PBS Frontline shows how we got into so much financial danger in USA

[Friday on my mind]

This was on last night on PBS.It shows how both parties went along with Alan Greenspan and others and his life long Liberterian view of how to control big players in the financial industry.Even Greenspan now admits he was wrong.Earlier he thought even fraud should not be regulated and him and Robert Rubin and Larry Summers were out to crush (and did) attempts by a woman named Brooksley Born,head of the Commodities and exchange commision agency who saw the dangers of what was known as the derivative market and attempted to bring some regulation to it as it had none.

And the danger is still there as no new regulation has been ****** even though that derivative biz has been the one that caused all the problems .

Financial industry has 5 lobbyists for each elected official.

This is not about partisan politics as both parties are equally owned by these special interests.Many of the same players are in the Obama administration as they were in all in the previous republican and democrate administrations beggining as far back as Ford with Greenspan.

You watch this and you just know that almost certainly these things are going to happen again.This really is a telling indictment of the philosophy of let markets regulate themselves ,so called lazzie-faire or Libertarian.Greenspan after the fact (after the crisis we had starting last year) gets it, but the financial indsutry is so powerfull apparently nothing can be done.


Watch it here for the full story.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/view/

 

[Rey C.]

Unfortunately, I don't get any PBS stations on my system. But thanks for the link - I'll watch it this weekend.

I read some of the comments, and a poster pretty well captured what I would probably say (if I'd seen the show):

True libertarians oppose government interference in the economy, but the Federal Reserve's whole purpose is to interfer in the economy by keeping interest rates artificially low for savers so that banks can make more money. The government guarantees banks' ******** debts while letting the banks keep their ******** profits, so of course it should regulate their ********. It would be better to let bad banks fail, abolish the Fed, and allow the financial system to start over with real money backed by gold. Learn about the reality of the economy at mises.org

Certainly politicians and people of all political stripes had a hand in this disaster. But I hope the show spoke of Phil Gramm's role in this, with his backing of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act (while his wife worked at or for Enron). The one man we can all thank for the "Enron Loophole": Phil Gramm - the man who said in the midst of this recession that we were not in a recession, the American people were just a bunch of whiners and cry babies. McCain had him as his chief economic advisor and Silly Sarah as his running mate. God help us all!!! Two strikes right there... against a guy who I basically have always liked.

But I agree, there are many villains and dunces in this; Republican, Democrat, conservative and liberal alike.

I look forward to seeing this show. Good find, Friday! :thumbsup:

 

[rad2927]

Very important program-PBS always does a good,fair job with their Frontline prorams.

 

[Friday on my mind]

Unfortunately, I don't get any PBS stations on my system. But thanks for the link - I'll watch it this weekend.

I read some of the comments, and a poster pretty well captured what I would probably say (if I'd seen the show):



Certainly politicians and people of all political stripes had a hand in this disaster. But I hope the show spoke of Phil Gramm's role in this, with his backing of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act (while his wife worked at or for Enron). The one man we can all thank for the "Enron Loophole": Phil Gramm - the man who said in the midst of this recession that we were not in a recession, the American people were just a bunch of whiners and cry babies. McCain had him as his chief economic advisor and Silly Sarah as his running mate. God help us all!!! Two strikes right there... against a guy who I basically have always liked.

But I agree, there are many villains and dunces in this; Republican, Democrat, conservative and liberal alike.

I look forward to seeing this show. Good find, Friday! :thumbsup:

It's a good program,I was switching between it and the yankee game and found it more interesting.And yes you will see Phil Gramm going after the woman trying to warn us when they dragged her before congress telling her we are not about to allow you to do anything to make this derivitive biz more transparent or subject to any regulation.

 

[feller469]

It is only a matter of time before some "loony" fringe group decides to right some financial wrongs and sends the CEOs of these banks into a state of panic for their own survival

 

[HELLRAISER]

thanks for posting, I don't have time to watch this now but I will soon as I get the Chance