Posted by
Always To The Right on Monday, January 12, 2009 11:30:42 PM
If taxpayers are going to be asked for a doubling of the bailout of
the financial sector — reaching the stratospheric heights of $700
billion — shouldn't they at least know where their money is going?
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But if taxpayers really do have to shell out all that money as they
see their neighbors — or even themselves — getting laid off and being
foreclosed on, they should at least see how the money's spent.
The incoming Obama administration can improve on this by pushing for more transparency and accountability. But will it?
House Banking Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., whose
advocacy of forcing banks to be instruments of social justice helped
cause the mess we're in, is also pushing TARP reforms that would impose
"the most stringent nontax executive compensation restrictions" —
including forbidding golden parachute payments to executives and
applying executive pay limits retroactively.
Unfortunately, this is what the lack of transparency and no clear
strategy for exactly how the rescue money would be used has set us up
for: The micromanaging from Washington of the biggest financial
institutions.