by Deb Cupples | Yesterday, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson faced criticism from the Senate Banking Committee during a hearing. That's only natural: for days now, most of us have believed that the Bush Administration's
$700+ billion plan to bailout reckless Wall Street firms was intended
to be a mere handout -- without proper oversight or accountability built into the plan.
Mr. Paulson reportedly became defensive, claiming that he now thinks -- and always thought -- that the plan should include oversight provisions. Paulson claimed that he didn't actually recommend such provisions, because oversight is Congress's job, and Paulson didn't want to be presumptuous.
Think Progress points out that Paulson was rewriting recent history:
"Far from avoiding 'presumption,' Paulson’s plan released last weekend explicitly denied any review
'Section 8. Review: Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.'
"It can hardly be the fault of Congress for taking Paulson’s written plan at its word. In fact, one might say it would have been 'presumptuous' to assume Paulson actually meant the opposite of what he had written. (Think Progress)
Refusing to allow a court or administrative agency to review decisions about where our $7--+ billion end up is about as anti-accountability as it gets.
That's why it sounds as though Paulson is doing some backtracking -- which is understandable, given the growing public outrage over his original, free-for-all bailout plan.
Other Bush Administration officials also want to block accountability provisions. As I pointed out yesterday, for example, the White House does not want the bailout legislation to include provisions that would keep Wall Street executives from pocketing huge sums of our $700+ billion.
That, alone, makes it far from a stretch to think that the Bush Administration's bailout plan was meant to be a free-for-all handout to some of the same Wall Street miscreants who helped create our gargantuan economic crises in the first place.
Memeorandum has commentary.
Other Buck Naked Politics Posts:
* Bailout: Ignore the Sales Pitch -- Bush Plan is Not the Only (or best) Option
* Bailout Plan: Dem Thinks Congress Will Allow Lobbyists to Shaft Taxpayers
* Executives Skate out of Disaster with Millions
* Conservative Republican Opposes Bailout Plan
* The Virtually Undebated Plan to Save the Economy
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