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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhy Bill Black Won’t be Briefing Congress about Derivatives
from Dollars & Sense:
Why Bill Black Wont be Briefing Congress about Derivatives
When I was the Deputy Director of FSLIC [Federal Savings & Loan Insurance Corporation], House Banking Committee Chairman St Germain was helping Speaker Wright hold the FSLIC recapitalization bill hostage to extort favors for Texas control frauds, including Don Dixons Vernon Savings (which was providing prostitutes to the State of Texas top S&L regulator and was building towards having 96% of its ADC loans in default which is why we referred to it as Vermin). The attack on our agency was that we were mad dogs biased against Texas S&Ls and causing the Texas crisis by closing too many insolvent but well-run Texas S&Ls. Our response had many elements, but one of our principal points was that the Texas S&Ls we were closing were typically control frauds. At this juncture, St Germains staffers made a mistake. They requested that we testify on a host of issues, but the invite letter had a zinger, premised on an article saying that the Feds were slow to prosecute frauds in the Southwest. The invite specifically called for us to respond and discuss the role of fraud in the Southwest. We used the opportunity to explain the extensive role of fraud in Texas S&L failures.
The day of the hearing, I walked toward the witness table, but was called over by St Germains chief of staff. He proceeded to disinvite us from testifying on the grounds that we had filed non-responsive testimony. (We had, of course, responded to every inquiry they made. They simply hated the response because we documented the enormous role that control fraud was playing in causing Texas S&Ls to fail.)
Today, I received definitive word that I had been disinvited from a bipartisan briefing of members of Congress on the subject of financial derivatives. I have deleted the name of the staffer because he is not the issue. The relevant email thread is below.
The member of Congress putting the event together is one of the strongest advocates of the need for banking reform. I have assisted the Members staff in the past in such efforts. The Members chief of staff called me today. His position is that I was never invited to participate and that it was unfortunate that I booked the flights and put UMKC on the hook for the non-refundable fares and hotel before informing his office that I was accepting their inquiry about participation (as opposed to invitation). He explains that it is impossible physically to have me participate and that the decision not to have me participate has nothing to do with concerns about balance or bank bashing. I emphasize also that, unlike St Germains disinvitation the email thread states an interest in inviting me to speak at future briefings. I hope that such invitations will be made. The Member and the Members staff were polite while St Germains chief of staff was deliberately rude. ..............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://dollarsandsense.org/blog/2012/05/why-bill-black-won%E2%80%99t-be-briefing-congress-about-derivatives.html
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Why Bill Black Won’t be Briefing Congress about Derivatives (Original Post)
marmar
Jun 2012
OP
PDJane
(10,103 posts)1. Willful blindness is the problem, and it beggars the solution.
snot
(10,549 posts)2. Bill Black is a national treasure . . .
along with so many others who have correctly diagnosed our problems but have been almost entirely ignored by our gov't.
proud2BlibKansan
(96,793 posts)3. He's a local. I get to hear him speak a couple times a year.
We are blessed to have Professor Black right here in our city. Yes, he's a treasure.
girl gone mad
(20,634 posts)5. UMKC has the best economics dept. in the country. n/t
They Know what he will if he testifies.