We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Friday, July 15, 2016

Is Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Legislation a Hoax?

Click here to access article by Pam and Russ Martens from Wall Street on Parade

In their introduction the Martens attempt to put a gloss of bi-partisanship over the hoax of this bill, but fail to provide any linked documentation. Their conclusion puts the lie to any bi-partisanship involved in the evolution of this bill. Aside from their introduction the rest of the article provides an excellent exposé of how the bill is being used to fool the American people into believing that it significantly places restrictions on the too-big-to-fail banks.  
The legislation promised to rein in derivatives – it didn’t. It promised to end the future need for taxpayer bailouts of too-big-to-fail banks. It didn’t. It promised to institute the Volcker Rule to prevent banks from gambling with insured deposits. It didn’t. It promised to reform the practices of the ratings agencies that played a pivotal role in the 2008 collapse. It didn’t.