Bill Gross: American Patriot

Billionaire "bond king" Bill Gross has offered to put country before self:

One of the chief concerns about the Treasury Department’s $700 billion bailout plan is that the same Wall Street firms that helped create the crisis could make a killing cleaning it up.

William H. Gross, the manager of the country’s largest bond mutual fund, has a solution: he is offering to sort through the toxic assets — free.

“We have a large and brilliant staff that can analyze and has analyzed subprime mortgages that can help the Treasury out,” Mr. Gross, the co-chief investment officer for the Pacific Investment Management Company, said in an interview at the company’s headquarters here.

He added, “And I’d even be willing to say that if the Treasury wanted to use our help, it would come, you know, free and clear.”

Mr. Gross explained his offer as a philanthropic one. With Pimco’s $830 billion under management, “we make fees aplenty,” he said.

By the way, I change my earlier assessment. I now think Bill Gross is the odds-on favorite to run the TARP, with Buffett in second place. Since both men have said they'd like to do it (although Gross was the only one enthusiastic about doing it for free), a third option is that treasury bureaucrats run it with both Gross and Buffett assisting voluntarily.