The Financial Smoking Gun--Indict Geithner and Bernanke!

Since the mortgage meltdown occurred, many bloggers and reporters have known that the financial system was rigged to allow the fabricated fraud to go forward without any serious scrutiny, supervision, accountability, regulation, or transparency over what has been called “financial innovations”, in other words, fraudulent derivatives and securities, as well as credit default swaps, which established the marketplace as a revolving Wall Street casino establishment betting on something, but then, without notifying the “something”, betting that the “something” will fail.

What has come forward by such first rate reporters-bloggers-analysts, such as Michael Whitney, Karl Denninger, and the people at ZeroHedge, and explained in the television media by such personalities as Dylan Ratigan and Eliot Spitzer, Lehman Brothers appears to have engaged in fraud when it was still an investment banking institution.

Simon Johnson wrote in his piece “Senator Kaufman: Fraud Still at the Heart of Wall Street”, “He [Senator Kaufman-D.DE, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee] goes after Lehman -- with its infamous Repo 105 -- as well as the other entities potentially implicated in those transactions, including Ernst and Young (Lehman's auditors). This is the low hanging fruit -- but have you heard even a squeak from the White House or anyone else in the country's putative leadership on this issue?” Where is President Obama? Where is your outrage, sir? Where is the Change We Can Believe In? Is it in a Goldman Sachs bank account? Is it in your reelection campaign fundraising account over at Bank of America located at 3401 Connecticut Avenue NW?

I believe Michael Whitney coined the term “a planned demolition” when describing what the Too-Big-To-Fail financial banking investment institutions were doing to the economy as they performed their mortgage magic mirages upon the American people as they duped them into buying homes they couldn’t afford, with no money down, and no analysis of the buyer’s financial ability to pay. And, what went along with that was a bet that they couldn’t pay at some point down the line. From there, home prices grew in their asset values and formed a massive bubble that eventually exploded.

Michael Whitney wrote in his piece, 3-15-10, “Lehman Brothers Scandal Rocks the Fed”, “After a year-long investigation, court-appointed bank examiner Anton Valukas has produced a deadly 2,200 page report which details the activities that led to the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy. The report is a keg of dynamite.”

We might say that this just could be the smoking gun, the mushroom cloud that erupted out of the volcanic rubble left by the toxic mortgage’s magma meltdown brought to all us by capitalism gone bad as designed by Alan Greenspan, Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, and Timmy Geithner—the Four Financial Fustian Fiends, or the Four-Squared Fleecing Fools.

I have been calling the TBTF syndicate a financial crime syndicate with Bernanke and Geithner as the mobster’s governmentally appointed financial operating field generals doing what is necessary to make sure that the Federal Reserve cranks out cash to them through its Quantative Easing operation keeping the failed mega-investment banks saturated with liquidity.

This appears to be a full-blown conspiracy to dupe the Congress, American people and the world to believe that QE was designed to infuse the investment banks with taxpayer cash in order to loosen up the credit markets and bring the economy back on-line after being shut down. April Fools!!!

Written in Naked Capitalism, by Professor L. Randall Wray, “Timmy-Gate: Did Geithner Help Hide Lehman Fraud”, “Now we find that Geithner’s NYFed supported Lehman’s efforts to conceal the extent of its problems. Not only did the NYFed fail to blow the whistle on flagrant accounting tricks, it also helped to hide Lehman’s illiquid assets on the Fed’s balance sheet to make its position look better…it continued to take trash off the books of Lehman right up to the bitter end, helping perpetuate the fraud that was designed to maintain the pretense that Lehman was not massively insolvent.” “In terms of dollar costs to the government, this is surely the biggest scandal in US history.”

Professor Wray continued: The abuse was so flagrant that no US law firm would sign off on the practice, fearing that creditors and stockholders would have grounds for lawsuits on the basis that this caused a “material misrepresentation” of Lehman’s financial statements.”

As I have said before, why isn’t the RICO statute being dusted off and charges slapped down into the hands of former Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld, Fed Chairman Bernanke, and Tim Geithner, who was president of the New York Federal Reserve at the time when he should have been regulating LB. It appears that these three were engaged in the cover-up of Lehman Brothers worthless capital, which Fuld was using to borrow from other banks through what is called Repo-105. This is like a pawnbroker operation between investment banks. You give up some collateral that has market value, and in return, you get and equal value of cash to use for a very short term period of time, with the guarantee that you will pay it back soon, and reclaim your collateral.

But what was happening was Lehman was using worthless collateral and no one at the central bank, or the NYFed made Fuld and his underlings accountable for this shell game, yet it appears the NYFed knew about it and kept it from the investing public!!

Even though a New York Fed spokesman said the collateral accepted from Lehman was up-to-snuff, Lehman ended up failing two stress tests performed by the NYFed in order to determine if the collateral had real market value.

You might say that the New York Fed Outlet Store was pumping up the Lehman Brothers brand of tires, only to find they wouldn’t hold air, yet sold them to unsuspecting buyers without letting them know that in just about 10 miles, the tires would go flat.

Michael Whitney wrote that “[t]his is the huge scandal: [there were] collusive government officials who operate[d] as de facto agents for an industry saturated with corruption and conflicts of interest. [There was a conniving cover-up] of Lehman’s true position because he [Fuld] doesn’t work for the 10 million people who are now standing in unemployment lines, or the 35 million people who are now on food stamps, or the 6 million people who have lost their homes to foreclosure, or the hundreds of millions of people who have seen the home equity evaporate, their retirement funds plunge and their hopes for the future dashed so that a handful of insatiable landsharks could fatten their bank accounts in the Cayman Islands.”

“Today, there is only one market for junk: the Federal Reserve, which has lent $1.3 trillion in cash for trash, no questions asked. This amount exceeds the forecast[ed] Obama medical [health] care plan for the decade. No money for health insurance, but all for the junk-mortgage lenders.” (Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism, Whitney article)

Rave-on Michael Whitney! Beautifully said!!!

Mr. Whitney continues: “Is there really any doubt that Tim Geithner at the New York Fed, or Bernanke knew that Lehman was trading its junk assets to finance its ongoing operations? Doesn’t that in-itself constitute a cover up or [an “intentional” mislead[ing of] investors? And, if Lehman was exchanging garbage to feign solvency, then it seems likely that the other investment giants were engaged in the same type of charade. (Which implies that the rating agencies were culpable, as well.)”

Mr. Whitney had an email exchange with the brilliant, and former Wall Street economist, Professor Michael Hudson, who put this all into perspective. “If investigators can prove that the Fed exchanged US treasuries for MBS [Mortgage-Backed Securities] and other toxic assets that they knew were worth-less than the amount they provided via short-term loans (repos), then it is reasonable to assume that Bernanke’s quantative easing (QE) program operated under the same guidelines. That means, that the $1.25T QE program-which was supposed to extend credit to consumers and businesses—was actually a scam designed to transfer a gigantic load of capital to the very people who gamed the system and precipitated the biggest financial meltdown since the Great Depression. [Therefore, w]ithout question, that misallocation of capital has deepened the recession and sent unemployment skyrocketing.”

So, the big question now is what is President Obama going to do about this smoking gun, this mushroom cloud of information? Will he pull the curtain from behind the stage revealing the fraudsters that have engaged in a possible conspiracy against the United States in order “to transfer a gigantic load of capital to the very people who gamed the system”?

The Time Magazine’s Man Of The Year, and his side-kick dummy may actually be traitors, at the most, and, at the least, small fish mobster field generals who engaged in a conspiracy to perform criminal negligence. What would Joe McCarthy say about this one?

Thanks for reading, jerry

http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com

The Washington Stage Performance Starring Barack Obama

I am not sure how much the American people understand exactly what is happening in this nation in regards to the de-evolution of our standard-of-living, and overall way of life. There is a massive paradigm shift coming our way, which will affect around 80% of the country, and most dramatically, 70% of the population. It is not a matter of if, but more likely when.

Once you realize that what is being said in Washington is really a script to a massive David Mamet-like stage performance, you will see that there are more players than those on the stage. It all resembles the film, The Spanish Prisoner. It is basically a giant con game played upon an individual in possession of a corporate secret. There is more to the story, so I won’t spoil it, since it is very cool to watch!

But what is happening is a giant con game being played upon the average American, which will affect them for years and years to come. What is amazing is just how many people are watching something different unfolding. They are more engaged in what is happening on the periphery instead of what is happening at the core. They are upset with Obama’s determination with health care reform, and believe it is a government take-over of their health care insurance, when in reality their health care insurance has already been taken over by an industry that has caused millions of personal bankruptcies. Out of the 1.4 million personal bankruptcies, over 60% are because of medical bankruptcies. And out of those people, 75% had health care insurance.

Just this week we learned that the hypocrite Sarah Palin, after quitting her seat as governor, all the while condemning universal health care, was going to Canada for medical treatment. So much for using her own private health insurance when needed for her own care. When really desperate, use the Canadian’s socialized health care system instead, right Sarah?

These same people are seeing their roads filled with potholes the size of Baltimore, bridges decaying all over the place, empty shopping malls, and local community storefronts with for-rent signs propped in the glass windows. In small town America, we will see many more become ghost towns. These same people are victims and don’t really get it just yet.

This Washington stage performance is starring Barack Obama, and his cast members, which include his cabinet, Ben Bernanke, and others, such as Robert Rubin. But those people standing behind the curtain are the key to the script. This is an interactive stage performance because Congress is in the audience. We are watching it from afar, and really do not have a strong influence over the action, since we are thinly scattered all around the country. But nevertheless, our voices enmasse, are being heard through protests.

But what many of us know is that this entire political theater performance is filled with a fear, a silent fear, of actually fixing the problems that are destroying the very core of what this nation has achieved. There is a fear of fixing a very broken economy because to fix it properly would require a profound declaration that there has been collusion by those behind the curtain to keep it broken. And those who are standing out of sight, as I have said in previous posts, are the most powerful people in the country. They were able to control Lil’BoyBush, and now, they are controlling Barack Obama. The Shadow Cast members behind the curtain are directing the stage performance. The show should be called The Federalized Crime Syndicate Operations of the U.S. Government (FCSO).

What is occurring is the continuation of the transfer of wealth from the working classes to the top 1% of the income earners. Because of the shift of Treasury money to the Federal Reserve, and the process of off-handing toxic financial syndicate debt to the Federal Reserve for the taxpayers to cover, as well as for the Fed to increase the FCSOs liquidity as a result of the toxic debt exchanges in order to illegitimately prop up asset value prices; the public will ultimately be responsible for this subside to the rich asset classes’ return to full wealth values.

This blogspot has been posting many pieces on the fact that what exists in this county is financial crime syndicate operation. Much of it clearly performed in the open for all Americans to watch, but those in Washington continue to endorse it.

Washington’s infrastructure stimulus spending has gone into full body scanning machines (Chertoff Group) sold by former Homeland Security boss, under Lil’Boy,  Michael Chertoff. Let’s keep those former government insiders in the cash flow money loop provided by the US Treasury. Feeding from the public trough in and out of government. The other “infrastructure stimulus” appears to be the rebuilding of Iraq and Afghanistan, yet our streets, schools, bridges, mass transit systems, and rail systems can go to rot.

The US, being a sovereign nation, has allowed itself to be hijacked by the ‘FCSO’. For 30 plus years, this banking slim mobster take-over of our government and monetary system has been sanctioned with the phony legitimacy of those in power. The US is no longer a sovereign country, since the mega-investment banking crime syndicate has been allowed to manipulate currencies, the amount of money placed in circulation, interest rates at the consumer credit lending level, the level of debt and chicanery used to make us believing that such unauditable debt can be magically turned into capital, when inadequate or non-existent, as a result of this illusionary act. These financial crime syndicate operators have significantly controlled the political process and outcomes in the US, and around the world. The fact is that they have become the masters-of-ceremonies when buying and selling our government.

The Shadow Cast members has been pressing Senate Banking Committee Chairman, Chris Dodd-D-Conn. to fall into lock step. They have been pressing him to prevent a Consumer Financial Protection Agency from having any independence or political power. They have been forcing Dodd to make sure that any chief financial regulator duties would be performed by the Federal Reserve chairman, or stationed inside the Treasury so that the chief regulator would have all his/her teeth removed before taking the position.

David DeGraw, the author of The Economic Elite Vs. The People Of The United States, has written extensively how those behind the curtain, the Shadow Cast, are engaged in economic terrorism against working Americans. He begins his article, “Economic Terrorism": The Consequences are Poverty and Mass Unemployment, with this quote written by Michael Lind, ““The American oligarchy spares no pains in promoting the belief that it does not exist, but the success of its disappearing act depends on equally strenuous efforts on the part of an American public anxious to believe in egalitarian fictions and unwilling to see what is hidden in plain sight.” Lind is the Policy Director of the New America’s Economic Growth Program.

Mr. DeGraw wrote, “In total, Americans have lost $5 trillion from their pensions and savings since the economic crisis began and $13 trillion in the value of their homes. During the first full year of the crisis, workers between the age of 55 - 60, who have worked for 20 - 29 years, have lost an average of 25% off their 401k. Personal debt has risen from 65% of income in 1980 to 125% today. Over five million US families have already lost their homes, in total 13 million US families are expected to lose their home by 2014, with 25% of current mortgages underwater. Deutsche Bank has an even grimmer prediction: “The percentage of ‘underwater’ loans may rise to 48 percent, or 25 million homes.” Every day 10,000 US homes enter foreclosure. Statistics show that an increasing number of these people are not finding shelter elsewhere, there are now over 3 million homeless Americans, the fastest growing segment of the homeless population is single parents with children.”

And here is more: “The millions struggling to find work are just part of the story. Due to the fact that we now have a record high [when there are] six people for every one-job opening; companies have been able to further increase the workload on their remaining employees. They have been able to increase the amount of hours Americans are working, reduce wages and drastically cut back on benefits. Even though Americans were already the most productive workers in the world before the economic crisis, in the third quarter of 2009, average worker productivity increased by an annualized rate of 9.5%, at the same time unit labor cost decreased by 5.2%. This has led to record profits for many companies. Of the 220 companies in the S&P 500 who have reported fourth-quarter results thus far, 78% of them had “better-than-expected profits” with earnings 17% above expectations, “the highest for any quarter since Thomson Reuters began tracking data.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national median wage was only $32,390 per year in 2008, and median household income fell by 3.6% while the unemployment rate was 5.8%. With the unemployment rate now at 10%, median income has been falling at a 5% rate and is expected to continue its decline. Not surprisingly, Americans’ job satisfaction level is now at an all time low.

There are also a growing number of employed people who, despite having a job, are still living in poverty. There are at least 15 million workers who now fall into this rapidly growing category. $32,390 a year is not going to get you far in today’s economy, and half of the country is making less than that. This is why many Americans are now forced to work two jobs to provide for their family to hopefully make ends meet.” (End)

Phillip Davis wrote in Seekingalpha.com, in his piece, “America’s Commodity Crisis”, “Commodities are a TAX. They are the worst kind of tax because they flatly (not progressively) charge every man, woman and child in this country more money for the same food, fuel, shelter and clothing that they had to have last week in order to live. It doesn’t matter if those people are trying to save or trying to tighten their belts or trying to get out of debt - high commodity prices are a shake-down that rips money out of the pockets of the middle class and funnels it to the very, very small class of commodity producers, commodity speculators and the people who finance them and collect the fees.

Over 99% of the people in this country do not own mines or oil wells (and I’m not counting small farmers because they are literally raped by speculators and bankers, often leaving them worse-off than the consumers) or huge plantations and they do not buy futures contracts on margin with cash they borrow at prime plus 0.5% nor do they own tankers filled with 2M barrels of crude that they arbitrage along the crack spread, looking for an opportune moment to deliver their goods (hopefully during a crisis) at a maximum profit.

So 99% of the people in this country don’t even own a commodity ETF - they have no way to profit from high commodity prices and they need to eat, and they need to buy clothing and have shelter and they need fuel to heat or cool their homes and go from place to place. There is a word for people like that, at the bottom end of a transaction they have no control over - VICTIMS!” (End)

Who is Mr. Davis? He is a stocks and option trader, among other things. His clients are wealthy, but he understands exactly what is happening to the rest of us. He gets it!

In Michael Whitney’s brilliant piece, “Why They Should Be Indicted: The Case Against Bernanke and Greenspan”, Counterpunch.org, he clearly states that there is a clear-cut case to indict them for being the human vehicles who have allowed the financial crime syndicate, ie. economic terrorists, to take over the monetary system of this country. He writes that there appears to be enough proof that Ben Bernanke and Alan Greenspan aided and abetted the banks and other financial institutions in the sale of fraudulent loans to investors. He goes on to say that on one hand “Bernanke denies culpability in the meltdown, but--at the same time—[he] eagerly points out that the Federal Reserve is the chief regulator responsible for overseeing the “large complex financial firms that pose a threat to the stability of the financial system.” So, which is it? Does he accept responsibility or not? Here is a statement Bernanke made earlier in the week during an appearance before the Senate Banking Committee which may help to clarify the point.”

Bernanke said, “I think that stripping the Federal Reserve of supervisory authorities in the light of the recent crisis would be a grave mistake…we’ve learned from the crisis large complex financial firms that pose a threat to the stability of the financial system need strong consolidated supervision…”

Mr. Whitney responds to say that by saying that “Bernanke admits that the Fed is the ‘primary regulator’ that is responsible for “strong consolidated supervision” over “large complex financial firms that pose a threat to the stability.” If we accept his definition, than we must also accept that the Fed should be held accountable when it abuses its authority and puts the system at risk…at the very least, the Fed it guilty of criminal negligence.” (End)

Throughout the piece, Mr. Whitney quotes competent and brilliant economists who support the claim that the Fed purposefully executed a plan to transfer the nation’s wealth to the ‘FCSO’.

Georgewashington2.blogspot.com posted: Nobel Prize-Winning Economist: Federal Reserve System is Corrupt and Undermines Democracy,

“Joseph Stiglitz - former head economist at the World Bank and a Nobel-prize winner - said yesterday that the very structure of the Federal Reserve system is so fraught with conflicts that it is "corrupt" and undermines democracy.

[Furthermore], Stiglitz said: If we [i.e. the World Bank] had seen a governance structure that corresponds to our Federal Reserve system, we would have been yelling and screaming and saying that country does not deserve any assistance, this is a corrupt governing structure. Stiglitz pointed out that - if another country had presented a plan to reform its financial system, and included a regulatory regime that copied the makeup of the Federal Reserve system - "it would have been a big signal that something is wrong."

The Fed, and Treasury have done everything they can to put our economic system at risk in order to make sure that the top 1%, or top 400 people, remain in financial and political power. They have done this by making sure that this economy is debt based. They took mortgages and created investment vehicles, ie. capital assets, using that debt. They insured that debt using AIG as they were betting that the mortgage debt would go bust, since so much of it was bogus. They created debt-based, and over-leveraged instruments off of previously debt-based derivatives and securities. This was done over and over again. They colluded with the Federal Reserve to take on their toxic mortgage debt, and create money from that debt. They claimed that toxic debt was collateral capital, therefore, the Fed could go forward and print money using its Quantitative Easing policy.

The Federal Reserve prints money allowing the FCSO to borrow it at a zero percent interest rate, and hands over toxic, worthless mortgage based debt securities as collateral. Then the FCSO buys Treasury bonds and receives a 3+percent interest rate return. Then, when the government needs money, they borrow it from the FCSO, and pay interest to them for the use of the money that was originally at zero percent interest, and sitting in the Federal Reserve vaults. In those vaults, or depository, were the Treasury revenues, which were later lent to the financial crime syndicate, and then borrowed back from them for a price! Does any of this make a bit of sense? Is this not a type of Ponzi scheme? Is this not a way to further enrich the richest people in the country without them every really having to lift a finger to earn it? It is basically a planned Treasury theft.

Dr. Ellen Brown, in her piece, “What Goes Around Comes Around IMF-Style Austerity Comes To America”, masterfully explains what is going on behind the curtain. She points out that one of the Shadow Cast members is the Blackstone Group, and is currently chaired by hedge fund magnate Peter G. Peterson, former chair of the Council on Foreign Relations and one-time-head of the New York Federal Reserve. He is also founder of the Peter Peterson Foundation, which is engaged in imposing itself on Congress. The Blackstone Group has been hired by Congress to dispense government bailout funds to AIG. His foundation is spearheading a massive effort to remake Social Security and Medicare benefit allocations as a way to bring about fiscal governmental responsibility Peterson Foundation style. In other words, punish working Americans for what the corporate elite has created through their government take over.

In addition, Peter Peterson’s Blackstone Group is pushing for a mandatory government savings plan for all Americans to be administered by the Social Security Administration. This makes Wall Street salivate, since a good portion would be invested in Wall Street stocks. As Peterson’s group has embedded itself inside the government policy machine, as it feeds from the public trough, as well, he has been contracted to manage around $100B, that is one-half of the total pot of the federal employee’s savings plan, through his Blackrock Financial. I would say there appears a conflict of interest: working for the government, profiting off the government, and influencing government fiscal policy all at the same time. This appears perfectly OK by those performing on the Washington stage.

So much of what is going on upon the Washington stage is to convince working Americans that to issue any more money for stimulus is bad, that the creation of debt is bad, and that the only way to fix the problem is to squeeze on the middle class, and to make them further indebted to the corporate elite through increased fees, higher gas prices, higher food prices, current taxing levels, and higher commodity prices, as well as lower wages, while staying shackled to their employer’s health care plan and the banker’s mortgage contract. No health care mobility for YOU!

If you were to have a single-payer health care system, more than likely your wages would increase because you would have job mobility as you carried your health care elsewhere. Your employer might actually negotiate a wage increase in order to keep you working instead of leaving. Also, the opportunity for starting up your own business would open up. Ultimately, employers would not have to use profits or operating expenses for health care. The FSCO is against this.

What many fail to understand is that when workers have less money to spend, the tax base shrinks, less federal, state and local taxes flow through the system, taxes are likely to increase to cover shortfalls and losses, unemployment increases forcing government to support out-of-work citizens to survive, underemployment squeezes personal budgets, less personal savings, higher debt burdens occur as households use credit cards to pay weekly bills, their assistance in college tuition, and pay medical costs.

One way or another, the government will have to spend money on people and jobs. Either through stimulus, or personal disaster relief payments.

President Obama is planting the fear in Americans that he must look at ways to cut the budget because our rising debt is extremely harmful to our recovery. The fact is that we are paying less than 4% of GDP on the debt’s interest payments.

Dr. Brown writes that we are lucky that the US is able to pay its debts in dollars, which is not always the case with other countries suffering from debt burdens. “We have been deluded into thinking that “fiscal responsibility” (read “austerity”) is something for our benefit, something we actually need in order to save the country from bankruptcy. In the massive campaign to educate us to the perils of the federal debt, we have been repeatedly warned that the debt is disastrously large; that when foreign lenders decide to pull the plug on it, the U.S. will have to declare bankruptcy; and that all this is the fault of the citizenry for borrowing and spending too much. We are admonished to tighten our belts and save more; and since we can’t seem to impose that discipline on ourselves, the government will have to do it for us with a “mandatory savings” plan. The American people, who are already suffering massive unemployment and cutbacks in government services, will have to sacrifice more and pay the piper more, just as in those debt-strapped countries forced into austerity measures by the IMF.

Fortunately for us, however, there is a major difference between our debt and the debts of Greece, Latvia and Iceland. Our debt is owed in our own currency – U.S. dollars. Our government has the power to fix its solvency problems itself, by simply issuing the money it needs to pay off or refinance its debt. That time-tested solution goes back to the colonial scrip of the American colonists and the “Greenbacks” issued by Abraham Lincoln to avoid paying 24-36% interest rates.”

She writes, “But there is a solution to that too. The government can just mandate that the Federal Reserve buy the government’s debt, and that the Fed not sell the bonds to private lenders. The Federal Reserve states on its website that it rebates its profits to the government after deducting its costs, making the money nearly interest-free.

All the fear-mongering about the economy collapsing when the Chinese and other investors stop buying our debt is yet another red herring. The Fed can buy the debt itself – as it has been stealthily doing. That is actually a better alternative than selling the debt to foreigners, since it means we really will owe the debt only to ourselves, as Roosevelt was assured by his advisors when he agreed to the deficit approach in the 1930s; and this debt-turned-into-dollars will be nearly interest-free.

Better yet would be to either nationalize or abolish the Fed and fund the government directly with Greenbacks as President Lincoln did. What the Fed does the Treasury Department can do, for the cost of administration. There would be no shareholders or bondholders to siphon earnings, which could be recycled into public accounts to fund national, state and local budgets at zero or near-zero interest rates. Eliminating debt service payments would allow state and federal income taxes to be slashed; and the public managers of this money, rather than hiding behind a veil of secrecy, would be opening their books for all to see.” (End)

As has been written here, we are all but pawns of this Washington stage performance. It does not have to be this way. There are some obvious solutions, but President Obama and Congress are failing to strip away the curtain and unveil to the people the reasons that motivate the actions of the Shadow Cast members, when they could, at last, finally be declared as well deserving Shadow Cast-Aways.

Thanks for reading, jerry

http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com

So, Where Is My Recall, Dude?

Where is my recall, Barack? Why haven’t you recalled the fraudulent financial instruments that were sold to consumers, retirement funds, pension plans, as well as the fraudulent credit default swaps negotiated with AIG?

Congress has been so aggressive to demand that Toyota Motor Corporation fix the defective product components sold to consumers that, now, millions of automobiles are being recalled. Congress has called for investigations into the reason(s) why Toyota took so long to announce that they were investigating product defects, which led to the massive worldwide recalls.

(Now G.M. is “voluntarily”-to avoid decapitation-one million vehicles for defects.)

So Congress and Mr. President, where are the recalls resulting from the defective mortgage-backed securities sold by Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers and the other financial investment mobster syndicate banks?

There has been more hardship, more destruction done to consumers by the financial sector than anything Toyota has done. One-half of household wealth went up in flames as a result of defective and faulty make-believe securities produced by the Ponzi artists at the nation’s largest investment banking corporations. So, where is my recall, dude?

We now have Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe calling for a full-scale investigation of what he believes to be a criminal scandal surrounding scientific research involving climate change. He called it the greatest scientific scandal of our generation. He claimed that there have been scientists “engaged in illegal activity to deliberately falsify data and mislead the public on the facts of global warming.”

What we have is Senator Inhofe wanting to take scientists, who have been engaged in research, study, and theoretical climate design modeling to be investigated for their activities. I cannot really say that I have been personally affected, or harmed by the scientific research other than experiencing the Atlantic Ocean waters warming enough to have created enough moisture in the air causing the conditions that led to the dumping of over 3 feet of snow in just a few days in my community forcing me to spend tens of hours shoveling my sidewalks, parking area, roof, as well as chipping out 6-7 inches of ice build-up in my gutters. I guess, what has led to nearly breaking the city’s record of total inches of fallen snow in one season has nothing to do with climate change. Is that right, James?

This winter, which is not over yet, has demonstrated that Pittsburgh has experienced massive amounts of moisture in the air pushed up from the oceans, by southern warm air currents, that are mixed up with colder northern air, dumping lots of feet of snow in record amounts, has nothing to do with climate change. Don’t tell me that this is not possibly climate change? It very well could be. I am not ruling it out. I guess the rising of ocean waters, and the heavy amounts of moisture in the air is only about having a bad day.

My question to the Senator from the great state of Oklahoma is what has caused this nation more damage: the climate change scientific research community, or the possible illegal activity designed to deliberately falsify data to mislead the public on the facts regarding mortgage-backed securities, derivative contracts, collateralized debt obligations, bogus mortgage contracts, unregulated securities trading, shadow banking, computer automated high frequency market trading, and credit default swaps where there is no collateral, or a misrepresentation of quality and real value of the collateral, to back up the swap?

Here is a modification of your quote, Senator: “…engaged in illegal activity to deliberately falsify data and mislead the public on the facts of global warming

[OR, that are directly related to the economic mortgage-backed securities collapse].”

So which is Senator James Inhofe?

Senator Inhofe must NOT have gotten enough lobbyist cash from the climate change scientific community to redirect his rabid accusations away from them and onto the corrupt, fraudulent and dangerous mobsters running the largest investment banks. Has he not been reading how Goldman Sachs was directly involved in disguising the real value of Greece’s sovereign debt, which they eventually ended up buying back from Goldman Sachs after GS shorted their sovereign debt by betting that Greece’s debt was heading toward default?

I guess Republican Senator Inhofe feels that climate change deserves more immediate attention than investigating Goldman Sachs, and the rest of the mobster banking crime syndicate for criminal activity and the incredulous amount of harm they have inflicted upon the American people.

But wait, did not Senator Inhofe state that because the climate change scientific community had issued misleading, illegal, and deliberately false research documentation, while receiving government funding, they are subject to government investigations, which might just lead to prosecutions? Hey Senator, have you been sucking from the lobbyist feed tube for so long that you are now an addict? Have you forgotten so conveniently that Goldman Sachs, BoA, Citigroup, AIG, Wells Fargo, and the rest, have been receiving government funding for their own financial survival? Is it not true that the top mega banking-financial sucking squids had been given a $700B stimulus package, called a Bail Out, and backstopped with cash handed out or exchanged for worthless collateral mortgage backed securities, or loaned at zero percent interest from the Federal Reserve and Treasury to the tune of $14 trillion? Some say over $23T. Does this not count as government assistance? Could it also be called a Corporate Financial Social Welfare Program?

Isn’t Federal Reserve Chairman Bennie-da Beard-Bernanke receiving Treasury money--government money--as deposits? Is he not receiving government funding to operate his research program designed by former chairman Alan-daRandian-Greenspan? Are not what these two mobster finance officers basing their financial free-basing hallucinogenic theories on other theories, which came out of economic research studies while they were preparing for the doctorial dissertations in their graduate school academic programs?

So, what is different between geological climate change scientific research theories, and the Greenspan-Bernanke economic climate change social scientific research theories, Senator Inhofe? From here, Sir Nitwit, absolutely nothing!!! So, let the prosecutions begin!

Their economic theory is called Trickle Down, Supply-side Economics. Ronald Reagan loved the sound of those words. (His 5 most loved words in the English language.) The research came out of the Chicago School of Economics, and Ayn Rand’s greed-based worldview. The theories were all studied. Keynesian was one of their bible scribers.

They then reframed it and called it Neo-liberal economics, or today, we call it Economic Free-Basing using lobbyists to bribe CONgresspersons to write laws that allow the stealing of the Treasury for the accumulation of wealth at the top.

What we have witnessed since this theft went awry, and the Real Economy Pond went dry as the jobs were shipped off and Americans went poor, has been our treasury secretaries past and present, as well as president-past and president-present, caving into the demands of the corporate elite. At the beginning of this economic tsunami, these corporate oligarchs: bankers, financiers, corporate CEOs were awash in cash. They were weaving their underwear with $100 bills and blowing their noses with $20s.

As the economy began to sour, they were about to sell off their dollars and find refuge in safer currencies and investments outside of the United States. This would have crashed the dollar. Remember, the top 10% own 71% of the nation’s wealth. So what Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Lil’Boy Bush and CONgress did was to pay them off at 100% of the value of their disastrous financial gambles and bets in the mortgage-backed securities market. This kept the top 10% from taking their cash and selling it off. The taxpayers have now taken possession of their toxic, worthless financial garbage, so they could be satiated with full wealth and full employment. The Treasury sold bonds, and those bonds were bought by China, Japan and other sovereign nations to pay off the top 10%, as well as run our current account deficits. The Federal Reserve monetized the debt, through Quantitative Easing to also bankroll the wealthiest among us. To hell with everyone else and the Real Economy of manufacturing, jobs, and real production.

Now we hear the foaming and rabid mongrel dogs on the Right, such as Kentucky Regressive Republican Jim Bunning, and his butt sucking pup Regressive Republican from Arizona-Jon Kyl saying that just because the investment banking mobsters, and corporate elite sold the working American a bill of rotten goods, it is THEIR fault that they cannot find jobs in a continuously evaporating jobless marketplace where even those who were earning $100K are now out on the street looking for pizza delivery jobs. The Regressives are so good at blaming the victim.

In addition to this economic social research project designed by the Federal Reserve, and now implemented by the ‘Obuma-Baby’ administration, is the continuation of taxing wages and labor, instead of rents, land and finance, which hurts working people and manufacturing more than the richest 10%, which make most of their income off of dividends, capital gains, property, rent (lending of money to business, and consumers), and financial transactions: fees, and such.

Do not count on this administration to fix a thing!! All President Obuma wants to do is reach across the aisle to the enemy combatants who hate working Americans. All Obuma wants to do is play the role of hand-holder and make sure his play-dates with the Congressional Jihadis are civil. Instead of talking tough, such as taxing the top 10%, who have gotten a free ride and accumulated over 70% of the nation’s wealth during boom times, and not so boom times, to begin paying much of it back, through higher taxes (we all pay a higher tax rate than these fatcats) during the worst of times, so average Americans do not have to see their Social Security checks cut back, or their Medicare or Medicaid reduced, we watch this president blame the victims of neoliberalism, and the failure of Reagan-Bushies-Clinton-omics.

So again I ask, where is my recall, dude?

Thanks for reading, jerry

http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com

The King of Dharamsala Valley

Hi Everyone,
Carl here, I usually don't post much on the blog, Jerry and I do our video blog together, but Jerry brings his strong learned opinions and facts to the written version here on this page. I have posted rarely.
I usually post lighter stuff, so I've put together a short story, I thought Jerry's readers might enjoy.


Since His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama is state side and meeting with my good friend Barry, I thought it might be fun to write a little about my experience meeting the King of Dharamsala Valley.

So, I was invited to India to interview/audience His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama for a documentary I produced on the politics of Tibet. I had been to China and had interviewed nearly 100 Chinese government officials on the subject, including the then head of the Tibetan Autonomous Region as China calls it today.

This story took place while I was in India, getting His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama and the The Tibetan Government in Exiles view on the subject.

As while in China, in India we would interviewed nearly every authority involved in every aspect of Tibetan life in exile and culture thru the Tibetan govenment in exile. In a months time we had interviewed nearly 80 officials including the Prime Minister of the Tibetan Government in Exile, Samdhong Rinpoche and His Holiness himself. I even interviewed the Oracle. We would do three interviews a day, for 24 days. Time flew by, it was really grueling but I nor my crew felt it at all. I was just great to immerse ourselves.

We were working a one month long stoke of adventure.

This story isn't about the Documentary or the making of the Documentary. This is story about something that took place ad hoc, extra, something unexpected.

We stayed in a hotel near the home of His Holiness in McLeodganj . Located in the most populated province of India, known as Himachal Pradesh, McLeodganj sits above the Dharamsala Valley, at around five thousand feet. You can enjoy some of the most beautiful views of India from there. I would go onto the roof of our hotel and shoot sunrises every morning. The sun would rise from behind the mountain tops, sun beams would shoot upward. McLeodganj is located in the foothills of the Himalayas, with the great mountains rising up towards the Northeast, and beautiful sun washed Kanga valley and plains of India to the South.

Enough about the scenery! All of India is beautiful.


Our daily schedule was intense, we would be on the road every day by 8a.m. with interviews scheduled all day till 5.

After work we would land back at the hotel and figure out what to do for dinner, then afterwards go exploring around the hilltop town. There is a big tourist industry built around His Holiness living in McLeodganj , but most of the business's that feed off of his presence and his home are run by Kashmiris. They sell a lot of Tibetan things, mostly knock offs, there are a few Tibetan businesses but not like you'd think.

After dinner one night we happened upon a large tourist gift shop, run by Tibetans, it was pretty amazing, the things they had forsale, from silks to furniture, were simply beautiful.

We were just five guys wandering around, not big shoppers, on break looking more for a cold beer more than a stylish mala. But as a traveler you will look behind any door, so we are in this wonderful gift shop. Browsing. I hear some one say to me in clear European Danish English, "How do you like India"? I look and there is a mature women with dark black dyed hair, smiling at me, I smile back and say, I love it. She then responded, "it is a free country, completely free". I said "yes it is the kind of freedom that you'll never find anywhere else". We continued to chat, she was a Danish researcher, doing some work with one of the monasteries. I said so long. Her name was Halina.

The crew and I had dinner and a few drinks exhausted we would as with most nights be back at the hotel and be in bed by 11.

The next day we are scheduled to go to the Gangchen Kyishong, The offices of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives are located here. We'd be spending the day there doing three interviews, one with the Pime Minster Venerable Samdong Rinpoche, another with the now retired director of the Tibetan Works and Arhives Most Venerable Achok Rinpoce and finally the Nechung Oracle, Venerable. Thubten Ngodrup. These are some of the highest of high ranking tibetan religious figures in the world. All in the same day!

While at Gangchen Kyishong, between interviews, we had lunch just off the library, we ran into Halina my Danish friend again. We spoke briefly and parted. She claimed to be doing research for documentary also.

So the interviews went beyond well, I can tell you something about Tibetan Buddhism, how it strenghtens the mind, how it works, how the oracle or medium of Tibet functions, but thats not what this story is about. This story is about a Hindu, the King of Dharamsala Valley.

Its Friday, thanks to some proficient planing by me, who was now being called Dr. Quest, by his production team, we had scheduled weekends off.

This Dr.Quest thing was a much better nickname than my crew I used in China, who seemed to want to call me Chairman Mao, they also like calling me hu su, meaning black beard. Camaraderie is a great thing when working and traveling, they guys on the both crews, I will always be indebted to.

So its the weekend and everyone it thinking about finding some real beer and adventure in a far away land. We were getting ready to go to dinner, now the food in India is really great, but getting 5 guys to agree on where to eat is always a problem.

So we are standing on the street in front of our hotel bickering about what restaurant to go to, it's a one lane street, and a car pulls up stops and the window rolls down, it's our Danish friend Halina again. She reaches out her hand with a card in it, and says "here is my number, if you guys want to have some fun, call me tomorrow and I'll be happy to show you a good time".

Guys are funny, some laughed, some lurched back, I said fine and took her phone number.

McLeodganj has about twenty thousand people living there year round, a small town by India's standard, the main town area is around 3 square miles made up of shops and restaurants, with mostly tourists milling about.

We spent the off day just hanging around, talking with the locals, some of the crew tried and succeeded in scoring some hashish from a local Kashmiri rug vendor, I visited the Namgyal monastery, they have a coffee shop there, hung out, met some tourist, talked to the locals, Did some souvenir shopping, just taking it easy, we had two more weeks ahead, including our final week, which I had set aside for exploring as a reward for the crew, no work, Just Delhi and tourist sites around Dehri Dunn.

So it's Saturday night in McLeodganj, I figured, if a door opens, it's always better to walk through it. So I decided to take Halina up on her offer. I called her from the hotel lobby phone, she said to come to the bottom of hill and she'd be waiting for I and my filmcrew at the end of the driveway located near Mentze kahn, the Tibetan medical school, and then she said, I'm going to quote her, " Its the driveway of The King of Dharamsala Valleys home". Ok now I had never before met a king, but thought, gee this is getting interesting. Hailina went on to say that they would be attending a Himalayan festival in the valley and we would be guest of the King!

So I go back upstairs to tell the guys I had talked to Halina, and we were going to a Himalayan Festival with the King of dharmasala valley. "Get dressed, and tell our driver Tapa Ji, he'll get some overtime". The crew had mixed emotions about it, it was strange because all they and I new about Halina was her invite, "are you guys looking for a good time" and her exotic look, mature ,attractive and worldly. So they really had some apprehension. Not I!

So we piled into Tapa ji's Montero, and headed down the hill from Mcleodganj, sure enough as promised, Halina was standing at the end of the driveway. She climbed into the truck and told Tapa Ji to drive on. It's dusk and the road is now perfectly paved, one of the only roads we would travel on that was without potholes and dust. It was the Kings driveway to be sure.

May is the hottest month of the year in India, we were working in 110 degree temperatures everyday. So I'm thinking, at the very least, this King, if he is a really a King, will have not only cold beer, but ice too.

The driveway is a 2 mile road that winds through the jungle, there perched on a small mound is a 2 story home, made of poured concrete, surrounded by professional landscaping and landscape lighting. India does some interesting and beautiful things with lighting, when there is electrical service of course. We get out of the truck, and walk towards the home, we enter into this perfect outdoor piazza. Halina invites us to have a seat. This home is a walled home, including the piazza, with poured concrete benches, tables, and low lighting radiating from every corner. The Kings home, It's its a dark mysterious place, I'm thinking maybe my crews apprehension was correct, maybe we've explored far enough.

The driver Tapa Ji, didn't come in he stayed with the suv. Dorje our monk guide, did. So we are all sitting in this wonderfully strange place in the middle of the jungle, and then as if
in a scene from the movie Apocolypse now, out of the homes great doors comes a large man in traditional indian white attire, he strolls over to us, and Halina says, gentlemen allow me to introduce the King of Dharamsala Valley.

As leader of our group, I stand up and he reaches his had out to shake hands, ok, so maybe he is not so kingly, and says "welcome to my home, so you're the American film crew, thank you for coming" I look at him and say "thank you for having us". This is the first and only King I've ever met, I'm kind of beside myself, my crew is sitting there, with some kind of look between shock and fear on their faces, then in a Brandoesque tone the King says "Beer, whiskey, beer,whiskey", he said it twice, really fast and mumbly, I said "that would be fantastic' I hear Todd, our sound recordist, in the background say "It sure would".

So here we are sitting with the King of Dharamsala Valley in the middle of the jungle making small talk, I find out, in a very a matter of fact way, that his wife is the head of India's National Health Administration, equal to our surgeon general, and Halina, who has been in India for 30 years, is his mistress. The king in a very Kingly way stated these facts as non pulsed as anyone about anything, from one man to another. Having a mistress is a manly kingly kind of thingly. The King, and the trick to being King is to be focused, manly, and at all times non pulsed.

After having a few drinks at the kings home, it would be time to part for the Himalayan festival in the valley, we would be guests of the king, and his mistress.

We piled into the suv, and Halina got in the truck with us, the king had his own driver, and a white car, know as an ambassador. We would drive deeper into the jungle, thru winding roads, in India, every evening in the jungle, a fregrent flower opens, it's called night queen. It has a very sweet smell. This heavy sweet oder is wafting through our car, so strong was the smell, I asked Halina what it was.

After about fifteen minutes, driving on very dark roads in the forest, we pull up to what is a decent size hotel, the interior light is radiating from the rooms on all floors, the lobby lighing is glowing into the dark jungle, our head lights cut deep into the darkness, the building is some sort of resort. Tapa Ji parks the truck, Halina says wait in the car. It was the Club Mahindra Kangra Valley Resort.

I'm watching her as she goes to the Kings car, he gets out, they turn and walk rapidly into the hotel. The resort has some kind of event going on, its buzzing with people, all well dressed, the King and Halina disappear inside.

From the passengers seat in the Montero, I'm looking at the building, and I see through the hotels second floor windows the King entering into this large room, the people in the room are part of the event taking place there. Then in less than a minute from the Kings entrance, people start to flood out of the place, hurriedly, piling into their cars, all these white government cars.

One by one they leave the parking lot, the lead car with a blue police light flashing on the dash. Tapa Ji cuts into the motorcade at about the halfway point, following the cars.

We travel another seven or so miles at high speed, through the jungle, and arrive at an outdoor stadium, there are people everywhere, we are still moving very fast, too fast for conditions, we arrive at the gate to this outdoor stadium, parking is to the right, I'm thinking we are not going to find a parkng space.

Instead of going into the lot, there is an arched entrance going into the stadium, with a red carpet on the ground going through it, people walking into the stadium. We and the Kings motorcade turn left onto the red carpet, people are literally diving out of the way of the cars, we drive into the stadium, there is seating on the field in front of the stage, not just any seating, but theater seating for vips, our cars all pull up and we get out, Sitting in the front row is The king, a guy who is head of the Dharamsala arts program, next to him is Halina, and me. The monk Dorje is next to me, and then the crew. All the people look at the King as he arrives.

We are as advertised at the Dharamsala Valley Himalayan festival.

There were about 30 thousand people in attendance, all brown people, we are the only caucasians except for Halina. Around the primeter of the field are booths set up with games and food, it's not different than a festival or county fair in America, it's a public get together, with families, teenagers, police on guard, music, dancing, all very nice. And lots of home style Indian cooking.

About half way through the program, Halina hands me a glass of whiskey, public consumtion of alcohol is frowned upon in India, I take the glass, and I hear Dorje whisper in a low voice "Don't drink it", hmm interesting I think. I smell it, and take a sip, its whiskey. I hand the glass to Todd, without hesitation, he drinks it all.

It's about an hour into the show and I decide I want some video, I have only my 3 chip handy cam, portable, so I get up and walk around the stadium, it was wonderful to mix it up with the locals, no english spoken by the folk, particularly at this folk festival, but you don't need language to communicate joy, everyone was happy, loving joyous community. Great food, that would surely kill me if I ate it. We joked as Dorje and Tapa Ji, our guide and driver would warn us constantly about eating things, by saying "No that will kill you".

I returned back at my seat, and Halina says to me, the king and his friends are going back stage to have drinks , you should join them.

Ok, now this is when, I'll say, it's like the bottom of the ninth, the bases are loaded, we have turned what would have been a non eventful evening into a very nice comeback, this was an experience up to this point to say the least. I hate sports analogies btw. I know or at least I'm sure I can top this evening off with just one more swing of the bat. I look at dorje, and he is shaking his head no, a look at my crew, and say, and this is one of the worst moments, in my life, I say, "so do you guys mind'? I look at them, one of them, now don't get me wrong I'm taking all the blame here, I don't know what crew member it was, but they said, "no we should be going".

I looked Halina, I looked at the King, and I said thank you for having us, we should be leaving.

I've had many go along get along fails in my life, but this moment, for me was the most painful mistake.

Will I ever know what lay ahead that evening by joining the King backstage for drinks? No, not ever. Really sad.

He was the unoffical King, recognized as the descendant to the oldest line of kings in india, Kings are still there, they still have local influence and wealth. When I asked dorje about this "King" status, he said that in his provence of Lahdak they have a queen, and this "royalty" can be traced back thousands of years.

i may assume that this would be his prince son. http://kutlehar.tripod.com/id13.html

Either or, I missed the chance. regrets I have few, but to go drink with the King of Dharamsala valley, that is one I might take to my grave. Unless . . . .

The moral of this story, be bold, every step takes courage and never not trust your instincts..

Thanks for reading.
If you like this story you can also read fun stuff on my Facebook page aat http://www.facebook.com/pages/Carl-Cimini/199725261562