Day: January 11, 2010

The Secret Life Of Uncle Timmy

What seems like a decade or more during the nomination process of the Obama cabinet…….I had a post about little Timmy Geithner and why I thought he was a bad choice for Obama…..I was not alone…there were many of us on the so-called Left that did not think this was a good choice…..we felt that he was part of the problem, not a cure…..in February of 2009 I posted:

Under the plan, which Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is expected to announce within the next two weeks, the government will buy up virtually worthless mortgage-backed securities and other “toxic” assets held by the banks and provide guarantees against future losses for much of their remaining assets. It will also continue to inject cash directly into the banks.

Will It Be More Of The Same For Banks?

We have been watching and waitingf for that other damn shoe to fall…..and BAM! it has finally hit……Bloomberg is reporting:

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York, then led by Timothy Geithner, told American International Group Inc. to withhold details from the public about the bailed-out insurer’s payments to banks during the depths of the financial crisis, e-mails between the company and its regulator show.

“Secretary Geithner played no role in these decisions,” Meg Reilly, a Treasury spokeswoman, said in an e-mail. “He was recused from working on issues involving specific companies, including AIG,” after his nomination for Treasury secretary on Nov. 24, 2008. Geithner “began to insulate himself weeks earlier in anticipation of his nomination,” she said in a separate statement.

The e-mail exchanges between AIG and the New York Fed over the insurer’s disclosure of the transactions show that the regulator pressed the company to keep details out of the public eye.

Once again…there were many who said that Geithner’s nomination was just a move to reassure Wall Street that the status quo would be upheld….and so far we were right.  But what would this all mean?  And if Geithner is forced to resign who could they possibly find to take his place?

This was written in Roll Call:

For instance, several Democratic Senate aides noted that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is an extremely unpopular figure in the Senate. Geithner has also taken the brunt of the criticism for the administration’s handling of the economy and, these sources speculated, if the country’s financial picture does not brighten before Election Day, he could be the first secretary to leave the administration.

Probably a smart idea……But would that be a good move?  First of all, a good move for whom?  For the good of Wall Street?  I think it would……Dodd is a friend to banks, even though he has offered up a regulation bill that is being considered……if he was to be confirmed then that whole package in the Senate would be swept under the rug or watered down just as health reform was last year…..

In my yearly predictions, I have said that there would be an Obama cabinet member resignation….could Uncle Timmy be the one?

Sad Reality Of War

There are many stories, sad stories that come out as a consequence of war, but this one is one of the saddest…..

Exerpts from an article written by James Cogan for wsws.org:

American military personnel are continuing to take their own lives in unprecedented numbers, as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq wars drag on. By late November, at least 334 members of the armed forces had committed suicide in 2009, more than the 319 who were killed in Afghanistan or the 150 who died in Iraq. While a final figure is not available, the toll of military suicides last year was the worst since records began to be kept in 1980.

The Army, National Guard and Army Reserve lost at least 211 personnel to suicide. More than half of those who took their lives had served in either Iraq or Afghanistan. The Army suicide rate of 20.2 per 100,000 personnel is higher than that registered among males aged 19 to 29, the gender age bracket with the highest rate among the general population. Before 2001, the Army rarely suffered 10 suicides per 100,000 soldiers.

For every death, at least five members of the armed forces were hospitalised for attempting to take their life. According to the Navy Times, 2 percent of Army; 2.3 percent of Marines and 3 percent of Navy respondents to the military’s own survey of 28,536 members from all branches reported they had attempted suicide at some point. The “Defense Survey of Health-Related Behaviors” also found “dangerous levels” of alcohol abuse and the illicit use of drugs such as pain killers by 12 percent of personnel.

The trigger for a suicide attempt varied from case to case: relationship breakdowns, financial problems, substance abuse, tensions with other members of their unit, a traumatic event. What is clear, however, is that military service has seriously impacted on the physical and mental health of the victims.

The casualities of war mount up, and this is just not acceptable that some of those casualities die by their own hand…..