For Geithner at the New York Fed, this was no comfort: “We hadn’t chosen to draw a line. We had been powerless, not fearless. We had tried but failed to prevent a catastrophic default.”37 On this interpretation of the crisis, Geithner would go on to base an entire program of state building. If in 2008 what had been missing were adequate state powers of intervention, the answer was to equip the Fed and the Treasury with the right tools. What Geithner could not admit is the possibility that “Hank and Ben” had, in fact, made a mistake.
