Hack Watch

American workers have just started getting the barest minimum of a few lucky breaks. But that is terrifying to Rattner and his fellow moguls, so they need some sort of rational argument for why these bare scraps of power are actually bad for everyone.

Short-seller Hindenburg Research says the payments mogul Block has inflated user metrics, ignored widespread criminal transactions on its platforms, and evaded regulations.

Larry Summers, Steven Rattner, Marc Goldwein, Maya MacGuineas Among Top Targets

For the past two years, former Treasury secretary Larry Summers has begged, berated, and bullied federal policy-makers to suck as much wealth as possible, as fast as possible, out of the economy. He just never meant, you know, his wealth or his friends’ wealth.

Eh, not really.

In many cases, Summers refuses to distinguish between his personal ideology about economics and what he thinks are scientific laws of nature.

Uncovering what Summers argued, and how Westin framed it, offers a lot of insight into how the media trains us to think about the economy.

Considering how much of the financial press eagerly solicits Summers’ take on every imaginable economics topic, it’s bizarre that no reporters have gotten his thoughts about his involvement in this crumbling company, and the asset class it promotes.

The Commerce Secretary’s commitment to 90’s centrism has won her support from the Gray Lady, and hostility from actual voters.

Identifying people who don’t support the party’s key policies as Democratic thought leaders only serves to reinforce outmoded center right ideology.

Boosters of Ponzi products should not be granted the freedom to tout their products without ample pushback and skepticism. Because, as is all too common in Washington, when this media cover is combined with other forms of political pressure including lobbying and campaign donations, industry interests take precedence over the public’s. Politico knows where to find skeptical voices; they had Healthy Markets President and CEO Ty Gellasch on the panel that followed Alderoty’s remarks, albeit alongside three other preachers of crypto’s so-called greatness.

This week: inflation hawks double down on brutal rate hikes that will harm workers and the mainstream media goes out of its way to undermine rail workers.

Rattner has ridden his seven months in the Obama White House to an extremely influential punditry career, in addition to the millions he rakes in as Bloomberg’s money manager.