Blankfein was on Charlie Rose tonight, defending Goldman Sachs' role in devaluing risk,

Which most economists will tell you is why the financial world went almost all the way to hell, taking the rest of us with them, in 2008: risk was severely undervalued.

Blankfein, after giving one of the most politician-like double-talking substance-free performances by a non-politician that I've ever seen on Charlie Rose, gave away the store in the last minutes. He said there was a social good that firms like GS provide. He gave an example of a company that wants to "take a risk" and invest in an oil well (yes, it honestly was his example), but won't unless it can be guaranteed $80 a barrel when the oil comes out of the ground. If they knew it was actually only going to be $40 a barrel, they'd never put all the money into building the infrastructure and actually getting the oil out of the ground, with all the value-adding that implies in the economy as a whole. So GS is there to "hedge" the investor's risk and insure that they get the amount they expect. So where is the risk, exactly? Blankfein implies these capitalists are big heroes because they get things done, but what's heroic about doing something only if there's really no risk at all to you? You'll take any risk under those rules, because under those rules, **there are no risks!**

I would have loved to hear Charlie Rose ask Blankfein, so where does that money come from that relieves all those capitalists of the real riskiness of all their risk-taking? How do you hedge your bets, Blankfein? Where is that money going to come from if real financial reform is enacted that flashes a red light on severely devalued risk or on sure bets on bets on bets on bets on bets (to borrow Al Franken's imagery of derivatives on the floor of the Senate the other day)?

and they must review all processes and practices and make
changes. He admitted they must be more transparent and
communicate better with American Public.

He pretty much supports the Dodd bill for reform.

He also said, without specifying any particular measures he thought should be in the bill, that he preferred a "bipartisan" one to the Dodd version alone, claimv there wasn't much room between where the parties stand on finance reform, despite the rhetoric and gamesplaying. But he didn't say what those Republican measures he wants in there are. He seemed reluctant to say Obama is pushing in a good direction and afraid to deny it. I thought it was a very strange performance. Of course his firm us under ceinal investigation and there are bets on his being done for at GS.

He didn't seem to know what "consumers" were or what they want or what a consumer protection board would be for, not that he opposed it.