Political Argument of the Day
The New York Times makes stuff up again.
What so many liberal critics really want in a Democratic president now is someone who will denounce the wealthy and punish the barons of industry (and insurance).
Matt Bai, NY Times
Name them. No, what we liberal critics want is not to denounce and punish, but actual policy progress in the form of a new regulatory regime to prevent this kind of financial meltdown from happening again.
If a company, and especially a bank, is too big to fail then it should not be allowed to get that big, and if it is that big and must be bailed out, it should also be broken apart at the same time – not to punish anyone, but to prevent it from happening again.
If a company fails and must be bailed out, then the executives should not be getting multimillion dollar bonuses – not because we want to punish them, but because they are now receiving taxpayer dollars and nobody on government welfare should be receiving such sums, least of all the individuals most responsible for the global financial meltdown.
The only way to stop this kind of looting is to reregulate and enforce the antitrust laws that were put in place 100 years ago to prevent exactly this kind of meltdown from happening after the experience of the 19th century’s series of meltdowns.
