Corruption

Watching pompous politicians, egotistical economists, arrogant investment geniuses, clueless media pundits, and self- proclaimed experts on the Great Depression predict an economic recovery and a return to normalcy would be amusing if it wasn’t so pathetic. Their lack of historical perspective does a huge disservice to the American people, as their failure to grasp the cyclical nature of history results in a broad misunderstanding of the Crisis the country is facing. The ruling class and opinion leaders are dominated by linear thinkers that believe the world progresses in a straight line. Despite all evidence of history clearly moving through cycles that repeat every eighty to one hundred years (a long human life), the present generations are always surprised by these turnings in history. I can guarantee you this country will not truly experience an economic recovery or progress for another fifteen to twenty years. If you think the last four years have been bad, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Hope is not an option. There is too much debt, too little cash-flow, too many promises, too many lies, too little common sense, too much mass delusion, too much corruption, too little trust, too much hate, too many weapons in the hands of too many crazies, and too few visionary leaders to not create an epic worldwide implosion. Too bad. We stand here in the year 2012 with no good options, only less worse options. Decades of foolishness, debt accumulation, and a materialistic feeding frenzy of delusion have left the world broke and out of options. And still our leaders accelerate the debt accumulation, while encouraging the masses to carry-on as if nothing has changed since 2008.

Dumbfounded. That’s the only way to describe the reaction that future historians will have when they look back and study the utter perversion that is our global financial system. We live in a time when a tiny handful of people have their fingers on a button that can conjure trillions of dollars, euro, yen, and renminbi out of thin air. In the United States, it comes down to one man. Just one. With a single decision, he controls the lever that dominates the entire economy. When you control the money, you control everything– financial markets, consumer prices, risk perceptions, investment habits, savings rates, hiring decisions, pay raises, sovereign debt, housing starts, etc.  One man.

Few men have a resume quite like Jon Corzine.  Not only has Corzine served in the U.S. Senate and been governor of New Jersey, he has also been the CEO of Goldman Sachs and the recently imploded brokerage firm MF Global.   The insider blood filtrated through cronyism and the endless squandering of the public dime flows heavily through his veins. When MF Global went belly up back in the fall, Corzine was finally revealed for the inept, overly connected bureaucrat he really is.  Corruption seemingly follows the former Senator, Governor, and banker like shadows on a sunny day.  Earlier this week, New Jersey was declared the least corruptible state in the union much to the surprise of, well, everyone.  But as the great Jonathan Weil pointed out, the methodology in the study conducted by the Center for Public Integrity was horribly flawed.

All you need to read and some more.

• More HFT Posturing: SEC Probes Rapid Trading (WSJ)
• Fed’s Bullard Says Monetary Policy May Be at Turning Point (Bloomberg)
• Hilsenrath: Fed Hosts Global Gathering on Easy Money (WSJ)
• Dublin ‘hopeful’ ECB will approve bond deal (FT)
• EU Proposes a Beefed-Up Permanent Bailout Fund (WSJ)
• Portugal Town Halls Face Default Amid $12 Billion Debt (Bloomberg)
• Hidden Fund Fees Means U.K. Investors Pay Double US Rates (Bloomberg)
• Europe Weighs Trade Probes Amid Beijing Threats (WSJ)
• Bank of Japan Stimulus Row Fueled by Kono’s Nomination (Bloomberg)

There's a lot of it even in Germany, but it finally has a way of measuring it

All you need to read.

Yet another whistleblower has stepped up, this time one already known to the general public, and one that Zero Hedge covered just over a month ago: we refer to the case of former CBO worker, Lan T. Pham, who, as the WSJ described in early February, "alleges she was terminated [by the CBO] after 2½ months for sharing pessimistic outlooks for the banking and housing sectors in 2010" and who "alleges supervisors stifled opinions that contradicted economic fixes endorsed by some on Wall Street, including research from a Morgan Stanley economist who served as a CBO adviser." As we observed in February, "what is most troubling is if indeed the CBO is nothing but merely another front for Wall Street to work its propaganda magic on the administration. Because at the core of every policy are numbers, usually with dollar signs in front of them, numbers which have to make sense and have to be projected into the future, no matter how grossly laughable the resultant hockeystick." As it turns out, somewhat expectedly, the WSJ version of events was incomplete. There is much more to this very important story, one which has major implications over "impartial" policy decisionmaking, and as a result, Ms. Pham has approached Zero Hedge to share her full story with the public.

Here is where the parasitic 1% have their problem. What they have “sold” the American public as the spirit of the nation is now in direct opposition to reality. In fact, it has become so obviously untrue that the population is waking in drove to the truth and the truth is that we have a utterly corrupt, sociopathic minority running the nation like a giant criminal syndicate for their own power and money. Therein lies their weakness however. They have no philosophy. These guys are actually so twisted that all they think about is how can they keep growing their money and power. Furthermore, they are operating under an exposed playbook of control. Just take a look at Obama’s approval ratings. They are plunging. They are plunging despite fabricated economic numbers and biblical stock market rigging to make things look good. They are plunging because people are waking up and seeing all of this for what it is. A gigantic scam. All the signs I see point to increasing desperation on their part and exponential awakening on the part of the meat of the bell curve. These guys are toast and what we should now be focusing most of our attention on is what kind of society we want when this one collapses. Hopefully the other side of the bell curve can influence the debate for the first times in five thousand years. That is my hope and my vision of the future.

What is fraud except creating “value” from nothing and passing it off as something? Frauds interlink and grow upon each other. Our debt-based money system serves as the fraud foundation. In our debt-based money system, debt must grow in order to create money. Therefore, there is no way to pay off aggregate debt with available money. More money must be lent into the system to make the payments for old debts. This causes overall debt to expand as new money for actual people (vs. banks) always arrives at interest and compounds exponentially. This process is called financialization. Financialization: The process of making money from nothing in which debt (i.e. poverty, lack) is paradoxically considered an asset (i.e. wealth, gain). In current financialized economies “wealth expansion” comes from the parasitic taxation of productivity in the form of interest on fiat lending. This interest over time consumes a greater and greater share of resources, assets, labor, and livelihood until nothing is left.

Injection will have its desired affect.

Welcome to the Crazy House, a rotting McMansion ruled by power-drunk megalomaniacs suffering from delusions of invulnerability and god-like powers. Why are we here, you ask? Because the drunks who run the household make it so darned easy: just keep quiet, listen politely to their ravings, and you get subsidized meals, free rent, a houseful of techno-gadgetry and nonstop entertainment--and that's not even counting the amusement value of their delusional, sloppy-drunk ramblings out by the rust-stained pool.

All you need to read.

While reading Advanced Trading today we stumbled across the following curious excerpt:

Advanced Trading: You mentioned regulators and politicians are ignorant ...

[ITG's Jamie] Selway: I would say that their knowledge is incomplete.

Advanced Trading: Is this causing HFT to be scape-goated?

[ITG'S Jamie] Selway: Yes, there's a mixture of that. I am fond of saying I am not a huge regulations guy but I am a fan of regulations at an appropriate level that boosts confidence. I for one would prefer to be regulated by the SEC and not by ZeroHedge. So we have a team of experts and multiple agencies that are expert in regulations and know the markets and have the resources.

Here is our response.

In the U.S. we now have the perfection of cloaked crony capitalism: corporate cartels use their vast concentrations of capital and revenue to buy the political leverage needed to write regulations specifically designed to eliminate competition. Recall that the most profitable business model is a monopoly or cartel protected from competition by the coercive Central State. Imposing complex regulations on small business competitors effectively cripples an entire class competitors, but does so in "stealth mode"--after all, more regulations are a "good thing" (especially to credulous Liberals) which "protect the public" (and every politico loves claiming his/her new raft of regulations will "protect the public.") This masks the key dynamic of crony capitalism: gaming the government is the most profitable business model. Where else can you "invest" a few hundred thousand dollars (to buy political "access" and lobbying) and "earn" a return in the millions of dollars, and eliminate potential competitors, too? No other "investment" even comes close.