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From MSNBC's Morning Meeting Oct. 16, 2009. Dylan Ratigan explains how Goldman Sachs managed to make $3 billion in three months investing our tax dollars sent to keep them afloat with no strings attached.

For more you can read his entry at the Huffington Post Goldman Sachs' Black Magic, Here's How They Did It.

Goldman at the apex of the crisis is delivered this money -- which they then use to borrow against at $20 or $30 for every $1. Which at 30x equals $2.1 trillion in available capital.

As one of the only banks in the world with money at the time, Goldman Sachs was able to buy billions in distressed assets around the world at record low prices -- only to watch $23.7 trillion in US taxpayer money be deployed during the past year to re-inflate the asset's values that Goldman had purchased with our tax money.

The question is not why did we bail out the banks.

The question is why did we give the banks billions of our money so they could then buy assets by the trillions with our money and they keep the profits?

The answer is Henry Paulson, former Goldman Sachs CEO who ran the US Treasury, and Tim Geithner, current Treasury Secretary who at the time ran the New York Federal Reserve, willingly delivered Goldman Sachs the $70 Billion -- with no strings attached.

So what can we do?

1. We must demand the return of those investment gains made with America's money - it was stolen from us and we can get it back. Demand Claw Backs - and not from the future but from the past - That is where our money is.
2. We must have an exchange for all credit derivatives -- the current version is riddled with loopholes that let banks avoid transparency by mobbing offshore and prohibiting government regulators from being able to force the use of the exchange by the banks.

December 11, 2008 C-SPAN

November 18, 2008 C-SPAN

November 18, 2008 C-SPAN

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From The Cafferty File Nov. 17, 2008. David Sirota has more at Daily KOS.

Republican Senator Jim Inhofe from Oklahoma wants to put a “freeze” on the remaining cash in the big government bailout of the financial industry. In this week’s lame duck session, Inhofe plans to push for legislation that will require Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s plan for the remaining $350 billion in the bailout package to be voted on in Congress.

Despite promises from Congressional leaders that there would be both, there is absolutely no transparency or congressional oversight on where the first $290 billion has gone. Senator Inhofe suggests Paulson “may have given the money to his friends.”

Inhofe, who voted against the bailout package when it was originally passed, said in a letter to fellow lawmakers this weekend, “It is Congress’s duty to have a say in what happens with the remaining authorized amount of $350 billion. It is clear that it was a mistake to sign a blank check to one man for such a tremendous amount of money.”

Here’s my question to you: Should Congress freeze the remaining bailout money?

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November 13, 2008 PBS News Hour

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When Hank Paulson first went to Capitol Hill last month with hat in hand, he flat out rejected the "Japan model" of recapitalizing struggling banks with federal money. After his initial plan did NOTHING to help stabilize the economy -- indeed, things got much, much worse -- Paulson and the Bush administration finally caved and decided that nationalizing the banks wasn't such a bad idea. Fortunately for us, Jon Stewart was there to catch him in the act.

Stewart: So what are we gonna do to ease the credit crunch and get banks loaning money again? Well, last month Secretary Paulson made clear what we won't do.

Paulson: There are some that said we should just go and stick capital into the banks. That's what happened in Japan. But we said the right way to do this is not going around and using guarantees and injecting capital. That's the Japanese solution.

Stewart: We know the Japanese solution didn't even work. Their economy has been stagnant for fifteen years, there's no way we're ever gonna be so desperate to try that...

ABC News Report: Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson plans to inject money directly into banks that need it...

  (h/t The Big Picture)

 Don't you find it interesting that Paulson asks for this huge government bail out as Bush's term winds down? We all know Paulson and Bernanke just didn't stumble onto this problem. If Congress was informed of this months ago, the fat cats wouldn't have it so easy and there could have been enough time for a real debate to take place. Now, the sky is failing and you better sign off or we're all doomed. We heard it during the run up to the Iraq war too.

Typical sleazy Republican crap.

President Paulson didn't ask for oversight on our 700 billion dollar bail out of Wall Street because it would have presumptuous of him, but asking for the money in like a day with virtually no debate is supposed to be normal?

Paulsen: We gave you a simple, three-page legislative outline and I thought it would have been presumptuous for us on that outline to come up with an oversight mechanism. That's the role of Congress, that's something we're going to work on together. So if any of you felt that I didn't believe that we needed oversight: I believe we need oversight. We need oversight. 

Sure, we believe you.

Duncan asks:

This week, the Bush administration is attempting to steal $700 billion and give it to Wall Street. Will they succeed?

  OK... I know asking for only $150 billion is kind of ridiculous but why should Congress commit a whopping $700 billion to the Treasury without knowing how that money will be spent? Sen. Chuck Schumer asked Secretary Paulson at today's hearing how he arrived at the $700 figure and asked for an explanation as to why Congress shouldn't give them only a fraction of that, with the rest contingent upon the situation we find ourselves in in January. Seems reasonable enough, no?

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"One of you mentioned that you will use about $50 billion dollars a month. If that's the case, and you're certainly not going to use all $700 billion immediately, and as you can see there are a lot of questions about whether this will work, we understand you've done your best and you think this will work best, but it's clear we're in uncharted waters. But what about doing this in tranches? Why couldn't you ask us for $150 billion, and on January 15th or January 20th we would come back, we would assess how this worked and grant some more money if it's really working?"

The proposed bailout is undoubtedly an intensely complex matter that's way above my pay grade, but giving Paulson a blank check for a minimum of 3/4 of a TRILLION dollars (and quite likely more) just doesn't make sense. It seems to me that the Bush administration is trying to rip off the taxpayers one last time, hoping this market "shock" can provide them enough cover to actually make it happen. Although it's far from perfect, Schumer's idea of investing a smaller amount (if any) to get us to January -- when a new President and a new Congress take office -- seems much more reasonable.

Money from Cabaret (1972)

I find that the analogy to Germany during those last waning days of the Weimar Republic to work on many levels, maybe it's just me.  However, it's clear that money IS the number one topic on everyone's minds, given that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is appearing on just about every morning show, save CNN.  Sad that no one will have the gumption or journalistic integrity to ask Paulson exactly what he'll do to avoid this situation again.

ABC's "This Week" - Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson; Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn.; Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio.

CBS' "Face the Nation" - Paulson; Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass.; Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala.

NBC's "Meet the Press" - Paulson; New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

CNN's "Late Edition" - Douglas Holtz Eakin, adviser to John McCain; Austan Goolsbee, adviser to Barack Obama; former Rep. Rob Portman, R-Ohio.; Gene Sperling, former Clinton administration economic adviser; Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas.

"Fox News Sunday" - Paulson; Sens. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.; Bonnie McElveen-Hunter, chair of the American Red Cross.

"The Chris Matthews Show" - Panel: Bob Woodward, Elisabeth Bumiller, Norah O'Donnell, Rick Stengel; Topics: Which candidate can sell himself as best to fix the economy and Iraq? What do McCain and Obama need to accomplish in the first debate? Meter Questions: Is Gov. Sarah Palin a smart pick for John McCain? YES: 8 NO: 4; Can McCain beat Obama among swing voters? YES: 2 No: 10

CNN's "GPS with Fareed Zakaria" - Question of the week - Who on the campaign trail do you think will benefit most from the current economic situation? The Democrats or Republicans?

What's catching your eye this morning?