Tuesday, February 25, 2014
The BEST Way To Get Rich In America: Steal From The Taxpayers
If you want to get rich, don't bother inventing something to advance humanity, move to DC and go to work for a lobbying firm or Government contractor.
This is an interesting exposè of the 25 richest neighborhoods in America. While many of the 'hoods that make the list are associated with America's former industrial wealth, three of the top five are bedroom communities of Washington, DC.
I have to say, this is outright embarrassing and tragic for this country: Richesest 'Hoods in America
Having spent several months living in Georgetown in 2004, I can vividly recall that everywhere you went went within a 10-15 mile ring around Capitol Hill, the only thing you could "smell" was taxpayer largesse. What a sad statement about this country...
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Well said. Fraud and graft seem to be the national past time for the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street.
ReplyDeleteNoticed Toll's cancellation rate was up again, smaller number of sales contracts as well. But of course the news is all about how much money they made. Comical farce.
http://aaronlayman.com/2014/02/toll-brothers-q1-2014-cold-weather-ate-my-sales-contracts/
I think America has adopted the Soviet model circa 1980's. How long before we see lines of people waiting for bread and toilet paper? Mean while back on capital hill and the White House it's champagne and caviar, Beluga of course.
ReplyDeleteWe have bread lines. They're just in front of you and behind you in the stores with their SNAP cards. Before the year is out, we are likely to surpass 50 million on food stamps this fifth year into the Obama recovery that Hope and Change brought us. And to think Hillary is on deck!
DeleteBTW, seeing several articles today depicting exactly what Dave has been saying in recent months, housing is taking a huge turn for the worse!
This started way before Obama, Im so tired of the stupidity of thinking our Presidents did this. It's the federal reserve stealing our wealth. Learn about the monetary system and the federal reserve. Read the book Creatures from Jekyll island and you will see how our government is ripping off their own people. Obama is doing what he is told to do or he'll be killed like President Kennedy was.
DeleteRobert, when are you and Robert Wagner from SA starting the "Gold is Going to $770 Because There's Gold in Everyone's Basements" Fund? I just found $5.62 under the passenger seat of my Yugo and would like to be a lead investor in the fund.
ReplyDeleteSorry Dave, wrote Robert twice there!!
Delete@Anonymous - Good analogy. Financial repression and cronyism result whether communism, fascism, socialism, or unfettered capitalism. Classified corruption, top-secret censorship and other oligarchical oxymorons like Homeland Security, IRS, FDA, NSA, CIA, FBI, UN and WHO, such hoots. Same standard operating procedure and modus operandi. Business as unusual, insider deals, closed door politics, corporatized parasitism, collusive treason, sedition, counterfeiting, rackateering, drugs/guns/slaves/organ trafficking etc.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.batr.org/corporatocracy/021914.html
Missing Military-Industrial-Complex Money - James Hall - 02-19-14 EXCERPTS:
"When Major General Smedley Butler made his case,"War is a Racket" he did not pull any punches. "The normal profits of a business concern in the United States are six, eight, ten, and sometimes twelve percent. But war-time profits – ah! That is another matter – twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred per cent – the sky is the limit. All that traffic will bear. Uncle Sam has the money. Let's get it." The business of military procurement has multiplied since his fateful revelations.
Not satisfied with fair profits or feasible competition, the practices of the defense corporatists illustrate one aspect of waste, graft and systemic bribery....
This dramatic growth in budgets is even more significant, when viewed in the context of world expenditures of other counties....
Jonathan Turley in Pentagon Plugs: New Study Finds Pentagon Has Hidden Trillions In Missing Money And Equipment, references an example on how the overall avoidance of financial accountability, outright fraud and intentional concealment operates:
"A new report has detailed how the military has cooked the books to hide trillions, that’s right trillions, in missing money and equipment. The military calls them "plugs," a curious term for fraud. These are knowingly fake figures used to hide the fact that there is no accurate record of the money....
Reuter’s reports on a Special Report: The Pentagon's doctored ledgers conceal epic waste.
"Over the past 10 years, the Defense Department has signed contracts for the provision of more than $3 trillion in goods and services. How much of that money is wasted in overpayments to contractors, or was never spent and never remitted to the Treasury, is a mystery. That's because of a massive backlog of "closeouts" - audits meant to ensure that a contract was fulfilled and the money ended up in the right place."
Now trillions are sums that are unimaginable The Department of the Treasury acknowledges that U.S. gold reserves (if you believe their figures) total $11,041,059,958.16 as of their Current Report: January 31, 2014.
An eleven billion dollars equivalent is a mere drop in the bucket to the monies allocated to the military and homeland security. Taxpayers are regularly deceived about the costs. Congress is kept in the dark about black programs. And the war racket keeps funneling and siphoning off unknown sums to accounts that only a super computer can track.
Corporatocracy: How the Corporate Welfare State Divides and Conquers is a video by James Corbertt that provides an insightful analysis which establishes a surreal account how the oligarchy operates. The financial shenanigans of corporatists contribute to the interlocking directorates, which run the money pit that keeps the empire operating.
A rational reform of a depraved money laundering arrangement is impossible without a fundamental repudiation of the internationalist foreign policy doctrines that permeates the State Department. Funding advance technological warfare platforms that are unheard of to even congressional oversight is profoundly unconstitutional..."
DC has the highest % of MILLIONAIRES per population in the world....and they are all in CON-gress....sad and criminal...and when TSHTF...the decorations on the light poles will be a sight to see....imho
ReplyDeleteMore Cops & Firefighters Indicted In Multimillion 9/11 Disability Fraud
ReplyDeleteGothamist reports:
More than 100 former police officers and firefighters were indicted last month for allegedly falsely claiming 9/11-related psychiatric conditions to obtain Social Security disability benefits. Now, authorities say 28 more people have been indicted as the Manhattan District Attorney's office continues to dig into the fraud allegations.
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2014/02/first-responders-indicted-in.html
pad hours, feign disability, get bennies, get second job....everybody's doing it.
Perhaps we tax paying U.S. citizens should start forming events and show up at these congress persons mansions to help ourselves to their ill gotten riches ! We could classify them as reversed i.o.u. payoffs for the good of all taxpaying people who got them there in the 1st place.dw
ReplyDeleteECB to take the QE plunge this year…finally
ReplyDeleteBetter late than never, right?
Despite the myriad political, legal and financial obstacles, the European Central Bank will this year take the plunge and start printing money, several years after its counterparts in the United States, Britain and Japan.
That’s the view of economists at BNP Paribas, one of the first major financial institutions to predict the ECB will use the printing press, the central bank weapon of last resort, to slay the dragon of deflation and steer the fragile economy away from recession once and for all:
Asset purchases are increasingly necessary in order for the ECB to meet its primary objective of maintaining price stability. Inflation in the euro area has persistently surprised to the downside, eroding the safety margin against deflation. „ Additional conventional policy easing will not deliver sufficient monetary accommodation for the price stability mandate to be met. Thus, the ECB will reluctantly have to follow other central banks into balance sheet expansion via asset purchases.
http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope/2014/02/26/ecb-to-take-the-qe-plunge-this-year-finally/
Mersch Says Renminbi May Challenge Dollar’s Reserve Role
ReplyDeleteChina’s renminbi might one day challenge the role of the U.S. dollar as the world’s leading reserve currency, European Central Bank Executive Board member Yves Mersch said.
“Having become an important trading and payment currency, the renminbi is now taking the first steps toward establishing itself as an international investment currency,” Mersch said in a speech at Luxembourg’s Renminbi Forum today. “Due to the size of China’s economy and its importance in global trade and, potentially, finance, the renminbi might ultimately come to challenge the U.S. dollar” as a leading reserve currency.
China’s Communist government has been gradually allowing the currency of the world’s second-largest economy to float more freely in recent years, while keeping strict limits on the amount of money that can flow out of the country. The renminbi became one of the top 10 currencies used for payments last year as its use in settling trade has increased.
Introducing direct trading between the euro and the renminbi at the Shanghai foreign exchange will “bring benefits for the euro area and China,” Mersch said.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-26/mersch-says-renminbi-may-challenge-dollar-s-reserve-role.html
Eric Sprott: We're Looking For Ways To Survive "[The] Counterfeiting Of Money"
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/pAKoBYlfwTo
this is a good way, too....................
ReplyDeleteBlueCrest Internal Fund May Pose Pay Conflicts, Albourne Says
BlueCrest Capital Management LLP, Michael Platt’s $32 billion hedge-fund firm, has a potential conflict of interest over a fund that it runs for the benefit of its partners, according to a report by one of the world’s largest advisers to institutional investors.
Albourne Partners Ltd., whose clients include pension plans, endowments and family offices, issued a report this month that said it recently became aware that BlueCrest has a $1.5 billion internal fund called BSMA Ltd., according to two people with knowledge of the report, who asked not to be identified. BlueCrest said the fund has existed for years to retain talent and the firm has procedures in place to protect against conflicts of interest.
Albourne said it’s concerned that BSMA, which oversees some employees’ deferred compensation, may lead to management interests not being aligned with those of the firm’s investors, according to a passage of the report that was read to Bloomberg News.
“We also do not feel that BlueCrest has provided appropriate disclosure to Albourne or to external investors, as far as we are aware,” said the report, which was written by Jane Hughes, an Albourne analyst who focuses on researching fixed-income and credit hedge funds. “Nor have they been sufficiently open with Albourne when we have tried to discuss the possible conflicts.”
Hedge-fund firms normally run employee and investor money pari passu, or equally, said Vidak Radonjic, managing partner at Beryl Consulting Group LLC in Jersey City, New Jersey, which advises clients on investing in hedge funds.
A separate fund “is not common,” Radonjic said. “Usually employee money is co-mingled with investor money.”
Albourne made its comments about BSMA in an analysis of BlueCrest Capital International, a BlueCrest hedge fund made up of teams of traders overseen by Platt, 45, that manages $12.9 billion. The fund primarily invests in fixed-income based on Platt’s background trading interest-rate swaps at JPMorgan Chase & Co. before he founded BlueCrest 14 years ago.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-27/bluecrest-internal-fund-may-pose-pay-conflicts-albourne-says.html
Study: New HFs Make Investors Wait Longer To Redeem
ReplyDeleteIn its latest annual New Hedge Fund Study, law firm Seward & Kissel reveals 89% of new funds (up from 64% in 2012) restricted redemptions to a quarterly or longer-term basis.
And after all the post-crisis talk of increased liquidity, only 11% of funds allowed monthly redemptions in 2013, compared to 36% 2012. Moreover, the number of funds employing “hard lock ups” (usually one year in length) rose from 8% in 2012 to 27% in 2013.
http://www.finalternatives.com/node/26260
Get Elected, Get Your Kids Rich: Washington Is Spoiled Rotten
ReplyDeleteA governor’s daughter is made CEO without a MBA. A senator’s son starts a hedge fund right out of college. Democrats have joined Republicans in the new nepotism.
Joe Manchin’s daughter Heather was looking for a job. The now-senator and one-time governor of West Virginia was only a state level rep when he ran into Milan Pushkar—the head of Mylan Inc., a Fortune 500 pharmaceuticals company—at a West Virginia University basketball game. Heather was hired for an entry-level position at the company soon after. Records show Mylan benefitted from millions of dollars worth of corporate tax breaks in the state during Manchin’s gubernatorial tenure. And these days, after stints as Mylan’s director of government relations and strategic development, Heather Bresch (née Manchin) is the company’s CEO, one of Fortune’s 50 Most Powerful Women in Business. All this without even an MBA—a 2008 investigation found that Bresch did not actually earn her degree from WVU as claimed. Officials had altered her official records and covered up for it, perhaps motivated by Mylan’s lucrative relationship with the University—co-founder Pushkar (Bresch’s business world fairy godfather) donated over $20 million and had the football field named after him.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/02/27/get-elected-get-your-kids-rich-washington-is-spoiled-rotten.html