Fun with Phil and Wendy

I about fell out yesterday reading Susan Bankston at Kiss My Big Blue Butt. Talking about our Congressman Pete Olson being Phil Gramm’s puppet, she said “Pete can’t talk when Phil’s drinking water.”

I met Mrs. Olson last year outside my early voting site, and when she asked me to vote for her husband, I told her that I was troubled by his association with Phil Gramm.

She replied that “Phil Gramm is one of the greatest economic minds of the century.”

I just know that it was Phil Gramm that told her that.

I have friends that know the Olsons, and they assure me that they are fine people. Still, when I see him mixed up with DeLay associates, or signing a pledge for Grover Norquist I want to warn him about keeping company with criminal types. And that includes Phil and Wendy.

Today Susan linked to a story I’ve been waiting a long time to see.
Phil and Wendy were big players in the Enron debacle, but they skated on all that.
Gramm was behind the deregulation that crashed the US economy last year bringing world-wide disaster, but somehow that’s getting blamed on Barack Obama.
Now he’s done a number on the Swiss Banking system. When Gramm gave up his Senate seat and position as Chairman of the Banking committee, he parachuted to a V.P. slot with UBS, Switzerland’s largest bank. Last year UBS found itself holding $37 billion in bad mortgage debt from the Gramm-deregulated US derivatives market. Next, UBS lands in Federal court and agrees to give up the names of tens of thousands of US customers who thought they had a secret offshore tax dodge. Makes me wonder if the Gnomes of Zurich are the type of folks that would have somebody whacked for messing up their business.