It's clear from several House hearings this week, including today's with Geithner, that House Republicans fully expect to be in control come January.
I'm against Republican control for lots of reasons but most of all for the loss of Barney Frank as Chair. No Republican on his committee has anywhere near his breadth of experience or knowledge and Bachus (?), the current Sr. Rep. is a total loss.
Showing posts with label House Banking Committee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label House Banking Committee. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Friday, February 13, 2009
Bankers vs. the House Banking Committee: Highlights & Lowlights
Opening Statements
Anybody who listened to the opening statements (Feb. 12, 2009) might have wondered what the fuss is all about. It appears that many of the banks were profitable last year and took the TARP money only as sort of a favor to the Federal government. This got shot down pretty much through later questioning when it turned out that although all the bankers promised to return the funds by 2012, with interest, and would like to do it earlier there was one small hitch: to return it they must replace it with private capital and that they don't have. Still, I give the bankers points for a lack of arrogance and a recognition of the concerns of the Congress.
Republican Talking Points
I almost felt sorry for some of the Republican questioners as they desperately tried to get these Captains of Capitalism to buy in to Republican philosophy:
Are the regulators keeping you from making loans? No.
Is this government intervention destroying the free market system? No.
Shouldn't we step back and wait and think things through before we proceed? No.
Was TARP really needed? Is it working? This question was asked several times in different ways and the answers were a bit more ambiguous. Still, the most favorable to Republicans were still pretty weak: one CEO said he hadn't thought at the time that it was needed but, in retrospect, yes it was. Another, Jamie Dimon I think, said they'd be arguing about it for years, but he thinks it was, and that (at worst) it kept things from getting much worse.
Is a stimulus needed? Yes.
Isn't the idea of a systemic regulator bad? No. In fact, every single CEO welcomed the idea of more government regulation. That must truly have been galling.
Will those answers have changed the minds of the Republicans who asked the quesions? No. These Republicans are almost all ideologues who can't be bothered having their minds changed by simple facts. Indeed, in previous hearings I recall several basically admitting, when presented with facts they didn't like: "I know what I know". These Republicans are, politically, the equivalent of Creationists.
Quality of the Questions
I've watched almost all the hearings broadcast on C-SPAN since the start of this crisis last September and the questions, in general, from this committee were among the worst - to the point of being outright embarrassing. There were the grandstanders, of course. Ever since Ackerman got his 30 seconds of fame last Fall with the issue of private planes when the auto CEOs testified, an increasing number of his colleagues have decided they want their 30 seconds of fame, too. So we got a lot more blustering outrage than is usual - as well as the normal attempts to embarrass as much as possible those who are testifying. But the sheer ignorance of how the banking and financial systems work that was evident in many of the questions was truly appalling. Choosing the dumbest (in the sense that they demonstrated ignorance of how the system works) questions would be difficult, but Gutierrez (from Illinois, I believe) ranked among the least well-informed. It doesn't take much imagination to guess that probably all of the CEOs found themselves asking how they ever got in the position of having to politely answer questions put by such, to be kind, financially illiterate people (and they must have wondered how those Representatives managed to get elected let alone get positions on this committee - a question I was asking myself). On the positive side, the experience may be another spur for these executives to get their companies out from under government intervention asap. I doubt they want to go through a similar round of humiliation again.
My Favorite Comment
My favorite comment came from Emanuel Cleaver at the end of his questions (which fell into the outrage and "shame on you" category) when he remarked that he was "woefully unimpressed" by the diversity of the panel in front of him and for as many rows behind them [presumably filled by their staff] as he could see. Kudos to Mr. Cleaver. With the exception of Pandit from Citi, they were all white men. Otherwise there was not a woman, African-American, Asian or Hispanic in sight.
Overall Impression
Generally speaking, I was impressed by the bankers. These guys, for all the mistakes they've made, know change is needed and know that part of that change is increased regulation. Jamie Dimon, Mack, and Blankfein were especially fine witnesses. Pandit did the worse but then Citi is probably in worse shape than any of the other banks. And Lewis from B of A seemed to find the attacks harder to take.
Finally, I couldn't help but wonder how many years it has been since any of these men has had to raise a hand in answer to a question - let alone been subject to the level of abuse they had to absorb.
Anybody who listened to the opening statements (Feb. 12, 2009) might have wondered what the fuss is all about. It appears that many of the banks were profitable last year and took the TARP money only as sort of a favor to the Federal government. This got shot down pretty much through later questioning when it turned out that although all the bankers promised to return the funds by 2012, with interest, and would like to do it earlier there was one small hitch: to return it they must replace it with private capital and that they don't have. Still, I give the bankers points for a lack of arrogance and a recognition of the concerns of the Congress.
Republican Talking Points
I almost felt sorry for some of the Republican questioners as they desperately tried to get these Captains of Capitalism to buy in to Republican philosophy:
Are the regulators keeping you from making loans? No.
Is this government intervention destroying the free market system? No.
Shouldn't we step back and wait and think things through before we proceed? No.
Was TARP really needed? Is it working? This question was asked several times in different ways and the answers were a bit more ambiguous. Still, the most favorable to Republicans were still pretty weak: one CEO said he hadn't thought at the time that it was needed but, in retrospect, yes it was. Another, Jamie Dimon I think, said they'd be arguing about it for years, but he thinks it was, and that (at worst) it kept things from getting much worse.
Is a stimulus needed? Yes.
Isn't the idea of a systemic regulator bad? No. In fact, every single CEO welcomed the idea of more government regulation. That must truly have been galling.
Will those answers have changed the minds of the Republicans who asked the quesions? No. These Republicans are almost all ideologues who can't be bothered having their minds changed by simple facts. Indeed, in previous hearings I recall several basically admitting, when presented with facts they didn't like: "I know what I know". These Republicans are, politically, the equivalent of Creationists.
Quality of the Questions
I've watched almost all the hearings broadcast on C-SPAN since the start of this crisis last September and the questions, in general, from this committee were among the worst - to the point of being outright embarrassing. There were the grandstanders, of course. Ever since Ackerman got his 30 seconds of fame last Fall with the issue of private planes when the auto CEOs testified, an increasing number of his colleagues have decided they want their 30 seconds of fame, too. So we got a lot more blustering outrage than is usual - as well as the normal attempts to embarrass as much as possible those who are testifying. But the sheer ignorance of how the banking and financial systems work that was evident in many of the questions was truly appalling. Choosing the dumbest (in the sense that they demonstrated ignorance of how the system works) questions would be difficult, but Gutierrez (from Illinois, I believe) ranked among the least well-informed. It doesn't take much imagination to guess that probably all of the CEOs found themselves asking how they ever got in the position of having to politely answer questions put by such, to be kind, financially illiterate people (and they must have wondered how those Representatives managed to get elected let alone get positions on this committee - a question I was asking myself). On the positive side, the experience may be another spur for these executives to get their companies out from under government intervention asap. I doubt they want to go through a similar round of humiliation again.
My Favorite Comment
My favorite comment came from Emanuel Cleaver at the end of his questions (which fell into the outrage and "shame on you" category) when he remarked that he was "woefully unimpressed" by the diversity of the panel in front of him and for as many rows behind them [presumably filled by their staff] as he could see. Kudos to Mr. Cleaver. With the exception of Pandit from Citi, they were all white men. Otherwise there was not a woman, African-American, Asian or Hispanic in sight.
Overall Impression
Generally speaking, I was impressed by the bankers. These guys, for all the mistakes they've made, know change is needed and know that part of that change is increased regulation. Jamie Dimon, Mack, and Blankfein were especially fine witnesses. Pandit did the worse but then Citi is probably in worse shape than any of the other banks. And Lewis from B of A seemed to find the attacks harder to take.
Finally, I couldn't help but wonder how many years it has been since any of these men has had to raise a hand in answer to a question - let alone been subject to the level of abuse they had to absorb.
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