Author: susie

The revolving door

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Federal Reserve Bank of New York

Do you suppose there is anyone in the entire country who’s surprised by this? I imagine even the nursery school set has caught on by now:

From his desk in Lower Manhattan, a banker at Goldman Sachs thumbed through confidential documents — courtesy of a source inside the United States government.

The banker came to Goldman through the so-called revolving door, the symbolic portal that connects financial regulators to Wall Street. He joined in July after spending seven years as a regulator at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the government’s front line in overseeing the financial industry. He received the confidential information, lawyers briefed on the matter suspect, from a former colleague who was still working at the New York Fed.

The previously unreported leak, recounted in interviews with the lawyers briefed on the matter who spoke anonymously because the episode is not public, illustrates the blurred lines between Wall Street and the government — and the potential conflicts of interest that can result. When Goldman hired the former New York Fed regulator, who is 29, it assigned him to advise the same type of banks that he once policed. And the banker obtained confidential information, along with several publicly available facts, in the course of assignments from his bosses at Goldman, the lawyers said.

The information provided Goldman a window into the New York Fed’s private insights, the lawyers said, including details about at least one of Goldman’s clients, a midsize bank regulated by the Fed. Although it is unclear how Goldman bankers used the information, if at all, the confidential details could have helped them advise the client.

The emergence of the leak comes as questions mount about a perceived coziness between the New York Fed and Wall Street banks — Goldman in particular. Revelations from a former New York Fed employee, Carmen Segarra, recently stoked that debate. Ms. Segarra released taped conversations suggesting that her supervisors went soft on Goldman, specifically over a deal that one regulator called “legal, but shady.” Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, a senior Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, plans to hold a hearing on Friday about Ms. Segarra’s accusations.

But Chris said there was nothing to this story!

~ susie ~ 4 Comments

144_2098_ver03

Very interesting to those of us who are watching the Christie administration soap opera:

As Chris Christie draws closer to a run for president, there’s intensifying scrutiny of donations flowing to his political organizations from executives at financial firms that manage ever-larger slices of New Jersey’s $80 billion state pension system. Now, the Christie political confidant at the center of many of those questions is resigning.

During today’s meeting of the New Jersey State Investment Council, private equity executive Robert Grady announced he is stepping down from the chairmanship of the panel. Christie has called Grady a “friend of mine for nearly 40 years” whom he relies on for political advice.

In recent months, campaign finance documents revealed that under Grady’s leadership, the state has awarded lucrative pension management contracts to hedge fund, private equity, venture capital and other so-called “alternative investment” firms whose executives made campaign contributions to Christie’s campaign, his state party, the Christie-led Republican Governors Association and the Republican National Committee. The donations included a $10,000 contribution from Massachusetts Republican Gov.-elect Charlie Baker to the New Jersey Republican State Committee just months before Baker’s firm was given a New Jersey pension investment.

The donations were made despite New Jersey and federal rules aiming to restrict contributions to state officials like Christie who oversee pension investment decisions. Documents uncovered by International Business Times showed that Grady, a former Carlyle Group executive, was in regular communication with Christie’s campaign officials at the time the campaign was raising money and he was overseeing the state’s pension investments. Grady pushed New Jersey to move pension money into an investment in which his private financial firm was also investing, documents revealed. New Jersey also invested in Carlyle Group funds during Grady’s tenure, though he recused himself from final votes on those investments.

They never, ever, ever give up

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Here’s a “hit head on desk” moment for you!

While their Senate colleagues were engaged in a fiery debate over the fate of the Keystone XL pipeline, the House on Tuesday quietly passed a bill that environmentalists say would hamper the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to use the best scientific information when crafting regulations to protect public health and the environment.

The House voted 229-191 to pass H.R. 1422, which would change the rules for appointing members to the Science Advisory Board (SAB), a group that gives scientific advice to the EPA Administrator. Also called the Science Advisory Board Reform Act, the bill would make it easier for scientists with financial ties to corporations to serve on the SAB, prohibit independent scientists from talking about their own research on the board, and make it more difficult for scientists who have applied for grants from the EPA to join the board.

Ennobling the poor

~ susie ~ 2 Comments

http://youtu.be/a-Pnlnd4sIQ

No, really. He said that, the smug motherhumper:

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) explained on Tuesday that a new policy that could cut off food stamps for thousands of people in his state would be “ennobling” for poor people.

The Indiana Family and Social Services Administration announced last month that beginning in 2015, it would no longer request a waiver to the federal work requirement for certain people who use the SNAP program. Up to 65,000 single Hoosiers could lose food stamp benefits unless they are working 20 hours a week or attending job training.

Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Pence argued that 50,000 people had joined the Indiana workforce since 2008 so it was time to return to a “core principle” of welfare reform.

“How do you feel about people who say you are targeting poor people?” Fox News host Brian Kilmeade asked the governor.

“I’m someone that believes there’s nothing more ennobling to a person than a job,” Pence insisted. “And to make sure that able-bodied adults without dependants at home know that here in the state of Indiana, we want to partner with them in their success.”

“You know, it’s the old story,” he continued. “Give someone a fish, and they’ll eat for a day. Teach them to fish, they’ll eat for a lifetime. I think this is an idea whose time has come here in the state of Indiana.”

Missing voices

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

20-3-2003

Oh sure, we all remember this. I think that’s why I got wiretapped by the Bushies — I was interviewed in the Philadelphia Inquirer right before the war started, and I called Bush et al “war criminals”. I know that doesn’t sound so unusual now, but most people were cowed into silence and saying things like that back then was unusual. Even when it was really obvious that I was being tapped, I still couldn’t quite believe it. Like, “Really? One person with a small blog?” But even my mother could tell. “Susie, are they bugging your phone?” “Yes, mom, say hello to the nice man from the NSA.”

A new analysis of mainstream TV news has found there was almost no debate about whether the United States should go to war in Iraq and Syria. The group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, or FAIR, found that of the more than 200 guests who appeared on network shows to discuss the topic, just six voiced opposition to military action. On the high-profile Sunday talk shows, out of 89 guests, there was just one antiwar voice — Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of The Nation.

Here is a link to the actual study, published by FAIR
Nov 14, 2014
No Debate and the New War
Study finds little opposition to US attacks on Iraq, Syria

WTF is the matter with Texas?

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

Pr. donnie swaggart

Yes, Donnie, it’s EXACTLY the same, you shameless fuck:

Pastor and Christian activists Donnie Swaggart said during a broadcast of the Houston, Texas talk show Frances and Friends that LGBT activists are like the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in that they want to destroy Christianity and behead its practitioners. According to Right Wing Watch, Swaggart — the son of disgraced 1980s televangelist Jimmy Swaggart — made the statements in response to local efforts to enforce the city of Houston’s anti-discrimination ordinance.

“All of this is to shut the Bible up,” Swaggart said. “They want the Bible gone. And I’m going to make a statement: These people that are trying to do this in Houston, the only difference between them and ISIS, those thugs in Iraq, is those here cannot chop our heads off. That’s the only difference. The heart is the same. The heart is the same. If they could silence us that way to intimidate others, that’s exactly what they would do.”