I wish we had known about this ahead of time. It's our mistake for missing it and not alerting readers. The questions submitted and voted by Digg users were outstanding. Tougher and more intelligent questioning than I've seen in any interview of Timmaaay, including Fareed Zakaria's commendable effort. Steve Liesman and Erin Burnett should seek solace under a rock considering their feeble attempts with the Treasury Secretary.
The disadvantage for us is that because of the public nature of voting (Digging) the submitted questions, Turbo knew ahead of time what would be asked and was fully prepared with rehearsed answers. Still the questions were so aggressive and critical in nature that TG couldn't help but squirm through many of them.
I've had a draft post half-written for 8 weeks entitled Ten Questions For Geithner And Summers. One of these days I'll get around to completing it, but the first question on my list is the most glaring omission from the Digg final 10 and is the same that I posed to Simon Johnson and Brad Delong:
- In the discussion of bank losses, why are taxpayers asked and expected to bear the entire loss, while bank bondhholders who recklessly lent trillions to risky bank management teams, are spared completely from this discussion? They knowingly took the investment risk in search of higher returns and they aren't even being asked to forfeit a penny on their bond holdings. It is criminal, conspiratorial and reeks of Treasury capture. What say you, Mr. Secretary?
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Top 10 Questions Submitted and Voted on by Digg Users
- 1. Why has the federal reserve bank never been audited?
- 1134 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 2. Goldman Sachs is a large, profit seeking company which you were/are a part of. Isn't it a conflict of interest to funnel tax dollars into this private company using your new power as Secretary of the Treasury, keeping in mind that you and your old buddies benefit monetarily? Maybe I'm mistaken, but isn't this a textbook example of political corruption?
- 728 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 3. What is your position on Ron Paul's House Resolution 1207? (Which as of the writing of this question has 282 cosponsors.) http://www.auditthefed.com/
- 712 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 4. You failed to pay some of your federal taxes in 2001. And in 2002. And in 2003. And in 2004. Please explain.
- 690 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 5. How do you feel about the revolving door between high job positions in the treasury and Goldman Sachs?
- 579 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 6. Last week you requested that Congress raise the $12.1 trillion statutory debt limit, saying that it could be breached as early as mid-October. This is in addition to the increase already approved in February this year to accommodate the added debt from the $787 Billion stimulus plan. How is this anything other than runaway government spending? What will it take for us to see US debt go the other direction?
- 520 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 7. Why is the government only supporting aging and increasingly obsolete car makers? You've given an extraordinary amount of money to GM, but the government has failed to encourage new, innovative, and cleaner forms of personal transportation such as produced by Tesla Motors. Why has TARP money not been invested in companies such as Tesla, and will the government support similar companies in the future?
- 441 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 8. Are you, yourself, troubled by the massive amount of government spending? What do you think will happen to the dollar over the next 10 years?
- 376 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 9. You are a member of the Federal Reserve, a group that so thoroughly mismanaged our monetary policy that they helped create a massive housing bubble because of foolish loans and speculation enabled by low interest rates, and then you were involved in a horribly mismanaged bailout that hasn't freed up credit markets and can't even account for all the money it spent. Why are you running the Treasury Department?
- 357 diggs
- What's your view? »
- 10. You've amended your tax returns for the years 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005 and 2006 and found that you've owed an additional $31,536 http://finance.senate.gov/press/Bpress/2009press/prb011309d.pdf ... Giving you the benefit of a doubt (that you are neither inept nor corrupt but were simply overwhelmed by an overly complex system), what recommendations do you have for simplifying the tax code?
- 347 diggs
- What's your view? »