Goldman Sachs rules the world...
By louisehartmann
Are the banksters fueling a global market meltdown? Heads turned yesterday – when stock trader Alessio Rastani went on the BBC and predicted that the Eurozone is going to crash within the next twelve months – and that a lot of banksters will make a fortune off it. "This problem cannot be solved,” Rastani said. “I’m fairly confident that the Euro is going to crash, and it’s going to fall pretty hard.” Rastani then admitted that he – as well as traders in giant banks on Wall Street - have actually placed bets that global markets will crash, and are poised to make huge profits if their bets come in.
Rastani said, “The depression in the 30′s wasn’t just about a market crash. There were some people who were prepared to make money from that crash. I think anybody can do that. The governments don’t rule the world,” Rastani added, “Goldman Sachs rules the world. Goldman Sachs does not care about this rescue package.” From manipulating food prices that spark a hunger crisis around the world – to distorting oil prices that trigger recessions here in the United States – to bringing down an entire global economy – it’s all part of a day’s work for traders like Rastani and Goldman Sachs.
How much longer are we going to let speculators and banksters run the show – and screw us all over?
Comments
#2
Goldman Sachs does not rule the world- they are only trying to through you off.
It's Jardines Fleming, and they are insanely jealous of Jewish gold.
"Her Majesty's a pretty nice girl, but she doesn't have a lot to say."
#3
This looks like a great time for my union pension fund to step up, hedge their bets, and finally make some money for a change. If only they would follow the banks investing strategies all of us members would benefit far more than we are now. I still cannot find out how all my monthly dues are distributed. Much information seems to be protected.
#4
Legalize all Hemp products.
SNVJmwUzGc
This is the most important topic. Making it's way through...
H.R. 1009 To legalize industrial hemp.
#5
I know a way to fight Citizens United without a Constitutional Amendment. It's "Civiliter Mortuus" (Civil Death). It's the legal concept that allows States to prevent convicted felons from voting, or possessing firearms, or being lawyers, or working in certain professions. It allows the Federal government to prevent convicted felons from enjoying full Constitutional rights. Among the most important of those rights is that to can be taken from you is the right to life. The States and Feds can kill you if you're convicted of certain crimes.
Many corporations have been convicted of federal crimes. Many more would have been if the U.S. Dept. of Justice hadn't come up with the idea of "defered prosecution" that allows a felon corporation to escape conviction by paying a fine. That nonsense needs to stop! What the Justice Dept. could do is forbid corporate felons from spending money in political races (corporate free speach) or hiring lobbyists to enfluence legislation. Free speach is a constitutional right that can be taken from a convicted felon.
The Supreme Court said that corporations are persons. If they're persons they can be convicted of felonies and as convicted felons they can lose their right to free speach. How could the conservatives on the Court get around that stumbling block to the corporate theft of our democracy?
(An interesting aside is that the Colt arms corporation pled guilty to a felony over 30 years ago for cheating the Federal government. That created a problem because they couldn't legal possess firearms. Congress rushed through an exception to the federal firearms laws concerning concerning convicted felons--of course Colt got the exception. But any convicted felon can apply for the exception to the rule that prevents them from possessing firearms.)
#6
I'd sell my Disney Stock, and Berkshire Hathaway, before something weird happens.
#7
Just a note about Jardines Fleming, opium and cannabis- Robert Fleming formerly controlled jute production in the United States, and made quite a big sum selling both sides jute sandbags during the Civil War, while China was forced by Jardines to allow the opium trade through their ports into China.
#8
Thom and the rest of the rational world,
ARE you sure we all didn't get sandbagged by the 'YES' men?
Ned
#9
As long as you and your (media) ilk keep propping up candidates like Obama (or Bush, or Romney, or Kerry, or whoever the status quo candidate is)!! How can you even ask that question with a straight face??? It's not like you DON'T know that many of the same advisers and banksters that got us into this mess are still advising the prez and have positions of power etc... I mean when you've got Robert Rubin, Greenspan, Bernanke et al fighting the CFTC back in the late 90's or early 2000's fighting to stop any kind of regulations at all on OTC derivatives and such, and these are the guys that are STILL in charge of this mess, and you expect something different? This makes sense to you?!? You praise Obama and (sort of) rally against the banksters! What's the difference??? You're not serious, or you're stupid, and we all know that you're not stupid. Oh and the so called "wall street reforms" that Obama got passed? Give me a break! Obama is a friend to the banksters, otherwise he wouldn't be in office, and so was Bush and so was Clinton and so will be Romney, or Perry, or Bachman, or Cain, or Huntsman, or Santorum, or Newt.
You know that there is only one candidate that would actually try to rein in the speculators, but your loyalty to your ideology, I suspect, prevents you from being honest and declare that if we really want things to change we have to elect Ron Paul! I mean you cannot with any amount of honesty rail against the the status quo and at the same time do everything you can to keep it the same.
#10
I want a Glass-Stegall Act for the 21st century passed NOW, with plenty of restrictions on Wall Street trading; I want it implemented globally; and I want to MAKE BANKING BORING ONCE MORE!!!
The US had a stable financial economy for 50 years after the New Deal. I want a Newer Deal that deals with the Great Recession!!!
GS does NOT rule the hearts and minds of the people, and eventually the people are going to come crashing down on these irresponsible members of Congress and ride them out of town on a rail!
#11
Is cat food ok for human consumption or should I just eat the cat? Maybe with a little Ripple to wash it down?
#12
The question is exposure. Who is going to expose the real level of speculation by firms such as Goldman Sachs? This has been going on for years but you hardly hear about it. The right controls most of the media sources and don't allow it to see the light of day. There are not enough Thom Hartmann's. We need to help Free Speech t.v. become available on all television networks. If you can't get Free Speech t.v., call your provider and demand they be added. If someone has a grassroots program to expose speculation of this variety, I'm in. Just let us know how to help.
#13
Dylan Ratigan has a new petition at getmoneyout.com to amend the constitution. I think getting the money out of politics is the only way to fix the system
#14
I don't know if it is Goldman Sachs or some other group but there is definitely a group manipulating things for their own agenda and financial benefit. I'd love to help stop it but have now idea how to do that. I want more regulations and have stated that in e-mails to my representatives in D.C. and to the President. Don't know what else to do. I also have asked to have banks pay back what they were given. Too bad the money didn't go directly to the people that needed mortgage help. Then they would have won, the banks would not have a large number of reposessed properties, and the economy would be in a bit better shape.
#15
The politicians have two choices: keep representing corporate interests to the harm of the middle class and poor and have one or another type of revolution that will throw those bribed bastards out on their asses, or start representing humanity's interests.
And until the day when a corporation is sentenced to prison for murder, a corporation is NOT a person, so they should not have ANY of the rights that people enjoy.
There is one way, however, that I could see my way clear to agree with the Supreme Court that corporations are people: if the Supreme court openly admits that it is a traitorous bunch of fascists who hate America and want to destroy it. Which would be the first time they have told the truth since they got a republican majority.
#16
Banksters will run the show until their unstoppable countdown to social chaos ends. Then fear and hate will take over.
#17
The San Francisco Chronicle article on Sunday, Europe pressed to reach debt plan, shows Geithner talking to IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde. "Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner bluntly told officials at a meeting of the IMF that time was running short to stave off potential domino-style defaults in Europe." Now for the rest of the story the article doesn't mention - Geithner, the Chicago School "Shock Doctrine" "architect," along with other Goldman Sachs crooks, liars and thieves, have rammed through the United States and world economies their own version of what we did to the rest of the world economies and now he is sitting there telling them they need to fix the mess or dominos will fall! He does have the nerve of Hitler! And no pun intended...this is the very economic crisis Geithner and friends orchestrated! Alan Greenspan said upon retirement that the Chicago School model did not work and was a failure - the model the "Shock Doctrine" was based on. When is this madness going to end with criminal indictments for RICO violations against them all? Where is President Obama and Eric Holder? In their pockets unfortunately...and that is why I won't be voting for him next time around!
#18
Sociopath/Vulture: "The depression in the 30's wasn't just about a market crash. There were SOME PEOPLE who were prepared to make money from that crash. I think anybody can do that. The governments don't rule the world."
Concerned Citizen/Me: "The depression in the 30's wasn't just about a market crash. There were MANY PEOPLE not prepared or expecting to become jobless, homeless, and hungry. I don't think anybody should have to live like that. We need governments that practice Democratic Socialism to honestly represent the citizens of the world."
People like Rastani created the reason for.... "origin and rise of government; namely a mode rendered necessary by the inability of moral virtue to govern the world...." Thomas Paine
#19
Taylor Caldwell wrote Captains and Kings as a novel in 1972... her vision of the world is dead on. As long as greed and power is involved we as a nation/world/species will never evolve. Hopefully in a few million years we will pull ourselves out of this primordal goo...
#20
"How much longer are we going to let speculators and banksters run the show – and screw us all over?"
The answer to that is: As long as we continue to believe that a social-system of true "representative democracy" can actually exist beyond the most localized of levels.
A recent news article on the resistance of indigenous people in Bolivia will help make my point more clear: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/09/20119278844472501.html
This news clip gets at the root problem Indigenous people, and all people that wish to live more in harmony with Nature, face: Government interest = Corporate Interest; and that profit-driven, exploitative and destructive activity continues to reign wherever that false authority exists, even if that authority includes the 1st Indigenous president of a country. These thousands of people trying to protect their land, and preserve it for their children, are told "This highway will be very beneficial for the nation's economy." What these indigenous people of Bolivia realize is that just means it will be beneficial for the ruling class, not any one else. "But this project will create jobs!" the farmers of humans proclaim. Yes, jobs to destroy the natural environment and just further the monetary/corporate dependence of the masses.
This goes on everywhere, the other day I saw a local South Carolina news report about people calling for legal action against a corporation that severely polluted the water in a natural area, and what did the politician interviewed say? Something like "If we fine this corp too much they may have to lay-off workers so we must act prudently." Do you see how this works at the fundamental level? They prevent you from living self-sufficiently and sustainably on the Earth, then make you beg for jobs that further destroy the environment, further entrenching their control and your enslavement.
The only solution is for families to claim sovereign land as a human right (i.e. nonviolent green-anarchism); nothing else can stop this never-ending abusive relationship between disturbed control-freaks (aka "officials") and the rest of the world (including other species and the ecosystem as a whole).
#21
The question you posed should be given to Barack Obama. Mr. Hartmann, you have an excellent program, but I'm mystified that you're still carrying water for him. I know your arguments well. They pale more every day in the light of more pressing facts.
#22
These banksters and speculators must be stopped, and the markets can do it. Two simple rules need to be implemented to bring sanity back:
1) No more short selling!
If you don't own the stock/bond/commodity, you can't sell it. The markets were invented to provide capital to industry and profits to legitimate investors, not to gamblers.
2) No more high-speed trading!
If you buy a stock/bond/commodity, you own that lot for 48 hours minimum.
An I crazy, or would these rules, properly applied and agreed by worldwide securities markets, solve the main problems?
-- Dean (just an engineer...)
#23
You are crazy.
#24
I don't really see anything changing until we have another Great Depression. Or maybe another World War. We'll have to hit rock bottom before we can climb out of the hole we've dug.
Corporate America is so entrenched in American Government that it doesn't matter what politcal party is elected, as they are both unduly influenced by special interest money, and pass laws and policy accordingly. As long as corporations are accepted as persons, and as long as the people running the corporations have no other mandate except to the bottom line of the shareholders, the greater good of society will be ignored. What's a million dollar fine to a multi-billion dollar company? The cost of doing business. Why create manufacturing jobs in America when you can greatly increase your bottom line by moving overseas?
Our economy is based on CDOs, futures, and other abstract, economic terms that to most people have little tangible meaning, and is itself a bubble that will one day burst.
Interstingly enough, the Supreme Court decision which led to the legal fiction of corporate personhood, set a legal precedent not intended by the court or any of the justices. In Santa Clara v. Southern Pacific Railroad, 1886, the Railroad, a 30 million dollar company, was refusing to pay $30,000 worth of taxes, because of a dispute regarding the assessment of the railroad's property by Santa Clara Couty. Among other defenses, the Railroad was attempting to claim personhood status under the 14th amendment's equal protection clause. The SCOTUS had presided over several other similar cases involving the legal fiction of corporate personhood, and had struck the idea down each time.
This court ruled in favor of the Railroad, but the merits of the case were decided on the fact that the county assessed taxes that it was not entitled to assess. Accordingly, the court never ruled on the issue of personhood status. End of story. Except for one thing: The court recorder added this little jewel to the headnote of the case:
"The defendant Corporations are persons within the intent of the clause in section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
He entered this note because of a misunderstanding over comments made by Chief Justice Waite. It was never a factor in deciding the case. It DID NOT carry the weight of law, and it WAS NOT the offical position of the court. Yet, it was referred to, time and time again by other courts deciding issues of corporate personhood, and so became law.
A detailed account can be found here:
http://www.truth-out.org/unequal-protection-the-deciding-moment68397
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"A working class hero is something to be"
-John Lennon
That song goes a long way in describing what its like to make a median income or less. It talks about the oppression of the wealthy on the poor. One of my favorite lines in it is "There's room at the top they're telling you still, but first you must learn to smile while you kill". Obviously Lennon saw things as they were and are.
N