JPMorgan Responsible for the Destruction of U.S. Financial System

or so says this post at marketoracle.co.uk. Quite interesting. Here's the end of it, less the sales pitch for the author's newsletter:

Oct 16, 2008 - 05:19 PM

By: Jim_Willie_CB

HIDDEN USGOVT COUP BY WALL STREET

The US Congress has been subverted by intimidation and ignorance, maybe bribery. Regulators and law enforcement bodies are mere accomplices. The entire US banking system has undergone an unprecedented grand nationalize initiative, including the financial system, when considering the mortgage and insurance giants. The total bailouts are huge when put into perspective. This is a hidden coup, complete with deep fraud, corruption, and ruin for both prosecutors and whistle blowers. The US Dollar is caught in the middle of a black hole scrambled with fraud. Paulson is the new Chancellor of US Inc, Bernanke the new Currency Lithography Manager, and Sheila Bair the Investment Banker (a la Goldman Suchs). Paulson assumes all powers over the financial state from the president, via the banking industry control.

The government bailout redemption of $trillion past fraud closes the loop. Bernanke manages all efforts to use printed money for the purpose of buying worthless counterfeited and fraud-laced bonds, buying commercial bonds and posted collateral among businesses, as well as making printed paper products available to foreign central banks in relief of past fraud. Bair will act as the director of slaughterhouse traffic for JPMorgan, which needs a steady supply of bank deposits to offset their destroyed balance sheet from continued credit derivative implosion, thereby betraying the chartered FDIC pledge to protect bank depositors and senior bank bond holders through liquidation procedures, with full recognition of expedience. Hail to the king, long live the king! The US public seems so dumbstruck that it cannot demand even full disclosure of the process, let alone private offshore bank accounts for the new leaders of the successful coup.

The coup formalizes a climax to a Ponzi Scheme. A pyramid scheme is a non-sustainable business model that involves the exchange of money primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, without any product or service bearing true value delivered. With the ongoing steadfast support offered by Alan Greenspan, they were able to maintain an incredible Ponzi scheme. They sold financial toxic waste products in the form of Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS), Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO), Structured Investment Vehicles (SIV), Unidentified Financial Objects (UFO), and Credit Default Swaps (CDS). My favorite remains the UFOs. The corruption of politicians in Congress enabled the process, with relaxed guidance by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB). The two key ingredients for the Ponzi Scheme are a mythological ideology and a high priest to endorse the game from a credible pulpit. Alan Greenspan claimed legitimacy of the US banking system, blessed credit growth and fractional bank practices as beneficial, and praised risk pricing systems using credit derivatives as sophisticated. The high priest used to be Greenspan, but now a tag team has replaced him. Hank Paulson is the spearhead for the great coup of the US financial system. Usage of short restrictions rules has been key to both instilling instability at necessary times, and raiding hedge funds. US Fed. Chairman Bernanke swaps USTBonds for any piece of bonded garbage known to mankind. Mammoth placements of leveraged trades by Wall Street firms make for some of the most grotesque insider trading in US history.

DECEIT & INTIMIDATION

The lies, deceit, backroom pressure, and fleecing of the American public is deep. Take the Emergency Economic Stability Act. Most of the initial $250 billion outlay was not devoted to American bankers, but rather to foreign bankers, primarily in Europe and England, and to purchase preferred US bank stocks. The US public was not told about this redirection, which constitutes misallocation, misappropriation, and fraud. Tremendous backroom pressure was exerted at every step. The underlying assets involved in swaps do not even have to be US-based mortgage bonds. The formerly submitted Paulson Manifesto was revived in a power grab, complete with considerable infighting and squabbles, since Morgan Stanley was given favor. The usage of funds to buy investment stakes in the giant US banks is yet another direct Fascist Business Model tactic, assisting banks close to the power center, yet reeking with corruption. The sickening irony is that they have no more money to disseminate and distribute. They cannot reveal their lies until they formally request more Congressional funds. Much discussion has come that the USGovt should adopt the Swedish model in the resolution of the current crisis. Not in a New York minute!! That would require heavy stock and bond losses, and more transparency of scum. Interestingly, the market discounts words as worthless, while bailout actions fail to produce even a positive reaction for a full day, until Monday last week when the Dow Jones Industrial index rose over 900 points. That was clearly Wall Street engineering a profitable short cover rally. Check S&P futures positions beforehand, if you can. The credibility of the US Fed. is close to being destroyed. On October 15, the same Dow Jones index fell over 700 points, almost 8%. Even the global rate cut was rejected by stock markets, a major insult.

Intimidation of the US Congress has been huge and powerful, similar to when the Patriot Act was passed in 2002. The Congress was actually threatened by martial law in the cities of the United States if the big bailout package was not passed two weeks ago! This was not reported on CNN or CNBC, but C-Span did cover it. The mobilization of the US Army for civilian control is well known in the past couple weeks. See the Third Brigade back from combat duty in Iraq. This account came from Rep Brad Sherman of California. To achieve supposed financial stability, the nation succumbed to totalitarianism by Wall Street thieves, conmen, fraud kings, and criminals. Instead, the bailout only covered up $trillion fraud. My position has been very stable and consistent, that such tactics are typical characteristics of the Fascist Business Model. The state merges with the large corporations, who proceed to terrorize the citizenry after unspeakable protected corruption and theft. To object is to be labeled unpatriotic!

TOP DOWN SOLUTION FAVORS THE ELITE

The top-down approach used to date aids the wealthy bankers, while the homeowners are denied aid. That aid is promised but rarely arrives. The fundamental problem here is that billion$ are devoted to shore up insolvent banks, to redeem their worthless (or nearly worthless) bonds, and to give a giant pass to the executives. Trust has eroded throughout the system. Banks distrust each other's collateral. The result is that eventually the US Economy will enter not a recession, not a depression, but a DISINTEGRATION PHASE. Despite Bernanke's studious efforts, borrowing from revisionist history, his liquidity is nothing more than bailouts at the top for the perpetrators of the housing bubble and mortgage debacle. The bank system benefits little inside the US walls of finance. A bottom-up approach might have had a chance to succeed, but a top-down approach is a sham. To expect a top-down solution that actually relieves the housing inventory logjam is insane. That is like feeding a teenager with meals placed inside the human rectum, expecting nutrients to find their way to the rest of the body! The credit mechanisms do not travel upward within the pyramid, but rather in the downward direction, starting with a borrower, a good collateralized risk, and an underwritten loan, when plenty of lending capital is available. The US public has bought this stupid ‘Trickle Down' philosophy for years, learning nothing. The US Economy is on the verge of collapsing. Short-term credit is being denied at key supplier intermediary steps, soon to result in recognized disintegration.

The primary practical objective of this corrupt trio (JPM, GSax, FDIC) is to avoid Credit Default Swap fires, which would bring an end to their reign of terror. This US Economic failure is in progress and is unstoppable. The 1930 Depression resulted after monumental credit abuse from the bottom up, as hundreds of thousands of people leveraged investments 10:1 with stocks primarily. The 2000 Depression will come after monumental credit abuse from the top down, as hundreds of big financial firms leveraged investments by 7:1 and 20:1 with bonds primarily. The most absurd of all is the CDO-squared, leveraging upon leverage. Total seizures have crippled the banking system. Short-term credit has largely vanished, as letters of credit are routinely not honoured at ports in the United States. The panic will continue, especially when supplies dry up.

GOLD & SILVER AWAIT THEIR EXALTED STATUS

We are witnessing the disintegration cited in my recent forecasts. It is a systemic failure, marred by lost confidence and trust in the entire financial system. Expect foreigners soon to pull the rug from under the American syndicates in control. Several key meetings have already concluded, totally unreported in the US press, which occurred in Berlin Germany. Consider it the Anti-G7 Meeting. Implications are profound, and involved the Shanghai Coop Org tangentially, since its member nations possess so much new commodity supply. Consider it the Anti-NATO group. An important and powerful alternative financial system is soon to spring into action, including high-level bilateral barter. Those who expect the current US Regime to continue their financial terror are in for a big surprise.

Expect defaults in the COMEX with gold & silver, whose prices for paper vastly diverge from physical, to the anger of foreigners watching. They hold massive precious metals assets. Disparities now contribute to powerful forces, sure to break the current system. Grand systemic changes come. THE RESULT WILL BE A BREATH-TAKING DISCONTINUITY EVENT.

Ironically, the more inner anguish felt on the falling gold & silver prices, the closer we are to a new financial framework, with the US Dollar relegated to a Third World role. A REPLACEMENT GLOBAL RESERVE CURRENCY HAS ALREADY BEEN DECIDED UPON. Its launch awaits the proper moment. The Americans are last to know, as usual. The US leaders are under the illusion of being in control!

Ravi Batra on Greenspan Economics

I just heard Ravi Batra on Thom Hartmann's show. His 2005 book "Greenspan's Fraud," which I'd never heard of until now, sounds like a good source for an explanations what's going on in the finanacial markets. (Hartmann's review of the book is here, on Buzzflash.) I searched and found this old interview from Southern Methodist University, where Batra is a professor of economics.

Q&A With Ravi Batra

SMU expert talks about Greenspan's Fraud

Additional background:

Greenspan's Fraud by Ravi Batra

Greenspan timeline

People are talking: Reviews

About Ravi Batra

You are highly critical of Greenspan and yet the general impression of Greenspan throughout his career has been generally positive. How has he managed to maintain a golden image for two decades?

After becoming Fed chairman Greenspan deftly handled several economic crises, including the 1987 stock market crash, the Mexican crisis of 1995, the Asian crisis of 1997, and the Russian default crisis of 1998. He applied the same remedy to each case—a grant of IMF loans to the afflicted countries. But people forgot that most of these crises were created by his own monetary and trade policies. In any case, his remedy failed to avert the global stock-market crash of 2000-2001 that started before the 9/11 massacre. Still, investors fondly remember Greenspan for staying calm in turbulent times.

Why do you think Greenspan was under-qualified for his position as chairman of the Federal Reserve and how did he overcome his shortcomings to get the job?

Greenspan had no banking experience when he became Fed chairman. He was not an accomplished economist either. But he did have a lot of influential friends in the White House. In 1974, he became the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers with incomplete knowledge of economics, because he did not even have a Ph.D. at the time. But once in government, he came to know many well-known politicians who made a case for his eventual appointment as the Fed chairman.

What is the most serious charge you make against Greenspan?

He helped raise the payroll tax in 1983 in order to cut the Reagan budget deficit but sold his plan to the public as Social Security reform. No wonder there is no cash in the Social Security Trust Fund today. In the process he generated a regressive tax system which was copied around the world, and which eventually lowered GDP growth in the United States and sharply raised unemployment in Western Europe, including Germany, France and Italy.

What new evidence did you find to make this claim?

There is a lot of new evidence summarized in Table 2.1 of Chapter 2 in Greenspan’s Fraud: How Two Decades of His Policies Have Undermined the Global Economy.

You say our standard of living is lower than it was before Greenspan’s tenure, and yet he has convinced most people of the opposite. How can this be the case?

Greenspan’s measure of the living standard is real per-capita GDP or income. But this is an average figure, which aggregates the enormous incomes of a small minority of people with the meager ones of working Americans. The truth is that the purchasing power of the wages of production workers, who are as much as 80 percent of the workforce, has declined in the Greenspan era, which starts from 1981, when the income tax rate was reduced sharply.

Why do you think Greenspan is partly to blame for the market euphoria of the 1990s that led to recession?

Greenspan’s fault was his poor understanding of economics. He thought that the productivity jump resulting from the adoption of information technology generated high profits, which lubricate stock markets. But he forgot that when wages fail to keep pace with productivity, then the economy needs explosive debt growth to maintain profit growth. But debt growth cannot increase forever; so a stock market crash was inevitable. That is why all speculative bubbles pop in the end.

What are Greenspan’s motives in supporting Bush’s current proposed reforms of Social Security and how can we expect this major news story to unfold?

He wants to stay on as the Fed’s interim chairman, which all depends on President Bush.

Why would Greenspan create policies that are preferable to big business at the expense of the average citizen and how has he done so?

Greenspan realized early on that keeping Wall Street happy was the key to a Fed chairman’s long tenure. So he did whatever was necessary to please his constituency of big business, and in turn, was rewarded with several reappointments, even when politicians were unhappy with his policies. He even protected the profits of big speculators from their own mistakes by bailing out the crisis-prone countries. His policy of financial deregulation led to the deindustrialization of America. This, in turn, hurt the real wages of the vast majority of working Americans and generated the mushrooming trade deficit. By now things are so bad that the country needs a world subsidy of $2 billion per day to stay afloat.

Think about that for a moment. $2 billion a day. That's about $700 billion a year. And that was 2 years ago—I can't even imagine how much it must be by now.
How much do we spend on foreign aid? Latest estimate I could find was about $80 billion a year in 2004, of which about half was "phantom aid" which didn't really help. So, consider. The net result is that the nations of the world have been financing US follies at home and around the world. At least until now.

Then consider one of those follies—the war in Iraq. It's pretty obvious that one of the main geopolitical reasons for this "war on terror" is to rein in China, by establishing bases near it and controlling its access to oil.

As a result of nearly everything in WalMart being built in China, I've heard that China holds $1.3 trillion in US dollars. Until now all China could do with these dollars is buy US treasuries. How long do you think China will continue to fund US attempts to threaten it?

Ok. On with the interview:

What policy reforms do you recommend that would be more protective of the interests of the average citizen?

In Greenspan’s Fraud I have shown that GDP and employment growth were much higher during the 1950s and the 1960s than between 1981 to 2004.We disregard the 1970s which were distorted by giant oil prices. My recommendation is that we go back to the policies that worked wonders in those earlier decades. These policies called for high income and corporate tax rates, a high minimum wage, but low Social Security tax rates. Creating a surplus in the Social Security Trust Fund through giant payroll taxes was a Greenspan-devised ponzi scheme that worked perfectly for its covert purpose, which was to preserve the pro-wealthy Reagan tax cuts and, subsequently, the Bush tax cuts.

What do you think will happen when Greenspan steps down in 2006 and how should investors prepare?

I am not sure if he will step down in 2006, because if President Bush fails to appoint anyone else as Fed chairman then Greenspan can legally stay on as an interim chairman until 2008. Currently, Greenspan is busy supporting Bush’s ventures to curry favor with the president. This has been the chairman’s modus operandi all along, namely to court those who are crucial to his position as the head of the Fed.

If Greenspan indeed steps down, it will turn out to be a non-event. The stock markets will remain sluggish for the entire decade, unless Greenomics is abandoned and new reforms are introduced.

What might we expect from a new Fed chairman and how could that change our current economy?

He or she is likely to be a Greenspan clone, because the maestro represents a consensus view of popular economics.