Rolling Stone Magazine's Matt Taibbi is Good at Making Billionaires Look Bad
Aiming to please guest Matt Taibbi, Imus read aloud an article in yesterday’s Los Angeles Times: “After a two-year bipartisan probe, a Senate panel has concluded that Goldman Sachs profited from the financial crisis by betting billions of dollars against the subprime mortgage market, then deceived investors and Congress about their participation.”
Without missing a beat, Taibbi, who writes for Rolling Stone, remarked, “We’ve been saying this for years!” For example, in a story he wrote not long ago about Goldman Sachs, Taibbi reported that exact scenario, but was, he said, “brutally criticized” for not understanding what he was talking about.
“Goldman was betting against the same subprime stuff that they themselves were marketing all over the world as a good product,” he said. The only new revelation to emerge this week is that Sen. Carl Levin thinks some Goldman executives may have made misstatements to Congress, which had Imus all excited.
“If they perjure themselves, they can go to jail,” he said, delighted, then pointed out that this development made Taibbi seem like less of a bomb-thrower. “Even thought you are.”
Along those lines, Taibbi noted how ridiculous it is that so much time and taxpayer money is being poured into prosecuting Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens for obstruction of justice, while the Wall Street executives who stole or misappropriated hundreds of billions of dollars receive nary a slap on the wrist.
“There are insider trading cases that are there for the taking that they could be pursuing,” he said of the Justice Department. “And they’re not doing it.”
Taibbi’s current Rolling Stone piece is called The Real Housewives of Wall Street, and while none of the women mentioned are terribly pretty, they are pretty terrible.
As a preamble, Taibbi explained that during last year’s debate over the Wall Street reform bill, some members of Congress were granted a partial audit of the Federal Reserve to discover how much money had been disseminated during a two-year period of the bailout between late 2007 and 2009. Just this past December, the results of that audit were released and included a list of names of people who received enormous loans and bailout money from the Fed.
“There are so many crazy names on this list,” Taibbi said, joyously. “I just picked out the absolutely craziest one I could find, and made a headline out of it.”
The lucky recipients of Taibbi’s detective work were Christy Mack, the wife of Morgan Stanley Chairman of the Board John Mack, and Susan Karches, the widow of Morgan Stanley Executive Peter Karches. “They got a $220 million loan from the Fed through a program called TALF,” Taibbi said.
TALF was designed to provide incentive for banks to lend money at a time when they were loath to do so. But it also offered lenders the rare—and seemingly insane—opportunity to keep any gains they made on loans while the Fed swallowed 90 percent of the losses. Mack and Karches were both principal investors in a company called Waterfall TALF Opportunity and, according to Taibbi, they sought and received such a substantial loan because of who they knew.
“You or I couldn’t do this,” he told Imus. Other names that appear on the list are former Miami Dolphins owner H. Wayne Huizenga; controversial hedge fund investor John Paulson; and a man named Kenneth Dahlberg, who, Taibbi pointed out, was embroiled in the Watergate scandal.
The only thing that could have possibly made Taibbi’s story any more salacious would have been if there was some sex involved. Taibbi admitted he tried hard to dig up more dirt, but all he could muster was that Mack is into alternative medicine, and her sister was married to Charlie Rose.
Sighing, Imus declared, “That’s a life sentence.”
-Julie Kanfer
Matt Taibbi 
Reader Comments (2)
Mr. Charles:
I have planned my day around your show for as long as my memory serves me.
It will never be the same without you around to keep the "Old Cowboy" in check.
Thinking about joining your all white bible study group to chant prayers for your return
Pray that you will pull a Reggis on us.....and return to your desk
thank you from the bottom of my heart for the information..and laughs
douglas petepiece
ontario Canada
ps...thanks for telling the daggen goobers where charlies will be fishing...lets pray they don't find him
Charles:
As a long time fan of the Imus show I am going to miss you when you leave. Your wit and intelligence light up the show and make it one of my favorites. I wish you good health and all the blessing God can bestow upon you.
P.S.: Please don't tell Imus but you are really the star of the show. I don't want the old fart to have a heart attack!
Adios Amigo
Anthony King