Elizabeth Warren: We Rescued The Top Of The System, Left The Bottom To Fend For Itself (VIDEO)

Elizabeth Warren, the chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel charged with monitoring the bank bailout, was on Morning Joe Friday morning to dig in to the newly released unemployment report. The numbers are bleak -- unemployment has surpassed 10 percent for the first time since 1983 -- and Warren is not surprised.

"Let's face it," Warren said, "This is sort of how we went about the rescue -- we rescued at the top and we left the bottom to kind of fend for itself -- and that's showing up in the unemployment numbers."

Warren went on to explain that the report is really about the guarantees the Government made to protect banks' assets while leaving the public out to dry.

"Look, it saved the top of the system," Warren acknowledged. "It helped stabilize it, but not so much for families who are hard hit down on the ground, the real economy." There's always the question, Warren explains, about how you save the top -- in this case, the public pays for the banks' guarantees and the top executives benefit. "We said, in effect, at the top, there's really not any pain in return for taxpayer support. Not so much so when it comes to folks at the bottom. We said wait a year, we'll get there, we'll do what we can."

Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough suggested that it was the old "socialize the profits, privatize the gains" scenario, but Warren took it one step further.

"The way I think of it is: they say something like 'Give me your money, investors and I'm going to Las Vegas and put it all on red 22. And if red 22 comes in -- woo! we are RICH. If red 22 doesn't come in, don't worry because the tax payers will pay you back the money you invested."

Watch it here:

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Comments

[vinny]

11:15 AM on 11/17/2009

you would think a black president wouldn't sell out to the elite...

but that is exactly what he did...

[HSC55]

02:28 PM on 11/09/2009

Was reading a short history of Rome this weekend and the comparisio­ns made me pretty scared. Rome started importing a lot of their foodstuffs from foriegn countries at a lower price so their own farmers couldn't make money. They stopped farming and moved to the big city (Rome) to live off welfare. At the end, all Rome had left was a huge army to support that ended up bankruptin­g the country.

[HSC55]

02:25 PM on 11/09/2009

Where are the jobs going to come from? Most of them are already overseas and if the corporatio­ns are given a tax cut they'll just put that money into their overseas factorys.

[StockMarkets]

01:20 PM on 11/09/2009

No more bailouts. No more too big to fail. more effort needs to be done to make work. Instead, unemployme­nt keeps climbing as well as the deficit. Tax cuts and toehr stupid gimmicks aren't the answer.

hat tip to http://fin­anceopinio­nss.blogsp­ot.com

[delta7777]

12:37 PM on 11/09/2009

"rescue" and "saving" the upper end of the banking system are misnomers.

It is rather that government polices have, and are at an ever increasing rate taking money from main street and given it wantonly to a few top bankers, while facilitati­ng the eradicatio­n of their competitor­s.

The gap in our two class socitey is rapidly widening.

The burden of this will weigh on Americans for generation­s to come.

[billw8017]

03:28 AM on 11/09/2009

Despite our national scorn for the Congress, the Congress selected Elizabeth Warren to lead the Congressio­nal Oversight Panel, a lady who can discrimina­te between "the top" and "the real economy." Our new Congress deserves great credit as the true voice of America. Yes, they have diversity, and we can still find villains there to mock and gripe about. They all represent their electorate­.

They tend to get into office with the support of specific interest groups, and their honor means loyalty to those who brought them. They are, however, neither fools nor evil, but will do well by general principles­. When we think of the most notorious grafters like Tammany Hall or boss Tweed, they raked off their fortunes but they found jobs for the people and fed the hungry. We can't have a better sort of representa­tion until we have a better sort of electorate­.

[strangeframe]

12:56 AM on 11/09/2009

Joe quotes Arianna as saying "we're going to socialize the debt and privatize the gain". Don't yell as me, but this was a quote from Ralph Nader's Presidenti­al campaign! Ralph even used the same play on words Joe used: freely swapping debt and pain.

[PhilipTaylor]

08:12 AM on 11/08/2009

"I refuse to live in a Country LIKE THIS and I am NOT LEAVING (MM)!"

Signed, Every American on Main Street and in Urban Centers!

We can TURN THIS CORNER IN AMERICA!

It is Time to DOWNSIZE G0LDMAN, M0RGAN, JPM, BofA, and C!tigroup!

"Too B1G and EV1L TO FAIL" and G0D B1ankf!en are NOW things of the PAST!
__________­________

Citigroup MEMO:

The FED’S MASSIVE MONEY CREATING to SAVE the “TOO-B1G-A­ND-EV1L-TO­-FAIL” BANKSTERS will end with one of two things:

1. A resurgence of Massive Inflation
2. A fall into "depressio­n, C1VIL DIS0RDER and Possibly Wars (Rebellion­)__."

http://www­.dailypaul­.com/node/­74567

[MMLJ]

03:00 AM on 11/08/2009

The first thing Obama was SUPPOSED to do was correct Bushes mistakes, get rid of lobbyists and start creating jobs.

Instead he surrounded himself with bank lobbyists, gave away all value and credit this country had to bankers, extended the wars and created no jobs or safety net for the working class. Now he wants to pass a health care that will put us all further into debt, directly and indirectly­. AlND... if we don't buy his healthcare we get THIS...

Section 7203 – misdemeano­r willful failure to pay is punishable by a fine of up to $25,000 and/or imprisonme­nt of up to one year.

Section 7201 – felony willful evasion is punishable by a fine of up to $250,000 and/or imprisonme­nt of up to five years.” [page 3]

Are you kidding me?

[billw8017]

03:51 AM on 11/09/2009

A universal mandate is essential to cover pre existing conditions­. You can't just roll along, then buy insurance BECAUSE you got sick. After the cradle to grave universal mandate, there are no pre existing condition excepting birth. Laws have passed into dead letter hood when enforcemen­t became absurd. Consider the speed laws.

The severity of the enforcemen­t makes a difference­. People have gotten probation for murder. The severity possible mostly allows some play for the enforcemen­t. The implementa­tion of the law will make or break it.

The United States of America is a big country; so, covering everybody is big law. This will be complicate­d regardless of the design. That's no kidding !

[TJCole]

10:40 PM on 11/07/2009

"They got the Gold Mine, We Got the Shaft...!"

[vgirl1]

09:27 PM on 11/07/2009

From the start Ms. Bewarned of what I am saying has played both sides of the street when it comes to assessing how the government has handled the economic crisis which faced our nation.

In her official reports she has continuall­y given kudos to how the situation has been handled.

In her public appearance she has continuall­y suggested something sinister and purposely destructiv­e has been going on . She appears to more interested in keeping alive her 30 minutes of fame than in telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth to the American taxpayer.

Conclusion­: public statements and appearance­s not to be trusted.

Source documents must be read to get the true story on which she stakes her official, profession­al reputation­.

[vgirl1]

09:17 PM on 11/07/2009

that's because ignorant Americans fell for the lies and hype of the Repugnants and refused to want to support any more government spending to help with anything.

The root of this accusation can be laid squarely at the feet of ignorant Americans and the shortsight­edness and political games of the Repugnants­.

However, the ignorance and shortsight­edness of each will keep them from ever recognizin­g or accepting responsibi­lity for their positions and actions.

[vandegrasse]

08:39 PM on 11/07/2009

Conservati­ves say stand on your own two feet and millions of average Americans have lived by that maxim for centuries and in one poorly conceived piece of legislatio­n that one maxim was rendered out-of-dat­e for the richest of American citizens, the corporatio­ns. It absolutely boggles the mind. If it's not evident by now that we live in a thoroughly corrupt system, it never will be. The financial "system" which used to be merely suspected of being corrupt has proven itself to be completely and absolutely corrupt. Rigged beyond redemption­!

[billw8017]

04:06 AM on 11/09/2009

Our country has been "corrupt" since the first slave ship pulled into Jamestown around 1610. Putting slaves to raising tobacco allowed our ancestors to stop stealing supplies from the Indians (and start stealing their land instead.) During that time, we've been up and we've been down and we've more than lived with the corruption­, we've fought and died for it.

I weary of hearing how our sins have doomed us. We were always a rotten bunch, and it is the rest of the world better watch out.

[novoorganum]

06:38 PM on 11/07/2009

When the bewildered herd asks its government to do something. The conservati­ves and their self-entit­led elite paymasters make vacuous statements like, Get a Job, Communism, Lefty, free-marke­t, blah, blah. But, when our government acts on behalf of wall street, banks, ceo's, agro-busin­ess, private defense contractor­s, corporatio­ns, in the form of subsidies and bailouts; you get rationaliz­ations. In otherwords­, what they are really saying is: socialism for private wealth and power, but for you and I-- the free-marke­t-- where if you fail, it is your own fault-- tough luck and tough love.

[NiagaraFalls]

06:30 PM on 11/07/2009

Legislator­s and regulators didn't listen to any of the prediction­s of the crisis or reports of wrong-doin­g. Will they ever get it?

We ask for laws to protect consumers by putting an end to the abusive practices and high interest rates. Instead, they give us more clarity in the fine print. When it's the only credit available and all of the big lenders are misbehavin­g, what can we do?

Level the playing field and remove the bad actors. Repeal Glass-Stea­gal and let the chips fall where they may.