September 24, 2008
As the house of cards built by corporate greed and fraud is collapsing, the FBI are investigating the mortgage giants Fannie and Freddie and insurance behemoth AIG — companies that were recently bailed out by the US government with American taxpayers’ money:
WASHINGTON (AP) ― The FBI is investigating four major U.S. financial institutions whose collapse helped trigger a $700 billion bailout plan by the Bush administration, The Associated Press has learned.
Two law enforcement officials said Tuesday the FBI is looking at potential fraud by mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and insurer American International Group Inc. Additionally, a senior law enforcement official said Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. also is under investigation.
The inquiries will focus on the financial institutions and the individuals that ran them, the senior law enforcement official said.
[…]
Read more here.
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economics/recession/markets, George Bush/Bush Administration/American Empire, News and Commentary, News/Commentary/Opinion, News/reports, USA | Tagged: AIG Insurance, corporate criminals/fraudsters, corporate fraud, FBI investigation of major financial institutions, Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., US fiancial crisis/meltdown, Wall Street banksters, Wall Street criminals, Wall Street fraudsters | 
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Posted by verbena19
September 23, 2008
In the preface to her post, Arianna Huffington has this to say about the Paulson bailout package:
“Over the past 30 years, Americans have been bombarded with sermons evangelizing for the free market religion of the Right. In the course of selling us on buying, the market-worshippers tried to convince us that all concerns about the most vulnerable members of society could be left up to the soulless, self-correcting calculus of supply and demand. Government involvement was an anachronism, regulatory oversight an impediment. The last few weeks have demolished that notion. In the battle over the proper role of government, the high priests of the church of the Free Market — including Bush, Paulson, and the Masters of Wall Street — have suffered a monumental defeat. So why are we allowing them to dictate the terms of their surrender?
Arianna begins her corresponding article The Bailout Plan: Welcome to Economic Shock and Awe with this:
See if this sounds familiar:
There is a gathering threat to the safety of the United States. We must take immediate action. Congress must quickly grant the President and the Secretary what they want and also give them full and unfettered authority to execute the plan.
Welcome to Economic Shock and Awe (or as some have dubbed it, according to Paul Krugman, “the Authorization for Use of Financial Force”).
Even the amount of taxpayer money being bandied about — $1 trillion — is similar. Think you got your money’s worth for the Iraq war? Congratulations — you’re about to buy another pricey debacle.
[…]
Read the rest of this article here.
1 Comment | economics/recession/markets, George Bush/Bush Administration/American Empire, News and Commentary, News/Commentary/Opinion, USA | Tagged: Arianne Huffington, corporate fraud, financial markets, George Bush/Bush Administration, Governnment bailout, Henry Paulson/US Treasury Secretary, Paulson's economic bailout, The Huffington Post, US economic crisis/recession/depression, US politics, US taxpayers, USA, USA's financial crisis, Wall Street and Washington, Wall Street banksters, Wall Street corporate criminals, Wall Street Crisis | Permalink
Posted by verbena19
September 23, 2008
This post by Jason Linkins in The Huffington Post sheds light on the proposed Bush Administration bailout package:
A critical – and radical – component of the bailout package proposed by the Bush administration has thus far failed to garner the serious attention of anyone in the press. Section 8 (which ironically reminds one of the popular name of the portion of the 1937 Housing Act that paved the way for subsidized affordable housing ) of this legislation is just a single sentence of thirty-two words, but it represents a significant consolidation of power and an abdication of oversight authority that’s so flat-out astounding that it ought to set one’s hair on fire. It reads, in its entirety:
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.
In short, the so-called “mother of all bailouts,” which will transfer $700 billion taxpayer dollars to purchase the distressed assets of several failed financial institutions, will be conducted in a manner unchallengeable by courts and ungovernable by the People’s duly sworn representatives. All decision-making power will be consolidated into the Executive Branch – who, we remind you, will have the incentive to act upon this privilege as quickly as possible, before they leave office. The measure will run up the budget deficit by a significant amount, with no guarantee of recouping the outlay, and no fundamental means of holding those who fail to do so accountable.
[…]
Read the rest of this article here.
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Posted by verbena19
September 23, 2008
This latest bailout is the ultimate power grab with Congress giving up its power over finances into the hands of crooks. It is terrible and suicidal for a country that once was a ‘beacon of freedom and democracy’ to the rest of the world.
“If you must break the law, do it to seize power: in all other cases observe it.” ~ Julius Caesar
Read Larisa Alexandrovna’s chilling piece in the Huffington Post here.
No time needs to be wasted on hearings as we already now have in writing, formally as presented to Congress, the intentions of this administration to nullify Congressional powers permanently, to alter Judicial powers permanently, and to openly steal public funds using as blackmail the total collapse of the US economy if these powers are not handed over. You do see how this is blackmail, do you not? You do see how this is a manufactured crisis precisely designed to be used as blackmail, do you not?
[…]
Leave a Comment » | economics/recession/markets, Fascism, George Bush/Bush Administration/American Empire, News and Commentary, News/Commentary/Opinion, USA | Tagged: corporate fraud, corruption, coup d'etat, Fascism, George Bush/Bush Administration/American Empire, Larisa Alexandrovna, Sarah Palin, The Bush family, The Huffington Post, US economic crisis/recession/depression, US financial crisis, Wall Street and Washington, Wall Street banksters | Permalink
Posted by verbena19
September 23, 2008
Mike Whitney calls Henry Paulson’s bailout plan “a band-aid approach to a sucking chest wound”. He goes on to say: “The debts are enormous and the pain will be substantial, but the problem cannot be resolved by crushing the middle class or destroying the currency”. Whitney’s article condemns and explains the deregulated US financial system: “Now taxpayers will pay for the lawless system which men like “industry rep” Henry Paulson put in place. That’s deregulation in a nutshell; a system that allows Wall Street banksters to create credit out of thin air and then run weeping to Congress when their swindles backfire. shows the dire consequences of an unsupervised marketplace where individual players are allowed to create as much credit as they choose”.
The system is at the breaking point, and despite Wall Street’s elation from the proposed $1 trillion dollar bailout to remove toxic mortgage-backed debt from banks balance sheets, the market is still correcting in what has become a vicious downward cycle. This cycle will persist until the bad debts are accounted for and written off for or until the exhausted dollar-system collapses altogether. Either way, the volatility and violent dislocations will continue for the foreseeable future.
And more…
The problems cannot be resolved by shifting the debts of the banks onto the taxpayer. That’s an illusion. By adding another $1 or $2 trillion dollars to the National Debt, Paulson is just ensuring that interest rates will go up, real estate will crash, unemployment will soar, and foreign central banks will abandon the dollar. In truth, there is no fix for a deleveraging market anymore than there is a fix for gravity. The belief that massive debts and insolvency can be erased by increasing liquidity just shows a fundamental misunderstanding of economics. That’s why Henry Paulson is the worst possible person to be orchestrating the so called rescue project. Paulson comes from a business culture which rewards deception, personal acquisitiveness, and extreme risk-taking. Paulson is to finance capitalism what Rumsfeld is to military strategy. His leadership, and the congress’ pathetic abdication of responsibility, assures disaster. Besides, why should the taxpayers be happy that the stocks of Morgan Stanley, Washington Mutual and Goldman Sachs surged on the news that there would be a government bailout yesterday? These banks are essentially bankrupt and their business models are broken. Keeping insolvent banks on life support is not a rescue plan; it’s insanity.
[…]
Read Mike Whitney’s entire article here.
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Posted by verbena19
![Daily Mail [UK]](http://web.archive.org./web/20170910013111im_/http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t193/Annamarie_033/mHead2.gif "British daily newspaper")
FBI Investigating Companies At Heart Of Meltdown
September 24, 2008As the house of cards built by corporate greed and fraud is collapsing, the FBI are investigating the mortgage giants Fannie and Freddie and insurance behemoth AIG — companies that were recently bailed out by the US government with American taxpayers’ money:
Read more here.