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A Christmas Message From America’s Rich | | Rolling Stone

24 Dec

Is Dimon right? Do people hate him just because he’s rich and successful? That really would be unfair. Maybe we should ask the people of Jefferson County, Alabama, what they think.

That particular locality is now in bankruptcy proceedings primarily because Dimon’s bank, Chase, used middlemen to bribe local officials – literally bribe, with cash and watches and new suits – to sign on to a series of onerous interest-rate swap deals that vastly expanded the county’s debt burden.

Essentially, Jamie Dimon handed Birmingham, Alabama a Chase credit card and then bribed its local officials to run up a gigantic balance, leaving future residents and those residents’ children with the bill. As a result, the citizens of Jefferson County will now be making payments to Chase until the end of time.

via A Christmas Message From America’s Rich | | Rolling Stone.

Why Do GOP Bosses Fear Ron Paul? | The Nation

21 Dec

Ron Paul represents the ideology that Republican insiders most fear: conservatism.

Not the corrupt, inside-the-beltway construct that goes by that name, but actual conservatism.

And if he wins the Iowa Republican Caucus vote on January 3—a real, though far from certain, prospect—the party bosses will have to do everything in their power to prevent Paul from reasserting the values of the “old-right” Republicans who once stood, steadily and without apology, in opposition to wars of whim and assaults on individual liberty.

Make no mistake, the party bosses are horrified at the notion that a genuine conservative might grab the Iowa headlines from the false prophets.

via Why Do GOP Bosses Fear Ron Paul? | The Nation.

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Letters at 3AM: Occupy the Future

20 Dec

It is not my place to speak for Occupy, but I’ll use my own “people’s mic” to offer a proposal: that Occupy demands a constitutional amendment to reverse Supreme Court decisions that have given corporations the rights of citizens. Carefully craft this amendment to make clear, beyond doubt, that a corporation does not enjoy or deserve the constitutional rights of a citizen. Rather, a for-profit corporation is a commercial venture subject to the republic’s laws governing commerce. This amendment must state and enforce that corporations are not people.

Change the Supreme Court’s stance that corporations are people and you change the fundamental rule under cover of which corporations conduct themselves. The passage of such an amendment would go a very long way toward getting corporate money out of American politics.

via Letters at 3AM: Occupy the Future – Columns – The Austin Chronicle.

Ron Paul For The GOP Nomination – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast

14 Dec

And I see in Paul none of the resentment that burns in Gingrich or the fakeness that defines Romney or the fascistic strains in Perry’s buffoonery. He has yet to show the Obama-derangement of his peers, even though he differs with him. He has now gone through two primary elections without compromising an inch of his character or his philosophy. This kind of rigidity has its flaws, but, in the context of the Newt Romney blur, it is refreshing…. When he answers a question, you can see that he is genuinely listening to it and responding – rather than searching, Bachmann-like, for the one-liner to rouse the base. He is, in other words, a decent fellow, and that’s an adjective I don’t use lightly. …

And on some core issues, he is right. He is right that spending – especially on entitlements and defense – is way out of control. …

I don’t believe Romney or Gingrich would cut entitlements as drastically as Paul. But most important, I don’t believe that any of the other candidates, except perhaps Huntsman, would cut the military-industrial complex as deeply as it needs to be cut. What Paul understands – and it’s why he has so much young support – is that the world has changed. Seeking global hegemony in a world of growing regional powers among developing nations is a fool’s game, destined to provoke as much backlash as lash, and financially disastrous as every failed empire in history has shown.

via Ron Paul For The GOP Nomination – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast.

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When every year is election year – 2012 Elections – Salon.com

12 Dec

The Presidential election season has become 4 years long. These numbers are insane! And the system is broken.

On money, the sky’s the limit. In 2000, the total federal election season cost $3 billion; in 2008, more than $5 billion, of which an estimated $2.4 billion went into the presidential campaign. With the Supreme Court having made it easier for outside money to pour in, thanks to its Citizens United decision, funding for campaign 2012 is expected to pass $6 billion and could even top $7 billion. The Obama campaign, which raised $760 million in 2008, is expected to pass the billion-dollar mark this time around (with money already pouring in from the financial and banking sector on which candidate Mitt Romney is also heavily reliant). …

It’s true that, on November 6, 2012, Americans will enter voting booths and choose a candidate for president, and that makes this an “election.” But thinking of it that way won’t get you far. It’s also true, that, on January 20, 2013, a newly elected president will step into the Oval Office. What any of this has to do with democracy, as opposed to spectacle, influence, corruption, the power of the incredibly wealthy to pay for and craft messages, and the power of media owners to enhance their profits is certainly an open question. Think, at least, how literally the old phrase “money talks” is being updated every time you hear the candidates, or see their ads, or get a robocall from one of them, or receive a geo-targeted mobile ad of theirs on your iPhone or Android.

via When every year is election year – 2012 Elections – Salon.com.

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An Open Letter from America’s Port Truck Drivers on Occupy the Ports | Coalition for Clean and Safe Ports

12 Dec

There is so much at stake in our industry. It is one of the nation’s most dangerous occupations. We don’t think truck driving should be a dead-end road in America. It should be a good job with a middle-class paycheck like it used to be decades ago.

We desperately want to drive clean and safe vehicles. Rigs that do not fill our lungs with deadly toxins, or dirty the air in the communities we haul in.

Poverty and pollution are like a plague at the ports. Our economic conditions are what led to the environmental crisis.

You, the public, have paid a severe price along with us.

Why? Just like Wall Street doesn’t have to abide by rules, our industry isn’t bound to regulation. So the market is run by con artists. The companies we work for call us independent contractors, as if we were our own bosses, but they boss us around. We receive Third World wages and drive sweatshops on wheels. We cannot negotiate our rates. (Usually we are not allowed to even see them.) We are paid by the load, not by the hour. So when we sit in those long lines at the terminals, or if we are stuck in traffic, we become volunteers who basically donate our time to the trucking and shipping companies. That’s the nice way to put it. We have all heard the words “modern-day slaves” at the lunch stops.

via An Open Letter from America’s Port Truck Drivers on Occupy the Ports | Coalition for Clean and Safe Ports.

The paradox of a ‘responsible’ arms maker – Opinion – Al Jazeera English

11 Dec

…the US has not published a single document on its development and production of conventional armaments, despite having the highest level of government expenditure, the greatest volume and value of exports, and the largest number of private companies in the world. Instead, they have made some basic information about the scale and scope of the arms production available along with that of other major sectors in the Annual Industrial Capabilities Report to Congress.

via The paradox of a ‘responsible’ arms maker – Opinion – Al Jazeera English.

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Wall Street’s politically suicidal lawsuit – Wall Street – Salon.com

10 Dec

The conclusion:

If Greece defaults and Europe’s major banks can’t make payments on their debts to Wall Street, another bailout will be required. And the politics won’t be pretty.

There you have it. A federal court will now weigh costs and benefits of a modest rule designed to limit speculative trading in food and energy.

But in coming months and years, the American public will weigh the social costs and social benefits of Wall Street itself. And it wouldn’t surprise me if they decide the costs of the Street as it is far outweigh the benefits. If so, the Street has only itself to blame.

via Wall Street’s politically suicidal lawsuit – Wall Street – Salon.com.

NY press corps yucks it up with Bloomberg – Occupy Wall Street – Salon.com

8 Dec

Another rich guy fiddles while Rome burns:

Bloomberg made sure to crack a few jokes at the expense of Occupy Wall Street, whose encampment he ordered forcibly cleared on November 15, by way of a surprise paramilitary style raid. Reporters attempting to cover the police action were harassed, assaulted, and barred from viewing the area — for their own protection, Bloomberg later claimed. (Congressman Jerrold Nadler, who represents the Financial District, has since called on Attorney General Eric Holder to launch an investigation.) All told police arrested twenty-six journalists.

In response, the New York Times, along with The Associated Press, the New York Post, the Daily News, Thomson Reuters, Dow Jones & Company, WABC, WCBS, and WNBC sent a strongly-worded letter to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly denouncing the NYPD’s conduct during the raid.

None of this stopped New York City’s press corps from laughing it up with the mayor last night.

via NY press corps yucks it up with Bloomberg – Occupy Wall Street – Salon.com.

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6 Shocking Revelations About Wall Street’s “Secret Government” | | AlterNet

2 Dec

We now have concrete evidence that Wall Street and Washington are running a secret government far removed from the democratic process. Through a freedom of information request by Bloomberg News, the public now has access to over 29,000 pages of Fed documents and 21,000 additional Fed transactions that were deliberately hidden, and for good reason. (See here and here.)

These documents show how top government officials willfully concealed from Congress and the public the true extent of the 2008-’09 bailouts that enriched the few and enhanced the interests of giant Wall Streets firms. Here’s what we now know:

* The secret Wall Street bailouts totaled $7.77 trillion, 10 times more than the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) passed by Congress in 2008.

via 6 Shocking Revelations About Wall Street’s “Secret Government” | | AlterNet.

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