Posted by WILL WORK FOR PEACE on 04/04/09

             Bill Black, interviewed by Bill Moyer in this video, was a senior government regulator in 1989, when five United States Senators (The Keating Five) were accused of corruption and interfering with the federal investigation of the collapse of Lincoln Savings and Loan.

            The failure of Lincoln Savings was just one part of the Savings and Loan Crisis, for which American taxpayers paid $124.6 billion - chump change compared to the cost of today's financial crisis.  (You'll recall that Senator John McCain was one of the Keating Five who benefitted financially as a result of his association with one of the king-pins in the scandal, Charles Keating. As a footnote, all five of the accused senators went on to serve their terms.)  The Savings and Loan scandal differs from today's in that a lengthy and exhaustive investigation ensued into the causes of the Savings and Loan Crisis. 

            Now, as an Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri,  Bill Black has coined the term "control fraud" to describe the how people in power use their positions to commit fraud on such a dramatic scale that it can trigger systemic failure. The Crash of 2008 was made possible when government regulatory institutions looked the other way while those in the banking, insurance and credit-rating industries all joined forces to bring about a "perfect storm" in the financial industry - fraud on a scale so immense that the effects continue to shake the foundation of the entire world banking system. 

Follow The Trail Of Fraud and Corruption:

- Borrowers lie about income, job or assets to take out loans.

- Loan originators make loans without proper verification.

- Loans are rated AAA by ratings agencies without scrutiny.

- Loans are combined and then repackaged and sold to investors world wide with a AAA rating.

A Perfect Storm:

- Justice Department reassigns 500 white collar crime specialists to 9/11 investigations and doesn't replace them.

- Government collaborates with financial industry lobbyists to destroy existing financial regulations and to specifically exempt credit default swaps from proposed regulation after they were discovered to present a systemic risk.

- Savvy financiers in the insurance industry set up insurance protection (credit default swaps) for nervous investors and others who simply speculate on the possibility of default.  Since insurance companies are not required to keep money in reserve to pay the policyholders if the loans should default, this was also a fraudulent product.

- People at the highest levels of government hamper the investigation while at the same time failing to follow laws currently on the books for dealing with insolvent financial institutions.

This is a great interview:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04032009/watch.html 

           Don't taxpayers at least deserve to see a thorough investigation along with criminal charges filed against those found guilty of aiding and abetting fraudulent activities within our financial system? 

Posted by WILL WORK FOR PEACE on 03/11/09

"In the U.S., you can advocate torture, illegal spying, and completely optional though murderous wars and be appointed to the highest positions.  But you can't, apparently, criticize Israeli actions too much or question whether America's blind support for Israel should be re-examined."

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/03/10/freeman/index.html

Posted by WILL WORK FOR PEACE on 03/05/09

545 PEOPLE

By Charlie Reese
 

Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.

 Have you ever wondered, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?

 Have you ever wondered, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have inflation and high taxes?

 You and I don't propose a federal budget. The president does.

 You and I don't have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does.

 You and I don't write the tax code, Congress does.

 You and I don't set fiscal policy, Congress does.

 You and I don't control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank does.

 One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president, and nine Supreme Court justices...545 human beings out of the 300 million are directly, legally, morally, and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.

 I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress. In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered, but private, central bank.

 I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason. They have no legal authority. They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman, or a president to do one cotton-picking thing. I don't care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator's responsibility to determine how he votes.

 Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.

 What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall. No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits. The president can only propose a budget. He cannot force the Congress to accept it.

 The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes. Who is the speaker of the House? Nancy Pelosi. She is the leader of the majority party. She and fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want. If the president vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.

 It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can not replace 545 people who stand convicted -- by present facts -- of incompetence and irresponsibility. I can't think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people. When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.

 If the tax code is unfair, it's because they want it unfair.

 If the budget is in the red, it's because they want it in the red .

 If the Army & Marines are in IRAQ, it's because they want them in IRAQ

 If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it's because they want it that way.

 There are no insoluble government problems.

 Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power. Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like "the economy," "inflation," or "politics" that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.

 Those 545 people and they alone, are responsible.

 They and they alone, have the power.

 They and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses.

 Provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees.

 We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!

Charlie Reese is a former columnist of the Orlando Sentinel Newspaper.

Posted by WILL WORK FOR PEACE on 03/03/09

I find this surprising.   

The U.S. has the highest incarceration rate inthe world.  Though the United States has 5% of the world's population, it has 25% of the world's prison population.  In Idaho, one out of every 18 adults is in the "justice" system.  Only Georgia is worse. 

http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=87395&sectionid=3510203

Posted by WILL WORK FOR PEACE on 02/28/09

Rand Paul is considering a run for Senate, but will need support:

http://www.rand2010.com/rand_paul