A new report from Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program in the Treasury Department, says it all: Americans have “entirely legitimate concerns about the lack of transparency, program mismanagement and flawed decision-making processes that continue to plague the program.” Under President Obama and his Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, the department’s management of TARP has made a mockery of the Freedom of Information Act, even as the program has clearly failed to accomplish its stated purposes. Barofsky cites numerous failed TARP goals, including increasing lending, alleviating unemployment and preserving home-ownership against the foreclosure meltdown. With those failures, the public’s confidence in Treasury’s ability to repair the economy is sinking faster than the dollar against foreign currencies.
That should be no surprise. Barofsky’s blistering report released Monday ticks off a list that would make readers’ heads spin: “When Treasury refuses for more than a year to require TARP recipients to account for the use of TARP funds or claims that Capital Purchase Program participants were ‘healthy, viable’ institutions knowing full well that some are not or when it provides hundreds of billions of dollars in TARP assistance to institutions and then relies on those same institutions to self-report any violations of their obligations to TARP, it damages the public’s trust to a degree that is difficult to repair.”
