msncbc-banksters-government-exposed

Well, in America today, we are getting closer to fully exposing the greatest con and cover up in the history of this country. It involves our banks, the Federal Reserve, our Congress, and of course you and me. First, though, think of the Fed as the godfather in this con. I want to make him an awfully counter-refugee. The role of the godfather played by former Fed Chief Alan Greenspan, who appeared before the financial crisis inquiry commission this morning, denying that he ever knew what he helped perpetrate. The notion that we in any way favored any of them, or basically were influenced with respect to policy by what they said other than the facts they gave us, which we always evaluated, I sort of know evidence of that in my tenure. The way they made out of that favor to among the banks, because Greenspan was working for all of the banks against you. The bankers, of course, the unrepentant conmen being supported by the Federal Reserve. Remember that sting experience? How good you felt? So good getting that money for free, getting away with it? Here's how the con went down. The bankers were operating under an implicit guarantee from the godfather, the Federal Reserve, in the form of guaranteed low interest rates, guaranteed cheap money exclusively for the conmen. Then, Chairman Greenspan, the godfather, would agree to hold those rates, let's say, 2% for as far as the eye could see. The banks, or bankers, the conmen, would borrow that money from the Federal Reserve, let's say 2%, and then turn around and lend it back to you, and let's say 6%. That encouraged the patsies you and me to be drawn into the con, because 6% looks like a pretty low rate. Low rates for houses, low rates for cars, heck, you could join a health club, pay make that on payments, they'll turn that into bonds, and of course, promises of a higher than average return. For those managing teachers and policemen's and judges' pension funds that are buying into the con as well. And here exactly is where the con comes in. As you and I both know, the banks had no money, they were getting it from the Federal Reserve, which is us, it's funny money. They had no capital to back up their lending, but that did not matter, because they also had no risk in the lending. If the lending paid off, they win. And they won big when they did that because they did it with leverage. Top Manhattan executives alone paid themselves $121 billion in bonuses over the first part of the decade. Now, mind you, when the bank loans failed, they knew they were too big to fail. So the rest of us, you and me, would have to bail them out. The ignorant electorate, if you will, the Pat Sees, who had no idea and really still don't understand how badly they are being conned by our government and our banks. Once the banks, however, realized there was no losing, the question was, how do we make the con bigger? How do we get more money through this crazy machine so we can get richer? The question or the answer, I should say, is simple. Make more loans. More credit card loans. Think about the credit card applications that were sent to you over the past 10 years. More car loans if the reason General Motors went upside down was in the cars. It was because they were running a financing scheme. Home loans, you know the narrative. So the people most hurt by this con, the home buyers, the cops, the teachers, pensioners who were suckered in by the bait of low credit and high returns and exchange for buying worthless toxic assets. Manufactured by the bankers. That's why your pension fund was wiped out. That's why the interest rate on your savings to this day remains around zero. If you're a retiree, you know what I'm talking about. It's also why you're now drowning in a mortgage on a house. That's worse, worse, far less than you owe because the bankers were happy to lend you money. They did not have to drive up the price of that house because they knew the more loans the better, but no downside for them. So what's next? Higher taxes for us, higher interest rates for us to pay for the bailouts while our government that was theoretically elected by us refuses to recover the stolen money by the conmen, or fix the system that allows them to continue to perpetrate the con against you and me. The current financial reform legislation proposed by our government would give the Godfather the Federal Reserve in this case, even more power to regulate the game. The conmen represented by the Wall Street bankers, of course, giving our Congress a cut of the action, 344 million dollars so far lobbying against the bill second only to health care. We saw how well it worked out for special interest on health care. Home run, they got a guaranteed customer base with no reform. I'm sure the bankers will be pretty well as well. All this, of course, while assuring our lawmakers, many of whom do not even understand how the con works in the first place, that the financial crisis has been fixed, of course, with an infinite supply of your money. After all, just check out stocks over the past year. We are back over 10,000 on the Dow. Thanks to that blank check from the Federal Reserve. So now as we finally head towards Congress debating financial reform in our country, the question must be asked. Does it make sense for our government to give more power to a Federal Reserve and banker conmen, who unrepentantly cause this crisis and make money at your expense on the pension side and on the credit side? That's the current plan. Give them more power. Joining us now, Congressman Alan Grayson, Democrat from Florida, who sponsored the audit of the Fed Bill with Ron Paul, Congressman Pleasure to see you again and on the phone, Bill Fleckensstein, president of Fleckensstein, capital and more importantly, author of a rational exuberance, the Greenspan bubble, Bill doesn't exceptional job of explaining exactly how the Godfather, Alan Greenspan, allowed the banks to perpetrate this con, in fact, Bill profited rather handsily betting against the con, knowing that it was a bubble. I know Congressman Grayson that you understand more or less everything that I just said and then some, and I'm more frustrated than I am at our Congress' unwillingness to actually acknowledge or understand the con or address it. Why do you think it has been so difficult and continues to be difficult for anybody in our Congress to really deal with this? Well, I have the benefit of having worked as an economist for four years before I was elected to Congress, and that does give me some insight into how that works. I think a lot of people on capital he'll simply don't understand how this works the way you describe it. Clearly, they should be listening to your show. If you are too, if you don't understand that the banks in Santa Bistolend is much money as possible without any repercussions, because the only way they make money is with lots of lending or gambling effectively. And everybody else's incentive is to try not to get screwed, and yet the Congress is feeding the money to those who have a directly adverse incentive. They make money by screwing over pensioners and borrowers, and our Congress is making that more possible, not less possible. How do we find ourselves in this situation? Well, I think the fundamental problem is campaign finance before I'm not trying to change the subject. I think we're not going to have to have that problem, except for the fact that a lot of the is hand out $5,000 checks. Bill, explain in the simplest sense why it is valing green spanish so directly responsible for creating this con. Well, first of all, let me say, Dylan, yours was one of the most distinct explanations of the problem that I've heard, so that was a quite a good incentive that you did. Because Green spanish is ultimately responsible because he was the one who put rates at a level that was too low, and then refused in the face of all evidence to do anything to try to retard the potential for an asset bubble. He was in denial about the equity bubble, and then turned around and created the stock, sorry, the credit slash housing bubble, and to this day refuses to accept any responsibility for when prices are held in an artificially too low of level, by putting too much money into system, that money seeks its way out into other places, and if you end up creating a bubble, and the more leverage using the bubble, the more danger should become. Green spanish not only made the interest rates too low, he advocated the policies and he cheerled for the housing bubble, for instance. He made a speech where he tried to explain why housing could not possibly be a bubble. So it was not just this conduct of monetary policy, it was the things the speeches he made, and he was held in such a regard. Other people adopted his behavior in his philosophy. Congressman Grayson, you mentioned campaign finance reform and the need to get the lobbyists out because the lobbyists of the bank lobbyists, 344 million dollars, a cut of the action on the con goes to Congress. Are you as cynical as that would suggest that basically Congress knows that they should create transparency and capital requirements, which would end the ability for there to be a con like this, but refuses to do so because they're afraid of losing that those checks? I think it's worse than that actually. We live through an economic disaster, and now we're slowly recovering from it. We lost 20% of our national wealth in 18 months, the last 18 months of the Bush administration, and housing topped out 3.5 years ago, not just in Florida, but around the country, and nobody has been held responsible, not Alan Greenspend, not anybody else. In Japan, they have a way different solution to these kinds of problems. It's called Harry Carrey. I think what confuses people at this point, Congressman, and having been talking about this incessantly for a few years now, most people, if you look at the polling, understand at least enough of this to know that Congress works for the banks, not for the American people, and yet Congress still seems phenomenally willing to drag its feet in addressing this. Harry Carrey may be interesting or nice. We're probably not going to see it. We live in a democracy where we're told we've elect people who look out for our interests, and yet the same people are creating laws that allow this group to con the American people out of the largest transfer of wealth in the history of the world with no consequences. Are you suggesting special interests have so much control that our government literally is willing to facilitate that level of wealth transfer with no consequences? I think that's a fair statement. I would add to what was said before that we've got the creation of the idea of two big to fail under Alan Greenspend. We've got him gunning the economy through the Y2K money supply increase that led to economic disaster within four months. He made mistake after mistake, after mistake, and what we never hear from many of these people is I'm sorry. We don't even hear that. And you think it's because the system is enslaved? Yes, that's right. And the Senate bill unfortunately does that. The Senate bill takes whatever possibility there is of somebody who's actually looking out for the consumer and puts that in of all places the Federal Reserve as the one responsible to do that. The Federal Reserve which is actually run by big banks. It's governed by big banks. They choose the people who occupy the seats of power in each regional bank. And they're giving more power. I do. And if the American Banking System is the directors and higher-ups, they're held personally liable for some of the problems as they are in Brazil, for instance. And as they used to be in this country seven years ago, then you might get a level of oversight and a bank. And have them pursue policies that we would line up finding less or less different. It's not that difficult. You just have to make the guys in charge personally liable for some of the problems in some of the people we go away. Any chance of that Congressman? Yes. In fact, we're working on a bill to do exactly that. And we've examined what happens in other countries when they make the kinds of mistakes we've seen the last few years in America. And it's not a pretty picture for the people in charge either in Wall Street or in the capital. Yes. Listen, Congressman, we appreciate your efforts on our behalf to correct for the con and get the money back in fixed system and bill. Thank you for your journalism and your efforts to make sure people actually understand how this happened. Truly billflock and thank you.