Obama Says Terrorists Don't Have Special Powers in CNN Interview

Obama says terrorists don't have special powers. Exactly. Finally. Republicans act as though terrorists are a special breed of people, when it's exactly the opposite. Attributing special powers of evil to terrorists elevates them. Why is that so hard for people to understand? Obama is also asked by an Internet viewer why our tax money went to banks without any reciprocation from the banks.

Ed Henry asks if Obama is going to read Sarah Palin's book and if Obama will run in 2012.

Warren Speaks on Executive Pay on The Early Show

Wall Street will never understand why everyone is in an uproar over their pay. They don't think like we do. They do the jobs they do because they are motivated by greed. But they don't view it as greed. They view it as capitalism. In a way, they feel they're being altruistic. They make the world run, after all.
Greed is part of their culture and our society contributed to that culture by equating success with money. Greedy bankers can also point to the people who knowingly bought a home they couldn't afford or borrowed against their home for a shiny new whatever. In a nutshell, subprime mortgages brought down a global financial system.

Bankers and investors were only fulfilling a demand in their view.

But while the people on Main Street are suffering severe consequences, Wall Street isn't.
Bailed out bankers don't care about families facing foreclosure. They don't care about people losing their retirements. They believe in survival of the fittest, free markets. They believe that they have superior positions. These are different breed of people.

But perhaps we've learned capitalism without restraint doesn't work for a society. Bailed out execs are about to get 50% pay cuts in total compensation. But even with cuts, they'll be able to manage just fine.

Elizabeth Warren is at a loss for an explanation as to why Wall Street doesn't get it:

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Larry Summers Close-Up in New Yorker Oct. 12 Issue

Peter Orszag, Christina Romer, Larry Summers, Timothy Geithner, Jared Bernstein

An inside look at Obama's economic team and a close-up on Larry Summers (loathed by the left) in the New Yorker's money issue:

In early August, Lawrence H. Summers, President Barack Obama’s top economic adviser, accompanied Vice-President Joseph Biden aboard Air Force Two on a trip to Detroit. Michigan has a fifteen-per-cent unemployment rate, the highest in America, and Detroit has become virtually a ward of the federal government: the United States now owns ten per cent of Chrysler and sixty-one per cent of General Motors. The purpose of Biden’s trip was to announce an additional $2.4 billion in federal grants, to help jump-start the electric-car industry; more than a billion will go to battery and auto manufacturers in Michigan.
Summers, who is the director of the National Economic Council, the White House office that coördinates all economic policy in the Obama Administration, has rarely travelled outside Washington this year, and was in Detroit on a fact-finding mission. After nearly a year of debate about how much federal intervention was needed to beat back the recession—a debate that started during the end of the Presidential campaign—he was somewhat optimistic. The principal measures that Obama had taken—implementing the stimulus package, rescuing the banks, restructuring the automakers—had begun to stabilize the economy. In a speech three weeks earlier, Summers had put it this way: “We were at the brink of catastrophe at the beginning of the year, but we have walked some substantial distance back from the abyss.” It seemed like a good moment to check in on the government’s investments in Michigan.

Summers reminds me of record producer Rick Rubin, who often sleeps to produce. Summers catching a few winks:

Summers looked exhausted. The previous day, he hadn’t left the White House until after midnight, and he was up at dawn to make the flight to Detroit. As Granholm talked about layoffs, he eyed a bottle of soda on the table in front of her. Summers drinks many Diet Cokes a day, and he was badly in need of one. He got up, his shirttails peeking out from underneath his jacket, and shuffled over to a counter at the side of the room in search of a caffeinated beverage. All he found was an empty glass, which he carried back to his seat. The manufacturers took turns explaining their plight. Wes Smith, of E. & E. Manufacturing, argued that although the public hates bailouts, “helping manufacturing is popular.” An executive from Atlas Technologies quoted Jeffrey Immelt, the head of G.E., who had recently said that manufacturing jobs should make up twenty per cent of total employment in the United States—twice what it is now. Several of the participants argued that the bank bailouts hadn’t revived lending in their industry, so the government needed to intervene. Ned Staebler, one of Granholm’s top economic advisers, explained excitedly that the new assistance program for struggling companies had already approved its first loan even though he hadn’t advertised the program.
As they spoke, Summers caught Granholm’s attention and mimed a request for some of her soda. She moved the bottle closer to him, smiling. He drank quickly, but it didn’t help. He shifted his weight in his chair. He made jerky, shaking motions with his head. He ran a hand through his hair. Still, by the time Mario Sciberras, of Saline Lectronics, was speaking about what he would do with one of the new loans, Summers was asleep. Read more at the New Yorker

The writer Ryan Lizza talks about the story:

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Geithner's Excused for Lame Bank Rescue Rollout

The Geithner team used their wits and changed course late in the game, which caused nearly everyone to wonder what Geithner was smoking when he announced his detail-less plan.
The team couldn't come up with a new plan fast enough because it was dogged by a lack of help -- the administration hasn't yet filled out the treasury department. Geithner simply needed more time. This is all according to a story in the Washington Post today:

WaPo: Just days before Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner was scheduled to lay out his much-anticipated plan to deal with the toxic assets imperiling the financial system, he and his team made a sudden about-face.

According to several sources involved in the deliberations, Geithner had come to the conclusion that the strategies he and his team had spent weeks working on were too expensive, too complex and too risky for taxpayers.

They needed an alternative and found it in a previously considered initiative to pair private investments and public loans to try to buy the risky assets and take them off the books of banks. There was one problem: They didn't have enough time to work out many details or consult with others before the plan was supposed to be unveiled.

Gibbs on Geithner's Plan

Geithner's plan to clean up the banking system wasn't well received yesterday because he left out the details.

More Gibbs:

Corporate Waste Alert: Wells Fargo Going to Lavish Wynn Hotel

Wells Fargo, which received $25 billion in taxpayer money, has no plans to cancel its trip to Wynn hotel in Las Vegas. 

Update: Wells Fargo cancels trip. Good for them. They can "recognize" and "value" their employees at a cheaper place.