http://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2012/02/foreclosed-on-america-obama-his-crimnal.html
http://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2012/01/39-say-us-has-crony-capitalist-system.html
WHEN ASKED IN AN INTERVIEW AT THE WHITE HOUSE ABOUT THE PUBLIC'S ANGER NOTHING HAS BEEN DONE ABOUT HIS CRIMINAL BANKSTER DONORS, OBAMA REPLIED WITH A STRAIGHT FACE THAT THIS WAS BECAUSE HIS DEPT. OF JUTICE HAD DONE NOTHING!
THE SAME DEPT OF JUSTICE THAT HIS HIGHLY PROACTIVE IN PUSHING OBAMA'S LA RAZA AGENDA OF AMNESTY, DREAM ACTS, NO E-VERIFY, NO I.D. REQUIRED OF ILLEGALS VOTING, AND HAS SUED FOUR AMERICAN STATES TO PUSH HIS LA RAZA SUPREMACY AGENDA!!!
THE ONLY TRUTH THAT HAS EVER ESCAPED OBAMA'S MOUTH IS:
"I'm not here to punish banks!" FLOOR of the SENATE - IN THE FACE of the AMERICAN (LEGALS) FACE, STATE of the UNION MESSAGE.
Regulators collude in lawbreaking by Wall Street banks
By Barry Grey7 February 2012
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the main federal regulator of banks and financial firms, routinely grants major Wall Street banks waivers from legal penalties as part of cash settlements in securities fraud cases, the New York Times reported February 3.
In its own study of SEC records over the past decade, the newspaper said it uncovered nearly 350 instances in which the regulatory body exempted banks such as JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs from legal provisions stripping firms that violate securities laws of privileges worth billions of dollars in profits.
The article provides a glimpse of the corrupt relationship between Wall Street and the government that enables the financial elite to engage in fraud and swindling, knowing that it can count on the protection of the agencies that supposedly exist to police it. The Times report, which spans both the Bush and Obama administrations, points to the complicity of the entire political establishment in the orgy of speculation and criminality that led to the financial crash of 2008 and the devastating slump that followed.
The big Wall Street firms, as is clear from the article, wantonly and repeatedly break the law and factor in the cost of cash settlements with the SEC and other bodies as part of the cost of doing business.
Banks and executives who have been caught red-handed lying about the securities they market or other aspects of their business are not only shielded from criminal prosecution or civil trials, they are given waivers so they can continue to enjoy lucrative advantages in the sale and underwriting of stocks and bonds, the management of mutual funds and the raising of funds for small companies, while retaining immunity from shareholder lawsuits.
The Times quotes David S. Ruder, a former SEC chairman, as saying, “The ramifications of losing those exemptions are enormous to these firms.” Without the waivers, agreeing to settle charges of securities fraud “might have vast repercussions affecting the ability of a firm to continue to stay in business.”
The newspaper says it found 49 cases since 2005 where firms that settled fraud cases were granted waivers allowing them to fast-track stock or bond offerings, and only 11 instances where companies lost that privilege. There were 91 waivers since 2000 granting immunity from lawsuits and 204 related to raising money for small companies and managing mutual funds.
“Close to half of the waivers,” the Times explains, “went to repeat offenders—Wall Street firms that had settled previous fraud charges by agreeing never again to violate the very laws that the SEC was now saying that they had broken.”
It quotes Meredith B. Cross, the SEC’s corporation finance director, as saying, “The purpose of taking away this simplified path to capital [the fast-track privilege] is to protect investors, not to punish a company.” She fails to explain how giving a pass to companies that defraud investors and the public “protects” them.
JPMorgan Chase, the largest US bank by assets, has settled six securities fraud cases in 13 years. Nevertheless, it has been given at least 22 waivers since 2003, with most of the SEC settlements involving two or more exemptions. Last July, the bank agreed to pay $228 million (out of $2.9 trillion in total assets) to settle civil and criminal charges that it defrauded cities and towns by rigging bids with other Wall Street companies. It received three waivers as part of the deal.
The bank’s lawyers argued in letters to the SEC that the waivers should be granted because of JPMorgan’s “strong record of compliance with the securities laws.”
Bank of America and Merrill Lynch, which merged in 2009, have settled 15 fraud cases and been given at least 39 waivers. In eleven years, Citigroup settled six fraud cases and received 25 waivers.
All of these banks, as well as other recipients of waivers in fraud settlements such as Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, were handed billions of dollars in taxpayer funds in the 2008 bailout and have received many multiples of those sums in virtually free loans from the Federal Reserve and other government subsidies.
Not a single major bank or top echelon bank executive has been criminally charged for violations of the law in connection with the frenzied speculation in and false marketing of subprime mortgage-linked securities that precipitated the Wall Street crash. In 2010, the SEC agreed to cash settlements with Goldman Sachs and Countrywide Financial ex-CEO Angelo Mozilo for fraud in connection with the housing bubble rather than bringing their cases to trial.
Last April, US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released a 639-page report providing detailed evidence of rampant mortgage fraud by the bankrupt savings and loan giant Washington Mutual and deceitful marketing of mortgage-backed securities by Goldman Sachs. The report documented Goldman’s drive to sell off its large holdings of mortgage-backed securities and home loans beginning in 2007 and generate profits by betting against the very mortgage securities it was selling to investors.
The Senate report also detailed the complicity of federal regulatory agencies in Wall Street fraud and criminality and the role of the credit rating firms Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s in giving inflated ratings to subprime mortage-backed securities in order to boost their profits.
The Senate report, barely reported by the media at the time of its release, has remained a dead letter.
The author also recommends:
Senate committee details Wall Street criminality[15 April 2011]
Senate report on Wall Street crash: The criminalization of the American ruling class[18 April 2011]
OBAMA’S CRONY CAPITALISM, A LOVE STORY BETWEEN THE ACTOR PRESIDENT, AND HIS BANKSTER DONORS!
Records show that four out of Obama's top five contributors are employees of financial industry giants - Goldman Sachs ($571,330), UBS AG ($364,806), JPMorgan Chase ($362,207) and Citigroup ($358,054).
*
Obama's Wall Street cabinet
6 April 2009
A series of articles published over the weekend,
based on financial disclosure reports released by the Obama administration last
Friday concerning top White House officials, documents the extent to which the
administration, in both its personnel and policies, is a political instrument
of Wall Street.
Policies that are extraordinarily favorable to the
financial elite that were put in place over the past month by the Obama
administration have fed a surge in share values on Wall Street. These include
the scheme to use hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds to pay hedge
funds to buy up the banks’ toxic assets at inflated prices, the Auto Task
Force’s rejection of the recovery plans of Chrysler and General Motors and its
demand for even more brutal layoffs, wage cuts and attacks on workers’ health
benefits and pensions, and the decision by the Financial Accounting Standards
Board (FASB) to weaken “mark-to-market”accounting rules and permit banks to
inflate the value of their toxic assets.
At the same time, Obama has campaigned against
restrictions on bonuses paid to executives at insurance giant American
International Group (AIG) and other bailed-out firms, and repeatedly assured
Wall Street that he will slash social spending, including Medicare, Medicaid and
Social Security.
The new financial disclosures reveal that top Obama
advisors directly involved in setting these policies have received millions
from Wall Street firms, including those that have received huge taxpayer
bailouts.
The case of Lawrence Summers, director of the
National Economic Council and Obama’s top economic adviser, highlights the
politically incestuous character of relations between the Obama administration
and the American financial elite.
Last year, Summers pocketed $5 million as a managing
director of D.E. Shaw, one of the biggest hedge funds in the world, and another
$2.7 million for speeches delivered to Wall Street firms that have received
government bailout money. This includes $45,000 from Citigroup and $67,500 each
from JPMorgan Chase and the now-liquidated Lehman Brothers.
For a speech to Goldman Sachs executives, Summers
walked away with $135,000. This is substantially more than double the earnings
for an entire year of high-seniority auto workers, who have been pilloried by
the Obama administration and the media for their supposedly exorbitant and
“unsustainable”wages.
Alluding diplomatically to the flagrant conflict of
interest revealed by these disclosures, the New York Times noted on
Saturday: “Mr. Summers, the director of the National Economic Council, wields
important influence over Mr. Obama’s policy decisions for the troubled
financial industry, including firms from which he recently received payments.”
Summers was a leading advocate of banking
deregulation. As treasury secretary in the second Clinton administration, he
oversaw the lifting of basic financial regulations dating from the 1930s. The Times
article notes that among his current responsibilities is deciding
“whether—and how—to tighten regulation of hedge funds.”
Summers is not an exception. He is rather typical
of the Wall Street insiders who comprise a cabinet and White House team that is
filled with multi-millionaires, presided over by a president who parlayed his
own political career into a multi-million-dollar fortune.
Michael Froman, deputy national security adviser
for international economic affairs, worked for Citigroup and received more than
$7.4 million from the bank from January of 2008 until he entered the Obama
administration this year. This included a $2.25 million year-end bonus handed
him this past January, within weeks of his joining the Obama administration.
Citigroup has thus far been the beneficiary of $45
billion in cash and over $300 billion in government guarantees of its bad debts.
David Axelrod, the Obama campaign’s top strategist
and now senior adviser to the president, was paid $1.55 million last year from
two consulting firms he controls. He has agreed to buyouts that will garner him
another $3 million over the next five years. His disclosure claims personal
assets of between $7 and $10 million.
Obama’s deputy national security adviser, Thomas E.
Donilon, was paid $3.9 million by a Washington law firm whose major clients
include Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and the private equity firm Apollo Management.
Louis Caldera, director of the White House Military
Office, made $227,155 last year from IndyMac Bancorp, the California bank that
heavily promoted subprime mortgages. It collapsed last summer and was placed
under federal receivership.
The presence of multi-millionaire Wall Street
insiders extends to second- and third-tier positions in the Obama administration
as well. David Stevens, who has been tapped by Obama to head the Federal
Housing Administration, is the president and chief operating officer of Long
and Foster Cos., a real estate brokerage firm. From 1999 to 2005, Stevens
served as a top executive for Freddie Mac, the federally-backed mortgage
lending giant that was bailed out and seized by federal regulators in September.
Neal Wolin, Obama’s selection for deputy counsel to
the president for economic policy, is a top executive at the insurance giant
Hartford Financial Services, where his salary was $4.5 million.
Obama’s Auto Task Force has as its top advisers two
investment bankers with a long resume in corporate downsizing and
asset-stripping.
It is not new for leading figures from finance to
be named to high posts in a US administration. However, there has traditionally
been an effort to demonstrate a degree of independence from Wall Street in the
selection of cabinet officials and high-ranking presidential aides, often
through the appointment of figures from academia or the public sector. In
previous decades, moreover, representatives of the corporate elite were more
likely to come from industry than from finance.
In the Obama administration such considerations
have largely been abandoned.
This will not come as a surprise to
those who critically followed Obama’s election campaign. While he postured
before the electorate as a critic of the war in Iraq and a quasi-populist force
for “change,” he was from the first heavily dependent on the financial and
political backing of powerful financiers in Chicago. Banks, hedge funds and
other financial firms lavishly backed his presidential bid, giving him
considerably more than they gave to his Republican opponent, Senator John
McCain.
Alongside Wall Street, the Obama cabinet is
dominated by the military, including three recently retired four-star military
officers: former Marine General James Jones as national security adviser;
Admiral Dennis Blair as director of national intelligence, and former Army
Chief of Staff Erik Shinseki as secretary of veterans’ affairs.
These are the deeply reactionary political and
class interests that are represented by the Obama administration.
Friday’s
financial disclosures further expose the bankruptcy of American democracy.
Elections have no real effect on government policy, which is determined by the
interests of the financial aristocracy that dominates both political parties.
The working class can fight for its own interests—for jobs, decent living
standards, health care, education, housing and an end to war—only through a
break with the two parties of American capitalism and the development of a
mass, independent socialist movement.
Tom Eley and Barry Grey
*
Obama’s Economic Advisers: International Socialists, Union Thugs, NBC Execs, Soros Scholars, Subprime Lenders, Amnesty Shills, and Campaign Cronies
Posted on February 24, 2011 by Ben Johnson
http://floydreports.com/obama%E2%80%99s-economic-advisers-international-socialists-union-thugs-nbc-execs-soros-scholars-subprime-lenders-amnesty-shills-and-campaign-cronies/
THE REALITY of OBAMA'S CHANGE...
http://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2012/02/obamas-report-card-reality-of-change.html
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