Wall Street's "swinging dicks," as they are called, are back in the saddle. They have neutered financial reform and seem to have silenced the President who seems to want o cheer up the people rather than inform them about what's really going on as food and gas prices rise while inflation begins to rear its ugly head.
Veteran investor Jim Rogers told the Daily Bell: "It's already happening; prices are going higher. Now the blame game starts and the government will blame it on draught or crop failure or whatever. Politicians will do and say anything to avoid explaining that inflation is a monetary problem. Their reactions are always the same and it's always astonishing to me. As President Ford said, "there is no problem" -- and even if there is, it's not his problem. Well there are always people who are in denial; then the problem gets worse not better."
Wall Street's Hedge Funds are having a field day. The New York Times reports that wealth among exes in that part of the financial labyrinth is so concentrated that 25 Hedge Fund managers "pocketed a total of $22.07 billion"At $50,000 a year, it would take the salaries of 441,000 Americans to match the sum."
Who is speaking out against this? Not the Republicans for sure. Not many Democrats either. Not even the President or his "more wealth for the wealthy' booster Treasury chief Tim Geithner.
Wall Street is stronger than ever. Its "reforms" are proving to be a joke. No big execs that profited from pervasive mortgage fraud have gone to jail as prosecutions dwindle.
There has been a respite in Wisconsin as a State Judge shoots down the GOP's attempt to outlaw collective bargaining but similar laws have passed in Ohio and New Hampshire. The courts have the muscle the movements still lack.
In a globalized world, we are all interdependent. What happens to one part of this web affects us all. That's why we have to pay attention the falling economic dominoes in Europe where Portugal may be next to go with Spain and Ireland not far behind. So far protests by hundreds of thousands in Britain have not dented much less changed the government's cutbacks in the name of austerity.
Serious critics may have the facts on their side but are still being marginalized. They are considered ranters, not reasonable. Journalist Chris Hedges was honored when he wrote for the New York Times. When he left, and was finally able to speak his own mind, he began challenging the false promises of globalization.
He writes, "The refusal by all of our liberal institutions, including the press, universities, labor and the Democratic Party, to challenge the utopian assumptions that the marketplace should determine human behavior permits corporations and investment firms to continue their assault, including speculating on commodities to drive up food prices. It permits coal, oil and natural gas corporations to stymie alternative energy and emit deadly levels of greenhouse gases. It permits agribusinesses to divert corn and soybeans to ethanol production and crush systems of local, sustainable agriculture. "
It permits the war industry to drain half of all state expenditures, generate trillions in deficits, and profit from conflicts in the Middle East we have no chance of winning. It permits corporations to evade the most basic controls and regulations to cement into place a global neo-feudalism. The last people who should be in charge of our food supply or our social and political life, not to mention the welfare of sick children, are corporate capitalists and Wall Street speculators."
So, once again, a gauntlet has been thrown down, but so far activists, advocates, unions and even progressive journalists stay submerged in fighting partisan wars and are not taking on the deeper fight for economic justice.
If we want to walk in the footsteps of Dr King, we need to broaden our understanding of the scale of what needs changing and target the banksters on Wall Street as well as Republican pols that do their biding.
News Dissector Danny Schechter directed Plunder The Crime of Our Time, a film on the financial crisis as a crime story. Plunderthecrimeofourtime.com
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