This kind of give some credibility to some of the claims about the NWO conspiracy stuff…

Jed Clampett

If you are wondering why this all happened, you merely need to look at the collusion between big business and government (happening globaly it seems).
Alaska is a great example of the affliction (greed) at the moment. Just listen to what 40 years a senator Stevens had to say on a private call to his business buddy…
Stevens said. “It may be what we’ve done leaves the impression we’ve done something wrong, but you have to make up your mind you’re doing something wrong, you have to have an intention to do something wrong to really be guilty of a crime. So it’s a long way before we’re going to be in front of a jury. I hope to God neither one of us is, but we don’t want to get ourselves there by trying to do something that leads to a different kind of charge.” … “These guys can’t really hurt us. They’re not going to shoot us,” Stevens told Allen. “Hell, the worst that can happen to us is that we run up a bunch of legal fees, and might lose and might have to pay a fine and might have to serve a little time in jail — I hope to Christ it never gets to that — and I don’t think it will. I’m developing the attitude that I don’t think I did anything wrong so I’m going to go right through my life and keep doing what I think is right.”

Which basically means what I’ve told you before. These guys feel that if they convince themselves, and ultimately investigators, prosecutors and maybe a jury; that they had no bad intention in commiting their crimes, then there is no crime. Much like the guys from AIG going on a $400 thousand vacation after getting bailed out for $85 billion. Or the guys from Bear Sterns (or whatever financial management firm it was that went under) that gave themselves multimillion dollar bonuses on the way out. Shouldn’t those millions have been spread among the workers who actually made the company into an investment powerhouse rather than the executive board whose stupid decisions destroyed it?

We should make bribery in government that is contrary to the tenets of the constitution, fairness in business and empathy for the populace, a capital offense. Apparently, jail time is not a deterrent to these guys, they can do a few years in club fed and then return to enjoy their fortunes. At least, make it a life in prison charge for abuse of a public office and theft from the treasury… particularly in a time of war, this should be considered treason.

Peace

Jed Clampett

the company was Lehman Brothers not Bear and the executive was Richard S. Fuld Jr.
Dick made over $260 million over Lehmans best 4 years of 2003 to 2007. Most failed loans were provided by unregulated institutions rather than the regulated Cummunity Reinvestment law pushed by ACORN and others that the republicans are trying to blame the collapse on. The guys ranks 11th on forbes highest paid CEOs list. One of the 3%-ers.

en.wikipedia.org/wi ki/Richard_S._Fuld,_Jr.

5 year compensation total… $354.03 million. Wow. He really must be good if he commands that much money, how did his company fail? perhaps he wasn’t as good as $75 million or so a year.

http://www.forbes.com/lists/ 2008/12/lead_bestbosses08_Rich ard-S-Fuld-Jr_A9P0.html

Ran ks 374 on Forbes 400 richest americans. These are the guys that we are helping with out $700+ billion. Those who have the most to loose from a financial collapse.

http://www.forbes.com/li sts/2006/54/biz_06rich400_Rich ard-S-Fuld-Jr_A9P0.html

Pea ce

Jed Clampett

Damn it. The Judge and the prosecution are already doing things to help the Stevens defense and derail the prosecution of these guys. He’s already dismissing some evidence because of the way it was presented. Sure the hours billed were fraudulent, it’s just further evidence of how corrupt the players actually are. I would hate to see the old fart escape this trial.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy n/content/article/2008/10/02/A R2008100201492.html?hpid=moreh eadlines

Here’s what a few thousands b.uys you from a senator… quite lucrative investment if you think about it. They s.ell us out cheap, remember Cunnigham?

alaskareport.com/n ews98/x61629_trial_2393937272. htm

Peace

I’m a bit miffed about the fate of the 17 Chinese Uighur detainees at Guantanamo. Can you BELIEVE they got that judges order to release them OVERTURNED? These guys never did anything to anybody. We hold them in our caribbean hell hole for 7 YEARS. These guys should have been released 6 years and 11 months ago.

The administrations lawyers just had to raise the specter of 9/11 and ‘terrorists’ (none of which has anything to do with these guys). “OMG, release them on American soil” you say? DAMN RIGHT. What right did we have to take 7 YEARS from the lives of innocent people? We can’t legally release them to China where they will surely be tortured or killed. We owe them this.

Jed Clampett

Justice, American Style.

I guess it is the same freedom, fairness in treaties and justice offered to the native people’s of America. The Cuban people. The Americans who chose to join a comm.unist or soci.alist party. etc. etc.
Realize the deception now? Take your country back or you will be the next victims.

Peace

Latent racism, again.

TinMan,

They’re scared poopless that if they release them, NOW the 17 WILL be terrorists. Wonder why? Years of incarceration and abuse? Torture?

At the time you say they should have been released, this country began programming them to be terrorists.

Given that this IS the 21st Century and we have YEARS and YEARS of history and experience to draw from, could any government be more STUPID!!??!!

Not unlike the criminals we’re programming in our penal institutes. Makes sense, really. If we don’t have enemies (terrorists, criminals, et al) then we don’t need funding for the services designed to ‘protect’ us from them.

And a bureaucracy is tops on Darwin’s list of ‘animals’ clawing to survive. Okay, make that DirtyDennis’ list, but that doesn’t sound as good.

Jed, I agree with you completely that something fiercer needs to happen to these CEOs that run their company into the ground and walk with millions upon millions of dollars. Fuld actually made $500,000,000 since 2000 with Lehman Bros. That is inexcusable especially since he did a $hit job with the company. The greed and lack of ethics of both politicians and corporations is responsible for this, including the likes of Stevens and Barney Frank who were too concerned with their own interests instead of looking out for those they were elected to protect. By the way, the guys from AIG that went on that junket should be dragged out into the middle of the street and beaten with socks of coins.

SWIM,

I’m getting the feeling that you are not exactly ‘in the middle’. The issue of CEO pay (while somewhat relevent) is really more of a red herring. The thing that we all need to understand is that this bailout as currently implemented is fatally flawed. There’s no way that we can throw enough mo.ney at these guys to solve the liquidity crisis. They are used to borrowing and lending trillions of dol.lars every day. Right now they are putting it all in T-bills and mo.ney market funds (the giant mattress). There is no regulation and no transparency so nobody trusts anybody.

The answer is built into the bailout bill, but Paulson doesn’t want to use it. He should do what the Brits are doing, b.uy out the majority stock in these banks at current bargain-basement pri.ces, fire the executives (if they deserve it) and reorganize the assets. This is the only way that they can save the system with a ‘paltry’ sum like 700B.

The government would not have to hold onto the stock very long. As soon as the value went up, they would se.ll and make back the 700B plus interest.

All economists I have heard interviewed (right and left) have recommended this action. Paulson is hesitant because there will be a short-lived dip in the stock prices once they are obtained.

Paulson is like a monkey with a coin in his hand in a narrow-necked gourd. He wants to get his hand out of the bottle, but he is stuck because he is greedy and won’t let go of the coin.

SWIM,
I’m not happy with democratic senators either. But the real force of our fury should be directed at Bush, Paulson, Bernanke, and Cox. Cox was a $hitty regulator, he and Bernanke were asleep at the wheel. Bernanke, Bush and Paulson started the snowball rolling on the lack of investor confidence by carting out the hyperbolic doomsday rhetoric at the start of the major crisis. I hope they learned their lesson about trying to shock wall street, but I doubt it.