September 21, 2008

So what do you get when you put the CEO of Halliburton and the CEO of Goldman Sachs in charge of the country with the biggest access to debt?

From AmericaPANIC:


You get a kleptocracy the likes never before seen by man.

You get trillions and trillions stolen from the people.

You get Halliburton and Goldman Sachs as the two biggest beneficiaries.

And you get a world ravaged by economic misery and unending warfare.

Thank you, voters of America, for going along with the plan.

A kleptocracy is a term applied to a government that extends the personal wealth and political power of government officials and the ruling class (collectively, kleptocrats) at the expense of the population.

A kleptocratic government often goes beyond mere cronyism and nepotism, or awarding the prime contracts and civil service posts to relatives or personal friends rather than the most competent applicants.

They also create projects and programs at a policy level which serve the primary purpose of funneling money out of the treasury and into the pockets of the executive with little if any regard for the logic, viability or necessity of those projects.







9 comments:

Anonymous said...

One has to wonder why Treasury secretaries under Presidents Clinton and Bush -- Robert Rubin and Hank Paulson, respectively -- took no action to curb these abuses. It certainly was not because they did not understand Wall Street's practices -- both are former chief executives of Goldman Sachs. And why has Congress been so silent? The Wall Street investment banking firms, their executives, their families and their political action committees contribute more to U.S. Senate and House campaigns than any other industry in America. By sprinkling some of its massive gains into the pockets of our elected officials, Wall Street bought itself protection from any tough government enforcement.

This is no doubt the same reason why so many members of Congress were consistently blocking attempts to reform and downsize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are essentially giant, undercapitalized hedge funds. These two entities have been huge money machines for Democrats in both the House and the Senate, many of whom recently had the gall to ask why these companies hadn't been reformed in the past. Nor should several Republican congressmen and Senators who likewise contributed to watering down legislation aimed at reforming these institutions be let off the hook.

Wall Street's actions are now profoundly hurting American families, communities and the entire U.S. financial system. People are being thrown out of their homes. Once seemingly indestructible financial entities are succumbing to the crisis they have created and have jeopardized the stability of the global financial system. Isn't it ironic that the same firms that preached free-market capitalism are now the ones begging for a taxpayer bailout? Many investment professionals operating in my world believe, as do I, that we are facing the greatest financial crisis since 1929.

Fortunately, today we have safety nets, such as federal deposit insurance, that were non-existent during the Great Depression. Yet there has not been a time since the 1920s when Wall Street has enjoyed as much influence over Washington as it has for the last 12 years. Let's hope that this influence fades rapidly -- and that this financial crisis doesn't end the same way as the one of nearly 80 years ago.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/19/AR2008091902808.html

Anonymous said...

Yea..... disgusting.

Anonymous said...

Right you are Keith. It was all Bush and Cheney. Chris Dodd, Cuckie Shummer, Clinton (both of them) had nothing to do with any of it.

Paranoid much?

Anonymous said...

Goldman Sachs, the Modern Knights Templars

Sept. 20--Goldman Sachs investment bank is "the modern equivalent
of the Knights Templars; they are all powerful in every country.
And they will be just as hard to extirpate," a London financial
analyst said in a discussion yesterday. The Knights Templars were a military order founded during the 11th century. They were
notorious, during their existence, for their combination of military success in the Crusades and the power they gained from their vast financier-banking operations throughout Europe and Southwest Asia. The London analyst said that while it is certainly true that investment banks are now utterly useless, and are being taken down, Goldman Sachs is "not going to go quietly." It could well
be something like, "we go, and we take everything with us," the
analyst said.

Anonymous said...

Bushco and Cheneyburton must be investigated at once.

ANY wrongdoings would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law possible.

DO IT NOW

Anonymous said...

"So what do you get when you put the CEO of Halliburton and the CEO of Goldman Sachs in charge of the country with the biggest access to debt?"
----------------------------------
I like to think of it as the Libertarian New World Order. This is what you get when the conservatives are in controll for 40 years.

Unknown said...

So... Buy Goldman Sachs? Is there anything I can do to not lose all my money?

Anonymous said...

Hank Paulsons connection to Goldman Sachs can not be under estimated in Paulsons remedies for the Housing Crisis .

When you have a Bail Out of this
degree ,you don't leave it to
Paulson and the Fed Chairman to
draft the bail outs .

What would be more normal is to have Paulson submit the proof and
figures of the situation and have "experts" submit drafts of what the different options would do . Than Congress and the Senate in a deliberate slow careful fashion would
review the different options . Than Congress and the Senate would debate the issues and options and
price tags and draft a bill .

If this is such a emergency they could of closed the Stock exchange for a week if they wanted .

There should never be unlimited Blank checks handed out ,or clauses that make it impossible to punish a public official for their acts.

The fact that they are rushing to get this Bill through is not a good sign . Haste makes waste .It's not as if we are being attacked by Russia and we need immediate authorizations for actions .

Insuring money market account for a certain time period of maybe 6 months until the matter could be sorted out would of been one thing that could be passed immediately ,until issues could of been sorted out .

I think a lot of the emergency aspect of this Bail Out talk lies in the fact that Goldman was being affected .The Banks have been waiting around for their bail-out
for a time and when Paulson didn't do it with Lehman ,all hell broke loose telling the Banks and Investment firms that they might not get a bail-out.

This is why it is bad to start bail-outs to begin with . WAMU knew they had to sell right away as well as other firms .This was the best thing that could of happen .You get into the issues of why this company and not that company when you pick and choose bail-outs .

Also ,a bail-out should not be considered based on the fact that the bankrupted company will created lost jobs . Other Companies pick up the slack and
new ones form to replace the fall of a bankrupted company and replace lost jobs .

When going into a recessionary economy ,you must expect that contractions take place regarding credit . It's not wise to loan easy when the market is not expanding . So Paulsons reaction to credit contractions is not mature . Jobs and new productive
industries would be the answer to recessions ,not pumping money into lost causes and lost money and corrupt companies with bad balance sheets .

Give it up Paulson, you can't bring back the housing boom by straddling the majority with the banks losses from the last fake housing boom .

Anonymous said...

"So what do you get when you put the CEO of Halliburton and the CEO of Goldman Sachs in charge of the country with the biggest access to debt"

--

The root of the housing/credit bubble was the incompetence and easy money policies of the Greenspan Fed - not anything done by Cheney or Paulson. And, yes, Greenspan was appointed by a Republican, but he was reappointed by a Democrat.

Paulson only became Treasury Secretary in time to deal with the clean up. Trust him or not, at least Paulson understands the credit markets - unlike O'Neill or Snow.