The economy, like
everything else adverse, is someone else's fault. But if only we borrowed and
spent a trillion dollars, unemployment would stay beneath 8%, Obama promised.
It soared far above. It's still above. No apology. No acknowledgment. Now, he
hails any dip as proof of progress when, in fact, it comes because so many just
give up seeking work.
THE ENTIRE REASON THE BORDERS ARE LEFT OPEN IS
TO CUT WAGES!
“We could cut unemployment in half simply by reclaiming the jobs
taken by illegal workers,” said Representative Lamar Smith of
Texas, co-chairman of the Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. “President Obama is on
the wrong side of the American people on immigration. The president should
support policies that help citizens and legal immigrants find the jobs they
need and deserve rather than fail to enforce immigration laws.”
CAN
WE AFFORD 49 MORE MEXIFORNIA’S? THAT STATE IS A MEX GANG INFESTED DUMPSTER! THE
STATE HAS THE LARGEST AND MOST EXPENSIVE
PRISON SYSTEM IN THE NATION. HALF THE INMATES ARE MEXICANS! THE CA
ATTORNEY GEN KAMALA HARRIS DECLARES THAT HALF THE MURDERS IN CA ARE BY MEX
GANGS! THE STATE PAYS OUT $20 BILLION PER YEAR IN WELFARE TO ILLEGALS! ON TOP
OF THAT COUNTIES HAND THEM MORE TO BREED ANCHOR BABIES. L.A. COUNTY PAYS OUT
$600 MILLION PER YEAR IN WELFARE TO ILLEGALS…. NEXT TO DRUGS AND CRIMINALS,
MEXICO’S BIGGEST EXPORT IS PREGNANT WOMEN!
Obama soft on illegals enforcement
Arrests of illegal immigrant
workers have dropped precipitously under President Obama, according to figures
released Wednesday. Criminal arrests, administrative arrests, indictments and
convictions of illegal immigrants at work sites all fell by more than 50
percent from fiscal 2008 to fiscal 2009.
The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold.
The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold.
*
MOST OF THE FORTUNE 500 ARE GENEROUS DONORS TO LA RAZA – THE MEXICAN
FASCIST POLITICAL PARTY. THESE FIGURES ARE DATED. CNN CALCULATES THAT WAGES ARE
DEPRESSED $300 - $400 BILLION PER YEAR!
“The principal
beneficiaries of our current immigration policy are affluent Americans who hire
immigrants at substandard wages for low-end work. Harvard economist George
Borjas estimates that American workers lose $190 billion annually in depressed
wages caused by the constant flooding of the labor market at the low-wage end.”
Christian Science Monitor
THE ENTIRE REASON THE BORDERS ARE LEFT OPEN IS TO CUT WAGES!
"We could cut unemployment in half simply by reclaiming the
jobs taken by illegal workers," said Representative Lamar Smith of Texas,
co-chairman of the Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. "President Obama is on
the wrong side of the American people on immigration. The president should
support policies that help citizens and legal immigrants find the jobs they
need and deserve rather than fail to enforce immigration laws."
FROM JUDICIAL WATCH org
Illegal Immigration
Today, between
eight and fourteen million illegal aliens reside in the United States, draining
our nation’s economy, while presenting a security threat to the people of the
United States. Public officials have not only repeatedly failed to protect our
borders from this illegal alien invasion, but they have also been complicit in
the effort to undermine our nation’s immigration laws.
Judicial Watch
has an active investigation into the Obama administration’s policies and
actions on immigration. For instance, Judicial Watch had uncovered documents
indicating collusion between the Department of Justice and the American Civil Liberties Union with
respect to legal challenges of Arizona’s SB 1070. Recently, Judicial Watch
obtained documents revealing that administration officials misled Congress
regarding the scope of deportation dismissals in Houston, Texas. Additional
documents were obtained that detail a behind-the-scenes effort by the
administration to suspend deportation proceedings against “DREAM” Act aliens
and other illegal immigrants. Judicial Watch also routinely obtains smuggling
statistics and has revealed details of a shocking sex slave trafficking
operation in Houston, Texas.
FAIRUS.org
The
Administration's Phantom Immigration Enforcement Policy
According
to DHS’s own reports, very little of our nation’s borders (Southwestern or
otherwise) are secure, and gaining control is not even a goal of the
department.
By
Ira Mehlman
Published on 12/07/2009
Townhall.com
Published on 12/07/2009
Townhall.com
The
setting was not quite the flight deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln with a
“Mission Accomplished” banner as the backdrop, but it was the next best thing.
Speaking at the Center for American Progress (CAP) on Nov. 13, Homeland
Security Secretary Janet Napolitano declared victory over illegal immigration and
announced that the Obama administration is ready to move forward with a mass
amnesty for the millions of illegal aliens already living in the United States.
Arguing
the Obama administration’s case for amnesty, Napolitano laid out what she
described as the “three-legged stool” for immigration reform. As the
administration views it, immigration reform must include “a commitment to
serious and effective enforcement, improved legal flows for families and
workers, and a firm but fair way to deal with those who are already here.”
Acknowledging
that a lack of confidence in the government’s ability and commitment to
effectively enforce the immigration laws it passes proved to be the Waterloo of
previous efforts to gain amnesty for illegal aliens, Napolitano was quick to
reassure the American public that those concerns could be put to rest.
“For
starters, the security of the Southwest border has been transformed from where
it was in 2007,” stated the secretary. Not only is the border locked up tight,
she continued, but the situation is well in-hand in the interior of the country
as well. “We’ve also shown that the government is serious and strategic in its
approach to enforcement by making changes in how we enforce the law in the
interior of the country and at worksites…Furthermore, we’ve transformed
worksite enforcement to truly address the demand side of illegal immigration.”
If
Rep. Joe Wilson had been in attendance to hear Secretary Napolitano’s CAP
speech he might well have had a few choice comments to offer. But since he
wasn’t, we will have to rely on the Department of Homeland Security’s own data
to assess the veracity of Napolitano’s claims.
According
to DHS’s own reports, very little of our nation’s borders (Southwestern or
otherwise) are secure, and gaining control is not even a goal of the
department. DHS claims to have “effective control” over just 894 miles of
border. That’s 894 out of 8,607 miles they are charged with protecting. As for
the other 7,713 miles? DHS’s stated border security goal for FY 2010 is the
same 894 miles.
The
administration’s strategic approach to interior and worksite enforcement is
just as chimerical as its strategy at the border, unless one considers
shuffling paper to be a strategy. DHS data, released November 18, show that
administrative arrests of immigration law violators fell by 68 percent between
2008 and 2009. The department also carried out 60 percent fewer arrests for
criminal violations of immigration laws, 58 percent fewer criminal indictments,
and won 63 percent fewer convictions.
While
the official unemployment rate has climbed from 7.6 percent when President
Obama took office in January to 10 percent today, the administration’s worksite
enforcement strategy has amounted to a bureaucratic game of musical chairs. The
administration has all but ended worksite enforcement actions and replaced them
with paperwork audits. When the audits determine that illegal aliens are on the
payroll, employers are given the opportunity to fire them with little or no
adverse consequence to the company, while no action is taken to remove the
illegal workers from the country. The illegal workers simply acquire a new set
of fraudulent documents and move on to the next employer seeking workers
willing to accept substandard wages.
In
Janet Napolitano’s alternative reality a mere 10 percent of our borders under
“effective control” and sharp declines in arrests and prosecutions of
immigration lawbreakers may be construed as confidence builders, but it is hard
to imagine that the American public is going to see it that way. If anything,
the administration’s record has left the public less confident that promises of
future immigration enforcement would be worth the government paper they’re
printed on.
As
Americans scrutinize the administration’s plans to overhaul immigration policy,
they are likely to find little in the “three-legged stool” being offered that
they like or trust. The first leg – enforcement – the administration has all
but sawed off. The second – increased admissions of extended family members and
workers – makes little sense with some 25 million Americans either unemployed
or relegated to part-time work. And the third – amnesty for millions of illegal
aliens – is anathema to their sense of justice and fair play.
As
Americans well know, declaring “Mission Accomplished” and actually
accomplishing a mission are two completely different things. When it comes to
enforcing immigration laws, the only message the public is receiving from this
administration is “Mission Aborted.”
*
MEXICANOCCUPATION.blogspot.com
Obama soft on illegals enforcement
Arrests of illegal immigrant
workers have dropped precipitously under President Obama, according to figures
released Wednesday. Criminal arrests, administrative arrests, indictments and
convictions of illegal immigrants at work sites all fell by more than 50
percent from fiscal 2008 to fiscal 2009.
The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold.
The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold.
*
Here is the Department of Homeland Security's Hotline for
reporting suspected illegal employees and employers: 866-347-2423 (YOU MAY BE
WASTING YOUR TIME HERE. HISPANDERING OBAMA SELECTED LA RAZA JANET NAPOLITANO TO
HEAD “HOMELAND SECURITY = PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP” FOR OPEN AND UNDEFENDED
BORDERS)
*
Shaping up to be the most corrupt
administration in American history:
administration in American history:
- Obama’s team:
Not the “best of the Washington insiders,” as the liberal media style
them, but rather, a dysfunctional and dangerous conglomerate of
business-as-usual cronies and hacks
- In the first two
weeks alone of his infant administration, Obama had made no fewer than 17
exceptions to his “no-lobbyist” rule
- Why the fact
that the massive infusion of union dues into his campaign treasury didn’t
trouble him in the least reveals Obama’s credibility as a reformer
- The lack of
unprecedented pace of withdrawals and botched appointments -- and how
getting through the confirmation process was no guarantee of ethical
cleanliness or competence, even as Obama’s cheerleaders were glorifying
the Greatest Transition in World History
- Inconsistency:
How Obama, erstwhile critic of the campaign finance practice known as
“bundling,” happily accepted more than $350,000 in bundled contributions
from billionaire hedge-fund managers
- How Obama broke
his transparency pledge with the very first bill he signed into law --
helping make hostility to transparency is a running thread through Obama’s
cabinet
- Michelle Obama:
Beneath the cultured pearls, sleeveless designer dresses, and eyelashes
applied by her full-time makeup artist, is a hardball Chicago politico
- Joe Biden: It’s
not just that he lies, it’s that he lies so well that you think he really
believes the stuff he makes up
- Treasury
Secretary Geithner: His ineptness and epic blundering -- including how he
nearly caused the collapse of the dollar in international trade with a
single remark
- The appalling
story of Technology Czar Vivek Kundra, the convicted shoplifter in charge
of the entire federal government’s information security infrastructure
- Obama’s “Porker
of the Month” Transportation Secretary, Roy LaHood: An earmark-addicted
influence peddler born and raised on the politics of pay-to-play
- SEIU:
Responsible for installing a cabal of hand-chosen officers who exploited
their cash-infused fiefdoms for personal gain and presided over rigged
elections -- in the process, becoming all that they had professed to stand
against as representatives of the downtrodden worker
- How Obama lied
on his “Fight the Smears” campaign website when he claimed that he “never
organized with ACORN”
- ACORN: How the
profound threat the group poses is not merely ideological or economic --
it’s electoral
- ACORN’s own
internal review of shady money transfers among its web of affiliates: How
it underscores concerns that conservatives have long raised about the
organization
- Liar, liar,
pantsuit on fire: How Hillary Clinton has already trampled upon her
promise not to let her husband’s financial dealings sway her decisions as
Secretary of State
- How even a few
principled progressives are finally beginning to question the cult of Obama
-- even as Obama sycophants in the mainstream media continue to celebrate
his “hipness” and “swagga”
ARE AMAZED AT HOW UTTERLY BRAZEN THESE CORPORATE OWNED
POLITICIANS ARE?
GET THIS BOOK!
Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats,
Crooks, and Cronies
by Michelle Malkin
Editorial Reviews
In her shocking new book, Malkin digs deep into the records
of President Obama's staff, revealing corrupt dealings, questionable pasts, and
abuses of power throughout his administration.
From the Inside Flap
The era of hope and change is dead....and it only took six
months in office to kill it.
Never has an administration taken office with more inflated
expectations of turning Washington around. Never have a media-anointed American
Idol and his entourage fallen so fast and hard. In her latest investigative
tour de force, New York Times bestselling author Michelle Malkin delivers a
powerful, damning, and comprehensive indictment of the culture of corruption
that surrounds Team Obama's brazen tax evaders, Wall Street cronies, petty
crooks, slum lords, and business-as-usual influence peddlers. In Culture of
Corruption, Malkin reveals:
* Why nepotism beneficiaries First Lady Michelle Obama and
Vice President Joe Biden are Team Obama's biggest liberal hypocrites--bashing
the corporate world and influence-peddling industries from which they and their
relatives have benefited mightily
* What secrets the ethics-deficient members of Obama's
cabinet--including Hillary Clinton--are trying to hide
* Why the Obama White House has more power-hungry,
unaccountable "czars" than any other administration
* How Team Obama's first one hundred days of appointments
became a litany of embarrassments as would-be appointee after would-be
appointee was exposed as a tax cheat or had to withdraw for other reasons
* How Obama's old ACORN and union cronies have squandered
millions of taxpayer dollars and dues money to enrich themselves and expand
their power
* How Obama's Wall Street money men and corporate lobbyists
are ruining the economy and helping their friends In Culture of Corruption,
Michelle Malkin lays bare the Obama administration's seamy underside that the
liberal media would rather keep hidden.
ISBN-13:
978-1596981096
*
WHAT DID THE BANKSTERS KNOW ABOUT OUR ACTOR OBAMA THAT WE
DIDN’T KNOW? HERE'S WHAT: PROFITS FOR BIG BANKS SOARED UNDER OBAMA'S FIRST TWO YEARS ALONE GREATER THAN ALL EIGHT UNDER BUSH!!! FORECLOSURES ARE SOARING AS WELL!
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).
BARACK OBAMA HAS COLLECTED NEARLY TWICE AS MUCH MONEY AS
JOHN McCAIN
BY DAVID SALTONSTALL
DAILY NEWS SENIOR CORRESPONDENT
July 1st 2008
Wall Street firms have chipped in more than $9 million to
Barack Obama. Zurga/Bloomberg
Wall Street is investing heavily in Barack Obama.
Although the Democratic presidential hopeful has vowed to
raise capital gains and corporate taxes, financial industry bigs have
contributed almost twice as much to Obama as to GOP rival John McCain, a Daily
News analysis of campaign records shows.
WHY WALL STREET
GORGES ON OBAMA: HE’S PROMISED THE CRIMINALS NO PRISON TIME AND SEVERELY
DEPRESSED WAGED BY WITH HORDES OF ILLEGALS CLIMBING OUR OPEN & UNDEFENDED
BORDERS TO GET AT OUR JOBS!
PUTTING LA RAZA IN
OUR JOBS, KEEPS WAGES DEPRESSED AND PROFITS HIGHER FOR THE 1%!
BUT ISN’T OBAMA
MERELY THE PRESIDENT FOR ILLEGALS AND HIS CRIMINAL BANKSTERS?
HIS CRIMINAL BANKSTER DONORS MADE MORE MONEY DURING THE
FIRST TWO YEARS UNDER OBAMA, THAN THEY DID ALL EIGHT UNDER BUSH!
NOT ONE HAS GONE TO PRISON, EVEN HAS HUNDREDS OF OCCUPY WALL
ST PROTESTORS HAVE BEEN ARRESTED.
IN FACT, THE SHIFT THIS NATION’S ECONOMY DEEPER INTO THE
POCKETS OF THE RICH HAS CONTINUED UNABATED UNDER OBAMA!
HE IS THE 1% PRESIDENT, AND IF YOU’RE A BANKSTER, OR STRONG
TIE$ TO BANKSTERS, OR A LA RAZA PARTY MEMBER, YOU CAN COME WORK FOR THE
BANKSTER-OWNED PRESIDENT!
“This return of
corporate power comes in part because the revolving door between government
influence and corporate paydays has begun to turn anew. Even President Obama
has submitted to its centrifugal force. His new White House chief of staff, William Daley, comes directly from
J.P. Morgan Chase. Daley scored that lucrative gig after serving as commerce
secretary during Bill Clinton's second term.”
TWO YEARS OF OBAMA:
Fifteen million
Americans are out of work, thanks in part to reckless Wall Street
activities. Yet corporate profits are at record highs, companies are sitting on
vast amounts of cash, and, after a tough two years, business interests are
again atop the Washington power structure.
*
THE U.S. CHAMBER of COMMERCE,
LIKE OBAMA, ADVOCATES NO BORDERS WITH MEXICO, NO E-VERIFY, AND AMNESTY, OR AT
LEAST CONTINUED NON-ENFORCEMENT. IT’S ALL ABOUT KEEPING WAGES DEPRESSED!
Big business is back in business
By Dana Milbank
Wednesday, January 12, 2011;
Wednesday, January 12, 2011;
There was a festive atmosphere at U.S. Chamber of Commerce headquarters Tuesday
morning as the corporate lobby delivered its annual "State of American Business"
address.
Margaret Spellings, the former Bush
Cabinet officer who cashed out
and joined the business group, made the introductions, telling members that
despite "the worst economic climate since the Great Depression," the
chamber had scored a "number of legislative victories, tremendous success
in the elections and another strong year of fundraising."
Thanks to the chamber, Spellings
boasted, "the American business community always has a seat at the
table."
A seat? Business has just
about all the seats at the table - and more on back order.
Fifteen million
Americans are out of work, thanks in part to reckless Wall Street
activities. Yet corporate profits are at record highs, companies are sitting on
vast amounts of cash, and, after a tough two years, business interests are
again atop the Washington power structure.
This return of corporate power comes in part because the
revolving door between government influence and corporate paydays has begun to
turn anew. Even President Obama has submitted to its centrifugal force. His new
White House chief of staff, William Daley, comes directly from
J.P. Morgan Chase. Daley scored that lucrative gig after serving as commerce
secretary during Bill Clinton's second term.
As Daley came in through the revolving
door, OMB Director Peter Orszag
had just gone out. He cashed out to become a vice chairman of Citigroup, where
his government expertise should be worth seven figures annually. One of
Orszag's partners on Obama's economics team, Larry Summers,
is returning to Harvard - but that won't stop him from delivering the keynote address
to the Global Hedge Fund Summit in Bermuda.
The thrill of cashing out has been
endorsed by Obama himself. Explaining press secretary Robert Gibbs's decision
to depart, the president told the New York Times: "He's had a six-year stretch now where basically he's
been going 24/7 with relatively modest pay." The poor Gibbs, who had been
earning a "modest" $172,200 a year,
is now contemplating making much more than that representing corporate clients.
At the other end of Pennsylvania
Avenue, corporate interests are becoming increasingly brazen. Lobbyists have
snagged key staff jobs in the new GOP House leadership and chief-of-staff
positions in many new lawmakers' offices. On the day John Boehner was elected
speaker last week, lobbyists were literally strutting their stuff on the House
floor.
Bob Livingston, the former Republican
congressman, was buttonholing members; he's the head of a lobbying firm that advertises
Livingston as "the only
practicing former chairman of the House Appropriations Committee." Also on
the floor, Marty Russo,
the longtime Democratic congressman who had just stepped down as head of the
lobbying giant Cassidy and Associates, shook Boehner's hand.
A House Republican source says
Livingston left when informed that, as a registered lobbyist, he was not
allowed to be on the House floor.
Such behavior by lobbyists - both
registered lobbyists and unregistered corporate "advisers" - has
become more common. At last year's State of the Union address, Post
congressional correspondent Paul Kane observed, on the House floor, former
members Mike Ferguson, who runs a lobbying firm, and Jim Greenwood, CEO of the
biotech lobby. Kane has also spotted former senator Bill Cohen, who runs a big
lobbying and consulting firm, on the Senate floor; former representative Sherry
Boehlert, now a lobbyist, in the Speaker's Lobby off the House floor; and
lawmaker-turned-lobbyist Al Wynn entertaining clients in the members' dining
room.
The Center
for Responsive Politics has identified more
than 340 former members of Congress, and 3,665 former staffers, in lobbying or
related fields. The few rules to slow the revolving door do little, both
because of the routine granting of waivers and because of loose registration
requirements for lobbying.
All of this gave the business lobby
much to celebrate as chamber members discussed the State of American Business
over mini-muffins and banana bread Tuesday morning. Tom Donohue,
the chamber's white-maned CEO, hailed the "new tone coming from the White
House" since the elections - which the chamber influenced by spending tens
of millions of dollars from donors kept anonymous, Donohue explained, so
opponents couldn't "demagogue them." Donohue said he's
"absolutely convinced" that the new business-friendly White House
will move his way on regulation and trade.
A reporter asked Donohue for a
suggestion of what corporate America, with its record profits, should do to put
people back to work. "I got to think about this for a minute,"
Donohue said, then added: "I think the most important thing to tell a
company is to return a reasonable return to their investors."
*
NEW YORK TIMES
January 10, 2010
Op-Ed Columnist
The Other Plot to Wreck America
THERE may not be a
person in America without a strong opinion about what coulda, shoulda been done
to prevent the underwear bomber from boarding that Christmas flight to Detroit.
In the years since 9/11, we’ve all become counterterrorists. But in the 16
months since that other calamity in downtown New York — the crash precipitated
by the 9/15 failure of Lehman Brothers — most of us are still ignorant about what Warren Buffett called the “financial weapons of mass destruction”
that wrecked our economy. Fluent as we are in Al Qaeda and body scanners, when
it comes to synthetic C.D.O.’s and credit-default swaps, not so much.
What we don’t know will
hurt us, and quite possibly on a more devastating scale than any Qaeda attack. Americans
must be told the full story of how Wall Street gamed and inflated the housing
bubble, made out like bandits, and then left millions of households in ruin. Without that reckoning, there will be no public
clamor for serious reform of a financial system that was as cunningly breached
as airline security at the Amsterdam airport. And without reform, another
massive attack on our economic security is guaranteed. Now that it can count on
government bailouts, Wall Street has more incentive than ever to pump up its
risks — secure that it can keep the bonanzas while we get stuck with the
losses.
The window for change is
rapidly closing. Health care, Afghanistan and the terrorism panic may have
exhausted Washington’s already limited capacity for heavy lifting, especially
in an election year. The White House’s chief economic hand, Lawrence Summers,
has repeatedly announced that “everybody agrees that the recession is
over” — which is technically true from an economist’s perspective and
certainly true on Wall Street, where bailed-out banks are reporting record
profits and bonuses. The contrary voices of Americans who have lost pay, jobs,
homes and savings are either patronized or drowned out entirely by a political
system where the banking lobby rules in both parties and the revolving door
between finance and government never stops spinning.
It’s against this
backdrop that this week’s long-awaited initial public hearings of the Financial Crisis
Inquiry Commission are so critical. This
is the bipartisan panel that Congress mandated last spring to investigate the still murky story of what
happened in the meltdown. Phil Angelides, the former California treasurer who
is the inquiry’s chairman, told me in interviews late last year that he has
been busy deploying a tough investigative staff and will not allow the proceedings
to devolve into a typical blue-ribbon Beltway exercise in toothless bloviation.
He wants to examine the financial sector’s
“greed, stupidity, hubris and outright corruption” — from traders on the ground
to the board room. “It’s important that we
deliver new information,” he said. “We can’t just rehash what we’ve known to
date.” He understands that if he fails to make news or to tell the story in a
way that is comprehensible and compelling enough to arouse Americans to demand
action, Wall Street and Washington will both keep moving on, unchallenged and
unchastened.
Angelides gets it. But
he has a tough act to follow: Ferdinand Pecora, the legendary prosecutor who served as chief counsel to the Senate
committee that investigated the 1929 crash as F.D.R. took office. Pecora was a
master of detail and drama. He riveted America even without the aid of
television. His investigation led to indictments, jail sentences and,
ultimately, key New Deal reforms — the creation of the Securities and Exchange
Commission and the Glass-Steagall Act, designed to prevent the formation of
banks too big to fail.
As it happened, a major
Pecora target was the chief executive of National City Bank, the institution
that would grow up to be Citigroup. Among other transgressions, National City
had repackaged bad Latin
American debt as new securities that it then sold to easily suckered investors during the
frenzied 1920s boom. Once disaster struck, the bank’s executives helped
themselves to millions of dollars in interest-free loans. Yet their own
employees had to keep ponying up salary deductions for decimated National City
stock purchased at a heady precrash price.
Trade bad Latin American
debt for bad mortgage debt, and you have a partial portrait of Citigroup at the
height of the housing bubble. The reckless Citi executives of our day may not
have given themselves interest-free loans, but they often walked away with the
short-term, illusionary profits while their employees were left with shredded
jobs and 401(k)’s. Among those Citi executives was Robert Rubin, who, as the
Clinton Treasury secretary, helped repeal the last
vestiges of Glass-Steagall after
years of Wall Street assault. Somewhere Pecora is turning in his grave
Rubin has never
apologized, let alone been held accountable. But he’s hardly alone. Even after
all the country has gone through, the titans who fueled the bubble are
heedless. In last Sunday’s Times, Sandy Weill, the former chief executive who
built Citigroup (and recruited Rubin to its ranks), gave a remarkable interview
to Katrina Brooker blaming his own hand-picked successor, Charles Prince, for
his bank’s implosion. Weill said he preferred to be remembered for his
philanthropy. Good luck with that.
Among his causes is
Carnegie Hall, where he is chairman of the board. To see how far American
capitalism has fallen, contrast Weill with the giant who built Carnegie Hall. Not only is Andrew Carnegie remembered for far more epic and generous philanthropy
than Weill’s — some 1,600 public
libraries, just for starters —
but also for creating a steel empire that actually helped build America’s
industrial infrastructure in the late 19th century. At Citi, Weill built little
more than a bloated gambling casino. As Paul Volcker, the regrettably powerless chairman of
Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, said recently, there is not “one shred of neutral evidence”
that any financial innovation of the past 20 years has led to economic growth.
Citi, that “innovative” banking supermarket, destroyed far more wealth than
Weill can or will ever give away.
Even now — despite its
near-death experience, despite the departures of Weill, Prince and Rubin — Citi
remains as imperious as it was before 9/15. Its current chairman, Richard
Parsons, was one of three executives (along with Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman
Sachs and John Mack of Morgan Stanley) who failed to show up at
the mid-December White House meeting where President Obama implored bankers to increase lending. (The
trio blamed fog for forcing them to participate by speakerphone, but the
weather hadn’t grounded their peers or Amtrak.) Last week, ABC World News was
also stiffed by Citi, which refused to answer questions about its latest round
of outrageous credit card rate increases and instead e-mailed a statement blaming its customers for “not paying back their loans.” This from a
bank that still owes taxpayers $25
billion of its $45 billion handout!
If Citi, among the most
egregious of Wall Street reprobates, feels it can get away with business as
usual, it’s because it fears no retribution. And it got more good news last
week. Now that Chris Dodd is vacating the Senate, his chairmanship of the
Banking Committee may fall next year to
Tim Johnson of South Dakota, home
to Citi’s credit card operation. Johnson was the only Senate Democrat to vote
against Congress’s recent bill policing credit card abuses.
Though bad history shows
every sign of repeating itself on Wall Street, it will take a near-miracle for
Angelides to repeat Pecora’s triumph. Our zoo of financial skullduggery is far
more complex, with many more moving pieces, than that of the 1920s. The new
inquiry does have subpoena power, but its entire budget, a mere $8 million,
doesn’t even match the lobbying expenditures for just three banks (Citi, Morgan Stanley,
Bank of America) in the first nine months of 2009. The firms under scrutiny can
pay for as many lawyers as they need to stall between now and Dec. 15, deadline
day for the commission’s report.
More daunting still is
the inquiry’s duty to reach into high places in the public sector as well as
the private. The mystery of exactly what happened as TARP fell into place in
the fateful fall of 2008 thickens by the day — especially the
behind-closed-door machinations surrounding the government rescue of A.I.G. and
its counterparties. Last week, a Republican congressman, Darrell Issa of
California, released e-mail showing that officials at the New York Fed,
then led by Timothy Geithner, pressured A.I.G. to delay disclosing to the
S.E.C. and the public the details on the billions of bailout dollars it was
funneling to its trading partners. In this backdoor rescue, taxpayers
unknowingly awarded banks like Goldman 100 cents on the dollar for their bets
on mortgage-backed securities.
Why was our money used
to make these high-flying gamblers whole while ordinary Americans received no
such beneficence? Nothing less than complete transparency will connect the
dots. Among the big-name witnesses
that the Angelides commission has called for next week is Goldman’s Blankfein. Geithner, Henry
Paulson and Ben Bernanke should be next.
If they all skate away
yet again by deflecting blame or mouthing pro forma mea culpas, it will be a
sign that this inquiry, like so many other promises of reform since 9/15, is
likely to leave Wall Street’s status quo largely intact. That’s the
ticking-bomb scenario that truly imperils us all.
*
*
Posted on Mon, Apr. 18, 2011
Obama ran against Bush, but now governs like him
Steven Thomma | McClatchy Newspapers
last
updated: April 19, 2011 09:15:43 PM
WASHINGTON — He ran as the anti-Bush.
Silver-tongued, not tongue-tied. A team player on the world stage, not a
lone cowboy. A man who'd put a stop to reckless Bush policies at home and
abroad. In short, Barack Obama represented Change.
Well, that was then. Now, on one major policy after another, President
Barack Obama seems to be morphing into George W. Bush.
On the nation's finances, the man who once ripped Bush as a failed
leader for seeking to raise the nation's debt ceiling now wants to do it
himself.
On terrorism, he criticized Bush for sending suspected terrorists to
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and denying them access to U.S. civilian courts. Now he
says he'll do the same.
On taxes, he called the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthy wrong, and
lately began calling again to end them. But in December he signed a deal with
Republicans to extend them for two years, and recently he called the entire tax
cut package good for the country.
And on war, as a candidate he said that the president didn't have
authority to unilaterally attack a country that didn't pose an imminent threat
to the U.S., and even then the president should always seek the informed
consent of Congress. Last month, without a vote in Congress, he attacked Libya,
which didn't threaten the U.S.
Big differences remain between Obama and Bush, to be sure. His two
nominees to the Supreme Court differ vastly from Bush's picks. Obama does want
to end the tax cuts for the wealthy. He also pushed through a massive overhaul
of the nation's health insurance system.
Yet even on health insurance, his stand wasn't so much a reversal of
Bush's approach as an escalation. Bush also pushed through a massive expansion
of Medicare by adding a costly prescription drug benefit — at the time, the
biggest expansion of a federal entitlement since Lyndon Johnson's Great
Society. Indeed, some of the differences between the two presidents are
measured in gray, not black and white as once seemed the case.
Some of the changes in Obama can be attributed to the passion of
campaign rhetoric giving way to the realities of governing, analysts say.
"He is looking less like a candidate and more like a
president," said Dan Schnur, the director of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute
of Politics at the University of Southern California. "He has discovered
that it's much easier to make promises on the campaign trail than it is to keep
them as president."
At the same time, some of the surprising continuity of Bush-era policies
can be tied to the way Bush and events set the nation's course, particularly on
foreign policy.
"Morphing into Bush was not a willful act," said Aaron David
Miller, a scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
"It was acquiescence to the policies his predecessor shaped and the cruel
realities that Obama inherited."
For example, Obama found he couldn't easily close the prison at
Guantanamo Bay because he couldn't find a place, abroad or at home, willing to
take all the terrorist suspects held there.
"Bush created, on the military and security side, new realities
from which no successor, Democrat or Republican, could depart, "Miller
said. "It's like turning around an aircraft carrier. It cannot happen
quickly."
Among the ways Obama has reversed his earlier promises and adopted,
extended or echoed Bush policies:
DEBT
In 2006, Bush had cut taxes, gone to war, and expanded Medicare, and
increased the national debt from $5.6 trillion to $8.2 trillion. He needed
approval from Congress to raise the ceiling for debt to $9 trillion.
The Senate approved the increase by a narrow vote of 52-48.
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., voted no.
"Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and
internationally," Obama said in 2006. "Leadership means that 'the
buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices
today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt
problem and a failure of leadership."
Now Obama's on the other side. He's increased the national debt to $14
trillion, and needs Congress to approve more debt. Moreover, Obama's aides now
say that congressional meddling to use that needed vote to wrangle budget
concessions from the White House would be inappropriate and risk financial
Armageddon.
What about Obama's own vote against the president in a similar
situation? A mistake, the White House said.
TAXES
As a senator and presidential candidate, Obama opposed extending the
Bush tax cuts on incomes greater than $250,000 a year past their expiration on
Dec., 31, 2009.
In 2007, he said he was for "rolling back the Bush tax cuts on the
top 1 percent of people who don't need it." In a 2008 ad, he said,
"Instead of extending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest, I'll focus on
you."
As president, Obama proposed letting those tax cuts expire as scheduled,
while also proposing to make permanent the Bush tax cuts for incomes of less
than $250,000.
But he didn't get Congress to approve that. When the issue came to a
head last December, Republicans insisted on extending all of the tax cuts or
none, and Obama went along lest the tax cuts on incomes below $250,000 expire
even briefly. His final deal with the Congress also added a one-year cut in the
payroll tax for Medicare and Social Security.
"What all of us care about is growing the American economy and
creating jobs for the American people," Obama said. "Taken as a
whole, that's what this package of tax relief is going to do. It's a good deal
for the American people."
He said again last week that he wants to let the Bush tax cuts for the
wealthy expire, this time on Dec. 31, 2012.
TERRORISTS
As a presidential candidate, Obama vowed a broad reversal of Bush's
policies toward suspected terrorists.
Most pointedly, he said he'd close the prison in Cuba and try suspected
terrorists in civilian courts, not in military tribunals.
"I have faith in America's courts," he said in a 2007 speech.
"As president, I will close Guantanamo, reject the Military Commissions
Act, and adhere to the Geneva Conventions. Our Constitution and our Uniform
Code of Military Justice provide a framework for dealing with the
terrorists."
He ran into a torrent of opposition, however. Members of Congress balked
at transferring suspected terrorists to U.S. prisons. New Yorkers balked when
his administration said it would try accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh
Mohammed in a civilian court in lower Manhattan.
Last month, he changed course, saying he'd keep Guantanamo Bay open, and
would try Mohammed before a military court.
The reversal, said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., the chairman of the House
Committee on Homeland Security, "is yet another vindication of President
Bush's detention policies by the Obama administration."
Echoing Bush, Obama's also asserted that he has the power to hold
suspected terrorists without charges or trial, and that he has the power to
kill U.S. citizens abroad if his government considers them a terrorist threat.
WAR POWERS
During his campaign, Obama signaled that he'd be far more circumspect
than Bush was in using military power. He did say he'd send more troops to
Afghanistan, which he's done, and that he'd attack al Qaida terrorists in
Pakistan, which he's also done.
But he opposed the Iraq war from the start, and said he didn't think the
president should wage war for humanitarian purposes or act without
congressional approval, absent an imminent threat to the U.S.
"The president does not have power under the Constitution to
unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve
stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation," he told The Boston
Globe in 2007.
"In instances of self-defense, the president would be within his
constitutional authority to act before advising Congress or seeking its
consent. History has shown us time and again, however, that military action is
most successful when it is authorized and supported by the legislative branch.
It is always preferable to have the informed consent of Congress prior to any
military action."
On March 19, the U.S. attacked Libya on humanitarian grounds, absent any
threat to the U.S. and without approval from Congress.
ORGY
OF GREED… Wall Street Celebrates Victory Over Their Crimes on Americans! AND NO
ONE SERVES THIS GREED MORE THAN BARACK OBAMA!
*
“On
the other side of the social divide is an uninhibited orgy of greed, documented
most recently by a Wednesday story in the New York Times (“Signs of
Swagger, Wallets out, Wall Street Celebrates.”
Thanksgiving
in America
US
corporations shatter profit records
25
November 2010
US corporations took in $1.659 trillion
in the third quarter, breaking records going back 60 years, according to a
Commerce Department report released Tuesday. It was the seventh consecutive
quarter of profit growth at “some of the fastest rates in history” according to
the New York Times.
If any more proof were needed, the
third quarter profit record exposes the lie promoted by Democrats and
Republicans alike that only the “free market” and private businesses can
reverse the nation’s 9.6 percent unemployment rate. The corporations and banks
are sitting on a cash horde in the trillions of dollars. This money is not
being used to hire workers, but to line the pockets of the executives and top
shareholders.
The profit bonanza that lasted from
July through September eclipsed the old record of $1.655 trillion established
in the third quarter of 2006—just as the money-mad speculation of the financial
elite was hurtling the US and world economy toward the precipice of its worst
economic crisis since the Great Depression.
The resulting financial crisis, which
erupted in the autumn of 2008, threatened a total collapse of the global
financial system. In response, the governments of the world, led by the US,
used the disaster to hand over tens of trillions in public wealth to the very
finance houses that triggered the crisis. This process continues, as
demonstrated by the International Monetary Fund/European Union-dictated rescue
of the Irish banks this week.
The enormous profit realized by US
corporations in the third quarter are only the latest indication that the
Bush-Obama bailout of the financial and corporate elite has achieved its
desired aim of protecting the personal fortunes of the rich:
*Annual bonuses rose by 11 percent for
executives at the 450 largest US corporations last fiscal year, according to a
recent survey published by the Wall Street Journal. Overall, median
compensation—including salaries, bonuses, stocks, options and other
incentives—rose by three percent to $7.3 million in 2009. Shareholder returns
increased by 29 percent.
*An October survey by the Wall
Street Journal found that employees at 35 of the biggest banks, investment
banks, hedge funds, money management firms, and securities exchanges will be
paid a record $144 billion in 2010.
*According to Forbes magazine,
the net worth of the 400 richest Americans increased by 8 percent in 2010, to
$1.37 trillion, more than the GDP of India, population 1.2 billion.
These vast fortunes have been made
possible through the impoverishment of the working class, the vast majority of
the population that must work in order to maintain itself.
*In 2009, 15 percent of all US
households, about 50 million people, went part or all of the year without
enough food to eat, according to a recent report from the US Department of
Agriculture (USDA). More than a third of these households, home to one million
children, went without meals on a regular basis.
*A record 49.9 million US adults went
without health insurance for at least part of the past year, up from 46 million
in 2008, according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC). The uninsured now constitute 26.2 percent of the total adult
population, more than one in four, up from 24.5 percent two years ago.
*Average annual wages for US workers
fell by $457 in 2009, and the median annual wage fell by $247 to $26,261,
according to recently updated data from the Social Security Administration
(SSA).
*The US Census Bureau found that about
44 million Americans were living in poverty in 2009, the highest number on
record and an increase of 3.8 million in one year. Nearly 19 million Americans
were living in extreme poverty in 2009, defined as half of the official poverty
level, an increase of 11 percent in one year.
This sampling—many similar statistics
could be cited—paints a portrait of a financial oligarchy literally gorging
itself at the expense of the population. Yet this reality, which permeates
every aspect of life in the US, has only whetted the appetite of the elite and
its political servants.
The holiday season finds the lame duck
111th Congress putting the finishing touches on two years of wealth
redistribution to the rich. It is almost certain to extend Bush-era income tax
cuts for the richest Americans.
On November 30, five days after the
Thanksgiving holiday, unemployment benefits will expire for 1.2 million workers
due to Congressional inaction. By Christmas and the New Year, this figure will
swell to 2 million. The fate of these workers and the several million children
who depend on them, tossed out without cash income into the worst job market in
seven decades, is of little consequence to the millionaires and
multi-millionaires who populate Congress.
One result of these policies is that
more people than ever, including those with jobs, are forced to turn to soup
kitchens, even on a day when families traditionally gather for a holiday
associated with the “bountiful harvest.” Charities across the country are
reporting record demand for help on Thanksgiving—a holiday established at a
national level by Abraham Lincoln in 1863 to honor the material abundance of
the Republic, even in the midst of the Civil War.
On the other side of the social divide
is an uninhibited orgy of greed, documented most recently by a Wednesday story
in the New York Times (“Signs of Swagger, Wallets out, Wall Street
Celebrates.”) From cosmetic plastic surgery to high-priced art auctions, from
rental properties in the Hamptons to bachelor parties that cost tens of
thousands of dollars, “Wall Street’s moneyed elite are breathing easier again,”
the article states.
The stranglehold over society and the
economy exercised by this parasitic social layer, this modern-day aristocracy,
must be broken once and for all.
Tom Eley
Wsws.org… get on their free no ads E-NEWS!
*
Lou Dobbs Tonight
Monday, November 12, 2007
Mortgage giants Wells Fargo and Banks of America are accused of slapping dubious fees on homeowners struggling to save their homes. With fewer new mortgages being written, these
companies appear to be leaning on these lucrative fees to stay profitable—with devastating consequences for homeowners. We’ll have that report.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Mortgage giants Wells Fargo and Banks of America are accused of slapping dubious fees on homeowners struggling to save their homes. With fewer new mortgages being written, these
companies appear to be leaning on these lucrative fees to stay profitable—with devastating consequences for homeowners. We’ll have that report.
“Rightly or wrongly, the
bankers seem to believe that a return to business as usual is just around the
corner.” PAUL KRUGMAN
NEW YORK TIMES
April 27, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Money for Nothing
On July 15, 2007, The New
York Times published an article with the headline “The Richest of the Rich,
Proud of a New Gilded Age.” The most prominently featured of the “new titans”
was Sanford Weill, the former chairman of Citigroup, who insisted that he and
his peers in the financial sector had earned their immense wealth through their
contributions to society.
Soon after that article was
printed, the financial edifice Mr. Weill took credit for helping to build
collapsed, inflicting immense collateral damage in the process. Even if we manage to avoid a repeat of
the Great Depression, the world economy will take years to recover from this
crisis.
All of which explains why
we should be disturbed by an article in Sunday’s Times reporting that pay at
investment banks, after dipping last year, is soaring again — right back up to
2007 levels.
Why is this disturbing? Let
me count the ways.
First, there’s no longer
any reason to believe that the wizards of Wall Street actually contribute
anything positive to society, let alone enough to justify those humongous
paychecks.
Remember that the gilded
Wall Street of 2007 was a fairly new phenomenon. From the 1930s until around
1980 banking was a staid, rather boring business that paid no better, on
average, than other industries, yet kept the economy’s wheels turning.
So why did some bankers
suddenly begin making vast fortunes? It was, we were told, a reward for their
creativity — for financial innovation. At this point, however, it’s hard to
think of any major recent financial innovations that actually aided society, as
opposed to being new, improved ways to blow bubbles, evade regulations and
implement de facto Ponzi schemes.
Consider a recent speech by
Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, in which he tried to defend
financial innovation. His examples of “good” financial innovations were (1)
credit cards — not exactly a new idea; (2) overdraft protection; and (3)
subprime mortgages. (I am not making this up.) These were the things for which
bankers got paid the big bucks?
Still, you might argue that
we have a free-market economy, and it’s up to the private sector to decide how
much its employees are worth. But this brings me to my second point: Wall
Street is no longer, in any real sense, part of the private sector. It’s a ward
of the state, every bit as dependent on government aid as recipients of
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, a k a “welfare.”
I’m not just talking about
the $600 billion or so already committed under the TARP. There are also the
huge credit lines extended by the Federal Reserve; large-scale lending by
Federal Home Loan Banks; the taxpayer-financed payoffs of A.I.G. contracts; the
vast expansion of F.D.I.C. guarantees; and, more broadly, the implicit backing
provided to every financial firm considered too big, or too strategic, to fail.
One can argue that it’s
necessary to rescue Wall Street to protect the economy as a whole — and in fact
I agree. But given all that taxpayer money on the line, financial firms should
be acting like public utilities, not returning to the practices and paychecks
of 2007.
Furthermore, paying vast
sums to wheeler-dealers isn’t just outrageous; it’s dangerous. Why, after all,
did bankers take such huge risks? Because success — or even the temporary
appearance of success — offered such gigantic rewards: even executives who blew
up their companies could and did walk away with hundreds of millions. Now we’re
seeing similar rewards offered to people who can play their risky games with
federal backing.
So what’s going on here?
Why are paychecks heading for the stratosphere again? Claims that firms have to
pay these salaries to retain their best people aren’t plausible: with
employment in the financial sector plunging, where are those people going to
go?
No, the real reason
financial firms are paying big again is simply because they can. They’re making
money again (although not as much as they claim), and why not? After all, they
can borrow cheaply, thanks to all those federal guarantees, and lend at much
higher rates. So it’s eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you may be
regulated.
Or maybe not. There’s a
palpable sense in the financial press that the storm has passed: stocks are up,
the economy’s nose-dive may be leveling off, and the Obama administration will
probably let the bankers off with nothing more than a few stern speeches.
Rightly or wrongly, the bankers seem to believe that a return to business as
usual is just around the corner.
We can only hope that our
leaders prove them wrong, and carry through with real reform. In 2008, overpaid
bankers taking big risks with other people’s money brought the world economy to
its knees. The last thing we need is to give them a chance to do it all over
again.
*
MEXICANOCCUPATION.blogspot.com
*
Go to http://www.MEXICANOCCUPATION.blogspot.com
and read articles and comments from other Americans on what they’ve witnessed
in their communities around the country. While most of the population of
California is now ILLEGAL, the problems, costs, assault to our culture by
Mexico is EVERYWHERE. copy and pass it to your friends.
*
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*
GET THIS BOOK!
*
Obamanomics:
How Barack Obama Is Bankrupting You and Enriching His Wall Street Friends,
Corporate Lobbyists, and Union Bosses
BY TIMOTHY P
CARNEY
Editorial Reviews
Obama Is Making
You Poorer—But Who’s Getting Rich?
Goldman
Sachs, GE, Pfizer, the United Auto Workers—the same “special interests” Barack
Obama was supposed to chase from the temple—are profiting handsomely from
Obama’s Big Government policies that crush taxpayers, small businesses, and
consumers. In Obamanomics, investigative reporter Timothy P. Carney digs
up the dirt the mainstream media ignores and the White House wishes you
wouldn’t see. Rather than Hope and Change, Obama is delivering corporate
socialism to America, all while claiming he’s battling corporate America. It’s
corporate welfare and regulatory robbery—it’s Obamanomics.
Congressman
Ron Paul says, “Every libertarian and free-market conservative needs to read Obamanomics.”
And Johan Goldberg, columnist and bestselling author says, “Obamanomics
is conservative muckraking at its best and an indispensable field guide to the
Obama years.”
If
you’ve wondered what’s happening to America, as the federal government swallows
up the financial sector, the auto industry, and healthcare, and enacts deficit
exploding “stimulus packages,” this book makes it all clear—it’s a big scam.
Ultimately, Obamanomics boils down to this: every time government gets bigger,
somebody’s getting rich, and those somebodies are friends of Barack. This book
names the names—and it will make your blood boil.
*
Obama Is Making You Poorer—But Who’s Getting Rich?
Goldman
Sachs, GE, Pfizer, the United Auto Workers—the same “special interests” Barack
Obama was supposed to chase from the temple—are profiting handsomely from
Obama’s Big Government policies that crush taxpayers, small businesses, and
consumers.
Investigative
reporter Timothy P. Carney digs up the dirt the mainstream media ignores and
the White House wishes you wouldn’t see. Rather than Hope and Change, Obama is
delivering corporate socialism to America, all while claiming he’s battling
corporate America. It’s corporate welfare and regulatory robbery—it’s
Obamanomics. In this explosive book, Carney reveals:
* The
Great Health Care Scam—Obama’s backroom deals with drug companies spell
corporate profits and more government control
* The Global Warming Hoax—Obama has bought off industries with a pork-filled bill that will drain your wallet for Al Gore’s agenda
* Obama and Wall Street—“Change” means more bailouts and a heavy Goldman Sachs presence in the West Wing (including Rahm Emanuel)
* Stimulating K Street—The largest spending bill in history gave pork to the well-connected and created a feeding frenzy for lobbyists
* How the GOP needs to change its tune—drastically—to battle Obamanomics
* The Global Warming Hoax—Obama has bought off industries with a pork-filled bill that will drain your wallet for Al Gore’s agenda
* Obama and Wall Street—“Change” means more bailouts and a heavy Goldman Sachs presence in the West Wing (including Rahm Emanuel)
* Stimulating K Street—The largest spending bill in history gave pork to the well-connected and created a feeding frenzy for lobbyists
* How the GOP needs to change its tune—drastically—to battle Obamanomics
If
you’ve wondered what’s happening to our country, as the federal government
swallows up the financial sector, the auto industry, and healthcare, and enacts
deficit exploding “stimulus packages” that create make-work government jobs,
this book makes it all clear—it’s a big scam. Ultimately, Obamanomics boils
down to this: every time government gets bigger, somebody’s getting rich, and
those somebodies are friends of Barack. This book names the names—and it will
make your blood boil.
*
Praise for Obamanomics
Praise for Obamanomics
“The
notion that ‘big business’ is on the side of the free market is one of
progressivism’s most valuable myths. It allows them to demonize corporations by
day and get in bed with them by night. Obamanomics is conservative
muckraking at its best. It reveals how President Obama is exploiting the big
business mythology to undermine the free market and stick it to entrepreneurs,
taxpayers, and consumers. It’s an indispensable field guide to the Obama
years.”
—Jonha Goldberg, LA Times columnist and best-selling author
—Jonha Goldberg, LA Times columnist and best-selling author
“‘Every
time government gets bigger, somebody’s getting rich.’ With this astute
observation, Tim Carney begins his task of laying bare the Obama
administration’s corporatist governing strategy, hidden behind the president’s
populist veneer. This meticulously researched book is a must-read for anyone
who wants to understand how Washington really works.”
—David Freddoso, best-selling author of The Case Against Barack Obama
—David Freddoso, best-selling author of The Case Against Barack Obama
“Every
libertarian and free-market conservative who still believes that large
corporations are trusted allies in the battle for economic liberty needs to
read this book, as does every well-meaning liberal who believes that expansions
of the welfare-regulatory state are done to benefit the common people.”
—Congressman Ron Paul
—Congressman Ron Paul
“It’s
understandable for critics to condemn President Obama for his ‘socialism.’ But
as Tim Carney shows, the real situation is at once more subtle and more
sinister. Obamanomics favors big business while disproportionately punishing
everyone else. So-called progressives are too clueless to notice, as usual,
which is why we have Tim Carney and this book.”
—Thomas E. Woods, Jr., best-selling author of Meltdown and The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to American History
—Thomas E. Woods, Jr., best-selling author of Meltdown and The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to American History
*
·
Hardcover: 256 pages
·
Publisher: Regnery Press (November 30,
2009)
·
Language: English
·
ISBN-10: 1596986123
·
ISBN-13: 978-1596986121
*
ARE AMAZED AT HOW UTTERLY BRAZEN THESE CORPORATE OWNED
POLITICIANS ARE?
GET THIS BOOK!
Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats,
Crooks, and Cronies
by Michelle Malkin
Editorial Reviews
In her shocking new book, Malkin digs deep into the records
of President Obama's staff, revealing corrupt dealings, questionable pasts, and
abuses of power throughout his administration.
From the Inside Flap
The era of hope and change is dead....and it only took six
months in office to kill it.
Never has an administration taken office with more inflated
expectations of turning Washington around. Never have a media-anointed American
Idol and his entourage fallen so fast and hard. In her latest investigative
tour de force, New York Times bestselling author Michelle Malkin delivers a
powerful, damning, and comprehensive indictment of the culture of corruption
that surrounds Team Obama's brazen tax evaders, Wall Street cronies, petty
crooks, slum lords, and business-as-usual influence peddlers. In Culture of
Corruption, Malkin reveals:
* Why nepotism beneficiaries First Lady Michelle Obama and
Vice President Joe Biden are Team Obama's biggest liberal hypocrites--bashing
the corporate world and influence-peddling industries from which they and their
relatives have benefited mightily
* What secrets the ethics-deficient members of Obama's
cabinet--including Hillary Clinton--are trying to hide
* Why the Obama White House has more power-hungry,
unaccountable "czars" than any other administration
* How Team Obama's first one hundred days of appointments
became a litany of embarrassments as would-be appointee after would-be
appointee was exposed as a tax cheat or had to withdraw for other reasons
* How Obama's old ACORN and union cronies have squandered
millions of taxpayer dollars and dues money to enrich themselves and expand
their power
* How Obama's Wall Street money men and corporate lobbyists
are ruining the economy and helping their friends In Culture of Corruption,
Michelle Malkin lays bare the Obama administration's seamy underside that the
liberal media would rather keep hidden.
Product Details
• Hardcover:
376 pages
• Publisher:
Regnery Publishing (July 27, 2009)
• Language:
English
• ISBN-10:
1596981091
• ISBN-13:
978-1596981096
*
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