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Just two weeks ago, ABC's Betsy Stark reminded us, the current Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson made headlines by announcing that the $700bn Troubled Asset Relief Program that he controls would not be used to relieve financial institutions of troubled assets. Well that was two weeks ago. Paulson's latest announcement was the terms of the federal bailout of Citigroup. The partial nationalization of the bank has been expanded from a $20bn investment to $45bn and it "now seems to include dealing with toxic assets," mused Stark dryly. The taxpayer is now guaranteeing $306bn in Citigroup assets. CNBC's Erin Burnett called Citigroup, with 200m customers worldwide and 300,000 employees, "simply too big to fail." She reckoned that the federal government now owns 7.8% of the bank. "Why rescue Citigroup and not the Big Three automakers?" CBS' Kelly Wallace wondered. Paulson answered that his TARP "is for the financial sector only."
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