Would You Put Trump In Charge Of Guarding Your Money?

Most Americans-- including some who voted for him and even some who plan to vote for him again-- do not find Trump honest and trustworthy. Pollsters never ask if respondents would put their pretty under-age daughters in a room alone with Trump or if they would agree to let Trump hold on to their savings for a few months. I think we've all know from the beginning-- albeit New Yorkers more than anyone is Alabama or Wyoming-- that Trump is a crook from head to toe and always has been. And I think more Americans are waking up to that now.

When Congress passed their big bailout bills, they were smart enough to make sure the bailouts would be subject to oversight by a team of honest brokers. But they somehow weren't smart enough to anticipate that Trump would fire the head of the team and replace him with a lackey. It should have brought chills to every Americans' spine when Trump said he himself would be in charge of making sure all the money was spent properly.




Yesterday Washington Post reporters Peter Whoriskey and Heather Long asked the question we'll be hearing a lot between now and November: Who's Getting These Hundreds Of Billions In The Government Aid?. They know the answer; we won't be finding out any time soon and, obviously, "if the names of the beneficiaries of the aid are withheld, it will be difficult to gauge how much of the relief money is being wasted, fraudulently obtained or reaching places it was intended to go, experts and watchdog groups say... The names of businesses that collectively will receive hundreds of billions of dollars in coronavirus relief from the federal government," they wrote, "may not be disclosed publicly, an omission that critics say could make the massive spending program vulnerable to fraud and favoritism. The $2.2 trillion Cares Act approved by President Trump last month requires that the names of recipients of some forms of federal aid be published, but those requirements do not extend to significant portions of the relief. Chief among the omissions is the $349 billion expected to be doled out to small companies in chunks as large as $10 million. The rescue legislation does not compel the Small Business Administration to disclose the identity of the recipients. So far, the agency has said it received about 487,000 applications totaling $125 billion in requests. A potentially even larger gap involves the trillions going out to businesses under the auspices of the Federal Reserve."

The legislation requires that the Fed disclose the loan recipients and the amounts they receive, "but there is a significant exemption: the Fed chairman, Jerome H. Powell, may request that the information be kept confidential, meaning only congressional leaders would be given access." Powell is petrified of Trump and rarely stands up to his outrageous demands.

Though most of the $2.2 trillion in spending has yet to begin, disputes already have arisen about who will be responsible for making sure it is done ethically.

The Cares Act requires several layers of oversight: It calls for a special inspector general, a congressional review commission and a “Pandemic Response Accountability Committee,” a group that will be composed of inspectors general armed with enhanced powers to subpoena documents and testimony.

But President Trump already has taken steps that undermine these reviewers. In signing the Cares Act into law, Trump angered some Democrats, who had insisted on oversight measures, by declaring that the special inspector general cannot issue reports to Congress without “presidential supervision,” a constraint that could compromise the watchdog’s independence.

Then on Monday, Trump removed the chairman of the federal panel Congress created to oversee his administration’s handling of the Cares Act. Glenn Fine, who had been the acting Pentagon inspector general, was informed he was being replaced at the Defense Department by Sean W. O’Donnell, currently the inspector general at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Regardless of what happens to the oversight panels, the public disclosure of who receives the trillions in emergency money could play a critical role in the public debate over the programs.

Publishing the recipient information would enable outside groups-- not just government-appointed bodies-- to check into the spending, said Jordan Libowitz of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonprofit watchdog group.

“We are always going to be in favor of as much transparency as possible in government spending,” he said.

But under the $2.2 trillion spending bill, the requirements for disclosure vary by the type of spending.

For example, one of the best known elements in the bill, which allows the Treasury Department to spend $46 billion to help airlines, air cargo companies and “businesses critical to national security,” requires the Treasury to promptly publish the name of the company getting money, the amount of the loan and the contract.

The Cares Act similarly sets out requirements for the Federal Reserve to disclose information about the loans it offers.

The Fed is required to turn over to Congress-- and ultimately put up on the Fed’s website-- the basic items of loans issued: the identity of the business, how much money was lent and the interest rate. Later it will disclose how much of the loan has been repaid.

Powell has stressed repeatedly in recent months that he believes the Fed must be transparent and accountable to the public in all its actions. In a speech Thursday, he also emphasized that the Fed is making loans that it expects will be repaid, not outright financial grants.

“I would stress that these are lending powers, not spending powers,” Powell said. The Fed’s expectation is “the loans will be fully repaid."

As the Fed chair, Powell has the discretion to keep the company name and amount borrowed confidential, sharing it only with certain congressional leaders who oversee Fed activities.

During the global financial crisis, the Federal Reserve refused to turn over to reporters the records of some of its emergency bank lending. Bloomberg, the media company, sued for their release and, in a case that went to the Supreme Court, won three years later.

...There are no such requirements, for example, for the $100 billion destined for health care providers, or the $3.5 billion for companies developing diagnostics, medications and vaccines, or the $10 billion supposed to go to airports.

Those agencies could still release the information, however, and some are planning to do so.

...One of the most divisive of the disclosure debates could arise over the $349 billion promised to small businesses, a figure that could rise to almost $600 billion if a follow up relief bill is approved. The Small Business Administration hasn’t yet said how much has been disbursed.

Keep in mind, Trump absconded with millions of dollars he illegally misappropriated from his Inaugural Fund which was widely padded by crooked businessmen and even other countries to bribe him. Yesterday, Neil Barofsky, the former special inspector general for TARP, penned an OpEd for the Times, Why We Desperately Need Oversight of the Coronavirus Stimulus Spending. He went out of his way to take the high-road and not assert that Trump is a crook, a road that at this point in time is just patently absurd. But he did make note that "More than $2 trillion is about to head out the door, committed in a single news release last week by the Federal Reserve Board. In that release, the Federal Reserve announced how it and the Treasury Department intend to leverage just a portion of the $454 billion that Congress gave the department in the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, known as the CARES Act, with the potential of trillions more in lending to come."

He asked the key question: "Who will conduct oversight of this staggering amount of taxpayer money? We need to ensure that this government aid is not being stolen, wasted or given to political cronies"-- all of the things Trump is best known for. "And we need to make sure that the public is aware of how and to whom those trillions are distributed. In short, we need watchdogs. As it prepares for more relief in the wake of vast economic ruin caused by Covid-19, Congress has leverage-- and must use it."

During TARP, the compliance officials at the Federal Reserve were often careful and thoughtful. But within the Treasury Department, where many of the key decisions were made, officials often had a far less rigorous approach-- and given the rushed nature of their actions so far, I fear this may apply even more so today.

For the CARES Act, Congress demanded the same watchdog function within Treasury-- but so far, that dog is still in the pound. The legislation promised a brand-new agency headed by a special inspector general for pandemic recovery who would keep the programs on the right policy track and protected from fraud. The new agency would also provide the necessary transparency to make sure that when decision makers fall short, as they inevitably do in the haste of an emergency, it could make quick recommendations to correct course and share both the flaws and the proposed solutions with Congress and the American people.

Perhaps most important, it would shine a bright light on the decision-making process within the Treasury Department, deterring policymakers from making decisions-- which are likely to determine which companies survive and which fail-- based on personal connections or cronyism rather than the merits. Unfortunately, President Trump included a signing statement to the CARES Act that suggested he would limit the ability of the new inspector general to reveal to Congress efforts by his administration to obstruct or impede his inquiries.

Some are also raising questions about the president’s intended nominee for the job, Brian Miller. Even in the absence of what the signing statement may portend about the president’s intentions, the job of special inspector general for pandemic recovery would require fierce independence and the steeliest of spines. Mr. Miller demonstrated those qualities when he was the inspector general of the General Services Administration for nearly 10 years. But he is now on the president’s legal team at the White House and apparently played a role in fending off oversight requests during impeachment.

This raises important questions, but Mr. Miller deserves the opportunity to demonstrate at a confirmation hearing that he is prepared to repel any efforts to muzzle his ability to provide unvarnished reports to Congress. That won’t be possible until he is formally nominated and a confirmation hearing scheduled. Until then, the critically important role of the special inspector general remains unfilled.

The money is already flowing. Critics of the CARES Act pointed out that there could be a delay in the appointment of the special inspector general, but we were told not to worry, there would be a Pandemic Recovery Accountability Committee immediately organized that consisted of sitting inspectors general. Even better, the widely respected acting inspector general of the Defense Department, Glenn Fine, was named as its chairman. But that didn’t last long: He was quickly sacked by Mr. Trump with no explanation, leaving the committee leaderless, dormant and very possibly housebroken.

Because Mr. Fine’s dismissal came after attacks on other inspectors general (including another Pandemic Recovery Accountability Committee member, Christi Grimm, the acting inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services), a chilling message was sent and received by the watchdogs who are expected to play a crucial role in overseeing the trillions of dollars spread throughout the government as part of CARES: Criticize the programs at your peril, and think twice before even raising your hand for the task of overseeing them.

Until there is a new chairperson of this commission who can operate without the fear of being fired merely for taking the position, this watchdog has been effectively neutered.

And then there was a Congressional Oversight Commission, patterned on the Congressional Oversight Panel from the TARP legislation, which a then little-known Harvard professor named Elizabeth Warren turned into a beacon of transparency and accountability. But the commission, like Congress itself, is dependent on cooperation by the administration to provide access necessary to analyze and report on the programs. The recent assertions by the White House that it can ignore congressional subpoenas provide little comfort that the commission will be able to fulfill its role.

Only one of its five commissioners has been named, and we are waiting for the critical chairman to be named by congressional leaders. Keep in mind that, as we wait, trillions are committed and will begin to be spent.

What is the best use of Congress’s leverage? It is already apparent that additional relief will be necessary. Before parting with another trillion dollars, Congress must condition any further funding on the inclusion of protections to ensure that the inspectors general overseeing the Treasury Department’s actions can be removed only for cause shown, the nomination and hearing for Mr. Miller must proceed as soon as possible, provisions must be enacted ensuring that oversight bodies will have unimpeded access to the information that they need to carry out their tasks, and the seats of the Congressional Oversight Commission must be filled.

Otherwise, buckle up for what oversight helped limit in TARP-- vast amounts of taxpayer money lost to fraud, policy decisions made in the dark with little chance of success and scandals that may make us yearn for the relative quiet of impeachment.

Cars, Jobs, Kentucky

Today Bernie did incredibly well in Kentucky but just couldn't penetrate the low-info precincts in Louisville and Lexington... not even with all the support he had from low-info precincts in coal country. Hillary, with all her gigantic "advantages," managed to scrape by with the narrowest 212,549 (46.8%) to 210,626 (46.3%) plurality. Bernie's strongest returns came from historic Harlan county in the extreme east of the state where he beat her 62.8% to 25.9%. Both candidates have been awarded 25 delegates each so far, with 5 remaining to be determined. And then the Oregon results came in... and Bernie took the lead with the first ballots counted and never lost it. A.P. called the race with just 60% of the vote counted and Bernie ahead 219,459 (53.0%) to 194,359 (47.0%) for the establishment candidate who stands for the status quo. (His lead has grown as more ballots were counted.)

After her big win-- fraught with the typical boss-ridden voting "irregularities"-- in New York, Hillary had declared the primaries over and said she wouldn't be competing with Bernie any longer, just campaigning against Trump. A couple of thumpings in Indiana and West Virginia cured her of that and she was all over Kentucky, a closed primary state that doesn't allow independents to vote. The main thrust of her campaign in Kentucky was to malign Bernie with a discredited lie she tried out-- and failed with-- in Michigan, namely that he had opposed the auto bailout.

Her technique, perhaps not as blatant as Trump's, was to simply mislead voters. Bernie voted for the auto bailout-- and she knows it. When it was shoved into the TARP Wall Street bankster bailout for her campaign financiers he voted no, while she, of course voted yes with great enthusiasm, which partially explains why so many independents and progressives will never vote for her to be president. TARP was to bail out the banksters and everyone knows it. She lost in Michigan because she was unable to deceive Democratic voters there. Maybe she thought Kentucky Democrats are dumber.

Her claim, PolitiFact, explained "leaves listeners with the impression that Sanders’ opposed bailing out the auto industry. But he voted in favor of providing auto companies with $14 billion, which was separate from the Wall Street bailout funds he opposed."

Yesterday one of Bernie's campaign spokespersons suggested she stop trying to distort the truth about his support for legislation to help carmakers and auto workers. Bernie, he said, voted for a $14 billion aid package which passed the House of Representatives on Dec. 10, 2008. When that bill ran into a Senate Republican roadblock, the White House turned to a separate Wall Street bailout fund for loans to the auto industry. "It is absolutely untrue to say that Sen. Sanders voted against helping the automobile industry and auto workers. Secretary Clinton first made this false claim before the Michigan primary. She now is recycling the erroneous charge in Kentucky. Once again, Secretary Clinton is simply not telling the truth... It is true that Sen. Sanders voted against bailing out the crooks on Wall Street whose illegal behavior and greed brought this economy into the worst downturn since the 1930s," the statement concludes.

Clinton and Sanders were both in the Senate at the time, and contrary to what Clinton implied Sunday, both supported the idea of an auto bailout.

Sanders argued that letting the auto industry go under was too big of a risk for middle-class workers-- it could lower wages across all sectors of the economy and have a ripple effect on states like Vermont that were fairly far removed from the auto industry. He was quoted by Vermont Public Radio at the time as saying:

The problem is if you don't act in the midst of a growing recession, what does it mean to create a situation where millions of more people become unemployed? And that could spread, and I have serious concerns about that. I think it would be a terrible idea to add millions more to the unemployment rolls.

But Sanders was vehemently against the larger $700 billion bailout to prop up the banks. (As evidenced by his presidential campaign, Sanders is no fan of Wall Street.) So he voted against the bank bailout.

The bank bailout was so big it had to be doled out in portions. In January 2009, Senate Republicans tried to block the Treasury Department from releasing the second half of the money, some of which was designated for the auto industry. Sanders, based on his opposition to the Wall Street bailout, voted against releasing that money as well.

Please consider helping Bernie win this thing, especially as crucial primaries in New Jersey and California come closer:

Bipartisanship-- The Bad Kind

Yesterday I went upstairs to put on my shoes and socks and there was that Ku Klux Klan guy from Louisiana, Republican House Whip Scalise, yapping away on MSNBC about President Obama threatening to veto the "bipartisan Defense appropriations bill" that had gone through the wonderful bipartisan committee process led by Chairman Thornberry. Military families and pay raises and helping our allies (the fascist gang that's taken over in Ukraine) defend themselves... The bill did get through Thornberry's House Armed Services Committee, which has 36 Republicans and 27 Democrats and it did pass the full House, 270-156 on October 1. As for "bipartisan"... well, 146 Democrats voted against it. And the 37 Democrats who voted in favor were mostly Blue Dogs and New Dems who vote with the GOP on most things anyway, the Kyrsten Sinemas, Henry Cuellars, Gwen Grahams, Pete Aguilars, Collin Petersons, Cheri Bustoses, Jim Costas, Kathleen Rices, Sean Patrick Maloneys, Ann Kusters, Denny Hecks, Ann Kirkpatricks, John Delaneys, Patrick Murphys... all the worst Republican-lite garbage from the Democratic side of the aisle.

And the 10 Republicans who crossed the aisle in the other direction and voted with the Democrats against this $612 billion monstrosity of a GOP bill? Walter Jones, the second most senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, and a batch of libertarian-leaning Republicans like Justin Amash (R-MI), Johnny Duncan (R-TN), Raul Labrador (R-ID), Thomas Massie (R-KY), Mick Mulvaney (R-SC) and Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA).

Adam Smith (D-WA), the Ranking Member of the Committee, encouraged President Obama to veto the mess (which he did today):

The President has said he will veto the defense bill because it is bad for national security. I agree with his assessment.

This bill misuses the Overseas Contingency Operation fund to evade the congressionally mandated budget caps and is itself a political game. Defense Secretary Carter has said the funding scheme outlined in this bill fails to provide a stable, multi-year budget on which defense planning is necessarily based.  In his words, it provides a “road to nowhere.” That is not the kind of defense bill our troops need. Signing a bad bill does not make us safer.

We can’t give our troops the tools needed to fight our aggressors using this kind of budgeting gimmick. We must eliminate sequestration and enact a long-term, comprehensive budget deal.

If passed, the President should veto this bill, and Congress should fix it. That is what is good for national security.

Obama and most Democrats are concerned that by endorsing the Republican workaround to the sequester for defense spending, they will give Republican lawmakers an excuse not to address the dysfunctional limits in their entirety when Congress gets around to finally negotiating a full budget in December. As Smith said, "too many in the Republican Party don’t care about spending other than defense... If we let defense out of jail, give it all of this money... that makes it even that much more difficult to do anything about the budget caps on the other appropriations bills." And that's just fine with Republicans disguised as Democrats like Blue Dog Cheri Bustos (IL) and New Dem Patrick Murphy (FL).

Along the same lines of phony-baloney bipartisanship, the banksters are again looking for more taxpayer handouts and the most crooked Members of Congress are the ones pushing for them. This time it's an attempt by big recipients of campaign donations urging congressional leadership to not end federal dividend payments to banks. Sounds like TARP, Jr! Although 103 Republicans signed on to a letter from two bank shills-- Republican Bill Huizenga and New Dem Bill Foster-- what's really ugly about this is that so did 47 Democrats! Worst of the crooked Members pushing hardest for the predatory banksters. The dollar amounts are what each candidate took in legalized bribes from the banksters last year only (starting with the 2 chief sponsors of the letter):

• Bill Huizenga (R-MI- $540,180)
• Bill Foster (New Dem-IL- $478,450)
• Scott Garrett (R-NJ- $1,172,579)
• Patrick Murphy (New Dem-FL- $1,130,150)
• Steve Stivers (R-OH- $1,046,181)
• Ed Royce (R-CA- $999,718)
• Robert Dold (R-IL- $864,500)
• Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY- $834,947)
• Kathleen Rice (New Dem-NY- $757,717)
• Michael Fitzpatrick (R-PA- $751,485)
• Sean Duffy (R-WI- $747,554)
• Erik Paulsen (R-MN- $743,350)
• Andy Barr (R-KY- $738,173)
• Ed Perlmutter (New Dem-CO- $711,230)
• Pete Sessions (R-TX- $702,380)
• John Carney (New Dem-DE- $621,378)
• Carolyn Maloney (New Dem-NY- $588,800)
• Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ- $552,253)
• Mick Mulvaney (R-SC- $525,010)
• Gregory Meeks (New Dem-NY- $512,733)
• Terri Sewell (New Dem-AL- $501,602)
• Farmer Fincher (R-TN- $493,244)
• Rodney Davis (R-IL- $435,680)
• Denny Heck (New Dem-WA- $429,989)
• Lord Charles Boustany (R-LA- $410,947)
• Stevan Pearce (R-NM- $328,625)
• David Jolly (R-FL- $316,524)
• Ann Kuster (New Dem-NH- $310,601)
• Gwen Graham (Blue Dog-FL- $308,962)
• Mia Love (R-UT- $290,798)
• Michael McCaul (R-TX- $283,384)
• Carlos Curbelo (R-FL- $264,428)
• Bruce Poliquin (R-ME- $254,650)
• Frank Guinta (R-NH- $229,400)
• Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA- $225,350)
• Tom Cole (R-OK- $208,900)
• Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA- $204,596)
• Tim Walberg (R-MI- $190,640)
• Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN- $166,150)
• David Valadao (R-CA- $163,900)
• David Schweikert (R-AZ- $163,150)
• Kurt Schrader (Blue Dog-OR- $153,733)
• David Brat (R-VA- $117,640)
• Steve Womack (R-OK- $111,875)
• Rod Blum (R-IA- $101,386)

This is what Bernie is talking about when he rails against a campaign finance system that rigs the entire economy towards the wealthy. All these Wall Street shills above-- whether Republicans like Scott Garrett and Jaime Herrera Beutler of Republican-lite fake Democrats like Patrick Murphy and Kyrsten Sinema-- are taking huge sums of money, year after year after year, from special interests to serve their needs at the direct expense of ordinary working Americans. No Republican will ever fix this and neither will Hillary Clinton (just as Bill Clinton didn't and Barack Obama didn't). Only Bernie doesn't take money from these crooked banksters and from the corporate predators who are always offering legalized bribes to politicians. Scooping up campaign cash-- a part of the epidemic of ugly careerism that plagues our political system-- is the number one priority for most of the members of Congress. But Bernie isn't that way and has never been that way. This is how he responded when pharmaceutical predator Martin Shkreli tried to bribe him recently:

A Wall Street hedge fund manager named Martin Shkreli decided that he could make a lot of money off a life-saving drug for AIDS patients and other sick people by jacking the price from $13.50 per tablet to $750. Sick people be damned.

I started a congressional investigation into his price gouging. Shkreli promised to reduce the price, though he hasn't done so yet.

But Martin Shkreli was angry. He didn't like that I criticized him, so he tried to get a private meeting with me. And he thought the best way to do that was by donating $2,700 to our campaign.

That may be how other campaigns work. Not ours. We are taking Martin Shkreli's $2,700 donation and are giving it straight to an AIDS clinic in Washington, DC.

...The economic and political systems of this country are stacked against ordinary Americans. The rich get richer and use their wealth to buy elections and legislation.

Saying to Wall Street and the drug companies and the rest of the billionaire class, "please, do the right thing" while taking their money to fund your campaign is both naive and ultimately ineffective.

If we’re serious about creating jobs and health care for all, and addressing climate change and the needs of our children and the elderly, we must be serious about campaign finance reform.

If you'd like to contribute to Bernie's campaign-- and to the campaigns of any of the progressive candidates who have endorsed him, you can do that here... and long as their are no special interest strings attached!

Barney Frank Drops A Financial Crisis Bombshell; The Press Responds With Silence

by Gaius Publius

I can't take credit for this, though I wish I could. David Dayen, who writes at Salon, has been reading Barney Frank's new book Frank and also its reviews. Dayen is one of the most knowledgeable writers on the mortgage and financial crises — both. (Note to readers: It's not a financial crisis if there's no mortgage crisis. It's the inability to pay mortgage debt that started the avalanche of derivative-caused banking losses.)

Dayen noticed that in his book Frank makes a startling revelation, but since it involves (a) mortgage borrowers, not bankers, and (b) the current Democratic president, it has gotten zero coverage. What's the revelation? Barack Obama could have singlehandedly made sure TARP money, as mandated by Congress, was made available for mortgage relief, and chose not to.

For doomed mortgage-holders, as opposed to protected and bailed-out bankers, that makes Obama the perp. How do we know? Barney Frank said so in print. Here's Dayen's catch (my emphasis):

Barney Frank drops a bombshell: How a shocking anecdote explains the financial crisis

Barney Frank has a new autobiography out. He’s long been one of the nation’s most quotable politicians. And Washington lives in perpetual longing for intra-party conflict.

So why has a critical revelation from Frank’s book, one that implicates the most powerful Democrat in the nation, been entirely expunged from the record? The media has thus far focused on Frank’s wrestling with being a closeted gay congressman, or his comment that Joe Biden “can’t keep his mouth shut or his hands to himself.” But nobody has focused on Frank’s allegation that Barack Obama refused to extract foreclosure relief from the nation’s largest banks, as a condition for their receipt of hundreds of billions of dollars in bailout money.

The anecdote comes on page 295 of “Frank,” a title that the former chair of the House Financial Services Committee holds true to throughout the book. The TARP legislation included specific instructions to use a section of the funds to prevent foreclosures. Without that language, TARP would not have passed; Democratic lawmakers who helped defeat TARP on its first vote cited the foreclosure mitigation piece as key to their eventual reconsideration.

TARP was doled out in two tranches [slices; bundles] of $350 billion each. The Bush administration, still in charge during TARP’s passage in October 2008, used none of the first tranche on mortgage relief, nor did Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson use any leverage over firms receiving the money to persuade them to lower mortgage balances and prevent foreclosures. Frank made his anger clear over this ignoring of Congress’ intentions at a hearing with Paulson that November. Paulson argued in his defense, “the imminent threat of financial collapse required him to focus single-mindedly on the immediate survival of financial institutions, no matter how worthy other goals were.”

But Frank kept pushing: 

With the first tranche of TARP funds running out by the end of the year, Frank writes, “Paulson agreed to include homeowner relief in his upcoming request for a second tranche of TARP funding. But there was one condition: He would only do it if the President-elect asked him to.”

The "President-elect" was Barack Obama, and he said no, we're just going to bail out the banks, which is told by Frank via this classic Frank-ism:

Frank goes on to explain that Obama rejected the request, saying “we have only one president at a time.” Frank writes, “my frustrated response was that he had overstated the number of presidents currently on duty,” which equally angered both the outgoing and incoming officeholders.

Dayen goes on to document just how often the President-elect violated that "one president at a time" principle before taking office. He also notes that there was a second round of negotiation with Congress about releasing the second tranche, in which promises were made by the President-elect and broken. Seems the man was determined not to bail out the "wrong people" — an opinion widely held among elite opinion makers and leaders.

Remember, this is Barack Obama vintage 2008. Certainly post-campaign — he'd already won — but pre–taking office, with all the rolling betrayals that entailed. Only those watching his FISA vote, perhaps, knew what was coming.

Dayen couches this unfortunate event in humanitarian concerns, as he should, but also in economic terms. By not bailing out the nation's purchasers, the public, Obama extended the crisis:

That’s the main reason why the significance of Obama’s decision cannot be overstated. The fact that we waited six years to get some semblance of a decent economic recovery traces back directly to the failure to alleviate the foreclosure crisis. Here was a moment, right near the beginning, when both public money and leverage could have been employed to stop foreclosures. Instead of demanding homeowner help when financial institutions relied on massive government support, the Administration passed, instead prioritizing nursing banks back to health and then asking them to give homeowners a break, which the banks predictably declined.

But again, we're back to elite opinion, which holds that even though the way out of a crisis like this is to stimulate buying and demand, that option is off the table. Because, whether people will say it or not, in our post-Reagan job-creator world, only the wealthy deserve to be made whole by the government. That's not snark; it's one of the guiding principles of our government.

Dayen makes a great catch, and his Salon piece is a very good read, including his baseball-metaphor conclusion. My point is a little different than his, however. Our need to service the "free" market  wealthy, obvious in this anecdote, will kill us, literally. But that's a climate story for another day.

He drank the milkshake of the mortgaged.
Did Obama hold the straw?

Do stay tuned though; the "free" market wealthy are draining most of California's water, drinking that milkshake as well, and there's a war brewing. More on that shortly.

GP

Sometimes Bipartisanship Leads To A Plot Against The People Of This Country By The Beltway Political Elites

This diagram shows the ideological spectrum of the Members who supported the Grayson amendment on police demilitarization

George Bush demanded-- hysterically-- that Congress pass the TARP giveaway to banksters that came close to wrecking the economy. But it can't only be pinned on Bush; both Establishment Beltway parties were complicit in that catastrophic vote. Boehner voted for it and he was rewarded with the Speakership. Three Republicans were elected U.S. Senators: Blunt (MO), Kirk (IL) and Boozman (AR) and Mary Fallin was elected governor of Oklahoma. I bet virtually none of their constituents know they backed TARP. (Ironically 2 Democrats who voted against it-- cousins Tom and Mark Udall were elected to the Senate from New Mexico and Colorado.)Other Republicans were rewarded with other goodies for doing the wrong thing. Fred Upton (R-MI) was named chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Paul Ryan (R-WI) was rewarded with the chairmanship of the House Banking Committee. Hal Rogers (R-KY) walked away with the chairmanship of the House Appropriations Committee. Dave Camp (R-MI) was made chair of the Ways and Means Committee. John Kline (R-MN) was given the chair of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Buck McKeon (R-CA) was given the chair of the House Armed Service Committee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen's (R-FL) pay off was the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. And two other big backers of Bush's legislation, Steve Israel (D-NY) and Pete Sessions (R-TX) became the heads, respectively, of the DCCC and the NRCC. (Sessions later was given the chair of the House Rules Committee). You see that pattern? Republican voters may have hated TARP but the congressmembers who voted for it and passed it were given control of the party caucus. It's the way DC works. And on the Democratic side, another crook, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, was eventually made head of the DNC and promised a "pathway" to the Speakership. Pelosi, Hoyer, Clyburn, Crowley… virtually the entire Democratic House leadership-- with the exception of Xavier Becerra (D-CA)-- voted for it too.

Who says Congress isn't bipartisan enough? More recently, as we've been writing (here, here, and here) Boehner and Pelosi both instructed their caucuses to vote against Grayson's amendment to put a stop to the militarization of local police forces. Grayson had lined up the 2 Blue Dogs-- Barrow and Matheson-- plus the 19 Republicans he needed to pass the amendment, certain his own party would back his attempt "to prohibit use of funds to transfer aircraft (including unmanned aerial vehicles), armored vehicles, grenade launchers, silencers, toxicological agents, launch vehicles, guided missiles, ballistic missiles, rockets, torpedoes, bombs, mines, or nuclear weapons." Military Industrial Complex whores Steny Hoyer ($992,040) and Pete Visclosky ($1,025,000) persuaded the increasingly persuadable Pelosi that Grayson's amendment was "a blunt instrument."

Writing this week for NewsTaco.com, Dr. Gabriela Lemus, executive director of Progressive Congress explained behaving as a nation at war with itself has been traumatizing for much of the country since the 1980s' so-called War on Drugs.

The confluence of the drug wars and the war on terror and its impact on local law enforcement has been a disaster. The devolving wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have meant finding alternative uses for surplus weapons or-- as I refer to it-- new toys for the boys. The 1033 Program, as it’s referred to, is named for a section of the National Defense Authorization Act-- a program first implemented in the early 1990s. It allows the Department of Defense to reissue billions of dollars of military equipment and sell it to domestic law enforcement forces particularly to elite units like SWAT Teams that have traditionally needed to fight the advanced weapons available to the narco-traffickers. Here’s the problem, if they have them, they will use them…

Even military veterans who went to Iraq and Afghanistan say that police in Ferguson were excessively armed. SUNY Plattsburgh professor Tom Nolan, a 27-year veteran of the Boston Police Department, wrote in an OpEd in DefenseOne this past June that police forces are increasingly militarizing and communities of color are hearing the message-- “You are the enemy.” As we have recently witnessed, this is a recipe for disaster.

Peaceful protesters are now angry protesters targeted with pepper spray, tear gas and rubber bullets. Journalists are now targets of the police and arrested for trying to do their jobs and cover the news. Michael Brown’s death and the evolving situation in Ferguson is a warning to us all. Our democracy is in peril lest we not pay heed.

We are witnessing a local law enforcement running amok and instead of protecting the safety and civil liberties of the residents, it has been employing tactics that violate the rights of citizens. Sadly, Ferguson is not alone-- there have been other incidents in New York, Los Angeles, and many others that haven’t gotten the attention of the media.

Law enforcement will continue to receive military equipment unless Congress puts a stop to it.  Yet, there is no agreement there either.  In the wake of this chaos, Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., distributed a letter to his congressional colleagues saying he plans to introduce the “Stop Militarizing Law Enforcement Act,” which would further monitor, limit or eliminate sales of military equipment. On the same day, U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin praised an announcement from the Department of Defense’s (DOD) Defense Logistics Agency to fully and permanently restore the DOD surplus equipment programs to benefit counties, school districts and rural fire departments.

How will it end?  Not well if cooler heads do not prevail. The militarization of our domestic law enforcement can only lead to more violence and the potential violation of human and civil rights with impunity.

Polar Opposites: Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) And Ted Lieu (D-CA)

I'm up to the part in Elizabeth Warren's new book, A Fighting Chance, when she's the chairman of the congressional oversight panel (COP) for TARP. The chapter is called "Bailing Out The Wrong People" and one of the villains is Wall Street shill Jeb Hensarling, a corrupt and backward congressman from Texas' 5th congressional district sprawling out from Garland northeast of Dallas into Lake Highlands and the eastern Dallas suburbs through Mesquite and Balch Springs and southeast down into small towns like Palestine, Athens and Jacksonville. The PVI is a daunting R+17 and Romney won the district 65-34%. Hensarling beat his little known Democratic opponent by roughly the same margins and, though it was a near tie in Dallas County, 42,158 (49%) to 41,652 (48%), Hensarling did win each of the 7 counties in the district, Van Zandt and Wood with 81% each!

It's a safe district and he can get away with murder-- or with selling his constituents out to the banksters. Which is what he does. The Finance Sector has rewarded Hensarling well for his efforts-- chronicled in part by Warren as he did everything he could to disrupt the TARP oversight-- on their behalf. Last cycle he got the 5th largest amount of legalistic bribes from the Finance sector of anyone in the House, $1,321,206. So far this cycle he's already at #3, as you can see in the chart below of the dozen most Wall Street-corrupted members of the House this year:

Warren makes it clear that he's a shameless partisan hack whose only interest in TARP oversight was protecting his Wall Street donors from oversight. His only role on the panel was obstruction and dissent. The banksters rewarded him with more than just cash. The told Boehner to give him the top position on "their committee," House Financial Services in 2013. He now chairs that committee. And the banksters, needless to say, are as happy as pigs in shit. He's there for exactly one reason-- protecting the ability of the banksters to rip off the public with impunity. What's not to like? It's how Wall Street rules.

Reading Warren's hassles with Hensarling reminded me of another political sojourn, one by a California state senator I've gotten to know this year, Ted Lieu, who Blue America endorsed for the Henry Waxman congressional seat. Though Ted first came to our attention for his efforts to stop unconstitutional, warrentless, bulk collection of civilian communications in the state of California, it was his multi-cycle war against the mortgage banksters that helped us envision him as a Member of Congress worthy of Waxman's legacy. In 2007 Ted wrote the following OpEd for the San Jose Mercury News at a time when many people still idolized Fed Chair and sociopath Alan Greenspan. Greenspan eventually ended up apologizing to Congress much later and acknowledged his views were wrong. It was under questioning by Congressman Waxman. Ted's prescient title: Greenspan And His Policies Bear Much Blame In Foreclosure Crisis.

As Alan Greenspan tours the world promoting his memoir, an average of 12,000 Californians and 55,000 homeowners across the nation receive a foreclosure notice every week, the highest in American history. Next year, a record 2 million adjustable rate home loans are scheduled to spike upward nationwide, putting 1.4 million homeowners at risk of foreclosure. We are at the tip of the iceberg in a rapidly accelerating mortgage meltdown, and the prime cause started with the former Federal Reserve chairman's policies.

The roots of the foreclosure crisis can be traced to three deliberate decisions made by Greenspan. First, by reducing the federal funds rate to a mere 1 percent in 2003 and refusing to increase it for a year, Greenspan and the Federal Reserve created the economic conditions for rampant investor speculation and a loosening of loan underwriting standards as lenders frantically competed for market share.

Second, Greenspan shunned increased regulations, even though he has now admitted knowing about abuses in the subprime loan industry. His failure to act has resulted in the mass use of the foreclosure, one of the most inefficient mechanisms in the market. Not only is there a severe human toll to families thrown out on the street, but foreclosures also carry with them massive societal costs, with lenders losing up to 50 percent of the loan value on each foreclosed home.

Third, blinded by the irrational exuberance of surging home prices, Greenspan promoted the non-traditional mortgages that have devastated so many homeowners. In a speech on Feb. 23, 2004, Greenspan stated consumers were paying too much for fixed-rate mortgages and asked lenders to provide "greater mortgage product alternatives to the traditional fixed-rate mortgage." When a person of Greenspan's influence and stature promotes alternative mortgage products, lenders and consumers listen.

Wall Street followed Greenspan's call and designed a whole range of risky, alternative adjustable rate mortgages, including those with low teaser rates that spiked after two to three years. These risky loans were sold-- sometimes fraudulently-- on a mass scale to a public ill-informed about their significant risks. The regulatory system also allowed mortgage brokers to receive monetary incentives to place a borrower in a higher interest, adjustable-rate subprime loan even though the borrower would have qualified for a fixed-rate prime loan.

California and the nation are now suffering the consequences of Greenspan's policies. As the first large wave of adjustable rate mortgages started to spike earlier this year, hundreds of thousands of homes went into foreclosure when homeowners were unable to pay the increased monthly payments. Some of these borrowers could have saved their homes by refinancing but were unable to because of significant prepayment penalties.

My colleagues and I recently proposed a set of reforms in the mortgage industry that will be introduced as bills in January. We propose to: ban kickbacks to the broker for putting a homeowner in a higher interest rate loan; ban prepayment penalties; and mandate that the lender evaluate the borrower's ability to repay the loan based on the entire length of the loan and not just the initial teaser rate. We also call for increasing counselors and financial literacy, and making loan terms easier to understand. The intent is to ensure this crisis never happens again, regardless of what the Federal Reserve and Wall Street might think up in the future.

President Bush recently set forth a proposal in which some lenders and loan servicers will voluntarily agree to freeze the interest rates for up to five years for non-delinquent borrowers on certain subprime adjustable rate loans. The Center for Responsible Lending estimates the Bush plan will reach 7 percent of homeowners.

For many homeowners, especially the hundreds of thousands that have already defaulted, there will be very little the state or federal government can do. They can thank Greenspan. Maybe he can donate the profits of his book to those families who have already lost their homes.

It took Ted 3 sessions of the legislature to pass his bill. The mortage banksters fought ferociously but he never gave up. It actually passed the second time by Gray Davis, a corporate whore from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, vetoed it. The next year many progressives sat on their hands when the execrable Davis was recalled and replaced with Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger. Eventually, Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Ted's bill into law-- after first vetoing it-- when both house of the legislature passed it on his third try. In 2008-- and sounding a lot like Elizabeth Warren-- Ted wrote that "during the mortgage boom, industry players became addicted to the drug of high-yield, adjustable rate subprime mortgages that they foisted on borrowers. Raking in massive quarterly and annual bonuses, corporate executives didn't care if borrowers could repay the mortgages a few years later. It was greed on speed, the future be damned, and now all of us are suffering the consequences." AB 1830, his legislation was a comprehensive subprime mortgage reform bill banning predatory subprime loan practices and exotic, overly risky and unsuitable loan products. Ted:

If the Bush Administration wants to use your hard-earned money to bail out Wall Street, then taxpayers should demand major industry reforms. First, industry should agree that they will no longer fight mortgage reforms such as those contained in AB 1830. Second, industry should agree to fix executive compensation so that the Gordon Geckos of Wall Street are not incentivized to place short-term profits above long-term financial health.

Third, we need to slow down the number of foreclosures and stabilize home prices or the problems will get even worse. This can be done by granting bankruptcy judges the ability to modify loans on the borrower's place of residence, and by following the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation's lead of imposing a foreclosure moratorium.

Ted's persistence eventually overcame the banksters' dogged opposition. He beat them. But they weren't done. They went to the corrupt Democratic leadership in Sacramento, the same way they had gone to Boehner in DC to tell him to appoint Hensarling to chair the House Financial Services Committee. But in this case, they demanded that Ted be removed as Chairman of the Banking Committee. He was duely "promoted" to the Chair of the Assembly Rules Committee. Ted has already shown he'll be part of the Elizabeth Warren team for working families. If you'd like to see him in the House as a counterbalance to the wretched Jeb Hensarling, please consider contributing to his campaign here.

Big Money Invented Paul Ryan To Work For Them, Not For Teabaggers

Palin's not happy with the Republican Party Establishment-- and she claims she may be ready to bolt and start one of her own. No one represents that Establishment better than Paul Ryan. Ryan's a packaged product, courtesy of Wall Street and Madison Avenue. That's all he's ever been and Boehner was more than happy to boost him into the chair of the Budget Committee to please the banksters both serve. Recall, if you will, Ryan's first big effort for the criminal banksters who lifted him out of obscurity.

It's September 2008 and the GOP kleptocrats are winding up their last months in office. They wanted to deliver one more grand giveaway to Wall Street-- Henry Paulsen's bankster bailout. One problem: enough Republicans (133 of 'em) joined with Democrats to defeat it 205-228 when it was first brought up for a vote. Wall Street's best-paid shills, Boehner, Cantor and Paul Ryan, mobilized for battle. At the time Ryan, a relatively junior Member, had already taken $1,704,095 in legalistic bribes from Wall Street (a number that has now risen to $$3,303,872, just slightly more than the $3,283,687 the banksters gave Democratic crook Steve Israel). After the defeat in the House, Wall Street and the banksters went bonkers and pulled all Bush's strings and he and Paulsen easily got the monstrosity passed in the House of Lords and then went back to the House with a no less odious version of the bill that they had rejected a few days before. This time it passed 263-171 with not 65, but 91 Republicans joining in. Among the vote switchers who had had their arms twisted by Boehner, Cantor and Ryan plus the official registered Wall Street lobbyists:

• Gresham Barrett (R-SC- $807,723)
• Judy Biggert (R-IL- $1,675,717)
• Charlie Dent (R-PA- $760,872)
• Mary Fallin (R-OK- $336,576)
• Jim Gerlach (R-PA- $1,670,352)
• Pete Hoekstra (R-MI- $295,830)
• Gary Miller (R-CA- $807,688)
• Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL- $928,068)
• Mean Jean Schmidt (R-OH- $458,449)
• John Shadegg (R-AZ- $1,218,261)
• Lee Terry (R-NE- $1,246,007)
• Patrick Tiberi (R-OH- $2,438,284)

At the time some people wondered if teabaggers and fiscal conservatives would hold a screamingly hypocritical Ryan accountable at all. Yesterday's selection by Romney-- popular with the GOP base-- shows they didn't give a damn. At the time, Ryan was the ranking Republican on the House Budget Committee and a member of the Ways and Means Committee. He' had assigned himself the job of spokesperson for fiscal austerity but he had already taken more money from the banksters than any other politician in the history of Wisconsin politics and, as we saw, he voted for the bank bailout not once, but twice. In fact, Ryan was one of the hypocrites exposed in Michael Moore's film, Capitalism: A Love Story:

In a section of the critically acclaimed examination of how Wall Street insiders diverted hundreds of billions of tax dollars into their accounts, Moore illustrates how the bailout happened. Democratic and Republican members of Congress who do the bidding of the bankers scared their colleagues and the American people into approving a massive bailout of the speculators whose misdeeds created the financial meltdown that shocked the nation in September 2008.

Ryan, the Republican congressman from southeast Wisconsin's hard-pressed 1st District, is shown playing the fear card by telling the House that it had to steer almost $800 million BILLION to Wall Street's sleaziest players.

"If we fail to do the right thing, heaven help us-- if we fail to pass this I fear the worst is yet to come," claimed Ryan.

The statement from the Wisconsin Republican who has positioned himself as a budget specialist in the House played a significant role in securing support for a bailout bill that had not been adequately analyzed and that included few protections against fraud.

Had Ryan used his reputation and his role on key committees to aggressively oppose the bailout, he might have blocked the rush to judgment that economists now say could end up costing American taxpayers trillions of dollars-- and a big chunk of their country's future.

Instead, the GOP establishment's favored point man on fiscal issues claimed-- without benefit of facts, figures or any grounding in economic reality-- that a failure to give the bankers everything they were asking for could bring on a depression.

"This is a Herbert Hoover moment," Ryan told the House, as he reached a fear-mongering crescendo. "(Hoover) made mistakes during the Great Depression-- let's not make those mistakes."

It was a virtuoso performance. Moore was right to highlight it.

The filmmaker has given Wisconsin taxpayers a dramatic illustration of how it came to pass that we are bailing out bankers and billionaires at the same time that auto plants are closing in cities such as Janesville and Kenosha-- both of which are in the 1st District. More importantly, Moore has reminded the voters of southeastern Wisconsin how key members of Congress such as Paul Ryan determined to take care of the speculators on Wall Street rather than working families on Main Street.

Ryan was overjoyed to bail out his bankster/paymasters on Wall Street but when it came to bailing out their victims who, through no fault of their own, were swamped with screwed up mortgages, he changed his tune... drastically. Ryan always stands up for corporations and never stands up for working families.

And Ryan's a gift that keeps on giving. Over the weekend, a far right propaganda website wigged out at the way Ryan's playing Pied Piper to Republican House backbenchers over immigration, just as he did in the TARP battle.

Ryan has been meeting with House conservatives to persuade them that reform of the immigration system, including a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, is an economic necessity and critical to fixing the nation's fiscal problems.

...Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist said the sheer amount of time Ryan has spent talking with House Republicans about budget issues gives him the credibility to court them on immigration reform.

"I would bet you a nickel that he has had more face time with each member than anyone else in the caucus," said Norquist, an influential conservative who also believes immigration reform is vital to the economy.

Republican strategist Whit Ayres calls Ryan "one of the most effective messengers the Republican party has in the House," adding that "If Paul Ryan talks, the House Republicans will listen."

That assessment may be overly optimistic, considering the large number of House Republicans from conservative districts who see legalization of illegal immigrants and offering them a path to eventually become U.S. citizens as an "amnesty."

But Ryan said a Republican-backed amendment to the Senate bill to boost security on the U.S.-Mexico border improves the chances that the House and Senate could ultimately agree on a compromise version of the legislation.

The amendment "brings the Senate bill closer to the House's position and that gives me the belief that we have a better chance at getting this law fixed at the end," he said.

Unlike Republican Senator Marco Rubio, an architect of the Senate immigration bill and a potential rival for Ryan if both seek the presidency, Ryan is not writing legislation or participating in a congressional working group on the issue.

But both Ryan and Rubio face risks from the divisiveness of the immigration issue among Republicans.

Support for immigration reform could cost either man votes with conservatives who will nominate a 2016 Republican candidate. On the other hand, the influence of Hispanic-Americans in U.S. elections could make it harder for any candidate who opposes immigration reform to win the White House.

...In April, Ryan teamed up with his friend, Democratic Congressman Luis Gutierrez, who is a staunch supporter of immigration reform, to tout the issue at an event in Chicago. He has also co-sponsored immigration reform bills in the past.

Like Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, Ryan talks of the work ethic of immigrants and the high proportion who start businesses. He often tells of his Irish ancestors who fled the potato famine in the 1850s and started a family farm in Wisconsin.

In the interview, he cited future budget deficits as a reason for urgency on immigration reform. With 10,000 baby boomers retiring from the workforce each day, "our economy is going to need more labor in the future," he said.

Ryan said he believes the country needs a system "designed for the economy, to bring workers in to do jobs that people won't do or to bring their high-tech intellectual capital."

The fiscal argument helped fuel momentum for the Senate immigration bill when the Congressional Budget Office estimated it would reduce deficits by $197 billion over a decade because of additional workers paying income and payroll taxes.

If Ryan is worried about a conservative backlash on immigration, he is showing no signs of it.

He has offered to debate anyone who says an "earned" path to citizenship is the equivalent of amnesty.

And the man who has sparred for years with Democrats on budget issues believes he can play a role in getting the two parties to work together. "I think when you get Democrats to listen to Republicans and Republicans to listen to Democrats you can find the common ground," he said.

Alex Nowrasteh of the libertarian Cato Institute said Ryan could give other Republicans political cover to support immigration reform. "Nobody is going to question the conservative credentials of Paul Ryan," he said.

Really?

Whose Side Will Teabaggers Be On If Neel Kashkari Challenges Darrell Issa In The GOP Primary?

In 2008, Obama narrowly beat McCain in California's 49th congressional district, Darrell Issa's San Diego/Orange County seat. This year Romney won 52.4 to 45.7%. Although the San Diego part of the district, which is the biggest part, is trending Democratic, the Orange County part-- which now goes all the way up past San Clemente to Laguna Niguel, Ladera Ranch and Dana Point-- is still rabidly Republican. Issa beat Jerry Tetalman in the Orange County areas 66-34% but only took 56% in the San Diego section. Overall, Issa probably feels pretty safe. He won 139,127 (59%) to 97,454 (41%)... and Steve Israel, who gave him a free reelection pass, has been reappointed DCCC chairman... so no need to worry about a serious challenge. At least not from that quarter. Could Issa be facing a serious primary though?

Do you remember Neel Kashkari? A financial industry predator, Kashkari was brought over to the catastrophic Bush economic team from Goldman Sachs by his old boss Henry Paulson, Bush's Treasury Secretary. Never confirmed by Congress, he was the Interim Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Stability and is best known as the guy who ran T.A.R.P. He co-wrote a doomsday bank rescue proposal, entitled Break the Glass, that formed the basis of what became TARP. If you haven't already done so, now's the time to watch the video up top.

Kashkari doled out $700 billion dollars in taxpayer funds to his Wall Street pals on behalf of the Bush regime right after it-- and they-- had crashed the economy. Kashkari had some high-profile clashes with progressives like Dennis Kucinich and Elijah Cummings on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. But he also tangled with then ranking-Republican on the Committee (now Chairman), Darrell Issa. Now's the time to watch the video down below.

After the country was finally rid of Bush, Kashkari scurried off to make a fortune from his new bankster best friends. He washed up at PIMCO and has been a frequent guest on TV shows when they needed someone to twist the meaning of "entitlements" and talk about how the U.S. needs to cut back on Social Security, Medicare, jobless benefits, aid to veterans, etc. In recent years, Kashkari has been a generous donor to right wing politicians and has given thousands of dollars to Senate Banking Committee bigwig Bob Corker (R-TN), the ranking Republican on the International Trade and Finance Committee, the area Kashkari worked in at PIMCO. Last year he gave the RNC $15,000 and he's also contributed heavily to Rob Portman (R-OH), another Banking Committee Wall Street shill, Romney and, of course, George W. Bush. This week he announced that he's leaving PIMCO and looking into running for... something.

“As much as I have enjoyed my time at Pimco, I feel an obligation and a desire to serve my community through public service,” Mr. Kashkari said in the statement. “My time at the Department of the Treasury was the most rewarding professional experience of my life and I want to find ways to continue to serve my fellow citizens in some capacity.”

Staying true to his roots, he would run as a Republican-- even in overwhelmingly Democratic California. (Pimco’s headquarters, however, are in Newport Beach, Calif., an oasis of conservative politics in the largely liberal state.)

So what office will h run for? Is now the time to give Issa a little payback? It's slim pickings for Republicans-- even very rich ones-- in California. Although southern Orange County, where he lives, routinely elects Republicans to everything. But would the man who ran TARP for Bush go over well... even in Republican primaries? I hope we get to find out, especially in the 49th.