tim g agrees. is tim g. i would assume would be timothy geithner? >> those are joe price's notes? >> yes. >> i would have to assume with you because they are his notes. >> based on your recollection of what was going on and based on the notes we see from the cfo that was there, fire board of directors if you do it, was that your understanding? >> the -- that was is probably a reference to the conversation i mentioned that i had with secretary paulson. but, again, those are his notes. >> based on your personal recollection, is that your understanding that the board of directors would be let go if this mac clause is invoked? >> i mentioned that i need a license with whether he said could or would, but basically the premise was the management and the board would be removed if in fact we did -- >> including yourself? >> correct. >> so if the suggestion from the federal government was have your job removed as well as the board of directors, can it be looked at any other way other than a threat? >> well, actually, we didn't -- we didn't actually re -- have much of reaction to the commen

tim g agrees. is tim g. i would assume would be timothy geithner? >> those are joe price's notes? >> yes. >> i would have to assume with you because they are his notes. >> based on your recollection of what was going on and based on the notes we see from the cfo that was there, fire board of directors if you do it, was that your understanding? >> the -- that was is probably a reference to the conversation i mentioned that i had with secretary paulson. but, again, those are his notes. >> based on your personal recollection, is that your understanding that the board of

tim g. agrees. i mean it just seems like there's no other explanation here. and i can understand maybe from the smile and what not that you agree but can't say it here. but let me just say, if you learned later on that there was a 12 billion in losses that you didn't know about. it wasn't so much what they said but how they said it, the seriousness of which they explained the need for you to move forward with this merger, if not 12 billion, wheres the threshold that you would have said can't do it? can you enlighten us there a bit? >> i can't. because i dealt with the circumstances and i don't know -- what caused that to happen, to your point even if you -- whatever you want to call it, i wouldn't change how i described it. how compelling was the seriousness of that conversation? what would have compelled you if the losses were twice as big as you did not understand that they were. what if it were $24 billion instead of $12 billion? >> at some point, you could not have made it a viable deal. it was a number, the whole was just too big. >> 24 is just as easy a

if you do it, meaning the m.a.c., tim g agrees. so it seems that he ve