Why haven't Bernanke and Paulson resigned?

[StageLeft]

We know that Bernanke has, up until the 11th hour, given Baghdad Bob-like outlooks on the economy. Even when it was clear to pragmatists in, say, February that the economy was anything but rosy Bernanke was still mindlessly optimistic (and don't say that's part of his job to be optimistic, because if that's the case he's not doing that right now).

Then we have Paulson who in this article was saying no to any financial bailouts and then last week is asking for an outrageous sum. Things have gotten worse in six months but it's not like nobody could see it coming. Heck, the Glenn Beck article on the five defeconomies, also in Feb of this year, seemed to predict the chronology of events with an eerie marriage to reality.

If your investor lost 30% of your money on a bad pick, would you stay with him? Would a company keep a CEO that has completely missed the boat? These guys are not cutting the mustard. I just don't trust their ability to get this right.

 

[glenn1]

That might not be a bad idea. However, they may have already offered their resignations and been refused by Bush - reports are that Rumsfeld offered to resign after Abu Graib and was turned down.

 

[winnar111]

Bernanke wasn't Fed Chairman during most of the run-up towards the current situation.

 

[theeedude]

Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

 

[ProfJohn]

Removing them at this point would be bad policy.

Right now we need the people at the top and below them 100% focused on the crisis. If we remove the two people at the top their organizations will lose focus and direction at the worst possible time.

There is also the worry that the people below the top two will become focused on CYA instead of working to solve our problem.

 

[Pliablemoose]

If this were China, they'd already be dead.

This is the biggest damn clusterfuck of all time, and what's really starting to piss me off is that the high estimate of 2 trillion is likely off by a fucking factor of 20 or better.

 

[babylon5]

Incompetence pays in Government jobs.

 

[jpeyton]

They're doing a heckuva job.

 

[ranmaniac]

I'm sure they already have their escape pods ready to South America or the Cayman Islands if things get any worse.

 

[smack Down]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Removing them at this point would be bad policy.

Right now we need the people at the top and below them 100% focused on the crisis. If we remove the two people at the top their organizations will lose focus and direction at the worst possible time.

There is also the worry that the people below the top two will become focused on CYA instead of working to solve our problem.

There sole focus is seeing how fast they can raid the treasury.

 

[Lemon law]

Its really a one way or the other binary result. Heaven help us if the current turkeys in charge are merely on a little above or below the mean.

There are really only two ways to gain complete economic consensus.

Method one is to do a magnificent job of managing the economy, somewhat the Alan Greenspan method, but Alan is no longer in charge.

Method two is to completely fuck up, the Bernanke and Paulson method, be asleep at the switch while small problems turn into huge disasters, and then scream only we can save you now.

Face the damn facts, either method works equally well. Public be pleased or public be damned, its a totally irrelevant metric.

 

[LegendKiller]

Originally posted by: senseamp
Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

And you'll probably have your job. Doesn't that suck.

 

[smashp]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Removing them at this point would be bad policy.

Right now we need the people at the top and below them 100% focused on the crisis. If we remove the two people at the top their organizations will lose focus and direction at the worst possible time.

There is also the worry that the people below the top two will become focused on CYA instead of working to solve our problem.

Good points and i do aggree to a certain extent


I mean Leadership is important but a bad leader could lead all his lemmings off the cliff.

With no leadership, you might not get much acomplished, but atleast youll have some lemmings left over.

 

[Lemon law]

Dang me, Dang me, they ought to take a rope and hang me, high from the nearest tree, Lord in Heaven have some mercy on me.

 

[theeedude]

Originally posted by: LegendKiller

Originally posted by: senseamp
Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

And you'll probably have your job. Doesn't that suck.

Sure does, I could use a few months severance paid vacation before getting a job across the street.

 

[Jhhnn]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
Its really a one way or the other binary result. Heaven help us if the current turkeys in charge are merely on a little above or below the mean.

There are really only two ways to gain complete economic consensus.

Method one is to do a magnificent job of managing the economy, somewhat the Alan Greenspan method, but Alan is no longer in charge.

Method two is to completely fuck up, the Bernanke and Paulson method, be asleep at the switch while small problems turn into huge disasters, and then scream only we can save you now.

Face the damn facts, either method works equally well. Public be pleased or public be damned, its a totally irrelevant metric.

I'm sorry, LL, but that analysis is so far out in the weeds as to be laughable.

The Greenspan method got the economy hooked on cheap money and unlimited credit. Coupled with the Bush Whitehouse and Repub Congress use of enormous deficits, we live in a fools' paradise of "growth" based on debt, shuffling paper, selling each other houses, obfuscating individual risk into systemic risk with false wealth based on hedging and derivatives.

It should tell us something when things represented as "wealth" or "assets" are just repackaged debt.

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: senseamp

Originally posted by: LegendKiller

Originally posted by: senseamp
Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

And you'll probably have your job. Doesn't that suck.

Sure does, I could use a few months severance paid vacation before getting a job across the street.

You are naive

 

[LegendKiller]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: senseamp

Originally posted by: LegendKiller

Originally posted by: senseamp
Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

And you'll probably have your job. Doesn't that suck.

Sure does, I could use a few months severance paid vacation before getting a job across the street.

You are naive

Sadly, many are.

Ex Fed guy, Mishkin, told a story of his father. His father owned a grocery store in Manhattan in 1929. After the market tanked his father remarked "those rich guys deserve it". In 1930 the store shut down.

 

[rchiu]

What the heck does Bernanke and Pualson has to do with the current mess? The whole freaking crisis started with mortgage problem, mortgage companies like Fannie Mae is regulated by OFHEO and HUD. And then the mortgage crisis's ripple effect hit investment banks, that are regulated by SEC. How is Bernanke and Paulson all of sudden linked to those agencies?

Seriously you people need to learn about how the market work, just because someone has the tool to solve the problems doesn't mean they caused the problem in the first place.

 

[Aharami]

Originally posted by: senseamp

Originally posted by: LegendKiller

Originally posted by: senseamp
Paulson is gonna be gone with Bush, I am sure if he hands over $1Trillion of your bucks to his buddies, they'll take good care of him.
Bernanke should be fired, plain and simple. His solution to any problem is print more money.

And you'll probably have your job. Doesn't that suck.

Sure does, I could use a few months severance paid vacation before getting a job across the street.

yea...just like my competent but overconfident friend who got laid off from Bear. He declined a job offer because he wanted to relax and travel a bit on his severance pay. Now, couple months later, he has no offers and his severance pay is nearing its term.

 

[Atreus21]

Bernanke is a smart guy. I'm still witholding judgement.

 

[StageLeft]

Apparently Newt agrees with me

Link

Bernanke is a smart guy. I'm still witholding judgement.

Not smart enough to see this while many others did.

 

[JohnnyGage]

If Paulson and Bernanke should resign then Chris Dodd and Barney Frank should also resign chairmen of their respective committees. Frank is Chairman of the Financial Services Committee and Dodd is Chair of the Senate banking committee(his Fannie/Freddie mortgage scandal not withstanding). Both should have at least known something about what is going on. This was a screw job from both political parties--so apparently no one has to do anything except put zero's at the end of whatever number.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: rchiu
What the heck does Bernanke and Pualson has to do with the current mess? The whole freaking crisis started with mortgage problem, mortgage companies like Fannie Mae is regulated by OFHEO and HUD. And then the mortgage crisis's ripple effect hit investment banks, that are regulated by SEC. How is Bernanke and Paulson all of sudden linked to those agencies?

Seriously you people need to learn about how the market work, just because someone has the tool to solve the problems doesn't mean they caused the problem in the first place.

Didn't see it coming or do anything about it. Instead of injecting a flu shot early, now it's the proverbial deathbed.

Greenspan has already admitted to fvcking up. Bernanke has the same job he did. If you will recall, Bernanke was head-in-the-sanding well into this year, oblivious to what even laymen saw as a looming catastrophe. I remember mocking back in February his delusional statements about the strength and future of the economy in the short term. The last class on economics I took was probably 15 years ago and I was probably daydreaming about the girl in front of me. It was pretty darn obvious what was happening well before the government appeared willing to do anything about it.

 

[Nemesis 1]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
Its really a one way or the other binary result. Heaven help us if the current turkeys in charge are merely on a little above or below the mean.

There are really only two ways to gain complete economic consensus.

Method one is to do a magnificent job of managing the economy, somewhat the Alan Greenspan method, but Alan is no longer in charge.

Method two is to completely fuck up, the Bernanke and Paulson method, be asleep at the switch while small problems turn into huge disasters, and then scream only we can save you now.

Face the damn facts, either method works equally well. Public be pleased or public be damned, its a totally irrelevant metric.

Were ya been man/ This didn't happen overnight. It was that idiot Greenspan that set this in motion. Greenspan in front of congress basicly said Oops I goofed.