Mortgaging the White House
Published on Saturday, May 2, 2009 by CommonDreams.org
by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship
President Obama's been busy, but contrary to many of the pundits, he's no FDR. Our new president got his political education in the world of Chicago ward politics, and seems to have adopted a strategy from the machine of that city's longtime boss, the late Richard J. Daley, father of the current mayor there. "Don't make no waves," one of Daley's henchmen used to advise, "don't back no losers."
During "an era of unbridled and ultimately disastrous risk-taking by the financial industry," the Times reported, "... He forged unusually close relationships with executives of Wall Street's giant financial institutions.
With these two (Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner) as his financial gatekeepers, President Obama's now in the position of Louis XVI being advised by Marie Antoinette to have another piece of cake until that rumble in the streets has passed on by.
In fact, other Wall Street insiders -- many of them big contributors to the Obama presidential campaign, and progressive in their concern for the public interest -- privately are expressing serious concerns that Geithner, Summers and their associates are leading the president and America's taxpayers down a path toward further economic disaster.
This week, as Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois unsuccessfully fought for a congressional amendment he said would have helped 1.7 million Americans save their homes from foreclosure, the senator told a radio station back home that, "The banks -- hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created -- are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place." Read more.
by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship
President Obama's been busy, but contrary to many of the pundits, he's no FDR. Our new president got his political education in the world of Chicago ward politics, and seems to have adopted a strategy from the machine of that city's longtime boss, the late Richard J. Daley, father of the current mayor there. "Don't make no waves," one of Daley's henchmen used to advise, "don't back no losers."
During "an era of unbridled and ultimately disastrous risk-taking by the financial industry," the Times reported, "... He forged unusually close relationships with executives of Wall Street's giant financial institutions.
With these two (Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner) as his financial gatekeepers, President Obama's now in the position of Louis XVI being advised by Marie Antoinette to have another piece of cake until that rumble in the streets has passed on by.
In fact, other Wall Street insiders -- many of them big contributors to the Obama presidential campaign, and progressive in their concern for the public interest -- privately are expressing serious concerns that Geithner, Summers and their associates are leading the president and America's taxpayers down a path toward further economic disaster.
This week, as Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois unsuccessfully fought for a congressional amendment he said would have helped 1.7 million Americans save their homes from foreclosure, the senator told a radio station back home that, "The banks -- hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created -- are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place." Read more.
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