Pierce writes: "...over the course of a decade, a bunch of cheats, thieves, and suited mountebanks stole most of the national economy and then wrecked whatever was left of it. But what's most extraordinary about the whole thing is that, after they swindled their swindles and heisted their heists, and got paid off by the rest of us for having looted our national economy, they all kept doing the same things they were doing before."
A Citibank branch in New York. (photo: Reuters)
Livin' in a Bankster's Paradise
17 February 12
�
f all the things for which I have little patience - Willard Romney, lottery machines in convenience stores, and the current state of the Montreal Canadiens, to name only three - the notion that the best way to deal with things is to "look forward, not back" is right at the top of the list. This is especially true as regards the undeniable fact that, over the course of a decade, a bunch of cheats, thieves, and suited mountebanks stole most of the national economy and then wrecked whatever was left of it. But what's most extraordinary about the whole thing is that, after they swindled their swindles and heisted their heists, and got paid off by the rest of us for having looted our naional economy, they all kept doing the same things they were doing before. These included extravagant bonuses and, of course, continued crimes of capital that ought to be capital crimes.
This is extraordinary. All this Citigroup fraud and thuggery took place after the events of the great meltdown had taken place. This whisteblower's co-workers, instead of checking for fraud or making reports about underwriting defects to the FHA as required, argued with her over the soundness of the loans, she said. Employees who acted as "gatekeepers" applied "what they describe as 'brute force' to pressure Citi's quality control managers" into downplaying defects, according to the government's complaint.
Some colleagues had pay incentives tied to reducing the number of reported problems, and they spent hours trying to get her to relax her warnings, including those about the most basic deficiencies, Hunt said.�"They started beating us up over the quality-control reports," she said.�Last year, she said, she became convinced she was being asked to look the other way on serious flaws. That's when she decided to become a whistle-blower.
Last year.�The more I think about it, the more I believe that we, as a society, gave up on the pillory too soon. And $158.3 million is tip money for CitiGroup.
This is what happens when real punishment for real crimes is considered to be too inconvenient, or too difficult, or too traumatic for the nation, which is made up completely of candyglass children incapable of existing with the knowledge that their financial lords of the universe are really no different from stick-up kids in a bodega. This is what happens when nobody goes to jail. This is what happens today.
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Granted, best would be to go after the war criminals but it is WE who would have to make that happen.
can "zombie" any man.
Remember the 1962 film
"The Manchurian Candidate." ?
Either that, or you're disappointed that it did not cover every jot and tittle involved in the Israeli nuclear arsenal and that country's constant agitation to bring U.S. and international pressure on Iran, aimed at regime change.
This is a terrific article and neither spares Israel nor fails to put the Iranian nuclear program in perspective.
Those bogus documents, along with "Curveball's" fabrications, were a lynchpin of Cheney's strategy to gather support for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. The U.S. media, led by pernicious sycophants such as Judith Miller and Michael Gordon at the NY Times, gobbled it up, though any well-informed schoolchild could have told them it was complete bullshit. Of the major media, only Knight-Ridder resisted.
I must confess that I had not read that Manning's documents exposed what was in effect a U.S. takeover of the IAEA for propaganda purposes through its stooge, Amano. I had noticed at the time that with his appointment, it became completely ineffectual.
That still doesn't make it any less hypocritical for the modern State of Israel to tell other countries they can't have nuclear weapons when it is well-armed with the same.
The "upside down morality" extends itself to sectors other than the military. However,as we have seen in this debacle against Pvt. Manning, no one in the other sectors that have turned many Americans live irreversibly upside down forever, will ever be prosecuted, despite of reams of evidence against them.
Appalling to think we live in such an immoral century and in a country that is lead by a man whose "infamous dictum only wants to look "forward not backward.""
Finally, many thanks for your insights and straight shooting as an intrepid and incorruptible journalist.
Something huge--something beyond human comprehension-- needs to happen to turn it all around. Hope karma works on a grand scale.
Thank heavens for Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and all the other genuine patriots who have and still are blowing the most beautiful whistles on the monstrous "patriot act" bull poopy of official washington, d. c. and its wall street manipulators.
How can the "Family of Nations" ever trust the US again. One day we may need real help from allies who no longer exist.
Which Leadership skills to admire?
What Poison to assimilate, and make sense of
~
Dear Commanders of Our Armed Forces,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen Martin E. Dempsey.
Major General Jeffery S. Buchanan Convening Authority for Bradley Manning's Court Martial,
The Commander In Chief of our National Defense Forces, President Barack Hussein Obama II, your CIC, has openly stated during Bradley Manning's confinement for trial that he is Guilty.
UCMJ ART. 37. Unlawfully Influencing Action Of Court
Talking to you General Class Commanders these days is a Top Secret America JSOC death sentence for our children too. Been hit hit hit, defenseless and wretchedly sick of it for years thus I've nothing to lose to begin with in our present unlawful state. I am though ruled by principle so in speaking out to you here on this direly urgent matter I am for my part carrying out what I consider my Duty as a Veteran and a natural citizen soldier of our true Constitutional National Defense Force, We the People. What we have here as this Bradley Manning Trial is outrageous, what you do here will define you. Better look in the mirror...
Bobby Baxter HCVeteran & Marihuana Felon
United States Army Security Agency 69-72
Founder Alternative Energy Systems SV.74
~~~*~~~
facebookcom/BobbyBaxterHCVeteranMarihuanaFelon/posts/10151613608857901
But shouldn't we talk about the war crimes? You know, the violent illegal acts that DID destroy thousands of lives? That is the debate we should be having right now.