Financial Rescue Package Explained

Tim Cavanaugh | November 1, 2009

I'm not one of those toffish, royal-following, Masterpiece Theatre-watching Anglophiles, but I rather wish our country had banking officials of the caliber of Sir George Parr, who gives an erudite and coherent analysis of the financial meltdown.

With Oxonion pith, Parr describes how the markets were stabilized during the 2008 financial crisis, explains the new rules for risk in banking, and lays out a clear blueprint for regulators to handle systemic risk in the future. Here is the full 10-minute chat, and here is an excerpt:

Meanwhile, on this side of the Pond, irrepressible satirist Tim Geithner sends up the self-serving lies of greed-driven bankers with an outrageously deadpan wit that rivals the best work of Professor Irwin Corey.

Comments

TP|11.1.09 @ 8:18AM|#

It's buggery!

|11.1.09 @ 8:49AM|#

the "self-serving lies" link appears to not work.

hmm|11.1.09 @ 9:48AM|#

It's just self-serving.

Chad|11.1.09 @ 9:13AM|#

I do find it funny that if my dog had been given tens of billions late last year with essentially zero interest, and I had blindly dumped it into a generic blend of mutual funds on this behalf, my dog's profits would look a hell of a lot like those of Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase.

But clearly, these guys are so smart, they DESERVE all the loot they are hauling in, right?

Barrack Obama|11.1.09 @ 10:24AM|#

It's not that they deserve all that loot. If I don't give it to them, the entire economy will implode!

Factories will collapse in on their foundations in a blink of an eye. People will forget how to operate machinery. Farmers will wander around aimlessly forgetting to plant crops. It would literally mean the end of civilization.

We must raise taxes on other Americans in order to keep the magical banking industry afloat.

hellp|11.1.09 @ 7:36PM|#

shhhh ... we're not supposed to tell Chad that Dear Leader is actually on the side of the evil banks, it might shake his confidence in him ... and the Easter Bunny

|11.1.09 @ 11:46PM|#

But clearly, these guys are so smart, they DESERVE all the loot they are hauling in, right?

You tell me, Chad. The market was in the process of burying them alive, and then the geniuses in the legislature voted to inflate about a trillion bucks out of thin air and bail them out. We free-market advocates are against that. How about you?

-jcr

TP|11.1.09 @ 9:51AM|#

Well, we can always give even more regulatory power to the Fed and FDIC.

http://www.house.gov/apps/list.....2709.shtml

anon|11.1.09 @ 10:00AM|#

As long as Americans don't use the "Sir"s and "Lord"s titles, I can dispationately listen to any brit ferner.

But when our pasty skinned cousins are introduced as Lord Tosser Montbank of the Exchequer or Sir Richard Branson, or for fuck's sake Sir Paul McCartney I want to rip their fucking throats out...

How about "George Parr"...

|11.1.09 @ 2:39PM|#

Hey, they pay good money for those titles. I on the other hand paid nothing for mine.

monlith|11.2.09 @ 10:52AM|#

you do realise it was a comedy sketch?

anon|11.1.09 @ 10:01AM|#

"dispassionately" not "dispationately". (I don't use spellcheck or preview - that's how I roll)

tarran|11.1.09 @ 10:30AM|#

The sad thing is that the actual economy continues to shrink. All of the productivity gains reported in the GDP are really the product of increasing government intervention, activities that actually don't create wealth.

Neu Mejican|11.1.09 @ 10:57AM|#

Well, you overstate. Both in the sense of "all the gains" and "actually don't create wealth".

|11.2.09 @ 9:58AM|#

True, NM. More accurate to say 90% of the "productivity gains" reported in the GDP are really the product of government spending, which doesn't create wealth in the long run.

|11.1.09 @ 10:34AM|#

LOL, lies, lies and more lies! Never fails does it!

RT
www.complete-privacy.at.tc

anarch|11.1.09 @ 1:27PM|#

Here's the full ten-minute video.

Tim Cavanaugh|11.1.09 @ 4:04PM|#

Fucking gallery pages. The links to the full Bird and Fortune thing should now go directly to the Bird and Fortune thing. Sorry.

|11.1.09 @ 7:06PM|#

"we can lend people their own money and charge interest".

Remarkable succinct, consider in that bailouts are coming from tax dollars, and the banks are explicitly being instructed to lend it out.

Well, from future tax dollars.

So ... it's more like "we'll lend people their future earnings and charge interest".

Which, if you think of it means that people will have to arn more than their future earning in or to it back.

It's like one of those time-travel paradoxes.

|11.1.09 @ 7:06PM|#

Er... people will have to earn more than their future earnings in order to pay it back.

Orlando|11.2.09 @ 1:26AM|#

Fantastic satire.

|11.3.09 @ 8:42AM|#

Cleary, the answer is to End the Federal Reserve. No other institution has the authority to create worthless paper money out of thin air, and therefore alter the economy. Wasn't there a fifth plank of the Communist manifesto? Something about Central planning?

Nothing but a bunch of Fascist's wrapping themselves up in the American flag.