NOT Liberal, Libertarian, or Populist Enough…. For 2016.

NOT Liberal, Libertarian, or Populist Enough…. For 2016.

“You could say I'd lost my belief in our politicians -They all seemed like game show hosts to me…”  - Sting, If I Ever Lose my Faith in You

By  J.M. Hamilton 6-28-14

Yes, Mrs. Clinton is running for President, and her campaign strategy is already abundantly clear.  Quite simply the establishment's Trojan-candidate will become the nation's first woman President by becoming the "Anti-Bill," and by boring us into apathy and submission.  Have you heard this lady speak, or read her new book?

Looking for a cure for insomnia?

We surrender already.  We know Mrs. C has been bucking for the top slot in the corporation for some time... Her resume screams it.  From when she "temped" as the junior Senator from New York to her recent stint as Secretary of State.   A job in which Mrs. Clinton was so understatedly unsuccessful that she had no response when asked to list her achievements, as Madame Secretary, and neither could Foggy Bottom produce a list either.  After all, it wouldn't do to tell her adoring base that her greatest achievement at State was to act as a shill for Boeing, at the taxpayer's expense.  I know pretty snarky, but what part of the above isn’t true?

The Clintons sold out a long time ago... whether it was asking arch-right-winger Senator Jesse Helm's campaign advisor, Dick Morris, to run the Clinton's 1996 re-election campaign.  Or uniting with Treasury Secretary Rubin (of Goldman $achs fame) and Senator Phil Gramm (R. - TX) in the repeal of Glass-Steagall and deregulating swaps and derivatives.  We often forget, deep within the inter sanctum that is Hillary 4.0 beats the heart of a Goldwater Republican.

It's all here, the Clinton years: The Prelude to the 2008 Financial Crisis, and the resulting Great Recession.

In fact, Clintonian politics is symptomatic of today's binary/winner take all political economy.  On the heals of Mr. Reagan (after a very brief Bush interlude), the Clinton’s led the way with extraordinary '90s deregulation and welfare state rollbacks.  The GOP is now so extreme, and the nation and the Democratic Party have been pulled so far right, that today's core Democratic Party looks a great deal like the all but extinct "moderate republican," or what I like to call GOP-Lite.  The result of this extremism and the rendering of the social contract, in line with Newton's Third Law: A Populist backlash at home, and in Europe, and I would argue globally.

With the economic disparity (i.e. inequality) between the one percent and the balance of the nation never greater, and finally receiving the long overdue attention it deserves, even “Hills,” whose Clintonian policies helped to usher in a neo-gilded age, is now attempting to burnish her populist cred?

Good luck with that.  More likely, the uber-hawk can't wait to be ensconced into the oval office and lead this nation quite possibly, into yet another war, presumably as payback to all those defense contractors, who will write lavish checks for her coronation.  Iron Lady II?  That's probably not far off the mark.  Remember it was Senator Clinton who voted for W's, and Cheney’s, and Blair’s folly in Iraq.  

"Mission Accomplished,"indeed.

So go back to sleep progressives, liberals, and libertarians because this one (2016) already appears in the bag.... Mrs. Clinton's withering drone demands submission and somnolence, and is more deadly than a fleet of drones of an entirely different sort, aptly named Predator and Reaper.

Mrs. Clinton is said to have never met a dollar that she didn't like, and that makes her both highly malleable and much sought after by this country's billionaire aristocracy.

Of course, it doesn't have to be this way... The establishment doesn't always have to win, nor do Americans have to go on perpetually bailing out the Wall Street cartel, and the plutocracy, on the backs of the poor and our children.

All it takes is to focus and a brewing populist revolt at the polls.

That and a couple of brave souls to step forward, like.... Senators Elizabeth Warren and Rand Paul.  The "establishments" worst nightmare and respectively, the best hope for humanity and this nation's future.

Politics makes strange bedfellows, and some say, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”...Senators Warren and Paul may utilize different reasoning, logic, and ideologies to draw the same conclusions; but the really important point is that these two leaders, often via circuitous routes, repeatedly draw the same conclusions on many of the same issues and are often 100 percent correct.  Both are populist and neither is a friend of the plutocracy, or the establishment that has bankrupted this nation.  Therefore, they already have the majority of Americans support.  Whether most Americans know these two individuals, yet, is an entirely different story.

So let's quickly run down why these two senators are at the right place, at precisely at the right time, for protecting the nation from yet another round of Clintonian politics.  Think of Warren and Paul as a safety valve for what remains of our democracy, the best democracy money can buy - thanks to SCOTUS/Roberts/Scalia.

Issue One:  Foreign Policy

Warren comes at this from a more cerebral aspect, in that she basically adopts General Stanley McChrystal's maximum that when you kill one terrorist you are likely creating ten more.  Mr. McChrystal led the war in Afghanistan before being sacked by President Obama, because his staff popped off in Rolling Stone (I have often wondered if President Obama knew of Mr. McChrystal’s thoughts, emails, phone conversations, and peccadillos well in advance of the Rolling Stone article- just like another General's downfall - via email, Patreaus - and could the President have been informed, courtesy of the NSA and a rival General Alexander?  But I digress.).  

General McChrystal and Warren are both right of course, and they have two failed wars, a bankrupt nation, and war weary public to point to as support.  Meanwhile, militant Islam has not been subdued by U.S. power, only made more virulent.  Not to mention a suicide rate among active duty soldiers that is a national disgrace.  Establishment Republicans, and the "Neo Con-men," believe every thing can be resolved from the barrel of a gun (Senator John McCain being a case in point).  That's what makes Mr. Paul such an anomaly as he argues from our founder’s perspective to beware of foreign entanglements, and from the law’s perspective that the U.S. has no constitutional prerogative to play the world's policeman.  Moreover, efforts for America to play the world's top cop have both failed, repeatedly, and ran up the U.S. national debt by the trillions.

Both Paul and Warren are correct, and would likely keep this nation out of yet another war.  If Afghanistan and Iraq have revealed anything to the American people, it is that the U.S. doesn't go to war to spread peace and democracy; no, America goes to war for oil, and to protect multinational corporate and sovereign/foreign interests (here, think of the Royal House of Saud, and the Europeans).

As for the Clintons, remember Kosovo?  A war conveniently, ramped up, at the same time Mr. Clinton was under fire for the Monica Lewinsky scandal.  "Wag the dog" during the Clinton's third crowning?  It's an all too real possibility.  As for our European, and our so-called Saudi allies, isn't it time for them to fight their own battles?  America is energy independent.  Why are we sending the nation’s poor to die for Monarchs who spread Wahhabism, and Europeans, who take off the month of August to vacation on the French Rivera?

Issue Two:  The NSA & Privacy

I have to give this one to Mr. Paul.  Hell, he's actually suing the NSA, which makes the German Stasi look like the boy scouts.  Only Orwell could have envisioned an organization that has been so damaging to this nation's reputation, U.S. global security, and U.S. global commercial (IT) interests (not to mention is evil-incarnate).  As a Libertarian, you can tell that Mr. Paul feels strongly that the NSA has made a perfidious hash out of the constitution and our civil liberties.  Mrs. Warren has written a letter with several other Senators protesting the NSA, and helped sponsor legislation to rein in the Surveillance State, but beyond that she's been rather reticent.

Mrs. Clinton, on the other hand, has never seen a taxpayer funded defense, or intelligence, dollar spent that she didn't like.  Some of those dollars, undoubtedly, and indirectly, find there way back to the Clinton Foundation.

Here, I'll take the two Senators any day, as the truly sincere alternative to Mrs. Clinton, whom less than 50% of the voters believe is truthful.

Issue Three:  The Wall Street Cartel

As Mr. Paul is known for being outspoken on MIC and NSA matters, Mrs. Warren is the Queen of Wall Street containment.  It's not that Mrs. Warren is anti-Wall Street per se, it's that she's passionately against the fraud and double-dealing that passes for standard business practice on the Street, and recognizes the tremendous drag on the economy that Wall Street represents.  Whether its collusion in the FOREX market, in the commodities market, collusion in bidding on LBO business, or gambling with the nation's finances/future in a seven hundred plus trillion swaps and derivatives market, or a HFT rigged stock market and dark pools.... Senator Warren has been fighting pathological malfeasance and perpetual fraud, since well before the 2008 financial crisis began.  The expense and costs of Wall Street's grand larceny have been passed onto the average U.S. citizen and investors in the form of bailouts, massive Federal debt, higher commodity prices, a depressed economy, a lousy jobs market, and headline inflation – for years and likely, the decade to come.  

Moreover, Warren would be the candidate most likely to do something about it.  She's smart, ethical, and would not look the other way, and that puts “the fear” into the Street (Or as President Obama told Senator Warren, "You make them very nervous.")  

Is there any greater endorsement?  

The irony is the public would likely return to Wall Street investments, and the stock market, in droves under a Warren Administration, if they knew the stock market wasn't rigged.

A President Warren would actually be the best thing that ever happened to Wall Street.

Ironically, the Tea Party, before it was co-opted by the Koch brothers and assorted  billionaires, was formed in direct response to the revulsion the GOP elicited, when Republicans and Government $achs repeatedly bailed out Wall Street.  Mr. Paul, presumably, and many libertarians state that they are pro-free market; and therefore, that does not make Mr. Paul, or libertarians, a natural ally of big business and the Wall Street cartel, who are perennially in bed with Federal and State governments, in our crony economy.  

That being said, the concern I have with libertarians is that their revulsion for big government all too often does not translate into revulsion for monopolies and cartels (which after all, are creatures of the state).  Government does indeed have an important role to play in a capitalist society.  As acknowledged by both Messrs. Smith and Hayek (free market deities) that role is to set and establish moral rules of the capitalist road, and the rule of law, which within businesses are to operate.  The morality play for capitalism is that it is the best provider of goods and services for the American public, and used to do pretty well at job creation.  Which is the antithesis of what capitalism has become in America, as crony capitalism is now dominated by cartels, monopolies, and a bunch of Robber Barrons - who want to get rich at the expense of everyone else (citizen, taxpayer, employee, would-be employees, students, consumers, stockholders, and small business owners…  did I miss anybody?).

Government is not there to be co-opted, paid to look the other way, aid in a rigged system, or to create barriers to entry, or starved of regulatory funding, which is exactly what the GOP and Dems have allowed our crony economy/government to become.

In the plutocracy’s/bankocracy’s rush to place laissez faire economics before all, I'm not, entirely, sure we can count on Mr. Paul, or libertarians, to save us from the next Wall Street generated calamity.  If the Wall Street cartel continues unfettered, they’ll take this country and the global economy down, and everyone in it.  And but for extraordinary measures, and government intervention, the banks damn near pulled it off in 2008.


The Federal Reserve already has us floating along in yet another bubble, generated by quantitative easing and interest rate suppression.

On this issue, I lean Warren, but would very much like to hear more from Mr. Paul.
 
Ironically, the Clintons, alleged "liberals," played a huge role in spawning the 2008 financial crisis with the aforementioned swaps and derivatives dereg, and Glass-Steagall abolition.  Way to go!  And guess what?  Dodd-Frank is laughable in its ability to prevent the next crisis, and Glass-Steagall has not been reinstated.

Issue Four:  Jobs and the Economy

One might conclude from the facts that Mrs. Clinton is for any billionaire, or any corporation, wealthy enough to pay her, which means the average person doesn't factor into her political calculus.  Mr. Clinton, as incredibly bright and as politically sophisticated as he is, recently stated that the issue in America is not “inequality,” but rather, helping the middle-class.  Which just goes to show, not only has Mr. Clinton missed the boat, but he’s gone over to the other side and is a full fledged plutocratic member.  Contrary to what Mr. Clinton would lead us to believe, these two issues, inequality and helping the middle-class, are inextricably linked.

Elizabeth Warren understands that rapacious Wall Street banking, Shadow Banking, and Private Equity industries, kills jobs and opportunity as do cartels and monopolies.  These entities are a huge tax/economic drag upon our society (via monopolistic profits, leveraging up and bankrupting previously financially healthy companies for executive enrichment, and through tax avoidance... just to name a couple of examples), and they absolutely crush opportunity and innovation, via globalization, layoffs, and reductions in R&D spending.   

Senator Warren might even enforce the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, the law of the land, which would create jobs and opportunity immediately, by smashing venal and greedy cartels and monopolies.  Comcast and AT&T, for some reason, immediately come to mind.

Mr. Paul gets that the GOP has to change, and that in his words the GOP can no longer be ruled by rich, old, white men.  Truly, with his vision of inclusiveness, Mr. Paul is the future of the Republican Party, if the Party is to have a future.  That said, many of us would like to know more about these three politicians plans to bring this nation back, economically.  Mr. Paul knows that the Fed's trickle down monetary policy, and hopefully, he knows our trickle down tax-code, are not the answer.  The plutocracy, and the GOP establishment owned by billionaires, have had their way for thirty-plus years, and have failed this nation, while enriching themselves.

Note, for sake of time, I didn’t touch on these politicians' views on other key issues, such as: immigration; campaign finance reform (and a possible constitutional amendment to rein in the billionaires and SCOTUS); the record rates of incarceration in this country for victimless crimes (designed to disenfranchise a whole class of citizens); or the environment.  Give me time.

There’s a great deal of talk these days about obvious distractions, such as Iraq, Benghazi, and the failure of Imperial America to “man-up” and take care of our Empire (code for, let’s start another war).  All of which are convenient distractions from the real issues at hand, and that most politicians don’t have the cojones or ovaries to address: Namely, how to rein in billionaires, and monopolistic corporations, from looting the land, eviscerating the remnants of the middle-class, overthrowing our democracy with unlimited campaign contributions, and dodge paying billions in taxes!

How indeed.

Don’t count on a President Clinton, Trois, to act on these issues.  The Clinton’s, once occupiers of a humble Arkansas governor’s mansion, have moved up in the world and have come a long way.  God bless ‘em for that.   Why should we begrudge them their success, achieved through a rigged economy they helped create?

Clearly, the Clintons are not the answer to what ails the U.S., today.

Mrs. Warren is shrewd.  She should not announce her candidacy, if she wants to run, until after the 2014 midterms.  Until then, let Hillary talk, frequently and often.

As for Mr. Paul, the GOP's greatest hope, remember what happened in the Republican primaries in 2012.  It was an absolute brawl, fiasco, and a GOP establishment bloodletting on a monumental scale.  Your conclusions, Mr. Paul, are often 100% correct, but might your cause be better served if you were to - at times - wrap your libertarian beliefs, values and solutions in more mainstream arguments, ready-made for mass-consumption (it requires a little thought, but it can be done, and the American public is ready for you).  Don’t reject your father’s core values, as much you will be pressured by the GOP establishment to do so.  Unfortunately, at some point, you will likely have to pander to an ultra-socially conservative Christian base to some degree, in order to get the GOP nod.  In 20 years, these folks will be gone, but today, you’ll have to deal with them. 

Deal with them, however, you must…. Just be sure that the arguments you use to get the Republican nomination are not turned against you in the general election.  That thankfully, was Mr. Romney’s downfall.  Some of my readers will attack my support of Mr. Paul as hypocritical because I often argue from the center-left and have knocked the Tea Party in more than a few columns, but Mr. Paul is both inspiring and certainly a cut above most Tea Party candidates.  To date, I detect NO racism or xenophobia in this man.  Quite the opposite.

A President Warren or President Paul would be a wonderful thing.  For Liberals, with a President Warren, you get the whole agenda, and with a President Paul, Libertarian, you get three-quarters of the same Warren outcomes, but via an entirely different logic.  In fact with a gerrymandered congress not going away anytime soon, Mr. Paul might actually get more legislation passed.  A President Warren would likely have to use executive orders to carry out her agenda, which is not a bad thing.

For Libertarians, Mr. Paul is the future of the GOP, but a President Elizabeth Warren would be the next best thing.  Don’t forget that.  If your state allows crossover voting, strongly consider switching over in the primaries to put these two into play.  It may even be a strategic political play to cross political parties in 2016, and re-register, in order to get these two nominated. 

Call it “The Anti- Hillary/Anti - Establishment” vote.

Almost anything is better than another status quo, establishment candidate, like Madame Hillary Clinton…. An establishment that ran this country into the ground, repeatedly, for the enrichment of a few and at the expense of many.  

Mrs. Clinton has the next two and half years to convince us otherwise.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2014

The Simple Economics and Math in Mr. Cantor’s Defeat….

The Simple Economics and Math in Mr. Cantor’s Defeat….

By J.M. Hamilton (6-14-14)

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor suffered a stunning upset this week from Republican outsider David Brat.  Mr. Brat ran on opposition to crony/insider capitalism, and against immigration reform.  Is there a lesson here for establishment democrats, who are also acolytes and devotees of the same flow of funds coming from commercial interests and commercial interest lobbyist?  

Here then are some simple economics and math equations to ponder.

Equation A:  Bank Bailouts

Congress supported repeated Bank Bailout(s), plus a

Reinvigorated mortgage securitization market, funded by GSEs and the FED, equals

Failure to refinance homes and failure to provide debt forgiveness, and millions of homes owners still upside down on mortgages, equals

Less discretionary income, less aggregate demand, and the lack of a universal rebound in the housing recovery, equals

Fewer jobs and opportunity, and the inability of labor to relocate.

Equation B:  FED Policy

Congress supported bank-centric FED policy, plus

Interest Rate Suppression and Quantitative Easing, equals

Political Cover for Politicians and a Stagnant Economy (benefiting the financial elite to the exclusion of Main Street), equals

Fewer jobs and opportunity (In short, the lost Japanese Decade(s), visited upon America)

Equation C:  Support for Private Equity, M&A, and Monopolies

Congress’ blind support for PE, M&A, and Cartel and monopolistic mergers, equals

Globalization, highly leveraged firms (teetering on bankruptcy), pink slips, temp labor, stagnant wages and a stagnant economy, and lower top line growth, equals

Fewer jobs and opportunity.

Equation D:  Tax Policy, or the Lack thereof

Congress continues to support tax loopholes/dodges that favor the rich equals,

Higher taxes for the 99%, equals

Less discretionary spending, on top of already stagnant wages, equals

Lower aggregate demand and lower top line growth, equals

You guessed it, Fewer jobs and opportunity.

Equation E:  Rising Xenophobia

Congress’ unyielding support for equations A + B + C + D (the Crony Economy) equals

Fewer jobs and opportunity, equals

Fear, equals

Rising Xenophobia, Racism and Political Extremism, equals

Mr. Cantor – unceremoniously – hitting the streets, and not a moment too soon.

Good bye Mr. Cantor, you aren’t the first, and hopefully, you won’t be the last. 

Populism is here to stay, as Mrs. Clinton is about to learn, if Mrs. Warren decides to run.

In a salute to Mr. James Carville: It’s all about the jobs, stupid! 

That is to say, bring back opportunity, by reversing some of the equations above, and we are likely to see: More jobs, less fear, more racial tolerance, and more polite political discourse.

Don’t forget failure to pass immigration reform will ultimately end the GOP (double-click this link for a picture worth a thousand words).

P.S. 
Missing from the equation above is the deleterious effect “financial engineering” has on jobs and the economy, so that earnings per share and executive compensation can be boosted.  Separately, two failed nation-building exercises did much to enrich the MIC, but left the nation’s finances in poor condition.  These wars were costly, resolved nothing, and as result, the government finances are not where they should be to help offset the reduction in private sector spending, during these troubled economic times.  

Both financial engineering and wars are strongly supported by Congress, and destroy jobs and opportunity.


Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2014
 

Rakoff

Some two and a half years later (because that's how lawyers and judges often operate), Judge Rakoff has been overruled on the Citigroup/SEC deal, but remains 100% Correct… which goes to show and as many have learned since 2008: What is often times “legal” is in many instances amoral and “criminal" (malum in se).

Fear not Judge Rakoff, you may have lost this battle, but your arguments are winning the war.  The U.S. government now charges banks with crimes, and the penalties are now running well into the billions.

A Tsunami of Cover-ups and Lies

“As Ferdinand Pecora, the Depression-era prosecutor, is supposed to have said of the events leading to the Wall Street crash of 1929: Pitch darkness was among the bankers’ stoutest allies.”  - Gretchen Morgenson – NY TIMES

By J.M. Hamilton (12-4-11)

In a land where back room dealing, and double dealing, in government, banking, and many other facets of our lives, has become the norm, Judge Rakoff’s position on the Citigroup/SEC deal was a breath of fresh air.

The Judge’s position, unfortunately, would appear to be – by current standards – anachronistic.  Mr. Rakoff’s appears to be standing against the tide of history, more akin to a tsunami of cover ups and lies, and yelling 

“Stop – a little honesty and integrity, please!”

Please recall Judge Rakoff, a Federal Judge, was supposed to rubber-stamp a deal between the Securities and Exchange Commission and Citigroup, a bank that has been bailed out by the U.S. taxpayer, ad nausem.   In fact last I checked the U.S. government still holds a substantive stake in Citigroup, as a result of the bank’s failure in 2008.  The “deal” was Citigroup would cough up just north of a quarter billion dollars, and its role in selling, possibly, fraudulent security products, like derivatives and CDOs during the height of the financial crisis, would vanish w/out any admission of responsibility or wrong doing.

How convenient.   

And yet this is the norm in our two tiered justice system, where the public deals with one set of courts, and banks get fast track justice with no trial, relatively light fines, and where the fines, themselves, are considered a cost of doing business.   Americans, of course, have become numb to Wall Street’s recidivist activities.  And so for Judge Rakoff to say “no more,” was truly exceptional.

We can see why the Judge’s behavior was novel, almost rebellious: the Wall Street cartel has co-opted our government, regulators, our judicial system, rating agencies, and our laws and law making.  Our opaque accounting system is laughable, when we consider how derivatives and swap are not accounted for in financial statements (often only receiving a footnote); and Repos – an accounting maneuver/derivative product that helped bring down MF Global (not to mention Lehman), and with it possibly a billion plus in client money disappearing – are an all too common practice.

Granted Judge Rakoff’s decision could possibly mean more trials and the SEC spending more time proving its case against the major banks – at a time when, as recently noted by Arthur Levitt on Bloomberg Radio (Hosted by Tom Keene and Ken Prewitt), Republicans are starving the organization of money and funds.   Mr. Levitt is the SEC’s former chairman.  The Republicans, lap dog of Wall Street, and advocate and stander bearer for the one percent, quite possibly may believe they are doing “god’s work,” by supporting a monopolistic cartel and restraining government agencies, like the SEC.  However, the SEC is the first, and often only, line of defense against the predatory Wall Street oligopoly, in the protection of ordinary Americans, investors, business – both big and small, and of course, the government, itself.

But can you hardly blame the Republicans?  With all that money coming their way from Wall Street, and presidential candidate Romney meeting with Jamie Dimon,  (Mr. Romney, himself making his bones on Wall Street with private equity’s Bain Capital), why not perpetuate crony capitalism and crony democracy?   After all, and gee-whiz, Wall Street paid back its TARP loans with interest….isn’t it time to get off the cartel’s back?

And therein lies the problem, because as much as Republicans would like to wish away the financial crisis of 2008, and assure us that the banks’ have paid back the U.S. taxpayer in full, quite the opposite has in fact happened.   The Banks, who have received 7.0 plus trillion in handouts and government benefits, as reported by Bloomberg last week (that’s half of U.S. GDP), have not paid for the damage they have caused to the real estate market (the cornerstone of life savings and equity for many Americans), the economy, nor for their share of the fiscal mess our government and economy is in.

Not by a fraction.

Republicans are often portrayed as being unfeeling, uncaring, and against the welfare state… that paradigm does not hold up, however, when the welfare is gifted to the Republican Party’s core constituency, the one percent.

So for Judge Rakoff to shine a bright light of truth on an unacceptable practice, tantamount to a banking whitewash and cover-up, was both brave and the kind of iconoclastic practice Americans need to see more of, in both business and government.

Some might call Judge Rakoff a bully.  I call the Judge a hero.

In the land where who you know and one’s connections, as often as not trumps the truth, Judge Rakoff’s act was a singularly courageous event.   

Kudos and accolades to Judge Rakoff!

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2014

Binary Party

What’s that?  Populist outrage against the bankocracy and the plutocracy, was expressed in this week's E.U. elections?

Of course, you could have learned about this, blowback, and Newton’s Third Law of physics, two years ago…. By reading J.M.H.

Binary Party

By J.M. Hamilton (5-18-12)

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”  – Baron Acton

Far too many years to count now, or maybe its just vanity that prohibits me from counting, a boss called me into his office.

He pointed his finger at me, and half serious, half in jest, said in a stentorian tone:

“Mr. Hamilton, are you and your job of any intrinsic or extrinsic value to society?”

It had the feel of a “Dickensonian” moment:  “I pay my taxes, sir.  I try.”

And of course, I believe that my job adds value to society and I am fortunate enough to work for a company that provides a meaningful and valuable service, particularly in times of want and need.

Which is a lot more than I can say for your typical Wall Street Bank.

Wall Street Banks gamble, bet, and speculate (i.e. “make markets”) for the possible enrichment of a few and to the detriment of the many.  Sometimes there’s a crash, and at other times there’s merely a bailout, but the path always leads to what the one percent like to refer to as “creative destruction.”

For the ninety-nine “creative destruction” is code for another round of socialism and redistribution of wealth from the many to the few, a wrecked economy, unemployment, inflation, and our government – and at least one political party – becoming more binary and extreme to rationalize, justify and prop up a failed financial elite.

Their products are the products of any casino, binary bets:  derivatives, synthetic derivatives, repos, collateralized debt, and in most instances are highly illiquid.

One wonders if the financial elite that rule us will ever swear off boom and bust cycles, in favor of a more mundane glide path to economic harmony and prosperity?

It can be done, but at the expense of the wolves.

But is Mr. Dimon listening?

That is to say, many of JP Morgan’s services and products are of no intrinsic or extrinsic worth to society.  And the only product banking does provide that is esteemed by society (the ninety-nine), JP Morgan largely abandoned sometime ago….  Ordinary lending at non-usurious rates, where the bank actually underwrites the prospective client, and retains the loan on its books.  How quaint.   Or put another way, how did society function for the last two millennium without CDOs, MBS, and derivatives and swaps, which are reinsured and underwritten by the American taxpayer?

What will we ever do without financial products that lever up the riches, and entitlements, for the one percent, but enslave the ninety-nine in an never-ending stream of ruinous bank bailouts?

If Wall Street doesn’t get the message this time, perhaps it time to elect officials who will nationalize, smash, and sell off the leviathan: as non-threatening commercial banks (non-speculative – backed by the Fed and the Treasury); and investment houses (free to gamble with theirs and their clients money, and not reinsured by the American people).   These reconfigured institutions might be retained by the government, particularly staid commercial banking, or released back into the wilds of the free market.

As it stands, Wall Street is a threat to the American people and to our national security.

I know…  quite radical stuff, right?

I’m going to hazard a guess.   Everything is relative, even the extrinsic and intrinsic values of society and her politics.  And while JMH may sound left of center today, say in ten to twenty years, if the nation and her elite continue upon its present course, this blog may, possibly, read like the notes of a reactionary right winger, and a slave to the bourgeoisie.

Newton’s third law of motion is that for every action there’s a reaction.

The Republican Party and the Chicago School of Economics, and their laissez faire ideology (both owned and manipulated by the financial elite), have ruled this country for more than three decades, and their hegemony over political and economic discourse has – one would hope – reached its zenith.  Enter Baron Acton, above, and his famous quote.  And enter a few famous Republicans and their quotes:

“I would remind you, extremism in the defense of Liberty is no vice.” – Mr. Barry Goldwater.

“Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorist.”  – Mr. George W. Bush

“I fought against long odds in a deep blue state, but I was a severely conservative Republican governor.” – Mr. Romney

Nothing but the extreme here.  No room for polite discourse here?   No nuance or shades of grey here?   Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon need not apply to today’s – shoot from the hip – kill you now, check the facts later  –Republican Party.

Besides thinking requires energy, and darn it… thought and time.

It’s so much easier to keep doing what we are doing, except the speculative bubbles, crashes and financial hangover’s are occurring with greater and greater frequency, and the public is beginning to wake up and take notice.  The crashes are no longer isolated but global in nature…. Indeed, the world is very small.

And finally the true right wing extremist in today’s Republican Party are unleashing, as Mr. Newton forecast, a virulent and no longer dormant response from the true Left.  A socialist head of state in France, resurgent communist and fascist political parties in Europe, and elected officials in Greece that are perhaps willing to tell both the IMF and the E.U. central bank to “go to hell.”  Potentially setting off contagion and the euro’s collapse, a veritable masochist’s party.

So please allow me to let you in on a little secret.  Come closer because I want to whisper this in your ear:

“The Republican Party, with it’s severe economic and financial ideology, just might want to tone it down a little and rejoin the human race; because you’re a breeding ground for revolution, the poster child of anarchy, and your extremism is unleashing forces beyond your control.”  

The GOP would be terribly naïve to think their policies do not have global impact.

Check out the Arab Spring, and please – by all means – check out Europe.  It’s not too late.

And above all, don’t shoot the messenger.  Please.

P.S.

A business model that is based upon unmitigated greed, rabid speculation, and offers no redeeming product or service to society, and in fact is detrimental and dangerous to society, must be relegated to the dustbin of history.  Just ask Mr. Jamie Dimon.  And so must politicians who support same.  Monolithic banking institutions, gambling and earning lousy returns on equity, are failed monuments to the egos that manage them.

Not so ironically, the Tea Bag movement has already been co-opted and absorbed by the Robber Barons — moreover, the mainstream media has reported that the militants within the party have accepted large sums of money from the Cartel they were elected to end.

“If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.”  – President John F. Kennedy 1-20-1961

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2014

Revolutionary Messiah

Revolutionary Messiah

“How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?”  - Pope Francis

By J. M. Hamilton  5-26-14

Religion, with all its mystery and human foibles, has always mesmerized me.  Besides one cannot study power, economics, and politics without studying the Almighty and the religious affect.  My earliest memories of church involved attending Assemblies of God with my mother on Sunday evening, and Lutheran church service Sunday morning with dad.  It was a study in contrasts.

For a child to take in Evangelical worship before the age of five... Well, maybe there are limits to what a child should be exposed to.  I found those speaking in tongues to be not only surreal but ostentatious.  (Then again, perhaps I was never given this gift?)  Evangelicals, despite proclaiming the grace and promise of Christ's salvation, seemed to emphasize the "fire and brimstone" side of things.  Always it seemed, was the emphasis on the law, obeying the God's law, being "saved/born again," or facing the eternal hell fires of the damned.  Moreover, if you wanted to get to heaven, one best stay attendant to an Assemblies of God church, because all other protestant denominations were doomed, as were the Catholics.  The entire premise of the church and the road to salvation appeared fear based.

So it was with some relief, not without some considerable guilt mind you, that my dad forbid my sister and I to attend my mother's church after ten years of age.

Dad's Lutheran church (Wisconsin Synod) was positively boring, compared to mom's church but it was staid and welcome.  There were no raised hands in the air, shouts of "praise God" mid-sermon, and no praying in the aisles.   Lutherans were also, a little more tolerant, since it was okay to drink.   Lutheran communion, or the sacrament, was served with real wine, as opposed to grape juice.  Not unlike the Evangelicals, the Lutherans too, felt that they had it all figured out, and that pretty much everybody else was going to hell, particularly those Pope loving Catholics.   As for those of Jewish faith, despite both churches acknowledging that the Jews were God's chosen people, and they should always be treated with dignity and respect, there seemed to be a general belief that their failure to recognize Christ might prohibit admittance to heaven.

All this emphasis on the law, and "thou shalt nots," with a sprinkling of God's grace (but only if you were a member of the correct Protestant faith or sect) -some years later - struck me as the ultimate in branding/marketing.  Think about it?  How likely is your flock going to stray, when faced with damnation for joining an alternative religion or philosophy, such as Catholicism, Judaism, or even Zen Buddhism?  All that "guilt," with an emphasis on Old Testament law, as opposed to the New Testament tolerance and Christ's salvation, also has a way of reinforcing church structures, hierarchy, and orthodoxy.  Having fallen short many times, how are we, the church congregation, to question the church's hierarchy and patriarchal structures, since they, the church ministers and administration, are so close to God?  (Or so we thought.)

Emphasis on the one true faith, to the exclusion of all others, also made me extremely curious about these other faiths and religions.  After all, just how decadent and depraved were those Catholics, Hebrews, and other Protestants?  What forbidden fruit was I missing?  Being preternaturally curious, I had to find out.  Eventually, quite by accident, I started dating a Catholic girl, and began attending Mass.  Imagine my complete shock when I discovered that Catholic mass was nearly identical to the Lutheran service or sermon, w/just a few minor changes to the Lord's Prayer and the Nicene Creed.  And it all made perfect sense.  After all, Luther before he nailed his complaints against a Renaissance Pope, for selling indulgences to wealthy patrons, on the church door - in essence kicking off the Protestant Reformation - was a Catholic priest.

How bad could all those Catholics be?  Later, going through Pre - Cana, I discovered that the older Catholic padres felt that the Protestants were the heretics, apostates, and the ones destined for Hades, while the younger Father I was dealing with, was more tolerant and ecumenical in outlook.  Clearly, there appeared to be a generational divide within the Catholic Church: with older priests focused on the law and the younger generation focused on God's grace and salvation, or at the minimum, appeared more tolerant.  As with the Protestants, however, it appeared that the Catholic hierarchy, traditionally, used fear and old testament law, as a means to keep the flock in line, strictly adhering to Catholic dogma, and keeping faith and allegiance with the Church in Rome.

Jesus Christ, however, appeared to have an altogether different plan.  If one believes passages from the New Testament, Christ appeared to democratize faith and communion with God.  He surrounded himself with the poor, the socially undesirable, prostitutes, and the lame and the ill.  It's worth noting that nowhere in the Bible is Christ, specifically, quoted as speaking out against homosexuality.  During biblical times, Jesus' following would have been the 99.999 percent.  With the elite and the educated in Israel made up of nobility, Jewish religious leaders, a hand full of bankers and traders, and the Roman Prefect.... This was a time of extreme poverty, and Christ and his teaching would have been a direct threat to the Jewish religious hierarchy, and potentially destabilizing to the Romans as well.  After all, if God is walking the earth, hanging out with the masses, feeding thousands, healing the lame and the blind... Why would anyone show up in synagogue on Saturday, or ever listen to the Roman or Jewish authorities/patriarchy ever again?  Most importantly Christ offered salvation and hope, and the de-emphasis of the Old Testament and the law.

Christ states that he came into this world carrying a sword.  Surely, that sword was not directed at the poor/the 99.999 percent, Jesus' following; but rather, it was aimed directly at the heart of the economic, political, and religious hierarchy/patriarchy in Jerusalem, who respectively, kept the poor fearful and economically oppressed.  According to the scriptures, if we are to believe them, Christ entered Jerusalem triumphant on Palm Sunday.  One day later, he drove from the temple the money changers and bankers. Two days later, he took on the city's religious leaders and the patriarchy.  And for those "sins," of taking on the establishment, Christ was crucified that same week.  By crucifying Christ, the authorities, both the Roman and Jewish elite, hoped to remove a threat to their mortal existence and their moral authority; but in crucifying Christ, they made him God and a revolutionary figure, who was a model for the ages to come.  (In the 20th century, think Gandhi and MLK)

In particular, Christ's primary commandment, 'love your brother as yourself,' did not contain the caveat: but only if your "brother “was the same skin color, came from the same socio-economic background, attended the same schools, and worshipped at your local church or synagogue.

Since The Passion, Church hierarchy has often had a symbiotic relationship with the economic and political elite (in fact, if you go back far enough, church hierarchy was often the ruling elite in parts of Europe and vv. - here think of the Holy Roman Empire).  Nobility and the economic aristocracy accepted, encouraged, and sponsored the church as long as it emphasized earthly and biblical law, kept the masses fearful of their immortal soul and in check; and above all, as long as the church recognized that kings and monarchs had a Devine right to rule, and/or at least on this earth, the primacy of various forms of earthly government.  That is to say, the church emphasized to the lay the metaphysical:  Christ's kingdom in heaven, the need to obey "Caesar" and biblical laws (laws the ruling class often rarely obeyed themselves, see Machiavelli's - The Prince), and do good works on this earth, in order to gain admittance into heaven.  De-emphasized by the church was Christ's teaching that God was accessible, that one could pray and confess their sins directly to God, w/out intercession from the church or its administration, and that Christ had little tolerance for religious or governmental autocratic or patriarchal structures - that stood between him and his flock; nor, did Christ appear to have a strong affinity for the wealthy, who often exploited and oppressed the poor or 99.999 percent (through usury, and sometimes enslavement or indentured servitude, et al.).  

Not to put too fine a point on it, often de-emphasized by the religious authorities through the ages was Christ's enlightenment, his passion for the poor's physical needs, and his striving for earthly economic and social justice.

Christ through his actions and his teachings demonstrated a revolutionary agenda, not just metaphysical in nature, but both economic and political in this temporal world.

Fast-forward to 1971, and Gustavo Gutierrez's book, A Theology of Liberation.  This book marked the beginning of a new theology, refocusing on Christ's revolutionary zeal and advocacy for the poor.   The theology was called Liberation Theology.  Liberation Theology (LT) flourished in Latin America in the 50's, 60's and 70's (and even to this day), in response to the extreme economic and social injustice experienced by the poor.  LT also spun off social justice movements for women, minorities and indigenous peoples.  In the early to mid eighties, aspects of LT were condemned by the Church in Rome for being overtly Marxist, and for emphasizing institutional sin, the sin of the elite, (government, commercial, and economic systems) over the sin of the individual.  In short, Liberation Theology was a direct threat to symbiotic relationship between church hierarchy, and the ruling economic and political elite.

What really got the Vatican's robes in a bunch, however, was LT identifying The Church in Rome as both sponsor and part of the cycle of crushing economic oppression, and The Church hierarchy as being members of the elite establishment, themselves.  Liberation Theology also empowered the lay, who began conducting their own masses, and emphasized practice (or praxis) over church orthodoxy and dogma.  Praxis being the interpretation of Christ's teachings, true to form, from the poor's vantage point.  (Note: That would be as opposed from the vantage point of the plutocracy.)  Under pressure from the lay, and the ruling power elite, this democratization of Catholic faith was a direct threat to both the Church in Rome and church hierarchy.

Enter Cardinal Ratzinger, Pope John Paul II's enforcer and oft described Pit Bull (later Pope Benedict XVI), who denounced Liberation Theology for its emphasis on praxis over church orthodoxy.   Cardinal Ratzinger's words speak best for themselves:  "(the) people is the antithesis of the hierarchy, the antithesis of all institutions, which are seen as oppressive powers.  Ultimately anyone who participates in the class struggle is a member of the 'people.'  The 'church of the people' becomes the antagonist of the hierarchical Church."  Cardinal Ratzinger had also been critical of attempts to apply Christ's Sermon on the Mount to the modern day poor, and to the social, political and economic conditions surrounding the 20th century  poor.  As if the 20th and 21st century poor are somehow different than the biblical poor.

Despite The Church in Rome’s denunciation of aspects of LT, Cardinal Ratzinger was said to have went on to denounce the crime of colonialism and the scandal of the arms race.  Pope John Paul II went on to decry the ever-growing expanse between the wealthy and the poor, and stated "expropriation"is not inappropriate as a remedy, despite affirming the legitimacy of private property rights.

As a result of the Cardinal's denunciation, in the 80' s and 90's, various Latin American priests were suspended, censured, and even ex-communicated.  Moreover, aspects of Liberation Theology were strictly prohibited from being taught under Catholic Church auspices.


Like the Protestant comparisons of my youth, today presents a political, economic, and religious study in contrasts for global society as a whole.  Perhaps never before in the history of man has the mechanizations and strategies of the economic and political elite been so exposed to double standards and hypocrisy.  Where the poor or middle-class can go to jail for a victimless crime like marijuana possession, but the banking and financial elite can be caught in numerous acts of collusion, commit hundreds of billions in fraud, and never enter a jail cell; where approximately, twenty-five short years ago democracy with the fall of the Berlin Wall appeared to be on the march, and today, thanks to a Citizens United and McCutcheon SCOTUS decisions, democracy is for sale and purchase by the highest bidder.  For the average citizen, the expectation is the same, often exhorted by churches, both Protestant and Catholic: follow church rules and obey the state.  While for the wealthy, the expectations are also the same:  break the rules, re-write the laws to achieve maximum advantage, and dodge paying taxes.  For the elite, it's play nation states off one another in a regulatory, labor and tax arbitrage race to the bottom.... All in the name of unmitigated greed and at the 99 percent’s expense.  Everyone saw in 2008, that socialism worked perfectly well, when it came time to bailout global banks and the wealthy, as well as, printing money in support of same; and yet, the socialism in the form of food stamps for the indigent, or healthcare assistance (at a fraction of the bank bailout expense), is all too often considered moral hazard by the GOP and global conservative and business interests.  The economic elite want the masses to compete hourly for their daily bread and advocate free market principals for everybody else, while seeking out grants of monopoly and cartel from the government for the businesses they own and operate.  In short, competition is good for everyone else, except the ruling plutocracy.  Pointless wars are now fought, with fruitless and endless nation building exercises, that appear to profit immensely jingoist, the MIC and MIC supporters, while ignoring real threats and wreaking havoc within the federal budget.

Even the Catholic Church is faced with unprecedented pressures, between its obligations to the power elite - Caesar, and its obligation to reverse course and become true again to the teachings of the revolutionary messiah.   Catholic and Protestant church attendance is on the wane in the West.  Many Western Catholics are highly upset by the patriarchy that runs the Catholic Church, its treatment of women, and worse still, the abuse of children.

For the faithful, it's no surprise that Pope Francis has now appeared at a time when Christian religion, capitalism (what remains of it), and democracy are all at a crossroads.  Pope Francis hails from Argentina, and assuredly was influenced by: the extreme poverty; economic and political cronyism/corruption; and right-wing oppression/death squads he saw in that country.  That he was exposed to Liberation Theology is not in dispute; and that, publicly, he's the first pope possibly in centuries that emphasizes the grace and salvation of Christ, the promise of the New Testament, over the fear, loathing, and intolerance produced by Old Testament law, also appears not in dispute.

Like Christ before him, Pope Francis seems bent on lifting up the poor, and saving the souls of men.... even at the grumbling and possible expense of patronage and support from the wealthy and the powerful.  He's put badly needed reforms within the church into review and play, at the risk of upsetting the Roman Curia.  The pope has eschewed the vestiges of royalty in favor of asceticism, even removing a German bishop who sought to live like a monarch at the poor's expense.  Pope Francis appears ready and able to champion the earthly and spiritual needs of his global flock, at the possible expense of the church's present hierarchy... And perhaps in doing so, is saving the Catholic Church in the process.

As such this pope appears more contented to embrace, teach, and live by the path established by Christ, than any political or religious figure that I have witnessed in my lifetime.  His fire for economic and social justice in this world, along with his desire to save men's souls for the next, makes him a revolutionary pope.  No matter your faith or beliefs, arguably, we should all pray for the pope's physical health, strength, moral clarity, and longevity.  Above all let’s pray he stays the course, in both advocacy for the poor, and bringing about real reforms to the Catholic Church.

The pressure on this man to dial down his rhetoric, his actions, and his proposed and pending reforms will be tremendous from many sides.  How far Pope Francis will go in walking the path of the revolutionary messiah remains to be seen.  Right now - the Pope appears to be a gift from God.


P.S.

As for my study of religion, I continued to broaden my horizons.  Studying Zen Buddhism as a philosophy and reading the Koran, post 9-11.  Contrary to what I was told in my youth, the study of alternative beliefs and religions only strengthened my faith in the Rabbi, Christ.  Today, I see more similarities between Catholics and Protestants than I see differences.  I believe the future of Judeo-Christian values in the West is one of tolerance, a return to the core message of hope and salvation, and advocacy for the poor - married with advocacy for real reforms in our present economic and political systems.  Absolutely key to tolerance is a more ecumenical outlook among the clergy, of all faiths, including Judaism.  Through the ages, it seems that we should not worry so much about God's word, as distorted as it may sometimes seem - handed down generation after generation; but rather, how man all too often shapes, manipulates, and perverts core religious values (for his own ends), that spans most successful faiths and philosophies.  Unfortunately, religion, including Christian religion, has been used by man through out history to justify all manner of atrocities (including but not limited to wars and crusades) that are an abomination to the teachings of Christ.

Finally, western democracy has long held the importance of a separation between church and state, so that people of all faiths are free to practice their religion.  In the last century worship of money and the material, in a "live for today" ethos, has taken on a religious dynamic, if not become a religion itself.  So that democracies are often subverted by this new religion, faith in Ayn Randian greed.  Perhaps it's time to introduce a new tenet or law to modern day democracy to address this new religion:  the separation between commercial interests and state.  Such a separation would save democracy and capitalism from the decay and destruction caused by today's movement towards crony economic and political systems, where an elite few benefit immensely to the near exclusion of everyone else.

Revolutionary Messiah was inspired and written in Munchen and Berlin Germany, and Salzburg Austria.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2014