General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsGasparino: Citigroup Is SPYING On Sen. Elizabeth Warren
jwirr
(39,215 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)Big Money and Big Influence through the privatization of NSA technology and contracting.
A person with integrity could break the fierce spiral.
elleng
(130,905 posts)'You call it spying, I call it monitoring.'
" You call it monitoring,...I call it spying.."
elleng
(130,905 posts)Segami
(14,923 posts)...said:
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)These fuckers need to be put in their place, and hard.
tracks29
(98 posts)These guys are really going after her. It only proves she is right. We need to have her back. I hope the party stands with her.
Take care , Liz. Keep fight the good fight.
brooklynite
(94,571 posts)Anyone who actually watched the story will know that this is about tracking--monitoring every public utterance of a political figure, which is something every political figure should assume is happening, and which, quite frankly, SHOULD be happening. No suggestion or evidence that her phone is being tapped, her mail is being read or her trash is being search through.
I contribute large amounts to American Bridge which spends the bulk of it's time tracking and monitoring Republican Presidential candidates. No reason to grumble when Republicans do the same.
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)Back in December there was a flurry of press around the passage of a banking bill that was 1) reportedly written by Citigroup and 2) put taxpayers on the hook for over-the-counter derivatives, obscure financial instruments that periodically blow up and in which Citi had a big position. Distrustful cynics like Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren claimed to see a connection:
But most other people, especially those who remember how enthusiastically Citi blundered into the previous decades housing bubble just in time to be nearly-bankrupted by it, tended towards a more charitable explanation: Citi wasnt smart enough to manipulate the legislative process, so whatever they were up to it was probably accidental.
But then Zero Hedge published this, which calls our preconceptions about Citis stupidity into question:
Is Citi the next AIG?
This fascinating piece of investigative journalism is too long and complex to excerpt here. You have to read the whole thing because every paragraph and every chart is a new bit of damning evidence. But for those who refuse to read it (though seriously, you should) Ill summarize the high points:
In the third quarter, the part of Citi that is insured by taxpayers went on a derivatives writing binge, taking its total exposure to $70 trillion (with a t). Then it wrote a draft of new legislation that would delete part of an old law forbidding the government from bailing out banks derivatives positions. Then it lobbied successfully to get its language written into the latest banking bill. Then it revealed its new derivatives portfolio to the world.
In asking if Citi is the next AIG, Zero Hedge is referring to the previously-obscure insurance company that had somehow become one of the worlds biggest derivatives players just in time for that market to blow up in 2008. Had it not been bailed out with several trillion dollars of taxpayer cash it would have taken down Goldman, Citi, JP Morgan Chase and pretty much the entire rest of the global financial system. Zero Hedge then goes on to speculate that Citi might be covering up some kind of company-threatening position that will, in the near future, require the aforementioned taxpayer bailout.
If all this is true, then Citi deserves serious props for adaptability. They screw up, and instead of immediately melting down they hatch an imaginative plan to hijack whats left of the federal government, implement it over the public objections of high-profile senators, and then kind of brag about it by announcing their new status as Americas biggest derivatives player.
http://beforeitsnews.com/economy/2014/09/is-citigroup-the-dumbest-bank-ever-john-rubino-part-1-2662320.html