". . . a republic, if you can keep it."
“A US judge on Friday ordered Iran to pay $25 million plus interest to the family of IDF soldier Nachshon Wachsman, who was kidnapped and executed by Hamas in 1994.
Wachsman’s mother and six brothers filed the lawsuit in 2006 against Iran and its ministry of information and security, saying Tehran was responsible for the death because it provided training and support to Hamas. (AP)” (Read more from ynetnews.com)
Jurisdiction?
The crooks are in charge.
Obama = more of the same
“WASHINGTON — Obama administration special envoy Richard Holbooke was on the American International Group Inc. board of directors in early 2008 when the insurance company locked in the bonuses now stoking national outrage. Holbrooke, a veteran diplomat who is now the administration’s point man on Pakistan and Afghanistan, served on the board between 2001 and mid-2008.
During that period, AIG undertook the aggressive investment strategies that led to a near-collapse and forced a multibillion-dollar federal bailout.” (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)
Disgraced former NY Governor Eliot Spitzer published this article on Federal protection of the banking sector. Shortly thereafter, Patriot Act laws were used to spy on his finances which ultimately exposed his penchant for prostitutes.
“Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye.
Let me explain: The administration accomplished this feat through an obscure federal agency called the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC has been in existence since the Civil War. Its mission is to ensure the fiscal soundness of national banks. For 140 years, the OCC examined the books of national banks to make sure they were balanced, an important but uncontroversial function. But a few years ago, for the first time in its history, the OCC was used as a tool against consumers.
In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative. The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks. The federal government’s actions were so egregious and so unprecedented that all 50 state attorneys general, and all 50 state banking superintendents, actively fought the new rules.
But the unanimous opposition of the 50 states did not deter, or even slow, the Bush administration in its goal of protecting the banks. In fact, when my office opened an investigation of possible discrimination in mortgage lending by a number of banks, the OCC filed a federal lawsuit to stop the investigation.” (Read more from washingtonpost.com)
Like I always say, government is not our protector against monopolistic companies, they are the creator and enforcer of monopolies.
“Decisions made during the final months of the Bush administration created an environment in which the most politically connected investment banks, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, not only flourished, but saw their competitors laid waste, with firms like Lehman in bankruptcy, and others, like Merrill Lynch and Bank of America, forced to merge in desperate hope of surviving.” (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)
In terms of power and influence, no other bank seems to come close to Goldman Sachs. Their name comes up a lot as you travel down the rabbit hole of government secrecy.
“In case you were wondering where on earth all that money went that you shoveled into the black hole known as AIG, we now have a pretty good idea.
* $13 billion of it went to Goldman Sachs
* $12 billion went to Soc Gen
* $12 billion went to Deutsche Bank
* $9 billion went to Barclays
* $7 billion went to Merrill Lynch
* $5 billion went to Bank of America
And so on.
All these firms did business with AIG voluntarily. All these firms knew (or should have known) the risks of doing business with an unregulated firm in an unregulated part of the market. All these firms were willing to take the risk that AIG wouldn’t be able to make good on its commitments.” (Read more from businessinsider.com)
Thank to the bailouts, the line between government and industry is perverted. Banks have good reason to continue being irresponsible, as government will cover their losses with taxpayer money, and politicians have good reason to stick their selfish, stupid paws all over the decisions of private companies, as it’s politically expedient to create the impression of control and punishment.
Once again, Ron Paul is right. If the money must be spent, better to earmark it and spend it publicly, than shroud it in secrecy. Without earmarks, the money still gets spent.
Listen to how Cavuto goes after Ron Paul, trying to spin him as a porker – the very thing Ron Paul has made a career of fighting. Ron Paul crushes him with logic and reasoning, as he does most propagandists.
“What this will do is force anyone who produces food of any kind, and then transports it to a different location for sale, to register with a new federal agency called the ‘Food Safety Administration.’ Even growers who sell just fruit and/or vegetables at farmers markets would not only have to register, but they would be subject inspections by federal agents of their property and all records related to food production. The frequency of these inspections will be determined by the whim of the Food Safety Administration. Mandatory ‘safety’ records would have to be kept. Anyone who fails to register and comply with all of this nonsense could be facing a fine of up to $1,000,000 per violation.”
“Update: The Husband of the Bill’s Sponsor Does Work for Monsanto
Rosa DeLauro (D- CT) is married to Stanley B. Greenberg.
Here’s a bio on Greenberg:
Stanley B. Greenberg is Chairman and CEO of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research.
He has served as polling advisor to President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, Prime Minister Tony Blair, Presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki, Prime Minister Ehud Barak, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada of Bolivia and their national campaigns.
Greenberg provides strategic advice and research for companies, organizations and campaigns trying to advance their issues amid shifting social currents. . . .
His private sector clients include BP, Boeing, Monsanto, Comverse, Sun Microsystems, United HealthCare, the Business Roundtable, and the organizing committee for the 2004 Olympics in Athens.
—END UPDATE—” (Read more from cryptogon.com)
Corruption is an inevitable and predictable consequence of the marriage between government and the private sector. The hands-off approach would have simple, and simply effective. Irresponsible companies would go bankrupt. Responsible ones would survive.
“Rather than using federal bailout money to reinvigorate lending to consumers, some banks that received funds from TARP have spent it on questionable items that have done little to improve the health of the country’s financial sector but have certainly helped out foreign economies such as Dubai and China.
For instance, Citigroup Inc, which received $50 billion in Troubled Asset Relief Program funds, made an $8 billion December loan, not to an American entity, but to a Dubai public sector company, according to a newly released Monday memo by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), chairman of the House Domestic Policy Subcommittee.
The Goldman Sachs Group, which received $10 billion in TARP funds at the end of October, saw fit to spend $2 billion earlier in the year on the repurchase of company stock, which resulted in an increase in company share price.” (Read more from rawstory.com)
See Also: More Evidence Feds Don’t Know What the Hell They’re Doing in Bank Bailouts
“Boris Fyodorov, the late Russian Minister of Finance who struggled for many years against corruption and the abuse of authority, could be blunt. Confusion helps the powerful, he argued. When there are complicated government bailout schemes, multiple exchange rates, or high inflation, it is very hard to keep track of market prices and to protect the value of firms. The result, if taken to an extreme, is looting: the collapse of banks, industrial firms, and other entities because the insiders take the money (or other valuables) and run. This is the prospect now faced by the United States.” (Read more from tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com)
The last act of any government is to loot the treasury.
“The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that about $50 billion of more than $173 billion that the U.S. government has poured into American International Group Inc since last fall has been paid to at least two dozen U.S. and foreign financial institutions.
The newspaper reported that some of the banks paid by AIG since the insurer started getting taxpayer funds were: Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Deutsche Bank AG, Merrill Lynch, Societe Generale, Calyon, Barclays Plc, Rabobank, Danske, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, Banco Santander, Morgan Stanley, Wachovia, Bank of America, and Lloyds Banking Group.
Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs declined to comment when contacted by Reuters. Bank of America, Calyon, and Wells Fargo, which has absorbed Wachovia, could not be reached for comment.
The U.S. Federal Reserve has refused to publicize a list of AIG’s derivative counterparties and what they have been paid since the bailout, riling the U.S. Senate Banking Committee.” (Read more from reuters.com)
If we had just let these criminals go bankrupt, everything would have been so much simpler.
“The bills would require such a burdensome complexity of rules, inspections, licensing, fees, and penalties for each farmer who wishes to sell locally – a fruit stand, at a farmers market – no one could manage it. And THAT is the point.” (Read more from godlikeproductions.com)
Open your eyes, my socialist-leaning friends. Government is the problem. Liberty is the solution. Government is not the thin red line defending us from greedy monopolies. Government is the creator and enforcer of monopolies. More regulation and government aren’t the solution, they are the problem.
“The ‘food safety’ bills in Congress were written by Monsanto, Cargill, Tysons, ADM, etc. All are associated with the opposite of food safety. What is this all about then?
In the simplest terms, organic food and a rebirth of farming were winning. Not in absolute numbers but in a deep and growing shift by the public toward understanding the connection between their food and their health, between good food and true social pleasures, between their own involvement in food and the improvement in their lives in general, between local food and a burgeoning local economy.
Slow Food was right – limit your food to what comes from your region and from real farmers, and slow down to cook it and linger over it with friends and family, and the world begins to change for the better.
And as we face an unprecedented economic crisis, and it is hard to be sure what has value, one thing that always does is food. Which is why the corporations are after absolute control over it. But what obstacles to a complete lock on food do they face? All the people in this country who are ‘banking’ on organic farming and urban gardens and most of all, everyone’s deepening pleasure in and increasing involvement with everything about food.
Farmers markets. Local farmers. Real milk. Fresh eggs. Vegetable stands.
Those are things we not only all want, but things we are actively getting involved in, and things we very much need. And where they are truly good, they are growing.
The international financial corporations which have wreaked havoc around the world with astounding nonsensical ‘solutions’ that are destructive of everyone but them, are brothers to the international agribusiness giants (Monsanto, Cargill, Tysons, ADM, etc.) which are just as aggressively after their own form of ‘taking.’ Just seeds, animals, water, land.” (opednews.com)
See also: Action Alert
Government cannot create jobs, they can only redirect jobs. They must destroy jobs in the private sector by way of taxation, inflation or debt, in order to create jobs in the public sector. Jobs based on economics are sacrificed to create jobs based on politics. There is no more thoroughly discredited theory than that of socialist, centrally-planned economies, yet between people’s desire to have government solve all their problems, and the hubris of politicians, these long-discredited ideas again rise from the grave.
The Keynesian central planers benefits from a rhetorical advantage. We can see public works being built, banks receiving bailout checks, or money falling from Ben Bernanke’s helicopter. Meanwhile, it remains difficult for the Austrian economists, free marketers, and liberty lovers to wake the masses to the vast quantities of goods and services sacrificed in order to create the public works, bailouts, free money, or for that matter, foreign wars. This requires thought and imagination.
For now, the Keynesians have won. The result is already a circus of greed, lies and opportunism, as ignorant government bureaucrats attempt to demonstrate economic prowess, and businessmen attempt the bend the laws to their favor. Try to enjoy the show. It’s only beginning. Had we done nothing, the incompetent people would have gone out of business, and the responsible ones, the ones who’d been saving and investing wisely would have had the opportunity to buy out their assets. After a few years of pain, we’d again find ourselves on sound footing. Instead the circus has come to town:
– Concerns raised that GM will not survive (this is after taxpayers gave them $13.4 billion)
– AIG’s Fourth Rescue May Not Put End to Taxpayer Help Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke testified to the Senate yesterday that AIG’s collapse “would be devastating to the stability of the world financial system” and would keep the U.S. government from recouping its investments, which had already ballooned to $150 billion.
– Sen. Sanders: “Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars?” Bernanke: “No.”
– Black Hole Alert: GM, Chrysler Seeking More Federal Support
– Another $30 Billion in Funds to A.I.G.
– AIG Sues U.S. Government (WTF?)
– JP Morgan Chase Continues Foreclosure Proceedings Despite Promised Freeze
– Obama: “This time, CEOs won’t be able to use taxpayer money to pad their paychecks or buy fancy drapes or disappear on a private jet.” This time? THIS time???? How about the last time you gave them hundreds of billions of dollars? Remember? It was just a few weeks ago.
– Lawyers chasing bonus-receiving Merrill Lynch execs New York’s top legal officer on Thursday demanded Bank of America Corp Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis provide names of Merrill Lynch executives who received 2008 bonuses, and how much they got, before the bank’s takeover of the firm in January.
– Stonewalling in Style: Bank of America Subpoenaed [BOA president] Lewis refused to provide a list of bonus payments to the New York Attorney General, after arriving in New York in his $50 million corporate jet. Earlier this week, President Obama said the days of bank executives flying corporate jets “were over.” Not for Bank of America.
– U.S. Economy: GDP Shrinks 6.2%, More Than Estimated
– Citi Gets Third Rescue as U.S. Plans to Raise Stake (Update6)
– Stimulus Watch (A great state-by-state overview of congressional pork. They’re throwing anvils at a drowning country.)
– AIG enters record books with $61.7 billion loss
– Obama unveils his $3.6tn budget He has predicted the budget deficit for the current year will be $1.75tn, which is 12.3% of annual output and the biggest since World War II. Planned spending includes $634bn to pay for healthcare reform and an extra $250bn to be set aside, in case it is needed to bail out US banks.
– Bend over, everybody. Bernanke Says U.S. May Need to Expand Bank Rescue
– Bernanke Blasts AIG For ‘Irresponsible Bets’ That Led to Bailouts “I think if there’s a single episode in this entire 18 months that has made me more angry, I can’t think of one, than AIG,” said the characteristically reserved central banker.
– SIXTY jobs created by stimulus (CNN). This is news??? Sixty? Are you kidding me? That’s about $13 billion per job.
– Jim Cramer: “This is the most, greatest wealth destruction I’ve seen by a president.”
“A fund run by Joe Biden’s family was jointly branded with one of Allen Stanford’s funds. Allen Stanford is charged with $8 billion in fraud. The Biden fund has cut ties with Stanford’s companies af… A fund run by Joe Biden’s family was jointly branded with one of Allen Stanford’s funds. Allen Stanford is charged with $8 billion in fraud. The Biden fund has cut ties with Stanford’s companies after learning about the allegations against Stanford.” (Read more from sodahead.com)
The crooks have been in charge for a long time. Every once in a while, a little sunlight shines into their mansions, and the cockroaches scramble for the shadows. The best thing we can do is give these crooks as little of our hard earned money as possible.
“Bernard Madoff is seeking to keep a $7 million Manhattan penthouse and an additional $62 million in assets, saying they are unrelated to the fraud that authorities say cost victims more than $50 billion. In court papers filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Madoff and his lawyer claim the apartment, $45 million in municipal bonds and $17 million more in a separate account all belong to Madoff’s wife, Ruth.” (Read more from news.yahoo.com)