Want to pass the plan? Sack Paulson.

[cottonseed]

Seriously. He's a Bush guy, former CEO of Goldman, partly responsible for the mess, and looks like a crook. A lot of the public's apprehension here is due to handing over the money to THAT guy.

I would love it if they could make part of passing the plan is having Bush sack Paulson and replace him with an emergency Treasury Secretary approved by 50% +1 in both houses.

[aquart]

1. That's reasonable.

Reasonable has no chance. Only complete panic is effective.

[EFerrari]

2. He shouldn't be there in the first place. Huge conflict of interest. n/t

[dkofos]

3. That would be a start.

[AwareOne]

4. Who wants the plan to pass?

The American people are overwhelmingly against it. Members of congress are receiving calls and letters ranging from 25 to 1 against to 100 to 1 against. I'm receiving e-mail from all types of left groups telling me to be against it. Who really wants this thing to pass besides the president, Wall street fat cats and the DNC types?

[cottonseed]

6. I know the public is overwhelmingly against it.

That's why I hate being lied to for the last 8 years. It's brass tax time and we don't know what or who to believe. This plan will go through, and I'm just suggesting that when it does, the caretaker of this huge amount of money not be Paulson.

Also, I'd agree to it if we created a new top marginal tax rate for income of $2 million + at around 65%.

[avaistheone1]

5. It would be a great start. Paulson personally is responsible for $100Billion dollars when he was at

Goldman Sachs. They need to get a person in there negotiating who clearly is on the taxpayer's side.
We need someone who is smart,understand the financial markets, the economy, someone who can be tough and can be a good steward of the Treasury and the taxpayer.

Paulsen is comprised by his history on Wall Street with this mess.

[ColbertWatcher]

7. Yup.

[chill_wind]

8. Agree. A little probe and shake-up of the whole Senate Finance Committee

might not hurt either. They gave us this guy.

[cottonseed]

9. I laughed at "little probe". Parts of this bailout kind of make me feel that way.

:)

[chill_wind]

11. A Bush/Paulson Heist, with the SFC driving the get-away car.

Nobody was holding a gun to their heads, either.

It's here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-sirota/the-paulson-payoff-at-the_b_24379.html

And here:

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?dist=newsfinder&siteid=google&guid={5801D6FE-295A-4326-894B-ACB0454619C5}&keyword=


That was two FULL YEARS ago.

[chill_wind]

10. And send these guys packing with him too, don't you think? Talk about a Hostile Takeover...

Paulson Taps Ex-Goldman Colleague Forst as Rescue Plan Adviser

By John Brinsley

Sept. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson hired former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. colleague Edward C. Forst to advise him on the government's $700 billion rescue plan, a Treasury spokeswoman said.

``He is here to provide the secretary and the domestic finance team with advice on financial market issues as they work through the legislative process,'' department spokeswoman Brookly McLaughlin said today.

Forst, 47, left Goldman Sachs in June to become executive vice president at Harvard University. Paulson was Goldman's chairman and chief executive officer until taking up his Treasury post in July 2006.

Forst started work this week at Treasury and will work for several weeks as a ``contract employee'' for $5,000 before returning to Harvard, McLaughlin said. He worked at New York- based Goldman for 14 years, most recently as global head of investment management, before joining Harvard to help supervise the university's $34.9 billion endowment.

In his more than two years at the Treasury, Paulson has recruited other executives from Goldman, including naming Kendrick Wilson as an adviser last month.

link: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=ai1ysfhc3nFM&refer=home

[chill_wind]

12. Cottonseed, you should do a poll to see where more of DU really is on this.

That might be really interesting.