but it was instructive nonetheless so i'm glad you posted it.

for those who hate watching videos. (That's me, but I make an exception for Warren.)

On the past:

We don't know where the 700 billion dollars is because the system was initially designed to make sure that we didn't know. When Sec Paulsen first put this money out into the banks he didn't ask for - what are you going to do with it -, he didn't put any restrictions on it, he didn't put any tabs on where it was going to go. In other words, he didn't ask. And, if you don't ask, no one tells. And so we have a system that originally put more than 200 billion dollars into the financial institutions, basically saying, "Just take it."

On the present:

The way I see it is that the financial system itself is quite fragile, and the underlying economy, the real economy - jobs, housing, household wealth - is still in a very perilous state.

On the reasons why:

Q: I was a reading a transcript of a hearing that you conducted with Sec. Geithner, and you had a very good question, which was: why is that the banking institutions and the automobile companies were treated differently [....] And I'm not sure he ever answered it.

A: If he answered it, I didn't catch it. This isn't a political cheap shot that I was engaged in. I want to understand. If it's taxpayer money on the line, if these are described as systemically significant institutions and that's the reason for coming in - did he think the banks were better run? The Treasury Department on behalf of the taxpayer was tough in dealing with the auto industry [....] They were not tough with the banks, and I want to understand why.

On the future, and an implicit answer to "why?":

Q: Are we going to look back in two, three years at this TARP expenditure and say, well, it worked, it had its, you know, what it was supposed to do, its short-term effect?

A: What was so astonishing about the first expenditures under TARP was that taxpayer dollars were put into financial institutions that were still - left all their shareholders intact, that were still paying dividends, that paid their creditors a hundred cents on the dollar. We put taxpayer money in without saying, you've got to use everyone else's money up first. And once that's the case, I don't know how you ever put the genie back in the bottle. I don't know how you ever persuade either a large corporation or the wider marketplace - that if you can just get big enough and tie yourself to enough other important people , institutions, that if something goes wrong, the taxpayer will be there behind you. That's a game changer, that is a whole different approach than any we've ever used before.

[Ok, she lost control of her syntax there, but you can see what she means. Her demeanor is priceless. Elizabeth, you are my hero.]