It’s Time to Fix the Fraudulent Financial System

For several million dollars in campaign contributions — also known as bribes — you too can own a member of Congress, get whatever you want and have American taxpayers bail you out when your fraudulent actions cause the greatest depression since 1929 and make sure that meaningful reform that might cut into your billion dollar profits and fraudulent business practices doesn’t happen, as well as making sure you stay out of prison despite all the fraudulent crimes you’ve committed.

President Obama, in his brief career as a U.S. Senator and presidential candidate reportedly received more money from the FIRE Sector (Finance, Insurance, Real Estate) than anyone else in the history of the legislative branch — a total of $42,268,166.00.

Two other presidential candidates, John McCain and Hillary Clinton came in a close second and third: John McCain received $33,339,458.00 and Hillary Clinton received $29,800,366.00 from the FIRE Sector. Three other Senators — John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Chris Dodd — also former presidential candidates, received a lot.

Wall Street isn’t taking any chances. Senator Dick Durbin admitted this past April that banks are still the more powerful lobby on Capitol Hill, and they own the politicians in Washington. A financial coup d’etat has ended up plaquing this nation. Since 1990, the financial sector has doled out $2.28 billion in campaign contributions and $3.69 billion in lobbying since 1998.

$6 Billion Gives You a License to Steal

The results of the financial sector’s bribes to Congress are painfully evident today. For ‘contributing’ almost $6 billion, the financial sector has received a license to steal from U.S. citizens and they’ve done it well.

Companies that were fraudulently awarded taxpayers’ money from their subjects in Congress spent $77 million on lobbying and $37 million on ‘campaign contributions’ last year. The return these companies made on their investments came to 258,449 percent.

The fraudulent Wall Street bailout from a year ago may have averted a full-scale financial collapse, but it hasn’t helped the American taxpayers that are footing the bill for Wall Street’s fraud. Instead of increasing lending as advertised, it resulted in banks using money to buy other institutions, create capital cushions, and pay out bonuses to the fat cats responsible for defrauding the American public, among other things.

Instead of implementing any type of reform and holding the fraudsters accountable for their actions, and making sure the ‘too-big-to-fail’ financial institutions were brought in line, the U.S. government bailed out their Wall Street masters and allowed the ‘too-big-to-fail’ financial institutions to get even bigger. America’s economy is now more vulnerable than it was a year ago. More on the state of the economy and Washington’s puppet masters can be found from PBS.

The More you ‘Contribute,’ the More you Receive

Despite the lack of serious reform for the financial sector that has been proposed by President Obama, Wall Street is dead set against it — so much so that Wall Street is investing more money in the U.S. Senate in an effort to block or help shape any type of financial reform. Of the $10.6 million the financial industry has ‘contributed’ to sitting U.S. Senators this year, more than $7.7 million has gone to Democrats. As I’ve stated many times in the past, there is little if any difference between Republicans and Democrats and America’s major two-party political system is broken and extremely corrupt.

Some recipients of contributions from companies that were bailed out are reportedly the same members of Congress who chair committees charged with regulating the financial sector and overseeing the effectiveness of the fraudulent bailout. In total, members of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, Senate Finance Committee and House Financial Services Committee received $5.2 million from recipients of the bailout. President Obama alone received $4.3 million from employees of bailed out companies for his presidential campaign.

Companies that gave the most in ‘contributions’ — Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley — are among the biggest donors of all time to U.S. politics. Companies that gave the most to fund campaigns were those that received the most money from the fraudulent bailouts. Other companies that ‘donated’ record amounts of money to help them stay afloat include General Motors, Bank of America and American International Group (AIG). A chart showing how much was received and how much was given is available from Open Secrets.

Buying off the President and other Presidential candidates isn’t the only way Wall Street and the other fraudulent industries screw the American public. Democratic Senators such as ‘the honorable’ Dianne Feinstein exemplify reasons for problems that Americans face from those that are elected to represent them — instead of representing the people, they prefer to enrich themselves by enabling endless war and by destroying basic civil rights and liberties.

In 2002, Senator Feinstein voted to authorize the attack on Iraq — an attack that was fraudulent from the start and has turned into an illegal occupation. Whatever then-President George W. Bush wanted, Feinstein was more than happy to provide. Using her stature on the Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, Feinstein twice voted to ‘legalize’ Bush’s warrantless eavesdropping and immunize the lawbreaking telecoms that aided the Bush cabal. Both illegal, neverending wars have cost billions of dollars and have slowly helped bankrupt this country.

More than 151 Members of Congress Earning Profits from War

Despite the fact that General Michael Hayden was caught presiding over the illegal surveillance program, Feinstein led the Senate’s effort to confirm Hayden as the CIA Director. She also manipulated the confirmation of Michael Mukasey as Attorney General despite the fact that he refused to answer basic questions about torture and indefinite detention of U.S. citizens. Recently, as noted by Glenn Greenwald, Feinstein also used her stature to gut almost every proposed reform to the PATRIOT Act and to allow the illegal actions of the Federal Government to continue.

The ‘honorable’ Senator Feinstein has done everything she can to further enable the illegal actions of the Federal Government. Feinstein’s personal wealth is also tied directly to the illegal ‘National Security’ policies she continues trying to illegally expand. Feinstein’s husband, with her aid, won multimillion-dollar defense contracts in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars — both of which are illegal and based on nothing but lies that have led to several thousand deaths of American troops — and the fraudulent ‘War on Terror.’

Senator Feinstein and her husband have gained great wealth at the cost of her constituents and the rest of the country. In Feinstein’s ongoing quest to enable neverending illegal wars, she has tried pressuring the White House to further escalate the war in Afghanistan and send more troops, despite the fact that it’s a war that can’t be won. The longer the illegal wars go on, the more money Feinstein and her husband make. Feinstein isn’t the only one that profits greatly from endless illegal wars.

More than 151 members of Congress reportedly have up to $195 million invested in major defense contractors that are earning profits from the illegal occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact, companies with Congressional investors were the beneficiaries of more than $275.6 billion from the U.S. government in 2006.

It’s Time to Fix the Fraudulent Financial System

Feinstein is just one example of Democratic politicians that exemplify the stench of corruption in politics. There are many more. There are many Republicans that continue pushing for endless war and destruction of rights, liberties and freedoms for their own personal gain too. Again, America’s two-party political system is broken and corrupt. Despite the propaganda and the ‘keeping America safe’ rhetoric, these illegal wars and the fraudulent ‘War on Terror’ have further endangered this country, and resulted in numerous illegal power grabs by the Federal Government.

The only ones not being affected by the rising unemployment rates and the financial meltdown that has brought this country to its knees is the financial industry that fraudulently caused the meltdown in the first place. It’s time to put an end to the bribes on Capitol Hill and it’s time to enact some major reforms across many sectors. Bought and paid for politicians — along with all the War Criminals that have defecated on the American public and the rest of the world — need to be held accountable for their actions and put in prison where they belong.

Political corruption has led to a financial sector that, as noted by Information Clearing House, is riddled with fatal flaws that have created a monster that drains the real economy, promotes fraud and corruption, threatens democracy, and causes recurrent, intensifying crises. It’s time to abolish the ‘Federal Reserve’ that in fact is a private entity, not Federal and it’s time to fix our fraudulent financial system and hold the financial fraudsters accountable too.

As mentioned in the opening paragraph, for several million dollars in bribes, you can own a member of Congress, get whatever you want, have American taxpayers fund your fraudulent actions, make sure you stay out of jail and avoid any responsibility for your actions. It’s time to put an end to that.

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