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Posts tagged CitiGroup

Revolving Door

(Via Sheldon Richman.)

From Zachary A. Goldfarb’s recent article for the Washington Post (2010-12-30) on that Left-wing radical Obama and his revolutionary socialist administration:

The president's recently departed budget director is joining Citigroup.

The New York Federal Reserve Bank's derivatives expert is joining Goldman Sachs.

And numerous investigators from the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission are joining Wall Street's top law firms.

The vast overhaul of financial regulations and the renewed intensity of investigations into white-collar crime has been a boon for regulators, prosecutors and financial policymakers looking to cash in on their government experience and contacts.

In recent months, prominent officials from the White House, Justice Department, SEC, banking regulators and other agencies, both federal and state, have been walking through the proverbial revolving door to join Goldman, Citi, other financial companies and top law firms in Washington and New York.

— Zachary A. Goldfarb (2010-12-30), Regulators are finding opportunities at firms looking for government experience, in the Washington Post

You might think that I am going to say that all this poses a conflict of interest for the regulators. (Certainly, that’s how the Washington Post puts it.) But I’m not going to say that. That’s the conventional way of talking about it, when it comes up, but the conventional way of talking about it is nonsense. There is no conflict, unless you believe some very unrealistic things about the interests of government (even a progressive government) and its politically-appointed regulators.

I don’t: there is no conflict; they were already all in this together. This is nothing more than business- and politics-as-usual, and the state-capitalist system is functioning exactly as designed.

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In fifteen words or fewer: simple solutions to stupid problems (#2), featuring Senator Carl Levin (D-General Motors)

From a recent generally appalling column by Maureen Dowd:

How could Citigroup be so dumb as to go ahead with plans to get a new $50 million corporate jet, the exclusive Dassault Falcon 7X seating 12, after losing $28.5 billion in the past 15 months and receiving $345 billion in government investments and guarantees?

… The former masters of the universe don't seem to fully comprehend that their universe has crumbled and, thanks to them, so has ours. Real people are losing real jobs at Caterpillar, Home Depot and Sprint Nextel; these and other companies announced on Monday that they would cut more than 75,000 jobs in the U.S. and around the world, as consumer confidence and home prices swan-dived.

Prodded by an appalled Senator Carl Levin, Tim Geithner — even as he was being confirmed as Treasury secretary — directed Treasury officials to call the Citiboobs and tell them the new jet would not fly.

They woke up pretty quickly, says a Treasury official, adding that they protested for a bit. Six months ago, they would have kept the plane and flown it to Washington.

Senator Levin said that the financiers will not be able to change their warped mentality, but will have to be reined in by Geithner’s new leashes. I have no confidence that they intend or desire to change, Levin told me. These bankers got away with murder, and it's obscene that close to nothing is being asked of financial institutions. I get incensed at the thought that a bank that's getting billions of dollars in taxpayer money is out there buying fancy new airplanes.

So why not stop giving them billions of dollars in taxpayer money?

Jesus H. Christ.

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