Banksters on The War Path

[FOTD]

 Banksters on The War Path
How Wall Street Is Fighting Back and Winning Their Fight For The Status Quo

by Danny Schechter (news disector)

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13462


New York, New York: Dick Durbin knows his way around the Senate. He's been there a long time, long enough to know how things really work. Over the years, the man from Illinois has come to realize that it's not the elected officials who are in charge. Last week, he said it was the bankers "who run the place" acknowledging that Senators may be in office, but not necessarily in power.



Usually, the people who pull the strings stay in the background to avoid too much public exposure. They rely on lobbyists to do their bidding. They prefer to work in the shadows. They may back certain politicians, but coming from a world of credit default swaps as they do, they hedge their bets by putting money on all the horses.



They have so much influence because they have been reengineering the American economy for decades through "financialization," a process by which banks and financial institutions gradually came to dominate economic and political decision-making.  Kevin Phillips, a one time Reagan advisor and commentator,  says our deepest problem is "the ascendancy of finance in national policymaking (as well as in the gross domestic product, and the complicity of politicians who really don't want to talk about it."


Curiously, despite the journalists like Bill Moyers and Arianna Huffinton who have been blowing the whistle on the role of the "banksters" in our political life, criticizing the Republicans and Democrats who deregulated the financial system, this issue seems to float above the heads of most of the public, much of the press, and even the activist community more drawn to punishing the torture inflicted on a few by a former Administration than the economic duress being imposed on the majority of Americans by a minority of the superrich. 



Demonstrators are still drawn more to the White House than the banks that have proliferated on every corner of the country.



Last week, a Zogby poll found that a majority of the public believes the press made things worse by reporting on the economic collapse. Not only is that blaming the messenger, it also overlooks the fact that much of the media was complicit in the crisis by not covering  the forces that caused the collapse when it might have done some good.



Exacerbating the problem is that the Obama Administration has, in Robert Scheer's words, enlisted "the very experts who helped trigger the crisis to try to fix it."



"Obama," he writes "seems depressingly reliant on the same-old, same old cast of self-serving house wreckers who act as if government exists for the sole benefit of corporations and executives."



The team of Tim Geithner and Larry Summers has been carrying Wall Street's water as Robert Rubin did before them. No wonder that Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder told the Street last February, "We're not going to go on any witch hunts."



That was before we learned that Wall Street forced US regulators to delay the release of stress test results for the country's 19 biggest banks until next Thursday, because some of the lenders objected to government demands that they needed to raise more capital. They are trying to rig the results.



That was also before the public learned of the obscenely huge bonuses the firms benefiting from the TARP bailout were shelling out to their executives. That was before, we saw how the bankers with help from Democrats, including new convert Arlen Spector, vited managed to kill a bill to help homeowners stop foreclosures.

"The Senate on Thursday rejected an effort to stave off home foreclosures by a vote of 51 to 45. It was an overwhelming defeat, with the bill's backers falling 15 votes short — a quarter of the Democratic caucus — of the 60 needed to cut off debate and move to a final vote. Across the United States, the measure is estimated to have been able to prevent 1.69 million foreclosures and preserve $300 billion in home equity." 



Commented the Center for Responsible Lending, "Instead of defending ordinary Americans, the majority of Senators went with the banks.  Yes, the same banks who have benefited so richly from the TARP bailout.



(There was one small victory with the House approving a bill to protect consumers from credit card abuses. Its not clear if the Senate will pass it too. "It's one step forward and one step backward," said Travis Plunkett, of the Consumer Federation of America. "Congress is moving in fits and starts to re-regulate the financial services industry and the banking lobby still has tremendous clout."



"Tremendous clout" is an understatement."



In this past week, we also saw how a few hedge funds undermined the attempt to save Chrysler from bankruptcy by holding out for more money even after the unions and big banks agreed to compromise to save jobs.

The President was furious but apparently powerless: "A group of investment firms and hedge funds decided to hold out for the prospect of an unjustified taxpayer-funded bailout," Obama said. "They were hoping that everybody else would make sacrifices, and they would have to make none. Some demanded twice the return that other lenders were getting."

Explains the blog Naked Capitalism, "the banksters are eagerly, shamelessly, and openly harvesting their pound of flesh from financially stressed average taxpayers, and setting off a chain reaction in the auto industry which has the very real risk of creating even larger scale unemployment than the economy already faces. It's reckless, utterly irresponsible, over-the-top greed."

Will they be allowed to get away with it? A "captured" Congress is doing their bidding. There is no doubt that class antagonism is stewing,  says the editor of the blog. He expressed a fear of a reaction that will go way beyond flag-wavng tea parties.

"... I am concerned this behavior is setting the stage for another sort of extra-legal measure: violence. I have been amazed at the vitriol directed at the banking classes. Suggestions for punishment have included the guillotine (frequent), hanging, pitchforks, even burning at the stake. Tar and feathering appears inadequate, and stoning hasn't yet surfaced as an idea. And mind you, my readership is educated, older, typically well-off (even if less so than three years ago). The fuse has to be shorter where the suffering is more acute."

One is reminded of the title of that movie, "There will be blood." Rather than show contrition or compassion for its own victims, Wall Street is hoping to jack up its salaries and bonuses to pre-2007 levels. The men at the top are oblivious to the pain they helped cause. And so far, they've only occasionally been scolded by politicians that have mostly enabled, coddled, bankrolled, funded, rewarded, and genuflected to their power.

Wall Street's behavior may be predictable but how can we account for the silence of so many organizations that should be out there organizing the outrage that is building? Knock, Knock, Obama supporters, bloggers, trade unionists, out of work workers and fellow Americans. Will we fight back or roll over?

Pitchforks anyone?"

Mediachannel's News Dissector Danny Schechter is making a film about Wall Street based on his book Plunder (www.newsdissector.com/plunder). Comments to dissector@mediachannel.org 




Danny Schechter is a frequent contributor to Global Research.  Global Research Articles by Danny Schechter

There was not one question on the bank crisis in Obama's press conf.

[FOTD]

Charlie Munger, agrees.

This is good: http://www.retirerichblog.com/2009/05/charlie-munger-on-berkshires-off-year.html   

Berkshire vice chairman Charlie Munger discusses Berkshire's difficult year and where he thinks the economy is headed, with CNBC's Becky Quick.

[FOTD]

 Last week, following questions from The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Friedman, 71 years old, disclosed he would step down from the New York Fed at year end. In an interview, he said he made the decision because the waiver letting him own Goldman stock and be a Goldman director expires at the end of the year. He added: "I see no conflict whatsoever in owning shares."

Good riddance! Fire him instead! He violated the law!

New York Fed Chairman's Ties to Goldman Raise Questions

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124139546243981801.html#mod=mktw


Here is an intersting chart found some months back on this subject :

http://www.1psheet.com/wp-content/ChartsGraphs/gs-gov.gif

Those Busheviks and their cronies pulled off quite the heist.....

[FOTD]

http://www.goldmansachs666.com/

The tea baggers don't seem concerned and outraged with the looting.

[FOTD]

Nation Ready To Be Lied To About Economy Again
MAY 4, 2009 | ISSUE 45•19

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/nation_ready_to_be_lied_to_about

"Washington—After nearly four months of frank, honest, and open dialogue about the failing economy, a weary U.S. populace announced this week that it is once again ready to be lied to about the current state of the financial system.

Tired of hearing the grim truth about their economic future, Americans demanded that the bald-faced lies resume immediately, particularly whenever politicians feel the need to divulge another terrifying problem with Wall Street, the housing market, or any one of a hundred other ticking time bombs everyone was better off not knowing about.

In addition, citizens are requesting that the phrase, "It will only get worse before it gets better," be permanently replaced with, "Things are going great. Enjoy yourselves.

"I thought I wanted a new era of transparency and accountability, but honestly, I just can't handle it," Ohio resident Nathan Pletcher said. "All I ever hear about now is how my retirement has been pushed back 15 years and how I won't be able to afford my daughter's tuition when she grows up."

"From now on, just tell me the bullshit I want to hear," Pletcher added. "Tell me my savings are okay, everybody has a job, and we're No. 1 again. Please, just lie to my face."

The national call for decreased candor began last month, after the Department of Labor released another soul-crushing report that most Americans agreed "wasn't helping anything" and "didn't need to be so specific, at least."

The report estimated that 663,000 private and public sector jobs were lost in the month of March—a revealing statistic many people found shockingly blunt. Responding to the new information, an overwhelming majority of citizens said they believe that, during these extremely uncertain times, our leaders have a responsibility to come together, sit the American people down, and lie through their teeth about everything from misappropriations of taxpayer dollars to the severity of the credit crisis.

"I don't need to be constantly reminded that the lack of regulations on Wall Street compounded with failing institutions like AIG basically plunged the world economy into a global recession," said 32-year-old office manager Alexis Harrington. "What I want is for someone to tell me with a straight face that the GDP is through the roof so that I can feel better and instantly forget what all these terms even mean."

"For the first time in my life I know who the secretary of the treasury is," Harrington continued. "And I don't like it."

Reluctantly informed citizens like Harrington have also asked that CEOs of the nation's five largest banks release a joint statement saying that the October bailout worked perfectly, normal lending has resumed, and that we're nowhere close to having the entire monetary system collapse upon itself like a house of cards.

According to a CBS News/New York Times poll, 98 percent of Americans no longer appreciate President Barack Obama's attempts to break down the economic crisis into simple terms they can understand. Instead, many say the president should have the decency to insult their intelligence by using complex jargon to confuse and deceive them, perhaps even implying that the subprime mortgage fallout was just a big misunderstanding that resulted from a clerical error.

"I know when he's telling the truth, and it bothers me," recently laid-off schoolteacher Mary Hanover said of Obama. "He gets this serious expression on his face and says things like, 'This is the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.' Who needs to hear that? For Christ's sake, smile a bit and say we just found a diamond mine under Montana that's going to pay for everything. I'll believe you."

"Please, treat me like a child. Treat me like a five-year-old," Sacramento resident David Cooke, 64, wrote in a letter to Congress. "I lost everything when the Dow tanked, and I'm too old to start working again, so why punish me further by explaining in detail the clever ways these investment firms ripped me off and how they're all going to get away with it?"

Thus far, many policymakers in Washington have responded favorably to their constituents' requests, saying they respect and understand the public's need for dishonesty.

"I think we can accommodate the American people on this," Senate majority leader Harry Reid (D-NV) told reporters. "Why, just today we made excellent progress with GM, whose CEO Fritz Henderson told us that every penny of federal and taxpayer funds would go directly to the construction of three new auto plants in Detroit that will create over 90,000 new jobs and spark the economic rebound we've been waiting for."

Continued Reid, "Things are looking very, very bright."

[guido911]

Do you realize that you are the only one posting on this thread? (except of course for this one) NO ONE CARES!!!

[waterboy]

Just because no one replies doesn't mean it isn't being read.

[Gaspar]

I'll check this thread again in a few years.

[FOTD]

Yea, recall any of those economic disaster prognostications that went without group participation. Without notice, the economy crashed on September 15th only days before FOTD got banned from TNF for relaying a YOUTUBE video portraying the demise of the Republicans. Threads have been monopolized several times by this single poster not only for bait but for attention.

Boy, this demon sure misses IPLAW.

[FOTD]

Was done under the Bush rescue pre TARP. Just want to keep the record straight....