Time for a Change

Many Republicans are getting closer to asking for Treasury Secretary Geithner’s resignations. Geithner’s call to AIG Chairman Edward Liddy last Wednesday where he ’supposedly’ demanded that Liddy renegotiate AIG’s current bonus structure, is raising questions about Geithner’s credibility.

The burgeoning bonus controversy raged Tuesday as Sen. Richard Shelby, ranking Republican on the Banking Committee, charged that Geithner had known about the AIG bonus payments before they were made and failed to stop them.

“I don’t know what President Obama knew about it,” Shelby said. “I’d say he probably didn’t know about it.”

Shelby said that Geithner “either knew or should have known what was going on. We need to know, what are the details of this? When were the bonuses signed up? Who’s getting it?”

The Alabama senator stopped short of calling for Geithner’s resignation, saying “he’s under fire from all sides now.”

….”this is just another example of where he seems to be out of the loop. Treasury should have let the American people know about this.” Huffington Post:

To pretend Secretary Geithner didn’t know about AIG’s bonuses is naive. He was after all the architect of the original AIG bailout that needless to say has been a complete disaster.

The whole AIG situation raises some serious questions, not only about Geithner’s credibility, but also about his clarity at time when markets desperately need transparency and certainty. Up until couple of days ago the Treasury Secretary had been quietly working against the release of AIG’s “counterparty” bailout beneficiaries list. Coincidentally, Goldman Sachs (GS) was at the top of that list as the largest counterparty recipient. That confirmed rumors that had been circulating for the past few months alluding to reports that in September 2008, Geithner, with then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson - engineered an AIG bailout in which Paulson’s own firm, Goldman Sachs, (by the way Geithner is a Goldman guy through-n-through, and a protege of uber-Goldman guy Robert Rubin) secretly and without taxpayer’s knowledge received $12.9 billion.

Geithner has so far proven to be nothing more than just another glorified bank lobbyist like his predecessor, Paulson, who is in way over his head. He has yet to produce a coherent plan to fix the banking system andhas convinced no one with his actions, uninspiring oratory and non-existent personal charisma, that he’s the right man to lead the nation out of the crisis.