The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Health and Human Services Department (HHS) recently announced that it will be holding the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of Fortune 500 companies in the health care industry personally accountable for fraud and that they will be subject to criminal charges on top of the fines levied on their corporations. The OIG is adopting this new posture because of the repeated violations of many of these Fortune 500 companies, that, upon being caught, simply have promised not to do it again, wrote out a big check to Uncle Sam, and then passed the costs of the fines onto the consumers.
Why is the OIG targeting the CEOs of the Fortune 500 companies in the health care industry? Because it is not the little guys running Medicare fraud scams that are killing us. It’s fraud on the industrial basis that costs us the bulk of the money. The big health care companies commit more Medicare and Medicaid fraud than anyone else by a long shot. That’s not just conjecture, it’s fact.
In 2010 the Department of Justice recovered $669 million from Pfizer, $302 million from AstroZeneca, and $193 million from Novartis. And that’s just the monies that they recovered under the Fast Claims Act.
So why go after executives? Because the fines offer no disincentives at all. They just see it as a cost of doing business and they move on with their lives. It’s the executives who are getting rich off of these scams.
Now the health care industry says punishing these executives isn’t fair. But the Feds say that it’s the only way to get these companies to insist on real accountability. With the executives ass on the line, believe me he’ll be checking twice to see if the company is ripping off the government.
Now just think about it, if this policy had been in place in the 1990s, Rick Scott might have faced jail time instead he ended up in the Florida governor’s mansion. As Suzy Khimm of Mother Jones points out, Florida Governor Rick Scott’s company, HCA/Columbia, had to pay a record $631 million for a huge Medicare fraud case in 1997. Scott resigned but he said that he didn’t know anything about the fraud and he didn’t face any charges.
He didn’t know that his company was running a record-breaking Medicare scam at his company?! Come on! Of course he knew about it. And that’s why executives should be held responsible. They are the ones pushing these programs, and they are the ones making money off of it. So if you are going to do the crime, you got to do the time. So I love this new program.
As the Democrats have the Republicans on the ropes, they hit them with Medicare in the 26th district of New York: they are in bad shape. In 2012 they could run all these ads against the Republicans saying these are the guys who all voted to destroy your Medicare, and it would absolutely be true. What are they going to do? You know it. They are going to give the queen right back to them.
Here is Steny Hoyer on the budget negotiations that are going on right now between the Democrats and the Republicans and the White House; and remember that Hoyer is the Minority Whip, the second most important Democrat in the House:
“I have said it over and over again, everything needs to be on the table…Medicare is one of the things that needs to be on the table.” Democratic Representative Steny Hoyer from Maryland, the Minority Whip.
My God, man, how stupid are you? He is not alone. Vice President Joe Biden came out and said, first of all we have already come out and agreed to over a trillion dollars in cuts to Republicans. Now, were tax increases included in that? Nope, not a single dime of a tax increase. Bush tax cuts, did we get rid of them? Nope, nope, no, it is all in spending cuts. But Biden says, later we are going to demand our tax increases. Ha, ha, ha, of course you are. Of course you are.
Meanwhile Eric Cantor, the Majority Leader for the Republicans in the House says, “This process shows that if people come together, finding spending cuts isn’t that hard…I reiterated that tax increases cannot pass the House.” Republican Representative Eric Cantor from Virginia, the Majority Whip.
So what has happened in the budget negotiation thus far…the real ones, the ones that are actually going to get passed? The Democrats have gotten nothing, NOTHING, okay? And what have they given up? A trillion dollars in spending cuts according to Vice President Biden. And on top of all that, what they’re going to do is help the Republicans out by cutting Medicare. So they are going to let them off the hook, and the Republicans will say, … do you think that they will turn around and run ads saying the Democrats cut your Medicare when Democrats agree with the Republicans plan to do that so? Of course. They will run that ad in a second; they already run it.
Do you know that Corwin in the midde of that 26th district race ran an ad against Hochul saying she cut your Medicare because she agrees with President Obama’s healthcare bill. But that’s taking out Medicare Advantage, but that was also in Paul Ryan’s plan, that she supports. Did that stop her from running that incredibly deceptive ad? Of course not. That’s what all of the Republicans are going to do the minute that the Democrats give them back the queen.
The ability of the Democrats to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory is unbelievable. It is legendary. Okay? And will they do it again? I would be shocked if they didn’t. Shocked.
Who’s going to turn it around? Who is going to come in and say, do you know what? Let’s not do this the way that the Republicans want. This is stupid. This is not what the American people want. It is not good politics, it is not good policy. Instead let’s demand that we get rid of the bush tax cuts. And that’s a large part of the deficit. And let’s demand that we do defense spending cuts and that’s a large way to balance the budget. We do want to balance the budget but we just have a different idea on it. And we don’t want to do these Draconian cuts to social security, medicare, or medicaid.
Who’s going to do that? The Democrats? Ha, ha. Oh, when they make that mistake, … oh, you Obama bots, come on, tell me what a genius he is. I know. Oh, right now you’ve been telling me that he ain’t going to do it. Alright, let’s see what happens. Do you think that Vice President Biden and Steny Hoyer are making stuff up? Or do you think that they are going to change their minds and change course from this disastrous path? They’re not going to do that because they believe, Washington has them convinced, that the most important thing is cutting spending, we’ve got to do that right away! That would prove that we are centrists. Washington, do you love us?
Now meanwhile there are polls and the polls show that folks do not support deficit issues and cutting spending jobs over jobs at all. For example, in Ohio, where Sherrod Brown is going to run, 56% said that they care about the jobs, whereas 35% said that they care about the deficit more. And that was true in almost all the swing states.
Meanwhile we had a poll come out on whether you would be more likely or less likely to vote for President Obama if he did Medicare cuts. And this poll specifically was worded as asking, cutting medicare or medicaid in order to balance the budget. So it is a fair question. In swing states like Ohiio, 12% said that they would be more likely to vote for him, 58% say less likely if he does Medicare or Medicaid cuts.
But undeterred the White House continues on that disastrous path, in my opinion. Let’s hope somebody turns them around.
Accountants CPA Hartford, Connecticut, LLC, located in Berlin, Connecticut, offers quality accounting, auditing, tax, bookkeeping, and QuickBooks consulting services at fees of one-third of those of our competitors to individuals and businesses across a wide spectrum of industries throughout the entire United States. William Brighenti is a Certified Public Accountant and Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor. For all of your accounting, auditing, bookkeeping, tax return preparation, tax planning, and QuickBooks services, please consider us: (860) 249-1323.
We now have new information about the Federal Reserve and who they gave our money to, and it continues, of course, to be disastrous. We now find out that they gave $30 billion each to Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, and Royal Bank of Scotland at the grand interest rate of 0.01%. That means basically they gave them free money.
Now you might think, hey, wait a minute, that’s Federal Reserve of the United States of America. I wonder if the Royal Bank of Scotland is an American Bank? Well, if you were wondering that, you were right, it is not an American Bank. Neither is Credit Suisse. In fact, we have given to a great number of foreign banks now that we find out what the Fed was actually up to. And here’s my favorite, by the way, of course, there is the Deutsche Bank and all the European banks, etc., but we also gave to the Arab Banking Corporation. We gave $28 billion in loans to them. And guess who their majority owner is? That’s right, Libya Central Bank. In other words, Gaddafi’s bank. Now that was back in 2008.
But get a load of our Federal Reserve. Who needs money? Anybody, anybody, anybody, the Arab Banking Corporation, Credit Suisse, come and get it here, at almost 0% interest rate. Now do you remember them asking Congress that they could distribute our money to other banks? Our banks, let alone foreign banks?! No, no, they didn’t because they are totally unaccountable. It is an absolute outrage.
Look, did we know that they were doing this before? Yes, we did. Did we know at the time? No, no, no, now why didn’t they tell us. Well, it would endanger the banks that we were giving the money to; people might think that they were not solvent and that there might be a run on those banks. The reason people might think they were not solvent is because they were not solvent. That’s why you need to give them $30 billion each.
And by the way, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Overall they gave $3.2 trillion in loans. These new ones we just at least identified the banks and identified the interest rate, which is 0.01%. Do you have any idea how outrageous that is? If you went to the Federal Reserve and said, hey, dude, I’m broke, man, like Goldman Sachs, can you give me $30 billion at 0.01%? If they agreed to that deal, do you know how fabulously rich you would be? Not because you would get to keep the $30 billion. It’s a loan, you would have to return it, right? But you could then, for example, turn around and buy treasury bonds with that, and whatever the rate might be, ranging from 3% to 4%, and you would get to keep the 3%. And ironically you would be lending it back to the United States government. You would be fabulously wealthy, and that’s exactly happened to all of these banks, US and foreign one, because we just gave our money away. Just gave it away.
Oh, but there was an economic crisis. Who caused it? Well, those banks. So why do we help those banks that caused the economic crisis? Okay, fine, we had to, that’s what they all say, it was a panic, we had to give away all of our money, etc.
Alright, what did we get in return? Did we get significant value? Charging 0.01% interest rate is not getting something in return. It’s getting literally almost nothing in return. Did we get a piece of Goldman Sachs, or Credit Suisse, or the Arab Banking Corporation? Because, you know, look, if you go to a private person, or any entity, and say, uh, I’d like to borrow $30 billion, they’re going to take a lot of hide for that $30 billion, let alone the $3.2 trillion overall. They’d own you. Did we do that? No. We gave it to them for almost nothing.
By the way, how did we find out this information. Two ways. Congressman Ron Paul and Congressman Alan Grayson to their eternal credit, fought really hard, and so did Senator Bernie Sanders, and eventually got part of the reform bill, which is one of the few parts of the bill that I like, and that was worthwhile, to audit the Fed. So they passed that in the Dodd-Frank Bill and now we’re seeing some of that audit. Plus news organizations like Bloomberg did a freedom of information act and they wanted to get the information from this somewhat government organizations. So through both of those avenues we’ve now found out.
Now the entire time, the Fed fought this tooth and nail. They fought the reform bill and they fought the freedom of information act in court. They went to court to stop it. Now on top of all that, the head of the Fed, Ben Bernanke, now says, “I personally have always been a big believer in providing as much information as you can to help the public understand what you’re doing, to help the markets understand what you’re doing, and to be accountable to the public for what you’re doing.”
What an unbelievable joke. They didn’t want you to find it for the last three years and only gave it under the threat of law: oh, yeah, fine, I gave away all of your money for free, and all of those guys got rich off of it.
Unbelievable crimes, man. And I told you, this is the back door, they figured it out. They’re like, Treasury? Oh, no, we’ll never make that mistake again. Go ask Congress for money through TARP? That was a disaster. People got held accountable for that. No, no, now we got a piggy bank at the Fed: we’ll just print the money. And we’ll “loan” it to you at nearly 0%, and you make a gigantic return, all my banker friends, and you bring the money back after you have made all of your money.
Accountants CPA Hartford, Connecticut, LLC, located in Berlin, Connecticut, offers quality accounting, auditing, tax, bookkeeping, and QuickBooks consulting services at fees of one-third of those of our competitors to individuals and businesses across a wide spectrum of industries throughout the entire United States. William Brighenti is a Certified Public Accountant and Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor. For all of your accounting, auditing, bookkeeping, tax return preparation, tax planning, and QuickBooks services, please consider us: (860) 249-1323.
Cenk Uygur: Paul Ryan, the Congressman who came up with a plan to cut Medicare, is being asked to explain it, and the fact that it is incredibly unpopular, I love his explanation. Here’s the clip for you.
David Gregory: How much damage has Newt Gingrich done to your effort to reform Medicare?
Paul Ryan: I’m not a pundit; I’m a policy maker. I’ll let you and your panel figure that out, and it’s up to the voters to figure this stuff out. The point is this: we’ve got to get beyond this and we’ve got to get into a serious conversation of what it takes to fix the fiscal problems in this country. And the people in New Hampshire can figure this stuff out.
Gregory: That’s a dodge. You are the chairman of the committee, you are serious about entitlement reform, you’re also a politician. You say that you want to do it on your terms. Law does not become law without building political consensus, and you don’t have that. And now you have a major figure in the Republican party say this is right-wing social engineering. So I’m wondering how much you feel undercut in getting this thing passed, which I assume is your goal?
Ryan: First of all, if people are describing this accurately in the polls, it is far more popular than the poll you reference. Second of all, leaders are elected to lead. I don’t consult polls to tell me what my principles are or where our policy should be. Leaders change the polls. And we are leading in the House; we are not seeing this kind of leadership from the President of the United States. We are going to lead and we are going to try to move these polls and change these polls because that’s what the country wants.
Uygur: I love that ending. Ignore what the polls say about what the country wants; instead what the country wants is for us to change their minds. Really? That would sound counter-intuitive, counter-logical, and counter-factual. Hey, but you got to give the Republicans credit on this. They do want to push the polls. They are very aggressive, and when they see a poll that is not on their side, sometimes they run for the hills when it’s bad enough, and they have largely enough on this Medicare plan, funny enough, but in a lot of other instances, they say okay and let’s double down on our talking points. Let’s reeve up that machine of Fox News Channel and all the politicians saying the exact same thing, repeat it, repeat it, repeat it, until we get the polls to move.
Whereas the Democrats, when they see a poll that’s only 60% in their favor, they say, oh, that’s not enough, oh, God, please, please, the polls…and they run.
Now what Ryan says makes no sense. The American people have spoken in those polls and they do not like Ryan’s plan. Every single poll shows that by overwhelming margins. But Republicans think, who cares what the American people want. We’ll strong arm them into wanting something else. And now Ryan continues that in the next clip.
Ryan: I just did nineteen town hall meetings in a district that I work for, that went for Obama, Dukakis, Clinton, and Gore. People are hungry for solutions, and I really fundamentally believe that the people are way ahead of the political class and I think that they are going to reward a leader who steps up to the plate and actually fixes these problems no matter how much demagoguery, no matter how much distortion, no matter how much political parties try to scare seniors in the next election, I just don’t think that they are going to buy it this year, and they are hungry for leaders to fix this problem before it gets out of control.
Uygur: Alright, except that they don’t want to kill Medicare as you do. They don’t want to turn it into a voucher program. They don’t want to get rid of guaranteed benefits. And the Republican so-called proposal for fixing Medicare is ending Medicare. So how does that fix it?
Later you won’t have Medicare, so that’s why you should sign unto a program now that ends Medicare. That makes no sense whatsoever.
And of course, the reason for all of this is that they need more money for tax cuts. Remember the other half of Ryan’s plan is to lower the top tax rate for the rich from 35% to 25%. Now where is he going to get all of that money. He’s going to raid your Medicare and Social Security. That’s where he is going to get that money. That’s why he’s got this trick where he wants to convince you to believe something you do not believe.
Barefoot Accountant: In spite of Godwin’s Law, I will risk the following assertion. Isn’t this posture of leading on pure “principles” in opposition to the will of the people, or, worse yet, even with the intent and determination to change public opinion through the techniques of propaganda, including the use of the media (e.g., Fox News?) as well as politicians and paid political mouthpieces repeating over and over again how ending Medicare and going on a voucher system is the only way to save our country from being destroyed, reminiscent of that of Hitler and Goebbels during Nazi Germany? Shouldn’t leadership in a Democracy reflect and represent the will of the people, and not the other way around: i.e., forcing the will of a country’s leaders onto that of the people? 80% of the American people wish to preserve Medicare. 72% of the American people have expressed their solution of fixing deficit spending: by taxing the rich. And a similar majority also wish to cut military spending.
It is interesting that in the very same plan to cut Medicare in order to correct our country’s deficit spending that Paul Ryan wishes to also reduce taxes on the very rich and on corporations even further than what they are now; and they are much too low now.
Accountants CPA Hartford, Connecticut, LLC, located in Berlin, Connecticut, offers quality accounting, auditing, tax, bookkeeping, and QuickBooks consulting services at fees of one-third of those of our competitors to individuals and businesses across a wide spectrum of industries throughout the entire United States. William Brighenti is a Certified Public Accountant and Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor. For all of your accounting, auditing, bookkeeping, tax return preparation, tax planning, and QuickBooks services, please consider us: (860) 249-1323.
For our Republican Con Job of the day, we have a great example of the Republicans pretending to speak for the people while actually doing the bidding of the rich. You are going to love this one. Last year Former Republican Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota helped form the right-wing think tank, the American Network Action. They claim to be a grass roots group whose primary goal is to put our center-right ideas into action by engaging the hearts and minds of the American people and spurring them into active participation in our democracy.
Grass roots, democratic participation, American people? That all sounds pretty good, right? Well, the American people voicing their opinions would be terrific. Do you know how many people contributed to the American Action Network? Eleven (11). Not eleven thousand, eleven hundred, but just eleven.
Do you know how much they gave though? $2.75 million. When you look at that, it turns out that those eleven foks were really rich. Who could have seen that coming? The group got two checks for a million dollars. And the smallest donation that it received was for $25,000.
Now what do you think? Is that grass roots support for Republican ideas? Or is that rich people just buying our elections?
And what was the result of all of that money? Well, they bought ads like these to attack Democrats who actually cared about the middle class.
How can you tell the taxpayers in Steve Kagen’s district? We’re not so tough to spot. Kagen stripped us with the wasteful stimulus: $800 billion.
Congressman Martin Heinrich. Is robbing us to bring to Washington our tax money.
Meet Nancy Pelosi’s star pupil, Washington insider Chad Causey. Causey graduated from the Obama Pelosi team, that gave us the wasteful stimulus, the $1 trillion Health Care.
Do you get a sense from all of that? The theme is whatever you do, more tax cuts, and not spending on the middle class. No, you don’t want that.
Gee, I wonder why rich people gave these people money. By the way, who spent all of this money to make sure Republicans win? Well, it turns out, we have no idea. Because of new laws, the American Action Network isn’t required to disclose its donors at all, which is pretty convenient.
The group’s president claims that more donors contributed after the group’s startup, but of course he wouldn’t say how many or how much they gave. Oh, of course, we had plenty of variety. The third Koch brother came in and gave us money. And the Koch sisters came in and gave us money. Isn’t that grass roots? For the record, we don’t know if it’s the one Republican group that the Koch brothers did not give money to.
Now these guys claiming to be a grass roots group supported by average Americans while getting only eleven checks from incredibly wealthy donors is our Con Job of the day!
Accountants CPA Hartford, Connecticut, LLC, located in Berlin, Connecticut, offers quality accounting, auditing, tax, bookkeeping, and QuickBooks consulting services at fees of one-third of those of our competitors to individuals and businesses across a wide spectrum of industries throughout the entire United States. William Brighenti is a Certified Public Accountant and Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor. For all of your accounting, auditing, bookkeeping, tax return preparation, tax planning, and QuickBooks services, please consider us: (860) 249-1323.
UYGUR: Democrats just mauled Republicans in the last congressional election on the issue of Medicare. So they have this great whipping stick to use in 2012, right?
And of course the Republicans are reeling a little bit. They`re standing their ground, but they`re hurt, dawg.
So what are the Democrats going to do? Well, they might be poised do what they do best — snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Today, Vice President Joe Biden resumed talks aimed at reaching a budget deal before a potential government default this summer. Now, that makes sense. And he`s talking about over $1 trillion in cuts, but other Democratic leaders have said Medicare is on the table in these negotiations.
Does that make sense? I`m not so sure. Why would you do that? You have them on the ropes. Why would you let them off?
But a lot of Democrats say it`s OK, because this would be Medicare reform, not Medicare cuts. Now, is that a real distinction? And what does it mean?
Let`s try to figure that out together. The guy who is going to help me do that is someone who might be able to shed a lot of light on this. He`s Joe Biden`s former chief economist, Jared Bernstein. He`s now a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Jared, thanks so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
JARED BERNSTEIN, SR. FELLOW, CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES: My pleasure, Cenk.
UYGUR: All right. Now, you`ve seen that Vice President Biden said that we have got a lot of big-ticket items on the table here. And other Democrats have said it as well.
First, is that a good idea, to put Medicare on the table here just as the Democrats have the Republicans on the ropes?
BERNSTEIN: Well, the way I hear that — I mean, I`m not in the room anymore, but the way I hear that, I know the way Joe Biden thinks about Medicare, I know the way President Obama thinks about this issue as a key health care security issue for older persons. And the idea that you would take that guaranteed benefit away and replace it with a voucher, I guarantee you is anathema to these Democrats, and you will not see that in the negotiations.
UYGUR: I know. I know. But Jared, that`s easy. No, no. But that`s easy, right?
BERNSTEIN: Right.
UYGUR: So I want to get into the details that are hard.
BERNSTEIN: Sure.
UYGUR: I know they`re not going to say we`re taking away guaranteed benefits. Democrats wouldn`t agree to that. That`s simple, right?
BERNSTEIN: Correct.
UYGUR: But when you get into the specifics, for example, they say they want to cut waste and fraud. Again, that`s also easy. Everybody`s in favor of that.
They say that they want to negotiate with drug companies. Let`s pause there for a second. I thought the Obama health care bill did not allow us to negotiate with drug companies. So where is that coming from?
BERNSTEIN: Well, look, I mean, one of the things they`re going to be sitting down and talking about is new ways to control costs in health care spending across the board. And I think that`s precisely the kind of distinction you want to make here.
I mean, there`s no doubt, Cenk — and you know this as well as I do — that health care spending — and it`s worse in the private sector than the public — is on an unsustainable course. So what these negotiators need to do is preserve the guaranteed benefit, and in a balanced way, get under the hood. And by the way —
UYGUR: No, no, no, Jared.
BERNSTEIN: Let me just say, if they can shift to, for example, generic drugs under Medicare, that`s probably $100 billion in savings.
UYGUR: But that`s what I`m talking about. If that`s Medicaid reform, I`m in, that`s lovely. But can we even do that? Isn`t that part of the bill that we are not allowed to negotiate with the drug companies?
BERNSTEIN: There has to be new legislation that allows for that kind of negotiation. So, you know —
UYGUR: Oh.
BERNSTEIN: Believe me, there are new ideas out there that can amplify some of these savings without affecting the experience that I think seniors have on Medicare of this very favorable guaranteed benefit program.
UYGUR: All right. Look, if you open that issue back up, I think that`s terrific. I think it leads to huge savings for the American people.
OK, that`s good reform. Now let`s go on to the next set of questions on Medicare, because the Republicans want to, for example, raise the eligibility age and they want to cut benefits.
Now, is there any chance that the Democrats are going to agree to those last two things?
BERNSTEIN: On Medicare? Yes. I don`t think so. I don`t think so at all. Again, I`m not in the room, but those are precisely the kinds of service delivery benefits that the Democrats want to preserve. And it`s the key distinction between, as you well know, between where the Republicans want to take this and where — look, the Republican thing is a big risk shift, a big cost shift from government on to the backs of seniors, and the Democrats are going to do everything they can to present that shift.
But at the same time, they have to implement reform that gets the costs on a sustainable path. And there are ways to do that that improve the cost-effectiveness of Medicare, not hurt the consumer side.
UYGUR: So, Jared, last thing then. You`re saying no actual cuts as far as you know and suspect, not raising the eligibility age.
Is there anything else that would be on the table in terms of Medicare for the Democrats?
BERNSTEIN: Nothing that I know of. I mean, again, I think the things that I know about, the things that I`ve heard about — both, by the way, publicly discussed right now — are the kinds of things that help you control costs in the spirit of cost-effectiveness.
So, you know, folks not wasting their money on treatments that don`t do anything, in fact, may actually be more harmful than good, that`s the kind of reforms that we need and that`s the kind that I believe the Democrats will go after.
UYGUR: All right. Jared Bernstein, thank you so much for joining us.
BERNSTEIN: My pleasure.
UYGUR: Former chief economist for Vice President Biden.
All right. A great pleasure having you on. Very informative, actually. Thank you.
Accountants CPA Hartford, Connecticut, LLC, located in Berlin, Connecticut, offers quality accounting, auditing, tax, bookkeeping, and QuickBooks consulting services at fees of one-third of those of our competitors to individuals and businesses across a wide spectrum of industries throughout the entire United States. William Brighenti is a Certified Public Accountant and Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor. For all of your accounting, auditing, bookkeeping, tax return preparation, tax planning, and QuickBooks services, please consider us: (860) 249-1323.
CENK UYGUR, HOST: Good evening, everybody. I`m Cenk Uygur. We have got a great show for you tonight.
Sarah Palin is coming — uh-oh. Newt Gingrich might be going. Uh-oh for him. And the Republicans are generally standing their ground.
Well, let`s start with that one.
Even though Paul Ryan`s plan to end Medicare is dragging them over a political cliff, the GOP is still standing right behind him. Forty Republican senators just voted for his bill yesterday.
And just listen to Dick Cheney.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD CHENEY (R), FMR. VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I worship the ground that Paul Ryan walks on. I hope he doesn`t run for president because that would ruin a good man.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: Man, that`s amazing. He sounds like a schoolgirl with a crush on Justin Bieber. That was fun. Man, I`ve got to hear that again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHENEY: I worship the ground that Paul Ryan walks on.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: Oy. By the way, when you`re further right wing than Dick Cheney, you might be a little too right wing. But Cheney is not alone. Republicans everywhere are doubling down on Paul Ryan and claiming Medicare didn`t lose him that election in Upstate New York.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH), HOUSE SPEAKER: The fact is we didn`t win. And part of — the small part of the reason we didn`t win clearly had to do with Medicare. Well, we have outlined a plan, frankly, that we believe in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: That`s great. I love how he starts. He`s like, I`ve got to be honest with you, we didn`t win. Yes, we already knew that. It`s not like a big concession.
And then he says Medicare, this is a small part of the reason we didn`t win. Really? OK. You want to go down that road? Have at it, Hoss.
Now, Ryan himself, of course, is telling Republicans not to get all wobbly on him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you say to maybe these weak-kneed Republicans?
REP. PAUL RYAN (R), WISCONSIN: Yes. It`s not the time to go wobbly. They`re going to run these attack ads at us regardless. This is a time for leaders to be leaders.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: All right. It looks like Republicans are deluding themselves into thinking what`s wrong is their sales pitch, but not what they`re actually selling.
Listen to Oklahoma Tom Cole. He says, “If we`ll just stay with our argument and do a better job developing it, we`ll be fine.” Just fine.
Florida`s Allen West says, “We need to be stronger in marketing who we are and our message.” I know, it`s just marketing.
And Karl Rove himself says, “Republicans need a political war college that schools incumbents and challengers in the best way to explain, defend and attack on the issue of Medicare.” I thought they had that. I thought it was called Fox News Channel.
Anyway, hey, listen, Republicans. You guys are all right. Just keep going. Hit that cliff? Don`t worry about that cliff.
You`ll be fine — just a little further now. No (INAUDIBLE).
Well, look, you have got to give the Republicans on one thing. They do stand their ground, which isn`t always the case with Democrats.
So will the Republicans be able to swing public opinion with enough ads bought by millionaires by the time we have those elections in 2012, or will they find themselves over that cliff they seem itching to walk off of?
Let`s discuss. Let`s bring in Congressman Jim McDermott. He is, of course, a Democrat from the great state of Washington. He serves on the Ways and Means Committee and is a proud member of the Progressive Caucus.
Congressman, welcome.
REP. JIM MCDERMOTT (D), WASHINGTON: Hi, Cenk. How are you?
UYGUR: I`m awesome.
So, first question — the Republicans continue to go down the Paul Ryan path. Are you happy or unhappy about that?
MCDERMOTT: I hope they stick with that all the way up to the election of 2012. It`s a losing plan and they knew it. They had polling — Ryan had polling before he went out on the floor with it, and they went with it anyway because they`re true believers.
They simply thought they won the last election in 2010 on the basis of jobs, and then they pivoted and said it`s all the deficit. Let`s cut grandma, throw her under the bus, and the people will elect us in 2012.
It simply is bad politics.
UYGUR: But here`s what I`m concerned about. Honestly, I would rather have them run for the hills. And I know some of them have. You know, five of the Republican senators voted no — Collins, Snowe, Scott Brown, Murkowski and one other.
OK. So that`s good. I like that, because I don`t want this policy to pass because I care about the policy more than that, more than anything else. But if they double down and they got all those ads with all the money that they buy, is there any concern that they might actually be able to swing public opinion?
MCDERMOTT: The American people have figured it out and they`ve decided that the Republicans wants to get rid of Medicare as we know it and give a voucher out to people. And that`s not good for grandma and it`s not good for grandma`s children or grandma`s grandchildren.
And there`s nothing they can do with advertising that will change the American perception of that. The Americans have made up their minds on this. That`s what New York 26 showed. That race they lost because people in a Republican district said this is crazy, we don`t want these guys in here.
UYGUR: Congressman, of course the key is for people to fight back. And Kathy Hochul, in that district, of course did a great job fighting back, and that`s why she won the election. But, you know, some are concerned — and I say “some,” let me keep it real — it`s me — I`m concerned that the White House is going to do a deal where they say they`re going to reform Medicare.
Now, so let`s get a little bit more realistic here. What do you consider reform and what are you willing to live with? And what will you draw the line on as a member of the Progressive Caucus?
What will you say, hey, you know what? If you, for example, move up the age where we get Medicare, I`m out, we`re not going to do that, where do you drew those lines, Congressman?
MCDERMOTT: There are two ways to deal with Medicare. And I agree with that the costs are a problem just like Paul Ryan does. His response is put the cost on to grandma, and we`ll just give her a voucher, and whatever else she needs has to come out of her own pocket.
My review of reform is you have to start looking at drug companies and at pharmaceutical companies and medical prices and hospital prices. You have to start looking at the ways you control costs inside the program. It can be done. It`s been done in every industrialized country in the world except the United States.
UYGUR: So if they try to say, hey, you have to get Medicare at a higher age, are you going to draw the line on that and say you`re opposed to that?
MCDERMOTT: Absolutely, I`m opposed to that. The problem is now it ought to be 60, because people are being laid off from jobs, they can`t find jobs.
You have more long-term unemployment in this country right now than you`ve ever had in our history. And those people are desperate to have the security of having health insurance. So I think Medicare ought to come down rather than push it up.
UYGUR: All right. That is very clear.
Washington Congressman Jim McDermott, always happy to have you on. Thank you so much for joining us tonight.
MCDERMOTT: See you again.
UYGUR: All right.
Now let`s bring in a pair of old battle axes — Bill Press, host of “The Bill Press Show” on Sirius Radio, and MSNBC political analyst Pat Buchanan.
Do you guys mind that?
BILL PRESS, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: You didn`t say experienced, Cenk.
UYGUR: OK. Experienced battle axes.
(LAUGHTER)
UYGUR: Battle axes is cool though. That`s fun. I`d like to be a battle axe.
All right, Pat. I want to start with you tonight.
Are the Republicans genuine here? Do they really think that they didn`t lose the Upstate New York race because of Medicare? They can`t believe that, right?
PAT BUCHANAN, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, they`re realistic, I think. I think Medicare was probably the primary reason why they lost that district up there, which is a heavy Republican district.
But I will say this, Cenk — and I think you might agree with me — they are showing some courage and grit not running away from their principles after they have suffered a single defeat. And while they have suffered a defeat, and this is a problem for them, I think Bill Clinton is the one who is wise on this. He said, look, simply because Ryan`s plan might not be the right one, we`re going to have to do something about Medicare, because Medicare, Social Security, defense and Medicaid, they`re going to take us down to where this country may have to default. And if we do in the next two or maybe six years, and Barack Obama is in the wheelhouse, then he is Herbert Hoover and they have forgotten Paul Ryan.
PRESS: Hey, Cenk, by the way, it didn`t take Bill Clinton to say that. Part of President Obama`s health care reform plan, which is now the law of the land, reformed the way Medicare is delivered in a way that you don`t have so much repetition and procedures and docs, which according to the Congressional Budget Office, will pay $200 billion over the next 10 years.
But let me tell you what this is, Cenk. This is classic political overreach. And Pat has seen it. I`ve seen Democrats do it and Republicans do it.
They get in office. There`s that arrogance of power. Think ignore the polls, they ignore their consultants. They`re determined, they think they`re right. And they go and they just simply overreach.
I think it`s like political Jonestown. You know, Paul Ryan mixed the Kool-Aid, John Boehner served it and forced everybody to drink it.
BUCHANAN: You know, Bill —
UYGUR: But Pat, you have got to be worried about that, right?
BUCHANAN: — this isn`t Jonestown.
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: This could be the end.
BUCHANAN: Oh, come on, Cenk.
UYGUR: I mean, if you look at what happened to the 26th District, I mean — no, but that`s a heavily-Republican district, Pat.
BUCHANAN: Cenk —
UYGUR: I mean, if you`re not concerned about that, I`m surprised by that.
BUCHANAN: Look, they`ve lost a district, there`s no doubt about it. They have a got problem with this issue.
But let me tell you, the United States of America has a hellish problem. We have got a deficit that`s running at 10 percent of the gross national product for the third year in a row. Barack Obama — the big O`s budget went up there, voted down 97-0, and here`s what — let me tell you, if you don`t address this, and Medicare is part of it, and this country goes down, it`s the man in the White House that`s accountable.
PRESS: Pat, what are you talking about? Pat, come on. What are you talking about?
Joe Biden is leading a group right now which is looking at responsible ways revolving (ph) against the Democrats to balance the budget. And here`s the problem. These phony Republicans up there, they talk fiscal responsibility, and yet, at the same time, they want to continue the subsidies to the oil companies and they want to continue the subsidies stop the wealthiest of Americans in terms of taxes.
That`s a total contradiction. You can`t have it both ways. Instead, they`ll take it out on grandma.
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: Look, we`ve had that oil subsidy discussion before. Obviously, I agree with Bill on this.
I know where you stand, Pat, but let`s stay on Medicare here. And I want to see if we can get any kind of agreements.
Bill, what would you agree is proper reform of Medicare? What would you be willing to cut?
And then, Pat, you tell me if you`re willing to go in that direction at all or if you think it`s right to stay on that Ryan plan.
So, Bill, you go first.
PRESS: Well, I just mentioned, look, having worked in the health care thing last year with a big labor and business group, there are enormous wastes of money in Medicare the way it`s delivered, the duplication of docs, the duplication of procedures, procedures that are —
UYGUR: But that`s easy, Bill. Everybody says that.
PRESS: Wait. No, no, no. But do it. Do it, Cenk. We talk about it, we don`t do it.
And the other thing is, built into the health care law again is this panel which Republicans want to get rid of that says if they see too much overbilling, that they can move in on a hospital or move in on a doc and do it. You need those kind of cost controls in Medicare. At least start there.
BUCHANAN: All right. You know what I`d do, Cenk?
UYGUR: Yes, go ahead, Pat.
BUCHANAN: Here`s what I would do. Look, I was with Ronald Reagan and they put together the Social Security Commission. I didn`t like the results of it, but clearly you had to give some here.
Age is going to have to go up, the benefits are going to have to be pared back. Then you`re going to have to get both parties behind the thing and agreed upon, and the leaders, and they`ve got to come forward.
I don`t agree that you can have any change that`s dramatic because it lends itself to demagoguery, as it did in the 26th District. But if we — let me tell you this —
UYGUR: So you think the Ryan plan is a bad idea then.
BUCHANAN: Here`s the problem. Look, when it came out, I said if I were a presidential candidate, I would say Ryan clearly has shown courage here, he`s worked on this thing, he`s a guy that you ought to respect, he`s an intellectual. But I would not embrace it as a presidential candidate, because you`ve got 18 months to a presidential campaign, and you don`t lock yourself into a fixed position when you`re an outsider, as a candidate, because the party in power does that.
PRESS: Cenk, there`s one other reality here which I think we saw in New York in the 26th. The political dynamic for 2012 has changed dramatically. I mean, the House is now in play for Democrats on this issue alone. This is a battleground. Every race is going to be run, Ryan plan: are you up or down?
BUCHANAN: But you know —
PRESS: Wait a minute, Pat, just a second.
Every presidential candidate. That`s why some of them are really nervous about that.
(CROSSTALK)
BUCHANAN: Let me tell you what`s wrong with the analysis, Bill. It`s not going to be the issue for this reason —
UYGUR: No, no.
PRESS: Yes, it is.
UYGUR: It`s already an issue, Pat.
BUCHANAN: We`re going to get an agreement —
UYGUR: Pat, it`s already an issue.
BUCHANAN: No, it is an issue, but Cenk —
UYGUR: They`re all going to get asked about it.
So let`s show you what Pawlenty said and then you guys can react to it. Let`s show you Pawlenty first.
BUCHANAN: But Cenk, it`s a year and a half between now and the election. Here`s what`s going to happen. Either Biden or the other fellow is going to come up with changes in Medicare which are going to go through, and that`s going to supersede Ryan.
That will be the issue. If they go through, Ryan is —
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: Guys, hold on. Let`s look at Pawlenty and then get your reaction.
Go to the clip.
PRESS: All right. Let`s go.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TIM PAWLENTY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We`ll have our own plan, and it will have many similarities to Congressman Ryan`s plan, but it will have some differences. And the Medicare part of our plan will have some differences, too. You`ll have some similarities also. But if I can`t have my own plan — as president I`ll have my own plan. If I can`t have that, and the bill came to my desk, and I had to choose between signing or not, Congressman Ryan`s plan, of course I would sign it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: All right. Look, they all get asked, they all get put on the record.
PRESS: Absolutely.
UYGUR: But as Pat said, there`s going to be a different plan probably by the time the election rolls around.
So, Bill, does this hurt them, people like Pawlenty? Or do they get beyond it because at some point the White House makes a deal?
PRESS: Well, first of all, I deny the premise. There is — what do you think, this gang is going to get something that — they haven`t gotten anything done in the last two-and-a-half years. What makes you think they`re going to get a plan done in the next 12 months? They`re not going to.
This is going to be the issue. It has already started. It was the issue in 26. And every Republican presidential candidate is going to have to answer that question.
UYGUR: Last word, Pat.
BUCHANAN: All right. Now, Cenk, now let me tell you. You`ve heard Bill.
Let me tell you, if Barack Obama, president of the United States, does not get some kind of deal which involves the big items, Medicare, defense, all those things, Barack Obama is a failed president. And Barack Obama alone will be responsible if this country goes over the cliff toward which everybody agrees it is headed.
PRESS: Yes. Nice try, Pat. Nice try.
BUCHANAN: The economy will be the issue in 2012, not Paul Ryan.
PRESS: Here we go, Cenk. You can`t defend Paul Ryan, so you attack Barack Obama. That`s what they`ve been doing for the last —
(CROSSTALK)
PRESS: It doesn`t work. They`ve got to take a stand on Paul Ryan.
UYGUR: Pat, I know you`re going to agree that part of that package should be big revenue increases, right?
BUCHANAN: Well, this is — well, and I`ll tell you, the whole deal, Cenk, you`re exactly right.
UYGUR: All right. All right.
BUCHANAN: Republicans are burned on this thing. They are burned. And you watch them back off on any kind of deal as well. And if there`s no deal, who`s on the ballot in November, 2012? It ain`t Paul Ryan.
UYGUR: Well, he actually is going to be on the ballot in his own race, and he may suffer from that.
PRESS: Hey, Cenk, I just think we heard Pat agree to getting rid of those tax cuts for the wealthy. Didn`t you? I think I heard him agree to that.
UYGUR: Well, that`s what it seemed to be. But all right —
PRESS: Good for you, Pat.
BUCHANAN: Hey, Cenk, half of all Americans don`t pay any income taxes. Take a look at them for a change.
UYGUR: All right. All right.
PRESS: Come on, Pat.
UYGUR: You got that one in, Pat. All right.
Bill Press and MSNBC political analyst Pat Buchanan, thank you both. Great as always.
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Joining me now is our power panel. I love this. With me is Alex Wagner, reporter for the Huffington Post and MSNBC analyst. very powerful.
Ari Berman from the Nation and author of “Herding Donkeys: the Fight to Rebuild the Democratic Party.” and Simon Rosenberg, founder of the New Democrat Network. Yesterday Vice President Biden signaled that such big-ticket items as entitlements might take a hit.
I made it clear today that revenuing will have to be in the deal. Everybody knows at the end of the day we’re going to have to make some really tough decisions on some of the big-ticket items, but I think we’re in a position where we will be able to get to well above the trillion dollars pretty quick in terms of what would be a down payment on the process.
Alex, i’m going to start with you. First, does this indicate that we have not actually done any tax increases yet, that the revenue side is not on the table yet, the whole trillion is in spending cuts?
This is — this is the Democrats’ efforts to get some skin in the game on the question of entitlements, but fundamentally it’s to get the Republicans to the table on tax increases. You know, the Republicans have been pretty masterful in terms of framing this debate and getting the Democrats to say we’ve got to tackle the Medicare. For a long time the White House said entitlement programs are not an immediate threat to the economy. They have changed course on that, but given the manna from heaven, there’s no way they’ll get close to attacking the problems in the same way.
I know, not in the same way. Look at what Democratic House Minority Steny Hoyer from Maryland said, I have said it over and over again, everything needs to be on the table. Isn’t that going to totally blow their advantage that they just got and we had evidence of in the 26th district race?
We’re clearly in the early stages of these negotiations. I think as Alex said, one of the most interesting things is how can there be any negotiations if the Republicans are saying that revenue increases are off the table? There’s no way to have a serious conversation about reducing the deficit unless there’s substantial new revenue into the government.
Look, i know, they’re tough guys and always want to say, we’ll never raise taxes. I get that, but how about our side? When you talk about progressives, saying, hey, we should cut medicare, does that make any sense given what’s happened?
I think the deal that the Democrats strike this year includes large substantial cuts, as opposed to reforming that will save monies, and I think these are different things. I think there’s — i think if there are cuts, as opposed to modernization, I think it could be trouble in the Democratic base.
Ari, is there a real difference between cuts and reform of medicare?
Well, there could be. There could be, for example, letting an independent advisory board address this issue or there could be Paul Ryan’s voucher program. What republicans are doing, they are begging Democrats to bail them out on this issue. They realize they made a huge mistake embracing Paul Ryan’s plan which we saw play out last night, and now they’re saying, c’mon, throw us a lifeline, and it would be crazy if the Democrats did that, if they let Republicans get off the hook for what they have already voted on.
Ari, that is absolutely correct. If they say we’ll help you cut medicare, what are you doing? That’s crazy. All right, but that’s been my position. To the next question, why do Republicans want to attack Elizabeth Warren so bad and should President Obama give her a recess appointment? Last week she dove into a confrontation with Patrick McHenry about what time she was allowed to leave. Warren said staff agreed to let her go, but McHenry said he had made no such agreement. Basically called her a liar. Let’s watch that first.
We had an agreement.
You had no agreement —
We had an agreement for the time this hearing would have occurred.
This is simply not the case. This is not the case.
Mr. Chairman, you just did something that I — I’m trying to be cordial here, but you just accused the lady of lying.
She’s accusing me of making an agreement that I never made.
I think you need to clear this up with your staff.
Why do the Republicans hate Elizabeth Warren so much? Not personally, but as in getting that position. They don’t want her to get it under any circumstances.
That was awkward. I think they actually don’t like her personally either, Cenk. Elizabeth Warren was largely the architect of the Consumer Protection Bureau, and Republicans have not liked her since the beginning. not just because of who she is but what she’s trying to do. The housing industry doesn’t like her. She was releasing reforms for mortgage documents, and they don’t like that. They think it stifles innovation.
Here’s what I said. I want innovation stifled in the financial industry.
I was at this hearing yesterday and covered it. It was incredibly surreal, but it wasn’t surprising. Republicans have been attacking Elizabeth Warren and the bureau for a long time. They attacked it during the Dodd/Frank debate and they’re attacking it now. The people that gives them the most money, the biggest banks, the mortgage brokers, all those people don’t want to be regulated. That’s what these attacks are about.
Should he do a recess appointment? Should he say apparently they’re not going to confirm anyone anyway, why not put her in?
He has no choice, because Republicans in the Senate have said they won’t confirm anybody, not just Elizabeth Warren without change for the bureau, which the Obama administration is not going to agree to.
Do you agree?
I think the biggest mistake tactically, the more they attack her, the more he has to appoint her, because it looks like he’s giving in. Otherwise, if they had just left this alone, this may have been — the President may have had a choice. He doesn’t have a choice anymore.
I hope you guys are right. I would love it if he did a recess appointment. If he has no choice, in my book, that’s fantastic. Put her in. She fights for all our consumers. One last question for you guys. is the GOP war backfiring? Look at this new poll on Florida governor Rick Scott. It’s got him at 29% approval rating, with 57% disapproving of the job he’s doing. I have a bold prediction. I don’t think he’s going to make it out of a first term. I think somehow he’s going to get thrown out of office. Am I crazy? Alex, go.
I think getting thrown out of office is one thing. I think that same poll, 54 or 53% of the voters thought his budget plan was unfair. I think that’s what the Republicans will have to work on, the idea that people that got us into this mess are the rich, and the people that are bearing the burden of it disproportionately are the poor and working class. When you’re saying to workers in Florida, you’ll have to take parts of salary to put it toward your pension, and slash education spending, it feels unfair. The Republicans thus far have not sold the country and Floridians, a package that I think is palatable to them.
Will he not make it out of the first term?
He never should have been governor in the first place. Before he was governor, he ran the nation’s largest for-profit hospitals. He was accused and pled guilty to 1.7 billion in medicare and medicaid fraud. It was the largest health care fraud settlement in history. Somehow Floridians elected him, but almost instantaneously they didn’t like the guy. Maybe they should have looked closer at who they elected.
Simon, last word.
What’s amazing is Republican numbers all across the country are tanking, the congressional generic is showing some substantial movement. It’s happening very quick, and I think what’s happened is the American people realize the Democrats want to give them more, the Republicans want to give them less, they’re not happy about it, and it’s having a significant impact across the country. The Republicans are in trouble very early. One of the great stories you’ll be covering is how much the presidentials are trying to distance themselves from the early Paul Ryan politics. We’re going to be following this story for months.
You end on a completely correct note. Governor Christie is in trouble, Walker is in trouble, they’re all in trouble.
They’re all in trouble.
Great panel tonight. Alex Wagner, Simon Rosenberg, and of course Ari Berman from the Nation.
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We are finally seeing signs that the government or part of it is starting to crack down on banks that are still profiting off the crisis. Over the last few weeks, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has reportedly opened a probe and requested information from Wall Street banks about their mortgage security operations during the credit boom. He specifically requested meetings with representatives from Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley. The investigation has not yesterday been made public, but the probe has been expanded to include JP Morgan Chase, UBS, and Deutsche Bank. All right. You go get them, Eric. The inquiry appears to be quite broad. He has requested mortgage-related documents and could be looking into fraud, God bless his heart. Can he pull off this investigation that the rest of the government seems wildly disinterested in? I hope so. Or are they simply too big to jail? Let me bring in Pulitzer Prize-winning columnest and editor for the New York Times, Gretchen Morgenson author of “Reckless Endangerment.”
Thanks for having me.
First there’s a theory out there that it wasn’t the banks fault but the government: they forced the bankers to make these risky loans, to minorities and poor people, and the banks didn’t want to do it, but they just got forced into it. Is there any truth in that?
It’s so interesting that there’s so much blame to go around in this whole crisis. As you know, anything that could achieve trillions in losses really cannot be just a few people at the wheel here, but really what these lenders did, as we are finding out more and more, even four years after the crisis erupted, they actually targeted minorities and targeted first-time home buyers, people who are unsophisticated, with some of the most poisonous mortgages you can imagine, mortgages with low interest rates that would explode or balloon higher, really mortgages that were very different for even the most sophisticated even higher net worth individuals to pay, so it really wasn’t that they were forced to do it, these were very lucrative loans.
Yeah, no question about it, of course, nobody made them make billions of dollars, but I think a lot of people wonder, why is making these risky loans more profitable for them?
You know, it really is true, the more poisonous the loan, let’s say there’s a prepayment penalty associated with it. If you’re a borrower that has a bit dicier credit, you have to pay a higher rate of interest. These are all elements that go into the profitability of a loan. So the loans that were given to people that were maybe on the lower rungs or who never had a home before or no credit, they really paid through the nose.
Now, they got crushed by that, right? There’s another set of victims. All these mortgages would get wrapped up into the securities, that then the big banks would sell off to the clients.
That’s right.
But meanwhile, they were betting against their clients. If they were betting against their clients making good on these loans, isn’t that fraud?
Some were betting against their clients. They argue it was not fraud, because they disclosed they were making bets or disclosed that they were making bets. Now, that is their argument. What you have to think of as an everyday person, is that the kind of investment bank I want to buy products from, where they’re betting against me, and I, you know, really would have to say no, I think those are the kinds of practices that normal, everyday people would find questionable.
So how have they been getting away with this for all this time? Obviously the collapse happened in 2008. Finally Eric Schneiderman appears to be going after them right now. Why hasn’t the federal government been doing anything?
I think it’s important to remember that the regulators who were really charged with watching over these markets in the buildup to the boom, i.e. 2003, ’04, ’05, ’06, were asleep at the switch, not really doing their jobs. What that ended up doing is not only did it not protect people during the boom, it also meant there were very few facts, figures and less data than ever to bring cases now. So it’s a double failure that’s really, really problematic.
Look, I think realistically those banks give a lot of money to those politicians. One last real quick question for you, Gretchen, is this thing fixed at all, or will it blow again?
We did have the Dodd/Frank law to try to fix some of the problems, but my feeling is that it did not fix the biggest problem, which is that we have large politically connected institutions that will not be allowed to fail.
Yeah, that’s a huge, huge problem. Gretchen Morgenson, thank you for joining us.
One of the myths out there in conventional wisdom in Washington today is, we don’t have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Do you know how many times Republicans say that? Below follows a sampling of this new found Republican, liturgical mantra. These Pharisees say unto you….
Eric Cantor: “We don’t believe that Washington has a revenue problem; it’s a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
John Beohner: “Washington has a spending problem, not a revenue problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
Mitch McConnell: “We don’t have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
Marsha Blackburn: “It does not have a revenue problem; it has a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
John Beohner: “Washington doesn’t have a revenue problem; Washington has a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
{Amen.}
Such is the Word of the Holy Republican Gospel according to Cantor, Boehner, McConnell, and Blackburn.
And if they say it enough, you’ll believe it…right? The first cardinal rule of brainwashing: just keep repeating ad nauseum. And the first and only cardinal sin according to these Republican apostles is taxing the rich.
Obviously they say that Washington does not have a spending problem because they want to protect their rich donors who would pay more taxes, if, for example, you took away the Bush tax cuts. But the reality is we have a huge revenue problem.
Here is a chart that the Republicans do not want you to see. It is a chart from the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. The biggest part of our public debt as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by the year 2019 is going to be from the Bush Era tax cuts. Then you have the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then you have the economic downturn, all three of those caused by Bush and the Republicans: the tax cuts, the wars, and the economic downturn. Then a tiny sliver for TARP, Fannie, and Freddie, which might get bigger later. And then you have the rest of the debt.
In percentages, the Bush era tax cuts will account for as much as 35% of our public debt by 2019; the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for 10%; the economic downturn by 20%; TARP, Fannie, Freddie, and recovery measures for 5%; and all the other causes of our public debt for only 20%. So what does this show you? We have a revenue problem. It’s all the giant tax cuts!
The Associated Press said in an article today that people don’t want to cut medicare, but on the other hand they don’t want to raise taxes either. But that’s not true. They keep saying it like it’s true but it’s not true. 81% say that they want to raise taxes on millionaires. That would help to get rid of those Bush era tax cuts, and we would be in much better shape.
Do you know what we need? We need Democrats who are bold enough and brave enough to be actual progressives and say, “yes, we have a revenue problem; yes, we should raise taxes on people making over $250,000; and we should do it now because this country needs to balance its budget and that is the responsible way of doing it.”
TRUMP TOLD THE AMERICAN PEOPLE THERE ARE THE SECURITY STATE AGENTS WHO THINK THAT THEY RUN THE GOVERNMENT AND HE STOOD UP TO THEM AND CHALLENGED THEIR ORTHODOXIES AND PIETIES AND SHOWED AMERICANS, ESPECIALLY PEOPLE IN THE REPUBLICAN PARTY ON THE RIGHT, THAT THESE INSTITUTIONS ARE NOT NOBLE OR BENEVOLENT BUT ARE HIGHLY PERNICIOUS. THEY […]
Joe Biden said, if you're fully vaccinated, the chances that you can get severely ill, not even die just get severely ill, are very low. And the statistic that he gave is, out of every 160,000 people who have been vaccinated, only one ends up going to the hospital with a serious illness. So the […]
Glenn Greenwald: "So you have huge number of journalists who believe that, they have the right to lie and even when they get caught, they don't care because they know their audience won't hold it against them." Continue reading →
THAT'S WHAT THEY ARE USING JANUARY 6TH. IT'S DEMENTED TO COMPARE 9/11 AND JANUARY 6TH BUT IT'S SO CENTRAL TO THE AGENDA OF THE SECURITY STATE, THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, TO ESSENTIALLY INITIATE A SURVEILLANCE REGIME, A DETENTION REGIME, AGAINST PEOPLE ON THE RIGHT WHO ARE AGAINST THE ESTABLISHMENT. AND THEY’RE ALREADY DOING IT. AND THEY […]
Carlson: So now we’re arming the Taliban and marooning our own citizens in Afghanistan. Who could possibly have seen that coming. Glenn Greenwald is one of the few journalists who did see it coming. He writes for Substack where all … Continue reading →
And so that is what I call the birth of this woke industrial complex. It is a new leviathan, a new monster, that is far more powerful than what Thomas Hobbes might have envisioned 400 years ago, and it is the biggest threat to individual liberty today. It is not big government alone. Its conservatives […]
FBI CIA NSA are not only spying on American citizens but also are illegally unmasking their identities to journalists who support our fascist government Continue reading →
The government is instructing social media companies what should and shouldn't be allowed to be on the internet, these are the people least competent to judge what is misinformation. Continue reading →
Google, Facebook and Twitter should be treated as state actors under existing legal doctrines. Using a combination of statutory inducements and regulatory threats, Congress has co-opted Silicon Valley to do through the back door what government cannot directly accomplish under the Constitution. Congress is giving Big Tech immunity and more power in exchange for it censoring […]
THE SECURITY STATE HAS EXISTED SINCE THE END OF WORLD WAR II. THEY'VE BEEN OPERATING IN SECRET AND WITH NO DEMOCRATIC ACCOUNTABILITY FOR EIGHT OR NINE DECADES NOW. DWIGHT EISENHOWER WHEN HE LEFT OFFICE WARNED THE COUNTRY ABOUT THE DANGERS THAT THEY POSE. Continue reading →
Darryl Cooper, AKA @MartyrMade, is a podcaster who had a Twitter thread go viral with 13k retweets and 20k likes of the first Tweet alone. This one is 36-Tweets long. It makes very cogent arguments of not only why millions of Trump supporters believe the 2020 election was stolen, but also why we are justified […]
COVID-19 antibodies have been found in blood samples as early as September, 2019. China knew about the virus' transmission to humans months before it announced such to the world. Why has the media and our government not investigated this gross negligence, if not mass murder? Continue reading →
Democrats and elites are making straight white men the enemy of their new world order. Blacks, hispanics, gays are now the good guys; straight white men are the bad guys. Continue reading →
This ruling class of administrative state, big tech, corporations: all of these people think that they can get rid of Trump and we'll go back to normal. They're wedded to a broken system that has sold out the American people. And now they're going to try to sell out the American people and the middle […]
The real threat is collusion. When journalists strike secret alliances with the very people they're supposed to be holding accountable, we are in deep trouble. Lies go unchallenged. Democracy cannot function. And that's what we're watching right now. Continue reading →
The CIA from the very first days of the Trump administration, even before he was inaugurated, devoted themselves to sabotaging the administration because Donald Trump questioned just a few of their pieties. And that can't be done in Washington. Whoever does that must be destroyed. And so the CIA and the Deep State operatives became […]
The problem is the corruption that is absolutely pervasive in the U.S. news media. There are newsrooms all throughout New York and Washington DC, where top editors are explicitly saying they do not want this story investigated. And they're being clear that the reason that they don't want to investigate it is because they think […]
So Apple isn't fighting for diversity. They're doing exactly what they appear to be doing: they're trying to keep wages down and keep their workers compliant by importing labor from abroad.This isn't about diversity. It's about exploitation. It always is Continue reading →
Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC
Accountants CPA Hartford Connecticut is an accounting firm in Hartford, Connecticut offering a variety of accounting & tax services.
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The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Health and Human Services Department (HHS) recently announced that it will be holding the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of Fortune 500 companies in the health care industry personally accountable for fraud and that they will be subject to criminal charges on top of the fines levied on their corporations. The OIG is adopting this new posture because of the repeated violations of many of these Fortune 500 companies, that, upon being caught, simply have promised not to do it again, wrote out a big check to Uncle Sam, and then passed the costs of the fines onto the consumers. 
In 2010 the Department of Justice recovered $669 million from Pfizer, $302 million from AstroZeneca, and $193 million from Novartis. And that’s just the monies that they recovered under the Fast Claims Act. 
Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC
Republicans are lying when they say we don’t have a revenue problem. GOP is protecting its rich donor base.
One of the myths out there in conventional wisdom in Washington today is, we don’t have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Do you know how many times Republicans say that? Below follows a sampling of this new found Republican, liturgical mantra. These Pharisees say unto you….
Eric Cantor: “We don’t believe that Washington has a revenue problem; it’s a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
John Beohner: “Washington has a spending problem, not a revenue problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
Mitch McConnell: “We don’t have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
Marsha Blackburn: “It does not have a revenue problem; it has a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
John Beohner: “Washington doesn’t have a revenue problem; Washington has a spending problem.”
{Lord hear my prayer.}
{Amen.}
Such is the Word of the Holy Republican Gospel according to Cantor, Boehner, McConnell, and Blackburn.
And if they say it enough, you’ll believe it…right? The first cardinal rule of brainwashing: just keep repeating ad nauseum. And the first and only cardinal sin according to these Republican apostles is taxing the rich.
Obviously they say that Washington does not have a spending problem because they want to protect their rich donors who would pay more taxes, if, for example, you took away the Bush tax cuts. But the reality is we have a huge revenue problem.
In percentages, the Bush era tax cuts will account for as much as 35% of our public debt by 2019; the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for 10%; the economic downturn by 20%; TARP, Fannie, Freddie, and recovery measures for 5%; and all the other causes of our public debt for only 20%. So what does this show you? We have a revenue problem. It’s all the giant tax cuts!
The Associated Press said in an article today that people don’t want to cut medicare, but on the other hand they don’t want to raise taxes either. But that’s not true. They keep saying it like it’s true but it’s not true. 81% say that they want to raise taxes on millionaires. That would help to get rid of those Bush era tax cuts, and we would be in much better shape.
Do you know what we need? We need Democrats who are bold enough and brave enough to be actual progressives and say, “yes, we have a revenue problem; yes, we should raise taxes on people making over $250,000; and we should do it now because this country needs to balance its budget and that is the responsible way of doing it.”