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| Economy |
| The two faces of O |
| 2009-12-15 |
| Via InstaPundit In public, President Obama is on a tear against Wall Street. In private, not so much Over the weekend, Obama attacked fat-cat investment bankers, telling "60 Minutes" he didn't become president to aid and abet Wall Street -- which, only a year after the financial meltdown and taxpayer bailout, is now scheduled to hand out tens of billions of dollars in bonuses to its bankers and traders. But the president's meeting yesterday with the CEOs of the largest banks was nearly a lovefest, I'm told by attendees. Yes, White House spinmeisters advertised the gathering as a chance for Obama to channel the public's disgust over Wall Street's celebrating while Main Street still suffers 10 percent unemployment, thanks largely to Wall Street's bungling. But that's not what he did. But if you want to know why they're rolling in the dough, look to Wash Obama started off with the obvious, reminding bankers that the bailout of insurance giant AIG benefited them because it meant they could actually collect on the AIG insurance policies (credit-default swaps) on their risky bond-market bets. But he also seemed to concede their dubious claim that some of them probably would've survived an AIG collapse, given all the other billions the government threw at them during the crisis. After that, people with first-hand knowledge of the sitdown said, it was a heavily scripted affair -- with none of the fireworks Obama displays in public. Indeed, the White House last week sent the CEOs the president's talking points: bonuses (too high), lending (more loans to small businesses), the need for more regulation of the financial business (support the bill now before Congress), etc. So there were no surprises for the likes of Jaime Dimon of JP Morgan, Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, John Mack of Morgan Stanley or Citigroup's Richard Parsons. Said one CEO who attended: "I expected to be taken to the woodshed, but the tone was quite the opposite." Said another senior exec with knowledge of the meeting: "The whole thing was so telegraphed that not much was accomplished, other than giving Obama a PR stunt . . . He might have sounded mean on '60 Minutes,' but during the meeting he was a hell of a lot nicer." Maybe Obama's softened tone was recognition of Wall Street's election help. Campaign-finance filings show that firms like Goldman -- now getting ready to dish out $20 billion in bonuses after nearly imploding last year -- favored Obama over John McCain by a fairly wide margin. Nearly all the major Wall Street CEOs -- including Dimon, Blankfein and Mack -- have told people that they voted for Obama. |
| Posted by:ed |
| #1 There are only two faces? |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2009-12-15 17:21 |