Pussy Bourgeoisie

If you know me or have read this blog you know that I'll go to the ends of the earth to find out what's going on in this world. Yesterday I was talking to some folks in Egypt and Greece. Thankfully they spoke English because I speak only bits of several foreign languages and not fluent in any. It's all Greek to me for the most part. In Egypt they are very proud of our actions taken against Wall Street. One photo they posted showed an Egyptian flag at one of the protest marches in Solidarity. From the articles posted they too are experiencing a rather brutal crack down on their right to protest. Trumped up charges have lead to lengthy jail stays and most cases come before a military tribunal and not some civilian court. Nothing like treating your people like soldiers to make things better.
In Greece the situation is tense but they seem to know the outcome of the sham that they call a government. As you may recall their president called for a referendum vote on accepting a bail out. As I mentioned in an earlier post the strings attached to that rescue were severe austerity measures aimed squarely at the people who could afford it the least. The speaker who I talked to over there is living in Athens but will now not be able to live there due to the cost of living and the employment situation. This reminds me of something out of a medieval saga where the crown prince demands more taxes out of the poor villagers when they can barely eat now. No, the people there aside from being outraged and taking to the streets understand that this will take a while to remedy. They knew that the referendum was only a ploy to keep the current president in power just a few days or weeks longer. You think maybe that'll give him enough time to move his own funds to safety before he gets tossed?

Yes there is a lot of anger out there and there should be. That cat sandwich up there has come to represent the 99% while its' owner lord and master the 1% is about to chow down.


bank fails later

Now back to the revolution

Two banks failed this week one in UT and and in NE

Little guys are starting to win

Don't take this as some sexist slam it wasn't meant to be only the best image that I could find to illustrate a point. And sorry for the mixed metaphors I was in a hurry.

Us Peonage, as Randal Graves would call us, are beginning to put a crack in the establishment containment bubble dome forged through years of gnawing away at our rights and economic positions. What started as a simple protest in a park in New York city has quickly spread first nationally then globally to the likes this world has never seen. But the best part is the effects that this is having on the very people who's duty it is to provide our security. Realizing that they too are part of the majority they are stuck in a rather precarious position. That is to do either the will of their overlords who hold most of the wealth in this country or side with the protesters, the now unwashed masses.
In Oakland just a few days ago the mayor wiping egg from her face and facing a possible recall vote has had a change of heart and issued a memo stating that all non essential city workers were to take Wed. off to join in the protests. No one in Hollywood could have written such a script as I'm sure the audience would have scoffed it off as being unbelievable yet here it is happening in Livestream for the world to see as it unfolded.
This certainly has sent a mixed message to the Oakland police department as indicated by a letter from it's police union:

OAKLAND (KRON) -- The union representing Oakland police officers says its members are confused by the city's response to the Occupy Oakland movement.

In an "Open Letter to the Citizens of Oakland," the Oakland Police Officers Association says, as a union, it identifies with some of the goals of the Occupy movement.

We, too, are the 99% fighting for better working conditions, fair treatment and the ability to provide a living for our children and families," the letter reads. "We are severely understaffed with many City beats remaining unprotected by police during the day and evening hours."

The letter notes its members followed Mayor Jean Quan's orders to clear Frank Ogawa Plaza and remove Occupy Oakland protestors. Within hours, the letter notes, the mayor had allowed demonstrators to return and set up tents.

Union leaders say they're also confused that the Mayor is giving most city workers Wednesday off to participate in the general strike Occupy Oakland is holding. At the same time, all police officers must report for work.

"That’s hundreds of City workers encouraged to take off work to participate in the protest against 'the establishment,'" the union's letter says. "But aren’t the Mayor and her Administration part of the establishment they are paying City employees to protest? Is it the City’s intention to have City employees on both sides of a skirmish line?"

The letter wraps up with a call for leadership from city officials.

"We love Oakland and just want to do our jobs to protect Oakland residents." it says. "We respectfully ask the citizens of Oakland to join us in demanding that our City officials, including Mayor Quan, make sound decisions and take responsibility for these decisions. Oakland is struggling – we need real leaders NOW who will step up and lead – not send mixed messages. Thank you for listening."

editors note: And now if we could just get our military to do an all out assault on the Hamptons we could have a mop up team finish the job by Thanksgiving.

Ah geez it's starting all over again

As we all may recall form the economic meltdown of 2007 that great Ponzi scheme seems to be rearing its' ugly head again. No I'm not talking about Bernie Madoff but what had happened to Goldman Sachs and the Lehman Brothers investment firms. A snipet from the Wall Street Journal :

MF Global collapse sparks FBI investigation
The fallout from MF Global Holdings Ltd.'s collapse intensified as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission voted to issue subpoenas to the securities firm and the Federal Bureau of Investigation planned to examine whether client funds are missing, according to people familiar with the situation.


MF Global admitted to federal regulators that money had been diverted out of customer accounts, according to a federal official who said the move violated the law. Aaron Lucchetti has the latest on The News Hub.

The two moves are the result of a discrepancy of hundreds of millions of dollars in the New York company's books that was discovered just before MF Global tumbled into bankruptcy Monday, according to people familiar with the matter.

It isn't clear if the discrepancy, about $900 million as MF Global raced to sell itself over the weekend, was caused by money being diverted by company officials desperate to meet margin requirements or collateral calls as the financial situation became dire, these people said. Another possibility is that the gap reflects bookkeeping or accounting errors, as well as a delay in recording transactions in MF Global's books given the securities firm's far-flung trading and clearing operations.

Now I'd bet that anyone with a retirement account (remember many pension funds rely on these investment houses) may not know if their retirement is safe. The funds after all investments are as diverse as can be imagined. If you bother to actually read a prospectus I'd bet that many of the companies listed you've never heard of. And knowing exactly what is going on with your money at any given moment would be near to impossible. But we all rely on the honesty of those we instill with our trust. We can only go by past performance which is never an indication of future gains (a standard warning neatly tucked in the fine print). However this example is the reason Glass Stegal was put in place so many years ago. That Act split investment houses from banks so that bankers could not play Vegas with our money and loose it before we had a chance to spend it,

This isn't exactly the greatest theft in American history as compared to 07 but it sure isn't helping the situation. And seeing as how the game of chance is still going on we'll have to wait and see when the other shoe drops. So many things are right on the tipping point at the moment it's scary to sit back and watch. But keep your eyes peeled over the next three weeks as the perfect storm develops.

And let me add: You think anyone of them will go to jail?... I don't think so either.

The news you can't use and couldn't care less about

Ever notice how when you click on your favorite news site up pops the drivel of the day. I realize that every day is not filled with informative eye popping headlines but sometimes the latest jaunt to the Google Wiki Yahoo News results in a real time waste. Did I know or do I care that there are 8 ways to cook asparagus? And no I really could care less about how to get rid of dark circles under my eyes except that maybe I need more sleep. More like did I bother to comb my hair before going out the door because you always get one of these feathers sticking up in the back that you didn't notice when you were shaving because your focus was on that tough chin area and not the back of your head?
Save me from the latest cat fight from tinsel town because I have no interest in who wore what dress to what function that landed up the latest diss headline in some gossip rag. Let me ignore the latest political gaff spewed from the mouths of political whores who'd say anything to get just a couple of points ahead in the polls. All as in better to get some attention than no attention at all. It'll do wonders for the tell all book sales later when the career in politics gets dashed on the rocks of reality. God I'm starting to sound like Ron James here eh?
Anymore the news is getting more like prospecting where you have to pan through worthless sand to get to something important. How did we get to this point? Hasn't our culture gone global? But lest we forget our outstanding educational system that cranks out the less than well informed that think a completed assignment only needs two of the five Ws because they can only think in 140 characters. Abbreviations may be fine for a quarterback calling plays in a noisy stadium but if this trend continues imagine what such text talk would do if it was used by world leaders. I'd give an example but my abilities in that language are like omg not great.
And I have no idea where this post is going so I'll let you carry on and keep on panning for the gold. And should you find anything of real interest send it my way and by all means use more than 140 characters because there's room and I think my attention span can handle it.

It's Sunday

And time for the weekly installment of morning political talk shows. Avoidance of said programs is highly recommended by the shear fact that you will never see an opposing view and comic relief wears thin after endless talking points have been presented.
But I do have a theory as to the popularity of the latest clown that leads the pack from the republican clown car. Think for a minute. If you have exhausted every conceivable argument of the reverse Robin Hood doctrine that keeps your benefactors in the wealth that they have been accustom, and all of your stable of presidential hopefuls are looking more and more like third grade dropouts (sorry I know that's an insult to third grade dropouts) then what would you do? You would of course run the most unlikely destined to lose mouthpiece you could find. This would be knowing that he will lose and the candidate that you can really control who now resides in the white house will win by a landslide. I wonder just how long it took for them to turn Obama but I have my guesses. You may recall or not that Obama met with a few groups of the real money controllers in the Hamptons just prior to his election. And I'd bet that they laid down the law to him as they saw fit. He wasn't about to spoil their party which by the way is neither "democrat" nor republican. Think of any piece of legislation passed since he took office that didn't have tucked away in it yet another perk for the wealthy. And even those bills passed that did have a crumb for us working stiffs was watered down to the point of little or no benefit. All of this was under the guise of "ah gee I tried to get something better but I've been prevented". What better way to be a good servant serving a corporate master than to play into their hands.

You will note that none of these corporate criminals has seen so much as the inside of a courtroom. Even after senate and special investigations that clearly show wrong doing has our own Justice Department acted. It's only now that our federal government has failed to act that state attorney generals have brought the matter up to public scrutiny. Fraud is still fraud no matter how it's packaged and labeled. Just because it has a corporate label on it doesn't make it legal. And just because a president says it doesn't make something true or honest ( recall "I am not a crook"?) Indeed words and actions have become something to be closely watched. We've seen how congress espouses one thing on the senate floor and another at a town hall meeting. And now we have no meetings. So which is your true position on the matter senator? What's that you say? What day is it? And what city am I in? Oh we're so sorry we had to interrupt you from your meetings with lobbyists.

Time for a Friday working pussy

Ever notice street workers standing around a hole looking bored at the task at hand? I know what you're thinking. Four guys standing around looking at some torn up concrete, must be a government job. I have done my share of concrete removal over the years so I know what it's like and I'm here to tell you it's no picnic. Most street workers are lucky to make it to 60 before age and disability stop them. Breathing in concrete dust for years on end does wonders for the respiratory system too. So how do they manage. One cubic foot of the average concrete weights 100 lbs. So in order to get your roads and sidewalks back to their pristine uncracked state 4 or 5 worker will take turns hammering and wrenching the old material out of its' resting place. You can only work for ten or fifteen minutes at a time because the pain of such labor is so great. And by rotation the work gets done and usually ahead of schedule in most cases. So the next time you see a group of hard hats leaning on their shovels give a wave because I know that if it was you out there you'd be whining like a baby after hour or two.

I'm a bit perplexed. There's a call for a general strike on Nov. 2. by OWS. This seems a bit early. I know it is in response to events in Oakland but to try and organize such an event in such a brief period is at best impossible. So I'm not expecting anything major to happen next Wednesday but then again I didn't think the movement would spread as fast as it did. We will see...

bank fails later
One bank failed this week in IL

And on that topic I just went to a local credit union to start the process of moving my money out of one of the big banks. To my surprise there were 25 people ahead of me doing the exact same thing. And even the elderly gentleman behind me was doing the very same thing. As I said before this isn't fooling around. People are pissed and they aren't going to take it any more.
November 5 is "Move your money day".

The beatings will continue until morale improves

It truly amazes me just how societies can not get their acts together. From a national level all the way down to a small town the rallying cry is for more cuts. All the while the fat cats in the financial sector world wide continue to rake in the dough. This isn't happening in just this country but in Europe and Asia as well. The ones getting the bail outs aren't the people on main street but in the guise of some heroic effort as bail outs for a nation. All the while the people of those countries are getting the life blood squeezed from their existence. This is headed for the great downward spiral. As you cut jobs you reduce revenue in the form of taxes. The Eurozone may be patting itself on the back but they have failed to address the true problem. That would be a loss of income from taxes. They have cut and cheated their way to their own demise then have the gaul to laid blame on people who had nothing to do with the problem in the first place.
But alas the cuts will continue and people will suffer and it's always those at the bottom because after all who's easier to beat up? It's surely not the guy with body guards riding in the limo. We're already witnessing the beginnings of things to come. Open up the doors to the mental hospitals and lighten the case load. Lay off more police and firefighters and watch buildings burn and crime go unreported. Kick the poor off of Medicaid because, you know, they can barter for their health care. And when they show up at the emergency room turn them away because they use it too much.
Exactly how cruel has this world become? Where is the respect we were taught for our elders and the poor? And all of this while those at the top continue to suck the last drop of debt the very marrow of the bones of this country out of the very least that can afford it. They will cut and cut and cut until there will be nothing left but the parched white bones drying in the desert. And they won't even hang around to witness the demise. With a corporate jet to some far off private island they'll flee leaving the graveyard that they made behind.

And you thought there were scary things at Halloween. Jason doesn't have anything on these guys.