$700 Billion Was a Bait and Switch
Written by Sam on November 12th, 2008This morning Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson addressed a skeptical press about the latest plans for those 700 billion dollars that were appropriated for the “TARP” — or Troubled Asset Recovery Program. Now Paulson says Treasury won’t buy those “Trouble Assets” — one of the many metamorphoses this program has had in its young life.
No Troubled Asset Purchases? Then what are they doing with that $700 billion blank check? They are buying bank stock, not troubled assets. We probably shouldn’t call it the TARP anymore. Instead, they are focused on a capital purchase plan (CPP) which is the widely reported $250 billion plan to use taxpayer money to purchase a stake in banks.
ABC News
The whole thing was a big gimmick from day one and a lot of people foolishly bought into it. All of those threats and warnings that we had to do this now or our entire country would collapse. It was a load of crap. Congress gave Paulson the money and he’s not using going to use it for buying up the debt anyway, which he said was so dire and our future depended on.
So, is this the biggest bait and switch in American history? There will certainly be critics who say that Paulson and the Bush Administration were disingenuous when they were selling Congress and the American public on the program back in September. And they’d probably be right.
Let’s not beat around the bush (no pun intended). They flat out lied! Don’t be surprised by it. The Bush Administration lies about everything. They lied about the bailout. They lied about Iraq. They lied about being conservative. Bush’s entire presidency has been a lie. He’s the biggest socialist to ever set foot in the White House (until January).
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Hmmm, do you mean that the massive power given to the government is going to be misused?
Are you saying that the government misrepresented both the threat of financial collapse and the extent of its new size and scope of power?
Are you trying to insinuate Sam that not only were the American people lied to but they are now going to suffer from this massive, possibly irreversible socialist intervention into the very fabric of our economy?
I am shocked at this! Who could have predicted any of this? Why oh why didn’t anyone on this blog bother to point out that this entire thing was a sham, that Bernake, Paulson, Pelosi, Bush and Reid were fools leading everyone down the primrose path?
Oh wait, this blog did, many, many times over. Sam, thanks for following up on this and please excuse all of my sarcasm. The real irony of Obama’s election to the presidency is that we didn’t have to wait for him to get into office for the socialism to start.
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Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, Washington, and Adams are all somewhere angst at our stupidity as a nation.
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On a slightly separate note: I don’t think we can move forward as a party until we publicly condemn Bush and this last eight years of crap as a socialist, liberal farce. Rove should be shouted down when he appears on TV, Bush should be openly scorned and mocked. This was a president on the level of Dick Nixon and possibly worse.
Now is the time to throw these assholes under the bus: Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Powell (who looks to be a part of the new Obama administration), O’Neil and the rest of the gang that couldn’t govern straight. Rove of all people should be a pariah for his idiotic, unconservative “master plan” that gutted the party in its prime.
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Well Ryan, all good things come to an end. The American people wanted this and now they have it.
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Nixon was arrogant, but competent. If Nixon was not forced out, he would have probably went down as a decent president. Definitely not a conservative, but decent in the eyes of most Americans.
The Bush administration was arrogance mixed with gross incompetence.
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Decent? The man instituted wage and price controls! Holy freakin marxism Batman. The guy was just as big a socialist as Bush is. He created that monster know as the EPA. The rampant corruption in the Nixon administration was also shameful. “Decent in the eyes of most Americans” is probably one of the lowest historical standards one could ask for. I trust the American people’s judgment on such things about as far as I can throw a 50 pound bag of leaky shit.
EDIT: One more thought, Nixon appointed four supreme court justices, only one of which wasn’t a worthless liberal: William Renhquist. Just how much damage Nixon did judicially to the Constitution can never be fully calculated.
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I wouldn’t entirely blame Bush on the war in Iraq. Rumsfeld’s strategy of invade worked but his strategy of occupation was a dismal failure. The war at times was too PC. The surge then worked after Rumsfeld was gone. There was some mismanagement of the war but almost have eliminated the terrorist launching pad in Iraq and now trying to establish a democracy there. That is working.
Bush supporting the bailout convinced me that he wasn’t what he said he was in his debates in 2000 and 2004. The Republican party needs to rebuild, stop licking wounds, and crack down on “big government” nonsense!
Next step - 2010 (not 2012)!