Years ago, reporters for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer are reporting this week, the FBI knew that home mortgage scams were being perpetrated by banks all across the country. They told the Bush Administration, and were denied agents or resources to pursue their cases.
Two years ago then-New York Governor Elliot Spitzer tried to prosecute banks - along with governors or attorneys general of all 50 states - for just these types of crimes and the Bush administration used an obscure Civil War era law to stop him.
Today we learn that the very hustlers who helped destroy our economy, the so-called "investment bankers" at Morgan Stanley and AIG (who have gotten billions of our taxpayer dollars in the recent bailouts) will be getting their bonuses this year, to the tune of $1.13 million in cash for the 400 brokers at AIG.
But while they should be denied their bonuses, the criminals for whom we should re-open Gitmo are Phil Gramm, John Boner, and the other Republicans who changed laws reaching back to the Republican Great Depression of the 1930s to prevent exactly these types of scams.
Reopen Gitmo! Get it ready for the Republicans!
Thom can be heard daily on his radio show 12pm - 3pm ET visit www.thomhartmann.com to stream live or find a station near you.
THEY ALL SERVE ON EACH OTHERS BOARD OF DIRECTORS (see link below and track for yourself)
Not one Elite Big Banker has gone to JAIL!
Have any CEOs been Fired (Thain was redundant in BofA)?
The reason these guys stay in their jobs is they all serve on each others Boards of Directors and that should be illegal.
They vote on each others Salaries and Each others Bonuses so that is a primary reason Boards of Directors have become useless Rubber Stamps in this theft from Wall Street Banks. Business Week offers a way to drill down and see how "CROSS-SERVING" these executives are. See:
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/board.asp?symbol=BAC
These guys are not only ruining their Own Banks by creating Toxic Products but they and their thousand underlings are taking massive incomes from the Banks and leaving them near Bankruptcy, and of course, America is hurt as a result!
** (i.e. the Pelosi/Reid/Hoyer/Rockefeller/Schumer/Feinstein/et-al bunch, who know that THEIR bread is buttered, no matter how bad they allow Republicans & Wall Street Loan-Sharks to wreck the economy.)
Bernie "gets it".
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2008/09/22-6
More like criminals, thieves and law breakers extrordinaire !!!!!!
By the way, perhaps nows the time for a 2nd american revolution?
We have, through protectionist legislation, insulated our biggest criminals from prosecution, be they financial lords or political kings.
Our great nation of laws has FAILED to protect the most vunerable and has made the health and wealth of the high and mighty its primary function.
When the citizenry of a nation finally realizes that en mass, then all rules are suspended--including the high-minded notions you present in your comment.
The Harm done certainly is good reason for a Sound Investigation and if appropriate prosecution.
I was looking in google and came across this article, which you might find interesting.
" We Are All Keynesians Now " - TIME magazine Dec 31 1965
excerpt:
"Today, some 20 years after his death, his theories are a prime influence on the world's free economies, especially on America's, the richest and most expansionist. In Washington the men who formulate the nation's economic policies have used Keynesian principles not only to avoid the violent cycles of prewar days but to produce a phenomenal economic growth and to achieve remarkably stable prices. In 1965 they skillfully applied Keynes's ideas—together with a number of their own invention—to lift the nation through the fifth, and best, consecutive year of the most sizable, prolonged and widely distributed prosperity in history.
By growing 5% in real terms, the U.S. experienced a sharper expansion than any other major nation. Even the most optimistic forecasts for 1965 turned out to be too low. The gross national product leaped from $628 billion to $672 billion—$14 billion more than the President's economists had expected. Among the other new records: auto production rose 22% , steel production 6% , capital spending 16% , personal income 7% and corporate profits 21%. Figuring that the U.S. had somehow discovered the secret of steady, stable, noninflationary growth, the leaders of many countries on both sides of the Iron Curtain openly tried to emulate its success. "
Link : http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,842353-1,00.html
It's Treason... they can have Guantanamo or Death Row.
Treason [tree-zuhn]
noun
1. a crime that undermines the offender's government
2. disloyalty by virtue of subversive behavior
3. an act of deliberate betrayal [syn: treachery]
Thom, you're one of the few audible voices of reason and I regularly cite your post on the similarities between the run-up to the last depression and this crisis. We hear you, keep up the good fight.