December 23, 2008
Steve Collins
Previous postings at this blog have documented the corruption that exists on Wall Street and in the modern system of world finance and banking. A flurry of recent revelations are worth noting as it indicates that the real extent of the rot inside Wall Street is now starting to spill out into public view.
You are all, no doubt, familiar with stories about the gargantuan ponzi scheme run by former NASDAQ Chairman Bernie Madoff. It scammed mega-billions from many famous people and organizations. The reports I’ve seen indicted the scam may have ripped off about $50,000,000,000 (50 Billion!) from those who invested their money with Madoff. This is a huge number that is barely comprehensible! It is over three times the size of the Wall Street “Bridge Loan” given by the US Government to the Big Three automakers recently. I wonder how many nations don’t have annual budgets that large!
Some media reports have documented that the SEC was warned about problems with Madoff’s dealings, but the SEC chose to look the other way (probably because Madoff was such a Wall Street “insider” that the SEC made a conscious decision to not look for the corruption that was there). That a former head of one of the major stock exchanges was running a deeply-corrupt, crooked operation makes one wonder how many more insider investment pools, hedge funds, etc. are also dishonest operations. In 1929, there were reports of brokers jumping out of buildings to commit suicide after the great stock market crash. Today, Fox News reported that the founder of one of the larger Hedge Funds involved with Madoff’s ponzi scheme was found dead of an apparent suicide (see first link below).
The SEC appears to have been complicit in Madoff’s ponzi scheme via its passivity. Indeed, the issue of corruption on the part of the government regulators is also starting to come out publicly. The USA Today’s December 23, 2008 issue reported that one of the top regulators at the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) was “removed from his job” because he had been complicit in helping Washington Mutual and IndyMac Banks “cook their books” by backdating capital infusions (see second link below). The article notes that “the OTS had also allowed other thrifts to record capital before it had been received,” leading Sen. Charles Grassley to observe: “What does that mean about the real financial condition of other banks?” A very good question, indeed! I think many people besides Sen. Grassley are wondering how extensive the dishonest financial accounting really is in large banking and Wall Street firms. The third link below is from Jim Cramer’s “Mad Money”‘ program on CNBC. Cramer calls for the resignation of the SEC Chairman Cox for his regulatory actions which tilted the market in favor of short sellers. It involves an arcane rule about an “uptick rule” re: short selling, but Cramer makes a good case that the markets have been altered (a layman would likely use the word “rigged”) to favor those who are short-selling stocks and (I assume) commodities.
The fourth link below (also from USA Today’s December 23, 2009 issue) reports on the extremely lax supervision by the US Congress and the US treasury re: the funds released so far as part of the $700 Billion TARP program approved willy-nilly by Congress without any meaningful hearings or debate. Do you realize how bizarre this action of Congress was? Congress has held extensive hearings on the $15 billion bailout for the Big Three automakers and asked tough questions of the automaker CEOs. They required the CEOs to give up their corporate planes, reduce executive salaries and perks, etc. (as they should!). However, ex-Goldman Sachs CEO Henry Paulson (on leave from Goldman Sachs to run the US Treasury for awhile) demanded $700 billion (50 times the amount given to the automakers!) to bailout the Big Banks and Wall Street Firms and Congress scarcely asks a single meaningful question. Did they demand that the Big Bank CEOs sell their jets, drastically cut their compensation and perk packages, etc.” like they demanded of the automaker CEOs? Of course not.
The fourth link below documents that the bailed-out banks are stiffing the Congress and media by refusing to answer any questions what they are doing with the billions being given to them from the Congress. Apparently, they don’t have to do so because Congress was too dumb to write the law with tough regulatory oversights attached.
In case you are not angry enough already over the corruption and misdeeds of big banks and Wall Street executives, the final link below should make you steaming mad. This AP story reports that the executives of the banks receiving the taxpayer bailouts are so self-indulgent that they are spending vast amounts of money lining their own pockets with bonuses, fat perks, etc. The AP article reports: “The total amount given to nearly 600 executives would cover bailout costs for many of the 116 banks that have so far accepted tax dollars…” A few token “cuts” have been made but they amount to nothing compared to the obscene self-indulgent use of taxpayer funds to lavishly indulge the executives of the big banks. Some of the more egregious rip-offs of taxpayers funds listed in the article include the following. Wells Fargo Bank gave “its top executives up to $20,000 each to pay personal financial planners” (What–they couldn’t afford to pay for financial planners out of their own multi-million dollar compensation packages?) Bank of New York Mellon Corp.’s CEO was given over $66,000 for a personal financial planner, almost $8.5 million in salary and bonuses, a car and driver costing $178,000 and even $800,000+ in “relocation expenses.” Goldman-Sachs gave its top staff “leased cars and drivers” which cost “233,000 per executive” (emphasis added). The JP Morgan Chairman ran up $211,000 in private jet bills last year “commuting between Chicago and New York.” You better be sitting down when you read the final link below.
Doesn’t it comfort you to know that all the above Big Banks have been pleading poverty to Congress so they can receive mega-billions of your taxdollars (and the future earnings of your children and grandchildren) to fund their stunningly self-indulgent lifestyles? If you are bothered by it, contact your US Senators and Congressional representatives. They are the ones who voted to permit this rip-off. It is the US Congress which has failed to exercise any meaningful oversight of the Executive Branch regulatory agencies which are suppose to provide oversight to the financial and business markets.
This blog documents some of the illicit industry-governmental cooperation that occurs behind the scenes. Revelation 18 prophesied this very thing would occur in the latter days. Revelation 18:3 prophesied that the “kings of the earth” (the government leaders and regulators) would be complicit with “the merchants of the earth” (leaders of all kinds of large multinational businesses) as they would mutually “wax rich” with “delicacies” by being in bed with each other (the Bible calls their business relationships “fornication”). Revelation 17-18 prophesies that this corrupt private-public system called “Babylon the Great” will collapse during the latter days and be replaced by a new global “beast” system which will first “burn with fire” the system of Babylon the Great before the beast system itself is later destroyed when it opposes the Lord Himself when he returns (Rev. 17:12-17). The public links cited below contain plenty of ammo for those around the world who are sick of the obscene self-indulgence of Babylon the Great’s system and want a new system of global finance to replace it. If you wish to learn more about the ancient origins of the current global system of world finance, you can read my article What Kind of Captivity? available at this website. If you want to learn about its biblically-prophesied downfall in the years ahead of us, you can read my recent article Is Babylon the Great about to Fall…Ushering in Global Beast System? (also available at this website).
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,471725,00.html
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/banking/2008-12-22-indymac_N.htm
http://www.cnbc.com/id/27850397
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/banking/2008-12-22-bailout-money-where_N.htm
http://money.aol.ca/article/executive-bailouts-bgt/463646/
