Money, Tits and Turning Tables
Money: it’s always talked big , but now its mouth is genormous. After the Savings and Loan scandals of the mid to late ’80s, there were more than 1000 federal prosecutions of bankers and related scoundrels (including W’s bro Neil). So why no high profile prosecutions this time around, when the damage was so much more severe? Because the fix was in early. In the fall of 2008, Timothy Geithner— now head of Treasury, then head of the NY federal reserve bank— told Andrew Cuomo (then atty gen of NY and known Wall Streeter crimes crusader) to go easy on getting the goods on these crooks. Geithner —in the midst at that point of bailing out “too big to fail” (and too small to investigate earlier) AIG gigunda-corp— said this would “protect taxpayers.” Plus, too much noise could cause a market freak-out. Nevermind the freak-outs of us normal citizens as we watched our meager investments, savings, and home values go down the tubes. Meanwhile, in Great Britain, prosecutions are moving forward nicely. 7 major Brit bankers and 2 in Iceland are facing fraud charges via, what else? The Office of Serious Fraud (love that title—out of a Dickens book). I wish it was being taken more seriously here.
It’s interesting to watch how the Republicans are swingin’ in the wind —at least as of today—re the debt ceiling debacle they themselves manufactured some months ago to further hassle Obama. As said in my previous post, the debt ceiling has been raised a lot—76 times since 1960— and the world has not ended. Each time, it’s been just another vote in the political industrial complex. Now, just when the Republicans thought they were on a divide and conquer roll, some Tea Party darlings won’t play ball by approving Speaker John Boehner’s plan so it can move forward; so things are all asunder and tables are turning in GOP land. Which brings to mind a favorite quote from an illustrious pol from the past, John Mitchell, who was attorney general under Nixon during the Watergate scandals. When it leaked out that the Washington Post was going to front page a story by Woodward and Bernstein —who’d been exposing various aspects of Watergate already—about Mitchell’s connection to the Nixon reelection slush fund that had funded the original break-in Mitchell said this about Post owner/publisher Katherine Graham: Katie Graham’s gonna get her tit caught in a big fat wringer if that’s published.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/watergate/stories/graham.htm. Of course it was Mitchell, Nixon & Co. who got their body parts all caught up in their scheme, and we all know what happened next. So I guess you could say today, in this 24/7media-land , that the Republican party has its tit caught in a big fat wringer. As someone who has endured mammograms can attest—geez that’s painful!
