Once upon a time the United States Government was being bribed and controlled by Wall Street. That time has not yet ended. From your local town mayor all the way to President Obama, the financial sector are in complete control. How? Lets go back a few years and I'll show you.
The Financial Crisis of 2007-2010 started with what we all know as the collapse of the housing bubble. People could not afford to pay for their homes (which banks were well aware of when giving out the loans, AKA Mortgage Fraud), and so banks failed, over 300 of them since the crisis began. Economy was affected on the international level. Jobs were lost. People lost there houses. Live's were destroyed. And then there's Goldman Sachs, who grew bigger during the depression then they were before it. Even better than that, the only one of there competitors left was a very brittle Morgan and Stanley, while Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, Merril Lynch, and other major competitors were thrown into bankruptcy. Goldman Sachs then used a large portion of their bail-out money on bonus's for their own employee's! They were being given American Tax-Payer money as a bonus, when they were one of the banks responsible for the crisis to begin with! When it came to bailing out insurance companies, the government choose to focus most of its bailout money on AIG. Oh, by the way, AIG owed Goldman Sachs Billions of Dollars, and if they weren't bailed out, Goldman Sachs would have never received that money. Coincidence? I think not.
The Financial Crisis of 2007-2010 started with what we all know as the collapse of the housing bubble. People could not afford to pay for their homes (which banks were well aware of when giving out the loans, AKA Mortgage Fraud), and so banks failed, over 300 of them since the crisis began. Economy was affected on the international level. Jobs were lost. People lost there houses. Live's were destroyed. And then there's Goldman Sachs, who grew bigger during the depression then they were before it. Even better than that, the only one of there competitors left was a very brittle Morgan and Stanley, while Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, Merril Lynch, and other major competitors were thrown into bankruptcy. Goldman Sachs then used a large portion of their bail-out money on bonus's for their own employee's! They were being given American Tax-Payer money as a bonus, when they were one of the banks responsible for the crisis to begin with! When it came to bailing out insurance companies, the government choose to focus most of its bailout money on AIG. Oh, by the way, AIG owed Goldman Sachs Billions of Dollars, and if they weren't bailed out, Goldman Sachs would have never received that money. Coincidence? I think not.
The U.S. Secretary of State and Chief Presidential Economic Adviser, Henry Paulson, used to be the Chief Executive of Goldman Sachs. He pretty much makes all of the financial decisions for our country. Three years before the crisis, Chris Swecker, the FBI Director, was already catching on to Insurance and Mortgage fraud, and even called for a new report to issue a warning. The government didn't begin his crackdown until Goldman had successfully removed all of its holding in the housing market. Our government was well aware of how banks and insurance companies were tricking Americans into expensive mortgage plans, and did absolutely nothing to stop it. Not only that, but after Goldman Sachs withdrew from the housing market, they even bet that it was going to crash! Obviously they were right.
When bail-out bills were in the process of being passed by congress, the makers of the bill gave only one hour before the vote to read the 1000+ page bill. They said they had no time to waste. Or did they have something to hide? These were the regulations printed on the bill "Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this act are non-reviewable and committed to agency desecration, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency." This means that Henry Paulson could do pretty much whatever he wanted to do with this money; and that no one in the world could have any say about where our tax-payer money went. What he did with the money is pretty much the reason why capitalism is thought to be an un-fair form of economy. Little companies just keep being eaten away by the bigger ones, and the fact that the government has it's own favorites make it even worse.
Now let me put something in perspective for all of you. The 2007-2010 Financial Crisis was started by none other than the banks, who were giving out mortgages to people that they knew wouldn't repay it. The government used an estimated 2 Trillion Tax-Payer dollars to bail them out. Now they are enjoying the bonus's while we are facing the consequences of what was their fault!
Henry Paulson, along with many, many other ex-Goldman Sachs employee's are still in our government. They are not here to help us, but are here to help there own wealth and business grow. They are criminals. Just recently an FBI Agent revealed papers which showed that Goldman Sachs was being given disclosed files of all stock orders headed to the exchange floor before they were even ordered! It's called High-Frequency Trading, and it's how Goldman Sachs and other huge business's have been making hundred's of millions of Dollars every day just by buying and selling stocks. They have super-fast computers positioned right on the Stock floor so they get everything first! Not only that, but it was a deal made with the runners of the Stock Exchange itself! This just goes to show the ill intentions of Goldman Sachs.
During President's Obama's campaign, he told voters he would not give donor's and lobbyists any positions in government. Not even 3 days after he was elected, dozens of his highest campaign donors (from Goldman Sachs), including Treasury Secretary Timothy Giethner (who was President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, huge player on Wall Street), were given positions in Government.
The United States needs to wake up. Our Government needs to wake up; and the United States Citizens need to wake up and kick Wall Street out of our government.
13 comments:
Is the reason Goldman Sachs isn't getting in trouble because they are too big to fail and that we need one stable company in the mix? I understand that mortgage fraud and such is a terrible thing and they should definitely be held accountable for that but if we get rid of them now, our economy goes even further down the drain.
I do feel that the bonuses paid out by tax payer money should be given back and used properly as opposed to letting the company get away with it. It all plays into the ethics of the company and clearly the ones running Goldman Sachs have no concern for them. Treating your employees right is one thing but to scam Americans and run the company the wrong way which ultimately is into the ground is ridiculous. There should be more integrity.
I agree that wall street needs to get out of our government. It plays a far too important role and leaves most Americans helpless to what they are doing. The government knew what was going on with the banks tricking citizens into mortgages that wouldn't and couldn't be paid out due to the failing economy.
Putting ex-Goldman Sachs employees in charge of government positions also doesn't help so clearly our government needs to look within itself and weed out those who are only self-interested. They need to be working for the citizens, not to add to their own wealth.
The measures to which Goldman Sachs is making it's money is absurd. Why something hasn't been done already is outrageous. They are clearly breaking laws with the High-Frequency Trading. You would think they know better considering the whole Martha Stewart incident. They are only interested in money which is clear so we need to keep these poisonous people out of legislation and other government ties.
I also agree with your approach into believing that Wall Street is corrupted and should get out of the governmental frame of things. I also like the support you used in this blog, such as explaining Goldman Sachs and how they led to other competing companies bankruptcy. The tole of Wall Street is much larger than it should be, and the problem with that is it puts many citizens at a dis-advantage when it comes to their economic stature. I also feel that we should wake up and realize that fraud is occuring everywhere we look. We must put an end to it. The problem is we can now classify some of these businesses as "sleezy and corporate" when we want to change that and make them operate with be honesty.
This was very interesting. Especially the fact that Goldman Sachs took many tax payer's money as bonuses. That really shocked me. I knew that there was fraud going on but not to this extent and this really shocked me. Even though this shocks me I'm not too surprised because big companies like Goldman Sachs get away with stuff like this all the time because they are so powerful.
It's common knowledge that companies like these are committing fraud in our country. Thank you for bringing light to the situation that is Wall Street. From what I know, Wall Street should never play a role in our government. The fact that banks are giving away these loans that can never be paid off is unethical. We're falling into a deeper and deeper hole and who do we have to blame for it? The fact that Paulson was put in charge of the biggest financial position of our country is absurd. We can't have ex-Goldman Sachs employees running our country. I believe that you're doing justice by revealing details like these to the public. We need to put a stop to government fraud and get rid of those idiots making all the cost worthy decisions that's putting our country's economy in a whole too deep to get out of.
I agree with everything Omar said. However, im sure this isn't just happening with our government but most governments around the world. This is because money runs everything and people can never get enough of it. And being in a high government position like some of these people, then it will open more doors to oppurtunities of making some easy money. I don't agree with what they are doing at all, but I don't see us fixing this problem any time soon. As for the High Frequency Trading problem I think there should be more crackdowns on companies who do this because as Omar said there is a lot of money that these companies are getting and it is not fair for those small stock brokers.
I agree that Wall Street is controlling our government. This needs to be put to an end. The banks need to stop giving out loans that they can't afford. People in general have to be careful with what they are doing because obviously it can dramatically affect our economy.
America is a greedy nation. Therefore making businesses greedy as well. I agree that Wall Street controls the government but there must be a time when officials recognize the issues and fix the conflict. Banks handing out loans that they can't afford began this process, as you mentioned. It's now our reposnibility ro fix the madness of what is broken. You took an interesting point in the article, and exposed the truth!
I have to agree that the goverment is frauded. With the Banks giving out balloon rates it caused the housing market to crash. Due to the tough economic time goverment officals will take every boost they can get. So in essence the goverment was being controled by the stock market. This needs to stop. The goverment needs to clean up its act there are getting a bad reputaion.
I agree that Wall Street shouldn't have nearly as big of an influence on our government as it does. It is inevitable that governments and large businesses are sometimes going to make decisions that are dishonest and help themselves at the expense of the population in general, and often times we will never find out. However, when something like the current financial crisis occurs, and we know who was responsible, I think they should be penalized in some way.
Sean Kamin - This is a perfect example of why our economy is doing so poorly. It's these companies like Goldman Sachs who are so self-centered that they are focusing more on the wealth for themselves instead of the wealth for the US citizens as a whole. As a result, it is very frustrating to me how companies like Goldman Sachs are able to get away with this. It's even more sickening to me how ex-Goldman Sach's employees were given the opportunity to be in charge of high government positions. And the basis of this terrible problem falls in the hands of Wall Street. It's a shame that something as powerful as Wall-Street doesn't have the integrity to do what is best for the economy for all US citizens rather then for themselves.
Juliana B-
Reading this made me think a lot about the control and power people have over our government. I cannot believe that Goldman Sachs used their bail out money to give bonuses to their employees!
I don't think that Golden Sachs should get away with this and I'm also really surprised that they so far have. I'm really impressed on how you wrote this blog and it seems that you put a lot of research and opinion into it. This is a really intriguing subject that I think I will have to look more into.
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