Transparency

When President Obama put together his bailout, all of the money was presented on a website for everyone to see. When former President Bush offered the bank to the rich and corporate, this same transparency was not available.

Due to the work of the Senator of Vermont, Bernie Sanders, we now know how the Bush administration spent the money.

From the official Congressional transcript:

"[W}hat we now know is the extent of the bailout for the large financial corporations. Goldman Sachs received nearly $600 billion. Morgan Stanley received nearly $2 trillion. Citigroup received $1.8 trillion. Bear Stearns received nearly $1 trillion. And Merrill Lynch received some $1.5 trillion in short-term loans from the Fed.

"But I think what is most surprising for the American people is not just the bailout of Wall Street and the financial institutions, and the bailout of large American corporations such as General Electric, but I think the American people would find it very strange that at a time when the American automobile sector was on the verge of collapse--and goodness only knows how many thousands and thousands of jobs we have lost in automobile manufacturing in this country--the Federal Reserve was also bailing out Toyota and Mitsubishi, two Japanese carmakers, by purchasing nearly $5 billion worth of their commercial paper from November 5, 2008, through January 30, 2009.

"While virtually no American-made cars or products of any kind are bought in Japan, I think the American people would be shocked to learn that the Fed extended over $380 billion to the Central Bank of Japan to bail out banks in that country.

"Furthermore, I think the American people are interested to know that the Fed bailed out the Korea Development Bank, the wholly owned, state-owned Bank of South Korea, by purchasing over $2 billion of its commercial paper. The sole purpose of the Korea Development Bank is to finance and manage major industrial projects to enhance the national economy not of the United States of America but of South Korea. I am not against South Korea. I wish the South Koreans all the luck in the world. But it should not be the taxpayers of the United States lending their banks' money to create jobs in South Korea. I would suggest maybe we want to create jobs in the United States of America. At the same time, the Fed also extended over $40 billion for the Central Bank of South Korea so that it had enough money to bail out its own banks.

"At a time when small businesses in Vermont and all over this country cannot get the loans they need to expand their businesses, I think the American people would find it extremely--I don't know what the word is--maybe amusing that the Fed bailed out the state-owned Bank of Bavaria--not Pennsylvania, not California, but Bavaria--by purchasing over $2.2 billion of its commercial paper.

"Furthermore, when we cannot get support on the floor of this Senate to extend unemployment benefits to millions of Americans who are on the verge of seeing them expire, I think the American people would find it incomprehensible that the Fed chose to bail out the Arab Banking Corporation based in Bahrain by providing them with over $23 billion in loans with an interest rate as low as one-quarter of 1 percent. So small businessmen all over America: Maybe you have to run to Bahrain and work with the Arab Banking Corporation there to get some pretty good loans. But it would be nice if maybe the Fed would start to pay attention to banks in this country.

"Furthermore, the Fed extended over $9.6 billion to the Central Bank of Mexico.

"What is interesting about all of this is that we had a very vigorous debate here in the Senate and in the House over the $700 billion TARP program. Every person in America could turn on C-SPAN and hear that debate. They could hear what President Bush had to say, hear what then-Senator Obama and Senator McCain had to say. It was all pretty public. But what took place at the Fed, which, in fact, amounted to a larger bailout, was done behind closed doors. Over $3 trillion was lent with zero transparency."

Note the last paragraph--Senator Obama--so this happened during the time of one of the worst Presidents ever, George Bush.