Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Obama and Goldman Sachs

Even Tom Friedman, the "World is Flat" author who normally is only interested in global issues, is pissed off at Wall Street, in particular, Goldman Sachs. However, if you read between the lines, he was really pissed off at Obama who had not put in appropriate preconditions to save those guys before billions were being handed to the "too big to fail" fellows:

...."President Obama is so much better when he takes a heated, knotty issue, like civil rights or banking reform, and talks to the country like adults. He is so much better at making us smarter than angrier. Going to war with the banks for a quick political sugar high after an electoral loss will just work against him and us. It will spook the banks into lending even less and slow the recovery even more.

That said, part of me can’t blame the president. The behavior of some leading Wall Street banks, particularly Goldman Sachs, has been utterly selfish. U.S. taxpayers saved Goldman by saving one of its big counterparties, A.I.G. By any fair calculation, the U.S. Treasury should own a slice of Goldman today.....

The above excerpt is from his column today here.

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