Capitalism USA 21st Century

OMNI CAPITALISM NEWSLETTER, JANUARY 30, 2011, Compiled by Dick Bennett

US capitalism is capitalism corrupted. Here the left and right can agree. "When government and private finance are in bed with each other, it's not a right versus left issue; it's a haves versus have-nots issue." Matt Taibbi.

Contents
Moore’s Capitalism
Rich and Poor
Plutonomy
Big Banks/Government Complex
Little for Local Governments
Foreclosure Crisis Unnecessary
Big Banks Avoiding Obligations
Monopoly, Oligopoly
Personhood of Corporations
Citizens United Case

OMNI VIDEO UNDERGROUND FEBRUARY 13, 2011 AT OMNI, 7PM
MICHAEL MOORE, CAPITALISM: A LOVE STORY
Interv. Democracy Now (9-24-09). Capitalism is unfair and unjust, and capitalists recently looted our national Treasure and individual treasuries.
OMNI’S 2011 VIDEO SERIES WILL SHOW 11 FILMS ON ENVIRONMENT/PLANET AND 11 FILMS ON THE NATIONAL SECURITY STATE-- the Corporate-Pentagon-Intelligence-White House-Congressional-Warming/CO2/Climate Change Complex.


RICH AND POOR

Plutonomy
WSJ says the rich are doing the heavy lifting. Lifting sacks of wealth to purchase expensive stuff. That's because they can and that's what Feroli calls a plutonomy.
"Sales of luxury goods are soaring, while sales at Wal-Mart are tepid. The affluent cardholders of American Express have rebounded, while Visa and MasterCard have yet to see the same surge. Mansions are selling again, ranch houses are not.
The reasons for the divergence are simple enough: The rich are benefiting from soaring stock markets, cheap money and rapid growth overseas. The rest of America is still weighed down by unemployment, poor credit, falling real-estate values and slow domestic growth.
Economists call this a plutonomy, or an economy dominated by the rich. “The heavy lifting is being done by the upper-income households,” Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. told Bloomberg.
http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2011/01/19/the-rich-doing-all-the-heavy-lifting-in-the-economy/ (from Larry W)


Richard Wolff, : Calling Time on Capitalism
Guardian UK 2011 Intro: "Recent decades have seen a massive redistribution of wealth, imposing the cost of successive crises on the poorest. Enough!"
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d47e53eab0a3d0

BIG BANKS/GOVERNMENT COMPLEX
$12.3 TRILLION FOR THE BIG BANKS, LITTLE FOR MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENTS
Ellen Brown. The Fed Has Spoken: No Bailout for Main Street , Web of Debt
Ellen Brown begins: "The Federal Reserve was set up by bankers for bankers, and it has served them well. Out of the blue, it came up with $12.3 trillion in nearly interest-free credit to bail the banks out of a credit crunch they created. That same credit crisis has plunged state and local governments into insolvency, but the Fed has now delivered its ultimatum: there will be no 'quantitative easing' for municipal governments."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d9026eb7546091

Elizabeth Warren | Foreclosure Crisis Was Avoidable,” The Miami Herald
Elizabeth Warren writes: "Lost in much of the back-and-forth over wrongful foreclosures is the question of whether the scandal could have been prevented. The answer is yes." https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3862e6399f47e

August 12, 2010
"Gaming the System": Study Details How Big Banks Are Avoiding Lending Obligations Under Community Reinvestment Act

A new report from National People’s Action shows how big banks have been able to wiggle around their obligations under the Community Reinvestment Act. The act was passed in 1977 to stop the redlining of low-income neighborhoods and communities of color. Federal bank and thrift regulatory agencies are holding a public hearing in Chicago today, one of several held nationwide this summer to reevaluate the act. [includes rush transcript]

Bill Moyers' Journal - PBS
“Was the Financial Bailout Just a Slick, Friendly Takeover of the Federal Government?”
Video:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10092009/watch.html
Transcript:
http://www.alternet.org/workplace/143209/bill_moyers:_was_the_financial_bailout_just_a_slick,_friendly_takeover_of_the_federal_government
Suggestion: Open these in two separate Tabs or Windows. Then read the transcript while you listen to the video. This adds to the clarification. Though each are perfectly fine as is. MT


TRUE VALUE
Raj Patel, The Value of Nothing. On the hidden costs of merchandise (subsidies) esp. the environmental costs that are not incorporated into prices. Prices need to reflect the true costs.


MONOPOLY, OLIGOPOLY, CARTELIZATION

EXAMPLE IN POTASH MINING
“The world’s eight largest potash miners are poised to tighten their grip on prices of the crop fertilizer as proposed mergers consolidate sales channels,” by Yuriy Humber and Maria Kolesnikova, Bloomberg News, in ADG (10-6-10).

EXAMPLE OF POWER IN EXXON VALDEZ CASE
Riki Ott, Not One Drop: The Betrayal and Courage in the Wake of the Exxon-Valdez Oil Spill. 11 million gallons of oil polluted 1200 miles of shoreline and still harming the enviro. and species. Original fine was $5 billion, but a judge cut it to $2 billion, and then to $500,000,000, and that is still not paid. Author argued need for change from 1886 Supreme Court ruling giving 14th Amend. protection to corporations. Democracy Now 3-24-09.



1. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_monopoly_capitalism - Cached - Similar
►
2. Monopoly Capital - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Monopoly Capital: An Essay on the American Economic and Social Order is an essay from 1966 by Paul Sweezy and Paul A. Baran. It made a major contribution to ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_Capital - Cached - Similar
3. Monopoly Capitalism
Dec 14, 2009 ... Monopoly Capitalism We live in an age of giants. Unchecked, they stride across the earth consuming much that lies in their path, ...
www.marxist.com › Historical Analysis › Economic theory - Cached - Similar
4. Monthly Review October 2004 Paul M. Sweezy
by PM Sweezy - 2004 - Cited by 11 - Related articles
Among Marxian economists “monopoly capitalism” is the term widely used to denote the stage of capitalism which dates from approximately the last quarter of ...
monthlyreview.org/1004pms2.htm - Cached
[For more, google Monopoly Capitalism—D]


CINDY SHEEHAN ON SUPREME COURT REMOVAL OF ALL RESTRICTIONS ON CORPORATE MONEY TO INFLUENCE ELECTIONS , Cindy’s Soapbox, Jan. 21, 2010
We have talked about the scandal of corporate personhood and how one sentence of Supreme Court Chief Justice Waite, before the oral arguments were even heard in 1886 in the case of The City and County of Santa Clara v. The Southern Pacific Railroad, changed our history forever:
"The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."
No law was passed giving corporations rights, not just privileges-no Supreme Court decision gave Goldman Sachs literally millions more votes than me (or you)-it was a freaking statement before the hearing ever began! We are losing everything because some old dead white guy flapped his jaws and, voila, the 14th Amendment applied to corporations.
Today, in Citizens United v. the Federal Election's Commission the Supreme Court ruled that any cap put on corporations and, presumably unions and other organizations, to spend on campaign ads and other campaign expenses (paid canvassers, etc) violates a corporation's "Freedom of Speech" which has been legally protected for 134 years.
Like I pointed out in the Myth that Elections Matter-our system is already rigged in favor of the Robber Class-corporations have NO MOUTHS, how can they have free speech?
This expansion of "Free Speech" to corporations effectively kills our "Free Speech" when it comes to elections.
Money is what buys influence with our government-that's all, nothing else. We ain't got no money-so we ain't got no influence.
The only tool we have left to us is Revolution as JFK said: "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable."




BOOKS
--Harvey, David. The Enigma of Capital and the Crises of Capitalism. Oxford UP, 2010. Dismisses all of Wall Street’s claims to be adding to general prosperity.
--Stiglitx, Joseph. Free Fall: America, Free Markets, and the Sinking of the World Economy. 2010. Interv. Amy Goodman 10-20-10