This article is pretty good, except it looks to
the US Conference of Mayors to do something. They
just elected Villarraigosa to lead the group, and
he's the master of privatization and
gentrification (using public construction to anchor private development).--MN
From The Ramparts
Junious
Ricardo Stanton
They'll
Steal Our Assets And Sell Them For Pennies On The Dollar
"Despite the fact that average American
citizens, much like the Greeks, had nothing to do
with creating these massive "budget holes," their
Social Security is being raided, and public
pensions have been invested in derivatives and
other toxic time-bomb financial
instruments. Now, they will surely face
austerity measures of similarly reduced benefits
and services accompanied by increased taxes to
absorb the damage. Although spending cuts and
smaller government through privatization might
make sense when faced with growing deficits, we
must be aware that austerity measures can also
hide in the shadows of privatization. Some
politicians are touting the privatization of
public services and assets as part of the
economic solution. However, the public is being
left out of the discussion about which services
will be affected, what public assets are being
sold, who is getting contracts or purchasing
assets and, finally, to what benefit to the
people. Given the self-serving track record of a
crony corporate State, we can only assume the
worst that none of these actions will actually
benefit average Americans, but only provide continued cover for more looting."
US Debt Woes Expose Hidden Austerity and Looting
of Public Assets
http://theintelhub.com/2010/10/18/u-s-debt-woes-expose-hidden-austerity-and-looting-of-public-assets/
Don't blink, if you do the Kleptocrats will
steal everything you have. Now they are doing it
gradually but as they continue to get away with
it under cloak and protection of the government,
they will get bolder and bolder. Who are these
master thieves and crooks who are robbing this
country blind? They are the international
banksters who own the Federal Reserve Bank, they
are the hedge fund managers, the Wall Street
Ponzi schemers and con artists, the local state
and US officials they bribe with campaign
contributions and a host of co-defendants too long to mention.
The economic implosion we are experiencing
is not an accident or some abhorrent business
cycle, it is part of a contrived, deliberate
scheme to gut the US economy, reduce the middle
class to debt ridden peons and usher in a
neo-feudal economic system with the Kleptocrats
as the new monarchy and land owners. The same
strategy that they used to foment the stock
market crash of 1929: promoting a get rich quick
mentality based on ignorance of the system,
massively over leveraged stock purchases, rigged
markets using pump and dump schemes and insider
trading to manipulate the stock market was used
to pump up and subsequently crash the real
estate, stock and derivatives markets. The game
was so thoroughly rigged that the crash is still
rolling out and we don't see it because the
corporate media is shilling for the system..It's
like living in a house infested with termites who
are eating away at your foundation, damaging the
load baring structures but your house hasn't collapsed yet.
The same scheme that rocked Wall Street in
the 1920's is at play here only this time its on
steroids. There are hundreds of trillions of
dollars in derivatives about to collapse and that
doesn't count the over leveraged (on credit)
Credit Default Swap side bets that have been laid
that have yet to be called since the collapse
hasn't occurred yet. If you want to know what's
going on read John Perkins' book "Confessions of
An Economic Hit Man" or watch some of his
lectures on YouTube. The same thing the IMF World
Bank and US-Aid do around the world to third
world countries is the same thing Goldman Sachs,
CitiGroup, Lehman Brothers and the other giant
investment houses did to Greece, Portugal, Spain,
Ireland, Iceland, Eastern Europe and the US. This
is why the people of Spain are in the streets
now, why the Irish are up in arms and the people
of Portugal are so pissed off pardon my French.
If you want to see how it was done here rent the
documentary "Inside Job" that won an Academy Award last year.
The same "austerity programs" the IMF and
World Bank loan sharks impose on third world
countries when they get so far in debt they can't
pay the loans off and what Goldman is imposing
on Spain, Portugal et al is going to happen
here, only under stealth and trickery. Many
states invested their pension funds in hedge fund
derivatives and Wall Street Ponzi schemes hoping
to get higher returns than the minuscule rates
they were getting elsewhere. That was the hook
the con men used to get their money. The Bu$h era
tax cuts for the rich were designed to create
huge deficits and the Bu$h/Obama imperialist wars
are forcing the US to borrow more and more have
created a debt bomb that is about to go off.
Now that the bottom is falling out, local,
state and federal governments have to raise mad
cash. Like the US many cities and states are
stealing (they call it borrowing) from their
employees' pension funds which in most cases are
already egregiously underfunded to keep the
lights on and pay the bills. Uncle Sam has stolen
most of the money in the Social Security Trust
Fund and now they are plotting to destroy it so
they don't have to pay us what we are owed.
While Social Security is a modified Ponzi scheme
it was working and would have
survived indefinitely except the government has
been stealing the money in the Trust Fund since the 1960's.
Now more and more governments are being
forced to sell their assets to raise cash. Jon
Corzine the former governor of New Jersey tried
to sell part of the Garden State Parkway and NJ
Turnpike to raise money! I saw an article about
one city that is selling the rights to their
parking meters to get cash . This will be the new
norm, massive fire sales of public assets to pay
off loans or to operate the government. The fear
is that municipalities will renege on their bond
obligations or go into default so they have to raise cash any way they can.
"Cities and states across the nation are
selling and leasing everything from airports to
zoosa fire sale that could help plug budget
holles now but worsen their financial woes over
the long run. California is looking to shed state
office buildings. Milwaukee has proposed selling
its water supply; in Chicago and New Haven,
Conn., it's parking meters. In Louisiana and
Georgia, airports are up for grabs... The deals
illustrate the increasingly tight financial
squeeze gripping communities. Many are using
asset sales to balance budgets ravaged by
declines in tax revenues and unfunded pensions.
In recent congressional testimony, billionaire
investor Warren Buffett said he worried about how
municipalities will pay for public workers'
retirement and health benefits and suggested that
the federal government may ultimately be
compelled to bail out states." Facing Budget Gaps
Cities Sell Airports, Parking Zoo By IANTHE
JEANNE DUGAN Wall Street Journal August 23, 2010.
Foreign investors in China and the United
Arab Emirates are buying US assets like crazy as
are the international banksters whose goal is to
own everything either directly or indirectly. It
will be like the Middle Ages in Europe with a
small group of haves and a massive sea of have
nots. You and I are not in the haves elite
circle. More and more local and state governments
will sell off assets as their tax revenues shrink
due to declining employment, tax give- a-ways to
the super rich and the wars that are bankrupting
the country. In fact US mayors are up in arms
about the cash drain caused by the wars. "The
annual U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting got off
to an international start on Friday, with some
backing a resolution to hasten the end of the
Afghan and Iraq wars and channel that spending
to cities. The resolution calls on Coongress to
redirect the military spending to domestic
priorities. The resolution says $126 billion is
being spent each year on the wars that should be
spent at home to create jobs, rebuild
infrastructure, develop sustainable energy and
provide for other needs." MSNBC 06-17-11
The US mayors know what's up and what time
it is. They are pleading for help so they won't
have to have a huge fire sale to keep their
cities operating. But the military industrial
complex is a powerful entity and new wars are
popping up every day. Unless more people in the
US wake up, take to the streets to put pressure
on the US Congress like their European
counterparts are doing our heirs will be serfs,
debtors and tenants in our own country.
-30-
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