Timothy Geithner Teaches Standard & Poor's The Chicago Way

Hardball: Hell hath no fury like an administration embarrassed by a top credit-rating agency stating the obvious — that its perilous spending policies and rising debts warranted a downgrade just like any poorly run business.

Speaking at a fundraiser in Philadelphia on June 13, 2008, candidate Barack Obama said of his Republican opposition: "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun."

In this case, in August 2011, Standard & Poor's brought an embarrassing downgrading of U.S. debt to AA+ from AAA in advance of the president's re-election bid, the first such reduction in U.S. history.

In response, the administration brought a lawsuit in 2013 charging fraud and seeking $5 billion in fines from S&P for the credit ratings it had attached to bonds supported by subprime mortgages in the years leading up to the financial meltdown.

At the time, it smacked of vendetta. As we noted last year, S&P's subprime securities ratings were virtually identical to those of Moody's and Fitch, yet the government singled out S&P for prosecution simply because it was the only one of the big three to pull the trigger on the downgrade.

The vindictive nature of the government's lawsuit was confirmed Tuesday when lawyers for McGraw-Hill, S&P's parent, filed an affidavit from the company's chairman, Harold McGraw III, stating that on Aug. 8, 2011, mere days after the downgrade, he got a call from Timothy Geithner saying S&P's deed would not go unpunished.

"He said that 'you have done an enormous disservice to yourselves and to your country,' and that S&P's conduct would be 'looked at very carefully,'" McGraw said. "Such behavior could not occur, he said, without a response from the government."

I am acquainted with people who, after attending a “tea party” meeting, were audited. Never audited before.

We see that IRS was explicitly going after tea party groups. That people who led tea party groups had their companies sued repeatedly by OSHA/EPA/IRS/ETC and that even when the lawsuits were thrown out by a judge, the agencies just re-filed.

Anybody remember the SWAT invasions of Gibson Guitars?

Palin herself of course was pummeled by lawsuits before she left the governorship and apparently her dad has been dragged through it by the IRS since then.

I noticed that Glenn Beck was the number one rated show in his time slot when he was pushed off the air, thus silencing his attacks on Soros and Obama. I notice that Jay Leno was number one in his time slot when he was pushed off the air and I can’t help but wonder if he stepped on someone’s toes.

I saw Holder trying to arrange a civilian trial for the author of 911 apparently for the purpose of getting Bush and Cheney under oath. I saw Holder running guns to the cartels while encouraging the Mexican government to sue American gun manufacturers. That only fell apart when it was exposed with the murder of the Border Patrol agent.

So now, on top of all this, they punish S&P with a multi-billion dollar lawsuit. It may go no where, or they may be blackmailed into giving up a few hundred million to make it go away. Either way, the message has been sent.

This regime thinks in terms of using its power to destroy its political enemies. It is a lawless regime.

S&P should have immediately gone public with the threat, while telling the TAX CHEAT TO FO!

“Dear Timmy,

“Here are our rating parameters.”
“Here is your performance data.”
“Your score is B.”
“Sorry if you’re unhappy with your performance.”

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.