{"id":181462,"date":"2010-01-14T11:30:37","date_gmt":"2010-01-14T16:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"tag:business.theatlantic.com,2010:\/\/3.33493"},"modified":"2010-01-14T15:15:10","modified_gmt":"2010-01-14T20:15:10","slug":"im-tired-of-populist-rage-against-wall-st-ceos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/181462","title":{"rendered":"I’m Tired of Populist Rage Against Wall St. CEOs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reading this<\/a> Dana Milbank article about Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein’s congressional flogging, it struck me that I’ve lost touch with America’s populist rage. I support financial re-regulation, but I’ve stopped expecting monthly demonstrations of contrition from the banks’ CEOs. I just don’t care anymore. Jamie Dimon can send me a fruit basket or a lump of coals, and my opinions about Wall Street, and what we should do to reform it, won’t budge. <\/p>\n

Milbank’s complaints have nothing to do with the events of the past or
\nthe policy of the future. They have to do with Blankfein’s attitude.
\nThe Goldman chief “made it plain that he was
\ndone apologizing” … “smirked as they spoke, challenged the premises
\nof their questions,
\noffered frequent lectures of ‘let me be clear,’ and often responded to
\nquestions by asking questions of his own. [Blankfein] seems to exempt himself from the rules of man.” Most of this is
\nutterly besides the point, and that last part doesn’t even make any
\nsense. <\/p>\n

Blankfein’s prickliness in yesterday’s testimony was often justified. For example, Angelides and
\nMilbank seem flabbergasted<\/a>
\nthat Goldman would sell mortgage securities
\nand also place bets against them. But that’s exactly what a market
\nmaker does.
\nAngelides’ comparison — “selling a car with faulty brakes and then
\nbuying an insurance policy” — is off. It’s like screaming at a bookie
\nfor holding bets on the Colts in this
\nweekend’s game after taking your bet against the Colts. That’s what
\nbookies do. Congress summoned Goldman’s chief to compare its core
\nbusiness to insurance fraud and he dared utter the phrase “let me be
\nclear.” <\/p>\n

What the heck does it matter what Wall Street CEOs act like<\/i>? We don’t need to line up Fannie and Freddie
\nand subprime home owners and the ratings agencies and all the little financial sinners and wrap their
\nknuckles until Yom Kippur comes around. This is Congress, not
\nConfessional. Just pass financial regulation. Not doing so is the only thing that would require a national apology. <\/p>\n



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Reading this Dana Milbank article about Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein’s congressional flogging, it struck me that I’ve lost touch with America’s populist rage. I support financial re-regulation, but I’ve stopped expecting monthly demonstrations of contrition from the banks’ CEOs. I just don’t care anymore. Jamie Dimon can send me a fruit basket or a lump […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1534,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-181462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1534"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181462\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}