"A nation can survive it's fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of Government itself." Marcus Tullius Cicero. Roman Orator, Statesman 42 B.C.
Matt Taibbi's excellent & prescient article in the July 9th-23rd issue of Rolling Stone titled "How Goldman-Sachs runs Washington" should be required reading for every American & all Open Salon writers. It tells the truth about what the hell is going on in our country. Run, don't walk, to your nearest bookseller & buy the issue, get out your yellow highlighter pen, grab a cup of coffee and take notes. Taibbi has done what every local and national report should have done but did not - investigate the history and role of Goldman-Sachs in the economic meltdown of America. And Taibbi inadvertently explains why no other reporter wrote this. The media has had a 20 year + love affair with all of the Bad Guys in the raping of the United States, so why would they suddenly write an article exposing their complicity in our downfall?
Taibbi has no such dark ties and exposes the dark, black underbelly of our economic freefall.
You will read this. And the scales will fall from your eyes.
Goldman-Sachs has single-handedly engineered every major "Bubble" since the Great Depression. Goldman-Sachs brought us the Tech-Stocks bubble. The Housing Craze. $4 a gallon gas. The rigging of the Bailouts. And they are about to bring us the biggest Ponzi scheme-scam yet: Global Warming and its end game: Cap & Trade.
If you've been laid off, fired, foreclosed upon, downsized, car repossessed? filed bankruptcy, evicted - Goldman-Sachs has touched your life. Apache Savage? Jane Smithie? Nanotay? Saturn Smith?
Contributing editor of Rolling Stone magazine Taibbi has no dog in this fight except for being on the punishing end of this brutal freefall.
Stop blaming your neighbor, your local SUV owner, your local politicians. This gigantic titanic of a scam was brought to you by Goldman-Sachs with help from its Bitch - the Federal Government. Everything you thought you knew? Not so much. And as far as crucifying GWB? Taibbi illuminates the beginning of the obscene ransacking of America & it starts with a bang under Bill Clinton & the de-regulation put in place by his Treasury Secretary: Robert Rubin. Read it and weep, my friend. Read it and weep. Burn his name upon your brain & never forget.
The American Media, instead of doing its job & investigating and reporting on the fraud, theft & graft taking place right under their noses LOVED Rubin & hyped him as the smartest man on the planet. [With special thanks to TIME magazine] All the while he grinned like a Cheshire cat and played a shell game with our money. Rubin thought the American economy was "over regulated" and needed to be "set free." (Sounds like a frat boy eyeing a sorority girls bra.)
"During his tenure at Treasury, the Clinton White House made a series of moves that would have drastic consequences for the global economy - beginning with Rubins complete and total failure to regulate his old firm [of 26 years] Goldman-Sachs during its mad dash for obscene short-term profits." Can you say Insider Trading? Conflict of Interest? Fraud?
This was done with pre-meditation on the back of us Americans. On our backs. And that is the pain we are feeling right now.
Every American should grab a pitchfork and a torch & head to Goldman-Sachs & demand that they cease and desist their ubiquitous looting of our treasury. Now. And they must be dismantled. Indicted. Imprisoned. They have, with the fawning aid of the Federal Government, turned a first world economy into what Simon Johnson, an Economics professor at MIT & former official at the International Monetary Fund calls the "crony capitalism" he has seen in Third World countries.
What this article illustrates is this: Goldman-Sachs, with the help of our elected officials & Washington bureaucrats have taken us down for "short term obscene profits" and this: Just Because They Could.
Obama is accelerating the crisis by putting in his own set of Goldman-Sachs cronies in place, ie. former G.S. lobbyist Patterson is now Treasury Chief of Staff, and pushing through the punishing Cap and Trade "environmental plan" which is nothing more than a government mandated rise in taxes. Goldman-Sachs has touched this new carbon-credit market during every step of its design ensuring they will be the private interest that collects the revenue. Taibbi writes, "...cap-and-trade will allow a small tribe of greedy-as-hell Wall Street swine to turn yet another commodities market into a private tax collection scheme. This is far worse than the bailout: It allows the bank to seize taxpayer money before it's even collected."
"For the traitor appears not a traitor – he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear."– Marcus Tullius Cicero 42 B.C
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Comments
This is important. Matt Taibbi is doing all of us a favor by investigating and publishing what the hell is going on. The media is spinning us completely, actually trying to blame us for the economic freefall when it is very cleverly being dismantled by Goldman-Sachs and the Feds.
bc too many people who should be yelling "we are mad as hell and wearent going to take it anymore" are too busy yelling, "whattaya want, heah? give 'im time!"
the moment is passing by right this very second. we lost. the bums lost, mr lebowski. the bums lost.
because us liberals cant speak up loud and clear. bc not being a genetic match for george bush is all we need to trust a person, anymore.
Taibbi's article cuts through the spin and hype and gives clarity to the rigged system - read it, cut through the B.S. so you're prepared to defend your right to live and not be systematically raped by the system.
Here is another interesting report about the housing crisis. Our politicians are to blame for this as well.
http://republicans.oversight.house.gov/News/PRArticle.aspx?NewsID=595
You correctly point out the sins of Clinton, who, urged by the DLC-types, led the Dem Party to support Republican "free market" deregulation.
The point you miss is that as awful as these "conservative" market principles were (and still are), they would have had far less negative impact if the investment banks weren't allowed to leverage so far over their capital reserves, a SEC deregulation introduced in 2004, and urged by the inv. banks, led by Paulson, then Goldman CEO. It was at that point the toxic subprime boom, then bust, began in earnest.
Further, there would have been some economic retreat, but not at the level of this current depression if Greenspan would have exhibited the same control under Bush as he did under Clinton. Without the artificial reduction of interest rates, which normally would have risen as Bush and the GOP sent us back into the quagmire of massive deficit spending, the cannibalistic feeding frenzy wouldn't have happened. Ol' Al decided he was more a Republican than a Fed Chair when he agreed to assist the GOP/Bush "Ownership Society" push to get more people into their own homes, the thinking being that would make them more apt to vote Republican.
There is no shortage of blame to spread around DC, and towards both parties, but let's not leave anyone out. However, keep in mind these were supposedly "conservative" market principles. Perhaps a re-examination of what that really means is in order.
It was a very good article. Rolling Stone had another article a few months back about how Paulson was diverting funds to his cronies. Also very good reading, but I agree that this one was much more comprehensive in its description of how they accomplish market manipulation.
Here is the thing ... the struggle between the 'financiers' and the people have been going on at least since there were financiers and people, and that extends back to the 1800's and the Corn Laws in England, which were free trade laws pushed by the financiers that decimated the farmers in England and made millions for, guess who, the financiers.
What I'm saying is that there is a history for context for the free trade laws, the de-industrialization, the subversion of the govt., the money manipulation, etc., etc, and it's time it got a little airtime.
I became aware of it reading A Century of War by William Engdahl. Other books are Petrodollar Warfare by W. Clark, The Creature from Jekyll Island (the Fed), by G. Griffin, and Web of Debt by Ellen Brown. I'm sure there are plenty more.
That being said, I think it's important work he does, and an important audience he engages, and this is a great way to continue to spread that word. Thanks for the link.
These days, we have 'neoconservatives' who would best be described as Fascists. "Unitary Presidency" anyone? The rich get richer and the middle class withers away in a state of unending war.
I do highly recommend buying Rolling Stone and keeping the article for reference. In the months to come, you'll recognize all the players. Al Gore has set his company up with three Goldman-Sachs alumni.
One important point that comes out of this is that while Goldman-Sachs and our Government are in bed together dismantling our economic system, they delight in us being at each others throats. There is a method to their madness. Let's not fall for it.
Tim Geithner? Didn't pay his taxes, cronies with all the bad men, is now Treasury Secretary. It's all clear now.
And there ARE gains for a while longer. But Goldman seems to be the only firm on the Street that heeds what Baron Rothschild said a long time ago.
Be greedy when people are fearful and be fearful when people are greedy.
By Greg Farrell in New York
Published: July 13 2009 23:33 | Last updated: July 13 2009 23:33
Executives at Goldman Sachs sold almost $700m worth of stock following the collapse of Lehman Brothers last September, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Most of the sales occurred during the period in which the investment bank enjoyed the support of $10bn from the troubled asset relief programme.
7/14/09 Robert Reich, Salon.Com