There is a new Czar in America""the man who will be running the $700 billion budget bailout/rescue program-- assistant secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs-- Neel Kashkari.
Henry Paulson tapped the company he ran, Goldman Sachs, to hire 35 year old Kashkari, who started as a senior advisor. George W. Bush nominated him as assistant secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs. The appointment was evaluated by the senate banking committee in early June 2008 and approved by the senate on June 27., 2008.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Khashkari's position as czar of the $700 bailout is "interim, pending Senate confirmation. It isn't likely the Senate will move on the matter before the November elections. Mr. Kashkari isn't expected to remain in the post after January, when the Bush administration comes to an end, and,
"Mr. Kashkari was part of the Treasury team that negotiated the asset-repurchase program with Congress, putting in marathon sessions along with Robert Hoyt, Treasury's general counsel, and Kevin Fromer, the head of legislative affairs. He was also one of the originators of the plan. Last year, he and Phillip Swagel, assistant secretary for economic policy, crafted a proposal called "break the glass" -- referring to the emergency nature of using such a tool -- which envisioned Treasury buying bad loans and other assets.
Treasury is trying to get the program running as quickly as possible. It is expected to begin soliciting bids from asset managers this week and could hire several managers before the week is over, according to people familiar with the matter. The department plans to hire managers with expertise in the types of securities the government likely will buy, in particular mortgage-backed securities and residential mortgages.
On the US Treasury site, the following profile is provided, which, it seems, has provided the bulk of material several dozen other articles have used to cover who Kashkari is:
Neel Kashkari Senior Advisor
Neel Kashkari is Senior Advisor to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. He provides counsel to the Secretary on key policy matters.
Prior to joining the Treasury Department, Mr. Kashkari was a Vice President at Goldman, Sachs & Co. in San Francisco, where he led Goldman's IT Security Investment Banking practice, advising public and private companies on mergers and acquisitions and financial transactions. Prior to his career in finance, Mr. Kashkari was a R&D Principal Investigator at TRW in Redondo Beach, California where he developed technology for NASA space science missions such as the James Webb Space Telescope.
Originally from Stow, Ohio, Mr. Kashkari graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Engineering. He also received an M.B.A. in Finance from the Wharton School. Mr. Kashkari and his wife Minal maintain residences in Maryland and California.
There's not much to be found about Mr. Kashkari beyond the Treasury's brief two paragraph description. Calls to the senate banking committee and the treasury yielded almost no new information, just promises of callbacks from press people who were not available. One spokesperson did say that the announcement of Kashkari's appointment had just occurred today. While not confirming that the senate banking committee did not know who would be doing this job, with its huge responsibilities, the indication that the announcement had occurred today was in response to a question as to whether the committee had known BEFORE approving the bill, who would be managing the bailout.
Here's a link to a Cspan video, where he talks about a new kind of mortgage for the US. He comes off as a bright, techo-geek economist kind of man""smart, articulate, knowledgeable. But he is introduced as being strictly a speaker on "covered mortgages"- and the audience is instructed not to ask him questions on other topics. In June 2007, he spoke on the Bush energy policy, and it was reported"he sidestepped most of the prickly issues."-
The Washington Post reports that Kashkari is a former vice president at Goldman Sachs, where he led the firm's security investment banking practice. Apparently, Kashkari was still a student at Wharton in February, 2002, when the Philadelphia Inquirer reported on his participation in a leadership class exercise. That would put him at no more than six years out of school.
In 2006, Neel Tushar Kashkari of Stow Ohio was reported to be selected as one of the regional finalists for the White House Fellows Program.A final listing of the actual recipients for 2006-2007 does not include Kashkari.
Kashkari is a 1991 graduate of Western Reserve Academy, a private college prep boarding and day school.
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It's almost as though the web has been scrubbed clean of any background on this man of the hour. What else can you dig up on him-- on the web, with phone calls to committees, the treasury, etc.
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Rob Kall (869 articles, 4016 quicklinks, 345 diaries, 1847 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 10:03:50 AM
It goes from bad to worse. I am sorry I don't mean to rip on someone we know very little about, I am sure this guy is very bright and capable, but for crying out loud he is 35 and all he has know is the past 2 decades of Wall street greed and bubbles. How in the world is this guy going to provide any new insights into what could be done to get out of this mess? I want someone who at least has 35 years of experience in Finance .... not someone who is only 35 years old.
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E. Nelson (27 articles, 3 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 289 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 11:26:18 AM
Yes - I have nothing against bright young people taking responsibility, but... some things require foresight and calmness rooted in deep experience. I also would want to see a US president who is emberrassingly superior to me, and not in at least some respects significantly inferior to many 14 year olds here in Western Europe (at least when it comes to languages and knowledge about international affairs and geography). I am not arrogant. I simply know both sides of the Atlantic well. To me it seems as if the insanity is destined to continue. When will they ever learn, someone sang.
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Stefan Thiesen (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments)
on Tuesday, October 7, 2008 at 5:10:28 AM
I say let's see. Remember this is temporary as the electon nears and he likely will have not had time to do much before a new administration takes office.
I am rooting for Obama over McCain because I feel a person who graduated with honors from Harvard trumps a bomber-jock ( who wrecked 3 planes ) who graduated 5th from the bottom at the Naval Acadamy, has better judgment in choosing people to deal with our economy. Look who McCain picked to be his VP!! He might offer the treasury post to Mr. Palin for all we know.
McCain would hire a former lobbyist from the banking industry.
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Paul Kruger (33 articles, 1 quicklinks, 6 diaries, 275 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 1:19:18 PM
According to articles in Zoom Info, Mr. Kashkari is an Indian American. He has a background in engineering as well as finance.
Kashkari was one of the drafters of Bush's "20 in 10" plan, to reduce energy consumption by 20% in 10 years, as by increasing the use of biofuels and other alternative energy sources, a plan featured in Bush's State of the Union Address, in 2007 I believe.
Kashkari has also commented upon the need for larger firms to buy up smaller firms, which are more innovative, as in areas of IT security.
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Douglas Drenkow (35 articles, 352 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 10 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 11:21:32 AM
he may have worked for Nasa but according to some who knew him, he's no rocket scientist especially when it comes to handling something of this magnitude. This comes from the Daily Kos:
But I don't want a rocket scientist trying to figure out a worldwide economic mess. Just like I wouldn't want a rocket scientist trying to figure out how to do a heart transplant.
Who cares what he did at NASA. What does he know about finance? He clearly is a bright individual. The qualifications and awards he has won puts him above just about everyone else that the Bush administration has working for them. But that still means nothing when it comes to figuring out a very complex situation that the greed of his generation helped to create.
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E. Nelson (27 articles, 3 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 289 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 11:36:37 AM
Mr. Nelson but by all accounts this guy made a most peculiar leap from NASA into finance. He is a very briliiant engineer from what I've read, yet has very little experience to handle something of this magnitude. Can a puppy be expected to handle the job of a bulldog? I would also remind that the department of the treasury is now the department of Goldman-Sachs and we are giving our money in this so called bail out to the very people who helped cause this economic problem in the first place. Now some might believe this bailout is our lord and savior. I'm not one of them and in fact I see it as the last great raping of the coffers before Bush retires happily into obscurity.
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Michael Shaw (8 articles, 1 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 348 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 12:34:52 PM
He doesn't exactly have a deep resume in finance. If the Bush administration didn't have a track record of one disaster after another people might not attempt to pre-judge but I agree with you that the days of giving this administration any benefit of the doubt is long since gone.
I just wish someone had some better answers and someone had the common sense to bring in a bipartisan expert that at least the American public and the markets would have some confidence in. I don't know who that would be.
But it is clear none of the international markets have ANY confidence that the Bush administration can show any leadership and guide us towards a solution.
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E. Nelson (27 articles, 3 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 289 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 2:58:20 PM
The recent Wall Street bailout legislation contains nothing to help struggling homeowners pay their mortgages. Congress should not be patting itself on its collective backs for enacting a plan that helps wealthy bankers and financiers without doing anything for the American middle class.
What is needed is for Congress immediately to craft new legislation providing that when any mortgage acquired by the federal govermnent with bailout funds is auctioned back to the private sector, the purchaser must immediately reduce the principal balance owed by the borrower to the price at which it was purchased and lower the interest rate by the same proportion. The normal tendency to want to buy at the best possible price possible would automatically be counterbalanced by the knowledge that the lower the price paid, the lower the loan balance and interest rate will be.
This would prevent windfalls to lenders who purchase mortgages at fire-sale prices but refuse to lower principal balances and interest rates. It would also force potential purchasers of federally held mortgages to analyze each loan with complete objectivity to determine what is the realistic principal amount and interest rate at which it can be purchased and converted into a solidly performing asset.
Gwain52
Georgia
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Steuart Knox (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 11:44:13 AM
New Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson looks to the State Department for his chief of staff and deputy, hiring Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s aide — and White House veteran — Jim Wilkinson as chief of staff and Taiya Smith, an aide to former Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick, as deputy chief of staff. Matt Rees, a former speechwriter for President Bush and former SEC Chairman William Donaldson, comes to write speeches. Paulson also taps a young Goldman Sachs investment banker, Neel Kashkari and Tony Ryan, from bearish money manager GMO, as aides. More changes at top rungs of Treasury are expected.
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E. Nelson (27 articles, 3 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 289 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 11:55:31 AM
So Neel has been at the wheel for two years already
Neel has been navigating and Paulson has been driving the bus for the past two years that is about to go off the cliff.
Could we maybe think about bringing in an outside expert? Although I guess the downside is the speed and urgency that is needed (if of course you believe they honestly want to do something to fix the problem). No one could get up to speed and understand what is already in place to really be effective in the short.
Man what a complete disaster. If anyone thinks voting and rewarding anyone from the Republican party is a good idea they deserve to be shot.
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E. Nelson (27 articles, 3 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 289 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 12:03:20 PM
Man what a complete disaster. If anyone thinks voting and rewarding anyone from the Republican party is a good idea they deserve to be shot.
Did the Democrats oppose the bailout and it never made the news, or was I just not paying attention?
Man, I feel like a total idiot. I had absolutely no idea that the Democrats opposed the bailout and deserve to be rewarded. Maybe I should turn on the TV once in a while so I don't miss out on important stuff like that?
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Mark E. Smith (21 articles, 30 quicklinks, 100 diaries, 1325 comments)
on Tuesday, October 7, 2008 at 2:00:48 AM
In no way am I intending to sound crass, but at this juncture in time, does it really matter who the hell Neel Kashkari is? Seriously!
Like everything else transpiring in this truculent Bush administration, there is absolutely nothing whatsoever that you, me, or the man in the moon can do about it. NOTHING! Congress no longer listens to us! Oh, I know? We'll all vote for Obama and he'll bring this magical change and everything we'll be spendid? No, because this man has already shown his true colors by not only voting for Bush Co.s FISA, but also failing to support Impeachment of Bush & Cheney, but then going to great lengths to fully support and voting for this rapacious (as Chris Floyd noted) extortion Bill, which could very well be the final straw whichs breaks the back of America.
We must understand that these are ruthless people who we're dealing with and who could care less about the American people or it's nonexistent Constitution.
Please, tell me who it is that'll intervene and stop them? Enlighten me.
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Munich (0 articles, 74 quicklinks, 13 diaries, 922 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 12:17:31 PM
is a complete investigation into the remarks made by Rep. Sherman on the House floor. His claim is several congressmen/people were threatened with invocation of martial law if they voted nay on the bailout bill. Isn't this extortion? Of course no mention has been made in the MSM, but it should be.
Mention was made in an article I just read that $61 billion of the $85 billion 'gifted' to AIG has already been spent, and the $700 billion figure (admitted by Paulson) is likely to be even $1.3 trillion. Want to bet they'll both be sliding their hands into our pockets for more?
Another thing that gripes the hell out of me is listening to this BS about the poor poor stock market falling 777 points last Monday. What these creeps fail to mention is the market rebounded almost 500 points the very next day. Some pretty one-sided fear mongering, and lies by ommission, I'd say.
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Paul Magill Smith (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 69 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 3:47:44 PM
check out hiddenmysteries.com , click on Headlines.......scroll down to "Top Stargate Area 51..........", this article tells A LOT about this man. I don't know if this article is true, half true or false.....but it's scary. Please read.
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Linda Bailey (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 52 comments)
on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 5:31:51 PM
Monday, October 06 2008 @ 07:16 AM CDT Contributed by: Admin Views: 35
By: Sorcha Faal
Russian Military reports circulating in the Kremlin today are stating that the entire $700 billion bailout package just signed into law by President Bush has been put into the hands of one single man by the US Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson in one of the strangest moves yet committed by the United States in its managing the total collapse of the World’s entire financial structure.
What makes this move so strange is that the man being tasked with saving the entire Western banking structure is an Indian-American named Neel Kashkari [photo second left] who though currently serving as the senior advisor to the US Treasury Secretary is better known in Russian Intelligence circles as the American aerospace engineer known as the ‘Stargate Commander of Area 51’ as prior to his entering the higher echelons of the US financial structure was one of NASA’s top scientists who created, among other technological wonders, the James Webb Space Telescope which is due to replace the failing Hubble.
Mr. Kashkari, these reports state, was employed by the American defense conglomerate TRW, which among its many government contracts includes its ultra secret projects at the Groom Lake, Nevada, otherwise known as Area 51:
“Area 51”, officially designated as an "operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada", is the nation's leading-edge aerospace research, development and testing complex, managed by the Air Force Flight Test Center Detachment 3 (AFFTC DET 3), headquartered at Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California.
This sprawling Nevada site is one of America's most vital conglomerate defense R & D complexes with a primary emphasis on weapons systems integration with avionics and aeronautics, employing an average of anywhere from 1200 to 1800 defense contractors personnel who work with various projects under highly compartmentalized programs and in various shifts and durations, such as on daily basis, weekly or even months-long assignments. The huge complex is equipped with fully sufficient accommodations for the contractors personnel who need to stay on the base until their assignments or projects are completed.”
These reports further state that Mr. Kashkari had just returned to the United States from Iraq where he was the lead investigator into the mass suicide of American troops attempting to ‘open’ what is described as a ‘stargate’ in the ancient Iraqi city of Babylon, and as we had previously reported on in our September 10th report “US Troops Commit Mass Suicide After Babylon ‘Stargate’ Opened”.
This task was particularly suited to Mr. Kashkari, these reports continue, due to his previous work with what is described as the ‘ancient technology’ currently being held by the United States at their Area 51 complex, and which has long been rumored to also hold the remains of aliens and their spacecrafts retrieved by the Americans over the past 60 years, and which earned him the Russian Intelligence codename of ‘Stargate Commander’.
Though it will most certainly pass without either knowledge, or comment, among the American people why the staggering sum of $700 billion entrusted by them to their government is going to an aerospace engineer instead of a World-Class economist, it has not escaped ours, especially when viewed in the light of these Americans last attempt to open the Babylon Stargate which resulted in the near destruction of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) which was being used as the ‘power source’ for this attempt to ‘contact the gods’, and which we had reported on previously in our September 11th report “CERN Attempt To ‘Talk To God’ Nails Heart Of Earth…Again”.
Further to be noticed of these events is that Pope Benedict XVI has begun the historic reading of the entire Christian Bible from Rome, and which is one of the most ancient, and feared, rites of Christendom meant to presage what they term as the beginning of the “Last Days”. This particular event should be particularly noticed as it is occurring at the same moment that Britain is preparing to end a 300-year-old exclusion of Catholics from the line of succession.
The greater significance of Pope Benedict’s actions we had, also, previously reported on in our April 23rd report “US-British Leaders Swear Allegiance To Pope As England Destroyed”, wherein we had detailed the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s sudden resignation and nearly immediate conversion to Catholicism in Rome.
Not to be overlooked in this “Grand Trine of Ages” [the merging of Rome-London-Washington D.C. into a new Babylon] being led by the British Empire is what is being called in some Russian Intelligence circles as the ‘final pegging’, where the United States will fall completely under the authority of the British Crown, and which for the first time in American history is now possible with the likely ascendancy of Barack Obama to the Presidency as under the British Nationality Act, 1948, his Kenyan father was a British citizen, along with all of his children, making the future American President a subject of the Queen as he has never renounced his allegiance to her throne.
To our most ancient of history we must look too as during the last age when the attempts were made to open the Babylon Stargate our World was met with near total destruction, and as told in the most ancient of stories surrounding what is now called the Tower of Babel.
From those most ancient of days the surviving physical reminders are the 30 Egyptian obelisks that have survived into our times for our warning/instruction, and of which only 7 remain in Egypt as 13 were removed to Rome as the ‘New Center of Babylon’, with the others being strategically placed in London, Israel, Turkey, France and New York. But, to the ‘newest’ of these obelisks, and the modern one meant to ‘merge’ the power of the ancients, one need only look to the center of Washington D.C. where the largest of these ancient monuments rears it defiance to the heavens and is called the Washington Monument.
It goes without our saying that it is neigh impossible for all but the most initiated in these matters to fully comprehend the fullest imports of these events, and of our words herein describing them. But, to our greatest understanding of these things it lies with the coming Full Moon as Mercury ends it retrograde and our Sun aligns once more with Neptune this coming week wherein the greater mysterious will be revealed more fully for those truly seeking knowledge, and which, and as always, we will dutifully report on.
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