Big Banking Blackmail

by Scott Creighton  May 7, 2010

The White House gets its way again. They get their way on two measures that would have given the people at least a little control of the "too big to fail" banking system. But how they got it, well that might just be the REAL story of the day.

The "HOPE" of getting real banking reform under this administration is dead. Dead on arrival. What is left is the "Chris Dodd Big Banking Giveaway Plan" which is to banking "reform" what Obamacare was to "healthcare reform".

Last night the Brown/Kaufman amendment was shot down by a vote of 61-33. The amendment would have broken up the largest 6 banks and then set limits on the size these institutions could become so their failure could not threaten the entire system. Thus… "too big to fail" would have been a thing of the past. 27 senate democrats voted with the large majority of republicans to kill the amendment and for the most part, the 30 who voted for the bill were either coming up on an election cycle this year, or they switched their votes after seeing the bill was going to fail... a clever little trick legislators use to end up on the "right side" of a voting issue.

Though top Obama administration officials have not publicly opposed the amendment, its leading economists have opposed ending Too Big To Fail simply by breaking up the nation's financial behemoths. Austan Goolsbee and Larry Summers have both fought back against this idea, as has Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Dodd of Connecticut spoke against the amendment.

Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) was indignant. "I don't understand this Brown-Kaufman amendment. Basically, what it says is if you're successful…you're going to break them up? I mean, where does this stop? Do we take McDonald's on?" Huffpo

This took place yesterday while another popular piece of legislation was being gutted by one of its authors.

Ron Paul is livid and he has pulled his support from the "Audit the Fed" bill.

I know that sounds crazy… Ron Paul has been pushing for this kind of accountability from the for-profit Federal Reserve Bank for decades. But yesterday, when the bill looked as if it were going to be passed, Ron Paul pulled his support and is actively campaigning against it.

He has good reason.

In a move frighteningly reminiscent of the now infamous Air Force One flight where single-payer advocate and "Obamacare" opposition leader Dennis Kucinich was brought before the anointed One, Barack Obama, for a little position changing "chat", Bernie Sanders was brought in to the White House late yesterday to work out a "compromise" on the "Audit the Fed" bill. No one knows why the "compromise" was even needed with the Pro-Banking Industry Obama White House since by all accounts, the bill had the votes to pass in the Senate as it was.

But, Bernie Sanders was brought before "the man" and had a little powwow in the White House. Since Sanders is one of the authors of the bill, he was authorized to change it, and "CHANGE" is what the White House got…

Thursday afternoon, Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin voiced the administration's opposition to the audit proposal. But hours later, following negotiations with Sanders, Wolin withdrew the opposition. Raw Story

"Bernie Sanders has sold out and sided with Chris Dodd to gut Audit the Fed in the Senate. His "compromise" is what the Adminstration and banking interests want: they'll allow the TARP and TALF to be audited, but no transparency of the FOMC, discount window operations or agreement with foreign central banks. We need to take action and stop this!" Ron Paul

The audit is only allowed back to December 2007, which leaves most of the work of the Fed’s Open Markets Committee in the dark - they were the ones who were supposed to be watching over Wall Street when they were laying the groundwork for the collapse. And according to Jay Newton-Small of Time Magazine, there will only be one audit - it will not be ongoing.

Ron Paul and Alan Grayson worked like dogs to get this through the House. And the White House would not have gone to Sanders if they'd been able to peel off the votes to tank the amendment. But with 68 Senators having voted for it or cosponsored it in the past year, that was a heavy lift. Bernie was the weak link. Firedoglake

How did all this happen late yesterday afternoon? What was the threat that forced all of these legislators to vote against the will of the people and to suddenly side with the corrupt banks? How on earth did all this happen LATE YESTERDAY AFTERNOON?

Hmmmm…. what else happened yesterday, PRIOR to the vote in the senate and Bernie Sander's meeting in the White House? Hmmm…

Could it be the "glitch" in the supercomputer that crashed the stock market by nearly a 1000 points in a few minutes? Could that have had something to do with it?

Could it have been Goldman Sachs and the big 6 mega banks sending a message to congress that if they think they are going to break up their hold on this nation, they will bring it all down with their stock market manipulating supercomputer?

Nesto calling these trades "bogus" drew backlash from the host and CNBC veteran Maria Bartiromo, who said those trades sounded like "market manipulation" to her.

" That is ridiculous," Bartiromo replied. "I mean this really sounds like market manipulation to me. This is outrageous." Business and Media Institute

Hmmm… I think we might be onto something.

Think about it… all that money poured into the CEOs and banking bigwigs bank accounts in the form of record-setting bonuses. Why is that important? Because if they chose to gut the economy, if they chose to trash the markets by 10,000 points in one day, they will be in their private jets by noon and super wealthy in another country sipping single-malts on the sea-shore by dinner.

And we will be left to fight for the scraps while the dollar becomes virtually worthless.

That was the threat yesterday. While the MSM was busy blaming the working class Greeks who are being robbed right in front of everyone's eyes, our congress was busy quietly handing over control of the nation to a bunch of criminal bankers who caused all of this in the first place.

The market didn't crash by a "glitch" and it wasn't the European Union or Greek riots either… it was terrorism. It was a message: Don't Fuck With Us. Congress got the message and acted accordingly.

The banking oligarchs sent a clear and unmistakable message that they could drop this nation's economy into the toilet at any time they wished and if congress thought for a minute that they really ran America, they had better rethink that position.

That's what happened yesterday.

It isn't a "coincidence" that the super-computer "glitch" happened a few hours before that senate vote and just a while before the White House had a chat with Sanders about his Audit the Fed bill. It was financial terrorism, pure and simple.

The Warning It doesn't take a great leap of faith to entertain the idea that the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone was no accident. Besides the usual forms of coercion, bribes and blackmail, Wellstone's assassination sent a message, a warning, to all of Congress that going against the agenda and telling the truth about certain 'events' that mold policy could cost them their lives. That warning has been taken to heart. None in Congress dare to speak about the hidden facts. It's called self-preservation.

First published at:

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2010/05/07/was-yesterdays-glitch-really-big-banking-blackmail/#comment-16447

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Insiders in government and business coordinated and facilitated 9-11 to obtain the assent of the people for the USA PATRIOT Act and the War on Terror. Similarly, insiders in government and business coordinated and facilitated the collapse of the US and world economies to obtain the assent of the people for greater theft and broader control. Now we have seen insiders in government and business coordinate and facilitate protection of the thieves in banking and finance by demonstrating once again that THEY are in control of the economy and can bring it down whenever they choose.