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What a nonsensical fabrication. Who would believe this stuff? What purpose does Ron Paul (or his supporters) have in making this up? The '16 trillion' is rea
by Cloven 15y ago
What a nonsensical fabrication. Who would believe this stuff? What purpose does Ron Paul (or his supporters) have in making this up?
The '16 trillion' is reached by aggregating all of the dollars in loans regardless of their term (page 131 of the actual GAO report) So super-short overnight loans which were rolled over day-to-day were counted, e.g., 365 times a year.
The GAO notes that this is ridiculous on the same page that the article cites, and then goes on to provide a more representative table on page 132, showing the annualized yearly average outstanding loan amount on a counterparty basis ('term adjusted'). Total loans come out to 1.1 trillion, not 16 trillion, and that's over a 3 year period.
"In late 2008, the TARP Bailout bill was passed and loans of $800 billion were given to failing banks and companies. That was a blatant lie considering the fact that Goldman Sachs alone received 814 billion dollars."
Innumeracy is a real problem. Political innumeracy is even more serious.
- pitiburi 15y agoSo, you say, giving away secretly 1.1 trillion instead 16 is then not serious, important or relevant.
- AlisdairO 15y agoregardless of whether it is important or not, misrepresenting information does nobody any favours. It opens people who have a real objection to issues like this look ridiculous.
- kahirsch 15y agoThe money was loaned, not "given away". All of the emergency lending programs were announced in advance and the Fed regularly reported the total balance of the programs. The only secret was who was getting each loan. The Fed did not want to reveal which banks were getting the loans because of the fear that the release of that information would cause those banks more problems, or even collapse. The details of who got the loans, how much, and when they repaid them was revealed because of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Bloomberg News, well in advance of this audit. This audit is not the "first-ever" GAO audit. The GAO has been doing audits of the Fed since its authority was expanded by the Federal Banking Agency Audit Act of 1978. There are some limitations on the extent of its audits. Lending to banks in a financial crisis is one of the main purposes of central banks. The Federal Reserve was established largely because of the Panic of 1907.