Robert Reich: The Wall Street Scandal of All Scandals

[Hissyspit]

http://robertreich.org/post/26708840314

The Wall Street Scandal of all Scandals

SATURDAY, JULY 7, 2012

Just when you thought Wall Street couldn’t sink any lower – when its myriad abuses of public trust have already spread a miasma of cynicism over the entire economic system, giving birth to Tea Partiers and Occupiers and all manner of conspiracy theories; when its excesses have already wrought havoc with the lives of millions of Americans, causing taxpayers to shell out billions (of which only a portion has been repaid) even as its top executives are back to making more money than ever; when its vast political power (via campaign contributions) has already eviscerated much of the Dodd-Frank law that was supposed to rein it in, including the so-called “Volker” Rule that was sold as a milder version of the old Glass-Steagall Act that used to separate investment from commercial banking – yes, just when you thought the Street had hit bottom, an even deeper level of public-be-damned greed and corruption is revealed.

Sit down and hold on to your chair.

- snip -

That would be a mammoth violation of public trust. And it would amount to a rip-off of almost cosmic proportion – trillions of dollars that you and I and other average people would otherwise have received or saved on our lending and borrowing that have been going instead to the bankers. It would make the other abuses of trust we’ve witnessed look like child’s play by comparison.

- snip -

So far, the scandal has been limited to Barclay’s, a big London-based bank that just paid $453 million to U.S. and British bank regulators, whose top executives have been forced to resign, and whose traders’ emails give a chilling picture of how easily they got their colleagues to rig interest rates in order to make big bucks. (Robert Diamond, Jr., the former Barclay CEO who was forced to resign, said the emails made him “physically ill” – perhaps because they so patently reveal the corruption.)

But Wall Street has almost surely been involved in the same practice, including the usual suspects — JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, and Bank of America – because every major bank participates in setting the Libor rate, and Barclay’s couldn’t have rigged it without their witting involvement.

- snip -

This is insider trading on a gigantic scale. It makes the bankers winners and the rest of us – whose money they’ve used for to make their bets – losers and chumps.

MORE[p]

[russspeakeasy]

1. Somebody come up with a punishment that fits this crime. I can't.

[BrainGlutton23]

5. Fitting punishment?

The fitting punishment would be pauperization and homelessness.

[SusanaMontana41]

10. Indeed. nt

[socialist_n_TN]

11. This^^^^^^^^^^^

There was another post that advocated jailing the bankers. Jailing doesn't go nearly far enough. They need their wealth expropriated AND jailing.

[gateley]

22. They'd never see a real jail, like Bernie Madoff.

[KansDem]

88. Forfeiture and Seizure

It's used on cannabis smokers: take their checking and savings accounts, then their homes and cars, then anything else not tied down. All before they come to trial...

[gateley]

21. Yes. And no "entitlements". nt

[sabrina 1]

42. Yes, take away what they most valued, valued above their own countries, their

own people, nothing mattered to them except the hoarding of money, and the power they thought it would bring.

As I understand this latest scandal, which is a mild word to describe the sheer breath of the corruption involved, 12 major Banks were involved.

The first step should be for these Banks to be nationalized, then thoroughly investigated and prosecutions need to begin.

The money they stole, and they it was stolen, no matter how sophisticated the theft, should be confiscated and returned to the people.

Politicians who facilitated this massive crime in any way, should also be removed from office and investigated and prosecuted wherever necessary.

They have caused death and destruction around the globe, and it didn't just start with the first world countries. They've been doing it for a long, long time and it's only now that it has hit first world countries that we are even beginning to pay attention to it.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

64. "...first step should be for these Banks to be nationalized..."

I don't think putting the banks in the hands of the politicians, who made it legal for the criminals to do what they did, is an improvement.

[sabrina 1]

80. I covered that. I also said that politicians who aided and abetted them

should be removed from office and investigated themselves. Iceland is the model for how to end this takeover of our government by corrupt Corporate interests and their representives in Congress.

Iceland arrested crooked bankers and politicians. No reason why we cannot do the same thing.

[kiranon]

106. Temporary nationalization would be appropriate and, if not that,

nationalization until the wrongs are righted.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

110. IDK...

...maybe but I can't imagine giving them back to the same guys again. These guys are worse than race car preparers. There's a story from NASCAR in the '60s regulating the capacity of the car's gas tank. One shrewd mechanic came up with the idea of using a 1" diameter gas line... and running in around the car about several times! Supposedly the extra gas in the line save the car 1 pit stop.

Packaging non-homogenous loans and selling them to mutual funds... These guys are unbelievable!

[raouldukelives]

75. Couldn't agree more.

"They've been doing it for a long, long time and it's only now that it has hit first world countries that we are even beginning to pay attention to it."

Fits the old "First they came for the socialists" quote. We've had quite awhile to watch what the effects of corporations and Wall St have on other parts of the world. So many remained silent, even encouraging the behavior by continuing to invest in them. This monster we have created will not stop unless we decide to stop feeding it.
I don't think we will.

[davidwparker]

87. +1

[Occulus]

103. A mass default on any and all loans and credit card payments

Would be a start.

Starve them.

[Gregorian]

19. For years now Max Keiser has been saying "The Hague".

And he should know. He was in the business.

[Kaleko]

48. This is part of an unstoppable eruption of a whole series of vulcanoes -

or perhaps I should call them boils - all of which are getting ready to pop now or soon-ish. Boom! no more business as usual. The banking system as we've known and hated it is finished. I can't see any other way. This time they won't be able to bury the fallout. There are small armies of class action litigators all over the globe getting ready to pounce on the major international banks as we speak. High-powered law firms can make a killing if they win a class action civil suit against any single one of these banks because the litigators get a percentage of the trillions that are at stake here. Imagine lawyers salivating so hard, they're slobbering. Meanwhile, a German government regulatory agency is administering a probe to the asses at Deutsche Bank and will report on its findings within a week. Those German gov. agencies are not as thoroughly corrupted as their counterparts in London and the U.S. That German report could turn out to be fatally honest, and even if it's not, there is no way to put the lid back onto an already exploding volcano in this ring of fire.

The Canadian Press is also pretty good at highlighting the scope of this latest banking scandal:
http://business.financialpost.com/2012/07/05/fallout-from-libor-scandal-likely-to-hit-canadas-financial-industry/

Fallout from Libor scandal likely to hit Canada’s financial industry

…. Libor — essentially the rate at which London banks charge one another for loans — is a global benchmark, a reference point for a whole range of securities and derivatives sold around the world.

“If major lenders were manipulating the Libor rate, then the number of businesses and consumers affected will be astronomical,” said Steve Szentesilaw, a B.C.-based lawyer and expert in regulatory law.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the total value of the securities and derivatives
is about US$800-trillion,
including more than US$350-trillion in interest-rate swaps
and US$10-trillion in loans.

………...

In one of the biggest Libor class actions so far, the mayor and city council of Baltimore is suing Royal Bank of Canada along with about 20 other big institutions over alleged losses from holding securities based on Libor.

Cheers. Have a nice quantum leap out of the old, decayed system, y'all.

[sabrina 1]

86. Trillions!!

That is an excellent article, thank you. I wonder how this affected the average consumer?

[Kaleko]

89. Libor rate-rigging has affected 'average' consumers in a staggering number of ways.

Some answers here:

http://articles.boston.com/2012-07-07/business/32565725_1_libor-interest-rates-credit-card-rates

A. Basically Libor measures the wholesale price for money, and is so broadly used within the lending world that it essentially determines what the retail cost of borrowing, for credit cards, mortgages for example, will be. Many types of business lines of credit are based on the published Libor rates.

Libor also affects consumers in many ways, from credit card rates, to student loans with adjustable interest rates, to home mortgages. For instance, 90 percent of subprime mortgages that had adjustable interest rates used Libor to set rates, according to a 2009 study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. The researchers also found that 45 percent of “prime” ARMs — that is, those given to people with good credit — had loan rates derived from Libor.

Q. So how could I have been hurt by rigged rates?

A. Libor is also used to set interest rates in many investment products, so millions of investors, taxpayers, and pension-funds participants could have lost money because they got artificially low returns. For example, the brokerage giant Charles Schwab sued 11 major banks, saying they were “surreptitiously bilking investors of their rightful rates of return on their investments.”

Each and every one of us has been bilked by the bankers. Both, directly and indirectly, since every nation on earth has been subject to the siphoning-off of its treasures.

[sabrina 1]

93. That is what I wanted to know.

Thanks for the links, people need to know all of this, but so far as I know, our MSM has not gone into much detail about the impact of this corruption on the average person around the world. I don't think they will frankly.

I imagine that when these facts filter down to ordinary people, OWS is likely to grow rather than 'die' as the far right would like to see happen.

News reports that just talk about 'another bank scandal' and refer to 'libor' and 'interest rates' will not capture the public's attention. This story needs to be written in language that is understandable to the average person who is not an economist.

I will always remember the scene in Michael Moore's 'Capitalism, A Love Story' where he talks to a Wall Street guy in NYC and asks him to explain 'Derivatives'. As he listens to the explanation, his eyes glaze over and he finally asks: 'Does Wall Street hire guys like you to come up with a language that the public won't understand'? The answer was 'yes'.

Since then I have made it a practice to decipher that language but sadly our Media continues to speak in 'Wallstreet' so that most people never really understand what is going on.

We should assign someone to translate all of this into plain language and distribute it everywhere imo.

Thanks again for the excellent links.

[Kaleko]

95. Matt Taibbi is one of the most effective translators of Financial-ese we've got so far.

Which is why he is relentlessly smeared by people who benefit in different ways from keeping the general population docile and chronically confused.

You and I can help with these translations as well. Many of us can and do, in fact. I love you all for not shutting up, my friends and fellow travelers here.

[Kablooie]

35. Everyone who was involved must give back every penny they earned during the scandal period.

Since it's been going on since 2005 that could mean many of them would go bankrupt.

To force them to rent a small apartment and worry about how to pay the electric and water bills is probably fitting.

[BlueToTheBone]

65. You mean "stole."

They earned nothing.

[davidwparker]

90. Oh, yes. Bankrupt and those involved jailed, with assets stripped. Join us 99%-ers. n/t

[Spitfire of ATJ]

37. I can. Their worse nightmare,

Reset.

Blank out all debt and their entire paper fortune based on debt in the process.

Do it a world moratorium.

[davidwparker]

91. Yes, complete debt forgiveness. Just like the Year of Jubilee in Judaism. n/t

[think]

59. A 25 million dollar golden parachute and stock options

[Martin Eden]

62. Genuine, Thorough, Regulation & Oversight -- with Teeth

Teeth to confiscate the proceeds of their crimes and put them in prison.

Punishment is important for seeing that justice is done and discouraging future crimes, but the most important thing is genuine & lasting reform of the banking system.

[canuckledragger]

68. here's one that may work!

[Warpy]

100. I can. Make them poor.

Make it a felony for friends and cronies to help them out. Give them a biweekly welfare stipend and typical Section 8 housing. Put ankle bracelets on them and allow them two walks to a grocery a week plus one walk to a park.

Make them live the way they've made us live with no money, no health care, no hope for a better future.

That would be the cruelest sentence of all.

[Poll_Blind]

2. That's a fascinating yet terribly disturbing read. K&R! nt

PB

[PoliticAverse]

3. "otherwise have received or saved on our lending and borrowing"

If the rate was set artificially high borrowers would be hurt and lenders/savers would benefit.
If the rate was set artificially low borrowers would benefit and lenders/savers would be hurt.

From: http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/the_libor_scandal.php ...

Say you have an adjustable-rate mortgage that resets every year. If your ARM reset in 2008 when banks were allegedly colluding to cover up their woes by pushing Libor down 30 to 40 bps, you benefited from the illegality by saving 0.3 to 0.4 percent off what you should have paid. But this isn’t free money; it’s a zero-sum game. The investors who own your loan, which were probably the hedge funds, mutual funds, pension funds, and banks (including some of the same banks who employed the manipulators) who buy or hold securitized mortgages lost that 0.3 to 0.4 percent. They’re not going to be happy about that and they’re going to want to recover as much of it as they can. The banks will be on the hook, not the borrower who unknowingly benefited from the manipulation.

[Teamster Jeff]

4. Insider Trading!

We should fine them or something!

[Kaleko]

51. It's also a conspiracy to defraud the public on a massive scale.

So much for the "Oh, they couldn't possibly keep this a secret for all those years!" bullshit.

[HiPointDem]

53. and it's still being played out, as cities and states go bankrupt, public employees are fired/lose

pensions and benefits, people go underwater on their mortgages, people generally lose jobs because of the economic slowdown, small businesses go under, etc.

all so the money can go to the banksters.

[banned from Kos]

6. Even I, who has been forced to defend banks from spurious attacks by "progressives"

admit this could blow up into a serious legal scandal of epic proportion (by financial standards).

The participating institutions may be hit with the mother of ALL class action lawsuits.

[PoliticAverse]

13. Yes there will be lots of lawsuits from groups hurt by the manipulation.

Some banks might even require/get another bailout.

[Ruby the Liberal]

17. "forced"

[trumad]

24. LOL---funniest thing I've read today.

[banned from Kos]

69. yeah, due process is normally a progressive concept (except for bankers)

With bankers you guys need no evidence, no trial -- just incarceration.

When Corzine and MF Global went bust it was LOCK HIM UP AND THROW AWAY THE KEY all around here (same with Taibbi) - and now we know he "stole" nothing.

Same way with Lloyd Blankfein when Taibbi falsely claimed he perjured himself.

Read this please - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Due_process

[Marr]

74. lol, no kidding.

In the same way I'm "forced" to punch my timecard, I suppose.

[trumad]

23. "spurious attacks by "progressives"

Oh---so finally you see wrong doing by the Banksters.

Dude--- please.

[Ruby the Liberal]

27. Lordy lu. And on the same M'fin topic just 4 days ago:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002899150#post11

But *now* its a "good point".

You can't make this stuff up...

[riderinthestorm]

38. Lawsuit?? Like that's going to scare them one bit?

Really?

These guys need to go to jail. They need to pay such huge fines they are bankrupted as they go to jail and all of their assets seized.

A lawsuit doesn't go nearly far enough to compensate for the damage they've done.

[sabrina 1]

43. So if you have been defending banks from "progressives"

which indeed you have, what does that make you might we ask? If you are not a "progressive" which I proudly am btw, then what exactly are you who has been so defensive of the corrupt Wall Street scams we "progressives" knew for a long time was going on?

Matt Taibbi was so right. His latest article goes into this and the beginning of the prosecutions, which naturally went unnoticed by those other defenders of the corrupt Wall Street Banks, the Corporate Media.

Matt Taibbi, he and Max Kaiser should receive Pulitzer Prizes each for the work they have done to expose these massive crimes against the people.

[Ruby the Liberal]

45. Thats the funny part.

Taibbi was only "trying to sell Rolling Stone", but *now* allofasudden its a REAL issue.

[sabrina 1]

55. Lol, I know. It's not as if Taibbi and Kaiser and certainly many

British writers, haven't been covering the corruption in great detail for years. I think what has happened now is that, while they were managing to cover up a lot of it, by constantly bailing out the banks, especially in Europe, this is the final straw. Which some of the British bloggers I followed over the past year, predicted. That it would all come tumbling down and all they were doing was 'kicking the can down the road' as one British Economic writer has been saying.

So BFK, like everyone else now, can no longer defend the massive corruption that is about to be uncovered. I guess he's sort of bailing out? Lol! He worked so hard to try to cover for them though.

I think a lot of rats will finally start jumping ship now. It looks like maybe, at last, the game may be finally over. Although they are resilient, and with so much to lose, who knows, they got away with it all so far.

[rhett o rick]

82. Nicely put.

[dkf]

52. The L in LIBOR is London.

Which again goes to the UK.

Isn't Europe really ground zero for this entire mess? I keep thinking that addressing US laws doesn't begin to do a thing.

I've mostly seen LIBOR in relation to floating rates. How much wider is it used? If its derivatives, then aren't the big boys on both sides?

I do find this a bit ironic considering the Fed is keeping rates artificially low knee capping our savers here. Has my credit union been a beneficiary of these low LIBOR rates paying me practically nothing for years or is that purely the Fed?

[just1voice]

73. "spurious attacks by "progressives"" = truth you don't want to hear

Turns out having a closed mind is a bad thing huh?

[rhett o rick]

83. I love this: "Even I,". Are you series?

You must defend banks against the verbal attacks by the horrible "progressives"?

I am certain that you are pulling our legs.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

109. If I were you I'd be grateful you've been given permission to be outraged.

[rhett o rick]

111. Yes, I am humbled that George Zimmerman wont shoot

me for wearing a hoody in DU.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

112. Well, if he did it would be the hoodie's fault us much as his. Just ask the Mighty Mustache Of

Justice.

[SDjack]

7. Big prediction here: No one goes to jail. n/t

[Ferretherder]

60. I'll see your 'no one goes to jail', and....

...raise you a 'they still all get golden parachute retirements'.

[SDjack]

61. I humbly submit to your superior insight. I should have seen it. U R of course, right. n/t

[Warren Stupidity]

67. It would create a grave moral hazard to deny the financial elites their billionaire bonuses.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

8. Is the Justice Dept. carrying out a serious investigation?

And I'd like to know if Wikileaks might have some e-mails that shed light on the involvement of Wall Street firms. Hopefully, there are or will be whistle blowers stepping forward.

[banned from Kos]

9. Top executives of Barclays resigned - which is a tacit admission of guilt.

Investigators will put them against each other just like they do on cop shows. Someone will offer info for immunity eventually. This will take a year or so.

[Lucky Luciano]

12. They already had to forfeit their bonuses, so fuckit.

Might as well resign.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

29. Serious investigation? Not a chance, unless they are also operating state-approved mj dispensaries.

[bvar22]

71. Our "Justice Department"?

Under "Go along with Billionaires to Get Along with Billionaires" AG Holder?

Serious Investigations into Wall Street abuse?


No.
Our Justice Department has different priorities.
The White House and Attorney General see Medical Marijuana Dispensaries as a more serious threat to America,
and have dedicated the Justice Department Resources to fighting THAT threat.

[Coexist]

14. great read

[Flatulo]

15. OK, that's it for me. Let's hang a few of these crooks. nt

[ErikJ]

40. Stockades on Wall Street

to throw rotten tomatoes at them.

[Po_d Mainiac]

16. And MSM is just starting to finger this out? wow. n/t

[Ruby the Liberal]

18. Well, to be fair,

Taibbi and Reich's blogs aren't exactly MSM, but its better than nothing.

[HiPointDem]

54. i figured it out before taibbi & reich, i just didn't know the details. but it didn't take a genius

to figure out that the financial sector was scamming bigtime, in a general way.

[Ruby the Liberal]

81. Follow the money.

No brainer.

When the economy is in the toilet, everyone's 401k's collapse, and Merrill AIG Citi Sacks & Co pay out bonuses in the brazillions at the end of 2008 and haven't missed a beat since?

Doesn't take a rocket scientist to know there is a scam afoot.

[Po_d Mainiac]

113. But at least one carbon bassed unit at one of the MSM

networks must have heard the rumors from at least one person that stayed awake during at least one of the Senate's banking committee hearings?

[Ruby the Liberal]

114. Jon Stewart did.

But yeah, having notes and getting approval in the pitch meeting are two different things. Sometimes I wonder if it is more that they just don't understand it (or know how to explain it to the lowest common denominator) than just not wanting to cover it.

[Po_d Mainiac]

116. or been bought off

Chasing advertising $ is the new 4th Estate

[Ruby the Liberal]

117. Indeedly doo.

There is that as well, and even promoted/defended right here on good old DU.

[alfredo]

20. Nationalize the banks.

[russspeakeasy]

25. Five years ago, I would have said you're crazy. Now, not so much.

[alfredo]

76. They have become an enemy of the people, it is time we protect ourselves.

[russspeakeasy]

79. Yes, it is.

[alfredo]

85. It will start in Europe to be sure. Americans might join in during summer reruns.

[Angry Dragon]

26. Throw them all in jail and sort them out later

[HIlton Brackett]

28. start over

Glass-Steagall must be reinstituted and the biggest banks be broken up

[davidwparker]

92. +1

[MrSlayer]

30. They should all be rounded up and shot.

Like the frigging rabid vermin they are. I'm not even kidding. Pitchforks, torches and summary executions are in order.

I'm positively livid over this.

[entanglement]

31. This was headline news in the UK. US MSM is a week late, despite the global impact of Libor and the

the extent of banker criminality. Fraud in fixing interbank rates is tantamount to theft on a global scale. You won't be surprised to hear that Bob Diamond is your usual venal, arrogant, corrupt Wall Street sociopath who had politicians on both sides of the Atlantic eating out of his hands. However, even the Tories have had to distance themselves from him and his pals at Barclay's after these revelations.

[Ruby the Liberal]

32. US MSM reported this Tuesday when it happened.

The articles on del Missier and Diamond are on page 3 of LBN. This author is blogging an OpEd analysis about it after the fact. Robert Reich is a professor at Berkeley and the former Secretary of Labor under the Clinton Administration.

Yes, we do get the news here, and this one was a BIGGIE to us as it affects us all.



On edit - here is a very good piece about it from a banking watchdog that is definitely worth the read: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002899150

[entanglement]

39. Thanks for the link to Taibbi's article

Of course I know about Reich.

You might find this set of links covering the Barclays scandal (from the Guardian, UK) interesting. They're sorted in chronological order:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/barclay?page=13

[Ruby the Liberal]

41. Nice.

Thanks!

The 9th circle of hell is too good for these assholes, IMO.

On edit - Ouch! http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jul/08/banking-scandals-barclays

[lovuian]

33. This has to stop

and it looks like Europe is going to be the one to stop it

[ErikJ]

34. RESTORE the 94% TOP TAX RATE!!

The thing tghey fear and despise most.

[FarCenter]

36. It will be very difficult for any given lender or borrower to prove damages from any given bank

The British Banking Association set LIBOR by receiving estimates from roughly 16 bank branches in London. Then they threw out the 4 high and 4 low estimates and averaged the middle 8.

So no one bank could actually influence LIBOR in a demonstrable way.

[Amonester]

44. You mean, Barclay's $10M/yr CEO Diamond resigned for "no damages" at all??

What about all the hundreds of incriminating emails?

[FarCenter]

63. The regulators got them for attempting to influence LIBOR

For a specific investor to prove damages would require the investor to prove that the trader had a position involving the investor, that the traders email caused the Barclay's submission to the BBA to be other than what it would have been, that the Barclay's submission was actually used by the BBA in calculating LIBOR, and that the investor was actually harmed thereby.

[suffragette]

84. This is beyond individual investors having to go up against bank legal $$$. It's a global

investigation with multiple countries regulatory bodies conducting the investigation.

It's gone well past one poor person (or even groups of those people) having to fight for their rights against the well-paid armies of lawyers the banks have at hand.

[Kaleko]

97. Exactly.

These probes will inevitably lead investigators straight into the dark heart of the Mother of Wall Street's Vampire Squid: The City of London.

I'm reading various articles about The City of London. The facts are mind-boggling. Apparently, The CoL operates as its own separate state with its own lawmakers and laws, much like Vatican City ... in secret and largely uncontested by the British Parliament.

[suffragette]

98. Good point - agree this goes straight to The City

I keep thinking of that picture of Cameron and his buddies when they were young and the captions showing their career paths.

Also, note that Anshu Jain, one of Deutsche Bank's new co-CEOs is operating from The City.
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-1715472/Deutsches-London-chief-pockets-10m.html

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-29/fitschen-and-jain-revive-deutsche-bank-co-ceo-tradition.html

Ackermann, the previous CEO for Deutsch Bank was one of the key proponents for austerity and had Merkel's ear. This while Deutsche Bank has been engaged in numerous corrupt practices. Ackermann tried to settle many of the investigations into their shady practices before leaving, but the ones stemming from Libor and energy price manipulation are now going on.

I've been trying to remember to include posts I make on this in my journal, so there's a bit of info there on this going back awhile.

[Kaleko]

102. Is this the photo you can't forget?

[URL=http://imgur.com/AIeoW][IMG][/IMG][/URL]

More pics at http://iconicphotos.wordpress.com/2010/03/14/the-bullingdon-club/

(1) the Hon. Edward Sebastian Grigg, the heir to Baron Altrincham of Tormarton and current chairman of Credit Suisse (UK)

(2) David Cameron

(4) Ewen Fergusson, son of the British ambassador to France, Sir Ewen Fergusson and now at City law firm Herbert Smith

(5) Matthew Benson, the heir to the Earldom of Wemyss and March

(6) Sebastian James, the son of Lord Northbourne, a major landowner in Kent

(7) Jonathan Ford, the-then president of the club, a banker with Morgan Grenfell

(8) Boris Johnson, the-then president of the Oxford Union, now Lord Mayor of London

9) Harry Eastwood, the investment fund consultant



Yeah, those old pictures of the Bullingdon Club frat boys should give us some clues about the Club George Carlin was ranting about.

[suffragette]

104. Yes, that's it

Grigg was also formerly a partner and managing director at Goldman Sachs.

And their actions now are not so different from their actions then:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=1710000&mesg_id=1710543

[Fire Walk With Me]

46. Where are the politicians saying "Let's get this money back instead of forcing austerity upon normal

people"?

(((crickets)))

[Amonester]

47. We know what the banksters will say:

"We R too big 2 fail," Remember?

Yep. They got Richer the first time. What about a Repeat, huh?

[Fire Walk With Me]

50. "It worked so sell before; let's use it once more..." -Front 242.

Yep, no checks and balances against theft of this sort, at this level.

[woo me with science]

66. Where are they, indeed?

It's time to face reality. Acknowledging the truth, that this theft is being enabled by both parties, is the first step to doing something about it.

Pull some heads out of some asses. We have had enough of passivity and denial.

[Kaleko]

94. Hard to accomplish with veteran denial artists

whose rigid position has affected their very bone structure

[URL=http://imgur.com/p1G7N][IMG][/IMG][/URL]

What kind of chiropractor would tackle that?

[donheld]

49. So, will anybody stop this madness?

[OnyxCollie]

56. K&R. nt

[blkmusclmachine]

57. Where are the politicians and the Courts?

Oh, yeah, cashing their big fat Wall St. checks to look the other way. How much money did they steal from us, under the watchful eye of the R's and the D's and the Courts??? Not enough zero's in the world to count up this massive, orchestrated con of the American people. "Fraud" is too mild a word. If we don't do something NOW, they'll be drinking our blood before it's all over. Massive, massive criminality.

[kiranon]

107. If "corporations are people too my friends" [Romney quote by way of "Citizens United"],

perhaps banks are people too. Shouldn't all laws against people apply to corporations/banks as well? Forfeiture of all the banks assets may apply or a forced bankruptcy and distribution of assets to those harmed. Reclaiming of bank property/assets to insiders within a year (or whatever the statute allows) could take place. Call back all their bonuses, golden parachutes and the like. Speculation: Did Romney know/participate/profit in this by way of Bain? Who knew and profited? What a huge mess. Is it a mess so big that it cannot be untangled so they all scoot away free?

[blkmusclmachine]

58. Go read about Operation Northwoods:

You'll never think about 9/11 the same way ever again.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92662&page=1

[WillyT]

70. HUGE K & R !!! - Thank You !!!

[just1voice]

72. There are totally serious trials being held in the U.S., most ignore them

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-scam-wall-street-learned-from-the-mafia-20120620

---The Scam Wall Street Learned From the Mafia
How America's biggest banks took part in a nationwide bid-rigging conspiracy - until they were caught on tape---

[Ruby the Liberal]

101. And hows that going.

Courts found for JP Morgan in their scam against Jefferson County Alabama and the financing of the sewer system.

Here is a followup to that lovely ruling:

http://blog.al.com/businessnews/2012/07/jefferson_county_requests_that.html

[alterfurz]

77. "I don't call them 'bankers'...

..."I call them 'French Revolution re-enactors.'" -- Andy Borowitz

[Dustlawyer]

78. CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM! Then we can fix wall street and everything else!

[rhett o rick]

96. How do you propose we get the crooks to reform themselves?

Send them nasty emails?

I am not aiming my frustration at you.

[yardwork]

99. It's hard to know where to begin.

[sandpan]

105. I don't know where to begin, either.

Until 18 months ago, I worked for Barclay's bank. I know these guys are crooks, criminals and the mob rolled into an expensive suit. My unemployment is going to end soon. I may even have to return $2700 of previously paid unemployment. I am so angry now. When I worked I did the right thing, I saved money and yet I get no return on my savings. That's what really makes me mad now. I want a decent return on the money I saved. Who do I sue? That's what I really want. I want to sue them, to make their life miserable, to be accountable and to return every dime from the first day the LIBOR index was rolled out. The banks can no longer justify their actions because they rigged everything. They messed-up so many lives while they continue to act like this is only a horse race.

[yardwork]

108. Welcome to DU. I'm sorry that happened to you.

You are among friends here.

[Quantess]

115. Welcome to DU!