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Obama's Deputy Defense Secretary, William Lynn, is just as tainted. The former Raytheon vice president and company lobbyist got Senator Charles Grassley to object over his "very questionable accounting practices" as Pentagon Comptroller during the Clinton years.
Obama's Undersecretary of Defense, Robert Hale, served as Assistant Air Force Secretary Financial Comptroller under Clinton, and according to author Andrew Hughes, he and Lynn "lost enough taxpayer money to pay for Obama's stimulus plan four times over." They now again oversee DOD spending.
The list goes on and includes National Intelligence chief, Admiral Dennis Blair, who backed Indonesia's terror, mass-killing, and occupation of East Timor in 1998. General James Jones is a Trilateralist and former NATO commander. Obama's entire national security team is composed of recycled appointees very much committed to continued imperial wars and outlandish amounts of military spending for them.
(8) Bailed Out Banks and America's Wealthiest Cheat IRS Out of Billions
It's an old story. "Only the little people pay taxes," according to former tax cheat Leona Hemsley (1920 - 2007), and rarely does anyone like her get caught.
In 2008, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) "reported that eighty-three of the top publicly held US companies have operations in tax havens like the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and the Virgin Islands. AIG, Bank of America, Citigroup, and 11 others got government bailouts. In addition, Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) helped wealthy clients "cheat the IRS out of over $20 billion in recent years, according to the Department of Justice."
Other notorious tax havens include Austria, Luxembourg, the Channel Islands, Singapore, Hong Kong, Andorra, Monaco, Gibraltar, the Bahamas, the Cook Islands, and Turks and Caicos. In 2008, they saved Goldman Sachs billions of dollars through "changes in (its) geographic earnings mix." For many other companies, it's much the same through legal provisions in the tax code. According to some estimates, "trillions of dollars in both corporate profits and personal wealth have migrated offshore, (and) the offshore banking world now harbors $11.5 trillion in individual wealth alone...."
(9) US Arms Used for (Israel's) War Crimes in Gaza
For decades, America has supplied Israel with tens of billions in aid, interest-free loans, and the latest in new weapons and technology, including illegal white phosphorous shells used against Gazan civilians during Operation Cast Lead.
In addition, Washington supplies F-16 fighters, attack helicopters, tactical missiles, 1,000 or more bunker-buster bombs, a wide variety of other munitions, and undisclosed new weapons for testing in real time combat situations against Palestinian or other Arab civilians.
In Gaza, shell fragments revealed names of US defense contractors, including Raytheon. Another was marked the Pine Bluff Arsenal in Arkansas. In shocking support for Israel's war of aggression, in violation of international and US law, both Houses of Congress overwhelmingly endorsed its continuation, and Obama stayed silent in the run-up to his January 20 inauguration.
(10) Ecuador Declares Foreign Debt Illegitimate
"In November 2008, Ecuador became the first country to undertake an examination of the legitimacy and structure of its foreign debt." In violation of Ecuadorean law, predatory international lenders were involved in hundreds of illegitimate irregularities. Billions in foreign debt at exorbitant interest rates resulted in debt service far exceeding the principal borrowed, at a staggering human cost. In December, President Rafael Correa announced his country would default. In April 2009, he was re-elected overwhelmingly.
Ecuador exposed the corrupted international finance system that could set a precedent for the poorest of indebted countries. Correa asked other Latin American nations "to forge a united response (and for) the United Nations to help develop international norms to regulate the foreign debt market."
The April 2008 House passed Jubilee Act was a positive step forward. However, the Senate failed to pass its S. 2166 version, then cleared the legislation from its books.
In June 2009, Ecuador agreed with 91% of its creditors to pay 35 cents on the dollar for its debt. Other countries may now follow suit, especially the most impacted by the global economic crisis.
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