BIG MONEY WINS, PEOPLE LOSE

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Sat., 6/6/09
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On April 30th, the Senate voted down a proposal by Sen. Dick Durbina top Democrat to allow bankruptcy judges to lower the monthly mortgage payments of homeowners trapped by exploding interest rates. This bill would keep families in their homes,... [read more]

BANKSTERS WAIL FOR MORE BREAKS

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Thu., 5/7/09
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You know those bankers who took bailout money from you and me? They're now in a pout about how they're being treated.

Having taken billions of tax dollars for their bailouts, and having refused to use those billions for loans that... [read more]

MAKING A MOCKERY OF DEMOCRACY

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Thu., 5/7/09
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Would you like to get a 22 percent return on the money you invest? Wow, that would be awfully good in today's sorry market! How about making $22,000 for each dollar you spend? That's the payoff that corporations can get... [read more]

Do something!

Monday, April 6, 2009   |   Posted by Jim Hightower
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Q: What made Wall Street implode? A: They were making too much money to stop

April 2009

Did you have a piggy bank when you were a child? Mine was a cheery, round pig--made of brown pottery, as I recall. For parents of that time, having their children feed pennies, nickels, and the occasional dime into these toy banks was a sweet lesson in frugality--a Kodak moment for many families.

Today, though, the term "piggy bank" has a wholly different connotation. America's leaders are stuffing trillions of our tax dollars into such voracious Wall Street piggies as Bank of America, Citigroup, and Goldman Sachs, and there's nothing sweet about it. Each day's news seems to bring ever more horrific stories of greed, incompetence, arrogance, excess, deceit, numbskullduggery, and inconceivable nincompoopery about this ongoing taxpayer bailout and exploding financial crisis.

After studying various theoretical models and applying careful mathematical analyses, the world's finest economic thinkers have now concluded that what we have here is, to use the technical term, "a mess." To help our readers get a better picture of it, this issue of the Lowdown offers some facts and tidbits, sets forth some Q & As, exposes a myth or two, explores a couple of reasons the stuff has hit the fan, calls out some culprits, and suggests a few steps towards financial sanity. Let's get started! [ read more ]

Name those greedheads!

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Mon., 4/6/09
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Last month, I asked my radio listeners to come up with new words to describe the abominable sense of self-entitlement that presently afflicts Wall Street bankers. I noted that terms like "greedy," "shameful," and "narcissistic" were way too mild to... [read more]

Time for real workplace democracy-- not the phony company version

March 2009

Last October, Home Depot cofounder Bernie Marcus blew a gasket, spewing outrage in all directions. "This is the demise of civilization," he exploded. "This is how a civilization disappears. I'm watching this happen and I don't believe it!"

Bernie's outburst came during an hour-long conference call with various other corporate executives and their political operatives. The purpose was to collect industry funds for a campaign to kill a piece of legislation called the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). Yes, the spark that ignited Bernie's fury, the hellish horror that he insisted would produce America's Armageddon, was a simple labor bill, and he was demanding that the corporate powers rally to save civilization as they know it.

"As a shareholder, if I knew the CEO of the company wasn't doing anything on [EFCA]...I would sue the son of a bitch," he foamed. "If a retailer has not gotten involved in this...he should be shot. They should be thrown out of their goddamn jobs."

He didn't specify whether such traitorous executives should be shot first, then thrown out of their jobs, or vice-versa-- but you get the point: Corporate America is working up a feverish panic over the very notion of linking the term "employees" with the concept of free choice.

"It is a political nightmare and a public policy disaster," shrieked a PR flack for a corporate front group opposing this legislation. He even claims that top executives "are ready to riot in the street about it." Now that's exciting! I, for one, would pay to watch a horde of red-faced, Gucci-clad, CEOs rioting, wouldn't you? [ read more ]

STOP CODDLING ELITE CROOKS

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Sat., 2/7/09
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Bernie Madoff is the world-champion Ponzi schemer who has confessed to bilking some $50 billion from investors, including many friends, associates, and even his 74-year-old sister who lost about $3 million and had to sell her home.

But rather than being... [read more]

Team Obama's plan for Afghanistan is a disaster in search of a strategy

February 2009

Sorry to interrupt the Obama celebration even before the man gets settled into the Oval Office, but--what the hell is he thinking!?!

About Afghanistan, I mean. Why begin the most exciting, most important administration in decades with yet another misguided military mission that promises to be a sinkhole for our troops, our treasury, our country's good name, and the world's hopes for this historic presidency? Yet, the Obama camp indicates that it is revving up for a troop surge in Afghanistan, claiming that this chaotic country is the central front in the global war against Islamic terrorists.

Some of the new president's top security advisors insist that this is "a war of necessity," the "good war" that George W abruptly abandoned in 2003 when he diverted our military into his misadventure in Iraq. Here's the logic: As Obama kept pointing out in the presidential campaign, Iraq had no connection to al Qaeda's 9/11 attacks on America, but Afghanistan did, at least in a supportive role. While neither Osama bin Laden nor his jihadist plotters were Afghans (nearly all were Saudis), they were sequestered in safe-haven hideouts in Afghan mountains. These terrorist forces posed the gravest threat to our national security back then, say Obama's hawkish advisors, and they still do today, so let's go get 'em and secure the territory!

But, wait--are we going to let Obama hawks rush us into what New York Times columnist Bob Herbert bluntly calls "a fool's errand?" It most certainly would be a horrific war...and for what? What, exactly, is our national interest, our objective, our plan, our "victory," our exit point? [ read more ]

Congress gives Citi all it wants

Cowboy hat By Jim Hightower - Thu., 1/1/09
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A DECADE AGO, CITIGROUP led a full-court lobbying press on Washington, ultimately winning what big bankers, insurance giants, and high-rolling investment wizards wanted: government deregulation. By forcing the regulatory cop off the Wall Street beat, these geniuses were then able... [read more]

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