American Ruling Class

The Military-Industrial Complex, Neocons and General Patraeus

"Frederick and Kimberly Kagan, a husband-and-wife team of hawkish military analysts, put their jobs at influential Washington think tanks on hold for almost a year to work for Gen. David H. Petraeus when he was the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan. The pro-bono relationship, which is now being scrutinized by military lawyers, yielded valuable benefits. The Kagans’ proximity to Petraeus provided an incentive for defense contractors to contribute to Kim Kagan’s think tank. For Petraeus, embracing two respected national security analysts in GOP circles helped to shore up support for the war among Republican leaders on Capitol Hill." Continue reading →

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David Galland: Justice

"Regardless of what the popular corruption indexes show, when you take into account the systematic skewing of the judicial and electoral systems to favor the entrenched politicos and their friends in high places, the level of corruption in the Anglosphere would make an African despot blush. It's not an accident that the Republicans and the Democrats, two sides of the same coin despite all the rhetoric, are never remotely at risk of losing their collective grip on power – the system has been carefully and thoroughly rigged to prevent that from happening." Continue reading →

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Bloomberg: Smart Money Is on Geithner to Replace Bernanke

"Geithner was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York from 2003 to 2009, the critical years leading up to and including the financial crisis. He has never worked on Wall Street. By design, the New York Fed has traditionally been the most powerful of the Federal Reserve banks, because of its proximity to the powerful Wall Street banks that it regulates. And Geithner played a major role, along with Bernanke and then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, in the bailouts of Bear Stearns Cos., Merrill Lynch, American International Group Inc. (AIG) and in the decision to allow Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. to go bankrupt." Continue reading →

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Two-Track Corporate Justice Is Not the American Way

"State and federal authorities decided against indicting HSBC in a money-laundering case over concerns that criminal charges could jeopardize one of the world's largest banks and ultimately destabilize the global financial system. Instead, HSBC announced on Tuesday that it had agreed to a record $1.92 billion settlement with authorities. The bank faces accusations that it transferred billions of dollars for nations like Iran and enabled Mexican drug cartels to move money illegally through its American subsidiaries. The case raises questions about whether certain financial institutions, having grown so large and interconnected, are too big to indict." Continue reading →

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US War Crimes Bring Huge War Profits

"It seems like just yesterday that President Clinton's moralizing humanitarian interventionists were taking the US into an illegal war in partnership with the terrorist Kosovo Liberation Army (a 1990s version of current US partner, the 'Free Syrian Army'). Now in Kosovo, where you can stroll down Bob Dole Street and Bill Clinton Blvd. while admiring the hulking and grotesquely cartoonish statue of our 42nd president, the 'liberators' of that tiny mafia state have returned to collect their rewards for bathing the Balkans in blood." Continue reading →

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The MIT-Central Bank Connection

"Every two months, more than a dozen bankers meet here on Sunday evenings to talk and dine on the 18th floor of a cylindrical building looking out on the Rhine. The dinner discussions on money and economics are more than academic. At the table are the chiefs of the world's biggest central banks, representing countries that annually produce more than $51 trillion of gross domestic product, three-quarters of the world's economic output. Their monetary strategy isn't found in standard textbooks. The central bankers are, in effect, conducting a high-stakes experiment." Continue reading →

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Bankster-Government Revolving Door (Mortgage Division)

"Bob Ryan, who served as a top housing adviser in the Obama administration, will leave for a senior mortgage-banking position at Wells Fargo next month. Ryan is currently a senior advisor to Shaun Donovan, the secretary for Housing and Urban Development. Ryan played a key role shepherding the $25 billion mortgage-foreclosure settlement between five of the nation’s largest lenders, including Wells Fargo, and 49 state attorneys general and federal regulators this past March. Wells faces a separate lawsuit over FHA-backed loans that was filed by federal prosecutors in October." Continue reading →

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Bankster-Treasury Revolving Door

"Former senior U.S. Treasury official Tim Adams will succeed Charles Dallara as the head of the Institute of International Finance, a bank lobbying group that represents more than 470 of the world’s largest financial companies. Adams will take over the helm during a major rewrite of financial regulations across the globe and amid the continuing debt and banking crises in Europe. Adams served as Treasury undersecretary for international affairs in the administration of President George W. Bush." Continue reading →

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Congressmen are Twice as Rich Now as They Were in 1984

"The rest of us are actually poorer. NYT reports that the median net worth of a member of Congress climbed 15 percent from 2004 to 2010, to $913,000; meanwhile, the median net worth for all Americans dropped 8 percent over that same period, to roughly $100,000. The lawmakers’ gains are even more noteworthy because over that same period the net worth of the richest 10 percent of Americans remained essentially flat, based on inflation-adjusted figures, says Slate. More regulations and more Wahington D.C.-based power centers result in many more wanting to influence congressmen, legally or illegally." Continue reading →

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