So what? I'm sure it was one of the things that Hillary very quietly disapproved of behind the scenes. You know, like every other thing about Clinton: Episode I that people don't like.

You simply don't get it.

If certain compromises hadn't been made in the '90s, we would never have been able to pass the progressive legislation then that leads us all now to yearn for the Clinton years.

I'm sure we're all aware of the legislation I'm speaking of, so I won't bother to cite it here.

The deregulation disaster of the Reagan/Bush/Clinton/Bush era made a lot of rich people even richer. Now we are beginning to see the legacy of that era; Bear Stearns is just the tip of the iceberg. As Ambassador Peck said (as quoted by Rev. Wright), "America's chickens are coming home to roost."

Paul Krugman is excellent at analyzing the economy. Although he clearly was for Edwards before he was clearly for Hillary (I assume because of medical coverage for all in both cases) I don't think it makes him a hypocrite.

The hypocrisy and lies of the Clintons are breathtaking. It has distressed me no end to see Paul Krugman, whom I always trusted to be intellectually honest, to go off this insane cliff. That he would have the audacity to write about banking deregulation and NOT mention Clinton's role in it -- I've lost all respect for him. I'll be writing a letter to the NY TImes voicing my disappointment.

What a lying hypocrite. But it appears that's what's necessary to join that particular club.

What did I miss?

Frankly, I see it as problematic the Clintons having strong tie-ins with supporters in the financial services and banking communities. It isn't illogical for this to be the case with Hillary as a senator from NY. I doubt there has ever been a senator from NY who wasn't mindful of legislation that favored this powerful NY constituency.

What I see as problematic is the general scheme of things within the financial community whereby there have been an awful lot of regulatory changes over the years and especially a lot of high profile mergers that should never have been approved. A number of these occurred in the last several years and I wrote the senator personally about at least two of these asking her to intervene on the side of disapproval. No such thing occurred and so we have the financial marketplace moving merrily along with centralization of financial power as a product of the political lancscape.

This consolidation of financial power coupled with unencumbered influence on capitol hill is thoroughly anti-consumer and anti-citizen. Even a superficial examination of credit card rates relative to FED, prime and mortgage rates informs us of how seriously lopsided the financial landscape has become. And that says nothing about industry practices which in many cases are highly questionable. This is not unassociated with what amounts to coerced borrowing because of depressed wages and the general scheme to disadvantage wage earners. This presents a unified picture whereby the power being wielded against consumers and working persons is politically subsidized. No matter the angle I examine this from it gives a similar view leading to similarly obvious and discomforting conclusions. And we can top this off with a largely unfettered buying and selling of private financial information that in my view should be impermissible in any way shape or form. I don’t see how it is viewed as ethical or appropriate to have peoples private financial information serve as a profit center for the banking or financial services community.
I want to depart here to address a recent article describing how China and India have and continue to regulate energy costs in their countries. Holding energy costs artificially low in these countries worsens the condition of having an advantage over developed countries relative to the cost of energy and makes for difficult relations between countries. In addition to the energy cost differential there is also friction because of the impact on global warming. Another element of this is energy prices in the U.S. rest at the opposite end of the scale with providers arguably passing along every nickel of cost and then some.
While developing countries benefit from this economic relationship it seriously harms American workers and their families and drives even more manufacturing to offshore locations. No amount of efficient manufacturing, green energy practices and conservation can account for the labor cost and energy cost differential enjoyed by developing economies.
The global economic transition that is under way will take half a century after which time the U.S. economy will be in dire straits, with two entire generations having to absorb the impact of a dramatically altered lifestyle. And that alteration encompasses far more than luxuries, digging deeply into U.S. workers ability to even get by. The final piece of this puzzle is that many U.S. corporations which are global in scope, are beneficiaries on both sides of this relationship. This is the ultimate double dip with that double dip being financed by American consumers and taxpayers. Coupled with the influence of these global corporations in Washington I see no chance of relief for the U.S. middle class and hard times ahead for the U.S. economy. The call for tax reductions and lessening of regulation on U.S. industry is total bullshit when viewed in this light.
The things I have described have a common genesis in our national governance. I’ve little doubt of the need to absolutely isolate government from the operations of the private sector and return to a regulatory climate that actually serves the long term interests of the citizens and particularly the majority working class persons of this country. However, I think that unlikely because our elected officials are compromised to the extent that I think it all but impossible to change course. In the final analysis Washington truly represents only a small minority of citizens. This nation was founded upon, among other things, a need to address inequities of representation. It is all too apparent that our government has revereted to the very scheme of kings, lords and what have you that is uniquely devised to primarily benefit an elite class of persons. As revealed in the current political campaigns all we really get from them is self-serving rhetoric. Any real alteration of the evolved system has only to do with the needs and wants of this elite class and nothing whatsoever to do with the majority. A simple examination across the last fifty years of who holds, and very importantly, controls wealth in this nation makes this an undeniable fact. Just ask yourself what has happened to the real value of IRAs or other government devised savings vehicles over the last decade or so.

Didn't the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 also have a controversial clause that restricted suing Wall Street denizens?

Age is the bane of memory.

To all:

The posts would be much easier to follow if people typed the name of the person they're posting to at the start of their post.

Paul Krugman must be reading our dialogue. Here is his admission this morning of the Clinton role in our current problems.

"In retrospect, it’s clear that the Clinton administration went along too easily with moves to deregulate the financial industry. And it’s hard to avoid the suspicion that big contributions from Wall Street helped grease the rails."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/24/opinion/24krugman.html

I don't know where you get off saying Krugman is reading your dialogue since that paragraph was in the column when you started your diatribe. You obviously didn't read down to the end of the end of the column since the last four paragraphs are the pay-off. Following the Clinton statement Krugman goes on to state:

Last year, there was no question at all about the way Wall Street’s financial contributions to the new Democratic majority in Congress helped preserve, at least for now, the tax loophole that lets hedge fund managers pay a lower tax rate than their secretaries.

Now, the securities and investment industry is pouring money into both Mr. Obama’s and Mrs. Clinton’s coffers. And these donors surely believe that they’re buying something in return.

Let’s hope they’re wrong.

When I read the column this morning -- all the way through -- I was rather impressed with how even handed it was. Hardly supportive of Clinton, unless you stopped reading at:

Hillary Clinton has not, as far as I can tell, made any comparably problematic economic claims. But she, like Mr. Obama, has been disappointingly quiet about the key issue: the need to reform our out-of-control financial system.

Hardly a rabidly pro-Clinton position, but obviously enough for you to stop reading and jump to conclusions. You should be doing an Emily Litella right about now

Ellen says, "It might be added that no evidence that there is a real problem in the financial system has been offered.... Indeed, there has been no evidence provided that the investment banks and hedge funds which are the principal beneficiaries of these bail-outs perform any useful economic function, at all."

Well, little evidence of any kind has been offered in this thread. But yikes: this is important.

I'll refer you to Krugman's blog for discussion of the current financial crisis. But briefly, if the investment banks fail en masse, the commercial banks will go with them.

And if they both go, it will be difficult for firms in the real economy to borrow money.

We've been on this road before: during the Great Contraction of 1930-33 whole geographic regions lost access to credit as banks closed their doors and the economy collapsed. One of the experts on this time period happens to be... Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. This helps explain his vigorous efforts to address this crisis.

Krugman's blog: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/

Let's remember the last time Paul Krugman was demonized and by whom. I have come to see no light between those that thre thew stones the first time and those who throw them now. The opposite side of the same coin.

I am ashamed of the association between this thread and my membership to the Democratic party.

Does the Cafe have anyone they could send to read Krugman columns that is the least bit literate? Taplin's One Big Complaint about the column is that Krugman forgot to mention Clinton's part in financial deregulation.

I happened to read Krugman's column a few minutes before stumbling across this TPMCafe post, and find myself startled to assure Taplin that Krugman did, indeed, mention Clinton, by name, in the column.

Of course the Clintons are two faces of the Devil himself, and of course Krugman is a demon from Hell, since he was once spotted daring to criticize St. Barack, which, without perfect recitation of the Lord's Prayer both before and after the attack is proof of demonic possession.

Sorry, Taplin, but to the Crime of failing to denounce a President Bill Clinton maneuver of the past, I am a witness to Krugman's innocence.

It had to be sarcastic.

Ellen;

Experts have been talking about impending peak oil - with increasing desperation - for a half century. Matt Simmons wrote "Twilight in the Desert" in 2004 or 5. The documentary "A Crude Awakening" was made in the same year and released in 2006. Economists have, overwhelmingly, been "in denial" on this issue...as they have on most environmental problems.

The housing bubble has also been a worry for a long time. Bubbles - after all - are endemic to a fractional banking, fiat money system. Greenspan said prior knowledge of their timing was impossible but Bernanke was speaking about deflation and the tools available to the Federal Reserve to combat it back in 2002. He's using those tools right now.

You like Schiller IN HINDSIGHT. Dean Baker also claims he was able to predict the course of events. I doubt it in both cases but "I told you so's" don't cut it. Whose predictions and policies do you like right now?

you say:
"there has been no evidence provided that the investment banks and hedge funds ... perform any useful economic function, at all."
and follow with
A deflation is desirable and will hurt primarily the investment banks, the GSEs which will be nationalized, and the hedge funds -- and we'll all be better off for it"
So you think it'll be a good thing if we nationalize USELESS hedge funds and investment banks. Great recommendation.

Nor are investment banks the only "useless" thing in our economy. Most of the things our economy produces and most of the people who actually produce them are useless...and this doesn't even begin to address the problem posed by the vast numbers of people who don't work and can't be educated for work. (which is why I think there's nothing at all progressive and progressives. you're all advocating stale egalitarian ideas which are completely out of step with the massively contracting economy of the future, and with our most recent understanding of genes and environment).

The best part of your post is the bit about investment opportunities. You're right about availability of credit and lack of opportunities...and that's the most worrisome thing of all.

Actually Krugman has pointed out repeatedly where Obama's policies suck and has not been shilling for shrill Hill.

Obama is not a god. His healthplan is also Mitt Romney's healthplan. Obama is WRONG on this one.

Stop crying and start pressing your candidate to do the correct thing for America and the American people.