the proper mechanism. Raising rates now would choke off what little growth their is and make the fiscal situation worse. It is interesting that despite the "massive debt problem" that the "flight to safety" remains UST's...

43 posted on 01/15/2013 7:08:30 AM PST by Wyatt's Torch (I can explain it to you. I can't understand it for you.)
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To: Wyatt's Torch
Do you want C/P games? Ok. First "your people".

<"People who are opposed to bailouts of any kind like to argue that TARP was not really necessary. Banks could have been allowed to fail and the economic fallout around the world would not have been so dramatic. This was, of course, the view taken by policy makers in 1929–31, after the Great Crash. Top people at the Federal Reserve and Treasury argued that the United States had experienced a financial mania (true), that a fall in asset prices was long overdue (quite likely, at least for stocks), and that the right approach was to stand back and — in the unforgettable words of Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, let the private sector "liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farms, liquidate real estate." The result was the Great Depression. No responsible policy maker would want to run that risk again."



http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/30/tarp-the-long-goodbye/

Next, what actually happened which pro-TARP, the end is near people refuse to acknowledge (PS if you use Wiki I can too)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_Finance_Corporation

Hoover's own TARP, "repaid" by the way, did not stop the depression, just gave FDR more of an excuse to "liquidfy" and spend, yee-haw.

Also how can the derivatives disaster be fully repayed, lol? Bankers, many going out with millions thanks to the protection of the government were sure glad, but the taxpayers got a blank return (Look at ALL the data BTW) plus all those non-Wall Street INDIVIDUAL citizens whose assets went way down, currently swimming underwater waiting for their "liquidation" to their own accounts, are never getting any of that stuff fresh off the printing press.
45 posted on 01/15/2013 7:37:03 AM PST by rollo tomasi (Working hard to pay for deadbeats and corrupt politicians.)
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To: Wyatt's Torch
I never said Geithner was Sec Tres. He was head of the NY Fed and was instrumental in arranging the "marriages" of many of the banks. He worked extremely closely with Paulson and was part of the team to come up with TARP.

So TARP was a good idea?

you do realize that if the government had let all the banks and insurance companies go the "Great Recession" would have been thousands of times worse right? The impact of the huge amount of derivatives would have wiped out many trillions more of wealth (of you and me not just banks) and the global economy would have completely collapsed. Credit markets would have frozen for years. It would have made the Great Depression look like a mild dip. Oh and the vast majority of TARP finds have been repaid.

Those were the fear tactics used to bail out those too big to fail. It helped stampede Congress into signing on to it. It is so easy to make those statements just like stomping my foot in my living room in VA keeps the elephants away. TARP After Three Years: It Made Things Worse, Not Better

TARP Inspector General: TARP was a Failure

Again this was Obama and Congress not Bernanke and Geithner and I agree that the Porkulus bill was a disaster.

Geithner supported the Porkulus bill and wanted to make it even bigger. The idea that you can separate Obama and Geithner in terms of policy is nonsense. And it was passed by a Dem-controlled Congress with almost no Rep votes. It was rammed down our throats just like Obamacare. Both Obama and Geithner claimed that Porkulus saved millions of jobs and was key to getting us out of the fiscal crisis.

We are still in a very slow recovery so low rates is the proper mechanism. Raising rates now would choke off what little growth their is and make the fiscal situation worse. It is interesting that despite the "massive debt problem" that the "flight to safety" remains UST's...

The interest rates are being held artificially low. With our huge and growing federal debt, when interest rates return to their historical norm of 4% to %5, our debt servicing costs will increase exponentially overnight.

The artificially low rates are not helping growth and they mask our serious debt problem. They are also causing the devaluation of the dollar and undermining the dollar as the world's reserve currency.

It is interesting that despite the "massive debt problem" that the "flight to safety" remains UST's...

Right now the Fed is buying 70% of our T-bills. China has decreased its holdings. The SSTF holds the greatest amount of T-bills--around $2.7 trillion. The Fed holds about $2.1 trillion. $11.4 trillion is held publicly with the foreign owned portion being around $5.4 trillion. China has actually decreased its holdings of T-bills.

You can take solace that investments in T-bills is the best options compared to all the other options, but the reality is that none of these options are good and the whole global economy will collapse like a house of cards once the dollar does its inevitable swan dive. We are headed the way of Greece.

48 posted on 01/15/2013 7:41:09 AM PST by kabar
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To: Wyatt's Torch
Well Bernanke's symbolism is on display again.

House GOP Leaders Consider Four-Year Debt Limit Deal

http://www.rollcall.com/news/house_gop_leaders_consider_four_year_debt_limit_deal-220724-1.html

At least there are cuts involved, lol, but history proves any promised cuts are just illusions. The Republican spin machine will still emphasize those cuts when pleading with the realist.
57 posted on 01/15/2013 8:50:04 AM PST by rollo tomasi (Working hard to pay for deadbeats and corrupt politicians.)
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