Guess who works for Phil Gramm at UBS?

[Octafish]

No. Not Karl Rove. The other guy on the right: the Ragin' Cajun.



After his exit from the US Senate, Phil Gramm immediately found a job at Swiss bank UBS as its Vice Chairman. Gramm today works in the Wealth Management department, where he brought on, among others, former President Bill Clinton, former pretzeldent George W Bush and one James Carville.



See for you'self.

It's a Buy-Partisan Who's Who:

President William J. Clinton
President George W. Bush Heh heh heh.
Robert J. McCann
James Carville
John V. Miller
Paula D. Polito
Anthony Roth
Mike Ryan
John Savercool

SOURCE: http://financialservicesinc.ubs.com/revitalizingamerica/SenatorPhilGramm.html

Who would have thought President Clinton and Sen. Gramm -- the two key figures in repealing Glass-Steagall -- would work together in Wealth Management at a Swiss bank?

Since the New Deal, Glass-Steagall had protected the US taxpayer from the Wall Street casino by law. After its repeal, the US taxpayer got put on the hook for, among other things, the most recent $16 trillion Wall Street bailout.

In September 2008 on DU2 I described the situation: Know your BFEE: Phil Gramm, the Meyer Lansky of the War Party, Set-Up the Biggest Bank Heist Ever.

Those interested may also enjoy what Robert Scheer thinks about Phil Gramm.



https://panamapapers.icij.org/20160403-panama-papers-global-overview.html

Until the Panama Papers, this information wasn't much interest to the USA's "news media." They don't like to disturb their owners and operators any more than they have to.

[snagglepuss]

1. knr

[Octafish]

21. Bill Clinton also works at UBS

After his exit from the US Senate, Phil Gramm found a job at Swiss bank UBS as vice chairman. He later brought in former President Bill Clinton to the Wealth Management team. What a coincidence, they are the two key figures in repealing Glass-Steagal. Since the New Deal it was the financial regulation that protected the US taxpayer from the Wall Street casino. Oh well, what are a few hundred million in speaking fees compared to a $16 trillion bailout among friends?

[CorporatistNation]

48. IT IS... ALL ABOUT THE GD MONEY! Carvilee is A POS Corporatist as Well

What "Democracy?"

[LondonReign2]

53. It's a big club, and you ain't in it

?w=640
?1456563540
?itok=yP-sh4AJ

?v=1429201091

[Dragonfli]

2. K&R for needed exposure /nt

[Octafish]

22. George W Bush also works at UBS

Jeb Bush's Administration Steered Florida Pension Money to George W. Bush’s Fundraisers

By Andrew Perez, David Sirota, Matthew Cunningham-Cook
International Business Times, April 14 2015 10:40 AM EDT

Four years before the financial collapse, Goldman Sachs executive George Herbert Walker IV had much to be thankful for. "I've been fortunate to be a small part of teams leading U.S. restructurings, European privatizations, global pension management and now hedge fund and private equity investing,” he said in the annual report of a banking colossus that would soon be known as the “great vampire squid” of Wall Street.

“The world,” said Walker, “just keeps getting more interesting."

As the head of Goldman Sachs’ alternative investment unit, Walker’s ebullience was understandable. At the same time he was raising $100,000 for his cousin George W. Bush’s successful presidential re-election effort, the administration of another cousin, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, returned the family favor, delivering $150 million of Florida pension money to an alternative investment fund run by Walker’s firm. Like other executives whose companies received Florida pension money, Walker is now renewing the cycle, reportedly attending in February a high-dollar fundraiser for Jeb Bush’s political committee.

Walker is not alone: He is one of 19 top fundraisers for George W. Bush -- known as “Pioneers” and “Rangers” -- whose financial firms received state business from Jeb Bush’s administration in Tallahassee. In all, an International Business Times’ review of government documents shows Jeb Bush oversaw Florida directing at least $1.7 billion of state workers’ retirement money to the financial firms of his elder brother’s major donors.

As Jeb Bush oversaw the State Board of Administration (SBA) that runs Florida’s massive public pension system, the state shifted billions of dollars into higher-risk, higher-fee alternative investments, benefiting the same sector of the investment industry he would work in upon leaving office. Many of those state deals delivered returns that fell short of projections. Roughly 20 percent of that system’s 53 private investment deals during Bush’s governorship went to companies that employed his brother’s Pioneers. Those financial firms, in turn, delivered more than $5 million of campaign cash to George W. Bush, the Republican National Committee and Jeb Bush’s Republican Party of Florida. (Click here to see the full list of Bush Pioneers whose firms received Florida pension investments from Jeb Bush’s administration).



CONTINUED...

http://www.ibtimes.com/jeb-bushs-administration-steered-florida-pension-money-george-w-bushs-fundraisers-1880592

UBS.

[Faux pas]

3. LOL should have had a warning for the first pic!

What a pair to draw to.

[Octafish]

24. Really Scary: UBS received $287 Billion bailout...and Phil Gramm still talks slow.

Remember how fast Bushler distanced himself from Kenny Boy? That was when all that HARKEN SEC brouhaha was bubbling up, again. Then, just before sentencing, Kenny left this mortal toil? Too sad.

Federal Reserve Directors' Banks and Businesses Took $4 Trillion in Bailouts -- Sanders FED Audit

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002807254

PS: Here's the Buy-Partisan ENRON angle:

Lieberman in ENRON Land

[sabrina 1]

37. They're all just one big happy family aren't they? We were so scammed! But not anymore thankfully.

[disillusioned73]

4. K & R

This getting ridiculous... who's going to stop this bullshit??.. they own this place at this point..

[Joob]

11. Clearly not Hillary supporters who claim they are Democrats.

Must be propaganda if it's against Hillary. Kind of like when a Republican defends their candidate.
If they want The Democatic Party to be Rebulican - Lite, by all means, have at it if she wins.

The real liberals will find a new party

[Octafish]

25. This land is their land. We pay them rent.

Very much like feudal times.

How Wall Street Parasites Have Devoured Their Hosts, Your Retirement Plan and the U.S. Economy

by PAM MARTENS
CounterPunch, SEPTEMBER 1, 2015

The riveting writer, Michael Hudson, has read our collective minds and the simmering anger in our hearts. Millions of American have long suspected that their inability to get financially ahead is an intentional construct of Wall Street’s central planners. Now Hudson, in an elegant but lethal indictment of the system, confirms that your ongoing struggle to make ends meet is not a reflection of your lack of talent or drive but the only possible outcome of having a blood-sucking financial leech affixed to your body, your retirement plan, and your economic future.

In his new book, “Killing the Host,” Hudson hones an exquisitely gripping journey from Wall Street’s original role as capital allocator to its present-day parasitism that has replaced U.S. capitalism as an entrenched, politically-enforced economic model across America.

This book is a must-read for anyone hoping to escape the most corrupt era in American history with a shirt still on his parasite-riddled back.

Hudson writes from his most powerful perch in chapters describing how these financial parasites have tricked our society into accepting them as a normal, productive part of our economy. (Since we write about these thousands of diabolical tricks four days a week at Wall Street On Parade, poignant examples came springing to mind with every turn of the page in “Killing the Host.” From the well-placed articles in the Wall Street Journal to a front group’s pleas for more Wall Street handouts in a New York Times OpEd, to the dirty backroom manner in which corporate speech was placed on a par with human speech in the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, to Wall Street’s private justice system and the Koch brothers’ multi-million dollar machinations to instill Ayn Rand’s brand of “greed is good” in university economic departments across America — America has become a finely tuned kleptocracy with a sprawling, sophisticated public relations base.

How else to explain, other than kleptocracy, the fact that Wall Street’s richest mega banks collect the life insurance proceeds and tax benefits on the untimely deaths of their workers – all codified into law by the U.S. Congress – making death a profit center on Wall Street. Or, as Frontline revealed, that two-thirds of your 401(k) plan over a working lifetime is likely to be lost to financial fees.

CONTINUED...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/09/01/how-wall-street-parasites-have-devoured-their-hosts-your-retirement-plan-and-the-u-s-economy/

Wall Street-on-the-Potomac is Buy Partisan.

[disillusioned73]

31. Great article..

I may have to get that book..

[AzDar]

5. K & R

[Octafish]

34. Guess whose Foundation is tied to UBS?

From the Small World division of Wealth Management:

After Hillary Clinton helped settle tax case, UBS increased foundation support

Clinton helped the IRS and UBS settle a tax evasion case in 2009 as secretary of state, and since then donations by UBS to the Clinton Foundation have grown

Jana Kasperkevic in New York
The Guardian, July 30, 2015

Hillary Clinton’s overlap of private and political activities was once again in the spotlight on Thursday after a Wall Street Journal report that since Clinton helped broker a settlement in a legal tax case against UBS while she was secretary of state, the Swiss bank has increased its financial support and involvement in Clinton Foundation projects.

In February 2009, the IRS sued UBS and demanded that it disclose the names of 52,000 possible American tax evaders with secret Swiss bank accounts. In the months that followed – thanks to involvement of Clinton as secretary of state and Swiss lawmakers – a legal settlement was negotiated. On 19 August 2009, it was announced that UBS would pay no fine and would provide the IRS with information about 4,450 accounts within a year.

Since the deal was struck, disclosures by the foundation and the bank show the donations by UBS to the Clinton Foundation growing “from less than $60,000 through 2008 to a cumulative total of about $600,000 by the end of 2014”, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The bank also teamed up with the foundation on the Clinton Economic Opportunity Initiative, creating a pilot entrepreneur program through which UBS offered $32m in loans to businesses, the newspaper reported. Other UBS donations to the Clinton Foundation include a $350,000 donation from June 2011 and a $100,000 donation for a charity golf tournament.

Additionally, UBS paid more than $1.5m in speaking fees to Bill Clinton between 2001 and 2014, the newspaper reported.

CONTINUED...

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jul/30/hillary-clinton-ubs-tax-evasion-settlement-foundation

Well. If it's not illegal, it's legal-like.

[sabrina 1]

38. Aw, how sweet!

And this is what they expect us to support ....

[Octafish]

39. Is the Clinton Foundation the Dulles Brother’s Sullivan and Cromwell?

You might also enjoy this:

Is the Clinton Foundation the Dulles Brother’s Sullivan and Cromwell?

by JOHN STANTON
CounterPunch, APRIL 15, 2016

EXCERPT...

As Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton instigated and legitimized the overthrow of the Honduran government in 2009 not all that unlike the 1954 Guatemala Coup engineered primarily by CIA Director Allen Dulles, supported by Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and with the glowing approval of President Dwight Eisenhower.

In a March 2016 interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now, Greg Grandin, a professor of Latin American history at New York University, discussed the fallout from the 2009 Honduran Coup. “I mean, hundreds of peasant activists and indigenous activists have been killed. Scores of gay rights activists have been killed. I mean, it’s just—it’s just a nightmare in Honduras. I mean, there’s ways in which the coup regime basically threw up Honduras to transnational pillage. And Berta Cáceres [a prominent Honduran activist assassinated in 2016], in that interview, says what was installed after the coup was something like a permanent counterinsurgency on behalf of transnational capital. And that was—that wouldn’t have been possible if it were not for Hillary Clinton’s normalization of that election, or legitimacy.”

In an April interview with Dana Frank, professor of history at the University of California, Santa Cruz, on Democracy Now, Frank indicated that President Obama had basically turned over Central and South America to Hillary Clinton. Frank then said this: “I think it’s really about the U.S. pushback against the democratically elected governments of the left and the center-left that came to power in Latin America in the ’90s and in the 2000s—Venezuela, Bolivia, Argentina, Ecuador, Chile, El Salvador, all these countries. And Zelaya was the weakest link in that chain. He, himself, did not come out of a big social movement base at the time of his election, certainly since the coup. And I think they were—the U.S. was looking for a way to push back against that. There’s a very important military base, U.S. military base, Soto Cano Air Force Base, in Honduras. And Honduras has always been the most captive nation of the United States in Latin America. So, I think they were testing what they could get away with. And they got away with it. It was the first domino pushing back against democracy in Latin America and reasserting U.S. power, in service to a transnational corporate agenda.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/15/is-the-clinton-foundation-the-dulles-brothers-sullivan-and-cromwell/

It is the foreign policy of Empire -- war abroad and repression at home to empower and profit the connected few -- today applied on the homefront via wall-to-wall cradle-to-grave spying and who knows what all.

[malokvale77]

6. Just as long as you don't equate...

one with the other.

[Octafish]

7. Never.

That's why the money is green.

[bobthedrummer]

8. Panama Papers: The secrets of dirty money (Suddeutsche Zeitung)

http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/56febf8da1bb8d3c3495adec

[Octafish]

35. ''Integrity is for paupers.''

What Tim Russert said...

CHOCOLATES AND NYLONS, SIR?

By David Podvin, Jan. 9, 2002

In 1992, shortly after being named moderator of Meet The Press, Tim Russert was having lunch with a broadcast executive. The mealtime conversation was about the pros and cons of working for General Electric’s NBC subsidiary. Russert expounded on how being employed by GE had brought him to the realization that things functioned better when Republicans were in charge.

“You know, Tim, you used to be such a rabid Democrat when you worked for Pat Moynihan,” said the executive. “But now that you’ve gotten a glimpse of who’s handing out the money in this business, you’ve become quite the Jaycee. Were you wrong about everything you used to believe so strongly?”

“I still believe,” Russert said, leaning across the table. “I believe in everything I ever did. But I also know that I never would have become moderator on Meet The Press if my employers were uncomfortable with me. And, given the amount of money at stake, millions of dollars, I don’t blame them. This is business.”

The executive agreed. “But are you concerned about losing yourself? You know, selling out?”

Russert pounded the table. “Integrity is for paupers!”

When Tim Russert joined NBC News in 1984, he began a personal transformation from Democratic congressional aide to broadcaster-in-charge of General Electric’s political interests. His early efforts for the network drew some criticism from the GE corporate suites as being “too knee jerk”, a euphemism for “insufficiently pro-GE/ Republican”. The executives at General Electric viewed with hostility the Democratic Party that wanted to burden them with obeying laws that the company preferred to break and complying with regulations that it preferred to ignore. While Republicans turned a blind eye to the serial environmental crimes and bribery committed by GE, the Democrats were less submissive. The company was especially upset that the Democratic Party had taken a position against transferring public ownership of the broadcast airwaves to the media conglomerates.

CONTINUED...

http://makethemaccountable.com/podvin/media/020109_Russert.htm

Money. It makes many people lose track of what matters. Their souls, for instance.

[JEB]

9. K&R&bookmark

Thanks for the excellent post and informative links.

[Octafish]

36. The Clintons and Wall Street: 24 Years of Enriching Each Other

Important history those who want to control the future work to minimize:

The Clintons and Wall Street: 24 Years of Enriching Each Other

by RICHARD W. BEHAN
CounterPunch, FEBRUARY 26, 2016

EXCERPT...

President Clinton appointed Robert Rubin, the Co-chairman of Goldman-Sachs, as his Treasury Secretary in January of 1995. Mr. Rubin went to work fashioning two laws of stupendous value to the New York banks, but President Clinton’s first term of office ended before they could be enacted.

Perhaps sensing the need to assure Clinton’s re-election, Wall Street saw fit nearly to triple its campaign contributions—from $11.17 million in 1992 to $28.37 million in 1996.

Continued nicely in office, Secretary Rubin triumphed with the passage of the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999, which repealed the Glass-Steagall legislation of 1933. Now it was legal once more for financial institutions to mix commercial and investment banking; in essence, to use depositors’ funds for trading the bank’s own account in the stock market.

A year later President Clinton signed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act. This law ended the regulation of derivatives, freeing Wall Street to manufacture mortgage-backed securities and sell them without restriction; these complex derivatives would power the “subprime” swindle soon to commence.

Meanwhile, in Clinton’s Justice Department a deputy Attorney General named Eric Holder in 1999 authored a memo entitled “Bringing Criminal Charges Against Corporations.” It became the Holder Doctrine, and after the financial crisis of 2008 it would be of incalculable value to the Wall Street banks. On leaving the Administration Mr. Holder joined Covington Burling, the largest law firm in Washington, D.C.. Among its clients were Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, UBS, Bank of New York Mellon, Deutsche Bank, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America.

CONTINUED...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/26/the-clintons-and-wall-street-24-years-of-enriching-each-other/

PS: You are most welcome, JEB! Thank you for grokking!

[RiverLover]

10. Lots of folks in on the Clinton Con.

Thanks for posting, Octa.

Another term for DINOs comes to mind, Democrats my ass.

[Octafish]

40. I once actually hoped Democrats would not succumb to the ecstasy of gold.

It was weird finding out just how far my idealism -- or the PR-generated, psyop-inspired rhetoric -- was from reality.



Taken For Granted At Davos That US Government Run On ‘Legalized Corruption’

By: DSWright
FireDogLake.com, Wednesday January 21, 2015

While there may be confusion among some in the US as to how the American political system operates, it is apparently taken for granted by participants at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that politics in America is based on bribery and corruption.

In an interview at Davos with Bloomberg News related to growing concerns about rising wealth inequality and its corruption influence on American politics economist and NYU business professor Nouriel Roubini stated as a matter of fact that it would be hard for the US to overcome wealth inequality because the US political system was based on “legalized corruption” which meant rich people – having more resources to bribe politicians with – would generally prevail.

Tom Keene, Bloomberg: How big is the plutocracy effect in 2015?

Nouriel Roubini: It’s significant because we are in a democracy where it supposedly has to be one man, one vote, but the reality is that those who are billionaires, those that have economic and financial power can affect legislation on taxation of capital gains, of carried interest by having that political power.

In the US we have a system of legalized corruption if you think about it. K Street and the lobbying affect legislation with the money they give the politician and therefore those who have financial resources have a greater impact on the political system than those who have less. So it’s not a true democracy, it’s a plutocracy.

This is not news to anyone paying attention. In fact, Princeton University produced an exhaustive study that made headlines demonstrating that the wealthy ultimately determine legislative outcomes in the US Congress. Add to that an experiment the progressive group CREDO and UC Berkeley ran where they offered meetings to representatives with either actual constituents or non-constituent donors with the representatives overwhelmingly choosing the donors and you certainly have a picture of a cynical system run on cash.

CONTINUED w/links...

http://news.firedoglake.com/2015/01/21/taken-for-granted-at-davos-that-us-government-run-on-legalized-corruption/#at_pco=cfd-1.0&at_ab=-&at_pos=7&at_tot=8&at_si=54c5412562e4586b

[cherokeeprogressive]

12. Buy-Partisan. Perfect Hillary description.

[Octafish]

43. UBS is all kinds of Buy Partisan

Pay must be good, too.

Hillary Helps a Bank—and Then It Funnels Millions to the Clintons

The Wall Street Journal’s eyebrow-raising story of how the presidential candidate and her husband accepted cash from UBS without any regard for the appearance of impropriety that it created.

by CONOR FRIEDERSDORF, The Atlantic, JUL 31, 2015

The Swiss bank UBS is one of the biggest, most powerful financial institutions in the world. As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton intervened to help it out with the IRS. And after that, the Swiss bank paid Bill Clinton $1.5 million for speaking gigs. The Wall Street Journal reported all that and more Thursday in an article that highlights huge conflicts of interest that the Clintons have created in the recent past.

The piece begins by detailing how Clinton helped the global bank.

“A few weeks after Hillary Clinton was sworn in as secretary of state in early 2009, she was summoned to Geneva by her Swiss counterpart to discuss an urgent matter. The Internal Revenue Service was suing UBS AG to get the identities of Americans with secret accounts,” the newspaper reports. “If the case proceeded, Switzerland’s largest bank would face an impossible choice: Violate Swiss secrecy laws by handing over the names, or refuse and face criminal charges in U.S. federal court. Within months, Mrs. Clinton announced a tentative legal settlement—an unusual intervention by the top U.S. diplomat. UBS ultimately turned over information on 4,450 accounts, a fraction of the 52,000 sought by the IRS.”

Then reporters James V. Grimaldi and Rebecca Ballhaus lay out how UBS helped the Clintons. “Total donations by UBS to the Clinton Foundation grew from less than $60,000 through 2008 to a cumulative total of about $600,000 by the end of 2014, according to the foundation and the bank,” they report. “The bank also joined the Clinton Foundation to launch entrepreneurship and inner-city loan programs, through which it lent $32 million. And it paid former president Bill Clinton $1.5 million to participate in a series of question-and-answer sessions with UBS Wealth Management Chief Executive Bob McCann, making UBS his biggest single corporate source of speech income disclosed since he left the White House.”

The article adds that “there is no evidence of any link between Mrs. Clinton’s involvement in the case and the bank’s donations to the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation, or its hiring of Mr. Clinton.” Maybe it’s all a mere coincidence, and when UBS agreed to pay Bill Clinton $1.5 million the relevant decision-maker wasn’t even aware of the vast sum his wife may have saved the bank or the power that she will potentially wield after the 2016 presidential election.

SNIP...

As McClatchy noted last month in a more broadly focused article that also mentions UBS, “Ten of the world’s biggest financial institutions––including UBS, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs––have hired Bill Clinton numerous times since 2004 to speak for fees totaling more than $6.4 million. Hillary Clinton also has accepted speaking fees from at least one bank. And along with an 11th bank, the French giant BNP Paribas, the financial goliaths also donated as much as $24.9 million to the Clinton Foundation––the family’s global charity set up to tackle causes from the AIDS epidemic in Africa to climate change.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07/hillary-helps-a-bankand-then-it-pays-bill-15-million-in-speaking-fees/400067/

The Revelation of Phil Gramm

Rich people already own a Party, the Republicans.
It bothers me to see them co-opt a big chunk of ours.

[artislife]

13. It is one big club. nt

[840high]

28. 'aye

[Octafish]

42. Mere mention of its existence brings out anguished (and now paid) cries of ''CONSPIRACY THEORY!''

"Most of the world is capitalist. And most of the world is poor."

[cherokeeprogressive]

46. And we ain't in it. nt

[amborin]

14. K&R Great research! Hope this gets wide publicity!

[Octafish]

45. Hillary, the Banksters Committed 'Fraud,' Not 'Shenanigans'

Hillary, the Banksters Committed 'Fraud,' Not 'Shenanigans'

William K. Black
Huffington Post, 02/04/2016

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in her debate with Senator Sanders minutes ago, said that she went to Wall Street and told them to stop their "shenanigans." The context was that she was being asked to respond to the complaint that she was too close to on Wall Street billionaires. She had every incentive, therefore, to demonstrate how tough she would be on Wall Street.

In that context, the best she could muster was the pusillanimous "shenanigans." Here is a typical definition of that word with examples.

1. : a devious trick used especially for an underhand purpose
2. 2a : tricky or questionable practices or conduct --usually used in pluralb : high-spirited or mischievous activity --usually used in plural

Examples of SHENANIGAN
1. students engaging in youthful shenanigans on the last day of school
2. an act of vandalism that went way beyond the usual shenanigans at summer camp

Hillary cannot bring herself to use the "f" word in the context of Wall Street CEOs leading the largest and most destructive fraud epidemics in history - frauds that made them spectacularly wealthy. A few minutes later, Bernie said that "fraud" was Wall Street's business model.

SNIP...

Here is the reaction of another prominent official to the plight of the homeowners:

"Along with innovation came complexity, and complexity is the enemy of transparency. I had high school friends and grade school friends that got put into mortgages by unscrupulous brokers. Some lost their houses, and I spent time with them and looked at what they had been conned into accepting--they didn't understand what they were signing on for. It was despicable."

"Despicable." The person I am quoting is Hank Paulson, former head of Goldman Sachs, and Secretary of the Treasury under President Bush. Paulson is not by nature someone with great sympathy for the poor. Hillary urges us to believe that because she started as a lawyer for an NGO she has established that she is a person of exceptional empathy. But her 2007 speech to Wall Street was a direct test of character that she failed. Hank Paulson, the leader of the "Vampire Squid," won the test of reality and human sympathy and Hillary lost -- and it wasn't close.

Hillary could easily have gotten the issue correct by talking with Miller and Madigan to get the facts. Both AGs are leading endorsers of Hillary's campaign. Hillary did not investigate, she did not even take the step that Hank Paulson did and check with friends with real experience with foreclosures.

Hillary simply believed the banksters' myths about the crisis. She pronounced sentence on the people losing their homes who were the victims of the banksters' frauds. She implicitly cast the banksters as the victims of the homeowners. The best she could muster was to note that the banksters should have vetted the loans more carefully. What courage.

SOURCE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-k-black/hillary-the-banksters-com_b_9164930.html

PS: Thank you for the kind words, amborin. Your friendship means the world.

[Hiraeth]

15. K&R

[Octafish]

47. Phil Gramm works at UBS

Last edited Sun May 29, 2016, 01:50 PM - Edit history (1)

UBS Money Launering: What Did Phil Gramm Know and When Did He Know

by Robert Scheer
TruthDig, Aug. 18, 2009

In recent days yet another wealthy private customer of the Swiss-based banking conglomerate UBS admitted to criminal fraud in a growing parade of perp walks that could extend into the thousands. It is a case that threatens to ensnare former Sen. Phil Gramm, the Texas Republican who is vice chairman of UBS’ investment banking business. Given the widespread involvement of UBS in what the Justice Department alleges were systematic efforts to violate U.S. tax laws, it must be asked: Did Gramm as a top executive have no inkling about what was going on?

Perhaps, but for Gramm this has to be a moment that at the very least tests his ideological commitment to the radical deregulation of banking that he championed during his 24 years in Congress. He joined UBS soon after the bank acquired Enron, a company that had gone bankrupt after jumping through the “Enron loophole” in the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which Gramm had pushed though Congress. Gramm’s wife, Wendy, had been an Enron board member and head of its audit committee but failed to sound the alarm before the Houston-based company collapsed. Then UBS itself ran into big trouble because of $37 billion in bad mortgage debt made possible by derivatives market deregulation engineered by then-Sen. Gramm. U.S. taxpayers have had to pony up money to heal UBS’ self-inflicted wound. But the bank’s involvement with tens of thousands of secret accounts tied to allegations of tax evasion raises starker issues—of possible criminal fraud through practices that Gramm as a senator helped keep opaque.

In his last years in the Senate, Gramm succeeded in blocking legislation that, as The New York Times editorialized, would have made it easier “to crack down on offshore tax havens” and “would have expanded rules that require banks to find out more about individuals and foreign jurisdictions they are dealing with.” The Times noted, “The legislation won bipartisan support but was blocked by Senator Gramm of Texas, a foe of government regulation. …”

Following that victory, Gramm stepped into a top position at UBS, stating: “It will provide me with an opportunity to practice what I’ve always preached. … I have a strange combination of experiences that a lot of people don’t have … knowledge of economics, a knowledge of government policy.” Given that knowledge, it is legitimate to ask just how Gramm could have been unaware of the extensive efforts of his new employer, UBS, to thwart the IRS. In court cases involving UBS over the past year, witnesses have provided extensive details of the bank’s alleged practices in abetting tax avoidance.

CONTINUED...

http://m.truthdig.com/report/item/20090819_ubs_money_laundering_what_did_phil_gramm_know

[Armstead]

16. Senator Gramm is a Good Guy now....Haven't you gotten the memo?

[Octafish]

49. It is amazing, believing what history shows otherwise.

Robert Scheer from 2009:

As The Wall Street Journal reported, “The U.S. crackdown on clients of UBS AG is widening into a global hunt, with the government detailing in court documents how the Swiss bank and outside advisers helped Americans hide money using enterprises set up in Hong Kong.”

Was Gramm truly unaware of the widespread efforts at UBS to defraud the U.S. Treasury? Did extreme ideologically driven naiveté lead him to believe that the bank would never engage in such chicanery? In the past he was the first to deny any hint of business naiveté and indeed defended his being hired by a bank that benefited from his legislation. Deflecting any suggestion of a conflict of interests, Gramm told a reporter: “You know, there is something to be said for not hiring people who just came in off a turnip truck. I have always believed that when I left the Senate that I would go into financial services as something that I know something about.”

Well, what exactly did he know about those offshore tax shelters that caused a revenue shortfall of at least $100 billion that honest taxpayers have to make up?

SOURCE: http://m.truthdig.com/report/item/20090819_ubs_money_laundering_what_did_phil_gramm_know

With Corporate McPravda and Crapadaemia being what they are, I can understand the ignorance. What is sickening are those who know, and chose to ignore it.

[snooper2]

17. They are all Cronies Octafish, you know this...Bernie- has a minor in cronyism LOL

Hillary- a major...

Trump- C- out of High School but is HATED by all teachers

[Octafish]

50. Until Vietnam, I didn't believe people could sacrifice their integrity.

Brown & Root co-founder George Brown (left) with President Lyndon B. Johnson. LBJ's ties to the Brown brothers dated back to his days as a Texas congressman.
From 'Builders'/ © Texas A&M University Press

Halliburton Deals Recall Vietnam-Era Controversy

Cheney's Ties to Company Reminiscent of LBJ's Relationships

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1569483

Now, it's what Levi Walking Bear said: "Grab all you can, any time you can."

[2banon]

18. Except wrt to the Panama Papers, a lot of us were painfully aware of this back in the day...

and good folks like yourself and others posted a lot about it, right here on DU.

Apparently a great number of HRC supporters just don't have a problem with knowing who the architects of the repeal of Glass Steagall, courtesy of President Bill Clinton, or why it was done and how that directly correlates with the ultimate crash in 2007/2008.

Surprise, surprise and golly gee, I didn't hear a word about this mentioned in tonight's PBS News Hour, while reporting on the topic of the Panama Papers.

Should we even wonder why?

[Octafish]

55. Thank you, 2banon! That's why the Infodump: to Clog the Memory Hole.

The Panama Papers are the tip of the iceberg. These cats have been moving mountains offshore for over a century.

The Family That Preys Together

by Jack Colhoun, Covert Action Quarterly, Summer 1992

"This is an incredible deal, unbelievable for this small company," energy analyst Charles Strain told Forbes magazine, describing the oil production sharing agreement the Harken Energy Corporation signed in January 1990 with Bahrain.

Under the terms of the deal, Harken was given the exclusive right to explore for gas and oil off the shores of the Gulf island nation. If gas or oil were found in waters near two of the world's largest gas and oil fields, Harken would have exclusive marketing and transportation rights for the energy resources. Truly an "incredible deal" for a company that had never drilled an offshore well.

Strain failed to point out, however, the one fact that puts the Harken deal in focus: George Bush, Jr., the eldest son of George and Barbara Bush of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, DC, is a member of Harken's board of directors, a consultant, and a stockholder in the Texas-based company. In light of this connection, the deal makes more sense. The involvement of Junior-George Walker Bush's childhood nickname-with Harken is a walking conflict of interest. His relationship to President Bush, rather than any business acumen, made him a valuable asset for Harken, the Republican Party benefactors, Middle East oil sheikhs and covert operators who played a part in Harken's Bahrain deal.

In fact, Junior's track record as an oilman is pretty dismal. He began his career in Midland, Texas, in the mid-1970s when he founded Arbusto Energy, Inc. When oil prices dropped in the early 1980s, Arbusto fell upon hard times. Junior was only rescued from business failure when his company was purchased by Spectrum 7 Energy Corporation, a small oil firm owned by William DeWitt and Mercer Reynolds. As part of the September 1984 deal, Bush became Spectrum 7's president and was given a 13.6 percent share in the company's stock. Oil prices stayed low and within two years, Spectrum 7 was in trouble.

In the six months before Spectrum 7 was acquired by Harken in 1986, it had lost $400,000. In the buyout deal, George "Jr." and his partners were given more than $2 million worth of Harken stock for the 180-well operation. Made a director and hired as a "consultant" to Harken, Junior received another $600,000 of Harken stock, and has been paid between $42,000 and $120,000 a year since 1986.

Junior's value to Harken soon became apparent when the company needed an infusion of cash in the spring of 1987. Junior and other Harken officials met with Jackson Stephens, head of Stephens, Inc., a large investment bank in Little Rock, Arkansas (Stephens made a $100,000 contribution to the Reagan-Bush campaign in 1980 and gave another $100,000 to the Bush dinner committee in 1990.)

CONTINUED for a Must-Download article:

http://www.afrocubaweb.com/bushes.htm

From his association with a former president, Frank got a great deal in Kazakhstan:

After Mining Deal, Financier Donated to Clinton

By JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
The New York Times, JAN. 31, 2008

EXCERPT...

Upon landing on the first stop of a three-country philanthropic tour, the two men were whisked off to share a sumptuous midnight banquet with Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, whose 19-year stranglehold on the country has all but quashed political dissent.

Mr. Nazarbayev walked away from the table with a propaganda coup, after Mr. Clinton expressed enthusiastic support for the Kazakh leader’s bid to head an international organization that monitors elections and supports democracy. Mr. Clinton’s public declaration undercut both American foreign policy and sharp criticism of Kazakhstan’s poor human rights record by, among others, Mr. Clinton’s wife, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

Within two days, corporate records show that Mr. Giustra also came up a winner when his company signed preliminary agreements giving it the right to buy into three uranium projects controlled by Kazakhstan’s state-owned uranium agency, Kazatomprom.

The monster deal stunned the mining industry, turning an unknown shell company into one of the world’s largest uranium producers in a transaction ultimately worth tens of millions of dollars to Mr. Giustra, analysts said.

SNIP...

Mr. Giustra foresaw a bull market in gold and began investing in mines in Argentina, Australia and Mexico. He turned a $20 million shell company into a powerhouse that, after a $2.4 billion merger with Goldcorp Inc., became Canada’s second-largest gold company.

CONTINUED...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/31/us/politics/31donor.html

From his association with a future president, George got a great deal in Bahrain.

Harken Energy And Insider Trading

by Stephen Pizzo
Mother Jones, September / October 1992

EXCERPT...

Harken Energy was formed in l973 by two oilmen who would benefit from a successful covert effort to destabilize Australia's Labor Party government (which had attempted to shut out foreign oil exploration). A decade later, Harken was sold to a new investment group headed by New York attorney Alan G. Quasha, a partner in the firm of Quasha, Wessely & Schneider. Quasha's father, a powerful attorney in the Philippines, had been a staunch supporter of then-president Ferdinand Marcos. William Quasha had also given legal advice to two top officials of the notorious Nugan Hand Bank in Australia, a CIA operation.

After the sale of Harken Energy in 1983, Alan Quasha became a director and chairman of the board. Under Quasha, Harken suddenly absorbed Junior's struggling Spectrum 7 in 1986. The merger immediately opened a financial horn of plenty and reversed Junior's fortunes. But like his brother Jeb, Junior seemed unconcerned about the characters who were becoming his benefactors. Harken's $25 million stock offering in 1987, for example, was underwritten by a Little Rock, Arkansas, brokerage house, Stephens, Inc., which placed the Harken stock offering with the London subsidiary of Union Bank -- a bank that had surfaced in the scandal that resulted in the downfall of the Australian Labor government in 1976 and, later, in the Nugan Hand Bank scandal. (It was also Union Bank, according to congressional hearings on international money laundering, that helped the now-notorious Bank of Credit and Commerce International skirt Panamanian money-laundering laws by flying cash out of the country in private jets, and that was used by Ferdinand Marcos to stash 325 tons of Philippine gold around the world.)

SNIP...

Suddenly, in January 1990, Harken Energy became the talk of the Texas oil industry. The company with no offshore-oil-drilling experience beat out a more-established international conglomerate, Amoco, in bagging the exclusive contract to drill in a promising new offshore oil field for the Persian Gulf nation of Bahrain. The deal had been arranged for Harken by two former Stephens, Inc., brokers. A company insider claims the president's son did not initiate the deal -- but feels that his presence in the firm helped with the Bahrainis. "Hell, that's why he's on the damn board," the insider says. "...You say, 'By the way, the president's son sits on our board.' You use that. There's nothing wrong with that."

Junior has told acquaintances conflicting stories about his own involvement in the deal. He first claimed that he had "recused" himself from the deal; "George said he left the room when Bahrain was being discussed 'because we can't even have the appearance of having anything to do with the government.' He was into a big rant about how unfair it was to be the president's son. He said, 'I was so scrupulous I was never in the room when it was discussed.'"

Junior alternately claimed, to reporters for the Wall Street Journal and D Magazine, that he had opposed the arrangement. But the company insider says, to the contrary, that Junior was excited about the Bahrain deal. "Like any member of the board, he was thrilled," the associate says. "His attitude was, 'Holy shit, what a great deal!'"

CONTINUED...

http://www.georgewalkerbush.net/harkenenergyandinsidertrading.htm

That's why I mean by keeping Wall Street and private business out of Washington and the public's business. What a coincidence.

[southerncrone]

19. K & R! It's all a cozy little country club, isn't it?

Gramm, as in Gramm-Rudman Act which immediately cut the top tax bracket's tax in half, while shifting the tax burden onto the backs of the middle-class. It was the beginning of the New Feudalism in America. Add on NAFTA, CAFTA & the other trade deals that punched us in the gut & here we are today.

They've been laughing at us for years; entertaining us w/their faux fights while robbing the coffers WE filled. This is EVIL. Take a close look at it. Time for them to pay the piper.

[haikugal]

29. I like the way your thinking...I want them to feel the Bern...fuckers. Evil! nt

[bobthedrummer]

20. Kick n/t

[jfern]

23. The corruption is high there

[think]

26. Thank you for the information. It's amazing the way these people operate..

[silvershadow]

27. k&r

[tex-wyo-dem]

30. One good ole boys (and girls) club...

Thanks for posting, Octafish!

[Hell Hath No Fury]

32. I fucking love you.

I have learned SOOO much from you over the years, and I thank you for it.

Just shared this with friends. Never agin will I vote for such corruption.

[bobthedrummer]

33. ^

[azmom]

41. K&R

[KoKo]

44. Also...its Amazing where Clinton Campaign People have ended up in their Afterlife..

For Profit...isn't it.

I remember loving Begala and Carville and their "War Room" that trashed and thrashed the Repubs trying to stop Bill Clinton from being Elected!

They proved to be the "Best in the Business" and how we Clinton Supporters adored and worshiped those guys.

Stab in the BACK...in retrospect. But, then, they are just the "Guns for Hire" and they work for other peoples campaigns in South America and other places these days.

Doesn't work to get "all romantic" over the Guns for Hire of Big Time Campaigns. Move On and reap the profits. It's just "BIDNESS."

[Octafish]

52. It's like a reward for all their hard work in government service.

Not that the work involved any "good deeds." Take Glass-Steagall, please.

After his exit from the US Senate, where he spearheaded the work to de-regulate Wall Street, Phil Gramm found a job at Swiss bank UBS as vice chairman. Later, Gramm brought in former President Bill Clinton to the Wealth Management team.

What a coincidence, they are the two key figures in repealing Glass-Steagal. Since the New Deal it had been the key financial regulation protecting the US taxpayer from the Wall Street casino.

Oh well. Too bad. So sad.

[raouldukelives]

51. K&R nt

[me b zola]

54. Buy-Partisan

That sums up so much of the problem.