Presidential meetings of the PPT are not announced to the press
The Plunge Protection Team's fame keeps increasing. Today, New York Magazine has a short article on the group (added to the sidebar) with a couple of interesting tidbits:
Among the revelations of last week’s market panic: We’re still not allowed to know anything about the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets, which springs into action during times of crisis. Don’t ask what its members do or how they do it—even if you’re Hillary Clinton. Tuesday morning, in a press conference about the “global economic crisis,” she asked that the president call in these Über–Masters of the Universe, if he hadn’t already. (The PWG doesn’t have a spokesperson, and it doesn’t keep minutes of its meetings.) Only the Journal bothered to print White House spokesman Tony Fratto’s brush-off: “We don’t announce meetings or conference calls of the PWG.”
Apparently, the White House spokesman was a bit ticked off about Hillary Clintons call for a meeting of the PPT to solve the economic crisis:
Either way, the White House would prefer that Clinton shut up about it. It “does not require ‘convening’ by the president,” Fratto sniffed, and he added that “everyone should understand that the members stay in regular communication and meet as needed.” Yes, yes—everyone understands.
This is an interesting bit of info. The PPT is in "regular communication". Does this mean that Paulson is on the phone to the heads of Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan daily? Is President Bush involved? Could they be on the phone right now discussing the continuing market crash in asia?
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