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Vulture Capitol
Much like John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, who accompanied the presidential candidate on a campaign plane earlier today, is very interested in what happens with the government's bailout plan. That's because his law firm, Bracewell & Giuliani, is letting potential clients know it can best steer them--with its new Task Force-- to deal with the bailout.
See the photo and press release, which says this:
Mr. Giuliani noted that the Bracewell Task Force includes a former Comptroller of the Currency, a former Assistant Secretary of Legislative Affairs of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, former members of Congress from both political parties, former federal prosecutors, and former SEC enforcement attorneys.
They will even have a blog, to update people on the latest revenue opportunities. I thank a loyal MR reader for the pointer.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on September 28, 2008 at 01:52 PM in Political Science | Permalink
Comments
I'm sure it will be a feeding frenzy. No doubt, the goofballs who allowed this thing to happen have turned their fund raising abilities to its solution.
Posted by: Alan Brown at Sep 28, 2008 2:19:40 PM
The title of the post should say Capital not Capitol, right?
Posted by: Joseph at Sep 28, 2008 2:37:05 PM
The title of the post should say Capital not Capitol, right?
Both work for me.
Posted by: at Sep 28, 2008 2:45:22 PM
I am shocked that Mr. Guiliani would seek to exploit a national crisis for his own personal gain.
Posted by: Rob at Sep 28, 2008 2:55:52 PM
The interst of Mr Giuliani and his friends/competitors is to secure a bail-out plan which is messed up and complex for the applicant, but ultimately workable. That sort of plan justifies fat fees to legal advisers.
The original Paulson plan was a mess, but was simple (Lord knows if it could have been workable). What we are now likely to get is further messed-up but probably has a better chance of being workable. The form of this "progress" is largely due to the obstinacy of a bunch of politicians (mostly Republicans as it happens). We do not have any clear information on who advised them.
This does not look like villains at work. The invisible hand of incentives is the more powerful the greater the sums at stake; and here the perverse incentives that McCain-Feingold trimmed at the margin are powered by billions.
Nonetheless, over the winter muck-raking journalists are likely to prosper if they trace the links of out-going Congress men and women to those who are advising bail-out applicants; and later if they trace political donations from the advisors in the lead-up to the 2010 elections.
Posted by: Diversity at Sep 28, 2008 3:46:06 PM
The counter-argument is as follows. As long as the program is an inside game, the amounts of corruption and waste will be penny ante. That's why it's best to have a complicated program which, at worst, a handful of smart lawyers and bankers are able to game. In contrast, if you have a program with clear parameters, it's easy for congressmen or other political actors to tinker with the parameters to benefit favored classes (e.g., farmers, small homebuilders). That gets really expensive.
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