Greenspan on the economic crisis

[kallend 2,230]

www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN2344023820081023

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[kallend 2,230]

More detail.

www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/business/economy/24panel.html?bl&ex=1224993600&en=da694ed4921c5e8b&ei=5087%0A

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[airdvr 210]

Obviously a witch hunt designed in part to keep the attention away from themselves.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[Rookie120 0]

Why is that man up there testifying for this dog and pony show? If I was him, 82 years old, should be retired and they told me to testify they would get a big FUCK YOU response. A lot of people are to blame here. These hearings the only thing that happens is some politician trying to make himself look good by saying "Look at this guy people! He's your bad guy!"

If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck!

[SkyDekker 1,465]

Don't think that is the case at all. He was the voice of deregulation, he was one of the main drivers behind low interest rates. He always maintained that a housing bust was near impossible. He was, if not the most powerful, one of the most powerful economic figures in the world for close to two decades.

This isn't a whitch hunt, this is people finally understanding that fully free market capitalism doesn't work for the same reason communism doesn't work.....greed.

[kallend 2,230]

Quote

Why is that man up there testifying for this dog and pony show?

Because those who don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[kelpdiver 2]

Quote

Why is that man up there testifying for this dog and pony show? If I was him, 82 years old, should be retired and they told me to testify they would get a big FUCK YOU response. A lot of people are to blame here. These hearings the only thing that happens is some politician trying to make himself look good by saying "Look at this guy people! He's your bad guy!"

No one is forcing Greenspan to talk non stop over the last year. He's the one with a sudden fear of losing his legacy, but he's making it very difficult for his successor to do his job.

[joedirt 0]

Oh...He's gonna have a legacy.

[airdvr 210]

I guess he's trying to save his book sales.

In the 500-page book, “The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World,” Mr. Greenspan describes the Bush administration as so captive to its own political operation that it paid little attention to fiscal discipline, and he described President Bush’s first two Treasury secretaries, Paul H. O’Neill and John Snow, as essentially powerless.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[jimmytavino 16]

Quote

Mr. Greenspan describes the Bush administration as so captive to its own political operation that it paid little attention to fiscal discipline,[/b

just as a small child can be 'held captive', by a balloon, or lollipop.... the distraction which results,, CAN be crippling...
There surely was an " Iraq-shun Distraction", and once that snowball started rolling down the hill,
it DID become an avalanche.. how sad...
it's tough to say THAT is the root of many of these issues, which we now face... but it's ALSO tough to deny it....

jmy
"causing trouble and raising a Ruckus, since the mid 50's"

[nerdgirl 0]

Quote

In the 500-page book, “The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World,” Mr. Greenspan describes the Bush administration as so captive to its own political operation that it paid little attention to fiscal discipline, and he described President Bush’s first two Treasury secretaries, Paul H. O’Neill and John Snow, as essentially powerless.

Concur w/that assessment w/r/t ineffectiveness of the early Treasury Secretaries. Why were they powerless/excluded/marginalized?

Former Secretary O’Neill suggested it was due to the elevation of ideology (neo-conservative) in the early days of the first administration over debate and consideration of pragmatic and fiscal aspects of executing policy based on that ideology.

During the second administration many of the early ideologues (e.g., Former DepSecDef Wolfowitz, former USD (Policy) Feith) had left. More traditional realist and comparatively fiscally conservative Republicans gained (some) power. (It's hard to stop a moving, fully-loaded train.) The unanswered question in my mind is the causal chain: did the latter gain some power due to recognition of problems and fiscal consequences of the early neo-conservative driven administration (which would be a more active scenario) or was it just a loss of critical mass (e.g., pure counting bodies)?

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[joedirt 0]

Well since he lowered overnight rates to 1% to prop up an economy that needed an overdue contraction, where exactly did his philosophy differ from the administrations? He's not exactly Volcker.