Treasury Secretary

So how did Hank Paulson do as Treasury secretary?. D

-- Former CEO of Goldman Sachs till 2006 and then Treasury Secretary he completely failed to see the crisis.
Even the once revered Greenspan today admitted his ideology of self regulation was wrong and he made mistakes. He literally said in so many words that his whole world view formed over last 40 years has changed due to the crisis. Atleast credit should be given for that given for around 20 years he was GOD of the financial industry.

-- He let Lehman Brothers fail which is considered now to be biggest reason for escalation of the crisis worldwide. Given that in retrospective one can blame him but even today he doesnt agree that it was mistake. With constantly changing stances of why he didnt save Lehman it is surely fishy.

-- Bailout Bill - The first version of the bill he presented would have given him unlimited authority and pratically a blank check. He rejected all other ideas of capital injection into banks which Charles Schumer (Democratic Senator) and others had given at that time. Later after 2 weeks of playing around when Europe did capital injections he followed still not admitting he had done anything wrong.

-- Sweet Deal to WallStreet - A man from Wall Street he got the banks a sweet deal. Each of 9 big banks got $25 billion at 5% with very limited restrictions and small possibility of upside when the stock markets recover. He did not insist on cutting dividends which Europe has done. Out of $125 billion, $25 billion will go to investors as dividend next year. IS this a bailout when banks are giving money?. 5% interest rate is far lower than what Warren Buffet got for exactly similar deal it did with Goldman Sachs. He has stated clearly that he does not want to be punitive to the banks. I dont understand WHY?. Banks are in this mess because of their own misdeeds so shouldnt they be punished.

-- Implementation of the Bailout - As expected he has hired people from Goldman Sachs to mange the bailout details. Isnt there a clear conflict of interest?. How will government price securities which it buys from Goldman Sachs. The people who will runt he bailout are the same people who were part of creating the crisis and still beleive in the same ideologies which seriously failed.