|
Korean Job Discussion Forums
"The Internet's Meeting Place for ESL/EFL Teachers from Around the World!"
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
|
 Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:48 am Post subject: Secret Banking Cabal Emerges From AIG Shadows |
 |
|
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aaIuE.W8RAuU
| Quote: |
Secret Banking Cabal Emerges From AIG Shadows.
Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- The idea of secret banking cabals that control the country and global economy are a given among conspiracy theorists who stockpile ammo, bottled water and peanut butter. After this week�s congressional hearing into the bailout of American International Group Inc., you have to wonder if those folks are crazy after all.
Wednesday�s hearing described a secretive group deploying billions of dollars to favored banks, operating with little oversight by the public or elected officials.
We�re talking about the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, whose role as the most influential part of the federal-reserve system -- apart from the matter of AIG�s bailout -- deserves further congressional scrutiny.
The New York Fed is in the hot seat for its decision in November 2008 to buy out, for about $30 billion, insurance contracts AIG sold on toxic debt securities to banks, including Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co., Societe Generale and Deutsche Bank AG, among others. That decision, critics say, amounted to a back-door bailout for the banks, which received 100 cents on the dollar for contracts that would have been worth far less had AIG been allowed to fail.
That move came a few weeks after the Federal Reserve and Treasury Department propped up AIG in the wake of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.�s own mid-September bankruptcy filing.
...
By pursuing this line of inquiry, the hearing revealed some of the inner workings of the New York Fed and the outsized role it plays in banking. This insight is especially valuable given that the New York Fed is a quasi-governmental institution that isn�t subject to citizen intrusions such as freedom of information requests, unlike the Federal Reserve.
This impenetrability comes in handy since the bank is the preferred vehicle for many of the Fed�s bailout programs. It�s as though the New York Fed was a black-ops outfit for the nation�s central bank.
...
As Representative Marcy Kaptur told Geithner at the hearing: �A lot of people think that the president of the New York Fed works for the U.S. government. But in fact you work for the private banks that elected you.�
And yet the New York Fed played an integral role in the government�s bailout of banks, often receiving surprisingly free rein to act as it saw fit.
...
New York Fed staff and outside lawyers from Davis Polk & Wardell edited AIG communications to investors and intervened with the Securities and Exchange Commission to shield details about the buyout transactions, according to a report by Issa.
That the New York Fed, a quasi-governmental body, was able to push around the SEC, an executive-branch agency, deserves a congressional hearing all by itself.
Later, when it became clear information would be disclosed, New York Fed legal group staffer James Bergin e-mailed colleagues saying: �I have to think this train is probably going to leave the station soon and we need to focus our efforts on explaining the story as best we can. There were too many people involved in the deals -- too many counterparties, too many lawyers and advisors, too many people from AIG -- to keep a determined Congress from the information.�
Think of the enormity of that statement. A staffer at a body with little public accountability and that exists to serve bankers is lamenting the inability to keep Congress in the dark.
This belies the culture of secrecy obviously pervasive within the New York Fed. Committee Chairman Edolphus Towns noted during the hearing that the bank initially refused to disclose even the names of other banks that benefited from its actions, arguing this information would somehow harm AIG.
...
Now, I�m not saying Congress should be meddling in interest-rate decisions, or micro-managing bank regulation. Nor do I think we should all don tin-foil hats and start ranting about the Trilateral Commission.
Yet when unelected and unaccountable agencies pick banking winners while trying to end-run Congress, even as taxpayers are forced to lend, spend and guarantee about $8 trillion to prop up the financial system, our collective blood should boil. |
The Fed is private. It is the face of a banking cartel. That cartel, in 1913, manged to gain control of the American monetary system and since that time the system has benefited the banks at the expense of the population (as it was designed to do). It it what it is. I'm happy to see that a Bloomberg columnist, of all people, is catching on. |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
|
| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 9:15 am Post subject: Re: Secret Banking Cabal Emerges From AIG Shadows |
|
|
| mises wrote: |
| The Fed is private. It is the face of a banking cartel. That cartel, in 1913, manged to gain control of the American monetary system and since that time the system has benefited the banks at the expense of the population (as it was designed to do). It it what it is. I'm happy to see that a Bloomberg columnist, of all people, is catching on. |
Anyone who's watched Zeitgeist, some of the Alex Jones videos, or a bunch of others on the Fed already knew that. Maybe the Bloomberg guy finally did.
Yet another conspiracy theory being proven true. Ho hum. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
nautilus
Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!
|
| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 2:57 pm Post subject: Re: Secret Banking Cabal Emerges From AIG Shadows |
|
|
| bacasper wrote: |
Anyone who's watched Zeitgeist, some of the Alex Jones videos, or a bunch of others on the Fed already knew that. Maybe the Bloomberg guy finally did.
Yet another conspiracy theory being proven true. Ho hum. |
Its also true that some peoples personalities cause them to look for conspiracies in everything. Maybe they got bullied at school, I dunno. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
|
| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:31 pm Post subject: Re: Secret Banking Cabal Emerges From AIG Shadows |
|
|
| nautilus wrote: |
| bacasper wrote: |
Anyone who's watched Zeitgeist, some of the Alex Jones videos, or a bunch of others on the Fed already knew that. Maybe the Bloomberg guy finally did.
Yet another conspiracy theory being proven true. Ho hum. |
Its also true that some peoples personalities cause them to look for conspiracies in everything. Maybe they got bullied at school, I dunno. |
The prevalence of Paranoid Personality Disorder is much less than the acceptance of the ideas presented in the above-mentioned films.
Furthermore, paranoid psychotics ideas are not based in reality, while the claims presented in the above-mentioned films are generally well documented.
It is a common tactic to try to smear those who would question the status quo with the epithet of mental illness. It doesn't work.
Its also true that some peoples personalities cause them to look for conspiracies only where there is evidence for it. Or don't you believe that some conspiracies actually exist here in the real world?
Indeed, those who believe conspiracies never occur are the ones out of touch with reality. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
