And here's what I wrote:
Ok, watched all of it. I like that if told more of a global tale than many of the US-centered things linked previously.
I'd say its biggest weakness is its treatment of regulators. They pretty much universally portray the Treasury, SEC, and Fed. as reactionary and as people trying to do what they thought was right at the time. Any criticism is usually overshadowed by an argument about how unprecedented the situation was, how difficult it must have been to work with all the parties involved in negotiations, and how political leadership slowed the process. When direct blame is assigned, it goes to people who've already lost: Dick Fuld, Angelo Mozilo, James Cayne, Joseph Cassano, etc.
Therein lies my criticism of this and other documentaries. Most present not a "Secret History of the Global Financial Collapse" but the Official History of the Global Financial Collapse. This is the narrative fronted by the powers that be - by Wall St., Washington, London, and many other metonymic financial and political centers.
We get a history where it was a few bad decisions by a few greedy and/or well-meaning individuals that sank the system and ruined the world. We have a narrative that relies on characters. If only James Cayne hadn't been such a pot head, he could have saved Bear Stearns. If only Richard Fuld hadn't been such an asshole, he could have worked with Paulson and the other banks to save Lehman. If only AIG had watched Cassano more closely, they could have stopped him from making such bad decisions.
It's all an attempt to remove blame from the truest source, the financial system. Don't believe for a moment that AIG-FP and Cassano acted outside their authority while racking up counter-party debt. They were making billions of dollars for their company and AIG loved it. It was the appetite for risk, and therefore for leveraged debt, which undid all these companies. And they accepted it willingly. Indeed, the Financial Products division was created int he 80s to do exactly what it was doing in 2008 - to speculate wildly and make a ton of money.
Our show portrayed Fuld as someone unwilling to negotiate and that's why he wasn't invited to the "secret" banker's meeting. Never mind that all the other banks benefited greatly from Lehman's demise. Never mind that all the other banks had equally poor balance sheets and were (still are) equally insolvent. Never mind that mere days later they were bailed out for billions of dollars in terms Lehman would have been glad to accept. Those are unimportant facts because Dick is a dick.
Let me also add that the show made it seem like the banks were subjected to regulations as a result of the bailouts - one specific regulation mentioned was limits on CEO pay. Were there ever any limits placed on CEO pay? No. Remember that fiasco about AIG bonuses mere months after the bailout? The CBC doesn't. No regulation ever took place. No limits were ever placed on executive compensation. These men signed the deal so willingly not because they were scared (as the show claims) but because they were given blank checks by the treasury and the taxpayer. (And some secret stuff, outside of TARP, that we didn't even know about at the time: http://www.unelected.org/audit-of-the-federal-reserve-reveals-16-trillion-in-secret-bailouts)
This show and the many documentaries like it are presenting a half truth. They show us the crisis. They show us a partial list of easily dislikeable characters to place the blame on all while portraying the true culprits as helpless victims (poor Hank Paulson has dry-heaves while writing Goldman a check from the American tax-payer for $30 billion, he was so stressed that he could only talk to Christine Lagarde for 15 seconds! Wow, it must have been so hard...).
This is the crisis they want you to remember. This is the crisis that will be in our history books.
Don't believe it for a second. I think the key to understanding the crisis is the old Latin phrase, Cui bono; For whose good? Who benefits?
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