How Wall Street Got Away With The Crime of Our Time, Libya Latest, On Wisconsin
February 28th, 2011 - by: danny
The Whole World Was Watching:
A Tip of the Dissector’s cap to Tom Hooper, director of The King’s Speech, last night’s Oscar winner for Best Picture:
I met Tom the first time in South Africa where he had made an excellent film about the struggle. His next project reportedly will be the film adaptation of Nelson Mandela’s classic autobiography, No Easy Walk To Freedom. I saw and chatted with him more recently at a screening of King Speech on the King Holiday this year at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens. I talked to him about the anti-fascist character of his great film that tells an uplifting and populist story while dissecting the dysfunctional aspects of the Royal family.
Also, an envious but sincere right-on to Charles Ferguson for his documentary Inside Job which covers, some of the same ground–with some real difference–as my Plunder, and for his saying before the Academy and the billions watching:
“Oscar Winner Notes Nobody Has Served Jail Time For Financial Meltdown”
That, just by chance is what I write about today in a commentary that first appeared on AlJazeera.net. As of this morning 1318 people recommended it.
QUOTE OF THE DAY: Before you read it, check out the latest from Bernie Madoff in today’s New York Times:
“After asserting to The New York Times in a recent interview that unidentified banks and hedge funds were somehow “complicit” in his elaborate fraud, Bernard L. Madoff goes on record again, this time with New York magazine in a series of collect calls.
The convicted Ponzi schemer says he isn’t the only one who should have been convicted, and that the bigger crime is that more people should have been prosecuted for the financial crisis: “It’s unbelievable, Goldman . . . no one has any criminal convictions. The whole new regulatory reform is a joke. The whole government is a Ponzi scheme.”
Mr. Madoff also says that his therapist told him he’s not a sociopath: “You’re absolutely not a sociopath. You have morals. You have remorse.”
The Ten Reasons The Banksters Get Away With It
The Wall Street Crime Syndrome Goes Deeper Than We Think …
Q: Why no jailings?
A: It’s the system, not just the prosecutor
Hats off to writer Matt Taibbi for staying on the Wall Street crime beat, asking in his most recent report in Rolling Stone: “Why Isn’t Wall Street in Jail?”
“Financial crooks,” he argues, “brought down the world’s economy – but the feds are doing more to protect them than to prosecute them.”
True enough, but that’s only part of the story. The Daily Kos called his investigation a “depressing read” perhaps because it suggests that the Obama Administration is not doing what it should to rein in financial crime.
Many of the lawyers he calls on to act come from big corporate law firms and buy into their worldview. They have no appetite to go after executives they know and naively hope will help speed our economic “recovery.”
Kos should be more depressed by the failure of the progressive community – his own readers– to focus on these issues, and for not pressing the government to do the right thing. Without pressure from below, there is often little action from above.
There is no doubt that Administration policy gave crooks great latitude, as financial journalist Yves Smith explains, “The overly generous terms of the TARP, and the failure of Team Obama to force management changes on the industry in early 2009 was a fatal error. It has embedded and emboldened a deeply corrupt plutocracy.”
There is, however, much more to this story. It’s also more about institutions than individuals, more about a captured system that enables and covers up crime and, then, deflects attention away from the deeper problem.
Ten Problems
You could see that when Television host Bill Maher pressed Taibbi to name the biggest Wall Street crooks, on his weekly political comedy show, he didn’t fully understand what we are really up again.
Here are ten factors that help explain the procrastination and rationalization for inaction. The government is not just to blame either. Several industries working together, through their firms and associations, associates, and well-paid operatives, collaborated over years to financialize the economy to their own benefit.
Personalizing bad guys makes for good TV without offering a real explanation.
When financial institutions and services became the dominant economic sector, they, effectively, took over the political system to fortify their power. It was a done incrementally, over years, with savvy, foresight and malice.
First, many of those who might later be charged with financial crimes and criminal fraud invested in lobbying and generous political donations to insure that tough regulations and enforcement were neutered before the housing bubble they promoted took off.
They did so in the aftermath of the jailing of hundreds of bankers after the S&L crisis, to guarantee that could never happen again when the next crisis hit.
In effect, their deregulation strategy also deliberately “decriminalized” the environment to make sure that practices that led to high profits and low accountability would be permissible and permitted.
Presto: The once illegal soon became “legal.”
The cops and watchdogs were taken off the beat. Anticipating and restraints, they engineered a low-risk crime scene in the way the Pentagon systematically prepares its battlefields. This permitted illicit practices, to be encouraged by CEO’s in a variety of control frauds to keep profits up so that the executives could extract more revenue with obscene bonuses and compensation schemes.
Today’s proposed Republican cutbacks for the funding of regulatory bodies aims to undercut recently passed financial reforms. Warns one Commissioner of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, if the budget is slashed, “there would essentially be no cop on the beat… we could once again risk another calamitous disintegration.” He added, according to a New York Times report, “the process will mean nothing, squat, diddley … if we get cut we’re going to be in a world of hurt.” The GOP knows exactly what the intended consequences of its plans are.
Second, the industry invented, advertised and rationalized exotic financial instruments as forward looking “innovation” and “modernization” to disguise their intent while enhancing their field or maneuver. This was part of creating a shadow banking system operating below the radar of effective monitoring and regulation. There was no focus on controlling the out of control power of the leverage-hungry gamblers at unregulated hedge funds.
Third, the industry promulgated economic theories and ideologies that won the backing of the economics profession which largely did not see the crisis coming, making those who favored a crackdown on fraud appear unfashionable and out of date. As economist James Galbraith testified to Congress:
“…The study of financial fraud received little attention. Practically no research institutes exist; collaboration between economists and criminologists is rare; in the leading departments there are few specialists and very few students. Economists have soft-pedaled the role of fraud in every crisis they examined, including the Savings & Loan debacle, the Russian transition, the Asian meltdown and the dot.com bubble. They continue to do so now.”
Foxes guarding the chicken coop
Fourth, prominent members of the financial services industry were appointed to top positions in the government agencies that should have cracked down on financial crime, but instead looked the other way. The foxes were indeed guarding the chicken coop guiding institutions that tolerated, if not enabled, an environment of criminality.
Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke were repeatedly warned by underlings at the Federal Reserve Bank about pervasive predatory practices in the mortgage and Subprime markets and they chose to do nothing. Now Greenspan acknowledges pervasive fraud but decries the lack of enforcement while Bernanke wants to run a Consumer Protection Agency after ignoring consumer complaints for years. Even as the FBI denounced “an epidemic of mortgage fraud” in 2004, their white-collar crime units were downsized.
Fifth, the media was complicit, seduced, bought off and compromised. As the housing bubble mushroomed in the very period that the media was forced to downsize, dodgy lenders and credit card companies pumped billions into advertising in radio, television and the internet almost insuring that there would no undue media investigations. Financial journalists increasingly embedded themselves in the culture and narrative of Wall Street by hyping stocks and wealthy CEOs.
The “guests” routinely chosen by media outlets to explain the crisis were often part of it, charges Jim Hightower, “Many of the ‘experts’ whom I read or see on TV seem clueless, full of hot air. Many of their predictions turn out wrong even when they seem so self-assured and well-informed in making them.”
His advice: “Don’t be deterred by the finance industry’s jargon (which is intended to numb your brain and keep regular folks from even trying to figure out what’s going on.”
Sixth, politicians and corporate lawyers fashioned settlements of abuses that were exposed rather than prosecutions.
The government benefited by getting large fines while businessmen avoided jail. When exposed, this led to practices such as the deliberate engineering of mortgages to fail being written off as a cost of doing business.
Financial executives were often rewarded with bonuses and huge compensation for practices that skirted or crossed the line of criminality.
Intentional violations of the spirit and letter of laws were justified because “everyone does it” by high priced legal firms that often doubled as lobbyists. Conflicts of interest were sneered at. Judges, dependent on industry donations for reelection looked the other way.
Seventh, as the economy changed and industries that were once separated began working together, regulations were not changed. In A FIRE economy, financial institutions worked closely with Insurance companies and real estate firms. Yet law enforcement did not recognize this new reality.
Financial crime was still seen almost entirely under the framework of securities laws that are designed to protect investors, not workers or homeowners who suffered far more in the collapse. Cases are framed against individuals with a high standard of proving intent, not under RICO laws used to prosecute organized crime and conspiracies.
By defining crimes narrowly, prosecutions became few and far between, reports Reuters:
“Cases against Wall Street executives can be difficult to prove to the satisfaction of a jury because of the mind-numbing volume of emails, prospectuses, and memos involved in documenting a case.”
Criminal minds
Convicted financial criminal Sam Antar who appears in my film Plunder is contemptuous of how government tends to proceed in these cases, in part because they don’t seem to understand how calculated these crimes and their cover-ups are. He told me. “Our laws – innocent until proven guilty, the codes of ethics that journalists like you abide by limit your behavior and give the white-collar criminal freedom to commit their crimes, and also to cover up their crimes.
“We have no respect for the laws. We consider your codes of ethics, and your laws, weaknesses to be exploited in the execution of our crimes. So the prosecutors, hopefully most prosecutors, are honest if they’re playing by the set of the rules; they’re hampered by the illegal constraints. The white-collar criminal has no legal constraints. You subpoena documents, we destroy documents; you subpoena witnesses, we lie. So you are at a disadvantage when it comes to the white-collared criminal. In effect, we’re economic predators. We’re serial economic predators; we impose a collective harm on society; time is always on our side, not on, not on the side of justice, unfortunately.”
Eighth, even as the economy globalizes, and US financial firms spread their footprint worldwide, there was little internationalization of financial rules and regulations. Today, even as the French and the Germans propose such rules, Washington still opposes a tough and coordinated global regime of enforceable codes of conduct to insure ethical standards.
Overseas, in Greece and England, and other parts of Europe, there’s been an indictment of American corporate predators, especially Goldman Sachs. They are being denounced as “financial terrorists” and discussed in terms of their links to various elite business formations like the Bilderberg Group.
Ninth, with the exception of a few polite inquiries by a softball Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, there has been no hard-hitting intensive investigation in the United States of these crimes. While Senator Levin of Michigan did spend a day aggressively grilling Goldman Sachs on one deceptive practice, their defense was more telling about the real nature of the problem: ‘everyone did it.” (Almost ten times as much money was spent investigating Bill Clinton’s sex scandal.)
The case for criminality as a key cause of the crisis has still not achieved critical mass as an issue or become a dominant explanation for why the economy collapsed.
In fact, the “crime narrative” is still being sneered at or ignored even as the public in many surveys feel they have been robbed.
Finally, tenth, a big disappointment in my countdown, is the role of the progressive critics of the crisis who also largely ignore criminality as a key factor and possible focus for a populist organizing effort.
They treat the crisis as if they are at a financial seminar at Harvard, focusing on the complexities of derivatives; credit default swaps and structured financial products in language that ordinary people rarely can penetrate. They argue that banks that should not be too big to fail, but rarely they are not too big to jail.
Few of the progressive activist groups stress the immorality of these practices, much less its criminality after all these years! There is little active solidarity even in the progressive community with the newly homeless or jobless.
Where are the active empathy, compassion and the caring for the many victims of financial crimes?
The response to the crisis has been muted. There is little pressure from below in part because unions stress their own issues and tail after the Administration. The talk about the American dream, not Wall Street’s scheme. The financial crimes task force that the Administration set up seems to mostly go after small fries.
It is as if this crime crisis within the financial crisis does not exist.
Curiously, even as most media outlets and politicians refuse to discuss the pervasive fraud that did occur, the Administration is using the threat of prosecutions as a way of pushing a “global settlement” of all housing fraud to get the issue off the table. They are proposing a $20 billion dollar deal to bury the problem.
The banks are saying this will hurt their investors and not bring relief to those facing the highest foreclosure rate in recent history. At the same time, as a quid pro quo, there will be no major trials.
What should be done? By all means, workers should rally to protect their rights to have unions as they have in Wisconsin, but they should also realize that it is the banks that are ultimately to blame for the financial pressures behind the attacks they face. Pension funds have lost billions because of Wall Street scams. State governments have taken a big hit. The unions didn’t cause the problem.
At the same time, why have the unions and left groups been mostly silent on the deeper issues? They are fighting to keep what they have. That is certainly important, but a failure to press for economic justice for everyone makes the issue seem to be one only of self-interest.
Ironically, the economic justice issues appeals to the anger in many diverse constituencies and could enlarge a real movement for financial accountability.
Even after the markets melted down, even after Wall Street bonus scandals and bailout disgraces, Wall Street has hardly been humbled. It is still spending a fortune on PR and political gun slinging with 25 lobbyists shadowing every member of Congress to scuttle real reform. Its arrogance is evident in an email the Financial Times reported was “pinging around” trading desks. It reads in part:
“We are Wall Street: It’s our job to make money. Whether it’s a commodity, stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn’t matter. We would trade baseball cards if it were profitable… Go ahead and continue to take us down, but you’re only going to hurt yourselves. What’s going to happen when we can’t find jobs on the Street anymore? Guess what: We’re going to take yours.
… We aren’t dinosaurs. We are smarter and more vicious than that, and we are going to survive.”‘
Perhaps it’s not surprising, that in an act of preemptive anticipation, some years ago, Wall Street firms began financing companies that built and ran privatized prisons. As long as they can avoid incarceration, they can profit from the mass jailing of the poor..
When will we call a crime a crime? When will we demand jail-out, not just more bailouts? Unless we do, and until we do, the people who created the worst crisis in our time will, in effect, get away with the biggest plunder in history.
News Dissector Danny Schechter made the film Plunder The Crime of our Time. (Plunderthecrimeofourtime.com) Parts of this essay appear in his companion book The Crime of Our Time (Disinfo Books) Comments to Dissector@mediachannel.org
William Lerach, Huffiington Post: Blame Wall Street, Not Hard Working Americans, for the Pension Funds Fiasco
Writer Clancy Sigal, On Wisconsin, The Guardian Comment Is Free
“Wisconsin is a make or break fight for labor. The citizen demonstrators camping out, in tents and on sleeping bags, in freezing Madison can expect almost no help from their natural ally, the national Democratic party, nor from President Obama. For years, the now-defunct “centrist” Democratic Leadership Council has been indistinguishable from the right wing US Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable. Two years ago, a campaigning Obama promised, “When I’m in the White House, I will put on a comfortable pair of shoes and I will walk on that picket line with you as president of the United States.” Today, he says he has “no current plans” to go to Madison — while his partner Michelle chooses this exact moment to fly off to way-expensive Vail, Colorado for a ski holiday. So much for solidarity!
We are on our own in this battle to save America’s middle class. But it need not be so.
The Wisconsin workers will lose unless they turn their skins inside out and make this a communityfight, too. Unions are notoriously insular and atrocious at public relations. They can’t afford the luxury of that ineptitude now. Unions win when they reach out, convince people that a strike is theirfight also, as Martin Luther King taught us during the Memphis garbage workers’ strike, and in the more recent, remarkably successful“Justice for Janitors” campaigns, and my own Writers’ Guild strike against studio corporations three years ago when we touched base with churches, synagogues and mosques, community groups, rock bands and even reached into police and fire stations to ask for their support. When you’re walking a picket line, there’s nothing more uplifting — and PR-savvy — than being serenaded by Bruce Springsteen or Billy Bragg while cop cars and fire engines drive by blowing their horns and flicking their lights in support.
Other News of Note:
Today: Egypt imposes Travel Ban on Mubarak, Oil Flows in Israel as Rebels Proclaim Provisional Government.
LIBYA (LBN) A bold play by Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi to prove that he was firmly in control of Libya appeared to backfire Saturday, as foreign journalists he invited to the capital discovered blocks of the city in open defiance of his authority. Witnesses described snipers and antiaircraft guns firing at unarmed civilians. Many said security forces had been removing the dead and wounded from streets and hospitals, apparently in an effort to hide the mounting toll.
William Bowles, Creative I The Empire Strikes Back
Coup Attempt In Congo: 6 people die in failed coup attempt in the Democratic Republic of Congo – Reuters http://bit.ly/hoCHUu
US Government Manipulates Social Media
http://www.pcworld.com/article/220495/army_of_fake_social_media_friends_to_promote_propaganda.html
Army of Fake Social Media Friends to Promote Propaganda
Computerworld Feb 24, 2011
It’s recently been revealed that the U.S. government contracted HB Gary Federal for the development of software which could create multiple fake social media profiles to manipulate and sway public opinion on controversial issues by promoting propaganda. It could also be used as surveillance to find public opinions with points of view the powers-that-be didn’t like. It could then potentially have their “fake” people run smear campaigns against those “real” people. As disturbing as this is, it’s not really new for U.S. intelligence or private intelligence firms to do the dirty work behind closed doors.
Thanks to The Green Arrow for additional editing. Your comments to dissector@mediachannel.org
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Rallying for Wisconsin, Layoffs Loom, Libyans Fight On
February 27th, 2011 - by: danny
Listen: News Dissector Radio this week with guests Ed Rampell on the Oscars; discussion of Libya with Libyan activist, Najla Abdurrahman.
Rallying Again
I answered the the call, and became one of the 50,000 Americans who turned out to stand with Wisconsin on Saturday in solidarity demos in cities and state Capitols nationwide.
The Mobilization was impressive because it was put together in a few days. In Madison, Wisconsin, meanwhile, they had their largest turnout yet – 100,000 – including organized cops. The Governor is threatening mass layoffs this week, so this crisis is hardly over.
NYT: PHOTOS OF RALLIES NATIONWIDE
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/02/27/us/20110227_RALLIES.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23
As the son of a labor family, I felt a duty to turn up at New York’s City Hall where the turnout — not as many as joined the AFL-CIO for a symbolic march on Wall Street last year – was certainly impressive considering. Some held union banners. Others wore cheesehead hats.
But when the speakers – mostly politicians, Congressmen like Rangel and Ndler did their warhorse thing, followed by city officials, the rhetoric seemed predictable Democratic Party cant about saving the middle class as if the governor of Wisconsin is the only one responsible for attacking it.
Wall Street, just a few blocks away, was largely off the hook with few mentions of substance about its role and the role of the big banks.
“Are you fired up?,” we were asked repeatedly but there was little inspiration. I sensed a beleaguered crowd because we all know this was a holding action, a fight to keep what the unions have, a defensive action, and not a rallying behind a program with broader appeal and a real program for change. The slogan du jour was “SAVE THE AMERICAN DREAM”, an appeal to what has become an unattainable myth at a time of mounting inequality. We need folks to stop dreaming and start acting, to free themselves from an attachment to slogans from another time. As one old song said, “nothin comes to a dreamer but a dream, y’all…”
Yes, its worth fighting for collective bargaining, a process I was part of as a shop steward at WBCN Radio in Boston in the days we were forced to strike to defend our rights (we won that one!)… but it wasn’t enough to secure the station’s future.
Wisconsin is showing a way to unify people of all backgrounds, but the rally I was at, alas, did not. Perhaps that’s what David Degraw is talking about in his latest post.
“Here is a rule of war that many people are failing to understand: ‘Do not fight the last war.” In The 33 Strategies of War, Robert Greene calls this “The Guerrilla-War-Of-The-Mind Strategy”:
‘What most often weighs you down and brings you misery is the past, in the form of unnecessary attachments, repetitions of tired formulas, and the memory of old victories and defeats. You must consciously wage war against the past and force yourself to react to the present moment. Be ruthless on yourself; do not repeat the same tired methods.’
The sad truth is that most people are still fighting yesterday’s war. The Republican vs. Democrat charade – good cop, bad cop nonsense – is a mere smokescreen.”
Workers, Students Vow to Fight on in Wisconsin Despite Threats of Lay-offs
Katrin Dauenhauer, Inter Press Service: “Despite heavy protests against Republican Governor Scott Walker’s ‘Budget Repair Bill’, the Republican-controlled State Assembly in Wisconsin abruptly passed the bill – which would strip the labour force of its collective bargaining rights – early Friday morning. The vote ended three straight days of strenuous debate in the Senate, but mass protests appear far from over… Wisconsin is only one of several Republican run states that have attempted to curb union rights. The struggle over labour rights has become a hot topic in several states across the country where new Republican majorities have proposed drastic budget cuts to tackle state
Iraq Veterans Against The War: “We Are Public Employees Too.”
http://www.ivaw.org/blog/we-are-public-employees-too
We Are Public Employees Too! ——– “Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) calls on all U.S. military service members to refuse and resist any mobilization against workers organizing to protect their basic rights. IVAW stands in solidarity with the multitude gathered in Madison, Wisconsin and many other cities to defend their unions.”
Real News Network: Live From Benghazi (Exclusive)
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Libya: The Fight Is Not Over
WP: Gadaffi Is Still There: Rebel army may be formed as Tripoli fails to oust Gaddafi
Army leaders in eastern Libya who have turned against Col. Moammar Gaddafi’s regime are preparing to dispatch a rebel force to Tripoli to support the beleaguered uprising there, a top military official said Saturday in Benghazi.
NYT: An effort by Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi to prove that he was in control appeared to backfire as foreign journalists he invited in discovered open defiance.
AlJazeera: As pro-democracy demonstrators gain control of more cities in eastern Libya, Muammar Gaddafi’s many properties in the hands of protesters have been ransacked and destroyed.
One such palace sits on the outskirts of Benghazi, Libya’s second largest city and the de facto capital of the revolution.
Set in beautifully landscaped gardens, with a covered swimming pool, a sauna and a jacuzzi for Gaddafi and his guests, the palace offers a glimpse into the fortified world of a leader, who, according to US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks, suffers from a severe phobia.
With a fully equipped underground shelter designed to keep the leader safe for several months, in case of an attack involving use of unconventional weapons, the palace is more than just a luxurious castle.
The bunker in the palace has a fully serviced air filter system and is also equipped with emergency generators, fire alarm, water pumps, and a ladder fixed in what could have served as a back emergency exit to help the leader escape.
Gadaffi’s Arsenal
AFP reports Italy Has Supplied It
ROME (AFP) — Italy has sold Libya explosives, gun targeting equipment and other military hardware worth tens of millions of euros (dollars) in the past two years, the Corriere della Sera daily reported Saturday.
The Italian newspaper quoted an official report from the interior ministry that listed signed contracts as well as ongoing negotiations between Libya and several major Italian defence companies including industry giant Finmeccanica.
Missile systems maker Mbda Italia signed a deal worth 2.5 million euros in May 2009 to supply Libya with “material for bombs, torpedoes, rockets and missiles,” the interior ministry report was quoted as saying.
…Italian anti-war non-governmental organisations earlier claimed that Italy in 2009 supplied Libya with 79-million-euros worth of light arms from gun maker Beretta, routing the shipment through the island of Malta.
“It’s also with these weapons that Kadhafi’s army is shooting the population,” the Italian Network for Disarmament and the Table of Peace said in a statement, asking the Italian government to suspend arms shipments.
Breaking news. Gadaffi’s Ukrainian Nurse Has Left his side.
Letter: Tyra Gerdiman writes: As Minyar Gaddafi loses his grip on Libya, one wonders how he was able to hold on for so long. For most of the people living on Earth, the name Gaddafi is synonymous with Libya. So how’d he do it?
“Divide and conquer, that’s how. Garner the loyalties of one tribe, then get them to believe that the reason why they are poor is because this other tribe has gamed the system. That way, America’s workers in the private sector can take out their rage on public sector workers who have decent benefits, the type of benefits that all workers used to have. That takes the focus away from the big corporations who got tax cuts while regular people go without insurance. Divide and conquer. Pretty clever, huh?”
Iraq: Lloyd Hart writes: “Anti-terrorist police in Nineveh, Iraq fired live bullets at demonstrators 02/25/2011 http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=131292120273300″
This is an abbreviated Sunday Blog. Thanks for being here. Comments to dissector@mediachannel.org
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NATIONWIDE PROTESTS TODAY SATURDAY TO SUPPORT WISCONSIN PROTEST AND UNIONS
February 25th, 2011 - by: danny
Wisconsin Solidarity Rallies Nationwide at State capitols tomorrow at noon.
MoveOn provides this link.
Join the Nation-Wide Rally This Saturday to Save the American Dream
“We see Wisconsin as just the beginning…Republicans are using the bad economy as an excuse to enact any kind of cuts to vital programs while giving tax breaks to billionaires.”
Alternet: Rupert Murdoch Joins David Koch In Effort to Crush Wisconsin Workers
http://www.alternet.org/story/150047/rupert_murdoch_and_david_koch_collude_against_wisconsin_workers?akid=6577.8467.zruDAl&rd=1&t=2
NEWS DISSECTOR RADIO SHOW
Listen: Friday’s News Dissector Radio Program. Libyan Activist and Ed Rampell, author of Progressive Hollywood discussing the Academy Awards’ This podcast is also available on iTunes and Progressive Radio Network.com
http://thenewsdissector.podbean.com/mf/web/zv9j9/NewsDissector022511.mp3
Saturday: Libya Update: President Obama Imposes Unilateral Sanctions, Freeze of Gadaffi assets, close of US Embassy, threats to take him to International Criminal Court By Other Nations (The US is not a member); protests and killing continues; Regional uprising spreads to Iraq: Wall Street Journal Reports: “Hundreds of Thousands of Arabs In The Streets.”
QUOTE OF THE DAY, John Pilger, writer and filmmaker:
“The revolt in the Arab world is not merely against a resident dictator but a worldwide economic tyranny designed by the US Treasury and imposed by the US Agency for International Development, the IMF and World Bank, which have ensured that rich countries like Egypt are reduced to vast sweatshops, with half the population earning less than $2 a day. “
Press TV: Foreign military intervention in Libya?
The following is a rush transcription of Press TV’s interview with editor of Mediachannel.org Danny Schechter from New York. Schechter shares his views on possible foreign military intervention in the Libyan uprising with Press TV. …
Letter from Josh Fox, Oscar nominated Director of “Gasland,” The powerful documentary exposing “fracking,” a dangerous procedure for extracting natural gas.
WALL STREET JOURNAL CAVES TO INDUSTRY PRESSURE ON GASLAND
Something bizarre just happened at the Wall St. Journal. At 6pm I was reading a home page story on WSJ.com called Oscar’s Attention Irks Gas Industry” by Ben Casselman which contained perhaps the most honest and revealing quote from the gas industry that I have read to date about their obsession with attacking my film GASLAND. The quote reads “We have to stop blaming documentaries and take a look in the mirror,” said Matt Pitzarella, a spokesman for gas producer Range Resources Corp. …
Just thirty minutes later the quote mysteriously disappears, edited out and in its place is a far more typical spin controlled statement from Tom Price of Chesapeake energy saying, “We need to be able to respond objectively and accurately.” Sounds like a robot at a PR agency, more than a person.
What the hell happened? Why did this key quote disappear from the article? Why did the WSJ censor its own piece? Does the Gas industry get to edit the Wall St. Journal?
Was this comment too honest? Is it a crack in their facade? Who pulled the quote? Who made that call saying that this moment of honesty was simply too embarrassing or too true for the industry to admit?
For the first time a Gas Industry spokesman told the truth, that they should look in the mirror instead of attacking our film. You can find the original quote by Googling “mirror”, “Wall St. Journal” and “Range Resources” but if you read the article now, the quote has vanished.
What is going on here?
Why would the quote be published, go on line, and then something happens and they censor it and suppress it? Not only is the quote deleted, but then in its place Tom Price, a Vice President from Chesapeake gets to defend the industry?
Does the Wall St. Journal care to comment? Does WSJ have any independence or integrity? Or does the Gas Industry get to just write it for them.
Is this evidence of what we have long suspected, considerable industry pressure on the mainstream media?
Anyone?
Josh Fox
Director, GASLAND
NY Times, Three Large Banks Told Investors….
New state and federal inquiries into their involvement in abusive mortgage practices can lead to sizable financial penalties.
Back To Friday’s News Dissector Blog
Blaming Outside Agitators Again
Gadaffi, a man who many believe has been high for much of his presidency, has now reached into Ronald Reagan’s playbook to blame all the unrest in his country on young people high on psychedelic drugs. He also threw Al Qaeda into the pot.
AlJazeera: Gaddafi blames unrest on al-Qaeda
Libyan leader says protesters are young people being manipulated by al-Qaeda, as violence continues across the country.
Foreign Policy Magazine reports: Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi appeared to be refortifying his control over the capital of Tripoli, with residents reporting that thousands of his mercenaries and military units loyal to him were gathering on the roads outside the city. However, rebel gains and further defections from the military cast doubt on how long the Libyan leader could hold out.
Residents reported clashes in a number of towns surrounding Tripoli, suggesting that Qaddafi’s forces were beginning to strike back. In the town of Zawiya, the minaret of a mosque, which protesters had been using as a safe haven, was destroyed by heavy weapons. Anti-Qaddafi demonstrators had previously declared that they had seized the town from government control.
But there were also signs that Qaddafi’s grip on power was slipping further. The town of Misurata, 130 miles east of Tripoli, reportedly fell to the rebels on Wednesday. At least half of the Libyan coast to the east of Tripoli is apparently in the hands of anti-Qaddafi forces.
Council on Foreign Relations Promoting Intervention: What’s the Next Middle East Shock?
Daily Beast: “As despotic regimes across the Arab world crumble or battle for survival, what lies ahead? That depends on whether revolutionary citizens stay the course, how much of the tired leadership can be swept away, and how protected dictators are, five experts tell The Daily Beast’s Rob Verger. “Given Libya’s geo-strategic importance to global energy markets, particularly in Europe, one cannot rule out the need for outside intervention, be it a pan-Arab force or even some form of U.N.-sponsored force, to intervene and stabilize the situation,” says Robert Danin, a senior fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.”
China Is Also Hopping Mad
BEIJING Feb 24 (Reuters) – China has suffered severe economic losses as a result of the political turmoil in Libya, it said on Thursday.
China’s Ministry of Commerce said in a statement on its website (www.mofcom.gov.cn) that as of Wednesday, 27 Chinese construction sites and camps in Libya had been “attacked and looted” amid unrest in the country after Muammar al-Qaddafi used the military to crack down on public revolt against his 41-year rule.
“China has suffered large-scale direct economic losses in Libya, including looted worksites, burned and destroyed vehicles and tools, smashed office equipment and stolen cash,” the statement said.
Channel 4 UK via Real News Network had this report on Libya
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More at The Real News
Another Country Heard From
From Afghanistan: We Support the People of Wisconsin and the World
We Afghans Are All Bouazizi By Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers
Afghan youth are quietly encouraged by the Egyptian uprising because the people of Afghanistan want what the people of Egypt want.
We are all Bouazizi.
We want dignified livelihoods.
Dare any scientist prove to us that 30 years of wars and more to come will successfully bring us decent livelihoods? Dare any human being prove to us that mutual killings somehow bring men and women some measure of murderous dignity?
Aren’t any of you curious about whether there are any ‘stirrings of Middle East change’ in Afghanistan?”
Are we Afghans so ‘animal-like’ that we are not capable of protesting for our bread and butter? Or is the world poised, in propagandic or silent complicity, to shoot any Afghan protester even before they take to the streets?
Why isn’t there even an Afghan ‘blip’ in the mainstream news?
The publicity-hungry Al Jazeera is also not picking up any ‘blip’ from Afghanistan, perhaps not even asking the needed questions, not even pursuing leaks.
No one notices us, not even when 103 of us burn ourselves, far less when we are dead.
Such sad and inhumane ‘oversight’ from the general public and mainstream media of the world, and from all Nobel Peace Prize Winners who refuse to comment about the War in Afghanistan, perhaps because their 2009 ‘fellow-winner-friend’ Obama is the War Commander-in-Chief who is prosecuting War as the way to Peace, and all the Nobel Peace Prize Winners approve of the approximately 2400 Afghan civilians killed in 2010 as just….
Suit Charges Abuse Against Muslim Americans
LOS ANGELES (CN) – In a federal class action, Muslims claim the FBI hired an “agent provocateur” to infiltrate mosques and “indiscriminately collect personal information on hundreds and perhaps thousands of innocent Muslim Americans in Southern California.” The class claims the agents had their snitch provide illegal drugs to Muslims and snoop on their sex lives, and that the fruitless “dragnet investigation” did not end until “members of the Muslim communities of Southern California reported the informant to the police because of his violent rhetoric, and ultimately obtained a restraining order against him.”
Represented by the ACLU and Council on American-Islam Relations, the three named plaintiffs say the FBI’s agent provocateur’s “violent rhetoric” about “jihad and armed conflict” disrupted their lives
More On Julian Assange
One Click: Judge Riddle approved the Swedish request to extradite Julian Assange. The ruling will be appealed in the High Court within seven days. Assange’s Swedish lawyer, Bjorn Hurtig, came out as the weakest link. Julian Assange’s bail conditions remain extant. The Appeal is likely to take many months. The European Arrest Warrant is 9/11 knee jerk reaction flawed law. This legal circus is set to run and run. The bills being run up by the Swedish taxpayer and Britain’s legal infrastructure are substantial.
The Economy
Cash Bonuses Down on Wall Street Cash bonuses on Wall Street dropped in 2010 while overall compensation rose 6 percent, according to the New York State comptroller, Thomas DiNapoli.
His report found that Wall Street doled out (ONLY?) an estimated $20.8 billion in cash last year, an 8 percent decline from 2009 and a fraction of what was paid out before the financial crisis. Lower cash bonuses may please regulators and lawmakers, but the shift may result in short-term pain for New York. “The industry’s greater emphasis on deferred compensation will hold down tax collections this year, but the state and the city will benefit in future years when taxes are paid on this deferred compensation,” Mr. DiNapoli said.
Frank Responds to GOP Plans to Eliminate Housing Programs
WASHINGTON — Congressman Barney Frank, Ranking Member of the House Financial Services Committee, released the following statement yesterday:
“I am very disappointed that the Republican House members who during the debate on government spending last week refused to limit agricultural subsidies to $250,000 per individual have announced that they will attempt to eliminate programs which help the victims of the financial crisis.”
“The Emergency Homeowner Relief Fund provides assistance to people who are unable to pay their mortgages not because they were imprudent or irresponsible but because they are unemployed. The program is modeled after a successful one in Pennsylvania and it is the single most effective anti-foreclosure program that has been put forward. It is substantially similar to a program that had been successfully implemented in seventeen states and the District of Columbia and that was successfully hailed by the Republican governor of Alabama. I find it therefore particularly troubling that Chairman Bachus is proposing to strike the additional $1 billion to allow other states to participate in the same program from which Alabama benefits.”
“The attack on the Neighborhood Stabilization Program is an attack on cities. This program provides important funding to cities that have already been hit by the foreclosure crisis and allows them to cope with the blight, expense and destabilization that come with the presence of large numbers of empty properties. The Neighborhood Stabilization Program allows cities to deal with this problem in a way that reduces municipal costs.”
“As we continue to respond to the victims of the foreclosure crisis in a responsible way, we will make the case that there are better ways for the federal government to cut spending than by attacking these programs.”
Your Letters and comments Continue to Pour In:
Baccar Mohamed writes on FB:
“He says he wants to become a martyr (not sure to what?) so maybe he has become a suicide bomber of his own country.” He makes appearances inside a building that had been bombed in the 80s. The martyr comment is probably telling Libyans foreigners are the enemies he is fighting against. His issue though is with Libyans, they are sick and tired of him, so he cannot come out of this as a martyr of any kind.. Martyr to whom? the devil, because that’s what he is…”
Marco Del Guerra writes from Brazil.
Hello Mr. Schechter, I am writing to you from Brazil. The reason is to ask for your help to dissimulate information about the amount of problems being created by the United Estates in a world level . The damages being created in the world by its form of government is destroying regional cultures and costumes. If you could send me material that could help with this purpose it would be very helpful. The world financial crises, the turmoil in the middle east, the license to kill given to the Israelis by the Us government has to be expose. I found about you on lLink TV. Hope we can talk on further contact. I`ll be waiting impatiently for your reply.
Pat McGinnis asks: “Where do I see your film near Malibu, Ca. ?
Great article about the US Economy. (A: Plunderthecrimeofourtime.com)
Mike Brown writes from Australia:
Having just read your article I concur with your thoughts and wonder aloud the following:
Were the trillions ‘lost’?
No, the trillions were in fact ‘redistributed’.
The term ‘lost’ is just bullsh*t, the quickest and easiest way to head off the majority of the population from insisting on forensic investigation and legal accountability.
Do records of transactions of this ‘redistribution exist?
Yes, and are available to legal authorities.
Could the major beneficiaries of this ‘redistribution’ be identified and investigated for illegality/culpability?
Yes.
Was the majority of the ‘redistribution’ legal?
I presume Yes.
If the majority of what happened was legal, are we happy for this sort of ‘redistribution’ to remain legal?
No, BUT, Most of those in power (and their rich ‘friends’) are happy not to rock the ‘gravy’ boat…… it is just one of many wonderful ways that the shepherds/wolves use to shear/slaughter the sheep.
The difficulty is, as always, for the millions of people effected individuals to organize their divided power into a collective force for change.
What do you think?
Any effective templates exist for the quick consolidation of a collective voice from the millions of individuals?
Keep up the good work Mr Schechter
As one of the sheep I will say ‘baaa baaa’ for now
Bill Robinson comments:
“I’ve been saying it’s all just one big Ponzi game for quite sometime now and I know you knew it before I did. And I know you are right about most just wanting to bury their heads and to focus their woes on the irrational (although the corporate media points them in that direction).
I have your book and movie on Plunder.
Bruce Johnstone writes:
I just read a synopsis of your film and I thought you might be interested in the following points.
First, the whole of western finance is based on a Ponzi scheme first engendered by the move away from a barter system and then enhanced by John Law in the eighteenth century. . Leveraged and securitized lending as espoused by Law requires a degree of faith that has frequently been eroded by the criminal actions of a few, – starting with Law’s own bankrupting of France with the Louisiana Company. Derivatives are a Ponzi scheme layered on a Ponzi scheme and are therefore even more dangerous. In October I was in London when The Times finally reported on the number of derivatives written on the defaults in California. What had started as less than a hundred million in defaults ( which should have been discounted by the likely residual value of the homes in question)ultimately had over four hundred billion in derivatives written on it. This is what caused the crisis, certainly not the level of the level of defaults.All of North America was built on a wing and a prayer, with much higher levels of default, yet somehow we muddled through. What has really changed?
The bring me to the secondary cause of the crisis which is an increasingly immature population that has been trained to rely on “experts” rather than on common sense. I used to refer to my job as “baby sitting” rather than broking and insisted that my clients learn something of the psychology of markets if they wished to remain my clients. If you recall the case of Michael Milken he was actually quite above board in his representations of his products. It was not he who failed the public in offering these products, it was rather the greed of the public that failed him in absorbing these products and then seeking a scapegoat for their own immaturities.
This last financial crisis will be dwarfed by the next if the do-gooders of the world get their way. Persons such a Soros must be slathering at the opportunities presented by a global market in carbon credits. Any trader worth their salt would be able to take billions from the market due to the inherent unreliability of both statistics and proposed versus actual actions of participant countries. Easy money, but certainly not something of interest to myself.
The global financial markets are a mess, and will remain so until the average person realizes their own worth in the financial equation. The ridiculous prices for both oil and gold and the continued manipulation of global currencies should be more than enough to illustrate the perverse reluctance of people to exercise their own free will even when openly having the information to do so. If one wishes to play in the ocean then it is highly advisable to learn how to swim!
In closing I will present you with an interesting case. – I sometimes participate in financial discussions using the name Arbadacarba. If you search this name on the comments section of “Heard on the Street” during the nadir of the markets you will find that I suggested that participants in the markets take a deep breath, look outside and ask themselves if ninety percent of the United States had ceased to be. I further suggested that if it hadn’t then perhaps the markets were oversold and that there was extremely good money to be made in stocks which “represented America” – suggesting three stocks. Within five minutes the predictable hoo-ahs started and all three of these stocks (some of the largest on the board) inflected upwards. This can all be checked out by reading the comments sections, and illustrates my point that the biggest failing right now is not crookedness from within, but immaturity from without.
D4peace writes
thoroughly enjoyed your brilliant article:
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/02/2011218151257526294.html
and would very much like to see your film.
thanks, dianne
Atlee Howard: “Keep up the good work man! We need all the info we can get.”
Gladys Schmitz, SSND writes from Minnesota:
Revolution. May it be so.
I am half way through my 80s and only within the last couple years have I been trying to read about the banks and financial sector since my areas of studies did not include economics. I am unable to avoid the idea of how important money is in distorting politics and policy — domestic and foreign – in causing the terrible human rights abuses, injustices, suffering, poverty and disparity in wealth. Wars,and more. Everything is related, it seems. Then after joining a community of women religious over 50 years ago, I did not really have to deal much with money and put my time and effort on other things. So, that may not be a good excuse for ignorance, but it is sort of an explanation. I have read several books and many articles and I’m beginning to get something of an insight into what looks mostly like a criminal enterprise, especially since the last of the meaningful regulations were removed. (Last book I just read was The Monster by Michael Hudson. Very helpful.)
I just read your article US Economy: One Big Ponzi Scheme and found it very good. At the bottom we are told that your new film is “Plunder: The Crime of Our Time”, which ” tells the story of the financial crisis as a criminal tale.” What kind of film is this? Is it a video or DVD one can purchase for home use and/or sharing with whoever one might find to view it too? (If so, what is the cost? And how long is it?) Or is it a documentary meant for theatres, or what? Whatever it is, it sounds very good and important as a learning/teaching tool.
John Hannah writes:
It is interesting that you mention Jeff Sachs challenging the US intellectual and elite establishment asking them essentially, “Are you guys wanting an Egypt in the US?”
I’m an old guy, a combat veteran, upper middle class sort at almost 67 year old. Every year now my amazement increases at how our populace has become a bunch of cows or sheep when really bad things are going on that run counter to all that the US should stand for. Like continual war, ever increasing income disparity, corporate off shoring of jobs, one way trade deals, outright propagandizing of the populace by elected leaders, unlawful acts being committed by our elected officials and so on. The tea party hoohaw really has amounted to little but a bunch of folks just blowing off steam and hyperventilating. The first real protest movement we have seen for years is the scuffle going on in Wisconsin. Those folks are finally reacting and get it, but where the hell are all the rest of the folks that are getting their economic ass kicked and why did it take over two years for even these folks in Wisconsin to get up off their dead asses and protest. I don’t get it.
Ree van Oppenwrites from Canada:
I read with interest and mostly in agreement with your column on 2/22/2011. However, what is the basis for your statement?: “Obama has already supported a law allowing him to shut it (the internet) down here in a national emergency.”
It is important not to misrepresent facts. Please clarify your statement!
Norm writes from Boston:
It was wonderful to read your article on Al Jazeera on Bernie and the banks and I so remember all your years in Boston hearing you on the radio with your wonderfully incisive comments. ” This is Danny Schechter your news dissector”
I hope you’re well and continue to speak your mind !
Rex Smith: I don’t think we are as passive as you might think. Remember we have a well armed society here in the USA….Maybe it keeps us acting sane.
Polar writes: “i saw your blog on Al Jazeera. must be the first time they hosted a report with yiddish words ( gonif ). score one for the international Jewish cabal.”
Chris Prieto writes:
I just read your article on AJE about the US economy being one big ponzi scheme. The part in your article that struck me was when you wrote:
“Many activists say they want to emulate the Egyptians, but who will organize anything as effective – even in a land that used to be known for people’s movements – to raise hell? In Egypt, young people used the internet to organize and mobilize for change. In the US, the internet seems to function more as an escape valve, consuming hours of our time and giving us another way to talk to each other – and ventilate against the government. Social media here seems to be more for socializing.”
I agree with you that most here in the US are to lazy or not interested in real change etc but part of the problem is that I/we don’t know where to start? I like Chomsky and what he writes but I also like what the Libertarian/Rob Paul party is about. Both are about real change – drastic change. While both differ in the change, they both see that change is needed to buck the status quo. I am not a fan of either the liberal or conservative movements and despise the neocons. I think most people that are informed really want change but just do not know how to organize or start a movement. If I knew where to start and who to contact I would. I just don’t know where to go? This country needs a revolution; one that changes the system and gets us back on a path to leading the world by example! A system that is truly of the people for the people and not banks, corporations, and the wealthy. Where do I start? How can I get connected? Until then, I am stuck with posting articles on FB just to have people ask me why I am posting so many depressing article!
Media
Al Jazeera: Anti-nothing, and Pro Nothing
ISRAEL INVESTING $1.6 MILLION IN “NEW MEDIA WARRIORS”
By Jillian Kestler-D’Amours, The Electronic Intifada, 24 February 2011
In early February, Israeli military spokesperson Avi Benayahu announced that more than a hundred Israeli “media warriors” are to be trained to use social media tools to disseminate Israeli propaganda to audiences around the world.
Clark Wilson: I thought this infographic might be of interest to you. It highlights a small service such as Netflix, while thought of as ridiculous just a year or so ago, has taken over Blockbuster’s user base, and brought not only a new aspect to movie rental through mail, but also now with their streaming service is set to hold on to the movie rental arena for years to come. You can check it out here at: www.slashfilm.com/infographic-netflix-destroyed-blockbuster/
Resource: Interactive Map of Arab Protest Twitter Posts
There you go, another day, another newsy blog. but I like to give the folks commenting on my work some space when their ideas are coherent even if we disagree.
You can share your comments by writing to me at: dissector@mediachannel.org
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About Danny Schechter
Danny Schechter is an Emmy award winning journalist, television producer and independent filmmaker who also writes, blogs and speaks about media issues.
His latest film is PLUNDER The Crime Of Our Time.
Mr. Schechter is NOT the Godfather of Soul.
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