i was so shocked by what happened with this aig thing. suddenly this money that was mine, whenever i wanted it -- i was told that it was, i would only get back 10% of my money. this was a bank. this was not some kind of punt i had a casino. >> i'm taking care of my mom right now who had some problems in rhode island. i have been around the common man in the hinterland, what people call flyover country. i say maybe they should drive through it once in a while and see the people they're making movies for. with all due respect to the differences between new york, l.a., and then the rest of the country, you know, people out there are really -- when they don't have a job, they don't eat. i mean, people are really having a hard time, and they don't see any hope. when you talk about attitude, you talk about confidence, you can have all the billionaires you want, but if the people out there by the tens of millions are not happy, you have a real problem. now, what happens when this culture of greed and, you know, we've had it, the japanese had it,

, construction downtown, aig, life insurance, 81 million policies with a face value of $1.9 trillion.teachers pensions, it's everywhere, you want too big to fail here it is. >> peter, as where you wrote the script, who were the villains and heros of that crisis? >> it's very interesting. because i started off with a lot of preconceptions about who the heros and villains were. but the truth is, one of the ironies of the piece is that there are a lot of heros and a lot of villains and sometimes it was the same people. you have people in power like hank paulson who went from being the ceo and chairman of goldman sachs, and was certainly part of the wall street trend of working washington and trying to deregulate, and now here he is, in washington, as secretary of treasury trying to deal with the situation that he himself has been part of the creation of. so that's -- a lot was very surprising. one of the villains of the piece is the idea that financial markets are inherently self-regulating and should be left alone. >> you're absolutely right. >> maybe it's alan greenspan. you know, not

come to think about it, even if jobs are hard to come by now, with gm and aig on the list, you might made the fortune 500 this year. i'm john berman for "nightline" in new york. >> back in black. the complete fortune 500 list will be revealed online tomorrow morning. thanks to john for that. hope you watch

this morning we were lecturing the entire country on -- >> aig has collateral. they have assets.ory. >> nobody's going to care. it's another bailout. with no legislation. the hill's going to go -- the country is going to go crazy. >> the plane that we flew in on this morning leased from aig. construction downtown aig. life insurance, 81 million policies with a face value of $1.9 trillion. billions of dollars in teacher's pensions. you want too big to fail, here it is. >> jimmy: well, there you go. congratulations. that's awesome. it's been -- i mean, must be great for you because you're on a sitcom and you're kind of a kid actor -- was "that '70s show" the first thing -- >> yes the first pig thing i did. i did commercials when i was a kid. >> jimmy: you did? what sorts did you do? >> really embarrassing commercials that have not found their way onto youtube. >> jimmy: well, yeah that's interesting, because we did find a commercial that you are in as a kid. do you mind if i -- >> yes i do mind. >> jimmy: you do mind. >> i'm going to kill you. >> jimmy: all right, well let's take a

de fuego los soldados norteamericano mataron a bin laden y tomaron custodia de su cadáver divulgaba aigshoras después el asesor de seguridad del presidente afirmó que bin laden había participado en dicho tiroteo y que por eso lo mataron y que había usado a una esposa como escudo humano, su versión no sesos tuvo ni 24 horas el martes el portavoz de casa blanca lo cambio, dijo que bin la dwen ni iba armado ni utilizó una mujer como escudo, también leyó una versión en que decía que el hecho que no esfuerzo viera armado no significa que no hubiese ofrecido5óhÑ resistenci cuando preguntaron cómo un hombre desarmado pone resistencia a un grupo elite militar, remo tío e a los periodista al departamento de defensa pero el pentágono no quiere hablar del tema. en pakistán una hija de bin laden que asegura haber presenciado los hechos, dicen que su padre no ofreció resistencia si no, que loe jec tarn ante su familia, ante el cúmulo de contradicción la casa blanca está a la defensiva que estas discrepancias se deben a la rap dado de la operación militar y el deseo de informar al público cuan to ante

$29 a share, that's pennies a share more than the government needs to recoup the money it put into aig when the insurance company was just hours from failing during the financial crisis. when this week's sale closes, the government will still own 77% of aig. >>> let's check in on wall street where we start thety today, a little bit of a loss yesterday for all three of our main indexes. right now i'm checking in on europe and they're all down, but just slightly. the debt across europe this morning. we'll look to see what could happen and affect our numbers as we get close to the opening bell. cost coreported a god quarterly result. this morning, crude oil prices dipped below $99 a barrel. investors say prices slip on signs of weakening demand for gasoline and the u.s. that comes as we head into the travel season creating concerns as the five continue to pile up. oil has dropped from a 30 month high of $115 a barrel at the beginning of this month. >>> all right, our time is now 5:21, waking up a freeman. east bay professor landed in jail in his native nigeria after disputed election. >>>

. >> i a rather like aig the insurance giant, bng too big toail? is it too muchf the truth because it woulde to much -- to embarrsing >> i tnk tre is truth in that. e americans want tose the prsure there are people in congress saying, w have given an 8 billn. it is time for tm to decide whe si they are on urea -- ose de they are on. there is going to be pressure. on t oer hand. there licy makers is a comic you have tundetand -- al-qaeda is brilliant and ey got it right. others e this as a t's ples you attack theld enemy india. -- aat's ploy t attack the oldnemyindia. >> thank you vy mu. the european union has annoced its imposg anrms embargo on sia and sanctions on3 senior officia, bunothing prident asad. western burb of dascu is the latest area to be sealed off. and with ts, hvy shooting. foren journalists a banned from goi toyria, so our corrpondent monitored the event fm the ritz. -- beit. >> informatn is sketchy. this amateur video, rertedo show tops and the eratn undeway. shooting w hea. uncfirm reports th a 12 year-old blake was kill. e ar co

unloaded a big chunk of its stake in bailed out insurer aig, $8.7 billion worth, including a small profit. >>> finally, the newly crowned duchess of cambridge is officially a hot commodity. but command for the $285 beige dress kate wore to greet the obamas at buckingham palace yesterday crashed the designer's website. it is a fantastic dress. >>> coming up, the canadian team will have a chance to win the cup. a walk-off homer for the os and a ninth inning come back in the bronx. >>> plus, lebron outpaced the man who replaced him as the league's mvp. your early morning sports headlines are straight ahead. >>> once again, possible tornados in the middle of the country are stealing all the headlines. your forecast is coming up. you're watching "early today." >>> good morning. if you're just waking up, this is "early today." in sports, last night, lebron james played some defense and helped move the heat to one win away from a place in the nba finals. here's nbc's fred roggin with an early look at all your sports headlines. >>> good morning. and like it or not, the miami heat, one win away fr

after the bell, bailed out insurer aig reported first quarter losses after paying back $2.4 billion itorrowed more than two years ago. after hours, visa jumped a healthy profit with increased card use at home and abroad. kraft reported better than expected first quarter profit and lowered its full year forecast. finally, how about giving moment a piece of movie history for mother's day. the chicago area where macaulay culkin made movie history in "home alone" is now on the market for $274 million. >>> a big nba playoff suspension, vancouver is on the verge and a pitcher goes nuts when he hits a home run even though it was only in batting practice. >>> plus, a revived lance bergman gives new life to baseball's red birds. your early morning sports headlines are straight ahead. >>> your weekend forecast is coming up and, of course, the all-important mother's day forecast. you're watching "early today." >>> good morning. if you're just waking up, this is "early today." in sports, once again the los angeles lakers ron artest has gone too far and both he and his team are going to pay for it

the treasury department owns 92% of aig and is expected to sell down at least 15% of that which couldaise as much as $6 billion. checking in on the numbers pretty quiet actually on wall street. slight gains following european's lead and asia market's lead with some slight gains. we have some housing news coming out in just a bit. that could send the market in either direction. >>> delta airlines and u.s. airways are trying again to swap some of their takeoff and landing rights at two major east coast airports. delta wants to give u.s. airways more than $66 million and 42 slots at reagan national airport in washington d.c. in exchange delta would get 132 takeoff and landing spots at la guardia airport in new york. so could effect travel. >> interesting. >>> time now 6:52. as expected lawyers are now involved. what they're saying about the case involving that bakersfield woman, arnold schwarzenegger and their out of wedlock baby. >>> silicon valley getting a new area code. but how it's going to happen is now a question. >>> good morning. 680 traffic moving well heading south. we'll tell

they started to keep or to monster like aig. so many miscarriages and. rape like fetuses and. my mom has seven miscarriage and one time she had a baby that looked like a crate and that made me stand but i have a abuses or it is an alien or is not even a human being. in december two thousand and five the marshallese presented the american government pictures of deformed babies born with gray hair and without ears a baby survived for only a few weeks the abnormal births you've seen photographs of of recent children i don't know that those can be attributed to any exposure and no one is investigating to find out are they in general radiogenic or are they caused by something else that's a question that may well remain unanswered. i am part of a program that the department of energy is involved in the department of energy is part of the u.s. government and so the medical program provides ongoing monitoring for radiation related of this for the people around the lab and you do it if you have one this is about break i mean yes birth defects now. it's about getting into me and it is a

the bottom three aig, bp and goldman sachs. >>> three years after a deadly tiger attack, the new plans to bring back the big cat exhibit at the san francisco zoo coming up. >> and osama's capture hollywood style. the hollywood director who wants to take it to the big screen. ,,,,,,,,,,,, be back over southern california's santa catalina island this morning. a fire that started behi >>> firefighting helicopters will be back over the santa catalina island this morning. a fire that started behind the yacht club has burned about 40 acres since yesterday afternoon. right now it's 30% contained. local fire crews protected some threatened buildings. more firefighters being dispatched to the island by barge. >>> we are just learning that some missing boy scouts were arkansas may have been found this morning. a helicopter crew spotted some people around a campfire in the area where six boys and two adult leaders are apparently stranded by high floodwaters. they were reported missing sunday night. scouts are in the same area where flash floods killed 20 campers last summer. >>> quite a storm the

the government may see some cash from its stake in aig this week. the treasury department will sell 200 million shares of the insurance giant it was forced to bail out in 2008. based on the share price, they should squeeze out a narrow profit, but even after the transaction is complete, the government will still own 77% of the company. >>> americans are doing a better job of paying off their plastic, according to the credit agency transunion, late payments on credit cards fell in the first quarter to their lowest level in 15 years. the average debt per person also dropped to just shy of $4,700, down 9% from a year ago. >>> if caffeine doesn't give you a jolt, the cost of your morning joe might. the maker of folgers and prepacked dunkin' donuts coffee has announced its fourth increase this year. kraft and starbucks also hiked prices recently. all blame supply and demand as the world drinks more java. >>> and another reason to hate your morning commute turns out it could be bad for your relationship. a study out of sweden finds a commute of 45 minutes

tuesday aig is expected to price the shares of its re-ipo. this is the first step in the government extricating itself from the company that received more federal bailout dollars than any other. thursday we get the second reading of first quarter gross domestic product, currently showing a growth rate of less than 2%. and on friday, the figures of total personal income and spend willing be out, as well as the university of michigan's latest reading on consumer sentiment. >>> finally today, i was honored to be the commencement speaker at st. john's university in new york this week, where i received an honorary doctorate degree. as 350 graduates begin to make their way in the world. >> life begins now. fight for your happiness. it's your life. own it. congratulations to the class of 2011! >> my bring attended st. john's. so being a part of the day for the red storm was really like coming home for me. my thanks to st. john's university. that's it for the show today. thank you so much for being with me. my guest next week noted investor mario gab

they are quick to separate themselves from aig. they're injected $182 billion to rescue the company in 2008. opening bell and 18 minutes. markets are mixed. strange days with the dow. the labor department vote short of expectations. general motors is putting out automakers wanted sign. and google is taking an on-line advertising system that is facing at u.s. government investigation that could cause the search leader $500 million. >>darya: the tsunami in japan took its toll and how good. the it is in its quarterly profit has gone down more than 75%. car production has been disrupted. but the forecast to the fiscal year of march 2012 citing an uncertain about look. meanwhile plato will likely returned to that number. earlier than first expected. on now 6:13 a.m. back to more. >>mark: they are trying to ease the pressure in the mississippi and send that water raging into the lake. 60 gates opened to direct the water out of this will in mississippi. in the mississippi delta crops have been washed away. thousands of people are fleeing

the giant insurer, aig, yesterday sold its first new stock offering since the government stepped in to prevent its collapse two and a half years ago. the treasury department made a small profit on the sale but still owns more than three-fourths of the company. >>> asian markets are lower because of sagging exports from japan and europe's debt crisis. tokyo's nikkei average lost half a percent today, the hang seng also down and in london, the ftse opened slightly higher. and on wall street, dow off a fraction yesterday, as was the nasdaq index. >>> new reports say former imf chief dominique strauss-kahn could receive a $250,000 severance paid partly by taxpayer. facing several sexual assault charges here in new york city and members of congress looking for ways to block strauss-kahn from receiving that money. >>> and big day at ground zero. magazine publisher conde nast set to sign a lease for the main building called one world trade center.r lease valued at the 25-year lease valued at $2 billion. the company plans to move 5,000 workers into the building. >>> this is tough news on these

would be higher and that that was for instance as a bankruptcy of lehman in two thousand and eight with aig. economies that this is all this a team that toppling the world's leading comes of the worst possible time this is not just the end of a career calm was instrumental in risking the uro's of most troubled states is a risk to seem to threaten the end of the euro itself r.t. . for the resignation of comics nascar has put the global financial community in a spin economic sound geopolitics right adrian subletting says his downfall welding rel plans to use alternatives to u.s. daughter as reserve currencies is having left its international wallop to her if she dramatic way shows that the powers that be were not very happy with mr stiles was promoting the special drawing rights which in a way part of the mechanism that would make the dollar suffer i think that we are going to see that whoever find we have a helm at the i.m.f. will keep away from him he struck too strongly participation in doing away with the us dollar in other words the u.s. dollar needs to be the key currency and anything w

measures nationwide protests in spain the country agreement to be next in line for a bailout to save aig. legal process against the now former head of the international monetary fund but even more stress on the e.u. tried heavily on support for many strands. last the russian president's visit away from confirming a reelection bid in which during an unprecedented cubase session with hundreds of journalists. here watching artie's we continue to feel welcome to the program but first an angry and government demonstrations sweeping spain afterthoughts is lost the battle to impose a ban on public protests countries are voting in regional elections today with the ruling socialists expected to suffer major losses but tens of thousands of people ok part of central square grid similar protests have sprung up in other cities as the country struggles to overcome the session do you record high unemployment and ses there first reports it's crumbling economy spain next tonight from rescue. that's greece then. and now portugal as the u.a.e. things play out. there are now serious concerns that spain coul

you don't have to sub is itize us like you do gm or aig. we're very profitable, we're very successful. but it does make sense for the government to go the extra mile on all these areas so that we can continue to build out domestically versus going overseas. >> host: peter cleveland, let's talk about tax rates. one of the issues is the foreign tax rate versus the american tax rate. what would intel like to have done with the tax system? >> guest: we'd like statutory rates to come down so that we can compete more effectively. oecd countries, many, many foreign nations have a much lower statutory tax rate. they have a much lower effective, marginal rate of taxation as well. we recognize there will be a trade-off. if you reduce those rates, then tax loopholes or expendtures as they're called, some will have to be closed. and that may, may not benefit us. but overall we want to compete against semiconductor companies in korea and elsewhere. we beat the competition right now. we're first class, we're number one, but tax rates are crucial. so as p

debt limit increases your choices are yes we're tapping the pensions of federal workers to prevent aig a lot economic calamity or no republicans are demanding that everything should be on the table except for what actually can fix this raising taxes so far over sixty percent of you voted no. log on to thom hartmann dot com and let us know what you think the poll we open until tomorrow morning. coming out it pays to know people at high places especially if you're a cheating senator governor or a well known politician after the break our men in power flexing their authority to silence their extra curricular activity. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so. you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else if you're see some other part of it and realized everything you saw you don't i'm sorry is a big. earlier this month that is senator john ensign resigned from his seat rather than testify under oath before a senate ethics committee about his affair with a staffer and hush money paid to keep that affair a secret and even though ensign is out of politics the sord

question about it but that could only do so much their game is almost over and we're seeing it with aig and with mainstream guys like forbes waking up and finally saying something has to change so gerald you're saying the fed game is almost over are you saying that the fed is going to collapse sometimes then oh no no i'm saying with the fed can't do anymore they're running out of cards to play christina they they can't lower interest rates anymore they're near zero they try to q e three game again the dollar crashes you know this is what people feel god and i was talking with you. i believe when it happened when you brought me on the day that bernanke gave that historic press conference the first is there ninety eight year history by the time he left the stage gold prices went up twenty dollars an ounce silver prices went up two dollars an ounce and you pointed out that the trade weighted basket of currencies against the dollar fell to three year lows out of games but the next day when this is what people have to understand is the next day is they take you to war we've seen this play ou

selling 300 million shares of aig. if the government could make 7.1 billion.will drop their ownership stake from 92 percent down to 77 percent. chrysler has repaid 7.6 billion in loans it received from the u.s. government and canada. 6 billion from the u.s. government. it has paid most of its bailout money. the u.s. treasury still parked owns 6.6 percent of chrysler. the number of costco members are increasing. the nation's biggest wholesale club has been a top performer during a down economy. earnings of $324 million for the quarter. that is up from three and 6 million a year ago. tickets >>: and national news, and george lauder is going to appear in court for hearings on whether he's competent to stand trial for the shooting that critically wounded congresswoman gabby giffords. this is video from the scene that happened in january. six people were killed in the attack. often spends five weeks getting a mental >>: and brian and david mitchell faces life in prison before conducting an essentially a veteran of elizabeth smart. smart says she plans to be in the

stock futures are mixed. [ bell ringing ] >> kristen: aig and government is offering to buy 300 million-- offering 300 million shares. >> eric: right now they are investigating a shooting at san jose university that left three people dead. >> reporter: the shooting happened here at this garage between ninth and tenth and san fernando. i talked to folks that did not want to go on camera but 10-20 minutes before this shooting there was a brawl at washington elementary school. two people i talked to were playing soccer and a brawl broke out and people were stabbed immaterial told. these two people were interviewed by san jose police. they gave them a report and they came down here, 10-20 minutes. whether they are connected. san jose police are not saying. take a look at the cleanup on that bent on until 5:00 this morning. they were trying to remove the blood from the concrete at the parking garage. san jose police quoted as saying that all three people are dead including the gunman. they are not saying much about it. it's not random. it's not gang-related and not a drive-by. it is isolated

treasury selling the aig shares at $29 each, above the price the government needs to get its money backut of the insurer in the crisis. a lower close yesterday in spite of the good news on the housing market, we have a dismal report on manufacturering from the fed. that put a damper on things. where would you rather go with the newlywed? beach or big city? the continental u.s. beat out caribbean as destination of choice with growing number of honeymooners heading to las vegas, san francisco, and disney world instead. i'm jane king with the bloomberg business report. . >>> there are reports that a source close to home leaked the information that led to stories about arnold schwarzenegger's love child. website tmz says schwarzenegger's estranged wife maria shriver was the source of the information that the former california governor fathered a child with a family housekeeper. another website radar online says shriver hired a private detective to find out if schwarzenegger has any more kids born out of wedlock. >>> today, a free-fingerprint your child event is held in presidio as part of t

overall, most of the money from the t.a.r.p., absent aig, has been now paid back with profits and with interest. but that -- and everybody says t.a.r.p. was a brilliant idea and hip, hip, hooray. but the recession that came as a result of the crisis was so bad that so many other costs -- detroit had been allowed to go to the wall. the unemployment benefit, the health care costs, all the attendant costs that would have gone with that would have dwarfed, dwarfed the seed capital that went to chrysler. >> that is far too nuanced a way of looking at things, richard. parsing it all together and seeing how it fits into the big picture. a new research shows that billions in stimulus funds went to contractors that owe the government $757 million in back taxes. about 5% of all contractors who got stimulus money are now delinquent on their taxes. these are the projects designed to build roads, create jobs. chrystia, do you think taxpayers got a raw deal on this? >> sure n these specific instances, absolutely. having said that, on balance, was the stimulus a bad idea? no, absolutely not. and if y

aig is one of them, but just one. it was going to take a lot of resources and politically terrible to go through it. but nothing was possible unless we did that. as you know, we laid out a broad financial strategy that people didn't regard with much affection and enthusiasm at the moment. it was an excellent strategy. we did everything that we said we were going to do. it had a huge impact in turning things around. that was not evident at the time immediately. and he did as you would expect. he did this all the time with us. he check in how are things going? and he'd ask me are you competent this is going to work? and that's the tough question. because, you know, if you look -- i said this, if you look back, took economist 60 years to figure out what caused the great depression, what was the lesson from that policy during that time? i said nothing is certain in life. but i'm very confident the strategy is better than the alternative strategies. it's the best chance for working. but that's an example of the question. >

effect as i described in the book and in this book of putting their stearns out of business, putting aig out of business they would have gone out of business any way the exacerbated the decline of all of their competitors. so if you can imagine goldman put on the street in the december of 2016 period that made them billions of dollars at the same time it put all the counterparties and competitors out of business. ruffles and devastating on another and cost us, all of us taxpayers trillions of dollars to rectify. >> host: people have raised problems with this proprietary trading things as you are seeing. it would have been better off letting that i am letting at collapse in the financial crisis. have we really resolved this issue as a nation? >> guest: this issue is not resolved, the local rule has supposedly made proprietary trading or some parts of the proprietary trading. now in truth, the guys that came up with this idea for the bet against the mortgage market , this proprietary trading 2006 was three or four guys on the mortgage desk. >> host: and they seem to borrow heavily from the

government has a stake in -- general motors, chrysler, fannie, freddie, aig, on and on -- it only adds up to 1.3% of the private economy. not 51%. 1.3%. >> well, the numbers that i had gotten were ones that i had read from a professor of economics that said we were over 51%. that was something that was reported in the investors business daily. that was my source for that comment. i stand by that source that i cited at the time. the previous question that you had -- >> chris: gangster government. >> yes, i think it is gangster government when you have president obama taking away the property rights of the secured preferred bondholders of chrysler and essentially giving their private property interest to the union interest in chrysler. we had over 3400 pink slips given to dealerships across america by the automobile task force. these are privately owned and held automobile dealerships. the federal government pulled the rug out from under those dealerships and essentially took away their private property interest. that's a gangster government when government makes the decision, as opposed

short on, lowered their marks, made a ton of money and the effect on the book, putting bear stearns, aig, they would have been got out of business anyway. as i say, they exacerbated the decline of all of their competitors. goldman put on the trade in the december of 2006 time period that made them billions of dollars at the same time, put all of the counterparties and competitors out of business. i mean i'm sure they didn't start out doing that. but that was the affect that this trade had. brilliant on the one hand. but ruthless and devastating on another. and cost us, you know, all of us taxpayers trillions of dollars to rectify. >> host: well, a number of people have raised problems with this proprietary trading thing as you are saying. you look back and wonder if they wouldn't have been better off just letting that die, letting it collapse with the crisis -- in the financial crisis. have we really resolved this issue? as a nation? >> guest: this issue is not resolved. you know, the volcker rule has supposedly made proprietary trading or some parts unlawful now. goldman make the argume

there are a lot of people really questioning that one and questioning why no officials from aig, the insurance company, were held accountable. people are also looking at the banks that failed like washington mutual, lehman brothers, and they wonder if there was anyone there who really saw the whole picture, masterminded this canute's some things and should have told the public. -- it masterminded this and knew some things. was this criminal, was this recklessness, was this stupidity? host: louise story has a master's from yale. she is a business reporter with "the york times" and is with us from new york this morning. our next call from michigan, on our line for democrats. go ahead. ed? caller: can you hear me? host: go ahead. caller: the savings-and-loan trouble started in 1985 during the reagan administration. james baker, i believe, was secretary of the treasury. he left and appointed a woman. he went down to texas working on his friend george h. w. bush's campaign. the taxpayers pay the in the billions. the taxpayers got stuck for something started by the banks. am i correct abou

they began to sell its stock in aig.n that although bailout for chrysler, this is the story on the detroit news website about michigan. it says, suvs saved chrysler. it is hardly off the debt cut, but it is refinancing its debt with private rather than public debt holders. the story goes on to say that suvs is what saved chrysler. that compared with this headline on the detroit news website. white house says no more full- size vehicles unless it is essential. let's go back to our phone lines and the question here this morning -- should public schools be charging fees? thomas of democrat and baltimore. caller: people putting down extracurricular activities are wrong. we should let people play in sports and everything. it is very good for their self- esteem and meaning that, as well as the cost of the education. we can spend billions of dollars on israel, our ally, but we cannot send any more to educate our own children in this country? host: this is the front page story of the "new york times," well, it is inside the news

they think about this the weeks of the failure of lehman and aig and all of that.tember, you know, it really was a gathering storm. a huge amount of momentum behind it. the world was shifting very, very quickly into recession. you know, the u.s. economy was falling in the fourth quarter with an annual rate of almost 6% a year. so a huge amount of momentum behind it. and that was threatening to engulf, you know, the strong institutions of the world. large companies, not just large banks. and that was a very grave -- a very grave moment. i think none of us new at that point. it was grave in part because we came into that crisis with in fact basic tools governments need to, you know, draw a circle around a firebreak around the failing firms and prevent the fire from jumping. we had none of those basic tools and that's what made it so dangerous. and again, that's another reason why, i think, with the reform act we're in a much better position to continue things because now we can force institutions to hold more capital against risk and when they make mistakes, we can m

you that good news this week between stock sales and aig, payback by chrysler. 75% of the money invested in the bailout has been paid back. at the time you're making those calls, did you think that was possible or impossible? >> possible but plausible. if you think back to the fall of '08, there's a broad-based run on the entire american financial system. it was really falling off a cliff. at that point nobody would have thought, there would be the prospect of where we are today. it's not just that we've gotten so much of the money back so quickly, but you have an automobile industry that is profitable now, restructured, much stronger, leading the sort of comeback of american manufacturing. into the financial system today that is much, much stronger, dramatically restructured. weakest part is gone, much more capital, much safer, much more stable. and we achieved that, i think ultimately it will be a very, very, very small ultimate cost to taxpayers. much, much smaller than anybody predicted. much smaller than the cost crisis, across the u.s. economy, at about three times gdp. so i think

i think looking over the costs here, two or three years, and aig and all of the things, we do need the government to be watching these companies. you know, we just really got stripped by all of these big companies. i feel like the oil companies are doing the same thing. they are making a lot, a lot of money, and they can set the price whatever they want. guest: first of all, bless you for being polite. i appreciate your kindness. i agree with you on a i g. this credit default swap business, derivatives, very few people in the congress understand what they were trying to do, but we did understand that when you work leveraging $1 100 times, if something goes wrong with your model, you are in real trouble. the people who picked up the pieces were the american taxpayer when we had to put all of our money into those companies to keep them from freezing up. i said less government. i did not say no government. there is a need for government oversight and regulation. it should be done in a way that allows individuals to have a reasonable opportunity to create products and services that they ca

government would legalized competition in the mortgage industry and congress would sell government shares in aige largest insurance company in america as well as chrysler, general motors, bank of america, and citi. it is time to get out of the private industry. [applause] uncle sam with then legalized private student lending. imagine that? that would end the federal government's and vall met. obamacare would be repealed and in its place congress would allow americans to published -- to purchase any health insurance policy they want in any state they want with no minimum mandates, using your own tax-$3, allowing all americans to deduct their costs on their individual tax returns. that is it. you can get thaall done in about 18 pages and we are there. the epa would then be subject to a full review and would downsize their mission focused on conservation, safe air, air, and water. no cap and trade, not now, not ever. [applause] congress would then legalize american energy production in natural gas, hydro, wind, solar. hamsters running on a case. all of us with public safety requirements a all witho

nominees for these important positions are blocked it will increase the likelihood we have another aig or lehman brothers and i urge everyone to remember what happened to the financial system of the economy three years ago and it's a serious business and shouldn't be so politicized the to block the nominee for nominee after nominee. and the panel agrees with that and i'm sorry my colleagues are not here to at least discuss this and think clearly through what actually can happen. my question for deputy secretary wolin u.s about the financial crisis in large part necessitated by the shadow banking complex initiated by the wall street firms that typically sell outside of the scope of regulation, the designation of the systemically important financial institutions as opposed to address this problem. i want to agree with senator toomey's comments and questions to each of you the council proposed rule seems like reflection, not an aberration or a road map of what is systemically important. it's not clear to me, and i guess from the answers to his questions from you at what point a large hedg

nominees for these important positions are blocked it will increase the likelihood we have another aig or lehman brothers and i urge everyone to remember what happened to the financial system of the economy three years ago and it's a serious business and shouldn't be so politicized the to block the nominee for nominee after nominee. and the panel agrees with that and i'm sorry my colleagues are not here to at least discuss this and think clearly through what actually can happen. my question for deputy secretary wolin u.s about the financial crisis in large part necessitated by the shadow banking complex initiated by the wall street firms that typically sell outside of the scope of regulation, the designation of the systemically important financial institutions as opposed to address this problem. i want to agree with senator toomey's comments and questions to each of you the council proposed rule seems like reflection, not an aberration or a road map of what is systemically important. it's not clear to me, and i guess from the answers to his questions from you at what point a large hedg

which iieve believe is utterly wrong and his questionable decisions with an outside consultant for aig big insurance company that had to be bailed out to the tune of i think $170 billion in this last bailout manner. he was anla independent consultt supposed to be monitoring that company for other errors they had made previously. and, that is a concern to me. ys i serve 15 years in the department o ifde justice as yof a attorney for almost 12, and aa an assistant united statesis attorney. i respect thee department. department. i love the department of justice but i am getting concerned about it.bo and i'm notut happy with some of the decisions and philosophies that are emanating from the department. i believe they do not reflect the highest standards and quality that we expect from that great department and this nominee has a lot of good aoo qualities. i believe he has a number of strengths that as management and some experience in his department that i would give hir credit for, but at this point in history, i believe that his approach particularly to the war on terror, along with the

aig was one of them and was going to take a lot of resources and it was going to be politically terrible to go through it. but nothing was possible unless we did that. and then as you know we laid out a broad financial strategy that people didn't regard with much affection and enthusiasm at the moment. but it was an excellent strategy. we did everything we said we're going to do. and it ain't a huge impact in turning things around. that was not evident at the time. immediately. and he did as you would expect. he ask him and he did this all the time. he would check and how are things going? and he would ask me are you confident this will work. and that's a tough question because you know, if you look back it took economist 60 years to figure out what caused the great depression, what made welcome what was the lesson from that period of time. so i said to mr. president, nothing is certain in life but i'm very confident that strategy is better than the alternative strategies as the best chance for working. but that's an example. >> in august you're going to be 50. how are you going to celeb

nominees for these important positions are blocked it will increase the likelihood we have another aig or lehman brothers and i urge everyone to remember what happened to the financial system of the economy three years ago and it's a serious business and shouldn't be so politicized the to block the nominee for nominee after nominee. and the panel agrees with that and i'm sorry my colleagues are not here to at least discuss this and think clearly through what actually can happen. my question for deputy secretary wolin u.s about the financial crisis in large part necessitated by the shadow banking complex initiated by the wall street firms that typically sell outside of the scope of regulation, the designation of the systemically important financial institutions as opposed to address this problem. i want to agree with senator toomey's comments and questions to each of you the council proposed rule seems like reflection, not an aberration or a road map of what is systemically important. it's not clear to me, and i guess from the answers to his questions from you at what point a large hedg