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General News    H3'ed 3/16/10

The Big Short Is A Bit Short: Crime, not "Delusion" Drove The Crisis

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Message Danny Schechter

Financial anlysis is not what the media is well equipped to communicate. As a media dissector and editor of Mediachannel, I have followed the reporting of this story closely with many detailed articles and in two books since, even before it became a story back to 2005 when I made my film IN DEBT WE TRUST only to be dismissed by some as a doom and gloomer for exposing the suprime mortgage fraud.

I was hoping that Rachel Maddow would challenge his mass delusion theory but she bought right into it in her interview. At one point Lewis opined that there was DECEPTION (ie lying by the investment world) but that too was not examined as he himself counterposed two explanations for the disaster, asking, "was it mass delusion or crime? " And then he "answered" his own question or appeared to by asserting that when you ask the people involved, they say it was delusion.

Duh Michael? What do you think they would say? Do think they would cop to their own criminality? For them, it was all one big mistake, never mind who got hurt which neither 60 Minutes or Maddow explored.

Sorry to say, Jon Stewart did no better with his part of Lewis' all star media mystery tour. He did introduce him as one of the people making big money on the crisis but then jokingly let him ramble on praising the people who made small fortunes betting against Wall Street. They were the heroes. Again no concern was expressed for the people they cheated--only the idiots who lost money in the" kingdom where the blind man was king."

Lewis, like many non-fiction novelists, prefers character-based story-telling or "yarns" to more objective analytical investigation. It makes for better narratives, and best sellers. It also gets e interviewers laughing instead of crying. Why? Because there are only smart men doing things that turn out to be stupid, it makes us all feel superior to them even if they had the last laugh on the way to the bank.

Sorry, the Big Short seems short---short of a serious consideration of what really drove the financial crisis and the reason that 82% of the American people recentl said they want a crack down on Wall Street, not a chance to feel sorry for the "delusions" of its masters of the universe. They want a jailout---not a bailout.

On the very day of Rachel's fawning but well intentioned interview, United States Senator Ed Kaufman of Deleware, the state that provides a sanctuary for most US corporations and credit card companies, made a speech which got at the heart of the matter.

Senator Kaufman did not get lost in the cloudsof "delusion." He was more down to earth arguing.

"Fraud and potential criminal conduct were at the heart of the financial crisis"

Let me repeat and capitalize this Senatorial assertion: "FRAUD AND POTENTIAL CRIMINAL CONDUCT WERE AT THE HEART OF THE FINANICAL CRISIS."

The Senator goes on: "Americans could draw at least three lessons from the (Lehman) report: that we must "undo the damage caused by decades of deregulation;" that the United States must "concentrate law enforcement and regulatory resources on restoring the rule of law to Wall Street;" and that Congress must help regulators and other gatekeepers "by providing clear, enforceable 'rules of the road' wherever possible."à ‚¬ ¨

Unfortunately, says Kaufman, "I'm concerned that the revelations about Lehman Brothers are just the tip of the iceberg. We have no reason to believe that the conduct detailed last week is somehow isolated or unique. Indeed, this sort of behavior is hardly novel." à ‚¬ ¨

Now it so happens that I have been making a similaer argument in a book THE CRIME OF OUR TIME, and a film PLUNDER THE CRIME OF OUR TIME." But I am not a former Wall Streeter or best selling author or a US Senator.

So my work and the work of many "outsiders" is still unknown. The media prefers to seek the truth from the very people who either caused the crisis or who were in media perches that ignored iyt.

The point is that many people, many very qualified who have arguing the crime thesis--some in my film--have not so far had the benefit of the prime time exposure even though the American people believe it even was the media downplays it.

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News Dissector Danny Schechter is blogger in chief at Mediachannel.Org He is the author of PLUNDER: Investigating Our Economic Calamity (Cosimo Books) available at Amazon.com. See Newsdisssector.org/store.htm.
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