The New Republic

READ MORE >>

Not so long ago, all eight of the members of Congress being investigated by the Office of Congressional Ethics were black. Now, two powerful black members of the Congressional Black Caucus are on the griddle. There are two entirely appropriate responses. READ MORE >>

The financial crisis in America isn't over. It's ongoing, it remains unresolved, and it stands in the way of full economic recovery. The cause, at the deepest level, was a breakdown in the rule of law. And it follows that the first step toward prosperity is to restore the rule of law in the financial sector. READ MORE >>

Yes!  Steve Weisman over at The Peterson Institute posted a nice riff yesterday about James Stewart's recent New Yorker piece reconstructing the week Lehman collapsed. His (and Stewart's) conclusion? Hank Paulson screwed up massively: READ MORE >>

Being Treasury secretary is usually not a job that calls for great political skills. But with a banking crisis crippling the economy and threatening to turn a recession into a depression, Tim Geithner has been plunged into the center of politics--as both the person responsible for what the administration should do, and as the main exponent of that policy. But he has faltered in crafting an effective policy and failed miserably in putting it forward. READ MORE >>

As investors all around the world ran scared this past month, their panic was about the only thing easy to understand. The global financial system was collapsing and almost nobody could say--in plain English--what exactly was fueling such a gigantic crisis. Not the president, who offered insipid generalities; nor the presidential candidates, who stuck to old themes like earmarks, taxes, and deregulation. READ MORE >>

Let's start with a basic assumption: The only thing worse in a market than disappointment is confusion. Investors can live with, and if they're smart profit from, bad news, as long as they understand it. But if things are confusing--say, a great, healthy company turns in horrible quarterly earnings, with no clear reason why--then investors get confused, and they panic. READ MORE >>

Right now Henry Paulson probably has, with Paul Bernanke, the most intellectually and emotionally fraught job in the world. So much has gone wrong and so much more can go wrong to the tune of trillions of dollars. Bernanke is a convert from the academy to public life, although he did serve on the board of education of Montgomery Township in New Jersey while he was a professor. Paulson's pre-life was as a banker, and his last work before Washington was as managing partner at Goldman Sachs. READ MORE >>

Earlier today, an economist I know pointed out this passage in Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's proposal: The Secretary’s authority to purchase mortgage-related assets under this Act shall be limited to $700,000,000,000 outstanding at any one time. READ MORE >>

Clay Risen is managing editor of Democracy: A Journal of Ideas and a contributing editor at World Trade. His first book, A Nation on Fire: America in the Wake of the King Assassination will appear in January.   READ MORE >>