Burn Frankenstein

Artist: Obsessive Gardeners

U.S. "Stock Market Is Rigged"

Courtesy of: CBS and 60 Minutes

Steve Kroft reports on a new book from Michael Lewis, "Flash Boys," that reveals how a group of unlikely characters discovered how some high speed traders work the stock market to their advantage.

 U.S. stock ownership is at a record low and less than half of Americans trust banks and financial services. And in the last two weeks, the New York attorney general and the Commodities Futures Trading Commission in Washington have both launched investigations into high-frequency computerized stock trading that now controls more than half the market.

The Gold Is Gone - Germanys' Access To Its Gold Denied

Courtesy Of: Russia Today

The world is losing trust in the dollar as a safe haven. 

A major blow came after Germany's Bundesbank demanded the repatriation of a big chunk of its gold being held in the US. 

Because as RT's Gayane Chichakyan reports, some are concerned the assets of foreign nations in the Federal Reserve are not secure or even there. 

The Germans were infuriated when the US Federal reserve didn't even let them examine their own assets properly. 

Peter Boehringer, the founder and chairman of 'German Precious Metal Association', says that's a bad sign.

The International Banking Cartel

Courtesy Of: PressTV

A look at the International Banking Cartel led by the Bank for International Settlement (in Basel, Switzerland) known as the bank of central banks (58 central banks) and The US Federal reserve System. 

Also a look at banking tycoons: from the Rothschild family in Europe to JP Morgan and others in the US. How banks not only control governments but also appoint politicians through huge campaign donations. 

Governments at the service of the major banks, the best example: the Obama administration and the history's biggest bail out of the same institutions that caused the Great Recession.

Four Horseman Of The Banking Cartel

They Rule The World

Courtesy Of Press TV

Rothchilds family are worth over 100 trillion dollars. This name Rothchild comes from Germany, The Rothchilds real family name is really Bauer. This Family changed the last name to match the name of a old Masonic German bank. 

There are 13 Families that rule the world

Capitalism Has Failed The World

Courtesy Of Al-Jazeera

It seems that mistakes made in Wall Street and the City of London are paid for by people around the world, but can we govern greed within the realm of capitalism or is it all just money down the drain? Is austerity really needed? Can we trust the banks?

Lord Turner said: “I’m not an egalitarian, I’m not a socialist, but I am worried about the sheer extent of the inequality that’s now growing. I think finance is part of that story.”

Lord Turner was at the helm of the UK’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) in the wake of the financial meltdown and is now trying to find ground-breaking solutions to global problems at the Institute of New Economic Thinking. Hasan challenges a man at the heart of rethinking the global economic system about his past experience, his present thoughts, and our future.

“I am concerned that we have not been radical enough in our reform,” concluded Lord Turner.

But he also sounded a note of hope based on some of the new ideas and policies coming out from previously orthodox bastions of economic thinking.

Joining our discussion are: Jon Moulton, a venture capitalist and the founder of the private equity firm Better Capital. He has nurtured a reputation for forthrightness even to point of challenging his private equity peers for abusing tax regimes. He is also one of the few men in the City of London who warned about the impending crash before it happened; Professor Costas Lapavitsas, who teaches economics at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London and is the author of several notable books on the crash and its consequences including Crisis in the Eurozone and Financialisation in Crisis; and Ann Pettifor, the director of PRIME (Policy Research in Macroeconomics),

and a fellow of the New Economics Foundation. She was one of the first to warn about the debt crisis in her bookThe Coming First World Debt Crisis, and is also well-known for her leadership of the successful worldwide campaign to cancel developing world debt - Jubilee 2000.

How Money Drives The ‘Cycle Of Tyranny’

In Order For The “Cycle Of Tyranny” To Exist, There Are 4 Key Institutions That Must Be Totally Co-Opted

By Jason Charles

This process can be termed the “Cycle of Tyranny” and is basically the method large institutions such as government, corporations, and banks participate in as a on going feed back loop that is totally driven by money and power.

This cycle is designed to centralize power, rob people of their liberties, wealth and ultimately dignity due to the very dehumanizing and egregious actions of the men who sell themselves to this system. In fact, this whole system thrives on the dehumanizing process and erosion of individual rights enshrined in the Constitution.

To achieve this effect in a society large amounts of money are infused at every layer of the targeted and co-opted institution to assure that typically good moral people are bribed and in continual defense of the corrupted institution. With out the money factor the internationalist system simply would not work because the incentive component with in the cycle would be removed. The ablity for banks to create money out of thin air is the driving force behind the “Cycle of Tyranny”. 

The Banks

“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.  Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.”  - Thomas Jefferson

The banking families of Europe have utilized a debt based system to centralize a vast empire of wealth and power over the course of hundreds of years. By lending governments and institutions money, it creates a state of perpetual dependence, the fear of losing the money source is how banks control and socially engineer these institutions to pliable agencies of the internationalists worldview. Money truly corrupts the hearts of man, as long as the money is flowing men will turn a blind eye to atrocities of all types. It is through the corrupting influence money has had on mankind we begin to see how money and it’s love is truly the engine in the “Cycle of Tyranny”.

Today’s America serves as a perfect model as to how the old banking families have been able to leverage their large financial capabilities into a free country in order to corrupt and take over all of the major institutions with in a society. America was founded on the Principles of Liberty which detested banking institutions to the point of war with England and the British monarchy.

The process begins with the establishment of a central bank, in America’s case the Federal Reserve in the year 1913. It is no coincidence that the American Industrial Revolution coincided with the founding of the Federal Reserve. What we termed the “Robber Barons” during the early 20th century like Rockefeller, Carnegie, Ford, J.P. Morgan were really no more than agents of the Federal Reserve and the European financial elite. These agents were lent massive sums of money through the banking apparatuses backed by the newly formed Federal Reserve. They then took over their respective sectors of society. For example, Rockefeller took the Pharmacological/Medical/Education and also Oil sector, while Carnegie took over the Steel and Railroads, J.P. Morgan served as a financial agent etc. etc.

All of these men became exceedingly wealthy because they were financed agents who built the mega corporations of today. It is these corporations that had an unfair advantage because they were specially trained, and groomed by the international elite for the sole purpose of building up all of America, with the long term plan of turning it back over to the globalists at a later date.

The bankers utilize the “Boom and Bust Cycle” of the economy to first “Boom”, or build up large corporations through influxes of capital that then creates large, businesses, property, inventions, and institutions. The bankers can then “Bust” the economy by drying up the lending credit suddenly to these reliant businesses and institutions. This sudden collapse in capital is called a “Depression” it is an orchestrated event planned by the central bank to purposely collapse companies into bankruptcy. Once bankrupt the bank can then buy up the company assets pennies on the dollar funneling these new assets to the share holders of the banks.

This “Boom and Bust” cycle is the verbatim tactic that our founding fathers warned us time and time again having seen this happen in European nations. They hated the bankers and fought tooth and nail to keep a central bank out of our country knowing their money is the moral ruin to everything America stood for.

One hundred years later we have forgot history and the bankers have utilized this system to create, crash then buy up resources and the wealth of nation in every country on the planet. This financial boom and bust is the mechanism of control they have used to enslave countries world wide in debt and are now bringing about their international global system called the New World Order. A banking order controlled by organizations such as the IMF, UN, and World Bank.

The Corporations

“I hope that we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.” -Thomas Jefferson
 

The companies that have been built up by the lending power of the central banks are controlled and sustained through bank capital and the drive of the share holders whose only motive is profit. This creates an amoral environment where everybody from the CEO down to the mail-room clerk are chasing dollar signs at every turn. Their only concern is how they can make more profit.

They do this by a variety of ways, they will cheapen the quality of their product, they will identify populations with low standards of living and human rights to exploit for little to no wages, they will also lobby government to create laws and regulations that favor them and harm their competition.

Through this process, of receiving unfair financial lending advantage, reducing ethics with in the institution, and creating fascist partnerships with government, corporations that place money first almost always inevitable become so corrupt that they begin to create even more and more devious ways to assure the take over and monopolization of their host countries competition. They soon grow so large they begin to covet the resources and wealth of neighboring nations, which put’s them in a new strata of power called the multinational corporation.

It is much harder to employee these tactics on an international scale because without the protection of the target countries government, the unethical and dirty dealings almost always lead to war.

The people will never go to war for a corporation. The vast majority of people wish to live in peace and harmony with their neighbors, but corporations have insatiable need for control, power and money and have to find more and more dubious ways to push their corporation into other countries to keep the feeding cycle going.

This is where companies can then hire think tanks to devise devious, far reaching plans that allow them eventual access to the resources of other countries as well as their own when they come up against obstacles towards their agenda.

Think Tanks

“If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.” – Samuel Adams
 

Think tanks are made up of individuals who have been long time agents of the system. They are usually made up of very smart people who have bounced back and forth between corporate and government structures gaining reputation, influence and command over the intricacies of corporate, banking and government institutions.

Whether it be military, intelligence, financial, social, political or international needs a corporation can hire a wide variety of think tanks to create plans that utilize the various sectors of societal institutions to further the agenda of their client. Both governments and corporations hire these companies for large sums of money for the sole purpose of creating facilitating plans to push their agenda forward.

Now that America is a fascist state, it is very, very difficult to determine where the corporate objectives end and the governmental objectives begin, often times they are one in the same. The think tanks are able to utilize assets of both institutions by pulling together military, intelligence and corporate teams to formulate plans to access resources and strategic objects that are beneficial for the corporation, the government and also the banks.

This partnership is very dangerous for the general public and society at large and is often wrought with corruption and shadowy dealings that must be hidden through the cloud of top secrecy and clandestine operations. Tactics of extortion, racketeering, money laundering, assassination and other criminal activity are almost always considered in the think tank atmosphere. There are expensive ways and moral ways to gain access to resources or their are covert ways often touted as much cheaper but are ethically bankrupt and criminal to gain the desired access.

The more covert means always need cooperation and cover by the government through national security and official channels. The think tank will then utilize their influence and lobby and produce policy that impacts political parties towards their “prescribed” resolutions.

Often times it is the government or corporation that comes to the think tank saying we want to invade here or secure our corporation here, the think tank provides both the plan to create a facilitating event which is carried out covertly through sabotage campaigns, or false flag attacks, or stage bombings and then when the crisis reaches a climax it will lend it’s credibility and solution towards dealing with the crisis they created. This is called “Problem, Reaction, Solution”. They simply create the problem, the reaction is the politicians and public demand action and then they turn around and offer the solution of sending in their corporations or military towards resolution. A resolution that just so happens to give them full access strategically, militarily, and politically to a targeted nation.

A successful mission will given them the desired result every-time, enriching multinational corporations, banks and governments alike as they split up the loot and resources of taking over countries and conquering. A program as old as time itself.

Government comes into play to provide PR and official cover for these programs. Obviously war and invading nations is nasty business and the government has to be on board, that is why you always see politicians defaulting to the think tanks who write the policies as specialists and advisers on such things.

Government

“Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.” – George Washington

The government is an institution charged with securing the liberties and security of their population. That is the sole reason for them to exist and is always formed through a unified agreement of the people towards this end.

The Declaration of the United States is a beautiful word picture of why governments are formed, who forms and empowers them which is the people, and when it is appropriate to disband them in favor of a new government body. The only proper way and time to disband a government is when it becomes so corrupt that it encroaches on the liberties, wealth and prosperity of the people. At that point the people have every right to nullify and succeed from corrupt government. Seeing it was them who formed the state they too can end the state.

Self-defense is a natural right of man, government is instituted to aid this natural right, but sometimes governments become so out of touch with the original charter they begin to infringe on the rights of the people to point of distress and ruin with in society. When this happens it no longer serves the interest of the people and must be opposed and resisted by force if necessary, why, because again self-defense of life and  the liberties of the people is a universal law that trumps all institutional agendas including government.

The people, if they through apathy allow government to get out of control, have a natural right to defend themselves against their own government that seeks their ruin. Nothing is more destructive than wicked government. Government, once taken over by politicians, corporate agents and banking controllers, history shows will act in the most dehumanizing, repulsive and tyrannical way possible. Instead of fulfilling their oath to the Constitution, they side with agents of the fascist system as it is taken over lock stock and barrel by the banking elite.

Why the government is such a powerful vehicle towards tyranny and oppression is because it has the power to tax the people to pay it’s debt to the banks i.e. IRS, it also is in control of standing armies which can be easily directed through manufactured crisis events either in the homeland or abroad wreaking havoc on society, and it also provides political and official cover for corporate and globalist agendas, agendas that are a determent to the people.

Tyrannical government has murdered, enslaved, imprisoned and bankrupted countless millions over the eons of human history. To allow it to get out of control is to invite destruction and destitution on a society.

Solutions

“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” – John Adams

The solution to these things is morality. Our founders were quite clear that without an ethical, knowledgeable moral, and well informed population these institutions would most certainly gain control.

If you as a philosophical libertarian equate freedom and liberty with living excessive lifestyles you are totally off base. These things have nothing to do with liberty, the moral resolve of our founders who many of them lost it all in the revolution is about understanding. They understood that defending life is paramount to anything we can do on this planet. Those who refuse to defend life, seeing that it is scared and worthy of protection have no concept of what it means to walk in the principles our forefathers bequeathed us. It is they who have sold themselves to these systems and jeopardize everything our country is founded on.

We have identified the “Cycle of Tyranny” it is driven by money, but equally so it is driven by those who have lost sight of the sacred principles enshrined in our Constitution, these men and women who put money and power over the moral, foundational Principles of Liberty are our enemies and must be treated and prosecuted as such.

World Bank Corruption Deceit and Greed

Note: This video was not part of the below article.

By James Turnage

Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter to John Taylor in 1816:  “And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”

The World Bank was constructed to lend money to the developing countries of the world.  It was designed to help put an end to world poverty.  A whistleblower by the name of Karen Hudes, former Chief Council for the World Bank for 12 years, claims the organization is filled with corruption, deceit, and greed.

Ms. Hudes says that the World Bank, in collusion with major banking institutions all over the world, is funneling the money to unscrupulous individuals, as well as to the executives of the bank itself.   The bulk of funds never reaches the people for which it is intended.

Ms. Hudes, a lawyer herself, witnessed securities fraud.  Full disclosure of 180 billion dollars-worth of bonds was never made to investors.  It was her job to ensure financial statements for investors were accurate.  She followed the corporate ladder, and reported her findings to the audit committee.  When she received no response, she took her information to the U.S. Treasury Department.  Once again, she was ignored.  When she went to the United States Congress, Senator Richard Luger, Republican from Indiana, sent three letters to the World Bank, asking them not to fire her.  The promptly fired her.

She says that it became obvious to her that Congress had no knowledge of the World Bank’s operations.  Three additional Congressmen asked the General Accounting Office, the GAO, to investigate.

Ms. Hudes claimed the money was ‘going everywhere,’ because when anyone reported the misappropriation of funds, they were fired.  She cited one instance when 900 million dollars was supposed to go to the poor in the Philippines, and instead it was diverted to a man by the name of “Lucio Tonn,” who was behind on his loan payments.  The Philippine National Bank, which never received the money, eventually went bankrupt, and a 500 million dollar bailout ensued.

She says she was attempting to unveil a massive cover-up, that went all the way to Congress, and included 188 ministers of finance around the world.  She claims the result of all the corruption will be a currency war.

Ms. Hudes says there are several World Bank whistleblowers, including the United Kingdom, Mexico, India, and Ethiopia, and that they are all reporting the same information.  The institution is corrupt from top to bottom.

She was asked by Abby Martin of ‘RT’ if she had gone to the financial publications.  Ms. Hudes said she had, but she discovered they were owned by one major conglomerate, which includes nearly all the financial institutions in the world.  She stated that the aim of the Banking community is to control the people of the world and their finances.

She told of the ‘Federal Institute of Technology, in Zurich, Switzerland, where three mathematicians looked at corporate data from 43,000 trans-national companies.  Through complicated maneuvers, they increased their financial power 10 fold, and own 40 percent of the assets of all companies traded on the financial markets of the world, and 60 percent of the earnings yearly.  In many countries, the money being printed has no value.

Ms. Martin said these institutions are obviously laundering money, and hiding much of it in ‘offshore’ accounts.  There is no oversight for most of the institutions, including the World Bank, and that they control geopolitics by controlling many of the world’s governments.

Ms. Hudes said that during the 2012 presidential election, she went to CBS news with information regarding Robert Zellig.  Zellig was the man who would have headed Mitt Romney’s transition team.  He was allegedly part of the Bank’s corrupted management.  CBS declined, saying that “the American people don’t need to know.”  She said that in this way, they were also controlling voters.

When Ms. Martin asked her for names, Hudes said that they were the owners of institutions such as ‘Goldman-Sachs,’ and the ‘Bank of America.’  She further stated that they were all one enormous financial entity, dominating the economic future of the world.

Ms. Martin asked why she hasn’t been singled out, as were Edward Snowden or Bradley Manning.  Ms. Hudes said it may be because all the whistleblowers are working together.  She is surprised that Snowden has received so much attention, because the media is controlled by the government.  The mainstream media is not trusted by the American people, which was shown in a survey.  70 percent of the country said they did not believe what was reported in the news.

The World Bank was created at the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, along with three other institutions, including the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The World Bank and the IMF are both based in Washington DC, and work closely with each other.

Traditionally, the World Bank has been headed by a citizen of the United States, while the IMF has been led by a European citizen.

The World Bank has two primary divisions.  The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) has 188 member countries, while the International Development Association (IDA) has 172 members.  Each member state of IBRD should be also a member of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and only members of IBRD are allowed to join other institutions within the Bank (such as IDA).

The World Bank requires sovereign immunity from countries it deals with.   Sovereign immunity waives a holder from all legal liability for their actions. It is proposed that this immunity from responsibility is a “shield which The World Bank wants to resort to, for escaping accountability and security by the people.”  As the United States has veto power, it can prevent the World Bank from taking action against its interests.

With no accountability, it’s easy for the World Bank to be filled with corruption, deceit, and greed.

Germany Repatriating Gold From NY Federal Reserve

Several German newspapers are reporting a surprising move by the Bundesbank in the aftermath of the “German gold scandal”. Handelsblatt’s sources confirm that a portion of the German gold stored with the New York Fed and the Banque de France is about to be moved back to Germany. [The information remains to be be confirmed by official sources, GR Editor]

This move by the Bundesbank may trigger a chain reaction, prompting other countries to start repatriating the gold stored in London, New York or Paris.

So far, only countries that have a strained relationship with the US have resorted to gold repatriation. Now, Bundesbank will be seen as walking in Hugo Chavez’s footsteps.

If gold repatriation becomes a worldwide trend, it will be obvious that both the US and UK have lost their credibility as gold custodians.

For gold markets worldwide, this move may mark a switch from “financial gold” to “physical gold”, but the process is definitely in its early stages. The decision to repatriate the German gold is a big victory for a part of the German press that first forced Bundesbank to admit that 69% of its gold is stored outside Germany. Almost certainly both the German press and at least several German lawmakers will demand a verification procedure for the gold bars returned from New York, just to make sure that Germany doesn’t receive gold-plated tungsten instead of gold. It seems that German decision makers no longer trust their American partners.

Via: "Global Research"

How Big Banks Victimize Our Democracy

Post by "Sayf Maslul"


By "Bill Moyers"

Matt Taibbi and Yves Smith discuss the folly and corruption of both banks and government. Also, Peter Edelman on fighting U.S.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon’s appearances in the last two weeks before Congressional committees — many members of which received campaign contributions from the megabank — beg the question: For how long and how many ways are average Americans going to pay the price for big bank hubris, with our own government acting as accomplice?

On this week’s Moyers & Company, Rolling Stone editor Matt Taibbi and Yves Smith, creator of the finance and economics blog Naked Capitalism, join Bill to discuss the folly and corruption of both banks and government, and how that tag-team leaves deep wounds in our democracy.  Taibbi’s latest piece is “The Scam Wall Street Learned from the Mafia.” Smith is the author of ECONned: How Unenlightened Self Interest Undermined Democracy and Corrupted Capitalism.

Meanwhile, for anyone who wants to understand why, in one of the richest nations in the world, so many poor people are teetering on the edge, author and advocate Peter Edelman talks about continuing efforts to fight poverty, and what it will take to keep the needs of poor people on the American political agenda. A former aide to Robert F. Kennedy and faculty director of Georgetown University’s Center on Poverty, Inequality, and Public Policy, Edelman’s new book is So Rich, So Poor: Why It’s So Hard to End Poverty in America.

The Key To Economic Recovery

Kucinich Explains Monetary Reform


Posted by "CavalierZee"



The N.E.E.D. Act would put the Federal Reserve under the Treasury as part of a larger to plan to allow Congress to invest in our economy without creating debt or inflation. It does this in three simple steps outlined here.

3 Card Monte

Posted by guest blogger "Sayf Maslul"


"But the problem is that we live in a society where capitalism itself has become rampantly feral. Feral politicians cheat on their expenses, feral bankers plunder the public purse for all its worth, CEOs, hedge fund operators and private equity geniuses loot the world of wealth, telephone and credit card companies load mysterious charges on everyone’s bills, shopkeepers price gouge, and, at the drop of a hat swindlers and scam artists get to practice three-card monte right up into the highest echelons of the corporate and political world. 

A political economy of mass dispossession, of predatory practices to the point of daylight robbery, particularly of the poor and the vulnerable, the unsophisticated and the legally unprotected, has become the order of the day." [David Harvey]

Check Kiting

Posted by Guest Blogger "Sayf Maslul"


Definition of 'Kiting'

Check Kiting is the illegal act of taking advantage of the float to make use of non-existent funds in a checking or other bank account; it is a form of check fraud. 

It is commonly defined as intentionally writing a check for a value greater than the account balance from an account in one bank, then writing a check from another account in another bank, also with non-sufficient funds, with the second check serving to cover the non-existent funds from the first account.

The purpose of check kiting is to falsely inflate the balance of a checking account in order to allow written checks that would otherwise bounce to clear.

If the account is not planned to be replenished, then the fraud is known as paper hanging instead. [Wikipedia]

-----------

The Federal Reserve is buying its own debt with more debt since China has stopped buying ours.

If you ever did that, they’ll call it “Check Kiting” and arrest your ass!!!

Check Kiting

Posted by Guest Blogger "Sayf Maslul"


Definition of 'Kiting'

Check Kiting is the illegal act of taking advantage of the float to make use of non-existent funds in a checking or other bank account; it is a form of check fraud. 

It is commonly defined as intentionally writing a check for a value greater than the account balance from an account in one bank, then writing a check from another account in another bank, also with non-sufficient funds, with the second check serving to cover the non-existent funds from the first account.

The purpose of check kiting is to falsely inflate the balance of a checking account in order to allow written checks that would otherwise bounce to clear.

If the account is not planned to be replenished, then the fraud is known as paper hanging instead. [Wikipedia]

-----------

The Federal Reserve is buying its own debt with more debt since China has stopped buying ours.

If you ever did that, they’ll call it “Check Kiting” and arrest your ass!!!

Exploiting Consumers Is ‘The Purpose Of The Banking Organization’

Former JPMorgan Banker: Wall Street Continues To Ignore America’s Anger At It, Sipping Champagne From Rooftops While Protesters March Below. 

By Travis Waldron 
November 18, 2011 
Courtesy Of "AlterNet"

Wall Street banks, largely spared from the economic ruin felt by millions of Americans since the financial crisis of 2008, have returned to profitability, generating higher profits in the two-and-a-half years since the crisis than they did in nearly eight years preceding it. But that hasn’t stopped them from seeking new ways to generate revenue — like Bank of America’s proposed $5-a-month debit card fee or the millions banks have made from charging consumers to receive unemployment benefits or food stamps.

If all this makes Americans feel like Wall Street banks only view them as money-making tools, well, that’s because the banks apparently do. According to David Mooney, a former JPMorgan Chase employee, Wall Street banks see consumers as an “income stream” to exploit for profit-making purposes, Reuters reports:

David Mooney, chief executive officer of Alliant Credit Union in Chicago, one of the nation’s larger credit unions, used to work at a one of Wall Street’s top banks, JPMorgan Chase. There’s a vast cultural gap between Wall Street and his new world, he says: Old friends from the Street, he says, now jokingly refer to him as a “socialist.” A credit union is supposed to be run in the interests of all members, he says, while commercial bankers tend to see consumers as customers who can be “exploited” by layering on more fees.

Says Mooney: “I don’t say this lightly, but the consumer is simply an income stream and exploiting that is the purpose of the banking organization.”

Mooney’s bluntness may seem shocking, but his assessment shouldn’t. Wall Street banks made millions profiting off shoddy mortgage lending practices, setting the stage for the housing collapse that plunged millions of Americans into foreclosure. They made a mess of the foreclosure process, using robo-signers to speed foreclosures and foreclosing on homes they either didn’t own or that weren’t even in foreclosure. They sold deals to investors that they knew would fail, and took advantage of customers with outrageous overdraft, credit card, and other fees.

In the aftermath of the financial crisis and the horrors it exposed, Wall Street banksspent millions to prevent the passage of financial regulatory reform. Once the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act passed, they spent just as much trying to shape its rules. They opposed the formation of a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the agency tasked with protecting consumers from predatory banking practices, and in concert with their Republican friends in Congress, have fought to shape who will lead the bureau and how it will work.

Unfortunately for Wall Street, it didn’t take blunt assessments like Mooney’s for Americans to take action. In October, 650,000 Americans joined credit unions, which, as Mooney noted, are “supposed to be run in the interests of all members.” 40,000more joined them on Bank Transfer Day earlier this month.

Wall Street, meanwhile, continues to ignore America’s anger at it, sipping champagne from rooftops while protesters march below.

Travis Waldron is a reporter/blogger for ThinkProgress.org at the Center for 

To Rob A Country, Own A Bank

Compiled By "CavalierZee"

William Black Tells Truth To House Financial Affairs Committee




William Black, author of "Best way to rob a bank is to own one" talks about deliberate fraud on Wall St

Part-1




Part-2

William Black: The finance sector is a huge parasite, it transfers wealth from the poor to the wealthy.




Part-3

Black: So many shoes to fall from this crisis it will be like Imelda Marcos closet after an earthquake.




Part-4

William Black: Ten steps to reform the finance sector - that the Administration and Congress won't do.




Part-5

What will it take for real finance reform - next "big one" will be much worse

The Global Financial MeltDown

Financial Institutions Have Been Rewarded For Misbehavior

I have included all 4 Al-Jazeera episodes on the Global Financial Crisis, in this post.

The Men Who Crashed The World

The first of a four-part investigation into a world of greed and recklessness that led to financial collapse.

Last Modified: 21 Sep 2011 09:26

In the first episode of Meltdown, we hear about four men who brought down the global economy: a billionaire mortgage-seller who fooled millions; a high-rolling banker with a fatal weakness; a ferocious Wall Street predator; and the power behind the throne.

The crash of September 2008 brought the largest bankruptcies in world history, pushing more than 30 million people into unemployment and bringing many countries to the edge of insolvency. Wall Street turned back the clock to 1929.

But how did it all go so wrong?

Lack of government regulation; easy lending in the US housing market meant anyone could qualify for a home loan with no government regulations in place.

Also, London was competing with New York as the banking capital of the world. Gordon Brown, the British finance minister at the time, introduced 'light touch regulation' - giving bankers a free hand in the marketplace.

All this, and with key players making the wrong financial decisions, saw the world's biggest financial collapse.




A Global Financial Tsunami

Examining how an epidemic of fear caused banks to stop lending, triggered protests and led to industrial action.

Meltdown Last Modified: 21 Sep 2011 12:57

In the second episode of Meltdown, we look at how the financial tsunami swept the world. We hear about a renegade executive who nearly destroyed the global financial system and the US treasury secretary who bailed out his friends.

Henry 'Hank' Paulson, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs and later an economic advisor to the US government; refused to bail out global financial services firm - the Lehman Brothers. Paulson said it was not the role of government to save private businesses.

Lehman's failure had repercussions around the world. Millions of people lost their life savings. Pension plans were decimated.

Christine Lagarde, the French finance minister at the time and a close friend of Paulson's, publicly described Paulson's decision on Lehman "horrendous".

Markets from London and Paris to Shanghai fell. An epidemic of fear caused the world's major banks to stop lending, ending the year in protests and industrial action.

Click here to watch the first part of this series, The men who crashed the world.




Paying The Price

As the toll of the financial crisis continues to mount, many are looking for its true causes - and finding a crime.

Last Modified: 21 Sep 2011 12:57

The third episode of Meltdown looks at how the victims of the 2008 financial crash fight back. A protesting singer in Iceland brings down the government; in France a union leader oversees the kidnapping of his bosses; and thousands of families are made homeless in California.

Hordur Torfason, an Icelandic singer, leads the way in holding protests over the country's economy, calling for the resignation of the government and new elections.

Geir Haarde, the prime minister of Iceland, was surrounded and pelted by the protestors. Haarde soon resigned and the country's government collapsed.

In France, workers fought back to claim their rights. The Continental Tire factory announced its plant would close by 2010, meaning job losses for its 1,120 employees. Workers occupied offices and trashed the place in protest. Protests spread right across France and Europe.

As the grim toll of the financial crisis continues to mount around the world, many governments are looking for the true causes of the meltdown. In many cases, what they are discovering amounts to a crime.




After The Fall

Some responded with denial, others by re-thinking capitalism, but who is preparing for the next crisis?

Last Modified: 21 Sep 2011 12:57

In the final episode of Meltdown, we hear about the sheikh who says the crash never happened; a Wall Street king charged with fraud; a congresswoman who wants to jail the bankers; and the world leaders who want a re-think of capitalism.

The financial crash of September 2008 brought the largest bankruptcies in world history, pushing over 30 million people into unemployment and bringing many countries to the brink of insolvency.

Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid al Maktoum calls himself Dubai's CEO. He claims to run his government according to strict business principles, but now many are quietly questioning his judgement and his leadership.

In the years before the meltdown, Dubai had the biggest real-estate bonanza in the world. During the crash, the market tumbled, losing 50 per cent of its value, leaving Dubai virtually insolvent. But this did not deter the sheikh.

In January 2010, Sheikh Mohammed threw a massive party to mark the opening of the world's tallest building - the Burj Khalifa - using PR strategies to suggest that the real estate crash was a good thing for the emirate.

As one world leader handles the crisis through denial, other leaders try to re-think capitalism. Even though the causes of the 2008 meltdown are now clear, there is no magic formula to stop it from happening again.

The world has to start planning for the next crisis, even as we recognise that this one is not over yet.

11 Facts You Need To Know About The Nation’s Biggest Banks

It makes perfect sense that a movement for an economy that works for everyone would center its efforts on an industry that exemplifies the opposite.

By Pat Garofalo
October 7, 2011
Courtesy Of "Alter Net"

The Occupy Wall Street protests that began in New York City more than three weeks ago have now spread across the country. The choice of Wall Street as the focal point for the protests — as even Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said — makes sense due to the big bank malfeasance that led to the Great Recession.


While the Dodd-Frank financial reform law did a lot to ensure that a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis won’t occur — through regulation of derivatives, a new consumer protection agency, and new powers for the government to dismantle failing banks — the biggest banks still have a firm grip on the financial system, even more so than before the 2008 financial crisis. Here are eleven facts that you need to know about the nation’s biggest banks:

– Bank profits are highest since before the recession…: According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., bank profits in the first quarter of this year were “the best for the industry since the $36.8 billion earned in the second quarter of 2007.” JP Morgan Chase is currently pulling in record profits.

– …even as the banks plan thousands of layoffs: Banks, including Bank of America, Barclays, Goldman Sachs, and Credit Suisse, are planning to lay off tens of thousands of workers.

– Banks make nearly one-third of total corporate profits: The financial sector accounts for about 30 percent of total corporate profits, which is actually down from before the financial crisis, when they made closer to 40 percent.

– Since 2008, the biggest banks have gotten bigger: Due to the failure of small competitors and mergers facilitated during the 2008 crisis, the nation’s biggest banks — including Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and Wells Fargo — are now bigger than they were pre-recession. Pre-crisis, the four biggest banks held 32 percent of total deposits; now they hold nearly 40 percent.

– The four biggest banks issue 50 percent of mortgages and 66 percent of credit cards: Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup issue one out of every two mortgages and nearly two out of every three credit cards in America.

– The 10 biggest banks hold 60 percent of bank assets: In the 1980s, the 10 biggest banks controlled 22 percent of total bank assets. Today,they control 60 percent.

– The six biggest banks hold assets equal to 63 percent of the country’s GDP: In 1995, the six biggest banks in the country held assets equal to about 17 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product. Now their assets equal 63 percent of GDP.

– The five biggest banks hold 95 percent of derivatives: Nearly the entire market in derivatives — the credit instruments that helped blow up some of the nation’s biggest banks as well as mega-insurer AIG — isdominated by just five firms: JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citibank, and Wells Fargo.

– Banks cost households nearly $20 trillion in wealth: Almost $20 trillion in wealth was destroyed by the Great Recession, and total family wealth is still down “$12.8 trillion (in 2011 dollars) from June 2007 — its last peak.”

– Big banks don’t lend to small businesses: The New Rules Project notes that the country’s 20 biggest banks “devote only 18 percent of their commercial loan portfolios to small business.”

– Big banks paid 5,000 bonuses of at least $1 million in 2008: According to the New York Attorney General’s office, “nine of the financial firms that were among the largest recipients of federal bailout money paid about 5,000 of their traders and bankers bonuses of more than $1 million apiece for 2008.”

In the last few decades, regulations on the biggest banks have been systematically eliminated, while those banks engineered more and more ways to both rip off customers and turn ever-more complex trading instruments into ever-higher profits. It makes perfect sense, then, that a movement calling for an economy that works for everyone would center its efforts on an industry that exemplifies the opposite.

The 7 Biggest Economic Lies

An Occupy Wall Street demonstrator marches with his baby around the Chase banking offices near Wall Street in New York October 12, 2011. The "Occupy" protests can't become an effective national movement unless more people know the truth about the economy, the author argues.

Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

This Nation Can't Improve Unless More Americans Know The Truth About The Economy

By Robert Reich,
Guest blogger
October 12, 2011
Courtesy Of "The Christian Science Monitor"



The President’s Jobs Bill doesn’t have a chance in Congress — and the Occupiers on Wall Streetand elsewhere can’t become a national movement for a more equitable society – unless more Americans know the truth about the economy.


The President’s Jobs Bill doesn’t have a chance in Congress — and the Occupiers on Wall Streetand elsewhere can’t become a national movement for a more equitable society – unless more Americans know the truth about the economy.

1. Tax cuts for the rich trickle down to everyone else. Baloney. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush both sliced taxes on the rich and what happened? Most Americans’ wages (measured by the real median wage) began flattening under Reagan and have dropped since George W. Bush. Trickle-down economics is a cruel joke.

2. Higher taxes on the rich would hurt the economy and slow job growth. False. From the end of World War II until 1981, the richest Americans faced a top marginal tax rate of 70 percent or above. Under Dwight Eisenhower it was 91 percent. Even after all deductions and credits, the top taxes on the very rich were far higher than they’ve been since. Yet the economy grew faster during those years than it has since. (Don’t believe small businesses would be hurt by a higher marginal tax; fewer than 2 percent of small business owners are in the highest tax bracket.)

3. Shrinking government generates more jobs. Wrong again. It means fewer government workers – everyone from teachers, fire fighters, police officers, and social workers at the state and local levels to safety inspectors and military personnel at the federal. And fewer government contractors, who would employ fewer private-sector workers. According to Moody’s economist Mark Zandi (a campaign advisor to John McCain), the $61 billion in spending cuts proposed by the House GOP will cost the economy 700,000 jobs this year and next.

4. Cutting the budget deficit now is more important than boosting the economy. Untrue. With so many Americans out of work, budget cuts now will shrink the economy. They’ll increase unemployment and reduce tax revenues. That will worsen the ratio of the debt to the total economy. The first priority must be getting jobs and growth back by boosting the economy. Only then, when jobs and growth are returning vigorously, should we turn to cutting the deficit.

5. Medicare and Medicaid are the major drivers of budget deficits. Wrong. Medicare and Medicaid spending is rising quickly, to be sure. But that’s because the nation’s health-care costs are rising so fast. One of the best ways of slowing these costs is to use Medicare and Medicaid’s bargaining power over drug companies and hospitals to reduce costs, and to move from a fee-for-service system to a fee-for-healthy outcomes system. And since Medicare has far lower administrative costs than private health insurers, we should make Medicare available to everyone.

6. Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. Don’t believe it. Social Security is solvent for the next 26 years. It could be solvent for the next century if we raised the ceiling on income subject to the Social Security payroll tax. That ceiling is now $106,800.

7. It’s unfair that lower-income Americans don’t pay income tax. Wrong. There’s nothing unfair about it. Lower-income Americans pay out a larger share of their paychecks in payroll taxes, sales taxes, user fees, and tolls than everyone else.

Demagogues through history have known that big lies, repeated often enough, start being believed — unless they’re rebutted. These seven economic whoppers are just plain wrong. Make sure you know the truth – and spread it on.


Robert Reich

Robert is chancellor's professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Clinton. He has written 13 books, including 'The Work of Nations,' 'Locked in the Cabinet,' and his most recent book, 'Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future.' His 'Marketplace' commentaries can be found on publicradio.com and iTunes.

The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger, click here. This post originally ran on www.robertreich.org.