من صحيفة النيو يورك تايمز:
Few Burns for Four Bankers on the Hot Seat
By MARK LEIBOVICH
Published: January 13, 2010
WASHINGTON — The four bankers of the apocalypse strode into the Congressional hearing room and formed a crooked line. They raised their hands haltingly, looking at one another as if to see whether the other guys were going to do it, too. It was one of the more indecisive swearings-in you will ever see on Capitol Hill.
Doug Mills/The New York Times
Wall Street bankers took oaths at Wednesday's hearing, from left, Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase, John Mack of Morgan Stanley, and Brian Moynihan of Bank of America.
For those anticipating a cathartic ceremony of dressing-downs, apologies or verbal brawling, there was little of it during the three-and-a-half-hour hearing. Nor did the circular House hearing room resemble anyone’s idea of a circus tent; it was packed but quiet, scattered with a few innocuous protesters. The 10 commissioners pressed the bankers on executive compensation, on managing risks and on lending practices, keeping up a brisk pace while the witnesses fidgeted like busy people who all had planes or trains to catch.
The initial round of questions and responses provoked disapproval, a few pointed fingers and sporadic shows of humility from the witnesses. “If you do everything right in business, you’re going to make mistakes,” said Mr. Dimon.
Labored metaphors abounded. Phil Angelides, the former state treasurer of California who is the commission’s chairman, told Mr. Blankfein that he sounded like he was selling cars with faulty brakes and then buying insurance on the driver.
Bill Thomas, the panel’s vice chairman and a cantankerous former congressman from California, compared the work of the commission to an iceberg that was only one-eighth visible over the water.
Commissioner Byron S. Georgiou noted that the banks had “eaten their own cooking” (sort of a gastronomic version of the “made their own bed” cliché). Mr. Mack heartily agreed.
“We did eat our own cooking,” he said. “And we choked on it.”
After Mr. Angelides called for a quick break, the chief executives bolted — except for Mr. Mack, who stayed behind at the witness table. “What are people supposed to think when they see these bankers taking big bonuses?” one reporter asked Mr. Mack, who began his answer by noting that he did not get a bonus. Behind him, a woman wearing a Washington Nationals baseball cap was scurrying around, trying to get people to take her homemade fliers denouncing the Bank of America. She wore a “Fire Kenneth Lewis” T-shirt (Mr. Lewis was until recently the bank’s chief executive).
“I’m here because I want to put these guys in jail,” said the woman, Judy Koenick, of Chevy Chase, Md.
No stranger to muscular but diminished adversaries, Mr. Angelides, who lost the governor’s race in California to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006, pointedly compared some Wall Street chief executives to blackjack players who could win huge amounts of cash but not lose anything. Mr. Dimon responded, “You can lose your job, and your reputation.”
Finally, before lunchtime, Mr. Angelides dismissed the executives.
A reporter asked Mr. Mack if the experience had been fun. “Well,” he said, making his way to the exit, “it’s just something that we had to do.”
Following a few feet behind, Mr. Dimon made the mistake of stopping to chat with someone and found himself gridlocked in a solo press conference.
Why were the chief executives not more apologetic? a reporter asked.
People “have to be very specific” when asking for apologies, Mr. Dimon cautioned.
He squared his shoulders and headed for the back door, only to meet an insistent question from Jonathan Karl of ABC.
“Mr. Dimon, does Wall Street get it?” Mr. Karl asked the banker, who kept walking and had nothing more to say.
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