alan greenspan did. the federal reserve chairman is the most highly empowered, most unaccountable economic czar on planet earth. it's better than economic czar. he is master of the universe. well, the rest is history. an 18 year run as chairman. seems like it was okay for a while. a lot of bad things happen on his watch. it seemed like he always bailed us out. i remember seeing him on the cover of "time" magazine where the title is chairman of the committee saves the world. you see a shriveled little man who was wearing a sign saying broken. 85 years old, mind you still totally there. his spirit isn't there. easy broken man. but i would be broken, too, if i was all before congressman henry waxman. have you ever seen henry waxman? this guy looks like a combination of the original phantom of the opera with lon chaney senior and mortimer's nerd. waxman growth greenspan. i have to admit that all that self interest stuff, all the virtue of selfishness tough, all that self-regulation stuff didn't work very wel

forman chairman of the federal reserve, alan greenspan. and the rest of the panel, the focus? with the economy the way it is, how will it affect the race for the white house. >> with us, msnbcs rachel maddow and alex castellanos. first, the washington debate over jobs, growth and the economy. what can government do? the toxic debt debate, does america trust their leaders to make the tough choices ahead? with us, two former presidential nominees for their party, senator john kerry, democrat of massachusetts and senator john mccain, republican of arizona. captions paid for by nbc-universal television >>> good morning. all eyes will be on the stock market tomorrow after the s&ps downgrade for america's credit rating. the ratings agency called the outlook negative signaling another downgrade is possible in 12 to 18 months. the white house and treasury is critical of the move. this weekend, the nation is coming to grips with another story. the horrific loss of u.s. soldiers in afghanistan. saturday, insurgents shot down american helicopters killing 30 u.s. soldiers, some from the s

joining me now, host of "rachel maddow show" rachel maddow, alan greenspan and austan goolsbee.lcome to all. i want to start on this side of the table, chairman greenspan, the markets tomorrow. how are they going to view this downgrade of america's credit rating? >> it's difficult to say. the only test we have at the moment is the israeli market, which is open today. it has tanked. the problem i have with that, however, is that there are riots -- not riots, real significant protests within israel at the moment. so i can't tell whether it is one or the other. but considering the momentum at which the market went down over the last week, it's very unlikely, if history is any guide that this isn't going to take a while to bottom out. so the initial reaction, in my judgment, is going to be negative. >> are u.s. treasury bonds safe to invest in? >> very much so. i think there's a -- this is not an issue of credit rating. the united states can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. there is zero probability of default. what i think the s&p did was to hit a n

alan greenspan did. federal reserve chairman is the most highly empowered, most unaccountable economic czar on the planet earth. it is better than economics. economics. is master of the universe and an ayn rand accolade got that job. the rest is history. he had an 18 year run as chairman. seemed like it was okay for a while. a lot of bad things happened on his watch. it seemed he always bailed us out. i remember seeing him on the cover of "time" magazine where the headline was chairman of the save the world committee. i met greenspan recently in washington and let me tell you what happens when you go into his office in washington to meet alan greenspan. you see a shriveled little man who was wearing a sign saying, broken. he is 85 years old. his mind is still totally there. his spirit isn't there. he is the broke and man. i would be broken too t if i was hauled before congressman henry waxman. have you ever seen henry waxman? this guy looks like a combination of the original phantom of the opera with rod

one about alan greenspan and one about ralph nader. he lives in forest hills gardens in a beautiful place in queens and was designed by olmstead's sun. >> frederick law olmstead junior. >> difficult to be more casual. not charlie. anyway, it is fun to be here and write off the bat i was a little surprised to see that you were -- had written these books about ralph nader and alan greenspan who are controversial in their day and time and still alive and kicking. then you pick olmstead who was pretty well thought of -- by the time he died, an interesting guy. what made you move from one to the other? what do they have in common? >> what made me move into olmstead was i felt as the new yorker like central park or manhattan, mike, yard with so many new yorkers and i started to get a deep appreciation for the park. i had a friend who became a tour guide and i moved to forced hills gardens and felt like my next subject was staring me in the face. as far as -- it does connect in a strange way to alan greenspan and ralph nader. i like subjects

alan greenspan did.he federal reserve chairman is the most highly empowered, most unaccountable economic czar on the planet earth. it is better than economics. economics. is master of the universe and an ayn rand accolade got that job. the rest is history. he had an 18 year run as chairman. seemed like it was okay for a while. a lot of bad things happened on his watch. it seemed he always bailed us out. i remember seeing him on the cover of "time" magazine where the headline was chairman of the save the world committee. i met greenspan recently in washington and let me tell you what happens when you go into his office in washington to meet alan greenspan. you see a shriveled little man who was wearing a sign saying, broken. he is 85 years old. his mind is still totally there. his spirit isn't there. he is the broke and man. i would be broken too t if i was hauled before congressman henry waxman. have you ever seen henry waxman? this guy looks like a combination of the original phantom of the opera with r

it's really is just as much their fault as it is alan greenspan's or bernanke ngs. well a couple of things i would say first i would agree with what was just said the fed caused the current economic troubles by inflating the housing bubble and i also agree that the european central bank even though theoretically they have a good single mandate price stability these indirect bailouts they're doing are reprehensible but my main point is that franklin delano roosevelt extended and exacerbated and worsened the great depression with all of his spending the higher tax rates more government intervention i mean hoover and roosevelt between them were two terrible presidents that kept the economy in the dumps for a long time now the only good thing i can say about the current political situation is that we do have gridlock because gridlock at least stops politicians from doing additional stupid things now and the long run gregg lock is a problem because we had desperately need to fix these entitlement programs this giant un kind of liability that the politicians have given us

and if you look at alan greenspan he clearly caused the housing. inflating the economy by keeping rates artificially low and i don't think this enter banks have done a lot of gods since inception of the federal reserve has and i love i don't see united states or clearly a lot of the blame. should be going to them on the other hands on now or as we are already seeing this very high debt bar and clearly there needs to be some other political solution because i don't think there's any is a grade to fix it as a mention apart from some form of debt restructuring but one point that was made earlier i don't want to comment on also though is that the european central bank is any better than the federal reserve in my opinion clearly that's not the case at all the moment ruining the eurozone but bailing out every eurozone country they can find in every bank left and right is they're desperate again records amount of italian debt spanish that italy is sitting on two trillion euros of that person no it's absolutely impossible even if germany was going to spend

has the ability to print money print dollars to pay them as former federal reserve chairman alan greenspan was happy to point out. this is not. true probably group of the four. speaking of printing money let's look at the big picture too because there is a lot going on in the world right now beyond the downgrade of the european central bank said that they will print money and will intervene more aggressively to protect italy and spain which are suffering from crippling sovereign debt crises as well so with europe and the u.s. seeming to look more like what someone called a race between two cripples it may be no surprise that people are saying i don't want to play getting out of the market and putting our money into places like gold which surged to more than seventeen hundred dollars an ounce today and maybe the bigger question that we all should be asking is where is the country and the global economy heading to look forward i want to first look back i want to go back to two thousand and eight when the u.s. government was bailing out the financial system at the time look at this concern co

has the ability to print money to pay them as former federal reserve chairman alan greenspan pointed out. because from. a profit group of the fools it's pretty simple you would know he was at the fed and speaking of printing money let's look at the bigger picture the european central bank said they will do just that print money and intervene more aggressively to protect italy and spain facing actual debt crises so with europe and the u.s. both seeming to look more like what someone called a race between two cripples it may be no surprise that people are saying i don't want to play getting out of the stock market putting their money in gold which surged more than seventeen hundred dollars an ounce today closed more than that and we get a bigger question to be asking that we should all be discussing is where is the country and the global economy heading to look forward i want to first look back to two thousand and eight when he was government was bailing out the financial system and there were concerns at the time listen this one from congressman ron paul. my sincere conviction by doin

unimpeachable story on monetary policy issues alan greenspan because he was caught recently as well saying something that maybe it's just this is from sunday maybe should have been off the record there's a mainstream media hasn't been quick to point this out obama hasn't been quick to point this out in any of the recent coverage let's hear what alan greenspan. is not . the united states. and he. has been. one of the. few rule probably of the four zero probability of the fall would have undercut all of the propaganda but also just so we're clear what he's saying we the united states first of all we the united states the government separate from the people can and will not default or doesn't have to default on any of us because as he said we can always print more money which is to say we can tax it by inflation we can her it's. so what are we doing about reining thing that greenspan failed to mention is that we actually don't have to default because there is enough money in the coffers to parent that we take in ten times that doesn't matter anyway as if they are debt but we can't afford it i

alan greenspan did.e federal reserve chairman is the most highly empowered, most unaccountable economic czar on the planet earth. it is better than economics. economics. is master of the universe and an ayn rand accolade got that job. the rest is history. he had an 18 year run as chairman. seemed like it was okay for a while. a lot of bad things happened on his watch. it seemed he always bailed us out. i remember seeing him on the cover of "time" magazine where the headline was chairman of the save the world committee. i met greenspan recently in washington and let me tell you what happens when you go into his office in washington to meet alan greenspan. you see a shriveled little man who was wearing a sign saying, broken. he is 85 years old. his mind is still totally there. his spirit isn't there. he is the broke and man. i would be broken too t if i was hauled before congressman henry waxman. have you ever seen henry waxman? this guy looks like a combination of the original phantom of the opera with ro

he could be separating himself from alan greenspan but he watched alan greenspan over the weekend when he said we don't have to worry because we can print our own money. how can he be oblivious of the consequences? only two ways interest rates can be affected. one is supply and demand. how much money do the banks have? the other is, when a government or central bank orders what interest rates will be, which will produce more prosperity for everybody, the free market supply and demand, not an order from the central bank. that is what we have today. this will fall down on the people who are exuberant. >>neil: the federal reserve can criminal short-term interest rates and it has in control over market interest rates, in other words, the markets set tone, if they fear the inflation or the spiral that you are worried about, that will be reflected and interest rates will become up although short-term interest rates stay the same so we could have the worst of both worlds. >>judge napolitano: yes, we could and bernanke is trying to absolve himself in the fighter from the consequences of that.

federal reserve chairman alan greenspan said he suspects the stock market to slide and continue. >> considering the momentum at which the market went down over the last week, it is very unlikely, if history is any guide, that this isn't going to take a while to bottom out. so the initial reaction in my judgment, is going to be negative. >> alan: there's still another big issue facing all street. the countries in europe and concerns the global economy is weakening. >>> we have new details emerging this evening about the helicopter crash that killed 30 americans, including 22 navy seals in afghanistan. u.s. officials say the american troops had just completed a rescue mission to assist an army ranger unit that was pinned down. the chinook helicopter similar to this one, had just taken off when it was hit by insurgent fire. everyone onboard, total of 38 people, died. two of the fallen seals worshiped at the same church in virginia. the congregation honored the two today. >> to see the sacrifice their families are making, this further sacrifice hurts us all, shocks us all. >> alan: nato began opera

the united states of america frankly isn't going to default as alan greenspan said. we can print all the money we need in order to present a default, but what we're going to do is destroy the value of the dollar slowly through the federal reserve, and that is how you'll get rid of this thing. but worldwide collapse, john, this is coming about because of two big things -- the united states it looks like is headed into a double-dip recession, and this horrendous crisis in europe from greece to portugal to ireland went to spain and italy and now france. >> eleanor? >> pat has a unique way of grading, saying the tea party is right. they helped bring about the catastrophe of the dote deal we ended up with because it wouldn't go along with the compromises. and it's plummeting in the polls and general reaction to the tea appear is evidence of that. but the president was correct in his in statements to instincts to say something. but look at where the money and the world is going, they're buying u.s. treasuries. the u.s. credit is still good, and that would have deflected fr

alan greenspan said last weekend fundamentally this is not a credit event but a blow to the american psyche. i think the market was processing that on monday. at the same time we've seen declining consumer and business confidence, weakness in europe, in the european banking system. they have their own full blown crisis there. so the market goes down, then it recovers. the fed acts in the middle of the week and ben bernanke said we're going to keep rates low for two years. initially as they were releasing that announcement, first the market went down then it went way up. then the next day, down again. judy: and behind the fed's decision, jackie, it's interesting because they essentially projected two years of a weak economy. they said we're going to keep interest rates low. what cemented that view? it wasn't so long ago the fed was saying we're not sure. >> it's become pretty clear that you're going to have continued high unemployment. we've all known from the beginning pretty much that this was a downturn driven by a financial crisis. they're always slow -- it's slow getting out of t

one about alan greenspan and one about ralph nader. he lives in forest hills gardens in a beautiful place in queens and was designed by olmstead's sun. >> rick. >> we need to be more casual. not charlie. it is fun to be here. i was surprised to see that you were -- had written the book about ralph nader and alan greenspan that were controversial in their day and their time and they are still alive and kicking and then you pick olmstead who was well thought of by the time he died and he was an interesting guy. what made you move from one to the other and what do they have in common? >> what made me move into olmstead was as a new yorker i live in manhattan, mike heinen yard with so many other new yorkers and over time i started to get a deep appreciation for the park. i had a friend who became a tour guide. the move to forced hills gardens and i felt my next subject was staring me in the face. it does connect to alan greenspan and ralph nader. i like to do several things and in the case of greenspan he was a professional jazz musician a

. >> here's former fed chairman alan greenspan giving the downgrade a little more context. >> this is not an issue of credit rating. the united states can pay any debt it has, because we can always print money to do that. so there is zero probability of default. what i think the s&p thing did was to hit a nerve that there's something basically bad going on and it's hit the self-esteem of the united states, the psyche. >> the obama administration's reaction to the decision included some name-calling. >> i think s&p's shown really terrible judgment and they've handled theirselves very poorly and shown a stunning lack of knowledge about basic u.s. fiscal budget math, and i think they've drawn exactly the wrong conclusion from this budget agreement. >> the basic case is they made a $2 trillion math error and forgot to check their work, so the rating agencies that didn't make a $2 trillion math error re-affirmed the aaa status. >> still, behind the scenes, the political reaction for some democrats is grim. politico quotes one senior democratic official saying this, "this is a political the

former fed chairman alan greenspan had this prediction. >> the initial reaction in my judgment is going to be negative. what i think the s&p thing did was to hit a nerve that there is something basically bad going on, and it's hit the self-esteem of the united states, the psyche. >> reporter: s&p officials warned of a one in three chance of another downgrade next year if america's financial position gets worse, or political gridlock becomes more entrenched. and if today was any indication, away any s not goingcc1: time soon. with republicans and democrats still blaming each other. >> this is the tea party of grade because a minoritycc1: people in the house of representatives countered even the will of many republicans in the united states senate. who were prepared to do a bigger deal. >> well, i agree there is dysfunction in our system, and a lot of it has to do with the failure of the president of the lead.1:states to cc >> reporter: for many americans, the big question is when will fasternomy start growingcc1: and adding more jobs. secretary geithner tried to reassure americans that t

as a high speed looting high frequency trading high frequency looting every day goes on the alan greenspan of the world ben bernanke of the world the barack obama's of the world will say well that's how the economy works reading liquidity the system we're making a market but yet when somebody down at the ghetto steals an i pod somehow that's morally abhorrent it's the exact same thing they're morally equivalent you have to decide cameron what kind of society do you want they want to they want to go down a factory path and say there is no society we're just going to kill each other for the available few bucks a quid or do we have some kind of republic or some kind of civilisation but you can't have both you can't have just one set of rules for your friends and another set of rules for the people who aren't from the same school that you want to know because there's two sets of laws there's two sets of rules there's two sets of moral paths that are being managed at the same time and one happens to be controlled by the folks that are doing the stealing and there's not the ghetto kids but georg

host: opponents might say alan greenspan said we have to ease regulation because companies will know not to put themselves at too much risk. they will not go that far, and they did. guest: the financial crisis is a perfect example. why were banks and mortgage bankers making these ridiculous loans? you had a system because of fannie mae and freddie mac where you could make a loan as a banker in the financial sector to somebody and you didn't care what their income was because you know that you could take that loan and packages with similar loans and sell as a mortgage-backed security because fannie mae and freddie mac under regulation had no choice but to buy it. so yes, banks were making stupid decisions, but they did that because the government intervention created the incentive and it was alan greenspan's federal reserve that inflated the housing bubble in the first place. it is an outrage that alan greenspan bears more responsibility for the financial crisis than any other human being and has the gall to shift the responsibility on some canals. host: the morning, george -- good mo

into two wars, put a $7 trillion prescription drug plan on financial pile of our debt, and so alan greenspan testified before the congress in the first weeks of the bush administration saying bush could leave office, with our country debt free. what happened was the reverse. he doubled the debt, walked out with 8 million americans losing jobs. >> the time expired. >> they want to cut the baby in half. we choose not to default. >> the time expired. >> thank you very much. >> at this time, i yield two minutes to the next governor of indiana, my good friend from columbus. >> recognized for two minutes. >> thank you -- [inaudible] >> without objection. >> thank you, mr. speaker. i thank the gentleman for yielding. this is a challenging time in the life of our country. our economy is struggling, millions are out of work, and now with the more than $14 trillion debt, america is on the verge of having debt exceed our statutory rowing limit. if you have debts, pay debts. congress has an obligation to defend the full faith and credit of the united states, but this congress also has an obligation to k

knows as alan greenspan said it warren buffet said they don't have to default they could print but that's worse especially if you're a bond holder and you get paid back with monopoly money and so what this means is that all debt in dollars should be downgraded whether it's treasuries muni's corporates you name it it is pay you back in dollars get rid of it all right now let's talk about the whole rating agency motif you know how they how they have the role that they've claimed in this crisis and what's been going on the last few years because during the lead up to the crisis they document very well in your book crash proof and crash proof two point zero you talk about how the rating agencies were remiss in that they gamed. the riverdance a collateralized debt obligations and these other concatenations bastardizations these securities ations triple a rating so why suddenly did they get religion how did that how that happened because they were they were in god it's funny that the obama administration is saying well why should we listen s. and p. after all they got it so wrong with the subpr

and so alan greenspan in the first weeks of the bush administration, he said, bush could leave office but our country would be entirely debt free. what happened in the reverse was he doubled the debt, walked out with eight million americans losing their jobs. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. fatah: but said to those who wanted -- mr. fattah: but said those who would -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. eier: i said to the next governor of indiana, my friend from columbus. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. pence: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. pence: thank you, mr. speaker. i thank the gentleman for yielding. this is a challenging time in the life of our country. our economy is struggling. millions are out of work, and now with a more than $14 trillion national debt, america's on the verge of having its debts exceed our statutory borrowing limit. now, i recognize if you owe debts pay debts. congress has an obligatio