The Scam Wall Street Learned From the Mafia
How America’s biggest banks took part in a nationwide bid-rigging conspiracy – until they were caught on tape
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-scam-wall-street-learned-from-the-mafia-20120620
This is a long article, I know, but it is worth reading to begin to comprehend the depths of the control of the oligarchy. There control isn’t yet quite so total that they can avoid any sacrifice (witness the (tiny) fines they had to pay, coupled with the (trivial) loss of these poor fellows), but what was revealed in the trial was systemic corruption so thoroughly entrenched that, as Matt said:
…Instead of anything resembling real censure, a few young executives got spanked, while the offending banks got off with slap-on-the-wrist fines and were allowed to retain their pre-eminent positions in the municipal bond market. Last year, the two leading recipients of public bond business, clocking in with more than $35 billion in bond issues apiece, were Chase and Bank of America – who combined had just paid more than $365 million in fines for their role in the mass bid rigging. Get busted for welfare fraud even once in America, and good luck getting so much as a food stamp ever again. Get caught rigging interest rates in 50 states, and the government goes right on handing you billions of dollars in public contracts.
Since these corrupt people are the oligarchy that owns our government and since it is undeniable that Matt’s description of these people as ‘Mafia’ is correct, that means, inescapably, that our government is made up of crooks.
Shocking, I know; sometimes I think I need to better prepare my reader(s) for such ugly truths.
