The Godfather: Paulson Makes Offer Banks Can’t Refuse
October 15th, 2008The backstories for what follows are:
Unloading Toxic Waste Mortgage Backed Securities: “We Americans Were Very Clever”
Here’s part of an email that I sent to someone a couple of days ago:
I’ve never been as close to honest to god mobsters as I was when I was
contracted out to [Wall Street firm]. No shit, pinky ring wearing,
Hey-Tony, fuggetaboutit mobsters.
When that stuff went down, the night before the paper dump… And no law
enforcement was involved in the investigation. Man, that was it. You
just knew that this was going to be handled off the books.
So, if I hadn’t seen that stuff at [Wall Street firm], I might think, “Maybe, maybe
not,” about that Jim Willie story. But I believe it. Oh yeah.
Why aren’t more people saying what they saw inside [Wall Street firm]??? The IT
contracting team that I was involved with was literally one step above
janitorial level in that thing and I COULDN’T BELIEVE what we wound up
seeing. Where are the stories???
I’m not the only one who’s afraid to talk.
Well, I’ve told what I know, but I haven’t linked the name to it.
The feds/anyone looking to get even won’t have to look far to find A LOT
of people who knew what happened. The front-line managers in that chop
shop were up to their eyeballs in it.
…
A big component of this thing is 100% criminal activity. [Wall Street firm] knew
the loans were going to bogus applicants…
…
And now Unkle $cam comes along to make it all better with the confetti
paper. HAHAHA
Via: Yahoo Tech Ticker:
The day after the news about a watershed change in American capitalism, the story behind the story of how Hank Paulson forced the nations top 9 banks to take capital is coming to light.
After a discussion of the state of the banking system and U.S. economy, the bankers were then unceremoniously handed a one-page term sheet outlining Paulson’s plan. The bank CEOs “weren’t allowed to negotiate,” The WSJ reports. “Paulson requested that each of them sign. It was for their own good and the good of the country, he said, according to a person in the room.”
In sum, Hank Paulson made the bank CEOs an offer they couldn’t refuse — like a present-day (and real) Don Corleone.
Oy! The USA is the Titanic, and most of us are steerage-class passengers. Oh well, time to get ready for another day of work at the narcissistic grocery store.
I’m looking forward to the baptism.
Somewhere in annals of my psychiatric/sociological training manuals there is a saying that sex and death are equated. There is also one teaching that sex and money are equated. I’m not sure tonight which is which.
But methinks Paulson doesn’t have a clue about sex, money or that he is even in the same club as the rest of us folk that acknowledge that yea, verily, this too will pass. All of it. In the face of my mother’s long term illness (10 years now this month and she’s in hospital tonight), I STRUGGLE to accept or acknowledge that just like a plant in a hard frost, or something similarly benign, her time, as well as mine on this blue marble, for better or worse will be done. My Mother and her tutorship for me was always one to do good. Be frugal. Earn your own way and live within your means. Save for your future. This tiny story of my family is just One of those billions of stories of those on this planet.
But there are always a few who think or behave as if there is any moral dictum involved with their actions. In terms of the economies of the world think these times have pointed out a cadre of individuals – call them Mafia, Illuminti or what not- who have found themselves in positions of power on this planet that have exhibited such irresponsible actions that seems to me at least that they are NOT the human condition.
The Paulson creature for me has joined the club of those like the elder Rockefeller with his eugenics that thinks he is a master of the financial universe just because he has a lot of money. Yet another a weird one I am not a Christian, but a thinking human. But I think for now, my posture is going to have to be “forgive him.” There is no way to stop this feller. He’s a part of the story line written into our time and there’s not a thing we can do about that. Except maybe enjoy this great story unfolding before us.
Financial destructionalism.