Obama Urges Wall Street to Join In
[Guest post by DRJ]
President Obama spoke about Wall Street today in New York:
“Noting that there should be no dividing line between Wall Street and Main Street, the president today painted an American face on the effects of the financial downturn and urged the financial industry to join with him to pass financial reforms, for the good of the country.
“I’m here today specifically, when I speak to the titans of industry here, because I want to urge you to join us instead of fighting us in this effort,” President Obama said today. “Because ultimately, there is no dividing line between Main Street and Wall Street. We will rise or we will fall together as one nation. And that is why I urge all of you to join me.”
It’s Obama’s Join-The-Club message: Why shouldn’t Wall Street be subject to the same boundless government regulations that he burdened Main Street with?
— DRJ
This from that great defender of Main Street,
AD - RtR/OS! (898e6a) — 4/22/2010 @ 1:57 pmwho has advanced innumerable programs that will secure to Main Streeters and their posterity the fruits of their efforts,
and counts them as his greatest group of supporters…
through the looking glass darkly.
I liked the FDIC bit in the speech.
imdw (df0dab) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:08 pmSomething tells me there is an “or else” implied at the end of that quote.
BT (74cbec) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:13 pmIts a load of BS. Wall Street is already participating in the financial reform legislation … by buying itself exemptions and loopholes with campaign contributions to Democratic leadership, and buying itself another bailout fund.
Faux reform is not going to aid our economic circumstances while Democrats continue to ignore the government’s contributions to our recent financial sector collapse.
SPQR (26be8b) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:19 pmThe best idea for financial reform is to vote the Democrats out of office as they come up for reelection.
Zelsdorf Ragshaft III (c72ac2) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:36 pm“buying itself another bailout fund.”
That’s what luntz told them to do!
imdw (8222e7) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:40 pmYou left out the new recurring challenge that Obama and Dems are using more and more:
“the president said that “unless your business model depends on bilking people, there should be little fear of the new rules.”
The only reason you can possibly object to more government control of everything is because you have nefarious intentions. You cannot deny the Truth that Big Government can ONLY do good, while individuals are to be feared and assumed to be harboring evil intentions. Now submit before the government gets rough with you!
in_awe (44fed5) — 4/22/2010 @ 2:51 pmAsk not for what Obama can do for you, but for what you can do for Obama.
Dmac (21311c) — 4/22/2010 @ 3:14 pm“We will rise or we will fall together as one nation. And that is why I urge all of you to join me.”
Someone should do a side by side comparison of this speechifying with the Nazi youth rally-style address Mr. Obama gave at the recent fundraiser for Lil’ Babs “Don’t Call Me Ma’am” Boxer.
What a kidder!
GeneralMalaise (24d3e0) — 4/22/2010 @ 4:26 pmObama’s specialty is the head fake. He demonized the Pharma companies as he gave them sweet favors. Ditto for health insurance companies. Now, it’s Goldman Sachs’ turn. You didn’t think they threw away that million they gave him, did you ?
Mike K (8df289) — 4/22/2010 @ 4:58 pmLet’s have an honest debate!
Instead of falling for Obama’s repeat rhetorical tactic of identifying and villifying the wrong enemy and presenting a series of false choices, let’s start with holding those accountable for the financial meltdown accountable.
Let’s begin with all those social engineering geniuses in Congress who encouraged home ownership at all costs and loosened the underwriting and loan purchasing standards on Freddie and Fannie as one of the prime mechanisms to achieve those goals. Let’s hold accountable those movers and shakers behind the Community Reinvestment Act who used it as a club to bully banks into loosening their mortgage lending standards and then turned around and villified the banks for foreclosing on loans that actually defaulted. Let’s hold accountable those officers of the GSE’s who engaged in accounting fraud to hide their true performance to line their pockets and hide the true nature of their balance sheets. Let’s hold accountable the members of Congress who fought tooth and nail against any effort to rein in the risky activities of those GSE’s. Let’s hold accountable those individual borrowers who took out bigger loans than they could afford or adjustable loans they couldn’t afford if they adjusted in the wrong way if real estate prices didn’t continue rising. Let’s hold accountable the Federal Reserve for keeping interest rates too low for too long. Let’s hold Wall Street accountable for throwing decades of risk management principles out the window in pursuit of profits.
Let’s overall ignore Obama’s simplistic explanations of what happened.
daleyrocks (1d0d98) — 4/22/2010 @ 4:58 pmThat is just silly-talk, daleyrocks.
JD (9f2abc) — 4/22/2010 @ 6:06 pmFull disclosure : I worked as an mortgage accounting clerk for a New York City bank from September 1965 to December 1965. Other than that, I have no relationship with any Wall Street institution.
I have a MBA with a major in Economics and a minor in Finance.
My take on the situation is that the mortgage lenders were not so much engaged in profit seeking as in loss reduction. They were compelled by a combination of government authority and community activist pressure to make loans that were, by any legitimate accounting standard, high risk.
The practice of “bundling” high risk loans and selling them to “profit seekers” was a result.
Longwalker (996c34) — 4/22/2010 @ 6:28 pmWe had an economic crisis.
We need to do something.
This bill is something.
Lets pass it.
Maybe after it is passed we’ll figure out what it does.
Will we find all the nooks and crannys in this bill before we find all the nooks and crannys in the health care bill?
MU789 (25b69d) — 4/22/2010 @ 6:35 pmFirst the verdict…
AD - RtR/OS! (898e6a) — 4/22/2010 @ 6:52 pmThen the trial!