Charlie Rose Science Series
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03/31/2008
John Snow
A conversation with John Snow
Keywords:
A conversation with John Snow, chairman of Cerberus Capital Management.
DVD
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Charlie Rose DVDs on Amazon.
Audio
Audio available through Audible.com.
Audio available through Audible.com.
Transcripts
Transcripts available through Voxant.
Transcripts available through Voxant.
Hi John Snow, you tell it like it is, boyz will be boyz, and no opportunity to earn a questionable buck will go unexplored. And when subprime adventures go awry make sure the risk is spread far and wide. In fact, you made it quite clear that merely knowingly selling worthless mortgage-backed paper to the suckers and then shorting that very same paper is considered a legitimate move in your game, and should neither be investigated, regulated or punished. I suppose that if it it were to be found that the entire sequence of events from predatory mortgage origination to collapse of the entire financial system were found to be vertically integrated by a single power addict cabal, that you would believe that the responsible miscreants should be applauded for their diabolical acumen and their trillion dollar fraud. Their victims, I am sure, would think 100 years in the slammer a more appropriate reward. A news item today says that Lehman is suing for a Japanese bank for $350,000,000 for fraudulent securities that were sold to them. What it doesn't say is that the Japanese were probably just getting even for certain toxic sub-prime mortgage-backed paper that was sold to a business associate of theirs. This sort of thing is bound to recur again and again, as legitimate institutions begin to question the veracity of counterparties in complex transactions, and contemplate reprisals. If the situtation gets bad enough, I predict that Barney Frank will hire Vladimir Putin as a consultant.
At the end - every single one of Snow's investment calls turned out to be wrong. He has established that he is a moron in private sector as he was in the government. After Bush - he is a poster child why people should not go to MBA programs, as it only teaches you thievery.
Dear Charlie, How did you ever become so adept at interviewing the members of The Club? The baseball season opened yesterday-they play with something called a hardball;but every night it seems like you play with soft balls? Why?
Charlie, Tell me what you thought of Secretary Paulson's remarks? Why not just ask if he wants a full-body massage or just a shoulder rub? Pathetic. The Incompetent Face of Deregulation in the Bush Administration, second only in foolishness to Harvey "The" Pitt, gets a softball question. Charlie, find a spine.
Mr. Snow is not convincing. The word is, "glib". For a complete specification of Mr. Snow, see the chapter about him in the book by David Cay Johnston, "Free Lunch".
Re JOHN SNOW "PALLIATIVE PABLUM" IS CORRECT.I HAVE NEVER HEARD SUCH A LOT OF GARBAGE. I AM SITTING HERE YELLING AT THE INTERVIEW. CHARLIE, WHY DID YOU LET THIS GUY OFF THE HOOK? HE'S TALKING ABOUT SELLING THE "PAPER" LIKE THIS CRISES DOESN;T REPRESENT PEOPLE AND THEIR LIVELIHOODS AND THEIR HOMES THAT THEY ARE BEING KICKED OUT OF FOR WANT OF DECENT CONSUMER LAWS TO PROTECT THEM FROM ALL OF THE PREDATORS THAT PUT THEM INTO LOANS THEY NEVER SHOULD HAVE HAD; "FOR WANT OF A FEE, WE SOLD THE SOULS OF A NATION". LISTENING TO JOHN SNOW YOU CAN TELL HOW OUT OF TOUCH HE IS WITH THE REAL LIVES OF PEOPLE. I'D LIKE TO HEAR YOU INTERVIEW PAUL O'NEILL.
A Snow-job extraordinaire. He spent too much time just rehashing facts rather than possible remedies. The venal whores ignoring prudent financial lending exploiting the vulnerable solely for the fees and selling the worthless paper down-stream sorely need regulating. Egregious greed needs checks and balances moreso than government. Mercenaries at the top like Snow-job will never permit it. He doesn't want tax increases to slow capital growth. But it's the very capital-laden wise guys that caused the sub-prime melt down. The wise-guys have ruined what could have been an enduring system. All the while blaming those they dispossess for the failure their unbridled greed brought about. They'll doubtless invest in pay-day loan shops to prey on them on the way down.
Hi Charlie, Thanks for asking all of the right questions, to all of the biggest American business leaders, about the future of the U.S. economy. I am troubled by one huge 'pink elephant in the room' that has never been mentioned as a root cause for our current financial challenges. Beyond the housing devaluation, and the credit crisis, and the huge Iraq War budget, and the cost of 'The Long March of 10,000 BabyBoomers A Day' entering our under-funded Medicare System (for another 18 years!) -- when is SOMEBODY going to mention that the fact that the USA is fully-enveloped in the confustion of a 'Post-Industrial' Economy? The term, 'Post-Industial' doesn't describe anything positive: It simply describes 'a skills-set for making money' that we no longer have! When will our leaders acknowledge the obvious: We Americans have lost our understanding of the next-level-of-value skills that we bring to the global economic stage, better than anyone else in the world. What will be the nature of the new, affirmative, value-driving force (to replace the term, 'Post-Industrial') that jump-starts our new economy? As of today, we are still awaiting the leaders that can help us learn the new skills, that will allow us to regain our confidence, to be the best in the world at something again... Thanks for your patient efforts to get to the root cause of our current dilemma -- so that we can fix it. HCS-P