mike, connie ford, and tim paulson, who wish to could have been here. thank you, tim, for your stewardship and support of all of this. i'm sorry to be long winded. i have said this. there's nothing more important. the first department head meeting i had was at west point and middle point. it was literally hours after i was sworn in as mayor. i said we needed to commit ourselves. to be back up where we are rebuilding those hunters point public housing sites, and we have real plans, real money, and real progress is being made. this is a point of personal privilege. we really consume ourselves and committed ourselves to this project and getting this done against a lot of hurdles and a lot of naysayers. i want to thank two people in particular. the predicate, the framework, the foundation that i spoke of -- that sits on top of the biggest impediment to this development, and that is what the navy left behind, and what that has meant to a community devastated by cancer rates and asthma rates. what is the big story, that deserves more consideration than anythin

causin>> tim paulson, who is the secretary-treasurer of the labor council would not appreciate that. the longer the gestation of this one, you would think it would not be timely are arriving at a moment like this, but no project could be timely. right now, the kids are facing their highest unemployment that i know of since the 1970's and perhaps since the great depression. a project like this -- the big infrastructure project will put some of the trades back to work, but there are no carpets that will be laid on doral drive. there are no waterless urinal that will be installed. no high-volume air-conditioning systems. nothing of the sort. a project like this will put trades back to work that otherwise would be close to starting. this project really could not be more timely in that regard. and followed by some of general hospital. it would be absolutely critical. but it is time it in another way as well. local government here, city government, and the federal government have talked about the future of work in this country being closely tied to green jobs. the building trades are among

but do you think hank paulson, tim geithner did the right thing? i say yes.use at that moment in time we needed intervention. is that where you are? >> yes. i absolutely agree that at that point in time, we needed to somehow bring liquidity back into the system. >> i mean, if people are starving, you don't say, sorry, you're on your own. you give them food. >> i think one of the big debates is -- is the perception of wall street, what was done after the public helped us out. i think that's what troubles a lot of people. >> robert, great to have you on the program. >> fantastic. i can't wait to read the book. i love the cover. >> thank you. you were great to talk to me in the book. thank you, robert. >> you're welcome. >>> up next on the "wall street journal report," a look at the news this week that will have an impact on your money. >>> and a lost viking artifact rediscovered. >>> for more on our show and your guests, check out wsjr.cnbc.com. you'll also find a link to my blog. >>> now a look that stories coming up that may move the markets and impact your m

i think hank paulson and tim geithner -- in order topproved they needed evidence this was a real situationnd lehman gave them that evidence. >> let's turn to the present day talking about the economy. there was a moment in ago on the heels of those home sales, figures being so terrible. everyone was concerned, have we increased our chances of a double-dip recession? >> i agree that with the administration's take that it's probably not going to be a double dip. i keep saying, it doesn't matter what you call it. you can label it double-dip, recession, depression -- it doesn't matter what it's labeled. the bottom line is it doesn't feel like anything's getting better. unemployment is a real issue, housing has been missing in action. we still have a lot of foreclosures in the system that are getting through the system. that's going to be a problem. business managers today are uncertain, complaining about higher health care costs, higher taxes. in many cases, with good reason, and as a result they're not going to stick their necks out and add heads to the payroll. unemployment's going to be an

she is probably going to be asked a lot about why now treasury secretary tim geithner and then treasury secretary henry paulson did not listen to her. she pushed on a number of initiatives that were kind of ignored. i think what they will focus on with her is what she was telling people, why they were not responded to some of her suggestions. host: looking at the list of bank failures, there was a lot of discussion yesterday of the washington mutual failure in 2008. according to this list, which is from wikipedia, at the time of its failure, wamu had $307 billion in assets. wondering where the line is drawn, where the fdic and other regulators will begin to consider how large is this institution and should it move to ok to fail versus what we should consider bailing out. guest: i think the distinction is kind of the global connectedness. meant thatnk wamu category. they were very exposed on mortgage-backed securities, for instance. there were pools of mortgages. but they did not have a huge amount of international exposure. i think they too big to fail concept really kicked in with these bigger investment bank