In my latest column for the American Prospect, I write:
In 2011, grassroots economic-justice organizations mobilized protests at six corporate shareholder meetings. This year, there have already been 20, including the stunning disruption of Bank of America’s shareholder meeting last week to protest foreclosure abuses and funding for mountaintop removal mining, and another 20 protests are scheduled in the coming weeks. That alone says something about the rising scale of public anger at the abuses of crony capitalism, but such anger—even when it takes to the streets—doesn’t always lead directly to concrete policy change.
Yet last month, Citigroup shareholders rejected a lavish $15 million exit pay package for the company’s chief executive, Vikram S. Pandit. Shareholder activism is nothing new, but this was the first time on record that shareholders at a major bank successfully blocked a CEO pay package. Taken as a whole, this suggests that protesters aren’t just lone wolfs tilting at windmills but, rather, represent the moral mainstream of America, agitating for and starting to achieve changes in an economic system that no longer works for working people.
Evolving toward what? Read the piece!
The protesters are not anti-American radicals. They are the defenders of the American Dream, the decision from the birth of our nation that success should be determined by hard work not royal bloodlines.
http://fxn.ws/pcKGz7
My first column for The Guardian’s Comment Is Free America outlet: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/aug/24/profit-wall-street-recession
What would Oprah and Henry Ford have done? http://bit.ly/osRoXG
My thoughts on Obama calling GOP bluff on debt, crumbling of Democratic liberalism, Immelt and Chamber of Commerce whining about “certainty” and Cisco firing people to grow profits >> If you want to receive my adVantage Points every weekday morning in your inbox, email info@movementvision.org
Debt Talks Display Crumbling Of Democratic Liberalism
Raising the debt ceiling has absolutely nothing to do with future spending. In fact, in a sputtering economy where the private sector is sitting on record profits and capital reserves but not creating jobs, government spending that creates jobs rebuilding infrastructure and educating the next generation is the solution, not the problem. That Democrats are helping kill government investment, instead of defending it, is a nod to the long-term victory of conservative ideology over liberalism.
Obama Should Call Republicans’ Bluff – story
If Republicans refuse to raise taxes even modestly on the couple hundred Americans who are faring damn well in this economy, Obama should call their bluff and use his Constitutional power to honor our nation’s debts anyway — and impeaching the Republican leadership for violating their oath of office to uphold the Constitution.
Jobs vs. Profits: Cisco Considering Layoffs To Boost Earnings - story
These are the CEOs who need more tax breaks! Conservatives heralding the allegedly-free market as the fabled savior of both millionaires and working stiffs should take note that big business, left to its own devices, will very often chose profits over people. But hey, I’m sure that with real unemployment at 20%, those Cisco employees will have no problem finding new jobs — maybe making parts for corporate jets?
Certainty, Schmertainty: Immelt & Chamber Call For Debt Deal - story
What is it with these wussy big business execs? Once upon a time, being an entrepreneur meant taking risks in an uncertain market environment — hoping that your gamble would pay off. Now, Wall Street constantly whines about how the government they want off their backs is, in fact, supposed to create certainty for them. Does that “certainty” come with a pacifier and blanky?
When I first arrived at Edda Lopez’s house, I wondered how this elderly woman lives on the second floor of her elevator-less home despite being wheelchair bound. After an hour with Edda, I no longer wondered. Edda is a fighter. She fought for her family and her way of life, persevering even after her home burned down and her husband died a few years later. And now, Edda is fighting Bank of America.
Bank of America services one out of every four mortgages in the United States and is responsible for more foreclosures than any other bank in the country. And now Bank of America is foreclosing on Edda.
Edda lives in Bronx, NY, on a tree-lined side street with playgrounds and parks nearby. You think it might be different, being in the big city, in one of the poorest parts of the nation. But Edda’s block looks a lot like the small towns and suburbs that speckle our country. You would feel right at home in her cozy living room or the wide front porch Edda’s husband once built with her sons.
When Edda’s husband died in 2005 and she lost her job in 2008, she still held on. Edda was approached by a mortgage re-financing company who promised to lower her monthly payments. But buried in hundreds of pages of documents were loopholes and scams. Edda was surprised to find herself an unwitting victim of predatory lending and a sub-prime mortgage. Her payments actually went up.
She tried again. Edda re-negotiated her mortgage with another, more-reputable bank and got her payments down to $2,101 a month, which she could handle. Everything was fine until, in early 2010, Bank of America bought Edda’s mortgage and announced her payments would be at least $1,000 higher. What? Edda called Bank of America and only then found out that they had rejected her modification and Bank of America considered Edda behind on her loan for failing to pay the higher amount all along. On the phone — and only because she called them — Bank of America told Edda Lopez that her home would be sold at auction on June 26, 2010.
To all those who blame the hundreds of thousands of families facing foreclosure for their predicament and argue that big businesses like Bank of America should be able to do whatever they want, whenever they want, in the spirit of “free market” capitalism and the American way, you need to meet Edda Lopez. Edda is just like the many other hardworking Americans, struggling to play by the rules and reach their dreams but repeatedly knocked down by cheating, greedy corporations. Since when did the American dream turn into corporate-only heaven?
You can watch a video about Edda Lopez and sign a petition to protect her home at http://showdowninamerica.org/edda-lopez. The community organization National People’s Action has made over 23 formal requests to meet with Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan to demand an end to unjust foreclosures for Edda and thousands of other American families. Today, Edda will at a vigil outside the $1 billion Bank of America Tower in New York along with her family, community leaders and clergy members praying that Bank of America does the right thing. It’s a sad day in America when hardworking families are reduced to praying for their livelihoods to the gods of big banks.
What else could we do with $5.5 billion in bonuses Goldman Sachs is giving its employees for the first three months of 2010? You’d think that after ruining our economy AND being indicted for fraud, Goldman would have the sense to give the American public the money to spend ourselves.
Actually, on second thought, they did such a great job tanking our economy, I’m sure they deserve it.
Watch my latest video blog with ideas for what else we could spend that $5.5 billion on.
And check out the Showdown in America, with events planned across the country of ordinary Americans telling the big banks enough is enough!
http://showdowninamerica.org/
Recently, Texas Gov. Rick Perry fired up a group of Tea Party activists by ranting against “big daddy” government. But when we’re facing the worst economic crisis in decades, brought about by Wall Street’s blatantly greedy and fraudulent manipulation of our economic security for their personal gain, we should be welcoming “big daddy” government with open arms. Wall Street needs a spanking.
But instead, in his speech today to financial sector executives, President Obama was at pains to provide comfort to the crooks of Wall Street rather than chastise them. “I believe in the power of the free market. I believe in a strong financial sector that helps people to raise capital and get loans and invest their savings.” According to the White House, the President is intentionally avoiding a scolding tone in favor of the sort of plain-people-joining-with-powerful-CEOs bipartisanship that was so plainly absurd in health care reform. Obama’s Kumbaya calculus seems based on two assumptions — first, that the American public doesn’t want their president to fundamentally criticize capitalism; second, that the American public will believe the spoon fed load of crap that Wall Street executives had our economic best interests at heart but just somehow, by accident, went astray.
Average Americans who’ve had their homes pulled out from under their feet, their credit card interest rates quadrupled, their jobs shipped over seas — because the financial industry literally created “investments” that bet against the American dream — are not stupid enough to believe that this was all an honest mistake. Taxpayers who were told that bank bailouts were the only way to save our entire economy from disaster can smell the deception buried beneath record Wall Street profits and bonuses now surfacing in the first quarter of 2010 alone. Our collective critique scratches more than the skin of “a few bad apple” executives here and there. In November 2009, a BBC World Service poll found that 63% of Americans think capitalism in its current form is not working. Since then, everything from the Citizens United ruling to the Goldman Sachs indictment has only confirmed our deep suspicion that the nature of capitalism in America is rotten.
That doesn’t mean we don’t believe in markets and business. Americans are nothing if not entrepreneurial and industrious. But that’s not what capitalism in America looks like today. The version of market economics that’s been shoved down our national throat is designed exclusively by and for the benefit of giant corporations. Big business buys our politicians and writes our laws so they can crush small competitors, pillage our environment and destroy workers lives and human rights and anything else that stands in their way. And because big business owns our media, too, they have the perfect platform to persuade us over and over again that this arrangement is in our collective best interest.
As Americans, we buy a lot of crap, but we’ve finally stopped buying this lie. What’s good for big business is not good for America.
For too long, mass public disaffection with the way capitalism in America is structured has been silenced because politicians and the media, beholden to big business, convinced us there is no alternative. Now, faced with such a sobering and stubborn economic crisis caused by very deliberate flaws in our economic structures, we’re more aware than ever not only that there is an alternative but that we must embrace it. That doesn’t mean socialism. But it does mean aggressively critiquing and re-constructing capitalism so that the market’s primary goal is to work for working class and struggling Americans. The very survival of the American dream is at stake.
On Thursday, April 29, 2010, thousands of ordinary Americans will descend on Wall Street to call for meaningful financial reform that holds big banks accountable and makes our economy work for everyone. Those of us who will be at the Showdown on Wall Street — and the millions of Americans we represent — are worried about our jobs, our homes, our farms, our children’s education, our very way of life. What we’re not worried about is hurting capitalism’s feelings. After all, capitalism never coddled us.
Here’s Jon Stewart’s take on fraud charges filed against Goldman Sachs and conservative opposition to clearly much-needed financial regulation. Brilliant (Stewart, that is — not the Wall St. crooks and Republican liars)!
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| These F@#king Guys – Goldman Sachs | ||||
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And if you never saw my video exposing how Goldman Sachs was betting on death in its “death bond” derivative scheme, there’s no time like the present:
Reports are surfacing that the man sent to prison for 150 years for defrauding hundreds of investors of $65 billion was not, in fact, mastermind Bernie Madoff but an imposter Madoff hired to take the fall on his behalf.
Americans across the country are appalled. “What the f*ck?” asked Drew Armarmarger, emptying his pockets to pay for gas money in Boca Raton, FL. “If you’re convicted of the crime, you should do the time.”
“It’s horrifying,” said Josefina Moran of Altoona, PA. “What if he strikes again? Our economy can’t take any more madmen like this running free,” Armarmarger exclaimed, clutching her purse tight to her chest.
Facebook and Twitter are afire with calls for investigations. “We will be responding,” announced Sergeant Tim Tratum, the New York Police Department officer in charge of making sure that the people who are convicted of crimes are the ones who actually physically get locked behind bars. In a rare moment of humility from the NYPD, Tratum said, “We’re feeling kind of stupid here.”
There have been conflicting reports that the real Madoff is now either running a new scam of nationwide check cashing stores or serving as an advisor to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.
The news of Madoff’s evasion of prison is popping up in other news stories. Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, indicted for war crimes and destined for incarceration himself, declared, “Awesome! That dude is my hero!” And beleaguered golf superstar Tiger Woods, who must have wished for his own imposter in recent months, expressed not jealousy but disdain. “Y’all in the media are covering what I did 24/7 and meanwhile let this slide by? What the f*ck?”
Actually… in 2009, the pharmaceutical manufacturer Pfizer was ordered to pay the largest criminal fine in U.S. history — $1.19 billion — for illegally marketing the painkiller Bextra, a drug the FDA approved only in low-doses for the relief of arthritis and menstrual discomfort. Pfizer nonetheless pushed Bextra as an all-purpose pain killer in high doses for acute, post-surgical pain — despite the FDA’s finding that in such uses, Bextra would significantly increase risks of heart attack and stroke.
The criminal conviction for illegal marketing of Bextra would have barred Pfizer from participating in federal Medicare and Medicaid drug programs. So, with the consent of federal prosecutors, Pfizer created a “shell company” — Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. — to take the fall. According to a CNN Special Investigation:
“…the subsidiary is nothing more than a shell company whose only function is to plead guilty. According to court documents, Pfizer Inc. owns (a) Pharmacia Corp., which owns (b) Pharmacia & Upjohn LLC, which owns (c) Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. LLC, which in turn owns (d) Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. Inc. It is the great-great-grandson of the parent company.”
Parmacia & Upjohn Co. is barred from doing business with federally-funded health programs, while Pfizer continues to reap profits from our tax payer dollars. This isn’t the only trouble Pfizer has caused in the last few weeks but while as a country we keep pushing for tougher law-and-order treatment of individual crimes, massive and monstrous corporate crimes are routinely overlooked by our political system (which is now officially a wholly-owned subsidiary of corporate America).
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