Oh and par particular attention to the part about a cover-up.

Can you say LBJ or Nixon ?? I Knew you could boys and girls.

C

This is really critical and needs action. I have added the video for this at my blog. Every person in the US needs to see (or read) this interview. The lies and crimes cannot be allowed to continue!

Thanks for jumping on this.

Excellent catch C!!

so what do we do now?

Am I nuts? Are we nuts?

Or have they just been that good at hiding the fraud? Better yet, is William Black just another windbag?

Are we ready to dismiss Bill Moyers? Get real.

Bill's Journal interview with Black yesterday is staggering. In the end, I will trust Bill (and in this case another Bill) will tudor me to a better understanding, at least.

Maybe it isn't all that complicated for us after all, and maybe Bernie Madoff is just a slumdog billionaire behind bars for being a little too careless or stupid, or both. Maybe he just pissed the wrong Hombre's off. And here we are convinced ol' Bern had graduated the slums in the 60's and will go down in history as Mr. Ponzi squared. Sheesh.

Which is more disturbing: That this is happening or that it's happening under Obama? Both are making me pretty damn mad.

For a contrasting point of view, geekesque points out some problems with Black's statements, the biggest being that the law does not mandate receiverships as the only option.

Also, the idea of the PCA does not only concern total collapse but the idea of pegging the right to invest in certain asset classes upon the amount of capital within a bank. So given a bank falls into receivership, the question of how to regulate it without becoming sucked into the maw of the beast is a big question. Consider this paper by Freixas and Parigi

Our model shows that the logic behind the U.S. PCA regulation is well rooted in the microeconomic analysis of banks’ incentives. In other countries, in particular in the European Monetary Union, bank capital regulation at the national level often follows both the traditional quantitative capital regulation based on risk-weighted capital ratios, and a mix of moral suasion and ad hoc resolution of bank crises. A policy implication of our paper is that a piece of regulation similar to PCA should also be adopted outside the US, especially in countries where a discretionary approach to bank crisis resolution may lead to regulatory capture by the industry. This is particularly true in countries with weak institutional environments where, as Bart. et al. (2006) argue, giving strong discretionary powers to bank supervisors may actually make matters worse

On a more serious not. When this whole thing brok last year my first reaction was "How could these people miss this stuff. I mean you have 435 Congressmen and 100 Senators. Plus all their aids and what not. They Had to of known."

But after watching, listening and thinking about all I have heard and read since - that congress and even Obama probably were (and for the most part still are) pretty clueless about what's really going on. They are simply far too out of the loop. If any of them pay any attention to the media, it most likely is the MSM, which won't cover this stuff. After all the MSM is primarily entertainment.

Also people in general will see and hear what they expect to see and hear, and/or what they want to see and hear. Which is why con-men and magicians can do what they do.

This is why we need a really good investigative media.

C

One last thing before I go and take a bit of a lie down. I do believe that there are those in the Administration and Congress that scared sh*tless about a complete collapse of the banks, as Black suggests. The government does not trust the people the same way we the people don't trust the government. Remember what Obama said about "not putting our money in the mattress."

I'm sure there are those that would go off the deep end if the truth go out now. But there have always been a small percentage of people who freak out about anything. Way it goes. And you cannot base policy on the reactions of a few.

Most would not even notice if the government put BoA or CITI into receivership. And more than a few would say "Well it's about GD time."

C

As one Kos diarist notes, Mr Black should learn the meaning of the word "or."

Prompt Corrective Action Act

TITLE 12 > CHAPTER 16 > § 1831o

§ 1831o. Prompt corrective action

(d) Provisions applicable to all institutions
(2) Management fees restricted
An insured depository institution shall pay no management fee to any person having control of that institution if, after making the payment, the institution would be undercapitalized.

SNIP

(3) Conservatorship, receivership, or other action required
(A) In general
The appropriate Federal banking agency shall, not later than 90 days after an insured depository institution becomes critically undercapitalized—

(i) appoint a receiver (or, with the concurrence of the Corporation, a conservator) for the institution;

OR

(ii) take such other action as the agency determines, with the concurrence of the Corporation, would better achieve the purpose of this section, after documenting why the action would better achieve that purpose.