Charlie Rose

Nassim Sabba  10/16/2008 01:48 PM Report

Mr. HilsenRath is absolutely concise with his choice of words, it is true the government is putting its umbrella BEHIND (not over) troubled entities, human or not.

The problem is that the umbrella, despite its appearance is not "protected".

Ivan Hajdukovic  10/16/2008 05:23 AM Report

In 2006 Goldman Sachs distributed 16 billion dollars in employee compensation. With roughly 25,000 employees at the time it added up to around $600K per employee. Secretaries included...

Other investment houses were following the suit - they all knew that the system is going to melt, but with millions in the pockets they just kept milking the unregulated markets.

Moso  10/15/2008 08:58 PM Report

When Martin Wolf, an otherwise sensible man, said that the end of the current financial crisis depends, in part, on the spending habits of Americans, I groaned in sheer disbelief. The spending habits of Americans, fueled by debt and cheap credit, landed us in this mess in the first place. Americans have to learn to live within their means. They can't soak up the rest of the world's energy and goods in order to achieve the so-called American lifestyle. Our economy, before everything fell apart, was 70% dependent on the consumption habits of individual consumers. That is outrageous. Cheap credit, a large supply of cheap goods, and big productivity gains are fundamental tenets of supply-side economics. This philosophy, when put into practice by market fundamentalists like Greenspan, has contributed directly to the crisis. We have to rethink capitalism, what we mean by quality of life, and what it means to live as an international citizen.

D. Tapia  10/15/2008 08:24 PM Report

Charlie Rose asked on a Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008 show when did this crisis start. It started when Congress changed the rules when ordinary citizens filed bankruptcy at the bequest of the Credit Card Industry, even though companies don't have constitutional rights since SlauterHouse ruling was overturned 50 years later. Instead of looking after the interest of the people, the first domino was tipped over when all of a sudden bankruptcy filings were being recorded at record numbers all over the U.S. that it cascaded into the defaults we are seeing now. At the time when the rules were being discussed, I, in Arizona, asked my representatives McCain, Guajalva, and Kyl that this would be an oppertunity to set regulations on Credit Card Ind. on how they do business, and of course as to be expected, they weren't listening, and now we have what we have because they forgot who they represent. And about the House boom and when did that balloon burst was when the U.S. Supreme Court made the eminent domain decision in which they basically said that we don't own our houses, if the city wants it, it gets it, even thought the eminent domain ruling has a flaw to it. When eminent domain is allowed, the public has a right to enjoy and use the area, such as railroad tracks were used by some people at times with their own convayance and the highways, freeways are used by the people freely were acquired thru eminent domain. If private property is taken to be given to another private property and said property is not available to the public, violates eminent domain authority.

hugh curran  10/15/2008 08:24 PM Report

Lev says: "But why should I pay more in taxes to bail out the deadbeats who bought homes they KNEW they could not afford? They are the real criminals..living off the fat of everyone else. Let's put the blame squarely where it should be."

Could you try at least to be just a wee bit more sympathetic? And if not how about facing some realities? How many buyers were enticed into purchasing by vague or misleading statements? Selling to those who were obviously unable to sustain payments, especially with escalating interest rates is certainly unethical if it is not considered criminal? Misleading the unwary and the vulnerable should be a crime and people like Lev with their transparently self-justifying philosophies fit into the classic sophistry pattern. In other words if the customer or client is innocent or naive it is their fault for not being able to read the fine print or to perceive the sophistry (ie cheating for gain or profit)in the seller's mind. Shame on those who fault the victim. At some point they too suffer the fate of the victim.

Dave Lev  10/15/2008 02:09 PM Report

On comment calls for prosecutions...for what, no crime has been committed? If you want prosecutions, go after the millions of people who knowingly borrowed way above their means. Now they excuse their excesses by pointing fingers at the lenders, AND the Wall Street executives who did earn enormous salaries..again, no laws were violated. You want indictments, go after the felons who don't file incomea tax returns..and who fudge on their receipts and expenses. We are talking about hundreds of billions in taxes each year. Get the Ass't US Attorney's involved..send the bastards to jail. We who pay rent, don't get tax breaks. We cannot sell our equity, caus there ain't any. Why not do away with the 250,000 and 500,000 exemption from taxes on home sales, as a beginning? There should have been a surtax on profits from the sale of those homes for the past 15 years. I know people who purchased homes for 100,000 here in California, and sold 25 years later for 1 million. That's horrendous profit, talk about greed, it's almost criminal. Perhaps banks will now be regulated to avoid some of this leveraging and gambling? That's okay. But why should I pay more in taxes to bail out the deadbeats who bought homes they KNEW they could not afford?

They are the real criminals..living off the fat of everyone else. Let's put the blame squarely where it should be. One does not have to own a 4 bedroom home in the suburbs to have a piece of the US pie. Hows about right back in the old neighborhood, in a comfortable apartment? Here in California, I see condos and townhouses going up all over the place. Sure, but who in the heck can affort 700,000 for a studio or 2,000 for a rental? Besides drill baby drill, we should have, build (projects) baby, build. You want to save jobs for Americans..I have an idea, buy American. Fords and GM are just as good as Hondas and Toyotas. But then again, maybe they are not as pretty, according to some. Like who cares? Labor unions are mobilizing their members for Obama. they say, he will be better for all of US. Sure, and who will pay for the trillions in new expenses..not just billions? He wants to give all of us, who don't pay any taxes, a credit..another name for welfare. I thought we already had a child tax credit. He wants to keep or increase taxes on corporate profits, while most don't have taxable profits. Who will pay for those that do, US. I guess success is now verboten? Why work harder, and longer hours, when it's eaten away to help defray the cost that those home owners never should have agreed to in the beginning. We criticize the Russians, we are no better. But they have 400 billion in reserves..and we have 10 trillion in debt. Let's keep on selling our souls to the Chinese and Arabs folks...they are smiling all the way to Dubai.

Anton Grambihler  10/15/2008 03:08 AM Report

When John Reed and Sandy Weill announced on television that Travelers and Citibank were going to merge even though they knew it was illegal, the Federal Reserve said they would be given up to 2 years to get congress to change the law so they would not be in violation. Illegal activity by this new entity called Citicorp was partially responsible for the Enron Default. John Reed was later rewarded by being made chairman of the New York Stock Exchange to help boost investor confidence in the Stock Market.

Now the Financial institutions are going for the juggler to bankrupt the United States.

STOP THE FINANCIAL APPEASEMENTS AND BEGIN PROSECUTIONS.

sock puppet  10/15/2008 01:16 AM Report

In other posts debasement of the currency by bailouts for banks, people, cats and dogs concerned me, but in a eureka moment it hit me that that is indeed intended. They can make a fictive value of homes increase through inflation. And alls right with the world - unless you're hungry due to high food prices. But, alas, I'm sure the financial wise-guys think they can fine tune any troublesome little problems. Targeted subsidies here, tax breaks there, voila problem solved. On to the next BUBBLE.

RE Mant  10/15/2008 12:05 AM Report

A company sells equity when it has nothing else to sell. Paulson, himself, was against directly giving the banks money initially. And as Stiglitz said yesterday the move is also all Europe can do since they don't, for the most part at least, have the mortgages. Nothing has yet been done about them. Without addressing the underlying problem, I don't see this measure doing a lot of good.

The essential problem is that people can no longer afford the mortgages made during what was basically an inflationary cycle induced by easy money, ending when the easy money ran out. People who bought the houses at those prices no doubt expected them to go even higher, but they have sunk, because they could not make their payments, and have been foreclosed, glutting the mkt with empty houses, and lowering prices dramatically so that even if sold many will not repay the loan. That is the homebuyers' fault, but the bubble was also the fault of the builders, the finance cos, the Fed, and the country-at-large for its fiscal imprudence, and all then should bear responsibility. The investment may be entirely lost physically if the houses are not quickly reoccupied, will probably also diminish the need for relief, and will stem the further drop in prices, which, besides throwing the homeowners out in the street, has evicted much of Wall Street. It clearly will not do anyone any good for this to continue now even tho an argument could rightly be made that it should only end of its own accord, when prices match affordable levels. There is a worry that it will go further than that, and we will end up in a situation with everyone hoarding and no business being done, the kind of situation that played a large part in bringing on WWII. McCain floated the refinancing suggestion 6 mos ago, with the idea, however, that lenders would agree. They have so far not. The provision was inserted in the $700bn bail-out pkg and in the last debate McCain suggested the govt pay the entire cost, which could be recovered from the lenders by some creative taxation. This plan makes more sense than buying the securities, which will be worthless without refinancing, or in funneling more money into the banks, the course taken by the British and now done here, which is also allowed under the bail-out bill, but which only attempts to treat the symptom rather than the cause. And it increases the money supply more because whatever is put in will be increased 10x by the fractional reserve, if, of course, it is lent and invested at all. Under the McCain/Feldstein plan the govt would not get stuck with anything if it buys a loan on a house that is worth less, unless the loan is for the lower amount. If it is just converted to a longer term and lower interest there isn't much difference unless the homeowner walks away, though if the FHA does the refinancing, it will only insure the loan up to 90% of the current value, meaning then that someone has to come up with the difference or forgiven, or the FHA policy changed. In any case, the other options are clearly "trickle-down" and this one is "trickle-up."