Arctic Adventurer: a Flicktion
September 11, 2009
In the few short months that I have spent in Nunavut, two mothers who had become my colleagues and friends, lost youthful sons to suicide. Within a brief period of two months, four youth in a community of less than 1,500 people committed suicide. Almost the entire community attended the funeral. The hall was filled with infants, toddlers, children, youth, adults and elders. The youngest children wove between chairs and family members comfortably a part of community life. Youth dressed in southern street-smart clothing respectfully gave their seats to elders. The shared pain in the room at the loss of their youth through suicide, was suffocating. At the graveside, it was cold and windy. It began to snow. As one mother witnessed the shovel-fulls of sand thudding onto her son’s coffin, another walked quietly alone to another fresh grave nearby. I stood there helpless feeling so overwhelmed I couldn’t move. I know many others felt the same paralysis. How many of us were mothers? How many of us had sons in their twenties?
The family of the young man, colleagues and friends provided support to the parents and to each other. On the return flight home, one man was unusually upbeat and talkative. Perhaps that is his way of dealing with the pain. I didn’t know who he was. He sat behind me. As I left the plane I asked the woman next to me who this man was. To my astonishment it was the *** for Nunavut.
Following the suicides, friends and acquaintances attempted to find ways of absorbing yet another tragedy. Some felt anger at the youth who committed suicide. Many expressed feelings of numbness. Some regretted their own inability to know what to do. They felt guilty for not knowing how to prevent it. Like many others I feel a sense of powerlessness.
December 11, 2002: While waiting for my plane at the Iqaluit airport I met a physician-researcher who had just completed a report on the Nunavut Ministry of Health. She told me about a two-hour conversation she had with a man called TNC in a hotel bar in Rankin Inlet. TNC had lost a friend to suicide. He was deeply bothered by his loss. He went to see a nurse. The nurse became very uncomfortable when Tommy mentioned he was depressed and upset by this suicide. She sent him to a Social Worker. The Social Worker was also ill at ease. She called the police. TNC spent the night in jail. They were concerned he might hurt himself. Because the small hamlet had no counselling services, TNC was flown to Yellowknife. He was separated from the only real support system he had — his mother and grandmother in Rankin Inlet. Later on the plane I sat beside a young man GRB. GRB worked for Baffin Correctional Centre. He started there in c.1996. He told me about a millionaire who made his fortune by buying high-end buildings in Iqaluit, then renting them at high rents to the Nunavut Government. GRB loved speed — the speed of the snow machine. His best moments were out on the land with a half a dozen friends on powerful machines. His work bothered him. He felt surrounded by uneducated, untrained fellow-workers — many of whom came from Halifax — who cared little for the young offenders. Many were there because they could earn huge salaries — especially with overtime. Some of them didn’t even have high school education and in Iqaluit they were earning much more than they ever could in the Maritimes. It frustrated him to see how these untrained workers wanted to work by the book to earn points from the supervisors. Sometimes a situation could be diffused before it became violent and ugly. By rigidly following the book, a small incident could escalate into an ugly incident very quickly. GRB came to know the offenders so he knew how to calm things. Increasingly the workers who lacked experience but were older than him, made the situations worse. GRB noticed the most improvement in the youth came through the on-the-land program. Youth would spend a couple of months with the elders. They came back healthier and more confident. He commented on the work of the psychiatrist Dr. Q He said that Dr. Q tried to prevent the worst from happening but he was not really in control of the situation. He was not able to make all the decisions that would be beneficial to the youth. GRB said that Iqaluit youth threatening suicide would be sent to the Youth detention centre. He would be stripped down, showered and then given ‘baby dolls’ to wear before being locked in a safe cell where he could do himself no harm. (What a contrast to the treatment my friend’s son received in Ottawa. )
June 2002: This text will change organically as the flicktion develops.
July 2009: This image was selected to be part of a phenomenal project entitled “We Feel Fine.”
Uploaded by ocean.flynn on 30 Nov 06, 9.15PM MDT.
Arctic Adventurer: a Flicktion
September 11, 2009
In the few short months that I have spent in Nunavut, two mothers who had become my colleagues and friends, lost youthful sons to suicide. Within a brief period of two months, four youth in a community of less than 1,500 people committed suicide. Almost the entire community attended the funeral. The hall was filled with infants, toddlers, children, youth, adults and elders. The youngest children wove between chairs and family members comfortably a part of community life. Youth dressed in southern street-smart clothing respectfully gave their seats to elders. The shared pain in the room at the loss of their youth through suicide, was suffocating. At the graveside, it was cold and windy. It began to snow. As one mother witnessed the shovel-fulls of sand thudding onto her son’s coffin, another walked quietly alone to another fresh grave nearby. I stood there helpless feeling so overwhelmed I couldn’t move. I know many others felt the same paralysis. How many of us were mothers? How many of us had sons in their twenties?
The family of the young man, colleagues and friends provided support to the parents and to each other. On the return flight home, one man was unusually upbeat and talkative. Perhaps that is his way of dealing with the pain. I didn’t know who he was. He sat behind me. As I left the plane I asked the woman next to me who this man was. To my astonishment it was the *** for Nunavut.
Following the suicides, friends and acquaintances attempted to find ways of absorbing yet another tragedy. Some felt anger at the youth who committed suicide. Many expressed feelings of numbness. Some regretted their own inability to know what to do. They felt guilty for not knowing how to prevent it. Like many others I feel a sense of powerlessness.
December 11, 2002: While waiting for my plane at the Iqaluit airport I met a physician-researcher who had just completed a report on the Nunavut Ministry of Health. She told me about a two-hour conversation she had with a man called TNC in a hotel bar in Rankin Inlet. TNC had lost a friend to suicide. He was deeply bothered by his loss. He went to see a nurse. The nurse became very uncomfortable when Tommy mentioned he was depressed and upset by this suicide. She sent him to a Social Worker. The Social Worker was also ill at ease. She called the police. TNC spent the night in jail. They were concerned he might hurt himself. Because the small hamlet had no counselling services, TNC was flown to Yellowknife. He was separated from the only real support system he had — his mother and grandmother in Rankin Inlet. Later on the plane I sat beside a young man GRB. GRB worked for Baffin Correctional Centre. He started there in c.1996. He told me about a millionaire who made his fortune by buying high-end buildings in Iqaluit, then renting them at high rents to the Nunavut Government. GRB loved speed — the speed of the snow machine. His best moments were out on the land with a half a dozen friends on powerful machines. His work bothered him. He felt surrounded by uneducated, untrained fellow-workers — many of whom came from Halifax — who cared little for the young offenders. Many were there because they could earn huge salaries — especially with overtime. Some of them didn’t even have high school education and in Iqaluit they were earning much more than they ever could in the Maritimes. It frustrated him to see how these untrained workers wanted to work by the book to earn points from the supervisors. Sometimes a situation could be diffused before it became violent and ugly. By rigidly following the book, a small incident could escalate into an ugly incident very quickly. GRB came to know the offenders so he knew how to calm things. Increasingly the workers who lacked experience but were older than him, made the situations worse. GRB noticed the most improvement in the youth came through the on-the-land program. Youth would spend a couple of months with the elders. They came back healthier and more confident. He commented on the work of the psychiatrist Dr. Q He said that Dr. Q tried to prevent the worst from happening but he was not really in control of the situation. He was not able to make all the decisions that would be beneficial to the youth. GRB said that Iqaluit youth threatening suicide would be sent to the Youth detention centre. He would be stripped down, showered and then given ‘baby dolls’ to wear before being locked in a safe cell where he could do himself no harm. (What a contrast to the treatment my friend’s son received in Ottawa. )
June 2002: This text will change organically as the flicktion develops.
July 2009: This image was selected to be part of a phenomenal project entitled “We Feel Fine.”
Uploaded by ocean.flynn on 30 Nov 06, 9.15PM MDT.
Echoes of Geurnica: Vukovar (1991)
September 11, 2009
Echoes of Geurnica: Vukovar (1991)
I created this Adobe Photoshop image in 1994 in response to the words and images of the women refugees of Vukovar. Women make up the largest percentage of refugees worldwide. Urban ethnographer and documentary videographer Cynthia Porter Gehrie, Ph.D. (Northwestern University) worked with the NONA Center for Multi Media, Zagreb, Croatia cgehrie@videodocument.org to produce a site where the story of these women could reach the world. (Currently under construction)
“I spent three months in the basement, and I had no idea of the extent of the destruction in the city. When they were taking us from the Hospital, where we all gathered, to the general warehouse, from the truck I saw what the city looked like. We drove through the main street all the way to Mitnica. The houses in ruins seemed to weep and moan as if in pain, and only the chimneys stood defiantly. I can still see a house devoured by flames and next to it a cow, which came from who knows where, dazed by the horror and destruction around it. When I close my eyes, I can see the ruins, the ghastly dead streets and, tormented by insomnia as I am, I can feel the eerie silence falling over the city of ghosts (Kumpf 1994).”
While looking for images in 1994 to complete this digitage, I came upon photojournalist, Ron Haviv’s site: “Blood and Honey: A Balkan War Journal.”; (Which is now available through Amazon.com) This is the url of his powerful photo of a Geurnica-like cow which so perfectly resonated with the eloquent, haunting words of a owman who knew what it was to be a refugee. She wrote about “a house devoured by flames and next to it a cow, which came from who knows where, dazed by the horror and destruction around it (Kumpf 1994).”
www.videodocument.org
Read more about Ron Haviv | digg story
Kumpf, Slavica. 1994. “For 1096 Days I have Felt Like a Traveler.” Vukovar Women’s Club. www.videodocument.org/nona/VulArc.htm
Uploaded by ocean.flynn on 19 Nov 06, 10.09PM MDT.
Viral Mapping
May 2, 2009
Swine flu, aka A (H1N1) and North American influenza.
Timeline
1994 Smithfield Foods Inc. who own half of the Granjas Carroll de Mexico, began operating pig farms in the region By the time of the pandemic in March 2009, they were the major producer in the country, with 907 workers, 500,000 thousand pigs in developing states of Veracruz and Puebla. Their website from their headquarters in Perote, Mexico claimed that they 56,000 sows in 2008 producing 950,000 hogs. They are 12 such mega farms surrounding La Gloria, Mexico, a hillside hamlet of c. 3,000 people in the located in the municipality of Perote, Veracruz. Residents of La Gloria, Mexico have long complained that some of the pits that hold pig waste are not properly lined; they fear their groundwater is contaminated. They’re frustrated and angry, too, about the stench and the swarms of flies that invade their village. Granjas Carroll de Mexico, half-owned by U.S.-based Smithfield Foods Inc., operates dozens of farms around La Gloria.
2009-02 In the end of February in La Gloria, Mexico, a hillside hamlet of c. 3,000 people in the located in the municipality of Perote, Veracruz, many people became ill with symptoms similar to a bad cold.
2009-03-18 Mexican government reported an unusually high level of flu-like illnesses.
2009-03-23 Veracruz health officials arrived in La Gloria, Mexico to take saliva samples. About a third of some 1,300 townspeople who sought medical attention – 450 or so – were diagnosed with acute respiratory infections and given surgical masks and antibiotics. (Washington Post).
Edgar fell ill a bit later; the energetic 5-year-old retreated to his bed with a high fever. Other kids in his school already were sick.
2009-03
2009-04-12 “By early April, the Veracruz government notified Mexican authorities of a possible flu outbreak in La Gloria. This alert happened to come around Holy Week, a time when lots of people in this largely Catholic country travel to visit family. On April 12, Mexican health authorities notified the CDC and the Pan American Health Organization of the unexplained cases of severe respiratory illness. One day later, people started dying (Cohen and Rodriguez 2009-05-01).”
2009-04-13 Adela Maria Gutierrez, a 38-year-old mother of three, was the first to die of H1N1 influenza virus. She had “arrived at a hospital in Oaxaca, in far southern Mexico, gasping for air, her oxygen-starved hands and legs a ghastly shade of blue. Her death was not just tragic, but alarming: Gutierrez had worked door-to-door for Mexico’s tax collection agency, interviewing scores of people. As it turns out, one of her co-workers, a temporary employee, was from Veracruz, the state on the Gulf of Mexico where the first swine case was confirmed. Family members said that woman had a bad cough (Cohen and Rodriguez 2009-05-01).”
2009-04-12 First two cases of A (H1N1) in California BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-04-25 “A day after seven new cases are confirmed in the US, the World Health Organization declares a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. From April 17-25 1, 455 cases of suspected A (H1N1) flu investigated. BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-04-26 Canada had 6 confirmed cases of A (H1N1); US had 20; Mexico had 18 BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-04-28 Confirmed cases of A (H1N1): UK had 2, Spain had 2, US had 64; New Zealand had 3; Mexico had 20. BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-04-29 Confirmed cases of A (H1N1): Canada: 13; UK:5 (London, Polmont, Redditch, Paignton); Israel:2; Spain:10; US:91; New Zealand:3; Austria:1; Germany:3; Mexico: 26. Deaths caused by A (H1N1) Mexico: 7; US:1; BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-05-01 Confirmed cases of A (H1N1): Canada: 35; UK:10; Israel:2; Spain:13; US:109; New Zealand:4; Austria:1; Germany:4; Mexico: 300; Peru:1; Costa Rica:2; Netherlands:1; Switzerland:1; Hong Kong:1. Deaths caused by A (H1N1) Mexico: 12; US:1. The UK, US, Canada, Spain, Germany confirm cases of secondary transmission. BBC 2009 Outbreak Map.
2009-05 “Influenza A(H1N1) – update 8.1. 1 May 2009 — “The situation continues to evolve. As of 23:30 GMT, 1 May 2009, 13 countries have officially reported 367 cases of influenza A(H1N1) infection. The United States Government has reported 141 laboratory confirmed human cases, including one death. Mexico has reported 156 confirmed human cases of infection, including nine deaths. The following countries have reported laboratory confirmed cases with no deaths – Austria (1), Canada (34), China, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region (1), Denmark (1), Germany (4), Israel (2), Netherlands (1), New Zealand (4), Spain (13), Switzerland (1) and the United Kingdom (8). Further information on the situation will be available on the WHO website on a regular basis. WHO advises no restriction of regular travel or closure of borders. It is considered prudent for people who are ill to delay international travel and for people developing symptoms following international travel to seek medical attention, in line with guidance from national authorities. There is also no risk of infection from this virus from consumption of well-cooked pork and pork products. Individuals are advised to wash hands thoroughly with soap and water on a regular basis and should seek medical attention if they develop any symptoms of influenza-like illness.”
2009-05-01 “Swine flu has been confirmed in 16 deaths, all from Mexico (one Mexican toddler died in Houston). It has sickened nearly 350 people in Mexico, and about 200 others from New York to New Zealand, including children, teens, adults, students and tourists. It has rattled the world’s financial markets, pushed oil prices down, caused a run on surgical masks and hand sanitizers, closed schools and churches, postponed sporting events, prompted travel bans, rerouted cruise ships(Cohen and Rodriguez 2009-05-01).”
Webliography
BBC. 2009. Outbreak Map.
Cohen, Sharon; Rodriguez, Olga R. 2009-05-01. “How swine flu virus hopscotched the globe.” Washington Post
WHO. 2009-05-01-23:30 GMT. “Influenza A(H1N1) Update 8.1.
CBC Recycles Anti-recycling Arguments
April 14, 2009
Anti-recyclers like the Cato Institute’s Grant Schaumberg, Katherine Doyle (1991), James DeLong of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (1994), Lynn Scarlett (1995) of the Reason Foundation, Jeff Bailey (1995) of the Wall Street Journal, Alan Caruba (2003-01), Daniel K. Benjamin (2003) of the Property and Environment Research Center (PERC), John Tierney (1996), J. Winston Porter of the Waste Policy Center in Leesburg, Va., Libertarian Michael Mungerar (2007) and La Giorgia (2009-01) argue that “the market” should determine what if anything is recycled. Anti-recycler Tierney claimed that the well-publicized 1000s-of-miles journey of the Mobro 4000, a barge carrying Long Islanders’ trash, trying to unload its cargo, incited a garbage guilt epidemic among Americans. He like other anti-recyclers, also claimed that the garbage crisis that emerged from this image continues today under false pretenses: there is no shortage of environmentally safe landfill sites; curbside recycling rarely pays for itself in direct returns; recycling is not economically efficient. (Tierney 1996-06-30)
Recycling advocates Richard A. Denison and John F. Ruston (1996) of the Environmental Defense Fund in Washington, DC argue that the think tanks quoted by the anti-recyclers such as The Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Cato Institute (both based in Washington DC), the Reason Foundation (based in Santa Monica, CA) and the Waste Policy Center (based in Leesburg, VA) that tend to promote market interests over the state, minimal government intervention in general and government programs of any kind. At least some of these think tanks accept funding from companies involved in “solid waste collection, landfilling and incineration, the manufacturing of products from virgin materials, and the production and sale of packaging and consumer products. Many of the corporations that fund the anti-recyclers have a direct economic stake in maintaining the waste management status quo and in minimizing consumers’ scrutiny of the environmental effects of products and packaging.” (Denison and Ruston 1996-07-18)
Timeline
1960s A political movement to save the environment emerged called the greening of America
1960s Martin Lapierre’s father founded Profix Environnement, an industrial collector of corrugated cardboard based in Laval, Quebec by collecting used boxes and selling them back to manufacturers for reprocessing. Martin, who inherited the business estimated that the cardboard the firm has recycled over the years has saved at least 750,000 trees (“(La Giorgia 2009-04-09).
1970-04-22 20 million people celebrated the first Earth Day in the United States.
1970-04-22 United Congress created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
1972 the Club of Rome published Limits to Growth arguing that the American way of life was not sustainable.
1980 Property and Environment Research Center (PERC) in Bozeman, Montana was formed by a group of economists claiming dedication to improving environmental quality through markets and property rights through research and outreach education. Research is at the heart of PERC’s work followed by outreach and education. PERC claims to have pioneered the approach known as free market environmentalism (FME).
1987 A barge named the Mobro 4000 wandered thousands of miles trying to unload its cargo of Long Islanders’ trash, and its journey had a strange effect on America.” Anti-recycler Tierney claimed that the garbage crisis that emerged from this image continues today under false pretenses. He also claimed that there is no shortage of environmentally safe landfill sites. (Tierney 1996-06-30)
1987 America devised a national five-year plan for trash. The Environmental Protection Agency promulgated a “Waste Hierarchy” that ranked trash disposal options: recycling at the top, composting and waste-to-energy incinerators in the middle, landfills at the bottom. The E.P.A.’s five-year goal, to recycle 25 percent of municipal trash, was announced in a speech in early 1988 by J. Winston Porter, an assistant administrator of the agency. Even as Porter was setting the goal, he realized that it was presumptuous for a bureaucrat in Washington to tell everyone in America what to do with their trash. “After all the publicity about the barge,” Porter recalls, “I sat down with some engineers in my office to estimate how much municipal waste could be recycled. At that time, about 10 percent was being recycled. We looked at the components of waste, made a few quick calculations and figured that it was reasonable to reach a level of 25 percent within five years. It wasn’t a highly quantified thing. Some of the staff didn’t even want me to mention a figure. But I thought it would be good to set a target, as long as it was strictly voluntary and didn’t involve a lot of regulations.” Politicians across the country had bigger ideas. State and city officials enacted laws mandating recycling and setting arbitrary goals even higher than the E.P.A.’s. Most states set rigid quotas, typically requiring that at least 40 percent of trash be recycled, often even more-50 percent in New York and California, 60 percent in New Jersey, 70 percent in Rhode Island. Industries were pressured to set their own goals. Municipalities followed the Waste Hierarchy by building waste-to-energy incinerators and starting thousands of curbside recycling programs-all in the belief that it would be cheaper than landfilling. But the incinerators turned out to be disastrously expensive, and the recycling programs produced a glut of paper, glass and plastic that no one wanted to buy.” (Tierney 1996-06-30)
1989 J. Winston Porter left the Environmental Protection Agency and became president of a consulting firm, the Waste Policy Center in Leesburg, Va. By 1996 he was advising cities and states to abandon their unrealistic goals of recycling and he “ridiculed EPA policies he had helped implement saying, “People in New York and other places are tilting at recycling windmills. [...] There aren’t many more materials in garbage that are worth recycling.” (Tierney 1996-06-30)
1991-09 anti-recyclers, Grant Schaumberg and Katherine Doyle, “Wasting Resources to Reduce Waste: Recycling in New Jersey,” Washington DC: Cato Institute,
1994-01-26 James DeLong, of the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington said, “The solution to the Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) non-crisis is to recognize that trash disposal is a commodity, like coal or asparagus, and to treat it accordingly. The government could establish a few rules to avoid externalities and cost shifting, and then let the free market work. Operating within this framework, waste disposal companies, truckers, railroads, municipal officials, recyclers, waste generators and others could all perform their receptive functions. The result would be a complex amalgam of regional landfills, short- and long-haul transportation by truck and rail, incineration, recycling, and source reduction. In a few years people would wonder what all the shouting was about.”
1995 anti-recycler, Jeff Bailey, “Curbside Recycling Comforts the Soul, But Benefits are Scant,” Wall Street Journal,
1995-01-19 anti-recycler Lynn Scarlett (Reason Foundation) “A Consumer’s Guide to Environmental Myths and Realities,” Dallas, TX: National Center for Policy Analysis,
2002 “The continuing dialogue about recycling is well illustrated by the February 2002 response of the National Recycling Coalition (NRC)—one of many groups formed around this issue—to the white paper put out by the EPA. The NRC finds much to approve of in the EPA recommendations but returns to the fundamental issue of sustainability: can we go on producing and consuming and disposing of material goods at an ever-increasing rate?”
2003-09 Daniel K. Benjamin published the report entitled Recycling Rubbish: Eight Great Myths about Waste Disposal with Property and Environment Research Center.
2009-04-09 “From last year’s peak, prices [for recyclable material] have dropped 50 to 90 per cent,” said Mairi Welman of the Recycling Council of British Columbia (RCBC), a group of government and industry members with a stake in recycling ( “(La Giorgia 2009-04-09).
2009-01 Profix Environnement, an industrial collector of corrugated cardboard based in Laval, Quebec was struggling to survive as the price of cardboard dropped to zero (“(La Giorgia 2009-04-09).
2009 Quebec promised $4.8 million in loan guarantees to support its recycling industry, as well as legislation allowing recycling companies and municipalities to renegotiate contracts (“(La Giorgia 2009-04-09).
Webliography and Bibliography
DeLong, James V. 1994-01-26. “Wasting Away; Mismanaging Municipal Solid Waste.” Competitive Enterprise Institute Monograph.
Denison, Richard A.; Ruston, John F. 1996-07-18. “Anti-Recycling Myths Commentary on ‘Recycling is Garbage‘”.
La Giorgia, Giancarlo. 2009-04-09. “No cents in recycling as economy kills demand for material.” CBC News.
Munger, Michael. 2007-07-02. “Think Globally, Act Irrationally: Recycling.” July 2, 2007. Library of Economics and Liberty. Accessed 2009-04-13.
Tierney, John. 1996-06-30. “Recycling is Garbage.” New York Times Magazine.
Benjamin, Daniel K. 2003-09. Recycling Rubbish: Eight Great Myths about Waste Disposal PERC Reports: 21:3.
Caruba, Alan. 2003-01. “The Utter Waste of Recycling.”
1982 Household debt in the U.S. — the money owed as individuals was c. 60% of income in 1982.
1995- 2000 Phil Gramm was chairman of the Senate Banking Committee; he was “Washington’s most prominent and outspoken champion of financial deregulation (Time 2009-04-07).”
1998 Powerful lobby groups comprising hedge funds and the banking sector including investment banks defeated Commodity Futures Trading Commission proposal to regulate the burgeoning derivatives market (Kiviat 2008-09-23).
1999 Phil Gramm “played a leading role in writing and pushing through Congress the 1999 repeal of the Depression-era Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial banks from Wall Street (Time 2009-04-07).”
2000 Phil Gramm ”inserted a key provision into the 2000 Commodity Futures Modernization Act that exempted over-the-counter derivatives like credit-default swaps from regulation by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Credit-default swaps took down AIG, which has cost the U.S. $150 billion thus far (Time Special 2009-04-07).”
Early 2000s Alan Greenspan, Federal Reserve chairman, brought in “super-low interest rates”. His assertive insistence on deregulation along with the easy access to credit are now considered to be leading causes of the mortgage crisis (Time Special 2009-04-07).
2005 Christopher Cox became chairman of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Under his direction the SEC did not insist on greater disclosure of big investment banks like Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch.
2006 Hank Paulson left the top job at Goldman Sachs to become Treasury Secretary. In 2008 during the last year of the Bush Administration, he single-handedly ran the country’s economic policy. Time argued that he was late in battling the financial crisis; he let Lehman Brothers fail; he pushed the big bailout bill through Congress (Time Special 2009-04-07).
2007 Household debt in the U.S. increased to more than 130% of income in 2007. Time magazine special report on the financial crisis lays blame on American consumer enjoyed living beyond their means and becoming dependent on credit.
2008-10 Alan Greenspan admitted in a US “congressional hearing that he had “made a mistake in presuming” that financial firms could regulate themselves (Time Special 2009-04-07).”
For more see “25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis” Time Magazine.
Kiviat, Barbara. 2008-09-23. “How Much is the SEC’s Cox to Blame?” Time Magazine.
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