What If??
By: James Burge
November 28th, 2011
Interesting and Enlightening Comment…
By: James Burge
November 23rd, 2011
Came across this comment posted in an article titled “JPMorgan Sued by BayernLB Over Mortgage-Backed Securities” which is amazing in itself, because there have been no federal charges against the banks found to be lending toxic assets with AAA ratings, but a German Lending Company Bayerische Landesbank sues over losses totaling $2.1 Billion due to the mortgage backed securities fraud.
The comment from Michael Rivero, (should have known since it covers all the bases, as he usually tends to) reads as follows:
After the last Depression, Congress enacted a law, Glass-Steagall, which forbid banks, insurance companies, and investment houses to be in the same institution, to deter reckless speculation with depositors’ money, which was seen as a major contributor to the stock market instability of the time. Then in 1999, at the height of the “Deregulation” craze, Citigroup and Travelers merged, a clear violation of Glass-Steagall. But rather than enforce the law, Congress repealed the prohibitions of Glass-Steagall with the passage of the 1999 Financial Services Act.
That opened the floodgates for runaway financial speculation. Wall Street knew that if they made money they would be allowed to keep it, but if their investments lost money, the US Government would step in to transfer the losses to the American people, because that is what had been demonstrated during the S&L debacle of the 1980s.
Starting about in 2005, Wall Street started bundling mortgages together into investment bundles. The initial offerings were greeted with great success, and soon everybody wanted to get in this new “product.” So great was the demand for Mortgage-backed Securities (MBS, also called Collateralized Debt Obligations) that Wall Street started running out of mortgages to front-load the system! This led to the creation of the “sub-prime” mortgage; granting mortgages to people who normally would not qualify. Congress, themselves invested in the Wall Street firms that were profiting from selling MBS, passed an $8000 first-time homebuyer tax credit (actually a loan repaid in future taxes) to lure more buyers in which helped front-load the process even faster. This sudden surge in new homebuyers increased demand and home prices skyrocketed! This made investors and homebuyers even more confident, demand for homes and MBS soared even higher and a genuine bubble was being formed.
Demand for MBS was so great that as the supply of available mortgages began to dwindle, brokers started taking ‘shortcuts’. Bear Sterns was pledging the same mortgages into multiple investment bundles; a clear case of fraud. Other brokers were blending mortgages into the bundles that were already in foreclosure. As the returns from the MBS failed to materialize evidence surfaced that the earlier earnings had not been genuine, but were “ponzi” payoffs, using money collected from new investors to send dividends to older investors.
The whole scan started to unravel in 2008 and here is where things took a dark turn. Because Congress had their own fortunes invested in the companies at the heart of the fraud, Congress decided to prop up the scam with taxpayer money and block any efforts to investigate or prosecute. That is why TARP was passed by the Congress despite 90% popular opposition. Congress were saving themselves at the expense of the taxpayers. The phrase “toxic asset” was DC-speak for the fraudulent mortgages backed securities, which were being repurchased in order to avoid investors seeking to jail the Wall Street criminals, which would have brought all of Wall Street down. Despite claims that the US taxpayer would be refunded when the “Toxic Assets” were resold at some point in the future, the reality is that none of those assets will ever see a penny of repayment, because they are all the product of the biggest financial swindle in history. Bigger than Tulip mania. Bigger than the Great South Seas Company disaster.
These fraudulent mortgage-backed securities were being given triple-A ratings by the Wall Street ratings agencies, which were supposed to provide independent analysis of the value of investments. But as we saw with Arthur Anderson and ENRON, the supposed independent authority colluded to make the swindle look better than it was. Because the ratings agencies were giving triple-A ratings to the mortgage-backed securities, even as they reeled from losses, pension funds and retirement funds were allowed to purchase them, which is the real reason why public pensions for teachers, police, and firefighters have gone broke.
Together with having to cover the credit default swaps sold with those mortgage backed securities, it is estimated that the swindle has cost the nation $27 trillion, at least $16 trillion admitted to by the Federal Reserve in “loans” and “bailouts” (actually buy-backs) from foreign investors such as Credit Suisse, Deutchebank, the Bank of Libya (boy, did THEY get hosed; 98% of their sovereign wealth fund destroyed by Goldman Sachs aka Gold In My Sacks!), etc. Globalism took a major swindle in the US financial system and turned it into a global cataclysm from which we are all still reeling.
But while the “Too Big To Fail” banks were being bailed out by the US Government, smaller banks caught in the mess were struggling to stay solvent as cash poured out of their coffers to buy back all that bad paper they had sold to investors. Those monthly payments made by home-owners were not sufficient to cover the losses; the whole value of those homes needed to be returned to the banks’ balance sheets to keep the banks technically solvent. So again, starting in 2008, Washington DC sent out a private message to banks and mortgage companies that DC would look the other way if foreclosures to home loans were “short-cutted.” This kicked off the “Foreclosuregate” scandal in which phony foreclosure paper mills, bogus notaries, MERS were all used to facilitate a massive land grab from the American people. As Damon Slivers put it during Congress’ hearings into the foreclosure mess, “We can have a realistic discussion of the foreclosure mess, or we can preserve the capital structure of the banks. We cannot do both. Which shall we do?”
In hindsight, it is obvious which choice the government made. We are seeing wealth confiscation, no different than when FDR confiscated the gold from the American people to save the banks, only this time, done in a covert way to trick Americans into thinking it was their own fault they lost their homes. But again, this was the result of official US policy which gave tax credits to corporations that actually encouraged offshoring of American jobs. In short, the US Government took their jobs to make it easer for the banks to take their homes, to save themselves from going to prison over the mortgage-backed securities fraud.
Iceland had the right solution. They tossed the crooked bankers in jail and fired the government that tried to loot the people to save those bankers and Iceland’s economy is already on the rise. (Which is why you don’t see much mention of them any more in the American media)
That is it in a nutshell!
OWS turning point(s)???
By: James Burge
November 23rd, 2011
This is both scary and terribly sad. In the last few days (weeks) we have seen quite a few incidences of police brutality which only serves to prove a few tragic truths to those paying attention (which seems to be more than it used to be).
- We live as second (or third) class citizens in a police state
- Local police forces have been heavily militarized in the years following 9/11
- Most Police work for the 1%
- Police do not see citizens/students as people and treat them worse than animals
- The establishment is afraid of what the 99% are accomplishing
First, we have the first major catalyzing incident in occupy Oakland, when police thugs hit a US Veteran in the head with a tear gas canister, and then lobed another into the crowd that comes to his aid. Deplorable, but wait it gets worse.
I saw a video the other day of a woman punched in the face by police as she tried to show them a court order allowing them to re-enter Zuccotti Park. At the same time, I saw another video of police attacking a protester because he got to close to the fences so they bashed his face to the ground causing severe bleeding. I’m not sure how long it took for him to get medical attention.
There was also the story of another US Vet who was beaten and left in a jail cell for 24 hours before they realized he was actually injured and he went to the hospital for surgery on damage to his spleen obviously due to the police beating. Before letting him seek medical attention, Police accused him of being a drunk
There was also a photo going around of an 84 year-old woman who was pepper sprayed by cops at Occupy in New York I believe. There are the videos of cops dragging woman through the streets by their hair, and the now infamous video of Officer Pike pepper spraying 11 students who refused to move and were posing no threat to the officer. Apparently pepper spray is okay when someone isn’t listening to you; Shame Officer Pike, shame indeed. I wasn’t sure there was much else to say on this matter, but then I was proved wrong again.
Recently there was a story, I think I heard about it around the time of the 84 year-old woman being pepper sprayed, a story about a woman, Jennifer Fox, a pregnant woman who was pepper sprayed and kicked in the stomach by police at an occupy Seattle protest. Well the sad news to report is that Jennifer went to the doctor the other day and found out her baby had no heartbeat.
“They said the damage was from the kick and that the pepper spray got to it [the fetus], too.”
Our thoughts go out to her at this tough time, and I hope she can be strong, because I think all of the events mentioned above have something in common. All have the possibility, whether alone or collectively, to spark a turning point in our society. When people realize that the cops are not here for our benefit and the injustice system is not here to provide justice for you and I. Modern justice comes at a price, a price which you and I are unable to pay, but the top 1% seem to be making out just fine with the new arrangement as it is usually only a fraction of a percent of the profits they make of toxic assets.
I heard a story the other day about a man who stole $100 and then felt guilty and returned it; he got 30 years in prison. Yet a banker who was found guilty of embezzling $3 Million gets 10-15 years and will likely serve less than 5 years at a posh prison. People need to wake up to the growing inequality in our world, right now you see protests about the economic inequality, but it shines a flood light on the social inequality that has been building for quite some time.
What the Gov’t and drug makers don’t want you to know… Canibis cures cancer!!
By: James Burge
November 21st, 2011
We’ve been hearing a lot lately about the medicinal benefits of marijuana. Here is one video of a man who used hash oil to cure his skin cancer. Apparently this is well known in the big business drug companies, but as can be expected, since it could never be patented and heavily controlled, it is impossible to get investors behind getting a canibinoid drug to market. It is said it takes over $100 million to get a drug out after all the required testing. Drug companies can pay this fee to push dangerous drugs on the market, such as Vioxx which was found to cause a dramatic increase in strokes and heart attacks, as long as the drug can be patented so that the investors get paid in the end with 3000% mark-ups on the drugs destined to cause side effects worldwide. While we are talking about Vioxx, it should be said that it was only allowed on the market after Merek hid the data that demonstrated its dangers prior to its launch, and as far as I know, no one has ever been charge with fraud in regards to the deaths this drug caused. Apparently since it is approved by the FDA, drug manufacturers are not responsible for any detrimental side effects (I think congress has tried many times to limit the liability and limit any punitive damages allowed against drug companies for any unwanted side-effects) because it is the FDAs fault for approving it, not Merek for falsifying data. You can see now why this is big business; low risk, high payoff.
Berkeley Police grab Female Protesters by their Hair…. Classy
By: James Burge
November 15th, 2011
Why can’t we all just get along…
By: James Burge
November 10th, 2011
Why Dollar Collapse is Garanteed
By: James Burge
November 10th, 2011
Ratigan seems to have it right…
By: James Burge
November 9th, 2011
Mother Should I Trust The Government???
By: James Burge
November 8th, 2011
Amazingly Inhumane, US soldiers torturing animals, for fun…
By: James Burge
November 8th, 2011
Okay well if you needed any more proof of the lack of humanity in US soldiers there is a video I just watched and didn’t want to post but felt I should. Watch as US soldiers seem to have nothing better to do then sadistically murder a sheep with a metal baseball bat. And of course the saddest part is that it takes 10 hits with the bat before the sheep stops trying to get away, which is of course natural when you feel your life is in danger. This is of course on par with videos of the US soldier throwing a puppy off a clif.
It is amazing to see this behavior but there is a dichotomy that arises, is it that people who seem to enjoy torturing young animals more commonly look to the military for a sort of justification for this hatred they’ve felt, or are these normal everyday human beings who have been pushed past humanity into insanity due to the conditions they deal with on a daily basis. It isn’t hard to understand that soldiers are coming back from war broken (PTSD) because if this is what they are doing in their free time, for sport, it makes one wonder what they will get up to once they are back at home and the normal rules apply once more.
