listen to this. >> is warren buffet is socialist? [ laughter ] >> you really have no [ censor bleep ] clue what socialism is do you? >> john, they have no idea. some things are done by the government, some things are done by private industry. it is a mixed system. roger ailes you are a clown. "viewpoint" with eliot spitzer is next. ♪ good evening, i'm eliot spitzer. this is "viewpoint." could facebook's big stock sales be turning into a major wall street scandal. and three senator want to end rules allowing banking executives to sit one federal reserves 12 regional bank boards. including the new york fed. bernie sanders and two democrats

are introducing legislation to curb that blatant conflict of interest. as for morgan's jamie dimon, his bad day isn't end there. morgan employees are suing the bank over losses to their requirement plans after morgan announced may 10th it lost over $2 billion in risky trade. the investigators are all over those trades. so we'll probably hear back from them in about a decade. they'll focus on morgan's financial reporting. and facebook stock fell. it's on the sec's to do list also. >> are issues we need to look at with respect to facebook and as we just testified to we're all looking carefully at the jpmorgan trading. >> facebook shares are now down

18% since friday, when they went on sale with enormous fanfare to the general public. a public that didn't have the benefit of inside information, all of whom reportedly cut their estimates of facebook's lowering the value. if you think that sounds fishy, you are not alone. with me now is with me now is the story today under the title "bombshell: facebook bankers secretly cut forecasts for company in middle of ipo roadshow" roadshow". all right. henry that sounds like a bunch of jargon. explain why this is a bomb shell.

>> as everybody knows wall street analysts publish estimates for companies, and they are available on firstcall and other services. you are go toen companies. there is a rule that says that analysts can't publish until 25 days after the ipo happens. turns out analysts do that anyway. so they have some numbers to go off of in saying we'll pay 12 or $13 -- >> are these analysts at the companies actually underwriting the stock? >> yes. >> i'm morgan stanley, i'm the lead underwriter my analyst is whispering to the fidelities and big boys saying they may not earn as much as we think they are. >> possibly. but you as a big investor get a

number that you are base it on. the company is going to earn a dollar next year. and the assumption is the company has reviewed that. >> the big investors, who have big, big piles of money, they got this information, but small little retail investors didn't. >> that's right. >> why not? >> because for whatever reason the industry convention which everybody in the industry says it is legal, is that those estimates are given verbally. and somebody told me this was designed to protect investors somehow. >> yes. those people should be shot. >> this is the existing system, and this i think you could agree is ludicrous. in the case of facebook something different happened that is much worse, which is that after those initial

estimates were given out, halfway through the road show analysts cut their estimates, which is a very negative sign. >> right. >> the stock prices go down so to institutions looking at facebook, that's very material negative information, and a lot of them were spooked by it and of course nobody outside knew that and ultimately facebook was brought primarily by individual investors. >> the big guys were getting critical material information that they could used to determine whether to buy both at what price and how much and little investors were being denied that information. >> exactly. >> you said something that is fascinating to me. they claim this is permitted. >> that it is standard practice; that it was, again put into

place. this is a verbal idea so that just certain people got it. maybe because it's not a part of the prospectus or what have you, but to your point it is as if the analysts are whispering these are the numbers, and i'm taking them down. >> the road show is when you market the stock. >> that's right. >> you said buy this stock that is going to go public you take it public and that's called the road show now could this explain why the -- the stock was a bust? why it didn't spike the way people thought it would. usually a stock like that would jump. instead it was flat and then dipped. >> what i have been told is when the estimates occurred institutional enthusiasm suddenly started to cool and other things started to make them nervous, and by the end of the road show one investor said

they had gotten the willies. meanwhile individual investors were going head over heels for the ipo had no idea any of this was going on. and what i have been told, and it's not confirmed yet, is that morgan stanley, the lead underwriter has different prices from institutions and individuals, and the individuals were much higher and that the deal was priced much closer to the individual number than institutions. >> right. >> so it's no surprise that a lot of individuals have sold out. >> i think we know based on the fact that the price has dropped, being viewed as a bust this is going to be critiqued, parsed evaluated, subpoenas will be flying -- >> they already are. >> they already are. we were involved in this ten years ago looking at what analysts did in the middle of underwriting. what should the rule be about how this information gets out? >> i think the rule should be

the rule in place in europe. research analysts should write their reports before the ipo road show. and the reason we don't do that is because people were worried they would hype the ipo before the road show, so there's the quiet period before they are allowed to publish. but the current system is vastly worse, because institutions have privileged access to management and they get numbers and incite that never appear to the individual. it is better if analysts say, here is what we think. >> if henry blodget thinks that's the way it should run, i'm happy to go there. what do you think the future holds for facebook? what do you think? does it have a business model that works? >> facebook is a great business a great company. my worry is because the business is already mature and starting to decelerate, what we're going

to see over time is multiple compression, where the amount that investors are going to pay is going to go down. the big problem i with the ipo is facebook is being priced at 65 times versus next years expected earnings, just a huge number. and if the company doesn't blow the doors off that multiple is going to go down. >> all right. henry blodget, thanks as always. >> thank you for having me. >> for more on the drive to change the rules that allow wall street bankers to sit as directors on the board of the federal reserve, i'm joined by bernie sanders. tell us what the bill is and why it is so important? >> this is why it's important. in the deeper sense if we're ever going to get our economy straight, strengthen the middle class, you have to deal with

wall street. and one of the important factors in terms of dealing with wall street is dealing with the feds. during the financial crisis what we learned is that the fed provided $16 trillion of low-interest loans to every financial institution in this country, wealthy individuals, corporations, and central banks all over the world, and obviously the regional feds played an important role in the distribution of that money. and one of the absurdities that we learned is that while somebody like jamie dimon was sitting on the new york fed, jpmorgan chase, his bank received over $300 billion in low-interest loans. jeff was sitting on the new york fed at that point, general electric received $16 billion in low-interest loans. i think the average american would think it absurd when you

have the function of the fed is to be protecting consumers and taxpayers against wall street, you have wall street right in the middle of the fed making those decisions. >> senator you know i could not agree with you more. i have written about this the conflict of interest adherent in having bankers sitting on the organization of the organization that loans them the money. and most people are not aware of this. you proposed this bill elizabeth warren has said let's end this. is there growing momentum to change the governance of these fed boards? >> we will see eliot. i have been disappointed that we have not seen more democrats and more republicans standing up using what recently happened at jpmorgan chase as just an

example to point out, we cannot go back to where we were with that kind of irresponsibility and recklessness that lead us into this recession, but we will see, but do not ever, and i know i do not have to tell you this do not ever underestimate the power of wall street under both political parties. >> that is unfortunately so true. but the recent instant where morgan chase has lost 2 $3 billion and has been lobbying the fed, to relax the rules relating to the voelker rule it is the definition of what is wrong with our structure. so how many sponsors do you have, and what happens next, and what can folks do to help you. >> we have a senator from alaska on board, and we're going to look for more sponsors. we're also going to get it

introduced in the house. i'm not sure who will do it there. >> tim geithner with whom i have disagreed fundamentally with so many things said something kind of ambiguous on the issue, saying there was a perception issue, on the one hand i'm glad he recognizes there is an issue, but will you get him to be supportive? >> we'll speak to him and ask him to be supportive. people really don't know much about the fed, but when you have on a regional fed nine members, six of them appointed by the banking committee, i think the average american will say, wait a second that is totally absurd. so what our legislation says if you are an employee of a bank if you have stock in a bank, you can't sit on the fed. we want the fed representing

ordinary middle class. >> did we learn anything -- do you think the record will be played out in full so in due course we'll begin to appreciate the magnitude of the risk? we need to understand that more, hopefully to persuade people that more needs to be done. >> i think frankly eliot we need to know more, but we know enough already. and what we know is that at a time when small and medium-sized businesses are calling out for affordable loans to create new jobs, produce new goods and services, you still have wall street engaging in multi-million dollars bets and the real change that we need -- and you are not going to improve the economy until you get to it -- we need the financial institutions to be investing in the real economy, not being a gambling casino

where they are making money just for themselves and when they lose money come to the american people to bail them out. >> and the other piece of that is they have taken the money that has been deposited and instead of lending it out, they are used it to replace the debts. >> exactly. >> senator bernie sanders thank you for time. >> thank you eliot. >> attack mode new ads from romny and obama super pacs. >>science and republicans do not mix. >>now it's your turn at the only online forum with a direct line to eliot spitzer. >>join the debate now.

the host of inside the actors studio, anded a cammy award

winning director, charles ferguson will join me next. i have said that we need more grown ups in congress which brings up to the number of the day, 10.6. that's the average of the number of speeches delivered in congress. the length of the worlds and sentences and on average members of congress speak as though they are about halfway through sophomore year. of course you do want your speeches to be understood, after all mar thin luther king's i have a dream speech comes in at freshman level. members of congress mostly speak to each other, and that level of discourse has dropped almost a fuel grade since 2005 plus here is a shock the lawmakers who speak at the lowest grade level are among the most conservative members of congress. this may help explain some of the other high school antics from the tea party-backed

members of congress. they might for no reason won't listen to anyone, and want everything their way right now. certainly sounds like we're dealing with 15 year olds. but he was not a politician. >>we're just getting started. (vo) the state of the 2012 campaign. it's the economy stupid has become the most off quoted and politically accurate slogan of the last 20 years. whoever comes out ahead on the economy usually comes out ahead at the ballot box. president obama continues to focus on mitt romney's time at

bain. >> i was suddenly 60 years old. i had no health care. and that's scary. when mitt romney did that he -- he made -- he made me sick. >> not to be outdone, karl roves gps hired larry mccarthy to produce its latest hit piece. >> i supported president obama because he spoke so beautifully. he promised change but things changed for the worse. >> but the economy isn't just a problem for president obama a new poll shows it should be a concern for romney as well with the candidates essentially tied when it comes to economic issues. romney leads by only 1%. the candidates are dead even when it comes to who would create more jobs. has the romney lead on the economy evaporated just like the

workers who's companies were bought by bain capital. joining me now campaign advisor, ford o'connell and democratic strategist and former senior advisor to senator harry reid, penny lee. your guy had a substantial lead in the economic domain. what happened? has he blown it? where has that narrative gone? >> i don't think he has blown it. i think what happened as the poll shows if essentially the economy doesn't improve, president obama is going to be out of a job as mitt romney can paint himself as a plausible alternative on the economy. he is still lacking that personal compelling narrative. only time is going to tell but this poll over all is not a good sign for president obama. and that comes from abc news amy walter. >> every time you are on the show, you keep saying he has got to paint the narrative and tell the narrative. when is he going to do it? this game only goes

unfortunately for some of us 167 more days. >> that's absolutely right. this is why he is going after bain, because if mitt romney cannot defend his record on bain, the totality of it being having saved more than lost then president obama is going to win this argument can mitt romney actually defend his record and say because of what i have done as a governor and successful businessman, i am better on this economy. we're going to find out. this bain, bain bain argument will be the entire campaign fight. >> i agree. all right. penny is bain a decoy? at some point the president has got to do something positive. he has been in charge. i have heard enough about bain. >> one thing you are seeing in that poll is you are seeing people are more hopeful than anxious. they are saying the economy he inherited was horrible, but that they are moving forward and

seeing positive growth, and that is the first time we have seen it. and that place to the president's advantage. because mitt romney doesn't have a record to stand on. >> look, i don't know where the optimism comes from. >> they are not where they were where they were losing 750,000 jobs a month. the unemployment numbers have come down, and mitt romney when he ran last time as a bain capitalist, he ran as governor of massachusetts 47th out of 50. >> i don't think the president is telling it any more effectively. where is the president's affirmative story going to come from? why doesn't he compare gm to bain? >> you are seeing that narrative come out. you are starting to see it day after day. that was the whole point of what the last couple of ads have been

about. and don't forget what we did for gm. it was mitt romney wanted them to go bankrupt. we actually saved its economy. >> if i were giving advice to the president i would be tempted to say, president obama i'm a better private equity guy than you are. myth i lead the gm bailout, match that buddy. how would he respond to that? >> that the president has not created one net job in his four years in office, that will be the real hard banger for president obama. one of the things that president obama is really worried about is the situation in europe. right now he is preparing for the worst and trying to take a page out of karl rove's book and a page out of barbara boxer's book. they are trying to take the fight to them. >> one thing about the swift vote ad they were false. >> you are assuming people know

these things. [ laughter ] >> penny you wanted to jump in. what are the numbers about jobs -- i don't think ford was accurate. >> no, the president is starting to see a net positive. now they are starting to see an add to the net positive. >> look, even an objective reality the job losses in the first couple of months when we were in a freefall. since then you are argue causation, but we have added 4-plus million private sector jobs. whether you want to get credit to the stimulus or not. ford i am correct that is where the numbers are. >> but it still hasn't brought us back to even. people on main street right now are basically jobless and given up hope, and unless they feel their lives have improved, president obama is in trouble right now. >> okay. i want to pivot for a second.

i want to ask you real quick each of you. ford how does your candidate, mitt romney respond if the supreme court says the health care law is unconstitutional? how does he react? >> the base is going to react for him, because they are going to say it is a federal overreach, and you can't do that. actually if i think it was upheld as constitutional, mitt romney's base is going to be even more fired up than he will. >> all right. penny what does the president do if they find it unconstitutional? >> again, it riles up the base to say we actually probably need to go to single payer. >> okay. one step beyond that. fascinating we'll have to wait and see. mccain campaign advisor, ford o'connell, democratic strategist and former senior advisor to senator harry reid, penny lee, thank you for your time tonight. >> thank you, eliot. >> sarah palin is talking sesame

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still to comment some performance advise for mitt romney from the imcomparable james lipton, but first the viewfinder when it doesn't fit anywhere else. >> here i am in a karn gan sweater sitting here in new port, rhode island. >> thank you, al for alwaysening your weather reports for what is happening in your neck of the woods. >> it's a drizzly booze day tuesday, everybody, but we can't care. >> what was your least favorite seinfeld episode? >> there was one where a guy had a stroke and we were feeding him on the couch. >> i look at this whacko who has

no talent whatsoever going around doing all sorts of things, and really abusing people, and somebody ought to whack him and he'll never do it again. >> and launch of the rocket as nasa turns to the private sector. >> someone leads gop operatives, shawn they seem to have the fighting instinct of mr. snuffellugus. >> i wish i could bat a thousand. i can't, but i'm basically in the industrious hall of fame. >> what would a romney presidency be like? day one, president romney approves the keystone pipeline and issues the order to begin replacing obamacare. day two, he is reminded that he lost to president obama by a landslide. [ laughter ] >> all right. mitt romney needs help acting

human. we all knew that maybe america's most famous acting coach can help. maybe. i kind of doubt it. james lipton joins "viewpoint" after the break. brought to you by spiriva.

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i have said it many times before in fact twice last week alone, mitt romney is the most awkward politician i have ever seen. after observing that mr. romney could use some help, james lipton, took it upon himself to give the candidate some advice on how to act more like a human being. >> since politics and performance have become pretty much fused and since you have been criticized by some for not

coming across as authentic by your public, maybe we could work on that today. you have this portrait of yourself as a common man. sir, i don't think you are a common man. my advice to you, sir, and you can reject it of course it is just advice is that you don't try to go with what you haven't got. >> joining me now to discuss what mitt romney could do to about more human is bravo's inside the actor's studio, james lipton himself. can it be taught? >> to whom? >> to somebody like mitt romney? >> acting is very hard to teach in any event. you have to bring to it a certain talent but, yeah it can be taught. >> but you look at a guy like

mitt romney and for those of us on this side one of these hated cable new types i used to be on that side, he is so easy to make fun of is there something genetically missing in his makeup that would even take you out of there -- >> i'm not the top teacher, but -- look, we teach our students -- one of the things that we teach them is to learn to access themselves to be at ease in their skin. we teach them to relax. that was the -- the [ inaudible ] of acting. and we -- we -- we have a whole bunch of exercises that train them to be able to access themselves. their real selves, not the phony selves, and not to put it on but to bring it out. >> what are you are saying is so fundamental. when somebody is at ease you sense it. and ronald reagan had that to a

tee. >> totally. i directed ronald reagan and bob hope in "new lincoln bedroom." >> what were they doing there, i dare ask? >> telling the filthiest jokes of their lives -- they started telling jokes, and none of them are repeatable here -- >> come on. sure they are. it's cable come on. >> no, no no. but he was totally himself. what is more he was a sad-card-carrying member of our fraternity who never took a duel rule. he was content to be himself, and he did it brilliantly. he was ant common man. as i said romney is not a common man. reagan wasn't, but he was a very good actor and very comfortable with himself, and he was able to convey that to the public.

>> we have a tape here of what may be one of romney's more awkward moments. >> just something very special here, the great lakes but also all of the little inland lakes that dot the parts of michigan. i love cars. in the 50s and 60s if you show me one square foot of any car, i could tell you what the model was. i still know the american cars pretty well. >> you almost cringe i like the big lakes, the little lakes, the tall trees -- >> i'm from michigan. i know those lakes and cars. there is a an expression of what we call flop swag. because he knows he is dying. a director once said relax you have got the job. >> and did the performance get better? >> well, sure. but he is constantly selling, selling, selling. >> that is part of the problem

he doesn't have a job. he feels such a degree of text and anxiety that every word will be parsed. can he ever get comfortable in his own skin? >> maybe too late. he should watch reagan and palin. when she is just making a speech, she is a model of ease. she is living in the moment. watch her [ inaudible ] use of the art, she is so graceful and relaxed -- >> sometimes ignorance breeds that. >> i'm not suggesting that. you said it. >> yeah. >> but the fact is that she is very easy and relaxed in her skin, and he is not. >> we have time for one more clip here which i think is again, mitt romney trying too hard. >> okay. >> we have in this room some -- some real young ones there is a little one in yellow. i would take a guess as to

gender, but when they are in yellow i can't tell. is that a boy or a girl? that's a girl. she is beautiful. >> that laugh is a killer. he is not the least bit amused. if you freeze the frame of that you'll see no amusement there. i get it. i understand it. we are on the same wavelength because of a joke, but he is too busy selling to share anything. the result is that that laugh comes out like the hah hah hah of the balloon in a cartoon. >> right. >> people think that crying is the test of an actor. laughing is the test of an actor. >> that's why -- a good comedian brings us into it right? and somehow we're enveloped in the sense of -- he thinks it is so funny or she -- >> it if the joke tells us

something we didn't know we say, i get it, and then relaugh. humor is a sharing. that's not the specialty of this fellow, he may have great virtues but he is not a good sharer. >> we have been kind of harsh on governor romney -- >> it has nothing to do with his politics. >> does president obama have that skill that you seem to admire so much? >> i recall a year ago in the white heat of the white house correspondence dinner, where he did what we call in our procession kill the crowd as he was simultaneously killing osama bin laden. that's cool. >> he impresses you. >> that impressed me. my god when i learned the next day that what was really on his mind -- that was a great

performance. >> that was compartmentalization on a grand scale and grand performance. and then being alive in the moment and able to -- actually able to convey to us what he was really honest to goodness thinking at the very same time his mind must have been racing elsewhere. that's -- that's a good performance. >> the host of inside the actor's studio, james thank so much for your time and wisdom tonight. >> thank you. >> defending the vehicler rule and common sense. my view coming up next. ♪ cat coira's film, "while we were here," is about how travel can change the way we look at our lives and loves. >>you never know someone until you travel with them, because it takes people out of their element. >>(narrator) director morgan spurlock's films have taken him all around the world. his latest, "mansome," is about grooming in the modern man.

the project brought him to germany to a professional beard building championship. >>just as there are beauty pageants for women, there are, you know, now these beard growing competitions and mustache competitions for men. >>i'm wayne rosenfeld at the tribeca film festival. and who doesn't want 50% more cash? ugh, the baby. huh! and then the baby bear said "i want 50% more cash in my bed!" 50% more cash is good ri... what's that. ♪ ♪ you can spell. [ male announcer ] the capital one cash rewards card. the card for people who want 50% more cash. what's in your wallet?

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♪ ♪ [ nervous ] i hope no one recognizes us... you...you think these disguises will... no. [ male announcer ] salty. sweet. and impossible to resist. i'll ask charles ferguson the author of the outstanding new book predator nation next. but first let's check in with jennifer grandholm. what is in "the war room"

tonight, governor? >> we're all about the right to vote. and to stop those gop lawmakers to restricting students and seniors from exercising the right to vote. and we'll be talking politics. and joined by sully, one of america's most famous here rose. >> spectacular, he is a real hero. ask mark mackinnon. that's going to be fascinating to listen to. i can't wait to watch. >> thanks, elliot. >> more "viewpoint" coming up. >>we're just getting started. (vo) the state of the 2012 campaign.

♪ can we fix america's financial services by bringing one law back to life? no. but could behelp the banks by reviving a system of laws? you bet. especially if that system is the one that gave us more than 60 years of banking stability. after jpmorgan chase reported losing more than $3 billion, a lot of people said bring back the glass sea gal act. we have been trying to put that back in place with the voelker rule. but andrew ross sorkin pointed out that glass-steagall alone would not have saved lehman brothers and bear stearns. a glass-steagall reenactment

might not mean that much. but i think andrew misses the larger point. reveal of glass-steagall was merely one part of a larger flaw in our thinking. we cut virtually all of the rules and regulations that kept our banks solid and credible for six decades, next thing we knew leverage ratio spun out of control, capital requirements shrivelled up, government and bankers believed in the myth of self regulation, and they were wrong. glass-steagall was one critical part of a structure that made sure no bank was too big to fail, no entity was grand enough to crush the entire system, and no single wave of bets could wipe out the whole economy. so andrew you are right, glass-steagall alone wouldn't do it, but as part of a larger structure, the voelker rule could provide some safety and stop the game of heads i win,

tails you lose that took us down the path of disaster.

charles ferguson enraged us all telling the true story about how large-scale criminality nearly crashed our economy, and those who did it remain unpublished. the book is "inside job on steroids." ever since the 1980s, ferguson writes much of the financial sector has been krimallized, and i quote:

joining me now is oscar- winning director of "inside job" and author of "predator nation," charles ferguson. which i think is important in terms of understanding how you can in fact understand so well and expertly what goes on annual street. thank you for joining us. >> thank you for having me. >> and please if you haven't seen the movie, see it. this new book one of the things you go into here as well as in "inside job" is how academia has been taken over. >> yes, many people who saw the film found that to be the most shocking thing. starting about 30 years ago the same important companies and industries that have put so much money into the political system also began putting money into

the academic system in effect buying prominent academics as consultants, members of the board of directors, and this has had a serious effect. >> explain where that matters. where does -- i completely agree with you and i said harvard should go through an crisis because they were essentially bought, but why does that matter? how does that help business effectuate its policies? >> well, we look to the economic discipline and law schools and business schools public policy schools for objective, impartial expert advice about how to manage this country, and what are appropriate policies with regard to the financial system and other parts of the economy? and it turns out that now very high fraction of the time, if

you see a prominent economist testifying in congress or writing an op-ed article in the "new york times" or speaking in the media, there's a very high probability that that person is being very well paid by somebody with a big stake in the outcome. >> it's almost as though the doctors who tell us what drugs to take have been on the payroll of big pharma and we haven't known it. >> that's exactly what it is like. >> we look to academia to validate what we'll being told and to define the parameters of our political discourse, and for years we had those saying yes tax cuts will create jobs. folks saying that were being paid by big business. >> yes, and they also were saying you can and should deregulate the economy and the financial system because these anies and these industries will take care of themselves. >> and that -- that was a burr

under my saddle and i waged that battle with so many academics and then you say for whom are they consulting? you realized so much of their revenues actually came from the companies that would benefit from the advice they were giving. >> yes. >> this is one theme that runs "predator nation," which is a brilliant book. you just kind of get enveloped by it. what with question do to turn harvard business school and others into more neutral arbitrators? >> i hope this book will have an effect in this that regard. we can insist that universities have the same time of disclosure and conflict of interest requirements that we expect of youralists. if you work and write for the "new york times," you can't make money from the people you write

about. >> right. >> and we need to get rules like that back into academia. >> and if doctors were weighing in on the appropriateness of prescribing certain medications you would want to know who is paying them. the lack of knowledge that we are denied or the information we are deny sod we can critique the advice we are being given is what we need to know about the academics, doesn't it? >> yes, that's absolutely right. i think we should go further. i think we should place elements on the amount of outside income that professors can have. if they want to start a company or write a mystery novel fine. but if they are experts on finance, they shouldn't be allowed to take large amounts of money from banks. >> the role that capital and those who control capital has

played has become a sen central point in this campaign. you were an entrepreneur you started a company, did extraordinarily well and proven yourself so adept in so many areas, do you think that is fair game for discourse and are they painting bain in inappropriate or appropriate light? >> i think it is totally fair game for discourse. and i don't know as much as i ought to what mitt romney did when he was at bain capital. but for the book and the film i looked at the private equity industry. and in many ways it is a quite unsavory industry. and it's profits depend primarily on legal loopholes and subsidies. >> so it is not as though these investments would necessarily be that effective on a neutral playing field.