The specific charge? That his approach is clearly wrong, so clearly wrong that one cannot entertain another motive but an eagerness to protect the banking industry at the expense of the lumperproles. Roughly, it is a view much reflected in the leftish blogosphere.
I think that is a sensible view, which I lean towards in an absence of convincing argument otherwise. Of course, there is the smoke and mirrors factor to consider: if Timmeh! sincerely believes that the Toxic Slime is undervalued, maybe he can get other people to believe that it is undervalued.
There’s a factor here that’s gone unmentioned, perhaps because its dumb.
The housing boom was an upper-middle class phenomenon. Or, at least, it probably should have remained that way. The big profits were not in building affordable housing for the modestly funded, but building suburban housing for the better off. Sooner or later, you run out of winners to pitch to.
Hence, the subprime mortgage was necessary to keep the illusion of the housing boom alive: the economy was not really thriving, people were not advancing economically, but stagnant. The prospective customer base for upper-income housing was shrinking, even as the supply expanded in a bubblicious fashion.
A whole lot of a bunch of criticism of The Plan over at Washington monthly, which includes links to even more criticism of The Plan, including an conflicting views between Paul K. and Brad DeLong. Soporific, but very informative.
There may well be a popular revolt brewing. Few regular people accept what the AIG financial experts are doing. The realities of the people are that there we are in far more serious trouble than the experts are willing to admit. There is a sense of doom while the financial experts that made the mess are still acting like they are entitled to even more millions. The foreclosures, job losses and closings of so many businesses is our truth. Life on the streets is full of dread. Confidence is an important component in our economy. You have to trust in the future to buy big things and help the economy. The people are scared.
There is a general revolt over the amount of money being spent by the government and it’s showing up as “tea party” protests. People are not happy with the idea that over 500 legislators rushed through a trillion dollar spending bill without due diligence. It would not have taken any additional time to construct the bill in data base form which is the most rudimentary of business practices yet they are spending weeks of effort clowning an AIG bonus package of 220 million. If Congress was a private enterprise it’s members would be in jail for fiduciary malfeasance.
