A remarkable passage of John Heilemann and Mark Halperin's Game Change has not drawn the attention it deserves. Near the end of the book, the authors discuss a series of conversations in September-October 2008 -- just after the demise of Lehman Brothers -- between Barack Obama and the financial counselors of the Bush administration: Bernanke, Paulson, and others. The talks were initiated by Obama. Once the contact was there, he did not let go. Here is the relevant paragraph of Game Change (pp. 380-81): Obama was talking regularly with Fed chair Ben Bernanke and daily, sometimes more often, with Paulson. The treasury secretary was astonished by the candidate's level of engagement. On one occasion, Obama kept his plane on the tarmac for a half hour after the final event of his day, with a long flight ahead of him, so he could finish a conversation with Paulson. On another, Obama called Paulson late at night at home and spent two hours discussing the intricate details of regulatory reform. As much as the substantiveness of the discussions struck Paulson, so did their sobriety and maturity. I'll be there publicly for you at any time, Obama told him. I'm going to be president, and I don't want to inherit a financial system that's collapsed. Obama has been true to his word. He has been there for them publicly at any time. He has supported their story of the collapse (a story with without villains, and almost without actors) and accepted their recommendations on the proper limits of the remedy. .... One explanation of the Obama-Paulson talks is suggested by Thomas Ferguson's "investment theory of party competition." Indeed, that theory unassisted will account for much of what we have seen in the new president's fiscal and economic policies. Big money tends to buy the winning candidate, and the buyers get what they paid for. The banks and the investment houses convincingly supported Obama over McCain, and in the process spent more money than has ever gone to a single candidate. It is only because the Republicans are covetous of taking Wall Street back from Obama that they have stayed clear of the usual target of populism, the conduct and mores of Wall Street itself. .... When Obama says of Lloyd Blankfein and Jamie Dimon, "I know both those guys; they are very savvy businessmen" -- with artless pride in the fact that he moves in their circles -- we are a long way from John Kennedy during the steel crisis of 1962, after U.S. Steel announced an across-the-board price increase: "My father always told me that all businessmen were sons-of-bitches, but I never believed it till now." No, Barack Obama would never say such a thing because he would never think such a thing. It is not that he is in their pocket. They are in his heart.
Here is the relevant paragraph of Game Change (pp. 380-81):
Obama was talking regularly with Fed chair Ben Bernanke and daily, sometimes more often, with Paulson. The treasury secretary was astonished by the candidate's level of engagement. On one occasion, Obama kept his plane on the tarmac for a half hour after the final event of his day, with a long flight ahead of him, so he could finish a conversation with Paulson. On another, Obama called Paulson late at night at home and spent two hours discussing the intricate details of regulatory reform. As much as the substantiveness of the discussions struck Paulson, so did their sobriety and maturity. I'll be there publicly for you at any time, Obama told him. I'm going to be president, and I don't want to inherit a financial system that's collapsed.
Obama has been true to his word. He has been there for them publicly at any time. He has supported their story of the collapse (a story with without villains, and almost without actors) and accepted their recommendations on the proper limits of the remedy.
....
One explanation of the Obama-Paulson talks is suggested by Thomas Ferguson's "investment theory of party competition." Indeed, that theory unassisted will account for much of what we have seen in the new president's fiscal and economic policies. Big money tends to buy the winning candidate, and the buyers get what they paid for. The banks and the investment houses convincingly supported Obama over McCain, and in the process spent more money than has ever gone to a single candidate. It is only because the Republicans are covetous of taking Wall Street back from Obama that they have stayed clear of the usual target of populism, the conduct and mores of Wall Street itself.
When Obama says of Lloyd Blankfein and Jamie Dimon, "I know both those guys; they are very savvy businessmen" -- with artless pride in the fact that he moves in their circles -- we are a long way from John Kennedy during the steel crisis of 1962, after U.S. Steel announced an across-the-board price increase: "My father always told me that all businessmen were sons-of-bitches, but I never believed it till now." No, Barack Obama would never say such a thing because he would never think such a thing. It is not that he is in their pocket. They are in his heart.
Apparently "being there" publicly for them extends to providing them with air cover from Justice as well as from regulators for acts for which they agreed to pay damages in civil court, acts that are, arguably,prima facie fraudulent. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
obama's respect for that obsolete, criminal mindset is one thing for an aspiring mixed race careerist. for a president it's a crying, ignoble shame.
respecting a con-men cabal is not a sign progressives can read anything hopeful into, alas.
it also send a clear message to other aspiring middle class careerists, of any racial blend, whom you have to serve to be granted symbolic power in this system.
just as bush came to show us how intelligence is not a requisite for being voted the most powerful fool on the planet, now we have obama to show us that rhetoric can be straight from heaven, while underneath said rhetoric something a lot more predictably pedestrian, well you decide.
do we want to believe in obama because we can't handle the idea that we've been conned so well?
or because the alternatives were a fast run to WWIII?
it's funny, because when i first heard obama, my gut said 'don't be fooled, this is just the best 'hollow man' yet', then during the campaign, i got sucked into the phenomenon. gee wow, america's going post-racist!
groupthink struck, iow.
now the record and the rhetoric have become so discontinuous, that i realise that while bush was bad, a president like obama, (as helen warned many times), by raising hopes so high in so many economically disadvantaged folks, is risking a huge backlash of disappointment.
i do think, to be fair, that he has done, and tried to do some good things, but his appeasement of enemies that would gladly rip him limb from limb is not proving to be an effective strategy for helping americans, other than the savvy 1%.
there are some parts of his mental architecture that are still appealing, and i do still harbour some doubts about whether he's much smarter than i am, and than i think he is acting.
i also think that like berlusconi, he's a complete one-off, a freak wave, an historical accident, and there's no one remotely as politically skilled in the field to take his place after his time is over.
i mean, can you really imagine a president romney now?
he does still command considerable political capital though, and occasionally shows brief flashes of potential to be so much more than the role of Great Mollifier he's acting now.
remembering mccain gives me cold sweats... ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
It's no secret that Wall Street holds the key to American politics. Obama did what he had to do. The alternative was having Republicans run the gov't. You have to ask yourself, would things look any different.
The US Supreme Court recently gave corporations the right to free speech, allowing them unfettered access to the corridors of power by doing so, and the Democrats want to pass legislation that will be bullet-proof against the Supreme court. They need to turn one of the 5 votes around, and that's probably Kennedy.
Now, if McCain had won, this would be a moot point. He would have appointed conservative supreme court justices.
American politics run through Wall Street and will continue to do so until the day that the country somehow manages to revamp its campaign finance and campaign system.
But, I note that Europe is not so different. There seems to be a cleave in Europe with financiers and ex-finance guys in gov't battling it out. So, one of them wants an EMF, while the other kills the idea, and what more, announces his faith in New York's rating agencies. There are two sides of the same coin.
Obama doesn't get elected without Wall Street behind him.
For insight into this dynamic, you should see how Warren Buffet and Sumner Redstone operate. both are Democrats with Democratic principles when it comes to social welfare, but they will not abide by one who even remotely threatens the flow (and lack thereof) of capital. Control is established through the media.
I have no idea why someone who is mixed race might be more susceptible to careerism than someone who is white, but...
i can...further to fall, higher odds to beat, both can focus the mind quite well.
great reply, full of good points, thanks Upstate.
perhaps it was not necessary to include that factor, if it seemed crass in any way, i apologise. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
In that context, Obama's actual race is much less a factor than his perceived race.
