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House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi wants a 1933 style investigation of Wall Street. She said that the American people are demanding to know the what and how of the Lehman, Bear Stearns and Merrill collapses. She wants to pattern her investigation after the Ferdinand Pecora hearings in 1933. The Pecora review "was probably the single most important congressional investigation in the history of our country, excepting the Watergate hearings. Congress is under public pressure to find out exactly what generated $1.3 trillion in financial industry losses, the details of the $700 billion dollar bailout and the $37 trillion destroyed in world markets. In response, John Larson, of Connecticut said: "We truly want to find out what happened to this country and level with the American people." Pelosi, in a speech on April 15 said: people need "to have a clear understanding as to how we got here and what the exposure is to the taxpayer to all this."Meanwhile, Barney Frank on the House side and Christopher Dodd on the Senate side want to rush into writing new laws. To understand what is going on we must understand that both Frank and Dodd are closely connected to the powerful banking lobbies who donate monies to political campaigns. One could guess that they want to rush in and pass laws and tell everyone that all is well to circumvent any investigation by Pelosi. How can you pass laws without first knowing what the problem is? There is much to be gained by the Pelosi investigation that the American people have the right to know.
Just to show you how deep the bank donors are entrenched in the Congress, the banking industry has given $463.5 million to every election cycle for the past 20 years. Individual and PAC donations from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE GS) totaled $30.9 million and Citigroup Inc (NYSE C ) $25.8 million.
Should Frank and Dodd wait until the investigation is completed before passing any new laws?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-22-2009 @ 4:41PM
clikdawg said...
"I am confident that the deal will fall through."
-- horse-trader Colonel Stonehill (from "True Grit")
Well now, seeing as how the primary result of the Pecora Commission's probes was the enactment of the Glass-Steagall Banking Act of 1933; and seeing as how Pelosi voted to repeal that act in 1999; I believe she's just blowing a little more smoke here -- you think her investigation is gonna point the finger at her?
"Not bloody likely!" as Eliza Doolittle says.
Madame Speaker could save us all a lot of time (which will be used to continue the fleecing of the American Public) and expense by simply issuing a mea culpa and resigning right now -- surely she knows she voted to open the door to all these abuses she now decries as she pays lip-service to a worthy Depression-era victory she helped trash.
Five'll get you ten she lets Frank get the boot in first ...
4-22-2009 @ 5:35PM
Iridium said...
Hide your involvement by blaming someone else. How typical.
The reason why we are in this mess is that congress removed safeguards that kept the pigs from raiding the troff.
Congress allowed the most corrupt of institutions, investment banks, to run wild and create an economy run on pure speculation using phony reports. The investment banks ran housing up 300% past acceptable levels. Created massive markets for default swaps and drove commodity prices sky high with no data to back up the increase.
Congress allowed profit at any cost to be the war cry of any business. Until that mantra is defeated we will never get out of this boom and bust cycle.