Category Archives: Business

Monkeying With The Money

Britain, Business, Fascism, Federal Reserve Bank

CNN Business News reports that British bankers and regulators have been caught red-handed, monkeying with interest rates.

And I thought that was the job description of the banking cartel.

Barclays Chief Executive Officer Bob Diamond conducted an “exhaustive internal investigation,” only to find that “other banks were involved [too] in setting and manipulating interest rates.”

In addition to the resignation of Diamond, del Missier and the chairman of the board, Barclays said many traders involved in the Libor manipulation are “no longer with the bank.” But Barclays plans to keep these individuals’ names confidential, since civil and criminal investigations are ongoing.
Meanwhile, Diamond had been consistently vocal about the need for bank to act responsibly. Speaking at the Fortune Most Powerful Women conference on June 18, Diamond said: “Being a better citizen is critically important to us in financial services today for all kinds of reasons. In order to be effective we need to regain trust in our industry.”

Buried in the news item is this nugget: “[T]op British banking regulators could be implicated in this wide-ranging investigation.”

USA, USA, We Are Always AAA: Expect the world’s top monopoly money counterfeiter to be right in the middle, stirring the money pot.

Two thoughts:

• When the ostensibly private arm of the baking cartel cops to mischief, its bankers take the heat and the hate. The public has been brainwashed into believing that Big Ben (Bernanke) and his counterparts in European and British governments are in the right to debase their countries’ coin. Therefore, the populations on our Ape Planet (where humans are becoming the dumber species) don’t blink over central banker shenanigans. (Except for Ron Paul, who gives Big Ben a hard time.)

• THE Cost. Barclays (BCS) spent “nearly £100 million” ($157 million) and three years conducting an ‘exhaustive internal investigation’ into its traders and executives’ role in manipulating … a key global benchmark interest rate.”

The populations affected (mentioned in the point above) disregard the price of central planning and the attendant regulation, even though these costs are passed on to the dumb public.

A free market in money would dispense with the waste.

UPDATE II: SURFACE By Microsoft (Leaves The Idiot Pad In the Dust)

America, Business, Human Accomplishment, Technology

At 15:14 into the unveiling of the Microsoft Surface tablet, Windows chief Steven Sinofsky says that Surface “provides the best WiFi reception of any tablet today.” The Surface’s dual Wi-Fi (“wireless networking technology that uses radio waves to provide wireless high-speed Internet and network connections”) antennae are the part My Contact in the bowels of the beast nailed.

Well done, genius.

Congratulations to all for bringing to market this “well-designed, very cool” product, over which industry experts are already gushing: It goes “toe to toe” with Apple’s iPad, says one, and even bests it (as “it runs as a full computer,” and sports a physical keyboard), says another.

Although I’ve been kept in the dark until now, I’m looking forward to receiving one of these as soon as possible. What piques my interest in that the Surface is a transportable PC, a facility the idiot Pad never offered. (I don’t need mindless entertainment; I want the ability to transport my work wherever I go, without the burdens imposed by a cumbersome laptop.)

UPDATE I (June 20): This is the stuff that makes one patriotic, right guys? American-coordinated ingenuity (with wise division of labor, naturally). Damn straight. (Wives are always kept in the dark … but, all I can say is that they deserve a medal. What a marathon effort The Surface has been.)

And, as someone who has never been tempted by the Idiot Pad: Yes, my instincts, on seeing what this thing accomplishes were very much, “This is a good fit for me.” And it has a keyboard and the easy ability to use a mouse with it, as opposed to the frenetic finger f-ck the traditional laptop requires.

UPDATE II (June 21): In this context, and on a personal note, the pressure of the effort above over months has had some unexpected consequences. (I heard it said that in the US there are two types of engineers: overworked or unemployed. A tough economy would indeed force increases in productivity: fewer and fewer workers are doing more and more of work.) The upshot: My husband has come down with pneumonia. I will be taking some time to look after him (and hoping to remain uninfected).

THE WND COLUMN will resume next week. RT will be featuring a golden oldie. Make sure you Click to Like, Share and Tweet it.

The Pain In Bain

Business, Capitalism, Critique, Democrats, Economy, Elections, Ethics, Fascism, Free Markets, Hillary Clinton

According to Salon’s Glenn Greenwald, a defense of “Bain Capital, Mitt Romney’s former firm,” and “the paragon of capitalist evil,” must be rooted entirely in corrupt self-interest. So there’s not even a smidgen of truth in Newark Mayor Cory Booker’s condemnation of the Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain? How about the other two prominent Democrats to defend Romney and his work? (Read on.)

“Booker went on Meet the Press and angered hordes of Democrats when he condemned the Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain as ‘nauseating,’ equating the anti-Bain messaging to the GOP’s sleazy use of Jeremiah Wright, and then demanding: ‘stop the attacks on private equity’ (in response to the backlash, Booker then released a hostage-like video recanting his criticisms and pledging his loyalty to President Obama).”

Without explaining the mechanism by which the private equity firm achieved this feat, Greenwald asserts further that the likes of Bain Capital are “destroying the middle class in order to enrich greedy vulture oligarchs.” AND, “We also all know that the Democratic Party is the defender of the middle class and the bold adversary of corporate pillaging.”

Do we?

DITTO Deval Patrick. HuffPo uses the same “reasoning”—“a history of ethically questionable connections to financial firms”—to condemn the Massachusetts governor for his defense of the Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney [05/31/2012] … during TV appearances.”

“The Democratic politician was supposed to be serving as a surrogate for President Barack Obama. Patrick, who has a history of ethically questionable connections to financial firms, applauded Boston-based Bain Capital, implicitly criticizing the Obama campaign’s attacks on Romney’s record at the private equity firm.”

Patrick is the second Obama surrogate with strong ties to the financial industry to defend Bain, following in the footsteps of Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, who ignited a week of outrage from Democratic Party strategists for describing the Obama campaign’s slams against Romney’s Bain work as “nauseating.”

AND THEN THERE WERE THREE. One other major Democrat has defended Romney and his job record. “This is good work.” “I don’t think we ought to get in a position where we say this is bad work,” said Bill Clinton.

The DC Decoder’s correspondent floats yet another crazy ad hominem: “Bill may be intentionally sabotaging President Obama in order to set Hillary up for a run in 2016,” which, to her credit, she doesn’t quite buy.

Others suggest the former president simply misspoke. But we don’t buy that either.
Here’s the thing: Clinton’s comments weren’t just “off message.” They were a declaration of war on the message. They underscore a fundamental split within the Democratic Party that’s less about Romney’s record at Bain than it is about whether the party as a whole is perceived as a friend or foe of Wall Street and the world of business and high finance.

UPDATED: Blame The Beast (DC) For Big Business’ Moral Bankruptcy

Business, Capitalism, Ethics, Free Markets, Government, Morality

Myron Pauli sends along an interesting series of Venn diagrams, reflecting the intersection between The DC Beast and Big Business, and purporting to “show how corrupted American ‘democracy’ really is.”

Registering his disgust, Myron writes this (with his usual flare):

“While the American Booboisie gets distracted with this ‘election,’ where the grandson of a polygamist
debates the son of a polygamist on ‘gay marriage,’ as the Welfare-Warfare-Deficit-Jail State
goes on – 800,000 arrested for marijuana last year – hundreds wounded or maimed in Afpakistan,
trillions of new debt and malinvestment, television cameras proliferating everywhere to catch
American citizens (e.g. ‘criminals’) violating an ever increasing list of ‘crimes’ ….”

Agreed, except that companies don’t have much option. Without buying and paying for a plant to do their bidding within the State apparatus, they are doomed to be investigated and prosecuted non-stop by the government’s alphabet soup of regulatory agencies; the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the Securities and Exchange Commission, on and on. Business gets dragged into court every other day and sued. By necessity, entire departments and budgets within corporate America are given over to lobbying and pacifying The Beast.

“When Bill Gates neglected to schmooze Washington, Joe Klein, the Justice Department’s top dog, picked up the scent and gave chase. The lesson being that if he wants to survive, the entrepreneur must also pay protection money to his political masters.” (“CONGRESSIONAL CHURLS TROLL FOR VOTES”)

Our “overlords who art in DC” “are the ones who force the entrepreneur to replace viable, voluntary trades and transactions with bureaucratic, politicized decision making. Rather than concentrate on satisfying consumers, proprietors must divert resources from innovation and production into getting around the bureaucrat’s tax and regulatory laws.”

“Unlike government (and CNN’s Anderson Cooper), you can keep private enterprise honest. Business aims to please its constituents, the consumers. …”

Downsize the state, strip it of its police-state powers—and business will shape-up. Capitalism is moral if practiced. We do no longer practice it.

UPDATE: Yes, Myron, why can’t I get this URL to work? I found another valid hyperlink for “18 Venn diagrams showing how corrupted American ‘democracy’ really is.“