Paulson Defends Refusal To Bail Out Lehman

New York Times:

It was the weekend of Sept. 13, and the moment Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. had feared for months was finally upon him: Lehman Brothers was hurtling toward bankruptcy -- fast.

Knowing that Lehman had billions of dollars in bad investments on its books, Mr. Paulson had long urged Lehman's chief executive, Richard S. Fuld Jr., to find a solution for his firm's problems. "He was asked to aggressively look for a buyer," Mr. Paulson recalled in an interview.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[rkimball]

02:46 PM on 10/23/2008

paulson better bail out lehman or lehman will steal what little is left of investors shares. one way or the other,the execs will get paid,honestly or dishonestly.

[honestpolitician]

11:30 AM on 10/23/2008

Paulson is getting a cut from these CEO's....I personally think he needs to be on CNN's most wanted list... In perspective, wasn't Paulson saying that the "economy was fundamentally sound" over 2.5 months ago? This guy shall be sharing the Bush legacy....

POLITICAL AD ATTACKS!! http://politicaladattacks.blogspot.com/

[quantumspin]

11:29 AM on 10/23/2008

The United States is being run by Goldman Sachs people.

It's fine to socialize the losses, but it's not ok to help Americans who are bankrupt, out of work, without medical care---no: that is 'socialism' for people, not for the banks and Wall Street.

Until a majority of Americans become educated to the realities of how corporations and banks have executed a coup d'etat on the United States, we will not have the radical change we need to free ourselves from Goldman Sachs as master.

Remember: the Fed is a private corporation too. Their interest is their member banks, not citizens.

We've been used as an ATM machine and we get thrown under the bus when we can't dispense cash like we used to. We as citizens have zero safety net, but Paulson gives his friends $700bn + untold other billions. We twist in the wind, while the banks and corporations get free cash.

What a country this is---it feeds its citizens to the banks.

[smurrayesq]

10:04 PM on 10/23/2008

Is it possible that Goldman Sachs would benefit from letting Lehman go down? Less competition in the future?

[ProfessorDuh]

10:25 AM on 10/23/2008

Fascist power is arbitrary. You steal money from the taxpayers, borrow trillions, reward your corporate friends with it, punish your corporate enemies by withholding it.
Once you've eliminated that pesky rule of law, it's easy.

[vippy]

10:19 AM on 10/23/2008

What does strike me very ODD is the fact that the only CEO offering NOT to take his bonus
was the guy from LEHMANN. Maybe he thought the whole deal did reek of something and would
not play along with Paulson and his ilk?

[LLyonnoc]

09:44 AM on 10/23/2008

Dammit!! Isn't that what Bush used to say."I wouldn't have done anything different". A man who thinks he is always right and cannot see anything that he would have done differently is usually a stubborn fool. In March Paulson said everything was rosy. Less than a month ago he said he would not put an infusion of cash into the banks and then reversed himself. He caused the problems by letting Lehman (a competitor of his dear Goldman Sachs) fall.

It's bad enough with a president who never reflected. Now we got the Treasury Secretary and, worse, we've got Alan the "Maestro" rewriting history.

I got one question: " How come were so messed up when no one ever made a mistake?"

[Yermammy]

09:21 AM on 10/23/2008

Paulson needs to be indicted, along with Bush and Cheney.

[javagirl322]

11:20 AM on 10/23/2008

Right on !

[ReasonIsMyReligion]

09:07 AM on 10/23/2008

Re "On Subprime Mess: "I'm Not Saying I Would Have Done Anything Differently"

That statement ALONE is cause for his removal from office, by impeachment if necessary.

[JohnFromCensornati]

08:17 AM on 10/23/2008

His defense is simple. Lehman was not Goldman-Sachs.

[ReasonIsMyReligion]

09:07 AM on 10/23/2008

Bingo.

[nofltwlt]

08:02 AM on 10/23/2008

Being a Bush appointee I would guess Paulson has an axe to grind with Lehman and this is his true motive.

[GatoPreto]

06:31 AM on 10/23/2008

These guys are scrambling to throw the blame as far from them as possible, but it ain't working. As increasing numbers of increasingly angry people are being forced to face the truth about an economy based on speculation and humbug, I don't see how they can weasel out of the mess they made on the carpet.

Now Paulson's stuck with the $850 billion mop in his hands, spreading it around in the hope it'll evaporate...

[1sanevoice]

02:39 AM on 10/23/2008

here is the deal

on wall street of not too long ago goldman and lehman were the fiercest of competitors, they saw themselves as above the merrills and morgans of the world in cache and ability... mmm, right...

the mistep was more than likely on purpose, hank sticking it to a former rival

[TheIndependenceParty]

08:11 AM on 10/23/2008

Amen, ... if I get that and you get that, ... does Hank think Congress is stupid?

[vippy]

10:21 AM on 10/23/2008

I know congress thinks we are stupid. After all, the majority of people were against
the bailout.

[CBS]

02:32 AM on 10/23/2008

Could it be that LB didn't contribute to the Booosh campaign?

[NotMcCain]

02:12 AM on 10/23/2008

Like all Bush appointees, Paulson failed us.

He mismanaged the problems by acting too late in each case--and due to arrogance, secrecy, and a dictatorial leadership style once he -did- act.

Letting Lehman fail was a HUGE mistake that sent a ripple through the world financial system that became a tidal wave of fear--and, as Paulson knows full well, the psychological aspect can be as potent a force as actual economic events.

Bush, too, showed zero leadership skills as events unfolded.

What a legacy.

[Sundialsvc4]

08:26 AM on 10/23/2008

What a CRIME.

Ladies and gentlemen, when our dear Madame Speaker uttered those famous (and entirely unconstitutional) words, "impeachment is off the table," she did not in the same breath use the words, "law-enforcement."

Had she done so, it would have sounded like this:

"I choose not to enforce the Supreme Law of the Land. I choose not to perform the law enforcement acts that I am bound by that Supreme Law to timely do. Instead, I willfully choose to aid-and-abet the criminal acts that I see happening around me, by protecting them from any fear of prosecution. I do so because I, myself, am a high-criminal."

We write laws, and frameworks of laws such as the United States' Constitution, specifically to give to ourselves "and to our posterity" the "equal protection under the law." But the people who are drawn, like moths to a flame, to positions of near-absolute power are frequently sociopaths. They covet, cheat, lie, and swindle while wearing $5,000 suits. They grasp at power for its own sake, and strive to avoid scrutiny and enforcement.

These are not "victimless" crimes. We have all become Plaintiffs.

Where's the inevitable downfall going to come from? Ironically, NOT from "We the People," but from the international business community. A swindle based on the crass manipulation of the Dollar don't mean squat in Moscow, which controls more oil than the Arabs ever had.

" 'We' have problems? Whaddaya mean 'we,' paleface?"

[Wiredwilly]

01:47 AM on 10/23/2008

I think the French were on to something with the Guillotine.