Council on Foreign Relations members Geithner and Paulson are going
to testify today before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, a
bipartisan panel established by Congress to probe the roots of the
financial crisis. The panel may be bipartisan but at least three
members sitting on the ten member panel are The Council on Foreign
Relations members. The CFR members on the panel include Commissioner
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Commissioner Peter J. Wallison and Senator Bob
Graham, Was this committee chosen to act in the best interest of the
American People or the best interest of the Council on Foreign
Relations members? Why aren't major media organizations pointing the
CFR connection out to the American people?
[Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Geithner, [Council on Foreign
Relations Member ] Paulson to address meltdown probe
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May 6, 4:19 AM (ET)
By DANIEL WAGNER
WASHINGTON (AP) - A special panel investigating the financial crisis
is preparing to hear from two key architects of the government's
response: Former Treasury Secretary [Council on Foreign Relations
Member ] Henry Paulson and Treasury Secretary [Council on Foreign
Relations Member ] Timothy Geithner.
[Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Geithner and [Council on
Foreign Relations Member ] Paulson will provide their perspectives on
the so-called "shadow banking system" - a largely unregulated world
of capital and credit markets outside of traditional banks. They will
describe their roles in selling Bear Stearns to JPMorgan Chase & Co.
[run by Council on Foreign Relations Member Jamie Dimon] after
pressure from "shadow banking" companies made Bear the first major
casualty of the crisis.
The pair will testify Thursday morning before the Financial Crisis
Inquiry Commission, a bipartisan panel established by Congress to
probe the roots of the financial crisis. It is the first time the
panel has heard from either of the men who called the shots in late
2008 as the global financial system nearly collapsed.
The panel is looking at nonbank
<http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100506/D9FH7MOO0.html>financial
companies such as PIMCO and GE Capital that provide capital for loans
to consumers and small businesses. When rumors spread in 2008 that
Bear Stearns was teetering, these companies started what former Bear
Stearns executives described Wednesday as a "run on the bank,"
drawing so much of its capital that it could not survive.
Then-[Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Treasury Secretary
Paulson and [Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Geithner, as
president of the Federal Reserve
<http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100506/D9FH7MOO0.html>Bank of New
York, engineered Bear's rescue. The New York Fed put up a $29 billion
federal backstop to limit JPMorgan's future losses on Bear Stearns'
bad investments.
Bear Stearns was the first Wall Street bank to blow up. Its demise
foreshadowed the cascading financial meltdown in the fall of that year.
The panel is investigating the roots of the crisis that plunged the
country into the most severe recession since the 1930s and brought
losses of jobs and homes for millions of Americans.
In earlier testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and
Government Reform, [Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Paulson
defended his response to the economic crisis as an imperfect but
necessary rescue that spared the U.S.
<http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100506/D9FH7MOO0.html>financial
market from total collapse.
"Many more Americans would be without their homes, their jobs, their
businesses, their savings and their way of life," he said in
testimony prepared for that hearing.
While losses have been staggering, "that suffering would have been
far more profound and disturbing" had the government not intervened,
[Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Paulson said.
In addition to [Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Geithner and
[Council on Foreign Relations Member ] Paulson, the meltdown probe
will hear Thursday from leaders of key players in the shadow banking
system including senior executives from GE Capital and asset managers
PIMCO and State Street.
In its first day of hearings on shadow banking Wednesday, the FCIC
dissected Bear Stearns as a case study, and heard from former CEOs
James Cayne and Alan Schwartz.
The commissioners challenged them and other former Bear Stearns'
executives on what caused Bear Stearns to collapse. The executives
testified that they did all they could to keep Bear Stearns afloat
before it fell victim to an unstoppable run on the bank. Its
<http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100506/D9FH7MOO0.html>business
strategy of borrowing funds from rival firms was sound under the
crimped credit market conditions at the time, they said.
The role of federal regulators also is key in the panel's autopsy of
the financial disaster and the huge Wall Street investment banks. The
Securities and Exchange Commission's oversight of the firms - some
rotting from within from piled-up securities tied to subprime
mortgages - was criticized by lawmakers and investor advocates both
during and after the crisis.
Wednesday's hearing marked Cayne's first public appearance in the
aftermath of the crisis. Cayne was a flamboyant character who led
Bear Stearns - a firm known for its go-against-the-grain scrappiness
- for 15 years.
Financialization is a new term used to discuss the emergence of a new
form of capitalism in which financial markets dominate over the
traditional industrial economy. Traditionally capitalism was the
accumulation of profit through trade and commodity production.
Financialization is understood to mean the vastly expanded role of
financial motives, financial markets, financial actors and financial
institutions in the operation of domestic and international economies.
The Glass Steagall Act, the FDR Banking Bill, was setup over 70 years
ago . On November 12, 1999 Council on Foreign Relations member
William Jefferson Clinton stated the, " Glass- Stegall is no longer
appropriate for our economy. This was good for the industrial age.
The Financial Modernization Bill is the key to rising paycheck and
great security for ordinary Americans". Council on Foreign Relations
member William Clinton then signed the 'Financial Modernization Bill'.
With the signing of the bill old capitalism and free market economics
died and the "new capitalism" and markets controlled by a small group
of elite investment bankers was born. The repeal was the foundation
that provided for non transparent financial manipulation and use of
leverage to revolutionize the activities of investment beginning in
1999, to amass huge fortunes for the investment bankers who designed,
marketed and oversaw the use of leveraged investments, and to
generate awesomely speculative endeavors at hedge funds, which have
gone unregulated by government oversight.
Investment leverage snapped with the $20 Billion Council on Foreign
Relations run Carlyle Group bond fund experiencing margin calls,
where risk was multiplied by 33 to 1 and the underlying assets
represented only 3% of the portfolio value; and those assets were
illiquid, thinly traded issues: it was reasonable that this fund
would be the first of many countless to break causing a sharp sell
off in the finance, real estate and banking sectors as investments
were sold at fire sale prices to meet the margin calls. Council on
Foreign Relations member David Rubenstein, co-founder of Carlyle
Group, in a keynote speech at the 15th annual venture capital and
private equity conference at Harvard Business School, laid some of
the blame for the private equity industry's troubles on investment
banks, "I analogize it to sex," Council on Foreign Relations member
Rubenstein said. "You realize there were certain things you shouldn't
do, but the urge is there and you can't resist."
A major trophy of Council on Foreign Relations member Sanford Weill
is the pen Council on Foreign Relations member Bill Clinton used to
sign the REPEAL of FDR's Banking Act. In April 1998
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travelers_Group>Travelers Group
announced an agreement to undertake the $76 billion merger between
Travelers and <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citicorp>Citicorp, and
the merger was completed on
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_8>October 8,
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998>1998. The possibility remained
that the merger would run into problems connected with federal law.
Ever since the
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass-Steagall_Act>Glass-Steagall Act,
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank>banking and
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance>insurance businesses had been
kept separate. Council on Foreign Relations member Sandy Weill bet
that <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress>Congress
would soon pass <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legislation>legislation
overturning those regulations, which Council on Foreign Relations
member Weill considered not in his interest. To speed up the
process, they recruited Council on Foreign Relations member
ex-President Gerald Ford (Republican) to the Board of Directors and
Council on Foreign Relations member Robert Rubin (Secretary of
Treasury during Democratic Council on Foreign Relations member
Clinton Administration) whom Council on Foreign Relations member
Weill was close to. With both Democrats and Republican on their side,
the law was taken down in less than 2 years. (Many
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe>European countries, for
instance, had already torn down the firewall between
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank>banking and
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance>insurance.) During a
two-to-five-year <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_period>grace
period allowed by law, Citigroup could conduct business in its merged
form; should that period have elapsed without a change in the law,
Citigroup would have had to spin off its insurance businesses.
Council on Foreign Relations member
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/v/paul_a_volcker/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Paul
A. Volcker, the former
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/f/federal_reserve_system/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Federal
Reserve chairman who endorsed Mr. Obama early in his election
campaign and who stood by his side during the
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/credit_crisis/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>financial
crisis has some advice; he wants the nation's banks to be prohibited
from owning and trading risky securities, the very practice that got
the biggest ones into deep trouble in 2008.
The only viable solution, in Council on Foreign Relations member
Volcker view, is to break up the giants.
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/morgan_j_p_chase_and_company/index.html?inline=nyt-org>JPMorgan
Chase would have to give up the trading operations acquired from
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/bear_stearns_companies/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Bear
Stearns.
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/bank_of_america_corporation/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Bank
of America and
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/merrill_lynch_and_company/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Merrill
Lynch would go back to being separate companies. Goldman Sachs could
no longer be a bank holding company. It's a tall order, and to
achieve it Congress would have to enact a modern-day version of the
1933
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/g/glass_steagall_act_1933/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>Glass-Steagall
Act, which mandated separation.
Council on Foreign Relations member
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/joseph_e_stiglitz/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Joseph
E. Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate in economics at Columbia and a former
official in Council on Foreign Relations member Clinton's
administration. "We would have a cleaner, safer banking system,"
Council on Foreign Relations member Stiglitz said, adding that while
he endorses Council on Foreign Relations member Volcker's proposal,
the former Fed chairman is nevertheless embarked on a quixotic journey.
And the administration is saying no, it will not separate commercial
banking from investment operations. Council on Foreign Relations
member
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/g/timothy_f_geithner/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Timothy
F. Geithner, the
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/t/treasury_department/index.html?inline=nyt-org>Treasury
secretary, and Council on Foreign Relations member
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/lawrence_h_summers/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Lawrence
H. Summers, chief of the National Economic Council, are sympathetic
to the concerns of investment bankers.
Council on Foreign Relations member
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/g/alan_greenspan/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Alan
Greenspan, the only other former Fed chairman still living, favored
the repeal of Glass-Steagall a decade ago and, unlike Council on
Foreign Relations member Volcker, would not bring it back now.
On Thursday November 19th Council on Foreign Relations
member Geithner took a beating as he urged Congress to pass
regulatory reform as quickly as possible, arguing that delay would
create uncertainty for businesses across the country. Lawmakers
sharply criticized him for his role in the crisis during the tense
Joint Economic Committee meeting. They were particularly critical of
his involvement in the decision, as president of the New York Fed, to
bail out AIG.
Council on Foreign Relations member Geithner pressed forward: "To
ensure the vitality, the strength and the stability of our economy
going forward, we must bring our system of financial regulation into
the 21st century. Nobody in my job should ever be in the position
again of having to come into a crisis like this without those basic
authorities."
The Council on Foreign Relations member spearheading the "new"
financial regulation legislation is Council on Foreign Relations
member Chistopher Dodd.
Council on Foreign Relations member Dodd, chairman of the Senate
Banking Committee, chose the marbled Caucus Room in the Russell
Senate Office Building -- site of past hearings on Watergate, Pearl
Harbor and the Wall Street abuses during the Great Depression -- to
open debate on a massive draft bill designed to achieve the most
ambitious reworking of the financial system in decades. "This is one
of those moments in our nation's history that compels us to be
bold," Council on Foreign Relations member Dodd said.
But soon, ranking committee Republican Richard C. Shelby (Ala.) took
the floor, and for 18 uninterrupted minutes he opined that nearly
every element of Council on Foreign Relations member Dodd's bill was
misinformed, uninformed, unnecessarily rushed or just plain flawed.
"This committee has not done the necessary work to even begin
discussing changes of this magnitude. Nevertheless, you have laid a
bill before the committee," Shelby said. "I will be opposing this
legislation. Not because we disagree on its ends, but rather on its means."
Shelby said Council on Foreign Relations member Dodd was wrong not to
conduct an investigation into the causes of the recent financial
crisis before pushing forward with legislation. He said rather than
ending the problem of institutions that are "too big to fail," the
current bill expands the government's ability to bail out big banks.
Shelby apologized for the length of his critique, expressed his hope
that the two men might "yet find some common ground," and yielded the floor.
Shelby is right there should be an investigation into the causes of
the recent financial crisis. That investigation should include the
role of the Council on Foreign Relations and its members in
engineering and profiting from the crisis. On March 10th 2009 Council
on Foreign Relations member Private <http://agonist.org/>equity
company Blackstone Group LP (BX.N) CEO Stephen Schwarzman said
"Between 40 and 45 percent of the world's wealth has been destroyed
in little less than a year and a half," Council on Foreign Relations
member Schwarzman told an audience at the Japan Society. "This is
absolutely unprecedented in our lifetime."
The money the Council on Foreign Relations members stole should be
clawed back and the perpetrators of the economic destruction should
be sent to a maximum security prison for the rest of their lives.
Sources
Repeal of The Glass Steagall Act Has Produced The Highly Leveraged
Investment Imbroglio That Is Just Now Starting To Unwind By The
Resourceful Bear Blog Monday, 10. March 2008, 01:29:42
<http://my.opera.com/richardinbellingham/blog/show.dml/1796860>http://my.opera.com/richardinbellingham/blog/show.dml/1796860
Volcker Fails to Sell a Bank Strategy By
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/louis_uchitelle/index.html?inline=nyt-per>LOUIS
UCHITELLE Published: October 20,
2009
<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/business/21volcker.html>http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/business/21volcker.html
Angry Congress lashes out at Obama ECONOMIC WOES TAKING A TOLL
House Republicans call on Geithner to resign By
<http://projects.washingtonpost.com/staff/articles/brady+dennis,+zachary+a.+goldfarb+and+neil+irwin/>Brady
Dennis, Zachary A. Goldfarb and Neil Irwin Washington Post Staff
Writer Friday, November 20, 2009
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/19/AR2009111903167.html>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/19/AR2009111903167.html
Sanford I. Weill From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanford_I._Weill>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanford_I._Weill
David Rubenstein: Buyout Bubble Was Like Sex by WSJ Blogs Deal
Journal February 2, 2009, 9:37 AM
ET
<http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2009/02/02/david-rubenstein-buyout-bubble-was-like-sex/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wsj%2Fdeals%2Ffeed+%28WSJ.com%3A+Deal+Journal+-+WSJ.com%29>http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2009/02/02/david-rubenstein-buyout-bubble-was-like-sex/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wsj%2Fdeals%2Ffeed+%28WSJ.com%3A+Deal+Journal+-+WSJ.com%29
<http://agonist.org/20090311/45_percent_of_worlds_wealth_destroyed_blackstone_ceo>The
Agonist News Megan Davies and Walden Siew | New York | Mar 10 45
percent of world's wealth destroyed: Blackstone CEO
<http://agonist.org/20090311/45_percent_of_worlds_wealth_destroyed_blackstone_ceo>http://agonist.org/20090311/45_percent_of_worlds_wealth_destroyed_blackstone_ceo
--
Please consider seriously the reason why these elite institutions are not discussed in the mainstream press despite the immense financial and political power they wield?
There are sick and evil occultists running the Western World. They are power mad lunatics like something from a kids cartoon with their fingers on the nuclear button! Armageddon is closer than you thought. Only God can save our souls from their clutches, at least that's my considered opinion - Tony
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