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Guest Post: Extend & Pretend: Its Either RICO Act Or Control Fraud
Submitted by Gordon T Long of Tipping Points
We are entering the Age of Rage.
It is presently most visible in Europe as austerity programs that potentially could shred a half century of social entitlement advances are met with increasingly violent street demonstrations. It is seen in the US Tea Party rallies with their fury that the very fabric which the US capitalist system is based on is being destroyed and discarded. Unfortunately these demonstrations of rage are focusing on the effects and not the cause. The cause is a systemic plaque of unenforced financial control fraud.
Americans witnessed CEOs arrested during the nightly news coverage of the S&L Crisis of the early 90’s. They were placated as they heard the details of over 1000 indictments of the perpetrators of fraud. In the aftermath of the tech bubble implosion ten years later, injured investors once again witnessed the most senior executives at Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Qwest and others being led off in handcuffs and disgrace to waiting police cruisers. Retirees with decimated retirement plans felt that some level of restitution had been made when 25 year sentences were meted out to these formerly high-flying felons.
After nearly two years since the greatest financial malfeasants in history and ten years since the last public example of financial crime, the public haven’t seen a single CEO sentenced to hard time for the financial meltdown. They have not had their thirst for revenge quenched by a single high level court case. Instead, the public infuriatingly witnesses politically crafted theater in congressional hearings that go nowhere, read watered down legislation that is replete with even richer lobbyist-authored loopholes and only occasionally see small headlines of quiet settlements with insulting token amends payments. Why? Were there no crimes committed? No laws broken?
The public is forced to accept excuses that we have enforcement agencies not enforcing, regulators not regulating and legislators not equipped to legislate properly in our modern fast moving financial world. The public is left with the gnawing concern of whether it is incompetence or something much deeper, more troubling, and more sinister. Confidence and trust in government and our democratically elected politicians continue to worsen from already pathetic levels.
The taxpayer while standing in long unemployment lines, reads in the newspapers of financial institutions that were making mind-numbing profits and paying horrendous executive bonuses suddenly being insolvent and needing taxpayer bailouts. Then as their unemployment benefits near exhaustion, they read of the banks’ profits soaring once again. These are the foundations of the emerging new age of public rage.
We have much more than a crisis of integrity. We have fraud that is so pervasive that it is now unknowingly institutionalized into our business and political culture. The sickening part is that it a like a cancer; if it’s not detected early, it will be too late to fight. We need to fully understand and prosecute the tenets of fraud before it is too late.
For the complete Research Report see: TIPPING POINTS – COMMENTARY
FRAUD
Fraud is the act of creating trust then betraying it. Fraud is deceit.
If I was to articulate this definition to the average person, I believe the vast majority (without formal legal training) would immediately respond that this is exactly how they’d describe the financial crisis! So why are there no indictments? Is the fraud of liar’s loans, NINJA (No income, No Job, No Assets) loans, false housing appraisals, false AAA credit ratings and false contingent liability reporting so hard to prove? Not really. It takes an indictment and that’s often a much too political process in America.
Some would argue it was not intentional and therefore can’t be seen as a felony. They‘d say it is more a matter of civil damages. Again, wrong.
CONTROL FRAUD
What emerged from the S&P debacle was the concept of control fraud. At the core of financial control fraud is the notion that a CEO would deliberately use the S&L as a camouflage to make bad loans, thereby gutting the underwriting process while knowing full well that the loans would statistically fail over the long run. By doing this, money is made in the initial stages, exactly in the fashion of a Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme. Profits are declared and rich bonuses are paid. Stocks soar and rich stock options are executed. Then when the inevitable day arrives as the defaults emerge, the CEO takes the company into bankruptcy with no claw-back provisions, or an even newer and richer approach - the CEO seeks government bailouts to replace the pillaged balance sheet.
Corporate Control Fraud might be viewed as having four tell-tales:
- Deliberately making bad loans or investments.
- Exceptionally High Growth (because improperly accounted profits are being booked today).
- The use of extraordinary leverage to maximize profits while profits are artificially available.
- False representation of actuarial appropriate loss reserves.
Sound eerily familiar?
The S&L debacle prompted the Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) Law (US Code: Title 12,1831o). William K Black the author of “The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own: How Corporate Executives and Politicians Looted the S&L Industry, “ argues that this law is presently being broken through the misrepresentation of bank asset positions. Additionally, because the Prompt Corrective Action Law is not being enforced, the felony of accounting control fraud is being committed.
I have written extensively about the degree to which the banks 10K and 10Q balance sheets do not represent current fair market value of their assets. When the FDIC continuously takes over banks and declares that asset values are 25- 35% overvalued, there’s no further proof required. The banks, which are sold as part of the regular FDIC “Friday night bank lottery” continuously see no CEOs indicted for falsely representing FDIC-insured assets. We the taxpayers are then unwittingly presented with the tab.
Above, I made the assertion that indictments are too political a process in America. Control Fraud isn’t unique to just CEOs. Heads of sovereign governments and their empowered representatives also fall within this type of fraud. We once again see ourselves moving upwards hierarchically towards people in authority, who are charged with a fiduciary and judiciary responsibility, taking positions that enrich or politically benefit themselves at the expense of the innocent. This is fraud. Though we find ourselves asking, where are they when we most need them, we should be asking, who will bring them to justice?
If you think this is not widespread, how do you rationalize that it was recently reported that Goldman Sachs never had a trading day loss in April yet its clients in eight out of ten cases lost money. Incompetence?
Stupidity? The Financial Times reports "The trading operations of Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase made money every single business day in the first quarter ... Goldman's trading desk recorded a profit of at least $25m(£16.8) on each of the quarter's 63 working days, making more than $100m a day on 35 occasions, according to a regulatory filing issued on Monday ... JPMorgan also achieved a loss-free quarter in its trading unit - making an average of $118m a day, nearly $5m an hour". Morgan Stanley reported trading profits on a mere 93% of the first quarter trading days. This defies any sort of logic in freely trading markets, unless the markets are controlled and the game fixed. These are better odds than owning a casino.
The famous Barnum & Bailey carnival barkers used to snidely boast "there’s a sucker born every minute". The carnival games were notoriously fixed so the 'sucker' almost certainly lost. I’m not indicting anyone here (I will leave that to our alarmingly incompetent regulatory and enforcement agencies), but rather I’m only reinforcing why we have entered an age of public rage and why I felt compelled to write the Extend & Pretend series of articles.
RACKETEER INFLUENCED AND CORRUPT ORGANIZATIONS (RICO) ACT
Under RICO, a person who is a member of an enterprise that has committed any two of 35 crimes—27 federal crimes and 8 state crimes—within a 10-year period can be charged with racketeering. Racketeering activity includes:
- Any act of bribery (lobbying?), counterfeiting (naked shorting?), theft, embezzlement, fraud, obstruction of justice, money laundering,
- Embezzlement of union funds (talk to the SEIU about Interest Rate Swaps!);
- Bankruptcy fraud or securities fraud (where do we begin!);
- Money laundering and related offenses;
- Acts of terrorism (Financial - High Frequency ‘flash crash’ Trading?).
In addition, the racketeer must forfeit all ill-gotten gains and interest in any business gained through a pattern of "racketeering activity." RICO also permits a private individual harmed by the actions of such an enterprise to file a civil suit; if successful, the individual can collect treble damages.
It seems it is the same names I continue to read about in the press. Do these financial institutions settle to avoid the magic ‘2 committed felony’ threshold qualification for a RICO indictment?
You don’t need a fancy high priced Philadelphia lawyer to tell you that “when the glove fits you can’t acquit!” - A little old fashion common sense is all that is required.
CONCLUSION
The Age of Rage during the French revolution cost people their heads when the guillotine administered public justice daily for the angry masses. Political and bureaucratic heads will also roll in the future if justice is not soon administered. As Marie Antoinette learned too late, it may be much worse than merely the loss of an elected position with all its trappings.
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Wall Street is not doing itself any favors by not sacrificing a few of its own to quell public anger. It's nice that the S&L Crisis and Enron and Worldcom saw perp walks but what good did it do other than pull the fleece over the taxpayers' eyes that there is Justice in the United States of America? I say, keep plundering.. The best punishment will be for them to bear witness as their Empire collapses and then wait, in pregnant silence, blindfolded, for their execution by firing squad for the Evil they have wrought.
junked
Bring back public floggings.
Neil Barofsky could have footage of Dimon and Blankfein admitting to any number of crimes and nothing would happen. When the rage erupts, it will be fierce. Very fierce.
I just don't see it happening. Bankers are idolized, lionized in the USA. To call them out is to call into question the "American dream"; too Euro. There will be anger, for sure, but directed at gays, illegal immigrants, or welfare moms.
Meh. The bankers, yes. Their regulators? No.
Matt Taibbi, on that aspect of the peasant mentality in America.
"But actual rich people can’t ever be the target. It’s a classic peasant mentality: going into fits of groveling and bowing whenever the master’s carriage rides by, then fuming against the Turks in Crimea or the Jews in the Pale or whoever after spending fifteen hard hours in the fields. You know you’re a peasant when you worship the very people who are right now, this minute, conning you and taking your shit. Whatever the master does, you’re on board. When you get frisky, he sticks a big cross in the middle of your village, and you spend the rest of your life praying to it with big googly eyes..."
http://trueslant.com/matttaibbi/2009/04/14/americas-peasant-mentality/
Sounds like Matt needs to read a little more Alexander Dumas
That's also why wars and "foreign demons" ploys work so effectively: Let's not look too closely at out banker neighbors, let's focus on a faceless enemy. Be wary of our government getting more and more belligerent toward foreign sovereigns.
Sounds like Matt hit the nail on the head. But, Americans prefer to think they are free of of such peasant thinking and quickly dismiss Taibbi as just another pissed-off liberal. Then, they get in line to vote against their own interests and in favor of the oligarchs. After all, it's the patriotic thing to do.
Stretching the facts here, mea culpa but to prove a point; Luis XVI was beloved until the minute his head was cut off.
You are so right qualia. The fundamental blockage in the thought process for Americans seems to be this "we cant have controls on the banks, and restrict their monopoly game rigging, because that would be SOCIALISM. And we all know that socialism is the worst thing in the world, I would rather live in poverty and die of hunger than live under socialism. God bless America, the land of the free etc etc etc...."
Strangely, I could foresee a jump to the right amongst the voters in the USA and UK ie. its "socialism" that got us into this mess, we have to stop living beyond our means, end free schooling, end welfare, end big government. In other words, the solution to this economic collapse brought about by extreme capitalism is a more extreme form of capitalism. You couldn't make it up.
Imagine a society that voted for a government that hands of over billions of voters money to give it to a few trillionaires. Without a murmur. Well we are living that nightmare in the USA and the UK.
wonder if there's a place to wager what will light the match attached to the powder keg
also, i dont count leeches checks not clearing. this will have to be middle class people who finally take the red pill and step out of the Matrix
Cursive
Bah, most people have no idea of who you speak.
Rage erupts when there is no food. When there is no tv. When your homeless city gets torn down.
The masses are blissfully ignorant.
You are correct sir! Until the finale of American Idol gets bounced off the air by a massive collapse of the grid and the local grocery store runs out of various chemical concoctions disguised as food, there will be no eruption of rage. However, if those 2 disasters were to occur, it's "Katie bar the door!" as they used to say down on the old ponderosa.
Just wait until TD Ameritrade is off-line for a whole day! Now that will stir up some folks with clout. And those folks are reading these very comments.
Personally, I think it's bogus that Crystal Bowersox didn't win it all.
Great post! The people are awake now:
Ron Paul: Inside Sources Told Me Fed Is Panicking At Mass Awakening
http://www.prisonplanet.com/ron-paul-inside-sources-told-me-fed-is-panic...
While it hasn't gone mainstream "yet" it does appear that more and more "public" people are finding not only their balls but their voice.
Keep the ball(s) rolling people.
Cognitive Dissonance
Most people are finding their balls at a nice safe distance from the action. Sure everyone talks revolution, everyone wants to be Bruce Willis with a gun. Then they have a nice meal, watch some sports drink a nightly beer tuck the kids and toddle off to await a new day.
What will happen is some store will run out of food. Riots ensue. With any luck it will be a gang banger hood so we can watch the nightly shootout. But if the MOVE debacle is a blueprint BIGOV uses then whole cities might get charred.
Hopefully the La Raza types and the Native Americans, Lakota have already, will see some opportunity and divide up the lands. Then with any luck red states will Balkanize.
If not, too many troops, too few patriots. Way too many self interested dummies with guns and sticks.
As long as thoes Welfare Checks, food stamps and Section 8 payments keep comming we are in good shape. Welfare Mom wants a raise she just has another Fatherless Baby. That is another $400. a month.
How about Octamom.
You left out unemployment checks. I don't want to strike any nerves but there will come a time when every able bodied person is getting a check!
There also comes a time when that no longer matters. The German WW1 "retirees" also had their cheque.
And veterans of the American Revolution had worthless paper bonuses too.
Those bonuses were bought up for pennies on the dollar. They were finally paid when speculators, mainly from New York, had bought up most of them and pressured congress to make them good. Sound familiar?
Too bad Washington didn't destory New York during the revolution. It's been a hot bed of torrie sympathizing, money lending and speculation for over 200 years.
La Raza means ' The Race' , these morons think they can claim land that was never apart of Mexico for more than 30 years. If civil unrest gives groups like La Raza the feeling to move they are going to re-learn , just like the back wards ass natives, just how it was the white man conquered the world.
The best way to fight these criminal bankers is not through riots or yelling about it, as that accomplishes nothing. The way to beat them and destroy them is stop paying debts period. What good is a credit score anyway, when they refuse to lend. Until people wake up and realize, the way to finish these crooks once and for all, is to stop paying, it will continue again and again, as the government cares less, the courts could care less, so take matters into your own hands. Once the entire nation has defaulted, the banks will fall. I know there are alot of people out there who feel this is not the "honorable" way to handle the situation. But, when you have all the odds stacked against you, and there are no honorable men in office or in the banks, then you fight fire with fire.
There is nothing a single creditor can do to come after you for unsecured debt, they can talk crap all they want, and make all kinds of claims, threaten you or whatever, but there is absolultely nothing they can do other than that. When they call, ignore it.
Secured debt is a little different. So, you have to be careful on that front. I would only recommend to stop paying on a car or house only if you are upside down or well behind payments already. Let the crooks have their collateral at that point, they will eat the losses hard.
So start fighting back, stop paying any unsecured credit card debt and personal loans that have no liens for those with loans tied to Citi, BAC, JPM Chase, WFC, etc... This is the only way to get the message across to this government people have had enough, short of riots in the streets. It is obvious which side the FED is on, and it sure isn't the American public's side. JMO of the whole charade.
Throwing feces at their windows couldn't hurt.
Dude - r we the only ones who have figured this shit out. i mean if u aint willing to kidnapp one of these fucking bankers, put a hood over his head, video tape the interrogation and confession of how he and his r bending the citizens over backwards and fucking us on the daily, the least u could do is resist by depriving them of their ill gotten gains...
fuck a bank and a banker man, i aint paying a mother fucking thing...they've been paid and r still getting paid by the government they control.....
it's been on man............
jkruffin
I'm always baffled why no one has a started a do this or we refuse to vote site. Say you demand investigations. The site carries the names and addresses of people who refuse to vote in any election until investigations are underway. Not promised ones but real hot seat ones. Not a single vote until the action takes place on the screen.
Throw in no more donations to either party.
Or better yet, votes for the Pot Party and donations to them.
The only real fear politicians have is people will not participate. That they can not claim a mandate. Even if it is a lie they enjoy the fiction of support.
You want to win hit them where it hurts.
The Yippies used to put fish in safety deposit boxes.
This is the dumbest idea on the Internet.
You have bought into the elite plan hook line and sinker. Not voting is EXACTLY what big business wants you to do.
Participation is the weapon of choice for big business, minimize participation minimize resistance in your way -- not the other way around.
Just wait until corporations tell you how to wipe your ass for being so stupid.
NOVEMBER INCUMBENT BLOODBATH !!!!!! MAKE IT HAPPEN !!!!!!!!!!!!
wyosteven
C'mon you know you are wrong.
Carlin nails it
"I have solved this political dilemma in a very direct way: I don't vote. On Election Day, I stay home. I firmly believe that if you vote, you have no right to complain. Now, some people like to twist that around. They say, 'If you don't vote, you have no right to complain,' but where's the logic in that? If you vote, and you elect dishonest, incompetent politicians, and they get into office and screw everything up, you are responsible for what they have done. You voted them in. You caused the problem. You have no right to complain. I, on the other hand, who did not vote -- who did not even leave the house on Election Day -- am in no way responsible for that these politicians have done and have every right to complain about the mess that you created."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIraCchPDhk
I first heard that routine when I was in junior high and it has stuck with me to this day.
no fun
Oh, fer chrissakes, dood!
You are completely incoherent (no offense, though) as you don't an even an inkling of how you are being so easily manipulated, although with over 50,000 foundations, and endless "think tanks" spewing forth manufactured consent, you can't help but be clueless.
The last democrat in office was John F. Kennedy -- he got whacked!
The last democratic public leader was Rev. Martin Luther King -- he got whacked!
The last democratic presidential candidate who had a probable shot at the White House was Bobbie Kennedy -- he got whacked!
Starting to notice a pattern here, per chance?
Now, we were presented with the usual: one of two Wall street lackeys as presidential candidates -- McCain, with Gramm as his financial advisor, and Obama, with Rubin as his financial advisor -- all bases thoroughly covered.
We have Hillary "I helped to overthrow the democratically-elected president of Honduras" Clinton as Sec'y. of State -- that base is thoroughly covered.
Four of Obama's first five appointments: Kissinger (Special Envoy to Russia), Eric Holder (A.G.), Larry Summers and Diana Farrell.
Those four's mantra: screw the worker; kill the worker.
All bases covered....get the big picture, dood?
don't blame me, i voted for zappa
They want you to give up. Don't give up. Keep fighting! Thats how you win. It is a battle of wills.
I do agree with you if People are over their head in Debt. Just stop paying and take the hit and rebuild. Like the Banks are doing.
Yet, I really think the way to get even is to be Debt Free. That way no one controls you. With the exception of the States with their Property Taxes.
I am getting close but not there yet.
I think the point is that they don't control you, even if you have debt with them. So just stop paying, and voila, you are debt free. So your credit score goes to crap. Who cares? We're all so brainwashed...
There's that teensy, eensy, weensy item about who monopolizes the land, capital and knowledge.
Rather an important item, that!
Indeed. It amazes me how a corporation can file bankruptcy or default and get through the court system in less than a month, back in business full scale with all the credit in the world to start the ponzi over again, and it is called a "business decision", yet when a consumer comes on hard times, has job loss or unexpected medical occurrence, etc... and they cannot pay or file for bankruptcy, they are labeled "deadbeats", and they get stuck in the credit system for 10 yrs. 1 month vs 10 yrs? Something is not right with this picture.
Being debt free is the way to be, but for some who only make a minimal living, which is a large portion of this country, they have to use credit to live, and end up in the snowball effect. I used to be in this boat many years ago. My family as I grew up, was in this boat, most of them still are hung. The fact is the system is built for you to fail and the bankers/businessmen to win. So, how do you turn the tables to your favor? Stop paying. That simple. It doesn't matter who you vote in office these days, because the majority, no matter what their stance is initially on the campaign trail, they will be bought. A quick history lesson of campaign contributions trail can clearly identify this problem.
Seiu
Is the taxpayer going to have to bail out the pension funds?
Leo will tell you YES
Very nice work..Dr. William Black anyone, "the best way to rob a bank is to own one" Send him in, Again...
It was a fraud from the beginning people. The Fed is just doing what you hired them to do, that is to promote and extend the lie. Nothing has changed until you choose another choice. Either way you are not going to avoid the shitstorm in the coming decades.
But no one noticed nor cared to be concerned about the essential nature of the fraud because humanity had one of the longest winning streaks in history - recorded or otherwise.
Consider this loose string of events over the last 300 or so years:
There's a reason many people still hold out hope that something will come up; after all, something has always come up before to save the ponzi's bacon.
I don't mind admitting that I would be amongst the first saying, "see you suckers later" if they announced some miraculous energy conversion technology, or some colossal, heretofore unknown fossil fuel reserves, or some incredible breakthrough in generically engineered crops, etc.
But there isn't going to be a miracle. The reason we know this is the case is because the PTB have fully committed themselves, and the very nation itself, to preserving the housing ATM economic model. (That is, credit leveraged asset inflation to finance retail driven consumption.)
Now why would they go "all in" with a losing hand? The West is littered with ghost towns - the mine played out, the people left to do other things. East coast fishing & whaling villages experienced the same shifts. What about the Rust Bowl? All previous economic models have either been abandoned or malinvestments were re-calibrated as they reached their termini; why not the 2001-2007 model?
It's not what they are doing, it's why. One should think about why they are doing what they are doing. Then you'll know & understand what's in store for each and everyone of us.
+ a e i o u and sometimes why
Nice post B9K9. Nevertheless, could you expand on your last paragraph? Perhaps your why is different from my why.
5 million an hour???? Whats the OT like?
Great piece. Like the Catholic Church scandals, the Europeans can go a long way toward teaching us how the old world shows its anger. Still young and naive but with any gross violation of trust, American citizens have no choice now but to grow up fast.
DaveyJones
Just how many times has White America rioted?
on the internet or in real life?
that's funny...
carry on...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War
There was a heck of a white people's riot in 1861. Also, a nasty one broke out in Germany in 1939. Just to name a couple. White people don't riot often, but when they do, they don't mess around.
Yeah, I think whites and in particular white men have been misrepresented in the media for so long that they're seriously underestimated. I don't know any Al Bundys.
It's the Archie Bunkers that you don't want to piss off. There are lots of them and they'll take you out in a heartbeat.
Many times throughout the 1930s. In the US, Canada, Australia, and England to name a few - probably other countries as well but.
If you expand the list from 'rioting for good reasons' to rioting for any reason, you can count various hooligan riots as well...
There is a pretty fun list of riots on Wikipedia. Heaps of white people, even white Americans, represented from the 17th c to decade-by-decade lists for the 20th c.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_riots
just kidding
Mako, do you trade for a living?
A game to learn to kids how debt is good. I thought of it but gave in the idea because it would not sell that well. Sometimes, it is better to keep quiet on good things. People do not like efficient stuff to be revealed.
unrelated update
HOUSTON — BP had to halt its ambitious effort to plug its stricken oil well in the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday afternoon when engineers saw that too much of the drilling fluid they were injecting into the well was escaping along with the leaking crude oil. http://j.mp/dgKQg9
"This is no trial; Louis is not a prisoner at the bar; you are not judges; you are—you cannot but be—statesmen, and the representatives of the nation. You have not to pass sentence for or against a single man, but you have to take a resolution on a question of the public safety, and to decide a question of national foresight. It is with regret that I pronounce, the fatal truth: Louis ought to perish rather than a hundred thousand virtuous citizens; Louis must die, so that the country may live."
Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre
Miss Expectations
Ragpicker: Yes, of course, because when you have no money, nobody trusts you, nobody believes you, nobody likes you.Because to have money is virtuous,honest, beautiful, and witty. And to be without it is to be ugly and boring and stupid and useless.
The Madwoman of Chaillot
Jean Giraudoux
You forgot anti trust law violations too.
....and secured bondholder rights.
Gordon Long doesn't get the Tea Party. What fury? I've seen Old Glory waved and a lot of very witty signs that get to the heart of the matter and heard plenty of speakers lay out the source of our mess. All this "fury" is from the talking points of the white house propagated by the lamestream media. The depth of corruption and collusion among the big players of Wall Street and government is well known. The game of borrowing and spending to put off the day of reckoning is clearly understood among the Tea Party. It's the summer of '39 in economic terms, a world wide collapse of money and credit just around the corner. At this point I don't that debt will be laid on our grandchildren. There is too much mounting up to even pay the interest very soon. We will default while the fraud-in-chief is still in office. I predict that when the big SHTF arrives, you'll find your local responsible adults that have it together will often be Tea Partiers. They will also be more likely to have a little gold, guns, and ammo stashed away. Acorn and SEIU will riot but they won't last long. This ain't Europe.
"It is seen in the US Tea Party rallies with their fury that the very fabric which the US capitalist system is based on is being destroyed and discarded."
LOL! I see passion and concern at tea parties but I haven't ever seen acts of 'Fury' and 'Rage'. Save the drama for when severe austerity measures reach our shores, when the nanny statists will demonstrate REAL acts of fury and rage.
This is far from over. People will be taking out bankers at some point. No question.
All this talk about people never striking out is bullshit, and shows even folks who fool themselves that they really know what's going on are as histroically ignorant as the 'sheeple' you all look down on.
23 Wall St. 1920.
What's coming for these greedy freaks will make that look like a kids game.
The masters of the universe (pussies with pinstripes) travel with a slew of bodyguards nowdays.
You ain't seen nothing yet.
If I remember my Roman history correctly, the Praetorian Guard "removed" more than a few emperors along the way.............
They were but tools of kingmakers.
Cassius Chaerea was sentenced to death for his part in the assassination of Caligula.
A Preatorian Commander scapegoated.
The question is, who pulled his strings?
It sure wasn't Claudius...
It's just like chess right?
The shah is lame, the vizier has all the moves!
Rage is usually for the purposes of bettering the lot of a downtrodden group. The current state of our society in more or less all developed nations, especially the US, can best be described as one of indolent bliss. There isn't sufficient suffering for people to radicalize. Also since bitching and complaining has become a form of accepted mainstream discourse, the impact factor is less. Most people don't want to disturb the status quo. Call it the political "Great Moderation".
For there to be serious rage there would have to be severe economic or political deprivation or serious status anxiety like the Tea Baggers. It may come as the global unwind progresses and the depression we're in starts accumulating road kill. I see it more as a gradual snowballing of rage rather than a quick shift, but events can change fast.
The system is so corrupt that I get paranoid about saying how I really feel for fear of retribution by the "watchers" in a time when our rights are being usurped away."like lookin in the mirror and seeing a police car".
Yes, people often say the 50's were the age of conformity. I think, more so, now. "indolent bliss" As shitty as everyone, in the US anyway, thinks they have it, they have no concept of what "shitty" really is, they've never experienced it. When shitty really does happen, well, then TS-really- HTF.
Caviar, Tea Baggers lick scrotums, like Anderson Cooper. Tea Partiers rally for the good ol' USA. I've never seen any status anxiety at a Tea Party. They are more like celebrations than anything else. You must be thinking of Anderson Cooper and Lord Obama, scrotum suckers.
Tea Baggers.
What exactly do gay daydreams have to do with concern for the nation?
Am I the only guy who wants one of those Bankster Monopoly Press games by Lehman Brothers?
As another Wall St. junior-league ponzi scheme goes bust, you have to ask: is it really the tipping point, or just the new normal?
"Kenneth Starr, chief executive officer of Starr Investment Advisors, was charged with having "engaged in fraudulent activity involving at least $US30 million ($36.5 million)".
http://www.news.com.au/world/guru-charged-with-defrauding-celebrities/st...
Brave talk, mostly from boomers who would likely drop dead if they had to run for a couple of blocks. The young kids with the energy to force change are too ignorant and/or narcissistic to even care. I don't know anyone with the stomach for real dissent, let alone revolt. We've been neutered, corralled, pwned. Start some shit and you will be labeled a terrorist, isolated, and removed from the game. Some have high hopes for the upcoming elections -- as if.
IMO the only hope now is a systemic collapse followed by a military coup where the big rats flee the scene leaving lesser rats to take the blame. Maybe Generalissimo X will be noble, or maybe he'll be a bastard worse than the rats he replaced (Castro). That is where we're at. A modern example was Chile under Pinochet. He was a ruthless SOB when his country needed an SOB, then he stepped aside, leaving in place a constitutional government with a sound, market economy.
There are ways to dissent and many dissenters, but a true reblel would be reluctant to talk about it on a blog.
Said like a TRUE REBLEL.
I am a reblel, just won't admit to being a rebel;=)
^ this.
Rogerwilco -
Do you not understand subversion??
You speak for no one but yourself with your "neutered, corralled, can't run a couple of blocks" comments.
Do not fear, others will do the work for you...
Actually, he is more than right.
Where were the baby boomers for the last thirty years as our jobs were being shipped across the globe? Oh yeah, making more social welfare programs for themselves that my generation will have to pay for.
Baby boomers didn't do anything before to solve any problems. The ones that were hippies all sold out for a few bucks.
They've stood by and sold out their children for 30 years now.
And they're the ones who are going to do something about the problems that THEY caused?
LOL. Fuck the baby boomers!
Boomers are aging, becoming frail - and dead.
Others will replace them that are not so complacent and apathetic. The ones who were sold out to begin with (by birth) have a far higher price - if they have one at all.
Oh, I don't know. Try Korea or Vietnam. Back off you coward.
Rogerwilco
That was the plan all along. Fight for Gay rights, forget about debt slavery. Idolize Paris Hilton and steroid jocks, forget Medgar Evers and Abby Hoffman.
And all the macho posturing by gun owning elites. Ain't a one no Panther, don't have the eye of the tiger. But it sounds oh so good over drinks " Look baby come hom,e with me and check out my smith and wesson. No not that baby a REAL gun, you know like Bruce Willis has in those movies. Pow, pow, pow". Ain't a one goin down like Omar Little.
But whitey always had a rich fantasy life.
Roger, back in the day us boomers considered demos recreation. Very few people thought we would make a revolution, even if Grace Slick like to shout about it at Winterland. Nobody admired the Weathermen, totally delusional, they saw trashing banks as heroic, meanwhile they had nice trust funds that let them fight for all us proletariat who didn't have trust funds. Like you say, most people have to be really suffering to put their lives on the line. As long as their is a path to reform through legal means suffering people will try that first. That's what happened in Central America in the late 70's, early 80's. They picked up the gun when they had no other way. The Spanish Civil War was a great example of ordinary people rising to the occassion. The Anarchists ended up taking responsibility fo rmaking the Madrid infrastructure work, a great irony. The Commies were too busy backstabbing their allies.
Rogerwilco? Over and out!
Just remember --
1) Pinochet owed his success to Coups-R-Us (CIA Special Ops).
2) Generalissimo spent his golden years fighting extradition to the Hague.
3) Chile under Pinochet privatized their social security system. Go ask 'em how that's working out. Already.
The "move your money" movement was launched several months ago.
It's goal was to have everyone starve the beast by moving their money from a TBTF bank to a local credit union or sound community bank.
A very simple act that for most would involve the minor inconvenience of closing one bank account and opening another.
IMHO, it would have sent a powerful, effective, non-violent message.
I'll bet less than 10% of the folks who heard the appeal to move their money took action.
I therefore agree that the lumpen proletariat and happy suburban masses will not wake up until slapped in the face by food/gas shortages, bank holidays and urban unrest.
It's just the nature of the human animal - the status quo is comfortable, change is hard and we simply don't act until the problem becomes a crisis.
When the time comes, the swiftness of the decline will suprise many, even those who are prepared.
Best to make your own preparations and then lay low or get out of the way when the herd is startled and then stampedes.
I just hope and pray something better emerges on the other side of the chaos.
I moved my money to a credit union.
Another issue is daytrading stops helping the bankers and quants continue the facade. The market will go down the sooner people stop feeding the beast. Stop trading if you can, and don't lever up and get called on your shorts.
Someone else mentioned not going to work for a few days. I'd go along with that if it could be organised.
The markets need sellers and buyers on low volume days. Bulls can't just trade with each other for an effective run-up; they need to sqeeze shorts. An organised day of not trading by millions would do a number on the market, especially if it coincided with bad news.
I moved my money to silver, brass and lead.
My rule: If its abroad on two legs, shoot it. (unless its a kangaroo)
How about funnelling that rage into the discipline to stop borrowing? If enough people (and that means you, governments) stopped buying shit we don't need and can't afford, the distended leeches we're fuming about could only feed on each other until the last one starves.
Lady across the street from me breeds chihuahuas. When I take my real dog for a walk, they rage and bark and cry for his blood. But while the bulk of them are mesmerized by the scpectacle, there's always a male taking advantage of the pandemonium to hump the hell out of one of the others.
We can do better than rage.
Why do people always so completely misunderstand the Tea Party movement?
No, no, no, no.
The Tea Parties are the OPPOSITE of the European protests. The Europeans are protesting for their entitlements to be SAVED; we are protesting for our entitlements to be KILLED.
Missing_Link
So those who collect Medicare/Medicaid Social Security or Food Stamps are returning those benefits? They are opting out of the corrupt system? Burning their cards and dancing glee fully around the massive bon fire which consumes them en masse?
I doubt it.
They got theirs and don't want the next guy getting his.
They got theirs and don't want the next guy getting his.
Yea, that's it Gully Foyle.
Holy shit man.
Gully, We know there won't be any money for Medicare, Social Security when we need it. That's one reason we Tea Party. Our parents' generation got theirs when there was money in the till. That's all over now, Baby Blue.
Gully, read this. ^^
The European protesters are arguing AGAINST fiscal responsibility.
The Tea Party protesters are arguing FOR fiscal responsibility.
They are OPPOSITES.
Social Security is far from dead. "They" want you to think that so you will not fight them when they steal it. The fact is that SS is the only income the vast majority of retirees will have, including the younger generations when they retire. You would be foolish to give up on it without a fight.
I reckon that failed state is sneaking up on us! As an avid subscriber to The Privateer, I pondered this from the last issue:
I sent a personal email to Bill Buckler asking about how I would handle the upcoming receipt of social security payments from ole Uncle Sam. His email reply stated, succinctly, that accepting a balance equaling what I had paid in would fit the formula. After that -- I am on my own! In the long run are we not always on our own?
Gully: Word!
I think there may be another way of looking at it.
I read it the same way at first.
It may be that “people” have or are losing faith in government.
So whether you are Tea Party (wanting less government, because you would retain property and liberty) or whether you are PIIGS (wanting to retain property and liberty) it is government that is the enemy.
The TP know that the government lives beyond its current means and will require the confiscation of their property and liberty to survive.
The PIIGS know the same. You may think them bankrupt.
But surely Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain can exists in liberty as independent soverigne states?
Yes. Their governments have made promises that they cannot possibly keep.
I think both the Tea Party and the PIIGS (those opposing the cuts) understand this.
It is the same argument.
And, as an aside, it seems that “Government” = “Bank”.
This is not a good thing.
No, no, no, no, no.
Agreeing that there is a problem is not the same thing as agreeing on what the problem is and how to solve it. There is little agreement on what the problem is, and the two have absolutely OPPOSITE prescriptions for the cure.
The European protesters are arguing AGAINST fiscal responsibility -- in favor of more entitlements and bullshit finance.
The Tea Party protesters are arguing FOR fiscal responsibility -- against bailouts, entitlements, and reckless spending.
They are OPPOSITES.
Speaking for Ireland, I can say that their financial problems are entirely due to the banks irresponsible behavior. Given that the banks are the #1 source of this catastrophe, why not just nationalize the banks and deal with these problems honestly. What do we have to lose from being honest, as opposed to foisting bank-generated debts off on innocent taxpayers?
Where was te Tea Party over the last thirty years, since the same thing has been happening in America for at least that long?
Oh yeah, voting for Reagan and people like Reagan.
I guess it took a Democrat doing the same thing as Reagan for them to become "outraged."
I think you are incorrect.
I think “people” have worked out that “Government” has become something that they thought existed in some other place. Some oppressive state but not their state. Not the people’s state. Not the land of milk and honey.
I think you are correct in saying “Where was te Tea Party over the last thirty years”.
I think they did not need to exist. Other than for the last decade.
It seems to me that all “governments” are borrowing money from “bankers”/”somebody” to maintain the illusion of their thirty year old promises.
I see no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. Do you?
By the way.
To whom do the “governments” owe the “money”?
Amen to that, JB. The teabaggers are the same ignorant neo-cons who elected a true moron...TWICE! All of our ills, from Govt. growth (and YES, Govt. IS the real enemy) to the National Debt are a result of Bush/Cheney malfeasance.
Obama has failed to do any heavy lifting to address our plight, but what did you expect? Too young, too inexperienced.
When Great Depression II comes, and it will be a global one...it will take years od discontent for the sheeple to rally against their wealthy foes.
Right, right, right, all Bush's fault. And when you finally get your dream candidate in office, it's still Bush's fault.
Not Nixon's fault for leaving the gold standard?
Not LBJ's fault for creating the massive Social Security and Medicare entitlements that now saddle our nation with so much debt?
Not Reagan's fault for normalizing the concept of massive government deficits?
Not Clinton's fault for his massive expansion of the Community Reinvestment Act that caused so much of the subprime crisis?
Ignorant little ass. Crawl back into whatever hole you crawled out of. The Tea Party movement is the only group of people actually out in the streets trying to do something about our nation's fiscal situation, and all you give it is contempt.
I'd tell you you should be ashamed of yourself if I thought someone like you was capable of shame.
You left out the damn military, the Vietnam war and two wars in Iraq. But hey, that's ok! Never mind what Ike said about being vigilent about the military-industrial complex. No, the real issue is that some rap-loving, drug-taking hispanic welfare mom might be able to feed her three kids by three different husbands.
You left out:
Lincoln for destroying the States sovereignty and making them powerless lackeys of the central government.
Wilson for income tax, the federal reserve and finishing off the States by stripping them of representation.
Roosevelt for turning the Extreme Court into a perverse circus and social security (and other acts too numerous to mention).
There's plenty of blame to go around. And we are begining to escape the matrix - but maybe too late.
Then there's the assholes that rant about 'where were you back when...' Hindsight is 20/20 I guess.
Lose the partisan politics - maybe you haven't heard, they're all part of the same beast. Johnson = Nixon = Ford = Carter = Reagan = GHW Bush = Clinton = GW Bush = Obama (all interchangeable parts of the same engine). Besides Obama is no more POTUS than I am - he just plays one on television.
Johnny, we got fed up with the Beltway GOP borrowing and spending like crazy. With TARP and all the bailouts, it was just too much. Lord Obama cranked it up way past belief. We should have got active back in Reagan's days. He started the bail outs. After 9/11 Bush bailed out United and American, companies that lobbied against cabin door security. I thought that was a disgrace. Somehow the USA survived the demise of TWA, Pan American, Studebaker, Rambler. All these bailouts were to put off paying the piper until the next's guys watch. These were the WWII generation doing it. The DC corruption is bipartisan. That's why the Tea Party targets the Beltway GOP as well as the National Socialists.
+++++
2- 6"x8"x12' treated lumber: $24.29
1- 3' by 2' by 1/2" plate steel: $37
Blanchard grinding to a razzor edge: $0 (I know the guy)
Reaching into the basket for the public's amusment: $priceless
-----------------------------------------------------
I wonder where they are going to retire ? How much protection
can an ounce of gold by ? Do they think they can just take the
jet to Europe, who is going to pump the fuel for them ?
Three words: Ground Almond Shells.
Thats how Dad did it, that's how Americans do it.
So, what the hell are you talking about anyway?
The guillotine (English pronunciation: /???l?ti?n/ or /??i?.?ti?n/; French: [?ij?tin]) was a device used for carrying out executions by decapitation.
Almond shells expand after a few minutes in a fuel system.
+1
Awesomeness.
The most revered rule of daytrading, the stop, paradoxically is the same reason bulltards are able to pull off bullshit like today.
If more bears that don't have to trade everyday would stop levering and sit on their shorts, they will make a lot of money when it all crashes. If one really believes what is going on, can't last without a market crash, then why feed the beast.
Interestingly Quants in Quantum particle physics sometimes refer to particles that seemingly can be in two places at once. Theories about space travel by threading through worm holes in folded space could make time travel possible some day. In fact, many physicists believe that there is no time, just space, and matters interaction.
The market will fall.
The daily interaction of the various participants including quants, just warp the time factor by creating volataility. All things come to an end as noted by "Zero Hedge". The market wants and needs to go down. Market participation just drags the time factor along.
Black swans are worm holes in the folds of cycles.
Brilliant....is that you Nassim?
I can only wish I was half as smart as that guy. Thanks
I think it's Nouriel Roubini, actually. You might want to drop to your knees and smile like a donut now....
Roubini only calls for a 20% correction. We'll be going down a lot more than that. I'm nobody just like you.
Actually I think JB is Turbo Timmay on his Blackberry when he's getting shuttled around - but you actually have a chance of getting into heaven.
A few token sacrificial lambs ! Is that what this is all about ?
Let's really get to the core. How about the culture of impunity. Start with 9/11 and the fraudulent cover up. Three buildings two planes. The bogus government sponsored report. Overwhelming evidence of a controlled demolition http://cms.ae911truth.org/.
Then you have the mortal enemy of the United States masquerading as a friend, its tentacles right inside the American body politic and in the judicial system itself.. The lobby group AIPAC. Any politician criticises, and he is immediately branded as an anti-semite and a holocaust denier !
Here is more food for thought.....
http://theinfounderground.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5367
How about investigating and prosecuting Larry Silverstein ? Building 7 was not hit by a plane.
*sigh*
I'm with you.
http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2010/05/flint_shootings_homici...
Civil unrest growing in all places, Flint, Michigan.
They would send in national guard...but they are all in Iraq defending the oil patch.
How the mighty have fallen. Decades ago, Flint Michigan made American autos. Now, you would'nt go near it.
Where were the baby boomers when our jobs were outsourced? Busy at the showrooms and malls---buying foreign crap thinking that the boom in housing would never end. We stirred up so much shit in the world that 9/11 was merely blowback. As a result, Bush the idiot ran the ship aground. The damn terrorists could'nt have dreamed of a better result.
The politicians are to blame for this clusterfuck (Dems & Republicans) --but we the People went along hand-in-hand...no savings, no loyality, no work ethic, no community. You reap what you sow.
I agree, the people have lost their virtue... sacrificing the common good for perceived
personal gain. The PEOPLE have to take responsibility for the malinvestment of borrowed dollars, but that's not likely to happen as the FoxNews/Teaparty crowd are in full howl, looking for sc apegoats.
This cannot end well.
"This is civil unrest," said Clack, currently a county commissioner representing part of Flint. "Criminals feel like they have the freedom in this city ... (and) people feel like they are prisoners in their own homes."
And your point, commissioner, is what ?
IT'S BEEN LIKE THAT THROUGHOUT THE RUST BELT FOR DECADES.
hang on....
"Prior to her (Clack) election to the MI State House of Representatives, she was a High School History and Economics Teacher for 32 years. "
You are living history now lady.
Nothing's happenin' until a lot of people get hungry, homeless, and cold. Then the swhtf. That's why our keepers have extended unemployment benefits and will keep extending them.
Big Brother will take care of you. Big Brother is your friend. Vote for Big Brother. One day you won't have to vote anymore. Big Brother will take care of you.
Tea Party led by Sarah Palin a source of revolution? Hardly.
The TPer's are being corraled and set-up to provide a voting block in the next couple of elections. Sarah is there to keep them focused - she'll be moved aside when the time is right - and the next media personality will be installed to to give the Tea Party its next set of marching orders. The swing is back to neo-conservatism under the guise of an anti-Obama/Democrats campaign - not that Obama was ever anything but a (now a completed discredited) left cover for TPTB.
It's too damned bad "Barback" can't see the game. But then again, neither can the TPer's or many of the posters at this site.
Same bullshit - different day. The only way out is to "opt out".
Alexander Solzhenitsyn said it best:
"Don't believe them, don't fear them, don't ask anything of them."
Who among us can really do it?
Personally I plan to "die trying".
During the French Revolution, "they''... were'nt believed, feared, or asked.
"They" were beheaded though.
Not advocating anything of course. Just stating historical fact.
Rampant criminal activity must be attacked head on. We need coast-to-coast arrests from California Countrywide to New York Goldman Sachs and every other part of the overlapping criminal enterprises, including the mortgage industry, the appraisers, Freddie and Fannie, Citi and the big banksters, the ratings agencies, the Wall Street investment banks, AIG, the federal co-conspirators at U.S. Treasury, SEC, OTS, and the Federal Reserve, especially FRBNY, and the members of Congress who aided and abetted the greatest financial crimes in U.S. history.
These overlapping criminal enterprises raped and pillaged the mortgage industry, ruined the housing market, destroyed the credit system, endangered federal/state/municipal financing, pension funds, and the banking system, caused massive unemployment, sent the economy into a downward spiral, endangered the world financial system, extorted the U.S. and the world to pay them billions in ransom or face the destruction of the world financial system and economy, and now are costing taxpayers hundreds of billions, even trillions of $.
The greatest financial crimes in U.S. history cry out for justice! We need Shock and Awe RICO prosecutions...mass trials in style of the Maxiprocesso (Maxi Trial) of the Mafia in Sicily during the mid-1980s that resulted in hundreds of defendants convicted.
The only thing that has any hope of stopping the continual rape and pillage of investors, pensioners, city and state funds, and taxpayers is to see the entire Wall Street RICO crime syndicate along with co-conspirators in the mortgage industry, the Fed, Treasury, SEC, and Congress arrested and perp walked in handcuffs to federal and state jails. Now. Not 2 years from now.
We need RICO confiscations of the hundreds of billions in illegal "profits" from the criminal enterprises of the banks, mortgage industry, and Wall Street Mafia. We need 20 years-to-life hard time prison sentences.
It takes only one prosecutor to investigate just one crime, and follow the money and the connected crimes, and bring down the overlapping criminal enterprises using Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) prosecutions.
The prosecutor who leads the charge will become a national hero.
+1. Problem is, the way the system works, ambitious prosecutors go after financial industry perps as stepping stones to higher office (do you remember Rudy Giulliani?) not out of any sense of prosecuting lawbreakers. Here in New York, the banks figured out how to beat that system: they became the biggest campaign donors on the planet so that here in this state, if you want to get elected for something higher than say, dog catcher, you can't go against the money interests. If you doubt me, just look with a critical eye at who Andrew Cuomo has chosen for his targets. He's an ambitious guy and could have gone after any of these crooks had he wanted to and become the national hero you seek. But he didn't. He chose a couple of lame hedge fund guys (and an Indian one at that) who nobody cares about anyway.
Yes, he and many other prosecutors have been disappointments, going after small fry and letting the man-eating sharks continue the feeding frenzy.
How far down the chain do you go? I know real estate appraisers who were so busy that they didn't even go out to do "windshield" appraisals (drive by and look out the window). They just appraised them for whatever the buyer's offer was. Do we take them down as well?
You are absolutely right and for that reason nothing at all will be done other than a little cosmetic window-dressing here and there. Madoff is the scapegoat for everyone else's guilt.
Okay, now to the serious stuffs. Let's talk about this important issue, could we?
"American Idol": Did voters get it right?An overwhelming number of folks feel that it is no. What do you folks think?
The real criminals in all this are the regulators/guardians authorities whose job it is to maintain standards, prosecute transgressions.
If all cops are bent cops then the criminals will go about their business without fear and brazenly. The major failure is with the bent cops.
The gatekeepers have failed. They should be dimissed. The gatekeepers have failed because they are complicit, they should be jailed for a long time.
When your first and last lines of defence are corrupt and complicit it is a breakdown of the highest order.
When the SHTF and the angry mob is in the streets it will be these regulators who will bear the brunt of attack. At that time they will run around like stuck pigs trying to save their necks by turning evidence on everybody including their grandmothers...but it will be too late. They will bear the brunt. People hate bent cops, they will hate bent regulators.
So those regulators better get used spending nights with bubba as bed mates as the banks and senate will sacrifice you. You think your mates in the banks and the government are going to help you, that you were one of them? You will be on your own.
We have traitors in the SEC, CFTC and you name it, selling out the system and everybody for a pat on the back from the powerful, thinking they belong to their club.
You need to take 3 minutes to watch this.
http://www.youtube.com:80/watch?v=H0a_FA_J6Sw
Ezekiel 33:6
For V shaped reovery, we need to drastically cut government. The money thus saved can be used to encourage our banks to lend into more productive areas of the economy. ?I say free market capitalism and trickle down economics are the best path to prosperity.
lol
Tonight I interview my Pug dog about all things financial; he had plenty to say:
http://economicdisconnect.blogspot.com/2010/05/economic-disconnect-special-exclusive.html
So if someone were to take out Lloyd Blankfiend, or Hanky Paulson, would you regard the assassin as a hero or a terrorist?