Wait Just a Damned Minute - FBI Investigating Wall Street

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

FBI investigating companies at heart of meltdown

Read that headline again. These guys are under criminal investigation and we're going to give them $700 billion? All I can say is that the federal owes Ted Bundy a huge fucking apology. He killed all those people and they didn't give him shit!

But seriously. One of the companies to be investigated would certainly be Goldman Sachs, and don't you think we should hold off until we find out if the Treasury Secretary, the former CEO of that company, is going to be charged as part of a criminal conspiracy? We'd be in essence paying money into the defense fund of the people who raped us.

Turns out Sarah Palin was an amateur at this sort of thing.

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080923/financial_meltdown_investigation.html|Link>

[cliffordu]

1. That's right. The Fed's new motto:

"Will pay for wire fraud"

[C_U_L8R]

27. "no crime will go unrewarded"

they borrowed Cheney's personal motto

[HowHasItComeToThis]

46. THIS IS BUSH'S LAST SHOT AT DESTROYING OUR NATION

THEY HATE FEDERAL REGULATION.
THEY LOVE WAR PROFITS.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

55. I agree...

Given this administration lies and their cronyism and that jaw-dropping incompetence, it's simply inconceivable to me that anyone -- anyone -- in their right might would give them $750 billion with no questions asked. We've seen what they did with Iraq funding. We've seen what they've done with Homeland Security funding.

Even if 90% of this money were used appropriately, that's still billion in kickbacks for Bush and his supporters.

Ed Schultz yesterday had a good analogy, for those who have a hard time wrapping their arms around the size of this bailout:

It comes to roughly $1 million per day, every day, over the next 2,000 years.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Edit your subject to show the FBI thing, or people might miss this post

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

5. Good Idea - Done

nt

[GreenPartyVoter]

6. :^)

[MadrasT]

3. WHOA... STOP the presses.

:wtf: No f'ing bailout, no way, now how, not til they get to the bottom of this.

I don't care if I have to dig up my whole backyard to grow vegetables and build a chicken coop with my bare hands.

This shit has got to stop.


Edited to add: But is this a real investigation... or an "Anthrax" investigation??? :hide: :tinfoilhat:

[malaise]

14. Just Say NO

No bail out before the elections.

[MadrasT]

17. I'm on "round two" of angry emails, faxes, & phone calls

JUST SAY NO! :hi:

[Maraya1969]

49. Who are you calling, emailing?

[MadrasT]

57. My Rep and my 2 senators

Turns out one of my senators (Bob Casey) sits on the Senate committee interrogated Paulson/Bernanke yesterday.

[Mojambo]

4. Oh BOY.

We just entered a whole other level.

Can't wait to see how the market reacts tomorrow.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

7. I hadn't even thought about that...

It's going to be brutal.

No wonder those rat bastards were in such a hurry!

[Canuckistanian]

8. You're right - wait a minute

Hasn't everyone been telling us that what the banks were doing was legal?

So, are we talking about REAL crimes here? Embezzlement? Corporate malfeasance? Sodomy?

[Canuckistanian]

9. dupe

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

10. You gotta admit...

Sodomy would be a lot more interesting than Credit Default Swaps.

[Corgigal]

11. Those CEO's are really going to need their

golden parachute now, for legal bills. However they might just want to flee this country to live in their summer house in France, Switzerland or any other beautiful expensive place. I hope they freeze their passports.

[zippy890]

12. 'brings the number of corporate lenders under investigation to 26"

FBI might have to hire some banking crime experts

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

13. Probably all former Enron employees

Sometimes it takes a thief.

I've been joking around on this thread, but this is deadly serious. On Kos today, there was a post about one economist who speculated that the ENTIRE subprime fiasco might have been premeditated. Basically they were playing chicken by ripping off consumers and then expecting taxpayers to provide billions to take the bad debt off their hands.

Times like this make me rethink my opposition to the death penalty.

[xiamiam]

19. i instinctively believe that the entire fiasco was planned...almost predictable...not enuf economic

understanding to even begin to discuss why...but the wisdom in my heart mind and gut tells me its been a contrived plan...all of it..

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

32. Iraq was a gas station hold-up gone wrong...

This was a bank heist...

Say what you will about this bastards, but they THINK BIG!

[Raksha]

38. I wish I knew how to nominate something for a DUZY.

This is the first time I've ever wanted to:

Re Iraq was a gas station hold-up gone wrong. This was a bank heist.

Brilliant!

[undergroundpanther]

58. I agree with you

Because the fucker psychopath neocons want a police state.They want us to be debt slaves,They want all the power,money and wealth and NO accountability to ANYONE ELSE.
So how can they get people to be 'disobedient'?
Start an economic depression, on purpose,so the people panic,lose jobs and can't afford to live,and when the middle class becomes the new poor and the poor can't afford to eat,and all the grocery store dumpsters are coated in ammonia so nobody can find edible food there , If it gets bad enough we hit the streets or if someone steals food the pigs have their excuse to torture, hit us with the microwave beams, tazers and other so called"non lethal" weapons to crush our dissent, bully us or attempt to bully,so if we fight back,we get beaten by blackwater/cops/military,than get arrested sent to jail to work for unicor for wages less ,and hours longer than Chinese slaves.
Or we get tortured to death or sold into sexual slavery.
We become debt slaves paying for golden parachutes for Ceo's and paying for all the stuff walmart imported from china with IOU's,and all the bailouts and scams of wall street.The rich parasites will not suffer any pain in the wallet at all.

[monmouth]

15. I think the FBI is sick of this crapola also. The vote was "absolutely

needed by Friday???" Well, FBI put a little wrench into that machinery. I think this game might be over. Thank you FBI, job well done...

[bluesmail]

16. Well that certainly should change things. FBI? I hope it's

an arm of the FBI we can trust. That would explain the urgency. Crap

[BR_Parkway]

18. No wonder Paulson wanted no review by the courts or anyone else

and all the dire warnings of the need for speed to pass his legislation (since when does these people get to write legislation?) It was to cover up everything

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

21. That little proviso in their plan takes on all-new meaning

It was essentially a pro-active presidential pardon.

[pleah]

63. Exactly! n/t

[Jacobin]

20. For anyone doubting that this whole debacle was premeditated:

The Subprime Primer:

Its entertaining and informative.

http://docs.google.com/TeamPresent?docid=ddp4zq7n_0cdjsr4fn&skipauth=true&pli=1

[MadrasT]

22. This is brilliant.

Thanks for sharing. :hi:

[Jacobin]

23. Glad you liked it

You can tell that someone in the industry wrote it.

[MadrasT]

37. I understood it pretty well before, but that really made it

crystal clear in a way that 'most everyone could understand.

(Plus the stick figures are cute.)

[fla nocount]

53. Hilarious! "Tell them you fucked up" n/t

[Greyskye]

61. "Fuck you!"

I'd be laughing if I wasn't so angry.

[Greyskye]

62. Thanks, that's a keeper.

Bookmarked to share with people who want to understand what the hell is going on.

:thumbsup:

[wildbilln864]

24. maybe that's why he was in such a hurry to get the 700 billion...

to bribe someone to get his ass off the hook!? :grr:

[wildbilln864]

25. kick again! nt

[LatteLibertine]

26. Well

we will see if anything comes from this. I think it may just be to make folks more comfortable so they lay back and let this bail out go through. I don't trust 'em.

[central scrutinizer]

28. curious timing - does the right hand know what the left hand is doing?

No way this could be kept under the radar. It seems like this will doom the bailout package (one would hope so anyway that this would be the cover anybody would need to oppose it) so why is this hitting the fan now. Wouldn't the mal-administration scotch this or at least impede it until AFTER they got their hands on that money?

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

30. And why didn't we hear about this weeks ago?

If the government took over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, you'd think the government would have said, "Oh and by the way, we think something fishy was going on here." And maybe we should have know BEFORE we gave $85 billion to AIG that they were operating a criminal enterprise.

And just for kicks, since McCain's Campaign Manager was a lobbying for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, might it not be possible that he aided and abetted in their criminal behavior?

Inquiring Minds want to know!

[cliffordu]

29. Which is kinda why they needed the dough RIGHT NOW!!!!

Ya can't make this crap up....

[Nikki Stone1]

31. Sort of like giving the burglar the laptop after he has stolen your TV and you've called the cops

Throw them in jail.

[Holly_Hobby]

33. Just heard on Sirius lefty radio update:

Freddie & Fannie, AIG and Lehman under investigation for fraud by FBI.

Also heard 56 Congress members hold stock in them.

[avaistheone1]

34. Just doing the math the housing debacle is only $200 billion. So what is Paulsen planning on doing

with the other $600 billion? I think they are trying to cover-up a fraud, a shell game they have been playing with the money $$$.

[Kablooie]

35. it's the new popular trend. Find someone suspected of a crime and reward him genrerously.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

36. Well in that case...

I'M GUILTY!! GUILTY I'M TELLIN YA!! I DID IT!

So where's my check?

[Raksha]

39. Here's what I don't understand: I didn't think the FBI

under Bush was that independent. I thought they had become as corrupted as the rest of the Bush Justice Department. I thought they only selectively investigated people the PTB wanted investigated, and were told "hands off" with the insiders, such as Dennis Hastert, et al.

So was the scale of this fraud too big even for Bush's FBI to ignore?

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

40. It may have started with NY State investigators...

The feds may have stepped in.

[Raksha]

45. If it started in NY State, it was probably because of Eliot Spitzer.

Here's a link to his whistleblowing article that was published in the Washington Post on February 14, 2008. This was posted on DU yesterday and I printed it out.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/13/AR2008021302783.html

It's called Predatory Lenders' Partner in Crime:
How the Bush Administration Stopped the States From Stepping In to Help Consumers.

I guess the FBI couldn't ignore it after that. Spitzer first became aware of the situation in 2003 when he was New York's Attorney General.

[Oak2004]

43. The FBI has had flashes of integrity under Bush

Not that they're a bastion of liberalism; they are just a bastion of reality.

It's the Justice Department that has been picking and choosing what to prosecute.

[nc4bo]

41. I wonder if Mccain's son's bank will be investigated too? I really wonder. nt

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

44. Or his campaign manager...

As reported elsewhere tonight, apparently he was on their payroll as little as sixty days ago.

[Barack_America]

42. For the love of God...

Just when I think this administration can no longer shock me...

Now we know why Paulsen was trying to slip in that personal immunity clause into the bailout bill.

:wtf:

[nadinbrzezinski]

47. Ah didn't I say that we'd see this too?

we did in 1929

Just be aware if they come up with even primary in six months I will be extremely shocked

Finantial forensics make murder forenscs in mass murders look like an easy thing to do

[ClayZ]

48. Ooopsi daisy! K and R

:popcorn:

[OakCliffDem]

50. K & R

[OregonBlue]

51. More likely they want to bury it "we can't comment on that because there is an ongoing

investigation". Dems should now insist that this be put on hold until the have the results of that investigation.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

52. Translation - We Can't Comment Because We're Guilty

[judasdisney]

54. Mueller is ERGENEKON. Don't tell me we trust this guy less than 2 months after the Anthrax Fraud

[mod mom]

56. I listened on NPR an Goldman Sachs was NOT one of the firms listed.

[Disturbed]

59. This Bailout is a Rescue Mission for the Millionaire Fraudsters.

The Rescue Mission must be taken out of the hands of the Govt. & placed with an
Independent Board. I know damn well that the Busholini Regime is trying to make their Coup Complete.

[Greyskye]

60. "The United States is Being Looted"

That's the sub-title of this thread I started last night while watching the news:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=4084343&mesg_id=4084343

I agree with your premise completely.