Monday, March 16, 2009

Government is still the problem

Just take a look at what is happening with the TARP legislation, passed in the fall:

"But with $300 billion of TARP out the door already, Jordan asked, “Am I correct in saying that not one mortgage-backed security has been purchased?” “Yes, sir,” said Kashkari. The program for purchasing MBSs, he explained, is still being developed. Treasury has so far spent $300 billion to treat the symptoms of the problem and prevent a complete collapse."

Who is Kashkari? Well:

"The first witness — Neel Kashkari, the interim assistant treasury secretary for financial stability — was on the hot seat for hours. Kashkari is a holdover from the Bush administration in a department where President Obama hasn’t even bothered to fill any of the open senior positions except for secretary of the Treasury."

Democrats can't just blame this on Bush--the Obama administration has been in power for 2 months, and they knew going in that Treasury would need to be parsing out this TARP money.