Bailout: An Inside Account Of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
A maddening account of how the Geithner regime at Treasury mishandled the aftermath of the global financial crisis from the watchdog responsible for monitoring TARP. Very readable, good explanations of some of the complicated deals the Treasury Department made with banks and mortgage lenders. Would have rated it higher but I found the bits of personal narrative a bit too pat and cinematic, like he's angling for a movie deal. Still, worth reading for the substance and a clear picture of how Treasury has acted as if its constituents are financial institutions instead of the American people. The personal story of the Special Investigator General for TARP (US bailout of banks, mostly). I will have to stop reading these books. I know enough to be worried but not enough to figure out if I should do anything (or if anything can be done). I think the banks had to be bailed out, but the terms could have been better and we haven't really fixed any of the problems. It's not really new that helping taxpayers gets the news items but not any real programs. It's not really new that there are multiple revolving doors between congress/staff/lobbyists/industry. If you're on the inside you get richer. If you're not, tough. Barofsky comes from a background of prosecuting fraud cases and it was interesting to see all the imaginative ways that people game the system for their own benefit (some legal and some not). Partly a result of rules based legislation written by lawyers in the pay of corporations. sigh.
What do You think about Bailout: An Inside Account Of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street (2012)?
Jon Stewart liked it better than the other 9 books he read on this subject.
—050893
Frustrating and intriguing insider perspective on the financial crisis.
—biancasu
The Washington corruption is worse than we thought!
—Raz
