Covering up the true extent of the financial damage

Could Fed Chairman Timothy Geithner be involved in SEC rules violation?

The New York Federal Reserve Bank under Timothy Geithner urged insurer AIG in late 2008 to limit disclosures about its payments to banks after getting a $180 billion government bailout, emails released on Thursday showed.

The email exchanges, between the New York Fed and American International Group Inc lawyers, showed that AIG initially proposed disclosing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in early December 2008 that it would pay counterparties 100 cents on the dollar to liquidate credit default swaps it sold them.

But the decision to pay Goldman Sachs, Societe Generale and other global banking giants in full with taxpayer funds was not disclosed by AIG until March 2009, when it announced a $93 billion payoff that stoked public rage over the bailout.

So much for that "open and transparent" Obama administration, eh?