Time and NBC's Today Show are trying to tag Bill Clinton as one of the villains responsible for the current economic recession-qua-depression. Bill will have none of it.
Clinton ushered out the Glass-Steagall Act, which for decades had separated commercial and investment banking, and signed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act — which exempted all derivatives, including the now-notorious credit-default swaps, from federal regulation. His administration also loosened housing rules, which added pressure on banks to lend in low-income neighborhoods.Time is right, in a way. But you need to apply the same logic that would hold an air traffic controller responsible for setting in motion the events that led to a jet being flown into the side of a mountain by a hijacker that commandeered the cockpit once the plane was in flight.
"None of it was an endorsement of permissive lending and risk-taking," the magazine concluded. "But if you believe deregulation is to blame for our troubles, then Clinton earned a share too."
Perhaps that's an exaggeration, but only a little.
President Clinton trusted - possibly too much - banks and Wall Street to regulate themselves. (As did every single conservative that is trying to shift blame to Clinton from Bush, but that's not relevant, is it?) But to hold President Clinton responsible for the failure of the Bush Administration to concern itself with what was actually happening in the marketplace, to oversee the lenders and the traders, is folly, albeit fairly commonplace in the know-nothing media. Clinton is right to object to the idea that, given the failures of the market to control itself, his Administration would have acted irresponsibly in the manner that Bush and his cronies behaved. Clinton showed again and again his ability to turn on a dime and to reassess issues. Traits that Bush continually failed to exhibit.
Take a look at my post the other day about Alan Grayson questioning Harry Markopolis, the Madoff whistleblower, regarding SEC enforcement actions during Clinton's tenure and Bush's tenure, and the order of magnitude decline in enforcement of the rules under Bush, and tell me again about responsibility.
More important than the speculation about how Bill Clinton's Administration would have dealt with poorly-regulated markets and the collapse of the real estate bubble, is the fact that the Clinton Administration left office in 2001 with a $127 billion budget surplus, and was paying down significant portions of the national debt (despite current Republican arguments to the contrary, which are at best misguided, and most likely flat-out dishonest), drastically reducing the government's interest payments in connection with servicing that debt.
And nobody believes that a properly-installed Gore administration would have acted in a manner as fiscally irresponsible as the Bush Administration. Remember the conservative-and-media ridiculed lock-box, anyone? Thanks for the good job there, too, mighty press.
What type of position would the nation be in right now if the federal government had sufficient economic strength to address the economic slow-down, bolstered by a budget surplus and small debt load?
Sure, Bill Clinton is an extremely flawed man. He's self-absorbed and indulgent, and sensitive to critique. And Clinton's market reforms were imperfect. But so is every decision made on policy matters where results are impossible to determine and human nature is involved. To blame a former president for a possibly flawed decision a decade ago, after the misjudgements and misdeeds of a subsequent administration have intervened in a monumental fashion, is just nonsense. The true test of judgement is to act in a way that assesses and follows those imperfections, makes adjustments, and continually corrects itelf.
Moreover, Clinton's sensitivity highlights even more his different approach from Bush - where Bush was stubborn and oblivious to criticism, Clinton's thin skin would have forced him to address issues that Bush failed to address - or even acknowledge.
Meanwhile, Time magazine, rather than simply reporting Clinton's objection and their characterization of his culpability in this crisis, chose to double-down on its charge, condecending to the former President, trying to make him sound like a petulant child (given, Clinton rarely needs much help with that characterization).
Time then takes the next step, by running a reader poll, to be answered yes or no, asking:
Of course, the answer has to be yes, as it also has to be for the idiot down the street from you that took out an interest-only loan on a speculative home purchase, and the owner of the home construction company that built that house and cashed out of his business 30 months ago, and the investors who placed bets on an ever-increasing stock market bubble, and hundreds of thousands of other people who made choices day in and day out, sometimes smart and sometimes foolish, sometimes greedy and selfish and sometimes selfless, sometimes - but certainly not always - honest. Each in his or her own way contributed to where we are now, some in large part and others in not so large part but in the aggregate as part of a flawed economy. There is blame, and then again there is blame. And I have no problem with the former or the later, as long as what we're really talking about isn't actually blame but responsibility, which are concepts that the media often conflate and cannot keep straight.
Yet Time lays its foundation, that noone could disagree that blame should be spread around to anyone who made any decisions at any time, and its trap that obviously Bill Clinton deserves some of the blame as well, and that he has disingenuously and recklessly charged that he bears no responsibility for anything that occurred or was set in motion by his Administration's policies. Which is, unfortunately for Time and its journalistic standards, not what the former President said. Undercutting itself (and providing itself with false cover), the article even acknowledges that Clinton agrees that his adminsitration could have done a better job with respect to regulating the derivatives industry. But Time disregards that fact and swiftly moves forward with its thesis, that Clinton is effectively a sniveling brat, unwilling to accept blame for his blunders. Which, accordingly, makes President Clinton one of the 25 people most responsible for the greatest economic crisis in a generation.
So Time Magazine unwittingly circles back to the question of judgement. But this time, for Time, it's its own.
More important than the speculation about how Bill Clinton's Administration would have dealt with poorly-regulated markets and the collapse of the real estate bubble, is the fact that the Clinton Administration left office in 2001 with a $127 billion budget surplus, and was paying down significant portions of the national debt (despite current Republican arguments to the contrary, which are at best misguided, and most likely flat-out dishonest), drastically reducing the government's interest payments in connection with servicing that debt.
And nobody believes that a properly-installed Gore administration would have acted in a manner as fiscally irresponsible as the Bush Administration. Remember the conservative-and-media ridiculed lock-box, anyone? Thanks for the good job there, too, mighty press.
What type of position would the nation be in right now if the federal government had sufficient economic strength to address the economic slow-down, bolstered by a budget surplus and small debt load?
Sure, Bill Clinton is an extremely flawed man. He's self-absorbed and indulgent, and sensitive to critique. And Clinton's market reforms were imperfect. But so is every decision made on policy matters where results are impossible to determine and human nature is involved. To blame a former president for a possibly flawed decision a decade ago, after the misjudgements and misdeeds of a subsequent administration have intervened in a monumental fashion, is just nonsense. The true test of judgement is to act in a way that assesses and follows those imperfections, makes adjustments, and continually corrects itelf.
Moreover, Clinton's sensitivity highlights even more his different approach from Bush - where Bush was stubborn and oblivious to criticism, Clinton's thin skin would have forced him to address issues that Bush failed to address - or even acknowledge.
Meanwhile, Time magazine, rather than simply reporting Clinton's objection and their characterization of his culpability in this crisis, chose to double-down on its charge, condecending to the former President, trying to make him sound like a petulant child (given, Clinton rarely needs much help with that characterization).
Given the sweep and severity of today's global economic crisis, it would seem there's plenty of blame to go around. But Bill Clinton doesn't think any of it should fall on his shoulders.
Time then takes the next step, by running a reader poll, to be answered yes or no, asking:
"Does Bill Clinton deserve some blame for the global financial crisis?"
Of course, the answer has to be yes, as it also has to be for the idiot down the street from you that took out an interest-only loan on a speculative home purchase, and the owner of the home construction company that built that house and cashed out of his business 30 months ago, and the investors who placed bets on an ever-increasing stock market bubble, and hundreds of thousands of other people who made choices day in and day out, sometimes smart and sometimes foolish, sometimes greedy and selfish and sometimes selfless, sometimes - but certainly not always - honest. Each in his or her own way contributed to where we are now, some in large part and others in not so large part but in the aggregate as part of a flawed economy. There is blame, and then again there is blame. And I have no problem with the former or the later, as long as what we're really talking about isn't actually blame but responsibility, which are concepts that the media often conflate and cannot keep straight.
Yet Time lays its foundation, that noone could disagree that blame should be spread around to anyone who made any decisions at any time, and its trap that obviously Bill Clinton deserves some of the blame as well, and that he has disingenuously and recklessly charged that he bears no responsibility for anything that occurred or was set in motion by his Administration's policies. Which is, unfortunately for Time and its journalistic standards, not what the former President said. Undercutting itself (and providing itself with false cover), the article even acknowledges that Clinton agrees that his adminsitration could have done a better job with respect to regulating the derivatives industry. But Time disregards that fact and swiftly moves forward with its thesis, that Clinton is effectively a sniveling brat, unwilling to accept blame for his blunders. Which, accordingly, makes President Clinton one of the 25 people most responsible for the greatest economic crisis in a generation.
So Time Magazine unwittingly circles back to the question of judgement. But this time, for Time, it's its own.
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