A former federal litigator who investigated the savings and loan scandal of the 1980s has accused Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner of being a part of cover-up attempts by banking executives to conceal large-scale fraud that has left many banks virtually insolvent. William K. Black, now a professor of economics and law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, said in an interview with Bill Moyers that banks and credit agencies conspired to allow “liars loans” to receive AAA ratings and zero oversight, creating a massive “fraud” at the core of the current fiscal crisis. Black also accused Geithner of helping keep the truth of this fraud from being revealed. Asked by Moyers if Geithner and others were trying to conceal the truth, Black replied, “Absolutely, because they are scared to death” to admit the truth that “many of the large banks are insolvent.”
Black, the author of the 2005 book
The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One, points out that when the Treasury Department bailed out AIG, AIG gave $2.5 billion of the funds it received to the Swiss Bank, UBS, which was then able to pay a fine of $782 million charged by the Justice Department for helping American clients evade taxes in the United States. As Rep. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said at the time, “It looks like we’re simply laundering money through AIG.”
-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky